Mentally, I am already on my weekend. I want to go home… but there are some exvessel tuna prices that I need to look up. Could they wait until Monday? Maybe…

So let me entertain you with some other observations…

Stella (How could I forget)
With that whole Sharpie fiasco, I forgot to finish talking about Stella. Below, you should be able to see a topless picture.. if I had Photoshop here at my new computer, I could have done some special effects for you.

and

I had never gotten around to saying why I had chosen Stella as the name. 2 reasons for this. The first reason was while I was in San Diego when I realized my “dream” for the first time, while we were doing an exercise on what would be our dream, I blurted out about my photography desires and I was amazed at how fluent and succinct I was at my answer. The person that I said this to was one of My Lovely and Talented wife’s sister directors Pam Castellana. But I didn’t see the name yet.

Secondly, I have a named already picked out for my business and it’s a play on the astronomical/numeric name that I used for Planet3rry and that is Interst3llar. But alas, the name did not enter my brain. Fast forward about a week or two and “powerful impact, BOOM from the canon” and I had it… the common thread of using the power of speaking my dream and the vehicle that would be my business was “stella”, and the deal was done. Plus who doesn’t like to just yell out “Stellllllaaaaa!”

Friday’s Run
3.16 miles, new route. I’m calling it the Fort Sanders Figure 8, which the middle 1.16 mile is a figure 8 configuration in the eastern part of the Fort Sanders area. I know, I forfeit points on creativity. Apart from the 25F weather (it warmed a point or two while I was running) it was a good run. For the first mile, I wasn’t sure if I was running too fast or if the cold weather was making it more difficult to breathe. The air was so sharp and cold… it’s almost as if it went to your soul. Good thing (for the race tomorrow) was that it was the cold and not the pace. My first mile was in 8:35 and I was glad that it was the cold and not the pace… I did not want to have overly tired legs for my little run of 13.1 miles.

I’ve been wanting to map out a couple of other routes in a more northernly direction (hence, Fort Sanders). A couple of runs ago, I had found a 3.1 mile route in Fort Sanders, but the pattern was such that I would never remember it and my last attempt of a route was less than 3 miles. So, today, I wanted to find a 3 or slightly over 3 course.

Apart from a circle, the best configuration of a route that would be most memorable would be the Figure 8. And sure enough, it was just about perfect. I did forget about the cold as I made my way up the big ass hill right at the start of the neighborhood. Further along the road when I recovered from the hill AND the cold effects, I thought that area would make AWESOME hill repeats! I could almost make a zig-zag route of UP and DOWN and UP and DOWN… Weeeeeeeeeee

The Fort Sander’s area is not as protected as my Market Square Fab 4 route or anything on the greenways. In Fort Sanders, I have to watch out for maniac college drivers, vagabonds and riff-raff. Also, I am not as visible as there are more parked cars that limit visibility. So I guess there is a little danger in running in this area.

Luckily for me, I didn’t encounter any maniac drivers, but I did have a sighting of a pair of vagabonds walking around. I thought about where they must go to stay warm, they were over a mile from the shelters… eh, they’ll get warm somehow.

When I came back to the starting point of my route (which would signify that I have 1 mile back to the aquatic center), I knew that it would be over a mile since the time was 10:14 for that figure 8. For the 1.16 miles, I averaged a 8:50 pace (seems about right) which was good since I was running in a somewhat new area.

I just figured out (thanks to gmap-pedometer) a 4.14 mile route that is, in essence, a double 8 configuration in the Fort Sanders area. So that makes a number of routes that I can take if I want… nice!

So tonight, after our date and the kids are in bed, I will start to get ready for my race in the morning. Layers, LOTS and lots of layers!