Go, you chicken fat, go away!

Recovery run.  Nobody to slap high fives to today except the kids and their parents at the elementary school.  I'll keep my creeper status to random strangers, Lady Liberties, and the internet.

Time - 26:13 (avg. pace 8:45)

Splits - 8:51, 8:39, 8:44

I ate a lot last night.  Hey, it was Valentine's Day.  We had heart-shaped meatloaf and potatoes dyed pink.  The green beans were dyed pink, too, but pink and green make, grink?  Since last year I had to watch the movie Valentine's Day for Valentine's Day (I was so lucky there were no hot pokers lying around to gouge into my eyes), I picked the movie this year.  I chose the A-Team.  Now that's a Valentine's Day flick!  Then I sliced up some cheese, summer sausage, smoked oysters, and got some crackers because that's always our romantic midnight snack.  Also, the Girl Scout Cookies came in today, so I downed some of those along with some chocolate ice cream.  Needless to say, I had some calories to burn off this morning.  And tomorrow morning.  Pretty much every morning for a couple of weeks now.

Time - 1:06:47

Splits - 8:34, 8:36, 8:37, 8:32, 8:36, 8:30, 8:34, 6:50 for 0.80 (8:34 pace)

Avg. pace - 8:34

Standard Deviation - 2.3 sec/mile

Median - 8:34

Mode - 8:34

Range - 7 sec

Variance - 5.3 s²

Probability of the 3rd mile falling within 1.8 seconds of the avg. pace with an 86% confidence interval - gonna need some help on this one, Bonnie.

I'm not going to run today.  Decision made.  I want my legs as fresh as possible for the last 5k tomorrow afternoon.  I sure did enjoy those runs.  Now they're going to replace it with a new kind of free run.  It's like an urban race.  You have to go around within a 3 mile radius and collect tickets from various places of work.  Then you get entered into a raffle where there supposed to be giving away like $3000 in prizes.  Sounds fun.  But if you volunteer three times for the race, you get new shoes.  Not a $100 gift card towards a new pair of shoes, any shoe off the rack!  So, I'm totally going to volunteer and get the most expenisve shoe in the store even if I hate it.

No accidental PR today.  I tried, (can you accidently try?) but the two donuts I had earlier in the day were my bane.  Oh, and last night's bout with half a pint of ice cream.  And the wrestle with the Valentine's clearance chocolate.  The numbers were stacked against me, and it wasn't a fair fight.

The "race" started as it always does with one of the store employee's starting a stop watch.  It's an out and back course along the Tempe Town Lake.  They finally got the distance right which was nice.  I was at the front of line, so I had the lead for all of a quarter of a second.  Another one of the store's employees was running, and he assumed his rightful spot in first place.  I tucked in behind him because he seemed to be running quite effortlessly.  Unfortunately, his sub 6 minute pace does require much effort for me.  I let him go, like a Please follow Fast Running Blog policy regarding vulgar language in the wind.  Shortly thereafter a couple of guys passed me.  I wondered if they were posers or the real deal.  One stayed strong, like a Please follow Fast Running Blog policy regarding vulgar language in an elevator.  The other petered out, like a Please follow Fast Running Blog policy regarding vulgar language in a game of blue darts.  I maintained a steady pace and passed him after three quarters of a mile, like a Please follow Fast Running Blog policy regarding vulgar language of the silent but violent nature.

I turned around at the halfway point and saw that there was a guy not too far behind me who I would have to hold off, like a Please follow Fast Running Blog policy regarding vulgar language on a first date.  However I knew he was probably hurting as much as me if not more, like a Filiberto's carne asada Please follow Fast Running Blog policy regarding vulgar language   I remember Karen told me to throw in a surge when in doubt, like a Please follow Fast Running Blog policy regarding vulgar language you can't control when you have the hiccups.  That seemed to do the trick because he became less of a threat, like a Please follow Fast Running Blog policy regarding vulgar language on the toilet.  Now I wondered if I could PR with a strong last mile.  But I was worn out, like a lingering Please follow Fast Running Blog policy regarding vulgar language in a landfill.

It took me a while to catch my breath, but I was happy with the effort.  I didn't win the shoes in the raffle, but I wouldn't have accepted them anyway.  There was some heart-shaped chocolates that I took advantage of.  Then I came home to a delicious home cooked meal of ultimate nachos.  Tonight is going to be like a...hmmm...I just can't think of anything to say.

Splits - 7:08, 7:21, 7:10, 0:46

It's been raining quite a bit today.  I've been wearing my running clothes for most of the day just waiting to go out.  I finally decided to go right after dinner.  What better training for Ragnar than right after eating two hot dogs and some Kraft Macaroni & Cheese?  I ran the first half mile with my sister-in-law as she rode her bike home.  Immediately I felt my belly jiggling.  I knew it would be a fun run.  My main focus was to not puke.  After about a mile it started raining again.  I got pretty soaked, but I was already sweating.  Hot dogs do that to you.  Speaking of dogs, there was a big dead one in the gutter.  It was pretty grizzly.  I don't like seeing dead things.  One time I came across this bum passed out on the sidewalk that I thought was dead.  That pretty much ruined my run.

Time - 48:57 (avg. pace 9:04)

Splits - 8:59, 9:09, 9:10, 9:08, 9:00, 3:31