Chug-along-chica!

1 Mile with Holly this morning.  She did a great job!  A new mile record for her at 11:59.   She is a really busy chica, and is going really really gradually with the running--just 1 mile 2X a week, but that is still infinitely better than doing nothing. 

I'm going to shoot for 3 miles by the end of the day.  4 Tomorrow, and 5 the rest of the week.  I should be all back to normal by Saturday--so I can run with Mik'L and (hopefully) Shauna without the lovely injury paranoia I have right now.

PM--2 miles mostly with my oldest little boy, who keeps me at a very controlled pace. 

Hey, I have a really cute picture of Mik'L and Michelle I was going to try to put in my blog today, but I can't figure out how to do it.  A little help...

2 miles with Christine this morning.  I successfully dragged her down to 10:30 pace on ave.  Felt great, wanted to go faster.  2 more tonight and I'm home free--back to 5 a day tomorrow.   

Look at this cute picture of part of the FBR cheering section at St. George:

There!  I did it.  This technological feat opens a whole new world of possibilies for me, blogwise.

PM--2 miles completed with the jogging stroller, slow.  Felt great.

Ran my son to school, then ran a couple more miles.  Had to take the double jogger for the last mile, because James had to take the car in.  12:50 (with my son), 10:20 alone, 10:23 partly with the jogging stroller, .89 at 11:20 pace with the stroller.

1.3 miles later to pick up my son from school.

I'm feeling really happy because James doesn't have to work today!  Yea!  We are gonna carve pumpkins and other fun stuff.

But I am also feeling slightly creeped out because I had to kill a bark scorpion. 

Incidentally, the first scorpion I ever saw was on my 2 year-old's back!  He came running to me saying, "a crab! a crab!" 

I said, "A crab?  Where?"

He replied with obvious delight, "On my neck!" 

Sure enough, it was the venomous bark scorpion on his shoulder blade.  I brushed it off and killed it, and we obviously both lived to tell the tale.  But this is just one more reason why I want to move to New Mexico.  NO SCORPIONS!

Look at my guys!  Halloween was good to us.

2.8 with Christine.  I would've thought that I was going sub 10 pace, but actually we went fairly slow today despite moderate effort.  Probably related to the yucky night of sleep from all the *coughing* chocolate I ate last night.  I've been off of my no-sugar diet since my 2nd son's b-day party, btw.  Time to get back on, though!  How can I gain that much in one stinkin' week?!

2.5 Running my son to and from school.  I broke the law today.  Well, I break the law everyday, but today was different because I did it about 6 feet away from a policeman (NOBODY TELL SCOTT ZINCONE!).  Let me explain...

Unfortunately, I am forced to J-walk across a 5 lane road everyday to and from school with my 3 kids in tow.  I would love to cross at the light, but there is some kind of nasty construction complication on the other side that renders it impassable.  Luckily, it is not a busy road at the times when I have to cross (and I always wait until there are practically NO cars in sight!) 

I have always been a little uncomfortable about this situation--especially because there are jillions of parents in a huge traffic jam in the school parking lot who are bored, and stare at me when I do it.  I've been a little concerned that someone would object.   So today when I saw the policeman sitting there on the sidewalk with his mototcycle right where I cross, I feared the worst.  As soon as I was within blubbering range, I immediately launched into an explanation/plea bargain of why I have to cross there.  His eyes glazed over after a few seconds, and he starting talking on his phone without even waiting for me to stop.  He never even said a word to me.  I still wonder if he was there to apprehend me, or was just  having bike trouble or something.  Anyways, since he seemed preoccupied, I just crossed the road as usual.  So this is why we pay taxes, people.  Just think about it.

Ran with Christine this morning.  9:59 average pace.  I'm feeling not so hot (queasy and headache) so I am skipping my evening run to save my strength for the run with Mik'L and Shauna tomorrow.  So, taper, I guess.

I got a letter from my son's principal about jay-walking today.  She said that if a policeman were to see me jaywalking, he would give me a written violation.  Sam's principal is a dork. 

1.) Spelled my name wrong

2.) Made a parallelism error (grammar)

3.) Called the police on me before even talking to me about it 

4.) Sent a warning letter which would clearly arrive AFTER I had encountered the policeman she had called

5.) Quoted laws in the body of the text that clearly indicated that what I was doing was NOT actually jay-walking  (I guess there must be a working traffic signal on BOTH sides.  On one side in this case, there is an intersection with no light.)

6.) Apparently had not even noticed that the sidewalk and shoulder along the route she recommended was completely obstructed

7.) Most likely could not run furthur than 400 yds. without passing out

I am slightly miffed.

Lovely little twilight run with Mik'L and Shauna.  It was my first time to meet Shauna--what a treat!  I hope we can do this again sometime.  We ran around  a humoungous lake--crossing over it twice on suspension bridges.  It was fun to talk.  I discovered that running in really deep sand can hurt as much as a very steep hill!  Lucky for me the sandy stretches weren't that long.  Ave. pace 10:34.

James and I got up at 4:30 to watch the trials.  I was quite shaken by the death of Ryan Shay!  This is partly due to the fact that I've had to come pick up James from an ambulance after a run.  I just feel so sad for his wife and family...

Congratulations Paul and Sean!  You are a credit to the blog and to distance running!  Logan, I am so sorry it didn't turn out as you had hoped, but I am so grateful you are okay.  You have only just begun to see where your talent and dedication can take you!  Nobody makes the Olympic Trials in marathon after only 3 years of running!   It is just amazing.