Sittin' Here Waitin' For The Sun To Come Up

Checkin' blogs, watchin' the MLB Network, & chillin'
before my Saturday long run ... (Jack' peeking over
the table waiting for his mom to wake up!)

Ha ... sounds like the name of my next country song or something!  But that's basically the way I spend every Saturday morning.  And if you're an early morning runner, you know exactly what I'm talkin' 'bout!

There are only about three months out of the year when I get to run during the week in some sort of daylight.  All of the other weekdays during the year are spent in darkness, before sunrise ... like a friggin' vampire!  But Saturdays ... Saturdays my friend are different!  On those days I don't have to beat the clock for work.  For these precious weekend long runs, I get to wait until I can see the hand in front of my face!  And if you spend 90% of your running time in the dark, you know the sunshine drastically changes your mood, outlook, and attitude!

Waiting for the sun to come up gives me time to think about this past week, and the coming weekend.  Twice this week, I ran into my daughter, Madison while out running.  She lives on the other side of town and has recently turned to occasional early morning running due to her college schedule.  On Tuesday morning, I saw a familiar shadowy figure running toward me in the distance.  If you run similar routes all the time, you often see the same people and can begin to identify them from quite a ways away.  Like, "Oh, there's that bald guy who always zooms past me!", or "Ah, here comes that girl with the dog who never smiles!", or "Hey, is that the Burger King out running this early?" ... but this morning, I didn't recognize the silhouetted shape ... but yet it looked familiar.  And as I approached ... sure enough, good ol' Madi!

The lovely Madison ... early morning runner!

It was kinda weird seeing her out running.  I had happened upon her and Nate one other time, but this time as she passed, we both didn't recognize each other at first.  She gave me a polite "Good Morning!", but then kept on running.  But then we both stopped and turned around and looked back after it clicked ... "Madi?" ... "Dad?" ... "Oh Hi!!!"  And then we ran together for a couple of miles.  It was awesome seeing her and spending a little time with her in the morning hours.  And later in the week, it happened again in almost the exact same spot, but this time I happened to have my camera, so I snapped a couple!  I'm sure she appreciated being photo'd that early ... but hey, I'm a proud dad, so deal with it kiddo!

She kept apologizing for "slowing me down" but I didn't care - it was awesome just running with my daughter.  Plus it was a recovery week after a marathon, so basically the clock goes out the window anyway as I try to get  my legs healthy for another run.

My son and grandson are staying with us for a while, and last night Ryder and I played a little game of, "Hey grandpa watch me throw these balls under the couch for the 92nd time and then laugh as you fish them out!"  But I didn't mind helpin' the little fella out!  His arms are really short. He can't reach anything under there besides a few dust balls.  Plus, it was funny watching him look under the couch and then explain to us where they went, "Blabah gibbetlo hahaha, didoopah!"  He thinks he's so interesting ... but he makes absolutely  no sense when he talks.

Me & Ryder lookin' for balls

So thinking about today, while everyone else is still asleep & I'm just waiting for some precious daylight ... there are only a few things on the agenda for this relaxing Saturday:

1.  Run 20 miles ... SLOWLY!!!
2.  Go see "Straw Dogs" with my sexy wife
3.  Check out the Top Of Utah Marathon results and find out how Terzah of BQby40 & Cory of Fast Cory do ... I know they'll rock it!
4.  And most importantly ... hang out with the fam

All in all ... a great Saturday ... hurry up sun!!!
... be great today!