Jack 15

Ran 15.28 miles this morning. Just for fun. Yep. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Truly though, I used this race as a training run. I have a marathon coming up in 4 weeks and I needed a decent, forced if you can call it that, long run.

The race was interesting - very small and also a relay. Most of the 100 runners were running the relay of varying amounts. Only 35 or so of us ran the full thing. I don't mind relays but when I'm running behind someone, using them as a guide to keep my pace going and then they stop at 7.5 and their super-speedy boyfriend takes over the last half, it's a little dejecting.

But my first hour was awesome. I was averaging a 10min/mile pace. Seriously! I finished mile 6 at 1:01. How insane is that? That really took me by surprise - especially since part of that - a couple miles or so - was on gravel! Thank God I have been training on gravel. That really helped.

But my next hour was rough. I really dropped in pace and motivation. My head wasn't in it, I was struggling to keep a decent breath, and I had a stitch in my side that would not go away. So I was at about 10.5 when I hit hour 2 and met up with MS.

The last hour went better. I realized if I got my pace back up I could almost make my same time I had in a half marathon 2 years ago. I was off by a minute or two for that mileage, but it made me feel so much better. My pace wasn't as bad as I thought. I was doing pretty well considering. So my mojo came back and I did better for the last hour. And I was able to pass one more person (granted he was, like, 90, but still) and that helped too.

The finish line was kind of pathetic. And there wasn't chip timing, but overall it wasn't a bad run. One of the bad things was that we were running to a specific landmark which you could see at mile 10.5 - that sucked because you knew to where you were running, but you also knew just how far away it really was. Uffda. It was at that point that I got a little sad that I don't get to run TCM next week. The best part of that race is that you don't see the finish until you're almost right on top of it so it's always there to look forward to reaching. Today, I just kept looking at the finish and wondering why it was taking me so long to get there.

Anyway, I'm happy with my time (2:56:18) and after today the meals will get back on track to help me get ready for the marathon. I'm hoping for a good time this year. I need it and I've been working hard for it.

Gearing up! And a woot!

I finally figured out my Garmin and I CAN get my splits once I download or upload, rather, my info to my online tracking. WOOT! So the watch stays and will be used.

Tomorrow I'm running a race that is 15.2 miles. It starts in a small town (at the funeral home - which I really think should be the finish line) and down some highways and finish at the next town's college campus. It should be an interesting run. I've read ONE review which said, "This is a great race if you like rolling hills. And I mean a lot of rolling hills." So hills it shall be.

MS is schlepping for me tomorrow again. Yay! It'll be nice to have him to run to. And with my new watch it should be great. A race report will come tomorrow! Woot!

So I've been "woot"ing a lot lately. I'm not sure how this got into my vocabulary, but I kind of like it.

So WOOT! :)

Best quote from last night:

MS was talking with his friend SMC last night about my new toy and apparently SMC had asked him if I liked running enough to spend the money on a Garmin or something. MS said, "She's addicted to it. She just sometimes needs a kick in the pants to get going." And with that tapped my butt with his foot and mouthed, "Get moving!" with a smile.

So I did. :)

New toy

Over the weekend I bought a Garmin. A Garmin 110, to be specific. A lot of my running friends have one version or another and I thought maybe it was time for me to suck it up and get a decent running watch - one that calculates my pace for me, one that can tell me how many calories I burned, one that automatically laps each mile (or however I set it up) so I don't have to push the button. So I took the plunge.

And I love it!!! Last night after MS and I got home from Kari's (where we watched the Cowboys-Niners game) it was just too beautiful to not run. So I headed out with my new watch in hand (or on my arm as it were) and gave it a whirl.

So of course, I started out too fast and had my first mile, on loose gravel, in 9:31. Holy crap. That scared me and had me out of breath so I walked for a bit to regroup. The rest of the run was awesome and I discovered that, per the Garmin, my run is 4.07 miles instead of the 3.77 I usually map it out to be. YAY! More miles!

The only drawback, and maybe I can figure it out, is that now that my run is done, I can't go back and look at my splits. My friend Sara's does, but she has a 210. I'm not sure I like that part. Maybe when I upload my runs, the splits will show up. If not, I may be taking it back and shelling out more money for a higher version. If it does, then I'm good. Most of the higher models have a lot of bells and whistles that I just don't need, so why waste the money. And maybe my splits aren't that important - just the overall pace, which I get. Maybe. :)

Ba-lloon

Everytime I hear the word "balloon" I think of Mindy from "Buttons & Mindy" on Animaniacs (or was it Tiny Toons?). Anyway... the way she said it always made me smile. I was trying to find it on youtube but of course I can't remember the episode and I'm at work so I shouldn't be doing that anyway.

ANYWAY...I digress. So yesterday I got some bad news at work. Not really bad because for the person it directly affects it's a great thing, but for me it sucks a$$. It's a long story and I can't & won't go into it here, but it sucks.

So last night as I was falling asleep I was dreaming about a balloon. It was purple and it was rising up into the air. Suddenly it popped and my hand, which was holding MS's (yes, I know - ewwww!) flopped up and down on the bed and I jerked awake.

It was disturbing so, as has been the theme as of late, I looked up what dreaming about balloon's means:

from dreamforth.com:
To dream of balloons represents deflating aspirations and difficulty in life. Something in your life could spiral downhill. Balloons are also indicative of an overinflated ego. Black balloons signify depression, especially if they are falling to earth.

To dream of a rising balloon means that situations in your life are working to elevate above you. This is your inner yearning to break free of it. Balloons within dreams also signify gatherings and joyous parties. You should revisit your inner youth.

If a balloon pops in your dream, this represents an aspiration that has not yet been realized. This could also be indicative of pressure in your life that is becoming unbearable.

and from sleeps.com
To dream of seeing balloons in your dream indicates a dashing of hope on any and all fronts, business or love, as well as a general falling off of all kinds of businesses you may be involved in. If you are ascending in a balloon this is an omen of especially frustrating conditions in your life.

The latter seems real - dashing of hope and frustrating conditions. Oh well. It's not the end of the world, but it does suck and right now, as I kept telling the person who told me this yesterday, "I'm not happy."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19TBzy81Mac

Running

Last Friday I had to complete my fitness assessment for work. So this is situps, pushups and a 1.5 mile run. I also had to have my waist measured.

My waist measurement was my scariest moment. I've yo-yo'd so much this year and last week I was back up, which isn't good. So measuring my waist was scary. Luckily the gals measuring measure differently than I do and measure smaller, so I was good.

Up next: situps and pushups. Last year I struggled with these but this year I rocked it. 51 situps with so much ease I could have kept going. 40 pushups that were a little more rough (I rested more than I needed or should have) but still that was 12 more than last year at this time. Woot!

Then I had Casey pace me again and this year my goal was 14:30. Last year I was sloooowww, and I needed to improve that this year. So 14:30 was the goal. We started out and I felt really good, and at one point she even said, "Um, you're about a minute faster on pace than you wanted to be...we should slow down a bit." So we did...but we were doing great. I was even able to talk a bit - a minute bit that is. :)

The bad thing was my shins were cramping which wasn't fun. And then the last half my quads started to get tight. But we kicked it in and I ended up finishing in 13:47.

!!!!!13:47!!!!!

I'm so stoked! Last year was 15:46... almost a full 2 minutes off my time from last year. AND it's my fastest time in the last 5 years, and probably my fastest ever. All day I kept saying, "13:47!" at random moments.

So at least, despite my weight issue, my legs are strong and my will is powerful. 6 weeks to Mankato. :)

Mini-vacay

MS and I took a little road trip this week so we could meet up with his best friends (and so I could get approval). So we headed to the hills for some fun. It was a nice relaxing couple of days with no worries, lots of fresh air, and great people to be around.

MS's best friend took this photo...happiness all around.

And more

This is almost getting funny...yet they aren't.

So last night's dream found me in a hospital waiting the impending birth of my mom's newest child.

Yes, you read that right. My Mom was pregnant in the dream.

She was just about to pop and so we...

You know...nevermind. This one is just disturbing on many levels - it wasn't just mom, there was another family there who had a horrible moment. I remember the other lady was wearing a white basketball uniform with green lettering being carried by two guys into the next room and her toenails were watermelon green. After that, the rest was just sad.

Nevermind.

More dreams

This one was short but by far my favorite.

Last night I dreamed that K showed up unexpectedly, because she sensed that I needed to be with a dear friend, and she brought the Nikanator along. It was great. After big hugs from both of them, K went to get Nika something and Nika yelled out, "Don't forget to bring one for Sara!"

My heart was all warm and fuzzy.

Miss you all - K, E and Nika. :) *hugs*

Car

I dreamt about a car again last night. This time my mom and dad were helping my 2nd nephew to buy a car. We were in the cities and met up with some guy who had a parking ramp in his basement where he stored the cars he sold. He had ONE for sale - a dusty rose colored 4-door wagon of sorts. It was kind of ugly but my 2nd nephew seemed to like it and so we took it for a test drive. I sat in the back seat behind the driver, my nephew, who pushed the seat back so far and then leaned it back so far that I could poke him all the way down his back. Weird. That was about the excitement of it.

So after all these car dreams, I decided to look up what this all means in a dream dictionary. I don't take a lot of stock in this but it's been 3 car dreams in a week so something's going on in my brain (besides poor diet).

So here you go:
To dream that you are driving a car denotes your ambition, your drive and your ability to navigate from one stage of your life to another. Consider how smooth or rough the car ride is. If you are driving the car, then you are taking an active role in the way your life is going. However, if you are the passenger, then you are taking a passive role. If you are in the backseat of the car, then it indicates that you are putting yourself down and are allowing others to take over. This may be a result of low self-esteem or low self-confidence. Overall, this dream symbol is an indication of your dependence and degree of control you have on your life.

So in a couple of my dreams I was navigating my life - but apparently not well if I'm driving an AMC Pacer in one and a truck that I can't keep in the right lane and end up running over trees and boulevards. Uffda. Of course later I looked up truck and here's what that means:

Truck: To see a truck in your dream suggests that you are overworked. You are taking on too many tasks and are weighed down by all the responsibilities.

Well that's completely true. This past week (weeks) has been rough. It's end of fiscal year for us and we're constantly trying to tie up a bunch of loose ends on top of continuing training for a big training event we have coming up in a week that I have no idea what I'm doing for it. I'm slowly going insane. No...I may already be there. I'm sure this isn't helping my blah feeling today either. But what do you do?

Blah, icky day

So it's been 17 years. Yep, 17 years since my Dad died. 17 years to the day, to the day of the week even. It's been kind of a slap in the face, which shocks me after all these years. I'm not weepy sad, just blah sad. It just kind of sucks that he's not around anymore. So much has changed that he's missed, where we've missed having him around. It's just sad.

Weird dreams

I know that my eating habits influence so much more of my life. This week has been awful for food. The other day my lunch was a Snickers and Diet Dew. I've been eating a lot of Jimmy John's too, which isn't necessarily bad, but not really good either.

But when my dreams turn wacko I know I need to work on what I'm eating. The other night I dreamt that I traded in Morty for this:


Yes, that's an AMC Pacer. But mine was purple. PURPLE. I know...I'm struggling here.

Last night, I dreamt that I was borrowing RAC's truck and I struggled to drive it because it was SO big that I couldn't turn it down the right road. In fact, at one point, I went around a building, in through the delivery door and parked in the popcorn store where I wanted to go. Somehow the truck fit in the store with no damage to the store at all. When I got out of the car, a pilot I know (who had a full beard - odd) told me he had watched me drive outside and was thankful that he hadn't gotten hit since I almost took a tree when I went over the boulevard to get the truck back in the right driving lane. Whatever. Then I looked for popcorn (because it was supposed to be a specialty popcorn shop) and all the place had was 4 boxes of factory popcorn, but a whole refrigerated case full of various kinds of cheesecake. So I ordered a chocolate covered cherry topped cheesecake. I wanted it in a box to go but the lady didn't understand me, so I ended up just taking it out in a small paper dish thing.

Yeah, I need to eat better. Help.

Notes to self

Don't write down on a running log that you're going to run later in the day because you know it's never going to happen.

Don't NOT run in the morning just because you think you're tired. The run will do you good and you know you won't get it done later in the day.

When you wake up in the morning, RUN. Don't think about it, just go.

In summary: Run in the morning as soon as you get it up if you want to run at all.

1 mile

I ran a mile today.

In some circumstances that would be a profound statement, but usually for me this is just a warm up. But today, the good thing about this 1 mile is that I ran it in 8:59.

The pessimist in me figures that the "mile" we run isn't actually a mile, but maybe. I mapped it out on Map My Run and from corner to corner it's 1.05, so maybe. I really should get a Garmin so I can actually map what I run. For now, that's pretty damn impressive for me - especially, this morning when it was so humid the guys I was running with said it felt like running through soup.

But hey, the optimist in me says that this time is awesome. I'm excited that I could make it in 9 minutes because that means that next week when I do my fitness test for work, when I have to run a mile and a half, I should make it in 14:30 which is my goal. If I can make it faster I'll be stoked.

Today, I downloaded all my training since January 30, 2009, which was all my log (DailyMile.com) still had listed. Based on the latter, I'm glad I downloaded all of these today. I don't want to lose any more, and I know that I had more before 2009. So now I have something I can fall back on. It was interesting to see how much more I ran in 2009 (which was the year I had my PR for the TC Marathon). Last year I hardly ran at all. It's amazing I was even sort of able to finish.

So far this year, I'm doing well with running. I do need to get a few more miles in, but considering a year ago I ran a total of 10 miles in August and this month I ran 62, I think I'm doing better. And I do have a couple extra weeks before my marathon this year, AND I've been doing extra strength training which is great.

So I ran a mile. And today that mile was a PR. And I'm a happy camper. I can't wait for my long run tomorrow. It'll be less humid and I'm sure it will go well. And if it doesn't, there's always the next day and I'll learn from the run anyway.