I guess this means I'm a runner

I was able to get in to see my knee doctor last week ($1 million tip: If you find yourself talking to a mean receptionist who won't let you talk to the doc to find out if your situation even warrants an appointment -- especially when she keeps telling you they can't work you in until September -- ask for the nurses' line. That line is a godsend!). After my bouts of pain at the end of our training run that Saturday, I had had a bit of swelling and plenty of worrying about what it meant for the future of my marathon training.

The doctor took a look at things and told me that, given my history of injury, there will just be times my knee hurts. There will just be times my knee swells. And in those cases of pain, I'm supposed to stop running. I told the doctor I could do that.

I was able to ask him some questions I'd had for a while now. Like whether or not the increased cracking of my left knee on stairs is something to worry about. (No.) Or whether I might be wearing my braces wrong. (No.) And is he sure I'm not insane for running a marathon with my history of knee problems? (No. Just kidding.) The doctor told me he has lots of patients who are runners, and they're all going to run no matter what. (OK, then.) He told me to come back after my marathon and tell him how it went.

He said I'd done well by taking it easy and icing my knee. I had waited until Wednesday morning to test out a 3-mile run. I started slow and easy. I even told K not to worry about slowing his own pace to stay with me. He reluctantly ran ahead. And by our halfway point, I had totally caught up with him.

Friday, we went for a quick 2-mile run, just to loosen ourselves up for Saturday's long run. It went well.

Saturday, we ran 12 miles. We were in PA, which is definitely hillier than VA. We'd been going along for a few miles before the tinges of pain started ... but we hadn't gone as far as I'd liked. I ran through them, just to see what would happen. They only lasted for a few steps. Sometimes even just two steps. But they would come and go, and I would wince while they were there, and give quick sighs of relief when they were (temporarily) gone.

The bouts increased along with our distance. Just before we reached 12 miles, there was a pain that made me cry out, but not loudly. It wasn't the first time that I'd done that (and it was primarily out of worry), but we were close to the trail that led to our car. The next step on my left knee resulted in a similar sound.

"Stop," K said to me.

I tried to argue with him. "No, I'm fine. We're almost done --"

"Fucking stop!" he handed me the keys, and, defeated, I hobbled back to the car.

Late Saturday night and several times throughout the day yesterday, I iced my knee. I took Motrin once yesterday and today, to help with the swelling and ease the (still minor) discomfort.

All these years, I had thought my right knee was the problem (see the surgery scars?)!

As you can see, my left knee is still pretty big. And I'm hobbling still -- particularly on stairs (which I deal with at home and at work). But I clutch the wall with one hand and the rail in the other, and I deal with it.

So far it's all like last week, which makes me think it'll gradually fade like last week. Which means I'll be in great shape (all right, OK shape) for my half-marathon this weekend. One of K's best friends is a doctor, and he suggested I take Motrin before the run. Done. I'll just take it easy until then, own the run, and take it easy after.

So I guess I lied to my doctor, but it was an accident. I mean, if my knee is going to swell and hurt from time to time regardless, why not just keep running? 

At least my doctor was right about something: Those patients of his who are runners are going to run no matter what.

(Sorry, Doc.)

Whoops!

So I just scrolled through this little blog, and I realized that 4 of my last 6 posts were talking about our crazy lives, how we need to slow down, and how I need sleep.

I think you get it.

So you know what you also get now? Pictures. Not because I loaded them, but because I stole them off of Facebook from less-tired people -- or those who are cool enough to suck it up, load the pictures, and sleep tomorrow.

Meeting ER's adorable (and tiny!) baby! I've seriously never been so excited to meet a baby before.

K, who (praise the Lord!) is a natural with kids. ER's baby is an absolute angel, though, and hardly ever cries! Also, this picture is awesome because it shows exactly what was going on in the rare moments that I wasn't holding the baby. :)

It's our standard pose! And we continued our tie tradition as well. K and me at Rachel's reception.

Happy times after kickball! In case you haven't noticed, when my weight fluctuates the tiniest bit (I'm talking like 3 lbs. here, people), the first first first place you see it is my face. Always. This picture made me realize that when my mom visits in a couple weeks, she's totally going to tell me I'm too skinny.

And yes, you read that right. Mom. Here. Two weeks.

Maybe we'll sleep at 28 and 33

Have I told you guys how tired I am? Seriously, ridiculously tired. I wondered a time or two if I should go to the doctor about it, but I did research, and I guess this just happens. I'm 27 now (FYI, I'm not one of those people who intends to ever whine about my age. 27 is young. 37 is young. It's just not the same level of young as 17, even if my schedule seems to show that I think it is.). I guess I can't just run around like crazy and not pay for it all day every day.

Of course, it doesn't hurt that we had our kickball game last night. We went to the bar after, and we left close to 11 p.m. I went to sleep at 12:15, and my alarm started going off at 5:30 because K and I were supposed to run 6 miles for our training. (That totally didn't happen.) I hit the snooze for a good 30 minutes, until I shut off the alarm and let myself go back to sleep. It was heaven.

And it was probably better that way. Today is K's birthday, and we're driving up to PA tonight for the weekend. We've got a couple fun plans in store that I'm excited about.

But first, back to that kickball game. I actually got on base both times I kicked. And -- AND!!! -- I caught someone's kick for the final out of the game. I told K that I'm feeling better about my Kickball Skillz this season. Instead of Sucking, I'm totally Mediocre now, and I plan on continuing to improve throughout the season. Maybe by early November, I'll actually be Not Bad!

K and I can't quit gushing about how grateful we are for having found kickball. When I met the girl from Meetup.com, who introduced K and I to a couple of her friends who were on this kickball team, they told us about it several times, trying to get us to join. I can only imagine the looks K and I gave them: "Kickball? Seriously? Riiiight."

But joining that team was the best thing we've done here! That one move has brought us 20 close friends and fellow teammates, and we've made friends on other teams as well. Everyone on our team is so nice, and we've marveled several times how little we actually know about mundane topics like what we do for a living. It's crazy when someone brings up a funny work story, and you find yourself saying, "I didn't know that's what you do!" when you've spent countless hours hanging out with the person at bars, the swimming pool, the movies, and sometimes even each other's houses. It's pretty awesome.

In other news, I've taken a ridiculous amount of pictures lately. Pictures from Rachel's wedding (that was two weekends ago), from when I met ER's baby (!!!), from various concerts, and from our kickball party last weekend. I haven't even uploaded most of them to my computer yet because -- you guessed it -- I'm so dang tired. And busy.

I keep thinking that K and I need to slow down or something, but this is pretty much what this time in our lives is for, right?

We never slow down

Last weekend was our last one without visitors or travels for at least a month. So what did K and I do? We packed it full of activities and decided to host our entire kickball team. That's how we roll!

Friday night, we headed to Busch Gardens, where I somehow just realized I have a healthy fear of heights (how the hell did I ever go sky diving?!). Saturday morning, we slept until 8 (whoops!) and got a late start on our 7-mile training run. Toward the end of the run, we were cruising along at an 8-min-mile pace. I wanted to pick it up even faster, but I wasn't sure how much farther we had to go, and I didn't want to burn all my energy and have to suck it up the last little leg. Suddenly, a sharp pain went shooting through my left knee cap. I told K I needed to stop. We had just hit mile 7.

We walked for a bit. I loosened my knee brace and slid it off my knee to give it a break. After a mile or so, K asked if I felt up to running the last mile to the car. Since my knee had been the only thing that stopped me, I thought maybe the walk would've ironed out some of the kinks. I pulled my brace back up, tightened it, and stepped forward with my right foot. As soon as I put weight on my left knee, I winced and stopped. The pain was still there. Yikes. Needless to say, we walked that last mile too (I'm on strict orders to not run through knee pain).

When we got home, I cleaned the house while K mowed the yard. As soon as we finished, we headed to the beach. I made a regular genius move and skipped the sunscreen, since I thought we wouldn't be out long. I had put sunscreen on my face before we left the house, so my face is fine, but my back and chest are a bit red. I'm kind of itchy today, so my back might start peeling soon. Yuck. Pretty sure I've learned my lesson.

After the beach, we had just enough time to get home and get showered before our kickball friends started coming over. We had a nice joint birthday party for me, K (his birthday is this Thursday), and another friend. It was a great party. The last guests left around 1:30 a.m.

We slept in until 11:30 yesterday morning. I could've slept longer, especially since I managed to nap a couple times on the couch. In the afternoon, we went to see Piranha 3D. I don't need to see it again, but it wasn't bad. Pretty silly. Definitely good for some laughs.

K and I ran some errands and grilled steak for dinner. We somehow managed to get ourselves to bed just before midnight when I'd wanted it to be an early night.

Now I'm supposedly back to the grind -- not that I can concentrate. My back is itching from time to time, and I'm still ridiculously tired. This hectic life of ours is hard enough without throwing marathon training in there!

Oh well ... You only live once, right?

Symptoms

• I'm tired. A lot.
• I'm hungrier than usual.
• I'm thirstier than usual.
• I have to pee all the time.
• Some mornings, my stomach is upset.
• Slight weight gain.
• Periods of increased breakouts.
• Regular thoughts about the pain and torture I'll be putting my body through in a matter of weeks.

Marathon training. Kind of sounds like something else, doesn't it?

27

Today's my 27th birthday, and so far, it's been a pretty good day.

Instead of getting up to run 3 miles for our marathon training, K left the decision up to me before immediately cuddling up next to me. I'm pretty sure he was just looking to get out of the run without being the one to take the blame. I was happy to oblige.

I woke up feeling nice and rested, and I was in a great mood. K slipped a small box by me while I was getting ready this morning. I was immediately in love with what was inside.

I had already decided to wear a new shirt I'd been wanting to wear for a while now. I really wanted to wear the necklace, but it wasn't the best fit for the ruffly shirt. In fact, with the ruffles and the shiny chain, it almost looked Guido-ish.

Should I change shirts? But I wanted to wear this one. It's the perfect birthday shirt--bright and fun and cute, all at the same time.

But I didn't want to wait to wear the necklace either.

My solution: It's my birthday. I'm wearing them both! And there's not a damn thing anybody can say about it.

I wanted a cookie!

Our department head resigned a couple weeks ago. His last day was Friday, but he planned to come in for lunch with all of us at some point.

I mentioned to a coworker that I was thinking of making cookies for that day. She told our former boss ... which meant I definitely had to make the cookies.

The lunch was scheduled for today, so last night, I baked. I packed enough cookies this morning for everyone in the office to have two. I planned on setting them out when our former boss came by the office.

Only he met us at the restaurant instead. So I had to give him the cookies there.

All day I'd looked forward to enjoying a cookie or two this afternoon. Instead, they're now on the way home with my former boss.

Dislike.

The craziness continues ...

Geez, I said I was going to come back to this thing, but I'm determined to make a liar out of myself, I guess. K and I are in our fifth week of marathon training, and I'm shocked how much time it takes up already. Not the running, necessarily, but the extra water drinking and snacking (burning those extra calories takes a toll quickly!) ... the extra peeing ... the extra sleeping ...

We typically run in the morning, and we still try to go to the gym and lift at night. If we miss the gym, it's because we're going to a concert or hanging out with friends -- or packing to go somewhere and see somebody.

We really never stop, I swear!

We actually had a power outage last Friday morning, and we were all able to go home early. Because of that, I was finally able to take care of the house work I'd been neglecting due to all that resting.

And it looks like there's no resting this week. We have the gym tonight, a movie with friends tomorrow, packing on Wednesday, a concert on Thursday, and early Friday we're heading to OK & TX for another wedding. The one where I'm maid of honor. The one where I have to give a speech about my friend marrying a guy I don't like.

I still need to write that thing.

Geez, does it ever stop?