Yesterday, for the third year running, I helped at the Lancaster County Home School Spelling Bee. My job was to pronounce the words for the children. There are two bees each year; a junior bee for 4-6 graders and a senior bee for 7-9 graders. The senior bee winners (1st and 2nd) advance to the written test "spell-off" in February where other local winnners are narrowed from around 100 to 30 who will then compete in a regional competition in March. These kids can eventually go to the Scripps National Spelling bee in late May or early June.
The senior bee was very short this year. We were into end of bee procedures (when there are only 4 or less left) after 1 round. I am proud to report that my niece, Elizabeth, will be going to the write-off next month.
The real competition this year was in the junior bee. These kids were tough! Round after round they kept spelling and spelling. Admittedly the first rounds were failry simple words. Although when you are standing in front of a group of friends and family at a microphone in a one and done contest I'm not sure how one defines 'simple'. It was great to see them do so well. These kids don't advance to the national bee but they got in some great practice for when they do.
After the bee we went to my brother and sister in law's house for lunch and visiting. I look forward that as much as the bee (maybe more). Dave came with me this year. It was a very nice day.
So it's Sunday now and the end of a week off from training. I did go to yoga on Wednesday and I did an hour on the indoor trainer on Tuesday. I did some stretching throughout the day on Monday as I watched the inauguration but nothing tough. I took Thursday through today completely off. Partly because I promised myself some down time and partly because I wasn't feeling great. I was in bed well before 10 most nights this week and before 9 one night. On Friday I had severe stomach pains - as in wishing that someone would cut off my arm because I was sure that would hurt less. The pains went away and I was left with chills and fatigue. I seemed to have recovered by Saturday with just a little bit of pain after eating. Today, Sunday, I seem to be ok.
I'm excited to get back to training next week. I'm looking forward to seeing what affect, if any, the week of downtime will have on this week. In terms of miles running I will pick up where I left off with 6 on Tuesday (half of my previous long run of 12); an hour on Thursday and 13 on Saturday.
One of the challenges this week will be that I'm out of town for work on Monday and Tuesday. Monday should be fine. I'll have my Ipad with me so YAYOG workouts can continue easily enough in my hotel room. My friend Terry has already asked me if I want to run with her on Tuesday morining so I have accountability for that. However, on Monday Harrisburg's forecast is for sleet, snow and freezing rain - as much as 2 inches. I may end up on the hotal treadmill on Tuesday depending on the condition of the roads/sidewalks on Tuesday a.m. As much as I hate the treadmill I can't let that derail this training.
So on to segment 2 of my training. I'll go from 13 to 18 miles in the next 6 weeks. Yoga ends this week (Jan 30). It doesn't start up until February 27th. I'll have to find something else to fill my Wednesday slots.
Speaking of Yoga - I've decided to add something to my daily routine. Starting tomorrow morning I'm going to try to do a Sun Salutation routine each morning just after getting up. It's not too hard - although I am not near doing the poses as well as the folks in these pictures. Doing these regularly - accepting where I am - can only help. I plan to do one routine for each side each morning. I watched video demonstration and even with some introductory remarks the whole thing was less than 5 minutes. I can spare that every morning for sure.
Thanks for 'listening'.
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