Here are some pictures Iris took during our run Saturday. I feel like a megalomaniac posting pictures of myself, but. . . I guess there's no good "but" other than the fact that "megalomaniac" isn't a clearly defined word so maybe it's not all that bad. Oh, and the pretty blue shirt is the one Sean Meissner gave me at the Rumble Race. Isn't it pretty?

MISC.

My dad's travel story, written about Glacier National Park, ran in the Kansas City Star this morning. Here is the link if you would like to take a look. I think it's a nice article and I'm deliriously happy that he included "woah bear!" in the article.

In running news, I am kind of lame. I did my 30 mile run yesterday with 6,000 feet of climbing (and descending) but today I cut it short. The plan was 20 but I was overwhelmed with desire to go to breakfast with my friends so I did 8.5 and rather than turning around and running back to my car, like I was supposed to, I had a huge and delicious breakfast. Gosh I love food. Anyhow, I may still do 12 tonight though. I will at least walk 1.5 to make it 10 -- then I will have 70 miles for the week. Not great but not terrible either. I must mention that Iris did about 18 miles with me yesterday which I appreciated a lot. Thanks Iris :-)

The weather today is beautiful and I'm optimistic that Spring may finally be here. Even on Friday it was snowing and sleeting and being nasty -- it's really time for Spring.

Finally, in Ted news, he is really making progress on his bookshelves and I think they are going to look really nice. I am impressed -- he is building pretty wood bookshelves for the "man room" from scratch. They will have a built-in look. I will ask him to take pictures so I can show you.

A shout out for my Boston PR-ing homies

(pictured above, me and Cheryl, aka NoTrain McPR)

I am so proud of my buddies who ran Boston yesterday!!! Miss Cheryl ran a PR, despite the fact that she no longer "trains" for races and ran a 3:36! Wooooooo!!! Cheryl is going to be crew extroardinaire at Western States and get me to the Placer track. :-)

Ed ran a 2:41 and Chris ran a 2:44:59 -- both PRs! Way to represent! (I'm referring to your representation of big bellied boys :p).

Nice work! Just imagine if Cheryl trained. ;)

(above: Ed and Chris, showing off their bellies)
I would worry about putting this picture on my blog but for the fact that they have been published doing this. . .

April Snow

I came down the stairs this morning and saw THIS:

I said nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The dogs checked things out.
Sonja seemed to think that we could still run today.
Callie too thought we could still run today. I was the only whiner, and only whining for a short while.
Sonja, Callie and I ended up enjoying the snowy run up at Herron Park and nailed down the Herron Hustle course, which should be under 5.5 miles (it's a "5 mile" race. . . close enough!).
Sonja was basically in heaven, she wishes the snow would never melt.
THE END.

Crazy Siberian Husky Story

No offense to Zeke and Sonja, but I doubt either of them are smart or motivated enough to do what this dog supposedly did. . .

http://www.elynews.com/articles/2008/04/17/lifestyle/life01.txt

Lost dog finds its way home after week and 77 miles

By JOHN PLESTINAEly Times Reporter

Whether it be impressive navigational skills or just a natural homing sense that brings some lost dogs home across many miles from unfamiliar places is up for debate. It's safe to assume that a lost dog didn't hitchhike a lucky ride 77 miles home to Ely.

Doug Dashiell and no-longer stinky Moon.

Other than stinking like the skunk that sprayed her somewhere along her journey, Moon, a Siberian husky, found her way to Ely across miles of desert and over the White River and Ward Mountain ranges.

Doug Dashiell had taken his three dogs with him for a weekend trip to Tonopah. He thought he would never see Moon again when she ran away April 6.He had let his three dogs out of his truck near Railroad Valley, a distance he later clocked at 77 miles back to Ely.

Moon, who is 1 year, 9 months old, got away when a catch on a chain let go. After several hours searching for her he drove home to Cross Timbers.“Last time I saw her she was headed northwest,” Dashiell said.

Because the dog was headed in the direction of the Duckwater Shoshone Reservation he contacted the Duckwater Tribal Police. Calls to them and others turned up no traces of Moon.Dashiell had all but given up hope that he would ever see Moon again until the White Pine Veterinary Clinic called him Monday morning.She had wandered up to R Place No. 1 on Aultman Street Sunday.In one week she had walked all the way to Ely.Alvin Molea found Moon outside of R Place, took her home, fed her and gave her a warm place to sleep.

Molea called Dr. Tom Sander's office at the White Pine Veterinary Clinic Monday morning because Moon was wearing a tag from the clinic.Moon had made it home unscathed except for the pungent stench of a skunk she had probably chased somewhere between Railroad Valley and Ely.A bath was awaiting the pure bred Siberian husky. “I want to get her to where she smells half way decent,” Dashiell said a hour after being reunited with Moon Monday morning.He speculated that Moon might have fed on rabbits during the seven days she was missing.Dashiell conceded that he had doubted he would ever see Moon again. “After seven days -- no way.”He added that he had thought Moon was either dead, turned wild and would not return or that someone might have found her and kept her.“I've had trouble with her running away before. She's always come home,” Dashiell said.This time was no different.

Race Photo

(photo courtesy of Glenn Tachiyama)

ROAD TRIP!!!

above: Oregon is for runners

below: Sonja was pretty good on her first road trip

Ted and I did a road trip to Sisters, Oregon (which is about 20 miles from Bend) this weekend where I participated in the Peterson Ridge Rumble 60k. All in all, I would say we had a nice weekend. First, Saturday was the first time we had driven past Spokane and the first time either of us had seen central Oregon. I woke up without a voice and was very congested, but didn’t feel sick. We hit the road around 7:30 a.m. I love love love roadtrips. This was a particularly neat trip, because little did we know that both Washginton and Oregon have vast areas of landscape that can be best described as desert. No trees, lots of scrub brush and nothingness for miles and miles. This is why I love roadtrips – you really get to experience the country in ways that you can’t when flying overhead. Ted and I had a nice time chatting and eating new candies that we had never had before. Our new favorite is Annabelle’s “Big Hunk.” We also had a Abba Zabba, which was previously known to us only as a Captain Beefheart song.

When we arrived in Sisters, we checked into our room which was a “pet room.” We stayed at the Best Western and were really impressed. The room was very nice and very large, and the hotel was a lodge directly adjacent to National Forest property. Sisters appears to be a touristy little town – very cute and pretty upscale. I was curious about Bend so we had dinner in Bend at a place called Kababa, which was incredibly good. I am not normally a big fan of falafel (it’s usually dry and not super flavorful) but their falafel was amazing. Ted thinks there was a strong clove flavor. I just noticed that there was a strong tasty flavor. We had a vegetarian sampler and everything was very tasty and very well prepared. And, I enjoyed a Deschutes Hop Henge Imperial IPA, which was one of the best IPAs I’ve had. I think Deschutes does a great job with their IPAs. And the Deschutes beer is brewed in Bend! So it was very local and I pretty much had to drink it. I did notice that I wasn’t very hungry and didn’t do a great job on my beer, needing Ted’s asssitance, and started feeling very sleepy during dinner. Of course, the lack of hunger could be attributed to the candy and the sleepiness could be attributed to the fact that the beer was about 8% alcohol.

On the ride back to the hotel I started feeling fairly awful. I took a hot bath and went to bed early, hoping I would wake up better. I woke up with a sinus headache and terrifically congested (still no voice) but wanted to have a nice day and willed it to be so. We went all the way to Oregon and I was running this race! I told myself that I was fine and lined up. I met Olga at the start – she is so charismatic and knows everyone! She gave me a hug and the race began.

I quickly settled into pace with a woman named Carrie from Bend. She has done Western States and so she gave me some advice and told me stories about her race. It was easy to forget about my head issue because Carrie was a lot of fun to talk to. The first miles passed pretty quickly. The trail was sandy dirt covered in soft pine needles and it was very pretty. It was a clear day so there were some incredibly vistas – the sisters (big volcanoes) were clearly visible and the sky was very blue. I was enjoying myself. We saw Olga a few times – she was having a rough run but was still chatting with everyone and seemed to be having a great time.

Somewhere near mile 18 the drug of Carrie’s enthusiasm and spunk wore off and I couldn’t ignore the pressure in my head. I thought my head might explode. I told her to run ahead, though she kindly offered to stay with me, and I put my iPod in and prepared for a rough 16ish miles. It was pretty warm and the heat was starting to bother me. But I was determined to finish the run, even if my head exploded in the process. I took great comfort in the fact that the aid stations all served pierogies, which I really love and took advantage of. And, I tried to keep a positive attitude and reminded myself that this was good mental training. If I can run with awful sinus pressure, I can tough out Western States. (At least I will try to believe that.) I had started the race with arm warmers, since it was around 34 at the start, and was able to stuff them with snow and tie them around my neck to cool myself off. This really worked. I will definitely have something at Western States to stuff with ice for my neck. As long as I’m on the topic of gear, I learned that my running skirt’s side pockets cannot be used or my skirt will fall down. Oops. But otherwise I’m loving my newest running skirt and plan to wear it at Western States. I will need to see the race pictures though before I make my final determination. Because I will not have a good race if I look fat or silly :p

I continued onward, trying to stay ahead of the course sweep. Olga had me convinced I was in last place – I was actually nowhere near last and I was safely ahead of the sweep by at least an hour I think. But it helped motivate me to run. It was a pathetically slow “run” but I hardly walked. Suddenly, in the midst of my focused forward movement, I found myself in the most beautiful field of green bushes and saw the most incredibly view of the snow covered volcanoes. The sky was so blue and it was so amazing I was really bummed that I didn’t have my camera. Lo and behold, crouched on the ground around a turn was Glenn Tachiyama, who takes really beautiful race photos. I told him he was famous and that I had arrived in ultrarunning if I was being photographed by him. I think he thought I was nuts but we chatted for a few seconds – it was fun to meet him. He’s a friend of Kendra’s I think.

Most of the rest of the run was downhill, which made it easy to keep moving. Gravity helps. Before I knew it I was finished (in 7:09) and helped myself to the Boca burgers being grilled up at the finish line. I received my cool race socks and the race director,Sean Meissner, a noted ultrarunner, gave me a pretty blue technical shirt for making the trip from Montana. Very nice!

There were showers in the locker room of the middle school where the start and finish was – and that hot shower felt great. However, when cleaning my filthy feet, I discovered a nasty blood blister, the size of a quarter, on my foot. Ted has asked that I not post the pictures here, so sorry. I think the pictures are cool, Ted thinks they’re gross.

Ted drove us home, which was very nice of him. I slept on and off while he avoided the deer that were caucusing in the middle of the road. I’m sure I’ve forgotten some things, but it was really a memorable and fun weekend.

YAY!!!! I grew up in Lawrence Kansas and did my undergrad at KU (for those of you who don't know) so needless to say I'm happy my Jayhawks are, for the first time in exactly 20 years, National Champions.

DARN CUTOFFS!

Yesterday I had hoped to run 30 miles, but due to horrible trail conditions (ice, snow etc.) things were very slow going. I wasted a ridiculous amount of time on this trail (officially called "Spur C" or "Cpur of Catan") where I ended up cutting my legs on all the razor sharp crusty snow as my leg fell through up to my knees. Who knew snow could make you bleed? There were some great dry spots though, and I had a nice time -- Iris ran 13 miles with me. I ended up with 26 miles before the dreaded cut-off. . . which was the time I had to leave to get home to get ready to be designated driver for girls night. I thought I had time to finish but when I checked my messages at the "aid station" (i.e. my car) I learned that we were leaving earlier than I had planned. I do want my gold star for being dd :) The upshot of it was I felt great after the 26 and was still able to dance the night away. And dance the night away I did -- we had so much fun.

(Back to running :p) I am definitely gaining endurance and strength. I did not feel physically different at the end of my run -- I felt about the same as when I started. I am not sore at all either. And obviously I'm feeling better after me week of annoying not-quite-sickness-but-something-buggin.

And now, for some pictures! Below, Iris and I had fun playing with our cameras. Oh, I suppose I might have had time for one more mile if we hadn't stopped to play, but what fun would that be?

Another Montana Moment: Iris and I are in the middle of the woods and what do we see but an abandoned refrigerator that appears to be used for target practice. Soon thereafter, Iris and I had to turn around due to gun shots. Although we decided the shots sounded like bb gun shots. Nonetheless, we weren't in the mood to be shot. Iris just took all this time off work with strep throat!!!

WHINE

Since returning from Vegas I've felt really borderline sick. Not actually sick, but borderline. Monday I felt pretty terrible and had flu-like symptoms Monday night, but since Monday I've just felt tired, weak, sore (which of course is probably from my brutal weight workout Tuesday night) and blah. The OCD side of me says "must run 80 miles this week or you fail." The soft side of me says "just relax this week, get better and attack next week." The Joe L. side of me says "you will feel pretty terrible towards the end of Western States so learn to push through sistah."

The reason I'm whining to you all is that I'd be interested in hearing how you approach quasi-illness. Full on illness is easy -- when you're on the couch you're on the couch. Your decision is made for you if you can't stand up without becoming sick. But when you just feel light headed for a few minutes and it passes and then you feel good and then you feel horrible? Push through? Write yourself a "pass?"

VEGAS BABY

I've been in Las Vegas for "continuing legal education." It's a good thing it's a cut-back week because I hardly ran this week. Grandma came up from Phoenix and we hit the town a couple nights in a row. I consistently overate -- I am a sucker for buffets. I probably gained 10 pounds in less than a week.



Being the high roller I am, I spent some time plopped in front of the penny slots. I won $20! I was pretty happy to leave Vegas finally -- it's a disturbing place in so many ways. I think "consumption junction" would be an appropriate name for the entire city. I did run one morning, and the run was pretty neat. People were either going to work, stumbling towards wherever they were going to pass out, or were out running. I felt a bond with all the runners, who all said "hi" and smiled knowingly. Yeah, we were all really proud of ourselves.



My regret is that I never made it to Red Rock Canyon/Red Rock Nat'l Park. I really wanted to go for a trail run but with Grandma there it seemed a selfish use of the little time we had to hang out together.

(above = grandma and me)

(above = penny slots)

(below = pictures from my run -- they're pretty blurry)

Ted made "hot cross buns" for Easter. There were many but now there is only one. I think I have eaten a dozen in two days. Not to mention the giant solid chocolate bunny. I don't feel so well.

Hurray!!! I ran 18 miles today (well, ran most of those 18) which brings me to 80 for the week. There's no way I would survive the long runs without my running buddies (left to right = Ruth, Leanne and Deb.) The bestest.

Time on my feet

Today there was no walking with purpose. Instead there was a whole lot of meandering, lollygagging, dawdling and relaxing. I did get 30 miles in, but I did not set any speed records :p I'm calling it a "time on my feet" run. I'm sure that has benefit. It was a beautiful day and I really enjoyed being outside. I wish I wasn't so tired at mile 30 -- I could have wandered around the valley all day. Well, I basically did, but I could have been out longer. Last night we watched "Into the Wild," which I really enjoyed (I personally relate to McCandless, only I would call my parents and plan better for my Alaskan adventure) so I downloaded the soundtrack. I listened to Long Night by Eddie Vedder about a millions times during my run. One of my bosses asked me to think about something in particular during my run (come up with ideas for something) but I never got to it. I was too busy spacing out and enjoying the perfect spring day. And thinking about the movie. I did take some pictures:

The Lone Pine Trail is mostly melted:

AHHHHHHHHHH SUN!
Our Flathead Valley
Me! Me! It's all about MEEEEEEEE!!!! :p
I did decide on a route for the Herron Hustle


Evidently this is where the deer cross:
This is so Montana. BONES AND BEER BABY!!!
WOAH -- I think that says it all

In case you haven't heard, the bears are pretty much awake now. I wonder if the "woah" sign is for the bears :p

Christian the Lion- Reunion!

This is pretty old but someone just emailed the video to me. I thought it was pretty sweet. These dudes bought a lion cub at Harrods department store and raised it until Christian was too big for their flat. Christian went to Africa to live and be in a movie or two and when these seventies guys came back Christian remembered them and still loved them :-) A little weird (just a little ;) but really sweet if you take it all at face value.

For today's long run (25 miles) I ran up and down and up and down Lone Pine. I felt good during the run and feel good still. I think that despite the fact that trail running is more exhausting and makes my heart rate higher, it hurts a lot less. My legs aren't screaming at me, which is nice. Leanne did LPs 2-4 (3 of 'em) with me, which was great. Thanks Leanne. And thanks bad music on my iPod for getting me through. This hill is bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S!!!

oh, it's the pain
It's ingrained in me



The above lyrics from "Sea Song" by the Doves, have almost nothing to do with this post, except that if you love Goth-y doomy and gloomy music like I do, that song is most excellent. It came on my iPod at the end of my run and made me so incredibly happy.

So (drum roll. . . ) I went to the gym last night. It was the first time I have been to the gym in over a year. I hate the gym but I feel proud. I did legs, back, abs, shoulders and a lot of standing around like a deer caught in headlights. I was unable to remember how some of the machines work -- which was really sad since at one time I was a good devoted weight lifter. Then I decided machines are dumb and I should use free weights anyhow. And then I was thinking: I could buy some weights at Target and save $$$ by cancelling this wasted membership. Then I was thinking: they have a sauna now so I can use that rather than hot yoga and that will cover the membership. Hmmm. Somehow this resulted in the decision that I will keep the membership and go twice a week. Hold me to this! Olga already said I need to do squats (he he he he I said squat) so there you go.

BUT, does anyone else hate all the mirrors at the gym? It's as if they're trying to remind you constantly of just how much you need to be there. Of course, mirrors help when lifting -- there's no question about it. But it's one of the things that just makes me hate the gym. Meh. It's not like I hate seeing myself in the mirror, but in the giant wall sized inescapable gym mirror it's just. . . a bit much. . .

P.S. Wow this was awfully whiny. I will call it whining rather than complaining, ok Meghan? (D'oh!) I am having issues with formatting and I'm done playing with it so sorry if this is hard to read.

TED BREAD

Am I a lucky woman or what. Ted has been baking a loaf of bread every week -- this week's turned out especially pretty. He does a really good job. I think I'll keep him around :p In other news, the dogs were brushed today. They were long over due. Now that we have two of these monsters the house is a giant furball even with vacuuming every other day.
For anyone with dogs, the Furminator is definitely worth the money. That thing works wonders. And, I finally figured out that you can use it on the couch too. It works better at getting the fur off than the vacuum cleaner.

Finally, in running news, I ran 73 miles this week and Sonja ran 48. Monday and Tuesday I ran 12 miles, Wednesday I ran 10, Saturday 25 and today 14. Sonja ran all but the 25 with me. She's a good running buddy. I sure missed Leanne this week though who was off travelling for work.



P.S. If you need inspiration of any sort, I encourage you to read this woman's race report from this race called Susitna 100, ran in Alaska in February. Pretty impressive. I don't know this woman or anything, in case you're wondering. :p

MISERY

Today's run was 25 miles and I decided I needed to make it more "race specific" so I included a run up to Camp Misery, a popular entrance into the Jewel Basin hiking area. One of the partners in my office went backcountry skiing at Jewel Basin this week and told me that people snowmobile up the unplowed forest service road with their skis -- and that I could probably run on the tracks. Supposedly the road is 7 miles up, though my Garmin says it's 6.4 miles up.

I parked the car at the bottom of the forest service road, at 3100 feet, and headed up. The first mile is pretty flat and sort of plowed. People live on that stretch. It was basically ice. Though now that I have IceBugs ice is perfectly good running surface for me. Then the road turns to snow, which was pretty well compacted by snowmobiles. It quickly became un-runnable for me so I tried to "walk with purpose." I'm still really slow at climbing. I need to work on this. As I got higher the snow became less packed down, deeper and more difficult to traverse. This slowed me even more.

This picture (above) was taken at around mile 5. That's Flathead Lake in the distance.

The views were beautiful. Although it was grey it was breathtaking. The pictures really don't do justice to the views.

So here is the "road" as I neared the top. As you can see, it's not ideal. But not terrible. But as I was running I was thinking, "I really DRIVE on this?" Scary. Anyhow, on my way up, a snowmobile passed and a woman was skiing behind as if she was water skiing. Behind her were two cute dogs racing up the mountain. It was really funny. I chatted with them a little bit when I reached the point where they decided to stop and ski. The dogs, though having run about 5 miles straight up behind a snowmobile, showed NO sign of tiring. The woman said they would be tired by the end of the day.

I started to feel a little dramatic and tired as I neared the top. My Garmin showed 6.3 and I was mustering up the positive thoughts to make it the last .7. My feet were pretty much sinking through the snow, but not with every step, which made it a little difficult to avoid falling. Then, rather suddenly, I could see the cabin that marks the end of the road. Here (below) is the restroom. Good thing I wasn't planning to use it.

Here is the cabin. Very snowy. According to my Garmin, this point was about 5700 feet, which means I climbed about 2600 feet. To be honest, I was disappointed that it wasn't more. It sure felt like more. And, I will have to climb much more than that in a much shorter distance at Western States. There might even be snow, which negates the fleeting though I had that "at least it will be dry trail." I suppose that's what the whole training thing is for -- to get me ready.

I cruised down back to my car where I did a shoe change, a bottle switcheroo and stocked up on Accel Gel. I then headed out to do the other half of my run -- on road. Now, if I was hardcore, I would have done two "Miserys" to get my 25 miles. I'm pretty sure these guys would have done 3, even though they're training for a marathon rather than 100. Maybe next week I will try doing two, or a double Misery (I'm having too much fun with this). Maybe Leanne or Tom will do the second with me. Misery loves company :p In any case, the road portion of my run was pretty easy. That said, while the uphill/downhill made me tired, the road does make me feel more pounded.

Near the very end I came across this sign, which I've seen before but never thought much about. I totally have no idea what it's talking about -- the big empty tree-less field?

Finally, here's a self-indulgent picture of myself happily finished in front of the lying liar sign that marked the beginning of my day's adventure. It's funny how totally impossible the last mile of any run seems, regardless of distance. And the joy I feel in being done. Even though I really truly do love running. I love the post-run pizza :-)