Day 5/6 of Marathon Training

Today I did my long run, on the treadmill at Riverpoint Sports & Wellness because I was over on the West Side to get a pedicure with my friends Jessica and Jena. (We went to Nail Time at Montano Plaza-- it's where Jena always goes and they were very good. They're a bit on the expensive side but in my opinion, well worth it.) I ran 4 miles; I alternated my pace but overall my time was 44 minutes. I always run faster and get more of a workout on the treadmill; it's my preferred way to run but I try not to do it too often because I need the altitude and incline training that's more in line with a real road race, and my dog Venus can't exactly run with me on the treadmill.

I signed up for the Run for the Zoo 5K tomorrow. I'm not in race shape but I figure it will give me a good starting time to build off of. I've never done the race but I've heard it's a fun time.

Speaking of races, I received some bad news: our group did not get chosen in the lottery to run the Nike Women's Marathon in San Francisco. :( I'm so bummed because I was really looking forward to it. My sister and I are going to pick another marathon to run around that same time period. So for now I'm training for a marathon, but I'm not sure which one!


Yesterday was a much-needed rest day. I was so busy I didn't get time to run; plus it was time to give my body a break anyway!

I took Katie to the physical therapy vet and they said she is doing very well in her progress of recovering after surgery. :-) They put her in the water treadmill for a little bit and she loved it, even though she usually hates water! They also showed me some exercises to do with her on a fitness ball. The vet pinched her front paw with pliers and she felt a little bit of pain; the vet said that's a good sign for sensation returning to that leg that they were worried about due to nerve damage. So that was great news, and then I brought Katie into the office with me. She was pooped and I think a bit overwhelmed by the visitors; she basically just slept by my desk until I took her home. Everyone at work was so concerned about her and happy to meet her; it was sweet.

After work I did some much-needed grocery shopping and household goods shopping at Walmart. Boy do I hate Walmart and I usually try to avoid it but the vet had said to get Katie's heating pads there. I got $130 worth of other stuff as well! I finally have some food and paper towels and stuff.  When I got back home I did Katie's electro-magnetic therapy treatment while I finished watching the movie Conviction. It is based on the true story of a woman who went to law school solely to prove that her brother, who was convicted of murder and sentenced to life without parole, was innocent. It was very inspiring and happy-sad; I found myself crying! I would really recommend it. It was nice to see a movie about lawyers that seemed realistic, although there were a few things that didn't make sense or seem right to me about the process (but I don't do criminal law so I'm not sure.) As a bonus Juliette Lewis has a small but great part in the movie, and I love love love her.

Hilary Swank as a law student preparing to free her brother from prison

Oh, Juliette -- you're so good at playing crazy people!

My BFF Jessica was on a bowling date and she asked if I wanted to meet up for drinks. So I met her at Anodyne downtown. It's a pretty chill place with an eclectic crowd, mostly hippy-types and students. I was in really relaxed clothes and it was funny to walk down Central by all the girls decked out in club clothes. We had a nice chat and a couple drinks and then I went back home to go to bed! That was my Friday night-- I sure am getting old.

Day 3/3 of NWM Training

Today I ran almost three miles with my good friend Carey (2.83 according to her Evo). It took us 32 minutes, which is an 11 minute per mile pace. I realized how very out of shape I am - she kicked my butt! ;) I need to keep running with her for the challenge!

Me, Carey, Venus and Tux at the Doggie Dash a couple years ago

We ran on the ditch bank near my house and then to some lateral ditches that were hard to maneuver because they were narrow and on the edge of water with tree trunks sticking into the path. We had my dog Venus with me and Carey is like a dog whisperer- she can get Venus to behave, not go after other dogs, not pull her arm off trying to get into the water, etc. I am really trying to learn how to do that because I tend to let Venus run wild.

We went running after work, at about 7, and then we went to Ezra's Place with Carey's friend Darbie (who's a vet and an awesome person--it's the first time I'd met her). Ezra's Place is this little hole-in-the-wall dive (it's actually in a bowling alley, Rt. 66 Bowl) in the North Valley (4th & Montano-ish, across from Smith's).  Carey is in love with their food, especially the fish tacos. I had Ezra's Salad which came with grilled asparagus and avocado, yum. There was an acoustic guitar player who was playing folk versions of the Eagles and other bands. At one point only the three of us were left in the place and he kept asking us for requests and not knowing how to play them (Dave Matthews Band, Counting Crows). He said he had a repertoire of over 19,000 songs and Darbie jokingly said "Not 19,000 cool songs, apparently." It was really fun. Then when the restaurant stopped serving alcohol we moved over to the bar in the bowling alley and Carey was delighted to find a Photo Hunt video machine; she loves that game. (To me both photos always look exactly alike!) Our name for the scoreboard was CarDarTa and I kept saying "Ta isn't really doing much to win these points." ;) 

It was a really nice time and we stayed out (in our running clothes -- Darbie was in her riding clothes because she had just come from the barn) until 11 pm which I hadn't been expecting. I need to spend more time with Katie-dog! It is so hard on the weekdays when I work and then go see friends. I will give her extra time this weekend. It was nice to hang out with Carey, which is a kind of rare thing these days, and to meet Darbie. I need to really keep running hard and watch what I eat-- I think the fact that I'm about 25 pounds overweight has a lot to do with my slow performance on runs! I haven't weighed this much in my whole life! :-( But I'm determined to get into the best shape of my life, ever. :-) Thirty seems to be a good age to do that!

Day 2/2 of NWM Training

Today makes 2 out of 2 straight days of training for the Nike Women's Marathon, in San Francisco this October.

This morning, before work, I ran for half an hour, which I think was at least 2.5 miles, although I still can't find my Garmin charger and therefore have to guess at the distance and pace. This amount is less than I'm aiming to run on a regular basis, but I acheived my goal of getting up early and running first thing. I am so not a morning person but I've realized that getting up a bit earlier and using the mornings for running is a sure-fire way to fit my goals in. Plus, I am really busy today, with my weekly counseling appointment over lunch and my weekly writing group after work (Tuesdays are always busy for me!), plus having to go back and forth to my house to take my sick dog Katie out and do some of her physical therapy exercises, so it was half an hour this morning or nothing. I'm trying to stay positive and focus on what I do accomplish rather than what I don't. :-) So go me!

I ran with my dog Venus along the ditch bank by my house. That is one of the things I'll miss if I move out of my current place, which I am now 99% positive I'm going to do, as part of my plan to save up money and for other reasons. Right now I'm renting a townhouse that happens to be across the street (cate-corner!) from the townhouse that I own. It's a long story but let's just say my life had been in some self-caused upheavel and up in the air for awhile, with some major changes, and I had been thinking about moving back East (I'm from southern Pennsylvania, right along the border of Maryland) to be near my family.  I became a nomad for a bit, during which time I rented out my townhouse to tenants, and then, when I returned to some of my senses (or so I thought), I took this townhouse with the intention of moving back across the street when their lease expired. Well, their lease expired in March but I had gotten used to lower monthly payments! My rent isn't as much as my mortgage, and their rent payment covers a big chunk of my mortgage, although not all of it. So by March I was still getting my footing and I didn't want to bid forever adieu to these stable, good tenants and starting paying for my expensive mortgage on my own, only to later wish I could still rent it out to them. I gave them the option to extend the lease for another year, and they took it (although they still haven't signed the lease, so, as usual, nothing is for certain as of yet).

The townhouse that I'm renting (and obviously the one that I own, across the street) is in Albuquerque's North Valley. I love living here because it's the greenest part of Albuquerque (although nothing compared to Pennsylvania, of course ;), and it's very eclectic, with a mix of different types of people, houses, stores, plants, animals, you name it, all coinciding together. It's centered around the Rio Grande river and it's the oldest section of Albuquerque. I love the history and the landscape and I also love that it's centrally located-- right between the East and West sides of the city, and a close drive to nearly anywhere within it (although it seems annoyingly far away from Nob Hill and from my BFF Jessica's apartment near Kirtland Air Force Base, where she works. It only takes me, however, seven minutes to get to my office/downtown from my house). Oh, and it has a lot of bike and jogging trails, like the one along the ditch bank where I take Venus running, but most places in Albuquerque do, because we are actually a very bike-friendly city.

Of course, with all of this beauty and convenience comes a downside: it's more expensive to live here than in other parts of the city, such as some places in the Northeast Heights, and pretty much all of the West side. This is especially true if you have a roomy-ish two-story, two-bedroom two-bath townhouse (duplex) with a fenced private yard and a garage and your very own washer/dryer etc. There's just not as much bang for your buck here (unless you count convenience/location as bangs, which I do, except that now I'm more worried about bucks.) So for quite some time I've been debating whether to move somewhere cheaper, or maybe even into something similarly priced downtown, so that I'm even closer to my dogs during the day and I can let them out more easily and frequently, especially with Katie's recent surgery, and perhaps even walk or bike to work.

I was trying my best to extend my originally seven month lease month-to-month while I pretend to make up my ever-wavering mind, but my landlord would only go for two months of that rigamarole. Now he's informed me that my rent is going up by $100 a month in June if I want to stay, and that he wants a 6-month lease at that price in September. So he's basically made up my find for me because I don't want to pay what I'm paying for rent, let alone $100 more, and I really don't think the place is worth it, despite it being in my beloved North Valley and despite the fact that he doesn't seem to care that I own an animal menagerie. (Or perhaps he does, and this is why he is raising my rent!)

To top it all off, just recently I've decided I definitely want to move to a new place and start over fresh. I never decorated this place in the eight or so months I've lived here, or even unpacked boxes that I'd brought from the house I shared with my ex. Living in it always felt very temporary and chaotic. I would like a new start in a new place, to de-clutter my life and downsize my junk. At first I worried that it would feel like I was going "backwards" by renting a smaller apartment when I own a nice townhome, but it seems to me that I have to go that way to move forward. Like many Americans I bought my house at the height of the market and had no idea it would crash so bad and end up underwater for [if you know how long please fill me in?], nor did I understand that my tax payments on the house would double after a year, and then go up some more, causing my overall house payment to go up by over $200 in two years.  I guess I rushed into buying my house when I should have sat tight and saved up money and lived in something smaller and more practical.  I'm definitely learning the value of patience! So now I'm going to do things "backwards" and keep saving towards my future rather than spending all my money on a mortgage or expensive rent. The hunt for a new place is officially on! And I'm definitely leaning towards cheaper rent over a location in the North Valley or downtown, although the combintation of both would be perfect of course.

Here's a random funny event: today I emailed someone who had an apartment listed on Craigslist, and when the person wrote me back, it turned out to be my former landloard, from whom I rented an apartment for three years or so when I was in law school! Luckily he always said I was a great tenant. I think it's a sign. :-) I had actually thought about calling him to see if he had anything available, because I knew he probably wouldn't care about my pets and also because the place I rented from him back then was really cheap and I am looking to save money.  Then I started thinking that I should live in a gated community apartment complex with a pool and fitness center etc. so that I can save on some of those bills (except that of course apartments that come with these amenities charge a higher in rent for them than private apartments that don't have them)!

Alas, I ran into some obstacles when almost every apartment complex I called wouldn't accept my dog Venus because she has the blessing-and-curse of being born a Shepherd/Rottie mix, and looks every bit of her ethnicity! (I know it's not called ethnicity in dogs but I don't care; I feel these policies are discriminatory because my corgi Katie is more likely to bite someone than Venus is!) In fact, I got Venus because she looks big and scary and I want protection on my runs around the sometimes-sketchy North Valley (its aforementioned "eclectic-ness" includes a halfway house that is less than a block away from my townhouse complex, several rundown apartment buildings in the vicinity that look like they house people in between their stays in jail, and a biker-bar that is close enough to walk to, but which I only enter when in the company of my no-nosense hispanic friends. ;) But hey-- the Nature Conservatory is close, as is several nice gated housing complexes... you just never know in the North Valley!) 

The strategy of adopting a scary-looking dog sometimes backfires on me when people refuse to believe she's friendly, just based on how she looks. And apparently most apartment complexes in Albuquerque aren't willing to give her a chance. I found one that will definitely take her (no breed restrictions), and one that might take her (I just said she was a shepherd mix, which is what her adoption and vet papers say, but let's not fool ourselves that if they do their homework and investigate, they won't take one look at her and know she's mixed with a rottweiler, which is on their restricted breeds list.  Still, I'm crossing my fingers and am just glad that shepherds aren't on their restricted breeds list-- as they are at many other complexes I've called).

Guess what breeds I am.
Do you think I could pass for a chihuahua on steroids??

In considering an apartment community, however, even though I'd like the pool and fitness center, I wouldn't like not having a yard for the dogs. They don't really need one because I only use it for the convenience of letting them out and occasionally for playing with them back there if I don't have time to take them on their runs.  I don't leave them out there when I'm not home, or when I am home for that matter, unless they're doing their business. Venus stays crated when I'm not home because she has separation anxiety and Katie is low-maintenance enough to just chill indoors. So while a yard isn't necessary, it is a bonus, and the apartment I emailed about, which ended up belonging to my ex-landlord, does have a yard, as well as two bedrooms. Plus he didn't seem to care about Venus the Maneater.  This might be a match made in heaven!  He said he'll email me in a few days when the current tenants move out.  In the meantime I'm going to check out the two apartment complexes where Venus might be welcome, and continue to scour Craigslist. Here's to finding an affordable but practical place to live! :-)





Desperately seeking shelter. ;)




Venus: Mom, I don't know how well your plan to call me a "shepherd mix" is going to work!
Katie: Oh just be quiet while I sit here and look pretty... I'll get us in somewhere!

Mom, how could anyone resist my smiley face?!



Start of NWM Training Program!

Today was Day 1 of my training for the Nike Women's Marathon in San Francisco, in October.  My sister and I just signed up for it.  There's a lottery system and we only get in if our group is pulled (we are in a group of about 300 people, which I was invited to join by a co-worker who is also in the group). If we don't get in, we'll just run another marathon around that time.  But hopefully we'll get in!

I'd been running 2.5 to 3 miles a day a few times a week with my big dog Venus. Part of it was with my little dog Katie, before Katie got hit by a car last week and required surgery, from which she is still healing and may never totally heal enough to run. :-( I had just started interspersing speed and hill intervals and some pace runs, as well as weights. So my new plan has me starting off at 3.5 miles, which I ran today. I ran along the ditch bank near Candelaria, with my dog Venus. I'll increase the distance every week from there, until I'm running 5 to 6 miles regularly, as well as a long run each week, and I will vary the workouts such as hills, speed, pace and tempo.  I also plan to do weights and cross-training. I have a Garmin GPS stopwatch to track my distance, time and pace, but at the moment (and for some time!) I'm not able to find its charger, and it's one of those picky chargers that can't be replaced with a USB cord or phone charger. So for now I'm estimating my distance based on time/feeling. It took me 40 minutes.

Our goal is to be in the best shape ever on October 16th.  Go us!  (Bikini, here I come). I'm at least 25 pounds overweight, so, I have a long way to go, but over 6 months to get there.

(This image is most likely copyright Nike Women's Marathon)

Other than for starting my training program, today was relatively uneventful. At work I found out that two of my small (metro/magistrate court) cases are set for trial in May. My BFF Jessica's car broke down so I took her to the car place -- I'm crossing my fingers for her that it's nothing major!! I took my dog Katie to her physical therapy appointment where they removed her catheter and told me she is making great process (it's been a week and a day since she was hit; she had pelvis surgery on Wednesday, and I brought her home on Friday).  Her disposition and attitude is pretty much back to its normal content, perky, low-key self, which makes me very happy!!!, but she can't stand on her right legs yet at all. I'm supposed to "walk" her with her sling/harness out to the yard to pee. Today it didn't go so well, as she didn't pee outside (she did eat a lot of weeds) but a short while after I brought her in, she peed on the floor.  Good thing it's tile! I just hope she gets the hang of it soon.  I'm considering posting a photo of her when I first brought her home or in the vet hospital, but it's very depressing.  I was sure she was a goner and I can't believe how well she's doing everyday. It's a lot of work-- meds, exercises, first changing her catheter and now taking her outside in her condition, physical therapy/electromagnetic treatment at home, taking her to the vet hospital for progress check-ups, etc... but I'm thinking it's really worth it since she is recovering so well.  Here are a couple pictures, from yesterday (she sure perked up on Easter, so she must have known it was a day to celebrate a new season and new beginnings!):

She was never a lapdog to begin with, but she's been letting me hold her on my lap and bounce her as if she's running, which the vet says is a good exercise for her legs. Here's to Katie's continued recovery. :)