12athon: Month 4 (AA)

Last Sunday I ran 14 miles, which I thought was pretty awesome and impressive. (For me.) This week I'm supposed to run 16 miles, according to the chart I'm pretty much making up as I go along, and since I'm supposed to do 12 today anyway, I thought, HEY! MIGHT AS WELL DO 16 AS 12, AMIRITE?

So I suited up, got my hand-held water bottle full of electrolyte drink, got my fruit-snacky-things, etc. It was great. For about two miles, and then my right hamstring, which has been a little cranky lately, said, "No."

I said, "Um, yes."

It said, "No. No, you are not doing sixteen miles, and at this point, twelve is laughable."

I said, "%^&*." (Well, not really, but you can translate.) So I finished out my 4-mile loop (I was planning on running it 4 times anyway) and considered what else I could do. I mean, according to the chart, I'm supposed to do six or seven miles today anyway, so . . . OH! Right! Tri This.

So I ran two more miles--and by 'ran' I mean 'kinda jog-walked'--and then grabbed my rollerblades, since they were right there in the garage.

Um. Okay. I suppose here I should explain a little bit of my history with rollerblading. Back in April of 2001, which, yes, was eleven years ago (I was eighteen and stupid) I went rollerblading, went down a hill I shouldn't have, skinned the hell out of both knees and my hands and elbows and probably parts I'm not remembering, and smacked my back into a wooden guard rail, necessitating a trip to the emergency room. Fortunately, everything was fine, for varying degrees of fine, but I've got a giant scar on my left knee because of it, and slightly-messed-up hips. (No, there's no picture of the scar on my knee. It's pretty gross, though.)

Anyway, and I live in a place where I have a driveway that looks like this:



So rollerblading for me involved a significant amount of 'walking' on the grass and, you know, prayer. I didn't fall, though! Yay! Four miles of that.

Then I had to dig my bike out of the basement, which was just annoying. I'm on the short side, so getting a bike up the stairs is a matter of leverage that I just don't have. Got it up, eventually, though, and of course both my tires were flat. And of course the bike pump had the wrong attachment on the end, and I couldn't find the box with all the bits in it. (Mr. Angle's bike has the other kind of valves.) But hey! The mini-emergency bike pump had my kind of valve attachments, so I got my arm workout for the day in by doing that. *sigh*

Anyway, two quick miles on the bike--after a half hour of prep work, feh--and I was done!

Also I wore the same shoes as last time--Kinvara 2s, 4 mm drop:

And I did all of my running/blading/riding on a trail:

And, last but not least, I managed to get some excellent work in on my farmer's tan:

It's about time to switch to tank tops, methinks.

Anyway, numbers!

Miles jogged: 6 (in about 1:30, but I can't prove it)
Miles rollerbladed: 4 (in about an hour; stupid walking)
Miles biked: 2 (in about 14 minutes)
Total mileage: 12 (of course!)
Challenges: Tri This (9) and Naturalist (4) and Woodsy Owl (4)
Injuries from various activities: 3 (2 rub marks from rollerblades, 1 pair of pants that finally gave up the ghost in an indelicate spot--that's an injury, right?)
Songs listened to: About 20, but about twice each
Weirdest song to run to: "Holocaust of Giants," Rasputina (musical number--geddit? eh?)
Calories consumed at dinner: I don't think I can count that high