Oh, that's nice.

It's been a totally lame week for me and running. I have so much to do in these last days of work before vacation, then squeeze in birthdays, engagements, dinners, interviews and then throwing running in the mix is stressing me out. Because I'm forcing it.

Running sucks when I'm in this overwhelmed threshold. For example, once again, I set out for a long run yesterday on my usual trail. I knew things were heading south as soon as I stepped out of the car and it was sooooo not 73 degrees...more like 85. I set out with a slow pace, around 11:00, for the first mile and a half. There are two college aged girls walking on the narrow part of the path side by side. Wearing all kinds of running gear. Walking slowly. They turn to look behind them as they hear me approach, and continue to walk side by side.

Uh, it's hot, I'm tired, I've got 4 million things on my mind and now I'm annoyed. I sound like a douche, but really, this is supposed to be my stress relief!

I run around them and shake my head. Now that I'm annoyed, I'm running about 10:00 m/m. About 2 minutes later, still on the narrow path, they start to run alongside me. Just. Right. Next. To. Me. Almost touching. Now, they're not going that fast, obviously, as we are running together now. Yet the one in the compression socks, camelbak, etc decides to just hop right in front of me and slow down to a light trot. I almost fell on top of her. I yell "excuse me!" as I balance on the curb to avoid ending up in the street to get around this crazy. Now I'm doing about 9:30 m/m...which is too fast for me. And it takes all my energy to focus on not turning around and giving them a Bronx welcome with a choice finger. I run up the crazy steep hill at the 2 mile mark and I hit a serious wall. I waited for my husband to catch up and we take a walk break. We did another mile back and I quit. As we walked to the car, there's a sign set up for some low key, unmarked ultra marathon that's going on. And it all makes sense, all these rude randoms on my route...out of towners. Watched a pack of five more nearly get hit by cars running against the light. Tried the whole smile and wave at more of these people only to get strange looks. Really happy for you guys. You can run 100 miles, oblivious to your surroundings, while being jerks...awesome.

And then we packed the car, went to Philly, saw Jim Gaffigan in Atlantic City and it was awesome. Goodnight :)

*positive posts to resume shortly.