Go, you chicken fat, go away!

I forgot to blog today.  If you're reading this, today is actually tomorrow.  But I'm writing it today, which is actually tomorrow.  Oh, never mind.  Nice run.  Only a dull ache in my soleus.

I felt real good this morning.  Up until I had about two miles to go and I had to stop at the street to wait for cars.  Then I slowed down.  Technically, I guess I still felt good because I was running slower.  Anyway, with less than a mile to go I saw an old lady walking her dog.  It looked like Ginger from far away.  The dog wasn't on a leash, so it ran up to me.  The lady was real apologetic, but I told her not to worry about it because I have a dog that looks just her (her dog, not her.)  I talked to the old lady for a while.  Her dog's name was Sandy.  I told her about Ginger's bloody paw.  Then I lied to her and told her I wanted to take her dog's picture for my kids, but it's really for you bloggers.  But I'm so old that I consider most of you to be my children.

4.1 for my 41st!  I went south down the Floodway and realized I wouldn't be able to go 2.05 miles before I ran out of Floodway.  So, I had to come up with an alternative route in my head.  Nailed it!

Haven't missed a day all month.  oh yeah!

I shouldn't have been bragging about how I hadn't missed a day of running in December.  Yesterday was raining all morning and Emily stayed home sick.  I hoped to go out later in the day, but never did.

Today I thought I'd feel pretty fresh from taking a day off, but I didn't.  At all.  The first 5 minutes was a 10:45 pace.  After I stopped at University to wait for traffic I felt a little better and my overall pace ended up being 9:59.  Slower than lately, but I'm not racing anyone.

It was really beautiful out today.  I run the same route all the time, but because it was so nice out, I really got to enjoy how beautiful of an area I get to run in.  The Floodway had a couple of inches of water in it because of yesterday's rain, and the ducks were waddling around in it.  I didn't think people would be out walking their dogs because they like to let the dogs run around in the Floodway and they wouldn't want to with all the water.  But man!  They were out in droves.  Not in the water, but up on the path that goes along it.  There's a retirement community right next to the path that tends to get inhabited in the winter.  Every poodle in the tri-state area was being walked down that path today.  Geez!

I wasn't sure how far I was going to go until I started to go.  I felt like I could do my Lateral 1 run, so I did.  My GPS wasn't working on the way there.  It was tracking my time, but not my distance.  I turned it off at the half way point and cleared it.  When I turned the app back on I could see that it was in the right neighborhood, but it still wasn't quite picking up.  So I rebooted my phone and it worked fine after that.  I saw two pretty ladies on the way back and I was so completely drenched in sweat and embarrassed that I couldn't look at them.  I hope my lack of eye contact made them not be able to see me, too.

I'm feeling better every day.  My RunKeeper App goes off every 5 minutes and tells me my average pace.  I was pleasantly surprised to hear my pace on the first alert, and I pretty much held the pace.  The fourth mile was a little slower, but not much.

I ran 2 seconds less than yesterday and 0.05 miles less.  About a quarter mile to go I passed by a lady wearing headphones.  You know that loud voice you make when you're wearing headphones and you can't hear hear  your voice over the music?  That was her as she said, "Are we having fun yet?"

My leg was real sore again this morning, and about 2 miles in it really began to ache.  On the bright side, there's over 100 ducks in this picture.

I only planned on going a couple of miles because my leg still hurts, but I'm getting fat, so I just kept going.  A ten minute mile pace felt right this morning.

My wife went to my daughters' school to help make gingerbread houses.  So I rode along so I could run home.  It was kind of cold out.  Knowing that I would be running less than 4 miles I decided it wouldn't do any harm to wear a cotton T-shirt to help keep me warm.  I was wrong.

I told you it was cold.

We've been doing the Twelve Days of Christmas (Secret Santa) for 11 years now.  We pick a family in our neighborhood and my wife's best friend picks a family in her neighborhood.  I had my running clothes on all day, but never got out the door.  Instead I spent most of the day picking citrus off our trees and making juice.  So when it was time to make the 11th delivery this evening, I decided to run home from my wife's BFF's family's house.  Unfortunately, now that we live pretty close to her, it was only a 1.3 mile run.  Oh well.  Better than nothing.

Since I knew I wasn't running a whole lot yesterday, I picked up the tempo.  That really aggravated my soleus.  Maybe I have a broken bone.  Me no likey.