running

Morning person?

Leave a Comment

Much as I like sleeping in and being lazy in the mornings, I find that I’m happier when I’m up and moving and it’s early (not crazy early).  As the day goes on, no matter how good that day is, I get more and more tired and worn out and less likely to want to do anything.  That’s mostly why I need to run in the mornings.  If I put it off to after work, I might never get out the door.  Actually, I’m gonna have to change that soon.  I’ll have to get downtown so early that I won’t be able to run in the mornings.

My point, if I had one, was that I like mornings.  Particularly sunny ones.  Oh, right, my other point is that I think I might like to become a morning blogger.  Not sure if that’ll happen, considering how long it’s been taking me to get ready for work lately, but maybe then I wouldn’t feel this pressure to come up with something in the evenings when I’m brain-dead.  What’s that you say?  I’m always brain-dead?  Don’t be mean.

Mornings agree with me

3 Comments

Sometimes.  This one does.  I didn’t want to get out of bed at first, but I convinced myself it was the right thing to do, mostly by reminding myself how good I feel after I run.  It worked, and I do!  The sun is rising earlier and earlier every day, so I didn’t have to run in the dark.  I did have to negotiate the ice in the ex-Bloom parking lot, but there wasn’t that much of it.  It added variety.  Anyway, I ran, the sun is up, the sky is blue, and I feel great.  And I’m hungry, so I’m off to Frosted Flakes and a banana.  I hope you all have a wonderful day.

(Is this too full of sparkles and sunshine for you?)

The ayes have it

2 Comments

The #6’s, rather.  I’ll mess around with version #1 and shades of green later.

I ran this morning.  Okay, it was more like a shuffle that sometimes looked like a slow jog, but it was more than walking, and more than I’ve done in weeks.  I ran twice on a treadmill in San Francisco, but not for very long either time.   It suddenly became very important that we both get out and run, mostly because I signed John up for a 5-miler in two and a half weeks and he coaxed/supported/shamed me into registering myself, too.  Five miles.  In two and a half weeks.  I’m an idiot.  Especially since we don’t really have anywhere to run.  Today we ran in the streets of our neighborhood, and that’s what we’ll have to keep doing until the county clears the sidewalks and paths along the major roads.  We can run laps around the Bloom parking lot, too, since no one is in it early in the morning (nothing is open).  It felt good to get out again, though.

Then we had breakfast, watched Heroes, and I went to the grocery store.  It was supposed to be a short trip, but I was gone forever because I got in the line with the slowest checkout clerk ever.  EVER.  I waited 15 minutes before she was done with the lady in front of me (who didn’t have THAT many groceries), and I got all excited for a minute because a new cashier was waiting behind the slow one and they even went so far as to lift the tray out of the register, but then I looked away for a second and when I looked back, the new cashier was nowhere to be seen and the slow one was starting to ring me up.  Frustrating.  She was using my cloth bags instead of plastic bags, and she got to the last five items and opened a new bag.  No problem with that.  She put the bananas and the grapes in the bottom of the new bag.  I got ready to object if it seemed like she was going to put the lotion and soap on top of the grapes, but instead she reached for a new bag.  Really?  These bags are big.  Just put the grapes on top of that stuff!  Why load up another bag?  I don’t get baggers.

Back to work tomorrow.  Yay.

Take control

7 Comments

Things I’m doing to get out of this hibernation funk I’ve been in since the snow started:

  1. Train the dogs.  I started practicing down with Riley and stay with Roxy, and I’m meeting with a trainer this coming week to work on leash manners and come when called.
  2. Clean the house.  Our room looks like a cave.  Clothes are EVERYwhere.  And there’s stuff piling up on all surfaces downstairs.
  3. Get outside.  Yes, it’s cold, so I won’t be spending lots of time outside, but it’s good for me to see the sun and breathe fresh air.  Dogs like walks and so do I.
  4. Meet with the financial guy.  I need to ask him tax questions and we need to finally pay off the student loan.
  5. Buy the new dining room table!  But not until I’ve cleaned up enough downstairs and found places for everything so we don’t immediately cover our new dining room table in crap.  But that might be today!

More later, I’m sure.

The snow makes running really difficult.  Impossible, really, unless I’m willing to run in the street instead of on the sidewalks.  I could do that in the neighborhood – you know, I might.  I have to do something, and exercise DVDs just aren’t calling out to me.  That should probably be #6, with eating right (and less) #7, but those are all-the-time things.

And here’s a picture for Corey.  It’s me, wearing all the clothes I could find ’cause we were taking the dogs for a walk around the neighborhood, standing next to the biggest pile of snow we have.  John took it Thursday evening, so there’s already been some melting and settling.

Get out of bed and RUN

3 Comments

I said earlier that I’d have more to say, but I was wrong.  I want to talk about other blogs, but I still haven’t read through the blogs I bookmarked.  I want to talk about TV, but that’ll take more time than I have right now.  Of course, that’s a self-imposed deadline, but I want to stick to it so I might actually get up and run tomorrow.  I’ve stayed up too late every night since Saturday.  It just keeps happening (yes, I know that makes me sound old), and I hate being up late when I know I have to get up early the next day.  I start to get anxious, like on Sunday afternoons when you can feel your weekend ending (thanks, Jess, for bringing that up recently).  I do the same thing if I realize I’m up past, well, my bedtime.  No, I don’t have a bedtime.  There’s just a time every night, different times on different nights, but usually around 11, when I get anxious about not being asleep.  So I generally aim for 10, knowing I’ll probably miss.  But aiming for 10 gives me some wiggle room.

Oh right.  Running tomorrow.  We were supposed to run this morning.  The alarm went off at 6 and I turned on my light.  Then I heard an unintelligible grunt from John.

“What?”

Still muffled, but I thought I heard, “Rain.”

“What?”

“RAIN.”

“Really?  I don’t hear it.”

“Double-check.”

So I got out of bed and peeked out through the blinds.  It was definitely wet outside, and if I listened hard, I could hear a rustle that could have been light rain.  Good enough for me.  I climbed back into bed, reset the alarm for 7, and went back to sleep.  When he hands me an excuse like that, it’s hard not to take it.

Big Day

3 Comments

I woke up to some unidentified noise exactly 15 minutes before my alarm was set to go off this morning.  I didn’t hear it again, I didn’t hear the sounds I associate with Roxy’s convulsing, and I didn’t hear Riley pacing back and forth like he does when he’s nervous (like when Roxy is convulsing), so I stayed in bed.  Wide awake.  I decided to take the dogs with me on my run.  I had an awful waking nightmare that the sound I heard was Roxy’s death cry and I would have to explain to my new employer, through my grief, that I wasn’t going to be able to come in today.  I told myself I was getting all crazy over nothing, Roxy’s fine, but maybe I should go for a short run to make sure I’ll have time to go through the 5 or so outfit changes it’ll take before I decide what to wear.

I got up.  Went downstairs to discover Roxy in recovery mode, wandering around the first floor checking things out like she’s never seen them before.  So she did have a seizure.  She’s fine now.  But the seizure meant I decided not to take them with me.  And my run got shorter.  Two miles is not enough to calm me down, but I did go a little faster than normal.  Anxiety is the ticket, apparently, for a speedy workout.  I’m inside, I’m warmed up, and I really need to stop typing and get ready.

Cold in Kentucky

Leave a Comment

Well, the weather outside is chilly (not very frightful), but inside is nice and toasty, made more so by the Yuletide Fire DVD Mom got.

I had a very weird few moments at the Canadian Brass concert (where they played only a couple of Christmas songs) Saturday night.  They played Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, which I know from their Greatest Hits album.  I listened to that album on repeat while reading The Mirror of Her Dreams and A Man Rides Through, by Stephen R. Donaldson, years and years ago, and ever since then, whenever I hear that album, I’m returned to that story.  That’s never happened to me with a live performance before, but it did Saturday night.  For the length of the song, scenes from the books were shuffling through my memory.  Strange.  But cool.

Then Jess and I stayed up to watch Love Actually and drink champagne.  🙂  Until 2am.

I wimped out on my run this morning.  I took Howdy with me, but I left my ear muffs and gloves behind.  We only made it three blocks before I decided I was too cold.  That was dumb, ’cause it’s going to be even colder tomorrow.  I won’t forget my ear muffs and gloves again, but I don’t know how much that’ll help.

Couldn’t do it

Leave a Comment

I tried to run this morning.  Really, I did.  I got up before John left for work, put on my running clothes, and then checked the temperature.  About 24 degrees, with a wind chill of 17.  I decided to wait.  Around 10:30, the temperature was about 30, with a wind chill of 20.  I added layers to my running clothes and headed out.  I got to the bottom of the hill, turned the corner, and was blasted back by FRIGID air.  SO cold.  I made it around the block and went home.  I can handle cold (to a point), and I can handle windy (to a point), but the combination is killer.  I thought maybe I could wait until it warms up a little today, but 1) it’s not going to warm up much more, and 2) as the air temperature rises (all of maybe 5 more degrees), the wind speed will rise today, too.  So the wind chill isn’t going to get any better, and I’m a little afraid of the wind chill.

Appliances shouldn’t tell lies

Leave a Comment

Today was a good day.  I ran 5 miles (in the windy, chilly, sunny morning), made kimchi, filed a little, and then went to the holiday party for my new job.  The new job I haven’t started yet.  It was fun, and I’m really glad I went.  I met most of the team for the project I’ll be working on.  My new boss (I think) was assigned to keep me company, so she introduced me to people and stuck by me.  She’s really nice, and she filled me on what I’ll be doing and who I’ll be working with.  Everyone was really friendly.  I’m sure I’ll be nervous as my first day approaches, but after this afternoon, I think I’ll be able to keep those nerves to a minimum.

In other news, I’m cold.  I think the thermostat is lying.  It says it’s 68 degrees in the house (or at least in the dining room), but I don’t believe it.  Appliances shouldn’t tell lies.  (Is a thermostat an appliance?  Maybe it’s a gadget.)  Looking for a replacement is on my list of things to do tomorrow, along with making copies of my house keys and getting an oil change.  And going to the library.

Race results

Leave a Comment

My official race time was 30:51.  That’s not great.  I need to be much better about getting my ass out of bed in the morning to run.

Anyway, Sunday morning.  We made it to Alexandria and parked in Old Town with plenty of time to spare.  Caught the shuttle bus to the starting line on the GW Parkway, and as we walked towards the tent to pick up our race packets, someone shouted my name.  Preethy was there!  This was her first race (and she beat me by almost 2 minutes).  So that was really cool.  We had over an hour to wait before the race started, so we hung out with Preethy and her friend.  I hadn’t seen Preethy since her wedding last August.  (And her new husband, Bob, was nowhere to be found.  He apparently decided to sleep in rather than cheer her on.  I’m sure you can guess my opinion on that.)

Anyway, it was hot and humid.  Upper 70s by the time the race started.  TOO hot.  There were over 1000 people running in just the 5K, so you can imagine how long it took for the crush of people to thin out after the start.  The last stretch was just under a mile, all straight, and at some point we could see the finish line, but it was MUCH farther away than it looked.  Or at least it felt that way.  I thought I was never gonna get there.  Erik came out to watch (yay Erik!) and I heard him shout my name as I went by (I smiled and waved for his camera, but I think it came out blurry or something) and then I heard John shout for me from the other side, but by then I couldn’t even look.  It was all I could to just cross the finish line, and then it took everything I had left to keep from throwing up.  But I recovered pretty fast.  John did very well (under 25 minutes and 81st out of over a thousand).  So we (Erik found me pretty quickly) found John and then headed over to pick up our t-shirts and a bagel.  We didn’t stick around for the post-race party, though.  We walked back to our car to pick up clean (dry) shirts and looked for a place to have breakfast.  We stopped at the first place we saw (the Royal Restaurant I mentioned last night).  It really wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t good.  We probably would have been happier at IHOP or something.  But it was good enough.  My calves were starting to tighten up, so we walked around for a bit and then took Erik home.  It was only 10:30 when we headed for home, which seems crazy to me.  How could we be leaving DC at 10:30 in the morning?  Right – we got there before 6:30.  Right.  Crazier.  We stopped on the way home to get a haircut for John (he wasn’t really sweaty anymore and he was wearing a clean shirt.  That’s not gross, right?  I didn’t think so), and then got sweatier and grosser by mowing the lawn.  On a side note, I don’t like dandelions.  I pulled a ton of them Saturday afternoon, and by noon on Sunday there were more!  I couldn’t have missed that many on Saturday.  Anyway, my point is that after the lawn and the grocery store, we didn’t have any other chores to do that day.  It was great.  And, like I said yesterday, we were exhausted, so it’s good we didn’t plan anything big.

John and I watched Be Kind Rewind last night.  It was cute.  Better than I expected, but also a little weirder.  And I just watched another episode of Dollhouse.  It’s not great TV, but I really like it, and I’m hoping they bring it back next year.

Playing favorites

5 Comments

I went through my bookshelves today and made a list of my favorite books.  It’s a little long.  I’m working on different ways of organizing them.  I ranked them, sort of.  I put them in three groups, anyway, based on how much I love them, but I didn’t rank within the groups.  I might group them by how long they’ve been my favorites.  Should newer books get a lower ranking because I haven’t read them a million times?  Should Anne McCaffrey books be ranked higher because I’ve loved them since i was 9 or 10?  And Anne of Green Gables?  And Pride and Prejudice?  Anyway, I’m obsessing a little over this, but it was a fun way to spend the couple of hours I was home before John got back from class.

Sunday

2 Comments

I’m not crazy about Sundays.  I spend too much time worrying about wasting the rest of my free time.  Take today, for instance.  We slept in, which was very nice, got up a little after 10 (I think), had breakfast around 11, watched some episodes of Mad About You, and went out around noon to get haircuts and buy holiday cards.  We’re back, it’s not yet 2 o’clock, and I feel like so much of the day is gone already.  It doesn’t help that the sun goes down before 5pm now.  I don’t really have anything else to do today, so I should just relax and enjoy it.  And I will.  Eventually.  I’m going to run (which should be interesting; it’s pretty windy today), and then shower, and then curl up on the couch and start on these holiday cards.  We got our first one yesterday.  I was going to check out the new Bloom’s that just opened in the neighborhood (I need contact solution) and maybe get something for dinner.  Maybe I should do that before I run so I don’t have to go out again.  Maybe I should run to the store.  🙂

(A couple of hours later…)

I did.  I ran to the store.  It’s not even a mile away (I think).  Getting there was easy.  And I wasn’t buying much.  So I just grabbed my wallet and put it in one of those cloth grocery bags, rolled it up, and carried it in one hand.  It was certainly chilly and windy, but I was warm enough while running.  And I was immediately overheated when I walked into the store.  I managed.  Anyway, I grabbed what I needed, checked out, and headed home.  It’s a LOT harder to run home with a bag full of stuff.  It wasn’t heavy (maybe 5 or 6 pounds), but hanging the bag from my shoulder meant it was bumping against my hip with every step.  I tried cradling it in my arms in front of me, but that was awkward, too.  So I ended up walking most of the way home.  I think next time I’ll try a backpack.

Now it’s about 5 o’clock.  We ensconced on the couch with our cheese and crackers.  John is trying to install a game on his laptop.  I will probably read.  Catch you later.

Electronic drumsets are SO cool!

Leave a Comment

We went to Melodee Music (in Sterling) and went directly to the drum section.  They had four electronic drumsets set up, but they were roped off with a sign saying to ask for help.  We didn’t have go very far, though, before a store employee showed up.  VERY helpful.  If he works on commission at all, I can see why.  The cheapest drumset (which is apparently for beginners or kids) is on sale for $800.  The two he demonstrated for us (and then let us play) were the upper two, on sale for $2000 and $3600.  That shouldn’t count as “on sale”.  But whatever – they were both REALLY cool and lots of fun to play.  We played Roland sets.  There are plenty of other companies making these, but I haven’t done any research to find out how much they go for and who makes the best ones.  I really haven’t done any research at all.  And because of the price for the upper level models (the ones with the most flexibility, the ones both John and I would prefer to have), this will be a future purchase.  But it’s so cool.  🙂  They have presets so you can change the sound of the entire set or of each pad individually.  The bigger ones have room to add on pieces, and because it’s electronic, you can plug the whole thing into a computer, so John could use it for his studio.

We finished playing around on the drums and John found a guitar to try out.  He wasn’t really crazy about it, but he says that may have been because of the amp he was playing through.  Also, the strings were too thin (lightweight, maybe?) or something.  I was sitting on a stool in the same room, half-listening, half-daydreaming.  I have no idea now what I was thinking about, but I was entertaining myself.  Apparently, I looked bored out of my mind, so John decided one guitar was enough to try today and said we could leave.  I didn’t realize he did that for me until we were most of the way home, though.  I just thought he was done.  I didn’t mean to look bored.  I was just deep in thought.  Honest.  🙂

We’re settling in for the night with a fire, a movie, and dinner.  And for the record, I did run today.

Fighting that lazy feeling

5 Comments

I ran this morning!  It feels like more of an accomplishment than it should.  I mean, I should be running almost every day, so the fact that I ran this morning shouldn’t feel so momentous.  I need to get back into the habit.  Whatever, I still did good.  I ran three miles today, no walking.  Usually, when I’ve taken this much time off, I have to add a couple of short stretches of walking.  Except for about a week’s worth of slow 2-mile jaunts with the dogs and two 3-mile workouts by myself (including today’s), the only running I’ve done in the last few weeks has been the races (three in November).  I’ve been lazy since the end of October.  I just reread that list of what I’ve done and it doesn’t come across as all that lazy, but to put it another way, I’ve gone running about 12 times in 6 weeks.  I should have gone running about 30 times (5 days a week, 6 weeks).

With colder weather coming, though, I’ll need to change my routine.  I should do that anyway.  Add strength training, something like that.

Well, I have to get ready to go.  Dentist appointment today (left side deep cleaning!  Woo!) and then work.  Exciting stuff.

Almost forgot about the Ashburn 5K results!

Leave a Comment

The results for the Thanksgiving Day Ashburn 5K were finally posted.  According to the official results (and considering the issues at the finish line, I have no idea how they measured this), I finished in 30:29.  Not terrible, but not below 30 minutes.  However.  These are results I don’t trust, don’t believe at all.  The problem is that I really have no way of estimating what my actual time was.  At the very least, I think I beat 30 minutes (in reality, in actual time) because it was about 20 seconds before I passed the start line and I was delayed for a while (definitely more than 10 seconds) at the finish line because of the line of runners backed up from the chute.  So I think I can comfortably tell myself I beat 30, without knowing my actual time.  I’m considering running with a watch in the future, and tracking my own time.  On the other hand, am I really that anal?  (Shut up, people.)  I’m not qualifying for anything, I’m not training for anything.  I’m running for weight loss and overall health.  I can be mildly competitive and not go overboard.  Right?  We’ll see.

It’s also possible that I didn’t beat 30 minutes.  I’ll never know.  So you know what?  No more obsessing.  About this race.  🙂

Health update and other things

10 Comments

I went to the doctor today.  I’d been feeling progressively better over the last few days, but then I couldn’t stop coughing last night.  I actually slept in the guest room because the bed in there is in the corner.  I piled every pillow in the house (I let John keep a couple) into that corner so I could sleep sitting upright.  It still took forever for me to stop coughing long enough to fall asleep.  It was nice to wake up to sunlight streaming in the window, though.  Our bedroom is on the north side of the house, so I don’t usually get to the see that.  The window in the guest room faces south.  Anyway, even taking the same medicines I’ve been taking all week, I couldn’t get my coughing under control today.  So finally I left the office this afternoon to go to the doctor.

Turns out I have bronchitis.

First Question: How can I have bronchitis and still feel perfectly healthy (cough aside)?  I don’t feel sick.  My head is clear, I’m not achy, I don’t have a fever – and yet, I have bronchitis.  Well, whatever.  I’m just glad to know what it is and to have the right medication.

Second Question: Does this mean I shouldn’t run in the Herndon Turkey Trot tomorrow?  I was assuming an immediate no since, you know, I have BRONCHITIS, but the doctor said that as long as I start the antibiotic and other medication (robitussin dm and an inhaler of some kind), I should be fine.  It’s at 4pm, it’ll be about 40 degrees out, and I’ll be bundled up.   So I’ll be running a 5K tomorrow and then hanging out with my friends (dinner and Bond!).  Totally weird.

In other news, I have no other news.  Really.  Work was slow.  We had our annual office Thanksgiving lunch, so there were a lot of people in the office we don’t usually see.  That makes it sound like we brought strangers in off the street or something.  Which actually would have been a really nice thing to do.  No, I meant that the people who work in the Ballston office came over, and some people brought their families in.  We saw all the new babies (who I stayed far away from, I promise) and got to catch up with coworkers we really only see about once a year.  It’s generally a nice event (and we have a new caterer this year who’s REALLY good), but I didn’t stick around since I figured it wouldn’t be polite to cough all over the crowds in the conference room and kitchen.

Damn.  I just checked tomorrow’s forecast.  It’s going to be about 35 degrees and WINDY tomorrow afternoon.  A 25mph wind will make it feel like about 25 degrees, and that’s what I’ll be running in.  Makes me look forward to it just a bit less.  Just a bit.  Then again, I have already discovered that the Weather Channel lies to me, so maybe it won’t be that bad.

Running in the cold is HARD

Leave a Comment

This may surprise you, but running in the cold sucks.  At least for now the sun is up when we go out in the morning, but it’s not really helping.  According to www.weather.com (which John is convinced I rely on too much), it was 31 degrees out when I left the house and 27 degrees when I came back.  Isn’t that  backwards? How does it get colder in half an hour when the sun is up and there’s no wind?  Doesn’t it usually get warmer as the day progresses?  So maybe John’s right and weather.com is lying to me.  Either way, I need to buy actual cold-weather running clothes.  Running when temperatures are below freezing takes almost all the willpower I have, and maybe having cool new weather-appropriate clothes will make it easier to get out of bed.

5K results

Leave a Comment

I realized late last night that I left out the actual results of the 5K we ran yesterday, in case anyone was interested.  My official race time was 29:48, which works out to a 9:36 pace.  That seems unreal to me, since when I run on my own, I usually run a 10-10:30 minute mile, and that stretches to 12:30 when I take the dogs.  In my first 5K, I finished in 29:22 or something like that.  My last 5K was 31:42 (ish).  I’m not all that consistent yet.  I plan to actually train for the Herndon Turkey Trot on the 22nd, so hopefully I’ll still finish in under 30 minutes.  John finished this one in 24:16 (a 7:49 pace!).  I think he’s trying to break 24 minutes.  I don’t really have a goal time.  I just like how I feel when I’m done.  🙂

Purcellville Turkey Trot

Leave a Comment

This morning was the annual (I guess, but we’ve never done it before) Purcellville Turkey Trot.  John and I registered a few weeks ago to run the 5K, but neither of us really prepared for it.  And then last night I checked the weather and saw the 50% chance of rain all morning.  So we decided to make the decision when we got up, based on whether or not it was raining then.  We both knew that putting off making the decision about whether to go until morning made it a lot less likely that we would actually get out of bed.  But 7:00 rolled around, the alarm went off, it wasn’t raining, and John (very unenthusiastically) said we really should go.  We paid to register, so we should go (and get our t-shirts.  I know that’s Dad’s big motivation!).  My argument was that the money was going to a good cause (Loudoun Valley Community Center, I think) whether we ran or not.  But he was right, so we got up and got going.  It took us about 25 minutes or so to get there.  It was a little chilly (mid to upper 50s), but we found a great parking spot in the (really cute) historic section of Purcellville, right across the street from the registration table.  Picked up our goodie bags, pinned our numbers to our shirts, and then stood in line for the bathroom.  Girls take forever!  Except me.  🙂  We were almost the last people to join the crowd at the starting line, and then John helped me get a little more towards the middle (because I’m really paranoid about being the last person in a race.  I didn’t want to start out at the very back.).

Anyway, the race started and I lost sight of John immediately (as usual).  I was trying to figure out which random people in the pack I would end up staying near the whole time.  There’s always someone I’m trying to catch and someone I’m trying to stay ahead of.  Today there was a short woman in a white shirt and a brown hat who was usually just ahead of me.  I passed her a couple of times, but never for very long.  There was also a woman wearing today’s race shirt (the shirts for this race are really nice – soft, long-sleeve, and nice autumn gold color) and long grey pants, tall, who stayed pretty much even with me the whole race.  We leap-frogged some, but neither of us could break away.  Finally, there was this girl in a light blue shirt who drove me crazy.  She was running just ahead of me, but then she’d stop to walk.  I’d pass her, and then a while later, she’d pass me, running again.  But she never got very far ahead of me, so what kind of pace was she running?  Fast enough to catch up and pass me after walking for a while, but not so fast that she never got more than 15-20 feet ahead of me – that’s a really weird, uneven pace.  And no, I wasn’t speeding up when she was ahead of me.  So that was driving me a little crazy ’cause she just didn’t fit.

The second mile was HARD.  It was all along this long, straight, hilly road.  There may have only been two or three hills, but they were big ones.  You couldn’t see the next one until you had climbed the first, so you couldn’t tell how many more times you’d be running uphill.  And no one likes to run uphill.  The third mile was mostly on the W&OD Trail, and that was gorgeous.  It was lined with trees, so the trail was lightly covered in leaves, and the sun had come out.  Very pleasant, even though the third mile is when I’m struggling and just trying to keep my feet moving.  I had planned to try to sprint to the finish, but I couldn’t see the clock and the line until I was almost on top of them, so I didn’t end up doing that.  I finished strong, though.  And I felt great when it was over.  We grabbed some water, walked around a little, and headed back home.  John wanted to stop at Melodee Music to see if they had a bridge for his guitar, but they weren’t open yet, so we had breakfast at the Georgetown Cafe in Leesburg.

The Georgetown Cafe is on King Street, just south of Market.  I’ve seen it a bunch of times, but have never gone in.  They had a sign in the window advertising chocolate chip pancakes, so we decided to go in (and then neither of us ordered chocolate chip pancakes).  Anyway, the waiter/host/etc (manager?) was Gary (I think), and was really nice.  A little goofy, but nice, and we’ll definitely be coming back.  I can see us becoming regulars (sort of – we don’t do breakfast out all that often).  He says he gets a lot of runners on weekends after races.

To wrap up this very long post, we had a yummy breakfast, went to Melodee where John did not find a bridge for his guitar, went to Potomac River Running to buy new shoes for me, and then came home.  We’re going to West Virginia in less than two hours, so I’m going to take care of a couple of things (like showering and packing).