The easiest hard decision I’ve ever had to make this week

I have a confession to make.  My last long run? Oh, umm, it was back in August on the 17th.  Fourteen miles…split between two days. It was rough.  The week before, I busted out 18 miles.  And by “busted” I mean, I ran on the treadmill.  Treadmill running is still legit but 18 miles on a treadmill is a WHOLE different world than on pavement or trails.  Ya know?   Then the week after the rough/split 14 miles, we went to San Francisco to celebrate our 5 year anniversary. After that, I kind of face planted into a mess of not wanting to get up in the morning to run, right as the teens started ramping up their daily doubles and the rest of the back to school events ensued.  And by events, I kind of just mean, back to school shopping and soaking up the rest of the summer in a kick backed manner.

Basically, I just painted you a messy picture of why I decided yesterday that I’m not going to run the Portland, Oregon marathon for my 4th year in a row.  (See I had to tell you I’ve already run it three times so you wouldn’t think I’m a slacker….but we all know the truth. Shhh….)

I’m ok with it.  I had been dreading it and already looking past it to future races.  I’d love to focus on some shorter races and stay in running shape for a half marathon being my longest distance.  I know there will be more full marathons, but for now, I’m really pleased with my decision. There have been some shorter races in the spring and summer that I would like to do and a trail running series that sounds fun, but I’ve either been too tired from marathon training or I didn’t want to risk getting injured. My hubs and I have already planned on running a local 5k here on October 5th and we’re going out for a test run next Sunday.  That’s progress!  We haven’t run together since October of last year.  Having a treadmill handy, I guess I kind of turned into an agoraphobic or one of these phobias:

Chionophobia

This is the fear of snow. Which if you're a winter sports fan sounds pretty unusual but it often centers around a fear of snow flakes, making it an awkward phobia to have in certain climates.

Gephyrophobia

Another awkward worry to have: the fear of crossing bridges. If you're unfortunate enough to suffer from this then your journeys could get a lot longer. Modern architecture helps prevent disasters like the Tacoma Narrows Bridge that collapsed spectacularly in 1940, just a few months after it was first opened to the public.

Fear of cracks in the pavement

Another one I couldn't find an official name for. This is the phobia of stepping on cracks in the pavement and is normally coupled with the worry that the cracks will open up and maybe swallow you up or - in one of the more extreme examples I found - suck you into another dimension entirely.

(source)

Oh and in other news?  Two of the peeps at my office have some sort of yucky cold/flu.

 

(SOURCE)

Not that I want to get sick but it’s not like I’m on Outbreak Watch like I have been in past years.  Well, I did disinfect my phone this morning after a client used it, so never mind.

 

(source)

More #3 Marathon Deets

Race day morning, I woke up at 4am and did everything right.  Everything that relates to fueling and well all that other fun stuff you do before a big race.  The one thing I didn’t do so well was waking my hubs up on time.  What?!  I gave him roughly 20 minutes to get himself together. haha!  Whoops!  I thought he was a big boy and he had set his own alarm.  Then I just lost track of time.  Doesn’t matter.  We still made it there with plenty of time to find a free parking spot, walk six blocks to our corral, stand in a long line for the porta potty, and even then, he still had time to walk all the way back to the care for our sunglasses and chapstick.  We had already started the race and he’s like, “Hey, I grabbed your cherry lip balm too, btw.”  Greatest husband of the year contender right there!

Uh so…I take really crappy awesome pictures right?  Here’s the start line…

and here’s a pirate or two…

  And here’s what we got at the finish.  The end.

Isn’t the shirt cool?  I kind of feel like a distant relative of an Olympian when I wear it! I mean, Kara Goucher and I both have brown hair, right?

Haha!  JK!  I know you wanted to hear a mile by mile break down of the marathon, right?  Hmm, well let me summarize…

• We started out great.  It was a little chilly and my fingers finally started warming up around mile 3.  My nose didn’t stop running until around mile 18.  At the start, it was in the low 50s maybe?  Perfect weather.
• The first half of the marathon, we felt great…stopped to pee twice.  My hubs added on a few seconds to our time because he went around a spot and wouldn’t go through a grassy area that looked muddy.  He didn’t want to get his shoes wet.  Our splits were good, not too fast and feeling great.
• Mile 13 my calves started to cramp a little and it was a long stretch to the next aid station for water.  Mile 15 I stopped to stretch while the hubs pit stopped.  I didn’t have to go….very unlike me.  Up the bridge, but not like last year where I ran the whole thing.  I made it though yet didn’t feel the elation on the other side.  It was warm, my nose was still running like crazy…was I seriously getting a cold on marathon day?!  Magically, it stopped running around mile 19…right about the time my quads started to crazy cramp up and I thought my legs could fall off.
• Then I stopped sweating.  I didn’t realize it at the time but I was suffering from moderate dehydration.  I’m never dehydrated, and yet I chose to run without liquid, like I had done the previous two years. BUT I failed to calculate the 20 degree spike in the temperature.  Normally, I take in a couple of ounces of water each mile, race day….it was down to every 1.5 to two miles and it was too late for me.  I was dumping water on myself now at each station to cool myself down.  The down hills were nice because even though it hurt, it didn’t hurt as much.  In the last 6 miles we passed 141 people (Race stats….no, I wasn’t counting) and only 11 people passed us.
• The last 6 miles were the worst and my confidence in my training wasn’t there.  I knew I hadn’t trained like I wanted to.  I also had the guilt of running with my husband in his first marathon and I was worried he would be disappointed in me and it would affect his race negatively.  At one time, I started to tear up and he barked at me that there was no crying yet.  Later we laughed because a lack of tears is a sign of dehydration…I claimed that’s why I was able to keep it together.  He just wanted to run a marathon with his wife and he didn’t care about the time except that it would be really cool to beat my time from last year. Awwwwww….

A couple of other weird things:

I completely forgot all my running mantras.  I realized it on the course yet it still did me no good. 

I might have broken my iPod too with all the water splashing.  I’m too scared to test it out.  It’s not the battery.  Maybe I just confused it? 

The state of one of my toenails is also in a precarious situation.  It may or may not make it.  I will be sure to keep you informed.

Afterwards, on our trip home, I drank and drank and drank…which thrilled the hubs with all the potty stops.  My appetite didn’t return until about 7 hours later which made my annual Yogurtland tradition kind of a disappointment and also our first trip to 5 Guys a little sad.

I warned you that I wouldn’t stop talking about the marathon for a whole year, so I bet you can’t wait for my next blog!

For you runnerds:

Split	Time
1	11:35.6
2	11:27.0
3	11:37.7
4	10:14.5
5	11:37.0
6	10:48.3
7	11:01.3
8	10:58.8
9	11:26.9
10	11:13.4
11	12:09.3
12	11:35.7
13	11:06.9
14	11:41.5
15	11:59.5
16	15:40.1
17	12:21.2
18	11:55.3
19	14:10.6
20	13:14.4
21	13:15.6
22	12:58.8
23	11:29.2
24	13:34.5
25	12:37.3
26	13:18.6
27	04:50.2
Summary	19:58.9

The road trip to marathon #3 – Portland, Oregon

Our marathon weekend started out with a short 5 plus hour drive with the husband o’ mine. In case you missed it, my hubs was running his first marathon with me.  And probably his last one. *sad face*  The drive caused some anxiety and I tried not to take the mishaps we encountered as a sign of what was might come.  Let’s see….we almost rear-ended a car in front of us, that instead of getting into the turning lane, it didn’t.  He just stopped right in the middle of the highway in a 55 mph section.  S saw the whole thing, brake lights, turning signal…then I showed him a bag of jalapeno jerky I bought him…we looked up and the car hadn’t moved over into the empty turning lane.  It was scary how quickly it all happened and how quickly things could have changed. The next mishap wasn’t so dramatic and just involved a very large tire that a semi truck lost and was dangerously in the middle of the road.  Lastly, we had a very large rock from somewhere nail our front windshield.  We now have a pretty nice chip that is almost an inch in diameter.  All this happened within the first 2.5 hours of out trip.  Thank goodness that was the end of the driving drama.  (Well, except when our GPS took us on a mini, yet scenic, detour of Portland.)
We made it to the expo with plenty of time to spare.  S was great and really let me wander around looking at everything.  It’s the only race expo I’ve been too x3 and I don’t think you could call it big…but I thought it was just the right size.  It seemed to me that there were more goodies there than last year?  Or maybe I was just a little more bold in snagging the free samples.

The participant shirt, my new free Nuun water bottle the nice guy gave me when I purchased a new to me flavor of Nuun.  The verdict on the grape Nuun is that I love it but I’m slightly weirded out that it’s not purple in color.  I’ll take no artificial colorings though over purple any day…it was just odd at first.  Some of the samples were from the hubs that he gifted to me as he’s not a huge fan of anything with the word “healthy” on it.  You also don’t see a few packets of fruit snacks that I had already eaten along with the samples that you had to consume there.  I’ll tell you more later about these fabulous snack bars we had there though.  OMG!

I had a celebrity sighting in the form of a blogger…and by celebrity, I mean…another normal person with a blog and I just happened to recognize her.  I didn’t say hi because I thought that would make me a weird stalker.  I told my husband and he said I was stupid and then tried to help me find her to say hi.  No luck.  I ended up stalking her on twitter instead.  We connected and all is restored in the land of crazy running bloggers.
After the expo, we went and found our cheapy hotel room.  I didn’t care it wasn’t so fabulous.  It was cheap, only a 15 minute drive from the start AND they were super nice and let us extend our late checkout to 2pm with no charge.  Hellooooo post race shower and ice bath for FREE!  Our dinner plans were changed rather last minute due to a certain college student not wanting to hang out with old people.  When will they learn to take advantage of free food?!  Fine then!  We ended up going to a better place than we would have gone…Claim Jumpers.  The main reason being that it was close to the hotel and something about some sports casters that the hubs always listen to…they eat there…blah blah blah.  I don’t remember names or any other part of the story.  That’s what a slice of cake that is bigger than your head will do to your memory.

Guess how much that slice of cake cost?

I was very pleased with my dinner choice too.  Some sort of parmesan crusted chicken breast and the obligatory spaghetti with marinara sauce.  It was delicious yet I managed to put half aside for after the marathon.  (Turned out that I took a couple of bites and then tossed it.  No appetite until later in the evening.)

I’ve told you before, my photography skills are something to be admired.

Back to the hotel for an early 4am wake up call for me.  I’m pretty sure I was asleep by 9pm.  Not too shabby!
To be continued….

Happy things…and a marathon tomorrow!

In just ONE day, I will run my 3rd marathon.  I’m kind of wishing that I had trained better.  I told myself last year that I would.  I can’t really pinpoint why I didn’t either.  Oh yeah, because I’m a lazy runner!  I’ve already started telling myself that, next year, I will train smarter and run faster/better/more amazing.  I better start talking to myself in a different tone of voice then to make that happen.
Speaking of happy, here are a couple of things that are making me happy at the moment. (I wasn’t really speaking of happy stuff.  That was just a really stupid way to transition to a completely different topic. I’m cool like that.)
The worlds very bestest cake parfait…yep, cake!

I carefully selected the breakroom table and fridge as the backdrop for this photo session.  To impress you even further, an Avon catalog can be seen if you peer through the tines of the plastic fork.  Amazing photography skills?  You bet!

Friday was supposed to be margarita lime cupcake day Friday…but alas, the bakery had every other flavor BUT the MLC, as I like to call it…because I’m hip to the cupcake lingo.  So, my eyes landed on the cake parfait.  I don’t know what sucked me in more, the pretty little mason jar, the yellow string, the fresh fruit?  (Thanks to Joel, he gave me his mason jar too.) Whatever it was, it was the best $4 that I have spent all week.  Unless you count the $4 that went towards the $6 package of jalapeno jerky I bought for my lovey.

That right here (nice segue, huh?) is the cutest, tiniest pumpkin in the whooolee wide world!  When you hold it, you can’t HELP but talk to it in the itty-ist baby voice EVER!  My blond moment for the hour was that I had no clue, absolutley none, that a crazy normal person could actually grow these in their own backyard.  Whoda thunk?! Not me!  I just never actually considered where baby pumpkins came from. NOW, I’m very excited for next year as I want to grow my own little baby boos. Oh and WHITE PUMPKINS!  I bet I can grow those too!  Reminds me of the time I had three pumpkin plants take over my back yard.

See?  I gave you a nicer background this time….my day planner.  You are welcome.  I like to call this, “Tiny Pumpkin”.  It’s for sale.  Serious buyers only please.

Well, wish me luck on the marathon.  That’s all I will be talking about for the next year.  Especially if I’m able to meet my goal in running it under 5 hours.  I guess I should go pack since we are starting the road trip in a few minutes.

I’m a horrible blogger

Ahem.  Who’s been busy?  Raise your hand!  Who’s NOT busy?  Says no one ever never.  That’s not why this blog is horrible.  It’s horrible because there are no pictures, no recipe.  You really need to make the White Chicken Chili I mention….there will be pictures and a recipe.  Pinky promise.  Oh hey, I could throw in a couple of pictures that have made me chuckle…that I stole from somewhere.  Let’s do that and call it good for now. FOUND THE LINK TO THE White Chicken Chili.  It is AMAZING.  I SWAR.  See?!!  I’m only a little horrible now.
PS All pictures stolen from the wide web of the world.  And if you don’t understand the whole ermagerd thing, then you’re just not living with a teenager silly.
I just wasted about five minutes of my life trying to figure out how to add a folder to my gallery on my phone.  I have a habit of taking pictures of recipes I want to try.  And I wanted to separate the recipes out from the other stupid pictures I take.  Can’t do it.  Bummer.  I wonder if there’s an app for that?
Life has been whizzing by.  I’ve successfully finished painting the piece of furniture I picked up on the side of the road for $20 when the price tag said $25 but the dude didn’t want all of my scrounged change writers desk that is in our kitchen and a chest that was at the foot of my bed. Maybe you want to see pictures?

Not my desk.

I’m itching to paint my desk and filing cabinet now but did I mention a baby quilt that I need to get finished?  I tried to finish the baby quilt last weekend, but our one and only fabric store is moving to a bigger location and instead of moving the inventory they are selling it at ridiculous prices.  I did not have patience to wade through the bargain shoppers that were in line to score 90% off.  I also don’t do Black Friday sales.  Tells you something about my patience levels.
The other thing that drove me crazy last weekend?  I had a gift card to Dutch Bros.  I had no energy.  I think, great!  I will try one of the Red Bull infused drinks.  It was free coffee day, everyone in town that was not at the fabric store was in line and causing traffic jams for a stupid free coffee at Dutch Bros.
Running…I’m doing it.  Tapering, so far, has not been too nasty.  I haven’t decreased my mid-week runs…just the long runs are getting shorter.  I just ran my last long run of 11 miles.  Sunday is the big day.  I run slower that most people and I run faster than most people.  There, I covered both groups of people. I’d love to run #3 in less than 5 hours…so anything with a four in front of it will have me on cloud 9.  The time to beat from last year is 5:22ish.  First year was 6:05ish.  See? I improve.  I will just slightly kill myself to run it in less than 5 hours.  Slightly.
KT tape…in pink.  Just use it!  I taped up my right calf on Sunday using the “calf strain” instructions.  Guess which calf hurt and which didn’t after the run?  You can bet I will be taping both calves on Sunday!  I don’t know how that stuff works, but I’m a believer.  I guess it’s something new call science?

Not me doing yergah.

Over the weekend, I went all Betty Crocker.  I made White Chicken Chili…which is always amazing.  I have a precooked pizza crust made in the bread machine raring to go on Wednesday night, and I made two batches of apple crisp.  Not a fan as I did something wrong.  It tastes good, but it doesn’t look right.  I’m thinking the butter wasn’t cold enough when I cut it in for the topping?
That’s pretty much it.  I laughed because I came to work to relax.  The weekends have been really busy and I’m trying to squeeze in as much as possible before the weather turns me into a shut in.  I like the snow, I really do.  I like being inside with something warm to drink and candles glowing all around.  I’m going to like it a lot more now that I have a treadmill.  I should put candles around my treadmill.
Ooohh…must create a playlist for the marathon.  Kind of cutting it close.

20 Mile Fun Run

Wowzers, what a weekend!  Mind you, I wouldn’t say wowzers unless I was making fun of you and/or being sarcastic, which I am never, but this really was one of those weekends.  Just very busy and productive, with nothing too fancy going on.  It started with a girls’ night on Friday playing with makeup.  Saturday morning I tried to sleep in since we switched our long run to Sunday….so I could catch up on my sleep.  But 7:30am just doesn’t seem like sleeping in much…especially when you wake up with a headache.  Coffeeeeeee.  I’m calling for youuuuuuu.  To take my mind off my headache, I decided to reorganize some cupboards in my kitchen.  Talk about feeling proud!  We should take bets to see how long they stay that way.  Anyone want to take a week?  One month? Uh, three days?
Next up was to paint my writer’s desk, aka the “kitchen catch-all.”  I’m soo SO SOOOOO excited to show you the finished piece but I have some finishing touches to, well, finish up.  Hopefully I’ll get to reveal it later this week.  For now, please note that I am absolutely in LOVE with glaze.  And also, the below conversation I had with two different family members, two different times….I wanted to punch them.
Them, “Are you going to leave it white?”
Me, “It’s not white, it’s “Antique Beige”.  The primer was white, this is cream colored PEOPLE!!!”

That pretty much sums it up!

Maybe I’m a little high strung, but it’s irritating to spend a lot of time on something and have someone breeze through and tell you you’ve done nothing.  Yes, that’s pretty much what it felt like.
I also did the requisite laundry, and dropping and picking up of kiddos at various locations….fell asleep during the rented “What to expect” movie…shocking.  Watch a movie in just one evening?  Nooo, I’m old.  Let’s spread it out over the month.  I can stay awake at a movie theater, most of the time, but watch a movie at home with both eyes open through the whole thing?  Not a chance!
Sunday morning was fun run day.  We switched it up to Sunday to give me one more day of rest since I was going to need it for a 20 miler.  Whelp, The fun run ended up being only 19 miles.  Considering that not too many people “only just run” 19 miles on a Sunday morning, I will be proud.  Still kinda kicking myself that I didn’t go the full 20.  Again, I gave up and said, “Screw it!”  I don’t know what’s gotten into me except that maybe I’m tired?
Lastly…since I have no pictures for you….I stumbled across this picture last night and I nearly laughed for a minute straight each time I looked at it….which was roughly 32 times.

Long Runs and Nesting

I ran: 18.09 miles in 3 hours and 37 minutes.

This morning was my very last (Thank you Jesus!) long run of this training season for my October 9th, 2011 Portland Marathon. I was NOT looking forward to this run one bit.

5:00am - Mother BEAR! - hit the snooze - TWICE!
Forced down a PB&J
Whined a bit to myself
Told myself to just shut up and do it

And out the door I went. My consolation prize was that this was my long last run of the year and my training season and I wouldn't see these views or my special friends for almost another year. In all the brilliance that I possess at 5:30am, I told myself in an almost audible whisper, "YOU CAN TAKE PEEEKKKKSHHHURRREESSS of all of these things and share them on your blog!! Whoooppeeeee!" It sounded great at the time. I did snap a few on my rather crappy IamthankfulIhaveacellphonewithagreatinternetplanbutcan'twaittogetmynewphoneformybirthday Blackberry and so without further ado:



My minivan taunts me. No?

I drove out and placed an extra water bottle...marveling at the eerie looking and weird mist that was floating over the land. As I drove by this one field, I checked to see if Cow in the Corner was there. Yup! I could make out the shadow of his head. I would snap his picture at around mile six. Cow in the Corner, you ask?



Why hellllooooo Cow in the Corner. Nice to make your acquaintance!

CitC was in his corner every time last year and this year that I ran by. I tried not to dwell on this too much because I got depressed for CitC when I started wondering if he ever left his corner. I thought about knocking on the farmhouse door to ask the question. Honestly? I don't think I want to know the answer.



New runners!

In a petite size eleven. A full stinkin' shoe size up so no, they really aren't that huge, and no, I'm not sensitive about my big feet. Kinda. These puppies should have been a little more motivating along the lines of, "Hey new shoes! Run like the weeeendd." But. No. They are Asics Gel-Nimbus 12 in case you were curious. I don't pronate or supinate. (Did I spell those right?) My running feet are very Swiss-like. Neutral.

And lastly, what is contained inside the blue portal of umm...well what's inside kindof sums up my run. And to boot? When I walked inside, the thing SHOOK! It nearly scared the crap out of me. Had it literally, I was at least in the right place.



The opposite of Disneyland, happiest place on earth.

This foul commode has seriously not been emptied or serviced since last year. And it's in one of the weirdest locations...out in the middle of nowhere, well obviously somewhere because power walking girl's car is parked next to it...it's out by this swamping little fishing hole. I seriously wonder who the heck fishes out there?! Judging by the broken beer bottles and the used condom that I discovered inside one time, I don't think a lot of fishing goes on there. But ewwww!! How romantically nasty is that! "Hey babe, your crapper or mine?"

Parts of this long run were ok. Very few, if any, were great. It's done, that's great! There was crying and hobbling and more walking at the end than planned on. The good part was that I told myself and actually BELIEVED myself that I know I'm ready and can run the marathon. This was by far the worst yet ONLY run that was overall DISMAL. And looking back at it now? It really wasn't that bad.

More deets on the run since I'm a numbers gal: I did have to stop a few times to stretch...and cry. Calve cramps something fierce. I know I won't be able to stop my Garmin for the marathon. Cool if I could! At one point, for about 7 minutes, I had forgotten to start my G back up. Sucky! So my distance is not accurate, nor is my time. Mile 18 was a combo of run/walk/hobble/run/walk. The hobbling was from a blister on my left foot, ring toe. (Don't wear toe rings but if my feet were hands...you get the idea.) The blister? DO NOT moisturize your feet the night before a long run! I've been using this fabulous emu oil stuff (thanks Danielle) due to my awesome moisture wicking running socks that caused me to get a crack in my heel. Well this stuff is great so I put it on other tootsie spots. Bad idea for the run. I knew better than that. It was really cool in the grossest of ways when I popped the blister though. And COME ON! I know I'm not the only Grossy Josie that thinks that way! (Please no offense if your name is Josie.)

Oh and the nesting part? It could be because I just got a new carpet shampooer, but the last two weekends in a row, I've ran 17/18 miles and then I've come home and gone on a huge cleaning spree. The naps that I've promised to myself never happened. I seriously don't know what my problem is. Does anyone else do that? Of course, this last hour I've been more than content to sit on my butt, be on my computer, and munch away on Sweet Maui Onion chips. I will miss my long runs for the simple fact of not really feeling an ounce of guilt for eating those things.