All Quiet

Not much to say lately for no particular reason.

Life is just ticking along. 

Work is busy, busy, busy.  We hired someone new in my group in early January, and hopefully in another month or two, she'll be able to take about 10% of my cases.  That should help.  I really wish I could just pick out the 18 cases or however many she'll take -- I could pick some of the ugly ones.  But instead, it will likely be by state or parts of a state.  I'm looking forward to giving up Indiana and Illinois, but choosing the others won't be easy. 

Running is slow progress -- but I guess that's still progress.  I raced last weekend.  Not long, but I tried to run smart and somehow I actually managed a negative split.  My last mile of the race was about 10 seconds faster than goal marathon pace.  Which makes me realize, I need to readjust my goal marathon pace!  I'm not even close to where I was 18 months ago.  I was going to write "no complaints," but that's not true, I hate it, but clearly not enough to really do anything about it!  I am trying to get in better shape, but it's half-hearted.  I slept in one day last week (I justified it because I ran to and from work the day before, it was cold, hubby was also sleeping in, and I was racing on the weekend (my usual rest day)).  My diet is a total mess (hoping Lent will be time to lock that down).  And in general, I'm just far more willing to phone in a workout than I should be.  But progress.  Today, for example, it was only 7 miles.  2 easy, 3 pace miles, 2 easy.  I did my first pace mile miserably slow.  I got passed by a new friend at the end, and I decided to try to hang with him for a quarter mile to have the company.  By the time we were halfway done with the mile, we were with another friend and he asked me how I was doing.  I told him I was sucking wind, but now that I was done with half of it, I was going to try to finish the mile I was in.  And then somehow, the final pace mile started on one of my favorite streets in Dallas to run in the dark.  I didn't check my splits, until I was done, but I was tuckered out.  I had hung with my friend for two entire pace miles, and then we did the cool-down together.  When we got back to our cars, I looked at my splits and was shocked to realize that they were progressive (well, that's not entirely true; I knew the first one was the slowest, but I had guessed the other two were even, or if anything, I slowed down for the last one).  Basically, my second pace mile was 30 seconds faster than my first, and my third one was another 10-15 seconds faster! 

Travel is on the horizon, which makes me happy.  Mardi Gras this weekend!  Going to Mobile, as always, and meeting my bestie and her family there.  And we've come up with a tentative plan and dates for our big trip.  I think we're going to leave around Oct. 7, and we'll head to Italy, then to Morocco, then to southern Spain.  Ah, it sounds good!  I also think we're going to Cali in April, which will be aweome -- I should be an aunt again by then, and I'll get to meet my new nephew.  I've also got some work travel, Philly, coming up, which will be a beating, but will hopefully make my caseload more manageable. 

Life is busy.  It seems like we have plans so many evenings lately, but in reality, I don't think it's much different from normal.  It just feels busy.  Fortunately there should be some naps on the calendar this weekend!  My husband's new schedule is still an adjustment and the house is a mess, but it's getting better. 

That's the news from Lake Wobeg... Dallas.