Saturday

This Saturday was great. Not as great as last Saturday, but lovely nonetheless. I am promising myself, by the way, that I will get up an official Wedding Post, not just blathering about love, but I need some time here folks. 
Anyway, we schlepped it up to the city today to run our long run {14}. My running has gotten so sloppy. I ran pretty well and steadily this summer, six days a week, five to seven miles at a time. I didn't do any long runs because I wasn't officially on a training plan yet. The first week of the plan happened to be Costa Rica but a one week difference isn't a big deal for me and these kinds of things. 
The week after CR was spent recovering and, again, I let it slide. I'm definitely the kind of athlete/runner who NEEDS her recovery in order to tear it up later on. So I started on the third week of the plan. It was also the week where school meetings started and then classes came the following week. It wasn't prudent of me to put off the training until these two very tiring weeks of adjustment, but I made it work...until the day before classes when I was at work until really late getting set-up. Thus ensued several days of being dead on my feet and I didn't want to be exhausted while teaching so I was lenient with myself. 
That brings us to two weeks ago. Mike and I got in our long run. I am also the type of runner who gains a lot of confidence from a long run so I took that as a good jump-start to re-beginning my miles, even though it was actually very hot and we ran at rancho which was soooooo hilly that day {not like it changes, but we ended up on hilly trails}. Then wedding week happened. Then the week after wedding week happened. Now we're at today. 
As I'm sure you know I love running. I've emoted on this topic before. Today made me realize that even more, even though I was SUPER pooped at the end. I'm really looking forward to getting back on track {no pun intended} and to tearing it up in December at the California International Marathon. Hear me now - I have a goal. I actually have many, but one bucket list-y thing is to qualify for the Boston Marathon. At the Nike Women's last year, my first 26.2 miler, I came close. Seven minutes close. It was an amazing experience. I had trained for almost 20 weeks and felt so pumped up; I loved every minute of it. Even when it was rainy. Even when it was windy. Even when it was hilly {and it was very hilly, being in San Francisco [which, somehow, didn't really come to mind at all in the months leading up...what a dumb-dumb I was]}. What I'm hoping is that with marathon número dos, I can shave off eight minutes. That's a fairly big improvement, but I'm hopeful for two reasons:
* It was pouring rain and windy and super hilly in SF last year.
* The CIM is supposed to be one of the fastest courses. 
Wish me luck!
After our run we drove across the bay to visit friend Eddie and he took us to a deli in his neighborhood.

It was so dang delicious. I got a sandwich that was on a French roll, which I normally don't care for. In fact, I'm not a huge sandwich fan unless it's Jimmy John's . But today, my provolone, prosciutto, mortadella, sauteed mushroom, grilled pepper and balsamic sandwich was incredible.
The deli also had a beautiful array of cold cuts and salads; total eye candy for someone who had just run longer that humans should and was ready to eat a whole cow if given the chance.

Don't waste your time and calories on the fruit salad...a life motto by me™.

It took a great deal of self control to not order one of everything as well as five pounds of three bean salad, my fave. 
I did make it out with some olives. I've been crazing salty this past week and the olives with the sandwich certainly gave me my allotment.
Mr. Mikey also came out on top; he got a pickle. It didn't even make it home; it got ett while he was driving. I'll stick with my olives thankyouverymuch.

One other random note to end this post. Poor Sugar, the other dog of the household, gets the shaft in terms of gratuitous pet-picture-taking. She's a bit skittish and the g-dog is very malleable, not mention pick-up-able and corner-able, thus, Guinness makes many an appearance on ye olde blog. But Sugar looked so cute last night and I was able to take these before she registered what I was doing and run away, her usual reaction to anything I do.
Both dogs will take advantage of ANYTHING that has been left on the floor. If it's edible, then they will eat it. If it's soft, then they will lay in or on it. This is Guinness' bed and a bit small for Sugar baby; that certainly did not deter her.

Happy week-end y'all!
xoxo, natty ♥