Dawn on the Run

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After returning from Seattle we relaxed at home for a few days. Hubby’s brother was in town on course so we visited with him for a bit. Heh, I even tried running again. I hadn’t run for a couple of weeks in hopes of a little rest fixing up my “cranky knee”. It worked! On Monday (way back on July 21) I returned to running. So what if it was only 20 minutes and sets of run 1/walk 1, it’s a start and was pain free. YIPEEEEEE!!!

Wednesday night I packed up our stuff again and on Thursday we headed down the road to Fernie. We were off to visit my Mom & Dad for a few days. It was Xena’s first road trip and she seemed to really enjoy it. As you can see below she spent some of her time watching the scenery and some of it sleeping. Myself, I chatted with hubby and completed several Suduko puzzles. I’m addicted to those things and getting much better at the harder ones.

This was also the first road trip with my HHR since buying it in March. Driving around the city had barely brought the mileage up to 2000km and now she’s at almost 3000km. Will soon be her first trip to the shop for an oil change. Anyhow back to the Fernie trip. We made good time and arrived in Fernie around 3ish. We had opted to stay in the “Guest Quarters” at where my Mom & Dad live. They live in a seniors complex and it has a bachelor type suite that family/friends who visit can stay in for $40 a night. Bonus, it allows dogs and has a small kitchenette area. Downside, no shower, but Mom & Dad’s suite is just down the hall and we were only staying there for two nights so no big deal.

First on the agenda was letting my Mom & Dad’s dog, Maggie get to know our dog. They did the usual greeting that dogs do and then it was like they had been buddies for years. They had a blast together. They wrestled with each other until they were warn out.

After the visit Darren & I went to Boston Pizza for dinner. It was just a short walk. Mom & Dad had to have dinner in the “home”. They have to eat their dinners with the seniors unless they give advance notice which they did for Friday night as we took them out that evening. After dinner we all headed down to my brother’s place for a short visit. It was great to see Tom and his family. Cool, Tom offered to take us out in his boat on Friday.

Friday morning we were up early. Well at least I was. At home I can just let Xena outside to do her thing in the mornings, here, I had to take her for a walk. I also needed to get in another run so I opted to run with the dog and get both down at the same time. We headed out just before 8:30 and did about 30 minutes. Again I stuck to sets of run1/walk1 but just somewhere in the middle of my workout I did a few sets of run2/walk1. I kept the pace slow, not wanting to push my luck with the knee but still managed to get in just under 3k. It was a beautiful location to run in and a gorgeous sunny day.

After returning from my run with Xena, I opted to keep on my running outfit. We had not brought any swimming gear with us and well if the boat trip included ending up in the water I figured spandex shorts and a tech shirt would likely be the best for getting wet in. It turned out to be a good plan. Anyhow, we had breakfast with Mom & Dad then once again headed over to Tom’s. Mom & Dad were staying with the dogs at my brothers to spend time with his mother-in-law who lives in a suite above their garage.

As Tom was taking his son and a friend along we took two vehicles. We headed down the highway - Tom leading and us following. I had a rough idea where Baynes Lake was but it had been a long time since I had been out there. It ended up being a little more then a 30 minute drive through the mountains. What a beautiful day for a boat ride. Thankfully I brought along sunscreen, water and snacks as we were out there pretty much all day.

Tom took us about half an hour south on the lake. It was a beautiful ride. The mountains and all make for great scenery. The lake is huge and goes well into the USA.

We stopped at a gorgeous sandy beach. No weeds and soft sand. When you got about chest deep there were some huge rocks but otherwise it was perfect. I don’t remember how long we spent on the beach but we all went for a swim. Told ya the running outfit was gonna work out just fine. Now I know I could also wear the shorts, sports bra, etc if I ever get around to doing a tri. The boys played on the beach for a bit until Tom told them to wash up as we were heading out again.

Next on the agenda for the boat trip was “knee boarding”. It’s kind of like water skiing only you do it on your knees. Everyone took a turn except me. It looked like a lot of fun but I wasn’t sure it would be a good idea considering all the work I was doing to get my knee back in shape. I got some great videos of the “guys” doing it. Click the name to watch - Tom, Darren and Thomas. Oh yeah, my nephew is named after his Dad. It was Darren’s first try at it and well his second try is pretty funny as well there were some waves. The lake is fairly calm except when other boats go speeding by and create some pretty good size waves. These ones rocked the boat and sent Darren flying…lol.

After the knee boarding it was back to the beach. Tom decided he wanted to haul this big driftwood log home. I reapplied my sunscreen for the ride back but missed or should I say forgot one area - the tops of my feet. Thankfully they didn’t burn too bad. On the ride home we managed to spot the famous “Ghost Rider” on the mountain. Ya know I had lived in Fernie for many years but this was the first time I ever saw it so clearly.

After cleaning up and changing we all headed up the ski hill to a restaurant for dinner. That’s were Darren surprised me with my anniversary present. He hid the box behind the desert menu and I found it when I moved the menus to make room for the food we had ordered. Inside was a gorgeous white gold ring that had a pink stone in the center surrounded by diamonds and then again down the sides. I’ll post a photo later. What a sweetheart…guess I’ll keep him around for a few more years.

That was it for my visit with the family and to Fernie. We had a fabulous time but headed home early Saturday (July 26th). More pictures from the trip located here.

Okay so I’m still trying to catch up on my posting. So here’s the next episode in my “catching up”. We headed down to Seattle bright and early on Friday, July 18th. We spend 3 fabulous days at the Drag Races before returning home on Monday morning, July 21st. Now I could go on and on about what happened that weekend but hubby has already done an awesome job of writing about it over on his blog so I’ll save some time and just send you over to - http://theultimateracefan.blogspot.com to read about it.

By the way I will mention that this trip was to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary. We got married at that very event back in July 1998. Wow, 10 years and still going strong. We had a blast and the weekend was over all to quickly. Thankfully we had a week after returning home to relax, well sort of….but that’s a subject I’ll cover in my next post.

Pictures are of course over on my Flickr site.
Friday
SaturdaySunday

Oops almost forgot about doing this one, told ya I would forget something and remember as I was catching up….

July 16th was the 20 minute challenge at the local Running Room. Run for 20 minutes and ya get a green hat. Okay so green isn’t my fav color but heh, it would be great for St Patty’s Day and it’s free so I went. I hadn’t been running for a couple of weeks. The leg had been really cranky so I had given it a break. No running just some walking and oh yeah, I bought an eliptical to do my workouts on without the extra pounding.

Anyhow my plan was just to do a 20 minute walk - one loop around the pond would do me just fine. I figured walking would be safe. It was, well sort of. Unfortunately it wasn’t pain free. I limped a lot and it hurt a lot. Dang it all this is frustrating. Oh well I got my free hat and I had a great chat with Donna, the ex store manager. She walked the distance with me as she hadn’t done any running lately either.

More photos in my 2008 June/July Misc Flickr Set.

Onto the fun stuff. Okay, the volunteering was fun too but heh, it’s Stampede week in Calgary. Well at least it was back in the earlier part of July. Anyhow, first event on the list for Stampede was EnCana Country. This is a big BBQ thingy that my company puts on for staff and family. They have a ton of food and lots of cool stuff for the kids. We took little Nikayla and she absolutely had a blast. The only down side to the event was the major downpour of rain and hail that hit just before it was to start at about 4ish that Monday, July 7th. That delayed the opening of the event by about half an hour so they could dry everything off. Remember in Calgary if you don’t like the weather, wait about 10 minutes or so. The rain didn’t last that long but it was long enough to create huge puddles and make things pretty soggy. Despite the soggy mess it was still a good time.

Well that was Monday. Tuesday it was back to work. It was a quiet but busy week as many people were busy stampeding the week away. Almost every morning there was a pancake breakfast. I hardly ever see my brother Steve, he lives at the other end of town. Anyhow, I always seem to run into him at this one breakfast. We always joke about it. The other cool event is at lunch and they have things like a fake shootout down at the Olympic Plaza. The usual collage is below but more photos over at Flickr.

On Friday July 11th, I got to go to my first ever rodeo. A group of us went from work. It was awesome. We watched the events and then headed over to Nashville North. We timed that well as the lineup to get in got really long after we made it in. A good time was had by all and I’m sure if you check out the photos you will agree…lol.

At the Rodeo

Well that’s it for a bit…gotta take a break. Will try to post more later in the week.

As I usually do I booked the first week of July off for Vacation. Now I will use the word “Vacation” loosely as well only a couple of the days are mine to relax and then it’s down to business volunteering at the HSBC Calgary Marathon. The race was held Sunday, July 6th but the days leading up to race day are very busy. As always we struggle to get enough volunteers, especially Course Marshals. Some how by race day we always make it but the days leading up to race day are often spent recruiting everyone from family members to complete strangers…lol.

I really enjoy working with all the volunteers. Oh yeah, my role is “Volunteer Coordinator”. I spend a lot of time on the computer organizing the lists to send out to to the other committee members so that each can contact their volunteers to let them know when and where they are needed. My week at the expo starts on Wednesday with deliveries and setting up the volunteer room. The expo site is busy over the next two days with all the booths being setup and it’s always cool to see a huge empty room be transformed into all these great booths that will house information and products for the runners as well as their race packages.

As for me, I hide out in a room at the back. That’s where each volunteer checks in and also can take a break. All our volunteers get tech shirts for helping out. This year they were burgundy. There were also a ton of great prizes - everything from River Rafting trips to Running Room gift cards. I also have a volunteer helping me. This year it was one of the ladies from my Learn to Run clinic. I really enjoyed working with her. The guys who look after the Course Marshals also hang out in the same room as their volunteers will check in with them. My days were spent handing out shirt or boxing up shirts for the groups that pick theirs up, such as the water stations. It’s hectic but fun and you meet so many great people.

On race day many of the volunteers are down on site before the sun comes up. While I don’t start my duties until after the race has started, I like to be down there to see the runners head out for each event. I did get some great photos of each event starting and some awesome ones as the runners finished. They are all over on my flickr site.

By the time the events are all off and running it’s time for me to get to work. First chore, organize the food for the elite runners tent. After that, a little time to wonder around and see how everyone is doing. Next it’s time to organize trays of sandwiches for the food tent and medical volunteers. Then I run a few sandwiches around to the vendor tents. Thankfully the area isn’t too big and the leg is cooperating…for now.

Here and there I get to take a break and watch the runners come in. As the 10k starts later then the Marathon/half Marathon, the first few finishers for the 10k and half come in fairly close to each other. It’s amazing watching some of these runners finish. They make it look so easy. Back to delivering more sandwiches and cookies. Somewhere around noon we lost a few of our volunteers who were cutting of the chips so I took over in that area for an hour or so. That was a blast. I kept saying goofy things like “Come on Down, your the next runner”. Some would laugh and others would look at me like “you have way too much energy for me lady”…lol. I gave them a choice foot on the hay bail or I would bend down for them. Some could barely move, others were still full of energy. There was a mist shower just before the hay bail area and of course I made a few smart remarks about runners who did or didn’t use it…lol. After a bit someone else took over and the runners were getting further and futher apart. They were kind of just trickling in.

As the runners thinned out we began our cleanup and tear down of the finish area. This is always the sad part for me. Packing up for the end of another race. Almost everything was done but there were still two ladies left out on the course. We all cheered when they came in and awarded them each a Running Room gift certificate for finishing. I always like to make the last runners feel special. Having been in their shoes, I know just how tough it can be to stick it out there for over 8 hours.

All packed up we headed over to the storage lockers to unload. By now the leg was not happy so I got to sit and supervise…lol. Another race week done, wrap up party tonight….lol.

Okay, I’m back tracking pretty much to a month ago so if I mess up a few of the details its cause heck I have trouble remembering what happened yesterday let along a month ago…lol

Anyhow way back on June 28th we wrapped up the “Women’s Only” running clinic. Now this wasn’t one I was teaching at but when I could I paced for Janice who was the instructor. She had also paced my group for a while as well. The “Women’s Only” clinic follows the same training program as the “Learn to Run” clinic only it’s all women for members. As there was no 5k race around the time that the clinic finished Janice and I had our own little timed trial run for those who wanted to join us.

It was a small group, only 3 ladies from her clinic opted to do the run. Janice’s hubby also joined us to help pace the group. I didn’t run, instead I used my Garmin to time each of the runners and let them know how they did. To complete the 5k each had to run the pond loop 3 times and add a little extra out/back at the end. To make it seem like a real race I supplied three prizes and let each runner pick what they wanted in the order that they finished.

It was a beautiful day for it and a fun time.

Okay I promised I would write a post or several to catch up on what all you have been missing. I can’t believe it’s been over a month since I posted anything decent. Man so much has gone on, I’m not even sure where to begin or what to write about and what to just say “ah to heck with it”. I see by my stats that there’s barely even anyone lurking about anymore. Oh well, my own dang fault, after all the pages have gotten a tad boring.

Anyhow, I do have a few things to write about so I will quit rambling about nothing and get on with it. Here’s what I need to post about and hopefully will get through it all over the next few days…lol.

• Wrapup Run for “Women’s Only” Clinic
• Volunteering for the HSBC Calgary Marathon
• Stampede Fun
• NHRA Drag Races in Seattle
• Road Trip to Fernie
• Early Morning Mountain Run (combined in Fernie trip post)
• 35 Minutes Without Pain

That should about catch me up. I might of missed a few things in there and maybe as I’m going along I’ll add more in but I believe 7 posts is about enough….lol. Some might even have photos…lol.

Okay….onto the first topic…….

Sorry I’ve been rather tied up with volunteer stuff and now getting ready to head out on a trip to Seattle. We’re off to the NHRA Drag Races to celebrate our 10th anniversary. I still have some last minute packing to do so I’ve only popped in for a quick note. We are back on Monday so hopefully I can catch up on everything next week. I’ve got a ton of stuff to post about and more photos to share. In the meantime head over to my Flickr site to see my latest photos.

Again sorry for not being here much. Hope you are all having a great summer!!!

Saturday was a busy one. I was up early to putter around on my computer and then headed over to the Running Room for 9:45 to meet with with the “Women’s Only” running group to hear their chat but I had no plans to run with them as I had flyers to deliver.

The HSBC Calgary Marathon is July 6th and we still need volunteers. So as I do every year Nikayla and I set out about noonish to deliver flyers along Memorial drive from the Curling Club to Crowchild. We drove down and parked the car a couple of blocks over near 19th Ave. Then we walked several blocks handing out the flyers. We moved the car again and repeated the process until the complete route was done. It took us just over 3:30 hours and over 8kms by the time we were done. That includes distances up & down walkways as well as walking back to the car. I wore my garmin cause I’m a geek and like to know these things. The garmin was only going when we were walking, not during the driving…lol.

Near the end doing stairs was killing me so Nikayla did most of the houses with stairs. Acutually she was a lot of help and did a good majority of the houses, I just walked along giving her more flyers to stuff in mailboxes. I’m a good supervisor…lol and she loves doing it. I wish I had her energy. She never complained through the whole task and was still running even at the last few houses. What a kid. I however could barely stand.

We picked up a few things at the grocery store after and I needed the cart to hold me up…lol. At home I iced my knee which seemed to help but I’m still in a lot of pain. Sleeping Saturday night was easy for Nikayla, she fell asleep half way through this cheerleading movie we watched. I however tossed and turned all night trying to find a position to sleep in.

Sunday morning I was a tad depressed. I’m tired of a leg that does nothing but give me grief everytime I think it’s getting better. I don’t know what to do about my training, my running or the clinic I’m supposed to instruct at the end of July. I’m usually pretty positive but yesterday I just felt like giving up. Of course my size doesn’t help but well my luck with losing anything seems to suck and I’ve pretty much given up on that. I’ve lost the same 5 pounds so many times in the last two years that had it stayed off I’d probably weight 50 pounds…lol.

Four hours of sun probably didn’t help either as I suspect it may also be the reason I felt like crap on Sunday. No sunburn as I did have on sunscreen but it was super hot and even though we drank lots along the way in a lot of ways it was long a long half marathon without the distance. I think this is the last year I may volunteer to do flyer delivery. I’d of never made it as a paper boy…lol.

I am going to take the rest of the week off from running and I do have a physio appt later this week. By the way I do feel much better today and thanks to a few supportive emails from friends I’m not ready to quit..lol. How about you? You ever feel like quitting? If so, why and what snapped you out of it?

So is it go slow cause there are pedestrians ahead or is it "slow pedestrians"…lol. You know what?

“I’m slow. I know. Get over it.”