Boo

Remember the weird Wednesday I had? Well last night the black cat re-appeared. My daughter claimed it as her birthday present, but I'm not quite ready to take it in. We already have 3 in-door cats and 2 dogs. I did give it some food and water and let it spend the night in the garage. Even a small piece of salmon that I had leftover from dinner. It ran out when I opened the garage door this morning when I returned home after my 3.14 mile run. Wonder if it will come back? She named it Boo.

black cat birthday weirdness

Freaky morning. I woke up at 4:15 a.m. and couldn't go back to sleep. I got up at 4:45 (alarm clock was set for 5). As I was setting my Garmin 310XT in the dining room window to catch satelite signals before I went outside, I noticed that the old dishwasher that I had put at the end of driveway last night was gone... It's too early for the trash truck to have come. As soon as I stepped out of the front door, I was startled by a black cat on the walkway staring up at me. It ran away as I was closing the door. A quarter mile into my run I saw a huge possum? scampering across the road. I've never seen one of them in the neighborhood. Then my Garmin was off... this route is almost always 3.11 miles, plus or minus 2 hundreths, but today it registered 3.01 miles. Lots of weirdness on my daughter's birthday. Hope she has a happy 12th birthday!

stick in the foot

I enjoyed an easy run in the light misting rain this morning after a week of not running. Towards the end I felt something stab my foot. Thankfully it was just a stick that got stuck in my shoelaces.

Today would have been my mom's 68th birthday. I miss her! I remember she used to have Chinese for lunch on her birthday, so that's what my daughter and I did tonight. Then my daughter convinced me to get manicures to celebrate (next door to Mah Jong, our favorite Chinese restaurant). We had a great time talking about memories of my mom.

Corn Maze

I didn't get a real run in today, but did take a brisk walk with a few sprints through a corn maze with my daughter at Jaemor Farms. Then we had fun picking a pumpkin (make that three) off the vine in the pumpkin patch. And after that, we had homemade peach and strawberry ice cream and purchased fresh vegetables to take home for dinner. Great day!

The truth about pasta

In case you were wondering...  A ramen noodle, taken out of boiling water and thrown on the ceiling, sticks for a very long time...  At least 24 hours. My precious daughter has learned to make her own snack/lunch of Ramen noodles and thought she'd be cute and toss one up to the ceiling to see if it was done. I was getting my hair cut and she called me laughing so hard that I thought she was crying. I worried that she was seriously injured to only find out that the noodle wouldn't fall from the ceiling. (I climbed up a ladder and removed it the next day.)

Sweetwater Creek State Park

Once a year we have an out-of-the-office business meeting to celebrate our accomplishments from the prior fiscal year. This year our meeting was held at Sweetwater Creek State Park. I know that a 50K trail race is held here so I took my running gear with me to the meeting. I planned to do a trail run, but a little over a mile into it, it turned into a technical hike. I decided to forego the running for the adventure of attempting to cross the creek. Gorgeous! Technical! Great adventure!

Mr. Grinch and the monsters

After my daughter's horse riding lesson this evening, I left her with her step-mom and I headed to the nearby Harbins Park for a trail run. Mr. Grinch* and the monsters started following me at about half-way into the trail run... I passed a scruffy looking guy wearing a backpack and with a dog off-leash and this set my imagination rollling... Thankfully, I made it through the 5.13 mile run unscathed. I should probably limit my trail running to weekend days or with a friend or pup to keep from going psycho. I tried out my new Mojo Loco headband today from http://www.goheadband.com/. It worked as advertised... kept the sweat out of my eyes and didn't slip. It even worked double duty to keep my hair out of my face while crusing with the top down in my convertible afterwards.

*When my daughter was 2 years old, I made the mistake of taking her to see the movie How the Grinch stole Christmas.  I didn't bother to check the movie rating beforehand, but regretted taking her to a PG movie mid-way through it and even more so afterwards. Mr. Grinch scared her. Beginning that night, and continuing now, ten years later, every night at bedtime, after prayers, she asks me "Is Mr. Grinch or the monsters coming?" To which I always say, "No".  I think now it is more out of habit, but funny how things affect your life.

not Chicago

A month or so ago, my friends and I decided to not do the Chicago marathon. We all had injuries of various sorts that prevented us from training properly. We were all sad this week.  So earlier this week I had decided to run 10 miles on 10/10/10.  But that didn't happen either. Mid-afternoon yesterday a brutal stomach virus hit me. I was sooooo sick.  I can't remember the last time I vomited so much. Not fun. I felt better today, but definitely not up to a 10 mile run. So I settled for just an easy jog/walk in the neighborhood. But hey, I did run/walk the neighborhood loop in 27 minutes and 10 seconds, so I guess I did get my 10 in :-)

Lilburn Greenway extension

I haven't run all week...  I'm feeling yucky...  tired, and couldn't concentrate at work, so left early and came home for an easy run. My goal was just an easy run/walk of about an hour, which was how much time I had before my daughter would be getting off the school bus. I decided to run to Lilburn Park, at a minimum. Once I arrived, I noticed that there is a new section of Greenway Trail. So I decided to check it out.  I followed the main path and ran until it ended at Killian Hill and then returned home. I feel like a sluggard, but happier now that I've finally gotten a run in. Life is good again!

Harbins Park Trail

I needed to do a long slow 10 miles today so I went to Harbins Park Trail. I remember from last weekend (or was it the one before?) that it was a great trail. The first loop was awesome! I startled a few deer. I tried to photograph them, but they are very well camoflauged. The second loop wasn't as much fun. At mile 8 I was wasted and felt the blisters forming on my feet. I slowed to a walk. Oh well, I did complete the entire 10 miles, and it was definitely slow...