I love getting toys and things for my dog. Seriously, she has way too many toys. And I love buying her new collars.
But she does not get walked enough. And we are both getting a little fluffy. Most of it is my bad but part of it is that finding a harness that doesn’t drive her crazy. She doesn’t play well with the just the leash- ok, well she’s not the best behaved on the leash.
I’m not sure about this…
Put a harness on her and she looks like she is being tortured. Seriously, the woe is me look is priceless. She’s tried on numerous harness’s at Petco- yeah, sorry about that- but no luck. And the one she does have? She runs when she sees it in your hands.
When it arrived, she was super excited like she is anytime I tell her I got her something. Then she saw it was a harness. Then I put it on her. Cue not happy face.
It was a few days before I got her outside with the harness- thanks 108 heatwave- and at first she was her usual sour puss self, Then it was like she realized she didn’t find it annoying and looked at me like “let’s go!”. So we went.
The next time I brought the harness out she actually looked excited and ran towards me and stood still while I put it on her. Say what???
Now, I am not saying it’s all sunshine and roses now. She still comes to a dead halt to sniff something and I have to literally drag her away. But she no longer reacts like she choking when I muscle her away from whatever “awesome” scent she is smelling.
Now, it’s been hot hot hot here, so full disclosure we haven’t been on that many walks in the short time we’ve had it. However I am looking forward to more. I really need to work on getting up in the morning and taking her, but well, me and mornings are not the best of friends. She actually came running into the room one morning last week and I think she wanted to go for a walk but I told her no. I’m sorry!
For reference- Zoey is around 65 pounds and wears the large.
I am looking forward to more walks with Zoey- maybe I’ll turn her into a runner someday.
Seriously, how is September half over?!! Actually, I might be ok with that if it wasn’t for the heat.
I love heat, I really do. I mean I use a space heater every day at work- every day. My favorite part of winter is bundling up in cozy sweats with a big fluffy blanket. But I am done. The heat kicked my ass this year. I never adjusted to it like I used to. It never felt comfortable. Normally I love 100* temps. Grrrr. Maybe it’s because I work in a town that rarely gets above 70. Or maybe because home town can have a 30-50 degree change throughout the day? Maybe I am getting old? Who knows. Monday it rained and it was awesome. When I started Tuesday’s run I was actually cold! It was awesome! I thought the temps were finally changing. I was starting to look forward to the 12 miler I need to run this weekend. Then came the news. The temps this weekend are projected to be a cool 100*. Waah.
Ok, deep breath, moving on. 😃
I like starting the week with my easy run, so that was the plan for Tuesday. I headed to the river path for an easy 4. The cooler air must have confused my Garmin because it said I had an elevation gain of over 550 feet for a 4 mile run. Yeah, um no. It’s more like 150. Luckily everything else seemed normal, I run this route often enough to know each mile point. Which is good since this turned out to be a run to remember. 😁
I started out with my usual walking warm up, but started running earlier. It was breezy and I was kind of chilled but it felt awesome. I laughed to myself that running more hadn’t really helped my first mile split but I was feeling good so who cared. I just kept trucking along and feeling good. No need for any walk breaks. Somehow my phone ended up on random and the song choices were amusing me. A song came on that I’d never heard before, I’m not even sure how it ended up on my phone. It was a little melancholy but I really liked it. I’ve been super stressed lately (and not hiding it well here on the blog) and something about it calmed me down and kept me running.
I did have to stop for a moment around 2.5 miles in. My stomach cramped pretty badly which wasn’t surprising considering I’d been eating Starbursts and cinnamon bears for 2 days. An older woman with a huge dog was heading my way and with my track record with dogs, I just decided to stay put until they passed by. No need to anger the dog right? Instead I scared the crap out of it. The dog jumped about a foot in the air when it saw me standing on the side of the path. What would it have done if I had run by?
That pause combined with the eerily timed song earlier had made me think. My fastest mile had been completed on this route in August 2014. I clocked in at 8:05. I suddenly wanted to beat that. Why? I don’t know, but I wanted to try. So I did. As soon as my watch buzzed for mile 3, I opened it up.
I knew I had a busy intersection in the middle of the mile so I my initial pace registered in the 8:20’s. It was feeling pretty good though. My goal was to pick it up just after the intersection. There was a line of cars so I skidded to a stop and paused my watch. The first car actually saw me so I was actually still sliding when they waved me on. In like a second I had slid, paused, un-paused and ran on. Half a mile left, time to fly. Except halfway down the path a dad was walking up with his toddler and a stroller. Between all of them they took up the whole path. I debated blasting through but the toddler was wobbling all over the path. Mowing down a toddler was not on the agenda. Another sudden stop and a pause to the Garmin. Didn’t people know I was attempting something here?!
Un-pause and run on. It was hard getting back into gear. My legs and lungs were protesting now. I ignored them and pushed on. I hit the end of the concrete path and headed for the dirt river trail. I almost ate rocks for dinner as I lost traction rounding the corner of the trail head. I got my act together and pushed on; I knew I was close. That was the longest 3/10 of a mile ever. But I did it!
7:48:9?! Holy crap! Would I have done better or worse if I hadn’t had to pause twice? I don’t know but it’s still awesome. 😃 I slowed to a walk but I didn’t feel like I needed to stop. I was breathing super loudly and probably sounded creepy since I was kind of hidden in the bushes on the trail. I walked for 1/10 of a mile before running it out for a total of 4.5 miles. I felt pretty good.
kind of a smile! not quite dead but kind of a ginger, too. ha!
So, while I may never ever do it again, I can say I got pretty damn close to my fastest mile ever back in high school. I really only had PE my freshman year of school but I was always stuck doing that Presidential Fitness test. I was so horrible at those. 😉 I’ve been thinking a lot about speed and my next half marathon so it was kind of cool to pull this off. I also think the cooler weather helped. The news just announced the predicted for Sunday has risen to 102 so hopefully the high from this run will get me out of bed early enough to avoid the heat.
Are you enjoying fall yet? Or still dealing with summer temps?’
Week 3 done! I hit all the required durations ( and then some) but my pace took a hit. It was the first week with the new hires and I seriously underestimated what training 2 brand new people at the same time would be like. I felt like I was running laps all day. I had to change my heels for flats halfway through Monday and I wore flats the rest of the week. This made navigating the maze of chairs easier but seriously pissed off my feet and legs. Grrr, I missed my boots.
Monday- Rest
I love rest on Mondays. I had tried to change to being a Monday runner but it’s hard. Plus we didn’t get out of work until 6 and I felt like I had run 5 miles already.
Tuesday- Plan 40:00 Easy
Our area was hit with some odd monsoon weather so we had high temps and high humidity. Ugh. It was so rough my mother canceled her tennis practice. She never cancels so I knew it was ugly. I was debating going to the gym but decided for work town instead. Work town is consistently around 65* but I don’t like running there for a few reasons. 1- the humidity is always high (like 70+) and my lungs hate me. 2- I feel like I have to wear pants. I know it’s all in my head but the idea of running in shorts and having a customer spot me freaks me out. I am so weird. 3- I have one route. There are very few sidewalks and the roads have non existent shoulders.
This route is an out and back that starts with an elevation of 150′ and drops to 0 then back up again. My GPS had troubles getting a signal so mile 1 was way off. I ran with traffic for most of the out portion- that side of the street has a sidewalk. Once I hit the state park I thought I was going to have to cut my run short. There was construction in front of the Inn and I couldn’t see a way to the path that gets me to the beach. The street has no shoulders. I spotted what looked like tire tracks and bolted across to the path. Then damn near ate it on the slippery Eucalyptus leaves. Walk break!
I ran to the end of the trail this time instead of just the beach and found the best natural stairs. Seriously I did a little happy dance at the top. I love running in the dirt. Too bad the trail portion is maybe a little more than .5 mile. I took another walk break after I almost did the splits on the Eucalyptus leaves on the way back and then ran on. Mile 4 had 100 ft gain and I ran most of it with my lungs on fire but pulled off a 10:06. Which I think is the fastest I’ve run that even when I was in top shape. Sweet! 4.05 ish Miles- 42:37
Wednesday- Rest
TOM came to visit, I rested. TMI? 🙂 Plus I had a doctor’s appointment with my gastro and Atkins is here to stay. He is also ordering a new CT to see why I have had the odd, intense pains. Boo.
Thursday- Plan – Speed work
This time was a doctor’s appointment with my primary so I can have my thyroid levels checked since I take a nap damn near everyday. Sometimes on the floor. 🙂 I changed before leaving work so I could head straight to the gym after my appointment even though my stomach hated me that day. Then I saw something on Facebook that pissed me off hurt my feelings and the last thing I wanted to do was run. I just wanted to sulk in a corner and binge eat pizza. I went home first. Somehow I pushed myself out the door 45 minutes later. It was a slow, hot miserable run. Seriously it was a slower pace than my long run this week. And I was chased by a damn dog. If it hadn’t been on a chain, I would have been bleeding. As it was I ran into traffic which wasn’t smart. 4 Miles -47:52. Then I ate pizza. 🙂
Friday- Rest
More running around like a crazy person at work. It was so flippin’ busy. I am so jealous of everyone who had the day off.
Saturday- Rest
I wanted to run my long run in the morning but I wasn’t feeling well and had a headache. I enjoyed a calm 4th with my family and finally watched McFarland, USA. And I call myself a runner? It was really good and even more interesting when I thought I heard work town called out during their first meet. I did!!! They competed against work town! Man, that must have been a drive. Turns out the first time they went to the beach was actually 4 miles up from work town too. They changed the location in the movie. Still it was cool hearing that.
Sunday- Long Run- Plan 1:10:00
Again, I woke up feeling rough and could not get going. I kept telling myself to get out of bed but it wasn’t happening. I finally headed out for my long run around 3. I still didn’t feel great so even though I wanted 10, I was aiming for anything over 6. My mother was out on a walk so the first 4.5 miles of my route was looping around streets and meeting back up with her. Yay for walk breaks! Then she went on her way and I continued running. One of these days I will find a long run that doesn’t have over 800 ft of elevation gain. I also had my first snake sighting of the summer. I refrained from screaming like a little girl but I did run into the middle of the street again. Luckily it was a back road but I really need to work on that. Mile 7, I stopped and spoke with an older gentleman out working on his van. At that point I’d run past him 3x so I think he thought I was crazy. Somewhere along the line I got my math wrong so I hit my driveway at 10.5 miles- 1:58. Considering all the walk breaks in the beginning and a few hills towards the end and I was actually at the high-end of where McMillan says I should be? Sweet! I made it in time for Sunday dinner. Family doesn’t mind if you’re sweaty right?All in all, it was a slow but solid week. Not too bad. I also officially registered for Big Sur in November on Sunday. I booked the hotel a few months ago and followed through with the race. 🙂 Woo hoo! Now I just need to actually register for my goal race in October. Oops.
This week, my goal is actually complete my speed work and have fun at my half on Sunday. And then eat cake- Because it’s my birthday. 🙂
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