Too Hot to Handle 15K

Today I ran the Too Hot to Handle 15 K.  Texas, July, 15K, sounds fun!  It actually wasn't all that hot, and the course was nicely shaded for the most part.  I finished in 1:53 and some seconds.  I did some serious walking in the second half, but ended up running more than I thought I would be able to.  My training, once again, was subpar.  My goal headed into the race was to make it to the half-way point before stopping to take a walk break.  The course was a nice out-and-back, so judging halfway was easy.  I felt really good the first half, so then decided to go to 5 miles.  Was still feeling good shortly before the 5 mile marker, so decided to get to 6.  Runkeeper told me when I reached 6 according to GPS, but I couldn't see the mile marker on the course anywhere.  I ran for another minute or so, before deciding to walk.  Not two seconds later, I saw the marker.  I made myself start running again until I passed it.  At one point around the 5 mile mark, I started thinking of trying to run the whole thing.  I swear my legs heard my thoughts, and they immediately registered a protest.  It was as if they said "look bitch, if that's the way you're going to think, we'll just quit now!"  I reconsidered, and said I would evaluate how I was feeling at 6 miles.  My legs concurred that this was a much better plan.

I ran a lot of the race without music, which was less boring than I thought it would be. Around mile 2, my iPod decided it didn't really need to send a signal to my headphones.  I unplugged the headphones and replugged them several times, but that fixed it only the first time.  I unplugged them so I could at least hear the Runkeeper prompts every half mile.  There were still a lot of people running near me, and I enjoyed listening to snippets of their conversations.  Around mile 8, I plugged my headphones back in, and the iPod decided it could send me music again.  It was much appreciated!  I made myself run the whole last mile, and I was so glad to see the finish line!  I actually started crying when I finished, which made catching my breath difficult.

A few thoughts about the race set up:  the race is held on the trails around White Rock Lake.  While it was nice to run on the trails instead of the road, the trails were still open to the public.  Several bikers were trying to do their rides at the same time the race was going on, and some of the bikers were none to happy to have so many runners on the path.  Some of the runners definitely contributed to the problem by not staying towards the right of the path, so the bikers could easily pass on the left.  The course support was great - water and powerade around every mile, with sprinklers set up at several stations.  Whomever prepared the powerade made it very weak though. After spitting it out at the second or third station, I stuck with water the rest of the time.  There was a nice lady around mile 7 offering ice cold washcloths.  I'm pretty sure she was an angel.  People park like assholes.  We got there about 45 minutes before the start.  Much of the parking is just along the side of the streets surrounding the park.  We passed at least 5 spots where someone could have parked if people had parked another foot or so either forward or back.  It seems to me that if you are attending a popular event, and you know parking is limited, you'd park yourself in a manner that would allow your fellow runners to park as well.

The same race organizers run the same race in January, called Too Cold to Hold.  I'm definitely signing up.  I will be very curious to see how much faster I can do this race in less hot conditions!

Reading Challenge Books #15-17

Book 15 was The Magician's Assistant, by Ann Patchett.  I enjoyed it, and managed to read it in under two days (difficult with three little kids!).  I'd previously read and loved Bel Canto by the same author, and so when I saw this one while unpacking books, I made sure to put it on my too-be-read-soon pile.  I still have no idea how this book ended up at our house though.  Neither my husband nor I have any memory of buying it.  Perhaps our books are breeding on the shelves or moving boxes, as the case may be.  Anyway, as in Bel Canto, I'll be pretending the ending just didn't happen.

Book 16 was The Age of Dreaming, by Nina Revoyr.  Interesting story, wonderful characters and plot, but a bit heavy handed on the foreshadowing.  I think this may just be a personal stylistic dislike, but I roll my eyes a bit every time the narrator flat out tells us there is something still to be revealed about his story.

Book 17 was A Gathering of Old Men, by Ernest J. Gaines.  Another book that appeared on our shelves apparently of its own volition.  This one came complete with highlighting and notes in the back.  The notes are not in either my or my husband's handwriting.  Neither of us recognizes the handwriting.  I really liked the numerous narrators.  Very good read.

Tomato Jam

We joined a CSA a few weeks ago, with a local farm called Comeback Creek.  We've been getting a ton of tomatoes, and have not been able to keep up with them.  I asked for suggestions, and someone mentioned tomato jam.  Perfect.  I googled for recipes, and settled on this one, as my husband said he'd prefer one that was more on the spicy side than the sweet.   I ended up adding a bit more cayenne pepper.  We started with this:

After 3 hours or so of simmering, I took out our stick blender to get rid of some of the larger pieces of skin:

All canned!

2012 Reading Challenge #14

Book 14 was City of Dragons, by Robin Hobb.  I realized that I was wrong, and it is not a trilogy.   Bah.  That makes my assessment of the previous book worse.  Book 2 of a series of indeterminate length is too soon for a filler book.  Book 3 was better, but it was odd to go from a book focused on only one plot line, to one that developed 3-4 new ones.

2012 Reading Challenge #13

Book 13 was Dragon Haven, by Robin Hobb.  It was pretty much what you might expect from the middle book of a trilogy:  it sets up the final book nicely, and has a few independent moments of excitement, but overall the reader is just settling into the story.  I'm glad I read it, and am looking forward to the final book, but I am also glad I decided to check the books out from the library rather than buying them.

2012 Book #12

Book #12 was Dragon Keeper, by Robin Hobb.  My father-in-law and his wife gave this to me as a Christmas gift, and I just got around to reading it this week.  I loved her Farseer trilogy, and the Tawny Man trilogy that followed in the same world, but did not enjoy the Soldier Son trilogy very much.  Dragon Keeper returns to the same world as the Farseer and Tawny Man trilogies (and presumably the Liveship Trader trilogy, but I haven't read those).  My favorite part of this book was the point of view chapters from the dragons.  I sped through this book in about three days.  We're headed on vacation tomorrow, and I requested the two other books in the trilogy from my library.  That is the nice thing about finding a series after its is already written -- no waiting for the next book to come out!

2012 Book #11

Book 11 was In the Garden of Beasts, by Erik Larson.  I picked this one up at an airport book store after finishing another book earlier than I anticipated.  I had not brought any work with me, and my iPad's battery was about to die, and I still had a good two hours before my delayed plane was to take off, plus the hour and a half flight to look forward to.  Usually when I find myself needing something to read in an airport I go for pure escape reading.  This book is not that (the Nazis on the cover should be a dead giveaway).  I was excited to see it though.  My husband bought me The Devil in the White City several years ago, and I bought Thunderstruck later based almost entirely on my enjoyment of The Devil in the White City.

I enjoyed In the Garden of Beasts very much, although probably not as much as The Devil in the White City.  I think that is largely because I did not know the story in the latter, and well, we all know how Nazi Germany worked out.  My one quibble, and it is a quibble I've had with all three Larson books I've read so far, is with his tendency to end chapters with a sort of foreshadowing, but not getting to the subject again for ages, sometimes long after I've forgotten to be on the lookout.  For example, we're told at the end of chapter 8 that meeting the young and sexually assertive Martha Young gave Hanfstaengl an idea.  The sentence that ends the chapter -- "Which gave him an idea." -- is set off as it own paragraph, clearly emphasized.  But the idea isn't revealed until Chapter 19 - eighty pages later. There are enough moving parts to the story that by the time the idea was revealed, I had forgotten to be looking out for it at all, which sort of defeats the foreshadowing.

Overall though, I really liked the book, and have added other Larson books to my to-buy list of books.