A Girl Named Velcro, and Random Thoughts

I have puppy brain! We are announcing the arrival of the newest member of our family, Miss Velcro. She is a red tri and she was born 5 weeks ago. We will be bringing her home in another 3 weeks.

We are so excited! As soon as I saw her picture, I knew she was the one. It was love at first sight. I could not stop thinking about her, and as things unfolded with the litters at Sky Blue Aussies, she was available. We have our eye on another pup who is only 3 days old as of today, so I will fill you in as soon as we know everything is certain with our second puppy. Velcro will have a sister, and most likely she will be coming home a month after Velcro.

Running is minimal but more consistent. I'll talk about that below, after I get the shitstorm off my chest.

Recent Random Thoughts

I haven't been writing on my blog much, it's been hard with all the distractions, between puppy brain and it being Pinktober, the month where cancer and pink become intertwined and there are a lot of things going on. I spoke 3 times in one week, and I have more coming up before the month is through.

I had somewhat of an "aha" moment yesterday when I was thinking about my struggles with getting my program off the ground. It's a challenge to get people to want to do something. Everyone I talk to about it, including healthcare providers, sees the obvious and intense need for this type of education for patients and their caregivers. But there are a lot of barriers to people being able to use it in the way it is intended. I've been barking up the wrong tree trying to get it through the traditional healthcare channels.

One thing I am doing, that should help, is writing a book, which will not only have the program in it, but will also discuss why everyone needs to be in on this. Healthcare is so screwed up and it's only getting worse. Absolutely unsustainable. Yet cancer is about to overtake heart disease as the number one killer of Americans, and our healthcare costs are rising at an insane rate, and our health outcomes and general public health are getting worse. We have more obesity and diabetes, more lifestyle-related illness, and our administrative costs of running the healthcare system are exceeding our ability to put our resources into patient care and education.

Healthcare Heretic Again

I am being the healthcare heretic again, and working to make nurse groups aware of a documentary film project. Health 3.0 is a concept that goes beyond this transactional model, we call it 2.0, of healthcare where physicians or providers don't have relationships with patients, instead they are more of a factory, cranking patients through appointments in 15 minute intervals. Check this out for an example.

This short video is being mild about it. What I wish I had time to say is that all of these cancer centers and freestanding emergency rooms popping up everywhere are only being built because the current system incentivizes it. The hospitals get paid more. They can get reimbursed at a higher rate for emergency room visits and can charge a facility fee for setting foot in a cancer center, rather than an independent oncology practice. This disincentivizes patients from visiting their oncologists for follow-up visits. The hospitals can charge up to $400 for a facility fee alone (not including the doctor's bill) just for having an appointment in a room at the cancer center.

Had I realized just how slimy this whole process was, I would never have supported the local facility as I did half a decade ago. The Big Heist is right. It is a heist, to the tune of 20% of our GDP. Not acceptable. But people need to wake up and get off their obesified butts!

Remember how when we were talking about the need for the Affordable Care Act just a decade ago, lamenting the overuse of emergency rooms because people didn't have insurance for primary care and preventive medicine? Well, now we have high deductible plans again, with rates rising, driving people out of the market, but hospital executives can clean up on higher reimbursements and facility fees. And we're not doing a better job for patients. Dumb and dumber.

Here we are again. The vicious cycle of healthcare, now has consumed independent physician practices, has doctors all working as part of the giant healthcare factory, working at the whim of their employers, being told what to do by insurance companies, and nurses are understaffed and miserable again, physician suicide rates are rising, and nurses are leaving the profession because of burnout and injuries from overwork. There's no nursing shortage, just a shortage of nurses willing to put up with the abuse.

And the people who wrote the ACA: lobbyists for the pharmaceutical industry, hospital executives, and insurance companies, have ensured they will rake in big bucks while starving the masses.

General Random Thoughts about Running

I've been running about 4 days a week on the average. About 6 or 7 miles each time.
I know!!!

It feels good to run when I feel like it and I feel refreshed afterward. My friend Emma is training for her first ultra, so doing long runs with her has gotten me out on the trails. I'm so enjoying this.

I miss my hair color. I now have a streak of reddish brown in the front of my scalp. It's a deep brown with a reddish tint, but it's my natural color. People pay a lot of money to get their hair tinted to that color. Now I have just a streak of it to contrast with my grayish white. What are you gonna do?

I refuse to dye my hair. I am getting too many thumbs up when I run, and I need that for the motivation. Plus it keeps the creepos quiet. Nobody catcalls their grandma. Much preferred this way.

Oh, and one more thing- one day I was actually able to reach my mouth with the toes on my left foot. I haven't been able to do it again, must have been a good flexibility day. I'll keep working on it until I can do it consistently. Then I will post pictures.

photo credit: Donna Rohde, Sky Blue Aussies

Leaning The Wrong Way

Wake up call!

After sitting on my butt more than I ever should, with at least another 4-6 weeks before I'll be less tethered to the desk, I happened to be in the doctor's office recently and got weighed.

I am 5'1". With each passing decade, it seems like my body has settled into a slightly higher weight. That's been okay when it happens gradually. My body is the type that clings to fat, it doesn't like to let go easily, and I have to work very hard to lose weight when I want to. Having a bad thyroid might have something to do with it, even though I take thyroid replacement hormones, they are never what your body makes on its own.

It might also have something to do with the fact that I am right at menopause, basically I am there, standing on top of it, at the peak, barring any surprises in the next few months to knock me off my self-assurances that I'm done with that pain in the ass body function that serves no purpose whatsoever except to make my race mornings more annoying. And I am 52 years old. My metabolic function is slowing, it's reality.

Most of my female relatives are short, like me, but most of them weigh barely 100 pounds and have little, tiny bird bone wrists. They don't have big powerful quadriceps or calves like I do. They're not athletes, either. I don't know where I got my bigger bone structure, or my muscular build, or my athleticism, but it's what I have, and it's served me well. I don't envy their bodies, I just envy their ability to keep their weight down at age 60 when I have to struggle so hard. And they have thyroid problems too.

But back to the wake-up call. I stood on the scale, having kicked off my shoes, and the medical assistant kept pushing the metal weight further and further to the right, until I felt like I was going to tip over with it. I've never seen it go that far to the right!

I've always had a tendency to lean to the left. Whether it's seeing runners finishing a long ultra, in politics, and social issues. And on the scale too. I really haven't spent much too time east of 120 pounds, just during short, occasionally stressful or inactive periods of my adult life.

I was flabbergasted when I saw how much I weighed. I have gained a full 20 pounds since I ran my last race in September of 2014.

Holy crap. No wonder I can only run 11 minute miles these days.

No wonder my new, one larger size, just bought last year because I caved, pants are too tight now. No wonder the other day when I was running in my capri tights for the first time this season, that I had the new, weird sensation of flesh between each iliac crest bouncing up and down.

And when I lean to the side in my office chair, I can feel flesh in a crease that never was there before. And my butt is spreading over the chair, covering more territory, encroaching slowly, as it dominates the seat surface.

That's it. Done. I need to get off my ass, start running and putting some effort into it, and quit eating and drinking without thought. I guess I'm too old to do that anymore and ever get away with it. My BMI is solidly in the overweight range. Over 25, by a good tick. I'm FAT. I'm obesifying!!!

What did I expect? Consuming things with abandon...thoughtless, repetitive, hand-to-mouth action...

Don't tell me I'm being too critical of myself, or that I look good, because I don't care how I look. Maybe I happen to hold 140 pounds well for a 5'1" person. I don't care.

It's how I feel. I feel FAT. And no matter what people say you look like, it is not healthy to be fat. Even if nearly everyone else is. My body is made to run. Long distances. At a reasonable pace, not plodding along.

So now I'm 5 days into being very careful of what I eat to get a jump start on changing my habits, I haven't had a beer since last Saturday, and I'm VERY CRABBY!

"She hasn't been the same since the house fell on her sister"

Tread lightly around me for the next few weeks. Your life depends on it.

Day 27: Stop Black Friday

It's 18 degrees outside and lightly snowing. We got 4 or 5 inches accumulated since yesterday. We had a quiet Thanksgiving and enjoyed our time with Bella. Simple meal, just a few things, but delicious.

Usually we spend the holiday with our friends here in town but this year they were visiting family on the Western Slope. We knew Bella would appreciate not being left at home alone, and we know it's her last Thanksgiving. We took the Bella to Starbucks for a pup cup yesterday, wrapped her up tight in an extra blanket. She loved it.

I have decided to mount my bike on the trainer in the living room this weekend, so I will have additional options for getting some movement in. The other day I was walking down the stairs and felt a twinge in my left IT band. It felt like a rubber band snapped. Just a tiny twinge, but I can feel that something in there is not quite right. It's not the whole thing, just the edge of it.

It's just a reminder that I need to get back to moving and stretching. Minimal hacking this morning so maybe I've finally got the worst of this bronchitis thing over with. No more excuses.

I try really hard every year not to buy anything on Black Friday. I really resent what it has become, it's like the worst of all the Walmart and Costco shoppers come out of the woodwork, parasites, crawling into lines at dark hours. If you are a Black Friday shopper, whatever your reasons, I don't mean to offend you personally, if you have a good reason for braving the flu-infested crowds, snotty kids, and people wild-eyed with greed, willing to draw blood and brawl on the filthy linoleum floors in the cash register lines for $20 off the TV they want so they can sit around and eat more crap in front of it.

I was so happy when REI announced its #OptOutside campaign. I know it's just another way to market themselves but it really would be nice if most companies would stop forcing their employees to endure the shopping frenzy on one more day when they could be taking care of their own families and well-being. Going outside and breathing some fresh air...what a concept.

I tend to abhor shopping for anything, even groceries, from November through December. Walking into a grocery store and being smacked in the face with the pungent, nose-frying smell of fake cinnamon-scented pine cones and whatever else they have parked near the doors and endcaps is enough to make me turn around gagging and walk out the door. Why we must all be subjected to such scents when some of us find them offensive even in their real form...I do not like cinnamon. And fake cinnamon is even worse.

I don't care about the blank red Starbucks cups. I really don't care about the holiday symbols, they don't bother me. Not a Christian here. I just don't like the greed and overconsumption that goes along with the holidays. Just 38 days until the first Monday after New Years, when it will be safe to go into a store and breathe again!

Bah Humbug and enjoying the fresh air!

Obesification Again...

I saw this article today on Modern Healthcare and it pissed me off, and even more so in the context of what's been happening in the headlines recently.

It’s long past time for American politicians to grow up. What a bunch of immature privileged frat boys we have in Washington.

Defending the gun lobby and preservation of a hateful symbol endorsed by state governments. Refusing to tell the truth about what’s going on with the proliferation of mass shootings and racially motivated violence. Lining their pockets from the even wealthier sociopaths and narcissists writing them checks.

But immature, spoiled little boys need more than a slap on the wrist. They need responsible adults to hold them accountable and take away their toys until they clean up their act.

Here’s a laughable thought…what if we could make a scale that was super cheap, purchased at Walmart, where you plug in your height and it calculates your BMI, showing you where you fall in the green, yellow or red or danger zones, corresponding to healthy, overweight, obese, and morbidly obese, since people can’t “see” body mass index.

If only it were that simple.

We’re not educating people about health, physical activity, and the consequences of what they put into their mouths while not moving their bodies.

We’re not teaching kids habits of taking care of their health from an early age, we’re not funding PE and sensible health education in schools.

We’re not building safe communities that encourage parents to let their kids play outside and safe streets for people to walk and commute by bike, not promoting healthy lifestyle habits, reasonable work hours, a chance to get enough activity during the workday, short commutes, healthy foods instead of fast food garbage.

Not only should we curtail the marketing of junk food and unhealthy activities on TV, we should curtail sedentary TV watching. We’ve been irresponsible in allowing corporate lobbyists from junk food industry to influence education, entertainment, and communities. Not only have we failed to invest in our infrastructure, we’ve failed to see that our infrastructure consists of the health of our people.

We've given science a back seat while putting money in the driver's seat. Except money doesn't have brakes.

When are we going to wake up? We have a political problem, and it’s intimately related to our 75% overweight and obese population, our dwindling life expectancy, our number 37 rank in the world on health care, our growing numbers of those impoverished and struggling economically.

We hear about the lack of investment in infrastructure- the things used by the little people- roads, bridges, communities, or the basic things a civilized society needs- public education, a future with promise, not debt and enslavement by a culture expecting people to pledge allegiance to the corporate states holding a noose around their necks.

Killing us with insurance premiums that keep expanding in the name of healthcare, you look down at us from your luxury C-suite seating. While the insurance companies, hospital industries, and pharmaceutical giants keep growing their profit margins, people’s waistlines are expanding just as fast as quality and length of life are declining.

We are headed into another election cycle with a larger than usual assortment of boy clowns with even larger gonads to deny and defend as needed the policies that keep the few and rich safe and secure while ensuring the continued decline of the American quality of life.

These boys continue to lie as their lapel flags disappear into their ever-growing bulk.

Because they know they will get away with it until American adults wake up from our sugar-fueled coma and roll our supersized bodies off the couch…

My Anaconda Don't...

30 to 51. It's not betting odds, a temperature range or a bad Superbowl score. It's the name of the new purpose in my life.

Today I went to the beach. Okay, it was Warren Lake, but it does have sand, and water, and driftwood, and today it had sunshine and 70 degree temperatures. But it was a wake-up call.

Faced with today's 70 and sunny reality of my fat pants being tight, and having a hard time finding a pair of shorts to wear that didn't chafe or fit too close to my approaching-Kim-Kardashian-proportioned buns, hon...

I decided it is time to get with the program. Vitamin D deficiency, less-than-stellar mood, sore back, inability to run, raging hormones, and blinding white legs be damned, I have 30 days until my 51st birthday and I know I can lose a chunk of this blubber by then, at least get to where I can fit into most of my clothes again. I think I just came up with a new hashtag: #runthepaws

I woke up this morning with a sore back again. I was doing better, got up to a total of 40 minutes of running in my walks. I've been walking between 6 and 8 miles a day, and every other day I've been running parts of the walk. I think it's something to do with the position I sleep in, if I wake up on my stomach that kills my back.

I took Thursday off, then I walked 5 miles Friday, without running. My back was fine. Then this morning, it was as painful as it was the first day this happened. I woke up face down. I don't know if there's anything else I could have done to prevent it from being this sore. Friday afternoon I went out with a friend for a beer so we could have some girl time and dinosaur talk. Dinosaur talk is when we talk about healthcare stuff. You know, the dinosaurs who run things in health care.

I have been indulging in the beer more often than I should, and eating things I shouldn't, like bread. Actually bread probably has been my biggest downfall lately. But it also leads to slacking on other carbs. When I don't feel like making breakfast, I've been eating PBJs. Bad, bad, bad. It would be one thing if I were running a gazillion miles, but I'm not.

I'm back on the floor with the ice pack again. I'll have to give up the beer, quit slacking on watching the carb intake, and do SOMETHING until my back feels strong enough to handle regular running.

Now that I'm committed, I need to think about where I'm headed, at least a climb of Mt. Whitney and a few miles of a little jaunt across the desert this summer...

Obesify Fort Collins...

So the big news this past week was that Dunkin Donuts opened in Fort Collins. Midtown Fort Collins, only about a mile from my house.

For a town that has so many mediocre restaurants and franchise chains, you would think, no big deal, just another restaurant with crappy food.

Well I found myself in a traffic jam while trying to cross College at Harvard, at mid-day in the middle of the week, so I made the mistake of trying to turn up the frontage road along College to escape the traffic jam.

Bad idea. It turned out that the traffic jam was cars lined up and wrapped around the entire block and blocking the frontage road both ways, trying to get in what appears to be a drive-through window at Dunkin Donuts!!!

Excuse me, that's spelled "drive-thru". This is Amurrica.

Hell, you would think they were giving away an iPhone 6 with every dozen donuts, or that Black Friday was moved up by four weeks. Haven't you people ever seen a donut before?

Once again I take refuge in my woman cave...

This morning I ran the Tortoise & Hare 5K with the Fort Collins Running Club. My third run this week. My hips and knees ache, I feel stiff and old. I did not go there to run fast and I stuck to my plan, which was to run at a leisurely pace and cheer for all the runners. There were well over 100 runners this time. I had to run to the bushes too because I drank too much coffee this morning, and still managed to somehow run it in under 29 minutes even with the pitstop.

I ran there and ran home, and then spent the rest of the day working on various writing projects and preparing for a webinar this week. Having to turn on lights in the woman cave now, since it's getting dark so early after the clock change last night.

Maybe this week I will be a little more active than last week. Right now I feel like I need about a year off...

The Big Picture

There's a lot going on in the world right now and I was thinking yesterday about all of it, trying to put it all in perspective. I really need to get back to running posts, and I will.

I don't mean to sound negative here, because I spend my days now doing work that I feel is important and valuable to real people, and I live in a beautiful place and environment, and things are generally good in my life. I am fortunate to be where I am at the moment, and I enjoy it.

The things I see and read on a daily basis are so disturbing that I have to put it out of my mind in some way, and I think that's true for most people who pay attention to things, care about things, and live with this onslaught of information about insanity in the world. This whole Ebola thing really gets to me for some reason, and I think it's just the images of government and health officials flapping their arms and wringing their hands and looking so indecisive and lost as to how to handle it.

There is so much distrust of government and authority that the efforts to educate the public with health information are often wasted. People don't listen to sources they don't trust. The anti-vaccination movement is one example, but over the past week, look at Ebola and the information coming out of the CDC, all of the things we try to teach people about taking care of themselves and preventing cancer and chronic disease, so much of it is not being listened to.

I was writing a piece for the local paper yesterday on breast cancer and I mentioned prevention, like exercise, eating right, managing stress. These are things basic to decent health, for prevention of any disease. And so many people don't even have a grip on those basic things. We are a society hurtling toward self-destruction by our own self-neglect.

Do people have an underlying death wish? Do they really think it's a comfortable way to go, by self-inflicted obesity, septic and bloated to 500 pounds from a diabetic foot wound and hooked up to a ventilator with families surrounding them praying for a miracle? I've seen this more times than you could imagine. I can still remember the smells. Should we provide guns to these people instead? It certainly would be cheaper.

I think there is such an atmosphere of distrust here in the US because of our divided government and everyone's self-interest at the top, the focus on profit. Think about it, we are trying to prevent a disease epidemic, whether it's flu or measles or Ebola, and some for-profit hospitals are so cheap they don't even provide adequate protective materials for their staff like gloves and gowns.

The spokespeople at the tops of government or worldwide agencies are often viewed as shills for an already distrusted government, and those suspicions turn out to be right. So that just strengthens the case for distrust of agency information, and promotes more reliance on untested, unscientific sources such as the so-called health gurus who claim there is a natural cure for everything if you take the right supplements (a multi-billion dollar industry), you can cure cancer with a daily kale and wheatgrass smoothie, people who still believe childhood measles vaccines cause autism, and it goes on.

What if they came up with a vaccine for Ebola? Or a vaccine for breast cancer?

All over the world there is so much unrest, I think it has always been this way but there was less ability to follow it and draw attention to it due to the Internet and technology. Having those mouthpieces available like social media, makes it more attractive to rebels to get attention and be seen by the world, bringing attention to their cause. People are always going to have their attention grabbed by the extreme, so these groups resort to the extreme and show it on video over Instagram or Facebook.

There are the very rich countries and the very poor countries, and the US can definitely take the blame for it's role in creating a good bit of it. But a country that is seen as a world leader, or was once seen as one, has serious problems at home within it's own people. Poverty, wealth disparities, greed, corruption in all levels of government, capitalism taken to the extreme that it robs the people of resources that would make their lives so much better, all of the things that the US always claimed to be above, those are all spreading like an epidemic and there is no leadership to correct these things.

I have always been politically left-leaning and socially liberal, but these days I find myself understanding more about why the people on the right feel the way they do, and the anti-government sentiments they express are often valid, even if they don't follow the same logic to get to those that I would. I hear the right wing complain bitterly about Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi and when you listen to them talk, the criticisms are warranted. I recently heard an interview with Nancy Pelosi that was absolutely nauseating, I wanted to kick her out on her ass. There are so few Democrats I view as being above the fray that I can't say I support the party at all.

Not to say that John Boehner and others are any better. The Republicans have their own full lineup of bozos just waiting to embarrass themselves and the rest of us in the upcoming 2016 primary election. Between now and then none of the politicians on either side will do a thing because it's an election year, or we're coming up on an election, so they do even less than they do regularly. The government does not at all represent the people, and here we are, the taxpayers, paying their salaries, benefits, healthcare, and all they do is act in the interest of the corporations and wealthy individuals who don't pay their fair share of taxes.

There must be a playbook somewhere that instructs the people who are groomed for so-called leadership positions: in government, finance, industry, professional sports, that teaches them how to be liars and slimebags, how to steal the public blind, and the language of corporatespeak or leaderspeak. Maybe it comes from Harvard business school or there's some kind of a secret club.

Not only are these things happening at top levels of government, but it goes all the way down to communities and local agencies. Corporate speak and lies, everywhere.

There are days when I think we would all be better off if a giant meteor hit the earth like a reset button. That would cure all of our problems! I am so glad I don't have kids because I would hate for them to be left in this world. I don't know how parents these days are preparing their kids for the kind of world they have inherited.

I look at my niece who is 17 and a senior in high school, and she's so smart and talented and I think the future of the world rests with her and kids like her. I hope they have the tools to confront it. I hope it doesn't hurt them too much to care.

Close Encounters of Three Kinds...

1. Touroidus celluloidus

When I was in forestry school at NAU (where I got my bachelor's degree way back in the ancient times, when dinosaurs still ruled the earth) we used to have a joke among our classmates, that when we went out to forest recreation sites, among the many wildlife species we would encounter were Touroidus celluloidus. The fat-assed tourist.

They drove as much as they could, parked as close to the destination as possible, the picnic was the highlight of their trip, and they always asked stupid questions.

It's true, we really did say that. Not PC at all. But that was also back in the days before the obesity epidemic really took hold, the early eighties. Reagan was president, the "gourmet" food craze was just starting out, and fat was only beginning to be thought of as the demon. What followed was the removal of fat from the junk food diet and replacement by carbohydrates, which led us to the great waistline expansion and Type II diabetes explosion of today.

When I think about my life back then I think I was some kind of alien among my classmates who were mostly male, very conservative, a few were rednecks, they listened to annoying, twangy country music and chewed and spat tobacco, always had a blob in one side of their jaw, spit into soda cans, drank cheap beer, and drove big pickup trucks with long antennas on top and wore pointy boots, jeans, and flannel shirts. And hats, always cowboy hats or baseball caps.

I was one of a small handful of women in my class. An alien race for sure.

Speaking of aliens, I have always been curious about Devil's Tower. I've been to the Black Hills many times for races and runs, but never took the opportunity to go see it, even though it's only about an hour out of the way. This time I made a point of going there on my way to Spearfish, where I was running the Leading Ladies marathon.

I drove north on a little highway from Douglas to Gillette, Wyoming, though oilfield country. Nothing but oil rigs, oil wells, oil tankers, and antelope. Then took a road off of I-90 to the monument. I could see the Black Hills from Gillette and the scenery got better as I drove north.

I drove over the Belle Fourche river, and from a high point on the highway, I could see some rock formations in the distance, and I knew the one by itself had to be Devil's Tower.

Approaching it on the road, it became more impressive the closer I got. People were beginning to turn off the road to take photographs, and I did too. I wished I could be there at sunrise or sunset so the light would be better, but it was noon.

I drove down a hill, around a curve, and there it was...Disneyland! Ugh.

Prime Touroidus celluloidus habitat. There was a long line of cars leading up to the entrance station, and I momentarily considered turning around and bagging it. But then I knew I'd be disappointed, so I stayed, sitting in line with the line of cars blowing exhaust, surrounded by tourists at the KOA and little stores advertising ice cream, trinkets, and other touristy garbage. There was even a car show going on.

There were lots of overweight people milling around eating ice cream, giant RVs parked in tiny parking lots, and people sitting there, in folding chairs, alongside the road, breathing exhaust, watching I'm not sure what...the line of traffic waiting to go through the entrance station to pay $10 to see the tower?

By the time I got a quarter mile from the trailhead, it got quiet and the crowds disappeared, with only occasional walkers, many of whom spoke German or Japanese. But there was one guy who easily topped 300 pounds, who was walking along, pouring sweat, and talking to his companion about how he feels like his body is pushing it's limits, that he could tell he was getting dehydrated...as if he were on some long remote trek in the wilderness...

I ignored the drama, but I really thought I would have a chance to practice CPR before I made it around the trail once. So many VERY unfit looking people. Very bad. It looks like this might be the most exercise most of them had in a long time. Huffing and puffing to get up little baby hills, maybe 20 feet high.

Looking up at the giant columns of "phonolite porphyry, a...greenish-gray igneous rock with conspicuous crystals of white feldspar" according to the Tower Columns, a newsprint souvenir freely distributed at the little booth at the park entrance.

The tower was different all the way around, many interesting views from each angle. Again, I wish the light had been better, but I got the best pictures I could.

2. Leading Ladies Marathon

After the tower, it was about an hour drive to Spearfish. First I stopped off at the Holiday Inn to pick up my race packet. It's an all women's marathon, so there were a lot of colorful items in the expo. Close encounters with a lot of pink stuff. Nothing I was interested in.

I walked around a little, got my number, t-shirt, and chip, and the information I needed, and then I went across the street to my hotel and was able to check in. Once I got up to my room, I cranked the air conditioning as cold as it would go, and started getting my stuff organized for a 3 am wakeup. The buses were leaving the Holiday Inn across the street at 4 am, for the 6 am race start.

I went out to get some food. I didn't see anything that interested me except a Mexican restaurant that someone told me was good. So I decided to go there and get take out, and go back to the room and eat. I could not believe the size of the portion they gave me. There were enough refried beans for an army. I happen to like refried beans if they are the really really bad kind, the Mexican kind, probably made with lard and they taste awesome. Well that was the case. And I ate them. It was 4 pm. I figured I was eating early enough that I'd be able to fall asleep.

I organized my clothes and stuff for the morning and thought about my plan, sitting down on my mat on the floor to stretch.

I was thinking if I could keep a 9 minute pace that would be good, so my goal in my head was to finish in under 4 hours. I had fantasies of running 3:30 a few weeks back, but given the fatigue in my legs I dismissed that altogether, even with the downhill. My goal would be to run sub 9s average.

I only ran 26 miles before the marathon that week. But one day I did do almost 16 miles and felt pretty dead at the end of it, so I knew my legs weren't going to perform any miracles. Plus with my tight hips and gluteals that I've been obsessively stretching and strengthening only for about a week, I knew I was limited.

I slept okay, turned off the lights at 8:30 and woke up once to pee but went back to sleep. No hot flashing, thanks to the AC.

I woke up at 2:55, and did my usual prerace routine. Coffee, thyroid pills, stretch, shower, dressed, eat something. I packed a sandwich to eat on the bus along with some water and a vitamin water zero. I took my running pack and a water bottle half filled with ice.

I left the room at 10 to 4, to walk across the street to catch the bus.

The bus went to the park where the finish line was, to pick up more runners, then up to Deadwood and past the town of Lead up to the country club for the start. We passed places I remembered from my trip with Ed, like the burger place on the highway that was our motivation. And I remembered getting lost trying to find the trail head and almost driving to Wyoming in the process, and finally coming back to the same road past the country club.

The woman I sat next to on the bus was doing the 50 states so she picked my brain for some ideas for marathons in different states. I was able to help her with about half a dozen.

We could see lightning in the distance, but there was no rain. When the sun rose it was clear. I hit the portapotties first- got at front of bus with that in mind. After 3 trips I thought I was done. I stretched in the dark, waiting for the start.

When we lined up at start, I was surprised to see pacers. A man was pacing the 3:45 group-the fastest paced runner group. Then there were women pacers: 4 hours, 4:10, 4:20, 4:30 and who knows what else was back there. The women pacing the pace groups looked like they might struggle with the times they were supposed to be pacing, but I do my own thing so I really didn't care. There were two women who looked like twins at the front. They looked to be older than me but had dark hair, they looked fast and skinny and had some sort of Boulder shirts on. I figured they would be up front so I got several rows behind them.

I stood in line next to the 3:45 pace dude, not intending to stay with him. The horn sounded, and we were off, on a gravel road, going straight up a fairly steep hill. After a couple of miles we were on pavement.

3. The Shrubbery

Shortly after mile 2 I realized I needed to use the facilities, which were nonexistent. They promised portapotties at most aid stations, but I knew I wasn't going to make it to the aid station, wherever it was. I spotted a place just up and off the road in some thick trees. It was a good three or four minutes before I got back on the road. Even though I was smart to bring some TP and baby wipes, I didn't bring enough. I was in trouble.

Then I was worried that my intimately close encounters with the shrubbery might have been poison ivy since I remembered it from my trip with Ed.

My splits looked like this (for those who are interested in such things): Mile 1 10:23, mile 2 19:57, Mile 3 33:53. Then it faded into an amorphous mess of uneven splits broken up by sprints into the woods. I was only focused on finding the next spot to take cover. I resupplied myself with toilet paper at one of the aid station portapotties.

It was a screaming downhill for a while, I hit 10 miles in 1:35:56, then there was a mile uphill gravel road section to some waterfalls. I actually considered quitting at mile 10!! I felt so crappy I just didn't want to do it anymore. But then I decided to continue with a tourist stroll. Maybe I would feel better later, I could only hope. I was behind the 4:10 pacer, I could see that group of three or four runners far ahead of me.

Walking uphill to the waterfall a young runner came up on me and started chatting. she was running and I was walking, she asked me if this was my first time. I smiled and said, I wish! I asked her if it was her first and she said it was. She asked me how many I've done and I said, I don't keep track, but it's a lot. I started to talk with her and started jogging along with her. It got me going.

She said her goal was to finish without walking. I gave her my nicest-toned gentle lecture about walking, which is, never feel bad about walking, there is nothing wrong with it, it gives your muscles a break and you end up going faster in the long haul. I walked for about 3 minutes before she caught me, and that was it for my walking.

Just before 13 miles there was an aid station. I stopped for some bananas and more water, then I took off. My legs were sluggish, but they were moving. By then I was only thinking about making it back to the hotel room in time to check out and get a shower before I drove home. That was my new goal, 5 hours.

I wasn't even mad at myself for not bringing my phone to take pictures. It was beautiful, but I was not in an enthusiastic mood.

I hit the halfway mark, the half marathon start, in 2:08:25. I had a couple more portapotty and shrubbery breaks before 17 miles. I ate a gel at 14, and another one at 18, plus a few banana pieces at the aid stations.

I saw a dead snake on the side of the road that made me jump. Maybe it was the adrenaline from that, but something happened after 17 miles, suddenly my legs kicked in, my gut felt better, and I started moving. My splits started to be consistently under 9 minutes and kept getting faster.

I didn't need any more pee or poop breaks, I must have gotten rid of whatever it was, the alien that took over my insides was finally expelled. I had exorcised the demons, or the other-worldly thing that followed me from Devil's Tower.

We had cool shaded canyons for the first 20 miles, a few sunny areas after halfway but it was quite pleasant and didn't really get warm until the last hour.

Around 18 miles I passed the 4:10 pacer, then around 21 miles I passed the 4:00 pacer, who were each running alone. Yup.

As I was descending the canyon I was passing people left and right, and not just the half marathoners who were walking. I must have passed about 25 marathoners on my way into town in the last 9 miles.

Whenever you're in a race and feeling good in the second half, spectators always see you and cheer for you. "You're looking great!" because compared to everyone else who passes them in a semi-death march state, you look good. That was happening to me, and of course that helps.

When I made the turn that takes you to the bike path that delivers you the last 3/4 mile to the finish line, I was flying, relatively. Eight minute pace is flying at the end of a marathon. I felt good and cruised into the finish, but really glad to be done. 4:10:52 on my watch. Not bad. Not good, but not disastrous. I know that without the poop breaks it would have been easily under four hours, I had to remember that.

At the finish they handed us COLD bottles of water, some scented towels (lavender?), and red roses, along with our medals, which said, "Queen of the Road". It was actually refreshing. I went looking for the shuttle that would take me back to the hotel and it was leaving in 10 minutes, so I looked for the results and had just enough time to see my first-timer buddy from the rough section finish her first marathon. I had passed her around 20 miles. I went over to congratulate her. She was still emotional and elated from her experience. It HAS been a LONG time for me.

I got on the shuttle and headed back to the hotel. I forgot about my drop bag, but all it had in it was half a sandwich that I never ate, some gels, and an old t-shirt I don't care about.

I showered, checked out of the room, and hit the road to drive home. It took 6 hours, and as I drove, my left thigh was screaming for about two hours. It seriously hurt. I was afraid to step on the clutch, I cringed every time I had to shift. I briefly wondered if I had fractured my femur, it was so bad. I was planning to take some ibuprofen when I stopped for gas, but by then it had quieted down and I didn't take any. Now it doesn't feel any different from the right leg. Not sure what that was about, but it's gone.

And now I'm home. Back to the routine. I'm slightly sore but not too bad. I walked and stretched today and didn't run. I'll see how things unfold this week, I might wait until mid-week before I start to hit it hard again. Only two more weeks and I'm tapering.

So it wasn't my best day, but I forgot about marathons. They are a different creature. Sort of alien to me now.

But the best news is, it wasn't poison ivy!!!!

Obesification: Soccer Parents

I am amazed at the excuses people make for not having time to exercise. The other day I was talking to a woman who told me that she wishes she could lose weight but she's too busy with her work schedule and her kids' soccer schedules.

This morning I went for a run where I go past a schoolyard that is often filled with kids playing soccer. The parents park alongside the street during the practice. I am always amazed at the number of people I see, sitting in their cars, sometimes running the engines, presumably for air conditioning, and texting.

When I first ran by, there was a VERY overweight woman sitting in her front seat, texting away. On my way home, about an hour later, she was still there, sitting in the car, still texting. I think it's a safe bet she hadn't moved the entire time.

In that hour, she could have gotten up and walked around the soccer field, getting some good exercise. I think her kid would have respected her more for doing that.

People like that woman in the car are contributing to the enrichment of pharmaceutical and hospital executives and sucking the life out of the rest of us.

Beer, Bacon Boobs, and Blight...

Just another Sunday afternoon in the Fort. The things that happen when you least expect them...never a dull moment!

Yesterday while I was out running and Dennis was with his friends at the Brewfest, there was an article in the paper alerting the public to a potential Hepatitis A outbreak traced to a restaurant where we eat frequently. We happened to eat there on the exact day to which they traced the source. It's been about 20 years since I had a Hepatitis A vaccine and thirty years for Dennis, so we decided we should go get vaccines. They advised online registration, so I did it and we had an appointment to go to the Larimer County health department at 1:40 p.m.

The registration shot back this e-mail, confirming our "tickets to the event". Like it was a concert...

Apparently so did a gazillion other people. When we got there, there were huge lines, people waiting to register, waiting to be screened, waiting for vaccines, waiting for immune globulin shots. They were all there for the same reason. I never realized how many people could be affected within a short period of time at a single restaurant. I saw quite a few familiar faces there, not from the restaurant, but just from around town. A lot of people eat there.

We waited in line and it wasn't too bad, we were in and out of there in 30 minutes. Now we are good to eat wherever we want, even the dumpsters!

But seriously, I noticed a few things at the health department. One was that the nurses giving the shots were not obviously washing or sanitizing their hands between clients, and that they were not wearing gloves while giving the shots. When you're dealing with public and large numbers of people, especially with the prevalence of viruses like Hepatitis C (not A, we're talking C, the blight of my generation) and who knows what other communicable diseases in blood and body fluids, you better be wearing gloves.

Anyway that was my observation, from the nurse in me. I got the shot anyway, and Dennis did too. He was giving everyone a hard time by saying he was turning into a zombie and was craving raw meat. That's the crazy dude I'm married to.

I got the shot in my left arm and it didn't hurt until afterwards, and so far it's not bad. I got a cute little blue bandaid. As we were leaving we saw some other people from the running club and stopped for a minute to talk.

We had to wait for two trains on the way home!

One was at Vine and Lemay, waiting for the endless train to go by. We decided to turn off at Lincoln and stop at Odell's for a beer. Dennis got a Nitro Five Barrel, and I had a Town Pump "Pail" Ale. Bitchen Swill.

While we sat there drinking our beers we observed the influx of people from the Brewfest and others. We got there just in time, because no sooner did we sit down at a table when a huge pile of people came in. Maybe 50 people arrived all at once. And they were HUGE...

There was one guy we called Bacon Boobs. He was easily 400 pounds, and was wearing one of those periodic chart t-shirts that said, Ba Co N, stretched across his man boobs. HUGE. Those boobs were much bigger than mine. Spectacularly Awesome. That shirt was made for him. He was sitting with two female companions and between the three of them they easily weighed 1000 pounds. Wow. I could not take a picture of Mr. Bacon Boobs though.

Then we got this view across from us. Much smaller person, but still...I think Bacon Boobs was easier on the eyes than the total package attached to this set of underwear, I spared you the front side.

One the way home from Odell, there was ANOTHER train at Riverside and Lemay! We circumvented it by going down to Timberline and driving home that way. What the train hell! Another fun fact about living in Fort Collins. The multiple trains that always block traffic at the most inconvenient times, typically at rush hours.

At least we avoided sitting in traffic in the 91 degree heat. A good beer is the perfect way to take the edge off a Hepatitis A vaccine. Just in case you ever need that bit of information.