Mupdate #2

Every time I think about the fact that I’ve agreed to run 26.2 miles (oboyoboyoboyoboy), I have a bit of a panic attack. That is awfully far. For Pete’s sake, that’s far to drive! It’s revelations like this that illustrate just how sharp I am. Most people realize this stuff before they commit. I am hopeful that following the training schedule pretty faithfully will have me much more blasé about going so far once the day arrives. If not, a panic attack plus the adrenaline generated on race day should be a potent enough combination to get me through at least the first half of the marathon anyway.

And to set the record straight, I (Kristen) am the one running the marathon. It is the Nike WOMEN’S Marathon, after all. While hubby does indeed look good in a skirt (the things you have to live down after your college years!), the closest he’s willing to get to a marathon is to cheer me on from the sidelines and I think he’s counting on me being too focused on running to notice he’ll only be cheering at the end after an extended lie-in in the hotel room! But I do thank all of you who gave me a good chuckle by assuming that the e-mail going out under hubby’s name meant he was the one running. Originally I was going to write and say that if you really know him you’d never make that mistake but then I realized that if you really know me, you’d probably never believe it either. But it is true and no, I haven’t been abducted by aliens.

Just in case you are worried about me actually being able to finish a whole marathon (and if you aren’t worried, why the heck not? I sure am!), I thought I’d reassure you by letting you know that I do have a whole race history behind me. ::snort:: Last summer, after only starting to run in March, I ran 3 5 K’s and one ½ marathon. Aside from the equipment malfunction on the first 5K I ever ran (anyone who didn’t get to read my account of my bra unzipping itself completely during my first-ever run, I do still have it in my e-mail somewhere), all of the races were pretty fun and uneventful. I’m hoping that I’ll feel the same way about this one come October 20th. Actually, I am hoping that the sheer obnoxious wave of self-esteem that I rode for several weeks after the half marathon will be doubled just like the race and I’ll be gloatingly proud of myself for months. (I’m so pathetic I actually did look in the mirror and tell myself I rocked every morning for weeks after the half was over—and I still have my medal hanging in my room like a little kid.) I *will* finish this race though, no matter what. I’m stubborn as they come and if I have to crawl, log roll, or be dragged across the finish line, cross it I will.

I got my first honk from a friend the other day. I was so in my own world I thought someone was being rude and honking to get me to keep my poky butt out of the way. She probably did want me out of the way but I think we’re good enough friends that running me over most likely didn’t cross her mind. And once I realized it was Holly, it seemed like such a friendly honk.  The same day a guy leaned out of car shouting at me. I didn’t recognize him and because I’m oblivious when I run, even without my iPod (it’s that scary inside my own head thing again), I really only heard: “body” and “running” and some other unintelligible mumbling. I am choosing to believe it was not “Running with a body like that reminds me of the Jello watch it wiggle, watch it jiggle commercial.” Instead I’m choosing to believe he was complimenting me on my lithe (ha!) and appealing form. Of course, I am the same person who chose to believe that high school boys intentionally blared the song “Sexy Mami” when I walked past their car in the fall as I followed W. into football practice. All I can say for sure on that was that they did blast the song; I was walking past them; and the lyrics sounding just like “sexy mommy” were terribly appropriate. Draw your own conclusions. 

I’ve had my first running related injury now. I managed to cut my own toe with the toenail on the toe next to it. The good news is that I didn’t notice anything until I pulled off my bloody sock so no pain to speak of. The bad news is that it meant that my shoes were a bit too small in the toe box. Given that I have wide feet, this is probably not a huge surprise. I think the running store folks just wanted to offer to let me wear a shoe box instead of a shoe and be done with it. As it was, they had to order in 3 pairs especially for my odd duck feet. Talk about weird: strong arches, high instep, small but quite wide and pronating (yeah, I don’t entirely get what that means either, nor does my spell check, but the store had cool plastic foot models to explain things visually). My family calls my feet Fred Flintstone feet. I don’t really care what they get called as long as they carry me over the finish line. But I can see that keeping reasonably decent shoes on them is going to cost me all summer long. I’ve never worn out a pair of sneakers before in my life (swimmers just don’t you know, unless they are doing the fully-clothed-in-the-pool-for-lifeguard-training thing—and even then we just let them dry out and continued wearing them) but I can easily see it happening in my near future.

W. was shocked to hear how much money I need to raise for this little endeavor . His take on it? “That’s more than a plasma tv. If people gave *you* that money we could get a huge tv and all would be well with the world” (I kid you not, those were his actual words). How is bookish me raising a kid who is so reverent about tv? At least he is physically active, although when I suggested he run the kids’ fun run at the 10K I’m going to do later this month, he quickly bowed out citing the heat and humidity. It’s probably not nice to call your own kid a wimp, is it? Anyone want to donate to the upcoming therapy bills in addition to the run?!

Brownie batter Gu, Body Glide or Vaseline. Bet you never knew running was such a dirty sport did you! Let me burst your bubble a bit. Gu is a gel of sorts you eat every couple of miles to help you to keep from depleting all your nutrients and energy stores. I bought myself a case of it in the chocolate flavor and the young kid behind the counter told me he didn’t like the chocolate because it was like sucking on brownie batter. I’m still wondering what is wrong with that since that’s exactly why I bought the chocolate! After all, I am a lick the spoon while making brownies kind of girl anyway. Nothing better (well, maybe uncooked chocolate chip cookie dough, but I digress). No wonder I’m not really cut out to be a real runner. As for the Body Glide or Vaseline, apparently I’ll need to slather this on myself to prevent blisters. Makes my skin crawl just imagining where I’d have raw rubs after such a distance. And yes, before I was informed otherwise, I did suspect you had to buy it at an adult bookstore and wondered how it would look for me to walk into one carting all three of my kids. Just imagine the questions I could have fielded on such a shopping trip! But it turns out you can buy Gu and Body Glide at a running store, even at the same time, and no one raises an eyebrow. Must be terribly sad to be so inured to such great potential potty humor.

And finally, training for this is good for my competitive little soul since it allows me to say that hubby will never, never, never be able to outrun me. He actually winced when I told him that I ran 8 miles the other day. Yup, I’m up to 8 for the long runs and still smiling. Of course, my weekly total is still fewer miles than I’ll have to run on race day (oboyoboyoboyoboy) since I’m only at 22 a week but that number is climbing steadily right now.