Mother Nature hates over achievers

Last Thursday I left the frozen tundra of ND and headed to Albany, Georgia. It took me over 12 hours to get to Albany, but the painfully long trip was immediately forgotten as I stepped outside the airport into balmy sixty degree weather.

Once in Albany I met up with my friend Pat (my neighbor from China) and a friend of his. All three of us were planning to run either a half marathon (me) or a marathon (Pat and Bill).

We started our weekend off with a 4 mile run on Thursday night. Just enough to get the legs moving – or that’s what Pat said. I didn’t say much because although Pat and Bill were running slow for my benefit I quickly found out that their pace was still fast – at least compared to my normal 11:30min to 12:00min mile pace.

We woke to great weather on Saturday for the race. It was foggy and there was “Dixie dew” in the air. It kept the temperatures reasonable during the first three hours of the event. Just before the race started I wished Pat luck as he had his sights set on qualifying for Boston. I told Bill – who was acting as Pat’s pacer; a.k.a the rabbit Pat’d chase for 26.2 miles – to get my friend to the end.

Shortly after Bill and Pat crossed the start line I headed out for my 13.1 miles. It was a great run. The course was flat and very picturesque. My goals for the event were simple

1) Finish
2) Try to finish under 3 hrs

Well I accomplished both my goals. Absent walking through the water stops I ran the whole event and finished in 2:34:58. My time would have been better except I took Bill’s mandate to hydrate well on Friday a bit too far. The day only got better after I crossed the finish line as approximately an hour later Pat and Bill came across. Pat had made his qualifying time and will be running Boston in 2010.

On Sunday reality came crashing back in as I headed to the airport only to find that my flight had been cancelled; just my luck. I thankfully was able to drive up to Atlanta (Thanks Pat and Bill for letting me catch a ride) and depart from there. I arrive in Fargo 6 hours after I was originally scheduled.

I immediately walked into a huge pile of work at the office on Sunday. To say this week is stressful is an understatement. Unfortunately just as I thought things were getting under control Mother Nature threw us a curve ball. We were hit with a blizzard yesterday. Everything in the state shut-down -- Schools, work, freeways, etc….

I had to laugh over the situation as I went from getting sunburned this past weekend to strapping on my Ug boots in order to walk through waist high drifts of snow to get into my home.

Even this morning it appears that Mother Nature is still working against me. I headed into the office at 5:45am. You could say I’m an overachiever but reality is I have an important deadline that I am facing down at noon today.

I made it out of my apartment and across town with no issue. As I turned into the last road to our office I had to stop quick as there was a huge drift of snow. It was shoulder high and covered the entire width of the road.

I executed a u-turn and headed back to the main drag and Caribou Coffee. I am still here sipping a drink of coffee hoping that the road gets cleared soon. I plan to venture out at about 7:30am to check out the situation.