Snark Alert! Nursebots' Week: Humanity is a Doormat

lion image credit: Nathan Nitzky

We now interrupt our regularly scheduled programming for this important public service announcement:

Readers, consider yourselves forewarned: You knew I couldn't possibly make it through a Nurses' Week keeping my mouth shut. So here it is, my thought for the week...

I haven't been on my soapbox about health care in a while, but this is a time of year that always lights a fire under my butt. I'm not having to deal with it directly anymore, which has done wonders for my physical and mental health, but I have many friends and colleagues who are still being rocked seasick on the tsunami of health care reform in the age of corporate dominion.

You've read my other posts and rants about nursing, I've said these things before, as have so many other people. Here's my take this time.

Patricia Singleton's excellent blog about abuse and healing from incest has much that is applicable to the corporate workplace. In a recent post she was writing about healing and educating, and stopping the abuse.

She writes, "It is through silence that...abuse has been allowed to continue and flourish for so long and become an epidemic in our world."

She further states, "If we don't educate people, who will...Abusers thrive in the silence. They count on the silence of those that they abuse. They count on the subject to continue to be taboo in society. The silence gives them free reign to do what they want. I refuse to be silenced again."

Workers are scared, they want to keep their paychecks, they have seen how the system handles dissent or differences of opinion. Retaliation is rampant, I experienced it the minute I opened my mouth. When the powers that be don't get blind allegiance and compliance, they do things to try to get rid of people. They threaten them with unsavory working conditions and force them to quit.

Someone has to talk about it, former coworkers tell me the old trick of writing letters doesn't seem to get any traction, and these people are so exhausted and defeated that they have no hope that their efforts will work. Conditions keep getting worse. Staffing won't get any better thanks to the dumbasses at the top, who cut regular staff and then have to hire expensive travel nurses to replace them, so that they can slide their Teflon-coated tactics just under the wire of getting dinged for dangerous work conditions. On what planet does this make sense?

The privileged and tone deaf executive class's planet. To be a fly on the wall at an ACHE conference...

It's outright abuse of health care workers. But it's part of the big picture of what we're doing to people everywhere in this country, the old, over-repeated story of the rich getting richer and the average people getting squeezed to death. People accept it because they feel powerless to change it, because they are too exhausted.

It's not a "caring profession" like the nursing school instructors tried to impart to us in their pathetic attempt to sell us a line of bullshit. Nursing schools are part of the problem, they keep the dysfunctional cycle going.

What kind of caring profession allows it's members to be lucky to make it through a work day without making a mistake? Who can care when they don't have time to look at the patient because there's so much charting to do? Not being able to take time to pee or eat for a 13 hour shift? Throwing pills in front of the patient and running out of the room? Clocking out and working for free after 12 hours because you didn't have time to chart everything but you'll get in trouble if you go into overtime?

I ran into a former coworker from the ICU in Starbucks last week. She was getting off night shift. She gave me an earful and she's always very animated and expressive about what's going on. Nothing I hadn't heard already from the others I keep in touch with.

I saw another hospital worker in there recently, early in the morning. I can remember those mornings, going in for my shift and walking across the bridge from the parking garage, seeing the downtrodden body language and frowns of people who used to smile and greet each other.

It was interesting listening to my former coworker talk. I was able to keep a detached and very occasionally amused distance from it, that means I am healing and not so personally wrapped up in it anymore. But I still feel the anguish and the frustration. It is a horribly stuck feeling. I see it in the twisted foreheads and heavy shoulders of these defeated, exhausted people. This is what we're allowing to happen to our fellow human beings. The same ones we expect to take care of us when we're sick.

Is there anyone out there who sees this and will take a sane approach? I will not see that in my lifetime, I doubt it. Elizabeth Warren talks about the parallels in the banking industry and how the little guys are getting abused by the way the system is stacked against them.

I do have hope that the millenials will turn things around. They will have to, or they will be doomed to a miserable existence. No one is investing in their future, instead, the older generations are sucking them dry, making money off of their futures. You can't prune the tree and expect it to bloom when you don't water the roots.

I am constantly amazed by the fact that the health care industry has no leaders who recognize that in taking all these steps forward, then panicking over missteps, staying focused on cutting costs, they are killing the workers and that leads to worse health care.

From physicians to nurses to techs to the people who take out the trash and serve the cafeteria meals, if they take the fast track to overworking everyone and burn them all out then what will we have? Richer CEOs and no health care. Mistakes. Injuries. Deaths.

The whole thing makes no sense whatsoever. Nursing doesn't even make sense anymore in this health care debacle. Keep on burning out physicians and making them leave medicine or preventing the brightest ones from entering it. Keep on grooming nurse practitioners, until there's a glut. Keep on relegating registered nurses to the status of court reporters.

Not that court reporting isn't an important job. It's just that when you're dealing with people's life and death situations when they are sick, you need to be able to focus on the sick person and not the transcription process.

Hell, court reporters make about as much as nurses do, with a lot less stress. They don't have to worry about killing someone.

I am sad to say that I no longer recommend that anyone take up nursing as a career. Recently someone asked me if I would attend a middle school career day to talk about nursing. I couldn't attend due to a prior commitment, but after thinking about it I realized I couldn't live with myself if I contributed to the lie.

The next time someone considering nursing wants career advice, I know what to suggest!

We will now return to our regularly scheduled program...Adventures in Iowa...

2014 Cornbelt 24 Hour Race: Adventures in Iowa

Pre-Race
It was a long pre-race day. I left Omaha Friday morning around 9:30 after doing some grocery shopping at Target there. I slept great in Omaha though I didn't plan the hotel location very well. It was out of the way of I-80 so I got a scenic tour of Omaha strip malls and suburbia.

It was windy as hell all the way across Nebraska and Iowa. I got great gas mileage.

It was a 4 1/2 hour drive east on I-80 across Iowa, after 7 1/2 hours on the road across Nebraska the day before. I stayed hydrated so I had to stop a lot, and finally, finally, finally got to Eldridge around 2:30 pm.

People drive slow in Iowa and there were a lot more semi trucks on the road, along with roadwork and the 70 mph speed limit. I kept seeing all these "Maid Rite" signs along the highway and I texted Rachel when I was close to Des Moines, just to see if there was a chance she wasn't at work that day. I asked her about Maid Rite. I was thinking it was like Home Depot.

She told me it's "loose meat sandwiches like Sloppy Joes" which already sounds really gross to me. But okay. I know what that is. It's just that Maid Rite doesn't sound like a restaurant. Sloppy Joes sounds a lot better than "loose meat"- that sort of makes my skin crawl. Is that a porn star's name?

Anyway, I arrived in Eldridge, the room wasn't ready, but at the front desk there were a couple of scruffy-looking characters fresh off the road asking questions. They turned around and one was Andy Lovy! Andy is the team physician for the U.S. National 24 Hour team and many other races, including Across The Years. He was trying to figure out how to get to the armory in Moline with a friend of his, John Surdyk, another ultrarunner who has been around for years but I've never met before.

Andy told me I should go for 127 to make the women's national team. One thing at a time, I told him, 110 was my goal for now. I needed to see if I could make it through that before setting my sights on that far out goal. Actually I'm not even sure 127 would qualify at this point, there have been so many women in the 130s or better. John started asking me questions and I didn't want to talk about it, so I changed the subject. They soon took off for their sightseeing, Andy offered to let me hang out in their room until my room was ready but I told him I had plenty of stuff to do.

I knew with Andy there that it would be a good day. I love going around in circles with him, he's always so encouraging and positive, and funny.

I went out in the parking lot while I was waiting for my room, and started making my PBJs and portioning out my race food into bags. As I was making PBJs a big truck from Minnesota pulled up next to me and I was so involved in spreading the peanut butter I didn't notice the guy walked up behind me until he said something. It was Ed Rousseau, longtime ultrarunner from Minnesota. He's 74.

He kept me entertained by his stories for a while as I made PBJs, then we must have both headed over to the track at the same time, so we helped each other drag our stuff to Lancer Stadium and onto lane 1 of the track. He entertained me with a few more stories and then we took a pre-race selfie, and he continued putting up his tent and I went back to the hotel to check into my room. Then it was time for the prerace dinner.

At the pre-race dinner I saw many familiar faces. It's been two years and that was the only other time I ran this event, but a good number of people remembered me. What a nice bunch of people. I sat with Ed and Dick Hogan and talked with Andy, Bonnie Busch, and the RD Karl Ungurean. We ate pasta and Karl gave a short pre-race briefing. There's not much to say. Hopefully no one would get lost on the course.

When we left there was a little sprinkling outside- some clouds, but the wind calmed down. The sunset from my room window was pretty. The weather forecast looked good, as long as the wind didn't get too bad.

In the morning the sunrise was gorgeous but I was too busy getting my stuff together, which is unusual for me. I usually never want to miss a sunrise or sunset. But this time I missed all of them- the pictures, anyway. I did get to enjoy them, they were all spectacular. I was focused and didn't want to waste time dealing with my phone.

I ended up only with these few pictures, and the selfies below, taken 12 hours apart.

The race
I did not sleep well the night before the race this time. This is unusual because ever since last fall since I quit work I have been sleeping great, including before races. The walls of this hotel are paper-thin and there were kids bouncing up and down on the floors somewhere, probably not anywhere close to my room, maybe upstairs. It took me forever to fall asleep, I got up and did things for a while, and then I probably got 4 hours of sleep. I woke up maybe half an hour before my alarm went off at 5.

I was glad I had my stash of chocolate cherry crack Clif Shots. I had coffee and ate a ham and cheese sandwich and some oatmeal. I left at 6 and went over to the track to finish setting up my table. There is so much to do to get things organized and set up right so you don't end up wasting time looking for things at each table stop.

Before the race, we met our first lap counters who work in 3 hour shifts. Then it was the national anthem, and at 7 am it was time to start.

My plan was to run 6:1 (run 6 laps, walk 1 lap) for the first 12 hours, keeping a comfortable pace for both. I was shooting for 3 minute laps average, but leaving time for screwing around. Bathroom breaks, a night clothes change, and table stops. That would put me in 12 hrs at 58 miles with lots of wiggle room. The plan was 110, 58/52. I was going to drop back to 4:1 for the second half, but if it was hot in the afternoon, I could drop back to 4:1 during the heat of the day, from about 1 to 5 pm. I could always make it up later.

The race is run in lane 2 of the track, which allows runners to set up their tables and gear in lane 1 instead of on the infield, where it is usually wet and muddy. That also makes it nice because the measurements result in 396 laps being 100 miles, or 99 laps per 25 miles. It's just nice to know you have the "bonus" miles already built in.

I got through 50K at 5:55 a little ahead of schedule, but it was cool outside. The wind was strong from the west, whichever direction we were going we would have the north or south side of the track into the wind, with a tailwind on the opposite side. I reached 50 miles in 9:43, again ahead of schedule, but I wasn't pushing it and I was actually holding back. At 12 hours I was at 60.5 miles. Then I took a 20 minute break to change clothes and get ready for night. I texted Wheaties Boy and told him how I was feeling. I told him I was trying to figure out at what point to bust it wide open- if I should wait for 100 miles to do that. He agreed.

I did great with hydration and eating all day, until about 9 pm. I ate 2 ham and cheese sandwiches, six of the 10 PBJs I made, ate 8 of the 12 yogurts, and just a few handfuls of potato chips. I also ate a baked potato at night, had about 4 bananas, half a bag of chocolate covered donuts, drank iced tea, lots of coke, a ton of vitamin water zeros, I like those with S caps in them, they taste better than water, and give some variety. I also did maybe half a dozen gels all night, just the caffeinated ones.

I hit 70 miles in 14:15, and 80 miles in about 16:30. Around 16 to 20 hours I was really struggling with getting the calories in. I was still running a lot more than I was walking, but I did dial it back to more like 2:2 for a while so I could find a way to get my stomach to cooperate. Finally I tried a banana and that did the trick, then I was able to eat donuts too. I did well most of the day so that saved me. I was peeing once an hour, the entire time, even toward the end when my fluid intake was down to a couple of cups of coke each hour.

I stayed on 6:1 through about 70 miles, but I noticed it was making it more difficult to eat and digest food at that point. I knew I would have to keep a balance between pushing it, being able to take in enough fluids and food, and not burning myself out before the end. I would have to say I managed it all pretty well and got a great result.

I wasn't swelling, didn't have blisters, and I never bothered with my feet at all- same shoes, socks, gaiters, compression sleeves the entire race. I did have a hot spot in the usual spot under my left foot, but I haven't been taking care of the calluses there the way John Vonhof always warns about. But it wasn't bad and in 24 hours it wasn't even uncomfortable enough to distract me, I just knew it was there.

One thing I was concerned about before the race was my left ankle. A few times, after the last few races, I had terrible swelling in front of the lateral malleolus. When I did my 30 miler on the track a few weeks ago, my ankle did that again. This time there was nothing. Whatever it is, it didn't cause a problem.

Bonnie is an incredibly strong runner. Going into the race I figured she would be my main competition and we could push each other. She wasn't having her best day though.

I had no idea but there was this young runner named Trista who is a marathoner, and for a while she was ahead of me. The only way I found out was that at one point we passed by the lap counters at the same time and it surprised me to hear that she was one lap ahead of me. She was running with two of her friends who came to the track. It looked like she was hanging in there, but fading.

My walk is a lot faster than just about anyone's, except for this one racewalker who was out there. Every time Trista started walking, I knew that I could gain on her by walking myself. So that kept me occupied for a while when my stomach wasn't cooperating and I didn't feel like pushing it yet.

When I got to 100 miles, it was at 21:16, which was a 2 1/2 hour PR for me. While having nearly 2 hours and 45 minutes seems like plenty to reach my goal of 110, but it's not as easy as it sounds. Averaging 4 miles an hour at this point in a race can be a challenge, especially when you're running low on fuel and fluids. If you're doing a lot of walking, unless you stay on top of a decent pace and get sub-4 minute laps, that's still 16 minute miles, which is slower than 4 mph.

I picked it up a little, but I decided to wait to really turn the afterburners on until we did our last direction switch at 22 hours. At that point I was at about 103 miles and I knew 110 was doable if I stayed with it, but maybe more if I had it in me. Doug was my lap counter and I told him I was going for at least 110, and I got lots of support from the lap counting tent. I can't wait to see the splits because I wonder how fast I went those last two miles. I think I had about 23 minutes left on the clock at 110 miles. I got through 111, and then started on 112. My final distance with the last partial lap was 112.29 miles.

There were so many moments during the race that I would observe the track and the sky and the people and for a moment realize that this was what I would rather be doing more than anything. running this type of event, where you truly get to share it with all the other runners, is my favorite thing of all. When the sun set in the evening and rose again in the morning, and we were all still out there, circling, more slowly but just as determined, to push through until the very last second when the finish gun went off.

I spoke to a young runner named Josh for a while, he was fascinated with Fort Collins and all things Colorado, and he is an admirer of Nick Clark. There were quite a few people doing their first 24 hour races. Amy was one of them, she was running well but she kept taking breaks and sitting down. I told her not to stop- to keep moving and do things while walking, because it takes longer to get your muscles moving again after you stop.

The Midwestern runners always are impressed when you tell them you're from Colorado. They love to visit Colorado. They always ask me why I come there for races when we have so many great trail races at home. I don't race trails anymore, and Colorado doesn't have enough road ultras and almost no track ultras, either.

Ed was doing well all day, he was trying to get at least 84 miles so he could finish his 1000th Cornbelt mile. He ended up going beyond his goal, and notably, won the men's race! At age 74!

Andy's friend John was plugging along, he said he had a headache, and he was starting to lurch to the right. Andy was having foot pain so he went as far as an ultra- 26.5 miles, and called it a day. The whole time he was out there it was fun hearing him cheer for me each time I went by.

There were several other runners I remembered from last time who I talked with, and their encouragement helped. And Bonnie, especially, she was cheering me on to my goal the whole time, and beyond it. At night on the track some of the runners had their spouses walking with them. In a small race like this it's nice that it's an uncrowded track. There were only 30 runners this time.

Between miles 90 and 100 I controlled my pace and spent time trying to force calories in. I knew I needed to have enough fuel to last through the two hours without wasting time to stop and eat and drink too often. I finally got bananas and chocolate donuts, along with iced coke, to work. Bob is one of the volunteers I remembered from last time, he runs the refreshment table at night. If no one comes by the table for a while, he sits on a cooler and nods off occasionally but if you let him know you need something, he is on top of it. He must have gotten me half a dozen cups of iced coke, and he cut up bananas for me, and brought everything to my table before I finished the next lap.

I was at absolute top speed for the last 3 or 4 miles. My legs felt like they were going to burn off. I doubt I was going much faster than 10 minute miles but that's fast enough at the end of 112 miles. When you see Karl walk out to the track with the gun, you are in an all-out sprint to get every last meter before you come to a dead stop when he shoots the gun.

I ended up with an 11 mile PR at 24 hours. I placed first overall, 10 miles ahead of the next runner. The top 3 spots were women, me, Trista and Bonnie, and 4th place was Ed.

The lap counters at this race are amazing. Totally on top of it. They let you know where you are each lap and make eye contact. Out of the nearly 445 laps I did, there were probably half a dozen times when the lap counter was distracted or had more than one runner going through and I had to yell their name to make sure they saw me. Every other time they were on it. It's the human touch, and they cheer for you, there's lots of support for the runners. Karl is the RD and he does a great job, along with the help of Bonnie Busch and her husband, and several other local runners.

Someone was nice enough to take this picture of me while I was waiting for Karl to roll the wheel around the track to measure our exact distance on the partial last lap we each did.

And just when you think the race is over...

I had enough time after the race to grab about half my stuff and put it in the car, then go to the hotel and shower before the post-race breakfast and awards. My last lap counter, Doug, helped me carry my heavy stuff to the car and Ed and I agreed to go back to the track after breakfast to help each other get the last of our stuff. While carrying my milk crate to the car, Doug remarked, "I see you have crack..."

My gels were organized by regular gels and "crack"- the super caffeine ones.

While undressing and taking a shower I had horrible foot cramps, leg cramps, back cramps, side stitches, and everything was seizing up. I figured I didn't take in enough fluids the last few hours when I picked up the pace but my stomach was not happy. I drank a bottle of water before the breakfast, but that was all I had time for.

I had an interesting experience at the post-race breakfast. I was sitting down at the table and started to eat a few small bites of food, when all of a sudden I started feeling funny. I felt the blood drain from my head and felt nauseated, so I got up to go over to the restroom. On my way to the door I don't know what happened, it happened so fast all I remember is that it felt like I tripped, hit the wall, and slid down, and suddenly I was on the floor, all I could see were some shoes and I heard some voices talking to me. "Are you all right?"

It was Bonnie and another woman from the group. I must have gotten up too fast and I bet my blood pressure tanked because I was so dehydrated from those last few hours on the track when I couldn't take in enough fluids.

Anyway I told them I felt nauseated and they helped me get up and took me into the bathroom, where I got down on the floor and sat there, waiting for it to pass. I had a few dry heaves but there was nothing coming up. Bonnie brought me some ice water and a wet towel, and hung out on the floor with me until I started to feel better. We started laughing about it. I said, this is too funny. She told me she's done it lots of times.

I was starting to feel better and she got me a chair from the other room. I told her to let everyone know I was okay, because the entire group saw me do this. Quite dramatic!

When Bonnie brought the chair in the bathroom, she told me I looked like the wicked witch, she pointed at my shoes and legs that were sticking out under the stall.

Soon we were giggling hysterically. I said, I need pictures of this, this is blogworthy material. So she took pictures of me on the floor of the bathroom.

Finally I felt good enough to go back in the room, and I drank my orange juice and diluted it with water and shook some salt in it. That was my old cure for when I got lightheaded at work- it was so hard to drink or eat enough, I always found myself lightheaded or having muscle cramps there.

Ed and I got our post-race selfie (the two winners!) and we headed over to the track again, along with Mick, one of the volunteers, and his wife, and they helped us get all of stuff loaded up.

So now I'm back in the room and I took a two hour nap and then went to the store, and the only thing that sounded good was soup. So here is my first pre-race meal. I'll be eating and sleeping this off for a few days.

I'm planning to take it easy the month of May. I can feel that this race took more out of my body than the 24 hour races have in the past. I did a lot of running and my mileage going into it, while decent, was not particularly high. I think the key to improving at the 24 hour event now is going to be more high mileage weeks with more intensity, not all the time, but more than I've been doing.

The results are here. I'll be back again.

Recipe for a Tailwind

This entire week so far has been nothing but WIND. Constant blowing and cold. We got a few sprinkles one day but no more moisture, just a steady howling with a few extra strong gusts, the kind that split trees in half, blow trash cans over, and generally make a run down any street lined with trees into Russian Roulette.

I went out anyway, just for a few miles each day, 4 or 6 miles at a time. It really wasn't that bad, even running into the headwind. Probably because I knew I'd be out there for such a short time. I've been following the forecasts for Iowa and it doesn't look much better there, actually worse because of rain, but it looks like this storm system is headed east, so I might have a strong tailwind blowing me across Nebraska. Could save money on gas that way.

I waited until tonight to run because the wind was super gusty today. Once the sun went down, the wind died down quite a bit and there was a sliver of a moon out, and there was still light in the sky until almost 8:30.

Iris has been following me around, every time I go to the bathroom she follows me and stares at me. Isabelle is more subtle about it but she's been watching me, too.

The bags are packed, reservations made, I have a plan for the race. I was talking with a running friend from Georgia the other day, Beth McCurdy, and we were laughing about last spring in Cleveland. She was telling me the story of when we were running North Coast in that heinous windstorm last year, and Beth decided to drop out and she told me, I said to her, "Oh, no! Why?" She tells people, "Because I'm not from freaking Colorado!"

Beth runs with Joe Fejes, and according to Joe, running a 24 hour is like baking a cake, following the recipe. I have my own recipe for this one and I think it has plenty of wiggle room for bathroom breaks, changing clothes, and any quick stops that are needed.

I'm ready as usual, overpacked, for whatever the weather gods throw my way. All I can do now is let the wind blow and follow the recipe.

Oil Change, Crack Dealer, and Errands for the Guilt Trip

After working all weekend I finally have a day to concentrate on packing and getting ready for the race. I did some errands this morning- got the oil changed, bought some race drinks and food that aren't perishable, and packed the table, chair, and coolers into the back of the car.

I started packing my clothes and running gear, with Iris's supervision, of course. Packing for a guilt trip.

Going through my running supplies, I have so much crap that accumulates in my foot box, first aid kit, and the other stuff that I bring to the table in my 24 hour races, that I have to go through it all and replace stuff. I also find the gels that expired in 2009, along with some old, leaky, sticky things that I can't identify.

Going through the gels, I realized my supply of double caffeine chocolate cherry Clif Shots was dwindling, so I had to make a trip to the crack dealer this morning. I went over to Runners' Roost and topped off my stash. There was a new guy there, looked like a college student, I'd never seen him before, and he didn't know me. I think I freaked him out a little when I asked him for crack.

I'm getting the evil eye while I organize all my stuff into bags. It's windy outside today, and cool. We probably haven't had more than 5 days where it got into the 70s yet this spring. It has been consistently cool. No rain, though. The leaves on the cottonwood trees are just starting to open, and there are a few lilac blooms.

With the weather the way it has been, I'm preparing for cold, wet conditions. Who knows what we'll get. Wheaties Boy and the Cereal Killas completed their R2R2R in cold, windy, rainy, muddy conditions, with a little snow. No problems with the heat for them. They did great, and it sounds like the weather made the adventure even more exciting.

The pictures they got were amazing, and they made a video, which I hope to be able to share or link to from this blog in the near future.

Back to packing...

Just Say No to the Taper Worm...

The taper is going as well as can be expected. I've been busy with work and other things so it's a welcome distraction from feeling like I need to bounce off the ceiling.

We took a trip up to the cabin this weekend to clear stuff out. We've decided to sell it, we aren't using it enough. We took the girls, they got a chance to hang out at their cabin hopefully before it sells. It's one of those "taper projects".

Iris knows where she is, as soon as we get over Kenosha Pass, she always goes crazy. We think it's the smell of cows, but it could be the scenery. This time there were no cows, probably too early for them to be grazing out there since the snow is not completely gone. As soon as we dropped down into South Park, she started getting excited.

On the way back the girls had to ride with all the junk we brought back from the cabin.

I was greeted by this nice piece of mail when I got home. One of those nice things about turning 50. Thanks for the pleasant reminder. Talk about the ultimate taper worm! I will have this done sometime this year, but I'm putting it off until AFTER the race.

The Wannabe Cereal Killa...

I am so envious right now my eyes could pop out.

This weekend Wheaties Boy and three other friends are off to the Grand Canyon to run rim to rim to rim. I haven't been down the Grand Canyon since 2003 and these days it is looking like a far off dream because of the state of my ankles. I would love to do that run again someday.

I sent them all a little note with Grand Canyon tips, from what I can remember from over 10 years ago. I addressed it to "Wheaties Boy and the Cereal Killas".

This morning I was forced to get my own butt out the door and run my mile repeats alone. The good thing was that I slept in, I didn't need a headlamp, and I wasn't freezing my butt off dressing in three layers. I am just at the beginning of my taper and I took yesterday off, and I'm feeling pretty good. I missed running yesterday, which is a good sign.

I did my two mile warmup and then jumped right into it. The first mile was hard, I started out a little fast and had to let up after the first quarter mile so I could survive it. I could not believe my eyes when I saw my watch.

I thought, it will be really bad if my next two are over 7 minutes because I blew out all the carbon on this one. I took my mile recovery jog and sipped some water, then took off for mile # 2. It seemed a little easier and I didn't go out quite so hard. I felt strong at the end but it was an effort. I guessed I would be right around 7 minutes.

Holy bat guano, this is what my watch said for number 2.

Again, I did my recovery jog, sipped a little water again, and psyched myself up. I was hoping I could hang on through one more sub 7 and I'd be thrilled.


This one felt even easier. I pushed a little harder in the last 200 meters or so because I was afraid I'd slacked off.

I guess not.

I felt so good, I wanted to do another one, but it's taper time and three one mile repeats 10 days before my race is plenty. I cooled down with an easy mile and went home. Holy crap, three sub 7s in a row and not 6:59.99s either.

I have a busy weekend ahead of me. Not from running, but for work! Yes, I am actually getting busy. I have real work to do! It's awesome!

I'm taking the day with Dennis and the girls Friday to do some family things, and then Saturday and Sunday I will do some short easy runs and get my work done. Next week is already getting busy before my trip to Iowa.

Today's workout was very encouraging. I've got my race strategy figured out, all I can do now is plan and prepare what's left and trust that I am ready for hundreds of laps around Lancer Stadium.

Can't Fix Stupid...

A gaggle of goslings...

On run number two, I met Emma at River Bluffs Open Space and we did a quick 6 miles at a good pace on the bike path. We had a great talk. I always appreciate being able to share our perspectives on all things. On the way out we saw these geese with their babies.

I stopped to take a picture but I couldn't get too close, sorry about the unclear photo, I didn't want to upset the mother, who started to hiss at me. Having been attacked by geese before while running the Mad Dog 50K in Arizona, I wasn't about to risk it...

On run number three I took Iris through the neighborhood for a short one after I got home from the run with Emma. Thirteen miles today, and now it's time to back off.

Time heals, and time reveals. I am learning that quickly, the universe is showing me that I have made the right decision on a daily basis, sometimes more often than daily. Sometimes the revelations are shocking, amusing, appalling, or just an affirmation that you can't fix stupid. Just a simple run last weekend on the bike path and running into someone, and listening to what they had to say, opened my eyes even further to this.

Where things seemed very fuzzy and cloudy initially when I left traditional health care last fall, it seems like on a regular basis now, both through face-to-face conversations, people who have contacted me both in response to my inquiries or unprompted by me, and occasionally in written form such as the link that follows, I am getting insight and validation into the types of decisions and uncritical thinking that guide modern health care. It's really scary.

Nurses' Week is coming right up. I am the queen of snark when it comes to Nurses' Week. Can't wait!