I have spent the last several weeks learning that getting back into running at 42 is a bit different than it was at 32.  Especially when you are an upstate New Yorker, whom has moved to Florida.  I’m unsure at this point if it is my age, the extra weight I have put on, or the fact that it is 95 degrees with 80-90 percent humidity that is causing the problem!  Regardless I am 4 weeks into returning to running.. Another of those “Once and Future Runner” points in life.

 I’m okay with this.

 For a status check – I’m so out of shape, that running 3-5 miles is pretty much out.  I started off running 2 minutes, walking 1 minute, repeat until done or medically incapable of continuing.  (Fortunately, that second one never quite happened!) At this point – I can go a mile, wallk a minute or so (it varies based on the seconds I stop at.  I walk to the minute on my time – making sure I get to walk at least 50 seconds.) and then repeat.   I am able to do 3 miles in this fashion, if I go over – my run/walk ration drops back down.

 I’m okay with this too.‘

I’ ve lost a bit of weight since starting – but have quite a bit more to go. My current goal is to be able to complete the Tallahassee Marathon 1/2 – in February.

But.. I’m back!

So my daughter is 12 going on attitude.  Now, for a 12 year old – she doesn’t have a bad attitude, but it is there.. Along with stubborn bizarre views (at no point here am I stating she is just like her mother.)  Well, part of her current 12-year-old-ness, is that she doesn’t like to wear shorts.  Preferably, she wants to wear black running pants and a black sweatshirt.  Now, she can’t wear said black sweat-shirt running, because then it would be sweaty and she couldn’t wear it to school

Seriously, this is a thing.

Notice.. not shorts, but black running pants..

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So my son has long wanted to be a runner.. He has been very successful at it thus far. Monday, Wednesday and Friday (along with a long-ish run on the weekend) are his days to run with Dad.  Until this week, we had not been doing well on getting two runs done during the week.  THAT CHANGED TODAY!!!!  We headed out for our 3.1 mile route, and while it was a wee bit cooler – it was still humid.

There aren’t sidewalks here, and I know my son misses them as much as I do.  We do pretty well on staying off of main roads – but anything over 1.5 miles is either going to be very repetitive, or require part of our trip to be on “Meridian” – a fairly busy road. Read more ›

S0, my daughter has long wanted to be a runner.. not to be confused with wanting to run.  She did the Girls on the Run in Maryland, and did AWESOME, and promptly stopped running.   After all, she was a runner with a T-shirt to prove it!  Maybe enough time has passed that she needs to run again in order to “prove” it, or maybe she genuinely wants to run.  (Though between you and I, the fact that as soon as it comes time to run – she tries to change my mind makes me suspect it isn’t the latter of the two.)

After Sunday’s Run with the Girl.

Regardless of the why, she came to me saying she wanted to run again.  She said this while we were in a shoe store, buying running shoes for her brother – so her timing was good.  She got running shoes as well. (Wait.. maybe she wanted to run to get more shoes?)   This means I am now lucky enough to be running with both kids! Separately… At different speeds..  So M-W-F is running with the Boy, and T-T is with the Girl.  Then I do two runs on Saturday or Sunday – one with each of them. No problem. Read more ›

I’m sure that you have seen the various articles and studies about how sitting is killing us.

picture by Robin Davey from the TIME article at: http:/time.com/sitting

Alice Park wrote an article for Time Magazine in Sept of 2014 titled “Sitting is Killing You.”  In addition to that article having an awesome image (seen above), it had some wonderful information.

A recent review of 43 studies analyzing daily activity and cancer rates found that people who reported sitting for more hours of the day had a 24% greater risk of developing colon cancer, a 32% higher risk of endometrial cancer and a 21% higher risk of lung cancer—regardless of how much they exercised. In another study involving a group of men and women who reported exercising the same amount, each additional hour they spent sitting was linked to a drop in their fitness levels. In other words, sitting was chipping away at some of the benefits of exercise Read more ›