Ready or not...

Here we go! Spring 2011 semester is on. I will be using my newfound terminal degree to teach a class as an adjunct, so I've got my weeks planned out from here until May.

The picture is from the Athens-Big Fork Trail run the first weekend in January. It's a very hilly and challenging 26-mile course that follows an old postal trail out-and-back over 8 Ouachita Mountain ridges. It took me 3 attempts at this thing to actually have fun. The last time I tried it was 2 years ago, when I was getting sick but didn't know what was wrong yet. I hauled my miserable body up and down those mountains for almost 8 hours. This time it only took me a little over 6. (insert smiley face here)...

I have a few decisions to make about which runs I'm doing this year. I had a heavy road marathon year in 2010, and lived by a weekly cycle of long runs, tempo runs, and speedwork. While it was fun in some ways, I'm kind of ready to slow it down and crawl back into the woods for some trail running.

Off to a good start!

Pass the chap-stick...

Stupid disease. When the drugs are high enough I can often forget that I have some serious issues. However, I'm entering that phase in Prednisone taper (again) when little syptoms are starting to peek through. All of a sudden, everything is so dry I can't stand it. Eyes, skin around eyelids, inside of nose, inside of mouth, lips, fingertips. Flaky rash firing up around my eyelids. Muscle pain/cramps starting to be more frequent. They seem to be worse in the week or 2 immediately after I drop a milligram. Nothing that's terrible or that I can't live with, just annoying autoimmune overlap symptoms. The worst part is knowing that they are indicative of a larger problem that is closing in. This is my second time through the cycle. Part of me just wants to go ahead and just let the flare happen so that I can go up on drugs again, instead of having an uncomfortable 3 or 4 month gradual slide. But that wouldn't solve any problems, the whole point is to try and come off of Prednisone. Does any of this sound familiar? Anybody else on this roller coaster?

October

Or really, almost November. Fall flies, doesn't it? Too bad, because it's a great season. I'm a Libra, of course I love these months.


Let's see... I left you before the Midnight 50K in July. That one wasn't pretty. The only conclusion that I've come to is that the more I try to hone my hydration and energy processes, the harder I seem to crash. The Midnight 50 ended in some vomiting, alot of walking, me feeling stupid, etc. Oh, well... it's not July anymore, other things have come and gone.


Namely...



I did the Twin Cities marathon in October. It didn't disappoint. The last couple of months have been hectic (starting the school year both as a staff member and as a student), as well as fall fun-stuff (football games, kickball league...). So I treated myself and didn't train. I mean, I worked enough to keep my fitness base and make sure I could cover the distance. But I wasn't making myself miserable over the course of 3 months for a mere 10 or 15 minutes on a finisher's certificate. And the perfect excuse to not care where you finish... costume, of course!


You may recognize the Spoonbridge and Cherry sculpture from the Walker Art Institute in Minneapolis. This was actually an ideal running costume, as the spoon was polyester and very light, and the bulk was on top, leaving my body fairly unhindered. Ringing in my ears is a thick Minnesota accent drawling, "ooooo, it's the spoooooon!" (heavy accent on the o's... you know how it sounds). I had quite a few of shouts of "Go, Art!" and "Yeah, Minneapolis!". I also had a couple of sperms, an ice cream cone, and an R2D2. The 3:53 finish was a little slow for me, but even worse for all those folks who got beat by the spoon!

(can you see the stem on top?)

I also did some international traveling and my best impression of a desperate doctoral student trying to finish a dissertation. A good fall, so far. The meds seem to be holding for now. I'm at 7mgs of Prednisone and dropping 1mg/month. Last time things got hairy around 3 or 4. We will see!

Midnight 50K, the remix

My second attempt at a 50K post-polymyositis comes this weekend. My first attempt at Sylamore in February did not go well. Leg muscles locked up with about 6 miles to go. After having to repeatedly lie down on the side of the trail and wait for them to loosen up, I had to walk it in. I'm not certain, but I think dehydration played a role. This time I'll try to be a little more diligent with it, and try not to be too ambitious in the earlier miles. Especially since the forecast high in the area has hit triple digits. I missed this run last year, and was sad. It's a perennial favorite of mine. Something about running in your flashlight tunnel with the locusts pounding in your ears... it's a bit transcendent at times. Then again at other times, it's just plain hot and nasty.

One consistency I've noticed when toeing the line for longer events is a blatant uncertainty regarding what the next several hours will hold. Once again, I can confidently say that I have no idea what will happen. Nirvana? Despair? PR? A ride in the sag wagon? Which is interesting, because I am a very play-it-safe kind of person in real life. I love how recreation gives us an opportunity to lead double lives. To enable risk-taking in appropriate arenas. Leisure scientists refer to this as sensation-seeking. I call it "what was I thinking?" Or "I hope I'm laughing about this someday."

Catch you on the flip side.

K

Summer love

I'm lying in bed one night this week. Waiting to fall asleep, but it's not coming as easily as usual. Here's why:

I have a gi-normous chigger bite on my ankle that all of my willpower can barely resist. I can pinpoint the day and trail on which I sustained it. Arkansas forests are full of them in the summer.

I can't roll over very comfortably because I have a large burn on my shoulder blade. I learned the hard way that a hydration pack causes burns when worn without adequate coverage on a 21 (or who knows?) miler. It's in an inconvenient location, and I have a hard time keeping the scab intact. I'm embarassed that I didn't know how to handle my gear better.

I can feel my pulse in my toe. I bruised a toenail during the course of a long run, and pulled it off prematurely, almost like a loose tooth. It's gooey and raw. I wonder if I'll be able to get a shoe on in the morning. I wonder if I should cover it or give it air. Injuries to digits are disporportionately painful to their small size.

And as I try without much success to get comfortable, it occurs to me:

I love this.

Ouchie

Getting sore again. Calm and fairly normal-looking on the outside. Distress call on the inside. It's been 3 weeks since my prednisone bump. The first 2.5 felt great, but the water is starting to leak through the dam again. Sore, sore, and sore. In odd places, too. I can feel it even when I'm still. Which is probably the worst time, because I can ruminate over it more. Shoot. Next appointment in 2 weeks.

"Never a dull moment..."

... which is what doc said when my CPK came back elevated this week. I wasn't suprised. I had been feeling it for about a week or so. Same odd soreness that doesn't seem to correlate to anything I'd done recently. Same sensation of low-grade fever and general malaise. Hands stiffening inward. My knee has been sore and swollen lately too, just like the first time when it couldn't heal from a simple bruise. That knee is proving to be a barometer for the inflammation in the rest of my body. A few days in to a bump in Prednisone dosage, I feel better, but not "all better". Still sore and stiff, just not as much. We'll see where this goes...