With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams...

Morning bike ride with MR.  11+ miles.  Beautiful day out.

90 min on elliptical in the morning then I rode the bike 5 miles to work and 10 miles home.

Knee was a little "off" today.  Took some pain meds to try and help.  I did pilates in the morning and then rode the 5 miles into work.

After work, the weather was beautiful outside so I decided to take an extra detour on my ride home.  I ended up with 14 miles.  I know it seems like small beans for all the hard core bike riders out there, but it was a good ride for me.  The wind was blowing around 13 mph out of the Southwest (the direction I was riding into) so I was pushing into the wind most of the time.  I was tired when I got home, but I had a wonderful surprise on my front steps- my shoes finally arrived!  So I had to put them on and take them for a quick run around the block.  It wasn't easy for me to make the transition from bike to run.  I can only imagine how that would feel amplified for someone who had already swam before biking.  Kudos to those of you who do!

I felt like I was running very slow.  I was surprised that I wasn't and my pace ended up being pretty good considering how I felt.

My tired legs were very tired after that.  I was cooking dinner when mini-me came home and asked me to go on a bike ride with her.  So I turned off the stove and got back on the bike.  We went around 5 miles.  I was having a tough time keeping up with her, but we got to enjoy a little bit of time outdoors together.  I think between 6 and 7 is a scary time to be out on the roads though.  Lots of traffic and the sun is at the angle where it's in the eyes of the drivers and makes it hard for them to see me. 

The prettiest little flowers (they look like bluebells) are flowering on my walkway now.  They're a better spring-time photo than the dead critter I saw on the ride home.

I haven't been sleeping well, and last night was the worst of the week.  If I would have gotten up to exercise this morning, I would have only gotten 4 hours of sleep.  So I stayed in bed and settle for 5 1/2 hours.

Afternoon was shopping with mini-me and visiting a good friend in the evening.  I'm sure another day of rest is probably not going to hurt my knee either.

Finally got some sleep last night.  It was awesome.  I would put a photo up here of how awesome it was, but my camera doesn't have an "awesome" filter on it, so it wouldn't look right if I were to post it.

After school I got to run home- it was in the 70's and beautiful.  I took a little detour to run down into a new neighborhood they're building.  The sign says there will be running trails in the community, so I hope they start working on those soon!

When I got home, I was feeling good and took the mile loop around the hood.  It was great to be able to run again!  My knees cooperated and I didn't have any problems.  It was a slow start for my pace, but by the end I was on target with where I'd like to be. 

The azaleas and dogwoods are all in full bloom right now.  It is beautiful.  The cherry and pear trees are almost all full of green leaves now, but I love the dogwoods and the bright colors of the azaleas.  Here's a photo of one of the dogwoods in my backyard.  I took it after my run.  I love spring.

Knees felt good after the run yesterday, and I want to do a long run on Saturday, so I took the day today to let them recover and rest.... and to let myself get some much needed catch-up sleep.

A simply wonderful day for a run.  I took mini-me to her ACT test and then drove to p-town for my run.  I'm getting tired of the same running routes, and since my mileage isn't long enough to go too far away, I went 5 miles from home to enable myself to run new roads.  

I'd taken my bike on the roads a couple of years ago, so I knew pretty much where I was going, but it was still exciting to be on a new route.  The roads were very runner friendly, and I didn't have much traffic at all.   I did get to an intersection at mile 6, and I wasn't sure which way I should go.  I've never figured out how to use the map portion of my garmin, but I decided that if worse came to worse, I would just turn around at mile 7 and back track.  Lucky for me, just before mile 7 I realized where I was and I got to run a different road back, keeping the whole run fresh and new.

I did go into a little redneck gas station around mile 9 to get some water for my water bottle.  The gas stations I've been in have always been really nice about letting me grab some tap water for my water bottle, and this was no exception.  I'm grateful that they're willing to let me steal a couple cups of water for the run back.  I had a couple dollars in my running belt, but I was happier with free tap water than paying $2 for a bottled tap water.

On the road home, I found my treasure for the day.  It is titled "Sounds of Blackness - Africa to America- the journey of the drum." 

It's scratched up pretty bad, so I won't be able to listen to it.  And since there's no shosholoza on it, I'm not feeling like I'm missing out on anything either.

I did miss out on sunscreen though, and wasn't prepared for the skin crispining I got.  Time to get the sunblock out.