CATCH UP

It seems I have a lot of catching up to do. My blog has been left abandoned lately. I truly enjoy blogging and wish I had more exciting things to blog about. Alas, little things called "work" and "life" are getting in the way lately. The Trailmomma household is still house hunting which is a daunting, depressing and just exhausting task. The Peanut has decided she likes going into other people's home and if they happen to have a pool, she's all about undressing to "go swimming."

I am trying to keep up my running/training so as not to lose my fitness. Pigeon is training for the Tahoe Rim Trail 50K which is this weekend and which I really hope to go and be a part of for her and for Coach Nikon (also doing the TRT 50K). I am hoping to tag along with Captain Kirk and Wonder Woman.

Therefore my running lately has been following the Pigeon's taper. This past weekend we met on Sunday rather than Saturday for an easy six miles instead of our usual double digit adventures. We met Sunday instead of Saturday because the Trailmomma family had scheduled a day trip to Napa. The Peanut is no stranger to wine country. She was actually very excited to see "baby grapes" on the vines.

Baby Grapes Momma!

Yes, Vans and I wine tasted a little bit which is why when Sunday morning's alarm went off . . .the thought of running six miles was not exactly high on my list of things I wanted to do.

Yet, I knew that Pigeon would be waiting for me. However, when I arrived at Rio Americano High School (our new meeting location) I saw this:

An empty parking lot.

Pigeon is always on time. In fact, Pigeon is usually EARLY when it comes to meeting up for runs together. So when I parked my car and I didn't see Pigeon I was a little curious.

Still, it was a beautiful Sunday morning. Even if she had not shown, I would have run because it was cool outside and the sky was really pretty.

I didn't have to wait too long however before Pigeon's car came rolling into the parking lot. It was immediately obvious why she was arriving on time vs early:

She brought her dog Toby!

This was a first for us. Toby is adorable and was visibly excited to be running with his momma. Pigeon figured a nice easy 6 mile run in cool weather was just what Toby needed.

The three miles out were fairly low key. We normally see a bunch of random wildlife when we run on the bike trail. Anything from fuzzy little bunnies to turkeys (ick) to crazy chipmunks and squirrels. Sunday, on our three miles back we only saw turkeys and I of course threw my camera to Pigeon and made her take the photos. On average, we see about 10 turkeys at a time . . . I barely survive.

These are super-sized turkeys, not your average turkeys mind you. If I wasn't running with Pigeon who was tapering, I would probably be running a sub 6 minute mile through these turkey sections.

Other than that, our run was fairly uneventful. Toby decided to say hello to random woman running. When I say "say hello" I really mean he jumped up eye level with her and looked her straight in the eye. She was quite surprised (and scared) and I don't think she appreciated it but what are you going to do? Toby took us all by surprise with that one.

We finished and Toby was smiling. Literally:

Pigeon is only a few days out from the Tahoe Rim Trail. Last night we met and ran 5. It was hot and she has had some extra work stress thrown at her this week. I am trying my best to distract her from that and anything else her brain may be trying to assess while we're running. Taper weeks always bring out the "paranoia" . . . "oh, that hurts, why does that hurt?" or "oh, I feel tired, if I can't run 2 how can I run more?" Hopefully my babbling is helping her.

Regardless, she's trained and she's ready and she's going to kick butt this weekend! GO PIGEON!