I Probably Should Make My Blog Public again

I embraced the gazelle today and was happy to be running in shorts and a tank top.  I just did an hour and then I did some Power Yoga.  I stink at the back bends, but otherwise I rock.  I did finally hold my 3rd back bend for a little while.

I hope to be outside by the end of this week.  The deep freeze might be over in a few days.

As you can see from the odd mileage--I got outside today!  Hooray!  I did a weird loop where I ran out of my neighborhood (streets are still snowy and "sidewalk" in some of the areas that I run is actually on the street, sorta like a bike lane, if you will) and then ran east down one road by the church/school and high school, south to the next block, then west and so on.  I ran some of the roads which had shoveled sidewalks two or three times.  I managed to get quite a few miles that way because my east/west roads were about 1/2 mile sections.  AP:  9:14.

It was cold, but not as bad as it has been.  It was 24 (17 with the windchill).

I did not feel particularly safe at the times where I was forced to run in the streets (and there were a few times).  I should go out and get a reflective vest at least, but I don't know if that will make me feel particularly safe either.  I'm considering the gym so I at least have access to a treadmill, but I don't want to run on the treadmill every day.

Tomorrow is supposed to be 36 (sorry April, I was wrong on the 46, but it's still above freezing for the first time in a while) so hopefully there will be some more melting!

In other news, potty training is going swimmingly.  The first couple weeks were terrible because the holidays led to us being inconsistent, but now Eli is doing great.  He's down to roughly one accident a day.  He's not pooping consistently, but I remember Caleb took a while to get that down, so I'm not worried.

I got started really late because I watched an ultra-exciting 6th grade boys' basketball game.  The final score?  26-12.  It was a nailbiter.

And that reminds me:  I heard on the news yesterday that some organization was trying to create a new punctuation mark to indicate that you are being sarcastic.  http://www.asylum.com/2010/01/12/sarcmark-introduces-punctuation-to-indicate-sarcasm/

Considering the subject matter, I'm not sure if they're serious.

On to other news, I watched 1000 Ways to Die while I was doing the gazelle.  That show is...entertaining, for lack of a better word.  Then I got bored with it and watched most of an NCIS episode, but I missed the beginning, so I spent the whole episode really trying to catch up.

Outside on Thursday, I do believe.  It was a balmy 36 Wed, and I think it'll be just as warm Thurs.

A glorious outside run.  It was in the mid-30s, with a 6 mph wind that I could only feel when I was going south, and it wasn't bad even then.  After school I picked up a reflective vest and a blinking LED light and I felt a little safer, but I still didn't let my guard down when I was running in the street.

Snow is melting and most sidewalks were clear, but the unshoveled ones were slushy.  Not bad mostly, but on 45 just south of St. Mal, the slush was pretty deep because that was a sheet of ice before the thaw.

I ran a minute and 1/2 before I realized that my watch hadn't picked up a satellite, so I stopped until it connected.  I figured the distance on the way home (it was .17).  So my real splits (not including that 1 1/2 minute .17) were 8:52, 9:04, 8:55, 8:37, 9:04, 8:37, 8:30, 8:07 and then 7:05 for the last .22.  The pace felt comfortable, not hard, but not easy.  I was working, and only slightly bogged down in some of the slushy areas. 

Woke up at about 1:30 feeling that silly pain in my left heel.  I don't know if the cause might be the pace from yesterday or that my heel likes consistency in the surface it is running on and is unhappy that it isn't getting it.

Then woke up at 4:30 to get in a run before work.  I went for an hour, stopping every 5 minutes to stretch my foot.  After I was warm I didn't feel it as much, but I feel it now and am wearing gym shoes to work and trying not to baby it.

I ran on a treadmill today since I was at my sister's.  This way I could keep an eye on the kids while my sister slept in a little longer.

I did a progression run.  Started with 1 mile in 9:30 and increased to 8:57 for the next two miles.  Then hit the up button 1 time for the next bunch of miles.  Then, for some reason, I decided that I wanted to finish 7 miles in 60 minutes and knew that I had to do more of an increase, so started hitting the up button once every minutes starting at 52 minutes.  The last 3 minutes were hard.  If I thought about it I could probably figure out exactly what he pace was, but I think in the last 3 minutes I was just above and then just below 7 minute pace.

I didn't finish in 60 minutes.  I was about 10-15 seconds over.

Then I cooled down 1/2 mile.

My sis diagnosed my heel as PF.  Aggravated by some sort of change in routine, probably.  It was a little bothersome in the first few miles, but felt fine as I kept going.  So I'll just keep doing what I've been doing, which is stretching calves and my arches.  I'm about to also check out the link that Bonnie posted to my blog yesterday (thanks!).