October 21st, 2008
Running looks to be fun this week, easy short jaunts in the newly cooled down weather.
Real life though, is peppered with annoying things I gotta do. Yesterday it was give a final blood test and pee in a cup to see if the slight weirdness shown in my last tests are still slightly weird or normal. Done.
Today is a thorough house cleaning because Nick’s half-brother is visiting from Spain tomorrow and staying a few days. It takes company coming for me to really clean our abode. I can run for several hours straight, but ask me to spritz Windex for a few minutes and I get completely freaked out, finding all sorts of ways to put it off. Look, I’m doing that right now by writing this.
Tomorrow is the annual Scam Of The Century revisit – getting my car inspected. They always find hundreds of dollars of crap I need to replace, so this time, Nick and I are carting Nick’s 92-year-old dad to this particular Russian inspection place (Nick and his dad are Ukrainian, but his dad can speak Russian when it counts) because they saved his dad buckets of dough. We have to take the old man because 1. we don’t know where it is and 2. he’s our secret password to get in.
I actually fixed parts of my car myself last year when it had been stalling (cleaned/unstuck the EGR valve, replaced a faulty coolant sensor and a couple other things) and after doing this, thought I was golden for the inspection. Nah, my local place managed to find stuff that a human can’t repair without lifting the car off the ground and charging $500, the bastards. Here’s hoping the Old World gas station guy takes pity on me and all I have to pay for is the inspection (what a wild concept!).
Tonight has some fun in store, we’re going to a beer-tasting event with our friends Jeff and Lara, where the restaurant owners are generously letting it be a wine-tasting for me, since I’m not a beer gal. Should be fun. May I just say how lovely it is to drink and do whatever without worrying about it adversely effecting my run the next morning. Yay, vices! (in moderation, of course)
OK, enough putting off the inevitable. Time to spritz, wipe, vacuum, mop, launder…sigh. I’d rather fix a car.
Posted in Running
5 Responses to “Chores”
Leave a Reply
Sign Up For My Newsletter and get
Click here for more info
|
|
|
|
You fixed your own car? I thought that stuff ended in the 80′s before electronic crap. I use to work on my cars when I was younger, but wouldn’t dare touch em now! Boy, I am glad I don’t have to deal with those inspections here in good ole TN..
Yeah, I saved myself a few hundred bucks by doing it myself, so it was worth it (fun, too).
Meanwhile, I just got back from the inspection…$360. When will an inspection cost $49.99 as advertised? Never, I guess.
Some fresh news today about Arien O’Connell, who sort-of-won the Nike Women’s marathon. Nike’s sending her a trophy, and announced that there will not be an elite start next year.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/10/23/MNCI13MDH0.DTL
Yeah, it’s some justice. Doggie Poo noted that yesterday (A winner, as opposed to THE winner) on the RW thread, when someone emailed the Race Director saying “look at what people are saying at RW” and got this in response:
Hello,
Nike is announcing today that it recognizes Arien O’Connell as a winner
in last weekend’s Nike Women’s Marathon with the fastest chip
time, completing the full race in 2:55:11. She shattered her previous time
and achieved an amazing accomplishment.
Arien will receive the same recognition and prize, including a Tiffany
bowl, the full marathon elite group winner received. Arien was
unfortunately not immediately recognized as a race winner because she did not
start the race with the elite running group, which is required by USATF
standards. Because of their earlier start time, the runners in the
elite group had no knowledge of the outstanding race Arien was running and
could not adjust their strategies accordingly.
Learning from the unique experience in this year’s race, Nike has
decided today to eliminate the elite running group from future Nike
Women’s Marathons. Next year, all runners will run in the same group and all
will be eligible to win.
Nike has a proven track record of supporting athletes and we’re proud
to be able to honor Arien and other athletes who surpass their goals
and achieve great accomplishments.
Sincerely,
Nike+ / Nike Running
It’s a different course (mostly) from the S.F. marathon that I ran. It’s not quite as hilly, but it’s not flat either. Maybe someone like Deena Kastor could do it in 2:30 or close to it. So yeah, not much of an elite field if none of them could break 3:00