Skip to content

Archive for

Nov 30

Turkey Trot 10K PR

It’s fair to say I struggle with the 10K distance. I think that’s one of the reasons I “got over” it pretty quickly. I’m pretty sure at this point I’ve run more half marathons as I have 10Ks. Or, at least, they are pretty close. I’m not a fan of the 6.2, though.

I think it’s because I always felt as if I was starting to “warm up” at the end of the run. 5Ks have a tendency to be fast. I’ve never ran a 5K over 30 minutes. That’s a quick run. I’m out and done,

10Ks are more of a struggle. When I ran a couple, I suddenly realized that the difference between 6.2 miles and 10 miles (a nice training distance for the half marathon) was pretty insignificant. It’s not surprising it took me 11-months to move from 5Ks to 10Ks, but only five months to more up to half marathons.

The marathon distance is still daunting. Even after a 20-mile run, it’s intimidating. I’m ridiculously scared of my first marathon this weekend, no kidding.

The point is I struggle with getting going, getting comfortable and then stopping. My joints thank me. My legs do too. But my mind tells me to keep going.

I ran my first 10K on Thanksgiving Day 2010. I finished in 1:03:18.

And my PR stuck for a year. I tried to regain the momentum. I tried to push harder. But the truth was, my 10K experience quickly moved to trails for something more challenging. I’ve really only run two “flat and fast” ones. My second fastest was somewhere around 1:05, which was because I had a bathroom break mid-run. I couldn’t avoid it.

So I had low hopes going into the Thanksgiving run in Stockton. The Run Against Hunger attracts a diverse range of people. Most compete in the 5K. Only about 200 do the 10K. I did the 5K in 2008 before I took running as seriously as I do now.

I was nearly thinking about now going to the run. Big Sur hadn’t gone as planned. I was tired. My stomach hurt.

And yet, Thomas dropped me off and I started the run.

One mile in, I couldn’t tell how I’d do. In fact, I didn’t look at my Garmin until I hit the turnaround point to repeat the course. By then the field thins out tremendously.

Mile 1: 10:02

Mile 2: 10:03

Mile 3: 10:01

I was feeling good. I started to see the field way ahead of me. That doesn’t bother me anymore really. People will finish before me. People will finish after me. I walked through a water station.

Mile 4: 10:15 — Still feeling good, but still not too sure about this run.

Mile 5: 10:40 — A stomach cramp got me at about mile 5.5. I slowed but stayed steady.

Mile 6: 10:07 — Looked at the Garmin here and realized I could come in under my time from last year if I pushed. So I pushed. It’s easier to push in a 10K than it is in a half marathon. So much easier.

Mile .19: 1.41 — I ran the tangents good on this course, definitely. I don’t typically come in under, but I hugged close everywhere.

Final time: 1:02:52

An incremental PR, but still a PR.

I was pretty stoked about this, despite the fact that I had to wait until Monday for official times to be posted. (This company often doesn’t have streaming results. And we didn’t have chip timing this year. We did last year. I have a feeling I would have shaved some seconds off with chip timing.)

It was a good run. I felt good.

Oh and it had started raining at some point during the last half of the run. Not even a big deal, outside of the fact that I finished with my glasses on my head. I’m going to run the marathon in contacts I think.

I’m happy this race happened. It redeemed two not too great race performances – Nike Women’s Half and Big Sur – but scared at the same time too. I usually run good, then bad, then good. I’m hoping a good 10K doesn’t translate into a bad marathon.

Keep your fingers crossed for me, four days and counting.

 

Nov 28

It’s official

I PRed at my Turkey Trot last week. The writing is small, yes. I was waiting to write my race review until the results. And I totally PRed!

Nov 24

On the edge of the Western World: Part II

And back to the race report: I started out strong enough in Monterey. I was averaging under 11-minute miles the first two miles. Then things literally went downhill. And uphill. And downhill.

Lots of back and forth on this run. The “flat” course turned out to have lots of rolling hills. It’s not that I didn’t train for rolling hills. I’ve been doing some hill work to prepare for the California International Marathon. But I wasn’t expecting it.

And so, my own ups and down began.

Mile 1: 10:48  — Started out strong, moving along kind of moving my way through the crowd. Felt good.

Mile 2: 10:51 — Still feeling good, think I’m finding my race pace for the day.

Mile 3:  11:20 — The first significant downhill, which marked the first significant uphill. I slowed down quite a bit. Starting to get a little warm.

Mile 4: 12 — Getting really warm. I slide down my Zensah arm warmers. Take a couple sips from my waterbottle. Suddenly feel as if I’m getting a little tired. The one significant uphill is here.

That’s a photo of me starting to head up the fairly significant hill. By midway through, I was walking. It was a sight to see, going into beautiful Pacific Grove. I passed by a movie theater where Thomas and I went on our first vacation together when we went to Morro Bay and Monterey for a week.

It was a quick uphill and slower downhill after that.

Mile 5: 11:06 — Going strong, but feeling as if I’m not going to make it through 13.1 miles. My legs feel like jello. I don’t know why, but suddenly I was more winded than I wanted to be.

Mile 6: 12:04 — Jello legs definitely slowing me down. I’m usually in a grove at this point. It’s not happening today. I feel it. But I continue to push.

Mile 7: 13:02 — My wall. And I hit it hard. I usually get into the later miles before I get winded, tired and feel as if I can’t go on. I’m barely keeping it together. I’m getting tired. I walk. I start to run. Then I walk more. I keep repeating that pattern.

Mile 8: 12:23 — Trying to pick it back up before and after the turnaround back to the finish area. I suddenly see Jamie. We stop to hug. That lifts my spirits tremendously. It was so nice to see a familiar face and hear a friendly voice. Jamie said something encouraging to me and it lifted me. I picked it up a little bit.

Mile 9: 12:09 — Still on a high from seeing Jamie, I kept pushing. I wasn’t moving as fast as I wanted to, but I was moving. One foot in front of the other, one foot in front of the other.

That is what a happy runner looks like. At this point, though, my feet were feeling the pain. My shoes kept moving back and forth. I wasn’t doing too well this race, especially considering my PR in San Jose in October. This was not my race.

Mile 10: 12:11 — Slow, but moving. Thinking about my mom seeing me at the finish line. This was the first time she accompanied me to a race. I was super stoked she’d be able to see me finish. I kept thinking about that.

Mile 11: 12:21 — This was one of my favorite miles, if only because we moved to the trails and we would soon be seeing Monterey again. A giant penguin jumped out near Monterey Bay Aquarium. I also knew Cannery Row would be coming up, which meant this race was almost over. I was starting to feel a little better.

Mile 12: 12:24 — Cannery Row! I loved the mile marker showing John Steinbeck.

The official photographer captured a great shot of me right before it starting raining pretty good. I almost look as if I’m not running, more so because my arms aren’t moving. I can’t remember what I was doing specifically right here. I have a feeling I was slowing down to put my visor, that I purchased at the expo from the awesome Asics booth, on because of the rain.

Mile 13: 12:04 — At this point my Garmin was covered because of the rain. I didn’t want it to get too wet, especially since it was new. I kept pushing, despite another hill.

Mile .3: 3 — Again, I suck at running the tangents. This course was supposed to measure 13.1. Oh well. My mom yelled my name right after I crossed the finish line. Then I got lost in a sea of other runs.

I was handed an awesome medal.

The sea lion on it reminded me of my dog Beau. I wanted to wear it the whole day. But after I grabbed my heat sheet and some food (the first of the day, which may explain my general fatigue), it started pouring. My mom drove us back to the hotel, which was awesome, and I quickly jumped in the shower.

It was the first half marathon I’ve run that I’ve been able to quick jump in the shower.

We sat down for about an hour and I tried to rest my feet.

Then we ventured to Monterey Bay Aquarium. My mom hadn’t been there since I was a child. The last time I went was in 2002 with Thomas.

We spent nearly five hours there AFTER I ran a half marathon. My mom said her feet hurt at the end and that she could only imagine what I felt like.

The deep sea area was one of my favorites. That’s where the seahorses where. And the larger fish. There was a lot to see. We stayed and watched the tank for awhile.

This gigantic whale sits above the main hall where the bathrooms and gift shops are. It was awesome from below, but from the top it looks as if it is staring right at you.

The birds were great too, but there were a ton of people checking them out. They had these crazy revolving doors too that made it hard to get through without hurting someone.

This was a type of leaf sea dragon. There were a lot of cool seahorses in the exhibit. That was one of the last things we saw at the aquarium. Overall it wasn’t too crowded, which was nice. It could be because it was a Sunday.

I visited the gift shop and bought a Puffin to take home with me. He’s now sitting on my television stand. The Puffins were one of the coolest exhibits. The Puffins reminded me of my ducks.

My mom and I got back to the hotel around 5 p.m. and rested until we went to dinner. We had a spectacular dinner at the hotel’s restaurant. We turned in early after watching some television. I woke up at 6 a.m. because I went to bed so early.

My mom and I ventured to breakfast where we had a great view of the golf course on the property.

And the food wasn’t bad to look at either.

We packed up and started toward home after breakfast.

I want to call the trip and the run a success for various reasons. It was the first time I ran away from home. The next time will be for the California International Marathon in less than two weeks. It went OK, but I learned I need to be prepared and get going quickly in the morning. It was also a nice weekend with my mom. We had a good time.

But the run was hard. That’s OK. I heard someone once say that the bad runs make the good ones all that much better.

That’s the truth.

I’d like to make this an annual thing, particularly the going away with my mom for the weekend part. The Big Sur Half Marathon on Monterey Bay offered a good escape from reality for a couple days too.

 

Nov 21

On the edge of the Western World: Part I

I knew nothing about the Big Sur Half Marathon on Monterey Bay at the beginning of this year. That last sentence might be an understatement. I didn’t know anything about half marathons in general at the beginning of the year. I had signed up for one in June. But I wasn’t quite ready for it yet.

That was until I had a great 10-mile run. I decided, why not?

So I ran the Oakland Running Festival’s Half Marathon in March. And then I ran another and another.

I can’t remember when, but my mom mentioned something about a marathon in Big Sur. I Googled it and found the 26.2 mile version in April. That wasn’t happening anytime soon, I thought.

Then I saw a link for the half marathon option in November. I could do that, I said, and it would be a good final training run for the California International Marathon.

So I signed up. It would be my first traveling half marathon. The only one that I’ve gone away and stayed the night for. My husband wasn’t interested in traveling to see me run. So I asked my mom if maybe she’d like to go, since she mentioned it to me initially.

She said yes. I booked us two rooms at the local Hyatt, one of the race recommended hotels.

We headed out on Saturday morning from my home in Tracy. By 3 p.m. we were browsing the expo.

Packet pick up was painless. They even had an option for packet pick up the morning of, which was incredibly awesome. We checked out some booths and I grabbed my burgundy-colored Asics fitted tech long-sleeved shirt. It’s awesome. I’ve heard people say this half marathon has a not-so-pretty array of race shirts. But I love my race shirt.

I had a coupon for $5 off of $45 at the Asics booth. I picked up a visor there because there was a chance of rain. Chance is actually a kind way to say, it was definitely going to pour at some point on Sunday. I also got a nice salmon-colored half marathon shirt. Both my Asics shirt are pretty nice.

My mom liked the iFitness belts like I have. I didn’t stay long at the expo. I was “over it” pretty quick, if only because I was tired and we had just driven more than two-hours to get there.

We ate at a downtown Monterey Taco Bell before heading back to the Hyatt to check in. Check-in was a quick process (and, oh hey, thanks for the awesome room rate Big Sur Half Marathon that included breakfast and Internet as part of the price, that was awesome). We settled down for the evening and watched some television.

I headed out for a swim, but wasn’t too hot on the pool. I was encouraged by a fire pit and really wanted to go and sit around it, but was too tired. I figured it would be there on Sunday night. It wasn’t, which was a bummer, but I digress.

We checked in bed at about 10 p.m. I couldn’t sleep for a couple hours. I think it was just because it was an unfamiliar place. That’s one thing I learned about traveling to run, bedtime should be earlier than expected.

I was up and out of bed by 5:20 a.m.

It still looked like it would rain. I pulled my “rain possibly” outfit out of the bag. That included my Nike capris, a pair of lululemon speed reflective shorts and my Nike Women’s Half finisher shirt. All those meant high visibility. The shorts also meant that I wouldn’t risk having a wet butt if it did rain horribly.

My mom and I were out the door for the 7 a.m. start. What I failed to do was explain “wave times” to her, so when the clock was looking closer to three hours than my average two and a half hours, she was getting worried (more on that in the second post in this series).

She dropped me off in the dark. It was cold, but I had my Zensah compression sleeves. That marked the first time I’ve worn those in a race and they were awesome.

I hit up a portable toilet with a short line. And made my way down Del Monte Blvd. to my corral.

All the way down at the end is the start line. We had a way to go. My actual start time was around 7:20 a.m. according to my Garmin. The organizers were very specific about letting the corrals go every three minutes.

My corral wasn’t too full. There were a lot of people with bibs that had names in red. That was what race organizers used to show that someone was running their first half marathon. A nice touch.

It started getting lighter and you could see the ominous clouds coming in. But the whole view was surreal. I was standing in Monterey, near Fisherman’s Wharf, getting ready to run my seventh half marathon of the year.

Wow. I’ve come incredibly far.

But the view was beautiful. I thought of this weekend as my reward for all the miles I’ve put in. I treated myself. This race was a treat in itself.

Yeah, I had it pretty rough prior to the race on Sunday.

It was at about this point that I realized I had forgotten by Gu. I figured my mom would be enjoying a nice breakfast at the hotel. I wasn’t going to call and interrupt that. My mom deserved a relaxing weekend. I also realized I hadn’t eaten anything, even something small.

Both of those weren’t good signs for the day. But my legs felt good and I felt strong.

Too bad legs aren’t the only thing that gets me through races…

 

Nov 21

Meet me Monday: The replacement

 

I’ve blogged about Gertrude the Garmin before.

She was my training buddy and the closest thing I had to a constant running partner. I loved my Garmin dearly. And then she turned on me. She kept losing battery life. She was fading, fast. I wrote about Gertrude going bad too. I sent it to Garmin after opening a request with them to do so.

I knew, from reading previous blog posts, that there was a chance Getrude wouldn’t be replaced at all. She’d be deemed unreliable and unusable. Then Garmin would send me a new one.

I knew it could happen. But I kept hope alive it wouldn’t when my.garmin.com didn’t update the serial number of my Garmin.

But, alas, last Monday I got home and found a small envelope stuffed in my mailbox. It contained the Garmin above.

It’s not Gertrude. Not even close.

I was so bummed about it that I didn’t blog about it. Gertrude was with me for my first half marathon earlier this year. She wouldn’t be there for number seven, the Big Sur Half Marathon.

I tried to sync satellites right after I got it. It took forever. I figured that signaled something. But it seems to be working fine. I ran the half (more on that later in the week when I have time to write up a race/weekend review). Even though my efforts at the Big Sur Half Marathon weren’t too stellar, my Garmin and I ran our first race together.

Our second will be the Run Against Hunger on Thanksgiving Day in Stockton.

So far, so good. But I miss Gertrude.

So in honor of her, I introduce you to Gertrude II. Or Gert-II as I referred to her on Sunday to another runner.

Our journey together is just beginning, but she’ll hopefully lead me through my first marathon in a couple weeks.

Nov 17

Beat

I have a lot to blog about, but no time to do it.

This week: Garmin came back, but not Gertrude. My students put out issue six of their newspaper. I have a front-page story in the newspaper (rare, since I’m often at my desk coding or behind a video camera). I got a new pair of lululemon shorts. Received my beautiful new “I was born to do this” necklace.

Started taper for Big Sur Half Marathon.

Packing up for that one tomorrow. Heading down with my mom on Saturday morning/afternoon-ish.

Long week. Exciting weekend ahead.

My goal? Not to break a leg or hurt myself. The marathon is less than three weeks away.

Yikes.

Nov 13

Training off track

I spent Saturday at a journalism conference with my students, after a very long week and three runs totaling 20 miles.

I was tired when I woke up on Saturday morning. Way too tired. But I kept on, because I need to be “on” for my students all the time. I’ve learned working two jobs that calling in sick isn’t useful or even doable most days.

So I spent Saturday at Sacramento State University listening to journalists and industry professionals educate the future patrons of the industry. That included a talk by Sacramento Bee reporter Jon Ortiz, who is the lead contributor on The State Worker blog.

That’s Ortiz talking to the student. The organizers of this conference have on-the-spot competitions. The students swarming Ortiz were competing for the photo category. They kept it up the entire time, which caused me to question why some kind of rules weren’t put in place allowing photos for the first 15 minutes only.

But I digress.

The day went by quickly. Everything went fine. My students got back to campus at a decent hour. I got home by 8 p.m. And I was out, literally, before 10 p.m.

During the early part of Saturday, my chest started hurting. It was sore. I was tired. I chalked it up to just not being at 100 percent.

By the evening, I was kind of heaving while I breathed. I woke up three or four times in the night. My throat was sore too. I’d gone to sleep early to make sure I wouldn’t miss my run with Jennie. I wasn’t even waking up too early with a 6 a.m. alarm time.

Plus, I had a new toy to try out on my run.

My iFitness belt that I plan to wear during the California International Marathon arrived on Saturday. I stuffed it in my bag and got pulled my clothes to the side.

I missed my alarm. I was actually awakened by a text from Jennie. By 6:15 a.m. by body was sore and my chest hurt bad. The run would be a no go. It sucked because I wanted to run. It sucked because Jennie was already getting ready. And it sucked because this was literally my last chance to redo the 20-mile run that we tried a couple weeks ago.

Instead, I went back to bed. I’d let myself down. I’d let Jennie down.

I slept for another four hours before finally waking up. I’ve been on the couch all day taking cold pills. I want to run. But I can’t. My husband says no. But I’d love to get on the treadmill and at least get in six before the days ends.

The problem with training for my first marathon is that I don’t know when I’ve pushed myself too hard. I don’t know when to ease back and when to push harder.

I run more now than I did eight weeks ago. The distances are longer. But will that sustain me through 26.2 miles? I don’t know.

And that worries me.

My training plan called for one 20-mile run. I did it. I also did a 15. And I’ve done several 10-mile runs. I’m tired now. My body is rebelling, even with rest days.

I keep saying that happenings like today put my training off track. I read somewhere that the marathon isn’t one day. It’s a reflection of training over many, many months.

I hope that comes through on Dec. 4 because I’m not feeling confident right now.

Nov 9

A glitchy Garmin

I noticed something a couple weeks ago when Jennie and I ran the 20-miler on a Sunday. Actually I didn’t notice it as much as I heard it.

Beeping.

Small, little beeps.

I looked down and my Garmin had a message that was coming more and more predictable: “Low battery.”

The 405CX had been in “training” mode for a little under five hours. It is supposed to last eight. It was dying.

I kept pushing forward because I really wanted to display to say “20.” How could I run 20 miles and NOT have the proof? How cruel would that be? And then it died. I had to boot it back up. I ended up running 20.09 miles because it didn’t track some of my running for some time.

I had to face a kind of horrible reality: The Garmin wouldn’t be able to hang with me for an entire marathon, particularly because I’m not fast. I average 10:50 to 11:30-minute miles during my long runs. I’m just hoping to finish my first marathon in under six hours. Garmin would die before I got there.

I also had to realize that there were warning signs.

My Garmin has been malfunctioning a lot lately. It would freeze. The battery was suddenly in dead zone, despite charging. It was getting more and more glitchy. During the Nike Women’s Half Marathon it didn’t even pick up a signal until I was somewhere near mile two. Then it started beeping at me and giving me no indication why at mile 10 of the same run.

It was time to face the truth: I had to open a ticket with Garmin.

I did. The first response was to update the software. I did. Then I went on a 10-mile run with Jennie. The battery drained 39-percent. It would, again, only last five hours.

I contacted Garmin again. They set up a “ticket.”

On Monday, I packaged my faithful running companion up and send it to Olathe, Kansas.

It’s blurry and sad. I had to basically strip Gertrude down to her bare bones. She left without even the wrist bands attached. Just the body. No accessories. I packed it in a box with care. I taped it up. I walked it over to the post office near where I worked. And I sent it on it’s way, overnight express.

I knew, from reading other blogs, that I will likely get a different unit sent back to me. I’m hoping that’s not the case. I love my Garmin, especially since she was with me for my first half marathon. I wanted her to be with me for my marathon. I’m sentimental like that.

I considered the sendoff kind of like a viking funeral. I sent Gertrude off in style.

And now I’m checking the myGarmin website to see where the progress is on it. It says “awaiting shipping.”

I’m not sure what happens from here, but I ran 10-miles this morning and definitely felt a little lost without my constant running companion. Jennie and I have another 20-miler scheduled for this weekend. I know the route, yes. But it’s not the same without Gertrude. Not at all.

 

 

Nov 7

Meet me Monday: You must do the thing

Here’s something fun to know about me: I’m completely and utterly petrified of not making the six-hour time limit at  the California International Marathon.

My fastest half is 2:27. My slowest is 2:53 (and that was with hills, dodging people for eight miles before finally decided it was more important to have fun that be fast).

When I signed up for the marathon in May, I thought I’d be averaging 2:15 half marathons at this point. Life got in the way. I’m too busy with other things. My distance training runs are up to par, but my speed work is not.

I’m scared of being pulled off the course. I’m hoping to finish somewhere around 5:30. I’m hoping to keep up the pace and keep moving. But I don’t know what’s going to happen.

So I’m relying on some inspiration to push me through. On the band of my RoadID, I had the last line inscribed with an Eleanor Roosevelt quote.

“You must do the thing you think you cannot,” is the quote. My RoadID, specifically, says “you must do the things.”

I had it put there when I was training for a half marathon. I didn’t think I could. I still can’t believe that on March 27 I became a half marathoner in Oakland. And I’ve ran five other ones since.

And now I’m hoping to conquer the marathon. In six hours.

I hope I can. I hope that it’s a mental block and it’s something I think I can’t, but actually can.

In any case, we’ll see in a month if that’s true. Crossing my fingers.

Nov 6

800

The clocks moved forward at 2 a.m. this morning, which meant that I got an extra hour of sleep before heading out for my long run today. That was nice, but I was also tossing and turning and waiting for my alarm to go off, thinking, maybe, I slept through it.

I grabbed my gear and got ready. Jennie sent me a text at about 6:20 a.m. asking if she could borrow a water bottle. No problem. I brought a refill bottle with me for part of our run. This was the view that greeted me in Mountain House from Central Community Park, the beginning of all of our long runs.

We started out right after 7 a.m. The bathrooms were even open, which is always good. We headed toward the still in-progress village battling the cold and somewhat wet conditions.

The goal? Well, we didn’t really have one. I think both of us would like a second shot at 20 miles. But, unfortunately, we both were battling this run early on. Jennie said her shin hurt. My right Achilles was sore. We decided half way through we’d likely only hit 10 today.

I say “only” because last week I ran my longest run of my life at 20 miles.

We are usually warmed up by mile three. Not this morning. We were slogging. In retrospect, we probably weren’t full recovered.

Worst, we were inconsistent:

I noted, though, before getting into bed that my dailymile was at 790.

That’s part of what propelled me to want to do 10. I’m pretty sure I said before leaving the house this morning: “Even if Jennie decides she wants to quit at mile 6, I’m going 10.” Of course Jennie doesn’t quit. She’s good like that. She motivates me. That makes her the perfect running mate for the California International Marathon.

So we kept pushing. And pushing. And finally, we were done.

And it never rained once.

It looked threatening, but it wasn’t. In fact, it wasn’t even as cold as we thought. I wore my new Mizuno running vest and a Nike long-sleeve Miler top and ended up shedding down my my Dri-Fit t-shirt at our 7-mile stop-at-my-car-and-get-more-Gatorade stop.

The beauty of our 10-mile runs is that the first six miles tend to be consistent. Then I changed it up because Gertrude the Garmin lets me do that. (I’m going to hold off posting about how I have a request in to Garmin to have the battery looked at, mostly because I want to see how this plays out and I’m deeply concerned with a half marathon and a marathon coming up that no good can come of me sending the 405CX in this close to the marathon. That said, the battery is dying at nearly five hours. No good for a first-time marathoner who runs 11-minute averages.)

Sorry about the aside. I’m having a little bit of an issue with the Garmin issue.

So our last four miles are kind of sporadic. We run just to run. I do this as a mental trick. I can’t give up if I don’t know where I am going, right?

Works for me.

So Jennie and I pushed. We finally got to 10. And, to be fair, this 10 was a lot easier than I’m used to. Why? Could it be last week’s 20-mile jaunt? Perhaps. Even with difficultly, which we had, it was easier than our usual 10-mile runs.

And I hit 800.

I have the dailymile tag on my blog to prove it:

I did a little dance. I had a moment. And I spent the day celebrating, like someone who has literally ran twice the distance she did last year should do.

My mom asked if I wanted to go see a movie. She came to Tracy and we saw the new Harold and Kumar movie (the duo I later referred to as the “Cheech and Chong” of my generation).

Oh, and there were blended margaritas:

That’s my husband’s hairy arm using the blender that literally hasn’t been out of the box since we lived on our rental. That’s more than a year. We really need to party more.

Plus, I finally got around to making stir fry with the vegetables I picked up from the health fair at work the other day. Best part? I have leftovers for tomorrow.

And, yes, it was delicious.

So I’m at 800. I’m not sure about getting to 1,000. I’d like to try, but that’s 200 miles in two months. Can I do it? Sure. I’ve been averaging 100+ for the past two months.

But the marathon is on Dec. 4. And that’s 26.2 if I make it. (Let’s be real, there’s a chance I could completely balk, I know this, even when people tell me I can do it.)

I have 6-7 on schedule for tomorrow. If I feel good enough I’ll do 8. And then 6 on Wednesday. I have a day schedule on Friday, so I can either run 10 in the morning or in the evening. We’ll see.

Jennie wants to try for 20 on Sunday. I’m chaperoning my students to a journalism conference on Saturday. Hopefully I’m not too tired to conquer 20.

So, my remaining goals this year: Get to 1,000 and run that marathon.

« Older Entries