Happiness Avenue

I ran by a street sign today that said Happiness Avenue and all I could think was how perfect it was!  It gave me a huge smile, it’s amazing how those little things can unexpectedly make your day.  I took a photo to post here but my phone decided to act up and erase it! Horrible!

Anywaym today was awesome. And a liiittttle hard at the end. The weather was beautiful again, not a cloud in the sky.  It finally warmed up though, and I could definitely tell that my body took a while to adjust to the sudden change in temps.  I felt like I drank about three times as much as yesterday and I still felt nauseous with dehydration from mile 15 on.  I also had this thought today when I started that I wanted to run today’s run like a marathon and not stop to stretch or eat or anything. I started out fast and I guess I felt like racing.  Anyway that lasted til a bit past halfway and then I had to refill my Camelbak and then stop 3 more times for water and fruit and by the end of the day my legs were sooore and I was cursing myself for not stopping to stretch every 6 miles like normal.  I also felt like a big baby because before all this I had no problem setting out to run 20 or so miles without stopping.  Now I notice right away if I get lazy with my stretching.  Am I getting old or something?!

I also had a wonderful experience with a giant scary pitbull today. He came running out at me barking like he wanted to eat my head for lunch, and when he was about 5 feet away I knelt down like I was going to pet him.  He turned right around and just ran back to where he came from.  Weird.  My heart was jumping out of my chest but it definitely gave me some self-confidence for the next dog encounter.  Which just happened to be 3 miles down the road, Haha.  Same exact thing happened, I did the same, and the dog ran away. Hmm…

So I finished the day with 26 sunshiney miles and a really attractive runners tan complete with a white sunglass outline around my eyes.  Woowee.  I’ve reached Las Cruces, NM and now I get a mini-vacation! I am giving myself 3 days free of running and full of other outdoor adventures.  It seems there is so much to do in this area that I think we will be very busy.  I can’t wait to go exploring :  )

Tonight we are being hosted by the very kind Cheryl and Matteo, mutual friends of a fellow transcontinental trekker.  They cooked a delicious meal and they are also runners so we shared a lot of nerdy running stories and obsessions.  And Cheryl gave me some sweet sweet sweet technical running shirts with the moisture-wicking fabric etc.  She also has a lot of experience in the running world; she’s worked at a couple running stores, done interviews with running stars and has lots of runner hotshot friends.  So it was really cool to hear her stories and share running tips with her :  )

So that’s it for today!  Can’t wait to go see some more cool things tomorrow :  )