Night, Snow, and Freezing Rain Shuffles

I really need to keep up with this blogging thing. Almost a whole week has passed and I didn't say one word about anything that has happened! First of all I got a promotion at work! It is temporary but I know I'll do an awesome job and it will be permanent hehe. I've been working 9-11 hour days and my schedule is going to be all over the place for the next few weeks. The replacement for my old position has not been officially hired so I will have to do my current job and my old job. Basically, I will have to still have to be at work at 5am for trucks, work the closing shift once a week, and work some time on the weekend. I'm going to have to plan when to prep my meals for the week and when I am going to exercise. This past week went pretty well. I managed to get in most of my workouts, although I did miss a strength training session. On top of my crazy schedule we have had some rough winter weather. I had to swap a run day with some indoor cardio because everything was a sheet of ice. I literally, had nowhere to walk outside.

Night Run- I went for my first evening run last week. It was pretty fantastic. I went out as the sun was sinking behind the Earth. I planned to stay close to home since I only had black clothes appropriate for the cold weather. It actually wasn't too cold on this night. I had forgotten how much I loved to run in the evening. When I first started running around 2005 I always ran in the evening. I love watching the light go out of the sky and smell people cooking dinner in the houses that I pass. I was glad that I did not travel far, when the sun did set my surroundings became extremely dark and there were still patches of ice to contend with. It seemed to have slipped my mind that there are no street lights around. I was even able to use the light on my Garmin for the first time because it was too dark to read the face.

I realized that I will probably be faced with many more evening runs and I should invest in a reflective vest of some sort as soon as possible. Therefore, the other day while I was running errands I happened to pass a Sports Authority and decided that I should check out the gear. I made a bee line for the reflective stuff. If I wander around a store like this I begin to want all of the really cute running clothes. Heck, I would settle for clothes that just matched! Anyway, they had 2 styles of vests. One was black mesh with 3 skinny lines of pink reflective material. The other was way less cute, made entirely of florescent green/yellow reflective material. Due to the fact that I am not going to a fashion show and actually just trying not to get hit by cars I choose the less cute green one. I honestly do not even know why they would make a black mesh one. Of course I will let you know the first time that I wear it.

Snow/Freezing Rain Shuffle - I've shuffled in some pretty wacky weather but Saturday morning was the weirdest yet. The temps were in the low 20's. The weather forecaster predicted snow, sleet, and freezing rain all morning. For some reason I choose to forget this as I decided not to wear my water resistant outer shell. After all, everything looked fine from my window. About 5 minutes into my journey I realized that it was "misting" out and the misty rain was freezing. There was a thin layer of snow/ice that crunched under my shoes. My feet were staying dry so I kept going. The noise was kind of nice. Plus, the streets were virtually deserted. I was exactly 20 minutes into my shuffle when the skies opened up and it started heavily raining. Crap. Sorry, I don't usually swear but that is exactly what I thought. This is because it wasn't just raining, it was freezing rain. This means that the rain is cold and freezes when it hits the ground. At least, that's what I think that it means. I should google that later. Anyway, I was getting wet and cold and I had 20 minutes before I would be home again. I couldn't even go any faster because the ground was getting slick. I kept thinking that I would be so mad at myself if I got sick. Luckily, after 10 minutes it let up and I made it home soon enough. I learned that anytime there is a prediction of rain or sleet or any other precip I will wear or bring some water resistant gear.