Four in a Row and a Pouch to Go

So since I have yet to save up enough money to get fitted for running shoes, I decided to reward myself with the next best thing: One of these!

I found this pouch on Tall Mom's blog, who just happens to be doing an awesome giveaway featuring this and a few other awesome products. Alas, I am too lazy to jump through the hoops to win hers, so I went and bought my own. Being the fiscally conscious individual that I am, of course, I Googled to find a coupon code for $1.00 off, (I do this for EVERYTHING, by the way) which brought my grand total to $5.48, including shipping. A bit of a splurge, perhaps, but I'm tired of trying to store my house key and bus pass in my bra, glove, or the bottom of my shoe. Compared to these sweaty alternatives, the Shoe Pouch will be much more safe and SANITARY.


You'd think that since I have enough time to surf the bloggosphere for cool gear that I can convince myself I need, that I would find more time to run on my week off. Not the case. Well, the time was there, I guess. But everything else managed to get in the way. On Monday I had one of those nasty hangovers that drag on all day. My head was killing me and I was pretty dehydrated so I decided to wait it out and hold off on my run. Perfectly acceptable, I tell myself. I'll definitely run tomorrow.

Tomorrow comes, and I wake up, put my running clothes on, tie my shoes, and then notice that within the ten minutes it took me to do those things it has begun to snow pretty hard. A storm was in the forecast but I decide to go out anyway and hope to beat it. How much snow could possibly fall in the 30 minutes it takes me to run anyway?

A lot.

Five minutes in and I could barely see in front of me, the sidewalks were covered and my feet were soaked. Miserable and grouchy, I looped back and jogged home. The entire outing was about ten minutes. Barely enough to get my blood pumping in those temperatures.

Fast forward to today - the sun was shining and the sidewalks had finally cleared enough for me to get my Week 6, Run 1 in. It was a good run, but my legs felt excruciatingly slow. I attribute that to the six-days of laziness/bad weather that kept me sitting on my ass for most of a week and skipping breakfast this morning. To get back on track (and get the most out of my last few days "off") I plan to run tomorrow and Sunday as well. Which basically means I'll be squeezing Week 6 into three days, and starting Week 7 on Monday. Much more intense than any running schedule I've been doing thus far.

This little plan of mine could go one of two ways. In the first scenario, I enjoy all four runs, improve my time, and get back on track with my regular running schedule. In the second, I get completely burnt out from running, have the worst W6D3 run of my life, and skip out on the fourth day, putting myself even farther behind schedule. Only one way to find out - I'll check back in Sunday to let you know how it goes. Assuming, of course, I can make it to my computer at that point.