November!

Am I the only person who is pretty damn excited that it's November?  Is it terrible that one of the reasons that I'm so looking forward to the month is due to a long weekend (Veteran's Day weekend - we have an in-service that is pretty creative this year) and, of course, Thanksgiving.  While we love traveling and visiting family and friends and all that this entails, we have zero plans for Thanksgiving weekend, and I cannot say how appealing that is to me.  Lame?  Maybe, but also indicative of my need for a total break.

November 1st, yesterday, came and went with two notable items for me.  First of all, I finished 18 student recommendations, a record for me.  Shew!  Most of the recommendations were quite good, some were even excellent, but a few were probably weaker than they would have been if I had been able to take a day or two more with them.  I know that I nailed some of them, but I do wish that I'd had a day or two more for the final 3-4 letters.

The second item of note is that I signed up for this event:

So excited about Vineman!  It's crazy that I signed up for a race that is in mid-July.  Even crazier that it sold out yesterday - the first day that registration opened.  After many conversations about 2013 with myself and with Michael ("I want to do an Ironman, I can't do an Ironman, it would be great to do an Ironman next year, this is a ridiculous idea for about a thousand reasons but I can think of a one or two great reasons...."), I - we - decided that such a goal was not a viable option.   So, I've set my sights on two long-course races.  I'm waiting to sign up for the other one, but my impatience got the best of me for Vineman.  Turns out, that was a good thing!  

As for the "why" - well, a lot of it has to do with timing.  At the moment, I plan to head south to Nicaragua again in August and while I loved my experience at the Boulder 70.3, I don't want that race to cut into the Nicaragua trip.  I will, however, still have time once summer break starts to both ramp up my training AND taper before the race in mid-July.  Also, Vineman seems like it will be a great venue. California wine country - why not?!  And the course sounds great.  

I can't wait for July, but in the meantime, I'm focusing on my trail race November 18th.  I pushed myself in October to run longer (and slower).  This definitely isn't marathon training and makes me realize that tackling 26.2 would be rough (and I have no idea how I did it so many years ago) as  I find that setting out on the double digit runs is daunting for me!  I maxed out at a 13.5 mile long run two weeks ago, and I plan on a 15 or so mile run tomorrow.  I'm excited and nervous about it and am trying to remember what a friend said -  think about it as a fast hike. 

So, fast hiking, here I come!