The Santa Monica Gobble Wobble

I did it! I ran a race! I ran the 10K in the Santa Monica Gobble Wobble and it was fantastic!

I said before it began that if I finished in under 65 minutes, I'd be happy. In the end, my official time was 59:59!! (The top three female times were 37:43, 39:28, and 42:38). The first two miles were KILLER and I thought I might not finish at all; turns out they were a slow and steady incline. Ouch. Miles 3 and 4 were a breeze and as I was getting tired at the end of mile 5, some guy ran up behind me and kept pace with me all the way to the finish line, so I didn't slow or stop when I would have on my own. Thanks, bib #172, for bringing me in!!

An ex-boyfriend (whose father is one of the people in whose memory and honor I'm doing my marathon as a fundraiser for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society) used to say that EVERY name could be found by Googling on SOME page SOME where... if only a race result page. At the very least, there's a race result page. I have officially come of age, I officially exist, my name is officially listed on my very own race result page.

Waking up to run Saturday morning was especially hard, what with having gone to a party at a friend's the night before and not having gotten a lot of sleep and having been too nervous to sleep well, but I had extra inspiration. The father of another ex-boyfriend passed away from leukemia on Friday night. Please consider making a donation to LLS.

LOOK! I added a widget for that too!! ---------------->>>>

"I believe that the Good Lord gave us a finite number of heartbeats and I'm damned if I'm going to use up mine running up and down a street."

Do we really believe that Neil Armstrong said that?

I haven't actually been running up and down a *street*; I've mostly been training in the park. Yesterday, that was to the tune of EIGHT MILES, which is by far the farthest I've ever run. It was awesome, and I had a show afterward and I didn't even fall down once.

Now we know this running thing has gotten really crazy: next Saturday, instead of training with the Team, I'm going to run in a RACE! My first ever and I have no idea what it's going to be like, but everyone says it's a really good idea to experience that organized-race thing before the actual marathon, the crowds and the starting gun and the whole different atmosphere, so I'm doing it. I still don't care about *racing* per se, in terms of being faster than anyone else (as long as I'm not last) but I think it'll be fun. I'll be running in the Santa Monica Gobble Wobble and I would LOVE it if you want to come cheer me on!!

Jesus, I've been blogging a lot about running lately, huh? I swear, there are other things going on in my life... like... for example... hey, look over there!

Walking is so... pedestrian.

In a funny coincidence, the two tabs of my browser are currently open to these two pages:

On the left:

The Great LA Walk, a 13+ mile stroll around town (that I WISH I could do, but I'm busy running on Saturday!)




and on the right:

an article entitled You Walk Wrong from New York Magazine.

RunBlog1

Look, I added a widget! ------------------------->

Somewhere over there on the right is a new box that says "Running:" and it's a little script that keeps track of how far I've run this week/month/year and I love it! Mike has one on his Marathon Blog and I'm very excited to be just like him :)

So I still think my plan to blog my run by way of iTunes playlist is brilliant, but I forgot the part where I'm not allowed to use an iPod during official training runs with the group, and most of my runs are with the group (I'm not so self-motivated, much to my chagrin). So that's not going to work out so well.

But here's the quick version of my last two runs: Saturdays are always the official Biggest Run I've Ever Done Ever days, with the team. Last week we ran FIVE miles and I was very proud of myself for doing that. Wednesdays we have a less-official mid-week group run, and even though I tried to go to that last week even though it was canceled and embarrassed myself truly, I went back this week anyway. And it turned out to be a 40-minute run, which still sounds like a whole f'n lot to me, and it was cold out, and I still don't really know anybody, and I didn't have an interval watch yet, and I immediately lost track of the people who I was going to run with who *did* have an interval watch and...
and I ended up having an AWESOME run because the only people who were going at the initial pace I was comfortable with were the two men, and somehow the three of us ended up doing the whole thing together and it was GREAT because I could keep up with them and we ran for more than 20 minutes before I needed a walking break and we did something like 4.5ish miles in something like 40 minutes and YAY ME!! I had no idea I could do that... but being distracted by conversation and having the challenge of keeping up with the boys made it just fabulous for me and it kind of flew by. AND it was my first day wearing my new sneakers (Asics) that I got THAT DAY at Road Runner Sports after doing their Shoe Dog analyzer thing which of course I loved also.

So that's my breathless update for today, except to also tell you this:
I JUST REACHED 10% OF MY FUNDRAISING REQUIREMENT FOR THE MARATHON!!
which is both super-duper exciting and kind of scary, because of the glass-is-90%-empty perspective that likes to visit me sometimes. SUPPORT ME PLEASE!

Okloveyoubye.

Back to Life?

I have been very stressed out and very busy with a handful of things the last couple of weeks, and I think that as of today, all the pressures are either relaxed or completely dealt with... meaning maybe I can relax again too. Yay.

And I did two loads of laundry today and ran the dishwasher AND took out the trash. Banner day, no?

I still have LOTS going on, but now maybe I can settle down and focus on some of the things I need to do, instead of being overwhelmed by *all* of them. That's a very good thing.

Upcoming: My first mid-week organized run and then an unprecedented (in my whole life) EIGHT mile run on Saturday morning, ohmigod. And a show that evening in Laguna Hills. Good times ahead. By which I mean: sore calves ahead...

If security has already been breached...

then you may as well read the article about me in the first-ever Alonim newsletter!!




[...even if, let's be honest, there are a few mistakes. I am overall very happy with the profile and totally thrilled that I was chosen to be profiled. Seriously. But could I really not mention the irony of their misspelling "Brandeis", of all words? And I did send them a handful of dance-related and flattering photos of myself for this, and instead they chose a random one from facebook, cropped out a friend, and used the resulting less-flattering less-professional picture you see there. A few mistakes here and there, but still, damn cool, no?]

RunBlog0

So, I've always been interested in running a marathon (and by "always" I mean since summer of 2002 when I first read The Philosopher's Diet and then The Long Run Solution) and I've spent a lot of years thinking about doing it and saying that I will *someday* run a marathon... just not today. And during that time I've read some very inspirational and wonderful books on running and it's probably the case that until now, I've spent more cumulative time reading about running than I have actually running. And when I meet someone who tells me they have run a marathon, I'm always very interested and I think I'd be very interested in reading their stories about the experience, and it does seem that almost everyone who runs a marathon keeps a blog about it and posts endless narratives with the details of mileage and injury and hunger and hydration levels and... I find them just mind-numbingly boring, I'm truly sorry to say. This is something I *think* I want to read about, but apparently I don't actually.

So.

So here we are, at the moment in my life in which I am not just talking about running or reading about running but ACTUALLY running. And actually training for my big MARATHON... and I have a BLOG... and I do NOT want to bore you to tears with the details.

So we're going to do this instead. My runs with Team In Training are necessarily iPod-free, so I'll just say this: First Saturday = 3 miles. Second Saturday = 4 miles. Tonight, however, was my first training run sans-team, meaning it was con-iPod and instead of giving you the details of my mental state at each moment, I'm gonna tell you what songs came on while I ran:

Wednesday 11/11/09

Deror Yik'ra / 3:40 / ESTA
If I Had $1000000 / 9:19 / Barenaked Ladies
The Old Apartment / 3:22 / Barenaked Ladies
It Feels So Good / 3:49 / Sonique
We Built This City / 4:49 / Starship
Mad About You-Ian / 3:53 / Sting
An Englishman In New York / 4:27 / Sting
Long Way Down / 4:00 / Michael Penn - but I only got halfway through it...

I ran about 2.8 miles (according to the very cool runningmap.com) in a very leisurely fashion, walking sometimes, stopping to get a schedule of the dance classes at a studio I passed, etc. According to the above playlist, I was out there for about 35 minutes, which means it was slooooooow going, (which it always is when I'm alone, yet a non-trying-hard timed mile last Saturday took me about 9:45) but it wasn't meant to be fast - it was just meant to BE.

So that's my plan, for the runs I do on my own - I'm gonna give you the playlist. Fun? Fun.

HAVE I MENTIONED YET THAT THIS WHOLE THING IS A FUNDRAISER FOR THE LEUKEMIA AND LYMPHOMA SOCIETY AND I CAN'T EVEN GO ON THE RUN IF I DON'T RAISE AT LEAST $3,800, WHICH I JUST REALIZED IS $145 PER MILE?? HERE I GO OFFICIALLY RUINING MY SUPER TOP SECRET REAL IDENTITY, ALL FOR THE CAUSE: HERE IS THE LINK TO MY FUNDRAISING PAGE. NOW YOU CAN DONATE AND SUPPORT ME YAAAAAAYYYYYYY FOOOORRRRRRRR YOOOOOUUUUU! thank you so much. More on the Leukemia/fundraising aspect of this to come.

RDB's week of culcha

So, last Sunday I went to see John Irving in conversation with David Ulin at The Writer's Guild Theatre in Beverly Hills, a conversation presented by Writers Bloc. John Irving has written 13 novels; I have read 12 of them and now own the new one, signed by the man himself last Sunday.

[On Wednesday night I had drinks at the Penthouse Bar at the Huntley Hotel in Santa Monica, but that's a whole different kind of culture. The kind where, if it's too hot for you in front of the fire, you don't relocate to a cooler spot, you ask the waitress to open the roof for you a little bit more. Ummm, a little less. How about... there. Perfect. Thanks. I'll have a martini, please.]

Thursday night I went to see Orhan Pamuk, Nobel-prize winning Turkish novelist, in conversation with Reza Aslan, presented by ALOUD. I won tickets to see this by being the correct (first) caller when it was giveaway time on KPCC. (Have I mentioned that I win things?) I read Pamuk's book My Name Is Red when I was in Turkey in 2003.

Friday night I went to see Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me, the NPR News Quiz, taped in Pasadena. It was an awesome show with George Takei (Sulu from the original Star Trek!) as a guest contestant, and it marked the third time I've gone to SEE a RADIO show be RECORDED. Is that weird?... or just really really dorky?

And indeed, Saturday morning I made it to the park at 7am for my second week of TRAINING TO RUN A MARATHON. Yay me. Just wanted to keep you all updated on my comings-and-goings. I know that I've just said a lot for saying nothing, but I had to do this first or I'll never be able to get out the interesting parts, like the contrast between what Irving talked about and what Pamuk talked about, or about how differently they spoke and how interesting it was to see them the same week.

[Ok, for completeness: Saturday night dinner at Nobu in Malibu. Yeee-ha!]

[Mmm, spent a couple hours in conversation on Sunday at the Literati Cafe on Wilshire on Sunday. Was recognized by someone from BCI... shit like that usually only happens in the Valley, not the City!]

I'm going to run a marathon.

No, really. I am so excited. Details to come, and of course the link to where you can donate to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, which is who is training me to run said marathon.

I. AM. SO. EXCITED.

(In the middle of an awesome week of exciting things and I promise to tell you all about them. I just had to put this out there so that woe-is-me post wasn't on top and instead the here's-what-i'm-gonna-do-about-it post was!)

Goodnight.