Thanks to the always amazing Gretchen for letting me steal this photo!

Happy Tuesday everyone, I have a couple of things I want to share with you today! First of all, I was super excited for our blogger meet up after the race on Saturday at Continental in Rosslyn. I’m reading and tweeting so many people on a daily basis that it was nice to see some people in person! Above you can see Beth, Ashley, Caitlin, Margaret, Gia, Emily, Theodora, Gretchen, Meg, Ashley, Jessica (can’t find your Twitter handle!) and yours truly. I also met Misha, Leticia, Megan a few others (trying to remember everyone!)

Secondly, got my professional photos back from the race. Also, after a year, I finally figured out how to make a photo collage (developmentally delayed apparently.) Love it! Here I am before, during and after. I’ve been told I make really painful looking faces when I run. That’s probably why I hear randoms from the crowd always yelling out my number and telling me to hold on. Yikes!

On another note, I wrote and published a piece at work yesterday about womens rights around the world. My main point is that we women in America have it good. There are women around the world being raped, tortured, abused and stripped of their basic human rights!

Pakistani womens rights activists light torches on International Womens Day this year.

  
Imagine being forced to abort your child or sold into sex slavery! What if you couldn’t legally drive a car or were forced to marry your rapist? These are the truly horrific things happening to women around the world. If you get a chance, feel free to check out my article. 

Some of you know that I began a Pinterest account for my workplace. I love Pinterest (duh) and I know it’s a growing and important social medium. Heck, the stats are rising too fast to even document! It’s intriguing and even Facebook has had to add features to keep up with it (the new Facebook Interests).

The future of social media is visual and Pinterest is on the cutting edge. So, it was awesome today that The Hill reported on “Pinning Politics” and included a spotlight of the Heritage Foundation and a couple of quotes from me! See excerpt:

To be sure, Pinterest doesn’t have any overtly political functionality yet. The site has no “politics” category to browse, and it’s nearly impossible to search for and find politicians by name or occupation. But Facebook and Twitter didn’t start in the political arena, either, points out Ericka Andersen, a senior digital communications associate at the conservative Heritage Foundation, one of the Washington-based think tanks also using the site.

“I think the future of social media is visual, and I don’t think Pinterest is going to go away,” she said. “If you start talking to someone about a bill or a piece of legislation, their eyes are going to glaze over. But if you show them a picture of a struggling family in Alabama, they’re going to get that.”

… “You have to look at it and say, ‘Let’s make politics more personal,’ and I think you can do that on Pinterest,” Andersen said.

Heritage on Pinterest: 

Lastly, good things on the health front for me. I have basically stopped eating dessert after dinner, which used to be a nightly occurance. Key? Don’t buy the ice cream! It’s hard but I’m saying no and drinking a lot of water (subsequently waking up to pee twice a night — annoying!)

And, I think I’m starting to kinda sorta see results from Crossfit. On Sunday, the day after the half marathon, I did my own make shift crossing training-Crossfit workout and kicked my own butt! My arms were so sore that today at actual Crossfit, it was a struggle but a good one. And this is basically what my morning workout consisted of:

This morning I felt like a huge wimp because I could barely lift the weight the other girls in my group were using. Also, I was dying from the shortened, beginner workout and wondered how in the heck these more experienced peeps were continuing their rounds. But, I reminded myself that I’m building up to it and I’ll get there. Part of me was like, do I really want to get there? But, I know I do. Goals honestly make life so much more fulfilling and doing something different makes me happy.

QUESTION: What NEW fitness or healthy living goals have you made lately? Ever get stuck in a run of the same old things? How do you keep it fresh & interesting?