in the double digits

it's been kind of a long, busy week. thursday i stayed up too late. friday, sk8 had an extra ticket to bloc party, which was great (she also gets the superstar award for getting her, me & the rookie arcade fire tix for face value on craigslist - go sk8!). the only downside was that it was at a new venue way up on 175th and broadway, which is pretty much the other end of the earth from where i live. (well, if we're talking planet manhattan).

the venue and the show were fantastic - it was seated venue, which i like because i'm old now and i like my personal space. and unless there is some really wasted jackass near you, you're probably not going to get covered in someone else's beer or vodka tonic. the bands both rocked - it was the first rock show in the venue, which has recently been restored and is beautiful in that regal, old-school sort of way.

the show got out a little after 11, which i thought would put me in bed at my goal time of midnight. this of course, was not to be. the a train, when it arrived to 168th was 1) already butt-to-butt packed with hipsters, and 2) running local. bud light was in the air and everyone was a chatter. thank christ for my ipod, which kept me sane for the 142-block trip.

by the time i got home, i was aiming for in bed at 12:30 (plan was to get up at 6:15, eat cereal, then go back to bed until 7:30). except there was a beeping. it was 4 short beeps, 5 seconds apart...over and over and over again. i was beside myself not knowing how the hell i was going to possibly get to sleep. i thought at first it was from inside my apt, but no - it was coming from somewhere else. aaaaaaaaaargh. miraculously though, because it was a high-pitched noise i could muffle it by having my blanked up over my exposed ear (it's down) and so was more or less able to sleep.

at 8 rand picked me up (the rookie has moved north, and cap was on vacation) and headed up to the park. we had a time restriction this morning, had to be done by 10:30. i am officially behind the advanced schedule, which is like 13-15 miles. because of the time, and my not speedy pace, we decided to go do somewhere between 10 & 12.

it was nice out and the first full loop went relatively quickly chatting with the rookie, who was taking it "easy" (aka running slow with me) cause of quad muscle issues. we took a goo/block/water break, and then only had 45 minutes left, so decided it would be prudent to just do another 4. plus, we have the scotland run tomorrow which is a 10k, so we'd be getting some miles in then too.

when we got around the west side i saw a familiar looking figure walking north - demps! we chatted, i introduced him and the rookie, and then we had to press on. it gave me a little burst of energy, which i needed at that point - thanks handsome :) exchanging more stories, we completed our four, which felt pretty good. the brooklyn 1/2 marathon is coming up and i did not want to be struggling for that, and i know i could have done another three should it be called for.

look for me in my kilt tomorrow out with the scots...

today's mileage: 10.0
season mileage to date: 84.985.7*

*due to bad math on prospect park run - i only added the uphill repeat, not the downhill, which means an extra .8!

!Blackberrys are good for something!

Wow so you should know that right now I am on a train on the way back from ct and am posting this from my very evil blackberry, hence the caps - they are auto and I don't know hoe to turn them off.

Yesterday was a very irritating day. I was irritated because I left work just late enough to miss practice. I was tired and cranky in general. And there were a few other things, some little dumb ones, some bigger annoying ones, that all added up to me being in a crap mood when left the office. This was further irritated my a jerk driver from nj almost killing me on the way home from work.

It was dusky when I got home, but I knew I wouldn't be able to run today so I decided to brave the east river afterhours. It turned out to be not scary and quite beautiful. With arcade fire's first album pounding in my ears, a coolish breeze off the river and the lights falling on the city, I ran and ran and ran.

I ran past the manhattan, to the brooklyn and finally turned around at the seaport (which by the way still smells a bit of fish). I adore all the bridges lit up, and the skyline from the river made me heave the "I love my city" sigh.

The running took the dark cloud over my head away and I arrived back home a serene girl.

yesterday's mileage: 5.8
season mileage to date: 75.7

just call me captain

it's official - i'll be fundraising captaining for fall. but! before you call me a total lunatic, i'm probably not going to be running. i might be running on my own, and i'll certainly go to practices and what not, but i'll just get to run for fun vs for training. i'll just be helping out with the fundraising aspect of things.

i'm not sure which event i will be working on (fall season is so big that each event will have a fundraising captain). there is a small chance that i will run the san fran 1/2 marathon, but for now i'm just going to play it by ear. with my luck, simply because i want to take a season off, i'll actually get in the ny marathon by the lottery...and then i'll have no choice but to run.

stay tuned...

roxie v treadmill: roxie 1, treadmill 2

finally, the treadmill didn't kick my ass.

nor did i do any ass-kicking, but i held my own, more or less. it still doesn't feel good - i feel like i run much harder on the treadmill. no, this doesn't make sense, but i do know my shin splints were killing me this morning. and i only did the bare minimum - 3 miles - before declaring myself done. but some is better than none, and if necessary i am ready to go into battle again.

then, feeling extra motivated, and having the potential company of my coworker & pal D (actually, we'll call her tri because she is also a fellow tnt-er training for the triathalon), i went to a 7 am yoga class this morning. the studio is very conveniently located at the end of my block, so i could pretty much roll out of bed and go.

i haven't been to a yoga class (a real one) in ages, so i was a little nervous about both my strength and flexibility. the class was only 6 people, which was great, and i actually felt like it was the perfect speed and difficulty level for both where i am and for 7 am. the class was an hour, and definitely got this gorgeous day of to a great start. i left feeling limber, and had a dumb "it's a beautiful day" grin on my face the whole bike ride to work.

and now that i've been so well behaved, anyone want to hit a garden for a beer or two after work today?

yesterday's mileage: 3.0
today's cross-training: yoga
mileage to date: 69.9

do-goodin'

saturday night, my friend euroskip and i headed out for an evening of driving around the city. we volunteered for a group called rightrides. basically, they give gals a free & safe ride home on saturday nights (vs walking or taking the train home alone), and we were one of the three driving teams.

so we picked up our zip car around 11:30 then headed out and about the city, driving to-and-fro the city and various brooklyn hoods, picking up various gals and bringing them right to their front doors.

it was fun. euroskip and i have similar music tastes and had come prepared with tunes - our goal was not only to be efficient (read speedy) drivers but the driving team with the best music. it's also entertaining to out at 3:30 in the morning completely sober.

highlight of the night? driving across hudson, this girl starts puking out of the side of her cab. eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeewe. euro, ever the photographer, snapped a picture of the very unhappy looking girl and the sullied cab. good stuff.

i got to bed around 5:30, and needless to say, i was very very tired when my noisy neighbors woke me at 10 or so. i had a lot of fundraising captain stuff to do, as well as run (i was going to go for 8 miles). of course the day didn't go as planned.

i spent most of my morning going through our participants webpages, checking out who potentially needed a call. there are a lot of people so this process alone tooke me a good amount of the day. it was at this point that i got really exhausted and decided there would be no run. i departed the coffee shop for the comfort of sweat pants and the couch and made my calls.

the people i actually spoke to actually seemed to be glad i had called, and i was able to clear up some questions about recommitment and what not. everyone else...avoided my call. i now know what it feels like to be a telemarketer. i think most people avoided the unknown number that came up on their screens. ah well, at least i tried.

and the exhaustion of saturday night made me sleep like a log and not drag my butt out of bed this morning. so that means...you guessed it. the treadmill. just a little longer and i might just be able to run outside even if i don't get out right at 6...

wish me luck.