I ran 3 miles today! I can work that into any sentence. “I need to take a shower because I ran 3 miles today.” “I’m too tired to do the dishes because I ran three miles today.”

When we left off I was planning on going for a run on a flat bike path to see if running hilly trails all the time (where I can’t do two miles without stopping and breathing like a freight train) actually made me fit enough to run three miles on flat ground.

I got up at 7 AM on a Saturday (ponder the weirdness of that for a moment) to go for this run since it was cooler than the surface of the sun at that point. Later in the day running on asphalt loses some appeal. I had a special eclectic playlist on the iPod just for this occasion.

I started with “Bad Things” by Jace Everett. That’s the theme to TRUE BLOOD. It has a steady beat but it is slow. I ran with it since I wasn’t going for time here. I wanted to make the distance even if it was in slow running motion. After that was “Bad Romance” by the Glee cast since I love Chris Colfer’s vocals on that. The half mile marker came up pretty quickly. I was going back and forth between the path and the shoulder since I like running on dirt and gravel better than asphalt. I run like a trail runner – short strides because you never know when something is going to try to trip you. I almost fell twice today going from path to shoulder. I figured it would be just my luck to hurt myself on the easy course.

“Centerfield” by John Fogerty was next. Happy, bouncy, just makes you want to run. “Dime que me quieres” by Ricky Martin came up. When I was in Costa Rica in 1992 his first solo album had come out and was a smash hit. At 3:30 on weekday afternoons my job was to watch the music video show and yell for the females in the area when any of his videos came on. Every woman from 15 to 80 would come running to watch. This one was a favorite for the motorcycles, shower, and barely legal Ricky doing bad choreography. (I was looking up the link on youtube and Z was dancing around the living room. See, everyone loves Ricky.) This one distracted me because I’m trying to put all the Spanish words in when I sing along and it is hard for me.

At this point I was in sight of the bridge! That’s the turnaround point. I was running to “Fame”. When I got there I collapsed on the benches. But the sun was beating down and I was hotter there than when I was running so I got up immediately and walked across the bridge and back to stay flexible.

“Hollaback Girl” was the end of the mix and I started back and then started the mix over. I ran all the way back. I even passed someone! She was older, overweight, strolling, and totally unaware that she was racing me but I passed her and she didn’t pass me back!

I felt pretty good on this run. Cardiovascularly I was just fine. My hamstrings and calves were tight. I need to do more yoga. Now that I know I can do the distance I can work on maybe getting faster.