brain dump run interlude

somehow i have reached a state where my mental to-do list right now reads:

1. write running blog post
2. put on bathing suit, get into bathtub, wash dog, necessarily wash self and bathroom
3. have skype meeting with work people across continent
4. strength train
5. possibly make peach pear cobbler
6. back to actual work

so, lots is weird. but i do what the list says, and apparently my head thinks i need to write a blog post.

lessee. i have three topics:

1. the plan
2. the swimming
3. the yelling

The Plan

my plan is to run three days a week until another race appears -- oh, and i signed up for one! it's a 12k trail race near home (where home will be in late july) -- i ran it once before and found it harrrrrrrrrrrrrrd but great. memorable aspects of the race were the woman behind me telling me i was a pace-keeping machine (very sweet) and the fact that the trail is on a biathlon training course (the one with the skiing and the SHOOTING?) so it's important not to get lost. i also remember getting back to the fork where you either finish (if you're doing the short loop) or start again (if, as i am, you're doing the longer loop) and thinking TEMPTATION ... but i did it, and will do it again. the race is July 19th.

prep for this race means: lots of strength training for legs. hills and stairs. (note: there are none of these here? i may need to resort to treadmill action, or driving to a hill and being a crazy person.) and making sure i get, say, three 12-15k runs done in the next month. i do not remember this being an easy course. ... so, sticking with three days a week. it's going fine. i will bring my garmin back out this week to make sure i'm going far enough.

The Swimming

i have also gone back to swimming. last night i swam a kilometre in the luxurious outdoor campus pool at all-laps time, and it was lovely and quiet. i should do more, but really that means i just need to remember how to go faster; perhaps i can aim to work up to 2k, but the problem is the potential for BOREDOM. ... the lifeguards told me there's a 100% blind woman who comes in and does 100 laps a couple times a week, and always finds the edge of the pool dead on. clearly she's got the boredom problem licked?

The Yelling

right, the yelling. i don't think we've discussed the people who yell out of their car windows at people running before? there are various different things that can happen here. last week i got two:

yelling no. 1: late wednesday afternoon, in a suburban condo complex, two skinny guys who looked not quite old enough to drink first honked and then *slowed down* their old station wagon to make faces and yell shit about how bad i looked running. thanks, very helpful.

yelling no. 2: friday around dusk, near the edge of campus, a big car pumping with hip hop beats, full of at least four guys, maybe more, stopped at a red light where i was running across, and a guy in the backseat pointed out the window at me and yelled to the front seat "bro, that's what WE should be doin!!" and gave me a sort of solidarity fist pump.

eh, so. you win some, you lose some. the second car, i flashed a smile and fist-pumped back! the first car... uh, i also gave them a gesture. well, there were two of them and i have two hands so i gave them one each.

sometimes when i am running down the street, a young woman in a pick-up truck will pass me. they almost always wave and smile exuberantly; i don't know why that particular combination is so reliable, but i really like them. they look like they know what i'm doing, even if they don't do it themselves.

k, back to the to-do list. even more than a run that won't go for itself -- this dog is definitely not going to wash herself. so, onwards. will keep you posted.