Let It Snow!

Speaking of a few feet of extra snow, the Great Blizzard of '09 is upon us (no lie -- the weather crew is predicting this will be our largest storm since '91 and our largest Christmas storm in nearly 6 decades). This year, I had to make a difficult and selfish decision: For the first time, I'm not going home for Christmas.

My parents live in Wisconsin, as do both of my brothers and sister-in-law, and with the prospect of all us driving in up to 2 feet of snow, my mother graciously asked to "postpone" Christmas for a later weekend.

How is this selfish, you ask?

I took today off of work and could have made it to their house before the storm. Unfortunately, my brothers couldn't get today off, and the prospect of being holed up in my parents house with just them for 5 days would have taken a major toll on my psyche. (I love my parents, but not to the point where I want to be trapped under the same roof with them for that long. Don't lie; you know where I'm coming from.) Here, I have plenty of books, movies, food, my cat, the comfort of my own bed, leg warmers, infinite sweatshirts, slippers, coffee, and (selfish point No. 1) a fitness center.

(Selfish point No. 2) While I could have gone into work today -- not only to get some of my own work done, but to help a few of my coworkers with their work -- I decided to start my solo stay-cation instead. I made it out for two short runs: The first when I woke up, the run during which I decided I was going to stay in Minneapolis over Christmas; and the second this afternoon while the snow began to fall and the wind began to pick up, the run during which I tried to impress in my mind what imperfect running conditions feel like.

I have a 5k in 8 days, and as the snow will be violently falling for the next 5, I'll probably be sticking to treadmills, elliptical gliders, and stationary bikes for my maintenance work until then. Knowing my knack for running quickly (ermmm, what I think is "quickly") on treadmills, I can only imagine this will lead to a sloppy spill and a pretty twisted ankle during the icy 5k.

My splits:
Morning jog (2.6mi): 8:34, 8:24, 4:46
Windchill: 20F (Actual: 24F)
Afternoon jog (2.03mi): 8:22, 8:13, :12
Windchill: 15F (Actual: 28F, windy & snowy)

Let it snow!