How fuchsia footie pajamas made me a runner.

I've been feeling a little more off every day for the last couple of weeks.

To be fair there has been a *bit* of stuff going on in the world around me, so at first I passed everything off as temporary reactions to the immediate environmental stresses.

By this past Thursday it became clear that regardless of what was going on my body had just plain settled into full on Bleah! mode; complete with allergies, tiredness, crappy eating, random adrenaline spikes, headaches, and a solid case of the HULK SMASHes.

Only then did it occur to me that I had switched from running three 5ks every week (with all the healthful eating and hydrating that entails) to a single 5k in two weeks, eating absolute junk, living in front of my computer (or my phone when the power was off), and drinking a glass or two of wine every couple of nights... and that maybe this had a little something to do with my general feelings of crappyness too.

I have apparently transitioned into the time of my life that living healthy actually feels better than doing whatever. Weird.

I was already determined to run this weekend because I had signed up for the run4nyc virtual 5k,  but this mood shift made me all the more determined to get out and get moving again.

I don't get a lot of sleep on average during the week so sleeping in and chilling out on weekends is key to my sanity. I recently dug out all of my winter gear so for the first time this year I got to rock out my fave winter PJs while kicking around my apartment.

I have clearly cornered the market on everyday sexy. Hope I don't get any of you in trouble at work with the racy content!

I spent the late morning and early afternoon relaxing in my footies. It was starting to get late and if I wanted to get a run during full daylight I would have to GO.

And so it came time to remove my delicious warm microfleece Muppet pajamas to put a meager few layers of cold flimsy tech fabric between me and the universe. I readied to leave my wonderful boyfriend and snuggly cats behind; to venture out into the cold; to test and exhaust myself on messy dangerous litter strewn roads... and I didn't think twice about a single second of it.

I think it was sometime around when I finished painstakingly weaving and tucking my earphones around and through a carefully crafted bra strap/safety pin maze that I fully recognized the decision I had made, and what that meant to me about who I am now and what I'm about.

Running is just what I do now, I'm a runner. Hunh.

Sure I may be a painfully slow runner all things considered, and apparently I set myself up to suck wind big time by going a week with only one short walk for exercise, (who put all that invisible plastic wrap in my lungs anyway?) but if any of that sort of stuff was going to stop me it probably would have done so months ago, and being able to say that feels pretty darn awesome.

Incidentally: if you're looking for some sexy Muppet footie PJs of your own you can get them here.

My Saturday run: run4nyc virtual 5k - a 5K run plus 5 minute warmup and cooldown walks
3.10 miles at an average of 11:34 per mile -  total time of 35:53
Positive splits all around! Not kidding, this one was hard.

So, what are my options for running at this point?

Like it or not road running has officially become a weekend activity. I don't typically get home from work until four thirty, and with daylight savings time it's pretty much dark at five now, so weeknight running is pretty much out until spring. The sun rises at about six forty am this time of year, which is less than a half hour before I already get up to be at work at eight. Given the amount of time it would take me to cool down and shower if I ran in the morning I would still be running in the dark then too (I do have to admit I'm immensely happy that's not a remotely viable option).

I have an extremely generous offer from Gigi of Running On Candy to use her treadmill since she lives very close (and is awesome), but transitioning my entire running workout routine to right in the middle of someone's home seems like it would get intrusive right quick and we Jawas are shy, retiring creatures. I love her for the offer but I think I'd be too mortified to actually make good on it. She does have cats which rival mine in awesomeness, (and she has a whole extra one) but by the same token I see treadmill + amazing cat time rapidly devolving to shenanigans.

I had already been looking into a Retro Fitness extremely close to me and I found out that they are running a cash special Thanksgiving weekend that makes the dues work out to ACTUALLY twenty dollars a month. I had already figured out a few things I could easily cut out of my budget to cover that and then my parents offered to kick in a sizable proportion of the membership as a holiday gift, so I'm pretty much decided.

I plan to do a guest pass one day in the intervening time to check it out (make sure they're not a front for trafficking endangered animals or anything like that) and if it seems worth it I'm going for it!