So i ran today outside in the elements and it was a pleasant 70 degrees. i drove by Stocker Stadium and kids (/gasp, i mean, young adults of the high school variety) were unloading football and cheerleading paraphernalia off a bus, so i decided to keep driving. i didn't want to run on the indoor track in the stuffy gym, so i headed to Sherwood Park and had my first sidewalk running experience. It wasn't entirely pleasant. Oh, the weather was nearly perfect, but it's not fun dodging teenagers and senior citizens and smokers when you feel like you're making a fool of yourself to begin with. Today i was running "really really slowly... Hit it like you mean it!" and at least two cars drove by full of teenagers that were laughing their heads off right when they passed me (hey, maybe i'm just paranoid, but it still felt like it was directed towards me). So... between the being paranoid about people watching, the chance of slipping on leaves, and otherwise injuring myself when i was already sore (i have no idea why)... it wasn't the most pleasant experience. My shins felt the impact most of all, and my back was unpleasantly tight, but i will say that it wasn't my lung capacity that was at fault for a change. i finished all three intervals, save for stopping 10-15s short at the end of my second (why didn't i just push through...? Maybe because my legs were killing me and it was all i could do to keep walking). Sherwood Park is definitely more hilly then you would think when just driving by, but the inclines, while not that lengthy, were definitely more steep than what i am used to. Yes, today was definitely a challenge.
For some reason, i was the only person exercising in the entire park. There was someone sleeping under a tree that made me feel a completely different type of paranoia ("if he jumps up and starts chasing me, i don't have the energy or adrenaline to run away... when is this interval going to be over?!?"), the four standing in the middle of the sidewalk laughed at me because i am wearing a "I Voted Touchscreen" sticker, and the smoker and senior citizen were surprised when i waved (in fact, the old fogie was utterly unresponsive). Yeah, not the funnest half hour, but i got through it.
Now i have to get back to my oral report for Children's Lit tomorrow. It took three librarians and me a while to find the book i was looking for (The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain by Peter Sis) because i couldn't remember the author, thought he was Ukranian instead of Czech, and was in Non-Fiction rather than with the auto-biographies or picture books even though it's an auto-biographical picture book. Fun, huh?
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