110 Pounds and Counting

Ghost Town Ride

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May 172012

The warm weather streak is continuing in Portland and I got another opportunity to ride my bike to work. I prepared a little bit better this time. It had also been warm for about a week so I figured that arm warmers were all I needed instead of my cycling jacket. It was 52 degrees Tuesday morning, last week my morning commute was 48 degrees.

Michael kindly helped me with breakfast and pumped my tires for me! Queen treatment! It was really helpful because I was running a little late that morning. I set out a few minutes later than I wanted and for the first 1/2 mile regretted not wearing my jacket.

Luckily I warmed up as soon as I hit the first few hills of my commute. This particular commute I got stuck at two lights because there wasn’t enough traffic and the sensors couldn’t detect me on the bike. This is one of my pet peeves about commuting by bike.

I enjoyed my morning commute a great deal. Traffic was light. The weather was warm. My body was feeling really good. I just enjoyed it. I made my way through Sellwood and then picked up the Springwater. Unlike last time, the Springwater was enjoyable. I wasn’t biking into a wall of wind resistance.

The city seemed to be a ghost town. There was hardly any other cyclists out for some reason. The Springwater was nearly empty. The Esplanade loop downtown was eerily quiet. I made it downtown and headed to work.

Despite getting stuck at a few lights, I made it to work pretty quickly. Check out my stats for the morning:

Pretty good if you ask me! I’m happy with my time and average speed. I have a lot of stops before I get to the Springwater trail so I doubt I will ever be any faster than that.

Morning Stats:
Time: 53 minutes
Calories Burned: 540
Mileage: 11.71

You know what else? I’m already itching to start commuting twice a week. Unfortunately the weather forecast for next week looks like rain again so back to Spin I think.

Afternoon Commute

Another warm one! But it was a pleasant ride home. I’m really glad that the Morrison Bridge is open again because that’s how I prefer to go home. It’s a quicker route out of downtown and there’s barely anyone on the bridge but me. Shooosh, don’t tell any other cyclists out there.

Once I’m on the other side of the river, it’s easy sailing for the most part. The route I take to the Springwater is not the best one because the roads are just AWFUL. It’s a very bumpy ride.

The sun felt nice and there was a comfortable breeze on the way home. I made it to Sellwood in no time at all and headed home. My new route is pretty scenic; I pass by a few farms on the way home.

It’s funny because my route home is just a tad shorter than the morning. I guess going over the Steel Bridge in the morning adds more distance than I thought. I also burn less calories on the way home (which is also weird because I feel like it’s uphill on the way home). Here’s the afternoon graph:

Afternoon Stats:
Time: 46 minutes
Calories Burned: 479
Distance: 10.49
Average Speed: 13.46 mph
Fastest Speed: 25.15 mph

Total Mileage for the Day: 22.2

I’m so happy that my first few commutes have been so great (knock on wood). I am considering adding a second day a week already. I don’t need time to recover and have felt great the day after.

Another bonus to commuting to work on my bike: it frees up my evenings for fun things. It’s amazing just how much time going to the gym takes and I just want to enjoy my free evenings.

QUESTION: How is your fitness changing with the season changes?

Eating out is often difficult for me because my eyes get bigger than my stomach and I am easily tempted by the things that sounds good on the menu. When I know where I’m going out to eat, I will look up the menu online and pick what sounds the healthiest to me. I may not always choose that, but I like to have a game plan. My go-to restaurant ”healthy” choice is usually the soup and salad combo; it’s a safe choice.

But with sushi, I don’t get that same anxiety about choosing the wrong thing. Part of the reason is that I think sushi is really healthy. IF you order the right things. The biggest tip for sushi: don’t order tempura! Deep frying anything immediately makes it not a healthy choice (even though the tempura is oh-so good).

I found a website recently with a chart for calories in sushi. The calories run from 50 calories to 700 calories. Just to give you a few examples:

Veggie Roll – 170 calories

Avocado Roll – 140 calories

Spicy Tuna Roll – 290 calories

Salmon Cucumber Roll – 230 calories

Sashimi is usually under 100 calories!

One of the good things about sushi restaurants? You are usually sharing the rolls with your friends! So you’re probably eating even less calories than you think. I rarely feel guilty about eating sushi because fish is so healthy and packed with omega-3 fatty acids.

A tip that I have for sushi restaurants is to get an appetizer first. The edamame (soy beans) lightly salted run around 100 calories. Miso soup is less than 100 calories for a small bowl. Both take the edge off the hunger. Also, if you’re not that skilled with chopsticks, it will take you forever to eat your sushi!

I recently met up with my cousin Anna for our monthly/bi-weekly-girl’s-night-out-happy-hour at Bara Sushi House. It’s in SE Portland on the trendy Clinton Street. I’ve been there for dinner at least three or four times and have always had a good meal there. Another bonus: I had a Groupon deal that covered a bulk of our dinner.

It was a Thursday evening after a gorgeous week in Portland with weather that was sunny and warm and a reminder of why I live in the Pacific NW. I wished that the sushi place had outdoor seating. I got there early and read some of my book while I waited for Anna to get there. I had a small cup of Miso soup while I waited for her to arrive. She arrived and ordered sake and I had a glass of dry chardonnay. We ordered some really tasty sushi rolls, some were ones I’ve never tried before.

We shared a Philly Roll (my favorite) and a Spicy Salmon Roll (Cucumber, kaiware, and yamagobo). Then we got two rolls that were more adventurous; the Tropical Punch was spicy as hell–as in my lips and mouth are burning spicy–but in a really good way. The Tropical Punch: Spicy albacore, house crab mix, mango and Thai chilies. And we got a Spider Roll (which was just two pieces): Fried soft-shell crab, house crab mix, tobiko, cucumber, avocado, yamagobo and kaiware.

We were both super happy with our choices and I felt like the calorie count was fairly decent. Miso Soup -50 calories; Spicy Salmon -330 calories; Tropical -297 calories; Spider Roll -317 calories for 4 pieces but I had 1 piece; Philly Roll -320 calories. So splitting all the sushi, how did I do on calories? I estimated 675. That isn’t too bad for a dinner out!

Whatever calories I saved by eating sushi I made up for at Pix for dessert! It’s a super cute, delicious dessert place just up the street from the sushi restaurant. We ordered the Amelie- it was creme brulee with a hint of orange, chocolate mousse with a crunchy chocolate outer glaze and caramelized hazelnuts.

Thank goodness we split it! It was rich and decadent and I absolutely loved the crunchy hazelnuts in it.

Splitting it was a good move; I think we each had about five bites before it was gone. Hopefully I didn’t do too much damage to my waistline with that little treat.