"Normal"

I am the worst blogger. I love reaching out to other runners, but as I get closer to an important race the less likely I am to blog about training or running or share what my goals are or other things that "normal" bloggers blog about. I love reading about all that stuff when other people write about it, but I like to make like a clam and close my shell. ;)

I don't think I mentioned this previously, but I was picked to blog about the Boston Marathon on Boston.com. I've done a few posts. My most recent post can be found here if you're interested...I found blogging on another site more challenging than I would have thought. I don't feel like I know the audience. I feel like most of the people who read this blog are probably people relatively similar to me, you know, running is just something we do (all the time). I'm not sure that's the case over on the other blog. Or at the very least, I just don't know what the general experience it. When writing posts I would find myself wondering if people would think an 80 mile week was excessive, or would they be really grossed out by the fact that I'm constantly losing my toenails? And for whatever reason, people can't seem to leave comments, so I have no idea what they might be thinking. 

I love when you guys leave comments. I think the best aspect of blogging is the dialogue that might come after a post. It's interesting to get other people's thoughts on various subjects. 

Well, Boston is 11 days away, so I guess I should mention the highlights. (If you're super interested in my training you can always see what I'm doing on DailyMile.) I'm in full on taper, and yes, also full on crazy mode. In true tapering fashion, my right hip started to bother me on Saturday, so I took Sunday and Monday off. 

During my peak week I ran 80 miles, last week I wound up with 53 (but had planned to run 60), and this week I'll probably wind up with 42-50 miles. All typical. My hip bothers me when I sit or lay down, but not when I'm running, which is also pretty typical for me. I'm so weird...

I have my ride to Boston with the GLRR all set, and my parents are picking me up at  the finish. My mom is so cute. I think she's been to the finish just to figure out where to park and such. I've been studying the course, and reading all kinds of "advice" for the Boston course, but honestly a lot of it seems random and not backed up by evidence or experience. I'm planning to call my college friend this weekend and get her take on the course. She's run there at least twice successfully. I'm predicting that when she eventually gets back there that she'll run sub-3:00. 

Feel free to throw in your thoughts on the Boston course (or if you'll be at Boston). One of the sillier things I read was to go out 25 seconds slower than MP for the first 5 miles...there was no explanation for this (other than you'll feel better at the end). I don't get it, though. It seems to me that it may actually take more energy to slow down that much if you're running down hill. Perhaps I'm missing something crucial.

I'll leave you with this gem from Calvin and Hobbes that Nick sent me last week. I'm not sure if it's Kosher that I copied it, but I got it from: http://www.gocomics.com/. It. Is. AWESOME! As an aside, Kaylee is a lot like Calvin sometimes. One day she asked me if she could pretend her pancakes were "grubs and slugs".