Change of seasons

Hey everyone! Thanks for all your nice comments/concern about Friday's pain in the neck wreck. We're very glad to be safe and 'relieved' that if this had to happen the Expedition and our camping trip are the only sacrifice made! To answer a couple of questions - the redneck showed NO remorse. She never apologized or seemed regretful in any way - only "upset" that "Nissan is going to be really mad at her THIS time". If it were me, and I made this mistake (because we ALL make mistakes) I would have been bawling and so completely upset that I created such a headache for innocent people - and could have REALLY hurt someone. I don't understand how she could be so empty of remorse - but one guess is that her insiders are as leathery and stretched as her outsides. Also, no one's airbags went off. I guess because ours was a side impact (and we have front and passenger a-bags) ours didn't go off. I'm not sure why hers didn't, but this is our first (and hopefully last) wreck so I don't really understand how all that works. I have a feeling I'm about to be really educated in how the whole insurance nightmare works. Thank goodness it appears she has insurance and one of our neighbors who owns an auto body shop said her insurance provider is pretty good.

Ok, so let's leave the wreck behind and talk about the rest of the weekend!! We weren't about to let redneck mullet lady "wreck" our Friday so we went to Outback Steakhouse for dinner Friday night with our camping pals P & S. Our original Plan B was to go to the new Cheesecake Factory that opened on Thursday....on our way there P called and their wait was 2.5 hours. CRAZY! So we went to Plan C and had a yummy dinner at the Outback. Brent and I have been to numerous Cheesecake Factories across the nation (Chicago, Vegas, Orlando, and prob a few more I can't remember) so we really didn't care. For a couple of work occasions I've even had a few sweet people fly in their Cheesecakes for me for the celebration! Afterwards we just hung out at their house and watched some telly. It was then that we realized it was our 10th anniversary! Ha! Not our wedding anniversary, but the 10th anniversary we started going out. (Our 7th wedding anniversary will be Jan 1st.) Sweet! What a way to spend the day!!

Saturday we slept in. It was really, really nice! Even Pippin slept in - instead of waking me up about 7 he slept until 8:30. I think it was around 10 before I even officially got out of bed. We decided to skip running Sat morning and head out to enjoy the beautiful day. We ran a few errands (including more shopping at Target - someone PLEASE stop me!!) and had a late lunch/early dinner at La Paz. Their food is SO good and they have a nice, large patio you can eat out on. It's Tex Mex and they have THE best cheese dip. A friend of ours turned us on to the place when he threw a party and had them cater it. There are 7 of them in various cities in the Southeast so if you ever run across one check it out. After we ate we did some more shopping at the Green Hills Mall. For my birthday Aveda, Origins and Victoria's Secret had sent me some really, really nice gift certificates so I ran in to cash in on my special gifts. They were really sweet deals so make sure you sign up on their mailing lists. Aveda sent me a $25 gift, Origins sent me $10 and Victoria's Secret sent $10. Not bad!! To top off the night we watched 40-yr old Virgin. It was pretty funny, but I had thought it would be funnier. It's no Old School. It's a renter, not a buyer. We printed out maps for today's 17-mile run and got some sleep....

So, the weather has changed here a bit over the past few days. In the middle of last week we had mid-80's. On Friday afternoon a cool front came through and dropped us to the mid-60's - which was actually really nice on Saturday. It was a beautiful day for t-shirts and jeans and a jacket at night. Today when we first got up it was cool, but also fairly sunny with blue skies and whispy white clouds. By the time we headed out for the afternoon run it was no longer sunny, the wind had picked up and the sun had basically set. From the start of our run to the end of our run the temperature dropped from 55 to 43. Uh, yeah. I knew it wouldn't be getting any warmer today but I didn't think it would be getting that cold! We created our running path using a map of the Vanderbilt campus and a running map of a surrounding neigborhood. We started out from a local running store and then headed down through Music Row and back up 21st. 21st is home to Vanderbilt and all of its affiliated hospitals, our fave Indian restaurant - AND - Ben and Jerry's. Yum! We ran the 3 mile path around Vanderbilt and then ran off the main road and through campus. What a beautiful campus! The buildings are very old and there were tons of leaves falling creating a beautiful fall run. There were chipmunks running around everywhere and I could just picture us on a sunny day reading a book stretched out on a blanket. We looped back around campus and took another trail through the campus. There was some sort of American Heart Association walk gearing up and they were setting up all kinds of booths and even had tubs of Dasani water all over campus. On a hot day we definitely would have borrowed some of those!! From there we started working our way back towards the car to exchange out our empty water bottles. It was so cold we really weren't drinking much, but around 10 miles I like to refuel just in case. Somehow we managed to time it perfectly and arrived back at our car at exactly 10 miles. From there we decided to loop through the neighborhood. I was having a seriously hard time running today. I think the weather (and some raging PMS) were a huge part of it. My arms have been hurting me ever since the wreck. It's actually from carrying Pippin around the hour after it, not from the actual wreck. He's nearly 30 pounds, so toting him around for an hour wears on you. Holding my arms in "running pose" kills me, so the run was not an easy one today. As far as legs, ankles, knees, etc - no problems. Today my #1 enemy was my head. I started having a rough time around mile 8, and continued the mental struggle until about mile 15 when I knew we would finish. From the car our plan was to head down one particular way until mile 13.5 when we'd be able to turn around and run back to finish the 17. About 2 miles in that direction the sidewalks ended so we had to make up some runs through the neighborhood. These houses are beautiful - old, early 1900's craftsman's cottages and A-frames, and some Victorian houses. They remind me a lot of the beautiful homes around Salem, Mass. If we decided to stay in this area, when we move next spring this is the neighborhood we'd like to move to. But man, it is HILLY! I swear we only went uphill - I have no clue how we missed the downhills!! We made several more laps throughout the neighborhood and ran past the Heart Walk celebration two more times before the run was over. We also tried out the gummi bears thing today. I have to say I liked it! I have a tough time with gu so the gummis were definitely much better and helped lift my angry mood. Our splits today were not pretty - we started out the first 5 or so miles right around (and often below) my 10.30 marathon goal, but then we slipped lower due to our mental battles, the stupid weather and the HILLS! Our overall average ended up just below 11.30 per mile. I don't think I've ever had splits that high!! I was cold for the last 7 miles, and once when it started to drizzle I thought about just laying down on the concrete and throwing a temper tantrum. So who wants to be my running partner?? Anyway, we made it - together - and I know next week will be much better. If you don't have runs like these how will you know when you've had a good run???

Rachel

Exercise -
Friday - 1 mile am walk with Pippin
Sat - no formal exercise but lots of shopping!!
Sun - 17 mile run