An announcement... and an embarrassment

It is a little early to raise money... since I am only about halfway thru training, but if I do get to my 18-mile long run, I'll be sending out the call-for-cash people. I'll be running the Country Music Marathon for an organization called ROMP, which stands for Range of Motion Project. They provide amputees in the developing world with prosthetic limbs and braces. They have changed the lives of hundreds of people in Guatemala and Ecuador by providing mobility among other things. This organization is totally awesome. Run and founded by a great friend of mine Eric Neufeld
(see http://www.rompglobal.org/). Go to the website and watch the ROMP documentary, if you don't tear up then... well... are you human? I'll tell you more about ROMP in the fund-raising call.

...and now an embarrassment.... on my 13 mile run the other day, I was dragging about mile 9, but guess what picked me up totally for the rest of the run - Beyonce's "Single Ladies." Thanks Beyonce.

Lets just say... i'm blogging at about a 15 minute mile

So I have fallen behind in the writing, but have been keeping up with the running.

February 22rd - SAYRE's BIRTHDAY!!! Sayre turned 3 today, and after we went to see "The Lizard Guy," who really should have been called the "Frog-Turtle-Snake Guy" (where Sayre touched an eight-foot long boa constrictor), we went to his gymnastics class (where lets just say 'circle time'wasn't his thing... he is more of a run and jump and roll guy). Spending birthday morning was a blast. But at nap time, I got to take a nice 10 mile run through the tough streets of West Windsor. Not much to report, save some beautiful little blue birds (emailed boss for species... will get back to you).

Feb 19th - watched the Sweden-Belrus hockey game from the comforts of a treadmill.

Feb 18th - 7 miles along Lake Carnegie. With all this snow there was lots of dog poop in the streets. Who isn't cleaning this stuff up? Maybe the city should hire an animal/animals that enjoy cleaning, eating, or storing dog feces and have them roam the city. Dung Beetles would work, but it's kind of hard to keep them in line.

This seven miles was hard, still felt like hell from wednesday's ice hockey game. (A re-newed hobby where to date I have impressed my teammates by being able to provide plenty of on ice hysterics, like being checked without getting hit). The wind was blowing, and the whole run i was having deja vu... of all the times I ran before... you know that feeling of how you always hated running... and you still do.

Feb 16th - 3 miles. Damn treadmill is boring and daytime TV is unbelievable. How did our species become so prolific?

Feb 14th - Happy Valentines Day Leigh! I love you. Here is some bamboo and a card. I'll see you in 2 hours I have to go run 13 miles.

I'm a real romantic. Truthfully,Leigh's V-day card, helped me through the tough parts of this run. Finished up still running strong, it felt good, and mmm... chocolate energy packets for strength. I also ate a lot of snow on this run.

Feb 13th - 3 miles...

Feb 11th - supposed to be 6 miles... Ran 4 on the treadmill and then they kick me off. There are some 20 to 25 treadmills at the gym and there is a line of people waiting to hop on. Now I don't mean to be a snob, but really if you are grunting aloud, or sweating all over the conveyor belt I think you should get less time on the machine and the non-grunting, more dessicated runner should get more time.

I have been running... really

[THis is at the top of the Sange Falls in the Udzungwa Mountains in Tanzania. IN the valley below is a lot of sugar cane plantations and some small holder farms. Great hike with Aggrey, Matt, and Karen. Consider this cross training day]


Okay so it has been a while, but I have been hitting the roads,paths, etc. Here's a quick update since the 21st of January.

Jan23rd - ran 5 miles it was fun.

Jan 27 - In Tanzania. Ran through the streets of Dar es Salaam at 7 am. It was like 140 degrees (okay about 90 degrees) but it felt like I was running in soup. Could only muster about 3 miles before I couldn't tell whether I was swimming or running. Had to call it quits and drink nice African coffee.

Spent the next 5 days in a National park (Mikumi for those who care). Would have gone for a run, but this isn't the kind of park with fences and white tail deer. Day one there were 2 juvenile (mo-hawked) lions about 300 yards from my cabin. Elephants pass by my cabin at night and Cape Buffalo roam free... a la not the kind of place you go out for a quick jog.

Jan 30 - 3 mile hike to the top of Sanje Falls in Udzungwa National Park. (awesome pic above, but see also http://www.tanzaniaparks.com/uzdungwa.html). Ran down, passing about a dozen of the endemic Iriniga Red Colobus Monkeys.

Feb 4 - Back in Princeton and found a nice 6 mile loop running around agric. fields and an old cemetery. Saw some kind of sparrow hawk. Ran hard in 29 degrees with winds, ran about 8 minute miles, but was trying to make up for lost time in Africa. It was a tough day out.

Feb 5 - 3.2 miles. Damn treadmill (15 inches of snow on the ground).

Feb 7th - Snow on the ground. 37 degrees, sunny. Alright, I haven't been too adventurous with my watch, but my brother-in-law-Doug told me to set up 'virtual partner' and run a slowish 12 miles. I thought I knew what I was doing, but after being out for over an hour my watch read 3.1 miles. I thought I was going cry. Turns out that when I turned off said 'virtual partner' I had run 7.5 miles. Praise the lord. That virtual partner was really holding me back! I jogged past my house where I had some potato chips, animal crackers and apple juice waiting in the wings for me (I was also told to practice eating and drinking... no problem there). Fueled up, hit the streets again. 12 miles was really tough after the time off. I ate my body weight in snow along the way. Ran through Mountain Lake State Park and all the x-country skiers thought i was an idiot running on the snow in shorts. But it was fun and beautiful. I stopped at exactly 12 miles, not a foot more. Took a snow bath (shoes off an everything, felt great, until it felt freezing cold - between great and freezing was about 6 seconds). Then had a long hot bath, consumed about 12,000 calories, and then Leigh and I watched the Bridgestone/Doritos SuperBowl brought to us by Comcast and Geiko. We saw the Frito-Lays Saints of New Orleans defeat the BudLight Colts.

Yesterday, sat on a bike in the gym, read a few nerdy academic articles.
... and today, well.... we have a state of emergency blizzard, roads closed, gym closed. So it was indeed time to update my blog. I consider that a cross-training day.