SO Behind

I meant to blog a week or so back-really and truly. It's been an action packed week, though. Oh well. Here are the short (okay, not at all) Cliff's Notes:

-I did a speed workout at the track a week ago. I was scared going into it, worrying that I could potentially mess up that lower leg with the mystery tweaks. The run was awesome, though-even if I felt like Clark Griswold. "Look! Mesa State College! Papa Johns! Hey look! Mesa State College! Papa Johns!" Repeat. Something about being able to really run free of tension and fear of slipping on ice made the track a lot more fun than I ever remember, and I was rounding the corners in a relaxed state. I'm not going to question the insanity of actually enjoying running on the track in the dark, and plan to stick with this weekly deal until I come to my senses.

-I went back again last night to the track. Decided to be the zen runner and just run for time and feel. I guess I got too relaxed and didn't realize that I'd shut off my Garmin roughly 38 minutes in. I finally noticed that my elapsed time and distance looked oddly spot-on each time I got around to the well-lit end of the track where I could read the watch. Oh, yeah. Because it HAS been the same each time. Ah well.

-In non-running news, some crook thought it would be really cool to get into our garage, ransack our vehicles, and steal various items from them, including my purse in the family truckster. Yeah, yeah. I know. Don't leave your stuff in your vehicle-and I usually do not. Occasionally, though, when I am corralling 4+ kids in the house with backpacks, groceries and other crap-I go back later for my stuff. Even more occasionally, I forget to go back for my stuff AND my husband doesn't grab it either (he almost always saves my bacon if I've left my purse in the car and brings it in if he sees it in a vehicle in the garage). As Murphy's Law would suggest, those rare occasions when one lets their safety guard down is when no-good crooks are most likely to monkey with your stuff. Just a reminder from your friendly neighborhood blogger that if you're the "Almost Always Removes Personal Possessions/Almost Always Locks All Doors" type, make a conscientious effort to become the ALWAYS type.

-A couple of excellent neighbors found aforementioned purse, ransacked in front of their house, about an hour after we'd reported the break-in. They called the sheriff's department first, and then discovered that my wallet was still in there, and called me. I've never been so happy to declare that I have such a cluttered purse, they got impatient and only made off with my phone and the few dollars in the wallet. I didn't even own a cell phone for two years and it chapped my behind to think of someone with MY stuff. Between nobody getting hurt, and not having to go through replacing my driver's license, though, I felt lucky given the circumstances.

-Between the good workout at the track, and the flurry of emotions that come with having someone violate your stuff, it seemed like a good weekend to race, and it just so happened that the annual $2 entry fee, no frills running club 4-mile race was taking place. It's a Wayne's World event in the best sense-just a small handful of people, a couple of dollars thrown in a collection box or jar on a folding card table, and everyone slides off the road into the shoulder just before the start to let a pickup truck pass. There were fewer than 25 people there and only four or five women.

Just trying to test out my leg and run on feel, my mile splits looked like 7:15, 7:31, 7:16, 7:11, and a 6:39 pace for the last 1/100 mile the Garmin recorded. Total time 29:16. There was a hill coming out of mile one into that second mile, and I never looked at my watch other than the mile lap times, so I liked that they looked so even. Not my most spectacular day of racing EVER, but taking into context that I haven't done any racing or speed work in over a month, just logging easy miles, I was pleased with this as a 2010 starting point. My only time goal had been to beat what I ran two years ago, six weeks after my partial thyroidectomy, when I ran 31:18. Though I'd only been back running for two weeks at that point, my runner-surgeon gave me carte blanche to cross train like a mad woman as soon as I was ready, so my fitness was all right when I toed the line in 2008. Beating that time into the ground in 2010 was a nice way to finish a crap week.

-One last footnote to the "no frills" race-okay, they actually had a frill this year. A frill that's really useful to me. Someone provided a couple of boxes of energy/protein bars that were sitting on the sign-in card table. For someone like me who sometimes gets headaches after the shorter distance, fast-paced races, this is worth a gazillion times more than yet another cotton race tee shirt, and I left the race headache-free after chowing down.

-The plot thickens on the robbery. I assumed our stuff was long gone as is often the case with these deals. Surprisingly, my husband got a call yesterday from the police. They had brought in some dope for questioning who had been bragging about his NEW PHONE and other stuff that he and a partner in jackassery (already in jail for something else) had stolen. He even had it on his person when the police were questioning him, though he wouldn't talk. The cops did notice it, though, and it sure resembled a certain running blogger's recently stolen phone. As of right now, we've provided the cops with all the numbers/details on that phone (wow-how did we manage to save that receipt AND know were we stored it?). We're now just waiting and hoping this is the guy, that he hasn't ditched the phone, and is held accountable for his actions. Either way-even if it's not MY stuff that was stolen-it's a silver lining that someone who stole things that didn't belong to him will be held accountable. That's very satisfying. I'm crossing my fingers, though, that these guys have things that belong to us, and that we get to prosecute.

Oddly enough, a friend of mine on the ol' Book of Face changed the following to her profile photo. The timing couldn't have been better for me, and the snark gave me a good chuckle in the middle of a week when I was pissed and upset that someone had violated my personal space and possessions. So, here you go: