Saturday, August 27, 2011

Apparently I cannot contain my runner enthusiasm

Instead of a weekly wrap-up this week I'm going to give you some of the highlights of my very stellar week.

Highlight #1: Friends rock. On Tuesday I had dinner with a bunch of other newish faculty that I've gotten to know. Good times. On Wednesday we hosted one of my college friends (Frank, who I ran the US Half with) and her family as they trek from DC to California for military relocation. On Thursday I had a fabulous girls' night with my neighbor and friend Kayla, which brings me to...

Highlight #2: Taking Kayla to buy her first pair of grown-up running shoes. Earlier in the week she texted me from a Sports Authority asking for input. I told her to leave and that we would go to a real running store together so she could get properly fitted. I had a *really* hard time containing my enthusiasm about bringing her into the fold. She intended to just buy shoes, but ended up leaving with shoes, body glide, socks, and some runner food. And then we had dinner at a chocolate bar. Because we can. Here we are afterward with our plunder. My plunder included new shoes, which brings me to...

Highlight #3: I have narrow feet. This means I wear a weirdo size of running shoe: 10-2A. After all your wonderful input about extra-cushion shoes (huge shout out here to Sarah--thank you so much!), I'd decided that it was a smart thing for me to experiment with. So when I got to Big River Running (LOVE that place) I asked for the Brooks Trance in 10-2A. Not manufactured in that size. Damn! So let the record show that I came home with my 400th pair of Brooks Adrenalines (8/26).

To sort of compensate, I decided to try some extra cushion socks. At $11/pair, I just bought one to try them out, and I'm officially a fan. I will be going back to get more. How have I not discovered them already? I'm hopeful that I have a good combo of stuff on the feet now.

Highlight #4: As if life could get any better, this weekend is one of my absolute faves in StL--the Festival of Nations. A little less than half of my neighborhood park is taken over by 42 booths selling foods from 34 nationalities (we got a list), plus a world bazaar where mostly the same set of nationalities sells goods, and live music plays basically all weekend. After my run I met my boys there so we could chow down. I'm not even going to tell you what I ate. You'd just hate me for it. Nom nom nom.

What did you have going on this week? Are you any more successful than I was at containing runner enthusiasm with newer runners? Yeah, I didn't think so. :)

3 comments:

Marlene said...

Sooo awesome to see new runners coming into their own!

Hope you enjoyed the festival!

Thanks for the comment, BTW. It can be hard to be brutally honest sometimes in admitting when training is just not going well... but I know it helps me to read about others dealing with the same stuff, so I try to put it all out there. And check the ego. :)

Run Jess Run said...

That's exactly how I felt when T said he wanted running shoes...jumping up and down while giggling could not be done.

Black Knight said...

I like this post full of highlights!!!
I hope that every post is positive like this.