Out of Shape

One of the women I work with hosts an annual charitable run/walk to honor her brother-in-law as well as other police officers killed on the job. It is a fundraiser for a survivor's group. Last year it was my first ever 5K and I won my age group. I quit running regularly in November when I was working 7 days a week and was exhausted and then failed to start running again due to a huge variety of lame excuses. Mary has been "bugging" me for months about running again this year. I decided that since I was not in shape to run, I'd drag the whole family along to walk with me :)

The kids had no idea what they were getting into so they whined about getting up early and about where they were going. (The event was at Junction City which is maybe 5 minutes from our house.) Once there, they kinda changed their minds. We got t-shirts and backpacks stuffed with candy, bottled water and other fun stuff. We got racing numbers. We got to eat from the buffet of donuts, fruit, sandwiches and chips. The walk was only one mile and the kids had a blast picking "wish flowers" and then spreading dandelion seeds into all the lawns along the walking route. We walked with Gene's cousin and his wife who we usually only see at Christmas. It was a good time. Maybe next year I'll run it. Or maybe not...

Now I have to get in shape for a park district team competition next month. It requires a lot of running (though thankfully not all at once) as well as rowing a small boat and many other physical activities. I was talked into signing up for no other reason than I'm one of the few people with Saturdays off. I figured it would be a fun couple of hours and that we'd not be competetive and that nobody on the team cared about winning or placement. I was wrong. My boss is pumped! Next Thursday the team is meeting at the (event) park to make sure everyone knows their way around and then to practice on the team building course they have. I suspect this won't be our only practice. Sigh.