Ok, FINE!

The 2009 Mayor's Cup was a success.  I successfully finished the race in greater than last place, and ran the whole way.  I was close to using a running-ninja-kick on a 10 year old that sprinted at the end and passed me up, but He won fair and square, so I let him live.

Thanks a ton to My friend who signed me up and provided a lot of motivation, and mostly to my wife who lived in a constant state of mild shock that I was actually putting on running shoes and working up a sweat.  She was reaffirming throughout the "training" and always gave me support when I needed it.  Thanks Honey!


Whats next?  The Podrunner series that I've been following goes on to the "Gateway to 8k" over the course of 6 weeks.  I might continue the 3 mile run for a week or two, and pick that up.  I'll probably keep my eyes out for another 5k so that there is that constant looming terror that seems to help with motivation.

5K done

Whew!  I've reached my goal now I can stop running.  Finally!

stones!

Went home early today cause of kidney pain.

Got home and took some pain meds, watched some TV, and took a little nap.

I felt much better this evening, and decided not to skip another day since the 5k was close.

I did the treadmill again, but this time, watched some food show while I was running.  This seemed to help with the boredom issue, and the run felt a bit better.  I calibrated the Nike+ based on the actual treadmill distance, since the treadmill is most accurate.  I started at 6mph, then at 2.5 mi went to 6.5, then shortly after went up to 7mph to finish it up.

Here's the run:  http://bit.ly/102xat

Snow!

Tonight's run:  http://tr.im/zmFm

Before I mention why I skipped _three_ days, can you believe it snowed today!?  Its still summer for a few more hours at least, and it snows.

My bride went to a ladie's retreat with some friends from church this past weekend, and so I was Mr. Mom for a few days.  It was fun to goof off a bit.  Me and the boys stayed up late, watched Star Trek TOS episodes, ate pizza, had Ritz crackers and EZ cheese for dinner, etc.!

Saturday night rolls around, and the boys get to bed around 9:00pm, I stay up a little too late reading, and then finally crash around midnight.  About 4:00am, my 3yr old comes into my room.  I wake up enough to notice he's walking toward the bed, and so I roll close to the edge.  He leans real close and says,
"Daddy, My tummy hurLLLLLRGGRRRH!"
I can say, that's the first time I've ever had someone else's puke in my ear.

I grab him up as fast as I can, and football carry him into the bathroom, but unfortunately 80% of what he ate for the last year is already in my hair, on my pillow, in the sheets, etc.

I parked the poor kiddo in front of the toilet, wipe off the big chunks from my face, and get him into some fresh PJs.  We moved out to the living room, and I set up a puke survival zone.  I had a pillow in a trashbag, covered with a pillowcase, several layers of blankets/sheets on the floor, a large pot, box of kleenex, bottle water, a flashlight and a hazmat suit.

I tried to explain how the pot worked several times, and he seemed to understand the instructions:
    -When tummy hurts, grab pot, place under face, eject disagreeable tummy fillings, wipe mouth with Kleenex, take drink of water, lay back down.

The munchkin seemed to be falling asleep, so I snuck off to the shower.  I managed to get most of the puke out of my ears, and got some clean clothes on.  Snuck a peek, and he was still sleeping, so I started on the laundry.

Once I felt I had most of the mess contained, I came back out into the living room, and I must not have been tip-toeing ninja style, cause he sat right up as soon as I got close.  I said, "Hey Bud, you doing ok?"  He smiled and said "yeaRRRHHHHGGGGGHH"

He hadn't quite mastered the pot procedure.

This went on for the next few hours, and finally we both got about an hour of sleep.  Luckily, my 6yr old slept in a bit.

In any case, that night when my wife got home, I was so wiped out from bio-hazard duty, that I ended up crashing pretty early.  Hence why I skipped an extra day.

Since it snowed today, I ended up going over to a fairly new 24-hour gym that opened up a couple of blocks away.  I started the week trial, and used the treadmill tonight. 

Has it really been that long since VMworld in SanFran?  I had forgotten how doubleplusungood the treadmill experience is.

I think I'll keep braving the cold until the snow is too deep to run in.  I probably need to get some cold weather running clothes.

Running with the munchkins

Tonight's run: http://bit.ly/19UCvN

My two munchkins ran with me tonight.  Well, they ran for about 30 seconds, then said "daddy wait!"  I left them in the dust.  I could hear their wailing fade into the distance as I kicked up dust and cackled with glee.

Luckily my sweetheart was also with us, and she graciously stayed behind with the hobbits as I waddled on towards 5k.

The Nike+ has some nice features.  You can change the type of "workout" that you want based on the goals you have.  Previously, I was just choosing "basic".  Tonight I tried distance, and found that a screaming banshee voice would interrupt my music and screech out distance in kilometers.  This of course caused me to pee a little the first time she invaded my perfect running zen.

Once I recovered, I turned down the volume of my iPhone, and found a perfectly acceptable and soothing female voice call out the kilometers remaining till 5k.

Overall it was a good run tonight.  I followed the week 9 podrunner, and was able to complete the whole thing.  I think I'm ready for the 5k in about a week!

Super Preferred

I spent an hour in an insurance salesman's office this evening.

I hadn't been in quite a while, and he had called to let me know there had been some small changes in policies, state requirements, etc, so I decided to make sure everything was up to date.

After we took care of auto and home insurance, we talked about my pitiful life insurance policy.  A couple of years ago, I took out an overpriced, undervalue policy in short notice because I was going to be taking a trip to Africa, and I wanted to make sure there was _something_ in place.  Because I waited till the last minute, I had to get something that didn't require a full medical examination, so they swabbed my mouth, and gave me a $150k policy.

Ever the procrastinator, I didnt get around to updating it till today.

The insurance guy and I sat down in his office, and he asked if I smoked, then proceeded to tell me the coverage and cost of the non-smoker policy.  Fortunately, on the printout he was using, I saw two other categories beyond non-smoker called "non-smoker preferred", and "non-smoker super preferred".  The super preferred cost was less than half of the plain non-smoker premium, but he was avoiding it like he couldn't see it.

After the spiel, I asked "so, how do I qualify for the super deluxe plan?"

He forced a smile, and tried not to obviously look at my man-boobs.

"Ha, well you know, I had a sprinter in here the other day and he didnt even qualify, but, you never know what will happen..."

Sprinter? 

Tonight's run: http://bit.ly/pbxWi

12 days!

Stats for today's run: http://bit.ly/ybYD7


Only 12 days till the 5k!

Nike+

I picked up the Nike+ doodad this afternoon. Since I don't own Nike shoes, I applied liberal amounts of duct tape to it and my left shoe, and then synced it to my iPhone.

I did my normal 3.3 mile path following the week 8 podrunner. This was a 5 minute warmup walk, a 28 minute run, then a 5-6 min cooldown walk.

The Nike+ was off a bit in distance, but since I'm fairly confident in the distance of the path I take (I used gmaps pedometer to measure it), I calibrated based on 3.3 miles, and here are the stats it spit out:

Distance 3.3 miles
Time 39:04
Pace 11'48" per mile

The Nike+ is definitely a cool tool. Hopefully it remains accurate after the next couple of runs.

fresh air again!

Here are the final counts from the treadmill madness in San Francisco:

8/30/2009 36:25 mins 2.64 mi
9/1/2009 33 min 2.66 mi
9/3/2009 34:23 min 2.95 mi

A couple more treadmill observations:
-Consistent! When I set the treadmill at a steady 6MPH, i know that I'll be running that fast whether I like it or not. Slowing down without the consent of the treadmill could lead to certain embarrassment, and likely pain.
-Tedious! There is nothing to do (once one has counted one's own nose hairs) but watch the clock on the treadmill. This makes the 30+ minutes seem like hours. I suppose this is the same as boring, but this is my blog, and I'll be redundant if I want to be redundant if I want to.

I'm back in Colorado, and tonight's run was back out in the open air again. I definitely enjoy it much more than the treadmill! Tonight was the podrunner week 7 track which was 3.3 miles in 40 minutes. There was a 5 minute warm-up walk, a 25 minute run, then a 10 minute walk at the end. The track ended after a 4 minute cool-down, but since I cant fly, I walked the rest of the way home.

I didn't ice at all in SanFran, so I'll go back to the ice again tonight.