A good weekend

Friday night, Eric and I ventured out to a fish fry. Something at work had made me a bit cranky, but I refused to let it get the best of me - but I did make Eric get me a couple of beers while we were waiting in line to get food (yes - a very popular place - we waited in line for about 45 minutes). I was feeling quite happy at that time.

Then we went to REI, and I bought a backback for my trip. I can now do some conditioning hikes, with my pack and my new boots! We were thinking about going out for a drink after our shopping, but as we were both yawning, we figured we would go home instead. And we were in bed before 10 pm. Yep, we're old...

Saturday, I went running with the group. I hadn't gone out since the bad run on Wednesday (thought I needed some recovery time) and tried to take it real easy. After mapping it out, it was actually somewhere around 5 miles, but I didn't even time myeslf to see how long it took. Drank some coffee with the group, went home to take a bath, then I was off to get my hair cut. It turned out okay - but it's a little shorter than I would have liked... the front will not tuck behind my ears, and it keeps slipping out of clips. But it's hair. It will grow. And this is the first time in a long time that I am not 100% pleased with my haircut.

After that, I went to the store, and finally bought the software to do my taxes. Then I went home, watched the Grey's Anatomy that I had recorded, then crawled into bed and took a nap until my husband got home. Ate some dinner, then started doing our taxes.

Sunday morning, I got the bed changed, the taxes done and e-filed (yay! getting a refund this year!), did several loads of laundry, made a good breakfast of egg beaters, 2% cheese slices and light wheat toast, and chatted with a friend who came over to clean up our computer (Eric and I are not "real" computer people.). The 8K race was scheduled to start at 1:20 pm. I got myself out of the house at about noon, to meet my freind at the registration area, we dropped stuff off at her car, used the porta-potties, and speed walked the three blocks to the starting area, where the race started about a minute after we got there.

It was kind of overcast and windy, but I had dressed well for the race. Up the first big hill on Summit Avenue - up to and across Snelling, I could hear my friend was breathing pretty heavy, so I asked her if she was okay - and she said she needed to walk - and I should go ahead. So I kept on. My goal was to jog/run the whole race. So there was Mile 1. The guy with the stopwatch said the time was about 12 minutes, 30 seconds. Which was okay, since I was in the back of the starting chute, and did not cross the start for a bit after the race was started.

At the mile two marker, the time there was somewhere around 22 minutes, 40 seconds. Close to a 10-minute mile! From there, to William Mitchell College - the turnaround point. Listening to my music, in the "zone", catching up to people, passing... up the small hill by Kowalski's, knowing that it's pretty much downhill from there. Down the hill past Snelling Ave, coasting, making good use of the hill. Wondering if I should speed up. Past Prior Ave (the starting point) and into the end. I finished strong, picking up the pace for the last two blocks, and seeing the time on the clock as 52 minutes.

Man it felt good.

My first 8K, and I feel like I made a very respectable showing. My friend ended up fininshing about two minutes after me, still not bad, but she was not real pleased because she felt pretty lousy throughout the whole race. Truly, what a difference a couple of days make!

It was a good weekend.

(Oh, and the scale was down another pound today - that makes 7 pounds lost... and I feel much better in my clothes!)

Happy Monday to you all!
~a