Pretty new shoes

I was kicked in the sternum by a child today. It was kind of a long day, and I'm still pretty irritated/frustrated by some things that are going on, but hey - if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all, right?

I came home to the welcome sight of a box from Zappos! I "accidentally" ordered some new running shoes the other day.

Hello my pretties!

I pretty much instantly changed into my running gear and went to run off some stress down in the basement.

It was supposed to be 3 easy miles, but I took it a little faster than I would normally do an easy run. Oh well. Running is the best therapy.

Now I'm relaxing with a beer, and Tom is grilling some burgers. We're planning on picking out some houses to go check out soon, which is pretty exciting! :)

Sunday Run-day

Seriously, where does the weekend go?

I took my sweet time getting out the door this morning for my long run. I didn't hit the trails until 10:30. Luckily the weather was cooperative and the clouds kept it from getting too hot toward the end of my run.

My training plan called for 13 miles. Yeah, I have maybe once run that far when I wasn't running a race. I found some much flatter trails than my last long run and did a few loops several times. I didn't mind the repetition too much since I took the time to make a new running playlist on Saturday night.

And I remembered to charge my headphones, so that helped.

There was a mild energy gel mess around mile 7 when I was trying to get all the gel out of the bottom of the packet and got it all over my hands. And some on my face. Classy.

I ended up at 13.13 miles in 2:21:21. Yay repeating numbers!

Now I have to remember to bring extra snacks to work tomorrow so I'm not starving all day.

And here is my favorite Buddy napping picture from the weekend.

That's how you know you're a runner

Yesterday was free of entertaining things to tell you about. I was at work from 7-6:15. It was long. We had pizza for dinner, it was delicious.

I did manage to put up a new bulletin board.

I am incapable of taking a level picture.

I also set up our new sensory bin. I really want to add some more things to it, but I'm not sure what yet. Our theme this month is the circus!

This morning I was up bright and early to meet up with the group. It was raining, which apparently scared some people off, because there were only 8 of us today. The weather was actually pretty nice for running, we are in the trees a lot, so there was just the right amount of rain to keep us cool.

We did our usual 6.51 miles in 1:02:59.

We talked a little about cross training today, and I mentioned that I'm really bad about cross training, because I get the "I could be running right now" feeling. They laughed and said, "That's how you know you're a runner."

I tried this protein brownie from my RunnerBox when I got home.

Flavor-wise, it was a good chocolate flavor with less of a peanut butter taste than the name implies. Texture-wise, it was very much a protein bar. Nothing I would go out of my way to find again, but pretty good overall.

We don't have anything planned for the rest of the day, just the way I like it! :)

One of those lies we tell ourselves

I'll stop if it hurts.

How many times have you said that before a run?

Just a few days after Jan posted about runners and our lack of intelligence sometimes, I found myself making a questionable call.

Right before my run today, I tweaked my ankle. I don't even really know what happened. I was moving from standing to sitting on the floor, and somewhere in the middle of that motion, something really painful happened. Really painful.

I gave it a few minutes, moved it around, hopped on it, and decided - I'll stop if it hurts.

Which of course is a lie. Something has to really, seriously hurt for me to stop once I'm running.

Luckily, it didn't hurt and I was able to knock out my tempo run for the day. I did a warm up, 4 miles @ 9:14 and a cool down for a total of 6 miles.

After my run, Buddy and I went and hung out in the yard for a bit. I can't wait until we have a yard that I can set him loose in.

Work was only slightly better than yesterday (nap time is still terrible), but at least I got to leave almost on time!

It's only Wednesday?

While yesterday felt like Thursday, today felt like it would never end. For some reason my kiddos arrived early today and I ended up being out of ratio (too many kids!) by 7:45. On top of that, they all seemed hell-bent on killing each other today. There was a lot of pushing, hair pulling, scratching, and screaming.

It was exhausting.

And then most of them didn't nap.

And then I had to work late.

I was very happy when it was finally time to head home.

A couple of my pear tomatoes were ready to be eaten today!

I had an easy 2 miles on my training plan for today. I have a hard time doing 2 miles at an "easy" pace. I really like doing it a little faster than I'm really supposed to. Oh well. Tomorrow is a tempo run, so I will have plenty of faster paced running to do then.

Tom threw together a tasty tray for a nice, light dinner. So good.

Olives, roasted garlic bread, pepperoncini, salami, sopressata, sharp provolone, some greens and a pile o mustard.

Also: I'm in the assessment part of Anatomy for Runners, and I have "failed" almost every test. It's kind of depressing. Apparently, I need to work on some things.

A slow day, a good run, and Buddy

Today feels like Thursday, I'm not sure why.

Work was absolutely crawling. I hate days like that.

After work I did a little snacking before my run. I tried this fruit/veggie leather from my RunnerBox.

It was really good! Tom tried it and said it was "like a pumpkin pie and an apple pie had a baby." If I ever see these at the store I will not hesitate to buy them.

Then it was off to the basement for an easy 3 miles. It was one of those wonderful runs where you feel great and really strong. I needed that today.

I bought Buddy a new toy yesterday.

He already broke it. But he loves it (he loves all rope toys), so we're trying to see if we can fix it so he's not just ripping string out of the middle of it.

He's kind of a weirdo.

A brief book rant

I'm sort of a book addict. I have stayed up reading past my bedtime since I was young enough to have a bedtime. I used to get scolded for being anti-social because I preferred (prefer?) books to people. And while more books are pretty much always better, there are exceptions to that rule.

Source

Some books are meant to stand alone. They should leave you wanting more, yes, but that doesn't mean that there's another book (or two) that needs to be written. I would rather be left wanting more than be given more and be disappointed.

I find more and more books lately are being written with the intention of being part of a trilogy. They are not all worthy of such a plan. Sometimes the story is not strong enough to carry on. There are some wonderful series out there, and I understand that more books (in theory) means more money for those involved, but there's a certain quality that gets lost in the quest for profit.

So please, if the story is told, accept it and move on. Don't reach for more and destroy the story and characters in the process.