Slow and Slower

I wanted to stay in bed. I went to bed late again and had my alarm set for ten after five, unfortunately I fell asleep on both my arms (how the hell did that happen?..)and was awoken by that about thirty minutes before I had to get up. Of course, I rolled over and adjusted so that I could resume my rest and then I hear the incessant..beep beep beep beep. Snooze. Beep beep beep beep. Snooze. BEEEEEEEEPPPPPP. FINE THEN! I dragged myself out today in an incoherent state and gingerly got dressed.

As we drove there I kept entertaining thoughts of just sitting at the Starbucks we park at and just sipping coffee instead of running. Leah pulls up looking as dead as I do. While we waited for the signal on her Garmin, we waste time with small talk to avoid the inevitable...fartleks*. It is only 6am and it is 80 degrees and 90% humidity. It is one of those good Southeast Texas mornings where you serve atmosphere on a plate. We decide that fartleks are not a good idea and just decide to power through our 24 minute run. It is needless to say miserable, it smelled wet outside (with the occasional cologne a la skunk) and I rereleased something this morning. When you run you feel every bump, incline, texture, crack and crevice. There are things I never thought I'd notice that I take for granted while walking that I now feel (and subsequently avoid). On the turnaround Leah commented that she felt like she was swimming in hot tomato soup. It felt more like going to the pool in the summer when it's about 101 degrees and there are too many bodies in the water. We finished at a colossally slower pace than usual (17:30 which included 6 minutes of walking). Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

P.S. I didn't die from the sandwich yesterday.

*Fartleks according to Wikipedia "Fartlek, which means "speed play" in Swedish,[1] is a form of interval training which puts stress on the whole aerobic energy system due to the continuous nature of the exercise. The difference between this type of training and continuous training is that the intensity or speed of the exercise varies, meaning that aerobic and anaerobic systems can be put under stress. It differs from traditional interval training in that it is unstructured; intensity and/or speed can be varied whenever the athlete wishes.[2]"