Tired. So freaking tired.

 I am emotionally drained. Tonight feels like a rough one sitting at home alone yet again on another Friday night reminds me why I’ve been so hellbent on scheduling my life so full. Sitting in the feelings is exhausting. Sitting at home by yourself reminds you how truly alone your life has become. I was not supposed to be alone. I was not supposed to be 46 years old without children and without a husband. What the hell happened to my life? Most days I am so good. I am so positive and I try so hard. The pervasive silence and utter aloneness is deafening.

 It does get better, life has gotten easier. But there are reminders everywhere of everything that was taken from me. I am no longer anyone’s priority. That is the strangest thing to go from being somebody’s first text, first thought, top priority to not even being a thought- to literally zero text messages coming in. Once upon a time I knew what my life was it wasn’t perfect, no one is, but I was happy - reallyI was. 

There are so many parts of my life now that I love. there are so many parts that I’m proud of, but it’s all just a cover, distractions I delude myself with. Choices I have made out of necessity- out of survival -sure they are better choices than some. I am proud that I made better choices than others, but none of them were choices I ever wanted to make.

I never wanted to sit alone in my home- in this world that I perfectly crafted for 21 plus years alone on a Friday night again. Reality tells me that in three days it’ll be six months without Chris and my emotions are all over the place. The truth is I am hyper sensitive right now. I miss my life. I miss feeling like I matter. I miss being someone’s priority, I miss having someone to text during the day randomness about my day. I miss someone loving me enough that even if they don’t care, they still respond and act like they do. Chris loved me . not only did he love to me, but he really knew me. He knew me in ways Nobody else will ever get to know me ever again. Not only because I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to open up again, but also because nobody else will ever understand the last 21 years of my life -that is something that exclusively belongs to me and Chris.

I am worried I am never going to find anybody else who will love me the way Chris did. for so many reasons. I am worried that in simply surviving I have become so hardened that I won’t ever let anybody really know me ever again. I am worried the world has become such a hard place to exist in that I won’t even find anybody and worse yet if I somehow miraculously did that I am too messed up to even accept it. 

Tonight is not an easy one. Tonight, I feel his absence. Tonight hurts. I know grief is never linear. I know it goes up and down and all around and bounces back-and-forth never in a straight line. I know I am doing OK but that doesn’t mean that I am OK all the time. It’s shocking to me honestly that I can sit here and feel this broken. I don’t like to be broken. I like to pretend I’m above it. Part of my amazingly tough demeanor is that grief doesn’t consume me the way it might someone else I pride myself on being so tough. I am the first one that will walk around and tell you I’m doing just fine. I hate it when I realize I’m wrong.

I’m ready to skip ahead I know not that long ago I said to not rush ahead through these messy parts but right now I just want to close my eyes and wake up sometime in the future when I’m happy and not alone. when I don’t have to walk through any more hard parts, I’m so tired of the hard parts. I am strong, but I am tired. Why do the hard parts never seem to stop? That’s the sick joke about grief. You literally were handed one of the worst most traumatic experiences of your life and then continually for an unknown amount of time you keep getting more and more hard parts- the hard parts don’t stop. 

Grief is doing a number on me tonight. This is exactly why I try never to sit in my house alone. I’ve been pretty successful at avoiding it for the last six months. I can probably count on one hand the amount of times I’ve sat on my couch by myself and watched TV in the last six months I can’t be here alone- not really. Sure I love my house and love coming home every night after I’ve successfully filled my day with all of the distractions. I come home like a crazy woman and attend to my animals and do the things that I must before crawling into bed. I act like this is normal -like this is a life -when in reality all I am doing is avoiding the harsh truths. the truth that if I sit still too long I will remember.  I will remember all the things that have happened to me and all the things that are missing in my life.

I can sit here all night and not talk to a soul and no one will text me. This is not how it was supposed to be. I drove by me and Chris’s favorite restaurant tonight and suddenly I remembered so many evenings spent there so many last-minute Friday night dinners. 

Six months without him and God willing if I am lucky so many years to go. How did this become my life? I am so lucky and so many ways I have such an amazing family my immediate family, and my extended family are so wonderful. I wouldn’t survive without them, but none of it makes up for your person being gone no matter how hard you try to convince yourself you’re happy and you’re doing OK and thriving. 

When will it be my turn? When do I get to be happy? Please tell me there’s a greater purpose out there for me. Please tell me I’m not spinning around in circles aimlessly for no reason.  I am trying to be such a good person. I am trying to find the positive and the happiness every day. It’s just really hard.

It gets easier. It gets harder. Today it’s such a harder one so I guess I cry. I guess I break down. I guess I lie on the floor heartbroken feeling vulnerable and ripped apart feeling lost and unseen - honestly feeling so unimportant. 

  

I’m tired. I’m just really tired.

Hello from the Other Side

Hello.

 I am fighting tooth and nail to refrain from breaking into Adelle lyrics, right?  Because the song is overplayed and yet I can’t seem to stop the song from swirling around in my head as I write this out.  Because it’s been a VERY long time.  Because apparently big blog hiatus’s are what I do from time to time, but we all knew that. At least I have not checked out from the internet world.  Hello, Instagram. You have become the best thing in the world and somehow the worst at the same time because you are an addiction that is incomparable to most.

 Here’s the good news world. I am still plugging along. I have had a fairly stressful and depressing beginning of 2016. Not what I would have hoped for but I seem to have slightly rebounded all things considered.  I am just trying to figure out my new life focus or restructure my desires to different pursuits. 

 I think I can finally say I am over the whole run a half marathon every weekend thing. Not because I can’t. Physically I am more than capable of running every weekend but because it doesn’t hold the same appeal at the moment for me. I’ve finally played that out. Been there, done that. With that said, I am NOT over running.  I think it has finally started to subside to the point where I have found some balance about it.  I want to run, but its quality over quantity.  I can’t stomach spending $100 a weekend to run another half that ultimately isn’t worth the price tag.  I am currently training for another full marathon.  If I’m going to do this thing, the running thing, it’s going to be something that challenges me.  Full marathons scare the shit out of me. Yes, I ran 3 of them last year and yes I am every bit as terrified as I was when I originally signed up for one.  In fact, in some ways, even more so because now I know what I’m getting myself in for.  They are a completely torturous process that I am sure is probably ultimately horrible for your body.  But we do it. And we gladly sign up for the torture.

 I am finding marathon training the second time around a different process.  I don’t have the same I have to do this attitude, although, I am still Emily and  therefore will still do every single run. That’s who I am after all.  But the desire level isn’t exactly the same.  I have found some new passions over the past couple months.  In a nutshell my gym lost classes. I volunteered to keep doing them for the couple people who took them with me. There was this little group of us that always did the classes. I said I’d write them up and we could still do them.  From January until about 2 weeks ago I was doing those 4 days a week. It was fun. 

 2 weeks ago a big new fancy gym opened up in the area and I signed up. It was like heaven. It reminded me of my very first fabulous gym that made me fall in love with gyms to begin with.  I am beyond happy there. Some of the people from my old gym followed me over and now I’m leading my own group workouts two times a week.  I am voluntarily doing this you see, as I am not licensed and therefore it is really just a group of friends working out.  I’m having fun with it all.  Sometimes it feels like pressure, sometimes it’s just fun as hell. 

 Balance. I forever search for the balance of life. Don’t we all.  I’ve been up, I’ve been down, I’ve been everywhere and which way in between.  It happens.  It’s funny how things change.  How some things stay exactly the same too.  My best friend Amanda is like 6 months pregnant at the moment. She’s still working out with me all the time. But very soon we will have a little baby boy in our lives.  I swear I’ve even become closer to Amanda over the past couple months if that’s even possible. 

 I don’t weigh myself. Like pretty much ever.  Why torture myself when I’ve seem to come to a good place in my life where balance exists on that front.  Maybe I’m way out of balance in a lot of areas but I’m pretty happy and comfortable in my own imperfect skin.  I’m not the smallest I’ve ever been but I’m pretty okay with what I see. And I have a ton of muscles so the weight on the scale is fairly irrelevant.  I am what I am, and what I am is a strong woman who loves working out for her well-being and health and who also loves food and eats far too much of it (including crappy bad for you food) and somehow it still all balances out.

 No need to go down the anxiety, obsessive compulsive food scale path.  Been there, done that a million times.  With that said, I’m sure I will eventually get on the scale again. I peek every so often and try to let it roll off my back.  I’m happy mostly, so who cares. When you can like the image you see in the mirror, even in a bathing suit (and it’s not perfect I can attest to that) but I can still feel happy and confident then that’s exactly where I want to be.

 I pretty much journal or diary my life daily on Instagram so I suppose in a lot of ways that has taken the place of my need to document my life here, although there are issues or stuff I could not go into on Instagram that’s true.  And there is a part of me that misses the ability to be batshit crazy and neurotic and this was the safe place I felt like I could do it at. 

 My life these days pretty much in a nutshell. I run. I lift. I eat. I snuggle my doggies. I go to work. I go to sleep. I do pretty much the same thing the next day.  There’s not a ton of other in my life right now and I guess that’s okay. I have nothing major planned or in the works.  I am just trying this whole existing thing.  It happens. It needs to happen. To just exist a little bit for a little while. And that’s about it for me. For now.  But hey, it’s an update. After 5 months, it’s an update :)

I'm still breathing

I know I’ve been MIA for a little while. Truthfully I’ve felt like I kind of lost my mind temporarily for a bit there.  It’s a series of factors all lining up all at once to create the most “off” mood.  It’s like the normal let-down of post accomplishing epic goals coupled with pure exhaustion and burnout and then on top of it the weather changing into cold and depressing territory.  It was inevitable that my high would come crashing down. I didn’t expect it to be quite so epic.  Honestly it’s a chemical imbalance in my brain that truly exists as well.  I tend to run away and hide from the world in such times.  Truthfully I have shut down from most parts of my life. I can’t exactly tell you why but I haven’t talked to or seen my family in weeks.  It’s bizarre for me. Of course I am still talking to and seeing Chris because well obviously he is my husband and we live in the same house so that is unavoidable.  Not that I would want to avoid him anyway.

I’ve been trying to work out my own inner demons.  They still exist and sometimes get the better of me. I have honestly been so majorly depressed for no good reason and I thought it better to avoid real life as a result.  I have been doing a better job the last week of sticking to some medications and trying to pep myself up and I guess that’s working okay.  Depression is a VERY real and very serious thing.  Let’s not forget that I come from the same genetic gene pool as a man who killed himself.  I am not trying to sound all poor me, but I’m just stating the truth.  I suffer from my own moments of mental issues that are completely derivative of both genetics and environment. 

Which leads me back to running.  Why running is so important in my life because it helps deal with the mental fog that I sometimes get in.  BUT alas, as the weather turns it gets harder to run outside and feel that freedom.  It’s sort of a catch 22 you see because I am tired and exhausted from running and want a break but the longer I take a break the more mentally depressed and unsure of myself I become.  I start to get panic attacks that I am going to lose all my ability to run.  And mentally I start to beat myself up as self-doubt enters the brain.  It’s all so stupid I know.  This Friday I leave for Vegas.  I feel like I should be more excited than I am.  It will be fun and I will have a great time I am sure.  But I also have a panic moment of what if I can’t run 13.1 miles?  I’ve been utterly slacking in my running as of late.  The last time I ran any major distance was on October 25 when I ran my last marathon.  That’s 3 full weeks.  Sure I ran some distances in between.  Like 3 or 4 milers during the week, but nothing more than like 4 miles. And it was hard. But the treadmill is always harder than outside. 

I’m getting into panic mode that what occurred last year is going to repeat itself. History always repeats itself right? After Vegas last year I didn’t run. Like not much at all. And consequently running got VERY hard.  Terrifyingly hard.  I don’t want that to happen again.  Today I went ahead and signed up for 2 half marathons after Vegas. One on November 29 and one on December 13.  Most likely these will be awful weather kind of runs. But it is what it is.  I am not sure if this was a really smart or really stupid idea. Probably a little of both.  Part of me wants to leave Vegas and not run again for months but the other part of me knows that ultimately it would cause me more stress. Even if I grit out shitty times, at least I will be putting the miles in and mostly at this point that is all that matters.

Trutfully I’m more freaked out because I can’t stop eating and I know I’ve gained like 10 pounds post Maui.  I am pretty much not joking.  I not only eat whatever I want, but I eat excessively shitty things.  Like since returning from Maui I have consumed all by myself not a like, 5 or 6 entire tubs of frosting.  Yes, I eat Rainbow Chip frosting by the spoonful right out of the tube.  It’s my favorite frosting ever and they recently brought it back. I am pretty sure that you aren’t supposed to just sit and eat frosting like it’s a candy.  Not to mention the constant Mcdonalds and other treats I somehow find myself justifying.  Bags of Oreos? Yup.  It’s cool. I can eat whatever I want, right?  WRONG.  I know its all wrong.  And all of it is just succeeding in making me feel worse.

This last weekend I did not exercise once. I took off Friday night and then all weekend. I didn’t leave the house but once on Saturday to go to the store to buy crappy ass food to eat. I ate and ate and watched TV and movies for almost 48 hours straight. And slept.  It was the most self-indulgent, inactive weekend I think I’ve had all year.  Not a lie.  And while resting felt good, it also felt horrible.  I can’t shake the you are a failure self-talk.  And the fear. Truthfully it’s the fear that because I have only successfully loaded my body with junk that I am going to be slow as fuck running.  That I won’t be able to endure 13 miles and it will be slow.   And honestly going to Vegas this weekend doesn’t produce high hopes for eating better. It’s Vegas. 

But maybe AFTER Vegas, right?  God I hope. REALLY hope that I can pull my shit together. Its called zero motivation at all. I give zero fucks about anything and it REALLY is showing in my behaviors. And if I’m not carefully it’s really going to start showing on my body very soon. I feel like I can already tell. But that is more so probably my brain beating me up than anything major physically.   But I realistically know if I don’t stop my behaviors it will be real all too soon.  Get thru this week, get thru Vegas and then fresh start? Please please pretty please.

I hate feeling this way. I hate depression and what it does to your mind. I hate that I have to deal with it at all. I hate that I can’t just ride the happy wave of feelings for well forever honestly.  But life doesn’t work that way. Never has.  We all have ups and downs.  I happen to be in the down right now. I will pick myself up and dust myself off and find a way out of this. I know I will.

Bad attitude

I have been taking it easy and I do feel better. Unfortunately when you take it easy, it’s hard to find the motivation to return to working out.  It’s ridiculous how quickly you get out of the habit.  I also think it’s partly the change in the weather. It’s cold and yucky outside and its depressing as hell and I just want to go home and eat and rest. 

I have decided that my body is truly just tired.  I am trying to forgive it for kind of falling apart because it took a real beating. I asked it to do like crazy insane things and now I understand its tired. I honestly think it’s going to take a couple weeks for me to return to any amount of normal.  I have been “going” for so long that it just wants to stop.  And hibernate and eat.  I can’t stop eating for the life of me.  Everything and anything.  And my willpower is non-existent.  My desire or motivation is totally lacking. See, we all go thru ups and downs.  I know this is normal.  I know that my generalized exhaustion is not helping.  I don’t feel that well as a whole and therefore it’s hard to exhibit signs of control in other parts of my life.  Makes total sense honestly. 

I think I should just function in survival mode for the next couple weeks.  Just survive.  Especially since Vegas is coming up VERY soon. Like in 2 weeks almost. Shit. How the hell did that happen? I honestly don’t even want to go.  I’m that tired and exhausted.  I pushed myself too hard honestly.  But I can’t back out now because Amanda and her boyfriend Rick are going.  And it will be fun.  I just wish I felt a little better as a whole.

On another note, my mom and two sisters joined weight watchers on Monday night.  This should help make my life a little easier as a whole.  I am hoping at some point here soon everything just clicks and it will help provide me with an extra little bit of motivation myself.  I refuse to get on a scale because I know things are spiraling out of control.  But honestly, I need to knock it off.  I truly need to get my act in gear soon before things get VERY scary. I just honestly feel so drained all the time it’s hard to care about much.  Tis the season I suppose.

I feel like I need about a week off to just sleep my life away.  But I suspect most people feel that way.  I will survive I am sure.  Plus let’s not forget that typically I always experience an afternoon slump so that’s part of it I am sure.  I just need more sleep as a whole.  And probably an attitude adjustment to boot.

I wish I had happier things to say today or anything really more positive than all of this, but generally speaking this is where I am at right now, and I can’t hide forever. I also want to be accountable to myself.  This is the downward spiral part where things fall apart or I figure my shit out.  I’m going to be okay. It’s all going to be okay. Somehow what is meant to be will find its way.

1 more to insantiy

I am exhausted. I am both physically and mentally spent.  I suspect this might be right on schedule for this time of year. After enduring a very run heavy summer culminating in pushing thru October I am just drained. I do believe this happened to me last year.  This is arriving right on schedule.  This weekend a year ago I ran a Halloween half marathon.  Then for the next couple weeks I barely ran and then went to Las Vegas in November and ran my final half of the year.  After that, I was just pooped and basically quit running all together for months.  This resulted in the idea that I didn’t think I wanted to run anymore.  And it also resulted in January not being able to run 3 miles without major effort.  I don’t want that to happen again.  I can’t allow that to happen again.   But right now I’m TIRED.

Last week I knew I was slipping. I knew things were falling apart.  Physically I felt horrible. By Wednesday I was sick.  I felt exhausted and drained and got hot and cold chills. I went home sick.  In the 7 years I’ve worked at my current job I have only called in sick 1 time.  Wednesday I went home sick so you must know that it was real.  For the life of me I could not make myself do anything basically Tuesday thru Friday. I had mentally just checked the fuck out.  I know that sounds harsh but it’s true. My physical tired/sore made my mental state horrific.  I was all over the place.  I had signed up for one last full marathon yesterday. It was in Tri-Citites Washington.  It is about a 4-5 hour drive from our house. I honestly debated not even going.  Chris didn’t really want to go honestly. But we decided that we should just power thru and do it.

I worked out last Monday night and went to the gym Tuesday but didn’t do much of anything.  I did not work out Wednesday thru yesterday. I have never taken that long of a break. I was uncertain how that would affect my full marathon yesterday.  Oh let’s not forget that I have been eating like shit too.  This goes hand in hand with exhaustion and fatigue.  Tired, beyond tired.  I knew it was going to be rough. I knew running a full marathon with little training was a stupid idea.  It pretty much was.

I have always said pretty instantly in a run I can tell how it’s going to go.  I just have a feeling.  I knew less than 2 miles into the run that it was going to be hard. That is was going to require everything I had just to finish.  At mile 2 I had to use the bathroom. I knew this was a 26 mile run so if I already had to use the bathroom that I needed to just stop and take care of it.  I ran off course to a bathroom in a park. It was locked.  I was pissed.  Not only did I run off course and screw my time and my distance but I didn’t get to pee.  I kept running.  It was getting worse.  Finally at mile 4.5 exactly another bathroom presented itself, this time it was open. I went for it.  This added minutes to my time as I dead stopped to take care of business.  At this moment I didn’t even care about going fast. I knew it would be all about just surviving and the time was not going to be great.  My legs didn’t have that extra spring in them.  So I did my business and got back on course.

In case anyone is wondering, 26.2 miles is a LONG way.  At around mile 8 I kind of wanted to be done.  I wasn’t running particularly fast. I wasn’t trying but that’s also because I knew it was a long race and I had to preserve my energies.  I am not joking for mile after mile I kept repeating in my head, this is brutal, this is all about finishing.  Just finish today.  I never found any sort of groove.  Almost every step was a struggle but I did push on. When I finally cleared the half way mark I was in a park and kind of ending up taking a wrong turn, adding a little more distance yet again to my Garmin.  Because 26.2 miles just isn’t far enough let’s keep adding on distance.

This was a small race.  So there were points in time where I was pretty much alone on course and somehow I end up taking wrong turns.  Lucky me. It wasn’t too bad.  It was beautiful scenery mostly so it wasn’t a bad course.  I just didn’t have my heart in it.  Once I got to about mile 16 my body was TIRED.  I knew I had 10 miles to go and then I knew that was another hour and 45 minutes of running and I wanted to cry. I didn’t want to go another step.  This race was most difficult for me in the 16-19 mile range.  Somewhere around mile 17 or 18, I honestly don’t even remember I came across Chris who was suffering the same fate as me.  Ill-prepared, lack of good sleep, lack of training and being spent.  I stopped and walked with him for a bit.  My body was aching. Physically my legs and hips and feet were aching.  And I had a long way to go.  We walked about ¾ of a mile or so and then I decided that I needed to try and jog on. Because at mile 18, I still had 8 miles to go and as much as I might want to, I could not walk 8 miles.  So I started running again.  Slowly.  About 11 minute mile pace.

Knowing I had 8 miles left was daunting.  I had serious moments of not wanting to go another step. It was miserable honestly.  That is what being ill prepared does to you.  Somehow though once I hit about mile 20, at my current 11 minute mile pace things felt better. It was like once I was in the 20’s it was less daunting.  Somehow being at mile 17 or 18 is hell, but once you are in the 20’s it feels much more bearable.  I was pretty much alone on course, which was a weird experience. Just me and my headphones trying to make it thru  the grueling final miles.  Each mile passing was a blessing.  I was still keeping a pretty consistent 11 minute mile pace and despite all the burning pain, I kept going.  I kept telling myself to push on. Each step was one step closer to the important finish line.

I also knew at this point that I was over on distance and my time was all about just finishing.  Gone were illusions of even touching my Portland Marathon time.  But honestly those illusions were gone after 2 miles.  I knew it was going to be a rough brutal kind of run.  Honestly even a half would have been hard yesterday yet alone a full marathon.  Somehow I dug deep and the last couple miles I managed thru.  I honestly think I handled the last 6 miles better than I handled miles 14-20.  Go figure.  I crossed the finish line at 4:50:44  I also crossed the finish line with my  Garmin reading 26.65 miles.  Could be better, could be worse.  Considering how out of sync I felt pretty much the entire run. The bathroom stops. The waking of mile 18, etc., 4:50 is acceptable. 

This was a humbling experience.  26 plus miles is a LONG way.  My legs ached. Badly. They still ache today.  I learned that I can’t take anything for granted.  You should never take running a marathon lightly. I was not prepared physically or mentally for it.  I was exhausted before I started. I had been sick the week before and mentally I had checked out some time ago.  Thus, just finishing is a victory. I pretty much ran everything other than that Mile 18.  I will take it.  I hurt pretty good towards the end and crossing the finish line was a huge relief.  Despite everything being stacked against me, I finished.

And now today I am pooped. So beyond drained that I just want to close my eyes and sleep. After we finished the marathon I had to drive 4 ½ hours home too.  We didn’t get home until fairly late last night and sleep is a precious commodity these days. I need more relaxation. I realize now my body definitely needs some time to recover.  I have put it thru an epic amount of shit and it’s time to be more kind.  In the last 5 weeks I ran 3 full marathons and the fastest half marathon I’ve ever ran.  In exactly 5 weeks’ time I asked my body to perform a lot. And now its exhausted as a result.  I do understand. I do get it.  It’s tired.  It needs a break. It’s not recovering well because I keep asking it to do crazy things. 

This is going to be an ease back into it week.  I say ease back into it because I need to also ease back into healthy eating.  I seriously have been horrible for 5 solid weeks pretty much. This week is getting the food back under control and being kind to my body physically.  This weekend I only have a fun 5k planned.  I am sure I am just walking it with my family so it’s not even as if I will run it.  In fact my next race isn’t until November 14 in Las Vegas so I do think I am going to allow my body some time to try and repair itself.  I have truly asked it to do so much in such a short timeframe.

I am pretty sure most things I read online told me that running a marathon is had on your body and you need all this recovery time, etc. And somehow I thought it would be okay to run 3 marathons in 5 weeks.  For the most part I did it.  But yesterday I knew was rough.  Yesterday I knew my body was at its limit.  I’m overall grumpy and irritable and lack any motivation.  It’s time to rest and recover and give myself a break.

A month and a half ago I hadn’t run a marathon now I have done 3.  That’s kind of a lot really.  I will try and not take for granted again how difficult 26 miles is on your body.  It’s hard. Plus honestly for the past couple weeks I truly have been so mentally off and I am thinking it’s a lot to do with pure exhaustion.  So I do think I am NOT going to the gym tonight. I am going to let my body rest one more day post running my 3^rd marathon.  Instead today I am just going to try and not binge on food.  That’s really the plan for today.  One day at a time.

There’s a saying that’s something like, you’ll never know your limits unless you push yourself to them.  I discovered my limit this weekend.  I pushed and pushed and pushed until I hit the limit.  That’s it. I’m calling it. No more full marathons for a while. Next spring.  Oh, I will run another one, don’t get me wrong.  I will probably run a few more for sure next year.  But not for a while, and not without training for them.

My legs hurt.  Just a dull tired ache.  And mostly I just need to sleep.  For like a week straight right? Ah ha.  I honestly never claimed to be the most rational or sane person around. 3 marathons, 1 half, 5 weeks. Sure.