A BUSY AND SUCCESSFUL WEEKEND

Dramatic capture by Laurel at Crawfish.

Weekends should never start at 6:30am, but mine did on Saturday. I had to be at the Crawfish Crawl at 7:15am to volunteer directing runners on the course. It was an abrupt and unwelcome wake up call, but once I got moving it wasn't so bad. I was actually on time and had a half hour or so to kill once I got my vest and flag and wandered to my place on the course.

Volunteering was a lot of fun! It was nice that it was only a 5k, as I suspected, the last walker was done about an hour after the race started. I was in two different spots during the race, one on the way out to direct runners into a park; and another up the road a couple blocks with the runners on the way back to make sure they didn't turn a street early. It was fun to cheer them on and the police officers blocking the road near me were really into it too and one guy was hilarious with his commentary as the runners flew by.

Anyways, once that was over I went out to breakfast with Laurel (back in the States for a bit!). My Sunday morning had just opened up, so I wasn't trying to squeeze my twelve mile run in before my Hood to Coast meeting at 1pm anymore. Laurel did great at the race and got a 31:40, beating her goal of a sub 32 minute 5k! She'll be sub 30 before we know it. Anyways, once I dropped her off afterward I didn't have much time to kill before my Hood to Coast Meeting.

The Hood to Coast meeting was fun but uneventful. It was in Clackamas so it was a bit of a haul to get over there. Once that was over (4pm) I had the rest of the night to myself (yay!) and really contemplated just getting my run out of the way so I could sleep in on Sunday. The early start was catching up with me though, and when I got home and turned on some sports games of interest it just wasn't happening. With that Sunday morning slot available the motivation just wasn't there. I drifted in and out of napping for the next six hours or so before finally stumbling upstairs and going to bed.

Sunday morning I woke up and was shoving Cheerios in my face around 9:55am minutes before heading out for my twelve mile run. The phone buzzes. Well, turns out my morning plans were BACK on (I could have opted out, but didn't want to) so I guess the run wasn't going to happen. The rest of my day was filled until about 8pm. The only slot now to run would be in the dark late at night. I doubted that would happen. I began trying to think of how I could run 12 on Monday.

The next part of the story is something I am very proud of. Anyways, I get home around 8:30pm with my belly full of about three pounds of Mongolian Grill (one of those places where you put all your noodles and veggies and sauces in a bowl and then they cook it up for you). It was all you could eat and I went a little overboard. I was very gassy and wanted to watch Breaking Bad at 10:30pm (the HD channel is all f**ked up with times). I had exactly two hours to do twelve miles. You know what? I got my ass out there and did it. It was a burpy, uncomfortable run but I got my miles in dammit. My first night run in at least five months or so and it was kind of fun. I just did my 10k loop twice since it was on the streets and not through shady parks.

I got back with 2 minutes before the show started. I laid on the floor and stretched while I watched (LOVE that show!). Anyways, I went to bed around midnight feeling SUPER accomplished. I got my twelve mile run in even though I could have easily just pushed it off.

Pretty decent splits for feeling like I wanted to puke the whole time.