ABC's

I came across Lisa's blog today, thanks to a new connection on The Daily Mile. Since I just finished grading 70 exams I thought I'd take a little break from work, and what better way to procrastinate than filling out random, useless surveys?

That's what I thought. So:

A) Age: 30 (gah!)

B) Bed Size: Queen, but the dog gets at least 2/3 of it.

C) Chore You Really Dislike: Cleaning the bathroom. There's nothing I hate more..especially such a small bathroom. You'd think it would be nice because there's less to clean but NO! It's harder.

D) Dogs? Kona. She's my best buddy and gets most of the credit for my fitness level - border collies and pointers make for high-energy puppers.

E) Essential Start Your Day Item: Coffee. Is there anything else?

F) Favorite color: You can't ask me to choose....green or purple. I won't choose between them.

G) Gold or silver? Silver

H) Height: 5’10"

I) Instruments you play: Used to play: flute, mallets, oboe, trumpet, alto sax, random percussion, and I fumbled around with guitar and piano. Now I play guitar, or will if I can ever find the time to sit down with it again.

J) Job title: Officially I think it's Graduate Teaching Assistant. There are many other unofficial words for it.

K) Kids: Eventually.

L) Live: In a cute old (built 1920) bungalow that I love....in a neighborhood that's declining fast. We're moving again in August...sigh.

M) Mom’s Name: We'll skip this one...

N) Nicknames: None I'm willing to share...

O) Overnight hospital stays: One. My blood pressure and heart rate were really low and the alarm kept waking me up. The nurse finally turned it off somewhere around 3 in the morning.

P) Pet peeve: Since I'm teaching, people who make lecture slides with improper notation (that "2" on "O2" is supposed to be a subscript!), too many words, or mixed up fonts.

Q) Quote from a movie: Uh....

R) Right or left handed? Left. The cooler one.

S) Siblings? Two younger brothers.

T) Time you wake up? Too effing early.

U) Underwear: How can this be a question? Yes, always...except running in the summer.

V) Vegetable you dislike: Mushrooms. What disgusting texture.

W) What makes you run late? The darn snooze button.

X) X-rays: I'm practically a professional.

Y) Yummy food you make: Black bean and corn enchiladas, lentil tacos, and chocolate chess pie!

Z) Zoo, favorite animal: Oryx. You should hear the sound they make.


And now off to enjoy more spring break!

Struggle Bus

Friends just recently introduced me to this term, and I heard a few students use it yesterday also. Right now, there's nothing that better describes where I am so I've adopted it for my own use.

Being sick the past week has really knocked me down a notch or two. Everything's a struggle this week - I'm sure part of that is left-over fatigue but I think a lot of it is just that I'm ready for a break. So very ready for a break. Fortunately spring break is coming, but it's still a week and a half away.

(Not that I'm counting, oh no. And certainly I haven't considered making a paper chain.)

If anyone happens to find my mojo - running, work, or otherwise - would you please send it back home?

At Least I'm Consistent

Looks like it was about this time last year that I came down with the chest cold from hell. Or at least, I thought that was the chest cold from hell.

Let me tell you, it had NOTHING on this year's version. Goodness.

Backing up, I'm still struggling with my running mojo but things have gone reasonably well the last couple weeks, considering. Two Fridays ago I got in a fast 7 miles (as in 58 minutes fast!) with some other PhD students, followed by two GREAT days of skiing in almost spring-like weather. Monday and Tuesday were busy as usual (and my legs were fried Monday, anyway) but I was looking forward to getting in some running during our February thaw. Ha! Wednesday I went out with 2 of the 3 fast PhD students for 3.5 miles in under 30 minutes and then Thursday, it happened.

The disease hit.

It started innocently enough. I woke with a cough on Thursday morning and knew I was in for a long day. It was forecast to be in the 50s but I knew I'd better dress a little warmer since I was clearly coming down with something. I sent a whiny "I'm sick" text to my mom that morning, but expected to make it through the day.

On my way into campus, I stopped for a cup of coffee. I couldn't stop coughing in the coffeehouse - don't you just hate that? I always feel like everyone around me thinks I have the Plague and I always want to explain that it's the transition from the outside to inside air that makes me do that. Anyway. Got my coffee, arrived at my office, sat down to work...and didn't even want to drink that coffee.

That's bad news, I'm telling you. I finally poured the cup out this morning - I don't think I even drank 1/4 of it.

By 10 AM I was freezing, shivering uncontrollably, and knew I wouldn't make it through the day. I found someone to teach my evening class, finished my grading, canceled office hours, and tried to last until my scheduled noon meeting. The second that meeting was over I headed home and hit the couch.

I stayed on the couch until about 10 PM, at which time I moved to the bed. Stayed there until, oh....Saturday. Basically. Friday morning I did get up to go to the doctor. My hips, glutes, and legs were hurting so badly you would have thought I ran 100 miles the day before. Clearly, however, I did not. I was sure this was the flu. The doctor, on the other hand, was not. She sent me home saying it was "justavirus" of the upper respiratory variety, and I just needed to rest and drink fluids.

And so I did, all weekend long.

Today I can finally stand for extended periods of time. I've stopped drinking Gatorade, actually eaten a couple meals, and coffee is (mostly) appealing this morning. I think I'll probably be able to stand for 80 minutes to teach my class..but I'm not entirely convinced yet. I know I'll have to go straight to bed when I finally get home.

But you know what? I missed some of the grossest conditions of the year so far. I mean yeah it was warm and that would have been nice, but everything was so soggy and ugly. That first thaw of the year there's litter everywhere (that had been hidden under the snow) and the only snow left is the piles along the road that are crusted in nasty black road disgustingness. Yesterday we got a fresh blanket a new snow - about 10" worth! Today we're forecast to get up to 3 more inches.

And so I'd like to thank the Justavirus of Death for choosing a weekend of no skiing and ask it to please leave me healthy enough to enjoy this new, fresh snow.

Did I Say I was a Runner?

Heh.

Lately I haven't been interested in running at all. I thought it was a rut brought on by school stress that would just pass. Well...it hasn't. Not that the school stress has passed either, but I thought I just needed to get into a routine or something.

The thing is, even when I have an opportunity to run (now, for instance), I don't really want to. Now I believe the windchill is still well under zero and that's a good part of the reason I'm not interested but....just blah. This is NOT GOOD seeing as how I am actually registered for both a half marathon and a marathon and talking about running at least one additional half.

Good thing I've been skiing...sort of.

I just don't want to push the running now, when I'm not interested, knowing that before long I'm going to HAVE to do it if I want to get through those races. I'm already thinking of blowing off any time goal for the May half and have proclaimed that I'm not even allowed to have a goal time for the marathon in October.

Sigh. If I keep going on like this it's going to be hard to run a 5k, even.