All Downhill From Here

Attack #1:
Remember back at the beginning of the month, when B & N made me sick and delayed my start towards Frostbite Falls? Well, they left a time bomb behind.

Unbeknownst to me, as I struggled to recover from my cold, set myself back on the indoor, rubberized track and hilly course to FBF, the little time bomb ticked away. Tick tick tick…

Last week on our local Penguin e-mail list, we planned out a weekend group run. I don’t usually get to run with the girls on weekends when Hubby works (like this one), but this time he wasn’t scheduled to work until 11:45, so I could still go run and be back to be with the kiddos before he had to leave.

Sylvie, Linda, Krista and I committed to showing up at 8 o’clock downtown Saturday morning to run 10 km along the river. Linda and I even agreed to car-pool. I awoke at 6 a.m. Saturday, dressed in cold weather running clothes, breakfasted and was just checking over my running belt contents when the phone rang. It was Hubby’s boss, wondering why he wasn’t opening the store.

Oh no.

(can you hear the deafeningly silent explosion as the time bomb went off?)

MY calendar says he works late. And I transcribed it with my own hand from the computer chart way back at the beginning of the month . . . when I was congested totally out of my mind. I had transcribed it wrong. I quickly headed sleepyhead Hubby to the shower, called Linda to tell her I couldn’t come after all, and made Hubby coffee and lunch. Sigh.

I didn’t let the time bomb hold me back, though. Sure I couldn’t go running with the girls, but once the kiddos were up and happily amused in front of their “electronic babysitters”? I went out in the sunshine for my 10 km anyway. They didn’t kill each other while I was out, and I got 10 km closer to FBF, so there.

It wasn’t a pretty run, as I couldn’t find a happy rhythm, and the hills in my neighbourhood didn’t help either. I wore my Yaktrax, which I needed about half the time, due to unshovelled walks and the snow that fell Friday night. It took me a whopping 80 frustrating minutes to get the distance in, but I was happy I’d foiled the villains.

Attack #2:
Dawn and I had planned to go to the Calgary Roadrunner’s Beer n’ Pizza night. Little Runner was going to go and play with Dawn’s granddaughter for the evening (since Hubby was working late), and I was going to treat Soccer Boy to a short run and pizza (yes, folks that’s 2 runs in 1 day, but there was pizza involved, see?).

Cutie-pie Dawn’s granddaughter came down with pink-eye (a Boris and Natasha casualty – they stoop so low!), and I decided that Little Runner already had enough complications in her life to add that to the list, so LR got to come along to BnP anyway. Thanks to Dianne, super-coach and friend, however, Soccer Boy and I still got in 3 decent kilometres while she hied Little Runner out with her younger boys to scale hills, gaze at stars, and make snow angels. The run was gentle and good, the pizza was delicious and the beer was juuust right.

Take THAT, Boris and Natasha, I’m on my way to Frostbite Falls anyway. 59.7 km down, 46.3 to go!