Cooked

Do you smell something burning?

It's been a whirlwind of a weekend, and I feel like I've been on fire for most of it, so something had to get removed from the schedule. Sadly, it was blogging. Fortunately, I'm back, and as of a few minutes ago, things have officially settled down.

I suppose it's time to take you back. Let's see... the last time I wrote anything was way back on the 25th, so I'll take you through life since then. First off, I had a massive project at work, parts of which took me far longer than anticipated. I worked extra hours last week and still could not quite get it finished until this morning. The schedule sucked a bit, but now I know for next month, and they're only called mistakes if we don't learn from them.

What made it particularly challenging, however, was that this ended up being one of the busiest weekends I've ever had. Saturday, I had to do some work in the morning before driving up to Round Rock to work some more. Back home I came where I got to work over dinner before heading out to see my friend's show, the third play that I'd seen on the weekend. Home I came, doing a bit more work before bed. In the middle of all this, I had to find time to do an 8-mile run, and the only time that I found was right around 4:00 in the afternoon. I don't know how many of you have been in Texas in late May at 4:00 in the afternoon, but it is not the ideal time to go running.

I started off well, and got stopped at my usual light about a mile into the run. It was super hot, but I had brought along a water bottle, so I figured I'd be fine. I did not take into account how quickly the water would get undrinkably warm, or that I would forget to restart my watch, negating any clue of how fast I was going in the heat. At about three miles in, I thought, "This is really dumb," at which point I turned around and headed home. It was a mere coincidence that this was also the moment that a buzzard started circling over my head. And I'm not kidding, he stayed with me for half a mile. If I ever needed justification to cut short a workout, that was it. Nature was betting against me.

Six miles is still pretty good in 94 degree heat, so I wasn't too worried about it, though I was overanxious to do my run with my new running "group" of sorts. Sure there's only three of us (maybe four very soon), but still gets me out of bed on a Sunday morning to know I'm going to meet friends. Unfortunately, one friend was out of town and I woke up to an email from the other saying he couldn't make it. No matter, thought I. Off to the trail. So I did.

Then it was a hurry home, change and shower for rehearsal, where I remained until 2:00 in the afternoon at which point the wife picked me up and we went to a barbecue. Normally, this would be quite enough activity for one afternoon, but we were just getting started. We swung back by the house to feed and play with the dogs (while I did two hours of work) before heading to another theatre party, reuniting the cast of a show I did last year. The night ended later than expected.

While the rest of the world woke up to a third weekend day, I headed back to my computer, where I would remain all day, finally finishing my project. An easy four in the afternoon (91 degrees) and just now a calm three in the morning (74 degrees), and suddenly, I find myself caught up. I've got four days (and only two miles of running) until the race, and I'm realizing just how ready I am. Maybe I got a bit of sunburn from two days of high heat running and one long afternoon by the pool, but every other part of me is ready to move ahead. My training is officially over.

It's time to qualify.

Tuesday's workout:
74 degrees, muggy, cloudy
3.11 miles