I am a nerd.

I went to bed at like 10:30 on a Friday night just so that I could wake up at 5:35 on Saturday to get my run in. that, my friends, is really sad and pathetic. but hey, I beat some of the heat, so that makes it worth it.

so yeah, out the door and made the drive to KMP by about 6:30. the parking lot is already packed with cars, I barely got a spot. I hear an old man commenting that he can't believe that may people were there already, and I'm thinking, "really? I wish I'd gotten myself out here earlier," because it's already hot as anything. when I know I don't have to be back in time to go to work at a certain time I tend to dawdle a bit in the mornings. It at least gives me the chance to eat a real bowl of oatmeal instead of having sportbeans for breakfast!

so anyways, start the run, feeling good. trodding along. garmin was off then on then off again throughout the whole route, so i'm glad it's marked out and that I know approximately where the mile markers are where the route I took isn't marked. I was in the 9:30's for the first two miles, then kept dropping until I was in the 8:50's or 9:00's. ended with a 9:08/mile pace, which I was very happy with. felt good, but hot and sweaty, pretty much the entire way. at about mile 7 I took the connecting route over to the path at ILRA and headed out that way. this path is always a bit less used, so there are a lot less people to dodge around.

speaking of... what's the deal with people who feel the need to take up the entire path? do you really need to run 4 people across, instead of having a couple people drop back? can you not see that there are other people trying to use that path too? the disturbing thing about this is that it doesn't seem to be just the inexperienced people who aren't used to the etiquette that's generally used on the trail. there were a lot of older, what seemed to be seasoned runners, who were doing this too. it's frustrating to literally have to run off the path so that I could get around them. totally annoying.

the nice thing about being done with your run by 9 means that you can go home, get a nap in, and get up again by like noon. granted, I spent most of the day lounging in bed reading anyway, so I got up again at like 3:30, but whatever. it's not like I was going to go outside again in this heat! good grief.