Deep thoughts

Am I the only one who seems to have deep thoughts and major life epiphanies while watching introspective tv shows like... Grey's Anatomy and One Tree Hill ?  Or reading an article in a very highly respected magazine such as...Oprah?? 

Just wondering.

Not sure if that is something to be proud of or not, but it is the way it is, and for some reason these shows just happen to get my mind in the right zone where it makes me just want to write all of my deepest thoughts down on paper. 

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I just met a new neighbor and I was pleasantly surprised to hear that she is an author, she writes mostly children's books.  I cannot wait to get a chance to pick her brain.  For now, just meeting with her and talking with her on two occasions has motivated me to feel like writing again so that makes me happy. 
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Watching many of my friends compete in a triathalon yesterday has also got me super motivated to get back on my training plan for the Half marathon.    I am officially 12 weeks away from race day.  The casual training will come to an end soon and we will be upping our training to four days a week.  Our long runs will make the jump to eight miles and work up to the goal of 13, and the current 6 mile runs that I have been so proud of will switch to being a casual run that we do on "easy days."    I am excited to move ahead and I THRIVE on working towards goals so while the training gets tough from here on out-I also have so much to be proud of.  As a perfect match to my goal-oriented training I was happy to find a training plan  (from a Runner's World magazine that I hijacked from my neighbor's house while I was dogsitting this weekend) that maps out the last 10 weeks of training before my race.  It adds one speed workout a week and tells you the pace you should be at.  Supposedly, it will get me ready to run this half in under 2 hours.   

The weather has started to get cold  (yesterday the high was about 45 and today I think it crept up to a whopping 50 degrees.)  While I normally take it easy on Sunday, I got a little lazy last week and only ran two days since it was cold.  So I wanted to take advantage of the sunshine  (and not having to get up at 6am and run before school, in the dark).     I tried running a speed workout, and by speed I mean I tried to run as fast as I could in order to just see how fast that really is.  Back in my high school days I ran track and I would like to say that I was pretty fast, not only did I go to State as a freshman but my dad was at almost every meet with his stopwatch timing me from the stands--and he assures me I was fast--so it must me true :)   I actually called my dad today to ask him if he remembers what my times were for the 1/2 mile back then, and he wasn't sure, but he thinks he still has the little notebook where he kept track of all my times.    If he finds it, it will be interesting to read what those times were and see what my body is capable of  (and how that compares to my current race pace).

For now,  based on today's workout --where I ran for a one mile warm up and then tried to run two miles as FAST as I could  (with a rest after the first one) I have determined that 7.5 min is my new PR for a mile  (I am sure it was the fastest I am capable of because I felt like I was about to DIE!  however I was running on a trail where I had to dodge mud puddles so maybe I could shave a few seconds off if I stuck to the pavement.)  Also--for the record this is me running at 5500 feet, and I can't wait to try the same workout when I go to Phoenix and HOPEFULLY it is a whole lot easier.