Spring Fever=13 miles

I was supposed to go to the gym today to lift and swim, but it was such a beautiful day..there was no way I was gonna do that. So instead I ran 13 miles. I have been stressing over the fact that I have the Tom King half -marathon coming up in a few weeks and I had not done any major mileage so I decided to just go for it today. I am now covered with that nice salty frosting we all love, and I have a pounding headache, but other than that I feel great. I am not sure how long it took, because my Garmin wasn't charged so I didn't have anything to time me, but I'm guessing maybe 2:15. I didn't run it fast because it's the first long run I've done in over a month. It was actually kinda nice just to go the pace I felt like going instead of racing a timer. The sun was out, the wind was blowing, and it was just a PERFECT day to run. The first 6 miles was really easy and I know I did them in under an hour, but the last 7 wasn't as kind. It still wasn't horrible, though. I had to walk some, and that's fine with me because the way I see it if there had been water stops I would have walked through them... so what's the difference? Ok..Shower time. I HAVE to wash this salt off and get some Advil in my system before my head explodes. I need to stretch this time, too. I can already feel my legs getting tight.

Update: Ok now I feel like total frickin' crap. What kinda idiot goes and runs 13 miles without training? The most I have done in a WHILE is 10, and that was 4 or 5 weeks ago. Hello??? I've managed to eat everything we have in the house, and later I am going to be scouring the streets for some pills. (Ha) I'll be fine tomorrow (I hope?) but right now I am suffering! Note to self.....Please don't do that AGAIN!

1st grade School Production

Uncle Sam

Connor, Barrett, and Grahm

Daddy, Connor, and Mommy

Tonight we went to Connor's President's Day program at his school. It was so cute and he had a speaking part at the very beginning. He was Uncle Sam. He would have taken over the entire production if they had allowed it. He's one of those people that HAS to be center stage at all times. My other son is the exact opposite. He HATES doing those little school productions. But, I have a feeling Connor will do Drama Club and Choir and anything else he can do to be on the stage as he gets older. They did a quick P.T.O. meeting beforehand (Yawn) then the kids sang some songs and talked about the different presidents, then it was over and we went to the classrooms to visit, and now we're home.

I took Connor to a doctor's appointment today, then I dropped him off at school and me and Christy went trail running. We did the 2.5 mile White trail and then ran some on the 2 mile loop. We ended up doing around 4 miles in all. I am really proud of Christy because she is taking this running thing seriously. Her plan is to be ready for the Cinco de Mayo 5k (on May 5th ..Duh) and I have no doubt she'll be ready for it. She wants to be able to run the whole thing without stopping, and I told her if she sticks with the training plan, I will buy her a new pair of running shoes before the event. I'll even do it with her. I have a Half-marathon the week before so I won't be ready to run a 5 k the next weekend anyway. It'll be fun. I ran the Party run with Cora last summer and it was one of the funnest runs I did because I could relax and enjoy it for a change. No pressure to beat my time or any of that craziness, or sickness I usually experience before a race. I think I will even dress up. I LOVE dressing up for races. Anyway, today has been a much better day. Tomorrow the plan is to hit the gym around 1:15, then swim around 2:00. I am really going to try to get all my swims in during the week because I want to do well in the swim class I have paid 40 bucks to be a part of. It's a waste of cash if I don't do my homework.

Help me out of this hole!

I'm not sure what's up with me lately, but I have done nothing but sleep for the past 3 days! I went swimming last night, but I slept most of the day yesterday, I slept all day Saturday, and today was a repeat. I think I may be dealing with a bit of depression for reasons I won't explain, but this sleeping crap has gotta stop. There's NO WAY I could be tired enough to sleep for days. I go to bed at night around 12:00, and get up at 7:00. That's decent.

Today I had one dog, and I went back to bed. My friend Christy called and forced me out of my room. I am usually the one pumping her up and motivating her, but today she was the "Tow Truck". She talked me into going for a run and lifting..which I did...but only half-ass. I do feel better though. Usually when I am feeling stressed or depressed, I immediately start exercising because I know it helps. I used to take prozac but I found running worked a lot better, with the added benefits of what running does for the body in general. Depression runs rampant in my family so I always have to keep in in check because it can take over if I am not careful. It has before, and I vowed never to let that happen again...no matter what. I had it bad after the birth of my second son. It was Post Partum depression and it took a couple of YEARS to shake. It got better with the prozac, but I found I didn't even need it anymore when I started training for the Country Music Marathon in October of 2003. So, I stopped taking it in March of 2004 and I have been fine. I hope this sleeping stuff isn't a sign of depression creeping back in. Whatever it is..I'll find a way to shake it off. Life is too good for me to be unhappy for any reason!

Swimming Lessons week 1

Aquatics Center

Coach Dee

Tonight was the first night for the new triathlon swimming lessons being held at the Williamson County Rec Center. There were a ton of people there, and the ones I knew were Valerie, Mary Thom, Wayne, and Martin. Dee was the coach and Ashley assisted. Ashley also teaches on Monday and Wednesday nights, but I can't make those so I was thrilled to learn about the one opening up on Sunday nights. We are going to meet for 5 weeks, then practice on our own during the week (She said 2 or 3 swims) then we should be ready for a tri or a master's swim team. I am SOOOOO glad I have been swimming some for the past 2 months because I would have been pitiful. It was a difficult work-out for me, but there were some people there who had not been swimming since they were kids so I know it had to be rough for them. We started off by doing 100 yards freestyle so we could get warmed up and she could see how we looked. There were 5 or 6 to a lane so it was chaos at first, but we got the hang of it. Then we put fins on and grabbed a kickboard, and swam 100 yards on our side hanging on to the board with our face out of the water. Then the other side. Then we did the same thing on both sides with our face IN the water and taking a breath every 3 secs. We had to make sure our legs were STRAIGHT and we were kicking from the hips. That was HARD. The fins started to hurt my feet so I took them off, and it slowed me down but I didn't care. Then we had to tread water with our hands out of the water, and once again kick from the hips. WOW!! That was REALLY HARD! I couldn't do it but she said if I had fins on it would be easier, so i put them back on and sure enough...it was. I am going to try and swim again on Wednesday and Friday and do the same work-out if possible. I don't think I can do it tomorrow since I swam tonight, but I might. The best part for me was seeing Valerie. I haven't seen her in months so I hope we can start running and hanging out again. I've missed her. She moved to Nolensville last summer, and it's really not that far from Brentwood, but it's a pain to to go running like we use to because the drive kinda sucks. We both work weird random schedules so that makes it even harder, AND she home schools her youngest boy on Tuesday and Thursday...which are my running days. But, we talked tonight and we are going to make more of an effort to see each other. :) What an awesome work-out, though! I can't wait till next week!

Had a "Ball"

Me and JessikaWelby, Jessika, Emmit, and Me

Yesterday..after my 3.5 hour coma, I was cleaning out Zeke's crate (My goat) and the phone rang. This was around 5:15pm. It was Jessika and she said she had an extra ticket to a formal event and she wanted me to go and be at her house by 6:00. I laughed and said NO WAY because if you could have seen me, you'd understand. When I went and told Doug about it, he questioned why I wouldn't go, so that made me question it too. I hardly ever go to any dress up events, so I said WHY NOT and I tossed up my hair, threw on a dress, put some make-up on, and headed out the door in less than 20 minutes. Now my make-up only consisted of some mascara, eyeliner, and lip gloss.... and this is painfully obvious in the photos, but whatcha gonna do? It was a record for me to get ready to go anywhere, and that's all the time I had by the time I made my mind up to go. Standing next to Jessika, I probably looked like a troll. (Oh well...Who cares? ANYONE who stands next to her looks like a troll. HA!) Luckily, I had washed my hair that morning because it smelled like smoke from the night before. ( I went to Tullahoma..lots of smokers down there..hehe) I really didn't have time to fix it though, so it had the "I meant to make it messy" look working.

My "date" for the night was Jessika's room-mate, Welby. I have met her numerous times but we had never really hung out. She was a lot of fun. We didn't get to sit with Emmit or Jessika, but we sat with a really fun group of people who were already pretty lit which made it even better. This one guy in particular, Cameron, had me laughing so hard I think I even snorted during one of the speeches. (Who brought me??) I LOVE comical people, but they tend to get me into trouble. Hey... I wasn't the only one amused by his antics, and the whole table was pretty rowdy so I don't think anyone noticed the tears of laughter running down my face. I think anytime you are really supposed to be prim and proper, (like at weddings or church or any dress up event) and something is funny, it makes it even worse. At least for me.

There was a Silent Auction going on, too. I wanted the cabin getaway and bid on it, but this woman out-bid me, then she hovered around the table until the time ran out, and I couldn't go back and re-bid. Welby bid on some acid peels and Botox, and she won hers. She told me I could do the Botox. Woo-Hoo! I need it on my forehead. After the auction, we left because we were both getting tired. (How could that be after the nap I had earlier?? ) Jessika and Emmit drove separately which is good because they usually don't come home till the sun comes up. It was fun and I am glad I got to go. I would have missed out.

Stress

Here's the latest...On Wednesday I was supposed to go to the gym and lift, but I didn't get off work till time for the kids to get home from school, so we went to the pool instead. I swam for a half hour but I tried to swim the whole time. On Sunday night I am starting a Triathlon swimming class that I am REALLY looking forward to. It's at the Williamson County Rec center and I think it will help me. Mary Thom, Jessika, and Valerie are going to do it as well.

On Thursday I ran the 5.8 loop at Percy Warner Park. It wasn't a good run because I could barely lift my feet from the ground. My leg muscles really hurt in the pool the day before from running the 5k on the track, and I think I was tired on Thursday because of the swim on Wednesday.

On Friday I ran another 6 miles with Kelli, and this time it was much easier. We set out to just do 4, but we decided to keep going and it felt fine. Well, up until the last mile, then I started slacking. I haven't lifted weights since Monday so I hope to do that at some point today. The Boys had basketball games today, and apparently they were supposed to go to Baseball evals today as well but I didn't find that out till I was at the game. The last email I got said they were tomorrow afternoon, but I guess they changed them because they thought it would get rained out. It's pouring down rain today, though!! Bailey has already missed his, but Connor can still go to his after his game. Unfortunately Bailey needed to go to his because his age group starts pitching this year, (instead of machine pitching) and he's a catcher so they needed to see what he could do as far as catching. Maybe they'll have a make-up day. I would like to think I am not the ONLY parent who didn't get the memo, but that would be typical Laurie fashion to be the last to know.(Sigh). It's just one more thing to add to my list of reasons I have been voted the "Crappy, Disorganized Mother of the Year Award". I wish that once...just once, I could be the hero and know what the hell I am doing as a parent.

Update: Connor went to his evals and Doug saw a previous coach there and he told him there would be a make-up day because apparently I am NOT the only one who didn't know about today. When I checked the email, it had been sent early this morning, but I didn't check it till later. Oh well. It was a good day for a nap anyway. Me and Bailey decided to take one and I slept 3 .5 HOURS!! (I guess I was tired. )We'll call this my "Rest Day".

22:59!!!

I was supposed to do Speed Sessions tonight at the track and do a 5k time trial, but it's supposed to rain so Mary Thom and I went to the Vanderbilt track and did it. I used the virtual trainer on the Garmin and set it for 26:00 because I thought there was no way I would do better than that on a boring track. Well....I beat the heck out of it. 22:59 was the final time! I am absolutely thrilled, and I almost wonder if it's right. It has to be right, though. The distance says 3.11 and it stopped timing me at that and a message came up that said "You Win!" Mary Thom did a 24.30 which is a P.R. for her as well. I called everybody I know and gushed about this P.R. I just set. It feels so good to see the times dropping..I HAVE to tell people. Nobody cares, but oh well. Then I went by Fleet feet to show them the Garmin and log my time so they could give it to the coach. Since they know me at least they were impressed. I don't think I could do a time like that on the road...yet...because the road isn't flat like a track, but still...I'll take it!

UpDate: As it turns out it DIDN'T rain at all. Not a drop! But Doug and I have been married 8 YEARS today!!!!!so we went to Stoney River to celebrate so it all worked out anyway. I can't believe it's been 8 years.( We have been together 11) We have been through hell and high water and we are still here. Happy Anniversary, Doug! I Love You!!