Still sick

Seriously.  Not cool.  I was sick for a few days, felt better for a couple, and then a new cold decided to piggyback itself onto the old cold.  The second one is definitely worse than the first.  The first time it was basically just a chest cold, this time it was a full blown fever/congestion cold.  Basically what it boils down to is that I haven't been for a REAL run in over a week now.  I went for a short one last week, on one of the two days that I was feeling better, but I didn't want to over-do it, so I only went about a mile.  Looks like it didn't matter how far I went though, as I got sick anyways.
Yesterday I was feeling completely miserable and I didn't know how I was going to make it through the day today.  Luckily, we had ANOTHER snow day.  This time though, I was actually looking forward to it, because I really wanted to just sleep.  I actually got up at 6 and found out that school was cancelled.  I did a mini-dance inside my head, put on my humidifier, brushed my teeth, and went back to bed.  Jealous? I bet.  Then I woke up around 10:30 and felt 10x better, but not great. Took a ridiculously long shower to absorb the steam into my membranes, took some medicine, went grocery shopping, and then shoveled.  Later, I even walked the dogs.  I think the sleeping until 10 really did it.  I was able to sleep off that extra bit of fever that was hanging around.  Hopefully I'll be able to run again this weekend.  I never thought I would say this, but I miss it!  I was just about to start interval training, and I was pretty excited about it, so I really want to get back at it.
Since I don't have any Charity Miles to share with you, I'll share this lovely picture I drew instead.  I thought it might be fun to put The Outsiders into comic book/graphic novel form, so I've been (sort of) working on that.  It's only chapter 1, and I'm not sure I really like the way my faces are coming out, but it's something, I guess.

Oh, and one more thing.  Remember those zip-ups I got?  Well, the other day on the T, I noticed that only the left side was working.  Seems to be a loose wire connection in the right side, because it comes and goes, depending on which way the wire is turned.  I have to say that I'm fairly disappointed in that.  This is supposed to be a great product and yet they're broken on me already.  I'm not sure how the company is going to handle this, but I imagine it's going to be tough to get a replacement without it costing me an exorbitant amount of money, considering it's an overseas company.....

Embarrassing moment

Tonight I ran 8 miles! Wooooooo!  I thought I was going to die by the time I got back to the start, but that's not really the point now is it?  I'm not truly sure how I am going to make that last mile on Sunday though.  Seriously.  It was getting extremely tough by the 8th mile.  My legs didn't seem to want to work anymore and I could tell I was slowing down.  The good news is that we did it in 1:20.  So even if I want to give up on Sunday, by the 9th mile, I have at least 25 more minutes for the final mile.  It's nice to have that extra bit of time I suppose.  We also ran part of the route the 15K takes, so that was helpful.  The 60 degree weather helped a lot too.  Unfortunately, by Sunday, it's supposed to be back down to 30s again.
Since my knee has seriously been hurting, I decided to try a new combo.  I've used a brace, which didn't seem to do anything.  The same goes for wrapping.  So I upped the ante and I decided to take some aleve, which helped quell the residual pain.  I also gave in and tried Kinesio tape.  Supposedly this tape is created to stretch skin and help blood flow, lessening the pain.  There's a very specific way to use it and I tried to follow the video, but I'm not 100% sure I put it on in the exact right spot.  Since it was the first time, I can't decide yet whether it helped.  My knee didn't feel as bad tonight, but it could've been because of the weather, the aleve, or the tape.  I really may never know.
But the title of this post is embarrassing moment and so here it comes.  I was using my zip-ups and went with both earphones today.  (There were 5 of us running, so I felt that it was safer to have both in, since others did not.)  About 3 miles in, my arm caught the zip and ripped the earphones out of my ears.  I looked down and noticed that one of my earpieces was missing the rubber piece that goes on the outside. Figuring I had lost it, and being very disappointed about, since they are brand new, I stuck the other earphone in my right ear and went on running.  When we got to the 7.5 mile mark, I switched ears.  That's when I started noticing that something felt a little bit funny.  It seemed like there was something inside my ear, but I just couldn't figure out what.  Until I stuck my finger in and clear my ear and realized that it was the rubber piece from my headphone!  Turns out, when I pulled the earphones out, the rubber piece must've gotten stuck in my ear.  Not noticing it, I shoved the other earpiece in on top of it, therefore shoving that rubber piece deep into my ear canal.  Long story short, at the end of our run, I had to have Rebz's mom, who, luckily, is a nurse, use some tweezers to pull the rubber piece out.  The bright side is that I didn't lose the rubber piece like I originally thought.  The bad news is, now I'm wondering if my left ear has been hurting for the past few weeks because I did the same thing with a different pair of headphones.  If that truly is the case, clearly I am an idiot and should no longer be trusted to use earphones.  (I'm pretty sure that's not the case with my left ear.  I noticed immediately that my right ear hurt and I could tell there was something off about my hearing.)  I'll let you know if there really is another rubber earpiece lodged in my ear though.
Unfortunately, my phone was dying tonight and I had to make a choice between music and mapping a route, so of course, I picked music.  I have no pictures from Charity Miles to show you.  Lucky for you, I DO have a picture of the earpiece stuck in my ear.  It's pretty up close and personal, but, it's also a picture of an ear, so really, I can't believe you're expecting to much.  Here it is.

I know it just looks like an ear, but that black spot is not the ear canal, it's actually the black rubber earpiece.  Wicked embarrassing.....

Training day

There is one week left until the 15K.  That's 7 days to be able to run 9 miles in under 1:45, according to the site.  As you saw, last week, I was able to do 6 in 1:01.  Today I decided to try a new route.  Instead of driving to the woods or the lake, and then running the 6 miles, I ran from my house to the woods and back.  According to Google Maps, the distance from my house to the entrance of the woods is only 1.5 miles, so it was easily doable.  That's 3 miles right there, just to go to the entrance and back home after all.  Of course I wanted to try and get at least 6 miles in, so my plan was simple.  Run through to Stone Tower, then loop back around and go back home.  Unfortunately, Stone Tower is on the top of a giant hill.  No joke.  If you happen to run Lynn woods and go through the Pennybrook Road entrance, down Jackson Path, towards Dungeon rock, you will encounter a series of hills.  Pretty much as soon as you enter, going down Jackson Path towards Dungeon Rock, you come upon some man-made wooden trail stairs.  (I don't really have a better way to describe them.)  These stairs are like mini jumps, they're just wide enough apart that you have to step in between to run up them, or jump.  Luckily, they head right back down on the other side.  However, after crossing through Jackson path you can either go straight and head up another set of man-made stairs to Dungeon rock, or loop around by Breeds Pond and come up behind the rock.
 I chose the loop because I wanted to add more miles to my run, but there's really no good choice here.  If you go straight, you run up the giant stairs and it sucks.  If you loop around, you run up a giant hill that never seems to end, and it sucks.  It's a Sophie's Choice here, except there's far less on the line.  Either way, you're running uphill though.  After that uphill, you can go straight across and down around Walden Pond (not the Emerson one) or go to the right and head up to Stone Tower.  The Walden Pond road will eventually take you to Stone Tower, should you choose to go that way, but it's almost like running a roller coaster track of up and downs. At least the road to the right just goes flat and then pretty much straight uphill until you reach Stone Tower.  The nice part is that you know when the big hill is coming because you can see the tower seconds before you actually hit the hill.  Not only is this hill steep, but it's covered in loose rocks and gravel, so take caution if you're running up it.
Once I got to Stone Tower, I went against every ounce of good sense I had and decided to stop for a minute to snap a picture.  It's a really nice view if you're not opposed to climbing a few stairs.  And let's face it, if you've just run up here, you can handle a few stairs.  The view is not as awesome as the one you get if you run up to Steel Tower, but I've only been able to find that one once, and it was by mistake, so I didn't want to go looking for it today.  Maybe someday I'll find my way back there and show you the view. Until then, google it.   I wore my zip-ups for the run today and they were everything I hoped for.  Having the second, loose, earphone zipped up with the one in my ear, I was able to keep the cable from bouncing all over the place and I didn't have to worry about that second earphone.  When I stopped for the picture, I put both earphones in, just for good measure.  I think I scared a guy and his dog who happened to walk by while I was up there, and were resting on the ledge when I came down.  Pretty sure he didn't realize there was anyone else around. I got a chuckle out of that.  Here's the view from Stone Tower.  Check out the zip-ups too.  Then go buy a pair.  If you look real close, you can see Boston in the background.  That's what all those buildings are too the left, behind the scraggly looking no-leaved tree.

Once I got through with my photo sesh,  I turned and went back down the giant hill.  I'll say this, it was definitely a more enjoyable run on the way down.  There was a slight uphill, but almost everything else was downhill.  I think I made up a lot of time there.  When I got to the tower, I was clocked at 2.5 miles in 30 minutes.  By the end of the run, I was at 5.5 miles in 1 hour.  So, maybe I didn't make up so much time after all.....Actually though, once I left the tower, the entire route was basically downhill.  I didn't think too much of it as I was running up, but I definitely noticed it on the way back down.  Noticing the downhill run back makes me more likely to run that path again, though I'm not sure it will become a routine for me.  Those rocky hills and stairs in the woods are really a lot of effort.  

Even after all of this though, I'm not sure I am ready for a 15K.  The 5.5 miles seemed a lot longer than the 6 miles I ran last week, and it was a lot of effort to force myself to even go the long way home.  (Full disclosure, this may have had something to do with the donut I ate earlier today; I can't be sure.)  Though I do believe that part of it was because I was running alone. Everything seems to take longer when you're alone.  Maybe with other runners around me, it won't seem so long.  Of course, if I'm dead last, it may still be that bad.  I just keep telling myself to remember that back when I started, I didn't think I could ever make anything more than 3 miles, and now here I am at 6, so 9 maybe isn't too far out of the realm of possibility.  Now I'm stuck though.  Should I try to get to 7 or 8 by mid-week or stay at 6 and hope for the best next Sunday?  I'm sure there's no good answer here, but I think I might try for 7.5 on Wednesday.  We'll see. As a parting note, here's a Charity Miles/Google Earth shot of my run from today.  Enjoy.

Mail Call

Today I checked the mail when I got home and didn't see any in the box so I figured the mailman had not come yet.  I went out and about on a run, taking my normal streets, where I usually see the mailman, but not today.  Turns out, he left the mail on the porch instead of in the box.  Why am I rambling on about mail you ask?  Well, if I had the foresight to check the porch BEFORE my run, I would've been able to go for a run with these!

They finally came! Almost exactly a month after the order was placed, but not a terrible wait.  It was about what I was expecting, considering it was international. So, I haven't been able to use these yet but I was just so excited that they finally arrived that I had to share.  Here's hoping they work out for me!

Short and quick, like I wish my workouts were

Merry Christmas!
As an added bonus, we here on the East Coast woke up to snow this morning.  It just doesn't get any Christmas-ier than that.  Not exactly a white Christmas, but at least it's a bit more festive than the 50 degree weather we've been having.  That being said, snow = not a fun running surface, so I guess there's the other side of that coin.
Took to the woods yesterday in my awesome Adidas climacools, (see previous post) and found them even better for traction over the iced up puddles and rocks.  They may be ripped, but they can still grip!
I must say I got the best new gift this Christmas, a brand new phone.  I've been using the iPhone 4 and I will just come out and say it, I hated it.  I need my Google apps and I hated having to run everything through a 3rd party.  Especially Google music.  That's what I use to pump my jams when I'm trying to ignore the fact that I hate running even though I'm halfway into my 3 miles.  However, on the iPhone, it takes forever to load and half the time it doesn't work on it's own.  I have to pull it out in the middle of my run to switch songs or restart.  Not exactly helpful when you're trying to focus on making better time.  So I'm pretty excited to switch to the Galaxy and be able to access my music straight from Google.  Of course the phone came with headphones, but what I'm really aiming for are the zip ups from JOP World  I wouldn't say no to the gloves either actually.  It's not necessarily that I NEED new headphones, but I have been hoping to get these.  I like to keep one headphone out while running. (Safety precaution, I like to hear what's happening around me.) When I do though, the other phone is just floating and bouncing all over the place.  I'm hoping that the zip-ups will stop this by holding the free phone in place.  If not, well, at least I'll have some pretty sweet phones. I can't find them at any of the stores here in the States, so I figured if I was getting them off the internet, I might as well get them from a site I like, which is why I plan to go through JOP World.  If I buy these (read: when), I'll be sure to let you know how well they work.