Beautiful Weekend

It was an absolutely beautiful weekend here in Nashville. There wasn't a cloud in the sky on Saturday. When Brent got up we geared up and headed out for some hill work. There's a subdivision about a mile from our house that's very hilly (it's actually called The Highlands). We don't get to run there much this time of year because it's always dark when we run and they don't have sidewalks or a lot of streetlights. It's straight up, and up, and you turn a curve and go up some more. Whew!! Once we leave the subdivision we make a turn through the park and back up a different street, then right on a major road and back into our subdivision. It ends up being a large loop with no repeats or out/back so it's a nice change from our normal Tues & Thurs night runs. We ended up running 4.66 miles at a pretty decent pace. Mile 1 was 9:38, Mile 2 (The hill portion) 10:10, Mile 3 (flat, flat, flat) 8:58, Mile 4 (steep hill plus traffic) 9:57 and the .66 was at a 8:55 pace. It was great run, after so many cloudy days it was fantastic to be out in the sun running again!! I think running in the dark so much now makes me LOVE the sunlight. There were a lot of people out working in the yard & decorating for Halloween so it was perfect morning to enjoy the fall weather.

Our main event of the day was Boston Terrier Day. Last year we went and had a huge time playing with the other Bostons. What we remembered last year was that everything was slow. All of the contests and group pictures were later in the afternoon. So, we slept in Sat morning (sort of - Pips woke me up at 7:30 for a bathroom break and I couldn't get back to sleep - which was not a pproblem for him and Brent didn't even know I had gotten up), went for our run, and then showered and headed out for BT day. It was slated for 10-3 and there was NO schedule of events provided on their website or on the emails from the organizers. We showed up about 12:45. They had already put the lunch up. Huh?? We had to ask if there was any food yet and this lady said 'Oh, did you want to eat?' Uh, yeah. The fat check I just dropped in your donation box says I've bought at least a few BBQ sandwiches for us and we were STARVED. Very unhappily she took the aluminum foil off of an extremely full tray of BBQ and made us two tiny sandwiches. Devil woman. When we got there they were finishing the costume contest and we saw part of the 'best trick' contest. Note to the people we saw: teaching your dog to carry a frisbee in it's mouth is not a trick. Seriously. And then that was it. BT "Day" was over at about 1:15. They started packing everything up and everyone left. We must have missed the group photo, too. I was really disappointed. Pippin wasn't because he got to lick a few BTs and jump on a few people. Since we had "allotted" BT day until 3 we went to the off leash dog park there at EW Park. Last time we went to this dog park it was us and two unfriendly pit bulls. Luckily it was swarming with tons of dogs and their people. We carried our lawn chairs and picked out a shady spot. Pippin is a little strange at the dog park - he won't come anywhere near us. He usually picks another family and will sit near them, run and play, and go back to other people. I've finally decided he does that because he's scared we're going to make him leave. If I try to call him he won't act like he knows me (or his name) at all. He usually runs from me and I end up tackling or cornering him when it is time to leave. Mostly he sat near another family, under a bench, until a group of big dogs came tearing through and sort-of cornered him under the bench. He's not a barker (he's a licker) and he doesn't like other barkers, esp when they're loud and in his face like these dogs were. He started freaking and barked and snapped at these dogs so I got up and rescued him. He sat in my lap for a few minutes and then decided he was safe to go back to his old spot. A little while later a little fluffy dog his size named Cocoa showed up and he decided he liked her A LOT. In the way dogs like other dogs. Cocoa felt like she really needed to know Pips better than that so she ran and he chased her for a while. Cocoa's owners were about our same age and sat over near us so we had a good chuckle out of it. Eventually we decided Pips was pooped and we headed home. BT day was a bust but Pips still had a huge time and he doesn't even know he missed the group pic. We also took him to the Pet Supermarket and let him pick out a couple of treats.


For dinner we headed to our fave Indian restaurant and on to Target and spent way too much money on halloween decorations. I'm super into Halloween this year so I got some lights for outside and then some garland and spider lights to go around our fireplace. And a skull that lights up. We found a bumble bee costume for Pippin. It's hilarious. Everyone should have a dog so they can dress it up! Then we headed home and watch Wedding Date. This movie sucked. It was boring and predictable, and was much better when it was called Pretty Woman and starred Julia Roberts and Richard Gere. We printed out some maps for this afternoon's 16 mile run and headed to get some sleep!! I'll post about the 16-mile run tomorrow. It was great, and we survived with only being nearly run over by a handful of cars.

Hope everyone had great races and runs this beautiful fall weekend!! Is anyone else craving cider?? Ever since we visited this place in Vermont a few years ago I LOVE getting cider in the fall. But it's just not the same from the grocery store. I've thought about buying some over the 'net from them but that may be just a little too obsessed.

Have a great Monday!

Rachel

Exercise-
Friday - 1 mile am walk with Pippin
Sat - 4.66 mile run, walking at the park
Sun - 16 mile run