Why I run at night

In Florida, I have two choices when running outside: early morning or night. I choose night, and here's why. 

1. I’m a natural night owl that dreads the morning. Gosh, I hate waking up early. It’s one of my least favorite things; it always has been. I wake up with just enough time to get ready. That’s it. No extras. I think I’d start to dread running if I had to wake up early to do it (races and training group runs are the exceptions). 
2. There is no big, scary sun to contend with. I burn easy. I get hot easy. I need to avoid this ball of fire if at all possible. 
3. There are limited (or no) people out at this time. I usually run around an almost 3-mile loop in my neighborhood. It gets very competitive in the morning and early evening. When my dad was visiting, he got stressed out trying to walk the dog because of all the congestion. There are runners, walkers, bikers, strollers and dogs everywhere. It's cool I live in an active area, but sheesh, I hate dodging all the traffic. 
4. It's peaceful. Because of reason #3, it's quiet. I love this.
5. It's dark. If anyone does happen to be around, they don't have to clearly see my sweaty, red-faced self.

Of course, running at night isn't perfect. Here's why.

1. There are limited (or no) people out at this time. Thankfully, I live in a safe area, and I've never had any issues, but I realize this could be a problem. I play it safe and never listen to music and stay alert. 
2. Bugs, specifically no-see-ums. If I go out at the wrong time, these bugs are everywhere. I come back from a run with a sweaty face plastered with bugs. It's a cute look.
3. It can get pushed aside. If work gets crazy, and I have to spend half the night proofreading, running gets bumped. Thankfully, that doesn't happen too often.
4. It's more humid ... or at least it feels that way. In Florida, it really doesn't matter the time of day, it's humid. Really humid. But, I think it's more humid at night. I have no scientific evidence to back this up, though.

My sweaty self after a humid night run

The most meaningful 5K

When I interviewed for my job almost six years ago, I met a woman with an incredible smile and an incredible personality to match. She made me feel welcome and comfortable immediately. I felt like I was talking to a friend throughout the interview.

When I asked others why they liked working there, they replied "the people." I could understand that response, if only for this woman. 

I got the job, and I got to know this woman a little better. She always had a smile, always had a funny story and always had a fantastic attitude. 

Unfortunately, a few years later, she was diagnosed with cancer. She kept her fabulous attitude, always smiling and never getting down. I've never seen someone go through such a serious illness with such grace. I never heard her utter a compliant.

Earlier this year, she died. 

On Saturday, my firm is participating in a run and walk that benefits a local cancer center in her honor. I'm proudly running the 5K.

I started thinking about my goal for this race: I want a better 5K time. But, then I realized my goal should be to enjoy every moment of this race. If a better time comes along with it, fabulous. If not, I'm honoring this woman with a smile, something she put on my face every time I was in her presence.

Running in a cotton T-shirt and other randomness

I have a lot of random stuff on my mind, so what better place to spew it than here (you may think otherwise ... sorry).

• I'm running a 5K on Saturday. In a cotton T-shirt. For a sweaty turtle, this is bad, bad news. Why the cotton shirt? It's a work-related run, so we all need to be corporate in our matching shirts. Great. I'll be a hot mess around work peeps.
  
• I get so irritated at the phrase, “I’m just sayin’.” Argh! It grated on my nerves to even type it. I really don’t understand its purpose. Obviously you’re just sayin’ because you just said it. See? There is no need for this ridiculous phrase. EVER.   
• Almost every weekend, we head to a dog park with a beach in Tampa. Being the baseball-loving girl that I am, I know that Derek Jeter (Yankees shortstop) happens to live on the island (not that I ever see him). Yesterday, Evan Longoria (Rays third baseman) tweeted asking for a good dog park/beach with real grass. Of course I suggested this park.

• I recently heard two guys admit that they sing along to Justin Bieber's "Boyfriend." As they should! That song is a jam (and reminds me of Justin Timberlake ... almost exactly). Don't be embarrassed, boys.

No morning runs for me ... for awhile

I went to a Cinco de Mayo/Kentucky Derby/graduation party on Saturday. Considering I didn’t drink tequila or Corona, I didn’t have one bite of Mexican food, we didn’t watch the Kentucky Derby or wear fun hats, I guess it really was just a graduation party. But, it was awesome. 

These peeps had the coolest yard ever complete with a pool, aviary and rooftop deck.

I am sporting some pretty awesome windblown bangs on the rooftop deck.

Being the awesome blogger that I am, I got so wrapped up in competitive games of ladder ball that I forgot to take one photo after the rooftop deck photo. Perhaps the black raspberry vodka had something to do with it, too. Ahem.

But, the important thing is: I dominated at ladder ball. I'm just a wee bit competitive.  

Source

Normally, I'd be worrying about what time we were leaving the party and when I needed to start chugging water since Sundays are long run days. But, since I ditched the running group for a few months, I didn't have to worry about those things. I just had to worry about winning ladder ball.

I'm not a morning person (at all), so without the group peer pressure, I'm not waking up early to run. Running at night is more my thing.

Welcome, my new long run night: Monday. Yes, Monday. I'm keeping my "long" runs between 5 and 8 miles now, so even for a turtle like me, that's an hour and a half at the most. Totally doable on a Monday night. 

The 16-minute run

I used to think that I needed to have at least 40 minutes if I was going run. Why I thought this, I'm not sure. If I had less time than that, I always picked another workout option.

Well, not anymore.

Enter SELF magazine.

A 16-minute workout? Can you really accomplish much in 16 minutes? 

A sweaty, worn-out turtle says, "YES!"

I ran almost 2 miles in 16 minutes. Pretty speedy for this slow girl.

The hard intervals seemed extremely doable because they were only one minute. The whole workout seemed extremely doable because it was only 16 minutes. 

I'm going to love this for days with limited time. Maybe I can even start doing this in the mornings. Oh, who am I kidding? Even 16 minutes in the mornings is too much to ask. 

The craptastic gym saga

You may remember that I recently did something brilliant. 

I stole the fan from the craptastic condo gym's weight room and put it on top of the elliptical in front of the treadmill. Genius, if I do say so myself.

When I say stole, I really mean borrowed. Even though I thought both the cardio and weight area equally deserved a fan, I put it back where I found it.

Every craptastic gym visit, I went to the weight room, grabbed the fan, set it up, ran and then replaced the fan when I was done. 

Until I saw this.

 Yes, those are TWO fans in the weight area. Uncool, weight room. Uncool.

So, at that point, I decided it was OK to leave one in the cardio area. Cardio folks deserve air movement, too. We're sure not getting it by opening the windows.

So, I left a fan in the cardio area. Seems fair, right?

Well, last night I arrived at the craptastic gym and found this.

Yes, that's a new fan with "DO NOT REMOVE" written on the bottom. Perplexing. 

When I went to the weight room to see what was up with their fans, I found this on the door. 

 And, the door was locked.

So, this leaves me with many questions:

• How does an entire weight room because inoperable? I understand if a machine didn't work, but the whole room?
• What happened in there? Did someone have 'roid rage because it was too hot with only one fan? Or did someone sweat so much with only fan that the room needed to be fumigated?
• Did I have anything to do with the fan with the giant "DO NOT REMOVE" message? Or was that directed at weight room fan hogs?

Running (and other randomness)

Since Florida feels like the surface of the sun (but more humid) from now until at least September, my race schedule drops off dramatically. As in basically nothing except one (maybe two) 5Ks until November. 

Surface of the sun (but more humid): craptastic
gym and outdoors (May-September)

 So, I decided to start dreaming about next race season ... just about six months in advance. 

And, I think I want to do a local halfathon challenge that involves four half marathons: October (Halloween race, and I think I require a costume), December, January and March, in addition to the Women's Half Marathon in November and Rock 'n' Roll in February. Six in six months. That's doable, right?

I keep hesitating because one race involves big, scary bridges. There's no way I'd sign up for the race on its own, but as part of a package deal, I'd have to do it. And challenge myself. I need that. 

Now for other randomness: 

• Jessica Simpson had her baby today! I shrieked a little when I heard it. I'm that excited. What I'm not excited about is that little Miss Maxwell Drew Johnson missed my birth month by a day. One day! I kind of love her name (and her mom), so I'll forgive her.

Maxwell's mom at the best concert ever

• I didn't try almond butter for the longest time because of it's pricey status. Um, $11 per jar? Is this normal? Do others actually pay this price? I found it on sale for $4.99 and could handle that. Problem is I now love it, but I refuse to pay double-digits for some nut butter. 
• I'm looking forward to a May trip to spend time with these crazy peeps.

Hmm. Maybe I'm the crazy one.