Running Into the New Year

Hello all! Hope everyone had a great Christmas! We sure did. We went home for what can only be described as a "whirlwind" trip. We drove to good old MTZ the day before Christmas Eve, spent Christmas Eve with my family, then drove to Bloomington on Christmas morning and spent the day with Greg's family. Then drove back to Lincoln the next day. Whew! We had a great time though. I took a few pictures but I haven't moved them from my camera to my computer yet and I'm too lazy to do it right now so I'll have to include them in my next post. Sorry!

It snowed about 6 or so inches in Bloomington on Christmas Eve through Christmas morning which made for an interesting drive. The roads actually turned out better than we thought they would be, so that was a relief. I was BEYOND thrilled to find that Lincoln received NO SNOW AT ALL!!! Based on the never-ending blizzard that was winter last year, it is nothing short of a miracle that we received no snow in this most recent storm. I don't want to be a grinch, but since Christmas is over, I'm going briefly embrace my grinchitude :-) I can't stand snow. The only thing I even remotely like about it is that it looks pretty when it's falling and I'm inside, warm and cozy under a blanket, preferably with a cup of hot cocoa in hand. I don't like walking in it, driving in it, touching it, and don't even get me started on what happens when it melts. So, long story short, I am happy as a clam to be back in snow-free Lincoln.

In other news....I decided that my lengthy hiatus from all things exercise had to come to an end. I'm not going to say how long it has been since I have run, but let's just say I had to thoroughly inspect my running shoes this evening to make sure spiders hadn't taken up residence in them. After ensuring they were indeed spider-free, I hopped on the treadmill to attempt a 3 mile run. Yowza!!! I decided going at what I thought was a "slow" pace would be a good way to ease into things. After all, I was running about 15 miles a week at a pretty decent pace not too long ago. Surely my body could handle my new slower pace without a problem. Ummm....no dice. After about 2.1 miles, I had to walk the rest of the way. And when I got done...I was COUGHING like I had developed a black lung or something. What the heck happened??? I almost feel like I'm starting completely over with running again. I'm running in the State Farm 10 miler in March so I really need to get my behind in gear.

I also decided that I'm going to do one more half-marathon in 2011 and then I'm going to do a full marathon in 2012. It actually makes me nervous just typing that. In both of the half-marathons I have run, I distinctly remember reaching the mark where the marathoners and half-marathoners split from one another (at around the 13 mile mark) and thanking my dear, sweet heavens that I did not sign up for the marathon because there was just no way....

Well, folks, there is going to have to be a way because I'm gonna do it!!! If anyone out there wants to do it with me, just let me know!

Ok, well I'm going to throw in the towel on what has become a post quite worthy of the the blog title Babbling Brooke :-) Hope you all have a fantastic evening. I promise to post some Christmas pics in the next post.