17 Miles on Kelly Drive

Happy Holidays kids!!!! Just 3 days til Christmas and for the first time in my life I have presents, already wrapped, in my apartment! I don’t have everyone’s gifts yet because they are coming in the mail but the ones I do have , are wrapped and ready to go.

Every year I tell myself that I am going to be the little baker and make things for my friends and family and every year…I find anything else on earth to do besides that. I went over my friend, Dani’s house this week and she gave me a box of assorted cookies. She made them all, which had to have taken a long time, because there were like 7 kinds in there. I finished them all the next day… Delicious! Tonight I have a chance to bake, should I want to, and I think I might just turn my oven on. If nothing else I can open the door and heat the place a bit, but considering it is 60 degrees outside, I should probably just put some cookie dough in there.

OK Saturday- December 17- Kelly Drive- 6:30…Ok OK 6:50am
I woke up reluctantly on Saturday to go meet Laurie for our run. We wanted to start before the team since we would be going pretty far. I got there later then I had hoped but it is a little over a mile from my apartment to Lloyd Hall so while Laurie was running her first mile, so was I. Since it was still dark, she had only gone out to the .5 mile marker and turned around. I really don’t like running alone on the path at night and she felt the same. When we met up it was a little before 7, so we were able to get 5 miles in before meeting up with the Team.

Our Route was from Lloyd Hall to Ridge Ave, back to Lloyd Hall, then back to the Bridge, and back. For those who were just starting they had to run the path down to Locust and back to get the extra 3 miles in, but Laurie and I headed right to Ridge. We were walking 4 and running 2 minutes which felt pretty good. We talked a lot which helped make the time go by faster. Coach Glen told me that it would be okay for me to just do some of the run, not the full 22 miles, and that I should focus more on the 16 next week. I nodded along but in the back of my head I wanted to be able to say I ran the full 22 miles. I was feeling fine at that point (5 miles in) so I didn’t see what the problem could be.

By the time we got to the TNT table heading out to Ridge (8-9 miles in) I was starving. Dunkin Donuts is across the street and all I smelled was warm onion bagels… The girls at the water stop did get us some munchkins and I popped two in my mouth, which probably wasn’t the greatest idea. I was okay though after our walk break. On the way back to Lloyd Hall, it felt like it was getting colder, which was weird since the sun was now up. About 13 miles in I started to feel my knee pain again. Around 7 miles I remember thinking ‘wow my knee hasn’t started hurting yet, this is great, maybe I will do this today.’ 5 miles later, there it was. I didn’t say anything at first because I wanted to finish with Laurie and I felt back leaving her alone for the last 6 or 7 miles. At mile 15 I decided that I better not be an idiot. I don’t have time to recuperate if I get hurt, so I finished back at the pavilion. I counted my walk home too and it was 17-18 miles.

Sunday I felt okay. I am getting excited for Disney now! This week I am still not sure whether I am working a water stop or not but hopefully I will be running 16 miles Christmas Eve. Laurie will not be there, so looks like it’ll be me and God at my pace.

I did of course snap a couple good pictures. I love that when I see family and friends I don’t see in awhile they comment on my pictures and it's so nice to know someone is seeing them.

This just in, while I was writing this, I got an email from the Celebration of Art and Life Exhibition that will be happening all of 2012….They chose one of my pictures! I drop it off, framed and ready to hang on Jan 4! It will hang in the Perelman Center or Penn Tower all of 2012 and they said I can sell it too so that is pretty awesome!!! Today went from clock watching, dragging, wishing it was 5pm…to hyper, happy, still wishing it was 5pm : )