A conversation with the wind

First and foremost, I'm alive. So, that's encouraging. 

I woke up today, ready to tackle my 90-minute run. I ate my toast, stuffed my super cool belt with a packet of GU and a bunch of Kleenex, donned my racing watch, fired up the iPod, and walked out the door. At first, it felt like any other run. There were fire trucks at Bob's 19th Hole, but the building didn't seem to be on fire, so that was good. I had to sidestep various crushed creatures on the side of the highway, but Gigantor did not make an appearance, so I seemed to be doing fine. 

About 40 minutes in, I started to feel myself slowing a bit. This might have been due to my minty lip gloss wearing off. This might also have been due to all the hills. Anyone who says there aren't hills in northern Indiana has clearly never run on the west side near the golf courses. The hills were starting to get to me. That's when I reached for the emergency GU packet. With no water available, I choked it down the best I could and kept on going. I must have missed that window, though, because the GU energy didn't really help the rest of the run all that much. 

When I turned to start heading back toward my house, I was greeted by the wind. The SOUTHERLY wind, mind you. So, I decided to have a conversation with the wind. See, this is why I can't go running on trails with other people. This was not an in-my-head conversation... I had an actual OUT LOUD conversation. "Oh, okay, wind, why don't you just keep blowing?" "Okay, seriously, wind? This seems a little over the top." "This is bulls***! I'm running south!" I exchanged some other strong words with the wind, but I will spare you from them. Use your imagination. And then throw in a lot of extra curse words. 

When I hit the 60-minute mark, I had to walk to stretch out my right knee. Currently, my right knee and I are not on speaking terms. We made it through the rest of the run alright, but not because we were really happy with each other. 

I WAY slowed my pace down the rest of the run, but when I got back toward my subdivision, I was reinvigorated and picked it up a bit. At 82-minutes, I reminded myself this was a run/walk training program, and called it a day with the running. My 8-minute cool down walk sure was nice, although if my neighbors were watching, they probably just saw a whole lot of coughing and wheezing and nose wiping. Yeah, I'm attractive when I run. 

I came into the house, stretched everything I could think to stretch, and then made myself a chocolate soy milk/banana protein smoothie. It's the little things that make a happy life... like the fact that today I can pretty much eat whatever I want and then take a long nap if I want to, because I've already been oh-so-productive. 

On second thought, I think I'll nap first. 

Oh, and, Go Irish!