Ilanarama!

I still love you, sweetie! A whole lot! ♥♥♥

A half-dozen more excruciatingly nineties photos here on Flickr. (Including the one of you with the shotgun air rifle, Dad!)

After 13.1 miles of it, I can now report that "running against the wind" really sucks. I was feeling good, well-trained, at a good weight, and healthy; in other words, I was ready for a PR, but the weather had other ideas. Strong south winds that funneled up the Colorado River canyon made the race a lot harder than it was last year. Still, I ran 1:40:25, which exactly ties my Other Half time from October (2 weeks after a marathon and a hillier course), and as the wind indiscriminately affected everyone, I ended up with 3rd in my age group, same as I did last year with a 3+ minute faster time.

( Gory details )

It was still a great weekend. Dee, an imaginary friend from RWOL, flew in from the midwest to run this race, and ended up taking first place Masters female even though she was disappointed in her time. I had margaritas at Miguel's the night before the race, and beers at the Moab Brewery after, with a bunch of other RWOL friends, including my usual race roomie Karah and our friend Kevin. (Karah's report has lots of great photos - I stole the one above from her - and is here on her blog.) The next day Dee and I visited Arches National Park despite the continued miserable windy weather, and it was fun hiking to the pretty arches even though the sky was cold and gray and the air hazy.

Despite the lack of PR, I still feel fairly confident about my upcoming marathon on May 1st. And I'll be running another half marathon, the local Steamworks Half, in June, giving me another chance at a PR.

I keep thinking of things I want to post about. But I don't want to write something off-the-cuff; I want to craft a perfect essay, and as a result, I never write anything. So here is ( some somewhat off-the-cuff musing about Facebook )

On Saturday I ran the Winter Sun 10K in Moab, UT. This race is put on by the same crew that runs the two half marathons there, The Other Half in October and Canyonlands in March. Three hours is a little far to drive for a mere 10K, but if you run all three races in one calendar year you get the "Triple Crown Award" which includes a guaranteed entry to the next Canyonlands (which is otherwise a lottery). I actually got my guaranteed entry by winning my age group at TOH, but I had already registered so I figured I might as well run. Besides, I'd already promised my race roomie Karah that I'd come out and split a hotel room with her.

The Winter Sun is known to be a fast race. Except for a slight uphill at the start, a long uphill in the third mile, and a flat finish around the high school track, it's downhill all the way. "Just go bombs away," said Karah. "You're going to surprise yourself." I was pretty sure I'd PR, since my most recent 10K was shortly after restarting running after injury time-off, 47:22 on a hilly course. Based on my last half time, the altitude difference, the downhill, and what my training had been feeling like, I figured I could run a 45:30 - 7:20 pace - with my seekrit stretch goal being under 45 minutes. With about 600 total runners, I figured my chances were reasonable for top 3 AG, even though age groups were 10 years and at 47 I'd be competing with a lot of younger chickies.

( Gory details )

( Cut to the chase for results )

( A couple of photos )

( Analysis, more nattering, future goals )

Leslie Nielsen falls
Get it right on his tombstone --
Don't call him Shirley.

Sunday I did a long run up the Colorado Trail. Little pictures link to big ones at Flickr.





I apologize to anybody whose optic nerve I have just burned out from the combination of pink CEP compression socks and psychedelic-patterned Dirty Girl gaiters. If you should want a closer look - can't imagine why - here you go.

I was driving back from Moab through Dove Creek (which claims to be the "Pinto Bean Capital of the World") and noticed a sign at one of the gas stations:

ATM - PINTO BEANS
   24 HOUR GAS

cahotage, I don't suppose you could swing by there sometime and take a picture? I think I giggled all the way to Cahone.

This morning, when I turned the corner onto our block at the end of my run, I saw a policeman walking with my husband around the corner of the house into the alley. This immediately made me nervous, as it would anyone. But when I got up to the alley and saw the policeman getting back on his motorcycle, and my husband getting into our pickup truck, I immediately guessed what had happened.

We've known Robin, who owns (and rents out) the house across the alley from us, for some time. She used to be active in the local Democratic party, but she moved to another county (some 350 miles from here) a couple of years ago, so we haven't seen much of her. The thing about Robin is - well, you know the classic definition of the optimist and the pessimist? With Robin, not only is the glass half-empty, it's FILLED with POISON because SOMEONE is out to GET HER. She's got to be the angriest person I've ever met. Pretty much every year we'd see her putting out the "For Rent" sign and cleaning up the house, and she'd come over and tell us about how the last tenant had seemed so nice but had SCREWED her and LIED to her and CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS SHIT THEY PUT ME THROUGH? For a while she stopped renting it and lived it it herself, with her, I dunno, 5 cats and 3 dogs, and then her conversation stopped being about her scumbag ex-tenants and was about her scumbag ex-husband and ex-coworkers, and how much she hated this town, and wanted to move back to the place she used to live. (When she finally did move, and came back to pick up some more of her stuff from the garage out back of her house, she complained about how much she hated the place she was living now.)

When she moved, she rented to a guy who, as it turned out, we actually knew. And like. And all was cool. There's a parking area out in back of the house, but he sold his second car because he was laid off and needed the money, and so since he wasn't using it (he preferred to part in front) we asked if we could park our pickup way at the back of that parking area - there'd still be room for his pickup, plus another car - and he said sure, why not?

Do you see where this is going? One day this spring Robin happened to be in town, saw our pickup in HER PARKING AREA, and went ballistic. She knocked on our door and gave my husband hell for parking there, so he moved our pickup for a week or so, until he figured she was safely out of the area, and then started parking there again. Well, apparently, today she found out. And called the cops. The cop was, apparently, apologetic, and agreed that the fact that the current tenant had given us permission was a perfectly legitimate reason for us to be parking there, but it is, alas, still her property, and therefore, she has a right to go ballistic. So I guess we are on her ENEMIES LIST. Along with, I dunno. THE REST OF THE WORLD.

The house, by the way, has been for sale ever since we have lived here. (Actually, since before we moved here - we had in fact looked at it first, but felt it was in too poor shape for the money she was asking then. Now, of course, the price is even higher.) I live for the day when she sells it to someone - anyone - and she is out of our lives for good.

In entirely non-related news, in a couple of hours I'm heading out of town, solo, in the Sportsmobile, headed for St. George, Utah, to run a marathon. Woo!

I think we get on average 2 phone calls per week with local, state (most), or national issue or candidate polls. I actually don't mind - usually. But last night I got the most obnoxious push poll for our local state house representative.

"Would you be more or less likely to vote for [candidate I think is a raving loony] if you knew he was a candidate for sainthood and on the short list for the Nobel?"

"Would you be more or less likely to vote for [candidate I support] if you know he was a father-murderer and mother-raper?"

Okay, not quite. But it totally pisses me off to be asked if I would be more or less likely to vote for a small businessman who supports cutting red tape for other businesses (that is, he wants to get rid of all environmental protection), and more or less likely to vote for someone who used to be a Washington lobbyist (oh, the horror! Except it was for an environmental organization!).

Finally I said, "I would never vote for [lunatic candidate] even if he gave me a thousand dollars and an iPad and a PONY." And the woman on the other end of the line said, "I don't have a place to write that down. Would you be more or less likely blah blah blah?"

I cannot WAIT for the friggin' election.

I've been doing stuff! But somehow failing to update.

( Labor Day weekend near Taos: gawking at hot-air balloons, climbing Wheeler Peak, and getting stitches in my elbow )

This Saturday I'm running the Imogene Pass Run for the third time. (First, second.) I'm not sure how I'll do this year; I'm not running as much as I was last year because of my recovery from peroneal tendinitis, but I've been faster at the short distances. My A goal is 3:49 or faster; my B goal is to beat my last year's time of 3:55, and my C goal is to just get under 4 hours. We shall see.