Holy Hotness, Batman!

These are the days when I’m more grateful for the Cleveland Half Marathon’s weather than I am for sliced bread. Truly.

I worked most of yesterday from the kitchen table (we don’t have much else in order yet) with the front door open and the sun shining in. The dogs sat at the foot of the door, enjoying their leisurely lifestyles, and expressed visible and audible confusion as the weather tumbled and rumbled from one personality to the next.

The morning started in the wake of the loudest thunderstorm I’ve ever heard. Seriously: one massive bolt I was certain had hit the house. It was that loud. But it was around 5 a.m. (and I had gone to bed around 2 a.m., which I’ve discovered is something I’m not capable of doing anymore) and I was too tired, really, to be concerned about checking.

Nothing caught fire and the morning was pretty fresh and mild. Had I slept enough the night before, I wouldn’t have resisted taking an early morning run.

That mildness, however, flipped between fiery 90s and blazing sun to big breezes and pounding rain from one minute to the next. By the time I was ready for a work break, though, it was muggy hot with all the day’s moisture thick in the air. My schedule called from a 6.5-mile tempo run, and I kept waiting from one hour to the next for “better” conditions. Maybe just a stroke of energy. But that late night did me in. No run, just chilling and food.

Thankfully laziness didn’t do me in the previous night. I ran an easy 5.5 miles along Lakeshore on Wednesday from my block to the Cleveland border, about halfway to the other border and back. It was probably closer to 9 p.m. and getting dark when I ran. But talk about a nice time to run!

Aside from the spring bugs (I probably only swallowed about 60), it was a pleasant evening bustling with dozens of friendly walkers and—get this—courteous drivers who actually stopped for pedestrians. No joke. Not only did I have every driver wait and wave me through before I reached the street, but none of them hit me, none swore at me for being a runner and at least two backed out of the crosswalk when they saw me coming.

Big deal, right? Well, it’s a huge change from the old neighborhood and major upgrade from the pedestrian-haters who used to run me down. OK, it only happened twice and I’m way overgeneralizing. But these early impressions are important and I need to hold onto them for when that one rude driver really ruffles my feathers.

Lucky for my training schedule, Friday calls for a rest day. Unfortunately that doesn’t mean I’m going to rest tonight. I do, however, get to run yesterday’s tempo without falling behind. Then I can hop back on schedule and find many more places to run in the heat (and get over this weather-related hang-up the way I dealt with rain).

Holy hot weekend, Batman!

I have somehow managed to become as good a holiday-eater as I am a cupcake-talker.

On Friday and Saturday, Neil and I made our way to friends' houses (Nate and Kate on Friday; Stef and Dane on Saturday) where we stuffed our faces with grilled eggplant and fresh mozzarella on fresh baguettes; tomatillo salsa sandwiches with tomatoes, swiss and lettuce; cream-filled chocolate cupcakes; chocolate-caramel torte; Nilla wafer-banana cream pie; and, mmm, cherries.

So, sitting down to my breakfast of a chai tea Luna bar and apple was a little less exciting than usual.

The exciting part of it, however, is that I bought the chai tea Luna bar at Whole Foods in University Heights, which conveniently opened shortly after I left the area. While I haven’t become dependent on bar-form meals, they’re a handy way of maintaining my nutrition when I could just as quickly sink my teeth into a quick donut or two. And as you can see from the above list, I can probably stand a few days away from any serious binging, eh?

But the weekend wasn’t all face-stuffing and naps: I kicked a little bit of running butt on what turned out to be a rather disgusting Saturday morning/early afternoon walk-and-run around the neighborhood. I started with a very fast 2.10-mile walk and then picked up into a 3.83-mile run.

I had intended on greater distances when I started the workout, but as the heat washed over me (I also started later than intended—I generally get running by 8 a.m., but didn’t get out the door until after 10:30), I felt like I was trying to breathe underwater. The trouble was primarily at the end of the run, so it didn’t seem to signal any grand deterioration of my shape.

It did, however, mark a new “accomplishment” in my world of running: it was my first workout in the present era without music. I had my iPod along to track the workout, but I had no music playing. Sure, it doesn’t sound like much, but I’ve had some serious attachment problems with running music—as if some form of audio distraction were absolutely necessary.

Ever since I became a more-frequent cyclist though, I’ve gotten used to the non-distraction workout. It’s obviously too dangerous to listen to music when I’m riding my bike (and, come on, when I do something it’s about 35 times more dangerous than the average participant), and I’ve kind of settled into that quiet space.

So, when I headed out on Saturday morning, I thought I would give it a try. It seemed a little strange at first because I like to use music rhythms to get me moving, but I found my inner motivation to push me instead. It took some digging…. And it will take some getting used to. Maybe I can just start singing to myself.