Go, you chicken fat, go away!

It was 40º this morning.  Still shorts and T-shirt weather, but just barely.  I only had time for 2 loops today.  Truth be told, that's probably all I needed to do.  I'm kinda sore.

52º today.  Cloudy.  I sweated a lot.  I've been eating too many Christmas goodies.

I knew I wanted to do a nice long run today, but I didn't mean to go quite so far. 

I started out heading up the Floodway/RWCD Canal.  I saw three ladies walking my way right before McKellips.  One of them bent down and picked something up.  She took a few steps and bent down and picked something else up.  By that time I could tell that they were dollar bills.  She kindly asked me if I had run by this way before.  I had to be honest and say that I had not.  But I offered to take the money from her.  In hindsight I should have set up a makeshift kissing booth.  $1 a kiss.  Except I hadn't brushed my teeth yet.

I crossed McKellips and there is a fence gate that's usually opened at the 1-3/4 and the Main Canal.  It's dry up season, and they've been doing maintenance work on the Canal.  I could see that there were no workers within the next quarter mile stretch of canal, so I went through the pedestrian opening.  I saw my Strava friend Mike Norberg as he was just starting out his morning bike ride.  We told each other good morning.  Mike lives at 1-1/2 where the barricade is at.  It was still up, so I turned west and ran through his neighborhood.  It's a gated community, but there's an open pedestrian access way.  Right at the gate there was a construction worker flagging dozens of big belly dump trucks into the subdivision that they're working on.  As I approached Val Vista some of them were coming back after dropping their load.  There were signs that said, "Truck Traffic 20 mph."  I thought that if I could run 20 mph (a 3 minute mile), I could hold them off.  But I was running closer to an 11 minute mile, so it didn't happen.

I turned north at Val Vista and headed toward the RWCD Main Pumping Plant.  There's some downhill here right before the turn on to the the dirt road that runs along the SRP Canal.  I figured if I ran along the South Canal Service Road, under the 202 Freeway, and a little bit beyond, I would reach 5 miles and would turn around.  I stopped after running about a quarter mile beyond the freeway.  I was at 4.8 miles.  0.2 miles to go.  But then I had an idea.  Maybe I could keep going and find a bridge to cross and I could take Greenfield back.  I started doing the math and thought that I wouldn't quite make 10 miles, so what would be the point of getting so close to 10 miles and not getting 10 miles???  So I would just do the 0.2 miles and turn around.  I started running and had another idea.  What if I kept going and found a bridge to cross at Higley?  Surely that would get me my 10 miles.  So, that's what I did.  Turns out there wasn't any bridges to cross the canal at Greenfield anyway.  I was now in no man's land, meaning I'd never run this far on this route before.  I stopped a couple of times to take pictures of the canal and to look at the map to make sure my plan would work.  I came upon a bridge and briefly contemplated crossing over it, but I could see a road up ahead and decided to cross it there.  It was a road to a concrete/cement company.  A few trucks passed by me while I was running there and it started to head back uphill.  I finally made it to Higley where there was more uphill to go over the 202 Freeway.  I could see that it was uphill back to McDowell, and having rode my bike by here on numerous occasions, I knew it would be uphill for a half mile past McDowell.  I knew that at Thomas Road I was just over 4 miles away from home.  How far had I run?  7 miles??!!!  Oh crud!  Oh well, I guess I'm doing 11 miles today.

It was also about this time that my left nipple started to get a little irritated.  Dang.  I still have 4 miles to go.  Do I take my shirt off?  Nope.  I'm too fat from eating so much Christmas food and I'm running on a main road.  I guess I'll have to grin and bear it.  Maybe my orange shirt would camouflage the blood.  So I soldiered on.  I would run with my arms close to my body so people wouldn't notice.  Then my right nipple started to bother me, but not as much as my left.  With three miles to go an RWCD truck honked at me.  Not sure who it was.  My legs were feeling it, but other than tired legs and the razer blades in my shirt, I was feeling all right.  With two miles to go I realized that I was still actively sweating.  Does that mean I'm burning calories?  The last mile was a slog fest, but I made it.  I stood in front of the mirror in my bathroom and was surprised to see that my right nipple looked like it had exploded!  What was I thinking?  Well, I don't regret it.  It was worth it.  Especially after not running the first day of the year!

I was still sore from Thursday, so I was worried about how I'd do.  It was cold, but not too bad.  When we hopped in Mike's truck, the sensor on his rear view mirror said it was 44º.  It was me, Vickie, Maggie, Mike, and Glen today.  As we got about a mile from the sheriff's station, the temperature gage said 38º.  What the heck?  How did it drop 6º??  From that moment on I kept an eye on it and by the time we pulled into the parking lot it was 35º!!  I didn't bring any gloves like last week, so I would have to tough it out.

Vickie and Maggie left right away.  They had a quarter mile lead before I started.  Mike left next.  I would have gone with him, but I felt a pebble in my shoe.  I shook it out and decided to take a quick tinkle before I left.  Glen was the last to leave. 

Vickie is getting faster each week.  Maggie always stays with her, but if Maggie ever decided to train properly, she would probably be faster than me.  I was caught by Glen at 0.4 miles.  It took me until 1.5 miles before I caught Vickie and Maggie.  I didn't like that they run side by side and Vickie closest to traffic.  I always hug the edge of the road.  Oh, I forgot.  Right before Glen caught me, a big semi truck came rolling down the hill.  If it wasn't cold enough already, the wind that he caused chilled me to the bone.  I yelled, "Whooo!!!"  1 second later Glen yelled, "Whooo!!"

I kept it nice and slow because I didn't want to risk a stupid injury from having two long distance runs so close to each other.  I saw Mike coming back downhill and figured he must be a mile ahead of me.  I got to the top and could see Glen's headlamp coming back up from the other side of the hill.  He has been going down to the Usery Park entrance the last few weeks, so I figured if he did that again, then he's a mile and a half ahead of me!  Turns out, he only went 8 miles (turned around at the shooting range entrance).  So he was probaly 0.6 miles ahead of me.  He had run 5 miles yesterday evening, so he was playing it safe, too.

It wasn't long before I saw Vickie and Maggie.  As the sun was slowly coming up, I spent the rest of the time trying to spot wild horses.  I didn't see any!  It's been a while since we've seen them, but I know they're around because I see some of my friends post pictures of them on social media.  Oh well.  I finished up, and realized that I had sprung a couple of leaks on my nipples again.  Apparently they hadn't healed up from Thursday.  We waited for Vickie and Maggie to finish, and I hid my breasts from them until I got home, because I know how it makes Vickie cringe.