Each Day Is a Gift

Had a dentist appointment so got out early for couple miles before meeting Karen, Wendy, Mary and Carolyn.  It worked out perfectly since I needed 8, Karen needed 7 while the rest of the girls needed 5.  What a gorgeous sunrise!  Beautiful run with great friends to start the week!  Life is good! :)

Had a sneezing frenzy yesterday and woke up with shortness of breath and tightness in chest.  Dashed out the door to meet Wendy, Carolyn and Karen; only to return to take 3 puffs from inhaler.  The last time I took inhaler was at mile 5 of UVM a month ago.  My friends insisted I take a rest day as I was having a hard time breathing.  Had to walk midway and cut the run short.  STINK!  :/

Went to the temple then lunch at Costa Vida to celebrate Karen's birthday.  While sitting in the temple, doing absolutely nothing, I had a yawning frenzy.  Seriously!  No lie!!!! UNCONTROLLABLE yawns every 60-90 seconds for 1.5 hours interrupted by a 5 min. hiccup episode, and blowing of the runny nose, very embarrassing! :}

Then I got home feeling completely exhausted and promptly fell asleep in my Sunday dress.  Next thing I knew hubby was home and woke me up!  So strange!  Can asthma meds cause excessive yawning, hiccups and knock you out cold?  The sneezing resumes upon getting up!  Life is weird!!!  :)

Another beautiful morning!  We saw a rainbow in the west sky; and brilliant sun beams shooting through clouds in the east mountains.  A nice run, good conversations with wonderful friends.  I love running with Karen.  I have grown to love her.  She is a great example to me!  I am so blessed to have such wonderful friends as Wendy and Karen.  Life is beautiful!  :)

Hubby had no meeting last night so we went to movie (got to spend the movie vouchers I won at AF Canyon 1/2) and a late night snack at Chick-fil-A!  ♥ Life is sweet! :)

Met up with Carolyn and Karen.  They wanted to run the RR trail.  We took the first couple downhill miles easy as warm up.  Then picked up the pace on the 3 uphill miles and cool down the last mile.  Very proud of Karen and Carolyn on their good solid effort.  Carolyn is feeling more confident for Saturday's RHPC!  

Had a RS/High Priest quilt-tying-salad-social last night where I ate too much yummy homemade salad and dessert.  Between the gluttony, the neighbor's dog barking and hubby's snoring I got a total of 2 hour sleep.  Stink!  :/

Got up early to quickly pack an overnight bag and out the door by 8:30am.  Today I got to go to *work* with hubby, not in his office, but on the road!  Yipee!!!  There was a huge traffic jam between Provo Center St. and University.  We were in a standstill for half an hour.  Had a coughing spell (from the asphalt paving and exhaust fume) which made me realize I forgot to pack my inhaler, Stink!  :/

Made it to Nephi where hubby parked at a gas station to do his conference call.  He's such a task master but also a great cheerleader! :) 

Next stop was in Fillmore where we visited with each teller, personal banker, operation manager, store manger.  Hubby is such a kind administrator! :)  We love the small hometown store where everyone is family!  The district manager and Randy, the regional manager and his wife came to cook a BBQ lunch for the bank folks and us.  Forced down a burger and skipped the potato salad and chips.  Still full from last night's gluttony...but didn't want to hurt Randy's feeling! :)

Then it's onto Parowan.  Did I mention I love the small town folks?  The store manager talked my ears off.  Again, they were so proud to show off their *WOW* and *Solution* performance!  They were so gracious and happy to see my hubby! :)

The last stop was Cedar City where we visited the store in historical downtown while hubby's boss visited the store in south part of town.  This is a much bigger and busier store than the two we visited.  Hubby and the store manager did a lot of reminiscing.  She had worked for 20 years while hubby has worked for 35 years in the same bank.  She filled us up on what's happening to some of the *old-timers*.  It was a good but long visit again with every single employee in the store.  Hubby is such a people person!

By the time we checked into our hotel, Springhill Suite Marriott, my dogs were dead tired from standing & visiting.  We had an hour to rest, clean up and get into our evening attire for the Board of Governor's Shakespeare Festival Gala.  There was a social hour with silent auction..more standing and visiting in heels, sipping sparkling juice.  I hate these kind of events.  The speech and presentation was long, dinner was cold.   As usual in these kinda gala, the dessert (a delicate & beautiful chocolate and cream concoction) and the salad were sitting on the elaborately decorated table probably for hours.  The salad was wilty.  I devoured the dinner roll.  I always love the crusty outside, soft inside, rolls, wish there were more. :) The entree was New York steak, grilled prawns with mango chutney, augrante potato with some fancy cheese sauce, baby carrots and squash.  It would have been delicious if it was hot.  There was just not even carb, so I ate the dessert which would have tasted good if it was cold.  As you can tell, everything was lukewarm.  But I shouldn't complain because the folks did a fabulous job to raise money for the new building to replace the old Adams theater.  This is a great year to do it being the 50th year of the Shakespeare Festival.

When dinner was finally over, we walked over to the theater for the show, the Music Man.  My knees were in bad shape as I walked down the stairs in heels.  I began to have thoughts of not running Bryce in the morning.  I dozed off a few times during the performance which was really quite entertaining.  I hope Earle (the Parowan store manager) and his wife seated beside me didn't see my snoozing off.  How embarrassing! :)  Finally at intermission, hubby mercifully excused us to head back to the hotel.  Hubby's boss assured us that he would tell us how the show ended! :)  

We hit the sack at 10:30pm.  The hotel suite was lovely, the bed very comfy.  Hubby promptly fell asleep while I stayed WIDE AWAKE!  What is wrong with me?!!! :)  I could doze off sitting up in a crowded theater during a marvelous performance yet could not sleep one wink in a comfy luscious hotel bed?  My legs and feet were soooo tired.

Life is grand!  :)

Even though I was wide awake all night, I did not get up until the alarm went off at 3am.  I wanted hubby to have the full 4.5 hr sleep so he could drive me 80 miles to Bryce Canyon City in the dark thru the winding mountain forest roads.  Words cannot describe my gratitude for a wonderful sweet sweet hubby!!! :)  What husband would give up sleeping in a nice hotel suite (especially after a long Friday of driving, traveling and working) or enjoying the hotel's breakfast buffet to get up at the wee hours and drive a crazy wife to a race???♥♥♥ :) :) :) My eyes were blood shot, my body dog-tired.  I only had 2 hr sleep in the last two days.  What was I thinking?  Was so tempted to go back to bed or have hubby drive me to Provo Canyon for the RHPC1/2 instead! :)

We checked out of the hotel (that sadly we didn't get to enjoy) at 3:30 am.  I studied the google maps which estimated a 1hr 37 min drive.  Since we've never driven from Cedar City to Bryce Canyon, we figured a 2 hr drive would give us some time cushion.  A beautiful full moon illuminated the pine trees, river and dark winding forest roads.  We must've seen at least a dozen deer.   Thankfully there was zero traffic and only two vehicles passed us the entire 80 miles.  I forced down a yogurt an hour into the drive.

We got to the start at 5:15ish.  Not knowing the logistic I had hubby pull off the side of the road close to the start by the second lines of pops.  Got my bib/chip and went to the pop.  While in the pop, I heard them announcing that cars cannot be parked alongside the road and must be moved to the Rodeo Ground.  What? Where?  I quickly got in the car to put on the bib and chip while hubby assessed the situation.  A lady volunteer asked us to move our car.  Hubby kindly told her that he was just dropping me off and asked where to pull off.  Good thinking on hubby's part, he pulled the car off the roadside just behind the police escorts and buses facing the throngs of runners walking to the start.  I went to the pop a second time.  My tummy was not happy.

In the haste of packing, I forgot to bring a jacket.  I was freezing so I stayed in the car while straining to watch for Leslie Petersen and hoped to spot Steam8 whom I've never met.  I was getting apprehensive.  Why am I running this?  What a surprise and delight when AmberG tapped on our car window.  THANK YOU AMBER for stopping to stay hello.! You had no idea how much that meant to me!  It totally lifted my spirit! :) :) :)  Then Lowell called! :)  He and his buddies had just finished their 34 mile moonlight midnight jaunt on the Poky Course.  It was so COMFORTING to hear Lowell's and Terry's voices and their *good luck* wishes.  I choked down a banana.  With a minute before start, I hesitantly kissed hubby goodbye and headed out into the cold darkness towards the start line.

I started at the back of the pack.  It seemed everyone had two or three running partners to walk, talk and laugh with.  It was a lonely chore to weave around them.  Saw a girl with long dark pony tail and beautiful long eye lashes, I ran alongside and loudly uttered "Amy! Amy!"  (She had ear buds on).  "Steam8? Steam8?"  No respond! :)  I was overjoyed when I spotted the beautiful Leslie at about 0.3 mile.  She was bundled up nicely.  We exchanged hugs and quick hellos.  Was so cold that I had to keep moving.  The first mile was a slight incline on Hwy 63 before dumping onto Hwy 12.  First mile split was 9:30.

Mile 2-6 splits: 8:43, 7:20, 7:31, 7:56, 7:58.  I had no time goal for this run.  Based on Sasha's calculator, my UVM time would put me at 1:50 for this course.  Since I was using this as a downhill training run, I decided to focus on form and feel and not worry about time.  Was a little concerned with my labored breathing from the get-go.  Then I realized the elevation was at 7,700 ft.  The biggest drop came between mile 1.5 to 2.5 where I passed many many runners.  My ears actually popped and breathing got under control and finally got warmed up as the sun rose.  The scenery was spectacular with a vast view of the surrounding mountains and valleys, voodoos and sandstone formations.  The sky was a cloudless sunny blue.  I highly recommend Bryce for its spectacular scenery and sweet downhill course! :)

Mile 7-10:   8:25, 8:31, 8:59, 8:15.  The first little uphill came just before mile 7.  Up to this point no one has passed me.  Some young legs now passed me on the uphill.  I wasn't too concerned, just concentrated on even effort and running the tangent.   My right knee, the one that's been bothering me, was holding out okay on the downhill.  The left knee started to squawk and the 1st metatarsal on the left foot also complained.  I chalked it up as a consequence of being in heels all day yesterday.  The course flattened out a bit as we got near Tropic and another uphill leaving Tropic.  I took a gu at the aid station in Tropic (mile 9).  The smell of greasy food wafting from some diners almost made me puke.  

Mile 11-finish:  8:11, 8:37, 8:29, 7:03.  My GI started to revolt.  Each time I came upon a pop, it was occupied, STINK!!!  I kept running and hoped that I would make it to the finish before the thing explode! :)  It was starting to get warm.  With 5K to go, I finally checked my watch and realized if I held my pace under 9mm, I could finish in 1:50.  I concentrated on reeling people in.  There was a little girl in a pretty salmon color top that was running with either an older brother or uncle whom I had been leap frogging with.  I finally passed them for good around mile 11.  Another slight uphill just before mile 12.  My shins started to cramp up with a mile to go.  Ignoring the pain, telling myself the sooner I get to the finish I sooner I get to the pop and end this misery! :)  With 0.1 to go, I saw hubby and heard JulieC's cheer which gave me the extra boost to *kick* it in.  I was elated to see the clock at 1:49:4x.  Yes!  I PR'd!  :) :) :)   My official chip time:  1:48:41.  What a blessing! :)

I kept walking in circles at the finish corral and saw Steam8.  She is tinier and prettier in person than her blog pic.  What a delight to meet her! :)  She also PR'd and had a great race!  She walked with me to pick up my race shirt.  We had a nice little visit and snapped couple of pic.  So happy I got to meet her!  I had to go to the pop couple of times before heading to the award ceremony.  I wanted to wait for Leslie to come in; but hubby needed to head home so he could mow the lawn and do his stake president's stuff.

Sadly, I made hubby stopped at every gas station and rest stop on the drive home.  The drive took 5 hours.  My tummy was cramping up badly.  Not sure if it was the salad from the RS social or the lukewarm dinner last night, but I must've had a bad case of food poison.  I lost 5 pounds!  After we got home, all I could do was lay in bed between bathroom trips.  So other than the tummy issue, I had a great time and enjoyed the beautiful Bryce Canyon!  If I were to run it again in the future, I would make it a vacation and hike Bryce Canyon!  :) :) :)

Life is a blessing!!!