C25K: W3D3 Done

Although I am scheduled to run on Tue/Thu/Sat, I was unable to squeeze in my 3rd run of week three in on Saturday. This was due to the 6.8 mile hike I referenced in my previous blog post that I lead on Saturday morning in the Shenandoah mountains. I wasn’t in the mood to get up at 6am and run before the hike since I’d stayed up past mdt on Friday at Literary Elly May's birthday party and I was too tired to complete the run after returning from the 5 hour hike in the afternoon. I promised myself I’d tackle the run Sunday.

Was that the dumbest idea ever? (Answer: YES). I was SO SORE from the hike due to the constant inclines/declines that I could barely move on Sunday morning or afternoon, much less run. Late in the evening I realized that a derailment in my running program based on my “feelings” (no matter how legitimate) could snowball into giving myself permission to skip running for whatever lame reason I managed to come up with in the future. I struggle a lot with self-discipline and do not want to lose any momentum that my regimented schedule of running has going so far. Therefore, I forced myself to do some stretching and laced up my shoes for my run.

Hubby decided to accompany me and promised to go at my pace (he normally runs at 7mph) and encourage me. We ran on my new favorite course – the trail at Jennie Dean park (it has a few hills which I think are important for training) and it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. In fact, during the middle of the run I realized my achy-from-hiking legs were less so and I felt calm and free.

During the second 3 minute run segment my calves seemed to lock up right after the small hill and I had to slow to a walk. I was very disappointed and started chanting “failure” under my breath and crying during the next 20 seconds while continuing to walk. Hubby wasn’t having any of this failure nonsense- he said I was doing great and gently encouraged me to do one final push and start running again and I was able to. Had to reach down deep to make it happen, but I did it. I’m a perfectionist so my first instinct after the run was to write the entire session off as failure and plan to repeat w3d3 again on Tue, but husband has me convinced that one 20 second deviation from the run is ok given the circumstances and I should proceed to W4D1 on Tues.

Overall it was really nice to have him coaching me during the run, especially as I needed an extra push of encouragement last night. It won’t be a permanent arrangement as he runs much faster than my 5.5-6mph pace and also because I find I like to get lost in the music during cool down and that’s difficult with someone making noise walking/talking next to me. He disrupted my zen moment. :)

I realized after we returned home that hubby had not cleared my GarminFR60 watch after his last run, so his run Sunday morning merges right into mine Sunday evening in the log. My stats begin (and his end) around the 40 minute mark on the charts: Garmin Connect. It’s clearly easy to discern his run from mine in the charts due to the dramatic speed differences and also because he’s not doing any intervals, but just a straight shot of running for 30+ minutes.

While I am proud of myself for exhibiting such self-discipline last night, I am paying for it physically today. I am sore again this morning, probably even more so that I was yesterday morning. It is going to be a day of taking it easy.

Board Game Review: Anno 1800

Whenever Martin Wallace designs a new game, I am all over it. This is because I absolutely love Brass Birmingham (another MW designed game); in fact Brass Birmingham is my #1 board game of all time. Over the years, his other games I've tried have been pretty good, but not necessarily amazing must-buys. Still, I keep trying each new release of his, searching for that next star performer. That's why I'm excited to report that Anno 1800 is, in fact, a star performer, and an amazing must-buy board game. Anno 1800 was adapted by the publisher (Kosmos) from a Ubisoft video game of the same name. In the board game, players take on the role of industrialists, charged with developing their island economies and exploring other islands. Each player begins the game with a personal industry board with trade & exploration ships, a shipyard, and industrial goods tiles printed on the board. A starting collection of workers (wooden cubes) of various types to produce the goods is a...

Board Game Review: Expeditions

Expeditions is my favorite game in the Stonemaier Games portfolio to date. The game is a sequel to Scythe, and continues the narrative years in the future. It has taken everything I loved in Scythe and expanded on it, while chucking out everything I didn’t care for (the combat). Designed by Jamey Stegmaier, Expeditions brings us into an age when a meteorite has crash landed into Siberia and things begin to go sideways for all who encounter it. One team after another sets out to investigate the crash site and they are never heard from again. No one knows what happened to them. Now it’s our turn to find out what’s really going on, each of us leading a competing expedition team into Siberia to bring back desperately needed answers. During a game of Expeditions, all players are seated around the game board, which is made up of individually placed hex tiles laid out as shown above. At the bottom of the game board is an insert affectionately known as the base camp. The base camp holds ...

A Fortunate Trade, an Unexpected Pledge of Support, and a Win for Yin!

What follows is the true and unredacted account of my tour of duty as a command leader for the Yin Brotherhood. Map: 5p POK Kazadoom’s Notch Map generated on https://ti4-map-generator.derekpeterson.ca/ Factions: Yin, Yssaril, Nekro, Vuil’raith, Hacan. Round 1 objectives: Engineer a Marvel (R1-1); Push Boundaries (R1-2) Five experienced leaders gathered this weekend to prove themselves worthy. As the Yin, I found myself wedged between the Hacan (around the corner of a notch in the galaxy) and the Yssaril. Word had come down to the Blessed on Darien through our ambassadors and spies that both nearby factions were set on amassing larger fleets and armies, but to what end we were unsure. The Blessed discussed the matter at great length and decided our best defense was to rebuild our flagship the Van Hauge and to take control of as many planets as we could (more, at least, then our neighbors). That would allow us to stand firm in the face of any aggression. As a command leader, I...