C25K Week #3...Again

This week I'll finish the third week of C25K. Again.

I have to say, this time through, it's fairly painful. I don't know, maybe I need new shoes. Perhaps it's the colder weather. Maybe it's my dad 'stopping in' at 7:35a.m. just to chat.

Each morning I wake up and I get dressed and The Skittish White Dog and I head for the door. If I plan to do anything else, I never get out the door. Then, I spend all day trying to fit in a half-hour for a 'run'. Ha. Never happens.

This week in particular was interesting. On Monday, I was up and out, first thing. That's about 8a.m. in Mrs. A Land. Off I go on my Week #3 workout: warm-up, run 90s, walk 90s, run 3min, walk 3min, repeat, cool-down. I was ready. I was looking forward to it.

For some reason, I never stopped running into obstacles. At every turn, every bend, every step of the way I was hit up with some sort of interruption.

There's some guy who walks with his basset hound I see quite often. He walks too fast for the dog to keep up so he takes the dog off its leash. Of course, my dog wants to eat his dog and his dog wants to play. So I play tug-of-war with my dog while trying to stay on schedule. Another dog related obstacle is the Bag Man. Lovely gentleman, but for some reason he has his cargo pants stuffed with plastic bags. Lots of them. After I passed the basset hound, I came upon Bag Man with his two dogs. Bag Man goes out of his way to intercept me. Tangled leashes ensued. I ran an extra 30s hoping that would make up for my schedule confusion.

The next thing I know, I am wrestling with my dog. She had some sort of dead rodent in her mouth. And then there were kids at the skate park watching me stumble along. Who skateboards at 8:15 in the morning?! Path was muddy and flooded. Soaker. Off in the distance, I see another dog off leash. I turn around to finish my 'run' the way I had come.

I was thinking how ridiculous this Monday morning venture was. I was considering my motivation for this morning exercise silliness and wondering if it was really worth it. My butt jiggles. My feet get wet. I wrestle with my dog. The. Whole. Time. Is this really worth it?

So. I am halfway through my final 3minute run. It sounds easy, doesn't it? It's not. I'm sweaty. I'm tired. Thirsty. There's a bruise on my leg that really hurts when I run. I can't wait to be finished. I turn the corner of the pathway to an uphill grade. I know if I can make it to the soccer goal posts, I'm home free.

Firefighters, people. There were firefighters on the path. Like, 25 of them had just leaped out of their calendars and landed on my walking path. Walking down the hill like they owned it. They were dressed in full gear carrying their helmets. Cheery buggers, the whole lot of them. Who puts firefighters on a secluded walking path half a kilometer from anything?

Turns out that The Skittish White Dog is afraid of firefighters. I was not surprised. I had to tow her through them while trying to look like a runner. Thank goodness for big windbreakers and mirrored sunglasses. None of them will ever recognize me. I made it up the hill and made sure they had turned the corner out of sight before I stopped running.

I finished off my walk/run thinking about how ridiculous and mixed up my whole outing had been. Before the firefighters, I was ready to just give it up and thrown in the towel for good. But after the firefighters, I realized there is always going to be some obstacle, some interruption, some unforeseen circumstance. After the firefighters I had to laugh. I figured the Universe is telling me to get over myself. I just need to suck it up and get on with it. Be confident and take advantage of my morning exercise opportunities.

Today, when I was heading out with The Skittish and Very Bouncy White Dog and my dad pulled into the driveway, I smiled. I was not flustered and frustrated with the interruption. Dad and I enjoyed a nice walk by the creek. Once he was on his way, I debated. It would be very easy to just go inside and get on with my day. But I didn't. I went ahead and did my walk/run. Amazingly, there were no firefighters on the path this morning. No loose dogs, puddles or firefighters. Did I mention that I think the firefighters might have been a one time opportunity occurrence?

So I head into the end of Week #3 thinking I should stick with my plan. If I can stand another 6 weeks of this, I could actually finish the program this time. And who knows what I'll run into while I'm out there. If anything, wrestling frozen bloody voles from the dog and being surprised by firefighters is interesting and newsworthy in the otherwise boring and mundane life of Mrs. A.