No Sleep...Thank God it's Monday...

Yes, that was right, Monday's for some reason always seem fast to me, Tuesday and Thursday are the drag days so it's good it was Monday today as the day has gone fast (maybe because I did come in a bit later to adjust to the new hours and I went to lunch with a friend which helped)...I literally got no sleep though last night. I didn't get quite enough sleep on Saturday cause I was out late, then got up early to go to the farmer's market with a friend, then her and I got her dog and went to Lake Calhoun to lay around and then go for a walk...then we headed back to my place at which time another friend called to let me know he was leaving work and would be to my place in a little over an hour (we were going to dinner). Got home, talked to mom and dad, complained about my balcony situation (will have to wait till tomorrow for more details on that) and then my friend got there and he and I headed out to have our "nookie" burgers...these are also known as juicy lucy's at other places in the area, but it's a burger stuffed full of cheese that melts and oozes out when you bite into it...so bad but sooooo good...and they have home cut fries, double yummy. After that my friend has never been to Barnes & Noble before (he's from South Africa) so we went there and looked around a bit and then rented a DVD...it was a bit late when we finished it and he decided to crash on my living room floor, I insisted he at least sleep in the bed in the spare room since I don't have a roommate as of yet which he did and he was snoring happily away in about 20 minutes...me on the other hand, who was exhausted, COULD NOT SLEEP!! I saw 12:00 am, 1:00 am, 2 am, I might have dozed in there but saw 4:00 am, 5:00 and finally got up around 6:30, did my run and headed to work...ughh...I'm functioning slightly today but also have to go to Barnes & Noble till 10...I am not going to survive the evening!! Need to be up early for 5 x 1 miles tomorrow...

22 Mile Long Run...2nd 20+ In the Bag

Long run today…planned 22 miles, had thought of running the last 8 miles at marathon pace, but alas, that wasn’t to be today…this is only my 2nd at least 20 miler so I can’t expect that it would be perfect, I’m still building up and I did run a hilly course, intentionally, since I know that MCM is hilly at least at the beginning and end…I’m doubting it is as hilly as what I ran (and it was mostly uphill, now I understand the stories of walking uphill both ways to school in the snow that I used to hear). Anyway, I averaged a 9:18 pace, even though I had to take a few walk breaks near the end, and had a stop for filling water bottles at a sprinkler, and one other stop to cool my face at a sink in a bathroom along the way…Oh, one other thing, I didn’t get going that early, which means it was warmer, although not nearly as humid as it has been. It probably got to 80 by the end, so it’s warmer, but it was still an OK run…I learned one new thing on it…Cliff Block Shots in Black Cherry (with caffeine) are really yummy and better than a gel…although they do take a bit of chewing and sometimes it wasn’t quite what I wanted…I drank almost 3 7 oz bottles of endurance Gatorade on the run, but only took the 2 servings of Cliff Shots and know I needed more calories which I’m sure was a big part of the slow down and somewhat “bonking” that I had. I have 3 more 20 milers and one 24 miler planned for this training session…time to resolve some of these issues.

Mile 1: 8:55
Mile 2: 8:49
Mile 3: 8:55
Mile 4: 8:55
Mile 5: 8:57
Mile 6: 8:54
Mile 7: 9:01
Mile 8: 9:01
Mile 9: 8:44
Mile 10: 9:18
Mile 11: 9:05
Mile 12: 9:28
Mile 13: 8:44
Mile 14: 9:07
Mile 15: 9:14
Mile 16: 9:54 (getting water on my face)
Mile 17: 9:48
Mile 18: 11:32 (playing in the sprinklers for more water)
Mile 19: 9:14
Mile 20: 9:56
Mile 21: 9:39
Mile 22: 9:14

OK, it’s actually much better on consistency…although planned pace is 9:12, and I’d like to be running the last half at 8:12 pace…but today was an OK run.

In other news…the roommate I had lined up suddenly decided he can’t afford it, now I’m not asking that much for rent, but OK, so he can’t afford it, WHY DIDN’T HE KNOW THIS?? Seriously, how can you not know how much you can afford BEFORE you look at places, he had put down a deposit on a place that was $300 more than I’m asking and didn’t include utilities right before he got out of that and was going to move in with me…that should’ve been my first clue. So anyway, I put up an ad on craigslist again and am looking through roommates.com, the place I have used before as well and ended up with an email from the last freak that lived with me, the guy that I kicked out, and he knew very well that it was my place and he tried to go through this whole thing how it was divine intervention that had him finding my listing when he’s looking for something cause his sublease is ending…umm, yeah, I kicked him out…I want nothing to do with him, I told him to never contact me again and since that time he has sent me a card with an apology, (again not respecting my wishes of never contacting me again), and then he sent me an e-mail wondering if I had received the card and told me that he had tried to call me but I didn’t answer (that was when I was at my parents and don’t get service in their house which I had told him if it goes right to voicemail, the phone isn’t on and I don’t see listings of missed calls either…idiot…but as we know, if I even see him again, I will commit a crime…what a freak…

Early AM Company

I had such an excellent morning run this morning that I just had to share it…got out the door at 5:27, that was even with getting up and deciding I needed to wash my sheets so pulled them off the bed (yet make the bed back up without new sheets, as I didn’t have time). I had gone to bed early last night so I was awake before my alarm and actually felt awake for the first time all week (at 5:15). I was out the door and we are under rain storm threats right now, so it was humid, which was actually good cause it was warm, probably 65, feeling to me, it’s been kind of chilly all week (remember I don’t like the cold running!!). Anyway, I got about 1.5 miles into my run and saw a deer in the street ahead of me, as I got to the point where it had been running too, I was looking for it and saw it now running the same direction as me, across the front yard of one of the houses I run past often, and then it stopped and as I came up to where it was stopped I noticed a fawn standing next to it, and as I was going PAST where they were, I noticed a second fawn…right there in the middle of the city I live in, a first tier suburb of Minneapolis, a city of 350,000 or so people (entire metro of about 2 million) was a doe and two fawns…I wish I had had my camera, but the picture shows what I saw, only imagine a nice suburban house behind them instead of the woods!! This isn't the first time I've seen deer (saw one a couple of weeks ago on a Friday long run) and I've also seen, at different times, red fox...I tell you, the city I live in is where everyone wants to live!!

I finished off the 3.75 miles I was running at an easy pace of 8:41 and headed off to strength train and get to my desk, still just before 7:30 even with the hours change I have to make (tonight my boss and boss’ boss are gone so I’m leaving at 4!! I’ve been given a week to adjust my hours). Tomorrow is a planned 22 miler…it’s supposed to rain…starting tonight at 9…continuing into the AM tomorrow…oh well…good thing I like running in the rain!!

Tempo Thursday, August 17

Another early morning, was up and out the door at 5:35, so I was finished by goal time of 6:45, although it still would be good to get up earlier, even with this so called change to my hours, I still want to keep going at the same time so eventually I can hopefully talk some sense into someone and get my regular hours back, not to mention a HUGE part of why I like to come in then is traffic before 7:20 is not bad, after 7:20 it adds another 10 minutes or so to my commute and granted, my commute is only about 15 minutes anyway, but I intentionally have that where I live near work cause I don’t like to drive in stop and go!!

Got up and heard that it might be raining, not a big deal but it has been cooler, went out to set the GPS to get a signal and it wasn’t raining but was cool again, but not as cool as Tuesday so I was comfortable in the shorts and coolmax t-shirt. Set out for an easy warm up and wanted to do a tempo run of 8 miles, 6 at tempo pace, and the pace I had in mind for today was 8:00, I didn’t quite get that, but I was fairly close and that’s OK. I still have time to build up and the speed will get there, I’m doing two things on these tempos as I’m trying to keep a higher speed but I’m also running it over some pretty decent hills, sure I could take the tempo to a flat area, but that’s not going to help me at MCM, so I go hills and make myself work. As long as I’m keeping under MP, and keep getting faster, I’ll feel OK. I ended up adding some interesting loops to my regular run just to get the mileage in too. Anyway, these are the splits:

Mile 1: 8:48 (warm up a bit faster than I usually plan)
Mile 2: 7:11 (there is no way this was this fast, I lost signal a couple of times and I think it averaged into the next mile, so I figure both mile 2 and 3 are 8:00, this one was flat)
Mile 3: 9:02 (this was up and over a couple of good hills)
Mile 4: 8:17
Mile 5: 8:34 (big hill later in the run than last week and faster, even though I did wimp out and have to walk a tiny bit of it)
Mile 6: 8:01
Mile 7: 8:16
Mile 8: 8:31 (supposed to be cooling down)
Mile .25: 2:25 (a little more than the planned 8 cause I was still a bit from home)

Overall not bad and it did start sprinkling, then actually had a pretty good rain, was wishing I had my hat yet again…but the run was good. I like the rain as long as it’s not terribly cold out. I just checked my plan and found I had wanted to do the tempo part at 8:10 pace, looking at it, I was close to that, although I did do the 5 tempo miles last week at a better pace...need to work more on that!

Still upset about the work hours thing. I just wish it was in my boss’ hands as he’s laid back and cool about it and has been quite accommodating with me working part days and extra hours to make up time so I can leave early a few times when needed since I have limited vacation time left this year…He very much knows the help me and my co-worker are to the department and appreciates us, he even said he hoped this wasn’t something that was going to make us want to quit…sigh…problem is his boss and honestly, I’m not sure why she is having the problem as I get along with her and have always thought she was cool as well…I’m going to discuss it more in 2 weeks at my 6 month and see if this can’t be a temp thing, I mean I can understand them wanting me here later for the time being with the acquisition we just had, (we pretty much doubled our company and quadrupled our work load) my hope is they will let me get back to “normal” hours once things settle in a bit and we MAYBE add extra staff.

Anyway, busy day, busy week so best get back to it. I have soooo many things to do.

Tuesday, August 15 Intervals and Frustrations

So even though I was up a bit too late with a friend last night, normally I go to bed early, he goes to bed pretty early normally too as he gets up quite early, but we were semi watching the Vikings pre-season game and I was explaining football to him, (he’s from South Africa and is of course not into American Football, I was explaining it and he was telling me about rugby in fact) and it got later…so I was asleep by 10:30, but I do need more sleep with my training…it’s interval day.

Intervals were pretty good although I was in shorts and short sleeved shirt and was COLD this morning. I don’t complain about heat, but I do complain about cold. Granted I ran a bit better, but I really could’ve been in long sleeves and tights and been comfortable, I don’t like this at all. I did do a pretty good workout though. I warmed up with 1 mile, cooled down with 1.5 miles and in between I bumped up to mile repeats with .5 mile recoveries, total time was just over 1:08 for an 8:30 pace overall. I’m going to work up miles for the next few weeks and will go back to 800s one time later to check them against Yasso’s idea/theory just to see how well trained I am at that time.

Mile 1: 6:58 (was shooting for 7:45 originally but thought 7:30s this AM)
Mile 2: 6:54 (OK, this and the first were downhill for some and the rest flat)
Mile 3: 7:12 (intentionally put in a good hill, it felt tough but still not bad for pace)
Mile 4: 7:11 (was beat, more of down hill, but I was feeling a side cramp even)

Not a bad workout, I feel good about the results and will try to maintain this pace and keep it up for the next few. I’m also intending on doing them mostly over hills just to maintain things.

So now the frustrating thing. I normally work 7:30-4, have done this for the year and 8 months I’ve been with the company now and it’s been nice. Most everyone else works later, my new boss was here around 8/8:15, now it’s more 8:30 (he moved further away), my co-worker is in anywhere between 9 and 10 and here later and my boss’ boss is here around 9…and she works a lot of hours…Suddenly now it’s mandated that everyone has to start work between 8 and 10…so now earliest I can leave is 4:30, heck, my boss even mentioned my co-worker here 9-5, which huh, that’s not the same as me, and she takes smoke breaks a couple of times a day. Apparently my boss’ boss has tried to get a hold of me after 4 a few times, not necessarily for urgent things that couldn’t wait till I’m in ahead of everyone else, but suddenly I have to be here later…which messes with Barnes & Noble and my being able to be there by 5…my boss is OK with letting it stay a bit flexible on occasion, and you know, I’d be fine with it if I was given a good reason, or told that after this monster amount of work gets worked through (we just acquired a company) I could go back to my earlier hours, or something…but this upsets me. Something I’ve liked from day one is my flexible hours and being able to get out early. I’m not a morning person, but I like to leave early so I force myself to be and it’s nice…Now for no good reason that I can understand, I’m suddenly having to stay later…and my more productive time is the morning. It always has been, by 3 pm I’m so fried I’m just ready to leave…I barely struggle with filing and basic things in the last hour…plus I’m most likely going to just be here at 7:30 anyway as traffic sucks coming in at 8, it’s fine if I’m here by 7:30/7:35, but sucks later…and going home, same thing…I’m suddenly not so happy in my job…oh, and the thing is, it’s not like I’m doing overtime, we have to be approved for it as we get paid for it (at least I do) although I haven’t ever been one to claim overtime even if I am there a bit later or work through lunch…such a simple thing to make an employee happy and they take it away from me…makes me feel less happy about my job and the company by a lot. Prior to this announcement, even through a lot of crap to deal with, I could say I really do like my job, now I’m not feeling so loyal or needing to stay, I could probably get more money elsewhere, but I liked the hours I was working and the way things are, this change just makes me wonder what else might change…

Long Run in Southwest MN

Back from a weekend at my parents. Aunt and uncle were in town from Alaska and I wanted to see them of course, but it’s such a boring place to run…flat boring farm country. If I still lived there there is no way I would end up running marathons as there is just no where to run!! So my run this weekend was a 14 miler, I decided to run from Heron Lake, my home town, to Okabena, the next town over, just over 3.5 miles from my parents house…Anyway, ran there and around the town and back, then around my home town to make up the 14 miles…I somehow managed to survive it. The weather was actually pretty decent, cooler, but a bit windy, at least I only had to run fully into it at the start. It was a bit humid though. Before going to for the run, as I ate breakfast, I was reading in the latest Runner’s World about long runs and the pace…there were a number of ideas and theories and I decided to try a new one. The idea of running half the run at MP + 60 seconds, then I ran the second half at MP. It was much faster than I ever run long runs or have tried…and it wasn’t too bad. I won’t do all of them that way I don’t think, but a few here and there, particularly if they are shorter runs like 14 miles. The splits went down like this:

Mile1: The first mile I kind of missed, I was .7 in before I started the watch
Mile 2: 9:09
Mile 3: 9:13
Mile 4: 9:01
Mile 5: 8:52
Mile 6: 8:46
Mile 7: 8:44
Mile 8: 9:28 (a quick stop for water and powerade)
Mile 9: 8:21
Mile 10: 8:14
Mile 11: 7:58
Mile 12: 8:04
Mile 13: 8:04
Mile 14: 8:01

The last .3 was at 8:12 pace I’m guessing around 9:15-9:20 for the first mile, and overall finish for the run average an 8:40. My planned MP is 8:12, but anything faster than 8:24 is acceptable as it gets me the BQ…so the last 6 and the fact that the last mile was on pace for it, I’m pleased with the results.

Anyway, I need to get stuff unpacked and get ready as it’s a friends birthday today and he’s going to be here in a bit to go out for coffee, drinks, ice cream or something. Just wanted to get a quick update in.

Tempo Thursday, August 10

OK, originally I was only going to do an interval workout this week since I ran last weeks race faster than planned, but I decided to keep mileage up and keep my workouts going, I would just shorten it from the 10 miles planned total run with 8 at marathon pace (working these up to a bit faster than marathon pace) to a 7 mile run with 5 at marathon pace. My goal time is 3:35, to give me cushion to achieve BQ. My pace I need to run to get that is 8:12 I think (can’t quite remember for sure) so I was shooting for the 5 MP miles at 8:10, eventually working those up to 7:45. I ran over the hilly areas in my neighborhood this morning for this run to conserve on time.

Mile 1: 9:22 pace (warm up and over some hills)
Mile 2: 7:47 (all flat and felt a bit harder, but didn’t realize it was that much faster)
Mile 3: 8:21 (hills)
Mile 4: 8:42 (has a very long, probably just under a half mile, fairly steep hill)
Mile 5: 7:44 (this had mostly down hill motion, although a few climbs)
Mile 6: 7:52 (again some ups and downs)
Mile 7: 8:08 (oops, this was supposed to be cool down)

Again not real consistent, but it was a good feeling run and the 5 MP miles were at 7:59 which is better than hoped for and I didn’t feel burned out or dead at the end obviously or I would’ve slowed down more when I could’ve. I could’ve gone at least another mile or two I think with the way I was feeling. And again, this isn’t flat terrain, I should take some pictures of the area.

Anyway, better get to doing some work. I only ran 4 yesterday easy in the morning with a strength session after. Took last night off to rest the legs and saw a movie, which I honestly should’ve skipped since I was tired and should’ve gone to bed early since I’m working tonight till 10 and then am getting up 45 minutes earlier than I need to to drive my roommate to the airport.

Tuesday, August 8 Intervals

I have an offsite meeting today but wanted to do a quick update of my morning workout…and actually even last nights right was good. OK, so cooler temps might be helping and the rest of last week (even if my race wasn’t really a rest). Last night was going to do 5, but ended up doing 6 because I was feeling good, had a yippy annoying poodle run up and bark at my ankles at one point and I must’ve sped up a bit due to annoyance cause mile 3 was 8:15, but the rest were in the 8:40s or so (one a bit slower as it was up a long hill) and averaged 8:40 pace, and that was just an easy run that felt good. This morning was interval day, Yasso 800s, well, half miles so I figure if I’m a couple of seconds slower than the predictor pace, that should still be OK…anyway, 10 x .5 with .25 recovery and mile warm up and cool down. Was between 3:00-3:10 for recovery and the intervals went like this:

1 – 3:36
2 – 3:38
3 – 3:30
4 – 3:30
5 – 3:38
6 – 3:37
7 – 3:32
8 – 3:29
9 – 3:28
10 – 3:41

Still not the consistency I’d like, but I’m getting a bit better and all but the last one were under 3:40 (if I have kept going straight instead of doing a tight turn that slowed me down I would've been under 3:40, probably 3:38 again), while I’d like to be running 3:30-3:35 (my goal marathon time) I’m still under the 3:40 I need to get my BQ sooo….guess we’ll see come October. Anyway, the temps were quite cool this morning, almost considered light tights. I’m going to do a 4 mile easy after work today (will need it after 8 hours of testing that I’m involved in today…ughh…). Today’s intervals did feel easier than the last two weeks for the most part too, so that’s good. I’m still contemplating if I’ll do the tempo run on Thursday or not, had considered not doing it, but I might just cut it shorter and do both workouts this week. The long run this week is only 14 miles (I’ll be in my hometown and it’s so boring running there, seriously running around the town only gives me 2 miles so I have to get creative where I run).

Oh, and I found a roommate...(Kurt, hopefully this one will be good and you won't have to be digging any holes). Met him on Sunday when he came to look, we talked a lot, he seems cool, I think we'll get along well and he works a 2nd shift, 4 pm - 1 am so not like we'll be there together a lot anyway to get sick of each other and what we talked about I think will put us in a good living situation, we both like clean, respect for each other's stuff, etc...and he works for Comcast which just bought Time Warner, my cable company, and gets free cable phone, cable internet and all cable...I get basic cable, but we'll get the digital tier and movie channels along with DVR!!! Plus he's paying me rent...I think this is going to be an awesome situation!!

20 Miler, A Race AND A PR!!!

Alright, so today, 20 mile long run, first of 6 planned, but this one was a bit different because I had a half marathon race in the middle of it…so the breakdown of the day.

Alarm at 4:30…ugh…was out of bed just before 5 though, had a new breakfast, scrambled eggbeaters with a little lowfat cheddar cheese (one serving), and 2 kashi waffles with light maple syrup and some water. I headed out the door at 5:45, and was to the race start line just before 6. I took off through the neighborhoods for a nice slow 5 mile run pre-race. Splits were 9:56, 9:38, 9:48, 9:16 and 8:59 for an average of 9:33, which was about what I wanted. I finished about 6:47 or so, had just enough time to go in, use the bathroom (love this race the flush toilets actually have a shorter line), do a little stretching of the IT Band and eat a fruit bar before the race started right at 7 am. Now I knew I could potentially PR on this race (this is the same course I got my PR last year, although the prior half I had run I knew had a very soft time on it) and still not do damage to my quest for a long run at a light pace…plus if I did race it, there is plenty of time to recover in the 11 weeks left before MCM!

We headed out and first mile was slow at 9:13, but it was a crowded start, I think there are about a thousand runners in this race, it’s a nice little race that I like to do because proceeds go toward classes where elementary school students learn about nature at a reserve area in the city. Parts of the course is through the city of Richfield's neighborhoods and parts are around some small lakes and the nature reserve so it’s a nice course, fairly flat, very shaded and while light on spectators is well run. This year they even managed to make it a “waste free race” by having cups that are biodegradable (which I expected to be recycled paper, but they were actually hard plastic, and kind of short, NOT good for trying to drink on the run out of, but oh well), food that was all organic and all waste is going to compost heaps, even the gear bags were made of recycled stuff, and the shirts are nice, light weight tech shirts, I LOVE my one from last year for training in and this year it’s the same one only green, my favorite color. Anyway, the only slight complaint I’d have about the race is that the first trip around a lake on a smaller path happens after the first mile, so the crowd hasn’t thinned out a lot yet, so it can be a bit tough trying to keep a nice pace and work through the crowds, but it’s not bad and I managed to keep a fairly good pace, just not real consistent (I’ll post splits in a little bit). Anyway, it was a nice day, cool, (probably upper 50s low 60s, I never heard a forecast that said morning temp) and overcast, it sprinkled off and on from mile 4 on and felt really good. It was humid though as I was dripping at the end…ah well. I started at the back and mainly moved up on people, only had a few pass me and around mile 10 I had one girl pass me but I kept her in my sights, there had been another girl I had been eyeing to move up on as well, and when I hit the place where there was about .5 to go, going into the last nature area we run through, I took off, flew past the girl who had passed me and the other girl I had been eyeing and a bunch of other people, but I guess an advantage of having run the course before is you know how much further you have to go and you know how much you have left in you…it felt so good too…just all out sprint, I hit the 13 mile mark and heard someone yell that if you sprint now you can just make it in clock time of under 1:54, I knew I was at least a minute faster than clock time, but I really pushed it and hit the mat at 1:54 on the nose…I grabbed some water, checked Garmin which told me I had just run 13.30 miles, so I jogged out and finished up my 1.7 so I could have a total of 20 miles for the day, that was at a very slow average pace of 10:30, but I had just raced, so the slower time was acceptable.

My previous PR, on this course last year, was 1:57:30, I ran 1:53:08 official chip time today and that was with a 5 mile “warmup” prior to the run…I think next year I’ll really race this course and see what I can do!!

Splits:
Mile 1: 9:13
Mile 2: 7:53 (oops a little fast)
Mile 3: 9:05 (water stop and first with those cups that kind of slow you down)
Mile 4: 8:21
Mile 5: 8:33
Mile 6: 8:34
Mile 7: 8:26
Mile 8: 8:47
Mile 9: 8:41
Mile 10: 8:56 (another water stop that kind of slowed me down a bit, kind of busy)
Mile 11: 8:24
Mile 12: 8:19
Mile 13: 7:51
Mile .1 (actually .3) 2:04 (mile pace of 6:38, I knew I was flying!!)

I got one of the free massages after, told her I had a tight IT band, but I think she was tired of doing it by then as I didn’t get a very good one, I think I need to get in and get this taken care of soon though, it’s been tight a while and part of the goodie bag had discount things for a massage at a few places…also had $2 toward a treat at Dairy Queen…I think I might have to go there before work tonight!!

Oh, I finally got the times added together now too, I had an 8:56 average pace for my “20 miler” today…I think I can count it as a true 20 miler too as the only break really in there was about 10 minutes, and bathroom break would’ve been something I needed at some point anyway…without the race, I am hoping I would’ve had an average of 9:10 or so, which is my goal for the long runs. The really great thing though is this showed me I can run a 15 miler the week before and still run a good half, so I can really race Disney and still run the 25K I want to run (as long as I take it slow and take an easy week before which I have planned) that I want to run. It’s the 25th Anniversary of this 25K and they are giving out beer steins as a keepsake…I want something other than a T-shirt!!

Alright, I’ve rambled on enough, I’m going to go lay in the sun and/or clean up my car and maybe take a nap before I have to work at 6 tonight and then head out at 11 for a drink with a friend…At least this week has gotten a bit better on the runs, I’ll take it easy tomorrow, maybe something light to loosen up the legs after today, but going into a hard week next week, although I might move intervals to Wednesday and take out the tempo run this week just to have a slight recovery.

Finally, a Decent Run

Yesterday after work I went for a run that was going to be 4.5 miles, I’m having a cutback week this week and am trying hard to keep mileage under 40 (preferably even closer to 35-37) and have a 20 miler this week…Tuesdays run in the rain was OK, I went .5 miles further than planned because of where I was in the run, so I was cutting back yesterdays wanting to run today as well (which I still might do, but can’t go further than 2.5)…I have 2 days of rest scheduled into this week as well, right now I might even have 3, which I really hate!! Anyway, I got out after work yesterday, it was cooler, low 80s, which is still fine for me, only a light wind but no humidity (well very light) which is what the drain factor for me is…I started out and it felt good, I had also taken Wednesday completely off so my body should’ve been fully rested and it was. I hit the first mile at 8:30…The next mile, a bit hilly, came in just under 9 and the rest were slowest of 8:40 and fastest of 8:25…all feeling easy, in fact it felt so good that I turned it into a 6 miler (average pace for the run was 8:36), which is why I really mean no more than the 2.5 today (I'm at 16.5 already for the week with a 20 miler tomorrow). I am running a half marathon tomorrow, mostly as a training run that gives you a nice technical shirt, I’m going to get to the start line early enough to get hopefully 4-5 miles in before the race, and then I’ll run the race and get another 2-3 in after to complete my first 20 miler of this training cycle. Weather should be good, slight chance for rain I think, but it should be cool. I’m figuring on running a 9:30 or so pace for the warm up run, then the marathon at or around 9 minute pace, maybe picking up the pace at the end see if I can PR this from last year and then the cool down slower to try to get an average closer to 9:10 or so for the entire 20, but we’ll see. I just hope the legs feel good tomorrow…it is a pretty nice course and is only a 15 minute (if that) drive from my house to the start. There was decent food after and even free tickets into the pool that is located by the start. I didn’t use them last year but maybe this year I will!!

Discontent...and some lingering Sadness

There is a discontentment that I’m feeling right now…a need or lacking of something in my life and I’m not sure how to go about correcting it and/or finding what is missing or causing this discontent.

On Tuesday night I was so excited, my friends were going to be in town and we were going to get to spend some quality time together before they continue on their journey to Idaho. They got to my place about 8:15 and we then went to meet up with other friends for dinner. We had good food and wine, a few drinks at another bar and then home and Leesa and I sat up, while Dan went to bed, and talked till late…it was just a really nice chance to catch up and so refreshing to find her and I are still so on the same wavelength about so many things. See, Leesa is one of those people that you never know where you are going to find them, but if you do, and are lucky enough to have them come into your life, you will forever be changed. She’s generous and fun, always concerned about others feelings and making sure what she is doing isn’t an inconvenience or burden to someone else, she is a beautiful person, inside and out. I love being around her as we just click so well when it comes to what we enjoy doing and our thoughts and philosophies on life and maybe it’s because it seems she has really lived while I feel like I have been watching so much of my life, that I have even more admiration for her. She has ended up finding things and takne me on excursions I never would've experienced otherwise and I'm so glad I Have. She is the kind of person that draws people to her because of the fact that she is so easy going. It’s when she moved to Minnesota and had complaints about the fact that it was so hard to meet people and find new friends that I realized exactly how true that statement was and how closed off the state is as she is someone you can’t help but like and enjoy being around. We met at a job orientation. It was a complete fluke as I was starting my internship (which really wasn’t supposed to start for at least another 2 months) and she was starting her first “real” job out of school. We started chatting during a break and she asked me for thoughts on things to do around the city…well, I went one better on that and gave her my number telling her I would be happy to show her around…thus started our friendship, in March of 1999. We went to Hawaii together, Italy, I visited her in Cincinnati, and will be going to see her in Idaho…we don’t talk on the phone often, e-mail some, but not as often as I would like, but no matter what, when we get together it’s like we were never apart and it’s so easy and I love that. After they left yesterday and I headed off to work, I just wanted to cry, because while it’s no different them being in Idaho than it was Kentucky where they are moving from, the time I spent just reminded me how much I miss seeing her. She is so much of what I want to be and I think that’s where the discontent is. She wasn’t happy in Minnesota, or at least not at the job she was in, so she found a new one and didn’t think anything of moving. Her and Dan are into the outdoors and wanted to move to Idaho, Oregon, or Colorado and when she found the job a few years sooner than planned, but 32 hours from their families (they were only about 7) she went ahead and went. It's so opposite of me and that brings me to my discontent…I’m jealous of that. I admire that and I want to do that…I don’t like Minnesota, I never really have. I hate cold for one thing. It’s not an area for single people (and no, I don’t want to move to meet a man, I want to move to have other single’s to hang out with and who understand my lifestyle as while some look at me funny for not wanting to be married and have kids, I look at them funny for wanting to be married and have kids, well at least the have kids part and that’s all part of the Midwest mentality). It’s not an area for those that don’t like cold yet hate running indoors…the cost of living is pretty high with not a lot to show for that either. I’d like a bigger place in a different area, but reality is I can’t afford it. I want a better climate, yet good culture, lower cost of living (or better pay) and a great area for those that aren’t attached with families…anyone know of anything?? To be honest, San Diego is where I want to be, but the cost of living isn’t a reality I don’t think unfortunately…where I’ve been thinking is Phoenix, Las Vegas, Denver/Boulder, DC/Baltimore (or even south into VA, but I think those areas are probably all expensive for living), maybe Seattle (but the rain and cloudy days would get me), Raleigh/Durham is listed as a great place for singles, but I don’t know anything about it there…The big thing is finding a job though…I need more networking and people who can point me to headhunters and/or job openings…and I’d love to be someplace where I can potentially pursue my MBA and/or JD eventually…I just know I need to get out…and I’m about at the 2 year mark I set for myself when I started my job here. Honestly I like my job, I wish I could take it with me…

Finally Some Rain

Yes, I woke up this morning and it was raining!! It was supposed to, and when I woke up at 2 I had looked outside I saw some lightning so knew the storms must be coming in, but wasn’t sure if they had, I had forgotten to bring the towel in that I had hung on my balcony last night to dry too (so as not to have to run the dryer) and when I set my GPS out at 5:30 to get a signal, it was drenched…oh well. I knew it was going to be fun to run in the rain again. I actually really enjoy a nice rain to run in in the right conditions. Today was the right conditions, but body is still acting out. I ran 4 miles last night in the heat, yes we hit 100 at one point yesterday, no idea what it was when I ran, but it was hot, I walked parts of it, but I wanted to get out so I did, 3rd run in a row without the GPS or a watch, I estimated time to be 9:30-10 minute pace…Today’s run I wanted to be easy tempo, nothing too hard, planned 6 miles (ended up with 6.5 due to a miscalculation in the distance I had come and no way to get back to the house sooner) and wanted 3 miles at tempo pace of 8:15 or so, the rest just easy, this is a cut back and easier planned week, plus I am running a half on Saturday (although that is just more part of my long run training run this weekend so not really going to be fast), but still, figured I could get a little speed out…nope…and I had to walk a few spots up some hills cause the legs were just dragging. I was feeling somewhat hungry, which should not be the case since I did eat last night and it was only 6 miles and I’ve gone up to 10 in the morning without having eaten anything for breakfast. I averaged 8:53 or so for the 6 miles and it was 8:57 for the 6.5 (the last half was up a pretty steep hill). I’m taking tomorrow off due to friends being in town, I’ll go easy on Friday, racing on Saturday and off again on Sunday, but I really need to be up for good speed work next week. I’m at 12 weeks till the marathon and right now, I’m not even sure I’m going to break 4 hours…honestly, I think the 3:42:54 is what my body had in it, that was it and I don’t think I’m going to go even close to that one ever again at this rate…I need something to give me some confidence and I just don’t know what will do that…or what more I can do to try to get the running to feel good again. I want the training feelings from this spring…

On the upside, tonight Leesa and Dan will be here. They are moving from Florence, KY to Sandpoint, ID, finally meeting their dream of moving to Oregon, Colorado or Idaho. They are both into outdoorsy things, hiking, skiing, Dan’s gotten into adventure racing and Leesa got into mountain bike racing, so it’s going to be perfect for them…now I just have to figure out if I want to attempt skiing on mountains and go see them sometime in the winter or if I should go visit in the spring!! But so looking forward to seeing them tonight, we are going to dinner at what is my favorite restaurant, Vescio's (this place was so good that when Leesa and I would be talking on the phone and it was near a meal time, if one of us mentioned the name, we'd be there in the next 30 mintues) and then probably for drinks, I’m off work tomorrow and hanging with them till early afternoon when they head off…so glad I was on the route to where they were going as it’s been way too long since I’ve seen them. I also can't wait for dinner...I used to be enough of a regular there that the waitress would know what I want (I almost always get their yummy baked rigatoni pasta with meat sauce, salad and then maybe dessert, they have fantastic tiramisu, black forest cake and yummy cheesecakes...what would I want most...)

Long Run, Heat and Humidity

Well, ended up doing only 15 of the 20 I had planned. I didn’t get up and running by 7:00 like I had wanted to. My run started at 8:30, and the sun, heat and humidity were definitely there, I drank as much as I could, but I know it wasn’t nearly enough, weight before and after the run showed a loss of 4 pounds, and I did drink some in that time, so definitely under hydrating, but I didn’t want more either…something about the heat and it affecting how you feel about drinking, eating, etc…anyway, partway in I knew that 20 would be a long shot, but I still attempted, just stayed close to home so I’d be able to cut it if I needed to. My first two miles were on 9:05 pace, just where I wanted to be, but everything slowed down from there. Even though I found one area to run that was actually not as terrible for heat, kind of breezy through it and tree shaded, but overall it was a crap run yet again…I got home and was dripping, it was like I had taken a shower, talk about gross. My running things went right into the washing machine. I still never complain about hot, but that has to be the most miserable conditions I have ever run in. But still beats running in the cold.

Had a weird night out last night and feeling the affects of it today, not so much in hangover, but in the typical after drinking kind of weird feelings I have…need to find a way around that, either no more drinking or find a way to not feel like this the day after. Which I don’t know how to do…anyway, I got up and ran 5 miles with no watch this morning, just to get out and run and relax, well, it was definitely hot, but oh well.

I really did enjoy having the whole weekend off though. It was nice being able to sleep and such too. Next weekend I work Saturday night and Sunday, I need to run on Saturday because I cut the run short today planning to run a half on Saturday and doing 4 before and 3 after so I can get 20 in then, then I will have a shorter run the weekend after when I’m at my parents. Thing that sucks about that though, I work on Saturday night till 11, and then again on Sunday, which just really irritates me. I’m sorry, but I work this place PART-TIME, I should NOT have to work full weekends, EVER…and I don’t care that I had this weekend off and the next full weekend off after that. But it doesn’t matter, I still should NOT have to work a full weekend (and to me, weekend is Friday, Saturday and Sunday, weekdays are Monday-Thursday, I work one day during the week and one on the weekend in my mind)…ughh…not looking forward to this week, except for Tuesday into Wednesday when I have two friends coming to stay with me that I haven’t seen in forever…they are moving to Idaho and coming through town on the way there. I haven’t seen her in over a year and him in 2 years I think…such a blah day…and for some odd reason I’m feeling kind of lonely…

Sleep…Finally

Just what my body was demanding. I went to bed at 8:30 last night, yes, you read that right, but I really knew I needed it. In fact I crawled into bed before that, was probably asleep at 8:30, and while I woke up once around 11:30 to use the bathroom, and again around 3:30 and almost felt awake (apparently brain thought we were going to go running again) enough to get up, but I went back to sleep till my alarm at 5:45, and didn’t get up till just after 6 (two snoozes!!). It felt great. Nine hours plus of sleep…I so needed it. I got up then and got myself to the fitness center to do some strength training with plans to do one of my yoga DVDs this evening as well. (I say plan cause I never seem able to use the workouts at home)

I thank everyone for the kind thoughts and words regarding my running lately. I know it happens to us all, it’s just hard to accept right now since I had such a long string of great training and runs there, I didn’t expect to hit this again. But what I decided is sleep is definitely important which is why I slept in this morning and DID NOT get up for the run that I normally would’ve, and while I strength trained, my plan is no run today…I'm letting my body have the recovery it seems to be demanding. Last night I was feeling the urge though and got my GPS set, started to put it on, and then decided to turn it off and leave it behind. I ran 3.5 miles, no idea how fast, and I don’t really care…it was warm, I was slow, but that’s fine. I even ran a route that I kind of like but usually don’t run because it’s just not long enough for what I usually do…that was nice too. Now I just hope everything gets itself back in shape for the 20 miler I have planned for tomorrow…And as a treat to get myself motivated, I’m going to Cold Stone with a friend after for a reward.

Tonight I'm just going to watch a movie and go to bed early, because the plan is to get up by 5:30/6 tomorrow and wake up, eat, (something I haven’t been doing on the Friday runs) and hopefully have a really good 20 miler. This one I think I’ll run one of my normal routes, but of the 7…umm, that doesn’t seem right, I think I might have to adjust that, 20+ milers I have scheduled, I’m going to run some of them in conditions to simulate MCM (meaning a hill early, some flats and rolls and then hill late). Hopefully all goes well tomorrow!!

Moments of Frustration…

OK, I'm sure this is becoming tiresome to some, but then again, this is my blog and where else am I going to gripe and whine, but this has been going on for a week and a half and it just doesn’t seem to get better. I was dreading today’s run and apparently for good reason. It sucked…I had plans for running a warm up and cool down mile and a middle tempo run of 7:45-8:00 minute miles for 6 miles…well, first “fast” mile was 8:45, I felt like I was running so much faster than that and I’m so frustrated by this…I got the next mile or two up to 8:30, but that felt tough, and then it slowed down, in fact I decided to bag the run at 6 miles, pulled off 6.5 final in 57:45, an average of around 8:56 per mile pace…horrible. How was I able to run 26.2 miles at 8:30, which felt almost effortless (until Mile 20 I was running the entire way, it felt great and from mile 20 on, I only walked through water stops just cause I needed to to be able to drink, was drowning as I got more tired), to this pathetic attempt…the only run that is a saving grace of any kind in the last 2 weeks is the run on Sunday, that did feel effortless and it was during a hotter part of the day, on less sleep even than some of the other days, and DRINKING the night before…what gives?? What exactly am I doing wrong? I’m actually working at what feels like a higher effort (and I’m running mainly in the AM so it’s not the heat, sure it’s a bit more humid, but it’s cool, and pretty decent weather for a run) than any previous training for slower results. Is my body that drained and tired?? I’m not getting the same amount of sleep as I was over the winter, my eating…hmm, yesterday was seriously crappy, too much sugar by far and not a lot of healthy things, but it’s not something I do ALL the time, and I am actually lighter now than I was during a lot of that training too…so shouldn’t it be easier? I know I’m getting enough calories in the day, although I don’t eat before my morning runs (except the long ones on a Saturday), but that wasn’t a problem during the spring either, the 15 miles I did 2 weeks ago without eating actually didn’t feel that bad, was a bit slower than I wanted, but it felt good, unlike the 17 last week and all the interval training to date…I think I’m going to have to review my training from last time though and see what is different. That training cycle I was on a new total build up after not running much the previous month, this time I’m coming off a training cycle and having run a marathon, it should be easier training shouldn’t it?? At this rate though, I don’t think even a 3:45 is a goal I could have for MCM…I’m just feeling so crappy about things. I guess cutting back on running is something I'm going to have to consider...but with only 12 weeks from Sunday to the marathon, that scares me...with 3 weeks taper, that's only 9 weeks or hard training...but I think for intervals (after this week, it's a cut back week) I'll cut back to only 6 and see what happens and work it from there. Or just focus on tempo type runs...what is more important...it just sucks cause I had no problems with all this prior to June.

I’ll give the run one kind of cool thing…I was running a bit different route than normal, up a hill that actually felt downhill, kind of weird, anyway, I’m running along this road and look to my left (this is after having to switch around my route because the creek I have to run by and through a bit of a tunnel for is flooded, weird cause while we did have some rain, it wasn’t much, definitely not enough to flood the thing and that rain was on Monday!!) and there is a deer, probably 10 feet from me, I jumped, it jumped and took off, but only a little way, I noticed it slowed down once it was “safely” away from me…talk about being as startled as the animal though. Oh, and while yeah, deer aren’t that big of a deal, I do live in a first tier suburb of Minneapolis, the city I’m in has 45,000 or so people…I tease one of my friends that lives way in the outer most suburbs that she’s in the boonies, they have almost 3 acres, have lived there for almost 2 years and have seen deer once (and her husband stays home with the kids so people are around to see), even the deer are moving into the city, they realize the boonies are no fun!!

Personal Space

Have we reached a place in the US that personal space isn’t an issue anymore? I know in most other countries, close talking and being within “wing span” is kind of normal, but in this country we are still all about our space (which as waistlines are getting larger, it tends to make you wonder when we will have to give up that wing span anyway because there just won’t be an ability for it). This comes to me though as last night a friend and I went to see a movie. We went to the “cheap theater” and it was bargain night (instead of the normal $2 for a ticket it was $1 which brings out people in full force, strange I know, it’s only $1 difference, but whatever). My friend and I were early because I know it can be busy and we chose seats in the middle, on the aisle. This is a theater with one main aisle and probably 8-10 seats deep on each side, so not a huge theater. Anyway, about 10 minutes before the movie starts, a man and woman come to our row and want to sit in it, we move out of the way so they can climb over (my friend was on the aisle and I was next to hear), his wife sits two seats from me and he sits down right next to me. This I found to be quite strange as there was plenty of room for them to leave one seat between myself and them. I mean isn’t it a common kind of “courtesy” thing to not crowd others unless it’s a packed movie theater (which this wasn’t, there were only the 4 of us in this row and only about 1/3 of the movie theater was full). Just weird, weird things…It was a new moon yesterday, maybe I’m giving off a strange aura, the guy running his hand up my ass on Saturday and grabbing it, now a guy having to sit too close to me (which was annoying as then I had to share that arm rest too!!).

Anyway, had a so-so run yesterday afternoon, recovery run to loosen up the legs, actually wasn’t even so-so, the heat and morning workout had zapped me…I ran it in 9:22 average and my runs lately for 4 mile recoveries have usually be 9:00 miles or less, and felt really easy (case in point, this AM’s run was 4 miles at 8:48), it was definitely humid, but I hate to use that excuse. I’m really semi dreading tomorrow’s run…8 mile planned tempo with wanting 6 at marathon pace – 30, which would be 7:45, even 8 minutes I’d be happy with, but just the way I’ve been feeling I don’t know if it will happen. I really have to think it must be the less sleep that is doing it. I’m averaging about 7 hours a night right now and I bet last winter I was averaging at least 8 to 8 ½…

Tuesday, July 25 Intervals

Tuesday’s Intervals

Well, didn’t start so well, at 5:10 I just didn’t want to get out of bed and pushed it to a point where I got out the door at 5:35, so not enough time and I really did end up rushing the workout a bit more than I should’ve, but what can you do? It was in the mid-60s when I started, heard it was 70 or so when I was leaving to work an hour and forty-five minutes later, but it was so humid you could almost drink the water. Now I never, ever complain about heat, I like it warm, but it does suck a little bit having to run in humidity (why I’d move to AZ but not FL!!), and I was drenched very quickly as usual. Started with my typical 1 mile warm up, stretched a tiny bit, (so my overall time actually isn’t the pace it seems, I keep forgetting that I stop and stretch a bit) and took off on the intervals…Again with the .5 mile with .25 recovery. I had originally been thinking about doing 10 this week instead of 8, but time constraints kept me from that, and I’m glad I didn’t force the plan on it as I just didn’t have the energy for it.

1 – 3:45 (and an expletive out of my mouth as I was so annoyed it seemed I was running faster and my goal was 3:30, 3:35 at the slowest)
2 – 3:28
3 – 3:27
4 – 3:42 (again annoyed)
5 – 3:38 (this is where I was getting really tired and was contemplating stopping at 6)
6 – 3:21 (this is what annoyance will get you!!)
7 – 3:31
8 – 3:51 (thankfully this was the last, I don’t think I could’ve forced 2 more, particularly with feeling upset about it)

Again recoveries were in the 3:00-3:15 range except one that went a little over (watch out for potential TMI) as I needed a bathroom stop…unfortunately for me the bathrooms around there were locked, thankfully for me there is a very wooded area around where I do the runs…and no one else was there…I could not have held it!!

Anyway, another interval workout done, but again not feeling so great. I’m actually almost dreading speed workouts this time and I hate that. I have planned 8 mile tempo run on Thursday, 6 miles at marathon pace – 15-30, we’ll see if I can do that or not. I’m going to attempt getting up early enough to run it in the AM since we are in 90s and humid all week. I guess I’m getting to bed early on Friday so I can be up early on Saturday (no morning run before work this weekend as I’m doing 20 and I just don’t see doing that before work, no way I’m getting up at 3:30!!

I’m also annoyed at my scale, yes I know, don’t weigh yourself, don’t think about it, etc…but I really want to get down in weight and I know I’m eating bad (case in point, I’m going to a movie tonight, that means popcorn, but I’m planning for that by not eating much between now and then and eating healthy choices!!). I know I did really bad in my eating over the weekend so expected this, but I need to drop about 7 pounds now…sigh…

2 1/2 more hours of work and then an easy 4 miler before maybe a nap and then the movie...

Adventure’s in Healthy Food in the Metro

Ah, my new car...OK, so in 2-3 years I'll have my student loans paid off and I'm getting this or the Pontiac Solstice...I'll have more than earned it!! Had to have the picture though to see how I'd look in it. I'm planning on purchasing in dark green or light blue...most likely green, I look good in green!!
What a busy weekend, yet again, although on Saturday I kind of got some very much needed “me” time. This was a very, very good thing. I went out for a drink with a friend on Friday night, but neither of us were up for a late night and I was home in bed sleeping by 1 am (hey, I know that’s kind of late, but early for a weekend the way my schedule has been lately). Anyway, I woke up the next morning too early (first at 6:30, then finally got up at 8:30) but felt refreshed, 8 hours of sleep, just what I needed!! Now if only I could get more of that. I kind of laid around for a bit, but decided I wanted to strength train so headed to the fitness center and did 30 minutes of strength and then 15 on the elliptical before I decided I should get going if I wanted to get errands done…it was already after 11. I changed into my new bikini so I could go to Lake Calhoun then swung by the cash machine for money before going to the Farmer’s Market…wandered the farmer’s market and ran into a friend that just started working for a farmer that sells stuff there, talked to him a bit then on for my errands…I bought flowers to plant and some cut flowers for vases in my house (maybe I’ll take and post some pictures later), a watermelon, then I ran that stuff to the car and went back and purchased sweet corn (finally got some good stuff), peaches and cherries…then it was off to Calhoun.

Laid around there for an hour or so just reading and relaxing, then I was off to Whole Foods for some of their yummy chips I’ve decided I love, and some more fruit bars to have on my runs since I’m officially sick of gels. Also found some Kashi waffles I decided I wanted to try, but also needed to get to the grocery store for some syrup since I am out and I didn’t want to spend the price of organic!! (cheapest I saw there and not in a light version was $6!! Ouch)…Also had sampled a piece of their angel food cake when I walked in and it was so not good, I later baked my own…mine is soooo yummy…I have a secret ingredient!! Then it was on to Trader Joe’s…I’m so glad we finally have one here. I’ve been hearing about it for ages and was so excited to finally have some. I bought some of the cookies I really liked that I bought last time, bad I know, but so far I haven’t opened them!! Some fruit leather and Kashi Crunch bars were purchased as well and then I headed home, where I did some laundry and hung my sheets on my balcony to dry so I could have fresh scented sheets!! And I vegged out on my balcony reading some more and relaxed a bit more, had turned off my cell and left myself “unreachable” for the afternoon so I could really just do whatever. I ended up taking a nap and finally figured I better get ready to head out for the evening, a friend was stopping to get me between 7:30 and 8…He got there at 7:45, we got my other friend picked up by 8:15 and were on the road to Fairbault, our destination to meet another friend and check out a band. We were to her place by 9:15 and off to the bar…quite an interesting experience let me tell you. We weren’t even there 5 minutes (I hadn’t even gotten a drink yet) when a guy came up and asked me how old I was…I went with my standard “never ask a lady her age” answer (and what is this, that was the first thing out of his mouth, he was guessing me at 21/22, but then he was in his early 50s…) so whatever, we watched the band and later a guy comes over and tells me he knows I’m with my boyfriend (actually isn’t the case…not sure what the boy with us is, he’s a friend, maybe a tiny bit more than a friend, but I am just not ready/sure about a relationship at this time, yes now that I’m able to run again, you can all forget my last post about loneliness, I’m back to feeling good and happy single!!) anyway, none of that mattered as he leaned in, grabbed my ass and told me I was gorgeous…How do you react to that?? Then he left, apparently he had leaned over to my friend and told him something to that effect about me as well, and told him maybe that he was going to grab my ass, I don’t know…it was just weird. Anyway, another late night though as a friend had to work the next day so we drove back yet that night and crashed. But I woke up at 10 and decided I needed to run (after going to bed around 4:30) and I headed out the door for the best run I’ve had in over a week…I had one mile that came up at 7:36, but the next was 9:50, somehow I think Garmin was off, but averaged 8:30 pace for 5 miles and it was getting hot then…and this was after having 2 Stoli Cranberries, a pitcher plus a bottle of beer and a shot…and I wasn’t hung over!! Just tired…hmm…is this what I need to have a good run?? Anyway, spent the next couple of hours cleaning up my car, making a mess of my house (not intentionally but my kitchen is a disaster, guess what I’m doing tonight) and then had to work at B&N, at least I was only there till 9…I came home, watched Gray’s Anatomy, ate and crashed…I was so tired, but didn’t sleep well cause it had really warmed up by the time I got home and was stifling in the house, but I didn’t want to turn on the A/C, bad move, so tonight the A/C is back on…sigh…last week was great, I don’t mind the 90s for temps either, but this humidity needs to go!!

And the thick air is back...just got back from lunch and man, you could almost drink the air!!

4 AM Run and 2 C- Runs

OK, so a friend told me that I should never grade my runs, but I still do…and I suppose it serves me right that I’m having the not so great runs considering I can’t remember ANY bad runs on the spring training cycle…darnit, should’ve run that marathon harder to get that BQ as I see challenges to it for the fall. I know, I know, I still have 13 weeks of training, plenty of time to get the speeds up and prepared for the distance, but I have actually not been feeling like running, well, I wouldn’t even quite put it that way, I feel like running, but I just want to plod along at a steady pace, however it feels good, I don’t want to “train” doing the faster workouts (heck even the long runs are fine, but getting set paces I haven’t been crazy about). This week so far:

MONDAY: workout was skipped because I was tired in the morning and worked that night
TUESDAY: I did my intervals, which were a bit slower in the first few than I wanted, but did feel good, I did an afternoon run to work the lactic acid out of my legs and just for enjoyment
WEDNESDAY: I did a morning run of 3.5 miles and strength trained finally this week
THURSDAY: I slept in so had to do the run in the afternoon, was a planned 8 mile tempo run, wanted the middle 6 at about 8:15 or faster pace, I ran them on trails in a park, I didn’t remember the trails being THAT hilly, but oh well…it was also a bit on the warmer side, but not as humid as it has been, wasn’t bad when I was in the woods, but it got hot when I was in the sun, there is also a trail called “challenge hill” that I ran into…I need to take my camera out with me next time, there is a reason it’s called challenge hill!! Anyway, my pace average was 9:22…way slower than what I had wanted, but I dealt with it. This was run at 4:30 yesterday, was done around 6 pm…Oh, also I was ready to bag the run cause I was so disgusted by my paces at mile 3 and things weren’t feeling good, but I decided I’d tough it out for 5 and hit a spot I could stop at a little over 6 so figured I could get that last bit in and finally by about 6.5 it wasn’t feeling so bad…
FRIDAY: Decided to get up at 4 again and do the run before work. I knew I could get 17 in if I chose to put my hair up and was out the door at 4, so I was out the door right on time and it seemed to start out OK, first mile was slow, but I had a couple of 9:09 or so pace which is what I’m shooting for for pace for my long runs…alas, that wasn’t meant to be this run. I did have a bathroom stop and water stops on each loop (first was 5.8 miles, second was 9 or so, but there was a place I got water in there and last was just under 3) so that took some of the time, but my average pace was 9:30 (that’s adjusting for the 2 minute potty stop, running right away has it’s disadvantages). Anyway, the legs felt so dead that it was hard to run some of it…OK, granted, yes I did 8 hilly miles last night, and I realize I didn’t eat a good carb load dinner last night, calories were a bit low yesterday actually, and I might not have slept enough this week…but still!!

Yes, I realize I have to be easier on myself, not every run will be great, I have to take the good with the bad, but I SOOOO want the runs of this spring back. Everything felt easy, suddenly I’m feeling slow as molasses and it isn’t the weather. It was actually cool this morning and only slightly humid, yesterday was a bit hot, but that’s not usually a bother to me. I’ve had some FANTASTIC runs during the hottest times of summer…

Congrats to Charlz Newman

I just realized I never got around to updating my blog yesterday…unusual for me during the week, but it has been a hectic week and I have tons to get done before it’s over with…Yikes.

I got home on Tuesday and did a light 4 mile run to loosen things up from the morning workout and did some stretching, then yesterday morning did an easy 3.5 before going to the gym for some strength training. This morning I was going to get up to run my 8 mile tempo run but was up too late last night, and construction kept me from getting home sooner so I slept in till 6:45 this morning (man that felt good) and am going to run it this afternoon…and I’m still contemplating getting up early for the long run and doing it tomorrow just so I can sleep in on Saturday…

Anyway, this is so cool though, the reason I was up so late was because a friend’s band was playing in a battle of the bands, actually it’s called “Have a Nice Gig” part of the option to win a chance for local bands to open for Bon Jovi on their tour. There were 64 bands to start with and a local radio station narrowed it down to 10 that listeners were able to vote for to narrow down to the final 5 that played on stage last night for judges from a couple of record labels (including Geffen, Bon Jovi’s label) and the fans got to vote…well, there was one band that had a huge number of people there, so we figured for sure they were going to win…then the radio station had to drag the stupid thing out forever so it was almost 10 when it got done, I expected it to be over by 8 or 9 at the latest, (the thing was to start at 5 and there were only 5 bands, they each played 5 songs), well it started late, they too SOOO much time between bands that it lasted so long, but I had to stay and find out the results…Charlz Newman WON!! I was so excited for them. The one of them that I know the best is a HUGE Bon Jovi fan so it’s like a huge dream come true for him. I’m so jealous myself as I LOVE Bon Jovi, I was supposed to win the tickets to see them play at Giants Stadium but alas, it wasn’t to be…Anyway, big congrats to Charlz Newman for a great show and winning set. They really deserve it.

Tuesday, July 18 Intervals

I managed to get up, (almost hit the snooze and was going to workout this afternoon instead, still might and have my first double of this session) and be out the door by 5:30, so I ran my mile warm up and then did 8 x .5 with .25 recovery, shooting for a 3:35 pace for the intervals (my planned marathon goal pace and Yasso 800 goal pace), I was getting quite frustrated by some of them though:

1 – 3:37 (or thereabouts, I realized my intervals were set for 1 mile repeat so I had to adjust and reset)
2 – 3:41 (thought it felt faster)
3 – 3:41 (frustration)
4 – 3:43 (WTF, this one had felt much faster)
5 – 3:44 (OK, this one really frustrated me)
6 – 3:24 (better, but a little fast)
7 – 3:20 (oops)
8 – 3:30 (much better, but this was also semi going uphill at the end so probably would’ve been faster)

Not a bad run, but wish those first ones would've been faster. The weather wasn't bad either, kind of cool in fact and lighter on the humidity. All recoveries were in the 3:00 or so range a few a bit shorter (I was running short on time) the run was planned for 8 miles, but due to not being able to get my butt out of bed sooner I cut it short and did only 7.5, I’m thinking this afternoon though I’m going to go for an easy 4 and maybe work in a strength session at lunch since I was too lazy to get up yesterday. I did get a little more sleep last night, was in bed and most likely sleeping by 11, when I had hit my snooze for the last time and was about to rule out the morning workout, I suddenly felt awake so I got up. I have now had a morning 16 oz of coffee and normally I have half of that left for the afternoon…so not sure how I’ll stay awake this afternoon!! I’m not a big coffee fan, but have learned to like a few, but none that they sell here at work (the Starbucks I bought yesterday was terrible even with splenda and syrup in it, have never been a fan of Starbucks and I remember why now, but it’s all they have downstairs for sale at work!!). I don’t like diet soda, and I don’t want to have a regular soda…trying once again to get it OUT of my diet, particularly after a really bad weekend. It’s a cause of some of those excess calories and the excess pounds that have once again attached themselves to me!! Sigh…

Suppose, should try to get some work done…

Struggling...Due to too Much Social Life...

To stay awake today. It was a rough weekend and not enough sleep. What I really, really need is a day to just sleep in, go to bed early the night before, do nothing all day…when can I get one of those?? I almost miss some of the days of winter when I was sitting around doing nothing as now my social calendar just is driving me insane and I keep promising things because people are making me feel guilty for not being there to do this or that and I just know it’s going to cause my running to suffer. I already had to give up sleep so I could run at 4 am on Friday…and I think I’m going to be doing that again this week and it just throws off my whole plan. I need to learn to say no and deal with others disappointments I guess but come on, this is my BQ I'm training for. It just sucks that so many things come up that I want to do in the summer. And having some new friends in the picture that make it more of a struggle to work things around them as well...

This weekend I was up again too late on Friday because I had friends wanting me to come out on Friday night when I was done with work. I just wanted to go home and sleep but instead I went out, had one beer and then didn’t get home and into bed till 3 am due to weird circumstances. I mean I was having fun, BUT I do like to keep to certain things and it just was a lot. So Saturday I got up, had to drive a friend home, then went to the farmer’s market and spent more time there than planned because I was multi-tasking by calling a friend at the same time and that made it hard to make my purchases…then I went to the fitness center and got a workout in, strength training and then even with the lack of sleep and long run the day before I still managed a semi-decent treadmill (only because it was just easy cause I was there) run of 6 miles at an 8:23 pace. I had missed my tempo run last week due to circumstances and looking at my schedule today am trying to figure out how I’m working this week now too!! Ughh!! Last night just ended up way later than planned, all because of discussions that came up too late in the night that just couldn't be left alone, it was fun, but not I'm just tired and couldn't get up and workout this AM and I work tonight so no workout today, which is probably good anyway since I didn't take yesterday off like I normally would (ran 4 very hot, sweaty miles, but didn't get my yoga in because of late starts from other things). I had been at a friends' out of town, we ate breakfast (I would've just gone home, but she wanted to go out and I couldn't say no) and then I was talking to mom and dad, by the time I was done with them, I barely had time to get a run in then call other friends and figure out what was going on. Things had all started because I had been requested to come up and grill ribs at a friend's place…2 hours later food was ready (and I was hearing crap about the time frame, but come on, a big Weber charcoal grill is only so big and can only hold so much food at one time and I was cooking a huge rack of ribs, potatoes, 12 ears of corn and 8 burgers…) and we ate lots…brownies and cupcakes for dessert…way too much, no wonder the scale hated me this morning. But this week I’m getting back on track with my eating too and finally getting serious about taking off that last 2.5 that has turned into about 7.5 again that I need to lose to meet goal weight. I just need to force out all the distractions!!

4 AM Run

Yep, you read that right...4 am...I wasn't going to have time much other than today to do it and it had to be before job 1, and preferably out of the heat so I could have a good one...And one other thing I should state, I just kind of made those statements about the heat yesterday in semi-jest, to prove it can get above 50 here (met someone once that didn't believe that, that summer we had tropical heat index days) but I do not mind the heat, it's not great to run in, and I'm a bit slower in it, but I much prefer it to cold. I almost never run on the t-mill no matter how hot, but am always on it if it's much below freezing.

Last night I went and saw Devil Wears Prada with a friend…great movie!! I also had read the book and enjoyed both equally. I got home and was on the phone with a friend till about 10:30 and then had to read a bit (nightly routine) but when I went to go to sleep I was unable to get there…it was after 11:30 before I managed it, it’s probably because of the nap I took after work instead of running yesterday (slept for an hour instead of the 10-30 minutes I had planned) but when the alarm went off at 3:35, I only hit the snooze twice and then crawled out of bed, into the dark, (well I did turn on the light, but man it was dark outside still), I got dressed, set my GPS to pick up signal outside, got my MP3 player, Gatorade, water and 3 fruit bars since it was too late to think about breakfast. Plan for today was 15 miles. I decided I wasn’t going to go far from home as it just didn’t seem safe in the dark, so I set my Gatorade and water at the entrance to my association, (there are bushes there I sometimes put water under so I can grab on the way) and headed out. I could tell right away I was going to need food so I ate one of the fruit bars (I had stuff I get at Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s, really 100% fruit and pretty tasty) and went along at what felt like a nice clip, it was too dark to see the GPS for the first few miles unless I was at a street light at the right time. My neighborhood is hilly, which is good for Marine Corp from what I hear (at least for the beginning and end) so I took one of the hilliest routes for the start, I did lose signal often, I need to update the software on that thing (was trying to one day but it was having issues) but I made it through the first loop, and had some water and Gatorade. Second loop I took a little longer and got back to my water and Gatorade at 12 miles, which left just a nice quick little 3 miler to get home and be done, it’s kind of nice to think in those terms and by then the sun was up and there were more people out on the roads (I had seen a deer on my 2nd loop which was kind of neat) both running and driving, heading out to work I suppose. I had wanted to hit my long runs at a 9:10 or so pace, this one was an average of 9:18, but I did have one mile in there that was over 11 minutes when I took my first water and in frustration stopped a couple of times to try to get the signal again. Run felt great, I felt really refreshed and wide awake, that is until I got home and showered and then wanted to crawl back into bed. But overall the run was nice, it was a little cool this morning when I started, but very, very humid, so I was drenched almost right away. It’s weird cause last night it had rained and was actually quite cool after the rain (I was shivering in tank top and shorts) so I opened windows last night but closed them and back to A/C today as I know it’s going to be really bad today and through the weekend…although I’m going to be gone tomorrow night and might turn it off again!! (Have I mentioned how much I hate A/C and only turn it on if the humidity has me sweating when I’m sitting on the couch watching TV?).

So weekend…I’m working tonight at 6:30, so I’m going home to nap from 4:30 to 5:30, grab a quick bit and head to work. I’m there till 11:30 and then MIGHT meet some friends for a drink or something (doubt I’ll have any, but I might go out) and then tomorrow if I’m up for it, I’m going to be volunteering, but somehow I doubt I’ll be able to get out of bed that early, but in punishment I’m running a 6 mile tempo (that I missed yesterday) and doing some strength training, maybe running on the treadmill, then heading to a friends place, to be there anytime after 6 to go out for the town she lives in celebration, BBQ Days, basically it means beer garden and tent dance. Sunday I might be going to a friends if her hubby and youngest are feeling OK, as her hubby wants me to grill ribs (she doesn’t like ribs and I’ve bragged about mine so he wants to try them), we’ll see though. I might just want to veg and do nothing on Sunday!! Too many late nights this week though, that’s for sure. I took my lunch break to go nap in my car, that 15 minutes or so that I actually dozed sure seems to have helped. I was dying this AM!!

MN is Hot...Literally!!

Ah, gotta love Minnesota, so many people think that it’s perpetually cold here (which don’t get me wrong, it’s cold much more than it’s hot) but where else can you live that can tell you in one month it’s dangerous to go outside due to the cold, but 5 months later it can be too dangerous to go outside because it’s too HOT?? That’s what we have here this weekend. And there are a lot of major sporting events going on. I guess I’m glad I decided against the 5 mile race I wanted to do, mainly because a friend has convinced me I need to come out of town that weekend and I don’t think I can get back up here soon enough to make it, but if I do, I might still run it. Anyway, the triathlon will most likely be shortened (already heard about that, even though I have determined it’s just not going to work out for me to volunteer at it this year, which is a bummer, they even have TV crews, I could be on TV!!), and I’m either doing my long run inside on a treadmill, or most likely getting up at the ungodly hour of 4:00 am tomorrow to run it. 15 miles, about 2 ½ hours of running and sweating, I don’t like the idea of getting out of bed, particularly when I won’t get to bed tonight till probably 10 and I was up too late last night (had to be, I was watching a band play and unfortunately they were the headline act so they played last, home in bed by 1…ughh) but I guess this is why I sleep all winter, cause I play all summer. Anyway, due to being up late last night, morning run was nixed, although I was up at one point I should’ve just done it and napped after work (which is what I feel like doing anyway) but since I’m going with a friend to a movie and I want to do at least 5 miles (preferably 6) I’m heading out into the heat of the afternoon and expect that I’ll lose at least 4 pounds, which is a good thing since the movie tonight will include popcorn, pop and M&Ms (you have to try popcorn and M&M’s if you haven’t…so yummy!). Anyway, should be a nice enjoyable weekend…if it wasn’t for the darn humidity, it actually would be!! Nothing like dripping sweat just walking out the door…and I hate air conditioning, but I had to turn it on yesterday…hopefully it can go back off soon!!

Tuesday, July 11 Intervals

Alright, not a lot to put in for today, so guess I’ll state my workout…although I have to say, sleep does wonders for the body. I crashed before 9 last night and slept hard all night…I got up at 5:30 (was out the door at 5:43, I was actually up a bit earlier than that, but I was poking around doing other things) and headed out for a 6 mile interval/repeats workout. I’m semi starting over and know that my body is still acclimating to the humidity and still somewhat recovering so I went light, 6 x .5 with .25 recovery. Shooting for 3:45 pace.

1 mile warm up about 9:05 pace
1 - 3:38 a bit fast, but it was down a hill
2 – 3:37
3 – 3:53 not sure why this was so slow, was getting a bit warm and tired
4 – 3:43
5 – 3:44
6 – 3:45

I then ran a .75 to finish up the 6 miles home. Not sure on the pace on that, but I’m thinking around 9:00 or so as the whole run was 55:20 for a 9:15 pace. Not bad, not as fast as I want them to eventually get to, but again, it’s a build up and lots of factors keeping me from being faster right now, important thing was hitting my goal of 3:45 as next week I want to speed them up to the 3:30-3:35 or true Yasso 800s as a predictor of marathon time.

Anyway, the sleep did good for me too as I managed to finally toss off the tail end of my cold that was still affecting my voice. Yay. Now to figure out the rest of my week. I want to be up early tomorrow for 4 miles and a strength session…means being up by about 5:30 again…Thursday/Friday is the tough decision, it’s supposed to get really hot the end of this week, 90+ and maybe into the 100s along with high humidity. I’m volunteering at the Lifetime Fitness Triathalon on Saturday, so my 15 mile long run would not happen till 2:30/3 that day, and that’s going to be warm…I can’t be up before that I don’t think as I work till 11:30 and have to be to the race start by 7 am…so I was going to go Thursday evening after work, obviously that now is going to be a tough thing to do with the predicted heat. I could get up in the morning on Thursday but am going to see a band play on Wednesday that could go late…so if I’m going to get up early, Friday might be the better day…decisions, decisions…If I didn’t work on Friday night, this would be so much easier!! And I’m so bad with decisions.

Exhausting, but Fun Weekend

Well, with having an all day meeting thing today, and having a break from it, but not knowing when we’ll go back up for it, I guess I can take a few minutes to catch up from the weekend…another exhausting one!! And eating was so bad again, but so far today has been better and I’m feeling better cause of the eating better so hopefully I can stick with it this week.

Friday I went out for a 5 mile easy run, ended up running about 8:35 pace, not planned, but that felt good so I went with it. Mom and dad got there just as I got back so I got the coals ready and grilled up burgers then we went for a little walk and mom watched the Twins play, they weren’t doing well…went to bed kind of early and was up at 7:30 when Max decided he wanted to go out and/or sleep with mom and dad. I got up and dressed to run, thinking I’d do that while mom and dad maybe relaxed a bit, but they wanted to get going, so we went and had a mocha at Caribou and then I went for my run and they left. I had planned 12 miles, which I managed to go the first 6 easy, the rest was a bit hard, had a bathroom break in there and then no energy, it’s what I get for not doing my normal routine and get some breakfast in (the mocha was all I had, not enough obviously). I think I averaged a 9:40 pace, 30 seconds slower than what I want to be doing my long runs at, but that’s my own fault. If I had run right away I might have been OK. Now I have to figure out my running this week. I think I’ll be running long on Thursday though, mainly cause I have to work on Friday night and Saturday I am volunteering at a triathlon around here and after will be hot and I’m heading to a friends for an evening out…

After my run met a potential roommate that seems like she’ll work well, and she called me back later saying she was pretty sure she was going to move in and was going to get back to me about dates and such, we couldn’t discuss it then as I was with a friend having ice cream and I didn’t want to be rude (so LOVE Cold Stone) I went for a walk around the lake to help burn calories, then went home, got ready and was out with other friends for the evening…got home around 4 am, had a friend crash at my place and we were talking till about 6…got up, took him back to his car and then went to my sister’s for breakfast with her, brother their SOs and my parents…oh, and all the fuzzy family members too…got home around 1:30, turned on World Cup Soccer and fell asleep till 3:30 when I had to get up, shower and go to work…I’m exhausted feeling today, but definitely getting back on track this week. I didn’t get my strength training in this AM but am going to do some light work and 4 mile run this afternoon and work up from there for the week. I need some downtime!! Thankfully I don’t work till Friday at B&N so I can get some cleaning done around home the next few evenings and catch up on sleep!!

Restless

I don’t know what’s wrong with me today…well, yes I kind of do. I’ve eaten crappy for the last couple of days. I started well, eating good during the day, but ate so much crap at night, mainly large amounts of fat. This is terrible. I try to limit myself to 60 grams of fat, 20 grams of saturated fat a day, I know that I occasionally go over this, but if overall in a week I keep it under those limits at least 5 of the days I’m happy, but so far this week has been terrible. Not to mention the fact that last night I didn’t get to sleep till probably close to 1, so needless to say I didn’t get up and get my AM workout in, which is something I was so used to and good at. Now today I’m restless, I want to go home and nap but I don’t really have time with having to get my run in before mom and dad get up here. I actually contemplated scrapping the run this afternoon just for a nap, that is so bad and I’m going to hate myself if I do, particularly since I have yet to figure out best way for my run tomorrow…see, mom and dad are coming p and staying at my place tonight. They will be up kind of early to run errands and such, but I won’t be up early enough to go run before I feel I should spend time with them and by the time they leave it’s going to be quite warm, so I’ll still run but it won’t be a fantastic run. Not to mention I have a potential roommate coming to look at the place tomorrow too. That’s going to be tough with parents there!! It always gets messy with extra people darnit…ughh…I actually was looking forward to just staying in and doing nothing today (except maybe going to see Pirates of the Caribbean 2) now I have my parents and my “fuzzy” baby brother going to be there…sigh…Not that I don’t want to see them mind you, I’m fine with the visit, just guess I wish I wasn’t working on Sunday so I could relax all day and plan for workouts then maybe…I just wish I wasn’t feeling so crappy about things, particularly my diet, today…I need to get back on track and working toward next goals and I’m starting to flounder I think. See, I think maybe I just need to stay in training mode all year round and forget races. The tapering and recovery has just killed me!!

Power Outages

Well, last night I was working at Barnes & Noble (really thinking about ending things there though, one of the managers is really getting on my nerves and some of their new corporate policies coming through are just too much, time to find something new, maybe that requires no weekends!!), I was on for 5-10 (love that shift, it’s short and I’m home at a reasonable hour) and about 5:10 the power went out. Seriously the whole store went dark. The computers were still up and one register was still working, but everything else was dead. We had to close up the store and then they expected us to do some shelving (yeah right, store was DARK) while we waited. The whole Galleria mall was out of power, and rumor had it that at 8 they would close the store if we had no power…unfortunately our end of the mall came back up at 7:05…we got things back on-line and then had to open and I had to work till 10…ah well. Still not a bad shift, tonight I’m on 6:30-11:30.

Today I was working away this morning and we had a power flicker at Carlson…and our tower went out, lost all power. This was only for about 10 minutes though. Weird that it happened two days in a row at two different jobs in two different parts of the city though. Last summer there was actually a time I came in and we had no power and they sent us home here till noon when it came back on. Funny thing is there are no storms happening right now to knock the power out at either place.

I’m still recovering from the weekend. I’m happy to report my cold is on it’s way out (thank God for Cold-Eze and Halls Vitamin C Defense with Ecenacia and zinc I swear by them for a cold to shorten the duration) but I was tired this morning and hit snooze instead of getting up for my run. I don’t work till 6:30 so I have time to go home and run 4-5 miles if I’m not lazy and crawl into bed for a nap before work, then tomorrow I’m going to do my interval workout I had planned for today and do my long run on Saturday, yes it might be a bit harder workout doing those two back to back, but the long run is only 12, not so bad to recover from, no way I would if it was longer.

I really need to get back into a better sleep routine and get myself up though. I didn’t strength train at all this week…and have only run 10 miles, but I’d say so far they were quality miles.

4th of July

What a great weekend….I already talked about my fun on Sunday, but while Sunday night I had trouble sleeping, I went to work for just 4 hours, came home and napped for 2 then went for a run even though it was hot outside. Not a great run, but OK, and all I was doing was loosening up for the week. I went home, showered, talked to mom and dad and then got ready to go see Soul Asylum play at Taste of Minnesota. Great show, can’t wait for their new album. Then instead of waiting for fireworks which weren’t till 10:20, we chose to head over to Uptown and Liquor Lyle’s for happy hour and hanging out with friends there. Even got to see some friends there that I haven’t seen in forever. Shawn was having good conversation with a guy there and I was just having fun hanging out…it was a bit of a late night though, which has been the case all weekend!!

Tuesday got up to great 4th weather…it was sunny but not humid and light breeze. I was going for a tempo run and got out at 8:30, a simple 6 miles with a 9:15 warm up mile then I decided to run a fast 5K, just cause I wasn’t paying to run one, didn’t mean I couldn’t…so I ran that in a 24:32, finally broke the 25 minutes which I had been wanting to do, but the really cool thing is this is not a flat course, and I’m still somewhat in recovery so it felt good to do the speed but wasn’t too hard or hurting myself…I cooled off finishing off 6 miles and then showered and ran errands while throwing a roast on the grill to bring on the boat. Got home and was ready to leave when Shawn got there. We met up with the others and were on the boat at 3 pm…(all the boats tied up at big Island) there were the 4 of us from Sunday along with Cordell’s “friend” Lynn and then friends of Jeremy’s, a married couple their daughter and an adopted into the family friend from South Africa. That was the big fun, getting to know someone from another country, I now have an invite to go visit someone in South Africa…He is hoping to stay here a bit longer but has to find a job, of course I suggested him marrying someone to stay here and it progressed from there with he and I planning our wedding in Vegas by an Elvis impersonator (I told him it would help me too cause I could get out of the country like I’ve been trying to do for a couple of years!!)…He is cute though, and has a very nice accent and he was singing Bon Jovi to me on the boat (he sings in a band back home) all ways to win my heart!! (picture of me, my "finacee" and Shawn) OK, all kidding aside though, I am supposed to take him out for Cold Stone as he hasn’t been there yet and he wants to come check out any bands with us if we go while he’s still here. Nothing like making new friends. I always figure you can’t have enough of them, and from another country that you can go visit, even better right!! Another gorgeous sunset...unfortunately none of the fireworks pictures I tried to take turned out. We watched them from the lake where they shoot them off a barge, but we were also able to see fireworks shows from all nearby cities...very cool way to spend the 4th!!

No run this morning as the cold is still tiring me out, and I did plan to just cross train, that will consist of walking around B&N tonight. Interval workout tomorrow, light one, and then working tomorrow night and Friday and Saturday off, yay!! I’m not doing anything on Friday night and going to go to bed early so I can get up for my 12 or 14 miler I have planned and feel rested.

What a Gorgeous Day

What a great weekend. I spent Saturday doing the not so great run, but that happens, then went out on Saturady night for dinner and drinks with a friend, met up with some other friends and then was tooling around the city, both into downtown and Uptown, in a black, Mustang GT convertible...so much fun!! And then the invite to Sunday...

Sunday was a gorgeous day out, sunny, suppoed to hit 90, no idea if it did or not, but the humidity was low enough that it didn't matter, definitely not the temps for a run, but Sunday is normally my rest day anyway and with me still in recovery and 9.5 miles in on Saturday, I went ahead and rested. Which was good, because I’d been out late the night before, had a couple to drink but wasn’t too bad, had pizza late at night, bad as my weight is climbing, but I’m back on track this week I’m promising myself, and I did sleep in…did a little cleaning (although my room is still awful!!) and then had a friend show up at my place about 12:15…we headed over to another friends around 1 to head out to Lake Minnetonka to meet up with yet another friend to spend the day on a boat…See back to the kind of day it was!! We all kept commenting on how beautiful it was, the sun was there, but there was a light breeze, just enough to keep it from being unbearable and we were on a 30 foot boat that had a bathroom and everything. Spent from 2 pm till about 9:30 pm on it, with a dinner break from 5-6 where we had to sit inside cause it was too busy outside…We had a drink at one of the outdoor bars, and just cruised around the lake, hung out at big Island for a while, anchored and hanging out where everyong goes to party in the summer...then headed in about 9:30...It was a perfect day out. Shawn and I were the "hood ornaments", Jeremy was captain drunk (OK, not really, he was responsible but I couldn't resist the picture of him at the wheel with the drink. Cordell acted as captain for a bit and we watched a gorgeous sunset. The plan is to do this again tomorrow!!

Last night I could not sleep though, I have a cold coming on in full force and it sucks. I’m never sick in the summer, this is so unfair!

Blood, Sweat and Tears…and a Reminder that Low Blood Slows You Down!!

Blood. Yes, I am trying to remind myself that I gave blood on Wednesday, I ran a marathon at a very good pace that drained my body 2 weeks ago, things are going to feel a little more difficult, along with the fact that I didn’t get out of bed and start running till 9:30 this morning, when it was getting hot and definitely humid (it was enough that I turned on the air conditioning today, which I really never do unless it gets really, really hot, I hate A/C). Oh, and the fact that I didn’t eat breakfast before heading out for 10 miles this morning…I know, I know, but I really didn’t want to wait any longer to run and I have and can run up to about 12 miles without eating, I didn’t carry water, I know, I know, again bad, but I did have a water bottle that I could get to and other sources if I really needed to. I did have to walk a few times up some hills…it’s funny…even with walk breaks and the other above issues, I did manage to average a 9:20 per mile pace, and that’s actually the pace I try to hold for long runs, although this training session (once I’m back on it in the next week or two) I’m shooting for 9:00 pace for the long runs.

Sweat. It was warm, I don’t mind warm, honestly, but I’m not quite ready for it yet, I still need to acclimate. It will come, that much I know. But it’s also a reminder why training for a fall marathon is hard…

Tears. OK, didn’t quite get the tears, but something is still up with me today…I’ve been feeling weepy still and that’s so not me. Sure, I cry at sappy movies, but to sit around for no reason and feel weepy…

Well, I’m about to get ready for an evening on the town. I need to finish up some cleaning too. And on a high note for the day, my roommate is gone! Yay…Freaky thing though, as bad as the situation has been, and we’ve had some nasty e-mails back and forth, and I got home last night to him gone, and surprisingly he had cleaned…and the freaky thing, he had left me flowers. A very pretty bouquet, but it’s just so creepy…they are tainted due to who they are from. It’s just creepy…I have had no flowers from a guy in so long and then I get some and they are a situation like this…ughh…