Day 8 - Stine: "If You Don't Run Early, There's No Guarantee You'll Get to Run"

As I learned a couple days ago, if you miss your morning miles, there is no guarantee you'll end up with the miles under your belt come midnight of the ticking "marco-clock".  I was in the predicament, as I outlined HERE, where I ended up running a midnight straddle - and in a bind, it worked great. (Confused on the marcothon challenge/concept?...the rules are laid out in the most HERE as a refresher)...I digress, but these miles early today nearly didn't happen.

I had committed to meet Priscilla out this morning for a nice morning run before church.  You can't even imagine the joy when I looked at my phone and read:

Homewood Temperature: 18 degrees, Feel Like 6 degrees.

WOO HOO!  Heat Wave. Well, kinda :)  It's all relative as we joked.  We kept saying "Boy, it's perfect weather for running today!"...then we reflected on how crazy that might sound to the general public.

I mean, this heat wave still did produce this pile of dirty clothes, not including my hat or gloves (note...I tried a different glove solution today to combat the trouble today.  Today I simply wore two pairs of stretchy knit nylon gloves...one pair over the next.  I don't know if it was the 10 degree warm up from yesterday, or simply the gloves I had on yesterday were duds...but this worked great!)

Marco-laundry, Day 9

So, it was 6:22am and I was doing my best to tiptoe down the stairs to keep all the 'little people' asleep.  As I'm stepping out, my husband says to check on our daughter as he heard her moaning in her room.  Assuming she had a bad dream, I go in and brush her hair back.  I touch her forehead and boom - fever :(  I convince her to come to bed with her dad and she begs for me to stay and rub her head.  Her dad reassured her that she'd be fine with him, so they cuddled up and I went on my way after giving her some Tylenol.

When I returned home an hour later, I find that both her and her Grandpa had gotten sick while I was gone (my in-laws are with us this weekend) and she's just yearning for mommy to stay in bed with her all day and rub her head and re-wet the wash cloth....every 10 minutes :) The plans to attend a family birthday party and pretty much anything else that would allow me to leave her side, are gone.  So, for the next X hours, my job is to be a mom.  Whatever it takes....no chance to run, no stores to go shopping at, just be here, watch her rest, and watch an old VHS tape of Alvin and the Chippettes with her (ahhhhhh!) which is in dire need of being pitched as the tracking is so awful you can barely make out the images (If you don't know what tracking on a VHS movie is, you're too young to read this blog post...haha).

But - back to the run.  We had a great time.  Anytime you run for an hour with just one other person, you find yourselves talking about any and all topics under the sun.  No topic is out of the rhelm of discussion or untouchable.  Sharing about family/work/running woes - only as a good friend and fellow "marcothon mate"....she "gets" it.  

Me and Priscilla - Izaak Walton Forest Preserve - Mile ~3.5 of 6

So, thank goodness I got out early.  I feel more confident and happy to handle the challenges at home with the mileage under my belt.  I will spend the rest of my day watching the Chippettes, scratching her back, and maybe catching up on my own sleep backlog.  Her and I are staying home from the family birthday party - and I can't say I'm bummed to get some time to just relax and be a mom to my oldest on a cold Sunday afternoon.

Tomorrow P and I plan to do 3-4 before work....it's gonna be a long week of two work overnights away from home and quick jaunt to Boston.  Oh boy....this day to relax in advance is just what the doctor ordered :)

Sunday Run

DEC 08, 2013  -  6:36 AM

MI

6.10

DURATION

57:10

AVERAGE PACE

9:22

CALORIES BURNED

687

(Side note...our nanny is now doing the marcothon with her boyfriend!  And with the baby being 17 months old, she has been joining her during the "warm hours" of the day outside on the 3-miler-minimums.  Anyone else out there taking on this personal challenge?  It's never to late to jump on board!)

"Future Runner" out for some marcothon miles!