Sleep

Oh how I love thee. My love of sleep makes my alarm clock my greatest enemy. As much as I truly wish to rise early, I blindly and frantically press that snooze button at least four or five times before I can will myself out of bed. This morning, I slept past my alarm for one whole hour! How can I wake up feeling good when I’ve already failed on my first goal for the day?! My sleep is not all that restful so when I am in that dreamy space, the intrusive sounds of overly cheery morning radio show hosts only remind me of all the millions of things I have to do during the day. As I visualize the foreboding ‘list’, I press my snooze button again snuggling deeper under the covers.

I have tried multiple alarm clocks and set them up in various locations in the house. This strategy has proven unsuccessful. I have tried changing the alarm sounds from the horribly obtrusive beeeep beeep beeeep to the softer sounds of morning radio. Neither make a difference.

I wasn’t always a “snoozer” and I’m not exactly sure how I came to be one. Maybe it was when my life became consumed with sitting in front of a computer screen day and night. Or maybe I just have no discipline. Could it be my iron levels? Or could it possibly be age? Rising at 5:30am used to be be part of the daily routine for several years - to go to swim practice, do yoga or fit in a morning run. Why is this so difficult for me now? Could I be so sleep deprived that I am constantly in a state of sleep debt?

If that is the case, why then will a sunny vacation allow me to be free from alarms and rise with the sun? Hmmmm......

ALS Adventure

Every year, through my so called racing and recreation adventures I aim to contribute to a different charity. This year I've decided to put my efforts toward raising money for ALS by participating in the ALS Adventure Challenge. This race is in honor of my friend Art, who was recently diagnosed with ALS. If you are interested in supporting our team Art's Army, please check out my fundraising page.

The race is a short adventure race that consists of trail running, mountain biking (that part will be laugh for me), kayaking and of course some 'mystery' events along the way.

The picture you see here is Art looking over the Grand Canyon. I thought this race was an appropriate event to support Art as he approaches life with a sense of adventure, enthusiasm and greatfulness. He inspires me with his outlook on life. I hope you will join me in helping to give something back...

Not Quite as Planned

Planned Run:
30:00 @ HR Zone 1
40:00 @ 8:10/mile or somewhere close to it
30:00 @ HR Zone 1

Actual Run:
1:54 penguin pace

My body was just not capable of upping the pace at all today. There was just one speed and that was slow! It may have been all the travelling this week, or remnants of the flu from last week or quite possibly it could have been the big flax muffin I stupidly ate for breakfast. What was I thinking? Anyway...despite my inability to stick with the plan, the sun was shining through the trees and the clear skies were magnificent! Every moment I thought of how painstakingly slow I was going, I reminded myself that I am so lucky to be running for the pure sake of running. I think of other parts of the world where it's actually illegal for women to run. I think of those that want to run that are physically unable. I think of those that are running but running for pure survival..away from violence and other terrors. I am grateful to be healthy and free to run.........

Blowing Snow and 30 Below

The bite of 30 below experienced in Moose Jaw this weekend is a brand new experience for this chickadee. I'd like to say that I'm unlikely to repeat the experience any time soon but I have a few work trips that are going to take me into the northern cold this month. That kind of cold with the wind chill dropping temperatures even further makes it feel like your face is going to freeze off within seconds. The frost bite warning was 10 minutes but with my circulation, 10 minutes sounds like an eternity.

You guessed right that my workouts took me indoors this weekend. Eighty minutes on a treadmill made me feel a bit hamster-ish but I was happy to be over with the viral evil that took me out last week and thrilled to get in some good mileage without any knee pain. I suppose those boring physio exercises are doing me some good. Also, with Tim running along beside me on his own treadmill, how could I complain?

As much as Saskatchewan winters inspire me to dream of palm trees and warm surf, it's hard to come home when you're leaving someone behind. I'm thankful that my other running partner, albeit he has 4 legs instead of 2, was here to greet me back to Vancouver where to no surprise, it's as wet and grey as when I left. Geez...30 below doesn't sound all that bad.

Oh my aching head

I've pumped my blood with extra vitamin C, Cold FX and tried thinking anti-flu thoughts to somehow boost my immune system. Psychoneuroimmunogy and vitamin therapy aside, I still feel my head gradually getting bigger and the increasing exhaustion is making it hard to complete a sentence. This is not looking promising for a Yeti race tomorrow morning. Hopefully soup and sleep will boost my T-cells overnight and kick this evil out of my body.