Hey everybody! I missed you guys. I was constantly thinking of cool things to blog about while I was gone on vacation. But, on the cruise we were totally cut off from “the real world.” They bragged about the 24 hour internet café in the ads, but didn’t mention it was like 75 cents a minute. And my cell phone was $2.29 per minute. So of course, nobody heard from me until I was back in the States….Let’s see where do I start without making this too long. I left for Miami on Thursday night with both of my sisters and my cousins. We spent the night in Miami and headed toward the Port Friday morning. My last cruise with my family was with Royal Caribbean cruise line, but this time we went with Norwegian. To say the least I was disappointed with our ship named “The Sky”. Our last cruise was so glamorous with bird shaped towels, fancy cut fruit and eager attendants ready to serve you. This ship had what they called “free style cruising” which I translate as “you ain’t getting all of that.” Other than the janky ship, everything else was great. We woke up Saturday Morning in Nassau, Bahamas. Nobody really wanted to spend a lot of money on a cruise sponsored tour, so we decided to be adventurous and create our own tour. We caught the Ferry over to the Atlantis Luxury Resort. It was beautiful. There were all the really high end shops that a girl only dreams of shopping in, and a huge casino and a beautiful aquarium in the ornate lobby. Justin Beiber
was there in concert. The guy on the Ferry pointed out the 10 room suite that Michael Jackson used to rent out for $25,000 and night, with a four night minimum stay. I could only imagine what it looked like inside. After Atlantis, I didn’t really want ride the ferry back, so I caught a taxi cab back to the port with one of my cousins. He was tired and burnt out from the sun so he got back on board the ship. I went shopping. I know that probably wasn’t the best idea, but I figure I’m black, so I shouldn’t totally stick out as a tourist wandering the streets alone. LOL. Anyway, I found the COACH store. AND they had a mini wallet to match my purse! I was so psyched. And, it was on sale and there is no tax! After the Coach store, I went to the straw market and got a few souvenirs, t-shirts and handmade jewelry. On my walk back to the port I was looking a little lost & confused, but that’s because it was so hot and humid. One of the locals asked if I needed help, and I told him I needed a drink. He offered to take me, I was hesitant, but he was heading back toward the customs building, and I needed a drink, so we walked together and talked. He told me I was beautiful and he wanted to take me to the beach so that I could stick my toes in the sand. I politely said no thanks, and he replied “Baby you’re so beautiful, why not, my last name is not is Van der Sloot.” I had to laugh; because all I was thinkng about was my cute pic and a CNN headline ticker tape reading “Shopaholic Wanders Alone and gets Abducted in the Bahamas.” Anyway, he was a total gentleman and led me to a well populated indoor juice stand out of the heat, where I ran into my sisters buying a local treat conch fritters…..That night, me and my family partied hard at the cruise night club. There were 17 of us total including my Actress Aunt her friend “Stanley from The Office” and my Gym Cousin (who of course worked out). I didn’t make it to the gym, I partied too hard and drank too much. Sunday Morning we woke up and were at the Great Stirrup Cay Island, a private island owned by the cruise line. It was so beautiful. Me and my Little Sis went snorkeling for the 1st time. It was awesome! At first I was scared and started scream under water, then I realized that didn’t work out so well. I calmed down and learned how to breathe through my mouth only. The fish were so pretty with their electric blues and tropical neon colors. I wish I had a water proof camera to show you. We did a lot more, but those are the highlights, and it’s late, and I’m still recuperating. Work was a mess, I literally had hundreds of emails this morning. So, I’m signing off. I’ll be back at Week 2 of my running program tomorrow. Pictures coming soon. By the way….
What Did Carli Eat Today?
I had an awesome food day, Protein Shake for breakfast, Salad for lunch, pretzels for snack and healthy choice frozen dinner with a side of corn. If you’re still reading, thanks, and Good Night!
Hey Guys, I’m totally running out of time. I’m such a procrastinator. Instead of starting Week 2 on Monday, I had to work late, run errands and pick up stuff for my trip. I was frustrated that my schedule was thrown off, but I knew that wouldn’t stop me from sticking to my plan. Yesterday I had a ton of errands to run too (if y’all knew how much I really try to accomplish in one day, you’d be amazed) I LOOOVE bloging, but it doesn’t pay the bills.) Anyway by the time I finished up everything it was almost 9 o’clock at night. Too dark to run outside, but the gym doesn’t close until 10. When I got there, of course the dirty old man was sitting in lobby. He greeted me with a big smile, I smiled back just to be nice, and hurried past him to the indoor track. I set my ipod to Week 2, and I got to running. I was actually eaiser than I thought it would be. The last two 90 second intervals were a little tough, but doable. I’m on my way to my Granny’s 76th b-day dinner, and then tomorrow, I’m off to the BAHAMA’s Yay! I’ll catch up with you guys in a few days! No time to proof read. Later!
I woke up this morning to my Gym Cousin, calling to warn me that I should take Nyah on my jog today since some boy scouts found a naked woman tied up in ditch in the park. Gee thanks cousin for starting me off to a happy morning…. Then he told me they think she might have tied herself up? …but he wanted to make sure I was aware and being safe just in case. He of course was on his way to the gym, but we ended up talking for about an hour about everything from our upcoming cruise to whether 50 Cent’s juice diet was real. After I got off the phone, me and Nyah went to Forest Park. I was shocked when I got there. There were boy scouts EVERYWHERE. There were tents and little boys as far as the eye could see. I thought he meant like a small troop of boys found the woman. I called my Mom and she told me there were over 10,000 boy scouts camping out, and she wished me luck on finding a parking spot.
I drove around looking for one, and was about to leave and go to the gym, but I forgot about my fur baby, she 
was so excited about our walk. So, I drove around a little more and finally found a parking spot. I turned on Week 1 and was on the move. It was already hot at 10 AM and I worked up a good sweat. I had a hair appointment at 11, so I didn’t have time to do anything extra. I didn’t even have time to run past the pond and look for my boo. LOL!…. I ran the first 4 intervals and turned around. I wove through all the camping tents and boys playing with sticks and finished the last 4 runs. I DID it. I finished Week 1! Week 2 here I come. When I got home all sweaty, I took the fastest shower ever. I didn’t want to be all stinky sitting in the salon. I should’ve just taken a whore bath… I’m sorry for the naughty word let’s call it a quick wash up; it would have been faster. Anyway, I threw on some comfy clothes and made it to my hair appointment just a few minutes late. It took forever because I got a sew-in weave. By forever I mean 5 hours! I like it though, it looks so natural. The things we do to look beautiful.
I wasn’t even going to blog today, but this was too good not to tell. After work, I rushed to the grocery store to get some food for this Mexican Fiesta dinner I had planned in my head. I got the tortillas and salsa and lettuce, I already had the chicken at home. When I got in line to check out, I thought I recognized the guy in front of me. I looked at him for a quick second as I tried to figure out who he was. Then it hit me, it was the dirty old pervert from the gym yesterday! Unbelievable! St. Louis has over 2.8 million residents, and I run into the very last person I wanna see. I quickly jumped into the next line, and held my head down so he wouldn’t feel the need to have a conversation with me. As I walked out the store, I just laughed and thought God really must have a sense of humor!
Its official, I decided to do the Couch to 5K program again! I’m sort of in shape, and I’m certainly past being a couch potato, but running requires dedicated training. I couldn’t believe how hard Week 1 was for me the other day, so I decided to challenge myself to do the whole program again. This time I plan on continuing on to the 5K to 10K program. But, unlike I did with the half marathon training, I won’t try to cram it in a few weeks. AND…. I’m finally going to make my 5K to 10K podcast! I think I need it to push myself to the next level of running. Making a good quality podcasts takes a long time. But, you guys can expect to see it this summer. I’m so excited about it! I get so many requests for it, so hopefully it will help others keep running past the 5K too. Today was Day Two of Week 1 of my 9 week training program. Week 1 consists of eight, 60 second interval runs spaced by 90 second walks….Even though I ran errands after a full day of work and didn’t make it to the gym until after 8:30 pm; today’s run was still a lot easier than Monday’s run. I finished 1.5 miles in less than 30 minutes. I felt good.
After running, I went down to the elliptical machine and did 20 solid minutes. While I was working out, I could see this dirty old man watching me in the mirror. Then he started walking towards me. I looked down, but I could only look down for so long without the blood rushing to my head as I pedaled. He grinned and said “You’re looking good!” despite the sweat pouring down my face and the sweat seeping through the funky t-shirt that sat in my basement for too long. I was polite and gave him a half fake smile. And then, he sat down and continued to watch me work out! I’m not lying y’all; I couldn’t make this stuff up if I wanted to. He pretended like he was sitting down to check his blood pressure, but he kept giving me that dirty scan looking up and down my body. I almost got off the machine, but I only had a few minutes left, so stuck with it despite the pervert. It’s ironic that Monday I was all excited about getting my confidence and my mojo back when the cute man touched my shoulder, but now I’m attracting snaggletooth old grandpas. LOL ….Anyway, it was great workout, and I’m ready for Day 3. If you’ve been thinking about starting, I hope you will run along with me and my podcasts.
