Trail Running - Not For Wusses

I thought I'd change it up a bit and actually talk about running on my running blog. I know, right? I'm as shocked as you. Anyway, after a 3 week running hiatus (or was it 4?), I was back in business this evening.

A few weeks ago, my friend Lara, suggested we form a team for the new Ragnar Trail Series here in Arizona. We show horses together and she was on our Ragnar Del Sol Team this year. I saw her at the barn this morning before work and she asked if I wanted to meet this evening and try one of the trails for the Ragnar Trail Relay.

Agreeing to run many hours in the future typically gives me ample time to create a wide variety of excuses to bail. But that Lara is a super dedicated runner. So I wasn't getting out of it.

Spoiler Alert: Those hills may be little in total height, but several of them are straight up. That shit ain't easy to run up if you consider a speed bump a hill. Just sayin'.

Whew! That's enough hill work for me!

I dutifully showed up at our meeting place to carpool out into the wilderness for this trail running adventure. Let me just reiterate that I abhor running hills. I can feel when I am running up a .ooooo2% incline. But I figured this was good for me.



Look how chipper she looks. That's not normal.

The trail Ragnar consists of 8 runners to a team and 3 loops at McDowell Mountain Park. Each runner runs each of the three loops. We decided to try the "easy" loop. If that was the easy loop, I'm scared to find out what the other 2 loops are like.

 

It's worse in person, trust me,

 

 

 This terrain is difficult to navigate because the loose gravel makes it easy to slip. Some of the hills were so steep that I had a lot of trouble controlling my speed on the downhill. And my toes are a little sore from being jammed against the edge of my shoe.

 

I'm dying.
(Also not sure why I have fuzz on the brim of my visor)

I better start adding some hill work into my routine because this kicked my ass. I ran as much as I could, but sometimes I would have to stop at the top of a hill to catch my breath. Not walk, but stop. Not feeling super athletic after this!

 

But stopping did allow me to take some pictures.

 

 

I think I ended up running (and I use that term lightly) just over 3 miles. Lara had planned a longer route and didn't make it back before dark. So now we're out in the desert alone and I'm starting to freak out a little bit. Rattle snakes come out at night here. No joke. (Also, spirits and ghosts come out at night, too.)

 

But just as I was getting ready to rally a posse to find her, she appeared. Whew! Crisis averted.

 

So I finally ran. I'm exhausted and now must sleep. Good night, all. 

 

 

 

 

Reality Bites

Why? Why do you put the coffee back like this and not make more? Honest to God, this makes me so crazy, I seriously lose my shit over it on almost a daily basis.

In case you're wondering, dear readers, yes I know there are real issues in the world, but sharing my first world problems with y'all keeps me from throwing myself on the ground in a tantrum in front of my coworkers. (Although, truth be told, I actually did throw myself on the ground in my boss's office in a mock tantrum. He was not impressed and I did not get my way. Hrmph.) Moving on. 

I'm having a little trouble right now motivating myself to run. As soon as the temps started creeping up, I lost my will to survive, I mean run. This sucks because NYC Marathon training begins soon.

I have been riding 5 days a week, so I'm not a total sloth.

I realize you're probably thinking to yourself, how is riding a horse a workout? The horse does all of the work. I've heard that like a million times in my life, so let me just say, it's a pretty intense core and leg workout if you're a competitive rider.

I can set a thigh adducter on the heaviest weight and not break a sweat. That's like 200 lbs. 

 

Anyway, I'm having some trouble in the motivation department, so texted my trusty partner in crime, Tara, and tried to rally. I'm thinking of signing up for Juneathon, which is a challenge to work out every day and blog about it.

Honestly, it's truly amazing that we finish any races at all.

Regardless, I think I'm going to bite the bullet and sign up for it. There's also a Janathon, which is in January. Check it out if you're interested: www.juneathon.com. (Hey Bogger app, a link option would be marvelous, thank you.)

Anyone else want to sign up for Juneathon?

I'm Wanted by the FBI

So there I was, minding my own business and cruising around the interwebs, when my computer locked up.  I kept trying to get to my task list so that I could shut down, but nothing would happen. 

For a brief moment, my computer would jump to a screen that said Department of Justice and something about my computer being suspended at the top and then go blank. Let me tell just how fast your blood pressure can rise when you see that. Fast.

I frantically forced my computer to shut down and then I restarted. I have an active imagination, so I braced myself for the immanent busting down of my door by Kevlar vest clad FBI agents with guns.

(Now if my sexy Criminal Minds crime fighters showed up, I might be okay with that.)

Finally, my computer rebooted and the same image filled my screen. Only this time it stuck, so I was able to actually read it. It said that my computer was suspended by the DOJ for 48 hours because illegal activity was taking place. I could bypass further prosecution by immediately paying a $300 fine.

Now I don't work for the FBI- sadly, that is true despite my younger self's plans of joining the x-files division- but I'm pretty sure paying an immediate $300 fine via the web without being notified of your crime is not how due process works. I wonder how many people fall for this scam. 

So I called the Scottsdale police, who said I had to call the Phoenix police who told me I had to call the FBI cyber fraud unit. And then they gave me a disconnected number to the FBI. Your tax dollars at work, my friends.

I grabbed my lap top and immediately raced over to Best Buy where an adorable young guy stole my money in exchange for fixing my problem. (Seriously, single youngins, head over to the Paradise Valley Best Buy and ask for Aaron from the Geek Squad. He's half my age and I'm not a cradle robber, but he's awesome. And probably going to be rich one day. You're welcome.)

Apparently, this is common and they call it the FBI virus. And Best Buy has to hold my computer hostage for a week. A week! I have to blog from my phone for a week. 

Aaron told me several stories about people freaking out over this scam. One lady even drove to the FBI and demanded they unlock her computer because she hadn't committed a crime. It is a little unsettling when you first see it.

And by the way, when did it become okay to just bring your dog to Best Buy?

 

So that's another Public Service Announcement from yours truly. Only this  time it's probably more useful than my PSA about how not to break up with someone. (That drama is still going on by the way. Seriously, don't be shitty to your ex on the net. Just don't. It makes you look like an asshole.) Don't immediately assume you are a wanted fugitive if this happens to you.

I haven't run recently, but I did clean my kitchen. I better show it to you guys right now because it will probably be messy again by tomorrow night.

Hopefully, I'll have some sort of fitness related post soon...once I remember how to do that fitness stuff that's all the rage these days.

Hold On, Let Me Dust Off My Tiara

You know what I love? People that are as easily influenced as I am. I have a hard time saying no to things I want to do. This is why I drive an older car and live in a pretty small condo. (I do own the condo, so at least that is a step in the direction of adulthood maturity, right?) Otherwise, my money gets tied up in things I love doing like showing horses and running races.

I mentioned before that I have two new running victims to mentor to their first half marathon, right? Originally, the plan was to do Tinkerbell Half. I knew Tara would be on board because she can't say no, even when her original answer is no.

Me: Hey Tara, do you want to do Tinkerbell?

Tara: Hmm, we've already done that one. I don't think so.

A few weeks later:

Tara: Aren't we doing Tinkerbell?

Me: You are easy to manipulate.

So that was the plan: Me, Tara and my 2 noobs for Tinkerbell.

Then the Glass Slipper Challenge was announced. And the noobs haven't been to Disney World... and there's an option of just a 10K... they were sold on it in a matter of 2 emails. I don't know which race the newbies will end up choosing, but Tara and I are doing the challenge.

In January:

Tara: I hate that f***ing swamp. I don't think I need to go back to Florida.

Me: I'll just wait until your amnesia sets in before I bring up another race.

 

Present:

Me: I think we're doing Princess instead of Tink.

Tara: Oooh, I hope we get a good medal!

Me: How easily you forget your hatred of the swamp.

So there you have it. I may not have been able to pull of Dopey for its inaugural go, but I am doing Dumbo and Glass Slipper. That's probably better because I can't even imagine being able to walk after Dopey. At least I know a 10K and Half Mary will be a piece o' cake when compared with Goofy.

With almost no arm twisting, I managed to convince three people to go to WDW. I'm pretty sure I can blame some of this on Abby, but I haven't quite figured out how. She's stealthy, that Abby. ;)

I may have to live without electricity or insurance in order to pay for it, but that's okay, right?

Princess Half 2011

Take Two

I finally redeemed my guaranteed entry for the 2013 New York City Marathon. I'm ridiculously excited, especially since I got a taste of what the finish line would feel like last year.

I'm not at all excited about training in Phoenix. If you've never experienced 120* temps, you can not even begin to imagine it. It truly feels like you've walked into an oven when you go outside.

Anyhoo, I'm in for 2013. I'm so freaking excited! 

Identity Crisis!

I'm having an identity crisis. Not in my "real life", mind you, but in the blogosphere.

When I trained for my first half marathon in 2010, I spent hours Google image searching running and half marathons. (Okay, I'll be honest: I was searching medals. Don't judge.)

Anyway, I stumbled across the wide world of blogging. Eventually, I started my own blog to post my own race recaps. (And all of my own bling.) The thing about running a bazillion races is that eventually, medals are not really that big of a motivator. I mean, I ain't turning 'em down, let's not get stupid, but I don't go searching the web for medal pics, anymore.

I've found that the blogs I really enjoy are funny and have pictures of the bloggers. People love to make fun of selfie pictures in gym bathrooms, but truth be told, I'm a total voyeur. And really, isn't that why people read blogs, anyway? To see what other people are doing? That's why I read them! The blogs I love the most have pictures of the bloggers!

Maybe I'm a narcissist and well as a voyeur. C'est la vie.

I stumbled across a site called GOMI. That's short for Get Off My Internets. It's basically a forum for people to trash bloggers. I can't link from my phone, but Google it. Look under forums and look at the healthy blogger threads. It will shock you.

A lot of the most popular running/healthy living bloggers have pages and pages of criticism, which sort of brings me to the point of this post.

Often, I think about branching out and really dedicating myself to making something of this blog. I could make it look more professional and do product reviews, etc. All of that seems like a lot of fun.

But then there's the other side of me that likes posting about completely random things like how not to go through a break up (See my previous post for that one) and pictures of my horse (see pretty much every post for that). That's what I enjoy writing about and I realize that not everyone wants to see how cute my pony is (what's wrong with you?!) but shouldn't I write about the things I like writing about?

Then there's GOMI. For all that I feel horrified by what's said on there, I agree with a lot of it. And I'm guilty of a lot of things that I see criticized. I'll admit, when I first read some of the threads, it bothered me enough that I didn't blog for a week. The price of blogger fame, I guess. Not that I'm winning any blogger popularity contests at the moment, but I've kept my blog pretty low key.

Anyway, that's what's on my mind today. I'm trying to figure out what direction I want to go. I'd love to hear what you guys think about this stuff because I'm sure every blogger has had these same thoughts.

Help!!

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do.

Public service announcement for you today, kids!

Break ups suck. They just plain suck. It's been awhile since I got dumped. Actually, it's been awhile since I've been in a relationship. (Why does every single man I meet insist that they want children?! It's an epidemic. Seriously. And I'm allergic to children.) 

Everyone has a break up story like getting dumped while still naked in the guy's bed or being dumped via effing email (oh, that doesn't happen to everyone? Just me?  Hmmmm). And hey, feel free to share any and all break up horror stories with me. In fact, lets meet for some serious happy hour and bitch about our exes! I'm totally in. Lets do it!

What I'm not into is seeing a break up happen publicly via teh interwebz. Actually, that's a total lie. I love watching that shit. But it does make me feel vaguely uncomfortable even though I seem incapable of stopping myself from watching the train wreck.

I follow someone on twitter that just recently got dumped. She's got over 700 followers and we're not personal friends or anything. She's really smart and entertaining, so I follow her. Right now, however, she's putting her heart out there for the whole world to see and it's a little painful to watch.

I totally get it. I mean, the very first thing a person wants to do when they get their heart broken is to passive aggressively lash out at the person that hurt them. In fact, I once got dumped and then got to see awesome things posted on social media like "love shouldn't be mediocre" and "I've never been into blondes, anyway". How unfair is that? (Why, yes, I do hold grudges, thanks for asking!) I get my heart broken and I get to see that stuff? Really? 

What people don't get in the heat of the moment is that while you're busy publicly lashing out at your ex, you also want them to miss you, right? I mean, everyone wants their ex to at least feel a little bad. Let me just say, I'm not missing you when you're publicly humiliating me. Just sayin'. Also, it looks a little cray cray.

Having social media on our freaking phones with 24/7 access to feeding our voyeuristic tendendencies, sometimes it's hard to rein ourselves in. I get it. Just know that once you put it out there, you can't take that shit back. Teh interwebz never forgets.

 It's like a globally visible version of drunk dialing. It makes perfect sense after drowning yourself in vat of Jose Cuervo to call out your horrid ex-boyfriend or girlfriend for that nasty case of herpes you got, but then in the oh-so-harsh hung over light of day, all you've really done is announce to the world that you have herpes. 

All I'm asking is that you think about it before you post something on the web. Give yourself a few hours, maybe even wait until that bottle of merlot wears off. I can't tell you how many "fuck you" letters I've written only to shudder reading them the next day. I make myself wait a day before sending something I might regret. 

I almost never end up sending the email/tweet/post. Anytime I've posted without waiting, I pretty much regret it 100% of the time.

I gotta go. I gotta see what else Is being posted on Twitter. If you have an awesome break up story, let's hear it!

Thank you, Santa!

Omfg, I've been bitching forever about the Blogger app. Bitch, moan, whine. It's what's for dinner. Or is that beef? I don't even know because, lately, my dinners consist of wine and/or French fries. Athlete for realz, right here, folks. 

Anyhoo, I'm super duper excited to let y'all know that the Blogger app has been upgraded! 

Now you can put your pictures anywhere you want in a post. Holy shit, it's like I've been released from blogger slavery and freedom tastes saaaaweeet.

I haven't figured out if you can add a caption, but I'll take what I can get for right now! Now go update your apps!

Spring Cleaning and Spring Training

Happy Cinco de Mayo!!

It's totally ironic that we Americans love to celebrate Cinco de Mayo, especially when you consider that A.) this isn't Mexico and B.) Cinco de Mayo is not a big deal in Mexico. We sure do love our drinking holidays!

I didn't go out and celebrate because it's been a long weekend, but that didn't stop me from digging up a picture of Tara and me in the Mexican Pavilion in EPCOT during Marathon weekend and posting it on Facebook.

Supah sexy, doncha think?

Our running coach, Susan, commented that she missed us. Now for those of you that don't know, Susan Loken is kind of a big deal. Like the type of person that is friends with Bart Yasso and has gone to the Olympic Trials in the marathon more than once. When I cheered for my friend, Ari, when she was running her first full marathon, I watched Susan cross the finish line with a time of 2:55 or something ridic like that. And that was with an injury, so it wasn't even a fast time for her.

Yup, that's Susan...on display at the NYCM 2012 expo. No big deal.

Anyway, Susan is pretty much the nicest coach ever. Not to mention she put up with Tara and myself being by far the slowest runners on that team and she treated us like we were just as important as anyone else.

The point of all of this is that it was nice to hear that she missed us. And it made me want to tackle training for the NYCM 2013! I'm lucky to have met her.

Speaking of the NYCM, I thought my shirt was lost for good! I have not been able to find it for months.

Safe and sound!

I know a lot of people don't wear shirts for races that they did not complete, but this one is different. No one was able to finish, so it's not like I'm pulling a fast one by wearing it. It represents a huge journey and a life changing event. I'm so excited that I found it.

I spent all Saturday cleaning and gutting my house. It's possible I have made a bigger mess than when I started. C'est la vie. It's a work in progress. I do have a lot of race shirts. And I found my NYCM shirt, so WIN.

Again, I need to ask why Run Disney shirts are so ugly...

I think my Ragnar shirt is my favorite.

So, um, yeah. I'm pretty boring tonight. I had all sorts of witty and entertaining things going on in my mind earlier, but this is all I can come up with tonight.

I hope everyone had a great weekend!

Six on Saturday

Holla!

1. So much for my crazy training. I knew it would have to come to an end sometime because that's pretty much how I roll. Actually, I have a decent excuse this time. I got pretty sick last Friday.

The last time I got sick was in 2010 right as I was buckling down and training for my very first half marathon. I got really, really sick twice within a month's time. I was starting to think that I was invincible. It really sucks to find out you're a mere mortal. *sigh*

I didn't even get to take a sick day! I got sick last Friday and was sick all weekend. So I pretty much haven't run in over a week. I'm feeling pretty good today, so I might actually go out for a slow jog around the neighborhood tonight.


2. My sister had her first baby, so I am now a brand new auntie! Because I was sick, I haven't been able to go see the baby, yet. Hopefully, my sister will deem me healthy enough to visit her this coming week.



Kaitlyn Abigail

I've already been informed that I am not allowed to get her involved with horses (hrmph) so maybe I can get her involved in running. I'm excited to be an aunt. It's much better than having one myself! Disney Kids Races, here we come!! (Too soon?)

3. I'm also becoming obsessed with the show, Hannibal. I'm on the fifth episode. I can't believe that they can air stuff that gruesome on network television. It's as gross as Silence of The Lambs. It's really twisted. Check it out of you're into that kind of thing.

Watch it. I'm hooked.

Gillian Anderson is guest starring next week!! I was the biggest X-Files nerd, like ever, so I can't wait for the former Agent Scully to appear as a guest star!

(source)

4. I'm really starting to wish I had signed up for the Inaugural Dopey Challenge. It seems like I'm seeing Dopey hype everywhere. I can't stand it!! I can't afford to go in 2014, so really, it's a moot point. But still. I want to do it! At least I can console myself with the fact that Dumbo Double Dare is going to be so freaking fun. I've got a pretty good idea for one of my race costumes, but I need an idea for the second. Hmmmm...

He's so cute!

5. Registration is now open for the New York City Marathon. Somehow, I keep forgetting that I'm running it this year. Maybe after all of the hype from last year and then the drama of having it cancelled, it sort of floated to the back of my mind. It's six months away. At least this year, I'm starting with a better base. Last year, I sat on my ass for most of the spring, so when training started, it was a real bitch. Right now, I'm regularly running 5 to 8 miles, so I have a bit of a head start.

Hopefully, I will get to actually cross
 the finish line this time...

6. I still need to do my recap from the Pat Tillman Run a couple of weeks ago, but I'm feeling a little lazy. I've been cleaning my house for most of the day, so I need to get back to work. I hope everyone is having a great weekend so far. Happy Saturday!