New shoes...new shoes.... Jerbear's got some new shoes...

Did you guys ever sing the new shoes song in grade school?  Apparently my classmates did in kindergarten (I didn't move to the town I graduated from until 4th grade) but we still would jokingly sing the song every.single.time someone was sporting some new kicks to school/gym/games/etc.

While I was out sick with the ninja death star flu, I had a package delivered to work.  Because I live in an apartment, I tend to have everything shipped there.  The receptionist who received the package is from a different part of my agency, so I don't work very close with her so she doesn't know me very well, yet when I walked in the office after being sick, she handed me the package and said, "I didn't bother calling you because I figured it was just more running shoes."  Hahah.  Awesome.  And she was right.

Not only that but they are the exact same running shoes I'm currently sporting.  After Vegas, I had a minor running shoe snafu.  I had a pair of Mizuno Wave Rider 14s (I'm currently wearing the 13s) sent to me with a pretty swell discount (Thanks LC!) except that the shoes felt like bricks on my feet and were huge!  Of course we didn't have the shoes yet in our town, so I couldn't try another pair on to see if I just had a wonky pair or what.  Finally weeks later we got the shoes in and I realized that the shoe I had was normal and it just ran big.  And the next half size down was too small.  And both shoes felt like bricks.

No biggie, thinks my brain, I'll just find some of the 13s to tide me over.  Except..... THERE WEREN'T ANY!!!!  SWEET MOTHER OF JESUS!!!!!!!  Panic attack grand freak out would be an understatement.  First I was being picky about the color selection.  Purple and gold?  Eew.  I'd rather run on glass shards barefoot (sorry Vikings fans.... wait.... no I'm not! :p)  Blue?  Already had those.  Red... meh.  But then I quickly realized that there were zero size 8s left on the entire planet.

Luckily since I'm a super internet sleuth, I did manage to track some down from a company I had never heard of.  They were super cheap, and I got free shipping on them.  Score!  They still feel a bit rock like compared to my nice broken in pair, but they'll get the (long run) job done.  I feel a little sad retiring the blood soaked pair because they make me feel like a super b.a. so I'm still wearing them for muddy runs. :)

I was really trying to show off how much of the tread I had worn down over the last 400+ miles, but my photography skills leave something to be desired.  Ho hum.

__________
Saturday I had a 16 mile LR on deck for training for Fargooooooooo.  Based on the current weather 1 degree, wind chill 10-15 below, I opted for the treadmill.  Not to mention that our city has been a solid sheet of ice all week long and it's snowed Friday and Saturday to hide the slippery ice.  Sooooo not cool, weather.  ::shaking my fist in disgust and outrage::

Let's just say I had zero motivation to head out for my long run.  Someone woke me up by tearing my sleepmask off my face (someone else = Jerbear was furious about this FYI).  Then someone was kicked out and told to come back after I had garnered the rest of my beauty sleep.  So procrastination #1 of the day:  naptime immediately following wake up time.  From there I ate 1/3 of a bag of soft batch cookies, watched Real Housewives of Miami, Top Chef, gave myself a manicure, and created a new long run playlist.  Finally I had nothing left to procrastinate with other than cleaning (and you know that isn't happening) so I got crack-a-lackin' for my run.  "Oooh!  I want to measure how long my hair is!!"  Guess I wasn't out of things to procrastinate with.... (16 inches in case you were curious.)

Don't act like you're not impressed.  That's WITH my haircut from last week.  P.S.  Check out my manicure.  :)

Upon arriving to the gym, I was stoked to see that Tom was knocking down some mileage on the treadmill.  Yayzies!  Tom is one of my running buddies (we've only really ran together once on accident, but he runs, and he's my buddy soooooo running buddy... yup).  I plopped down on the treadmill with him and chatted away 3 miles.  As soon as he was done (after knocking out a monster 14 miles on the treadmill, heck ya!) I realized my stomach was feeling.... wonky.  I preceded to stop the run about every mile from there.  I drank some water, thinking that might help (I was sweating buckets).  I ate some sharkies thinking that might help.  I decreased the incline on the treadmill.  Finally after 6 miles I called it good.

I got in my car and I was pretty defeated.  There's a sense of pride in finishing a super long long run, and I was bummed that I had given up on it (although not without multiple attempts).  When I glanced down at my dashboard at a stop sign I perked up a bit.  This is super cheesy, but it reminded me that a botched long run is not the end of the world and to focus on the big picture:  26.2.  [cue cheesy inspirational music a la Full House]

Check out the Studly Runner Marcia's Zensah bra giveaway here!