Time to go

We sincerely were glad to see you when you first arrived.

Come on in and let me take your coat. Can I get you a drink? How’s the family? Any new pictures?

You cracked us up with your stories about the latest adventures of the little ones. We reminisced and enjoyed the visit by a friend we had not seen in quite some time.

Sit, dinner’s ready. We ate, we laughed, we opened a bottle of wine. And then another. Good times. Good times.

Then the hour started to get late. We didn’t want to be rude hosts. But as our eyes grew heavy and we stole glances at the clock, you didn’t notice. You weren’t even slowing down. Midnight came and went. 1 a.m. soon was in the rearview mirror.

We’ve got to work tomorrow. Then you cranked up the music. And started dancing. On the furniture. Dude, you are going to wake the children. Craaackkk! There goes a table leg.

Uncool. Very uncool.

This essentially is how I am feeling about winter.

Fall completely rocks. I even like to see winter arrive. The crispness to the air is refreshing. A blanket of snow is absolutely beautiful. I was thrilled when the season started.

But now? Enough already.

I know, I know. It can't last too much longer, and others have had it far worse. Our old home in Milwaukee probably won’t dig out from all the snow until June. Chicago has not exactly enjoyed a picnic. But we’ve been smacked around by our share of ice storms this year. The snow keeps coming – and these jokers in this town don’t seem to know how to plow or shovel sidewalks. They keep shutting down the schools, exacerbating the daily chaos of our lives. My scheduled runs have had to be scrapped a few times.

When I do go out, it often devolves into a struggle to stay upright rather than a quality workout. Thursday morning didn’t seem so bad. At first. Then the sleet arrived.

My glasses have fogged over before. Running in the rain, I have had them covered in drops. Thursday was a first. The glasses soon were covered in a solid glaze of ice.

Rubbing them with a gloved finger did nothing. I needed an ice scraper like the one I use on my car, only smaller. Anybody know where I can get a miniature scraper?

What's the matter with Garmin?

OK fellow runners, the Philosophy Café now is open for business.

If a runner runs 6 miles, but doesn’t record it on his Garmin, did he really run?

This isn’t just one of those hypothetical if a tree falls in the forest ponderings. I am really wondering about the answer. Sort of.

This morning as I stumbled down the stairs to gather my gear and head out, I strapped on Garmito. As I turned on the power, it beeped at me. “Low Battery,” it whined.

For a moment I thought it had taken some kind of reading of my body and issued an alert. I was feeling kind of tired, but was I really that run down? Wait a minute. The warning was about the electronic device, not me.

Then as I thought I might be able to sneak in a run before the Garmin completely lost power, it went dark.

For a moment, I actually thought about scrapping my planned run. Pathetic, I realize. But I like my running companion. I like to hear the reassuring beep as I tick off the miles. I love plugging it in on my return to log my latest progress.

Nevertheless, I bundled up, sucked it up and headed out the door. Without Garmito.

I guess I ran 6 this morning. Don’t really have any satellite-in-the-sky-tracking-my-progress proof, though.

I got the low battery warning on my Saturday run, but it had enough power to survive the distance. I had the sucker plugged in the night before both times.

Something definitely is going around lately. People all over the place are getting knocked flat on their back with the flu and other assorted versions of the nasties.

Do you think my Garmin has caught a cold?

Extra fluffy

All is right with the world.

The flakes are falling. Big time.

I got my 8 miles in. Yesterday.

The perfect medley of tunes is providing a mellow Sunday morning soundtrack.

The cakes were extra fluffy and warm this morning. Mmmm.

Good tunes, good grub, but where's the good attitude?

Help me, fellow runners.

I went out this morning for a jaunt and once again encountered face-stinging, thigh-numbing cold. Enough already.

Many are suffering through far more severe winters this season. Running Jayhawk, Jason and Leah and Mouse all are getting dumped on by near-continuous ice, snow and arctic blasts in Chicago. Our previous home in Milwaukee has been getting dumped on big time this winter. One of the top 5 snowiest seasons, I think they are saying.

Still, even down here in the land of Oz, the ice storms, snow and cold are notching chinks in my runner’s resolve. I’m trying to catch a glimpse of sunny rays poking through the clouds, literally and metaphorically. Spring has to be coming soon. I’ll bet we shouldn’t have to deal with these truly unfriendly temperatures for all that much longer, but I need some help bucking up.

I would love to hear some of your coping with the bleakness of winter strategies, fellow runners. The Oz household has no gym membership nor treadmill, so those aren’t options. I need to get my tail on the road in the elements.

So I need to bundle up with fleece and other cold-weather paraphernalia. But most importantly, I need to wrap up in a good attitude. That’s the part that’s been hurting lately.

While not perfect, my approach involves good tunes and good food.

My buddy Henry, a fellow runner from Omaha, was appalled at my tendency to listen to what he considered to be boring podcasts while driving to and from work. He responded by sending me a tremendous gift: a couple of mix CDs.

Granted, I had at least a few of the artists already on my playlists. I had some KT Tunstall, Liz Phair, John Mayer and Colbie Caillat. But I felt even more tragically unhip than I usually do when I realized the depth of my tunes void when Henry introduced me to The Fray, Red Hot Chili Peppers, New Radicals, Feist and Natasha Bedingfield, among others.

I have been Jamming moreso than listening to Podcasts on my morning and evening drives lately. It’s definitely a welcome mood booster. I just have an old iPod classic, and not a compact iPod shuffle, so I don’t take the tunes on my runs, but I can see how that would be cool.

My other strategy involves food. Sure, I just about ate my weight in Girl Scout cookies in January, a couple of Dove Bars got scarfed in a fit of indulgence – and maybe a little self pity – and I did go for a juicy burger with piles of blue cheese and a mound of sweet potato fries the other day.

That’s not necessarily a helpful sort of food, though.

Comfort food – the kind that satisfies your soul and fuels a runner’s body – Now that is what I am talking about. On Sunday, I decided, I must roast a chicken.

Sliced some red potatoes, some carrots, quartered an onion and quartered some fennel (it looks weird, but try it; it’s awesome when roasted.)

Then cut a lemon in half, slice a whole head of garlic in half and then stuff it up the patoot of a chicken (after first removing the assorted stuff inside, of course)

Dump the veggies in roasting pan, put the chicken on top. I dribbled some melted butter over it, sprinkled with some salt and pepper. I got a little fancy schmancy with some sprinkled herbs de Provence, but you could also just toss on a dash of thyme.

Place that sucker in a 425 degree oven for an hour and a half to almost two hours. Take it out, let it sit for about 15 minutes. Then slice away and feed your friends, family, your soul and your runner’s body.

So I’m going to try leaning more on good tunes, good food (and the occasional Dove Bar) and thoughts of sunny days sure to come soon. Hope some of this works for you, too, and I would welcome your advice on getting through to Spring.

Shh! Don't tell anyone else we're racing

When not blessed with blazing speed, stealth helps.

I ran the 9 on the 9th this morning. What a fantastic idea to shake off the winter doldrums. It’s nothing short of brilliant, Nancy. Thanks for your stellar performance as race director. I needed a race to get my running mojo flowing again.

It was a wee bit chilly as the Saturday morning running group gathered south of town in Grandview, Missouri. Usually the starting area before a race is filled with a little tension as the assembled racers survey the competition and fight off any last-minute mind games before the gun goes off. Everybody seemed remarkably calm today, though. They were just chatting away before the various pace groups were dispatched.

It was like they didn’t even know they were participating in a race.

Er, I guess they didn’t.

I sure wasn’t going to let them in on the secret. Some of these runners are smokin’ fast.

While running along the trail near Longview Lake I would put a runner in my sights, grind it out and pick them off at will as I cruised on by. Again, it was like they didn’t even know we were racing.

Maybe if some of those rabbits that normally line up in my 5Ks had a similarly lackadaisical attitude I might get the chance to place in my age group. Sometime before I am 70.

Toward the end of the run, I finally let my running buddy Jeff in on the news that we actually were in an officially sanctioned event. But I made sure to finish with a strong surge at the end just to make sure nobody could sneak up from behind at the last minute.

Granted, my 10:19 pace for the 10 miles (the watch said I did 9 in 1:32) was more at training pace than true race pace. But in my mind, and that’s perfectly fine considering this was a virtual race, I was flying.

Have you seen my mojo?

I’ve been getting out there, in balmy weather and bad, to log some miles.

But, Dude, I can’t seem to find my mojo.

Following a training schedule again and looking forward to some halfs later in the spring certainly is helping. But you know what would really help?

I need a race.

Before my lovely Ozlings unleashed a near case of the flying yarkies, or a possible strep attack, I was planning to do the Groundhog Run a couple weeks ago. Running underground to get beautiful 70-degree temps in February certainly has some appeal as I look out the window to see the latest batch of the fluffy white stuff covering the ground.

But alas, I was feverish and weak – moreso than usual – and had to log a Did Not Start (or was it a DNR because I did not register?) for the Groundhog.

As I mentioned, the ground is covered with fluffy flakes so this isn’t exactly prime racing season here in the Land of Oz and surrounding environs. Not many, if any, races to pick from in the coming weeks. What to do, what to do?

Then along comes Topher telling me about Non-Runner Nancy and her 9 on the 9th!

Perfect!

You can tell I’m psyched because, ordinarily, I’m not one to go with gratuitous exclamation points.

So I’m going to sign up (not exactly sure of the procedure, but I’ll figure something out) and on Saturday I’m going to do the run. I’ll bring the proper virtual mindset, imagining all the rabbits at the starting line prepared to smoke me and my other fellow middle-of-the-pack runners that will be smoked –and maybe even impressed – by my steady pace and dogged determination. This thing is awesome. She's got a race logo and everything.

This event is like a ray of sunshine brightening up an otherwise bleak winter landscape.

Johnny Cash, Ninja runner

That whole man in black thing seemed to work well for Johnny Cash.

I don’t recommend it for a runner who gets his miles in before the sun comes up.

The wind shirt I grabbed out of the closet this morning did its job in keeping me warm. But black tights, a black wind shirt and a black hat didn’t make me stand out very well to passing motorists.

I know this because the newspaper guy just about sideswiped me and then nearly took my head off as he chucked the morning news out his van window to the driveway I happened to be passing at the time.

I completely failed to heed the recent sartorial advice of Half-Fast who urged runners in the dark to do their part for safety.

“Before I run in the dark I try and make myself more reflective than a disco ball and just as cool. The thought of getting hit by a car is more than a little unpleasant, which is why I wear reflective shoes, reflective pants, a reflective shirt, reflective gloves and of course the ensemble wouldn’t be complete without my über-cool reflective slap bands,” Half-Fast wrote recently.

Just this past weekend I was checking out one of those reflective vests. I walked out of the store without buying it, though, so it didn’t offer much protection this morning.

Then to add to my missteps, I was bored with my typical routes so I went exploring. It took me along this nasty busy road that lacked sidewalks. Do my frequent leaps from the road to the grassy shoulder as the cars whizzed by make this count as cross training?

I got my miles in this morning, but basically I feel lucky that I didn’t become a hood ornament on somebody’s car.

I am going to have to make some adjustments to the whole Johnny Cash-Ninja look before I hit the road next time.

Wardrobe malfunction

OK, so my wardrobe malfunction wasn’t quite so dramatic as the Super Bowl saga from a couple years ago.

It was a wee bit traumatic for me, though. Well, maybe traumatic is overstating. Can we go with pain in the patoot?

No networks stand to be fined. Though I am about to pay a penalty in the form of having to invest in new running gear.

Cruising along in the wee hours this morning, I was merely hoping to log an easy three miles.

It wasn’t too chilly, but I had my running jacket on to break the wind. Dang, got a little of the fabric caught in the zipper. Run a bit, then mess with the zipper. No luck. Run some more. Mess with zipper a little more.

OK, that wind is kind of cold. Sure wish I could zip up this jacket. Pull, pull, yank…..!

Oh no.

The zipper died. It stared at me forlornly with a zippery but definitely mangled sort of smile. I looked back with a similar sort of confused and dazed look as the ones that settled on the faces of Janet and Justin back in 2004.

I think this jacket is toast. That’s a problem because the next few scheduled runs will be on mornings when it definitely is not going to be toasty outside. I need a nice shirt for a base layer, some fleece and my once-trusty wind jacket.

Going to have to make do with some sort of a plan B. Then maybe I can pick up a new jacket in time for Saturday’s long run.

Don’t really have room in the budget for one of the fancy, schmancy really pricey Gore-Tex models. But something tells me that here at the start of February I am going to have a few more days this season when I need to layer up.

What to do, what to do…..