This morning I ran a four mile race: Camire's Firecracker Four (a four mile run in South County, Rhode Island).

I've run this race every year since we moved here -- uh, I had better rephrase that: I have signed up for every race but I did not run last year's race. Jennifer and I ran together in '96 and '97 and '98. Last year she did not want to enter so I just signed myself up for the race. However, I was in London the week leading up to the race and got home on Saturday night, very jet-lagged and very tired (having had only a couple hours of sleep the night before)... so when my alarm went off early Sunday morning I apparently just turned it off and fell back asleep (I have no memory of that) and when I awoke again it was about fifteen minutes prior to the start of the race. I leaped out of bed, quickly put on running shorts, t-shirt, socks and a pair of running shoes, grabbed my car keys and a bottle of water, and drove into town. By the time I got there, parked, dashed over to the registration tables, the race had already been underway for ten minutes. Not really a problem; I hadn't expected to turn in any kind of fast time, so I could just pin on my number and start running... except it was thundering and beginning to rain a little... and then rain harder... and thunder boomed again and again... and then a bolt of lightening struck an electrical transformer on the opposite side of the highway... and I decided that it might be wiser to get back in my car and go home and drink coffee and read the Sunday paper... I could go running later in the day, after the thunderstorm passed on.

So, this year I was determined not to miss the race and I was out of bed and downstairs making coffee around 6:30 a.m. (race starts at 8:30)... later, as I was changing into running clothes, Nancy asked how close I was to leaving... she decided to come along and join in the two mile health walk... My brother-in-law Tom was also running the race. We ran the course together, keeping up a conversation most of the way and really enjoying this beautiful summer morning. Summer running is hot work, but it because of the early starting time it was not yet too hot to run. I was quite pleased with my results, running the four miles at the same pace-per-mile as I had run in a 5K a week ago yesterday. It is probably foolish of me, but I am beginning to wonder about the Blessing of the Fleet 10-miler coming up in four weeks. No, I do not have time to properly prepare for it... I'm not even in good enough shape to begin a serious training program yet... but maybe... I could do the course at an easy jogging pace and make it through all ten miles... hmmmm, maybe? (Okay, okay, so I know it's a dumb idea, but still...)

Yesterday I borrowed Sean's bike (because he has an odometer on it) and checked my estimated distances along the bike path for accuracy and discovered that my distance estimates are fairly accurate, more than accurate enough for knowing how far I've run. It made me feel good.

I just found out that the local store in the Poore Simon's clothing store chain is going to close. Rats! I like that store; Jennifer and Sean and I like to buy clothes there. I usually order dress shirts and slacks from Lands' End but I liked Poore SImon's for things like jeans. For the past few years I kept hoping to get my weight down enough so I could wear pants with a 33 inch waist instead of 34... of course for the past year or so it's been more like squeezing my bloated self into 34 inch pants and hoping nothng would rip or pop. So, if I do succeed in my weight loss and fitness program, I will not only bring my waist down to an honest 34 (without excess flabby flesh flopping over), I will eventually get down to a 33... and then I would want to buy some new clothes... and Poore Simon's is where I would have gone to do my shopping. Oh well...

Last night we had dinner at my mother-in-law's house (lots of visiting family)... today Nancy's sister and family (who live on same street as mother-in-law) hosted a holiday cookout. I fixed marinated chicken on bamboo skewers (with mushrooms and grape tomatoes and red, orange and green peppers) and I also sliced up about three quarters of a watermelon. I cooked the chicken-kabobs on my electric grill so all we had to do at the party was to microwave them to heat them up; thus leaving all of their grill surface for the steaks and hot dogs. This was after having made tuna fish sandwiches and cole slaw for our lunch. I asked Nancy to drive because my back was sore from the food prep and cleaning up my kitchen afterwards and she laughed and said that I was the only person she knew who could be invited out for dinner and still end up spending the afternoon in the kitchen.

Thanks for visiting...

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