(Late but also) Early Christmas Pictures

I was going through my computer and found some Christmas pictures I'd neglected to post last year. Enjoy!

Eggnog milkshake with nutmeg from Braum's

Lights in Beatrice, NE

More lights in Beatrice

Lights in Lincoln, NE

Recent Goings-On

We put Krieg in a box,

and I decorated for Halloween.

(I also downloaded Picasa, which is how I made these collages.)

My 3/4 Marathon: The Cold, Windy, Rainy Sloggening

For the past three months, you've been listening to me complain and worry and obsess over my 3/4 marathon. Well, not so much listen as READ, unless you hang out with me in real life, in which case you totally did listen to me freak out about the race, but you get what I'm saying. Anyway, that fateful day took place a week ago, and I'm sure you've been wondering why I haven't posted about it yet! (Because you're all such loyal readers/listeners. Yes, I love you too.)

If you just want the basics, here they are: It was 19.35 miles. I ran it. I finished it. It took me 4:17:07.

If you want more details -- well, my friend, are YOU in luck because darn tootin' I have more to say!

(via Coach E Race)

The Coach E 3/4 Marathon is a race run in honor of Brunswick, Missouri's former high school basketball and baseball coach, the late James Edmundson, fondly known as "Coach E." The reason I chose to run this race? Well, when my dad Googled "3/4 marathon," there were two races that popped up. One takes place in Althone, Ireland; the other in Brunswick, MO, which is about an hour to the northish-east of Kansas City. Seeings as how my parents live in Stillwater, Oklahoma and I live in Lincoln, Nebraska, Brunswick seemed a perfect place to convene for a weekend of Family Fitness Fun (tm). My dad and I mailed in our registration forms.

Well, as you may or may not know, my parents then up and moved. To GERMANY. My mom nabbed a long-deserved (and -overdue) librarian job at the Heidelberg International School and took off mid-August; my dad followed her over Labor Day. I'm really proud of my mom and I'm excited for them, but I'm also jealous and more than that, I miss them. A lot. So when it came time to drive down to Missouri with Spencer for the weekend, I was feeling a bittersweet mixture of sick, nervous excitement and good ol' gloominess.

That feeling got even stronger as I prepped for the race, laying out my clothes and setting my alarm. My family has been present at every major race I've done (ranging from South Dakota to Nebraska to Oklahoma), so it felt very strange to know that they weren't going to be cheering me on in person. Mom & Dad did call me the day before the race to wish me luck, but I'm sure you understand that it wasn't the same.

(via Coach E Race)

Now, the Coach E race takes place along a stretch of Missouri Highway 24 (here's my MapMyRun, if you're interested), starting in Salisbury and ending in Brunswick. Didja catch that? It STARTS in Salisbury. It ENDS in Brunswick. Somehow, despite my hours of poring over the course map, examining the Google Street View, and generally immersing myself in the route I'd be running, I completely missed that important fact. Our hotel was about half an hour away from Brunswick, so with the race starting at 9:15, we left the hotel a little past 8:00. Just as we reached Brunswick (and were slowed to a crawl by a horde of Coach E 5Kers), I realized that we were headed to the WRONG END of the race! 

Here's some background on me: I freak out. Like, quite a bit. If I'd been born ten years later, I'd probably have been diagnosed with some kind of anxiety disorder. As it is, I'm a heck of a lot better at managing it than I used to be, but I still have a hard time holding myself together if bumps in the road hoist themselves into my way. So when I realized that it was 8:45 and we were still, oh, 19.6 miles away from where I needed to be, I PANICKED and told Spencer to "WE HAVE TO TURN AROUND. THIS IS WHERE IT ENDS. OHMAHGAHHHH I'M SUCH AN IDIOT ADFSJHGLSKJDALDJGHSKJFDGH." (That's the sound of me hyperventilating/crying/spouting gibberish.)

Spencer, bless his heart, has had over four years of dealing with my insanity, so he knew to just do as I said. As soon as there was a break in the pedestrian traffic (did I mention we were in the middle of the 5K race?), he flipped a U-ie. Here's where I need to tell you the Clower Family Motto: "Nothing is Ever Easy." It's depressing, but we're realists. The Clower Family Motto was in full force on race day. After turning around, once we'd cleared the end of the 5K, guess what Tory realized? If your guess was that we were headed in the WRONG DIRECTION, you win a prize. It's a lifetime-supply of frustration. You're welcome.

This is what we kept driving through. I apologise sincerely, 5Kers. (via Coach E Race)

If I wasn't already freaking out enough before, now it was a full-scale panic attack. Spencer turned around AGAIN (and again, bless his heart, that man deserves sainthood) and we drove BACK through the 5K, this time taking even longer because once we'd cleared the runners, we ran into the Pecan Festival taking place in downtown Brunswick. Once we were on the road, he gunned it and we made it to Salisbury in about 15 minutes. Let me remind you, this is the exact  route which I would be running for the next, oh, four-and-a-half hours. Yugh. We hit the Salisbury city limits about 9:05...at which point we saw the racers (all ~twenty of them) already out on the course, because apparently the race started at 9:00, not 9:15 as I'd thought all along. (Still not sure where that break in communication took place.)

One of the things about which I'd been nervous was the very real possibility (more like a probability, actually) that I would be the AEC -- Ass-End Charlie, or LAST. I kept telling myself the week before the race, "'Dead Last' beats 'Did Not Finish' beats 'Didn't Even Start.'" So seeing the runners out merrily bouncing along the road was actually somewhat liberating: now I wasn't going to be the AEC because of how much I suck at running: it was because there were CIRCUMSTANCES! Mitigating ones! Hooray!

As I headed to the bathroom, Spencer got my registration packet for me and chatted with the guys manning the table. When I came out, after having splashed some water on my face and calming down somewhat, I pinned on my bib and got my various GPS apps up and running on my phone while one of the organizers told me "You're only about 13 minutes behind them! I betcha you'll catch up and maybe even pass some of them." This bit of HILARIOUSNESS served to brighten my mood a bit as I guffawed, rolled around on the ground, and passed out from lack of oxygen due to laughing so hard. Once I'd regained consciousness, I told him that he was seriously overestimating my running capabilities, gritted my teeth, and took off. 

The racecourse was laid out along the shoulder of the highway. The first eight miles were on gravel. This was very hard. It was also in the mid- to low-50s and WINDY, and do you think the wind was at my back? If you answered "yes," you obviously didn't pay attention to the Clower Family Motto mentioned above. Nothing is Ever Easy (c). I was running directly into the wind. It was also overcast and dreary and by the time the race ended, I'd been rained on three different times. Highway 24 is fairly well-traveled, and apparently they're building a pipeline somewhere in the area. I learned this because I was passed by no fewer than SEVENTY BAJILLION "Oversize Load" semis, piled with huge pipes, preceded and followed by their companion flashing-light warning trucks. (After the seventy bajillionth truck, I resolved to pay attention to their license plates to make sure it wasn't the same goddamn truck passing me over and over again. It wasn't.)

I pulled this up via Google, and it's from a Canadian site, but it might very well be the exact same truck.
(via alchemistspecialitycarriers.ca)

Around Mile 2, I wanted to quit. Ditto Miles 3-7. At Mile 8, Spencer was waiting for me with a PB&J I'd prepared that morning. I snarfed it, dumped some gravel out of my shoes (picture Westley dumping boulders out of his boots after climbing the Cliffs of Insanity -- if you don't get this reference, I'm not even going to bother explaining it to you [side note: did you know that they filmed the Cliffs of Insanity at the real-life Cliffs of Moher in Ireland?]), and kept going. I waved Spencer down as he passed me to grab my radtastic glow-in-the-dark skeleton gloves since my hands were freezing and also because I needed an easier way to wipe my runny nose than onto my sleeves. Hashtag classy.

After that, I mostly just zoned out. I was listening to the end of The Dark Tower III: The Wastelands and then the beginning of The Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass on my iPod, which was pretty captivating. It helps that I have a huge crush on Eddie Dean (he's so snarky, swooooon) and a huge man-crush on Roland (definition of man-crush, according to Urban Dictionary: "When a straight man has a 'crush' on another man, not sexual but kind of idolizing him"). Upon reaching about Mile 15.5, I started feeling pukey if I ran for more than a couple minutes at a time, so I slowed my already-infinitesimal pace to roughly the speed of negative light. The race organizers had thoughtfully provided a big bucket full of water bottles and Gatorade bottles at every mile marker, so it was nice to know that there was always liquid available.

This was at about the half-marathon point.

Upon reaching the city limits of Brunswick, I was escorted to the finish line by two guys on a four-wheeler. Of course, my book got to a really climactic part just as the in-town traffic picked up, so instead of being grateful for my escorts' help navigating the traffic, I was thinking "ARGH EVERYONE JUST LEAVE ME ALONE, I HAVE TO KNOW WHAT EDDIE'S RIDDLE FOR BLAINE-THE-PAIN IS GOING TO BE!" (Don't tell me. I still don't know. I shut it off to make sure I didn't miss anything.) I also was having a hard time hearing the book due to -- I kid you not -- a group of bagpipers practicing before the Pecan Festival Parade started. It totally made me think of that "Substitutiary Locomotion" battle scene in Bedknobs and Broomsticks, which was a supercool way to end the race.

The sun finally came out as I neared the finish line (too little too late, Mother Nature); Spencer ran over and jogged the last 30 or so yards with me; I received a finisher's medal and a pecan pie. I did NOT barf and I did NOT fall over. Chalk up two wins for me! Yes, I was dead last, by a solid 20 minutes, but that was actually much better than I was expecting. Here are the final results; if you don't want to bother clicking through, I'll sum them up. There were 21 people who ran the race. Out of those 21, six were on two-person relay teams, so only 15 of us ran the entire race, and I was the youngest out of everyone!

We debated sticking around for the Pecan Festival, but Spencer had already scoped it out and knew the parade was about to begin (as he'd already driven through the parade lineup a couple of times), so we decided to beat a hasty retreat. I cranked up the heat in the car and told Spencer that all I wanted now was a stuffed-crust Pepperoni Lover's pizza from Pizza Hut. Upon reaching the hotel, I gimped to our room for a much-needed shower while Spencer walked across the hotel's parking lot to the conveniently-located Pizza Hut. As I was showering, Spencer pulled the curtain aside and held out a steaming-hot piece of cheesy, greasy goodness to me.

This entire racing story can be summed up thusly:

tl;dr I GOT SHOWER PIZZA.

On Acclimatization

As it's getting colder out (UGH), I'm invariably surprised by what I can get used to. Case in point: as I was getting suited up for a run this morning in 50-degree weather ("feels like 45," with a 10-mile wind), I pulled on a pair of runner's tights, a long-sleeve shirt, my regular ballcap, a fleece earband, and some raggedy glow-in-the-dark skeleton gloves (or, as previously mentioned last winter, "glubs" in the Clower parlance). 

Once I stepped outside, though, I ducked back inside to get a light hoodie because "zomg too cold!"

Does anyone else have the AccuWeather app on their smart-device? (It's really not a great app, but it's easier to complain about it than go through the process of finding, downloading, and using a new one.) There's a setting in it where you can set your personal weather preferences, and it will tell you if the weather is conducive to "outdoor fitness."

When I set up my preferences last February-ish, this is what I set:

Wind speed: 0-8mph
Wind gusts: 0-8mph

Temperature: 20F-75F

RealFeel Temp: 16F-75F

SIXTEEN DEGREES. Last winter, I was okay with SIXTEEN GODDAMN DEGREES. Are you effing kidding me?!

This is weather in which I ran last winter. (Ugly Sweater Run
 in Omaha with Xtine and training champ Emily)

Now, when it comes to dressing for the weather, the change of seasons has always thrown me off. I can't remember what various temperatures feel like, so I have no idea what to wear. Do I need an extra hoodie? Am I going to be sweltering if I take said extra hoodie? Can I get by with knee-length shorts, or do I need tights?  I updated my Facebook this morning with "The now-yearly tradition of relearning how many layers to wear at different temperatures when running outside."

My friend Mike (a marathoner, the insane bastahd) commented with "Easy. If it is above 40, shorts and a short sleeve shirt."

At least it's nearly Gluehwein season again!

The worst part? Mike was totally right. I very clearly remember checking my phone at the end of last winter (meaning, like, April 30th. Stupid Nebraska), seeing it was 32 degrees, and exclaiming "Sweet, it's above freezing! I can wear shorts again!"

Now I'm just going to cower inside with a steaming mug of coffee and deal with the weather when I absolutely can't stand being inside any longer. So I guess I'll see y'all on the trails in...May.

KIM. Or, why I hated Elizabeth Banks.

When I first started watching movies as an adult with a mind of my own (by which I mean, when I realized that the live-action "Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas" is one of the worst movies of all time, instead of looking forward to it at the holiday season), I was ambivalent to many actors and actresses. Over time, my opinions thereof have changed dramatically. Most of these (Nick Cage, ARGH) are stories for another day, but today I wanted to talk about one actress in particular: Elizabeth Banks.

(via hungergamesdwtc.net)

She's Effie Trinket from the Hunger Games movies; in Kevin Smith's Zack and Miri Make a Porno, she's the titular (lulz, see what I did there?) Miri; she was the sweaty, crying mess of a pregnant woman in What to Expect When You're Expecting; she was even J. Jonah Jameson's secretary in the Toby Maguire versions of Spider-Man. 

(whose name is apparently Betty Brant. Thanks, Wikipedia!)
(also, what IS it with Stan Lee characters having alliterative names?
Betty Brant, Peter Parker, Bruce Banner, J. Jonah Jameson, Pepper Potts...)

But where I first became aware of Elizabeth Banks was a little-known show called Scrubs, where she played urologist Kim Briggs from season 6 on, sometimes as JD (Zach Braff)'s girlfriend, and sometimes as THE MOST EVIL CREATURE EVER TO SET FOOT IN SACRED HEART.

If you haven't watched Scrubs and plan to, beware: ahead there be spoilers. If you are already a Scrubs viewer, you well know that JD accidentally knocked her up on their first date; they decided to keep the baby; JD drove to Tacoma to be there for their first ultrasound, and she revealed to him that she'd had a miscarriage. They parted amicably. At the end of the episode, it cuts to Kim actually getting the ultrasound, because...SHE HAD LIED ABOUT HAVING A MISCARRIAGE. I MEAN REALLY. Then, as if that's not bad enough, through sheer chance JD discovers later in the season that she DIDN'T miscarry and is actually 8 months pregnant, at which point she reappears in his life and begs him to take her back. When he says no, she's really upset.

So, recap: she lies about miscarrying his baby. He finds out otherwise. She begs him to take her back, and then has the nerve to BE UPSET when he says no. (And then all of JD's friends get mad at HIM for not being supportive of her. WAT.)

Shown here with Dr. Acula. (via tvfanatic.com)

This whole fiasco led to my brother and I declaring an Elizabeth Banks embargo. If she appeared in anything we saw, we glowered at the screen and growled a fiercely negative "KIM." I despised Elizabeth Banks for YEARS.

Well, over the course of said years, the pain of her Scrubs betrayal began to fade, and I enjoyed her immensely as Jack Donaghy's hot baby-mama Avery Jessup in 30 Rock; as a love interest in Stella; as a camp counselor in Wet Hot American Summer; etc etc etc.

Avery Jessup (via tumblr.com)

My "KIM." growl started to fall by the wayside, and I found myself arguing forcibly with friends as to why it should have been Elizabeth Banks, instead of Katherine Heigl, to star in Knocked Up. (For one, she doesn't have Katherine Heigl's big flat pancake of a face.) Plus, she runs a fairly boss website over at elizabethbanks.com, and has featured dear (albeit crazy-liberal) Aunt Peaches as a craft guru several times. 

All was well and good in my Banksiverse...until I started powering through Scrubs again, this time courtesy of Netflix. (I own all the seasons on DVD [except for the much-loathed "season 9," of which we shall never speak again], but Netflix means I don't have to get off the couch to change out discs every 5-6 episodes.) This time, when Kim appeared, I thought "Ah, I like Elizabeth Banks now! I shall not get my panties in a twist over Kim this time."

WELL GUESS WHAT EPISODE I JUST WATCHED, ELIZABETH BANKS?

HOW
DARE
YOU,

KIM.

Sunrise, Sunset (or more aptly, just sunrise)

Gorgeous sunrise this morning. You can tell it's good when all the cars in the parking lot outside your living room window are pinky-orange from the reflected glow.

(I'm very proud of these pictures because for ONCE, I managed to take pictures of a sunrise and not have to edit the heck outta them in order for them to look even halfway like the sky actually looked. These are straight off my camera!)

(click to embiggen.)

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 12 of 12

The big day is nearly here!

Mileage for the week: 7 miles
Long run: THREE-QUARTERS MARATHON!!!

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 11 of 12

Scaling down for the race...
Mileage for the week: 10 miles
Long run: 6 miles

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 10 of 12

Mileage for the week: 13 miles
Long run: 9 miles

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 9 of 12

Mileage for the week: 15 miles
Long run: 16 miles (my longest run ever!)

3/4 Marathon Training Debriefing: Weeks 6 & 7 of 12

It's been a weird couple of weeks for me and I've fallen behind on a lot of things, so I apologize for the double post today.

After finishing my long run of 12 miles a few weeks ago, I took off my shoes and felt an immediate pain on the top of my right foot, kinda along the tendon leading down to my big toe? Anyway, it got worse that day, and on Sunday I could hardly hobble around. According to the Interwebs, it IS possible to sprain the top of your foot, and I think that's what I'd done. No idea if there was anything in particular that caused it, or if it was just the higher mileage, but whatever.

As a result, the following week was a VERY easy week. I spent the majority of the week icing my foot, only did one run during the week, and scaled back my long run on the weekend from 9 miles down to 7. The long run also took place on Sunday morning instead of my normal Saturday, because I got up and ready on Saturday morning and then wimped out of the run, too scared that I was going to injure myself again.

The miles marked out with slashes instead of "x"s were walking mileage instead of running mileage. I also was lazy and didn't go to the gym at all. For shame, Victoria Marie!

---------------------------

This past week went a lot better, although we were experiencing a crazy-muggy heatwave in Lincoln that pushed me out the door as early as 4:55 to beat the heat...on the days when I actually made it out the door in the first place. (Shameface.) Plus side: the early mornings allowed me to rationalize a little bit of retail therapy, and I bought a cute little clip-on headlight to wear on the brim of my baseball cap!

As you can see, I only got 8 (running) miles in during the week, but I did my FOURTEEN MILES on Saturday morning. This was the longest run of my ENTIRE LIFE. MORE CAPS. It went surprisingly well! I was slow slow slow, but it was, as previously mentioned, muggy as all everloving hell, and I was taking it easy out of respect/fear of my Foot Formerly Known as OW I CAN'T WALK. My muscles weren't sore after, and I only had a couple minor-ish blisters.

Things I Need to Figure Out Before the Big Day, #1: A better fueling method. Which is to say, a banana, a bagel thin with peanut butter, and a string cheese prior to the run, plus three gel packs during, still left me famished around Mile 10. Maybe Power Bars or something?

#2: A better way of blister avoidance. I bandage up my feet before long runs, but that still doesn't entirely cut it when it's 10+ miles. Moleskin worked pretty well one time, but it hurt like the dickens when it came time to pull it off. Duct tape, maybe?

#3: Forget a "better" way -- a WAY to avoid chafing. If my shorts are too short, it's inner-thigh; if my shorts are long enough, it's...well, it's butt-cheek. I apologize for the TMI. Weird thing is, I've had it happen with every run 11+ miles this summer, but it's never happened during any of my four half-marathons. Maybe it's the humidity? My dad suggested an application of Vaseline, but that just sounds positively miserable. Any ideas, oh attractive and intelligent readers of mine?

See? Tolja it was hot. Check dat RealFeel.

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 8 of 12

Mileage for the week: 14 miles
Long run: 11 miles

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 7 of 12

Mileage for the week: 14 miles
Long run: 14 (this will be the longest run I've ever done!)

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 6 of 12

Mileage for the week: 13 miles
Long run: 9 miles

Running in the Dark

I forgot to tell you guys! Last week, when I was on my long run that started at 5:21 a.m. and was DARK as all heck for the first three miles, I was running through a section of wooded trail and got hit in the head by a bat!

No, no, a bat with WINGS.

Are you seriously not getting this?

Anyway, I was running and trying my damnedest to keep the trail's middle line in my peripheral vision, because it was so dark that that's the only way I could see it, and suddenly felt something of Hacky Sack-like consistency whap against the brim of my ballcap and go skittering off the crown of my head. I squealked (cross between squeal and squeak) in surprise and resolved to get a headlamp, or at least run on well-lit trails when it's still pre-dawn: for the sake of bats everywhere. Because that's just how kindhearted I am.

3/4 Marathon Debriefing: Week 5 of 12

What what, y'all! Another week successfully completed. My long run today was LONG and I barely averaged under 12-minute miles, and around Mile 9 I got SO HUNGRY I could hardly stand it, and also the top of my right foot started hurting, but it's done and that's what matters.

Here's the link, if you're interested. Don't judge too harshly.

Friday Fess-Up, 16August13

Recap: On Monday morning of last week, after spending a glorious weekend in Kansas City dancing my hiney off to the sweet, sweet stylings of Brandon Flowers and his Killers (and also eating pizza and cheese fries and Sonic peanut butter milkshakes with whipped cream), I got on the scale and saw a number I haven't seen in three years. Obviously, that was NOT OKAY. I immediately texted my buddy Elizabeth and asked if she'd be my accountability buddy. Because she is a gracious, understanding, kind human being, she said she would, and over the course of the week, I texted her about every single thing I put in my mouth, including but not limited to:

Isn't she the best? Seriously, this is like Weight Watchers 101 right here, and she NAILED it.

After texting Elizabeth every ev.uh.ree.thing, I got on the scale at WW last Friday and was down 1.4lbs, according to the WW records, which was actually SIX POINT THREE POUNDS since that terrible Monday morning! Hooray for Elizabeth keeping me on track! (Also, I looked back in my Weight Record, and that was my first loss in the WW system since my birthday on May 24th. Good goddamn.)

At the Flying Saucer Draught Emporium in KCMO

Low point: On Tuesday night, I got a call from a co-worker with a sick kid, asking if I could work for her in the morning. I said yes, and then realized that that meant I wouldn't be able to make it to my yoga class on Wednesday morning, and also that my day was going to run straight through from 8 a.m. until about 8 p.m., from one meeting directly to the next all day long. I didn't get to bed early enough on Tuesday either, so in addition to Wednesday being super busy, I was tired and dragging, and I hadn't had enough time to plan my snacks around the hectic schedule, so I was hungry and craving bad things all day. NOT TO MENTION that I found out at, oh, 7:20 that morning that my mom was flying out for a year in Germany at 1:00 THAT AFTERNOON, so I was mopey about that all day too. HOWEVER, despite these challenges, I still stayed honest to Elizabeth and still stayed within my PointsPlus Target. It was really really effing hard, but I did it. So I guess that's my high point as well.

Activity PPV: This week, I earned 54 Activity PointsPlus Values; last week, I earned SIXTY-TWO! See, I TOLD you I danced my hiney off at the Killers concert! It also helped that I'd already run eight miles that morning.

From an early-morning hash-scouting run
through the Tierra Park Woods

Mileage: This week, so far I'm at 12 running miles and my 12-mile long run is tomorrow morning. Last week, I did a total of 26.82, but like I said here, I credited five of them towards this week to avoid overtraining. Honestly, it was kinda nice to take a little break from running this week and not feel guilty about it. I'm feeling very ready for my 12 tomorrow, and I tells ya, last week I was really dreading the 11 I had to do.

Weigh-in: As previously mentioned, last week, I was down a total of 6.3 from what the scale had so maliciously told me that Monday (of course it's the scale's fault, duh). This morning, I was only down 0.2 pounds from last week. I was hoping for better, but after the challenges that I faced on Wednesday (and Thursday was tough as well), I'm satisfied with being down at all. And of course, it's thanks to Elizabeth's support. I absolutely cannot tell you how instrumental she's been the past two weeks with keeping me honest and in control. Thank you, Elizabeth! Here, I got you a flower.

One of those weird fuzzy-brain flowers, seen on a
walk through the Sunken Gardens with Kelsey

Oh, and I keep forgetting to mention: Amy picked up the Friday Fess-Up theme as well over at her blog, A&J - Lovin' Lincoln. Check it out, yo!

3/4 Marathon Debriefing: Week 4 of 12

Phew! This week just WIPED. ME. OUT. I ran a farewell hash (for those of you unacquainted with "hashing," I explained it here) on Saturday for our friends Amy and Jesse, who are moving to Germany for a year. The hash put about 5 extra miles of unplanned-for mileage on my week and that, combined with my work schedule, pushed my long run back to Sunday morning. Since I have to be at work at 8:15 on Sunday mornings, that meant that I had to get up at 4:30 yesterday in order to fit in my eleven miles.

Side note: eleven miles is the longest run I've ever done by myself!

Since I don't want to run the risk of overtraining and injuring myself, I'm planning to credit those extra five miles from last week towards this week, which makes me feel less exhausted thinking about another week of higher mileage.

As for the "123," I decided that I liked to just write each number once I'd done the weight training, instead of crossing them off. That means that this week, I got in my three weight training sessions. Yippee!

And because I know you won't be happy until I gross you out (okay, okay, so maybe it's ME who won't be happy until I gross you out), here's a comparison of boob sweat after running 9 miles and 11 miles.

As you can see, the extra two miles almost completely soaked my bra. Yes, I am aware, I am nothing but classy and sexy. You're welcome.

3/4 Marathon Debriefing: Week 3 of 12 (late)

This week went well, up until my long run on Saturday, when my thighs started chafing around mile 4. Finishing that run was TOUGH. I've read plenty of articles about "what to do if you have a bad run," but I never understood what they meant by "bad run" until that humid Saturday morning.

The extra "123" on the sheet is my new system for keeping track of weight training. I'm trying to do three weight-training sessions a week: yoga, free weights, circuit training, whatever. The checkmark is for tracking all my food.

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 5 of 12

Mileage for the week: 12 miles
Long run: 12 miles

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 4 of 12

Mileage for the week: 11 miles
Long run: 11 miles

Friday Fess-Up, 26July13

Howdy howdy howdy! This last week had definitely had a lot of ups and downs. (But geez, what week doesn't?)

Recap: I didn't manage to weigh in last week, since we were up in Rapid City for Mike and Abby's wedding. I had looked up the WW schedule, but failed to actually make it in (I really didn't want to weigh in the morning after Abby's bachelorette party, OR the morning after the rehearsal dinner). We got back into town on Sunday night, so Monday morning, I was right back on the wagon.

White and yellow nectarines in Honey Bunches of Oats.
We just read Beautiful Ruins in my book club.

Strawberry and Greek yogurt parfait. Yum!

Low point: ARGH. Monday, I did great all day...until the evening. I hadn't run that morning, because I was planning on running home from work and didn't want to completely wear myself out, but then it was about a zillion degrees that night, so I didn't run home after all, and then when I got home, I was craving junk food like wow. Then I got up on Tuesday morning with the plan to run a solid 6, and it was POURING. Like I said in last week's Training Debriefing, I'm not yet used enough to having a gym membership again and completely forgot that I can do that if the weather's not cooperating. SOOO, of course, I got up, looked outside, saw that it was raining, and thought "Rats, can't run; better eat cinnamon-sugar toast all morning while watching Orange is the New Black!" ...and then we got D'Leon's for lunch. If you're not from Lincoln, D'Leon's is delicious Mexican food with burritos that put Chipotle to shame.

High points: Well, after pigging out on junk all day on Tuesday, I was sitting at a train-crossing on the way home from work and just out of nowhere, I had an epiphany. Nothing really groundbreaking or -shaking, but just remembering how much better I feel about myself when I eat right. After that, it wasn't hard at all to get back on track for the rest of the week. (Protip: when I'm feeling really good, I take the time to pull out my journal and jot down how I feel. This way, I can look back on bad days and remind myself why I keep trying.)

Activity PPV: 37. Not too shabby!

Mileage: 27.4 miles...all running! MAAAAN do new shoes feel good!

And this is just for fun, found downtown last week.

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 3 of 12

Mileage for the week: 11 miles
Long run: 8 miles

3/4 Marathon Training Debriefing, Week 2 of 12

2/12 weeks: one-sixth of the way there!

Got rained out a couple different days this week, and our membership at the Y is still new enough that I forgot that it's my contingency plan in case of bad weather. Beyond that, I still got all my miles in, and my 10 miles this morning were pretty durn good -- it was a cool, slightly overcast morning and about half of Lincoln was out running.

I need to work my strength-training into my plan more diligently; didn't get any of it done this week, and I always feel so much better when I've lifted some weights and whatnot. Gotta keep my womanly figure! By which I mean I want my arms to look good!

3/4 Marathon Training Briefing: Week 2 of 12

Week 2, here we go!

Mileage for the week: 9 miles
Long run: 10 miles

(This is how I have my schedule displayed: clipped up on the wall in our bathroom. Every mile I run, I get to cross out! and the "10 wks 'til 20" means I have 10 weeks left until the 3/4 marathon, which rounds up to 20 miles.)