More than a third of my shopping list is candy

This has been my motto for awhile now.

Thanks anonymous stepfather for the meme!

This weekend I finally felt ready to venture out into the big wide world. I had a few plans. All of them required a sports bra, running shoes and no makeup, so it was really ideal all around.

Friday and Saturday mornings were the type that runners dream of - cool, low humidity, just a hint of a breeze. It would have been perfect for me to get my runs in then, but I like to make things difficult for myself, so I didn't.

Thursday night was the beginning of the NFL season (I say this because Alyssa from one year ago would have never known that fact) and I really had big plans of staying up to see the Ravens play. The game didn't even begin until almost 9, so a Friday morning run was out. I made it all the way until halftime at 10:30, and apparently the game took a dive into the crapper after that anyway.

I ran 8 miles (9:19 pace) after work and even then the weather was tolerable. By the time I was done and showered, it was nearly time for bed, because I had an early wakeup call Saturday.

Replace "party" with "internet" and that's me.

Baltimore has a free wellness series going on downtown at the Inner Harbor. There's free workout classes every Saturday and Sunday morning. My running store is getting involved by setting up a water stop (tons of runners training for the Baltimore marathon next month do their long runs there) and hosting a free fun run. I manned the station and hosted the run yesterday with my BFF Casi, and it was awesome. We did about 4 miles at an easy pace, and runners were super appreciative of the unexpected water stop.

It didn't hurt getting paid to stare at this view either.

After that, I finished my shift working inside the store and stocked up on my new favorite running "food" ever.

I could actually just eat this for dessert.

I had to rush out the second I my shift was over because just like the NFL, our touch football league began this weekend too!

Check out that gorgeous pink shirt.

We're playing with most of the same teammates that we played with in the spring. Our team is awesome, and everyone was super welcoming, but we'd never met any of them prior to playing, so I recruited my friend Mandy to join me this time. I actually became friends with her the old fashioned way (aka not on the internet). We work together, but less together this year now that I teach fourth grade, so I forced her to play football so she would remain in my life.

Our football game had the best possible outcome. I exaggerate a lot but I challenge anyone to find something better in any sporting event. The other team didn't have enough players show up, so they were forced to forfeit. Which meant that our team won just by showing up. It also means we get an extra $50 bar tab at the end of the season. We still had the field and referee so we played a 30 minute game just for fun, and with the pressure off, it actually was fun (sometimes I get a little stressed about my lack of skills regarding throwing, catching, and occasionally remembering which way we are supposed to run). I was so relaxed that we even went out with the team for drinks after our victory!

Since I'm hosting the fun runs at the harbor for the next few Saturdays, I'll be doing my long runs on Sundays. My friend Jen agreed to do 10 miles of my run with me this morning and offered to show me some cool new trails. 

I woke up at 4:40am all excited to finally try out this gorgeous running weather. My phone claimed that it was 70 degrees with like 88% humidity, so I kept refreshing, because I was half asleep and positive that couldn't be right.

It was. I struggled through 6 incredibly slow (10:18 pace) miles from 5-6 am, and then did a complete outfit change (hoping to avoid chafing yet completely unsuccessful) before hopping in the car. I met Jen at her house, and we ran just under 2 miles to the trails. I know that taking a break and drinking coffee in the car while driving to a friend's house doesn't really mimic race conditions, but I mimicked race conditions on my long run last week with an actual race, so we're good.

I was really, really nervous about this run. Not only did Jen really school me last week (I mean that as a compliment), we were meeting her friend Emily. I've run with Emily before and she's super nice, but also a really strong, fast runner that doesn't need to walk up hills on the trails (like me). We used to meet for bike rides followed by a 2-3 mile trail run and just that kicked my ass. 

But, I figured I can use speedwork to get faster, or I can run on unmarked trails that I've never been to with no cell phone with fast people. When your options are "keep up or die in the woods", you're forced to speed up. (They would never have really left me, it was more like my options were "keep up or embarrass yourself by begging for mercy and slowing everyone else down", so it was really shame that kept me moving).

I ended up with a total of 16.47 miles, and about 6.5 were on trails. 

The trail portion was miles 2-8ish.

Jen lives practically around the corner from Wegmans. I'm not sure how widely known this is, but anyone originally from upstate NY now living in a new state is unable to resist a nearby Wegmans. It's physics. Law of attraction or something.

Wegmans is amazing. I tweeted them last week about the lack of Chorizo in the store near me, and look what I found today.

AMAZING.

Last week they were also out of mellocreme pumpkins, much to my dismay. They distracted me from my horror by giving out free ice cream samples. This week there was no free ice cream, so thank god my pumpkins were stocked.

Eric and I are now 33 and 30, respectively, but sometimes I wonder if we are really adults. My shopping list had three kinds of candy on it. Because what am I supposed to do, replace the 1,400 calories I burned with broccoli?

FYI - choc = chocolate because I'm that lazy

Speaking of lazy, I was planning to put off my shower when I got home for like 2 hours while I drank coffee and stuffed my face. I'd changed into dry clothes after my run, and most of the sweat had dried from my hair while at the store. But then I took a look at my legs.

This forced me to shower before breakfast. #sobrave

 Stealing Logan's question: what do you refuel with after a long run/workout? What percentage of it is healthy? I'm trying to learn that whole "one treat, not an entire day of eating crap" idea. I'll eat my leftover hatch pepper grits before I dive into my half pound of candy tonight.