Of Snot Rockets and Streamers

Day 14 of what will be known as The Great Sinus Flow of 2011 ... at least today hasn't been filled with the intense sneezing fits I've has pretty much every day since my last post.

Training Stats:

Will not bore with the details of the past couple of weeks, but I did train some ... unfortunately pretty much everything was cut short or otherwise altered due to the insane allergy symptoms I've been sufferring.

Today:  12k 2:1 ratio for the first 4k ... then came the hill.  1:1 ratio for the next 7.??k with a few walk periods longer than 1 minute ... and ending with a barely moving walk for the last 1k or so.  My legs completely gave way one muscle group at a time ... and it was horribly obvious on the gps trainer as the running times gradually slowed from 11.25 min / mile (first 5k including the beginning of the hill) to 13.5 min / mile from the 10k mark to the 11.1k mark.

Total run / walk distance 12.25k total distance including warm up and dragging my tired @$$ home (aka a cool down) 13.5k.  Despite taking more than the usual amount of sinus meds the Great Sinus Flow continued throughout today's run.  I was not able to launch any true snot rockets due to the lack of viscosity of the flowage, but I did have a couple of streamers flapping in the wind before they wrapped themselves around my nicely braided hair like a sparkly and somewhat slimy decoration ... thank you dear for getting up early to do braid my hair for me.  I also managed to soak the seven tissues I took within the first 5k.  Once again the inhaler worked great - I did take one extra puff mid run ... It doesn't make running any easier, but it makes the recovery during the walks a lot easier.

The small victory of the run came between 10k & 11k.  I promised myself I would run at least to the edge of town.  My brain was telling me I didn't want to, my legs were telling me I couldn't ... the mental game, or lack there of, still plagues me ... but something pushed me ... that inner drive that I often lack didn't let me stop, and though the las several run segments were brutally slow, they were run segments.

Again I need to thank my niece Andrea for keeping me on pace.  I'm sure she could run much farther, much faster if I weren't lumbering along beside her.


Non training:

My highs and lows have definitely had their ups and downs ... Work goes smoothly then it gets crazy then it gets intolerable then it goes back to crazy which suddenly becomes the acceptable norm because it's slightly better than intolerable.  The only problem is it makes every other aspect of my life crazier and less tolerable than it should be.

I am really getting tired of the corporate philosophy of empty threats and broken promises.  I resent somebody who has 3 years experience delivering packages or picking up garbage telling me that my 20+ years of school bus transportation experience is meaningless because their system is better.  I'm mentally exhausted from getting my butt chewed for not having a report in on time when I was never informed that the report was due ... or that there even was a report, or a project or a meeting or whatever.  Thankfully my immediate manager is awesome and has faith in my abilities ... she let's me take an idea and run with it.  Sometimes they don't pan out, but more times they work the way I knew they would ... then corporate gets involved and tries to quash my ideas, my creativity, my spirit.

On a different side note.  My company may be opening a yard in Alaska ... they will need supervisors to help run the show for a while.  It may be my only realistic chance to see Alaska ... but I won't get my hopes up.  I'm considered a slightly rebellious rogue, although my area director of safety likes a lot of what I do and how I accomplish it ... He just won't man up and tell the VP level baboons that I know what I'm doing ... Oh well.

Right now photography is taking the edge off my tattered nerves.  Thank you Pam for getting me this camera.  I'd like to post about 638 photos ... actually, it's my blog so I can do what I want, but I'll stick with 5 of my favorites over the past couple of weeks.

OK, I lied ... It was more than 5, but I like them all.  The Sushi chefs noticed I was taking pictures of the food, so they made a happy face for me to shoot.  The squirrels were following me around ... cool.  Oh well.  Thanks for reading.