Running... and Not Running

A number of things have been keeping me from blogging as regularly as I would like.  I also have a few products that I have not reviewed yet...  This is not like me, at all.

For some reason, even though the wedding is over, I find myself with less "down" time than I expected.  I have been working on some post-wedding projects such as name-changing, our album, and thank-you stuff... but honestly I had to (finally) finish watching the Game of Thrones box set that I borrowed from my friend too long ago.

Still a couple of episodes left.

Besides that, I think work has been somewhat of a hindrance, though I won't go into anymore detail at this moment.

In spite of rain that has finally arrived in Southern California, I've also been running more, sort of.  Due to my newfound unwillingness to wake up early in the morning, I've primarily been running during lunch time, both outdoors and on the treadmill (sometimes).  Last week, my mileage total was 19, which sounds measly but much better than before.  "The Ukrainian" signed up for the Surf City Marathon coming up in February, though I had already signed up to volunteer again and wasn't sure I wanted to run a marathon a month before LA Marathon.  This is also not like me, and it even solicited a "you're not running marathons anymore because you're married?" comment.  Ouch.

Truthfully, my racing schedule for 2013 (see the sidebar on the right) looks a lot more bare than I would like.  I guess after an action-packed 2012, my wallet is probably pretty happy about that, though.  I keep picking up Competitor magazine every time I hit up a Jamba Juice to look for upcoming races, but nothing really piques my interest because I've either done the event before or the timing/uniqueness of the event doesn't feel right.  So for now, I have a couple of shorter races that are basically "for fun" and LA Marathon -- and my tentative goal for that race is to perform similarly as this year.

I'm still running sans Garmin, though I will probably start wearing it for "long" runs that I've started attempting again.  I've really grown to like heart-rate monitoring, mostly because I don't feel pressured but still feel like I am "logging" something (minutes, calories burned, intensity, etc.).  Running has been a lot more do-able overall due to this lack of pressure and structured training schedule, though I am aware that I do need to hit specific "long run mileage" before March.  

Most of the time, though, I feel like I'm starting (nearly) from scratch.