Training continues

On Saturday we ran 18 miles on the Alameda Creek Trail. Bree, Anita and I showed up to run at 6:30 am, hoping to beat the heat. We did that, but we couldn't beat the smoke from the fires blazing in the Bay Area. We were surrounded by fires to the south and fires to the east. My hopes that running near the bay would let us experience clearer air weren't realized.

The weather would have been perfect for running if not for the smoke. Even bright and early we could see the heavy haze. The sunrise was eerie red/orange and obscured. Anyway, we started slow, continued slower, and ended up walking almost the entire last mile. By then we were not only tired, we were all having breathing problems (especially me). But we got the miles in, had some great conversations and enjoyed being able to get out there and spend more than 4 hours on our feet. We are indeed fortunate to be able to do that.

Today was the annual Oakland A's Stitch 'n' Pitch game. Our large crowd from past years dwindled down to ... me. Luckily my bro and his family decided to take a break too and they joined me. It was "Turn Back the Clock Day" with a whole 80 year nostalgia theme (including the uniforms) and they gave away pretty cool jerseys. The SnP premium was a strange little drawstring backpack shaped like a shirt, with the A's logo and the SnP logo. We weren't going to stay for the entire game since we had other things that had to get done.

I'm a very unlucky sports fan. I won't watch my favorite teams on television since they always, always lose when I do. When I show up in person my average is still pretty low, although I've seen one or two winning games. So when it began to look like the A's were falling apart, we left. I was quite gratified to see they ended up winning, all because we left.

The latest mom news is that on Friday she was discharged from the hospital and taken to what might be, may be, could be her final home. It's an assisted living facility near Lake Merritt in Oakland which specializes in dementia residents. It's also one of only two such facilities in the area with a vacancy, that we thought would accept my mom. It would be much worse if it doesn't work out. It's been very hard for me to accept that she isn't going home, that she'll spend the rest of her life in a dingy little room that won't fit any of her treasures that she's spent her life collecting. I cry every time I think of it. In fact, I'm crying now. I can't believe it's come to this.

Hot, hotter, hottest

Temps blazing, skies full of schmootz; it's ugly out there. Well, the red sunrises and sunsets are pretty, but the gray/brown sky that matches the brown golden hills is scary. The heat around here rose to 105 degrees yesterday afternoon and only cooled down to the upper 70s. The winds shifted from our lovely, clearing westerlies to ones bringing smoke from the fires along the central coast.

Here are some frightening statistics about California burning for the past two and a half weeks:

Statewide Fire Statistics

Total Fires at Peak: 1,781

Total Fires Contained: 1,451

Total Active Fires: 330

Total Acres Burned: 614,808

These numbers are total fires and acres that have occurred from state, local and federal firefighting agencies beginning June 20, 2008. Being only the beginning of fire season, these numbers are certain to grow in the coming weeks.

Last night Olivia and I had a fast run brisk walk leisurely stroll along the Iron Horse Trail in Danville. Pam was busy so it was just the two of us. At the start it was still over the magical 100 degree mark but we started along, talking and walking. We got to the 2 mile mark and realized we really should turn around since we had to walk back again. Parts of the trail were shaded and it was still toasty in the sunny parts, even though the sun was very low in the sky by then. By the time we finished our 4 miles the temp had dropped all the way down to -- 95 degrees. Uggg.

I'll bet that tonight's swim will be in a massively crowded pool. Hopefully moms will be smart and keep the kiddies inside their air conditioned house, instead of letting them out in the polluted air. I'm not counting on it though!

Swimming, shaking, then some rest

I was sleeping peacefully in bed last night, minding my own business, when a loud noise woke me up at about 1am-ish. I thought it might have been my neighbor slamming his gate (which is right outside my bedroom wall). Or maybe another neighbor starting his very loud truck. I tried to go back to sleep and lightly dozed off. Then at about 1:50 am another very loud noise startled me. I thought it might have been an earthquake, or a truck hitting my house, or that gate being slammed again. Or maybe someone breaking into my garage. My heart rate had finally returned to normal when just after 2am my bed starting shaking and I could hear my washer and drier slamming against each other.

It was actually nice getting confirmation that it was "only" an earthquake! According to the USGS there were 3 little quakes; 3.0, 3.5, 1.7, centered in Alamo less than 10 miles from my house. The first one was at 1:51 am so I still don't know what woke me earlier. Nevertheless, it was a challenge getting back to sleep.

I've decided that swimming is oh-so-very-nice in a clean, toasty warm pool. Such a difference from open water like Shadow Cliffs. But I'm still not certain that I'm getting as good of a workout in that nice shallow pool.

Tuesday and Thursday are swim nights and Claudia, Phil and I are determined to swim every scheduled lap and do all the drills. We all met at the San Ramon pool on Tuesday, swam all the drills and laps and lengths. I was tired afterward, but doing ok. Last night Phil and I met again at the San Ramon pool and the cumulative workouts for the past week caught up with us.

The pool was full of students. What's up with that? It's supposed to be adult lap swim time and there's nowhere to swim. We finally scooted into the very last lane when some young students vacated. It's a hard lane to share because the stairway narrows the lane at one end but we were managing. We even told another woman who showed up that she could join us, but it would be tight. She disappeared somewhere else.

Then a woman stops Phil and tells him she's giving a private lesson and we need to move to another lane. We told her there wasn't another lane. She repeated and insisted that she needed the lane to teach. I told her in a very polite manner to stuff it and try the other pool. No really, I was polite, and it wasn't easy. We swam off and she must have found somewhere else to go.

Both Phil and I were tired, but we were determined to do all the drills and complete the timed swim. I was having cap dysfunction. This happened Saturday too and I'm not sure why; same cap I've been wearing since I started. But it kept slipppping off my head, taking my goggles with it. Believe it or not, the first couple of times I managed to pull it back on my head without a pause in my swim. But the fourth time it happened I stopped and tried to rearrange it, putting my goggles on under the cap, thinking that maybe they were the problem. I was wrong.

Luckily it was time to cool down. My cap stayed on while I did my cool-down laps in sidestroke. Restful, peaceful and soon I was done. 1300 meters and well finished!

Except for my shoulders and upper arms I'm not sore from track, I'm just very tired. Very very tired. Extremely tired. Friday is my day off (exercise day off, not work day off). Yay! A chance to rest and recharge for the busy workout weekend!

Looking back at 2007

Happy New Year! Every good year deserves a list. Here's what I did in 2007:

Marathons run: 7
(Shamrock, Avenue, Rock 'n' Roll, Erie, Portland, New York, Rocket City)
Marathons run under 6 hours: 6
(Shamrock, Avenue, RnR, Erie, Portland, Rocket City)
Marathons where I fell on my face: 1
(New York)
Marathons run in the pouring rain: 1
(Erie)
Marathons I ran with someone: 2
(Portland and NY with Bree)
Seasons with Team in Training: 1
(Spring, including Avenue and RnR)
Half Marathons run: 6
(Mercedes, Jungle Run, San Francisco, Chicago, Rock 'n' Roll, Nike)
Short races: 3
(Shamrock 8k, Run San Ramon, Bah Humbug)
Races I registered for and spent the morning coughing out my guts instead of running: 1
(Kaiser San Francisco Half)
Fastest race: Bah Humbug
(11:25 average)
Slowest race: New York City Marathon
(14:40 average)
States visited: 7
(TN, AL, VA, IL, PA, NY, AL)
Yarn shows attended: 3
(Stitches West, Stitches Mid-West, CGOA Knit Show)
Money spent on luxury yarn and needles: $Ihavenoidea; itsalot)
Other cities where I visited local yarn shops: 7
(Nashville, Birmingham, Chicago, Erie, Portland, New York, Huntsville)
Hats knit: many
Scarves knit: lots
Clapotis finished: 1
Temescal Bags knit: 3 (?)
Other items finished knitting: Uh, I'm not sure. Who's counting?
Blog posts: 233
Bears purchased: I'm not telling, it's embarrassing
Times I deep cleaned my house: none
Times I surface cleaned my house: enough
Weight lost: 10 pounds
Weight gained: that 10 pounds and a few extra
Dates: yeah, right
Movies seen in a theater: I think it's 0
Books read: dozens and dozens
Jobs: 1 (this hasn't changed for 18 years)
Earthquakes felt: 2
Resolutions for 2008: 1
(Try a tri) (which involves getting back in shape)

I guess it was a busy year; no wonder I'm tired! I've enjoyed my "time off" for the past few weeks and I'm hoping my knee and the weather cooperate with starting back in with training. I have a few more days of sloth resting and after the weekend I'll be back to it!

All shook up

Last night I was peacefully sitting at my desk in front of my computer, waiting for my dinner to finish nuking cooking, trying to download something to watch on the plane trip to New York. All of a sudden I felt a little gentle shake to the right, then to the left, another to the right, then RATTLE RATTLE RATTLE RATTLE SHAKE SHAKE ROLL SHAKE RATTLE and I saw that the wind devas hanging from the curtain rod in front of me were swaying wildly and the race medals on the little stand were clanking back and forth and the good glassware was making sounds of tinkling together and holy crap batman! I realized that if it was going to continue it would be a good idea to remove my ass from directly beneath the heavy ceiling fan so I scooted away. The earthquake stopped after what was probably only a couple of seconds (and felt like about 20 minutes) but everything in my view continued swaying and making noise. Wow, that was a big one!

When that happens there's no way of knowing whether you've just felt a big earthquake on your local faultline or whether it's a humongous quake on a different fault. It turned out to be on the Calaveras Fault which runs along Highway 680, a couple of blocks from my house. Niiiice! It was centered in the South Bay, and a 5.6 on the Richter Scale, the biggest we've had in the Bay Area since 1989. There have been a couple dozen aftershocks in the same area, mostly in the 1-2 range. They've been predicting and warning and cautioning very loudly that the Calaveras or Hayward were going to let go soon, and this was a big fat warning to all of us to be prepared. Ok, as soon as I'm back from New York I'll get right on putting together an earthquake survival package. Really.

Chaos continues at my office where we're expanding into more space and reconfiguring some of our old space. We had no warning that construction would start when it did so we've had to scurry around trying to get things out of the way, making decisions that we probably should have made weeks ago but didn't. I'm incredibly happy that I'll be out of here for three working days. What a mess.

After the shaking last night I knit a few rows on the Opera Scarf and realized that I must have dropped a stitch somewhere. So I unknit back a few rows, knowing that if I just ripped it off the needles I'd never recover; I can never figure out how to pick up yarnovers and usually just drop more stitches that way. I think my net progress last night was minus three rows. Good job!

Tomorrow we'll meet my newest bear, but in honor of Halloween the Gratuitous Bear of the Day is a group photo. I'm hoping tonight that I get some little trick-or-treaters at my door that are as cute as this group!

Get some sleep and be nicer

Another recent study has determined that lack of sleep can make you cranky. NO! Say it's not true! Heh. I could have told you that, without doing a very fancy brain imaging study. I only have to look at myself and just about every member of my family (not to mention some of my friends) to show that emotional imbalances are highly exaggerated after a sleepless night. Or several sleepless nights. And yes, I do realize that this study was showing why these results occurred. I'm glad for these studies because otherwise my sis would have to find another line of work and she likes what she does. Note to researchers: instead of concentrating your studies on the results of sleeplessness, pretty please do some research on how I can sleep better. You do not want my cranky butt coming after you!

The fires continue raging through Southern California. I'm keeping a close eye on them, hoping the San Diego fires don't head toward the coastal hills. Yes, it would solve the issue of my mom's having to pack when she moves but we still don't want that. Again, my heart goes out to those who have lost their home and possessions. The forecast is for the winds to switch tomorrow and that will help get a handle on some of the fires. I'm so relieved that we don't have our own local firestorms.

I'm starting to get excited about New York, doing pre-pre-planning. My brain is busy (at night, when it's supposed to be trying to fall asleep) deciding what to take, what to wear, what to do. Of course when I wake up I've totally forgotten what I've decided, so I do it again the next night. Very productive use of my insomnia. Like counting sheep, but I'm counting miles.

Bree and I are going back and forth about our race strategy. On the one hand we'd both love to finish under six hours. On the other hand we'd really like to have a good time out there. We're thinking of carrying cameras and taking pictures every mile. I think if we did that there's no way we'd finish under 6:30; Bree thinks it would only add about 13 minutes to our total time. I've always wanted to take pictures along the way in a race but I'm afraid that by about mile 18 I'd want to chuck the camera at the crowd and just plod on for the remainder of the course. I like my camera and don't want it either tossed or sweated into a moist ruin.

The Gratuitous Bear of the Day is Witch Bear. It's hard in this picture to see her complete costume. She has high heeled, pointy toed black boots, a lovely cape over her dress and the pointy black hat. She's carrying a trick or treat bag that matches her outfit. Very cute and not at all scary!

Running and knitting and bears, oh my!

I ran last night. No, really. Honestly, I ran. It seems so strange that this is the first weekday run since Portland. I'm glad Pam is back since I was starting to feel sluggish. More than usual. I have big problems canceling my regular runs with Pam although apparently I feel free to cancel the runs with Olivia. What's up with that?? Maybe because I've thought of the Olivia runs as "extras" and the Pam runs as "necessities." So I'm glad that we did our regular short short run. It's gone from being dark at the end of our run to completely dark for the entire run in the short break we took. It felt like fall. A warm fall, but fall. I felt really good after running and remembered why I do this.

My heart goes out to all the Southern Californians beset by the raging fires. My mom lives in La Jolla and can't go outside because of the thick smoke everywhere. She's away from the fires now but more are breaking out daily. [Yeah, she's just living where the roads collapse and water mains break.] It's horrifying to think that SoCal has two seasons: landslide and fire. We have those too but we also have a bit of the usual seasons. Even though we had a bunch of early rain last week apparently the Diablo winds (our version of the Santa Anas they get down south) have dried out all the vegetation again. Let's hope our little heatwave that we're having doesn't turn into our own inferno.

In an awkward segue, this weekend I took my car into service and got another key and fob. Remember when I lost mine, inside the car? I've never found it despite furious periodic searches. The service writer at Saturn got a huge chuckle when I told him it was lost somewhere inside the car. That little loss set me back just over $100. When I got the new key I had to try it in all the locks and realized that this car only has one door lock, on the driver's door. The passenger door and trunk must be unlocked from either inside the car or with the remote. The amusing thing is I hadn't ever noticed that before and I've had the car for ten month.

While I was waiting for my car I finished the latest (and possibly last) Point Lobos Hat. It's another Malabrigo one, in (I think) Violetas. I did this one on the size 8 needles again and with the patterned number of repeats. I'm still loving this pattern but how many hats do I need?

I'm trying to decide on my travel project for New York and I think I'm going to take one of my older UFO's. This is the Opera Scarf that I started at least a year ago, probably longer. I don't know why I put it aside since I love the yarn (Lorna's Laces) and the pattern is a simple repeat. Wait a minute. I just looked at the pattern online and I don't think it's the same as the one I have; I'm certain that mine is a 2 row repeat, not a 1 row repeat. Odd. Whatever, it's a very simple, pretty project so I think it'll be what I take.

I'm much closer to talking myself into buying the Sweetheart Bear from the Vermont Teddy Bear Company that I've been coveting. I even went as far as to rearrange my bears at home to find a place for her. And yes, I do have a perfect place, between my (almost) 50 year old dolly and little Frosty. What do you think, will I make it through the week without welcoming her to my house?

Heh. I should have a "Name the New Bear Contest." If I break down and get her, that is. Winner would get, um, hmmm, well. Maybe a Point Lobos Hat. In their favorite Malabrigo color that I have in my stash. It would be a hard contest since I'm running out of good bear names! Yes, I already have a Sweetie. And an SB. Geesh. Maybe I do have too many bears ...

But that's a hill

During the summer it gets very crowded in Danville on Thursday nights. There's the regular farmers market, which in comparison to most other markets is pretty sparse. Still, the parking lot and streets are fuller than normal. Something like every other Thursday they have a Hot Summer Night celebration which started as a car show and became a place where apparently every resident of the town shows up to see and be seen. The streets near the downtown area are a mess, tempers are flaring, it's hard to get there and risky to run. Pam and I decided to move our summer staging area to the Park and Ride. Much better. Of course, we had to tweak our course too. I mapped out a route that included more of our older route, but which didn't include the closed part of the trail or the downtown area at all.

We met at our usual time and trotted out onto the street. We found that we can use the school grounds for stretching so we're not just stopping on someone's lawn. We made a left instead of a right, another left, got back to Sycamore and, oh yeah, I remember that hill! We haven't run it in quite a while. As we started up I told Pam to go ahead, I was going to go slowly and walk if I had to. That was the plan, but except for the last block I was right behind her, gasping away. I ran the whole thing, got to the top, and we turned around and started running right back down. No breaks. I decided to take a break at the bottom instead. Then we forgot to take a break.

We ended up with a little over 4 miles, run at about a 12:00 pace. I was very very tired. For a week when I intended to take it a bit easy, because of the long run tomorrow, I didn't do a very good job. I'm going to have to try to start slowly tomorrow. Good luck with that!

There was an earthquake in Oakland very early this morning but I don't think I felt it. I remember waking a couple times in the night, one time having to jump out of bed to put pressure on my cramping foot, but I never looked at the clock and miracles of miracles I fell back asleep each time. Hopefully this is a one timer and it won't have bunches of aftershocks.

No knitting last night, I never even picked up the needles. My right hand has been bothering me a little, kinda sore and crampy and dropping things. I decided that since I was exhausted from the run too I may as well take a night off. If it had eyes I could imagine my Cider Moon scarf looking sadly at me as I neglected it.

I thought I'd throw in a picture of my pretty yard before summer happened. It's very sad that the only time my yard is very pretty is late winter and early spring. My gardeners have continued their destruction mode. They took a hedge trimmer to my jasmine, before it had stopped blooming, and now it looks like some mad animal chewed its way through the leaves. One of these days I have to start another search for a new gardener but I had no luck last year when I tried.

In preparation for Potter I decided to read the last 50 pages of the last book, just to jog my memory of what happened. Oh yeah, I remember all that! I'm ready now, ready to spend my weekend after the run reading away. Hmm, I wonder if I can read the whole thing this weekend. I also wonder if I'll take time to sleep. I'll let you know!

That's great, it starts with an earthquake ...

We had a little rock and roll last night and it wasn't R.E.M. I was sitting and knitting and watching Survivor when my couch started rocking. First, I had to decide that it was actually the earth moving and not a heart attack or stroke or something within my own body. Then, I sat there thinking "hmm, I should get up" (pause, pause, pause). "Yeah, I should really get up" (pause, pause, pause). It continued shaking and I though "I guess I'll have to get up." Then I remember the latest report I'd read that said standing in a doorway really doesn't help at all. I decided that my sofa was probably just as safe as anywhere else in the house. Finally, hours later (or maybe it was about 15 seconds later, I don't remember) the shaking stopped. As earthquakes go it was on the medium size, just a 4.2. It was centered about 14 miles from my house. Since then there have been a swarm of aftershocks, 14 to the time I'm writing this.

I wasn't scared, didn't think it was The Big One. There was no real damage anywhere so it was a lucky quake. Some people wonder why we live in earthquake country. Today's news says it all: no damage or death from the quake but in the south 20 people were killed by violent weather. And it isn't even storm season!

We got in our run last night; the rains have cleared for the next several days. It was pretty chilly, but at least we were dry. Pam and I ran our usual short short route and it felt good to be out and running again. Yet ANOTHER stupid car ran the red light as we were crossing San Ramon Valley Blvd. at the trail. It's now a regular thing and at least once a week some damn idiot zooms through the red light at 30 mph and accelerating. Even if they don't see the light, or the other cars slowing, they should see US with our lights, standing there. We've learned not to trust any car coming and we give them right of way, even if we have a green light and walk signal. I am NOT dying for my sport!

Today's GBotD is Youngster. My brother gave him to me when I was a senior in high school. My bro had bought the bear while traveling in Europe. He (the bear, not my brother) is a Steiff, complete with button in the ear. Steiff bears will last forever and are now about as expensive as a new car. Youngster is my second of 3 bears from when I lived in Michigan.

Lot of running scheduled for this weekend: 5 miles on Saturday with the Team and 20 miles on Sunday with my friends. Full reports on Monday!