I Probably Should Make My Blog Public again

It's good when running is a stress reliever.  I left my watch at home, which I think will be my new habit, at least for a while.

Very slow a.m. miles.  I contemplated peeing in my pants during this run to cool myself down, but figured 1.  urine is warm and 2.  then I would get major chafing.  Anyway, it was hot.  Should have brought water.  It was hotter than I anticipated.  Or I should say I didn't think about looking up the temp.  Silly me.

I have been taking care of my niece and nephew since Sunday.  With the extra kids and Chuck still working, it was hard to get out until today, though I did play in the pool all day on Sunday and do the Wii Fit for 1 1/2 hours on Monday.

To take the edge off the extra kids, I had a drink with dinner.  Then I went running.  Smart?  Nah.  Delish?  Yesh.

After running last night, I took what may be my last opportunity to run this week.  Chuck is going out of town till Saturday, and I'll still have the extra kids till he comes back.  I may be able to finagle a run on Friday if my bro-in-law takes the kids to the farm.  We'll see.

It was hot, but not as hot as last night.  It will be mid 90s again today...

I just typed a big long entry and then accidentally pressed the back button.  So here's the short version.

Tried to run on Thursday.  Couldn't.  Weird weather event.  Looked like tornado at first, but turned out to be a cloud of dirt brought up by the winds.  Kids got to see a tree fall while they were riding out the storm at the Knights of Columbus hall.  No run.

Chuck came back Saturday.  Drove up to Chicago and dropped the kids off with their parents, only to get them again 3 hours later for the night.  So finally got my relief on Sunday morning.

Sunday was my goddaughter's baptism.  Beautiful day. 

First run in a while today.  Felt good even though I ran in the late afternoon.  It's been cooler round here for the past few days, but it was still plenty hot. 

An easy 4.  My last run in town for a while.  It was nice and cool today.

Getting excited to meet April G, Carolyn and Burt in the next week!

The first leg of our journey was to St. Louis.  Here we are at the arch.  No running, but lots of walking.

Here are some pics.

Got to my hotel and had my choice of a faulty treadmill, halting ellipitcal and a recumbent bike that sorta worked.  Chose the bike.  Biked for a while then swam.

Then got to meet APRIL! 

Had a nice dinner, followed by some play time at the park, and then ice cream! 

 Here's our cute kids

And our even cuter us!

Then April had to drive right into a storm (sorry April) to get home.  And Chuck and I won Parents of the Year (to steal April's term) because Eli tried to open the emergency door at Walmart and set off the alarm.

Good times!

After a long drive from Kansas and a few hours at the Garden of the Gods,

I got to meet Carolyn!  We met up and had a nice dinner at Chili's.  Carolyn and her family are great, and I'm glad we were able to get together.  

Here's our awesome kids:

One strange picture of Eli (I didn't take it, as those are my legs in the pic):

Our two Calebs:

And awesome us:

Next time we'll run together I hope!

Ran with my friend Kerry in the area around her house in Colorado Springs.  I was huffing and puffing more than usual because of the hills.  But it was a good run.

Met Burt this morning (don't be jealous) at an early 5 am (at least it was early for him.  For me, it was still 7 am).  He drove us over to South Mountain in Phoenix.

It was a tough run!  Anyone who thinks Burt is a wimp would think twice when they saw him powering up the trail.  He ran the whole thing.  I stopped a few times to walk.  So I guess I'm the wimp.

Here's the view from the top:

But here was the best looking scenery on the mountain today:

And then I ran the whole way down.  Slowly.  I'm looking forward to a flat run tomorrow :)

I think that's what Burt said we went.  Second day in a row with the Burt-meister.  We ran along the canal by his house.  Another good run with good company!  It was nice and easy compared to yesterday's run...

No pics today, but I did get to meet Mrs. Burt.  She's certainly a nice lady.  Especially because she has to put up with Burt (ha ha).

But seriously, Burt's not as creepy as his comments sometimes suggest :)

So that ends my tour of bloggers.  Maybe next time I come to AZ I can run with Bonnie!  Next time we'll go back home the extreme southern route and maybe I can meet Joe and his family too!

Finally back at home.  After 3 days on the road, we arrived home last night, After we unpacked and all that good stuff, though I wanted to run, I couldn't sum up what seemed like the right amount of momentum to pull on running clothes. 

Oh wait!  I was wearing running clothes on the 10 hour driving journey.

So I couldn't sum up the momentum to open the front door. 

This morning, however, I felt ready.  It was cooler than it usually is here, but it was humid.  Because of that and my legs heavy from lack of use, I felt like this was a lot more effort.  I was afraid that I had gained a lot because I felt so slow, but after my shower I weighed myself, and the damage was just a gain of 1.3 pounds.  I can handle that.

Our grand total for mileage was 3,940 over 10 days.  Should I post that as cross-training?

Very early in my run I had to help catch a little dog that had escaped his owner and was chasing me. It was one smelly dog.  For most of the run, every time I itched anywhere near my face, I threw up in my mouth a little when hit with the foul odor of a dog that probably hasn't been bathed in the last two years. Towards the end of the run, I sweated most of it off, but still caught a faint whiff of that doggy perfume.

The run felt good at first (78 degrees, 78%).  A slight breeze, when I was running directly into it, helped me feel cool.  But towards the end of the run, it didn't feel so good.  My stomach was bothering me yesterday, and I felt a little nauseous.  Luckily the run was over fast.