Day 3: hurting in places I didn't know existed

Day three of running project

Total time out - 45minutes
15 minutes brisk walk for warm up
2 minutes running
1.5 minutes walking and waiting for crosswalk signal
1 minute running
1 minute walking
1 minute running
20 minutes brisk walk, contemplating how legs are turning to jell-0
4.5 minutes hard slow walk up very large hill back to house

Feel as if I should eat breakfast but at the same time, food seems very unappealing when one is sweaty and smelly. Dog is fascinated by the smell of the new shoes.

Goal for next time: increase run time to 5 minutes total

This blog was brought to you by the number 3 and the word 'umbrella'

um·brel·la /ʌmˈbrɛlə/

–noun

1. a light, small, portable, usually circular cover for protection from rain or sun, consisting of a fabric held on a collapsible frame of thin ribs radiating from the top of a carrying stick or handle.

So I'm flipping channels and, distracted, I end up on MTV. There's this new song by Rihanna called "Umbrella." Now let's consult the phonetics above (handily supplied by Dictionary.com) and see how many syllables this word has. I will wait......

That's right, there are three!

Now most of the time I pay no attention to what's playing on MTV (unless it's Fergie in which case I laugh my ass off) but when I heard this song I had to double-check just to make sure I wasn't hallucinating. Let's have a little sample from the chorus:

When the sun shines

We’ll shine together
Told you I'll be here forever

That I'll always be your friend

Took an oath Imma stick it out 'till the end

Now that it's raining more than ever

Know that we still have each other

You can stand under my Umbrella

(I cut and pasted these lyrics from a site I googled so please don't bust my chops for not running it through spell-check)

If the visual isn't enough then go listen - somehow, Rihanna transforms this perfectly innocuous three-syllable word into a FOUR-syllable word. I will transcribe into phonetics for your entertainment:

/ʌmˈbərɛlə/

There are things that get under my skin. Students who misuse "your" and "you're," instant mashed potatoes instead of real ones, when my father-in-law asks me to get him some iced tea and after I've boiled the water and found the tea bags he tells me that he meant the bottle of Nestea sitting on the countertop. But I'm sorry, this is ridiculous. I feel my IQ sinking simply because I've taken the time to blog about my outrage. Maybe it's because I'm a singer and I spend a great deal of my time learning to pronounce words in foreign languages. Among singers, the ability to sing in a foreign language without your native accent showing through is a prized skill - especially when you're American and attempting to get work in Europe. We spend a great deal of time listening to native speakers and trying to emulate the cleanliness of their speech patterns. If someone was attempting to learn English by listening to pop music, they would not only fail their conversation proficiency, they would forever misspell the word 'umbrella.'

And that, dear readers, is a shameful commentary.

Just Groovy

...is the color of my toenails. My mother gave me a gift certificate for a mani/pedi at this fun place on Newbury Street and Jaci got one from her husband for mother's day so we went and got our nails done. While my fingernails are a very sedate sheer pink, I decided to channel my inner high-school girl and have my toenails painted electric blue. And unlike my mother, who would roll her eyes and say, "Oh honey, why didn't you have them painted red?" my husband thought it was hilarious and remarked that they match my striped flip-flops, which they do.

In other news, I started running yesterday. Today my muscles are asking me why I did this to them. I am telling them to shut the hell up because I am 27 and I do not want to get rid of my skinny jeans when I turn 30. I refuse. I wish that my life was settled in one city so I could join the church softball team or settle into a routine with the yoga classes at the Y. I wish that I didn't love cheese and hollandaise sauce and margaritas. I don't eat fast food, I don't drink soda, I don't keep junk food in the house. But if I'm going to keep drinking good wine and eating my husband's amazing gnocchi pasta bake, it's the pavement for me and Sam the dog.

Today - shoe shopping for the right shoes. The Runner's World beginner guide says that I should follow the "hard day/easy day" plan and even though today is my easy day, I'm going to
get the shoes and go out with Sam for a walk later.

Tomorrow - on the road again.

Long time no blog

Sorry I've been out of touch. We have some houseguests - a friend of mine and her 4 month old baby girl - who have been occupying a great deal of my time. And for the record, NO the clock is NOT ticking. I taped down the snooze button, thanks.

The parents have safely returned from Germany - mom called me yesterday from the airport after sending copious emails and text messages. It took a little while for her to get the texting thing. She would send me a text, ask me a question, and then send me an email when she didn't understand my answer, having forgotten that she'd asked me a question some hours previous. *sigh*

But they're back home and hopefully their house will sell sometime in the near future and they will move out of the 'dell. I bear no grudge against Slidell, I really don't. I spent a lot of my youth there and there are parts of it that I remember fondly - my favorite snowball stand, the park with the huge forts where we used to climb up and have picnics, the old town soda shop (which breathed its last after the hurricane) with its skee-ball machine and chocolate-dipped cherries, Vera's restaurant out on the lake (yep, washed away). Most of what I loved about Slidell is gone now - my parents don't live in our old house in our old neighborhood, they live in this new neighborhood that flooded something awful. My friends from childhood have all moved away like I have and most of their families have followed suit so there aren't many reasons to stick around. It's a weird feeling when your concept of 'home' suddenly changes. I suppose that 'home' is where my dog and my husband are, so home for the moment is Boston, but I wouldn't say that I'm 'from' here. I do love me some Red Sox though.

Must get my lazy ass out of the house. Perhaps I'll take the dog with me.