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Thursday, December 6, 2012

Resolution Check In

Running - Goal: Run at least 500 miles this year; run at least 1 half marathon
[Seeing as how I broke my foot and all, I'm going to include miles biked in brackets.]


Through November 30
January: 47 miles
February: 72 miles
March: 80 miles
April: 69.5 miles
May: 76 miles
June: 81 miles
July: 67 miles
August: 108 miles
September: 14 miles [44 miles]
October: [112 miles]
November: 13 miles [44 miles]

Total for the year: 627.5 miles [814.5 miles]

Reading - Goal: Read at least one book per month

January Books
Riggs, Ransom - Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children
Bray, Libba - A Great and Terrible Beauty

February Books
Moran, Michelle - Madame Tussaud: A Novel of the French Revolution

March Books
Massie, Robert K. - Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman
Sussman, Ellen - French Lessons
Gilbert, Elizabeth - Committed: A Love Story

April Books
Clark, Colin - My Week with Marilyn
Morgenstern, Erin - The Night Circus

May Books
Raybourn, Deanna - Dark Road to Darjeeling
James, P. D. - Death Comes to Pemberley

June Books
Martin, George R.R. - A Song of Ice and Fire Book 3: A Storm of Swords
James, E.L. - 50 Shades of Gray (for the record, I hated this book)

July Books
Martin, George R.R. - A Song of Ice and Fire Book 4: A Feast for Crows
Bronte, Charlotte - Jane Eyre
Mantel, Hillary - Wolf Hall

August Books
Dunant, Sarah - The Birth of Venus

September Books
Worked on Anna Karenina... didn't finish it.

October Books
Gabaldon, Diana - Outlander
Flynn, Gillian - Gone Girl
Irving, Washington - The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (short story)

November Books
Davis, Kathryn - Versailles: A Novel

Currently reading:  
Tolstoy, Leo - Anna Karenina (I'm about to throw in the towel on this one)
Gabaldon, Diana - Dragonfly in Amber

Movies (no resolution; just to keep track)
The Artist
Underworld: Awakening
The Hunger Games
Wrath of the Titans
The Avengers
Mirror Mirror
Men in Black 3 
Magic Mike
The Dark Knight Rises
Lincoln
Anna Karenina

Things I Believe Thursday IV

I believe that travel makes you a better person.

It helps you not only learn about what makes us different, but reminds you that really we are all the same.

Wednesday, December 5, 2012

Better Late Than Never: Jingle Bell Run 5k Recap

You'd think that now that I can finally run again, I'd be writing up a storm. Guess not! I'm terribly delinquent on this race recap.

On Saturday morning, I woke up bright and early at 5:30 am to drive allllllll the way to the Jingle Bell 5k at Stony Point Fashion Park. Last year, I did this race by myself and it was a pretty sad experience. Not wanting a repeat, I set about getting Marcey to do this with me. Luckily, she wasn't very difficult to convince.

We met up 30 minutes before the start of the race so that we could each don our "festive" gear. Last year I did not wear anything festive and felt very left out. Generally, I'm not a big fan of wearing costumes or decoration while running, so I went minimal.

Jingle Bell run indeed.
After tearing ourselves away from the heated seats in Marcey's van, we wandered to the start line about 5 minutes before we were set to begin. Marcey had gamely volunteered to run/walk with me (despite my protests), so we lined up in the middle of the pack of about 300 runners (who knows how many there really were... I'm terrible at estimating this kind of thing).

I hadn't shared this, but my foot hurt all week long last week. I made a very stupid footwear decision on Sunday the 25th and for the rest of the week it felt like I had gone back in time to the beginning of November. My foot hurt again... a lot. I did not run at all leading up to the Jingle Bell, instead opting to swim and bike. I confessed my sins to Steve at PT on Thursday, who was baffled as to why 30 minutes in a pair of high heeled boots would cause my foot to freak out as much as it did. He was also mystified by my decision to wear said boots to the grocery store. (What can I say... my flats looked ridiculous with this particular pair of jeans, ok??)

Despite my nerves about my foot crapping out on me, I wasn't exactly keeping an eagle eye on my Garmin to ensure that we were running exactly one minute and walking one minute. The course for the Jingle Bell 5k starts at the shopping mall then involves some pretty steep hills in two office-complex cul-de-sacs before coming back around to the mall. Sometimes we walked longer if the walking leg was going uphill and then ran longer as we went downhill.



Anyhow, I was extremely nervous about running this 5k, so did not push it as far as pace goes. The race was not officially timed, but the almighty Garmin says we ran it in 34:17 (10:42 min pace), which isn't too shabby considering the run/wak and hills.

In fact, we did so well that we literally jingled our bells off.


I don't have much to report as far the actual race goes because really it was just a vehicle (read: excuse) for getting together with Marcey for a run. It's a pretty casual affair that includes dogs, walkers, strollers, reindeer antlers, and elf costumes. ID's are even required for packet pick up. It's small and generally well-organized and a nice opportunity to raise awareness and money for arthritis.

So "Road to Recovery" race 2 is now complete. The best thing about it was that I got to start AND end with my beloved HMR. Thanks for being there for me, Marcey. You're the best.