BOOKS ARE ENERGY: Day 12 and 13 of 28, Fueled by The Scorch Trials by James Dashner

Unfortunately, I have to report that I have been really slacking on this whole exercise thing. Last week I had so much work and some colleagues were in town on a business trip and so I had to go to dinner with them. Therefore I really did not have time to do any exercising. Therefore, I ended up picking up back where I left off, at Day 12, only a week later. I am really disappointed in myself, that I have been unable to keep up with this goal. I really need to make the time for myself.

On Friday, Day 12, the goal was 30 minutes of non-impact cardio. Since I am in Vienna visiting my boyfriend, and we were going to dinner at a pizza place (they have some really bomb GF pizza!), I decided that I was going to walk there.

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On Saturday, Day 13, the goal was to run intervals of 20 x Walk 1 min and Run 1 min.

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During the Friday workout, I finished listening to All The Light We Cannot See and started listening to The Scorch Trials, which is the 2nd book in the Maze Runner series.

I read The Maze Runner a while back — you can see my review of it here. I wasn’t too thrilled with it, because the ending was rather stupid, but okay. I thought that maybe the second book would be somehow better. I am a little over 2 hours into the book, and it does have a bit more action than the first book, but I still found my thoughts drifting a bit. I had to go back a few times to listen again.

Essentially, in case you have never read the first book, a bunch of teenagers (this is a YA novel) are stuck in this maze. They use different words (like “Schuck” instead of you know what). I am not sure if this is supposed to make it more “sci-fi” or “cool” or whatever, but I just find it rather annoying, especially because the author doesn’t use it correctly. “What the schuck” — correct. “This schuck door” — not correct (assuming the grammar is the same in this other world, which it seems to be.)

Anyway, so they are stuck in this maze and they have to figure it out. After having figured out the maze by the end of the book the group are taken to some government facility and it is revealed to them that it has all be an experiment because the world has a virus (wtf?) and that the trials are somehow going to help save the world (double wtf). Not sure how that makes sense, but okay.

At the beginning of The Scorch Trials only a day or so has passed and they find out that there was another experiment going on at the same time (Group B) which mirrored the experiment going on with Group A. Now they are told that there will be a second experiment, and oh by the way, the Group also has the virus so if they don’t do what they are told, then they won’t get the cure. I still don’t really get what solving a maze has to do with an epidemic or how that will help at all — however, the book has been entertaining so far, so let’s see if this continues.

 

 

 

 

 

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BOOKS ARE ENERGY: Day 9 to 12 of 28, Fueled by All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

I am a date late in posting this because last night I was just too tired. Yesterday’s goal in “Couch to 5K” was 15 x Walk 1 minute and Run 1 minute. While I was running, I was listening to the book All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. I have read this book before, but it was at a time when I was not blogging, so I decided to read it again.

I am about 4 hours into it so far (yesterday I had read up to 3 hours), and it was a really good book to exercise to. The story starts off before World War II and alternates between a young blind girl in France, and a teenage orphan boy in Germany. So far in the book, the blind girl and her father have to flee their home in Paris because the Germans start bombing them. There is a side story about a famous (possibly cursed) diamond that also really caught my attention. As can be expected, the German boy is indoctrinated into the Hitler youth.

In total I ran/walked 4.81 kilometers in about 40 minutes. I wasn’t too thrilled about the route I picked because I was essentially running along sidewalks the entire time. In addition to passing cars, I was running passed smelly garbage cans. Nothing like a whiff of garbage every now and then to really pump up your run!

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When I look at my times, from yesterday (above) and Saturday (below), yesterday’s are only slightly better than on Saturday, but I think that’s because I was running more and walking less each kilometer. The fact that they are really only seconds apart isn’t such good motivation, but I hope to get better with time.

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On Day 12 (Friday August 9, 2019), I ended up having to do two workouts (Day 11 and 12) together, since I missed Day 11. Day 11 was 15 x Walk for 1 minute and Run for 1 minute. Friday was 30 minutes of non-impact cardio. Therefore, I did the 30 minutes interval training and then walked for another 40 minutes, for a total of 1 hour and 11 minutes (7.41 kms in total)

I am still reading All the Light We Cannot See, and it is really strange reading about WWII, and walking / running along the WWII Bunker trails where the abandoned German bunkers are. On Day 12 I had read about 50% (about 8 hours). Things were starting to get serious — WWII was starting. The two main characters are getting older and their lives more complicated, and the story about the cursed diamond plays a much bigger role in the book than I had originally anticipated.

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BOOKS ARE ENERGY: Day 7 of 28, Fueled by Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson

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Today’s goal in “Couch to 5K” was to have 30 minutes of non-impact cardio. As you can see from the screenshots from Strava, I went a little overboard.

For the first segment (to the left), I was riding my bike to Haarlem in the Netherlands because I wanted to go to Native Coffee. I am currently attempting to write a novel, and I thought a change of atmosphere might get the creativity flowing.

On the ride there, I finished listening to Girl, Stop Apologizing by Rachel Hollis. I was sad to see the end of this book, because this was a great book to work out to! You can see my review of the book by clicking on this link.

I then started to read Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson. This was probably not a really good choice (especially not following Hollis’ book) because the subject matter was rather complicated, and I found my mind drifting a bit to other topics during the ride. The only thing I really remember, is that he was trying to explain something about antimatter.

In total on this first ride, I did 13.64 kilometers in about 45 minutes. I arrived at Native Coffee in a good mood, ready to tackle my 1,000 word goal, but was told by the barista that I could only use my computer on one table in the back, where there was already 5 places occupied out of 6.

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It did not look very inviting. Of course, I had already ordered a dirty Chai latte and a really good slice of gluten free chocolate cake, so I read The Cobra Event by Richard Preston instead, and then made my way to a different Cafe that didn’t have such ridiculous rules.

Two hours, another latte and 1,000 words later,  I was ready to head back to Ijmuiden. After getting a little lost on the way back from Haarlem, I finally made it home. As you can see, for some reason I ended up going through the National Park instead of going around it.

I’m not going to lie, it was rather beautiful, but it added around 4 kilometers to my ride, for a total of 17.36 kilometers on the way back (a total time of about 1 hour and 12 minutes).

On this trip, I ended up listening to about 2 hours of Astrophysics for People in a Hurry, but again I found it very complicated and kept getting side tracked. This is not the first time I am reading it, and honestly I thought that it would be easier to understand the second time around. It’s not. I don’t know, I could just be super dumb, but I think that I just feel overwhelmed by deGrasse Tyson’s use of a lot of big and complicated words / concepts. Sigh.

Good thing tomorrow is a “rest” day, because I am beat!

 

 

 

BOOKS ARE ENERGY: Day 6 of 28, Fueled by Girl, Stop Apologizing by Rachel Hollis

I have never run a 5k before in my life. This week I decided to train for one. Today is Day 6, and the exercise is 13x Walk 2 minutes / Run 1 minutes. I am really proud of myself that I was able to run through all the intervals.

While running, I had encouragement from Rachel Hollis’ book Girl, Stop Apologizing. Get healthy! Hollis basically shouts from the roof top — so here goes my experiment in getting healthy. I am currently about 5 hours into listening to the audiobook, and I really like this book. It was a great book to read while running, as it really made the time fly by. 45 minutes flew by so fast!

I have decided to post each of the runs, so that I can give myself the necessary motivation to complete them each day.


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