Race weekend

Not for me! It is for thousands and thousands of other people in Minnesota, though, because it's Twin Cities Marathon weekend! My days will be full because I volunteer with one of the race committees. Today I took a vacation day and squeezed in my weekend long run before kicking off marathon weekend festivities in the afternoon.

I looped around the river road through downtown Minneapolis. It was the coldest run I've done in many months: 37 degrees at the start - but more importantly, so windy. It turned out that I had inadvertently scheduled myself to run the entire first half basically into the wind, followed by the second half with the wind at my back. This was totally a coincidence, but it helped me finish the run feeling jolly instead of miserably cold. I definitely (and I'll say it again: definitely) could have used a pair of gloves during the first half.

It was so pretty out there. I'm feeling like a little bit of a broken record here, but it really was. The sun was brilliant, the clouds were puffy and the blue sky was so vibrant. It was been so gusty here over the past couple of days, but a lot of the leaves are hanging on, too.

First, I took a peek at downtown Minneapolis from under the Hennepin Avenue bridge:

This is what the bridge actually looks like:

Of course, I took a minute to look at leaves:

And I got over to the Lake Street bridge, and the sun was so bright, it ended up looking in photos like how kids draw suns:

The river (and trees along the river) looked beautiful.

That's the report, Reader. Next weekend's run is 12 miles, and the weekend after that is my own race weekend! This weekend, I'm just excited to cheer on friends and family, in one of my favorite races in the world.

Small victories

Today I won a race (because I simulated an 8K race by myself on the blustery and practically deserted pre-dawn streets of St. Paul) and I also got email notification that I won a pizza.

And that, Reader, makes for a pretty good Thursday.

The pup in the fall in the city

101 in 1,001 update: September recap

Hello, October! Here is my 101 in 1,001 update for last month. 

You know how this works. We start with an array of links!

The whole list
Last month's update
Track my progress (approximately) via google doc

Here's a little confession. I love that I wrote down 101 items, and just doing that has kept the spirit of the list in my head. I like the monthly updates, too. But I also don't refer back to each month's post until I'm ready to write the next one, so I'm perpetually getting surprised by an item I forgot I had put on my list. Oops!

How did last month go? Here were my goals:

 

#40 Take a Spanish class

"An opportunity has presented itself, and I just have to figure out if the timing is right," I wrote last month. It turned out that the timing was not quite right, because we decided to sign up for six weeks of dog training class and I didn't want to block out two evenings per week for classes, at least until after my marathon and the trips I have scheduled for the fall. Anyway, this will happen soon. I did pinpoint exactly which classes I'd like to take, so I'm hoping it will work for the winter session.

#60 Plan meals for a week and buy groceries once in that week

Yes! Yes! I did this. Josh and I talked through our meal plan for the week, went to the grocery store on Sunday and stocked up. (This might have been the height of my feverish soup-making craze, so it was basically a lot of soup staples.) I made it through the full week without going to the grocery store. I decided to set this goal for September because I had gotten into the habit of going to the grocery store all the time for one or two ingredients and then buying other food that I usually didn't need. This forced me to be more intentional. It saved money and time, too. The only real temptation was deciding on Monday that I really wanted candy corn and peanuts to mix together and then having to wait the whole week. (Yes, I did buy them the following week.)

 
#62 Send one card per week for three months

I've had to restart this one a bunch of times. I love to send cards, and for some reason, I've found it deceptively tricky to send one per week for 12 weeks in a row. But mark my words: as of late September, it has been launched once more.

#86 Make a huge batch of pesto in the summer and freeze it. 

Yes. I wrote about this project earlier in the month. Just enough time has passed that I already find the idea of a bowl full of basil from that day very beautiful and far away.

But that's kind of okay, because I have a bunch of pesto cubes in my freezer!

Surprise! With my miles on the Big Rivers Regional Trail, I also checked off #35 Run or bike on a new-to-me trail in the Twin Cities.

Where does that leave me?

23/101 goals complete

16/101 goals in progress

This month, in addition to continuing the ongoing projects, my goals are:

#9 Run a race in costume. The wheels are turning in my head and you'd better believe I'll keep you updated.

#26 Use my passport. I am going to a conference in Montreal!

#79 Complete a puzzle, jigsaw or crossword

#91 Make popovers

Begin #92 Read five classic books

That little list makes me even more excited about October. There are a lot of good classic books that I haven't read yet - I just read A Tree Grows in Brooklyn last year, for example - and some of you have passed along recommendations already (thank you!). Do you have an all-time favorite classic book that you want to tell me is a must-read? Are you a popover guru? And do you know anything about visiting Montreal?

Comment away, please!

Marvelous Monday: Week 40

Whoa. Typing "Week 40" feels pretty serious. And it's October, too. Wow!

Here are some marvelous notes to start the week:

1) Reading report: I finished In the Garden of Beasts, which felt a little slower-moving than Devil in the White City (the other book I've read by author Erik Larson) - but not in a bad way, just because each page was so full of research and detail that I felt like I had to mull it over slowly and carefully. It was a very interesting piece of the story of pre-World War II Germany, and again, I can't say enough about how fascinating I find Larson's method of combining letters and diary entries and other pieces of evidence into a smooth narrative. I mean, the footnotes section is 55 pages long. Can you believe that?

Reading that book so deliberately made for a strange transition to Gone Girl, a book I am absolutely tearing through because the plot is so crazy that I would like to find out what happens next.

2) It's Twin Cities Marathon week! I am loving the conversations I've been having with friends who are running one of the races this weekend. A couple of runners who I don't even know started talking to me about it when we were all waiting a stoplight on Summit over the weekend. The buzz is here for sure. And the weather for Twin Cities Marathon (and Chicago Marathon the same day) is - knock on wood - supposed to be dreamy.

3) I love October. I just love it. Nat reminded me today that I have a lot of exciting things happening in the next several weeks. I can't believe it's almost marathon time (in three weeks for me) - and time for my Montreal trip.

4) We started a new training class for Wish on Wednesday - well, by that I mean that I sent Josh and Wish to the training class by themselves because I had a meeting and couldn't go. (Oops.) Josh briefed me on what I missed, and we have been working more diligently with Wish on our walks over the last several days. I love to see how the training works (or at least is starting to resonate) and to see how responsive the pup can be, and I like the messages this class is sending. More on this later when I form more coherent thoughts. I am just happy about this class and am excited to go this week.

5) I went for a run early this morning and it was dark and oddly warm and windy. The leaves were swirling like crazy. I don't care much to consider that leaves are falling off some of the trees now at a rapid rate, but it was kind of eerie and properly October-like - but also fun because the wind felt warm instead of chilly. Also marvelous: now that I'm tapering and thus cutting back on my running to rest up for race day, my morning miles in the dark will start to dwindle.

What is marvelous about the start of your week, Reader? Anybody racing this weekend, in the Twin Cities or otherwise? What is the best part of fall for you, and what are you reading now? I'm almost ready for more book recs!