Inane Chatter

I can’t have a cat.  Riley would spend every minute bouncing off the ceiling.  Every minute he’s not trying to eat the poor thing.  He’s high-strung as it is.  I got further proof of that this morning when I brought a cat inside.  Briefly.  After I threw him and Roxy out on the deck.

Let me back up.

I went out this morning for a jog, as usual.  (Kind of as usual.  You know, every other day usual.  The way I left the house was as usual for when I go for a jog.  Oh, hell.  Leave me alone.)  About a half mile from the house, on the opposite side of a busy-for-my-town street from my neighborhood, I saw a cat narrowly avoid being hit by a car.  It was okay, hanging out on the sidewalk when I got there, not even a little bit afraid of me.  He’s a pretty little cat, not a kitten, not full-grown.  I guessed 6-7 months old (the vet said maybe 8 months, but not more).  No collar, no tags, not neutered, but he’s clean (and definitely a he) and seems well-fed.  Almost definitely not a stray.  Like 98% not a stray.  He was right behind a house in this other neighborhood, so I walked to their front door to see if he belonged to them.  He followed me.  Right by my ankles.  I knocked (it wasn’t even 7 yet – a little early for a doorbell), but no one answered.  I saw people at a house on the next block, so I headed that way.  He followed me.  They didn’t recognize him.  I tried another house.  Same thing.  I went back to the first house, closest to where I found him, and since there was a light on now, I rang the doorbell.  A guy and his little girl answered the door.  Not their cat.

Three houses with no luck, and the cat’s still following me, so I picked him up and headed home.  Easier said than done.  He let me carry him for a couple of minutes and then he struggled a little.  I calmed him enough to get by another house or so, and then he twisted again.  I put him down, thinking maybe he’d keep following me.  Nope.  He headed for a house like maybe he lived there, so I rang the doorbell.  No answer.  And then he went to another house like he lived there.  So, yeah, this little kitty doesn’t know where home is.  Scooped him up and continued home.  Repeat twice more, without the doorbell-ringing.

I finally got back to the house, but John was out running and I needed to get in the door without getting my face and arms clawed off when the cat tried to escape from the dogs.  I got the teenager across the street to hold him while I shoved the dogs into the backyard (more difficult than usual – Riley’s nose was glued to my cat-hair-covered shirt).  Then I locked the adorable little kitty whose patience was wearing thin in the hall bathroom.  He immediately starting yowling.  I don’t blame him.  I called a couple of the local vets.  All I was looking for was a place to leave this cat for a day or two while I post flyers (fliers?  Looks like fleers.) and look for the owner, and the shelter is kinda far in the wrong direction (wrong if I’m trying to get to work close to on time).  The first vet I called won’t hold a pet unless they know who the owner is.  Not helpful.  The second one was sympathetic, though, totally understood what I need, and was willing to take the cutie-pie, at least for a day or so.  In the meantime, Riley tried to throw himself through the sliding glass door to get at the CAT!  THERE’S A CAT IN THERE!  LET ME AT IT!

John came home about then, so I explained why awful screaming noises were occasionally coming from the hall bathroom (not hurt noises, just hilarious lonely noises) and why Riley (who was no longer trying to hulk his way into the house) was stomping his foot (he really does that) and whining urgently.  John got his camera, and I opened the door to find Stan (he looks like an Oliver, but we know a cat named Oliver, so he’s Stan and no, we’re not keeping him) on the bathroom sink.  John took some pictures (see below) for the flyers I’ll make later today, and I threw him (Stan, not John) in the car for the drive to the nice vet.

He was fine in the car (we no longer have a pet carrier of any kind, and we never had one small enough for a cat), and he was happy to go with the vet tech.  I have their number, they have my number, and when they can’t keep him any longer, I’ll move him on to the shelter.  If I haven’t found the owner by then.  After work, I’ll stop at FedEx Office (I think that’s what they call themselves now, not FedEx Kinko’s anymore), make a bunch of flyers, and shove them in mailboxes in my neighborhood and the neighborhood across that street.  I’ve already posted in the community forums, so hopefully I’ll get some response.

I got a phone call from John a little bit ago.  On his way out of the neighborhood this morning, when he left for work, he got stuck behind a car going REALLY SLOWLY down the street.  He was super annoyed at the time, but it occurred to him, as he sat in traffic, that it might have been the cat’s owners driving slowly by.  That’s probably how I’d go looking for my missing cat.  We’ll keep an eye out for that car, too.

Anyway, if I don’t hear from the owner in a couple of days, there’ll be a cute cat on the market.  Free to a good home.  Want one?

It’s a happy coincidence that I’m rescuing a cat on Wombat’s Random Act Wednesday, but there you have it.  Also, Spokeit‘s post from yesterday ran through my mind all morning.  Gotta love our online community.

I have a massive headache right now.  Probably sinus-related, but I can also feel it at the base of my skull.  Not fun.  To distract myself from it, I’m going to tell you about the best part of my day today.  I went for a run this morning.  Three miles.  Not anything huge, and it was kinda hard, but I was doing okay.  Right at the very end, I came up to a corner in the neighborhood just as John (who had also gone for a run) got to the same corner from another direction.  I slowed down to meet him, but he wasn’t quite done.  He took a turn to the right (onto the street I’d been running along) and kept going, so I picked up the pace a little to catch up.  I just wanted to jog along next to him, but he heard me coming and went a little faster.  So I went a little faster.  In the space of two house-widths (like horse-lengths, you know?), we were sprinting all out (or as all out as either of us had left after several miles each), and as long as I could keep it up, I WAS EVEN WITH HIM.  How crazy is that?  He’s nine inches taller than me.  My legs were churning as fast as I could move them and not fall down.  I felt like a cartoon of myself, like my legs weren’t visible as anything but whooshing circles.  It was awesome.

I think we should race.  Short distance, all out sprint, when we’re both fresh.

I fell today.  I was jogging along with the dogs, and I started to untwist the leashes, which is something I do at least three times every day I take them with me (Riley ducks and weaves around Roxy – he doesn’t want to miss a single tree, mailbox, clump of weeds, drain, or bush), and I stopped paying attention to my feet.  Usually not an issue.  Today, though, the sidewalk reached up and grabbed my heel, forcing me to trip over the seam.  For a split-second, while my feet were scrabbling for purchase, I thought I had it, I thought I was going to be able to recover and stay on my feet, but then I lost it.  I slammed into the sidewalk, caught myself with the heels of both palms and my right elbow, and bounced onto my right side.  (I think.  That’s the only explanation I can think of for why the right side of my thigh is scraped and bruised (along with my hands and that one elbow), but not my knees.)  I rolled onto the grass in someone’s front yard to take stock and find the leashes I’d dropped.  The scrapes are mostly just along the surface so my skin is a little rough, but there was no blood except for the scrape along my elbow.  Still, I cut my run short and headed home.

Not the most auspicious start to my day.

We have car drama, but I’ll save the details until we know what we’re going to do about it.  In the meantime, John gets to work from home (lucky dog!).

More amusingly, check this out (thanks, as usual, to The Bloggess for finding the funniest/weirdest/most awesome stuff on the internet).  My mind is blown.  I knew ducks were hiding something.  Sneaky bastards.

From the same website, here’s one for John.

Want to drool over kitchens?  Here – drool away.  I WANT them.  All of them.  I’ll settle for two or three.

I didn’t run this morning because I’m terribly lazy.  The alarm went off and I sat up and swung my legs over to the side.  Turned on my bedside lamp.  Then I dozed, upright, for nearly half an hour.  Tomorrow I need to take that extra step (standing up will help) and move in the direction of the front door.  Wish me luck.

For the first time in many many months, it’s cooler outside than inside (and there’s a breeze!), so I’ve opened the windows.  Feels good.  I can hear the windchimes from the front porch.  Roxy doesn’t care one way or the other (she’s happily gnawing on a new bone), so Riley and I sat out on the deck for a few minutes and communed with the crickets.  What time do crickets quit?  Or am I crazy for thinking they don’t do a lot of cricketing during the day?  Seems like a night-time thing, but here we are, 7:15 in the morning, the sun is the up (although not shining – overcast today) and has been up for about 45 minutes, and the crickets are chirping away.  And I can hear them because the windows are open!

They really do make a lot of noise.

I’ve been feeling pretty tired lately.  I think I’ve been doing okay about getting to bed at a reasonable hour, but I’m rethinking my whole let’s-get-up-super-early-to-run-before-the-sun-comes-up-and-the-heat-gets-unbearable idea.  I still think it’s a good idea, but 5:15 is kinda early.  I usually wake up 20-30 minutes before my alarm goes off, whatever time it’s set to, and waking up in the 4am hour is disconcerting.  And TOO EARLY, even when I get to go back to sleep for a while.  This morning I got up with my alarm, sat on the edge of the bed for a couple of minutes (felt like a couple, but when I looked at the clock I saw it had been about ten), and then I stood up and looked at the bed for another few (probably closer to ten again) minutes, and THEN I reached for my workout clothes.  On the one hand, maybe I need all that extra time I’m giving myself by setting the alarm so early.  On the other hand, if I used all that extra time for sleeping, maybe I wouldn’t be such a zombie and I wouldn’t need the extra time.

I don’t like being a zombie.  It doesn’t last long, though.  Once I get back from my run, I’m wide awake and talking a mile a minute.  Just ask John, who generally isn’t ready for that yet.

You know what shouldn’t be allowed?  Eighty degrees before 6am.  Hell, eighty degrees before 9am.  The only reason I’m getting up this early (5:15 today) is so I can run in the cooler temperatures before the sun comes up.  Sure, 80 degrees is not as hot as our high of 102 yesterday, but I’d hardly call it cooler, especially not when I’ll be warming up while running anyway.  Back in the AC I go.

I thought something I had planned for July was actually happening in June, and I was getting John all annoyed about it because it would have happened tomorrow (Saturday), and I’d be gone for the whole day right after coming home for the first time in two weeks.  And while we were talking about it (two days ago), I realized it might actually be scheduled for a Saturday in July,  but I couldn’t be sure….  I checked, and yes, it’s not until July, and yes, I can’t tell one month from the next.  But that means we can both sleep away the whole weekend, and that kind of rest is something we could both really use.  John got in last Sunday night from Rhode Island and has worked almost nonstop since then.  His mother and youngest sister stayed a couple of nights earlier in the week (college visits), so when he got home from the airport, he spent a few hours furiously cleaning the house from top to bottom.  Several days later (now that I’m home to see it), it still looks good.  Having your mother come to stay is a powerful motivator.  I have the same reaction to visits from both sets of parents.

Anyway, we have deliberate plans to do nothing this weekend.  I could see myself going for an early morning run, but only if I happen to wake up early enough (’cause it’s HOT here).  We might try to get rid of some of the crap in the basement, but that might take too much effort.  I guess I’ll just have to wait and see.

My run was too short this morning (I needed to make sure I’d have plenty of time to find the place I’m working at this week), but it was really nice.  Right around 60 degrees and overcast, with a breeze, so it was nice and cool, and I headed to the Cliff Walk to run.  Until I got there, I hadn’t noticed the ocean sounds, and then all of a sudden, I was looking down at a beach (waves and sand and everything!) and I could hear the surf hitting the rocks at the base of the cliff.  SO pleasant.  So it was a nice run.

On my way back from work, I drove in the way we used to come in, came down Broadway and around Washington Square, and then across Division Street to see our old apartment.  Looks exactly the same, even after nine years.  It could use a coat of paint, but I think it needed that when we lived there.  I climbed the stairs to my room (did I mention I’m on the 3rd floor of a bed and breakfast?), changed clothes, and went out for a walk.  I found myself on Spring Street (the wine store is still there, but I couldn’t find the breakfast place) and I got stopped by some guy on the sidewalk who asked me about my shirt.  I really need to stop wearing this one in public.  It says “Ask me about sustainability” across the front.  People do.  But this guy wouldn’t stop talking.  Forty-five minutes later, I continued my walk.  I ended up at The Black Pearl (the tavern side) for dinner, where I had one of the most delicious dishes I have ever eaten.  Scallops with bacon, mushrooms, and cream.  I don’t ever need to eat again.  I’m full up.  No more food needed.  After that, I was really glad I was walking.  And going uphill.  Exercise is good.  And when I made it to the top of the hill, my shirt (the “ask me about” part, anyway) prompted a couple to ask me for directions to The Red Parrot.  It was nice to be able to help them out.   (It helps that it’s kinda hard to miss AND I had just walked past it.)

Anyway, I’m back in my room and I want to go to bed.  The biggest decision I have to make is where I’m going to run tomorrow.

Where am I?

Or Durham.  Or Chapel Hill.  Or wherever the hell I am.  It’s not any better where I live, but I know my way around there.  I found dinner, I found Kroger, and I found my way back to my hotel.  I haven’t yet found where I can run around here, but that can wait until tomorrow.  I’ll start out in the hotel fitness center and then ask people who live around here.  When I meet them.  Which will happen in class tomorrow.

It’s entirely too quiet here, so I’m going to turn on the radio, read my book, and try to settle down and sleep.  The class I’m teaching tomorrow has a focus I haven’t really taught yet, so I’m not as comfortable with it.  Meaning I’m not as relaxed as I’d like to be.  A bath may be in my future.  Once I find a radio station I like.

The traveling part of this trip was totally uneventful (aside from some turbulence during the flight), no talkative seatmates, and it was surprisingly easy to find my hotel, so I’ve got nothing good to share tonight.  But I’m wireless!  Yay!  Here’s to posting from bed!  Maybe tomorrow. 

My neighborhood was Grand Central Station for bunnies this morning.  I’d forgotten about that aspect of spring, so when I took the dogs for a run this morning (for the first time in more than two months, I think), I wasn’t prepared for their reaction.  Nearly got my arms yanked off.  Over and over and over again.

I am looking forward to tomorrow.  Very much.  I asked for the day off a couple of weeks ago, just because (and also because I thought I’d need the escape since I was convinced I would be less than a month from unemployment by this week), and earlier this week I thought about not taking the day off and just going to work anyway, but then my boss reminded me that this was meant to be an easy week for us trainers (to give us a break from all the stressful traveling) and I don’t have anything to do, so why not take it?  I saw her point.  So now I have plans for tomorrow.  Plans to run, to get a mani/pedi, to get my very first ever massage, and to buy a new suitcase.  Almost in that order.  I need a new suitcase…do I?  Well, yeah, I do.  The one I’ve been using (big, rectangular, purple, on wheels) is coming apart at the seams.  I have another rolling bag, but it’s more of a rolling duffel and I have to travel with some stuff for work that wouldn’t fit very well in that.  I could borrow John’s (and I will if I don’t find something pretty easily tomorrow), but eventually, I’ll need one of my own.  I’m putting too much thought into this.

Hamburgers tonight!

Best run ever.  Early morning (okay, it was a little before 8am, but it’s Sunday, so it felt earlier), a little overcast at first, a nice cool day, and I only had to share Boston with a few other early risers.  I’m only a couple of blocks from Boston Common (the Boston Common?  Or just Boston Common?), so I headed there first.  Beautiful.  It’s the perfect park, with lots of paths crisscrossing and SO many trees.  The entire thing was shady.  (In the nice, cool, protected-from-the-sun way, not the scary/sketchy way).  So I ran in random directions on the Common, passing the frog pond where a group of older people were practicing tai chi, and then along Beacon Street where I saw a guy throwing a ball for his dog.  I headed up Tremont and then took some spur-of-the-moment twists and turns, and before I knew it, I was at Quincy Market.  I hadn’t realized I was that close.  So I ran through the market (too early for anything to be open) and circled back around to the Common (tai chi people were still at it).  I ran by a church (and dodged around the early church-goers) whose bells I could hear from blocks away.  The melody was close enough to “My Country ‘Tis of Thee” that it bugged me when it took a wrong turn into something else.

It felt fantastic.  I really liked running around the city.  Running through suburbia doesn’t have the same thrill. 

Alright, I’ve stopped sweating, and I think I’ve cooled down enough to hop in the shower.  The aquarium is next, and then Harvard, I think.

I feel so much better today.  For now.  I went to bed early and set my alarm for 4:50.  I slept mostly okay (weird dream that turned into a horrible nightmare (with people chasing me and trying to kill me) around 4am) and wasn’t too shocked when the alarm went off that early.  I took my time getting up, reading a little to wake my eyes up, and then I got dressed to go for a run.  I already knew I was heading to the fitness center (it was still dark out, and I’m not running in a strange place in the dark), but when I opened the door, I found out it was raining.  Pretty steadily.  I dashed across the courtyard area to get to the little fitness room.  I don’t really like treadmills, but that’s what I had to work with, so I set it up to go for 30 minutes and I turned on the little TV that was attached to it.  I had headphones, but I couldn’t find a jack on the stupid thing, so I watched TV (an episode of Married With Children) and tried to read lips for half an hour. 

About halfway through my workout, the thunder and lightning started, and the rain switched from steady to POURING.  Like the clouds were hurling all that rain down as hard as they could.  I was soaked after my dash back to the room.  Rain like that doesn’t usually stick around for long, but it was still raining as hard or harder when I splashed through the parking lot to my car to get to work.  I have to park about a block away from the building (at work, not at the hotel), so I stopped at my friendly neighborhood Kroger and bought a tiny little red umbrella.  You know what that means.  By the time I parked in the lot downtown, the rain had slowed to a sprinkle and I hardly needed the umbrella.  If I hadn’t bought it, though, it would have been pouring still. 

My point, if I had one, is that despite the soaking wet hem of my pants, and despite knowing that I don’t get to go home until NEXT Friday, I feel a little better because I RAN this morning.  (“SO much better” from the first paragraph has already been downgraded.)  Also, I get to see Mom, Dad, and Gaby tonight.  They’re stopping here to see me on their way back to KY.  AND (see? lots of good things today) my first couple of hours at work this morning have already been a vast improvement over the rest of this week ’cause I’m sitting down and I’ve only had to talk to two people.  Sitting down is crucial. 

Make that five people.  Still better than the rest of the week, and I have a built-in, supervisor-approved excuse so I don’t have to stay here all day.  Yay!

I would still call DisneyWorld the happiest place on earth (me and fifteen trillion of my closest friends), but I think the Coke museum in Atlanta (now The World of Coca-Cola) is the happiest place in Georgia.  (Ask me again after I go to the aquarium.)  I love Coke.  Me and Coke are buddies.  We like to hang out.

My class got out a little earlier than expected, so I headed out of the windowless training room on the 9th floor (windowless, yes, but NOT in a basement – big improvement) hoping to go for a run.  I got off the elevator to cloudy skies, but I was still hopeful.  Cloudy just means it’ll be cooler without the sun beating down on me.   Then I got outside.  Raining.  Hard.  Annoyed.  (Me, not the rain, although who knows?)  Then I had a brilliant idea.  I’m in Atlanta, it’s only 4pm, it’s raining, and I’m mere blocks away from a shrine to the only soft drink worthy of the name.  So I went – by myself – and joined a tour group and spent a very enjoyable couple of hours looking at all the Coke stuff, watching the videos, watching a ton of Coke commercials, and tasting many (not nearly all) of the really disgusting Coke products they manage to sell around the world.  On my way out (funneled, of course, through the gift shop, where I showed admirable restraint and did NOT buy myself a t-shirt), they handed me a Coke. 

In sadder news, Roxy had a seizure this morning.  John said it was a cluster seizure, and she was in the middle of it when he came back in from his morning run.  Riley had done his holding her down thing, there was hair everywhere, and he’d slobbered all over her neck.  (No blood.)  John talked to our vet this afternoon, and she apparently jumped to the conclusion that the new medicine isn’t working and that Roxy needs an MRI (costs at least $1000 according to her (the vet, not Roxy)).  I’m not sure why she (the vet) went there so quickly, though.  Roxy’s only been on the new meds for a month and off the old meds for only three weeks, and in that time she’s had basically two episodes.  That sounds pretty promising to me.  So we’re going to ignore the vet for the time being.  (That’s a strange phrase.  Time being.  I’m sure I’ve said it before, but I don’t think I’ve ever written it down.  Looks too weird.)

It got late before I realized it, and I haven’t eaten dinner yet, so I’m out of here.

Updated to add Roxy’s second set of seizures for the day.  Three this time.  John may be leaving her with the vet for observation tomorrow, since he can’t stay home with her.

One of the legs of the Pittsburgh Marathon is right outside our hotel room, and we have a great view from our window, so John and I are watching as we take turns showering, packing, etc, before we check out.  The pep band from one of the local universities (I can’t tell which one) is set up right on on the route, so I can hear all the standard pep band songs (“Louie, Louie”, “Another One Bites the Dust”, “Axel F”, plus a few extras (like the theme from Futurama – I could swear I heard that one a few minutes ago).  The rain is pouring down, which would explain why we’re watching from our hotel room and not from the sidelines, but now I’m thinking about volunteering to help out at local races.  Particularly the longer ones, the ones I have no interest in running in myself. 

Hitting the road soon.

(Na na na na na)  I have been checking things off my list left and right.  I ran (check), and while it wasn’t easy (since it was the first time since after work on Tuesday), it felt good to do it.  It threatened to rain the whole time, but mostly held off until I got back.  When I left the house, it was just starting, so I decided to only do two miles.  After the first mile, it had slowed to just a couple of raindrops here and there, so I figured I could get away with four miles before the downpour started.  At the end of the second mile, I had to the make the five-mile decision, and since the rain had stopped altogether by then, I decided to chance it.  At the end of the next mile (the one that made my four-mile run a five-mile run), I looked to the west, decided that the low grey clouds didn’t look that threatening, and took a left to add the one additional mile that extended my run to six miles.  As I came up the hill towards the house, those scattered raindrops began to band together, but within ten minutes, that fizzled out, too.  Those clouds were all talk.

I did some light cleaning (check), went to the library (picked up a P.G. Wodehouse book to listen to) (check), went to the bank to deposit an expense check (check), went to the office for about 15 minutes (check), went to the pharmacy (not on my list, so no check), and made a quick stop at Wegman’s to pick up an easy dinner.  The real grocery shopping can happen tomorrow.  Oh, yeah, I’m doing laundry, too.

See how productive I can be?

One week ago today, John and I got up ridiculously early (for a Sunday morning) (no, 5:20 is always ridiculously early) in order to get to DC (via metro) so he could run in the Cherry Blossom Ten Mile Run.  His training had completely derailed, since we had three feet of snow clogging all the paths and streets, and then when it finally melted, he got sick, he was working late, he had schoolwork – everything came together to make it hard for him to be ready.  He ran the Army Ten-Miler about three and a half years ago, but he hadn’t hit that distance since then.  And since he didn’t feel prepared, he was half-convinced the sweeper bus was going to pick up and take him out the race.  He had to keep up a 14-minute mile pace to avoid being picked up.  He knew (and I definitely knew) he’d do better than that, but that didn’t stop him from being nervous.

We go to the metro at Dunn Loring and got on the train.  Everyone who got on that train, at every stop, was a runner.  (They’re the only ones crazy enough to be going to DC that early.)  By the time we got into the district, the train was packed, and we all got off at the Smithsonian stop.  I wish I’d had my camera out because I looked back over my shoulder as we rode the escalator up and saw that the platform next to the train was one solid mass of people.  It looked really cool, but since I was part of that mass, I couldn’t get into my bag.  (I was playing sherpa, so I had the backpack to hold all sweatshirts, towels, water, etc.)

We followed the crowd from the metro to the grounds around the Washington Monument.  The race started in waves, so they didn’t expect all 15,000 people to be at the starting line at once.  The first wave was scheduled to go at 7:40, with the last wave at 8:00.  John was in the red wave, which I think was the second one.  All John had to do was pin on his number and go.  Of course, we’d just commuted in for more than an hour, so John (and every other runner) needed to find a port-a-potty.  Fortunately, there were tons of them.  Unfortunately, probably 7500 other runners had the same urge.  We joined one of the REALLY long lines and started to worry.  It didn’t look like it’d be possible for him to make it to the front of the line before the last wave started.  (It didn’t matter which wave he joined, so missing his wave wasn’t part of the worry.)

We waited in line for a while, and then he sent me off to find any alternatives.  I ran across 14th Street (near the starting line) and found another row of port-a-potties with NO LINES.  I raced back to John, waved him out of his line, and sent him running in that direction.  Feeling much better, he found me again as the next to last wave was starting, and we got him in the crowd.  And it was a crowd.  SO many people.  They were sent off, but they were packed in so tightly that they all walked for another few minutes.  So I walked along with them, outside the railing.

John in that crowd. The race has started, but nobody's running yet.

There they go.

I found a great spot along the rail right by the finish line (I was already there when  I look that last picture), so, along with some other very enthusiastic spectators, I shouted myself hoarse cheering on the finishers.  Long before John came in, Erik and Margaret joined me at the finish line, bringing much-needed caffeine.  We cheered John across the line, and then headed for our meetup point.  Here’s Erik, convinced he can spot John in the sea of people:

And here’s John, triumphant and sweaty.  He finished almost four minutes faster than his last 10-miler time.

From there, we hopped the metro out to Ballston to have a yummy brunch with Erik and Margaret at Whitlow’s, and then we went home, where both of us collapsed of exhaustion, even though only one of us deserved the rest.    Go John!

And they don’t include working after I get home on a Friday evening for several hours.  But I promised myself I wasn’t going to talk about that.  Instead, I’ll mention that Roxy got so excited about the pieces of lamb fat she was going to get that she repeatedly walked herself into the narrow dead end between the arm of the couch and the wall.  Head first.  She doesn’t like to back up, so she’d stand there, tongue out, tail wagging, with her nose just barely over the arm, until I nudged her backwards with my hand on her chest.  Like three times.

John is in the office pretending he’s Brian May, and I’m pretending I have time to check some of my favorite sites before my eyes close.  We don’t have any plans this weekend (other than the usual light house cleaning, lawn mowing, grocery shopping, and something (I know there was something else I wanted to do, but did I write it down?  Say it with me.  No!)), so I hope to run and relax.  And relaxing had better include catching up with my favorite online people.  Also my new favorites, thanks to a recent thread at the Dooce Community and, of course, Spoke’s Blog Love series (first day here).

Before I go to bed, this is for Mom, Sandwich Stealer (not that one), Jess, and other people I could name but will not.  Today.  Just you wait.

I think the point of mentioning my priorities in the title was so I could say I still have mine, and I think they’re in the right order, but I need to work a lot harder at figuring out how to make them happen every day.  Or most days.  I feel a bit overwhelmed, and not by anything bad, but by not being able to make time for all those little things I like to do.  But I will.  I will figure it out.

You know, I didn’t run 10 miles today, but I’m completely exhausted.  Getting up at 5:20 on a Sunday morning is not natural.  It’s evil.  But it was a good day.  Beautiful morning, once the sun came up.  John did great, beating his time from the Army 10-miler by 4 minutes.  Come back tomorrow for more about today, including pictures.  Going to bed now.

This is getting to be a habit.  The short posts on Saturdays, I mean.  We had a nice leisurely morning.  I ran six miles (takes me forever to do that) while John mowed the lawn.  I got back in time to help him pull up dandelions in the front yard.  Ate a quick breakfast, took a quick shower, and then we went to DC to pick up his race packet and have lunch.  DC was mobbed, of course, since it’s the weekend of the Cherry Blossom Festival, but we got a good parking space on the south side of the Mall, right at 12th St.  And then realized we had to walk to 4th and F to pick up the race packet.  Not the best planning.  Had lunch at Elephant and Castle (mobbed for lunch even though it was 2:30), and then headed home.  It was much later than we planned, but I guess that’s how it goes.  I went to Costco to pick up Roxy’s medicine and then bought new shoes from the Naturalizer outlet nearby.  I might still check out Nordstrom’s tomorrow since they carry Dansko and Sofft.  The Clarks outlet was disappointing.

A recap of my day is not the most exciting reading, but it’s all I can think of at the moment.  I’m tired and we’re getting up at 5:20 tomorrow morning.  I’m going to bed.

Oh, the cherry blossoms are all gone.  Not out here (there are lots of cherry trees still blooming around here), but in DC, they’re all green now.  I’m sure that’s a huge disappointment to the thousands of tourists in town this weekend.  It was a beautiful day, though, and DC looks great in spring.  The sky was almost a September blue.