A blustery, thoughtful 5 mile run inspired by crazy dreams

Yup...well...tonight my time management skills were not their sharpest again. Truthfully they were off to a rough start from the get go when I attempted to take the train in to work for about the third time this month (I've been spoiling myself by driving in during my quest to start work at 6 am for most of this month). I got to Dalhousie station at 6:38 am and there were no parking spots left. Rather than driving to the next station to park and arriving late I opted to suck up the $17 to park near my building and arrive on time. So anyhow....needless to say I didn't run with the Roadrunners tonight, so I was on my own. I decided to head out to Edgemont since it was close enough to arrive and finish running before dark. I wasn't feeling the crazy hills at the start of where I normally run though so I started a bit further on. This pathway is pretty quiet so my thoughts really start to wander normally. On a blustery night like this one it was even more quiet than usual, so it made for some interesting thinking throughout the run. I was remembering a recent post by No Wetsuit Girl that you have to read - but really she referenced an older post of hers about some of the crazy race inspired dreams she was having at the time that was leading my thinking. (You should read both posts if you haven't already...they are really good.) I've been having crazy running nightmares recently - mostly involving waking up in the morning and looking down at my right ankle and seeing it swollen into a heartbreaking cankle. I start hyperventilating because the Nike Half Marathon is a month away, and I'm just starting to train for the Goofy and this can't be happening to me... I'll put it in words now and say my ankle at times feels funny even now, although I know it is mental over anything else. I'm guessing the nightmares come from a certain amount of anxiety that I feel about starting to train for the Goofy because for as strong as I feel on some of my back to back runs, running that often still worries me. I ran a grand total of 92.17 miles last year over a period of about 2-1/2 months that resulted in a stress fracture. So far this year I have run 464.83 miles... I know I wasn't in a place where I probably should have attempted marathon training and that things are different now, but I guess I still have that deep seated worry in the back of my brain that creeps into my subconscious while I sleep. When I was looking at starting up running again last fall I walked into a Running Room store to talk to them about their group training programs to get some more information. I told the fellow behind the counter how I was recovering from an injury and I wasn't sure if I should try the 10K training group or not since marathon training really hadn't gone so well. He made an important point that the biggest thing about coming back from an injury is the mental aspect of it, and having to trust yourself a bit that you aren't going to go back out there and get injured right away if you are smart about it. Sometimes I think I'm there, but I guess the dreams indicate that I still need to learn to trust myself a bit more. Maybe one of these days I'll go back to having the non-running related dreams like where I show up to school but I've forgotten that I'm actually supposed to be back at school and I have no books and I don't even know where my classes are. Except I've been out of school for over six years now. Right....I think that will get an interpretation at another time....

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Anyhow, back to the fact that I ran tonight... Since I was attempting to beat the incoming storm and the impending darkness I only went out for 5 miles. I took my new Asics Gel Kayano 13s out for a spin to see how I liked them. I wasn't intending to put these in the rotation just yet since I've got a pair of green 2110s with 160 miles on them, and a brand new pair of pink 2110s that recently just came out of the box. I'm not loving the pink 2110s as much as my green pair though, so I'd like to see how I feel about the Kayanos in case I'd like to pick up a second pair for the tail end of my Goofy training and races. Truthfully I wonder if I don't love the pink shoes because they are pink....and for as much running in skirts as I do I'm not much of a girly girl and these shoes just scream girly girl to me. So far I like the Kayanos so we'll see where they go (plus they are orange...not pink). Oh....and the 5 miles went well.

Greetings from Seattle

Okay, okay....I know....I'm on vacation and I'm blogging. But I had a spare moment and I realized that I didn't have a chance to blog for a couple of days thanks to a serious case of life and work taking over.
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On Thursday I managed to get a quick 3 miles in over lunch just to make sure I hit that 10 miles of midweek mileage before I took off for Seattle. It is funny how inclement weather affects your pace during a run. It started off nice and sunny, but after stopping to tighten my shoe laces 1.2 miles in I looked up and some crazy clouds had rolled in and the wind really picked up. I was worried that thunder and lightning might be imminent, so rather than continuing on my loop I took a short cut back into downtown to quickly make my way back to the office. I kept running through the streets of downtown, and by the time I made it back to my building rain hadn't started yet so I took a quick zip around the block to finish out the 3 miles. The splits on those miles were great..! I grabbed lunch and as soon as I was back in my office it started hailing. Good thing I hadn't left for my run any later...
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Thursday afternoon was a crazy rush back home all the way on the north side of town...grab the dogs and drive all the way south of town to drop them at the kennel...then drive all the way north for my fitness assessment for BBC. The fitness assessment went really well - yay, I lost some inches and my upper body strength has improved! Instructor S also talked to me about some stretches for my hip flexors and kept on about strengthening my lower back to help keep injuries at bay.
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Yesterday DGB and I hopped a flight nice and early to the Emerald City of Seattle. After grabbing the rental car the first order of business was lunch. D was nice enough to indulge my serious craving for Chipotle... Not sure why I love that place so much, but I do know that I'm sad we don't have them in Canada. A chicken burrito bowl later and we were ready to hit the town. Hit the stores in the town that is. I found a pair of orange and silver Asics Gel-Kayano 13s in a size 10 so shoe shopping mission was accomplished. If nothing else happens this weekend at least I got new kicks. Alrighty....there is a college football game going on here soon - University of Washington vs. Boise and our hotel is right by the stadium. We'd better get out of here soon and on to the important stuff before we get caught up in a sea of purple vs orange and blue.

R.I.P. - Leana's Blue Asics GT-2100s

This afternoon I made it back safe and sound from Red Deer so I was able to get my super quickie run in before BBC tonight (2 mi to be exact). As we were supposed to be pretty close to Confederation Park I opted to hit the pathway there and run through Queen's Park Cemetery. Honestly the rest of the pathways through Confederation Park are sort of ho hum on the excitement scale, but the short clip through the cemetery is always interesting. It is super quiet, and a little bit eerie. Sometimes I wonder if people take offense to there being a bike/jogging path right through the middle of it. It is, however, a pretty spot and I like the quietness of it for a little bit of reflection. Part of today's reflection was over the life of the somewhat dirty and blue Asics GT-2100s on my feet. I've been faithfully tracking the mileage on them and know that they are nearing retirement age. But I didn't think they were there yet. Earlier this month I started noting shin pain down on most occasions when I ran in them, but the pain would always subside after a bit. Today both shins hurt, the knees hurt, the arches hurt...and I realize I have been running a lot, but I'm pretty sure I can attribute this to my shoes above all else. So at 263 miles it is time for the Asics GT-2100s to put in for early retirement for leisurely walks with the dogs and trips to the supermarket and nights of bingo. (OK, maybe not bingo, I'd have to go to bingo for the shoes to go to bingo.) These are the first ever shoes that I was fitted for and purchased at a running store - thank you Roger Soler's Sports in San Antonio - and they were the first shoes I tried on that day. I bought them one week before my ankle turned into a cankle and I found out about my stress fracture. They waited patiently for the days when they could see the pavement and the sunny skies and I was ready to return to running. They saw me through the CIBC Run for the Cure, the St. Patrick's Day 10K, the Go Red for Women 5K, the Minnie Marathon 15K and countless training runs. They were good sneakers.