Today's walk

So, this evening I was feeling a little down on myself and frustrated.  Then I thought, "Hmm...I haven't exercised in a while.  Maybe I should walk around the block."  So, five minutes later, I had donned my tennis shoes, grabbed my ipod, and got my coat out of the car.  Initially, I just set out to walk around the block.  Then, all of a sudden I had this rush of high expectations for myself and decided I wanted to walk around the block 4 times.  I've done twice before, but I figured since I hadn't walked, or really exercised at all, lately that I should give it a go.

Well, reality set in on the second lap when it started getting dark.  I came to the realization that I didn't really NEED to go around the block four times.  I decided, I'll just walk around the block as many times as I can before dark.  Then the raindrops started.  I LOVE walking in the rain, but the fact that it was raining was a little disconcerting, especially since I had looked at the weather report earlier on weather.com and they said that there was a thunderstorm that had gone through Portland and could shift over Oregon City.  With said thunderstorm, there were reports of penny-sized hail.  I wasn't so sure that I wanted to walk around the block in the hail.  So, then I decided I'd go until it was too dark to see, or it started hailing.

Surprisingly, there was no hail!  I was glad, but my glasses started fogging up on my third trip around the block. Ugh.  I could've possibly gone around a fourth time, but when the glasses fog up, it gets a little hard to see.  Not to mention that the raindrops were starting to gather on my glasses as well.

Anyways, I went around 3 times.  Not too bad.  Especially when I checked the distance on google maps and see that one time around the block is 0.8 miles.  That means I walked about 2.4 miles this evening!  I think I'll make it a goal to walk around the block at least once a day.  The more laps I put in, the better, but no pressure to do a certain number.

In addition to my walking, I think I found a new way to push myself to keep up the pace.  While I was walking, I was listening to my playlist that I so eloquently named "Yup".  It's just a mishmosh of songs I like.  No genre, no specific reason or common thread, other than the fact that I like them.  So, as I started my walk, I was just ambling on at a leisurely pace.  Of course, that changed as soon as the song "Groove is in the Heart" by Deee Lite came on.  That's the song we performed our Drum Major routines to for the USA All-Star trip to London my Junior Year of High School.  Anyways, I really like that song, just because it has a good beat and makes me want to dance-which I couldn't help doing as I was walking.  I'm sure I looked like a complete fool to any casual observer.  Ha.  I don't know that I care. 

As I was dance-walking, I noticed that I was walking in step with the song.  So, I forced myself to continue doing that until the song was over.  The next song that came on was "Everybody Dance Now" by C & C Music Factory.  Again, it had a nice beat, so I kept walking in step with it.  Soon, I had walked or jogged in step to multiple songs, and had kept up a decent pace as I walked.  I skipped songs that were too slow and songs that were way too fast to walk in step to.  It was fun-almost a game.  I think if I were to continue doing this, I wouldn't mind walking so much.  We'll see if it keeps walking fun.

I'm planning to put together a special playlist for my walks, so that I have songs that have relatively quick tempos in it to push me a bit faster on my walks.  I suppose it's always an option to skip the walking in step part, but I enjoyed it tonight, and I actually found I did it on instinct.  =)

If you want to contribute song ideas, I'd be totally open to it!  Just post them in the comments.  That is...if anyone is actually reading.