Back by popular demand!

The people have spoken, and I've finally listened.  Golly, I didn't know so many people missed my blog posts!  Well it's been an interesting year so I'll just give some highlights to get us all up to speed.  The last time I wrote was in February and I was droning on and on about the stupid snowstorms and stupid snowshoeing and stupid snow shoveling and stupid stupid stupid.  Oh and I was going to run the Hyannis 10k with my stupid ankle injury, but that didn't end up happening because it was - you guessed it - snowed out!  So that might have been the beginning of the temporary hiatus of my blogging.  But I'm back, and here's what you missed:

The official ankle diagnosis
Turns out I wasn't as much of a whining weenie as I thought, and I had very good reason for complaining about my ankle.  You might remember how, back on January 2, Julia and I went for a nice easy trail run (hard to believe there wasn't snow on the ground then) and I managed to destroy my ankle.  I diagnosed myself with a severe ankle sprain and waited for it to heal.  In March, fed up with the lack of healing, I went to see an ankle specialist at St. Vincent's in Worcester.  (Dr. Barrette, highly recommended btw).  After an x-ray (which I insisted I didn't need because I knew it wasn't broken for crying out loud), we found the culprit of my ankle pain: a ridiculous deformity called an Os Trigonum.  If you want details, click that link.  The short version is that it's a stupid extra bone in my ankle that got "nutcrackered" when I sprained my ankle, and is causing all sorts of problems.  I took time off running, had it in an ankle brace for a while, and then had a cortisone injection.  The next step will be surgery, but after the horrible winter we had, I really didn't want to be sidelined all summer recovering from another surgery.  So now I baby the ankle, can't run downhill, can't do speed work, can't take any quick turns, can't point my toes down.  Despite the restrictions, I've actually had a pretty decent year of running so I'm getting by with my mutant Frankenstein ankle.  After the Disney race in November I will reevaluate the surgical option.

Booked that trip to Disney I just told you about!
That's right, heading back to the most magical place on earth to run the Wine and Dine half marathon again in November!  So excited to be running this fun event again, and so are loads of other people based on the fact that online registration sold out in 20 minutes.  Ronnie and Donna are coming again, this time with their daughter, and my son Andrew is coming too!

A couple 5k's
Nothing dramatic here... Just a couple local 5k's in May and July.  I placed 3rd in one and 5th in the other, so I was really happy with that!

The Greendale Triathlon
Signed up for this because I had a discount voucher to spend this year, so I thought an early season triathlon would be fun.  What also would have been fun is if I had ridden my bike more than once or twice before this race.  Still, it was fun despite some equipment malfunctions and a staircase on the run.  A staircase?!?!  And I managed to squeak out a 3rd place which I was shocked about.

Random trip to Nashville
Becca texted me one day and was like, "do you want to go to Nashville next week?" and I was like, "okay", and then we went to Nashville.  It was fun, hilarious, and dehydrating.  We even managed to get a couple morning runs in before all the drinking sightseeing!

The Finish at the 50 10k
Said I'd never run it again, then I ran it again.  I'm training to be a politician.  But really, it was a good race and a fun time afterwards with grilling (illegally, no grills allowed!) and a fireworks show.  Unfortunately my ankle was a giant mess on this race and it was a pure struggle.

Logged a bunch of miles on the bike with Kristen
Apparently I only like training for races and not actually racing and getting the finisher's medal.  I did some long bike rides with Kristen to prepare her for Ironman Timberman.  (Side note: She, and everyone else, killed it!)

Survived another edition of "The Leavitts are trying to kill me"
This is going back a ways but long time readers will remember fondly the story of Mark and Diana, and the wild bike ride they dragged me on in the Alps of New York.  Well, they were up to it again this month.  We spent a week out in the Berkshires camping with our horses, and I inconveniently forgot to forget my bike, and went out for another punishing spin.  Mark and Diana really are sweet people, I swear.  This one might actually have been worse than New York, just because the elevation gain all came at the end, in 4 steady miles of climbing.

And that pretty much brings us up to current, where as recently as Saturday I had a little encounter with some fisher cats on my trail run.  Lucky for me I am quick thinking and thought, hey how about if I just don't run on this trail and promptly booked it back to my house, and then up the street instead.

So there ya have it.  Was it all you hoped it would be?  I promised to give you just the highlights, but hey I'm feeling generous so I'm willing to take requests.  If you want the "full story" on any of these, let me know!