The little things in life...

There is very little in this world that I would rate more highly on the 'simple pleasures' list than a perfect, star-lit, summer's night. 25ish degrees with a warm gentle breeze blowing. Stars brilliant against a black sky. Or alternately a harvest moon -- either option works for me :)

Got home around 10:30 tonight, but it was just that kind of night and I sooo wasn't ready to come inside yet. So decided to go for a run (remember that 15k idea -- yeah it's creeping up awfully fast and running all of about once a week - if that! - isn't really getting me anywhere :) It's been legitimately too hot to run during the days and most evenings I'm rather zonked by the time I get home, but today I was feeling good so away I went.

Now you have to understand - I'm a night person. I have always *been* a night person. If the day never started before about 10am and regularly went till 2, I'd be thrilled. Except I'd stay up late and even 10 would seem too early *g* The issue is, with this whole "adult" thing, no matter how late I'm up I still have to get up in the am. Boooo. And when I exercise, I'm usually rather spun (hence writing at midnight -- no sleep for a while yet!) Which makes the next morning brutal. But I'll worry about that tomorrow.

So I enjoy night. And I usually get an energy burst around 10 or 10:30 in the evening. And today I took advantage of it. Now running at night I learned a few things...

There are fewer people out (can't imagine why! :) but they ones that are are *much* friendlier. When I run that same route during the day, everybody I meet is in their own little bubble, bitterly trying to get some exercise in before their real day starts. Running at night, I met very few people, but every one of them smiled and at least said hi.

I have a vivid imagination. It's made more so by nightfall. This can be good or not >;-P hahhaha I swear I had half a dozen stories half written by the time I was finished my run; the only issue is I can't run and write at the same time, so they're now all lost. I know better than to try and reclaim them -- that never works. This vivid imagination though did at least keep me safely in reasonably well lit areas. Much as I wanted to run through the forest, the grown-up side of me said that would be a really dumb idea. And for once I listened to her.

Running on well paved streets requires FAR less effort than dirt roads. I could run faster and easier and was significantly less tired. I think that's the first run I've done where my cardio gave out before my muscles.

And this was due to lack of watch. Or not so much lack of watch as inability to read said watch in the dark. hahaha so instead of carefully rating my pace and x mins "running" (read carefully contained jog) x mins walking. It was more of run as hard and as fast as you can just for the sheer power of it and don't stop till you have to. I realize this is not the ideal training schedule, but it was a lot more fun *g* Well till I had to stop - a pretty brutal minute or two there, but I recovered and repeated the game; stopping just *slightly* before brutal on consecutive occasions.

Was the first run that I would say came anywhere close to resembling "fun" -- although I suspect a nice quiet walk through the same evening would've had the same results *g* But we'll ignore that little detail :)

And on a completely different note -- Athena got on the trailer after only about 20 mins today with no kicking, striking, or drama. Sweet. We're getting there.