The day after Valentine's

Yes, I really felt the day after Valentine's day would be gloomy.
It was and it wasn't.
It was because the Sun didn't shine all day and it looked gloomy all day.
But it wasn't for me, because I was feeling good today! YAY!
I have not walked the River in a long, long time and I decided I was going to do it!
When I got there, I could see clouds rolling in and it looked like it was going to rain.
But I decided to walk anyway and see how far I could go before the rain started.
Well, it sprinkled now and then, but it never rained hard, so I was able to do the
 whole 11 miles.



So I felt good about myself today. Even though, I haven't walked or jogged much at all since the 1/2 mara -

 I did accomplish something today.

And I even got to talk to a good friend on the phone (during my walk) that I haven't talked to in months.

I also got to talk to my daughter a little bit.

Then after getting home and cleaning up, I went to Ephrata.

I visited my M-I-L, Vera in the hospital and I was able to do a few things for her.

I felt like I may have lifted her day a little and then I went to visit my buddie Connie at work.

We had a great talk and I saw a few other pals and I really felt like it was a great day.

Wow.....I'm getting easier to please in my old age!

Speaking of old age, I've been cleaning out old letters that I've had. I hate to say it, but some of them are clear from Middle School. I even had some old valentines in there. I realized that these things are 40 +

years old!

I finally threw a bunch of these things away. But it was fun to go through a lot of them (especially the ones from my High School friends that wrote me when I went to BYU)

The Nostalgia really had set in after I read a lot of those letters.

Jay had written me a lot of mushy, lovey, dovey letters!  Can you believe that! I had to show him.

Anyways, I found a wedding invitation from an old roommate at BYU and decided to look up her name on Facebook. I found her! It was so great to re-connect and she looks like the same fun Jeanne that I remember. What an exciting thing it was. Life has really changed for us with all that we can do on the internet!

The Miami marathon

Well,

I do feel good about completing this 1/2 mara.

I couldn't sleep the night before, because I was so nervous about it. (And we had to be at the starting point by 5:30 AM - which was 2:30 AM pacific standard time.)

I've decided it's really all worth it, tho, even if

I still do have my doubts around mile 8. Saying to myself : " What do you think you are doing - you're not a runner." This is where my good  mantras come in and I have to be stronger than my weak mind.

There are always those very lean runner types that make me think - I shouldn't be here.  But then, there are really all types of runners and I'm so thankful to see those that have a little meat on their bones!

There were around 22,000 runners in this race. So it was fun to be with such a big group and see so much variety, even though I do prefer a smaller group.

The scenery was the best on this run: Palm trees swaying, blue skies, beach, big huge cruise ships sitting at the dock, and the tall sky scrapers of Miami's downtown.

Well, I didn't do my best time this time, but I was just happy to be there.  I waited for Rocky to complete his mara, but I was getting sick standing in the hot sun- sweating and trying to find him.  So I just about gave up and decided to go back to the car, when I happened to catch a glimpse of him. That was good, because then we got the pics that I posted above.

We both felt pretty good.....so we went back to the hotel and ordered a pizza.  And the minute the pizza arrived, we both felt ill. We had bad headaches and started throwing up.  I think it was a delayed reaction to the Sun. (heatstroke) We weren't used to the heat. Just two days earlier I was in the freezing temps of the Northwest.  Well, to make a long story shorter: we felt much better the next day and ate all the cold pizza.

Then Jay came and we had a great week together. We really enjoyed the warmth. The guys played golf and I just took it easy. We drove down to Key West and stayed a night there. On our last day, we took a ferry out to an Island. (Tortuga) It was 70 miles out and  had an old Fort on it.(Fort Jefferson).  What a history it had......I really enjoyed hearing it. I guess I don't have time to tell it all here.

Anyways, we did do some snorkeling, but the water was pretty cold. I didn't stay in very long. It was much more fun to just lay on the beach and take in the beautiful scenery.  It all seems like a dream now.