I got the flu for Valentine's Day this year

I didn't really notice February sneaking past. That's fine with me, because I kind of hate it. Winter loses its charm in its fourth month (if you count November, which is equally unpleasant for the Midwest). I'm sick of wearing heavy clothes and spending all my time inside. Good riddance.

Valentine's this year was eventful. Montana and I don't care much for showering each other in flowers and chocolate. Instead, we'd planned to go to a Passion Pit concert in Cleveland on the 19th. We were going out with friends to get dinner and drinks before the show. We were super excited. He skipped his Tuesday class and drove to Wooster late Monday night, only to spend the night (and the next day) puking. "A good cleanse," he called it. I sold our tickets.

Turns out Passion Pit had the flu, too. The whole concert got canceled.

So for Valentine's Day, I got myself something.

A NEW CAR!

I've been saying this Oprah-style in my head all week.

Ok, it's not new. It's used. And the interior smells like somebody left their cat in it too long. Still, I bought it with my own money, and I learned how to drive it in two days. Driving a manual and having insurance payments is a big step toward someday being an adult, right?

Also, I finished this and finally turned it into the higher powers that be:

And that pretty much wraps up my Wooster career. I feel a little empty inside.

But maybe that's because I just got over the flu.

exit February. 

Now for spring break and outdoor track. Florida, here we come.

wooster weekends

This is a typical winter Sunday. I spend a lot of time inside, observing my cat.

I hang out in my flannel pj's until about 11:00, when I start thinking about working on I.S. 

The physical copy is in its final stages (!). Notice the orange pen scribbled all over. That's a sign of good progress.  I'm trying to get it finished so I can go on spring break with the track team and spend a week lounging on the beach without worrying about finishing my graduation requirements. Also, I'm really enjoying my new cookbook and Spotify subscription, because they're superb distractions.

After spending so much time working on writing, layout, and editing makes me realize how much work goes into a monthly magazine. With that perspective, I feel like I've had a pretty leisurely timeframe. Six months for one issue? No problem. 

Speaking of track, indoor season is in full swing. Three days a week, we run at breakneck speed around a 200-meter oval. We race on the weekends. I've done two 5k's so far, and they haven't been as dismally slow as I'd expected, given the kind of training I did over winter break. Turns out trail running, wine drinking, and doing a couple P-90x workouts doesn't translate to intense track running. Who knew? (I did.)

Counting down the months till graduation. We've only got three. In a way, that seems like forever, but I know it's going to fly past.

birthdays and ice

After our track meet last weekend, I decided to go home to spend Montana's birthday with him. First we went out to dinner at Out of the Fire Café, our new favorite splurge-y dinner place. We only go there when we're really hungry so we can appreciate the food more. Unfortunately, thanks to some lack of foresight on my part, we didn't think to make a reservation. At 7:45, the place was packed. We had the option of going somewhere else (Brady's or some place called Gu's, which didn't sound promising). We had to wait 45 minutes just for a seat at the bar. By the time we ordered, we were both completely hypoglycemic. We couldn't even talk to each other (see: hangry).

But we finally got our food (which was excellent--they do a mean plate of sweet potato fries) and resumed enjoying our weekend. Snow was glittering down outside. In a fit of festivity, I decided to order dessert. Bananas Foster. It's supposed to be on fire, right? Like a birthday candle.

It was not. Turns out that their Bananas Foster was a bowl of hot bananas and some ice cream. Wht a ripoff. Still, we ended up lingering over it for half an hour before we went back into the cold.


Sunday brought a bluebird sky.

We took a walk over to Cucumber Falls to look at the ice (and I could try out my new lens). After last week's freeze, it was incredible.

 

Then we walked back so I could do my long run (oh, hey hills!) and Montana could ride his fat bike on the snowmobile trails. We had dinner at the pub (terrible service, mediocre food, cheap).

Overall, a successful weekend.

PUPPIES.

An Ohiopyle dog had a litter of puppies a few months ago. A bunch of little labradors got dispersed around town. One puppy went home with Jared and Amanda, the awesome head yogis of Power Yoga Morgantown, one of them went with a student at WVU, and one of them stayed at home with its mom. The runt of the litter ended up with an enormous bearded guy named Grizz, who lives at the White House with Montana. He named her Ursus, the bear.

She is devastatingly cute.

I'm not sure if Grizz thought this one out. He works days. And nights. Meanwhile, Ursa stays in her cage, waiting for him to come back and causing an ungodly ruckus when anyone walks into the house.

So Montana and I have been taking care of her during the day. Mostly to keep her from peeing all over the floor.

The other day we took her on a hike. It took some wrangling, but we eventually got her onto the leash.

 But of course, we had to stop for a play break.

 Before we finally got to the trail.

It was a beautiful day--one of the few days of winter sunshine we'll get all year in Pennsylvania. Ursa loved exploring all the new things in the woods.

Yum.

 It was a nice hike, but unfortunately we had to take her back home to Grizz.

As much as we'd like to have a dog, both of us think a puppy needs more stable people to take care of it. Someone trying to raise a puppy probably needs to be home for at least a few hours every day to give it some exercise and make sure it doesn't rip apart every sock in the house and pee all over the floor.

Sigh.

haven't you ever heard of skis?

Last year I packed on the winter miles and ended up with tendonitis. That wasn't too fun. So for the past month or so, I've been following a training schedule that allows a bit more room for improvisation. My running mileage has taken a big dip--most of my runs have been on snowy trails (which is actually about thirty times harder than normal trail running), and I've been doing a good bit of cross training. Since I don't own a pair of cross country skis, I've been getting creative with my snow activities.

For instance, this was my last hill workout.

Montana has been spending less time on the bike and more time perfecting his unicycle skills. He's actually been getting pretty good at it. Check out this expert filmage. And this one if you'd like a morning giggle. 

We spent our New Year's Eve riding bikes on snowmobile trails Laurel Mountain with our friends Rob and Chrissy. They just got a couple of Salsa's fatbikes, which are basically dirtbikes without motors. 

Montana and I just had our 29ers, which worked pretty well on the trails that were packed down. 

But Montana's singlespeed was geared a little too high to sit and spin up the hills. 

That might the first time he's ever uttered the phrase "Colleen is dropping me." He considered going back to get the unicycle after that. 

The riding was sketchy and slippery. My descents were painfully slow, and the climbs were exhausting. Especially the last one, which everyone but Rob had to hike. We passed a few snowshoers who laughed at us as they floated above the snow like elves. 

We managed to cover 15 miles in 3 hours, but it felt like we'd been out all day. When we finally got around to eating, I tried to crush a plate of cheesy egg scramble at a family restaurant off the highway, but I was too sleepy to finish it. 

Needless to say, our New Year's celebrations weren't too rowdy.  

Happy winter, people!

Change of pace

On Christmas Eve, winter finally arrived. Here in western Pennsylvania, that usually means that the sun goes away and ice pellets start falling from the sky. But sometimes the sun comes out, and there's enough snow to lace up an old pair of cross country spikes and go for a run without worrying about falling on my face.

Running in the winter is weird. It's the intermediary period between cross country and indoor track. I should be doing a lot of base work, but the nasty weather means a lack of motivation for long runs. And the schedule doesn't dictate much speed either. So I'll settle for slipping around on the road or the trails for a few miles each day, thinking about track season and trying to keep a tally of how many Christmas cookies I've eaten over the past week.

Today: maybe some snowshoeing and a bit of yoga.

pizza in your beard

The weekend was cold and snowy. We got buried under another solid 8 inches of snow on Saturday. I'm itching to run, but a good morning hike and a day spent driving around West Virginia yesterday is almost as good.

The best way to end that kind of day? Homemade gluten free pizza with lots of veggies and non-off-brand cheese.

Made with Bob's Red Mill GF pizza crust mix. I'm not sure if I did something wrong, but Bob's website claims the mix makes "light, crispy, delicious crust." Delicious, yes. But my crust turned out kind of heavy and hearty. In retrospect, I probably should've formed a ridge around the edge for the sauce and toppings to sit in. Montana called it (affectionately, I hope) "solid Rocky Mountain crust."

 Questionable crust thickness aside, it was some fabulous pizza.

While we were eating, we heard the fire station next door clank and whistle awake. Sirens bleated and the trucks coughed to life to trundle off somewhere. I just shrugged and kept shoving pizza into my face.

A couple hours later, a text and a picture of a building with flames spitting out the windows.

photo: Pittsburgh Trib

Apparently a freak fire destroyed the entire ski lodge at the only 5-star resort in town. Nobody was hurt, but the building's just a pile of rubble.

Bummer. There's finally enough snow to ski, and now there's no ski lodge to speak of.

At least we've got pizza.

winter

So. It's taken a couple days to actually realize that I don't have to go back to school for quite some time. In this case, it'll be about two months until I'm off to Hobbit School. What will I be doing in the meantime? Well, I decided to get a job. That's about it.

Without anyone/thing else to distract me, I figured I'd be getting in some mad mileage over the winter.

I went on my first winter-season long run yesterday. It was snowing lightly, and there was a sparkly dusting on the river trail. I looked out down the long, straight path and started running. And running. And running. For the first 5 miles, mile markers and skeleton trees were my only company. I tried listening to Mumford & Sons to make myself feel like a rugged Appalachian wanderer. It didn't work, since the next thing that came on my iPod was Adele.

Then I saw a tiny dark figure on the horizon. When I got closer, I realized it was my friend's dad. I was so thrilled to see another human being that I nearly jumped on his back for companionship. But he "didn't want to slow me down," so he went on ahead without me.

Ughhhh. No team, no friends, not even a dog to talk to. It was a sad, numb-fingered shuffle back to home base.

And now I realize - this is going to be my whole winter. Lonely. It's not even the cool kind of loneliness, like this:

Feh. I'd give anything to be out in the Western wilderness with Clint Eastwood and that horse. Instead I'm stuck running miles and miles alone in cold, dreary Pennsylvania.

But Christmas is roaring up upon us. Maybe the holiday spirit will get me through this hump. I do love seeing Christmas lights and eating Christmas cookies. So I'll probably be hopped up on sugar enough to distract myself from myself.