Fall in Love with Autumn

Love love love autumn. Saturday, we all worked in the yard raking leaves and cleaning up the flower beds. What a mess! Afterwards, we all loaded up in the car and went to Pettiti's to get harvest decorations and mums. They had this wonderful "front porch special" which consisted of 2 pumpkins, 2 medium size mums, 1 large mum, a bale of hay and a nice gathering of cornstalks for $30. How great to take the guesswork out of decorating. Our house now has fantastic fall curb appeal.

Today puppy and I went for a marvelous 7 mile trail run. I don't know who was happier - him or me! I'm not 100% back to my old fitness self, but I'm getting darn close. Seriously, is there any better sound to hear while running than crunching or rustling through leaves? Love this season!

Happy Autumn to all!

As Ice Cube Said, "Today Was a Good Day"

I rested my calf for two very long weeks with no running and no high heels. This morning was my first test run to see if my injury was too bad and would require me to cancel my November 8 race. But as one of the greatest rappers so wonderfully said, today was a good day. The 5-mile run was at Munroe Falls Metro Parks at 8am as part of the Ohio Outside Trail series consisting of two scenic loops of "rolling hills". I took it very easy on the first loop so as not to reinjure myself and to just see how my body responded after being dormant. I kicked it up a notch on the second loop, still not too hard, and actually felt like a little kid letting it loose running down a couple short hills! The race schwag was pretty cool - everyone received a pint glass instead of a boring white race shirt, a water bottle and a sample packet of the new Gu chomps. Post race they had hot mulled cider, cookies (my favorite gingernsnaps!), bananas and bagels. With the temps hovering between 38-40 the cider was fantastic. I enjoyed this course and small crowd so much, I will probably sign up for the rest of the series. Finished in a conservative 57:13. I would like to shave 4 minutes off that for the November race.

On another note, good luck to Elizabeth today at the Columbus marathon!

Vanity and Other Sins

Four weeks until I get to cross off the 20th state. One full week with absolutely no running...nada, zilch, zero. You see, two weeks ago I attended a wedding and reception where I debuted 6" stilletto heels...gorgeous works of art in which I received numerous compliments AND a calf strain which "popped" on my run a couple days after the wedding. I didn't take the strain seriously and tried running again and, this time, I was forced to take the pain seriously. So it's cross training for me on the cycle ops in the basement for the next two weeks, a swim here and there and NO MORE STILLETTOS - at least not for 7 hour stretches. Vanity...you devil.