Joanna Runs

Mondays in Love: Random

2012-01-30T22:41:00.000-06:00

I'm a little shy on content today, so you get a list of random things I was thankful for today.

Sunshine!!
My ability to work from home sometimes
New blog followers and connecting with more of your blogs
Neighbors we are blessed to call friends, who helped out today in a pinch
Some co-workers who have been incredibly thoughtful toward me lately
Seeing my belly move when baby kicks and squirms
My faith
Baking. Our neighbors helping us out gave me a great excuse to make chocolate chip cookies :)
Walking into the nursery and just looking around and daydreaming
Weighing myself this morning and feeling really good about how its going
Coupons. Go ahead, say it. I'm cheap.
Salad and fruit. Constantly.

That's all I've got, peeps. Run strong and carry on!

Freeze Your Thorns Off 5k "race" report

2012-01-28T14:38:00.000-06:00

Today was the date of the long-awaited Freeze Your Thorns Off 5k, hosted by The Boring Runner. I did my "race" as part of a slightly longer Saturday "long" run, but made sure to stop at the 5k mark and record my finish.

New PR? Not even close. Not even my fastest 3.1 this week. But you know what, this was what I had in me today, and that is more than ok! I am, after all, just days shy of being 7 months pregnant. Here are some more pictures from the "finish line" (which to any onlooker looked like a random spot on the running path).

Feeling groovy. And sparkly.

My silhouette at the "finish line". This picture was harder to take than it looks!

I finished out my run at about 4.75 miles and a huge smile on my face. It definitely is not about speed at this point. It's about feeling good and enjoying being healthy. Thanks, Boring Runner, for spicing up my Saturday run!

Can I gush for a minute?

2012-01-25T22:43:00.000-06:00

It was still dark this morning when my alarm went off. I laid there in bed thinking how if I skipped my run I could stay in bed for another hour. Then I thought about the weather forecast, and how it was supposed to start raining mid-morning and rain all day and tomorrow. If I didn't go run now, I wasn't going to get to until Friday afternoon or Saturday. If I didn't go run now, I was going to wish I had. So, I got up, got dressed, and headed out.

When I got to the corner of the park I decided to run the perimeter along the road to stay in the streetlights. By the time I got halfway down the long side of the park, it was light enough to head into the park and take the path. I warmed up enough to take off my gloves. I ran my whole 4 miles without stopping to walk at all. I felt free. I felt healthy. I smiled. The stress of the day to day melted away.

And all day I thought about how happy I was that I'd gotten out of bed and gone for that run. How glad I was that I'd grabbed the opportunity while I had it. I felt like I'd won. I'd beat the rain. I'd beat the sleepies. I'd done something I love. It's good to be a runner.

Mondays in Love & Giveaway Winners

2012-01-23T20:40:00.001-06:00

I'm not going go lie to you, I've had kind of a rough go of it the last handful of days. The weather turned all grouchy (as my son would say--actually he says this about an upset tummy but I think it applies), including ice on Friday/Saturday. JoePa's passing was emotional for everyone to whom WE ARE means something. But what got me was the exhaustion. And that is the root of today's Mondays in Love.

Just in case I don't talk about it constantly, I'm pregnant. I'm 6.5+ months pregnant. I'd gotten so I was waking up 3 times a night to go to the bathroom and come morning, my hips and arms hurt from the weight of being directly on one side. Not cool, and not conducive to running/motivation. But, it turns out that at least a temporary solution was simple. Today, I am thankful for pillows. I'm freaking sleeping in clouds and it's amazing.

http://ricsbastsa.blogspot.com/2008/09/sleeping-with-clouds.html

I now have a pillow under my head, a body pillow on one side, and a super cushy pillow on the other side. It's amazing. I'm back to waking up once per night and waking up much more rested and ready to RUN. I did my 4-miler this morning with a smile on my face!

Now, on to the Chickbands giveaway. There were 29 entries to my giveaway. Using random.org, the winners are...{drum roll please}....

Meg

tpinthehouse

Run Jess Run

Meg and Jess, I already have your email addresses, so I will put you in touch with Kara.

tpinthehouse, drop me a line at joannaruns@gmail.com and I'll get you hooked up! Congrats, ladies!!

Forever in our hearts

2012-01-22T20:21:00.000-06:00

"Believe deep down in your heart that you're destined to do great things." Joe Paterno

Eleven Random Things

2012-01-21T14:20:00.002-06:00

**DON'T FORGET TO ENTER MY CHICKBANDS GIVEAWAY (HERE)**

I absolutely love other peoples' "random things about me" posts. It's a fun way to learn about the bloggers I follow and see what crazy things people come up with. This time, you get to read some random from lil' ol' me, thanks to Marlene's 11 Randoms post yesterday. Here are the rules:
1. Post these rules
2. You must post 11 random things about yourself
3. Answer the questions set for you in their post
4. Create 11 new questions for the people you tag to answer
5. Go to their blog and tell them you’ve tagged them
6. No stuff in the tagging section about you are tagged if you are reading this. You legitimately have to tag people! (I'm downgrading the tagging from 11 to 5--11 seems like a lot)

11 Random Things

I am wildly allergic to honey. I know it doesn't make much sense, and it doesn't always happen (different strains of pollen? Different sugar concentrations?), but when I unknowingly eat it, really bad things happen. I discovered this thanks to honey nut Cheerios in the 3rd grade. You don't want details.
I really hate over-paying for groceries. I don't have a problem spending money on nice things every now and then--it's not an all-encompassing cheapness--I just hate over-paying for groceries. I have a whole routine of how I shop that's designed to save money. It works pretty well.
I once fell off a mountain. The ground was dry and just let loose under me and I fell, went over a small cliff, and slid for what seemed like forever. I was pretty sure I was going to die for about 5 seconds. I still have scars on my stomach and arm from the fall, and it was nearly 13 years ago.
My husband and I both hold degrees from Virginia Tech, and we met there, but we didn't attend at the same time. We actually met through my brother.
I think I've mentioned this before, but I love lemon curd. It's expensive, but so worth it.
I know it will be a while before we take another big trip, but I'm already ready for another vacation that includes West Virginia. Our vacation this past summer was perfect.
For years I ate what became known as my "10:30 Banana." Like clockwork. I still eat a lot of bananas, but I've diversified the snack repertoire.
I was born in the back of a moving vehicle. It was a red hatchback. Know what I grew up and bought? A freaking red hatchback. We are NOT going to delay in leaving for the hospital when the time comes. You just can't have consecutive generations born in red hatchbacks. It's too much.
I can't stand dirty floors.
I bake most of our bread. I actually got up this morning so I could get bread baked in time for lunch. I get kinda weirded out by the preservatives and unpronounceable things in commercial bread. Plus, see #2 above.
I talk and sometimes do bizarre things in my sleep. By far my personal favorite--about a year ago I punched myself in the eye while sleeping. If it hadn't woken me up in time to see my arm going back down I wouldn't have believed it. My husband happened to be awake for it too. We looked at each other like, "WTH just happened??"

Questions from Marlene
1. What is your favourite pair of non-running shoes?
Oh man, that's a hard question. I have a pair of Doc Marten mary janes that I've had for 10 years and they are still going strong. I love those things. I also have a pair of black boots that I wear all the time and love.

2. What are you wearing right now?
Yoga pants and a yellow and gray striped maternity hoodie. It's Saturday. I can't be held accountable.

3. What is the first thing you would do if you won the lottery?
Meet with a financial planner. Not very exciting, I know! I would just be afraid of making really stupid mistakes with the money.

4. Are you named after anyone/anything?
No. My parents had both taught for a handful of years before I was born, so they picked my name by process of elimination--what names didn't evoke memories of terrible students.

5. What is worse – being too cold, or being too hot?
Being too hot. It's nauseating.

6. What is hanging on your walls at home?
We have a lot of black and white framed pictures of places we've been, and a handful of framed pictures of family and friends. I also have a few city-themed things, like an old print of Chicago, a fabric rendering of the Paris metro map, and a framed piece celebrating Arizona's 75th anniversary. Finally, we have some more traditional art pieces, including paintings my dad did and some prints.

7. What is the last thing that you took a picture of?
Part of the stairs in our house. After I fell in December we decided to get carpet treads, which were installed yesterday. Hopefully this makes the steps safer for everyone.

8. Who is the last person you spoke to on the phone?
My very much missed Meg. We finally got to catch up last night.

9. Where did you go on vacation as a child?
We went to different places. We went to Chattanooga/Atlanta once, Niagara Falls, various beaches on the east coast, and once we went to Disney World.

10. What is your favourite TV show?
Probably Justified. So addictive.

11. How many pieces of jewelry do you wear regularly?
I always wear my engagement and wedding rings, and most days I wear earrings and a necklace. Sometimes I wear another ring or a watch, but not usually.

My 11 Questions

What do you consider your greatest accomplishment?
What's the funniest thing that's ever happened to you?
Are you a morning person? If not, how do you feel about morning people?
What's your favorite book?
If you could take classes to learn any new skill, what would it be?
What is your favorite track workout (or other workout if you don't do track)?
If you could visit any place on earth, where would you go?
Do you have an usual talent?
What's your favorite guilty pleasure?
True or false: Jimmy John's is awesome.
How long have you been in your current job?

Are you tagged??

Raquelita

Jodi

RunningFirst (because he hasn't blogged in ages)

Wym

Detroit Runner

CHICKBANDS GIVEAWAY!!

2012-01-18T18:59:00.000-06:00

Today I get to do one of my favorite things--host a great giveaway!

A while back the ever-fabulous Marlene did a Chickbands giveaway. While I didn't win, it made me aware of the product and I quickly fell in love. These are VERY reasonably priced headbands that really, honest-to-goodness do not slip. Here's what I love about them:

Price point
The fact that they don't slip, as mentioned. I think they are lined in velvet, which does an amazing job.
The HUGE range of colors, widths, and patterns they come in (I own 4 sparkly ones, an argyle, and a houndstooth, and there are like 15 others I want to buy)
They ship quickly and at a reasonable shipping cost ($1 for your whole order, I believe)
The owner, Kara, is an absolute sweetheart and is great to work with if you ever do have a question. For instance, I recently sent a Chickband to a friend as a gift and asked if she would include a gift note and remove price information, both of which she did and was so nice about it!

I wear them to run in (and this is proof that I don't just share the "good" pictures. What? It was early.) This was this morning in my silver sparkly super-skinny.

And every now and then I wear them to work. This is my argyle 5/8 inch Chickband.

The only caution I might issue is that the really wide bands don't sit flat enough to be comfortable for running. They work great for everyday wear though, and you may find that they work for running for you. Maybe my noggin' is just a funny shape. :)

Now, to the good part. I have 3 Chickbands to give away. Here's how to enter.

Mandatory entry:

You need to do two things. Go like the Chickbands Facebook page (and let me know that you did), and check out the Chickbands Etsy shop and let me know what you like. Leave one total comment to let me know you did these two things.

Bonus entry: As a second comment, follow my blog and let me know!

I will pick THREE winners on Monday. Good luck!!

Mondays in Love: Track Practice!!!

2012-01-16T09:00:00.000-06:00

Ok, sort of. I mean let's not get crazy here. But, I'm really excited about this.

Over the summer a new track was under construction about a mile from my house. On Saturday, I was planning to drive to my work to use the 3 lap/mile outdoor track (which maintenance assured me was clear of ice and snow). On my way I remembered the new, closer track and thought I would check it out. It's gorgeous! And if you look carefully, you can even see the Arch in the distance.

When I get back to training, I can run to the track as a warm-up, do my speed work here, and run home as a cool-down. How sweet is that?? For my last two marathon training cycles I've done my speed work in the park gauging the distance by Garmin (because really, a 3 lap/mile track is kind of a pain to do speed work on). So excited to be able to do it right next time around!

The Weekend Update

2012-01-13T20:01:00.000-06:00

Hellooooooo weekend!! I'm starting to like this semi-regular weekend update. It's fun to post the random stuff. So, it's the weekend, and you know what that means?!? I got through my huge deadline! Woooohoooo!! Time to relax a little this weekend. Here's to kicking things off with a little foto Friday.

Is there some way I could make racing NOT conflict with being hugely pregnant (or by then, immediately postpartum)?? At any rate, I laughed out loud when I saw it in the mail.

We finally had our first snow of the year. Less than an inch yesterday, a little more today. Way less than in our old town a few hours from here. So little snow, and yet more than enough to thrill the 3-year-old. <3 Normally I would plow right through and run in this, but...notsomuch at this point (there's some ice to it). Hello, indoor track, for a while at least.

My 28 week picture. Had a check-up yesterday and everything is looking healthy!!

Second Tri[mester] Wrap-Up

2012-01-11T21:14:00.000-06:00

We're there, folks--the third trimester has arrived! I so enjoyed writing my first tri{mester} wrap-up post, I decided to do it again after the second. Above all, I'm incredibly thankful that I am still running. But, running is not what it used to be!

On Miles

My mileage consistency has been so-so. ~~Excuses~~ Scheduling conflicts included below. Don't get me wrong here--the mileage is not blowing any one's hair back. Most "normal" weeks I've been around 12ish miles per week, and I've been fine with that. I've been particularly pleased by my gradual re-building after the early December stair incident.

Otherwise, my mileage has still been influenced some by nausea. Incredible, I know. But up until just maybe 2-3 weeks ago I was still having awful nausea some days. That's a solid 10-12 weeks later than I should have been having nausea. I could eat, but felt less than great and ended up drinking Cherry Coke a lot of days to try to settle my stomach. Honestly, it may have partly been stress. Whatever it was, I think it's finally behind me.

On Pace

In my memory, my pace started to slow down in the middle of this past trimester. But, according to the ever-handy training log, not so much. Until about a month ago my pace was anywhere from 0-30 seconds per mile slower than normal. And what happened a month ago? That's right, the stair incident. So, maybe it's possible that my Saturday "long" run is just getting back to pace rather than being a mirage.

The 0-30 second slow-down isn't new to the second trimester, but it's been more consistent. In the first trimester it was about keeping my heart rate in check. This past trimester, it's been more about shortness of breath and knowing that if I push too hard I put too much pressure on my tailbone.

More recently, I've had a few days where I just feel like a large moving object and for a few days I had shin splints. Shin splints?!? Seriously?? Where did that come from? I'm 100% ok with the slower moving days. Even though a slow pace still feels like all I've got, I'm still thrilled to be out doing it.

On Perception

I laugh every time I give someone the runner nod only to realize that they didn't see it because they were looking about 2 feet lower. Ha! But overall, I have to say, I get stared at a LOT less than I did when I was a pregnant running lady 4 years ago. Even my mother has stopped harassing me about it. And like I said on Monday, occasionally I even get some encouragement from strangers. Mostly people are really supportive.

On Logistics

I know, I know. Y'all know how much I've loved my maternity running tops. But a few other things have significantly improved my second trimester running. First, my Nathan Handheld. I haven't had to worry about whether the water fountains in my park will work on colder mornings, or when they will winterize the park. Also, I've noticed that I've had fewer headaches since I've been running with water rather than stopping every now and then when it was available.

I have no idea how running is going to change over the next couple of months. Some days are easier than others. I stopped running at 7 months with my first pregnancy, and hope to run longer than that this time around. Fingers crossed!

Mondays in Love: 9:19!?!

2012-01-09T09:00:00.000-06:00

....and, we're back on schedule. And I have a few posts planned, so things won't be quite so quiet around here. Game on!!

This Monday, I'm loving so much. Let me break it down.

My Saturday "long" run. It was glorious weather. I felt great. And I ran faster than I knew I was still capable of without feeling like I was pushing myself much. The first 4 miles of this 5-miler were 9:48, 9:30, 9:53, and 9:19. Nine-nineteen?!? Get outta here! I had no idea that was in me! The last mile was part running, part walking a cool-down.
Oh yeah. I totally park here now.

A woman in the park the other day who yelled, "You go! That's great!!" as she passed me going the opposite direction.
Getting close to my giant work deadline. It's Friday, and the project is coming together nicely.
Fruit jambalaya. I am crazy with the freaking fruit these days. Fruit on my cereal. Fruit on my greek yogurt. Fruit as snack food. Fruit in my salads. Now fruit for dinner. I seriously cannot get enough. FRUIT!

That's what I've got this Monday. Run strong ladies and gentlemen. And runners too. :)

Mondays in Love: Getting Ridiculous

2012-01-03T22:29:00.000-06:00

Seriously, this is getting ridiculous. This is my third week in a row of posting my Mondays in Love on Tuesday. First it was being wildly overwhelmed. Then it was the holiday. And last night I was working until bedtime, after staying home with the kiddo all day because his school was closed. Like I said, ridiculous. Things should be back to normal next week! Sorry guys!

**Back to your regularly scheduled programming**

Today, I'm loving two things.
1. Today is my parents' 42nd wedding anniversary
I love this. So much. And they are adorable in their very own, quirky way.

Yes, I definitely have more composed pictures of them. But really, this is who they are, and I love them. This was taken in 2006 when our family (Mr. Joanna and me, his Mom and my parents) spent Thanksgiving break in Biloxi doing Katrina clean-up work. This is my Mom vacuuming drywall dust off my Dad while he eats a banana. I love this.

2. The way my December 2011 running wrapped up

Rather than a monthly review, I did the year end post. But I'm really thankful for how December shaped up, too. The low-light of my month was the 9th when I started my day by falling down our stairs. I laid off of running for a few days to let my tailbone and side heal. Over the following weeks I slowly lowered the pace until I was back to about a 10:15 pace, and on New Years Eve I put in 5.4 miles. I am thrilled about this. I'm 6 months pregnant. Being able to cover that distance at all at this point is a huge joy. But being able to do it just a few weeks after a bad fall was even sweeter. By this point in my first pregnancy, running was not really comfortable. I am SO thankful that it's still relatively easy!! I'm in love with the fact that I can still say this:

Year in Review

2011-12-30T13:41:00.000-06:00

2011 was good to me. I got some shiny new PRs, some Rave Runs, and many other highlights. Welcome to the Year in Review!

Shiny New PRs
This was the year of the PR for me!

PR #1: Martian Half-Marathon, 1:55:56, Dearborn, MI
I had SUCH a good time doing this race (read it here). Actually, the whole darn weekend was great. The kiddo and I flew to Detroit to hang out with ODP, Kdot and my nieces, and sneak in this little 13.1. It was borderline cold for spectators, but perfect race weather. The course is pretty flat, with just a few rolling hills. Aside from a snafu in placing the turn-around point, the race was well-organized and went off without a hitch. Plus, I got to meet a bunch of the bloggers I've been following for a while.

Yours truly (w/ niece 2), Jess, Red, and Jessie

PR #2: March of Dimes 5k, 24:13

I entered this race on a whim and had a blast, but I KNOW I can totally smash this PR. It was windy as all get out and was a fairly hilly course (read it here). Plus, I was hardcore in marathon training mode, so not focused at all on running shorter distances. But, I'm glad I did it, and I won an award and everything!

PR #3: Cleveland Marathon, 4:16:07

If you've been reading my blog for long, you know this race (read it here) absorbed a huge part of my brain for much of the year, for reasons good and bad. I trained harder than I ever had, I PRed by over 11 minutes, and I met more awesome bloggers, but I made some key strategic fueling mistakes that cost me. Live and learn! I'll be back with a vengeance post-baby on this PR!

PR #4: Mileage

Ok, so not a PR in the traditional sense, but a PR nonetheless. As of today, I'm at 830.4 miles for 2011, or 100 miles more than last year. I'm especially proud of this because I spent just about half of the year pregnant. Woot!

Rave Runs

This year I also ran in some of the most gorgeous places ever--Southwest Virginia, multiple places in West Virginia, Salt Lake City, and Miami. The image that has stuck with me is, naturally, of the place that has meant the most in my life, Spruce Knob.

My craziest run of the year was certainly at Snowshoe though, where I accidentally ran waaaaay the heck down the mountain and ended up at the bottom of the ski lift. People were looking at me like I was absolutely crazy as I slowly ran my way back up.

Products Discovered

The longer I spend loving my life as a runner, the more fabulous running gear I discover. (Sidebar--I've been running for 15 years!! How the crap did that happen?!?) Things I've fallen in love with this year:

Pace bands
Nathan Handheld
Balega Hidden Comfort socks
Chick Bands (way cheaper than Sweaty Bands and work just as well!)
Arm sleeves
Maternity running tops

Other Highlights (in no particular order)

I lost 15 pounds in the first four months of the year. I actually weighed the same this Christmas (at almost 6 months pregnant) as I did last Christmas. This is going to make it so much easier to get back into non-maternity clothes faster after baby comes.
The biggest news of the year, finding out I was expecting!
Getting 3 more rooms of our house painted, getting more settled in, and building our set of local friends.
Becoming a running pusher for my friend Kayla, including getting to sherpa her through her first trip to a real running store.
Many great visits from friends throughout the year.
Our beyond fabulous vacation to Virginia/West Virginia in July. As our first vacation in 2 years, it was very needed and much appreciated. The running wasn't bad either.
Volunteering at RnR StL in October.

Goals for 2012

You know I love goals. Plans. Structure.

First and foremost, a healthy birth for my baby boy sometime late March or early April.
To rock the face off a 5k sometime in the fall.
To NOT enter anything longer than a 10k until the new baby turns 1. That's right. I will not be entering any half- or full marathons next year. Does this make me a little sad? Yes. But I also know that it is just too much with a new baby and a more than full-time job. But...I'm already thinking about some late spring 2013 races that just might have my name on them...stay tuned as I fantasize.
Lose the baby weight, or at least get under my Christmas 2010 weight before Christmas 2012.
A whole host of personal and professional goals that I won't make you read. :)

Holidays in Love

2011-12-27T14:49:00.001-06:00

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! It's hard to believe I've been away from work for almost a week now, because this past week has been a crazy, happy blur. My parents arrived last Wednesday and we quickly set to work on moving my office out of the baby's room and making the room into a nursery, and of course, all the preparations for Christmas!

Project Make-A-Nursery went very well, and while it's not finished, we are well on our way. My parents and husband painted the room a pale yellow, and a few days later my Mom and I spent about 5.5 hours shopping to find fabric, a rug, bins to hold adorable newborn clothes, etc. It was so much fun to browse through the stores and imagine the room coming together. I will definitely post a picture once it's done. And the Christmas prep, well, there was LOTS of baking, and we all know that makes me happy.

Christmas Day itself was a crazy ~60 degrees. This is me after my run on Christmas Day. Sleeveless with arm sleeves, and it was glorious. The shirt is the second maternity running top I got from Runningskirts. It's a little big, but does a great job!

And good news--I ran a little faster than I had previously and had almost NO lower back pain or pinching. I still walked up the hills, which I will probably continue to do. The run felt great, and I was smiling like an idiot all the way through. Glorious day, pain-free run, Christmas, what more could a girl ask for?!?

Next run on deck is tomorrow morning with K. Can't wait! And finally, thank you all so much for the support after my last post. It means so much!

Mondays...Tuesdays on Notice: Overwhelmed

2011-12-20T21:59:00.000-06:00

It's Tuesday. I know. It's not that I forgot yesterday, or that I absolutely couldn't have found the time to post this. I'm just gonna lay it out there for you: it was that I am completely overwhelmed in virtually all arenas of life and struggled with what to say. I need to ask for a little grace around here. When in doubt, I'll stick to running! That is, after, what this blog's about.

On Running: I went out Sunday afternoon to get in a weekend run. I think I totally made some dude's day when he passed me, looked over (I get looked at a lot these days when I run!), and I said, "Some day I'll be fast again!" He just laughed like, is she for real?? He was probably about 50 and was only running a 9:30-9:40 pace. Needless to say, my run was not my fastest, which was fine. But what wasn't cool--my tailbone did NOT respond well. It felt ok during the run but hurt afterwards. So, back to run/walk for me for a few more days.

On all other things: I am completely overwhelmed. I have a huge work deadline looming in mid-January and a whole series of smaller (but mandatory) deadlines on separate projects between now and then. And beyond those deadlines, work has been bat shit crazy (and stressful) with some non-project things. On the home front: our house is not ready for Christmas. Cleaning up for this has meant getting everything ready to move out of my office into the guest room so we can turn my office into a nursery. We're not there yet. Christmas itself is complicated by family stuff that I don't understand.

There is some beauty in this mess though. Some of my time recently has been absorbed in finishing not 1, not 2, but three Christmas stockings. They are all different color combos, but generally along these lines:

My little boy makes us smile every.single.day. Here's a glimpse of life with a three-year-old:

And just this past weekend we got to celebrate the marriage of our friends Chris and Kayla. Their wedding was beautiful and the reception was absolutely the most fun I've ever had at a wedding reception. Uhhuh. I brought my own ball. :) And bowled in a floor-length gown (thank you, Kdot!!).

That's what I've got, peeps. Needless to say, I am waaaaaay behind on reading blogs. There is no break in sight, but I will keep chipping away at the Reader list as I can. I promise!

Milestones and bellies and shirts, oh my!

2011-12-15T20:56:00.000-06:00

This morning I went on my first post-fall run. I went with my neighbor and we took it slow just to make sure nothing hurt. I'm happy to report that I think running is back on! In other news:

Another milestone: This morning I officially crossed 800 miles for the year! I'm beyond thrilled about this and can't wait to see where I end up by the end of the year.
It's time for another picture in the great Belly Watch 2011-2012. 24 weeks, baby! I had an OB appointment today and got to hear the heartbeat again. I cannot wait to meet this little boy!

The picture serves two purposes today--it's also the blog debut of my maternity running shirt (available here). I absolutely love this shirt and would recommend it. I love that it has thumb holes (and, therefore, sufficiently long sleeves). It's technical fabric. It's easily long enough. And I love the color. I am super impressed at the quality of the shirt, and so thankful that it's available, where nothing like this was made during my first pregnancy. I would recommend that you buy up a size, though. I would normally buy a medium, but because so many maternity shirts (from all brands, seemingly) tend to get short in the third trimester, I decided to give myself some extra space. All over, I think the size larger was a good call.

Mondays in Love: Ornaments & Signs for Sale!!

2011-12-12T07:00:00.000-06:00

I know, it's kind of a crazy announcement. See, a while back The Beastie opened an Etsy shop that mainly sells PhD-themed Christmas ornaments. She's amazing and they are beautiful and if you want to celebrate the attainment of a PhD (or Masters that involved a hooding), be sure to stop by. Well, when I celebrated my 300th blog post I did it the only way I know how--a giveaway of crafty goodness! The 13.1 sign went to Elle and the 26.2 went to Marlene. While talking with Marlene about how to customize her sign, she encouraged me to think big and consider opening a little Etsy shop. Given my already insane schedule, I wasn't so sure. But between Marlene and The Beastie, an idea had been planted.

Then, a few weeks ago I was in a craft store picking up the last supplies to finish The Beastie's Christmas stocking (yes, I am the Official Stocking Knitter of our generation, and I love it!! Every generation needs one. It might as well be me!). While I was there, I decided to pick up a 4-pack of empty glass Christmas ornaments and see what happened. At the very least, I thought, I could make myself one to celebrate my PR in Cleveland. Then things got crazy busy around here (like, unprecedented crazy, more on that in a few weeks) and I kind of decided I wasn't going to get to it. Until today. Today I decided I was reclaiming some ME time. So I sat down during the kiddo's nap and made it happen. For me. And the result isn't bad! (there is text on the back, too)

So here I am with the 3 remaining empty glass ornaments that came in my 4 pack, and nothing to do with them. What's a girl to do? Put it on Etsy!! I know, like I have time, but whatever. You only live once. :) So without further ado, here's my shop! Get yourself over there and order an ornament or running sign before they're gone. Order by Friday (or earlier, please!) to ensure Christmas delivery.

The Weekend Update

2011-12-09T17:28:00.001-06:00

This just in:

My Mondays....on Notice? post is officially going down as the most controversial thing I've ever posted, which surprised me. In response to a reader inquiry on the etiquette of 26.2 stickers, y'all covered the gamut of possible responses. One felt put off that the runner community might snicker at the sticker rather than celebrate the accomplishment. A few were indignant about questionable 26.2 claims. The majority were in the middle though, feeling like it was a bit questionable, but it didn't detract from your accomplishments, so let it be. I think this is a pretty reasoned response.
My maternity running top (that I scored a great Cyber Monday deal on--cha-ching!) came. I was super skeptical when I took it out of the package. I was sure they'd sent me a regular top. I should never have doubted. It's wonderful! Also, my new Nathan Handheld came and I got to try it out. Pictures and reviews to come.
Said review was to come over the weekend, but...that may have to wait. Today started with me falling down basically an entire flight of steps in our house, then spending the next ~3 hours in the pregnant women's version of an ER getting checked out (by doctor's orders). I am fine and the baby is fine, thank goodness (seriously, God is good). But my tailbone does hurt quite a bit and pregnant running already puts more pressure than normal on that spot. So I think I need to let it heal for a few days before I get back outside. On the plus side, my hubby met me for lunch afterward and brought me a donut to cheer me up. Because he's wonderful.

Mondays.....on Notice?

2011-12-05T21:20:00.001-06:00

Recently a question of running etiquette was brought to me and I want to turn it over to you. So today's theme is up to you, is it Mondays in Love, or Mondays on Notice? Here's the question:

Dear JoannaRuns,
I know someone who recently participated in a 24-hour walking relay event for charity. After the fact, he realized that he'd walked more than the distance of a marathon, so he bought a 26.2 sticker and put it on his car.

On one hand, he did cover the distance. On the other, he didn't train, didn't have a distance goal, and took many more hours than a marathon would allow before closing the course. Does this count?
Best,
Not a Canadian

I feel like slapping the ol' 26.2 on the car in this situation is a bit of a disrespect for the race. Finishing a marathon is about finishing a marathon, not about finishing some distance that happens to include a marathon. The marathon is about crossing that finish line, usually with a time goal, and a strategy. Or am I being too uptight here?

What's your take? Mondays in Love with the 26.2, or A Not-So-26.2 on Notice?

November recap

2011-12-01T17:00:00.000-06:00

Running stats
Miles ran: 46.6 (789 for the year)
# runs: 11 (a little low)
# states: 2, here and Florida
Highlights: The highlight of this month's running was just that I was having an blast a lot of the days I was out doing it. I've had some fast[er] runs this month, have loved the weather, and have just genuinely loved that I'm still able to be active.

Pregnancy Stats:
# weeks in: 22/40
pounds gained: 7-8

Otherwise, in review
November saw me jetting off to Florida

Learning the gender of my bun in the oven (read it here and here) when I was 20 weeks (btw, what a stupid phrase. Who bakes just one bun at a time?)

Then later hitting up Chicago with the fam. And, apparently I wear that shirt a lot. I wore it today, too.

And of course a lot of other fun stuff I didn't post here, like checking out a huge Christmas light display at a local park with my friend Kayla.

Looking ahead to December, I am SO excited about:

Getting my new maternity running top! The shirt I wore this morning is long enough so that you don't see my belly, but it hangs straight down off the bump, and my pants are at the bottom of the bump, so it's basically an open, huge vent for the ~35 degree air to access. Brrr!!!
Still running! As long as I'm able to run (and, knock on wood, but there isn't an end in sight yet!!), this month's mileage in the mid-40s is basically the minimum I should expect for a month. I will be passing the 800 mile marker in the next week. Anxious to see where I'll be by years end.
It's off-topic, but Christmas. Seeing Christmas through a 3-year-old's eyes is magical. We don't usually decorate this early, but we're planning to start this weekend only because he is just so excited about it. He is such a light in our lives. :)

What do you have on the horizon?

Gender reveal!

2011-11-30T21:56:00.001-06:00

I know, I know, I was a complete tease last week when I told you I'd had an ultrasound but wasn't telling you the gender yet. As promised, we told our families over Thanksgiving and are finally ready to tell the world. Without further ado:

it's a boy!!

Honestly, we were a little surprised. We did not have a preference, but both Mr. Joanna and I, and pretty much everyone who knew much about my first pregnancy and this one, thought it was a girl. It's fun knowing. Now we get to begin the wonderfully sweet process of picking a name, planning for the nursery, and daydreaming about snuggling and raising newbie.

Here in blogland, holy moly but y'all have been busy posting! I'm still catching up from being gone for Thanksgiving. I'm getting there!

Mondays in Love: Thanksgiving Edition

2011-11-28T20:12:00.001-06:00

I'm back from Thanksgiving and about ready to get back to the blog world (seriously, I'm really behind. I'm not trying to ignore you, I just haven't been home!). This very American holiday was nothing short of fabulous this year. We don't have any family in Chicago, but decided to meet up there anyway because, well, why the heck not? We got a fancy schmancy name-your-own-price hotel easily within walking distance of Michigan Ave. We made reservations for Thanksgiving dinner out, saw Being Elmo (fabulous! seriously for all ages), went to the Shedd Aquarium, did a little shopping, and fulfilled one of our very few family traditions: the mid-generation pre-Christmas martini night out.

Me (rocking the Shirley Temple), Mr. Joanna, Kdot, and ODP

This tradition started almost a decade ago when my brother and I escaped from our parents' house for some last minute Christmas shopping and from listening to Anderson Cooper at 14 decibels (my mom finally, years later, got hearing aids, thank goodness). We found ourselves at an outdoor mall near noon on a Monday feeling like.....um, yeah.... I looked at the predictable Applebee's, looked at ODP, and told him we were going in for a drink. So there, noon on Monday before Christmas, we had martinis. And a tradition was born. I love this tradition.

We got back from Chicago late Saturday night and today we're fully back into the swing of things and I'm back to running. THANK YOU Cyber Monday for letting me buy my coveted maternity running top at $15 off!! Can't wait for it to arrive. In the meantime, give me a day or two to get caught up with blogs!

Mondays in Love: It's a.....

2011-11-21T13:15:00.001-06:00

Healthy, growing baby!

Yes, as of this morning we know the gender. But you're going to have to wait until after Thanksgiving to find out. :) We are going to tell our families first. I hope you understand. For now all I can tell you is that everything is looking healthy and normal. We are so blessed!

In the meantime, let's see if y'all have reliable instincts on these matters. What variety of baby do you think I'm expecting??

Odds & ends

2011-11-17T21:11:00.001-06:00

Sorry if you saw an early version of this in Reader. Did not mean to hit Publish just yet...

It's been a quiet week around here. The I'm-shy-on-iron situation kept the early part of the week running-free. But, I got updates, yo.

I had a fantastic Wednesday morning run. I think I'm out of the woods on this whole iron situation. Leg cramping frequency is down. BOOYA.
The Holiday Booty Buster Challenge starts on Saturday. Since my mileage is so far down and I'm clearly not in training mode, I put myself in the "Building" category. I love the way this challenge is set up this year and I'm excited to play along!

I've also signed up for The Boring Runners' 2nd Annual Freeze Your Thorns Off 5k. I'll be just shy of 7 months pregnant on race day, but, why the heck not? I'm hoping to still be running, but if not, even a big pregnant lady can walk!
This is maybe my favorite part of this list. My friend/neighbor is planning to run another half-marathon and has asked for input on a training schedule. I'm so geeked about this. More than she probably realizes actually. I've made several of my own training plans, some with input and some without. I'm so excited to finally have a chance to help someone else make one of their own! Maybe she'll let me tag along for speed workouts and scream Fartlek intervals at her. Just kidding. Sort of.

Mondays on Notice: Iron Deficiency

2011-11-14T08:30:00.000-06:00

I have struggled from time to time in my adult life with brief periods of iron deficiency. Only once before can I remember it really being a problem. In the summer of 2009 for a while I was bruising like an over-ripe peach, the palms of my hands hurt all the time, and my muscles felt weak. With some focus on my diet, it passed.

Iron deficiency during pregnancy is common, particularly in the second and third trimesters (I'm currently second trimester). You can read all about it here if you're curious. I didn't realize until I traveled how closely I was walking the line on keeping my nutrition in check.

Two days ago while in Florida I noticed an odd bruise on my leg. Then Saturday I saw a similar one on my left arm. Suspicious. Then yesterday my legs felt like they had no strength in them at all. With a few other symptoms happening too, I'm pretty sure the signs add up to borderline iron deficiency. The second night I was in FL I woke up in the night with foot & leg cramps (low on potassium?). It only took 2 days of being away from bananas and iron-rich breakfast cereals for this to happen. Crazy.

The plan was to do about 6 miles yesterday. But I knew almost as soon as I woke up that I needed to take a break. So, I'm taking a break. RW says that all runners, regardless of consistent running volume, need to take a break every now and then. So, this is mine. This past week was very low mileage, and I'll continue to take it easy until I can bring my diet and symptoms into balance. I'm mainlining spinach, Mini-Wheats and bananas to get back in check. Wish me luck!

Unsweet tea: revelations of running

2011-11-12T11:33:00.001-06:00

I'm back from Florida. Old people are cute. And the running ain't bad either.

From the hotel, it was just a few blocks to the Key of Brickell, which is very small and almost entirely hotels, with a pedestrian-only path around the perimeter. I ran a few laps around the island (key?), joyously soaking up the water views and palm trees. I am really thankful for these chances to see and run in other landscapes from time to time!

A weird thing happened while I was gone. I found myself faced with the choice between sweet and unsweet tea at a restaurant. And I ordered unsweet. This can only mean that I've lived too far north for too long, right? Next thing you know I will be able to pronounce the word "Lysol" like a Yankee and will enunciate the"l" at the end of "school" consistently. Perish the thought! :)

Off to the Sunshine State, broken hearted

2011-11-09T21:05:00.000-06:00

Bright and early tomorrow morning I'll be on a plane headed to Florida for work. I'm hoping to get in a run in the sunshine while I'm there. Thank goodness for smart phones--the GPS keeps me from getting lost and I can use it to take pics to share. Win! AND when I get back I'll get to see some friends who are in town for (what's left of) the weekend. It's gonna be a great few days.

But I'm broken hearted too. Like everyone else, I am horrified, confused, and saddened by the events coming out of my beloved alma mater this week. I want to say two things about it. First, I think this sums things up pretty well and I encourage you to read it (if you don't fb you can read it here too). I realize this is controversial and I ask you to respect that this is my opinion, even if your own is very different.

Second, that we are still, now and forever, Penn State, and we are so much more than this. From Facebook:

‎"Penn State Football doesn't define us. We are so much more than that. We are the number one school in the country among recruiters from leading companies, according to the Wall Street Journal. We are a leading research institution accredited by the National Science Foundation. We are over 94,000 students across campuses, with alumni in every state and 87 foreign countries. We are the creators of the number one student-run philanthropy in the world, raising over $78 million for the Four Diamonds Fund since THON's creation in 1977. Don't forget how incredible this university is, and don't allow irresponsible oversight to destroy our reputation. FOR THE GLORY."

Mondays in Love: A Blah Run

2011-11-07T12:33:00.003-06:00

There's tension here at JoannaRuns. I had a crappy "long" run this weekend, but it's a beautiful thing anyway.

The thing I am desperately in love with is, in fact, the same thing that totally FUBARed my "long" run yesterday: the growing baby in my belly. Allegedly the kid is going through a growth spurt right now. No freaking kidding!! This weekend was an epic saga of eat-sleep-repeat (read: conserve energy) while cramming in as much work/family/cleaning the house time as possible. The run just was not going to happen on Saturday. And when it did happen yesterday, it was slow, tired, and not a lot of fun.

No runner likes to see a run go awry. But, I am so helplessly in love with this tiny person I don't know yet. I want to shout this from the rooftop: I felt the first kicks last Thursday, and it's beyond magical. Right now while I type this I can feel my baby squirming around, just a little. I can't wait to get to know this baby. The next ultrasound--and gender reveal--is in two weeks. I feel like a little kid at Christmas, just almost incapacitated by the desire for the big day to be here already. I so badly want a peek!

This weekend was the first real reminder that sometimes I'm going to have to let things go when it comes to running while pregnant. While I can and will continue to run long into the pregnancy (maybe even up until delivery, if I'm lucky--my doctor and I are both hoping for this), there will be times that I need to cut myself some slack in even the reduced mileage/speed that I've been doing the last few months. I have to remember that the bar is different now, and that my finish line is the healthy delivery of my child (God willing) and not a PR under a huge digital clock. (Although, incidentally, a "labor PR" would be welcomed. Seriously. I was in labor for over 22 hours last time. And the image of a huge digital clock over a hospital bed is hilarious.)

Those of you who know me well know that I totally suck at letting things go. But, I've been through this once before, I get it. And I'm just so, so thankful.

Hoarders, Running Data Edition

2011-11-04T16:20:00.000-05:00

Let me start by saying that I am absolutely not a hoarder. If anything, I'm a little trigger happy on disposing of things. Over-crammed closets, cabinets, and rooms stress me out. So imagine my surprise when I realized that I have become a hoarder of running data. It all started so innocently.

At first I kept data only intermittently or not at all. Then I kept it on runningahead.com, then on Garmin Desktop Training Center. Then, well, things got out of hand.

See, because I work around the clock and my employer prefers to keep it that way, my laptop belongs to my employer. Last week they updated it, and in doing so backed up everything except my Garmin Training Center data. *%^&!! I lost my data, at least in Garmin-ese anyway.

My response may have been overkill. I decided to start backing up to Garmin Connect. And...I've decided to start using dailymile (find me! I have like 4 friends on there right now. It's kinda sad and I feel like a noob), although that one was just for fun.

That means I'm now storing running data on Garmin desktop and online, runningahead, and dailymile. That's right, in FOUR places. Not counting the record keeping for HBBC and POTM (see badge to the right).

Am I alone here in my insanity? How many sites/places do you store your data? Have you ever lost massive quantities of it? This is out of control.

Only a runner

2011-11-02T08:30:00.000-05:00

Pregnant woman tend to remember more of their dreams and have more vivid dreams than the rest of the population. I knew this was true for me, but didn't realize how common it was until I got an article from babycenter.com. You can read all about it here (and probably learn more than you want to know about the approximate size and composition of buns in the oven at 17 weeks). The short version goes, we wake up to pee frequently, thus interrupting REM sleep and allowing us to remember more of our dreams.

The other night I had a dream where I had amnesia (true story: I just had to ask my husband what the word is for when you can't remember anything). In this dream, I could not for the life of me remember who I was. It wasn't like it was on the tip of my tongue and I just couldn't spit it out, it was like the information genuinely was not stored in my brain any more. In the dream, I solved this problem by happening upon a picture of me taken during a race, then used the bib number in the picture to look up the race results and figure out what my name was.

The weirdest part? The Redhead was helping me look up the bib number. We've met in real life on multiple occasions. Had this been real, she could have just told me who I was. But I think we've established that this is the ludicrous production of a pregnant runner's brain.

No one other than a runner would have this dream. Ever. This makes me cherish it. And laugh at myself. Do you ever have crazy runner dreams? What's the craziest of them?

Mondays in Love: Rocktober

2011-10-31T14:21:00.000-05:00

Ok ok, yes, I kind of hate mashed up words. Teddy bears that say "I love you beary much" make me throw up in my mouth a little. But seriously, October rocked. I said it weeks ago--I love all things about October + Running. This year did not disappoint.

First I caught you up on the ins & outs of first trimester running

Then I ~~salivated over~~ spectated from afar the Chicago and Detroit Marathons and thought back with love on spectating Chicago '07.

Then I celebrated my 300th blog post with a giveaway and met a handful of you through that (signs are finished and will be in tomorrow's mail!). Then I volunteered at Rock & Roll St. Louis and had a blast.

Then last week I surpassed my 2010 total mileage. And after all that, there was still some awesome October running to go. FIRST, last Friday I had my fastest run since I found out I was pregnant (4.03 miles at 9:18/mile, if you must know--not any Earth-shattering record, but I'll take it as a "pregnant pace run"!). SECOND, last week I had my highest mileage week since, unbelievably, the Cleveland Marathon (seriously, I triple checked the training log). THIRD, with today's run, October became my highest mileage month since May. Crazy, huh?

And today is Halloween! Which means I get to go Trick or Treating with my little boy, who will be the awesomest Batman you've ever seen. I'm honestly not sure which of us is more excited about it.

I love October running. I'm sad to see it go, but looking forward to seeing what kind of mileage I can post before the end of the year and what hijinks y'all are going to get into!

Faster in the dark?

2011-10-29T20:46:00.000-05:00

Lately I've needed to move my morning runs up about 30 minutes and it's been staying dark later. Together, this has meant that I've found myself running pre-dawn. A funny thing has happened. At first I thought it was just a freak thing and would pass, but it didn't. It feels like I'm flying and I'm not. I'm keeping about the same pace I always do.

I wondered if this was normal. As it turns out, at least one guy with a PhD in Psychology has written on this subject and why it happens (read it here). The weird thing is that most people (who left comments on his post, anyway) remember this phenomenon from childhood and notice it much less or not at all as an adult. So, am I the weirdo? Wait, don't answer that.

Maybe it's because I'm pregnant. Or a lefty. Or unaccustomed to running in the dark. Or on a path toward world domination.

Thoughts?

As it turns out, I love this running-before-dawn business. I can easily adjust my route to run along the street, in the street lights, until it starts to lighten. Logistics: check. And I'd forgotten how much I absolutely love greeting the day and seeing the sky lighten with the sun. And it's just pretty in the park--getting to see the street lights still lit against a vaguely dark sky. Life is good.

Another big milestone!

2011-10-27T12:30:00.000-05:00

I am thrilled to report that yesterday I surpassed my 2010 total mileage! Last year was my highest mileage year to date (read the 2010 recap here), and this year is bigger already with 2+ months to go, and I've spent almost 4 of these months pregnant.

Last year I covered 730 miles. I'm sure I can reasonably hit 800-825 this year. Go me! I'm really proud of this!

Running sign giveaway winner!

2011-10-26T13:08:00.000-05:00

Last week I opened up a giveaway for a personalized, handmade running sign.

And the winner is....

Elle!

Drop me an email at joannaruns@gmail.com with your mailing address what what 2-3 characters you'd like in place of the "STL" and I'll get that right out to you! Thanks everyone for playing along!!

Mondays in Love: Arm Sleeves

2011-10-24T20:03:00.000-05:00

*Don't forget to leave a comment on this post to enter my giveaway!! Handmade runner goodness!

I mentioned in my Rock & Roll St. Louis post that I'd picked up some arm sleeves/warmers and a new headband while volunteering at the race expo on Saturday. With temps in the mid-50s this morning, it was a perfect chance to try out the arm warmers. And guess what--I am in love.

As you can tell from the picture, my baby belly is starting to round out a bit. Because of this, my running shorts/pants move themselves to the bottom of my bump, making virtually all of my shirts too short. I have one short-sleeved shirt (the one shown here) and a tank top that are longer, but too skimpy for cool weather. Until the arm sleeves happened.

The deets:
They are Purple Plaid Arm Sleeves from Running Skirts (available here). At $39 a pair, they are not particularly cheap, but they are letting me delay the purchase of a maternity top and get more wear out of summer tops.

The good

Purple.Plaid.
I got the small size, and they stay put.
Thumb holes!
Pockets on the backs of both hands and at the top of one.
I didn't realize that I minded the bulkiness of long sleeved tech shirts until I wore these. I've heard other runners say this, but didn't really get it until now.

I really don't have much negative to say about them. They do leave an imprint on the crease of your arm. If they are tight enough to stay up, apparently they are tight enough to leave imprints along their folds. But this is not a big deal. My only real critique would be that I wouldn't have hated another half inch in length, BUT, I'm 5'8". I have a bit of a bigger wingspan than your average runner chick. So I can't really fault them for this either.

If you're considering some new fall/early winter running gear, I definitely recommend checking out some arm sleeves. They are freeing, fun, and make your running gear much more versatile. If anyone has recommendations of other brands/types to check out, please pass them along!

Rock & Roll St. Louis Recap

2011-10-23T20:53:00.001-05:00

**Quick reminder to see my LAST POST to enter the giveaway!!** It's for handmade running goodness!

Now back to your regularly scheduled programming:

I have always loved that I got to be part of the Inaugural Rock & Roll Chicago event. It was the first Chicago RnR and I've never had more fun running a half (read it here). I've also wanted to volunteer for a race for quite a while. So when the Rock & Roll series bought my beloved Lewis & Clark Marathon (recap here) this past year, then I got pregnant, I knew it was the perfect time for me to step up.

Saturday
I volunteered Saturday from 8-1 at the expo handing out race shirts. The expo started strong right at 9 and we had a constant flow of runners come through all. Honestly, I was having an absolute blast. Joking with the runners, dancing, singing, carrying on like schoolgirls with another volunteer at my table (hooray for a new running friend!). I wanted to capture the morning somehow and loved her idea of how.

You know you've always wanted to nestle yourself in a huge bin of size L unisex tech shirts. Oh yeah.

Once our shift was over, we headed to the rest of the expo for a little shopping. I picked up some arm warmers and a new (sparkly!) non-slip head band (reviews of both to come). I'm particularly excited about the arm warmers/sleeves--purple plaid!

Sunday
Sunday morning rolled around early. I was up by 5, out of the house by 5:30, and to the start area by 6. The folks at RnR had warm drinks and pastries for us while we waited for job assignments (thank you!). I was placed in the "secure area" (aka, finishers area) for the morning. This was the scene when we arrived.

We quickly got to work opening boxes of bananas, bagels, and oranges. We dumped the bananas out onto the first three tables on both sides until the piles were so high they toppled over, then started cutting oranges into quarters. I know most of you have seen finisher's areas, but the sheer volume of food purchased and in some cases handled is really incredible when you see it all at once. I was moved to a tent to hand out energy bars. It took a team of 5 of us well over an hour to get the bars unpacked and ready to hand out, but we were ready to go with time for a break before the first finishers crossed the line. During our break I got to sneak up to the finish line and check out the huge pile o' medals. The marathon medals were the same design in red.

It was a first for me to be at the finish when the winners came through. The first place female finished in 1:20 to lots of cheers. The elite runners came through slowly at first, then slowly the stream of finishers picked up and didn't let up for hours. That's when we went to work handing out the energy bars.

The good

Most people are incredibly gracious toward volunteers. I smiled a lot while handing out energy bars.
The people who are crying in joy. By FAR the most touching moment of my day was when I saw a guy crying and asked if he was ok. He said he was, but he couldn't help it, because 18 months ago he'd weighed 300 pounds. Six months ago he'd run his first 5k. And today he'd crossed that marathon finish line for the first time. Incredible.
The other volunteers were great! I told them that all the bending and constant turning at the expo had eventually been too much for the baby belly, and they wouldn't let me lift the boxes of energy bars to restock the table. And when I did anyway, they fussed at me to stop. Seriously wonderful people.

The bad

Some people are jerks. This can't be helped. You say "limit 2 bars, please" and people look at you, grab 4 (or more) and walk away. Or grab 2, walk 5 steps, turn around and come back and take 2 more. Or take 2, take 2 more "for my friend I ran with" then walk to the side of the finishers' area and hand them to someone who clearly spectated and did not participate. Don't do this. There really are not enough to go around when you do this.
The RnR staff was great about making sure we stayed properly hydrated, but no one told us where or when lunch was. So we were all basically starved by the time we figured it out.
Thankfully we had great weather, so it was nice being out, but it is a long day on your feet. Unless you sit on the ground, there really isn't anywhere to sit down.

I got to see one of my co-workers finish, and saw my friend from the expo finish (with minutes to spare before her goal!). Around 1:45 my assigned job had come to a close and there wasn't a clear reassignment, so I decided to head out. As I left I snatched a shot of the approach to the finish. Great siting for this! Right toward the Arch (which you can barely see in this pic)--love it! I really don't ever get tired of seeing the Arch, and I see it almost every day.

All told, I would definitely volunteer for a race again. For those of us who participate in endurance events regularly, it's only fair that we pitch in every now and then. I loved getting to see the race from this perspective, and getting to be a happy part of the day for so many runners. And if you get the chance to do a Rock & Roll event, I do recommend!

Happy 300th, with a giveaway!

2011-10-20T18:58:00.001-05:00

I have a LOT that I want to get in this post, so today you get a very rare appearance of Three Things Thursday here on JoannaRuns.

I can hardly believe it, but this is my 300th post! Happy blogiversary, me! In honor of this big event, I'd like to do a giveaway. Leave a comment on this post and I will draw a lucky winner next Wednesday to receive a personalized running sign like the one below.* I've wanted to make this for a while and decided, well, to just do it (ha! Sorry. Couldn't resist). You could pick city letters, a state abbreviation, 13.1, 26.2, or something else creative that's 2-3 characters.

And to give a better sense of its size, here it is with other things. It's about 9.5"x9.5". I'm going to put it on my office door at work.
Dear Thursday Run,
This week started out pretty crappy. But two nights of tv and knitting, with a Cards win in Game 1 of the World Series (honestly, how could you not be rooting for those guys??) and some progress on projects has wiped the grumpiness away. You were like that today, too. At first it was just chilly, but by the end I was totally into it and even tacked on an extra half mile. Thank you SO much for redeeming yourself and being such a great parallel to my week. You bring my life into perspective sometimes, and I love you for that.
xoxo, Joanna
I had my 16 week OB appointment today and everything appears to be going well! I heard the baby's heartbeat and all my numbers are looking good. I haven't gained even a pound yet, but this is of no concern at this point. The weight will come and I am at a healthy BMI, so there is no need to chug milkshakes. And since I'm emotional and super schmoopy about all things relating to my kids (plural! and who am I kidding, I can cry at the drop of a hat right now, thank you hormones) these days, I'm breaking blog protocol and sharing this picture. To steal a line from Kibble, you might be dead inside if this doesn't make you smile just a little bit. But maybe I'm biased. :)

Don't forget to leave a comment for the giveaway!
* US and Canada residents only.

Mondays in Love: Checking Off Another State

2011-10-17T09:00:00.000-05:00

Last week I was traveling for work. While work travel can be exhausting, I love that it lets me see people I only see a time or two a year, explore places I would likely not otherwise check out, and rack up more states I can say I've run in. When I returned from this trip I decided to make a map to officially start keeping track, because, why not? (14, for those of you wondering--13 shown and Alaska, which I left off the map for simplicity's sake) And, I've run 7 of these 14 in the past year. Someday this whole map will be purple. <3

The run in Utah was beautiful and kind of humbling. Before I headed out, one of my colleagues told me the route he'd run the day before, so I decided to try it. He said it was uphill the whole way, but I imagined hills like I run here. You know, rolling? Hahaha--yeah, not quite! I covered over 750 feet gain in under a mile. And, Salt Lake City sits at about 4300 feet to begin with. I was huffing and puffing and even walked a little bit of it. I decided to turn around and run back down into the valley and finish my run on the city streets. Before turning around I ran past the state capital and got a panoramic view of the city below.

Back in the city I ran back through the gate (not sure what else to call it) and back into the main part of the city.

I wound around to Pioneer Park, which is about a city block in size. This was to be my turn-around point before heading back to the hotel. It took me a minute to figure out if people were living in the park (a local had told me this happens) or whether it was an organized protest. The tent village turned out to be part of the Occupy Wall Street movement that's going on. Later that day I saw them out marching.

All told the run was a little over 4.5 miles and covered about 1800 feet in elevation gain, and I was feeling it even this morning. I'm always happy for a run that pushes me in ways I'm not used to. And, of course, lets me check off another state!

What states are you dying to run? Is hitting them all on your bucket list?

Irresponsible or Inspiring?

2011-10-12T14:45:00.000-05:00

It's been a huge relief letting people at work know about my impending bundle of joy. My colleagues are ready with wonderful comments about hoping I feel ok,complimenting my maternity clothes (which I'm starting to wear more often), letting it slide when I eat fro-yo for lunch, and not pointing and laughing when I show up in whatever it was that seemed reasonable that morning.

However, letting people in on my secret has also meant opening the door to the social norms held for pregnant women. Of course, this has been huge in the news this week, after a woman completed the Chicago Marathon in 6:25:50 and gave birth 7 hours later to a healthy baby (in case you somehow haven't seen this, read it here). The response to her decision hash been all over the board, some calling the decision irresponsible and others calling it an inspiration.

Considering that very pregnant woman clearly do finish endurance events and continue to have healthy babies made me hopeful that my much more constrained running wouldn't be shocking to people. I'm not planning to "race" anything over a 10k while pregnant, after all. And yet, what I'm getting is a lot of surprised responses when people discover that yes, in fact, I am still running.

I didn't realize how culturally rooted our perception of reasonable pregnant behavior was until I was enceinte with my son. At the time I worked in a very culturally diverse setting. One of my office mates was amazed that I continued to use my cell phone while pregnant. Others were horrified that in the United States a normal, natural birth (even one with drugs) merits only a 2-day hospital stay, and a c-section 4 days. In some countries you stay for a week or longer for a natural birth, and stay in bed for 2 weeks or longer.

Within the running community not one of you has given me a raised eyebrow. Neither has my doctor. Or anyone on board with the idea that I was a healthy runner before I was pregnant, and it's healthy for me to continue. But a lot of other people have given me flack about it. So last Thursday when I read Jodi's Thumbs Up Thursday tribute to the Marathon and saw this, I knew I had to put it on my office door. Not surprisingly, I've gotten a lot of comments about it already.

There will come a day sometime next spring where I will have to take a break from running. But today is not that day. Today is a day to stay fit and sane for myself and my unborn child. And represent just a lil' bit in the hopes that it will encourage others and maybe change some perceptions.

Mondays in Love: Chicago Marathon Weekend

2011-10-10T08:43:00.000-05:00

I've said it before and I'll say it again: I love everything about October + Running. I love it all, and Chicago Marathon Weekend is no exception. Over 40,000 participants and an estimated 100,000 spectators, it is something to behold. It also holds a special place in my heart. <3

I started endurance running with Team in Training in the spring of 2007. Our group was almost entirely training for either the Chicago Distance Classic (now Rock & Roll) or the Chicago Marathon. Meg and I did the CDC and planned to go back to Chicago to cheer for our teammates running the 26.2. When the weekend rolled around,Meg, Mr. Joanna and I headed north prepared with our glittery signs and ready to cheer our hearts out.

We went up on Saturday. Meg spent the day with her best friend (who happens to live there) and Mr. Joanna and I spent the day seeing the city. It was an incredibly sweet time for me, because we had the most wonderful secret in the world: I was pregnant with my son. I so happily spent the day wandering through crowds seeing the Field Museum, taking a ferry boat ride, visiting the Navy Pier, and eating yummy food, knowing that no one around us knew. Something about being in a city and a weekend away made that feeling memorable.

Of course, race day 2007 turned out to be a huge moment in American running, for being cancelled part way through for heat. I actually saw the "race canceled" signs. I'd been sitting in the shade sweating as we spectated, and had seen the fire trucks spraying water on runners, but still did not really understand the severity of the situation until later, when I heard it from my Teammates and read about it in Runners World.

We saw all our Teammates and one of our coaches, and all our people made it safely through the day.

This year, being pregnant again and spectating (albeit from a distance), I couldn't help but reminisce on Chicago 2007. I can't wait to read the race recaps from my bloggy peeps who were there this weekend!

Did you mean pregnant chicken?

2011-10-05T18:15:00.000-05:00

Since I couldn't tell you I was running with a baby on board for almost my entire first trimester, I decided to do a My First Tri{mester} wrap-up post to bring you up to speed on what pregnant running has been like. Mostly it's been lovely. But life has changed, some days more dramatically than others.

On the Reduction in Miles
My bloggy friend Jess said she was suspicious because I'd been blogging less about actual running, and she was onto something. The biggest change has been my reduction in miles, and that's been caused by a handful of things.

1. Inability to eat
Like my first pregnancy, I lost weight through the first trimester. When I'm not consuming enough calories to sustain my own body it's not only hard but probably just not smart to burn another 500 or 600 calories by running. And when I have eaten, it's been a lot of weird crap. About two weeks ago I texted my neighbor at 10:15pm on a Friday to go get fried chicken with me. And Mr. Joanna totally caught me doing this.

Yes, I've owned that shirt since 1994. No, I do not wear it outside my house.Yes, that's ice cream. Hey, at least I was putting in a bowl before eating it.

2. On the other hand
Inexplicably, running seemed to be the only thing that settled my stomach and allowed me to eat. After a morning run, I had about a 20 minute window where I could eat half a bowl of cereal, and the benefits seemed to go throughout the day. Yay running! So there was really a balancing act. But not of this variety.

3. Fatigue
Even this past weekend I fell asleep at 9:15 on Saturday night. I've fallen asleep while upright, working at my desk (ok, this only happened once, but still!). Fatigue has made it especially difficult to get up mornings before work to get that run in.

4. Distance
If you try to do your own web-MDing, you'll quickly find all sort of guidelines about what pregnant women should do. As I've said though, thankfully my doctor has cleared me for longer runs, and I am off and going!*

On the Logistics
1. Clothes
Right. So, I thought it was all so-far-so-good on this front, until I got home from my Monday morning run and realized that my pants had moved to the bottom of my bump leaving less than half an inch between the bottom of my shirt and the top of my pants when I was standing still. THANK GOODNESS for maternity running shirts. This is a huge blessing and recent revolution in running.

2. Hydration
Hydration is essential these days. This has meant drinking up before I head out and stopping about every mile for water along the way. Mr. Joanna is considering installing a revolving door on the bathroom for me, so I think I'm doing just fine on the hydration front.

contemporary bathroom design by san francisco interior designer Jerry Jacobs Design, Inc.

(btw, seriously??)

3. Pace
My pace has been a bit slower than usual. Largely this was an effort to keep my heart rate down, and sometimes some pregnancy-related aches and pains and every now and then some very heavy legs. Pace seems to be getting easier as I move into the second trimester. I'm not gonna lie--it's a blast to chick people while pregnant. BTW, if you Google Image search "pregnant chicking" you'll find some super bizarre crap ("did you mean pregnant chicken?"). The, um, most creative of which has to be this. You've been warned.

Do you have questions I haven't covered? Anything you're just dying to know?

* again, do NOT take this blog as medical advice. What I can do is specific to my personal medical history and fitness.

Mondays in Love: Saturday!

2011-10-03T09:00:00.000-05:00

Before I get to my Monday in Love, I want to give a huge shout out to my friend Kayla for finishing her first 13.1 and doing it in an awesome time!! And, just like I was a running pusher for her, I'm super proud of her for becoming a pusher with her friend she ran with. She convinced her friend of the need for some new gear that ended up making race day much more comfortable. YAY!

This Monday, I'm totally in Love with my Saturday "long" run. It was the absolute triple threat of things I love:

More miles!
Urban chickens!
Fall weather!

1. More Miles

As I said, I now have the all-clear to add on miles to my daily runs, and I couldn't be happier about it! I decided to take it slow and added one mile to my now-standard Saturday 4-miler, making it 5.1. It felt easy, let me expand the terrain I'm covering, and left me feeling confident about building up mileage a bit.

2. Urban chickens

I kid you not, there was a loose chicken in the park. You may remember my love of the urban chicken. I can't make this stuff up.

3. Fall weather

The park hasn't started changing colors yet, so for my newly added 5th mile I headed into a neighborhood where I knew I've seen some changing leaves. Bring it on! I love all things about October and running. Race season! Gorgeous mornings! Crazy costumes at 5ks! I love it all.

Happy Monday y'all!!

September Recap

2011-10-01T10:48:00.000-05:00

Miles ran: 44.6. Not what I wanted, but I'm happy with it anyway. More on this coming in another post soon.

# runs: 11

Highest mileage week: 16.2

Long runs: 0 (but I now have the go-ahead to tack on miles! YAY!)

Pace workouts: 5 (I just deleted the tempo/interval line from the recaps, since they won't reappear for quite some time)

XT days: surprisingly none. Oops.

Favorite run: All my runs have been 4 milers for a while with the pace varying somewhat from day to day. My run on 9/13 was my favorite because it was the first time in a long time that my pace approached what I'm used to (still ~20 seconds/mile slower, but that's a huge improvement) and it felt easy. Put a huge smile on my face! This pic is something I pass on every run and it always makes me smile, so I thought I would include it here too.

Current goal: Find running clothes to accommodate this without spending a fortune. I am beyond thrilled to discover that there are options now, where 4 years ago with my son I just ran in cotton in January. Huge, HUGE thumbs up to the running world for this!

Current obsession: The same things I've been obsessed with for about 3 months and just haven't been able to tell you about until recently. :)

Current need: See Current Goal

Current excitement: Telling the world about THIS, obviously!!

Current bane of my existence: Food. It's still really hard for me to eat a lot of the time. Or to be around other people eating. Or, when I do eat, to eat real food.

Current wish list: See Current Need and Current Goal. Also, some more Halloween decorations! I bought a few things last weekend and am pretty excited that it's finally October.

Current indulgence: We went to see the Addams Family (musical) here the other night and I bought this bib for the new kid. I wish all baby clothes were this sardonic. Just kidding. Sort of. I really have had a life-long love for humor like Chas Addams and Edward Gorey. I just love it.

Otherwise, buying myself a few new fall clothes items. While I hate spending money on clothes I'm going to wear for one season, it is fun to have a good excuse to do it. And I am picking up a few things that will last longer, like some fabulous flat boots. How did I live without these?!?

Surprise!

2011-09-28T20:35:00.000-05:00

I have waited a long, long time to write this blog post. I've thought about all sorts of kitschy ways I could write it (and let me tell you, I came up with some doozies). My favorite was that I was going to tell you that I secretly did a tri, it went well enough, and that I'm going to do two more. It's true! Sort of. But so are a lot of other things which Ears tells me were tip-offs for her.

No recent race announcements or training plans
The sudden disappearance of speed training
The drop in mileage, slow rebuilding, and no runs longer than 6 miles

Have you guessed yet??? I can't keep it to myself any longer!

I'm pregnant!!

It's true--beautifully, wonderfully, excitingly true!! And it does explain a lot!

(this is my "big" side. Yes, I look appreciably bigger from one side than the other. And yes, I felt compelled to tell you this)

I'm about three months along. I'm due the beginning of April. I can't even type it without smiling!

I will run as long as it's reasonably comfortable and safe, and possibly even run more than I have been lately. My doctor gave me the go-ahead to keep running as long as I can comfortably carry on a conversation, and that as long as I hydrate properly I don't even need to limit myself to 40 minutes, which I'd been doing as a precaution.* I like her a lot. Now that you guys are in on my huge secret, I can discuss what running is really like these days, register for 5ks without needing to explain why I'm not trying to PR, and explain that while I'm thrilled about the upcoming Rock & Roll race, I'm participating as a volunteer. Time to give back!

As I said in my last post, lots of fun stuff coming up, and I couldn't be happier!

* this was medical advice that my OB gave to me based on my fitness and medical history. Do not use my blog as a substitute for medical advice! Every woman and pregnancy is different. What applies to me might not apply to others.

Mondays in Love: Things Found Along the Way

2011-09-26T08:00:00.000-05:00

Before I get into today's Mondays in Love, I want to say that I realize things have been a bit sparse around here lately. Last week at work was flat-out crazy, seeing me at work until after 7pm two nights and traveling for work Friday and yesterday. Rest assured, I'm returning to the land of the living, and have some fun stuff planned over the next couple of weeks, including--are you ready--the inaugural Rock & Roll StL!

But first things first, today's Mondays in Love. Today it's all about the things you discover along the way.

A little while ago I blogged about spotting a single gravestone hanging out in the park I run in. Later that week I went back and took a picture of it to share. It's been waiting in line for a few weeks for its turn here on Mondays in Love.

I think this gravestone says Eliza Hoole (?), 1882. Remarkably, I can find next to nothing about it online, even in the historical documents of the park. I found a few other blogs that think the name reads Eliza Poole or Eliza Moore, also with some different interpretations of the year. I was hoping for a great story, of how this one grave ended up here. But I guess I am left to wonder and imagine.

Have you ever found something really curious along a run?

Mondays (work with me) in Love: My Love

2011-09-20T20:44:00.000-05:00

A few posts back some of you commented on the incredible invention that is my husband's invisible bike. Did he have invisible friends to go with it? Was he doing the happy bike dance? People who knew him in college might have asked if he got an invisible bike to go with his albino alter-ego.

Sidebar: Seriously, the man is pale. And blond. And pale. Back in the days when people used AIM his user name involved the word Albino. Really.

While an invisible bike would have been a really good trick, he did in fact get the traditional visible kind. I think he was just a little sheepish about sharing it with you.

(yes, that is really my husband. We're a bunch of hams over here, and I love it)

His real bike is the Giant Escape (lol, he bought a giant escape). He's been riding through the park and neighborhood and has even used it to commute to work a few times. I love love love that he's doing this. It makes both of us smile. That's what I'm in love with this Monday (like I said, work with me)--my hubby's new bike habit.

Think I'll catch the bike bug one day? Have you??

7 Links Throwback Post

2011-09-18T21:08:00.000-05:00

How thrilled was I to discover on Friday that the always lovely Beth over at discom-BOB-ulated Running nominated me to participate in a throwback post! I had a lot of fun reading her older posts again and am excited to dig back through my own. So what is this about? Thanks for asking. :)

Here are the rules:

1. Blogger is nominated to take part
2. Blogger publishes his/her 7 links on his/her blog – 1 link for each category
3. Blogger nominates up to 5 more bloggers to take part.
4. These bloggers publish their 7 links and nominate another 5 more bloggers

I want to preface this by saying that although I've had this blog for about 4 years, I didn't always participate in the bloggy world with it, exactly. Only my closest friends and family knew about it at first, so the categories of today's post that refer to popular posts and whatnot, I'm just going to use my posts from the past year and a half or so.

Post #1: My most beautiful post
For being pretty, this post of my park in the fall. For being emotionally beautiful, I don't know. I'm not good with these things. But, without going into really old posts, probably this one.

Post #2: My most popular postBy page views, easily this very old post. Blogger tells me that I get traffic to this post from people searching online, probably for the fake Eleanor Roosevelt quote. By comments, my most popular post was Cleveland Marathon Part 2. The support of so many friends and family meant the world to me. It was a tough race, but I held it together enough to PR (by 11 minutes!) and get home in one piece. I also got to meet a lot of fantastic people that weekend, including BoB, Jodi, Dave, and Jenn, and got to see Morgan and Spike again, among other people. I actually re-read this post the other day because I've long struggled with that race, how I dealt with it, and how I feel about it now. I think the recap is pretty fair, in the grand scheme of things--but rest assured, it's a race (and a PR) I will beat.

Post #3: My most controversial post
I'm not sure I have a whole lot that's controversial on here. I think the post I got the most blow-back from was this one, where I blogged about running while 7+ months pregnant. This is definitely from the era before I knew other bloggers or participated in the blog world, so most of you have never read this. But everyone I knew in real life from RunningFirst to my Mom gave me crap about it at the time.

Post #4: My most helpful post
I think my product review posts are the most helpful. I've fielded a lot of questions from female friends about how to shop for an adequate sports bra (see product review here). More recently I reviewed some Balega socks and got some good feedback from people. My TnT buddy Meredith has the same problem I do, borderline bruising on the bottom of the foot even in perfectly good but low-cushion running shoes. The socks were a good find for me, and hopefully for others (see here).

Post #5: A post whose success surprised me
This one from August 2010, because I was feeling kind of sorry for myself when I posted it. It was right after we moved here and I was missing my friends back in Illinois, and having people to run with.

Post #6: A post I felt didn't get the attention it deserved
May 22, 2010--a date I will never forget. I ran a 5 mile trail race that morning and was in the ER for an emergency appendectomy by dinner! Running related and super dramatic. What more do you want?! Haha :)

Post #7: The post I'm most proud of
This is hard, because it's less the post itself and more the race it recapped that I'm so proud of--my first marathon, Detroit 2009. My training cycle had been badly interrupted by injury, to the point that I wasn't sure I would be able to race. But with help from my Teammates I hatched a plan, stuck to it, gutted it out when the going got tough, and finished with a time I was thrilled with. It's easily the post I re-read the most often and even still sometimes get emotional reading, particularly about the end of the race.

Now for my nominations for other bloggers to re-share their posts:
1. RunningFirst, as a welcome back to training and fundraising for the Team
2. RunJessRun because, even though she's not the most frequent blogger in the world, I always enjoy her posts
3. Marlene at Mission to a(nother) Marathon, for being one of my favorite blogs

For the TEAM

2011-09-15T11:39:00.000-05:00

Some of you may recall that I got my start in endurance running through Team in Training. I trained with the Team for 3 years and mentored two seasons. I don't have a personal connection to blood cancers, but fighting cancer is something I have become passionate about through Penn State's THON and through my involvement with Team in Training. I know a lot of you also have a connection to TnT, so when my husband sent me this article yesterday, I knew I had to share:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/13/health/13gene.html

An Immune System Trained to Kill Cancer

By DENISE GRADY

Published: September 12, 2011

A closer look at what was done to cure two patients of chronic lymphocytic leukemia with a novel gene therapy — which may be useful against other cancers.

Mondays in Love: Toblerone and Perrier

2011-09-12T21:50:00.000-05:00

If history would teach me anything, it's that you guys don't know what to make of my crazy family stories. But this morning I impishly posted a Facebook status about wanting some Toblerone and Perrier, just to rib my brother about something that happened 13 years ago. I was surprised about how many responses the status got, mostly from people who thought it sounded like a lovely Monday. I had a whole other post planned for today, but after that, I had, had to ask my brother, ODP, to guest blog for me. So without further ado, I give you Toblerone and Perrier.

Gene's apartment was something between student housing, a commune, a speakeasy, and a rehab facility. In fact, it served all these functions during his 8-month stay there. He had a 50-gallon trashcan with "Pook Buket" written across the side. We once made a 4:00 AM trip to WalMart to buy a blender, at a moment that was identified as ideal for margaritas. Wrestling night was not to be missed. Sometimes there were naked people. Sometimes there were personality disordered stoners. Sometimes there was hard-core pornography and the Cranberries playing simultaneously. Sometimes there was an angry elderly neighbor demanding the return of his newspaper. We hadn't taken his newspaper, but we undoubtedly appeared suspect and I can't fault him for blaming us.

As a foolish youngster, I made a baseless and tragically responsible decision to remain sober during this time. As a result, I believe that I have the only cogent recollection of November, 1998 in Gene's apartment. Given my dysfunctional level of sobriety, I was often asked to make trips to the store. One afternoon Gene handed me some cash and asked that I go out for milk, Marlboro Lights, etc. On my way out of the apartment I casually asked if anything else was needed, to which Shawn responded, "I'll have a Toblerone!" Perhaps I was not functioning on the same level of consciousness as the rest of our company, all of whom recognized the joke. It seems that it's strange for 19 year old guys in West Virginia to eat Toblerone. Who knew.

A while later I returned to Gene's apartment. I unpacked the bag. Marlboro Lights. Etc. Toblerone.
"ODP, where's the milk?" asked Gene
"Oh, there wasn't enough money."
"How? There should have been."
"The Toblerone put us over budget. So, no milk."
Blank stares all around. I handed Shawn his Toblerone.
"Uh, thanks," he said.
"Sure."
"ODP," replied Shawn. "Who the fuck eats Toblerone?"

A better question was, "Who, in that apartment, was drinking milk?"

In fact, I ate Toblerone. Not frequently, but once in a while, it hit the spot. I still remember my first Toblerone. It was a rainy afternoon in rural Italy... I also had my first bottle of carbonated water on this high school Latin club trip. It seemed like a good combo at the time and I failed to notice that my new-found europhilic snacking preferences put me in a strange minority in our little rural town. Perhaps I had shown up that day with a bottle of Perrier. I did that sometimes. In combination with the Toblerone, an impression was struck. Ever since, I've been pegged as that guy who snacks on Toblerone and Perrier.

I can only express profound satisfaction that Jo's FB status regarding Toblerone and Perrier has attracted such attention. Perhaps I was just ahead of my time. Perhaps I was, and still am, kind of weird. Whatever the case, I am awesome, and so is Toblerone.

Cheers,
Daniel (ODP)

Mondays on Notice, belatedly

2011-09-06T08:20:00.000-05:00

You didn't think I was going to forget a Monday on Notice, did you? Not at all. Instead, I got carried away yesterday by running, baking, and hanging out with friends. And it was glorious. So, Tuesday, let's get this unapologetically belated Monday on Notice started!

I've actually decided to put my Notices on Notice. See, it's turned out that more often than not I have something I want to profess my love for. And who doesn't like positive sounding posts? So after much consideration I've decided to rename this segment Mondays in Love. There will still be an occasional thing On Notice (I actually have something today), but mostly it's just going to be a place to highlight the love.

Today's Mondays in Love is brought to you by this incredible, gorgeous weather. For the foreseeable future we have highs in the 70s and low 80s, sunshine, and a breeze. Do you know what this means?

If Mr. Joanna or I want to sleep in on a weekend, we can! I do not have to be running before 7am to beat the heat. If I want to run at 2pm, I can. It feels like such a freedom after the summer.
I can leave the windows open in our house.
When the air gets cooler in the evenings and mornings, I can snuggle up in a well-worn, well-loved hoodie.
My husband will start obsessing over stews and soups soon. I don't really care about stew, but I love watching him get so into things.
Undoubtedly one of my favorite things about fall--apple pie!!! I think we're planning a trip to a nearby orchard to pick fresh apples. YAY!
This last one's just vain and girly, but I can start carrying my one and only Coach shoulder bag to work. It's a dark red suede, very fall, and it's gorgeous. And I bought it as part of a charity fundraiser.

The one thing I'm putting on Notice this Monday? The irresponsible a-hole who left a big stinky pile of dog crap in our front yard. There are tons of dogs in our neighborhood and I'm usually fine with that. It's also a neighborhood of really great dog owners. Clearly someone missed the memo on proper dog etiquette. Jerk.

Weekly Recap: Operation Rebuild Base, Complete

2011-09-04T20:05:00.000-05:00

This week was a huge triumph for me. At long last, I've regained the base mileage I wanted to be at. And I XT'ed. It was just a fantastic week.

Monday
4.1 miles through the park with some of the fastest splits I've seen all summer. I was having an absolute blast and was actually surprised to see my first mile time when my Garmin chirped at me. <3

Tuesday
The conclusion of my very much loved yoga Groupon came with a last great 6:30am workout. It was a great way to end the month-long experience. I may yet do some drop-in classes. I just loved the studio.

Wednesday
4 miles through the park

Thursday
Rest

Friday
A slower run in the park. We had a couple days over 100 degrees this week. Mostly I didn't mind the heat wave, but it did slow me down a bit. Friday was also a stay-at-home-with-my-kiddo day (his school was closed). These days are few and far between and I cherish them. We had a blast. And since I can't leave you with a photo-less post, I'm going to introduce you to my new favorite brownie mix (dark chocolate FTW!). The kiddo and I picked this up at Target and made it together. It's about the best $1.32 I ever spent.

Saturday
We had another 100+ degree humid day, so I decided to sleep in and move my weekend run to Sunday, which had a high of 79.

Sunday
Today was the first run that felt like fall. The leaves haven't started to change yet, but the cooler weather, the 41% humidity which hasn't happened since maybe March or early April, the people out grilling in the park, all of it. I was so thankful to be outside and be running. A weird thing happened. I noticed a single, solitary gravestone in the park. I've gone past it at least 100 times and never saw it. It totally took me by surprise. I'll take my phone tomorrow and take a picture of it. I'm really curious now! Who the heck is buried there??

Weekly totals:
Miles: 16.2
XT: 60 minutes

August Recap

2011-08-31T20:42:00.001-05:00

Miles ran: 54.7--almost double myJuly miles!
# runs: 14

Highest mileageweek: 13.7
Long runs: 1
Pace workouts: 1
XT days: 5 days of yoga. I'm sooo sad my Groupon is over. I may dosome drop-in classes at the yoga studio I've been going to. The classes aregreat.
Tempo or interval runs: 0
Favorite run: either my 5.6 mile "long" run, forthe thrill of upping my miles, or my run this Monday. My pace was faster thanit's been in weeks and I was just having a blast.

Currentgoal: finish out this week between 15 and 20 miles.Right where I want my base to be.
Current obsession: don'tlaugh, but Christmas shopping. Yeah, I know. It's August. I can't help it. I'vealways done this. Oh, and Florence + the Machine.

Current need: really, there is nothing I need right now. Life isgood!
Current excitement: Balega Extra Comfort socks, and getting to be part of my friend's forayinto the running world! But you guys knew that already. :)

Current bane of my existence: the chronic periformis painseems to be coming back. I'm stretching, stretching, and stretching some moreand trying to ignore it and hope it goes away.

Current wish list: yep, stillhaven't finished the Master bedroom. But I've made progress!

Current indulgence: lime sherbet with chocolatesyrup. OK, ok, I had NO ideathis was weird until I served it to our neighbors the other night. I turned theweird-factor over to the judgment of the Facebook and it turns out that a fewpeople think it's weird, most have never heard of it but think it soundsfabulous, and a few have actually tried it. So that's my challenge to you forthe coming month--get out there and try some sherbet. With chocolate syrup. Youcan thank me later. :)

Otherwise, my park. I justabsolutely love running there.

Mondays on Notice: Everything that isn't these socks

2011-08-29T21:27:00.000-05:00

In my last post I mentioned that I was trying out a pair of extra-cushion socks and that I liked them. Since then two things happened:

One of my TNT buddies from Central Illinois asked for the deets about the socks. (everything you need to know is in the picture)
I wore them again and fell even more in love.

So today's Monday on Notice is brought to you out of the sheer LOVE I have for these socks. All other socks, on notice!

So why do I love them so much? Consider this a totally unsolicited review. And, I'm over-worked right now, so you're getting not one, but two lists in this post.

The tops are vented (a thinner layer)
The bottoms are cushioned. The Brooks Adrenaline is not a cushy shoe. This helps.
They are low cut, but have a tab on the back to protect from heel rub.
They don't bunch up.

Go! Buy! LOVE!

Apparently I cannot contain my runner enthusiasm

2011-08-27T14:02:00.000-05:00

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. :)

Mondays on Notice: The Death of The Burger King

2011-08-22T09:31:00.000-05:00

This week's Mondays on Notice has nothing to do with running. It's about my total lack of patience for most TV commercials. More often than not, I feel like the product is completely unnecessary (does anyone need air freshener that touts its new found ability to combine two tropical island scents into one jar??) or the style of the ad borders on being offensively trite. When commercials break the mold, I cherish them just a little bit. Yesterday I learned of the death of one such trendsetter--The King. As in, BK's King.

This mascot that has been cracking me up for years. I'm not sure if they ever even ran this ad, but it makes me laugh every single time I see it. I understand that some of their more recent commercials have been more contentious. I guess I haven't seen those so I can't really judge. But creepy? Really? Not even a little bit.

I'm gonna miss that guy. One thing I've had to distract me from my tears though has been a new commercial from Black Hawk Casino. Apparently some people find this distasteful toward cyclists, and I suppose if I had my pants bunched up far enough I might agree, but I still think it's hilarious.

Ok ok, one more. I freaking love this. And yes, there are a lot of casinos near me.

So today, I want to put the prim and trite ads On Notice. I want to mourn the loss of The King (or at least his less offensive moments). And I want to say a great big THANK YOU to the ads that continue to make me laugh.

Weekly Wrap-Up

2011-08-20T14:46:00.000-05:00

Week Three of Rebuilding the Base: Complete. My theme here is slow and steady wins the race (well, not really. I don't think Meb's going to adopt that phrase or anything, but you know what I mean).
My WIN this week: I did build mileage on my "long" run this weekend...but I also cut out my Friday run to keep from increasing mileage too much at once.
My PLAN for next week: keep the long run distance and add the Friday run back in. That will finally get me back to the mileage I'm after.

Monday: easy 4.1 through the park

Tuesday: rest day

Wednesday: easy 4.1 through the park

Thursday: yoga. And easily a highlight of my week, I finally nailed the side plank. As a runner, I tend to neglect my abs and related muscles, and that became blatantly obvious when I started this yoga routine a few weeks ago. I couldn't even do the side plank with my arm bent at the elbow and resting on the forearm. Total no-go. Until this week. That felt like a huge victory.

Friday: Not entirely intentional but strategic enough rest day.

Saturday: 5.6 mile long run success and NO pain. It was dark and rainy this morning, so I waited for a break in the clouds and headed out while it was still on the cool side. Gorgeous day, and I loved seeing so much going on in the park--an adult league softball tournament, a wedding being set up for later in the day, tents being set up for some sort of festival, a family reunion, a church group picnic. It is so fun to see people loving on the park and having a great time.

And, and this is beyond exciting for me, my love got a bike! He's been talking about it for a while (it was to be my anniversary gift to him, and that was back in June!) and looked unsuccessfully for a used one that would fit him. Last night he went to a local bike shop and brought one home. I am thrilled that he's getting back into a hobby that he enjoys and that will let him love our park and neighborhood like I do.

Total miles: 13.7
Total XT: 60 minutes

Mondays on Notice: Dwindling Days of Summer

2011-08-15T21:27:00.000-05:00

Dear Dwindling Days of Summer,

Please don't go. Please stay around for another month or so. While at first I was just relieved that the heat let up a little, and I'm still really enjoying these temps, I can't help but notice that fall is quickly approaching. Can't you please just stick around a little while longer?

See, while summer has been crazy and chaotic at work, the fall brings a different kind (no more, no less, just different kind) of crazy to my world of academia. People around me are starting to freak out. And by "around me" I don't mean physically around me (my family couldn't care less), I mean everyone I know in this industry nationally. Freaking out, thanks to you. Can I guilt you into staying?

We've had so much fun together, summer. I rediscovered my youth via a Dukes of Hazzard hat resurrected from my MIL's basement.

I overcame my horrific fear of my sewing machine and made progress on the curtain situation in my house (true story--no two windows in my house are the same size. Intimacy with a sewing machine is absolutely necessary if window coverings are going to look reasonable).

My family and I frolicked in the sunshine.

I had my first brush with the city's judicial system.

Sorry to get your hopes up about JoannaRuns on the Run 2011--it was just jury duty.

Summer, it's been great, and I'd love it if you could stay around a while. So I'm putting your departure On Notice, officially. I'm watching you.

Love,

Joanna

Weekly Wrap-Up

2011-08-14T21:35:00.000-05:00

Welcome to the weekly wrap-up for my second week of re-building my base. I am so flipping excited about a piece of running news that I can hardly contain myself. Seriously, I am SO excited to share. (if you are hell bent on skimming and want to get to the exciting running stuff, scroll to the bottom of this post) Here goes.

Monday
My traditional 4-miler through the park.

Tuesday
Another yoga class. This time we focused on inversions, which I now know is a fancy word for headstands. And I think I learned a bit, because it was the first time I've tried it where it hasn't hurt my neck. It definitely takes some getting used to and some learning to trust that the wall is actually behind you and won't let you fall. :) I'm kind of hoping we do this again next week so I can try it again.

Wednesday
My OAR of 4-mile perfection. MAN have I been loving this weather! Definitely still summer weather, but luscious.

Thursday
Rest day

Friday
Time to increase mileage a teeny tiny bit. I added part of a loop onto my run for an extra 0.9 miles and had zero problems with it. That means...wait for it...I'm officially clearing myself for a 6-miler this week if I continue with no periformis pain. YAY!

Weekend
Some of our good friends from our town back in Illinois came for a weekend visit and a Cardinals game. It was the first time my husband, our son, their younger son, or I had ever been to a Cards game. We had such a good time. Couldn't have asked for better weather. One thing I love about this stadium is that they let you bring in outside food and drink (with some restrictions). It's so family friendly, easy to get to--just a totally lovely night out. My friends are the best!

AND THEN...(this is the really exciting runner-related part)
We took the kiddos to the park to play this morning. While we were sitting there I met a mom from just down the street from me. She was wearing athletic clothing so I asked if she was a runner. Turns out that not only does she run, she is a retired professional triple jumper. As in, did Olympic trials, calls runnings' elite her personal friends, lived in an Olympic training village. She is the real deal. I was definitely a little star struck. And as icing on the cake, she is so nice. We talked for a while and she asked if I'd like to run with her sometime, which of course I said yes! Oh my goodness, I am beyond excited about having another mommy friend on our street and a totally awesome potential running buddy. I am sure she will run my ass off, but I don't even care. Putting today in the WIN category!

Weekly mileage: 12.9
Weekly XT minutes: 60

O.A.R.

2011-08-10T22:03:00.000-05:00

Monday and today both we have been blessed by a reprieve from the heat. Both days I have fully taken advantage of the cooler temps by heading out for an OAR. That's right, an Open Air Run. What? You thought triathletes were the only ones who get to make up acronyms? Hehe.

Today while near one of my traditional water stops (feature #712 that I love about the park: water fountains!) I saw people setting up something that looked like it was going to be a great time. I asked what they were doing and they said it was for a company picnic for one of the local casinos. Dang--those people do know how to put on a good time! I kinda wanted to stop and play for a while. Think I could get away with it? ;)

The run felt great and I'm loving building back up. Tomorrow is a rest day then I'm back out for a slightly longer run on Friday. Run strong & be merry!

Mondays on Notice: Jif Reduced Fat Creamy

2011-08-08T17:14:00.003-05:00

Dear Jif Reduced Fat Creamy Peanut Butter,

You have been a staple of my life. I have loved you longer than I've known The Original Bestie (Jamie) and my husband combined. I've come to rely on you like Tiger Woods relied on that caddie who is now super pissed at him. We had a good thing going. So what is up with this?

I scoured two grocery stores in search of the giant vat of Reduced Fat Creamy I've cherished for decades, to no avail. Apparently now you only come in this itsy-bitsy, totally impractical size. Are you aware that there are still 3-year-olds who mass consume this stuff? And runners, who love some pb before or after a hard run?

I hereby put you on Notice until you can come to your senses again and start selling a reasonably sized jar of peanut butter.

Love,
Joanna

Weekly Wrap-Up, the New Stuff Edition

2011-08-06T21:09:00.000-05:00

I had a fantastic week for my return to ~~hoping the periformis has healed just a little bit~~ more dedicated running after my light July. Seriously, there was so much about this week that I loved.

Thing I Loved #1
My hubby changed jobs back in February and now has an office even closer to the kiddo's daycare than my work is. This has meant that I am no longer the parent primarily responsible for dropping him off and picking him up. And you know what that means?? It means that for the seldom days when I turn to the 'mill, I can get to the gym early enough to run, shower, and get to my desk by 9. I realize this may not sound like a huge deal to a lot of you, but knowing I can get my run in in the morning without panic and worry about time is a huge blessing.

Thing I Loved #2
My new for August fitness excitement--YOGA! Yes, I have done yoga semi-regularly in the past, but it's been a while. A while back I snatched a Groupon for one month of unlimited classes at Southtown Yoga here in the city. It is a seriously nice yoga studio. A 1-month unlimited pass would normally be $150 (read: I got parked in by an Audi this morning when I went). I'm going with a girlfriend from work, and we just started on Tuesday. So far I'm really liking it. It works my body in such a different way than running. It's hard! And fab.

Thing I Loved #3
You've heard me talk about my uber-walkable neighborhood before. Well, it's still walkable and I still love it! The weather cooled off a bit for two days this week, so I grabbed the opportunity to "run" some of my errands around the neighborhood. That makes me so, so happy.

Overall it was still a light week, but the slow transition back up from July that I'd planned and hoped for. Here's how it shook out:
Monday: 3.6 miles
Tuesday: 60 min yoga
Wednesday: 4.0 miles
Thursday: rest
Friday: 2.1 miles ("running" errands)
Saturday: 75 min yoga

July Recap (better late than never!)

2011-08-03T21:17:00.000-05:00

I want to preface this post by saying that July was an intentionally light month. With vacation in the middle and a lingering desire for my periformis to heal, I decided to do a cut-back month. Also, I'm up to some really fun stuff for August, but you'll have to wait for that. :)

Miles ran: 29 (lowest since.....ever?)
Rest days: a lot
Highest mileage week: 12.8
Long runs: 0
Pace workouts: 5
XT days: still zero, but I'm into some new stuff for August and it makes me really happy!
Tempo or interval runs: 0
Favorite run: Easily Rave Run #3, but Rave Run #2 wasn't bad either. My beloved Appalachia!

Current goal: building miles back up and hoping the periformis plays nice
Current obsession: honestly, work. Work is absolutely bat shit crazy right now. I am eating, sleeping, and breathing a handful of big projects.
Current need: new running shoes. Thank you guys SO much for the input. I have some follow-up questions for a few of you that I'll probably just email.
Current excitement: Continued progress on decorating! Our new sofas came (LOVE!). (and yes, I straightened out the rug later, oops)

I finally finished painting the master bedroom and I bought curtains for both the living room and master bedroom. Plus, we agreed on wall art for the master. It's coming together, and it makes me so happy!
Current bane of my existence: exhaustion, but whatevs. It comes with the territory sometimes.
Current wish list: To see the master bedroom FINISHED completely.
Current indulgence: I'm almost embarrassed to admit this, but...new shoes. I finally figured out that the foot pain that shut down an 18-miler this spring was caused by a pair of shoes I'd bought for work. So I went on the hunt for a new pair....or two. :)

Mondays on Notice: Old Crap

2011-08-01T12:57:00.000-05:00

It was 82 degrees with 90% humidity when I woke up this morning. I knew it was going to be beastly and had planned ahead to hit up the gym this morning. I rolled into work around 7:30 and very thankfully made my way to the rec center and hopped on the treadmill. I was settling into my groove just as this internal monologue started rolling through the otherwise still sleeping part of my brain:

Hmmmm....my left foot is kind of hurting. I wonder what's going on.
[left, right, left, right]
How long have I had these shoes? Aren't these still my "new shoes"?
[left, right, left, right]
No, you know, this definitely feels like old shoes syndrome. Thank goodness I have a blog! I can go back and check when I got these. Score!

Apparently I've had these since March--they have about 410 miles on them. Time to trade these bad boys in--they've been put on notice!

I'd like some input from y'all. This spring while training for Cleveland I had some foot issues on runs longer than about 10 miles. It felt like a bruise forming where my toes meet the main part of the foot. I considered getting shoes with more cushioning, but backed away from it because the pair pictured above was so new and because the others were so expensive. Now that it's time to replace them, I need to know--is the higher cushioning worth it? Have any of you ever tried them? What did you think? Input please!

Mondays on Notice: Runmares

2011-07-25T07:30:00.001-05:00

Did you ever have that dream during college that you'd forgotten to drop a class and then all of a sudden it was the end of the semester and you had to take the final to pass? Or that you forgot or were hours late to a final? It's the classic college nightmare.

Well, a few nights ago I had the same nightmare but for running. I dreamed that I overslept on race day and was almost certainly going to miss the start gun. It was terrible! All these thoughts were going through my mind. Will they let me start late? Can I even get there soon enough to do that? Will my timing chip still work? Oddly, the race was in my hometown, possibly on our old cross country course (which was later totally blasphemed to build a baseball field).

Have any of you ever been late on race day? If so, what happened? Did you still race?

Random/Running

2011-07-23T11:19:00.000-05:00

I've learned that y'all often enjoy the random. A bit o' crazy. A little side dish of my three ring circus in a doggie bag. And of course we all love the run. So I've decided to do a blog piece at the intersection: Random/Running. Not sure if this will become a permanent blog feature--we'll see how it goes. Leave a comment and let me know what you think!

First up, the random--a picture and a story about hot weather

Let me direct your attention to the top right. Yeah. That's what that says.

(I'm actually a little afraid to admit this--but yesterday it actually felt kinda nice to be in the heat--I think it's growing on me)

About five years ago my brother, Mom and I collaborated to write a set of short stories about my lovably eccentric Dad as a birthday present. This is a cut-down version of one of those (all rights reserved).

I started dating my now-husband late in 2001, just after my parents moved to Annapolis, Maryland. After spending the spring of 2002 abroad, I returned to spend my first summer in Annapolis. Future Mr. Joanna (herein, FMJ) and I were thrilled to be living not just on the same continent but just a short drive from each other. We hung out a lot, and on this particular day decided to go outside and play Frisbee.

Annapolis disoriented me. Two of my recent summers had been spent at a camp in a large national forest in West Virginia. Most of the rest of my summers had been filled with lazy walks to the corner store, sitting on neighbors’ porches talking, hiking in the mountains and visiting my Grampa. In Annapolis, I was surrounded by pavement, cars, and condos, all reflecting the intense July sun. I pulled my rectangular, thick-rimmed olive green sunglasses down over my eyes and threw the Frisbee to FMJ. The whitest man alive. The man who, standing on this concrete-paved county-sized parking lot, wearing SPF 80, was already turning red. Furthermore, I was realizing that I was not properly hydrated, so after 20 minutes we headed inside to relax and cool off.

[I am totally redacting the middle portion of this story for my mother's benefit, even though it's hilarious. You're welcome, Mom.]

I got two drinks and walked to the kitchen table. I knew I was beat red, and so was he. “Some sun out there today, isn’t it? I think I’m starting to burn,” he said. “Yeah, what were we thinking, playing Frisbee in 97 degree heat with 90 percent humidity?”

Just then my Dad walked in. On account of the redacted part of this story I was thinking “Please Dad, say something normal. Anything, anything normal.” “You kids look worn out. FMJ, you look like you might have heat stroke,” he said. FMJ nodded, “Yeah, it’s pretty hot out there. We only played for about 20 minutes.” Dad nodded in that chipper, parakeet way that nodders nod. I was doing everything I could to look calm, but I could hear it. I knew what was coming. “You know, one time, in 1976...it was hot,” he began.

“Back in 1976, Joanna’s mother and I went to a dance in a high school gymnasium in Charleston. Back in those days people dressed up for dances. You know, suits, jackets, ties. Well, not that evening. Hot. There were no windows in this gymnasium. There was only one door, and it was in a brick building, in July. There were probably a hundred or a hundred and fifty people there, all dancing, so you can imagine the body heat we were generating. Oh my God, it was hot! I absolutely couldn’t stand it. I had to take off my jacket and my neck tie and sit down for a while. But there was a man just dancing up a storm wearing a polyester double-knit suit, buttoned up with a necktie on. I couldn’t imagine how he could stand it, I was burning up. So I asked him. And you know what he told me? He said, ‘it’s polyester, so it keeps the cool air in!’ Can you believe that? In a room with no windows in the dead of the summer—it keeps the cool air in. I bet if I had listened closely I could have heard the wind chiming through his head. Ding, dong!”*

Ten minutes later when I walked FMJ to the door I thought to myself, “If we survive this summer…” FMJ turned to me and said, “Jo, you know I love you, right?” And I did.

* to be absolutely clear, I love my Dad's stories. I really, truly would not have him any other way!

Running

Once....back in 2011, it was hot. By now you've all seen this fantastic weather map (seriously, go look at it. You'll laugh). I've been super thankful for the ol' gym, with it's ac, treadmills, nearby parking, etc. The convenient parking counts for a LOT. But one of the more obscure things I've been thankful for is this. Is this a sign that I'm getting old?!?

Vacation Wrap-Up

2011-07-21T08:00:00.001-05:00

We are home from our fantastic vacation, aka Joanna Returns To The Mountains 2011. It was the longest vacation we've ever taken, and I think my favorite. Just like when we got married, I wanted rural chic. Beautiful. Relaxing. Delicious. Rural chic. And that's exactly what we did. We started off with a long layover in Detroit to see some of my favorite people.

Then a few days at Mountain Lake, in Southwest Virginia.

After that we headed to Snowshoe Mountain, WV, where I'd always wanted to stay. LOVED IT.

Upon leaving Snowshoe we made a pit stop at Cass Scenic Railroad, also in West Virginia. Mostly we stopped there for a yummy lunch, but also for a train ride to kill some time and thrill my three year old. Because he's 3 and a boy. So trains rock his socks off.

We headed from there to my favorite place on earth--Spruce Knob, West Virginia, where Rave Run #3 happened.

Spruce Knob means the world to me. I went to The Mountain Institute as a student during the summer of 1998, then again as staff in 2000 for a program called Scholars Academy (which no longer exists). For a month we learned about the economic and cultural landscape of West Virginia, we camped hiked, spelunked, and wrote a 75-100 page autobiographical thesis. I've been back many times since, often for the annual reunion of people who went through the program I participated in. I love these people and this place. I would never have known how to love West Virginia without this experience, and I wouldn't have gotten into my specific field. It felt so good to go home. I wanted to stay forever.

Saturday was Mr. Joanna's birthday. Another Scholar alum brought cake and another made an amazing dinner. It was absolutely perfect. Did I mention that I wanted to stay?!? But we had other places calling our names. On Sunday morning we headed back down the mountain to Seneca Rocks to meet up with my BFF Jamie.

Let me tell you about Jame. I've known her since we were 12. She's as close to a third kid as my parents ever got. We get each other, and we are both openly, completely ourselves with each other. We've spent the last 12 years living in different states, and that hasn't slowed us down one bit. I swear, she knew my old commute as well as I did because my commute was the only time I reliably had to talk. She's outgoing, Irish, and crazy. I love this girl. And it was fantastic to see her.

We stayed in a ridiculous little cabin. They look cute from the outside, and then you step in to this utter weirdness. I'm pretty sure the picture doesn't even do it justice.

We hung out for the evening and went our separate ways on Monday morning. Mr. Joanna and I waaaaay miscalculated driving time and ended up on a wild goose chase all over West Virginia just so I could go to the Tamarack before we caught our flight back out. I LOVE the Tamarack. It's upscale, beautiful rural gorgeousness. It's a center where handmade products (and some manufactured goods) from around the state are sold and beautiful food is offered. I was hoping to find an art glass accessory for our master bedroom. Some of the women in my family worked in the potteries in WV during the war, so that industry in general has a huge place in my heart. I kind of knew what I was after--I wanted a new piece of Blenko to add to my collection. And I found it! It's being shipped and should be here in a few days.

We had just enough time to pick out the new Blenko, grad some sandwiches to eat in the car, and hit the road back to the airport to fly home. Coming home was like waking up from a dream. A long, amazing dream. I can't wait to do it again.

Rave Run #3: Spruce Knob

2011-07-19T21:56:00.000-05:00

One more installment in the Rave Run series, aka Joanna Returns to the Mountains 2011! The last run comes to you from my favorite place on earth, Spruce Knob, West Virginia. I'm going to tell you a bit more about Spruce in a vacation wrap-up post. For now, let's just stick to the running, shall we?

We were at The Mountain Institute's Spruce Knob Mountain Center, where I've spent a whole lotta very happy time. The Mountain Center is several miles from a paved road and is in one of the last dark spots left on the eastern seaboard. There's a dirt road a mile long that connects the "main" dirt road of the mountain with the main part of The Mountain Institute. It's a route I've run many times. I even acquired my first running scar on this run, waaaay back in 1998. This weekend I ran it out and back twice, for four miles. It's a run I carry with me every single day.

Here's the view just as I was starting out.

At the top of that little hill you're greeted by this splendor.

Here's my buddy Evan running ahead a bit, about a third of a mile in.

We ran a mile down the road then turned around and headed back. This picture makes me so happy I could almost cry.

When you crest the last hill of the run, you can see the yurts from a distance. Yep, I said yurts. These are the main buildings at The Mountain Institute. Because it's that insanely cool.

Then I got to turn around and run it all again. Best.run.ever. I absolutely love this place!

Mondays On Notice: Mobile Blogging Edition

2011-07-18T23:26:00.000-05:00

Hello world! I feel like that's the proper greeting now that we're back from our trip, which involved several days completely off the grid (more on that below). I'm 100% ready to call it a day, but wanted to shout out my Monday on Notice before it's not Monday any more.

Today's Monday on Notice is brought to you by my attempt to blog via the Blogger App. As some of you know, I'm kinda new to the whole 21st-century-cell-phone, what with it's apps and so forth. I know, I was the last hold out on that campaign. Well, after posting twice with minimal intervention via a laptop, I decided I was ready to go all-mobile-app-blogging.

EPIC FAIL.

I don't even know how to make a blog screw up its formatting the way my last post got screwed up. So, if you skipped over it because it was, well, illegible, give 'er another shot. She's all fixed up now, and man, was it an awesome run!! Mobile blogging has been put on Notice and the formatting is fixed!

So about the trip--it was awesome. It was exactly what I needed on so many levels. I'll tell you all about it in a bigger post tomorrow, but as a quick intro, we hit up Mountain Lake, VA (with some family), then Snowshoe, WV, then Spruce Knob, WV (my favorite place on earth), then Seneca Rocks, WV (where I got to hang out with my BFF, Jamie!!), then a crazy drive through WV today and flew back to the Midwest. A lot of these places are really remote. Snowshoe is actually in a Federally regulated quiet zone administered by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (read: NO cell service). I think it's regulated at least in part because the Green Bank Observatory (awesome, check it out here) is nearby. Spruce Knob is used by astronomy groups and recently had a small observatory built on it because it's one of the last "dark" spots on the eastern seaboard. I feel so incredibly blessed to know about these places, and to have such wonderful friends to visit with when we go.

Must sleep--more coming soon!

Rave Run #2: Snowshoe Mountain, WV

2011-07-15T09:44:00.021-05:00

(sorry if you saw a posted-too-early version of this with totally jacked up formatting. Turns out blogging via mobile app is hard!)

I'm sitting outside drinking a post-run iced tea as I write this (although it may not post until later). I have another Joanna Returns To The Mountains 2011 Rave Run to share! Today's run comes to you from Snowshoe Mountain, West By God Virginia. You may have heard of this place as a ski resort, which it is, but I highly recommend coming up in the summer too. We are having a blast--a lake/beach, paddle boating, water slide, ski lift through the gorgeous mountain. I love this place!

I ran a little over 4 miles today. I definitely ended up somewhere I didn't really mean to go, but that's ok. Otherwise it wouldn't be an adventure, right?!?

After I got into the main portion of the run I came across this view and had to grab a pic.

Not much farther along a few deer ran across the road in front of me. By the time I'd fumbled with my camera, I managed to get one of them into a picture. Too bad "say cheese" doesn't work on white tailed deer. :)

A little farther down I crossed a few paths and went under the ski lift. It is so pretty looking down the mountain.

I knew I'd been going gradually downhill for longer than I thought I should have, based on my read of the map. I think I actually got on the wrong road completely, I'm not sure, but I ended up basically at the bottom of the ski lift, but on the road. I got some looks as I ran/walked back up the mountain road, lol! I didn't mind one bit though. I even got to snap a pic of some of the one-sided trees to show you. No, really! We're high enough up that the wind is so strong that the branches only grow on one side. Kinda amazing, right!?

Dirty Dancing

2011-07-12T15:32:00.001-05:00

You know how I said I was going to let in more of the crazy? Well, here's your first little taste of it. Ready?

It totally creeps me out to tell the internet where I'm going before I go there.

But now that our time up on the mountain is over, I can tell you all about it! We spent a long weekend hanging out at Mountain Lake, in southwest Virginia, doing a whole lot of relaxing with some people I love.

For the girly girls among you, this is where Dirty Dancing was filmed. Yes, the gazebo, the stone lodge, all the landmarks you would recognize. And, this is also where Mr. Joanna and I held our wedding reception 6 years ago, so it's extra awesome for us. We've loved coming back and showing this place to our little boy. One of the sweetest moments for me was carrying my son (for communion on Sunday) to the alter where Mr. Joanna and I were married. Talk about an incredible moment.

You might also recall that I'm from central Appalachia. Being back in the mountains is so relaxing and therapeutic. We ate good food, heard some Appalachian storytelling, swam, biked, ran (of course), slept in, saw a magic show, and on and on. I can't say enough good things about it!

There are a few more really gorgeous runs to share with you from this trip, and a little more travel to share. Stay tuned!

Mondays On Notice

2011-07-11T14:22:00.001-05:00

Today begins a new blog feature that I'm calling Mondays on Notice. The name borrows a bit from Stephen Colbert's list of things that are on notice, which in his case includes Lutherans and bears. Obviously this means that Mondays are permanently on notice, but I think we can all agree to that. Each week I will be featuring something I would like to add to my list of those things on notice. Some of these will be running related, some will not. With that, my first Item on Notice:

Excessively short layovers.

Why? This past weekend we were traveling. Our travels involved an almost 2 hour long layover in Detroit, which was absolutely perfect. We had enough time to exit security and see these people. (Sorry for the photo quality. This was my first attempt to use pics from my phone and I haven't quite figured out how to make it all work yet.)

And a little of this.

And it was fantastic. I got to squeeze my nieces, drink coffee with my SIL, catch up with my brother and Dad (who is there because Kdot broke her collar bone and cannot drive, pick up babies, etc. Ouch!), then mozy on back through security and back to our gate. None of which I could have done with an excessively short layover. Plus, really short layovers induce all sorts of anxiety about delays and missed connections. So there you have it, Excessively Short Layovers, I hereby put you on notice!

At the other end of our flight, I finally got in a run I've dreamed of for a very long time--mountains! While there was a heat index of 112 at home, I was soaking up 4 miles of this gorgeousness. I think I had forgotten what mountain running felt like. It works those hammies and I loved it! This was the view as I started out.

The trail is 2 miles long. I came across this at the back end, about 1 mile into the trail. So picturesque!

I did the whole trail twice for a total of 4 miles. It got really steep in a few places, so I wasn't that surprised to see that my pace was well over a minute per mile slower than usual. It was tough and just exactly what I'd hoped for.

Good morning weekend!

2011-07-09T06:02:00.003-05:00

It's been a while since I was up before the sun. I couldn't resist the picture.
I have some awesome runs coming up this week and a new blog feature starting on Monday. I'm so excited to share both. But in the meantime, rock some longs runs, bloggy world.

June Recap

2011-07-05T21:38:00.000-05:00

Miles ran: 61.6
Rest days: 15
Highest mileage week: 18.3
Long runs: 0
Pace workouts: 4
XT days: a big fat zero....this will be changing later this month.
Tempo or interval runs: 2
Favorite run: my standard 4-miler on 6/29. I got an average pace of 8:41, which felt great! I finally let myself attack the pace again after the few days of back issues before that.
Current goal: consistent 16-20 mile weeks with maintained speed.
Current obsession: still decorating! I got the shipping notice for our sofas a few days ago, so they should be here soon. Also, I am almost finished painting our bedroom and the search for decor has commenced. I love doing this SO much! I love making our house something I feel good about and enjoy.
Current need: materially, there really isn't anything I need right now. But I do need some rest. And it's coming! We have a vacation planned, but I'm not going to tell you where, what, or when until we're back. :) So you'll just have to wait.
Current excitement: Feeling like I'm getting back into the swing of things. I feel like I'm slowly regaining control.
Current bane of my existence: I know I sound like an insufferable ray of sunshine here, but honestly, if all I can complain about is the state of the closets in our house, life is pretty fantastic. But the closets, yeah. They are pretty bad! Maybe I should take before and after pictures.
Current wish list: a new bathing suit
Current indulgence: DECORATING! And Schlafly Pale Ale. Because it's summertime.

An open letter

2011-07-04T23:40:00.000-05:00

Dear JoannaRuns,

It's been a while, blog. I've thought of you often. Wondered what I would say when we inevitably met again. What version of the truth I would tell you about where I was. Wondered if you'd still be here when I came back. I missed you, a lot.

See, it wasn't you. It was me. Things are good. No, not good, great. There is no cause for concern. But I did need some time apart, some space if you will, to embrace the side show my life often becomes, to re-think what I want for our relationship, and to set some priorities for what remains of summer. Maybe I should do a "day (or week) in the life of" post with you sometime. My SIL, Kdot (who I adore) tells me it's not normal--often in a good way and sometimes in a downright crazy way. Recently things had gotten a lot out of hand. It's not a complaint; I wouldn't live my life any other way. But I did need to stop and hash out a game plan.

I really want to get back together with you, but I need to lay some ground rules. First, I need to ask you to let me hit "mark all as read" and let me move on. It's gotten to the point that I just can't catch up on all the 9,837 posts in my Reader. Second, I want to ask if I can let in a little bit more of the crazy from time to time. I think this will be good for both of us. Third, I need to ask that no one judge me for reverting to the treadmill when the heat index reaches "blistering". For several years I've had a medical issue that makes extreme heat + exertion a real problem for me. Telling you this will make it a lot less awkward for me to talk about summer running. And with that, I promise not to whine about heat. Fourth, I want to do some giveaways. Soon.

I have had some fun while we've been apart. We've had some friends visit from out of town (reason #72 why I love living in a city: people have multiple excuses to come visit!). This ridiculously adorable pic is the kiddo with his very first friend ever, a little boy he used to go to daycare with, and whose parents we know from our old church. They came to town for a family getaway. Also, I started painting our master bedroom (XT, baby!) on Saturday night. It's just almost finished, finally, and I love it! Now I get to shop for decor and accessories, and Project Closet Reorganization will be underway very soon.

Thanks for not leaving me while I was away. I have so much stuff planned for us, and I'm super excited about it!

Run strong,
Joanna

The Suspect List

2011-06-18T22:01:00.001-05:00

Cotton: We haven't seen Average Joe's yet. They haven't made it to the court. It could be a psychological ploy, or something worse.
Pepper: They're definitely not on the court, Cotton. Their absence is noticeable.

....yeah, I know. I've been a little MIA recently. Sadly no, not a psychological ploy to....win the internet? Ha! Anyway, no. What's up is that when I left for my Monday morning run I knew quickly that something was really wrong. I had shooting pains sort of from the backs of my hips down my legs. I slowed down, waiting for whatever twitch it was to work itself out, but it never did. By the last mile I was walking on and off. Through the rest of Monday and then crazy on Tuesday, my calves tightened and felt like I'd shredded them. WTH.

Before I move on to the Suspects List, I want to jump to the end: I ran 4 miles today and had only a tiny bit of tightness and similar pain, so I think I'm almost out of the woods. I'm really thankful that it seems to be a temporary setback.

So what do I think caused this? Here's the Suspects List, in no particular order.

Suspect #1: The pain in my rear

Yes, that old chestnut. And yes, I made my husband take this picture. I didn't even realize the piriformis was angry again until Wednesday when I realized that it was painful, rather than being it's low, dull, 18-month-old pain. Truthfully, I've slacked off the foam roller since Cleveland, so it's back to that. I think this old injury is the center of this week's issue, made worse by both Suspects #2 and #3.

Suspect #2: Our couch

This couch and our kitchen table were the first pieces of furniture I ever owned. I loved this couch. But, 7 years and a child later, and I love it less. It was always deep, but with time it's gotten Little Shop of Horrors consumptive. And it makes my back hurt. New sofas are on their way! Cannot wait. They are going to be awesome.

Suspect #3: Bad Yogi

Y'all know I love the yoga. But...admission of truth--I haven't done it since well before Cleveland. Meaning, I haven't been stretching out the piriformis (or anything else) since early May. BAD YOGI. I have a Groupon for a month of unlimited yoga classes, so I'm starting back this week.

MOJo

2011-06-07T22:28:00.002-05:00

Haha, get it? MOJo? Because I live in Missouri and my name is Joanna? And no, you cannot call me Jo. Unless you already do, which probably means you're either from a small town in WV or I met you in the US between 1999 and 2003. And that's a whole other story. Anyway, I seem to have lost some of my running mojo. And I need some help finding it. So, completely without segue, some backstory:

See, I love coffee. (I swear, this is about running. Stay with me.) In fact, I love it so much I once took a picture of a freshly-filled canister of coffee beans to file away in a "Favorite Things" folder (before Pinterest was cool).

And yet, most summers I try to wean myself from it. Why? Because it's frackin' hot out, and coffee makes it worse. And, life is usually much less chaotic in the summer, so I actually get enough sleep.* Oh yeah, and I have this bizarre need to prove to myself that I can break the addiction every now and then. #masochism. So, yes, I'm currently in the weaning process. I'm down to about 3/4 of one mug each morning. I hate this process.

As if that weren't enough, did I mention that it's hot out? Because, in the words of my beloved Jamie, it's hot as balls out. The last few days we've had highs around 96, also with crazy humidity. I ran my normal 4-mile loop yesterday morning, starting at 7:45am, and was about to hurl by the time I got home.

Neither of these things--the coffee withdrawal or the heat--is particularly motivating me to run. And because I don't have a training plan right now, I'm a little shy on motivation. But I also don't want to lose my new found speed or fitness from the marathon, so I need to find a way to motivate myself. So, you know me. I like lists. Here's what I'm gonna do.

~~Steal underwear.~~ Suck it up, admit that I don't have to be a hero, and face the dreadmill until the heat breaks (which is supposed to happen sometime this weekend. But you know what I think of the weather forecasters here).
Read up on hot weather running tips and be ready when the temps drop back below 90.
Profit.** Set up a non-plan schedule to maintain fitness. Something like 15-20 miles a week with short Monday and Friday runs, slightly longer on Wednesdays, and "long"ish runs on Saturdays.

Any thoughts or advice? I know a lot of you have more experience in hot weather running and in non-training cycle running than I do, so please share!

*yes, normally work is slower in the summer. Just not right now. It's head-explodingly crazy right now. And I kinda like it.

** Please, please tell me someone got that joke. Please.

Three Things Thursday

2011-06-02T09:18:00.000-05:00

I have three things to tell you, it's a Thursday, so let's do this!

A big THANK YOU to Jodi over at Run Jodi Run for spotlighting me today. I've had so much fun getting to know her and am thrilled and honored to be part of her blog for the day! Read it here. You might learn a thing or two about me. :)
Yesterday was National Running Day. I ran 4.8 miles and added it to the Competitor.com miles reel. They were hoping to get 500,000 miles and ended up with about 12,000. Er...that's embarrassing! Did you know there's an International Mustard Day (August 5th, don't ask how I know)? Why shouldn't we have a Running Day?!? Mustard versus Running--I'm gonna be really sad if Mustard has more Facebook friends.
Summer has arrived! That means more frequent water stops while running, more time outside, a still-crazy-but-less-scheduled work life, and a few of my favorite things--painting (aka, finishing decorating) and ~~staring longingly at the empty space where our back-ordered porch furniture belongs~~ blowing bubbles with the kiddo.

May Recap

2011-05-31T20:58:00.003-05:00

Monthly recap, May Edition!

Miles ran: 75.0 (lowest since January, which was expected given the taper and post-race rest)
Rest days: 19 (yikes!)
Highest mileage week: 33.5 (the week of the race)
Long runs: 2
Pace workouts: 1
XT days: 1, but does painting my kitchen count? Because I did that over the weekend.
Tempo or interval runs: I did one hill interval workout pre-race
Favorite run: ~~it was only part of the day's run, but probably the March of Dimes 5k. New PR, a good cause, and an award!~~ (edited after I realized the 5k was actually in April.) The 6.3 miles I ran last weekend where I found my pace.
Current goal: set up my next training plan while everything is still fresh, and maintain a 20 mile/week base until I start training again.
Current obsession: waiting for our new sofas to arrive! I've purchased accessory decor items, painted the adjoining kitchen, and can't stop trying to envision the finished room! At the 1-year mark in this house (late June), I want to feel like at least the downstairs is pulled together and really feels finished. Have I mentioned that I LOVE decorating?!?
Current need: A bunch of organizational bins for when I attack the upstairs! I'm going to go all Monica on our storage space. Oh, and I need a freaking haircut. STAT.
Current excitement: Some exciting things going on at work, mostly. NERD ALERT.
Current bane of my existence: Nothing even worth mentioning. Life is good!
Current wish list: Some new mp3s. I really don't have an excuse, I just need to do it.
Current indulgence: The 4 pairs of shoes I purchased recently. What?! I said I needed new shoes last month!

Find your wings and soar

2011-05-30T17:38:00.001-05:00

It's true--I have a low grade obsession with Target. Pretty much every weekend I go to Target to buy household goods and some of our week's groceries. Yesterday while walking through I saw a little square piece of ~~wall art~~ inspirational decor that said

find your wings and soar

For a split second in my mind, it read as

find your wings and sore

And I thought to myself, that's exactly what this week was like.

Lately I've been noticing that my stride has gotten shorter and it's gotten much easier to run mile after mile at about a 9 minute pace. One of my coaches back in Illinois said he'd never correct our gait because it would correct itself to seek efficiency eventually. I think I've finally arrived at "eventually." I think I've finally hit my stride, so to speak (is that even a pun? or the literal use of the phrase? I'm not even sure).

On Saturday I went out to hit my 6.3 mile loop and was amazed to finish it faster than ever without feeling like I was even pushing the pace. Mile after mile, it just ticked off: 9:07, 8:47, 8:35, 8:34, 8:38, 8:45, 0.3 mi @ 8:49 pace. Total of 6.3 miles @ 8:45 avg. pace. My calves were a little sore on Sunday. So when I walked through Target and saw that decor, I knew it was literally my sign to write this post. :)

2009 schmoothousandnine

2011-05-26T22:18:00.001-05:00

I have some awesomeness to report.

No sadness--I just love HIMYM and this Barney-ism. But awesomeness, yes. I do have awesomeness. What you ask? Thanks for asking. This is what I have:

more miles so far in 2011 than in all of 2009

At the end of 2009 I'd covered 463.3 miles. It was a huge accomplishment for me at the time. I was in a different place as a runner and in life. As of today, I've covered 475.4 in 2011. And I'm loving doing it!

A little running, a little mid-week randomness

2011-05-25T22:37:00.000-05:00

My first run back

I finally got to run today, my first since Cleveland. I hit my usual 4 mile loop through the park. My legs were really heavy for the first mile, but I got into it and the pace seemed natural to me (negative splits from 9:28 to 9:00, yeah baby!). I got a little extra motivation toward the end--as I was crossing the main road back to my neighborhood, the tornado siren started going off! I don't think I've ever finished my run with such focus. :)

The storm was kinda crazy. I ended up in the basement for a while. My husband and son were ushered into the basements of their respective buildings (work and daycare) downtown. We had roughly walnut or ping pong ball sized hail. We still missed the brunt of the storm though, thankfully. Here in the Show-Me State I think we've all been mostly holding our breath and looking toward Joplin as they braced for another storm.

....and some random

Today's accounting:

6 purses (including two I plan to deconstruct for their bamboo handles)

1 pair dress pants

1 dress shirt

1 J. Crew dress shirt for Mr. Joanna

1 J. Crew zippy sweater (which looks HUGE in this picture) for me

__________________________________________________________________

$5. 19

I know it sounds a little crazy, but remember those girls from my birthday lunch? Well, we played a little hooky from work today and got a fancy-schmancy breakfast at a gorgeous bakery in my neighborhood, then headed to the Outlets. What Outlets? The Goodwill Outlet. Yep. That's what I said. The Goodwill Outlet. Where you buy clothing by the pound. At the rate of 79 cents. Even if stuff ends up not fitting, at worst it was maybe 30 cents wasted. And you can just donate it right back anyway. Win-win.

I think we went mostly out of curiosity, and I have to say, I had a blast. We dug through these huge bins of everything and found some great items. It's definitely an experience, and an insanely economical way to shop if you have the time to dig through the mostly unorganized bins and inspect everything you think you might want.

And for those of you who do crafty things, this is BY FAR the cheapest way I've ever thought of to get bamboo handles. I'm using mine (from that light green number--haven't decided if I'm going to destroy the gray-blue one yet) to make something sort of like this. It's going to be awesome. You're all going to want one.

On whining and babies

2011-05-22T17:26:00.000-05:00

Believe it or not, "whining" and "babies" are two entirely separate subject matters for this post. I struggled trying to decide which part to write about first. But, since it's a running blog, I'll give you running (whining) first.

On Running/Whining
This is the last post I'm going to write about Cleveland. I just need, psychologically, to wrap it all up and move on. I know that all runners bonk eventually. And I get that it was my day to bonk. I guess I've had races that were slower than planned before, but I'd always known why (I was postpartum, it was raining like cats + dogs, etc). But total bonkage was new to me, and it was crushing, both physically and emotionally. Thank you all SO much for your kind words of support and inspiration. I'd really wanted to go sub-4:10, then try for a sub-4 on the next training cycle. But, that clearly didn't happen. I still want to go sub-4 eventually, but it may take one more marathon than I'd originally intended. I keep having to remind myself, I bonked, but I improved, and by 11:20, which ain't little. Before I leave this topic, and promise to stop whining about Cleveland, I want commit to writing my biggest lessons learned.

It's hard to try for huge PRs in both the half and full-marathon in one training cycle. Admittedly, I was more devoted to a huge PR in the half, but I wanted both. Next time around, I'll focus on the full marathon and trust that the half-marathon time will just happen as a by-product.
Two nights' of bad sleep is detrimental to a full marathon. I know Tall Mom Running shared this lesson learned after Boston, but I just couldn't change my travel plans to include a longer stay. I flew to CLE on Saturday, raced Sunday morning, and flew home Sunday night. It made for bad sleep. Next time around, I will plan to arrive for a 2-night stay before the race, or a Friday arrival for a Sunday race.
I need more than one 20-miler on the training schedule. For the goals I had when I started training for Marathon #1 (Detroit '09 for those of you keeping track!), one 16-18-20 long run cycle was sufficient. This time around I did two 16-milers, one 18-miler (and skipped the second planned one), and one 20-miler. Next time around, I will devote more weeks to longer long runs.

And with that, I'm going to move on from it. I really cannot thank you guys enough, again, for all the encouragement, thank you, thank you, thank you. Runners are the best.

On Babies

Today has been a pretty awesome day--a day all about my little boy. Today was a little more emotional than I expected. See, three years ago yesterday I looked like this:

And three years ago this evening, my beautiful, amazing little boy was born. He doesn't look anything like this anymore. He's blond, and sleeps a lot less. He has changed my life in so many ways.

Today we had a party with friends from the neighborhood and work. Little Boy got tons of awesome gifts that have kept him entertained all afternoon. We had all kinds of yummy food, including some cupcakes that I made with my friend from next door. We made Devils Food Cake cupcakes with green, blue, and white with green sprinkles as a buttercream frosting. YUM.

I found myself feeling pretty emotional about his biggest gift, though. We finally removed the toddler bed (which his crib had converted to) and upgraded him to a twin bed, complete, of course, with all new Cars-themed bedding. (if you're not in the know about little boys, Cars and Thomas pretty much rule their world). We also finally replaced his changing table (which hasn't been used in ages) with a child's desk that he can use until he's raised.

Seeing his room without his baby furniture in it was momentous. And seeing his total joy when we asked if he was ready for a big boy room was priceless. My little boy is growing up. Even the baby furniture is gone. I both was and wasn't ready to see his room so differently.

he'll always be my baby.

Cleveland Marathon, Part 2

2011-05-16T23:17:00.000-05:00

Ok, back to the story--back to the start of the race. Long post warning.

This is the part of the show where I'm finally going to tell you what my Pace Band said: 4:04. And for a long time it's going to look like I was on Team Awesome. And for parts of miles here and there, I was.

Miles 1-5
As the race started out from the Stadium, I had a surprisingly hard time navigating the crowds to hit my first mile pace. It shook my confidence for a moment, but I knew better than to panic. I methodically made up for it in the second mile. This stretch was through downtown--a part of races I always enjoy. I love seeing the buildings, hearing the sound of thousands of feet running the streets. The rather intense fogginess of the morning added to the effect. I wish I could say I remembered a lot about the landscape, but truthfully, I look down when I run, and on top of that, I was pretty focused and just wasn't looking around much. I do remember that the early section of the race reminded me of running Detroit, which was kind of cool. Actual mile times in black, target times in blue.

Mile 1: 9:56/9:48
Mile 2: 9:26/9:38
Mile 3: 9:16/9:13
Mile 4: 9:15/9:18
Mile 5: 9:06/9:08

I know these times don't look off-mark, but by mile 4 I knew I was working too hard to hit them, but I had no idea why. Sure, it was crazy humid, but it was cool--in the 50s--with a very light mist. Certainly that couldn't be blamed. And I'd fueled properly. I decided it was early race stiffness, and assumed I'd run out of it.

Miles 6-10
I honestly can't tell you much specifically about these miles. I really wasn't looking around much. Around mile 6 or 7 I looked for the Redhead Cheering Section. Not seeing them, I assumed B.o.B. was ahead of me, they'd seen her, and moved up the course to cheer her into the finish. Sadly, no (you can read what happened here). I Gu'd shortly after mile 6, as planned. The spectators and on-course entertainment were awesome. Church groups, community groups, school groups, it seemed like everyone was out and cheering, misty fog and all. And every single one of them helped to keep me moving and smiling, even if I hadn't run through the stiffness; even if mile target times weren't getting easier to hit.

Mile 6: 9:18/9:08
Mile 7: 9:01/9:03
Mile 8: 9:19/9:08
Mile 9: 9:18/9:03
Mile 10: 9:07/9:03

Miles 11-15
Right around mile 11 I knew we were heading back toward the Stadium, where we'd started. I was starting to watch for the marathon/half-marathon split when I heard a guy on a bullhorn. Oh, on-course entertainment, I thought to myself. I've never heard an on-course entertainer quite like that. I think he's encouraging the ladies to chick people. Where is this guy? Oh, there is is. WHOA, those chicks with him are wearing really colorful wigs. COLORFUL!?! Wait! It's the Redhead, Jen B., and Spike!! We spotted each other just about the same time, I think. I waved and gave them a huge smile and just laughed and laughed listening to Spike's encouragement on his bullhorn. Best cheering section EVER that did not include a two-year-old.

Mile 11: 9:16/9:13
Mile 12: 9:10/9:03
Mile 13: 9:08/9:23
Mile 14: 9:32/9:08
Mile 15: 9:20/9:13

The marathon/half-marathon split was rather unceremonious, but the sign was plenty big and did its job. So I turned, Gu'd and went on my way. By the half, I was only about 1:15-1:30 behind pace, which was fine with me. And I smiled thinking about my support system back in the Central time zone, which I knew was tracking my splits and cheering me on. Plus, the bands and groups on course were great. I heard "This Little Light of Mine," which I love. I heard some GNR (and really, who doesn't love some GNR on a Sunday morning?!?), some early 2000's stuff.

But miles 14 and 15 had both missed their mark, I was doing a pretty careful eval of the pace band, my legs, and my head to gauge how things were going. I decided that there were only really a few "fast" miles left to go before the 80 second "cushion" in my pace would start to kick in around mile 20-21. I decided I could handle just a few more "fast" miles and then start to slow it down.

Miles 16-20
I think this section of the race was my favorite. For miles 17-20 we ran through Rockefeller Park, which was really nice. The park had areas named for different countries, and had a pretty canal. I saw a girl walking and encouraged her, which I never do. But she looked like she could use it. She would later return the favor, when I needed it.

For all the loveliness of the course, my goal times were slipping away from me, and I was starting to accept that there was nothing I could do about it. I'd mentally given myself a 7-second per-mile pace window, meaning that anything upwards of 7 seconds from my pace band was fine. For a while I had stayed within that window or made it up from mile to mile, but by mile 17 I just simply couldn't. I willed my legs to move faster, and couldn't believe the pace number on my Garmin wasn't budging. But it wasn't. Not even a little.

Mile 16: 9:25/9:13
Mile 17: 9:46/9:13
Mile 18: 9:38/9:08
Mile 19: 9:32/9:08
Mile 20: 10:01/9:13

At mile 19 I did the math quickly and thought I could still go under a 4:10, barely. A sub-4:10 had been my mid-range goal. Not even a mile later, at the end of mile 20, I knew it was not physically possible. I just simply could not will my legs to move any faster, and I'd fallen too far behind. Around this time I gave myself permission to walk all the way through water stops without feeling like I had to make up the time. That took off some pressure, and it helped me keep running between water stops.

Miles 21-25
I wish I could tell you the moment it happened. Like the moment I first knew I was pregnant with my son. Or when I was 16, running intervals for cross country, and I knew in an instant that I had a stress fracture. But I can't tell you exactly when I hit the wall. All I know is that I hit it so hard I cried on impact. I'm a grown woman. A marathoner. I've given birth. And I cried. On the course.

It wasn't even tear-filled crying. Just sobbing, trying hard not to burst into tears completely (why oh why was I wearing mascara?!?). Let me tell you something. There is nothing dignified about crying on a marathon course. It lacks the element of strict physical control you've honed over the 16 or 18 weeks you've trained for the event. While it's happening, all you want to do is go home. Get out of the cold drizzle (which the mist had now turned into). Stop moving. And all you can do is keep moving forward, in pain, watching your goal slip farther and farther away, unable to do anything at all about it. Your choices are simple: move forward, or get a medic to help you. Those are the options. I had more than one bike-medic offer to get me help when they saw me fighting to hold back tears. But as miserable as I was, I was going to see it through.

We ran by the lake for a while, which was reminiscent of the half-marathon I ran in San Francisco. Then the course returned to city streets, again reminding me of the last few miles of Detroit. I was walking more, and not just through water stops. It was in that stretch that the girl from the park passed and encouraged me. I thought it was incredibly classy, and kind.

Mile 21: 9:42/9:18
Mile 22: 11:14/9:33
Mile 23: 10:14/9:28
Mile 24: 11:28/9:38
Mile 25: 11:41/9:38

The Finish
Mile 26: 11:04
0.2: 2:39 (Garmin measured it as 0.32 miles, GPS error accumulated from the whole race)

I knew how close I was, and I tried to run as much of it as I could. Finally, I came over the bridge, passed the 26th mile marker, and turned toward the finish line. I scanned the crowd for the Bloggy cheering section, but I couldn't imagine they'd stayed out in the rain after B.o.B. had finished and was probably cold and hungry. I sped up as much as I could, thinking I could possibly beat the clock from rolling over to the next minute. More than anything, I was just thankful to be done.

Chip time: 4:16:07

1446/2633 finishers

408/1002 females

76/173 age/gender division

Finish Area

I got my medal (which is awesome, btw), some chocolate milk, looked around (unsuccessfully) for Jodi, Jenn, and Dave, and headed toward the bag-drop area. I walked for what seemed like an eternity, but was probably 10 minutes, and found it. Even the lady that retrieved my bag asked me repeatedly if I needed medical attention. I was shaking, shivering as an only possibly related matter, and still trying very hard to maintain control of my emotions. I told her I was going to be fine, but thank you. I got my bag, walked to an open space, and sank to the floor. Still half-crying, I started digging through my bag for anything that might be a comfort. My new hoodie sufficed, although I hated to get it wet with sweat and rain. Mr. Joanna called just then; later I felt bad that he'd had to live those awful moments with me. And I still had to walk, in the cold rain, back to my hotel. Thank the Lord I'd put an umbrella in my drop bag (#neuroticoldpersonbehaviorftw).

After I got cleaned up, I went to meet part of the bloggy crew to recap and return a shirt that had gotten stowed in my drop bag. Seeing them and decompressing was undoubtedly a highlight after the race we'd all had. But we'd all finished. We were all marathoners.

Thoughts

I know. I know. RunningFirst has already reminded me that I took 11+ minutes off my PR, and I should celebrate that. AND I AM PROUD of that accomplishment. I KNOW that every runner totally bonks during a race every now and then. I KNOW that the weather wasn't the best. I KNOW that I slept like hell for the 2 nights before the race. I KNOW.

But this was not the race I'd planned for. Trained for. Hoped for. And it hurt like hell. I burned through every gear God gave me just to finish. And it didn't have to be that way. At the end of Lewis & Clark last October, I felt great. At the end of Martian in April, I was ecstatic. It needn't have been this way in Cleveland. So what went wrong? I need to know. I want to go 26.2 again, and I never want it to feel like this again.

I know this has been a VERY long post--thanks to those of you who are still reading. All told, even though race day bit the big one, this training cycle was a blessing to me. I'm choosing to see it for the good in it. It was the me time I needed in an otherwise beautiful and stressful life. It was the introduction to my city that I needed. It was a goal, and I needed that, too. And while just 24 hours ago I was cussing under my breath that I'd never do this again, now I just want it more. I will NOT let this beat me. I am a runner.

Cleveland Marathon, Part 1

2011-05-16T09:57:00.002-05:00

Oh, where to even begin?? I know what you all want. You want a finishing time. But that's at the end of the race, so you're going to have to wait. :) I will tell you that I finished in one piece and I PR'ed, but it's a whole lot more complicated than that, unfortunately. Sit back and relax. Story time.

Pre-Race
My flight out of StL was at 8am on Saturday. As the trip started, I started reading Matt Long's The Long Run, great inspiration before a race! Total tear jerker though. I had to stop reading sometimes to keep from crying in public. RUNNERD, party of one! I arrived in Cleveland in time for lunch, which I had to force myself to eat. All told, a smooth trip.

Sidebar: I want to give a big shout out to Cleveland for a minute. You don't hear a lot of awesome things about Cleveland, so I wasn't sure what to expect. It was great. It was super easy (and only $2.50!) to hop on the train from the airport to downtown, where the terminal was centrally located and easy to get to and from. The downtown itself is surprisingly nice--beautiful buildings, shopping, walkable.

Before checking into my hotel, I went to the host hotel and caught the shuttle to the Expo, which was about 15 minutes away in Euclid. The Expo was about what I would expect for a race of 18,000 people. Lots of vendors, some big names, good energy about it. I picked up my packet, wandered around for a while. Bought a marathon magnet for my car. Then, just as I was leaving--I was maybe 10 feet from the door--I saw some girls looking through their packets and I thought to myself, I hadn't actually looked at my bib. I don't know why I even thought it. Or why I stopped (after a moment of deliberation) to do it then. But I'm glad I did. Because there was no bib in my race packet. WTH?!? I quickly made my way back to the packet pick-up area and immediately saw my bib in a small pile that had been left behind. I grabbed it, relieved, and then went outside to wait for the shuttle back downtown.

I made my way down the street to the Marriott. (huge high-five to them, btw. It was a great hotel experience, especially during a stressful time when the hotels were overbooked and downtown was crazy busy). I got myself all checked in and settled, bought a banana for the next day and some snacks for that night. Took in the view, to which the picture doesn't do justice.

I read for a while and relaxed, and before long headed to the race-organized pasta dinner, where I was to meet up with some other bloggers. The dinner was held on the ground floor of the Hyatt, which is gorgeously renovated.

I didn't see any familiar faces at first, so I got some dinner and sat and just chatted with people around me. This included an older couple, the wife of which was their official photographer. They were completely adorable. Then there was the vaguely eastern European training group that didn't talk at all. It was quite the mix. After a while Jodi and I found each other and I got to "officially" meet her, Jenn, and Dave, and I'm so glad I did! I had such a good time with them. You can read a bit more about how Cleveland became a "destination" race over at Dave's blog. Yeah, I'm not one to mince words.

Back at my hotel, I settled in for a night of pampering. I opened my 1,200 calorie box of whoppers (because, really, when else can you get away with buying crap like that?!?). Gave myself a pedi. Watched tv. Read my book. Thought about the race, strategy, and trying to visualize going through it. Laid out everything for morning.

But most importantly, I talked to my boys. I heard my son say, in his precious almost-three-year-old voice (with, I'm sure, some coaching from Mr. Joanna), "Good luck tomorrow. I love you!" And that was all I needed to hear.

Unfortunately, I slept like crap. I must have woken up 4 times in the 6.5 hours I was in bed. At 5:15 I was up, getting dressed, going through all the motions, and at 5:50, headed out to meet the bloggy crew. I was barely inside the Renaissance when I heard Morgan (who I met at Martian back in April) yell my name from above. She was there with Spike, B.o.B., Jen B., and the group from dinner the night before. It was the burst of sunshine I needed to get me going. We laughed, hugged, got all geeked out about the race, and headed out. I walked part of the way to the start with B.o.B., who is just as lovely in person as she is on her blog. It was great meeting her! I split off from the group to go to the bag drop (which was chaotic), then headed to an over-flowing start area. No one could get even close to their appropriate starting area (signs with paces to let you know about where in the pack you should be). So I lined up where I could find a spot, enjoyed the national anthem, and waited for the gun.

I wish I'd known what was about to happen, and at the same time, I'm glad I didn't. I'm afraid that if I'd known, I might have walked off the course at that moment and gone to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame for the day instead. And that, after all, is NOT what I spent 16 weeks training for. Stay tuned. Part 2 is coming shortly, with all its gory details.

Off to the races

2011-05-14T09:42:00.001-05:00

.Since blogger was down yesterday I didn't post. So here I sit in the cincinnati airport waiting for my flight to cleveland. game time.

Am I nervous? Yes. Excited? Check. Constantly checking the weather.affirmative. Wondering if I should have brought my detroit jacket?

My last run was wednesday in 73 degree weather with 91 percent humidity. It was finally a not so fun run, and oddly that comforted me. So let's do this thing.

Wish me luck. This is me signing off until show time!

Taper? What taper?

2011-05-05T12:17:00.000-05:00

It just hit me today that I'm tapering. I think I've been in denial. Then today I looked at the training plan and realized that there's no pace run tomorrow, just a short, easy run. No speed workout next Wednesday. And holy crap, the race is in TEN DAYS. I need to be storing up glycogen and hydrating, resting, and getting mentally prepared. It's time!

Taper madness will come. I think my denial is a form of taper madness all by itself. The taper is change, and change is scary*. Training has gone well, can't I just keep doing that? ha! I'm thrilled about the upcoming test, but there are doubts. We all have doubts. And the taper is the time to chase them away, to reflect on all that you've done and get your head in the game once and for all. It's time.

So I ordered my pace bands (and I'm still not ready to tell you what they say--sorry!). Checked the extended forecast for Cleveland, which I will do every day from now until then. The countdown is ON!

* I actually love change and thrive on it. Changes in training are scary, but absolutely thrilling too.

April Recap

2011-05-01T20:30:00.000-05:00

Yep, it's a two-fer Sunday. You know I couldn't miss doing an April Recap. 'Cause April was kind of a big deal. :)

Miles planned/ran: 165.4/148.5 (easily my highest mileage month EVER!)
Rest days planned/taken: 5/8
Highest mileage week: 42.7 (also a new record)
Long runs planned/ran: 5 (counting the Martian Half)/4 (life happened, which was OK!)
Pace workouts planned/ran: 3/3
XT days planned/done: 4/1
Tempo or interval runs planned/ran: 3/3
Favorite run: Oh, it's a tough call between the perfect 18-miler and my favorite speed workout, but I think the award has to go to the 18-miler.
Current goal: CLEVELAND, finishing healthy, happy, and at a time I'm not quite ready to admit yet. :)
Current obsession: making a to-do list of house projects for the week after the race
Current need: new worky work shoes
Current excitement: Uh, everything?!? Cleveland, fast approaching the "slow season" at work, using/wearing all the fun stuff I got for my birthday, yesterday's new 5k PR, the kiddo's upcoming birthday, etc.
Current bane of my existence: the butt pain (THANK YOU Jessie for the advice!). Massage on Tuesday should help.
Current wish list: a magical 8-ball that will accurately predict the weather in Cleveland, Ohio for May 15
Current indulgence: food (I may have started the crazy taper-fueled eating binge already), and still shopping for house things.