We Are Young but Getting Old Before Our Time.

Running isn't pretty...At least when I do it, it isn't.

 There weren't any races this weekend, so we had to make our own fun, and man, did we. We haven't been getting much done around the house, now that the weather has been better. Sometimes I feel badly about it, but usually I think, "If I died tomorrow, would I worry that my house wasn't clean or would I be sad that I didn't go out and play enough, while I had the chance?" Playing always wins. So, I'm sure that means I'll live to be one hundred years old in a filthy house. I can live with that.

I took 3 days off of working out last week. Not in a row, but that's a lot of time off for me. I'm glad I did, because I was a little crispy fried, and I came back on Saturday with a vengeance. I did a longer run and 50 mile bike ride to Kalona and back. It was a perfect day. I keep saying this, but I really do love my life these days. Since my girls are grown, I can do whatever I want (that I can afford and if it's legal...In general) and I am lucky enough to have found a partner who loves to play outside as much as I do.

Saturday morning, I ran a route I've been running since 1983, when I first moved to Iowa City. Of course, back then I lived downtown, so it was only 5 or 6 miles long, and now I live a lot further from it, so it has turned into a 9.2 mile route.

The last time I ran it was on February 21st. It killed me and I wasn't even going very fast. I must have just been out of shape from the Winter, but I did worry that maybe I was just old and it would always feel like that. Thank jeebus that wasn't the case. I ran it on Saturday and kept reminding myself to slow down, so I didn't kill myself like last time, but I kept just naturally "speeding" up and by the end of it, I was still just fine. I checked my stats from last time, and I averaged a half mile a minute faster than I did last time. I'm feeling a little better about running that 25K half trail run on April 11th. I just need to get some trail running in now...

John ran a 10.5 mile route, while I was running mine. We both decided to take 20 minute naps after we had grilled cheese and tomato soup for lunch.  Then at around 2:30, we headed to Kalona on our bikes.

We stopped briefly in Hills to say hi to some of our friends who were doing a different social ride and then continued on. We always take this great route that brings us through Amish country on dirt roads, where we see more horse and buggies than cars. The dirt roads never have any real gravel on them, so we are easily able to ride our road bikes on them...That was,  until now. We got caught in super heavy gravel, and the sad thing about those roads, is that there aren't enough cars to make a smoother lane. I just had to get into an easier gear and ride it slowly and remember not to brake and hope that I didn't pinch flat on a rock.

We got to the Brew pub a few minutes late, because of the gravel and the fact that my gears are screwy and need to be worked on, and my chain went off the tracks and we could barely pull it out of where it was stuck. Our friend Burn was waiting for us. He drove there and brought his bike so he could eat and drink with us and then ride part way back with us and turn around and at least get a little ride in. We ate and had a couple of beers and rode back on the wide shoulder of the highway instead of the gravel and got home just as the streetlights were coming on. We rode 50 miles there and back. It was a great way to play.