To sleep, perchance to dream...

In honour of a certain millionaire's awesome "someone took my ball (player)" rant, I've decided to blog this in the newest cool font: Comic Sans.

Even though I usual do the Running Room ...

Ok, can't type in this font in a straight face. Let's start over...

Even though I usual do Running Room runs twice a week, I rarely run in a group. I'm more "hit and run" with my fellow running friends. Running in a group usually the pace of the group is either too fast or too slow. Plus its hard to think of funny things to say when you are sucking wind.

However last Sunday, I had a chance to get re-acquinted with Michael and Brian during the usual early morning clinic run. Other than wearing completely inappropriate attire, i.e. a orange *cotton* shirt that soaked up every drop of sweat, it was a great running and chatting with the fast kids. The weather was just about right, the pace was perfect, and I got my knee issue diagnosed. Both Michael and Brian appeared to have suffered similar knee issues in the past, and diagnose me with "Scrawny Ass Syndrome". Supposedly bad genetics (thanks mom), hours of sitting in a chair (thanks Apple), and most probably improper running form (thanks...hmmm, that one is on me I guess) meant that my knee is taking some of the load that my glutes should be taking. Prescription for SAS? Squats and bridges. Sound reasonable enough. I still need to get a second opinion of the SAS diagnosis from my physiotherapist on Thursday but honestly, I find runners are often *better* at diagnosing running issues. I should also probably sign up for the Mindful Strides running clinic that I was eyeing for a little bit to get some tips on my running form.

Maybe because we were talking about my knee, it decided not to act up too much during the run. I still felt it and it gave out on an occasional stride, and I definitely shorten my stride (especially on downhills) as to protected it some, but it didn't hurt like it did last Wednesday. Probably the 2 days off I took helped as well.

The run was an out and back to Prospect Point, and shortly after the point, Master Jedi was good enough to grace us with his presence and ran with us during the last part of the run. During the run Michael and Dave chatted about the Tour de France. Dave mentioned how he couldn't sleep and woke up at 4:30 in the morning to catch some of the coverage on TV. Can't sleep? 4:30am? I have trouble wrapping my head around this concept.

I love to sleep. It is possibly my favorite past time. It's easy, it's affordable, and you can do it anywhere. It's a running joke among my friends that during road trips that I am out like a light within 30 minutes of hitting the road. Other than a brief bout of insomnia in my early 20s (for reasons I won't get into), sleep just comes to me. During the last marathon clinic, one of the guest speaker on pre-race prep told us to get a good night sleep 2 nights before the actual race, because "you won't be able to sleep at all the night before". When I heard that, I remember muttering to myself, "just watch me". Yeah, I slept like a baby pre-race night.

Waking up... now that's a different story. I wished I have some of Dave's early morning mojo, but I don't. My personal record for hitting the snooze button is 12 times. But until recently, it is a struggle that I've been pretty happy to lose. However, the last little bit, work has been on a hellish schedule, which means my usual evening runs was no longer possible. In the sober light of day, the obvious solution was to wake up earlier and get my run in then. Hence the plan was to be:

Sunday: Wake up at 7:15, do the 9km to the running room before the prescribe 16 km route to keep the Sunday mileage up

Monday: Get up at 7:30, do the 15km detour route to work, into work by 9am

Tuesday: Get up at 8:00, do the 10km direct route to work, at work by 9:15'ish

Yet, out of ashes of hazy post slumber logic, we get the reality of:

Sunday: Alarm goes off at 7:15:00. Suffocating the alarm with my pillow at 7:15:01. Play the left shoulder/right shoulder debate game on the merits of sleep vs run until 8am. Sigh.

Monday/Tuesday: ... ok, you are all smart people. I am writing this for a reason. I really don't need to repeat myself, do I? ...

Counting the 2 days break I took for the knee issues, I essentially only did 18km in the last 5 days. I did yoga. I was on the bike. But those are different. It feels different. And my legs knw it. I ran into Carolyn this morning right outside the office and I was whining to her on how my legs were starting to feel twitchy. And this (the legs and the whining) just got worse during the day. It got worse when 5pm rolled around and I realized that right about then Amelia and Ken were starting their weekly intervals around the UBC track, and I am stuck in the office.

By the time I got out of work, it was starting to get dark outside, but the legs were actually starting to thob. Taking a page out of Tera Moody's play book, I ended up running around the Brentwood Mall parking lot being stared at by rent-a-cops. Classy. Fancy Kits runners, eat your heart out.

Tomorrow is Wednesday, better known as "Chasing windmill" day. At least I don't have pretend that I'll wake up early to run tomorrow.