Out With The Old & In With The New

The holidays are always hustle and bustle and it doesn't seem to stop there.  After Christmas we prep for New Years.  This year we went out to the Warrington's to ring in 2011.  Hill fell asleep in the car on the way to their house so he just snoozed on into 2011 without a peep.  We had a great time hanging out with great friends.

Me, Tasha, Whitney, Lauren & JJ

Cokes
The new year always comes with goals or resolutions and so my goal was to stop drinking cokes, sprites, etc. My addiction to fountain cokes had become rediculous. They say the first step is admitting you have a problem.  I guess I'm on step 5 as I admit to you all of my wrong doings and still lust daily for the fizzy sweetness and crave that bubbly feeling down my throat.
These are the original Twelve Steps as published by Alcoholics Fountain Drinks Anonymous:^[10] 

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol cokes—that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alccokeoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

I think I will struggle most with #8 and #9.  I'm not sure I can make amends to those my addiction have harmed without injuring them.  I know Sonic for one will have a hard time making rent this month without my daily 'fix.'  Though, the Shell station on Hwy 12 may be glad because if you keep your cup your refills are cheaper.  I probably drank them out of house and home.  They lost money on me.

I'm 11 days clean and carbonation free.  I drink water and some tea.  It's hard and I think about fountain cokes every day.

Couch to 5K
"They" say when you give up a bad habit you need to pick up another healthier habit so I started the couch to 5K program thanks to my good friend / trainer / slave driver Whitney.  She is training me and a few others to be able to run a 5K (3 miles) in 9 weeks.  I have to say week 1 (last week) was ok, it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.  Don't get me wrong, it's rough - - but I survived.  It's 3 days a week and you do a little rotation of walk / run.  Whitney keeps the time and keeps us motivated.  She's pretty much awesome.

We started week 2 yesterday.  It was 32 degrees and slushy out but we ran our hineys off and I have to admit that it felt great.  The whole freezing air in my lungs was not fun at first, but by the last few runs I felt like a million bucks.  I could have done a few more!  Whitney said that out of the 25 mintues we ran for 9 mintues.  I was so proud of me!  Really, I ran for 9 minutes in a single day.  I don't think I ran for 9 minutes in all of 2010 combined! 

I'm enjoying it.  I plan to keep it up.  I am doing it for fun and as a bonus I hope to lose weight.
Thanks Whitney for being such a positive motivation and helping train us.  You don't know how appreciative I am!