Dazzled by the holiday lights

Mrs. Oz is an adherent to the Good Choice, Bad Choice School of parenting.

A typical case might involve her query to the boy Ozling just after he had been caught smacking his sister upside the head. “You struck your sister. Plus, it’s three days before Christmas. Now was that a good choice or a bad choice?”

This little pedantic exercise is supposed to help him realize the error of his ways.

My all-time favorite case was one Halloween when we were on a haunted hayrack ride where various spooky creatures popped out of the shadows in an attempt to frighten us. They had a headless horseman on a real horse. Very cool. Then we went around the bend and out popped a guy with a leather mask wielding a chainsaw and threatening to chop off our heads.

She turned to our son and said something along the lines of “Now, trying to cut peoples’ heads off with a chainsaw, is that a good choice or a bad choice?”

I didn’t do anything so crazy this morning as recklessly wielding a chainsaw or even smacking someone upside the head. But I probably have opened myself up for one of the infamous queries.

“So, Oz man, you have run twice in two weeks and today you ran 10 miles? What were you thinking?” ….(wait for it….) “Was that a good choice or a bad choice?”

In my defense, such as it is, I didn’t really mean to go so far. I just got caught up in the Christmas spirit. As I took off this morning, I kind of wanted to wind my way down to the Country Club Plaza. It was still dark, so I thought I could check out the beautiful Christmas lights. Plus, thought I might do some window shopping, er window running?

I kept telling myself to take it slow. And generally I did take it easy. John Ellis, sitting in for Steve Runner, on this past week’s edition of the Phedippidations podcast had some fascinating advice about base training. Running long and slow in the off season can provide major benefits as you prepare to begin training for a race.

He also said something about the importance of frequency and consistency. I guess three runs over two weeks doesn’t count. But I am hoping that the holiday craziness, my frantic work schedule and the icy nastiness on the streets will ease a bit so I can hit the road more regularly as I prepare for my races in 2008.