Still no miles

Yesterday was a disaster. I hate when work gets in the way of training. I forgot I had to teach a class in the afternoon, so I wasn't able to run at lunch as I had planned. Then I picked up the kids, dropped them off at home, and went straight to a swim team board meeting (the kids' team, not mine).

I am trying to get off the board, but the only people who showed up to the meeting were the current board and a few people who couldn't serve. That made elections impossible. Instead, we kvetched about the apathy on our swim team. That bitch session lasted three hours, so I went home and collapsed.

I have not run in nine days. Today isn't looking so hot either. Although I bought my wife's cards in advance, I still need to pick up flowers and such during lunch. I doubt she'd appreciate, "Happy Valentine's Day, honey. Mind if I go for a run tonight and we can get romantic when I get back?" Maybe I'll convince her that it'll make me hot and sweaty. Yeah, and maybe she'll convince me to sleep on the couch.

There's always tomorrow.

Another bad long run

Training tip: the night before a long run, eat something. Friday night as I lay in bed obsessing over my blog, I didn't eat dinner. Well, I had a bowl of cereal, but that was it. The next morning, I got down a smoothie before my run. Big mistake.

The combination of bad eating, lack of sleep (only 4 hours or so), and fighting sickness finally caught up with me. I had difficulty running 8:09 for 13. I stopped after 11 and change, and managed only 8:39. Not catastrophic, but two bad long runs in a row don't build confidence. The marathon is 2 weeks from today.

What makes it more demoralizing is that this week was a low mileage week because of the taper. Yassos were 8.5, tempo was 5, and long was 11.5. 25 miles for the week. I'm fighting the urge to do 5 easy on the treadmill to make 30.

I'm still waiting on the new domain. Very disappointing. My new domain is with 1and1.com, and I'm not up after almost 48 hours. With godaddy.com, where I registered my other domains, I could get my blog on the domain within an hour or two. Oh well.

Runner's soliloquy: to skip or not to skip?

I used to love skipping runs. It was like skipping school. But I hate skipping marathon training runs. Which I did today.

So I'm lying in bed, dealing with self-loathing and malaise. I'm fighting terrible allergies, which lead to a sore throat and insomnia. The insomnia leads to fatigue and decreased immune function. The fatigue leads to skipping runs. Which I did today.

One internal voice says, "Sickness above the neck doesn't affect running performance. Get your shoes on."

Another says, "If you run yourself down, you'll get really sick. Marathon day is 17 days away. Don't risk it. Blog about running instead!"

"Wimp."

"Psycho."

"Pantywaist."

"Does anybody use that word anymore?"

I left my gear at work, anyway. Oh well.... I called my wife. She's bringing my shoes. Five quick miles can't hurt.