A VERY Happy Halloween!

Today is a great day for so many reasons.

1. I’m still riding a high from an epic wedding weekend. My best friend since 7th grade tied the knot to an awesome man this weekend and I could not be happier for her!

My training suffered a smidge as a result of wedding festivities. The was no time for running on Friday due to manis/pedis, the bridal luncheon and the rehearsal dinner. However, my feet were very grateful for the pampering. And thus, I’m pretty sure that positive reinforcement contributes to training in some way shape or form.

And Saturday was dedicated to errands, updos, photos and well…the wedding itself. Once again, I wasn’t happy to take off for a second day in a row, but I’m pretty sure the calves got a workout of a different kind–dancing nonstop in heels.

The bride looked so beautiful and it was an all-around blast seeing family and friends and boogeying down on the dance floor. Wedding weekend=epic success!

2. It’s Halloween. Which means it’s the anniversary of when I first brought home this little girl:

meet santan, the love of my life.

Since she was small enough to fit in my hand when I brought her home and I bottle-fed her for a good long while afterwards, I consider Halloween this black cat’s birthday. Eat some tuna in her honor. Or spaghetti, potato chips, french fries or essentially any other food (what can I say, she takes after her mother when it comes to eating habits). Happy bday my girl!

3. I get to dress up after all! I’ve eluded to but not flat out told you all that I work at a restaurant. The publishing job that brought me to New York was a temp position, and the temp contract expired at the end of August. It was a sad day, but I didn’t mind the down time. I started waiting tables at a joint around the corner from the apartment for some spending money, and apparently, the staff dresses up for Halloween. I found this out last night, while still in Richmond. I have to be at work in 40 minutes and I’m still not showered from my run. However my green nail polish is drying, I found green lipstick at Rite-Aid and I’ve got a lovely black dress and witches hat. Creative? No. Costume taken care of? Yes.

4. I ran a little over 9 miles today. I meant to do 6. Oops. It felt good after taking off more time than I wanted to while in Richmond, but I need to get better about cutting back for this taper. Bah.

It was also super strange to be dodging tree branches, snow and other debris during my many loops around the upper bridle path today. Not too sure I’ll be wearing shorts for the marathon after all. Which is in 11 days. ZOMG.

5. The reason I finally buckled down to tell you about my restaurant job was not only because I wanted to share my very intricate and well-thought out Halloween costume, but because I can now also tell you that I will not be waiting tables for much longer. Because I got a job offer today! Wootwoot! A very exciting and fun communications position in midtown…ON THE WEST SIDE. Hello, awesome commute! I can’t wait to meet you next Monday!

This is a good thing and bad thing. Bad because I’ll be super nervous starting this new job. And I’ll be starting it during the last week of taper leading up to the marathon. Holy crap. I will probably gain 432423 pounds from nervous eating because (this is the good part) I’ll be severely cutting back on my mileage. It will be much less stressful to start a new routine when I’m only hammering out 3-4 miles at a time each morning, rather than 13-14.

Did I mention I’m late for work? I’m sure I’ll elaborate on all 5 of these things and then some tomorrow, when I have more time.

Happy Monday! Happy Halloween! And hope yours is as happy as mine is

 

 

Busy busy

The bad news is…sleep won over a run this morning. I felt like I was doing enough wining about my transportation woes last night and didn’t need to mention the fact that I didn’t sleep a WINK Wednesday night. But since I slept like a log last night, I feel it necessary to share, to justify my skipping a jog today.

I need justification because skipping a jog today likely means skipping all running/exercising from now til Sunday (but we all know wedding dancing counts as double the cardio). Because I’m off to the salon for a morning of mani/pedi pampering with the bridal party, then onward to the bridal lunch! From there there will be some last-minute running around and then we sweep right into getting ready for the rehearsal, followed by dinner, followed by bridal slumber partying. And in the morning, well, you know what the day-of entails–lots of pampering, prepping and getting ready to see some nuptials and dance the night away!

The good news is…I’ve already hit the mileage suggested by Hal for this week. Anything I can add on Sunday (and I DO intend to add) will only be icing on the cake (I’ll need to run off all the cake icing I’m consuming this weekend between my grandmother’s bday and the wedding)!

Have an awesome weekend everyone, and a very, very happy wedding weekend to Richmond’s classiest couple, Anne and Scott! Love you both to pieces and so excited to be part of your very special day tomorrow

 

 

Better Late Than Never!

Greetings from Richmond…once again!

Yesterday I was riding a running high all day, after a run with Katherine that left me feeling back in the marathon spirit (of course, seeing the setup getting underway for the NYC marathon probably fueled that feeling). Afterwards I strongly considered heading to the gym for some easy cycling (so worried about my joints cramping up over the next two weeks), but decided swapping out all of the tanks in the closet for the sweaters under the bed was stretchtastic enough. Operation bring in fall and winter wardobe=success!

Another success from last night? Saying no to the many pieces of Halloween candy sitting around my apartment (as I promised the internet world and myself I’d work on) and still satisfying the giant urge to have dessert after dinner. Thanks to the latest Self magazine, I had a quick-and-simple recipe for apple pie. If you can call it a recipe…because it consisted of microwaving a cubed apple with a pinch each of cinnamon and sugar. Annnnd it tasted just like the inside of an apple pie–minus the many calories and the crust (which I don’t typically like too much anyway). Viola! Thank you, SELF magazine. Thanks for a scrumptious 100-calorie sweet treat that is not wrapped in silver or orange. It was early to bed after that. Why?

Well because I’m a wee bit stupid. In order to squeeze in a smidge of family time amidst all of the fun wedding events going on this weekend, I thought it’d be a doable/smart decision to take a 7:30 flight out of LaGuardia this morning. Do you know what that entails? Here, I’ll tell you. Waking up at 5:15 a.m. (yes, apparently 5:15 does exist in the world of “a.m.” times…something I’m sure I’ll also painfully come to grips with on marathon morning) to catch a bus at 5:42 for a very stop-and-go/incredibly boring ride to the airport. Great decision Katie, great. Loyal to my loved ones down south? I’d say so.

Only the fun doesn’t stop there. It was freezing cold. And raining. And the bus broke down three times going over the Triboro Bridge. And then we were dropped off on the side of the road and told to wait for the next bus. No big deal if its warm and sunny and you’re not trying to catch a plane.

So I wandered the dark streets of IdunnowhereQueens until I could find a cab willing to take me the rest of the trek. I bolted through security as fast as I could, only to find out my plane was delayed. So I got coffee and waited. And it was delayed again. And again. And we finally pull out and up 2 hours and 15 minutes later. Travel woes.

Once the plane landed though the day picked up. My very dear friend and partner in the whole Maid of Honor business picked me up at the airport so we could tackle a few bridesmaid errands while everyone else was still at the office. This essentially consisted of stocking up on plenty of breakfast and snack foods for our pre-wedding day slumber party, lunch grub that doesn’t mess up pretty hair/nails/makeup etc. while getting dolled up on Saturday afternoon, and plenty of booze to keep everyone a little bit silly and very much happy (well, everyone but me, the marathonwiner who gets no more wine ’til AFTER the marathon).

Co-MOH duties took up the majority of the morning, and from there we headed to one of my all-time favorite Richmond joints–Sette. Yes, New York has amazing pizza around every corner, but Sette is one rare non-NY pizza place that can hold its own. Delish! My sister met us for the munchies so I’d have a ride back toward my parents hood afterwards. I had scheduled a hair appt to get things looking pretty for wedding pictures/more appropriate for winter weather (you know what I mean, bright blonde only works in the summer months), so that was next on the agenda.

Annnd much to my very happy surprise, my older sister asked if I wanted to join her for a jog once we got home. It was super important for me to keep the legs fresh by getting in a quick jog in between hair and dinner. So that I did. Just a few boring loops around my parents non-sidewalked neighborhood. I finished just in time to enjoy a dinner celebrating my grandmothers birthday, and after an awesome meal complete with amaretto cake, we headed down the road to my elementary school. What for, you ask? To go to their annual pumpkin lighting ceremony–something I have not had the pleasure of attending since approximately 1995. I was stoked, to say the very least. The night came to a Halloweeny close by curling up with my favorite little niece for some popcorn and the ABC airing of “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!”

Not sure if tomorrow will leave a second of time for blogging (or running for that matter, but the early bird in me is trying to fight off the groggy sleeper from Wednesday morning). If it does, see you then kiddos. If not, enjoy your weekend–I know I will!

Holy Wow

I finally took a break from the June Cleaver to-do list yesterday and made it out for a jaunt around the beautiful Central Park that I devoted a lot of gushing words toward. While my knees may have preferred the comfort of the bridle path, I opted to do the outer loop–ALL of the outer loop [read: Harlem Hills]. To the park and back adds about 2 miles so I finished up at 8ish for the afternoon.

From there, I scurried home to shower as fast as humanly possible, because I had yet another interview in midtown. This was round 2 for this particular company, but since I’ve made it to second and third rounds of interview approximately 4323643 times with no good news to follow, I certainly don’t have my hopes up about this one [but let's be real, I sort of do].

I thought maybe the achiness in my legs could have been from me finally sissing out after Friday’s long run/once again falling behind on strength training and stretching. And since I was in midtown anyway, and the JD alerted me he likely wouldn’t be home until midnight or so (really, the lawyer life BLOWS) I scooted over to the gym to hop on the ellip and pump some iron (go ahead, chuckle at the thought)!

So this morning when the alarm went off at the lovely hour of 6:30 a.m. and then again at 6:45 (I do so love the snooze button), it was difficult to drag my butt out of bed. Luckily, I had secured plans last night to run with Katherine. And the beauty of a running buddy is, as much as you want to be lazy, you can’t leave a running friend waiting. Oh but wait.

I pulled the ultimate runwithafriend fail, and rather than spring up an at ‘em, I texted Katherine attempting to get out of a run. Luckily, she is awesome. And agreed to postpone it until later in the afternoon when we both feeling a little more up for it.

I believe Katherine and I both deserve some epic pats on the back, because it’s really not easy to coordinate runs between two people who live on far opposite corners of Manhattan. We’re both a little crazy, and I was trying to squeeze in this weekends long run early and Katherine is upping her mileage base BEFORE she starts training for her marathon…in April. She is a nice running buddy to meet me for 10 miles when she really, really does not need to.

We finally met up around 1 p.m. at Engineer’s Gate (after I spent the morning continuing to clean and pack like a madwoman). The weather was–as it has been for a while now (knock on wood)–amazing. The perfect fall day, and the type of day I hope I wake up to on November 12th.

I felt a bit sluggish at first, but I believe thanks to spending the earlier part of the day dancing around the apartment in my compression socks and having company while running, I finally fell into a good stride. Katherine stayed with me through one and half 5-mile loops of the park and we distracted ourselves talking (as usual) running, blogging, life in NYC and (not always the usual) the wedding I’m attending this weekend

Circles around the park are much more fun when you continually pass by all of the lovely workers setting up bleachers and other necessities for the marathon in just a week and a half! I’m so excited I’m like a kid on Christmas morning, and I’m only spectating in this one!

excitement in the air or just noise from bleacher construction? all the same.

[Note: this photo was stolen from Shannon, who posted it on the NYC marathon FB page]

Funny enough, shortly after Katherine headed out of the park I bumped into none other than my new BFF Paul! This time we were running in opposite directions and [I believe] b0th nearing the ends of our respective runs, so we smiled and yelled some encouragement to one another and kept going. I can’t stress it enough, I love this city and all of its runners!

Since I’m still pretty sure Paul is far too busy of a business owner/father/marathoner/etc to ever read this blog, I do hope we’ll bump into each other again on a lunchtime run, because he is a nice man.

I headed out of the park after finishing my second loop and by the time I reached home had hit 12.65 about miles. I actually wanted to keep going because for the first time in a couple of days, I felt FANTASTIC. Holy wow, what a run! I felt refreshed and revived and ready to tackle more miles. But seeing how its taper-time and I still plan to knock out a few shorter runs over the weekend, I told myself that’ll do for today.

And while I was starving mid-run and have been plagued by taper hunger these days, I did not go home and pig out (get it? “that’ll do pig, that’ll do” okay. dumb babe reference). Instead, I feasted on a lunch of nuun (turns out it actually tastes okay if you only do a half tablet at a time) chased by a bowl of brussels, carrots and hummus (welcome back healthy Katie! your body has missed you) and some more water/nuun. Yum!

It’s on to tackle the to-do list and the day/stalk my email to see if I’ve been hired anywhere (fingers crossed).

Next time I talk to you, I’ll be running around Richmond (both in my sneaks and on wedding errands) gearing up for an awesome wedding weekend!

Happy hump day kids! Get jazzed about something today!

Autumn in New York

I never actually saw that movie…was it any good?

Since moving here I have an even stronger desire to see every single movie that strongly features this awesome city. I’m a giant nerd and stumbled upon this clip posted by CentralParkBuzz this morning:

I had been dreading the idea of a run today. My legs are a bit achy–I think I’m finally feeling Friday’s big run (guess I’m not as baller as I thought) and I have a laundry list of things to accomplish before a second interview this afternoon. One of those things happens to be laundry. Which is probably by far, my absolute least favorite thing in the world to do. I’d rather wash dishes for two hours straight. I’m serious. I don’t know why, but I really really hate laundry.

Anywho. As I was saying, I was toying with the idea of skipping a run today, when I stumbled upon the video above. It’s a little cheesy, but it’s a lot awesome.

I love Central Park.

I tell people all the time, if it weren’t for living in this city and having that glorious park to rack up mileage in, I don’t think I ever a. would have wanted to run a marathon or b. would have been able to properly train for it. Or at least not nearly as easily. How many people have so many perfect running paths just dropped into their back yard? On any given day I can walk out my front door and turn right towards the hilly park, left to the nice, flat banks of the Hudson River, or if it’s too dark to feel comfortable on paths, I can just take to the brightly lit sidewalks of Broadway.

New York is awesome. And it’s an extra special kind of awesome when the sun is out and there’s the crisp, cool air of fall. Autumn in New York is what is motivating me to get my running shoes on today.

hello pretty bridle path. i love you lack of pavement. and how nice you are to my knees.

My goal is to do my usual 6.5ish miles along the Bridle Path and reservoir OR be brave and try to tackle an 8-mile run that consists mostly of the paved outer loop. We’ll see what I’m up for.

And autumn in New York likely will continue to motivate me from now until I board a plane for Richmond in a little less than three weeks.

I’m all over the place trying to decide when to get certain runs in this week between work and heading out of town for a very special weddddding on Thursday, a wedding that will leave me pretty wrapped up in festivities all weekend (read: with very little, if any, time for long running, or running at all).

Thanks for giving me the chance for a little gush on Central Park/New York lovin’. And in case the above video clip was a little too mushy gushy for your liking, here’s some other NY entertainment for your viewing pleasure: http://halloweenorwilliamsburg.tumblr.com/

Have a very happy Tuesday kids!!

 

- What is your favorite place to run in NY? I know there’s still so many I have to discover!

- What is your favorite season, and in what city/state? I am loving how gorgeous NY is in the fall, but don’t get me wrong–summer sun is still my absolute favorite!

Beating myself up

I’ve been beating myself up, both mentally and physically for a while now. If you’ve read this blog for more than one day you’re probably well aware of the fact that I give myself grief on the regular over having chosen Hal’s “easier” marathon training plan. I dote on that for a while, throwing lots of billying (billy=bully in my world. long story) comments at the mirror and scoffing when I look at my training log that reports a peak week of 55 miles instead of 60.

Then I back up and tell myself to chill. This is, after all, my first marathon. Given the fact that prior to signing up for it my running history had essentially consisted of one–I repeat, ONE–half marathon and a Ragnar Relay (that really shouldn’t count because it was far too fun to really be considered work of any kind) I know I should pat myself on the back for every mile run past 13.1. I should be happy knowing that I killed 20 miles on Friday afternoon. Yes, but you read about so many others who run 20 miles THREE times while training. And then 22. And then 231.

See? Did you see the mean little voice come out? Happens all the time.

That is me mentally beating myself up.

Physically, I guess you could say a 20 mile run is considered a beat down. But I won that fight. I felt great after a little couch time Friday afternoon, and even made it through a very long night of work afterwards, completely pain-free. In fact, I woke up Saturday STILL feeling well. I ran 7 miles and some change Saturday afternoon–all along the Bridle Path and reservoir to give myself a break from the concrete. And I felt great. And could have kept going. My confidence was soaring because I figured if I could run close to 29 miles in less than two days, I could certainly do 26.2 in one day.

But then Saturday night came. And while I swore to myself that taper-time would involve ZERO alcohol, peer pressure [read: severe lack of willpower] got the better of me. And I was the one suggesting a shot of patron immediately upon walking into a bar on the LES Saturday night. I don’t even like shots! What the hey?! I think I was subconsciously have a delayed celebration from Fridays run/trying too hard to keep up with the JD and his sisters and our friends. Le sigh. Epic fail marathonwiner, epic fail.

Yesterday was an almost perfect day–beautiful weather, our company extended to include the JDs parents at a delicious brunch, a late afternoon walk around town with the JD (during which I got a great deal on some workout clothes at Gap and finally found shoes for this weekends wedding!), etc. etc….all with a weenie headache that refused to leave.

And was still hanging around this a.m. when I got up to run. So I spent the first half of my 6.5ish mile run thinking about how I’d have to come back and write about the worst run since that fateful day in September when I thought I would collapse into a pile of mush in the middle of the Hudson River Park. Instead, as running always does, it cured me. Halfway through the run I found the high, I found the calm, I got deliriously happy over the fall weather and I felt good. And I vowed that I’d instead come back and announce to internet world that the last few days just don’t count. And from this taper point forward, no alcohol, no inhaling bags of Halloween candy (courtesy of the JDs mom) in one sitting, no following every meal with “just a little taste” of dark chocolate dreams PB. It’s time to get serious. Healthy eating, health drinking (hello water!), and healthy sleeping from now until race day. This (unfortunately) includes this weekend, where even though I’ll be celebrating my best friends wedding in Richmond with my family and favorite friends, there will be no cheating. Okay, maybe wedding cake is acceptable. Just a smidge. Hold me to it, internet world, hold me to it!

In the meantime, I’ve got a speech to write, an interview to kill, packing galore and lots of stalking/memorizing of the Richmond Marathon website to do. Busy week!

Have a very happy Monday kids–enjoy this gorgeous weather!

And here’s a fun little clip to keep you entertained if you’re stuck in an office and can’t enjoy the weather right now:

- Tell me more about your taper. Do you have a Jekyll and Hyde thing going on too? I need pointers!

- This wedding is the first one that I’m in/the first one of my nearest and dearest friends to tie the knot. If you’ve got ideas on anything I can do to make it extra fun and special, do tell!

Oh hi. I ran 20 miles today.

That’s what I’m going to say to every single person I come across for the rest of the day. And tomorrow it will change to “Oh hi. I ran 20 miles yesterday.” And so on, and so on. Because guess what…I RAN 20 MILES TODAY! Actually, according to MapMyRun I did 21.58, but who’s counting? Oh, I am. Because if 20 is cool 21.58 is 1.58 times cooler!

Word vomit over. Let’s recap correctly.

I didn’t get home from work last night until about 1 a.m. and it was straight to bed. Rather than attempt a big run this morning off zero sleep, I decided to forego the alarm and let myself wake up when I wake up. Unfortunately, I had a lot of pre-marathon nightmares dreams going on and didn’t sleep that well anyway. Oh, well.

I rolled out of bed a little after nine and was pretty hungry since last nights work dinner was a simple PB&J. I decided to risk switching things up a bit and rather than doing my normal pre-run snack of a nature valley bar (or two) or a honey stinger (keep forgetting to buy) smothered in peanut butter, I lathered up two Van’s low-cal, low-fat waffles instead. They were filling enough and I figured had just about the same amount of fueling ability.

After letting that settle a bit and doing some half-assed attempt at stretching (my legs were still super sore and tired from lots of running/working/etc) I laced up and headed out the door!

The plan was to do four of the 5-mile loops around Central Park (102nd street driveway looping around the southern tip and back up). During the first 10 miles/2 loops all I could think about was how much more enjoyable that distance was two days ago with Katherine. However I got myself through it mentally by reminding myself we covered that distance in the rainnnn, so surely today–a beautiful (albeit slightly overcast) fall day in NYC–two loops would be a piece of cake!

Cake? Maybe not. Slightly enjoyable red velvet cake flavored yogurt or those low-fat dark chocolate decadence jello pudding cups? Maybe.

About halfway through my third loop (this is maybe mile 14?) a fellow runner strided up alongside to make a bit of conversation regarding my compression socks. Do they work? He wanted to know. I told him the same thing I tell people about the knee bands I occassionally wear: I’m not so sure that they do anything, but in my head, they are life-savers.

Compression sock question answered and fellow runner stayed in stride. And here is where we get to the part of my 20+ mile recap where I gush about HOW MUCH I LOVE NEW YORK. Where else, other than Central Park, do you just make friends with other sweat /self-induced pain lovers? My new bff (his name is Paul) was out on a lunchtime run as part of his taper period before the NYC marathon in two weeks. This is his 5th time running the race after about a 3-year hiatus. And from mile 14-about mile 19, I got to pick his brain, chat marathon training and gush to each other about our mutual love of Central Park. I doubt Paul reads my marathonwining blog (afterall, with a full-time job in Manhattan and a family out in Jersey he’s a very busy man…and yes, I gleaned this information and much more somewhere between miles 17 and 18), but Paul, if you’re out there, please know you saved my run today, and without you I may have never ever finished this distance. You Paul, are an angel.

Not only did my new friend Paul help me through some particularly tough miles, he encouraged me to switch up my plan of four 5-mile loops, and together we tackled HARLEM HILLS. This came at about 17 miles in…when I had NO desire to climb any unanticipated hills. But we did it. And we did it at what I’d call an impressive pace for mile 17!

We both let out giant pants sighs of relief coming back down around the west side and stayed together over the 72nd transverse. From there we exchanged names, thanked each other for the company and gave giant high-fives and well wishes for our respective marathons. Paul headed back south to the office, and me back north toward home.

I pulled out of the park and walked the mile or so back to my hood–only after lots of internal turmoil debating whether or not to jog it. My conscience finally told me 20 is enough to be proud of. And if I broke my ankle at any point after that just because I wanted to feel a little more like a badass, I would be a very, very unhappy (non)marathonwiner. I dragged my toosh back home, but not before stopping at Westside market and getting myself the BIGGEST salad known to man, a bottle of raspberry-lime HINT water annnnd a mini chocolate-chip muffin loaf…just in case As it turned out, the waffles were wonderful pre-run fuel, because I accidentally forgot to fuel as much as I should have during the run. In fact, while Paul and I discussed our favorite fuel tactics and failures (more so in my case, as I the marathon is three weeks away and I still don’t know what my plan is), I assured him that I had already had 2 vanilla GUs. But when the run was over and I was digging through my gear belt for my cell (so I could text everyone under the sun about my accomplishment), I found two full GUs and only one empty one. Oops. Told you guys, I really think I black out when I run and forget MANY, many details of many, many miles. Better luck next time? Oh wait, next time is THE MARATHON.

In the meantime, taper begins NOW. Which means I’ve got the next few weeks to carbo-load (no problem there), stalk the marathon website/course elevation chart/everything else related to Richmond, figure out EXACTLY what I will be wearing/consuming/every other detail of raceday overanalyzing, and probably lose so much sleep due to nerves that I’ll spend the month of December catching up. Good plan?

Happy happy Friday kids, have an excellent weekend!

- Are you running NYC? I’m getting so pumped to watch everyone!!

- What’s your max mileage/taper period like? I feel like after doing 15/18/13/18/14/20…three weeks of taper maxing out with a 12 mile run just isn’t enough before the marathon. I KNOW it is, but it FEELS different. Gah!

- Any other exciting weekend plans? My favorite running friend and the JDs sisters are all in the city this weekend Good times!

Peak of the Peak

It felt great to get out of work yesterday–as the rain was STILL coming down–and know that my run was well behind me (thanks Katherine!). Unfortunately I finished up at a normal hour (5:00), while the poor JD still had quite a few hours of legal hodgepodge ahead of him. Since it was the only night this week that both of us were home/free (read: me not gallivanting around DC/working crazy late), we had a dinner date…reservations at Giorgio’s at the lovely hour of 9 p.m. But with a significant amount of time to kill, I found myself at the gym anyway! I ofcourse avoided the treadmill since I met my mileage for the day, and instead focused on some ellipticalling and weight training.Three trips to the gym in one week? That hasn’t happened in a while, but I’m glad it did!

Needless to say though, my legs are tired today. And I very much want to knock out my 20 mile run tomorrow, and get it out of the way before a weekend full of visitors (the JDs sisters and my half marathon buddy, to name a few ). So I’m hoping to try to take things easy today. If it was raining like it was yesterday, that’d be a cinch, because I’d make friends with the couch and Netflix. But as it turns out, its gorgeous outside. And we all know that if the sun is out, than I’ve got to be out too! So now I’m trying to come up with a game plan for what to do in the city today–recommendations welcome!

I’m also welcoming recommends for WHERE to knock out these 20 miles tomorrow. I know Central Park is always an easy option for mapping mileage, as is running the perimeter of the island, but I also think switching up a route will also mentally help me get through the task, so if anyone has any suggestions, bring em on!

The 20 miler will be my longest run of training to date, and last long run before the big race. When I first started training I gave myself a lot of grief for choosing Hal’s easiest plan, and one that included just one 20 mile run (vs 2 20′s or a 20 and a 22). But in the last couple of weeks I’ve finally come to terms with this training plan. With weddings galore on the calendar this summer and fall, and lots of other trips to visit family and friends, I don’t know how I could have possibly followed a different schedule. And with my goal in Richmond being to just cross the finish line, I feel like I’ve trained well to accomplish what I’m setting out to do. So I’m going into this peak training run feeling pretty pumped about my progress and looking forward to a few weeks of taper time–though I hear the crazies set in in those three weeks…

Something else I’m looking forward to? Wearing my lovely new shirt on race day, courtesy of the JD:

front of the technical shirt

annnnd back. check out the JDs art/marketing skills--look at the blog/twitter plug!

Note to friends/blog readers/both: I just got back from gallivanting around the city all day to see that the entire rest of the post I had written this morning was never published. What the hey WordPress?! Anywho, my apologies for it cutting off where it did. I actually wrote a LOT more about my awesome t-shirt, the awesome JD who gave me the t-shirt because work won’t allow him to escape to Richmond for the actual marathon, and a whole lot of other stuff that I now don’t remember and can’t try to remember because it’s time to go to work. Again, what the HEY WordPress? This is one angry marathonwiner, signnnning off!

Happy Thursday kids!

Say It, Do It!

Katherine wrote a post a few weeks ago titled “Say It, Do It!” and I found it especially pertinent to this morning’s run. Why you may ask? Because Katherine and I have been trying to meet up for a run for about two weeks now, but with her living midtown east, and me upper west, its hard to find a nice middle ground. But today, Katherine had planned to tackle her 16-mile run (a PDR for her!) in the glorious hills of Central Park, and I had 10 that I wanted to knock out before work. So last night, even though Mr.Weatherman said we would be getting a large dose of rainage this morning (and all day today), Katherine and I said we were going to get our runs in rain or shine!

I woke up around 6 a.m. to the HAMMERING of rain outside my window. Seriously, it sounded like it was coming down by the bucket-load out there. I texted Katherine to see if she was feeling the dread as much as I was.

My text: “Holy rain. Not quite the drizzle I thought it would be…”

[insert silent plea to cancel due to weather]

Her response: “I’m still heading out! Doesn’t seem so bad by me right now!”

[Katherine gets badass points, Katie gets motivated]

About an hour later I met her at the northwest corner of the park, where she was settling into her long run around mile 5. I had one under my belt and after a very quick and wet introduction, we immediately got moving. The run was, well…awesome! The park was nearly deserted which is something I wasn’t expecting (this was my first early-morning return to the park in quite some time), as I’m used to it being packed with early a.m. runners. Guess a lot of NY is doing taper time and has no need to brave the rain? Any who, it was nice having the road to ourselves to chat, and chat we did. For 1.5 takes around the 5-mile loop. It’s always so fun getting to know a fellow blogger/runner! We talked what I think everyone in that category of community talks about: running and New York!

Katherine peeled off as we reached the southeast corner for the second time to finish up her miles/head home. A big fat congrats to Katherine for a PDR this morning…in the RAIN!

I continued back up to the northwest corner and finished up the run at about 12 miles. I only meant to do 10. And now I need to be at work in 4 minutes and I still don’t have my rain shoes on/my life together, so I need to cut this short! Sorry, I had wanted it to be long and detailed and filled with pretty pictures so all of you holed up from the rain would have something extra to read today. Cause my blog is your go-to for a good read, right? Wrong, I know. But a girl can dream

Just wanted to let everyone know how happy I am to have gotten that run out of the way early today, how THANKFUL I am that Katherine had the determination to get on the road this a.m. (otherwise I may have never gotten out of bed and spent 10 miles on the dreadmill tonight. YUCK) and how much I LOVE making new running friends

Happy Wednesday folks, stay dry!!!

Bolting Back

Good morning once again from the nation’s capital! Somehow not only am I up and blogging, but I’ve already knocked out a run this morning. I say somehow because I maaaay have had a wee too much wine than really necessary last night, while carving pumpkins and watching Harry Potter. I know, I know, wizards and pumpkins are fun enough, who needs wine? Apparently, this girl.

Later when I’m feeling more motivated, I shall try to remember to post some photos of my Grim Creeper pumpkin. I know you’re dying to see how they turned out.

Anywho I’m pleased to report that I still hit the streets by 7:45 a.m. for one more little run. I followed yesterday’s route, but cut out the Key Bridge and rather than loop back and end the run in Georgetown, once I got to my monument I cut north through the middle of the city and back to Dupont. All in all about 6 lovely miles!

good morning from the gtown waterfront!

Between the two scenic runs in my mornings here, and yesterdays very long afternoon walk around the rest of the city (I even hit up the National Geographic museum, one of my favorites), I think I did a pretty good job of getting my DC fill while here. So in about two hours, I’ll be heading back to Union Station to catch the bolt bus back to my not-so-new city. New York, I’m coming home! But first, one more pit stop–a quick meet up with my big sister who’s working in the area today. Yay!

Have a very happy Tuesday kids!