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April 20, 2006
Barely/Bearly Breathing
This title has a double meaning that will momentarily become obvious.
My new washer and dryer are now located in my home and they are presently passing their inaugural test wash/dry of rags. At last check, the machines continued to work and the rags were all in their normal state of raggedness. Additionally, the laundry room is not flooding, the curious dog hasn't been electrocuted, and nothing is on fire. Yet.
I now understand why people have said that you become an adult when you buy a washer and dryer. It's not really the act of buying these things, it's the maturity level that's required to install them in your home. If you can successfully do this task without launching a wrench through a window or cursing more than 10 times, then you are an adult. I will save all the ranting and raving about the usual malfunctions one has while "doing things," such as a lack of the proper tool or the instruction manual being written in English by a native Chinese speaker. Instead, I'll focus on the blatant malalignment of various factors of the universe that led to this adventure. Such as the electrical wiring for the dryer outlet being TOTALLY wrong. And how about the drain pipe for the washer being clogged with something resembling insulation? I shouldn't forget that I have no idea what was wrong with the hot and cold water faucets, but a real plumber had to come and fix those. These are the affects of the good government employees who so nicely remodeled my home before I moved in. I shouldn't be surpised now, with all the original surprises back when I first moved in! Alas, 8+ hours later (and only 2 hours of that was spent on actual set-up of the washer and dryer), everything SEEMS to be working. And, it's possible that I'm still alive, though barely breathing. I didn't even throw a wrench, so I must offically be an adult.
I think this blog is supposed to be about running, so I'll move on.
Yesterday I planned the 1200 workout, and I wanted to do it on the dirt track down the street. When I got to it, it was too muddy. With a limited amount of time, I had to improvise on the spot and change workouts to this week's 10k pace workout. So, I continued on with a 2 mile warm up, 2x20 min at 10k effort with 1/2 mile easy jog between, then a 1 mile cool down. I used a small dirt road loop through one of the maintenance areas for each of the 20 minutes on. The loop must be between 1/4 and 1/2 mile, and I ran many of those loops. I think the maintenance men (and 1 woman) thought I was the loopy one who wouldn't quit running past them. Oh well. This workout felt too easy, good, but easy.
This morning, I ran 6 miles easy with 5 strides at the end. It was a most gorgeous day, the best that we've had yet. I'll guess it was 55 or 60 degrees. For much of the day, the doors and windows were all open in the house! It was truly beautiful, and they're predicting more of it! I was TOO HOT running in a t-shirt and shorts! This evening, I sqeaked in a 3 mile second run. I know, it wasn't 2 days ago when I said that I'm going to suck up losing the easy miles for this week if I can get all the quality work in. But, I just feel so good, and it was a beautiful evening, and a run was a perfect outlet for my frustrations, and, and, and. However, perhaps I can draw your attention away from my mileage mongering by mentioning that I saw a black bear on this evening's run, about 1/2 mile as the crow flies from my neighborhood. He was a big guy, just meandering across the road. I wasn't at all afraid, he was way out there, but he sure got me breathing hard and my adrenaline pumping!
I have to go, my dryer (You know, MY dryer, the one one that's MINE, in MY laundry room.) just dinged.
Posted by Meghan at April 20, 2006 8:29 PM
Comments
exciting times in jellystone these days! enjoy YOUR dryer and YOUR washer and keep a watchful eye out for yogi!
Posted by: jeff at April 20, 2006 11:26 PM