Mrrrphhhmmmm....

I think that about sums up the amount of extra time / energy I have had as of late. I am not going to write one of those "woe is me, I'm such a bad blogger" posts begging for your forgiveness, though, because it's my blog & I'll go AWOL when I feel like it (at least until there is some monetary compensation involved). But let me just tell you, I am BEAT and SWAMPED, if for some ultimately great reasons.

Reason #1 - August has been an insane month up in here. We've been / will be out of town every weekend this month (weddings and races and camping, oh my!), plus the mini vacation we took the week of 8/6. These are all amazing and fabulous and wonderful things, but they do take up time & energy. I'll probably share a few highlights here & there when I can.

Reason #2 - I am still in the middle of transitioning into working full-time again. All the old contracts are wrapped up and I am now driving to one and only one location each day and staying there for a full eight hours, but what with all the rest of the August craziness, I haven't really had time to get myself fully settled & organized. I don't plan to keep driving every day, but for now that's how it is.

Reason #3 - When I haven't been out of town during the week, I am trying to make sure to get to karate every day that I can. Generally when I need an evening to rest / recharge / not be around other people, it's no big deal to skip a class, but with a black belt test looming, I feel a lot more guilty about this & have been trying to be there as much as possible. (Er, except tonight. I really needed a night off.)

My running during this period has been so sparse that it hardly seems worth mentioning. The abbreviated version:

July 31 - Aug 5: 23 miles.

• 8 easy.
• 2 wu + 2 @ 10K pace + 3 easy.
• 1.8 easy + Summer Breeze 10K.

Aug 6 - Aug 12: Vacation; no running. There was some reasonably strenuous hiking, though, so it's not like I was sitting on the couch eating bon bons all week. Surely that counts for something.

Aug 13 - Aug 19: 14 miles.

• 4 easy.
• 2 wu + 7 @ HM pace + 1 easy.

Which brings us to the present. I.e., the week of Santa Rosa Half. I may be able to break 30 this week (including the race) if I really work at it, but it seems like a bad idea to try to run a ton more than I have been & wear myself out.

Also, in my spare minutes, I've started & abandoned like 20 blog posts. I'll be like, "OOOH! That's a GREAT idea!" Then I'll proceed to write a paragraph and promptly fall asleep. Maybe one of these days some of them will see the light of day (if they're not hopelessly outdated by the time I can finish them, that is).

So that's that. I'm still alive, doing, y'know, some amount of running, and trying not to fall too terribly far into sleep debt. Hope your August has been great!!