Hope everyone had a nice Halloween! Dork that I am, I spent it at the zoo. Behold:
2009 has been a pretty piss-poor running year for me, but I ended it with a decent race, at least. Husband’s entire office was pressuring me to beat his coworker’s butt in the Hot Chocolate 15K, but as it turns out, he’s one of those little snots that never runs, trains for 2 months and then runs 7:30 miles with a bum knee. Sure, I run 7:30’s too…during my interval workouts. Life, why do you taunt me so?
It was a fun race, and I’m actually very happy with my time (1:19:03), considering I just started doing speedwork again recently, and just began running/training seriously (again) a month or so ago. I’m especially proud of my pacing job, as I started out strong and hung around a steady 8:30 for the next 9+ miles. My slowest miles were actually in the beginning, since it took place on a narrow lakefront path and the first few miles were so congested with people running at a slower pace. I couldn’t break out and find a groove until 4 miles in, and then I settled snugly into my zone.
Afterwards, there was plenty of chocolate, in the form of candy bars, chocolate fondue, and cups of hot chocolate. I was feeling pretty good until I came home and found out the elevator was broken. Then I had to walk up 6 flights of stairs after racing 9.3 miles, and I didn’t feel so hot after that. Next week: cutback week or 12-miler? I guess that depends on how much I eat…
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Speaking of eating, my friend Tina was visiting from New York this weekend, so we decided to visit our alma mater, Northwestern. And by “visit Northwestern,” I mean “hit all the restaurants that we used to frequent during college” because everything in my life revolves around food. In the span of an hour, we’d gotten bibimbap from our favorite Korean diner, cupcakes and other assorted pastries from Bennison’s, and frozen yogurt from Red Mango.
Bibimbap
Flower Cupcake
Bennison's Apple Tart
A few hours later, we had dinner at Rollin’ To Go and I ate a Carmelo sandwich (turkey, bacon, avocado, and remoulade). I love love LOVE this place, their delicious sandwiches and pizzas, and house-made potato chips.
The Carmelo
It’s hard to believe we’re in November already, huh?
