We’ve Been More Productive Before Eleven than Most People Will Today

Oh hey, so remember how I said I would tell you about my exciting Memorial Day?

You can check another item off my bucket list, because I ran the Boulder Boulder yesterday.

I use the word “ran” a little loosely here, of course, but let’s start from the beginning.

I had planned to run with Steph months ago, but she forgot and so when she had her friends from work sign them up, and Blake, she forgot about me.  This was sad for me, but I asked Blake to sign me up later.  He did, but unfortunately, he did so in the wave behind all of them.

I asked if they would wait to start with me and all sorts of things.  Steph wanted her own run.  Blake wasn’t sure.

The night before the race, I was supposed to stay with Steph, but she ended up having family issues recently.  I called up Blake, apologized, and asked very nicely if I could stay with him and Cameron, even though they were moving that weekend.  He said it was fine and I popped on up.

The boys live fairly close to the race start, not as close as Steph’s old place, but fairly close, so Blake and I decided we would walk there.  We actually did run into Steph for a bit, but she disappeared after she had to pee.  Blake also decided he would start in my wave with me, so that was exciting.

And then at just after nine, we were off.  We were in a 90-100 minute jog/walk wave, so that’s why I say I use the term “ran” the Boulder Boulder loosely.

It was really cold that morning, and at first I was sad, but I ended up being really hot while running and it was raining and cloudy, so I can only imagine what it would have been like to run in the heat and sunshine (like Shawn’s race last year).

Speaking of Shawn, I have a small tangent while you can pretend Blake and I are running the race.  So last year, Shawn asked me if I was running the race.  I said no, I hadn’t registered, and I was taking part in my Memorial Day tradition.

“What’s that?”

“Drinking margaritas and watching the Boulder Boulder.”

“I hope you’re not gawking at me, Deidree…”  (He says this, yet tons of people go to gawk at the race.  That’s half the point of the race.)

“I’m not up early enough to gawk at the qualified runners, just the people in costumes.”  (Shawn was in a C wave–around a fifty minute race–and he runs about an 8 minute mile, in case you were wondering.)

“I guess that’s okay…”

But this year, I got to be gawked at.

I also almost ran over some children.  A woman decided to cross her children across the path of the race and had the gall to yell at me.  Since when is walking your children across a 10K a good idea?  And how is that my fault?  As a runner, it’s not my job to watch your children.  But at the very least, I have good reflexes and didn’t trip on them.

At the end, Blake and I finished in one hour and twenty-three minutes, seven minutes faster than our projected hour and a half (and seventeen faster than our hour forty).  Steph finished in an hour and four minutes (so if she runs next year, she’d be in one of the F waves).

Blake and I also decided that next year we should aim for qualifying times.  Perhaps….

The only bad thing about walking to the race was that we had to walk all the way back to Blake’s house from the finish line, after running the race, so there was that….

See, this morning, I woke up and felt like death.  When I drove her to work, my mother pointed out a bruise on my leg asking if someone had kicked me.  I hadn’t noticed it earlier.  Or any of the other bruises on my legs (and I found five more)…  But next year, I’ll probably feel like torturing myself again.  When I get back to health, I think I’ll continue running.  My problem this year was that I found plenty of reasons to not run (such as it raining), so I probably wasn’t as prepared as I should have been.

Until next year.