Mood swings, bribes, and bridges

One of the myriad benefits of long distance running is the emotional roller coaster you begin to experience after being on the road for more than two hours. No other activity has quite the ability to make me happy, sad, pissed off, and elated...all back to back. It's interesting, this sport.

The double secret group met early this morning to get in 3.6 miles before joining the rest of Group A for 13.4 more. As an added bonus, we had to be at Newport by 7:30 (40 minutes early) to get the mileage done, and as a SUPER added bonus, we had to run two more bridges than everyone else (seven bridges total). Ha ha ha I hate Newport. :-)

I wasn't feeling great on the double secret route and actually considered going home and not doing the rest of the run. However, I bribed myself with a Chocolate Gu and decided I could turn around and go back at any point. (I tell myself a lot of things just make it through one more mile.) It was really, really windy today and we were doing the half Flying Pig course, which is basically all uphill with the exception of the last four miles or so (seriously). Somewhere in Eden Park I started getting pretty surly and decided I don't want to run at all next week (yeah, right). By the time we passed the Walnut Hills YMCA, I contemplated going inside and calling one of my parents to come and fetch me.

Another Gu and half a mile later, my 3:50 running pal found me and kept me distracted until we hit the Gilbert downhill. By then I was all smiles, waving at the people at the bus stop and loving life. I discovered I had a bit of fuel left in the tank and took off, only to discover that we had to run all the way to the Southgate bridge. Boo. Back to cranky. We finally made it back to Newport and found that our average pace was 8:50. Cheers to that! Happy.

I stopped at UDF on the way home to get two bags of ice and a delicious chocolate milk to enjoy in the bath. I also discovered the awesomeness that is hulu.com and entertained myself with a nice episode of the Facts of Life while I shivered and tried to avoid hypothermia. :-) All in all a good morning.