"Adieu to disappointment and spleen. What are men to rocks and mountains?"
Saturday, 9/8/7 - 18:58

A splendid day, really splendid.

First, a race. No, first, I was sleeping. It felt like I had been sleeping for days, I had dreams that took place over days. I woke up at 6:30 and had enough time to dream a few days more.

I got up at 7:45. I had a race, a 10K. If you were doing the 10K you ran the 5K course first and then did another 5K. At first I thought, damn it, why, again, do I do this? But it was fine, it was splendid. I will tell you why I do this: because I can, and it's awesome.

I started out really fast - I did the first K (they had the course marked off in Ks rather than miles, which I liked) in 4:30, which was too fast, so I tried to hold off a little, but my pace was pretty fast for the whole course, which meant I finished with a super good time (for me) - unofficially about 53:30, more than 5 minutes faster than the 10K I did in the spring.

You know that girl I passed so dramatically at the end of the last 5K? She passed me very early in this race. I considered giving chase and making her earn it, but I figured she was just doing the 5K, so I let her go. She was just doing the 5K and ended up coming in first for her age group.

I kept planning to stop and walk - I got a stitch in my side - but you can't stop and walk when there's someone right in front of you to draft off of, and you can't stop and walk when you've just passed someone, and you can't stop and walk on a downhill, and you can't stop and walk when you're running by water, and you can't stop and walk when there's only half a kilometer to go - so it just never worked out and I ran the whole thing. Fairly quickly, too (for me).

No one cares but me, but I'm happy about it and feel compelled to overshare. I won't tell you my splits but I could if I wanted to.

And I got my commemorative sweatshirt (along with the regular t-shirt) and I'm completely giddy about that. A sweatshirt!

After the race I rode my bike home and noticed it was squeaking. Need to oil. The only squeaky part of the day.

Then I sat in the yard and read Pride and Prejudice in the sun and it was the most beautiful day ever, the sun nice and hot, the air cool, the sky blue and the clouds white. It was so nice. Pride and Prejudice is a joy.

I was on a runners high and then got tired and it was tiredness that I'd earned and deserved and I took a guiltless unworthless nap in the sun and then read some more and talked to my neighbor and read some more.

Then I made soup, my first soup of the season. I burned my tongue (of course) and ate two bowls.

I decided to listen to a Broken Social Scene CD but turned on the radio station to see what they were playing and it was a set of BSS/Stars/Feist/Arts & Crafts songs and I was so appreciative of the serendipity that I called the DJ to tell him how much I liked it. And he was appreciative of the call.

If you like something, tell that to the person responsible for it. Otherwise they'll quit. This is true.