I love tailgate parties

We all thought that the Olympic Torch Relay finished last night…we were wrong. In a very unexpected and dramatic ceremony, Mc Colin emerged from his driveway with his very own torch and lead the 1/2 Marathon and Road and Trail group up to Hayward Lake this morning.

If you haven’t been to Hayward Lake for a while, the south section of the Railway Trail has undergone some major repairs and is in great shape.

After the run, we celebrated the 1/2 Marathon group’s completion of training (they will be running the Fort Langley 1/2 next weekend) and introduced the Road and Trail group to our version of a tailgate party. Man oh man do we know how to eat, we don’t work as hard as we do and not be able to enjoy life (cookies, Liz’s fabulous cheesecake, pastries, chocolate covered strawberries, chocolate milk…didn’t you read my blog Brian?). Thank you once again for hosting Conny and Colin and I am glad that my coffee urn box generated such stimulating conversation, I will put it on display again at our next gathering

There is a rant coming…

I went out for my speed training session this morning (to be quite honest my Tuesday night run with Conny felt more like speed training, she was on fire), once again it was cut short thanks to that mean teeth-bearing dog at the top of hill, but after last night’s run, I was ok with it being cut a little short today. As I was rounding the corner on my final kilometer (those of you in miles, that is .62 miles), the driver of a blue minivan (no Chris, it wasn’t Lysa) that was approaching me slowed down, wound down his window and threw his banana peel on the road.

Here comes the rant…I live out in the sticks, on either side of the road of the road in question, it is wide open acreage (grass, trees, no houses). The driver did not need a pitching arm to throw his banana peel into the open field, he just tossed it on the road. I know that there are many people out there that think it is perfectly acceptable to throw biodegradable fruit (apples, bananas, what’s the difference) out your window when you are driving, but most of you would not do it if there was another car around never mind a person running beside your car ,and I am sure that if you did, you would have the courtesy to toss it hard enough that would land out of sight and out of mind.

I was shocked and a bit out of breath (and kind in the middle of nowhere), all that I had in me was to point at the driver and give him the hairy eyeball

Why not just take your banana peel with you? There are many uses for a banana peel, you can grind it up and use it as potassium rich compost in your garden (not on my road), apparently if you rub them on warts they get rid of them, don’t have a wart but have acne it will work on that too, even take the itch away if you have come into contact with poison ivy or have a mosquito bite, polish your leather with it, hell, I think you can even smoke it.

I know that I could stop and pick the banana peel up with I drive by later today, but I have some serious banana issues and have a strict “no banana rule” (some other time) I am also quite certain that by that time it will be a squished stinky mess. So as this banana peel decomposes on the road for the next 3-5 weeks, I hope that nobody slips on it and that you Mr. Blue Minivan are haunted, have nightmares and have to seek years of therapy to help you get over that hairy eyeball I gave you!

Go Canada

5:00am was a bit too early for my sleeping beauty to get out of her warm bed to see the Olympic Torch come through Mission and Maple Ridge. Instead we played hooky from school and work this afternoon and met Mo-Mo and Granddad to watch it pass through Langley.

The streets were lined with a sea of people dressed in red (with the exception of my sleeping beauty, in her defense I she was not aware of my plan when she got dressed for school this morning) all waving flags (not quite sure how I ended up with 6 “Go Canada” car flags, I have a feeling that my sleeping beauty must have had a hand in this somehow). The torch was to cross 200th and the Langley Bypass at 2:00pm, but just before 2:00pm the lights at the railway crossing just past the Langley Bypass started to flash (I am reminded of the mental note that I made to myself at the end of yesterday’s post “you can’t control traffic”). It was a fairly long train but didn’t seem to slow the relay down at all (so maybe the powers-that-be did have some kind of control after all).

It was a great experience to be a part of the Olympic Torch Relay, and if Olympic fever had not hit yet, it has now…Go Canada!

Sunday morning rain is falling

I am not a second-saver, but I am organized. I don’t enjoy being rushed or stressed out in the morning so if there is something that I can do the night before to keep my world peaceful and relaxed (whatever), I will do it. So before settling in to enjoy my ultimate girl night at home last night (I love those nights…the girl equivalent of boy’s burp, fart and scratch night. Mine included a great glass of wine, trashy tv and of course bbq lays…I must be getting old), I laid my running gear out for this morning’s run as well as putting a bag together with a change of clothes so that I didn’t have to come all the way home to change before going to my daughter’s hockey game (again not a second saver, just organized).

The weather was fabulous yesterday, and on my last check the forecast for today was sunny-cloudy. Sunny-cloudy running gear includes my running glasses, I love my running glasses. Running glasses change everything, when you put your running glasses on you go from recreational runner to the cover of Runner’s World, sounds stupid, but it’s a running thing.

When my alarm went off this morning, it did seem a little dark out, but it was early. I made my way downstairs to get that all important cup of coffee and looked out of the window…it was raining. As the lovely Kelly says “What the hull???” I was so pissed off (once again sounding stupid). Needless to say my morning no longer felt tranquil. It wasn’t so much that it was raining, I am a runner so I run in the rain, if I didn’t run in the rain I wouldn’t be able to run on the West Coast, but today rain wasn’t part of my plan, and I was looking so forward to a nice day and my running glasses (stupid for the third time, but who’s counting).

I ended up getting it together and getting over it, I pulled out my running jacket and gloves, and made my way into Port Coquitlam and had a great run with Joanne and Ella along the river. Note to self, you can control many things, you can’t control your heart, traffic or the weather.

And now we taper

We’ve come a long way baby! The Saturday morning 1/2 Marathon group completed it’s last long run before the Fort Langley Historic 1/2 Marathon on the 21st. You are officially on taper my friends, give yourselves a big sweaty hug and a pat on the back

The ladies of Thursday morning

I always know when it is Thursday morning, when the group that I affectionately call “the troublemakers” walk through my Studio door.  I have been working with the same group of ladies on Thursday mornings for last few months  and over the course of our workouts, we have gotten to know each other quite well.  We share only a few commonalities, we all have children (of varying ages), we exercise (I am not going to assume that we all love to exercise), somehow we all seem to show up to class in the same colour theme (we call this getting the memo),  and we all love to laugh.   The ladies of Thursday morning don’t always arrive to class in the traditional form of transportation, some run to class (and home), some ride their bikes or mopeds,  while others drive their golf carts.  The life experiences combined with the quick wit that these ladies have would amaze you.  No topic is off limits for this group,  and I do mean that, with the exception of gossip and I do mean that.  We talk about life with children, life before children, husbands (only the good of course), food, wine, restaurants,  fashion or lack of,  television, Deb’s books, some current events…real stuff, real life, real issues.

I usually give up orally cueing the warm-up on Thursday mornings due to the decibel level of the conversation, but by the time we are into our second set of squats and lunges, we are ready to get to business.  This morning’s dialogue opened up about the “new hair” in the class, some a new colour and a new style, both very nice.  We moved from hair to the hatred of the second set of squats (they were nasty this morning), Tuesday’s curling victory being viciously taken from us,  fogging up the mirror,  perfectly timed calls from sick kids,  to home renovations, to Jodi’s chaps (there will be a mention of chaps in her road name)…it’s all a blur after the chaps.

I have said for quite some time that I would love to have my own tv show. In particular a car cam for when Conny and I, or any combination of the “Bad Girls” (my curling team) or our H2H team are out on the road.  I think that I would like to extend the car cam idea to include a Studio cam, of course at a flattering angle, and not just for the Thursday morning crew.  Not a “real housewife” type of show, it would be Canadian television, but with the possibly turning into a screen play.  So for any HBO, Slice or VH1 (as the content of this program may not be suitable for all audiences) network executive types reading this right now, have your people call my people.

Confessions of a chip-o-holic

I have a confession to make, I didn’t end up starting my Lifestyle log on Saturday as planned or Sunday for that matter, Monday ended up being the magical day. When I posted on Saturday morning, I did have full intentions of starting…the weekend just took over. The 80′s Party/Fundraiser was a success, maybe not monetarily (we did end up making a small deposit to the team account), but definitely in the fun department.

So for the last 2 1/2 days I have been documenting everything that passes between my lips, recording my activity levels, I have even been using my Garmin (the only time I ever seem to use this gadget anymore is when I leave town, I use it to chart my runs for my world map). So far I have discovered that I eat a very boring breakfast (although very nutritional) EVERY day, I am running above my target heart rate and that there is not enough room to write down everything that I eat in a day (if I didn’t include the chips I ate, I would have an extra room. Yes I eat potato chips, some eat chocolate, my weakness are potato chips, bbq lays) . This is going to be a very long 9 weeks.

Inside the mind of a groundhog

Does a groundhog really care if we get an early spring? I think that it does, the only reasons that a groundhog comes out of hibernation are for food and sex…if the ground is frozen and covered with snow there is not much food available to eat and no cute little groundhogs strutting their stuff in little shorts and tight tank tops.

Quote of the day

“Run when you can, walk when you have to, crawl if you must – but keep moving forward and never, ever quit.” Dean Karnazes, Ultramarathon Man

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