Weekend Run

After a crazy Friday at the office where I was so busy I hardly had time to catch a breath, I was glad the weekend was here! The weather is still a little off, cooler than usual for this time of year, and very windy. But at least we haven’t been having big storms move through, like in other parts of Texas and the US.

Weather.com had promised rain for this morning, so I was anticipating a long morning at the gym. To my relief, all the rain had cleared out by the time I was ready to drag myself out of bed and face the day, so I did my Memorial Drive, Chimney Rock, Woodway run. Today’s sightings included turtles at what I affectionately call Turtle Pond on Memorial, a dead but largely intact armadillo, and lots of kumquats at the still-inexplicable roadside garden at Memorial and Chimney Rock.

I also found a new-to-me running path. It’s parallel to the 610 loop and goes from Woodway to Uptown Park. It didn’t add much to my overall route, but it opens up options for new routes. I think this path is the paved-over version of a muddy little trail I ran on seven years ago when I trained with Houston Fit for my first marathon. Most of us were new runners, and the coaches were teaching us how to safely build our mileage. We were scheduled for six miles, but the coach who took my group misunderstood and our route was eight or nine miles, nearly killing us! An extra couple of miles can be brutal when you’re first starting out. Sometime after you’ve built up to nine or ten miles your body resets itself and an extra two or three miles is no big deal, if you’ve paced yourself correctly. Seven years ago, I was nowhere near that point.

But I digress.

Today’s run ended up not being one of my better ones. I felt tired for some reason. And although I was doing better with the asthma than last week, I still wasn’t 100%. But I ran 13 miles, and it never rained in spite of all the dark clouds swirling around, so it was all good.

I earned my Indian food, and Dan and I spent most of lunch arguing over a political matter. The funny thing is that we were both on the same side. It’s just that he insisted on bolstering his case with sound bites and false information. I felt compelled to call him on it, asking where he got the facts that led to his conclusions, but he couldn’t say. Then he got mad and I had to remind him all over again that we were on the same side. I just feel like if you’ve got a good case, you should be able to back it up with facts and conclusions of your own, not someone else’s worn out clichés and straw man arguments. But he's smart and I’ll teach him yet how to debate properly! At least Dan’s problem is that he never learned proper research and debate techniques. I can’t say the same for some of the talking heads on TV and radio, who seem to delight in spouting illogical nonsense intended to appeal to emotions instead of intellect.

But that’s a whole ‘nother topic that I don’t care to get into. This is a blog about bunnies and crazy human activities like running long distances. Besides, I’ve got important things to do, like check on the zucchini chips I’m making. Did I mention how much I love my new dehydrator?

Recent Workouts
Saturday: 13 mile run