Furlough Goals

Furlough rumors and realities:

1. America has deliciously unhealthy food!
2. It's almost certain that you will gain weight while you're on furlough.
3. It's possible that you might return to Indonesia completely exhausted.

These are some "rumors" that we heard just before we were going to go on furlough. The truth is- these are NOT rumors! This is reality! So to fight against these things, we've set some personal furlough goals.

Here are my goals:
1. Complete requirements for recertification of my Texas teaching license.
2. Participate in a 5k- maybe in every state we're in IF possible- not likely in California or North Carolina.
3. Take a test to get certified to teach mathematics in Texas.

Goal Progress:
1. I've finished all the requirements and now need to complete the paperwork.
2. Josh and I ran in our first 5k- story with photos below.
3. I've checked out a math book with examples- so I sit around doing math problems in my free time :)

5k Story-

This run was to benefit a non profit organization that builds houses for people.

I thought the run started at 9:30, BUT when we got there at 9:20 the only people standing around had blue jeans on and were holding cameras. We asked if the run had already started. Yep, it started at 9. Ooops! We asked if we could still run. Sure, they said, but your time will be all messed up and you probably won't win. We said we're not in it to win it. Grabbed our numbers and music and were off! I kept our time on my watch. We passed a hand full of people and finished 76th and 77th (out of like 80 people!) with an "official" time of 54 minutes... but our "unofficial" time (according to my watch) was 35 minutes. Not too shabby for us considering we had just finished week 4 of the Couch to 5K program.

Looking back at my motivation and attitude I think it's a lesson learned. In reality I knew there was no way that I would win... but what if I'm the only female in my age group? All I have to do is finish to win! What if the spirit of competition motivates me to push harder and finish faster? What if I could be better than I really am... what if my dreams could become reality?

**Reality Check**
You can't win races if you show up 20 minutes AFTER the race starts!
You can't win races if the first place runner was FINISHING when you were beginning!
The reason for running is NOT to win but it's to fight against an unhealthy lifestyle.
If we're honest, we're running for the t-shirts and to support good causes.


We finished!


The official- unofficial time.


The trophies we didn't win! :) **note** these were for the 10k runners- some finished right about the same time we unofficially did!


This is the first place finisher- notice the time in the bottom right hand corner.


Wooohoo! I finished it! Notice there is no time... they didn't write it down for the back of the pack.


Here's the proof that Josh finished too. I beat him because he LET me go first :) so sweet.


I'm a goal setter.