Temporary crisis...

I changed my plans for today. I was going to run the HCOR half marathon today but during the past two weeks a few little things have thrown my schedule off, in a good way.

I ran the 70 miler thinking I had more days off to recover than I actually did. I read my work schedule wrong, and realized at the last minute that I had to go back to work a day sooner! That was okay, but then I made the decision to get my flu shot at work earlier rather than later. I got it on Monday when I went back to work, and I felt okay other than a sore arm. My two days at work were not too exhausting, but by Tuesday night I felt tired and a little lightheaded. I figured it was the usual second day of work tiredness and maybe just dehydrated from not drinking enough at work.

Wednesday I went out running with Cat thinking I'd get 10 or 12 miles in. We were running the bike path and stopped off at the shopping center by Drake and Taft Hill road so she could use a bathroom. My legs felt tired up to that point, but as soon as we slowed to a walk, I suddenly felt lightheaded and had to sit down really fast to avoid possibly passing out. I sat there on the grass while she was inside using the bathroom, and I stretched a little, drank my water bottle, and by the time she came out, I felt okay.

As I was sitting there on the grass, I noticed the "flu shots" sign outside of Walgreens, and it occurred to me that maybe what I was feeling was the flu shot. It had been less than 48 hours since I got it.

We continued back on our run but decided to head back toward the cars early so we'd have the option of me cutting it short in case I felt bad again. Within a quarter mile, my legs started aching. It was mostly my quads and hip flexors, but I felt weak. I had to shuffle a few times to be able to maintain a slow jog.

I decided to stop when we got back to my car, that gave me 9 miles but I was wiped out! The rest of the day I didn't do much at home, I took a nap, and felt a little better. Thursday I didn't run at all, I took the Buffaloes out and walked for 6 miles.

Friday I woke up and decided to go to the lakes and try running. Except we had a crisis at home in the morning. Our cheap coffeemaker, the one we bought at Target a couple of months ago for under $10, no frills, no settings, nothing complicated, decided to quit on us.

What???? NO COFFEE!!!???????

It would have been funny to see a videotape of us scrambling around the kitchen, depserately looking for our cone, the french press, anything that would allow us to make coffee. The Buffaloes were watching us, getting all excited, trying to figure out why mom and dad were pulling things out of drawers and cabinets and making all that noise in the kitchen.

After a frantic 5 minutes of turning the kitchen upside down, we finally located the cone so we could make some single cups of coffee.

When I got to the lakes, I did a lap powerwalking, then started running when Cat joined me for about 5 laps. I felt great after about 13 miles, and picked up the pace, pushing hard on my last two laps, got a total of 26 miles in, and felt refreshed afterwards. We went out for sushi last night and I didn't feel like I'd done any more than a typical 10 mile run. I wasn't tired at all.

When I woke up this morning I decided I'd take today off instead of running the half. I feel like running, but I'm going to make myself take a day off. I don't feel like dealing with crowds, especially not in my favorite spot. We'll do yardwork today, blow the leaves out in the front yard, even though our neighbors' cottonwood tree still has half of it's leaves attached.

But first, I'm going to enjoy a cup of coffee from the new coffeemaker we bought last night. Crisis resolved.