Running Chick

Hey, remember when I was going to be all productive during my post race running hiatus?  Do some house projects, ride my bike, yadda yadda. Guess how many of those things I got done. One? Nope, sorry loser. ZERO. And I don’t feel bad about it, either because I believe we set a new personal record in going to the bar & eating out this week, and that took up some serious time & effort.  Priorities, man. Priorities.

Some race highlights/lowlights -

• Surprisingly consistent splits. I went out too fast for the first two miles, but dialed it in by the fourth.
• Almost choking on a crumbly Fig Newton. It’s probably time to experiment with gels again.
• Seeing “One Walker is beats [insert some number which I can’t remember] runners” chalked all over the road, thinking WTF? and then getting a lesson in Wisconsin politics from the dude running next to me who was definitely voting to oust Cheeseland Gov Scott Walker in the upcoming recall election.
• Eagle themed aid stations.  One had a old dude wearing a George Washington-looking wig, yelling into a PA system and waving an eagle puppet at all the runners.  Josh said he high-fived the eagle. I ran to the other side of the road. Creepy.  The other had a little kid sitting on the pavement on a pile of sticks that was supposed to look like a nest. She had cardboard wings strapped to her arms and sprung up from her nest and made screeching eagle noises when runners went by.
• Have any beer? I heard it at almost every aid station, but the only one which could have honored the request was the aid station at the bar and they could barely get water out in time. Sorry, lushes.

Soda Pops restaurant.  It’s a soda fountain!  Lots of fun drinks and yummy food. It was so good we went there twice.

The Hodag in Rhinelander, WI. We zipped over there to find me some shorts because it was going to be warmer than I anticipated and didn’t bring any. It was a bust. I have the absolute worst time finding shorts that fit my thunder thighs. Grumble.

Cocktails and sandwiches! I so wanted to go there, they were closed.

Strangest mannequins I’ve ever seen. The first one reminds me of the Joker.

Post race bar crawl photo at the Black Forest Pub in Three Lakes, WI. Drinks were expensive, food was good.

Compression socks & moccasins. My sexiness is beyond compare.

The view from our little cabin. Pretty, but that was about the only nice thing I have to say about that place. It was a serious dump.

Next week, running! Biking! Or, something.

Did you know that “Mad City” is one of Madison’s nicknames? Me neither.

Capitol Building

State Street

Machinery Row Bicycles. I have never seen so many bicycles in one place. Ever.

Graze, local food restaurant.

Artisan cheese plate with blue, cheddar, black truffle goat and govarti-capri. So. Good.

Josh had the grass fed pub burger with bacon and fries. It looked yummy…

…but mine was better.  Seafood Stew with shrimp, scallop, mussels, clams, halibut, chorizo, cannellini beans & braised greens in lobster broth. Winner!

Horsie carriage on State Street

Knuckleheads Tobacco, where I got yelled at for taking a picture of all their “tobacco accessories”.

New Glarus Spotted Cow. Yum yum.

Protest signs

Fin.

I had my first hot run of the season today, and it completely kicked my tail.  You think I’d learn how to manage the heat after many summers of running in it, but I guess I’m just a slow learner.

I woke up at 7:30, thought about going running, and promptly rolled over for another hour of sleep. When I did finally climb out of bed, I put my running clothes on and proceeded to get sucked into “Parking Wars” for the next hour. Or two. By the time I ate and got rest of my running stuff together, it was pushing 11:30 and already over 70 degrees and sunny. Uh oh. The first mile wasn’t too bad because it was in the shade, but the next five were full-on sun with no breeze at all. I didn’t make it any easier on myself by only taking one flask of water, because by the second mile I was already in water conservation mode and only taking small sips here & there. That’s not enough to stay hydrated, for certain, and I was thirsty for the majority of the run.  I took quite a few walk breaks and slowed down considerably and alternatively felt like jumping into or drinking the canal when I was done, but the good news is that those six miles were completely pain free.

I’m still doing two days on the treadmill and one day outside. I’ve slowly bumped up to 3.5-4.0 miles on the treadmill (yuck) and one longer run on the weekend. This week’s mileage was 13.50, which is the most I’ve run since mid-March, and thanks to good old 174, probably the only completely pain-free week of that amount of miles in something like two years. Could even be more, I’m not entirely sure. I’m not planning on taking my weekly mileage too much higher because I’m not training for any races (not allowed to race this year) and I have a ton of house selling work to do so I want to keep my free time as free as possible.

Anyhoo, the weekend we were in Madison for my appointment at the UW Health Runner’s Clinic, we hit up the Madison Farmer’s Market on Saturday morning before heading out of town. It was held right downtown on capital square and it was humongous. Unfortunately, there was so many people around that I didn’t have many good opportunities to snap pictures. I did get a few, however.

Sunflowers were big item at the stands.

In addition to radishes, rhubarb and asparagus were on almost every vendor’s table.

Sea of people.

And finally, a glamour shot of the kitty. Notice the disinterested, vacant yet sexy look? We have some serious modeling potential here, people. Supermodel quality for sure. I should get her an agent like Ice-T and Coco did for their dog.

Next up on the home improvement front: Josh and I attempt to hang wallpaper. Together. Will we both survive?