If I'm forced to work, at least it's with awesome people

 

 

I've been excited about Halloween for two weeks now. Not because I bothered to get it together and create a costume, but because it was my work BFF Kristin's birthday and I found the perfect gift for her.

 

That is a smile of pure joy.

 

 

Some background - she's the world's biggest Twilight fan (if you thought I was a major fan, you have no idea) and I am terrible at finding gifts for people. I was especially excited because she's such a great friend, I would most likely have been carted off to the looney bin by now if she wasn't across the hall from me!

 

 

Eric and I totally wanted to go out. Then we got home from work and were like.....OR we could just catch up on sitcoms right here on the couch. We used to go all out and put a lot of time and effort into costumes and have so much fun. Then we got old.

The fact that it was Thursday just screamed "post a TBT on instagram and stay home!"

We don't get trick or treaters, so I celebrated by refreshing my Facebook feed repeatedly and enjoying all the cute costumes that my FB friends put their kids in. Thanks, Facebook friends.

This weekend was quite the wild and crazy one in my world. I got home past 1am not one, but two nights in a row. It's seriously a mystery to me how that used to be my life in my early 20s.

Friday night, we went hung out with 3 of my fellow teacher friends and their respective men for a couples game night. We brought Cards Against Humanity and I think the group ended up playing it for two and a half hours. We went through almost the entire deck. If you have never played it, I recommend either coming over or buying it immediately.

Also, if you are reading CAH, I'd like a kickback, because my friends are all buying it.

Saturday night, I closed at the running store, then went out with 3 of my coworkers/friends and we ended up hanging out until after midnight.

I think it's time to give up my dream of being independently wealthy. I already screwed the pooch by marrying for love (well, love and incredible good looks) and I don't play the lottery, so I'm pretty much resigned to having a job throughout my adult life. But considering I spent both nights of my weekend hanging out with coworkers turned friends, and both nights resulted in laughing so hard that  cried and my stomach hurt, I guess being forced to work could be worse.

On that cheesy note, I decided to do that "30 Days of Thankful" thing. I mean, I've been squeezing my stress ball, and it's helping and everything, but why not take things to the next level? Once I decided to participate, a really embarrassing though process ensued.

"Ok, I want to do 30 days of Thankful, and focus on the positive things in my life and all that, but I don't want to post it on Facebook, because I really don't want to be one of those people, and who even reads those anyway? So.....what now?" And I was actually temporarily stalled for a minute until it occurred to me that I could just take it back to old school style and record it....for myself. Not on any social media. A novel idea, right? I mean, do any of us even remember a time when we could have thoughts and not share them in a public forum?

I took it an extra step back and decided not to even do it electronically. I'm doing it diary style, circa 1996.

An old gift from my BFF Nicole

The front of this little book was filled with directions. Before I had a smart phone, this + googlemaps was my GPS.

Shockingly, it was quite freeing to write something that was for my eyes only, and not have to worry if it was PC or going to offend anyone or even grammatically correct. I am thinking of starting a secret diary in addition to this blog.

I made my first attempt to do this weekend's long run Friday afternoon. It didn't take. I actually didn't end up completing it until Sunday afternoon.

Friday, I ran about a mile and then was like "nope" and turned around and went home and ate M&Ms instead. So inspirational. Such a model of healthy living.

Saturday, I tried to trick myself. I had to work at 3, so went down early (at noon) so I'd be trapped into doing my long run whether I wanted to or not.

It was really another "nope". My headphones crapped out at mile 3. I don't always run with headphones, in fact, I usually don't use them on even half my runs (I forced myself to give it up while training for the JFK 50, where they are strictly verboten). But I really wanted to finish listening to Insurgent, and even though my dead headphones left me not listening to it whether I ran or not, I was really opting toward not. I didn't totally give up on the run, but I didn't make it the intended 16 miles.

Since I had an extra hour after that before work, I ate samples from Harris Teeter and played on my phone. I'm a true role model for time management!

 

Sunday, I enjoyed the hell out of my extra hour of sleep (sorry I'm not sorry, parents), relaxed over coffee with Eric, and headed out for my 16 miler around 1pm. The extra hour of sleep must have been what I needed, because I had a fantastic run at a 9:22 pace, which I hate to admit is fast for me these days. That brought me to 55 miles of running this week. I'll take it.

 

Had any "DERRRR I'm super dependent on technology/social media moments lately?

 

Are you good at finding gifts for people? If you are, please help me.