How The Queen and I Are Alike. Really!

Yesterday after running with the Running Nazi and Ms. Harry Potter, a trip to McDonald's to get a chicken biscuit since I couldn't get back inside the house without setting the alarm off, taking a short nap, and then going to the gym to do weights, I was exhausted.  I decided to take my new People magazine and go out by the pool to thumb through it and relax.

It's amazing all the important information found inside this magazine.  I mean REALLY important stuff!  I couldn't do without it every month.

I got hooked on People magazines a few years ago when I would read them while I was working out at the YMCA during the winter.  The YMCA always had the latest copy and it was fun looking at the fashion and catching up on my favorite actors and actress.  It was also therapeutic to read about somebody else's drama and realize my life isn't as screwed up as theirs.

Eventually, I changed Y's and my new one didn't have People mags, so I got a subscription mailed to the house.

When The Murph started seeing them come in the mail, he totally didn't understand.  He was a little embarrassed to have them in the house.  I always had to hide them before company came over.

That was then.  This is now.

Now, after I've read them, they "mysteriously" end up in the bathroom among The Murph's stash of Downbeat, GQ, and Muscle Fitness mags.  (GQ! ha ha!!) Sorry, don't know why I think that's so funny.

The latest bathroom stash below...

He won't admit it, but he enjoys reading them too.  He even fills me in on articles I might have missed.

This latest People magazine was full of pictures of Jessica Simpson's new baby girl, Maxwell Drew (she's a cutie) and pictures of the Queen's diamond collection in honor of her Diamond Jubilee.  As I was looking at the pictures of Queen Elizabeth II and watching all the celebrating on television later, it occurred to me how alike we are, The Queen and I.

No, really, we are!

There are actually several reason's why I think the Queen and I are alike.  Some of these are....

1.  We are both animal lovers (she has dogs and races horses, I have cats and lost some money in a horse race once)

2. We both love diamonds (Although The Queen has more than I do and her diamonds are real.  I just pretend mine are)

3.  We were both born Princesses (The Queen was born into a royal family.  The Running Nazi once said that I have a "Princess" personality.  She's also called me a big baby.)

4.  We love to wear tiaras (only The Queen can wear her tiara in public without getting weird looks)

5.  We both wear hats

Hers

Mine

And...
 6.  We both have very loyal subjects

Hers

Another loyal subject.

Mine

See what I mean?  Very much alike!

There was also a picture of Jenny McCarthy with her clothes on promoting her new dating show.

Apparently, when she's not promoting giving bleach enemas to autistic children, she's in the Dominican Republic hosting "Love in the Wild."

Will Run For Beer- Mercedes Marathon Weekend

Yesterday was race day.  The Running Nazi and I ran in the Mercedes Half Marathon.  This is one of the biggest (if not the biggest) running event in Alabama.  It sort of started as the Freeze your half off run that was held this same time every year.  The Freeze your half off was my very first ever 1/2 marathon and also my fastest in under 1 hr 42 minutes.

In 2002, they did away with the Freeze your half off and created the Mercedes Marathon and 1/2 marathon.  That year I did the full Mercedes Marathon in an attempt to qualify for the Boston Marathon.  It was my first marathon and the most memorable.  I ran a 3 hrs 47 minute marathon missing the Boston qualifying time by 2 minutes.  I ran into my old running buddy D yesterday after the race.  We put in a lot of miles together training for those marathons and trying to qualify.  D ran the half yesterday and told me she was doing Boston again.  It was great seeing her and catching up.  I did eventually qualify for Boston that same year at the Huntsville Rocket City Marathon.

The Mercedes Marathon gets bigger every year.  This year both events filled up before the weekend expo even started.  For the first time ever, nobody could sign up at the expo.  There were thousands of people there Sunday morning in the 20 degree temps.  The Running Nazi and I bought a couple of disposable jackets at the expo for $8.  Yes, you can really buy disposable clothing here to pollute the environment.  We weren't being very green, but we did stay warm at the beginning of the race and disposed the jackets along the course after we warmed up.

I decorated mine the night before with some motivational quotes.  I think it  helped all the fellow runners that were passing me.  They were kicking my ass and feeling very inspired by the quotes on the jacket.  I'm positive.  Especially the one about Pain being temporary, but Internet results lasting forever.  That will make anyone run faster!  I have proof that this quote really inspired by all the super fast times all the runners posted.

Ken's vote on the funniest quote (because it was the lamest) was "Why are all these people following me?" Ms. Harry Potter liked that quote the best too.  She was there in her disposable jacket and I helped decorate it for her, of course.  I even remembered Mom on the front jacket sleeve.  I was suppose to wave to her when I saw the news cameras and I was going to raise my arm up so she could see where I had written "Hi Mom".   However,  I didn't see any news cameras and she didn't see me.  I was running too fast.

This was The Running Nazi and me when we got to the race start.  Don't worry, I brought my Sharpie pen so we could "decorate" the Nazi's jacket before the race started.  She wanted "Will Run For Beer" written across her back and a heart in honor of Valentine's Day.

We finished the race in under 1 hr 55 min and then headed inside to use the restrooms and warm up and hydrate before heading back out to run 7 more miles.  It was our last 20 miler before the marathon we are running in next month.  My calves are killing me!  So glad it's taper time and I have two 20 milers and a couple of 1/2 marathon races under my belt to help me prepare this time.

Conspiracy

Today I actually got up at 4:30 a.m to do a long run with the Running Nazi and another friend, who I will call "Ms. Harry Potter" or just Ms. Harry for short.  Ms Harry is actually a female, but she is obsessed with Harry Potter books, movies, etc so that's what The Running Nazi's hubby, Mr. Running Nazi calls her, so that's good enough for me.  I was rather proud of myself for this increasingly rare act of  training discipline.  Once upon a time, I was very anal about my training plan, but now I rarely have a training plan to get anal about.  These days that's the way I prefer it.

This morning there was a very large group of runners, who are training for a local marathon/1/2 marathon and today they were running the marathon course which is two 13.1 mile loops.  The group was meeting at 6:30 a.m. and some were doing the entire 13.1 mile loop (the marathoners) and some were doing an 8 mile loop (the half marathoners).  We decided to park about 3 miles away and run to where the group was starting, run the 13.1 mile loop with them, then run back the 3 miles to our car and then add another mile to run a total of 20 miles in all.  The Running Nazi and I are training for a later marathon than this one so we needed the 20 miler.   Their marathon is in two weeks so this group was tapering.

Initially, The Running Nazi and I were going to park where the training group was meeting and start with them to do the loop and then add on later.  Yesterday, I receive a text from the Nazi saying that there was a "large" group of runners doing 20 miles and they were meeting down the road at some mysterious church, the place changed twice before it was decided.  I had my suspicions.  Was this just another ploy of The Nazi to get me out a little further away from the group so if I changed my mind and got to my car I wouldn't be able to just quit at 13 miles and head home for coffee and a biscuit?  I would have to actually run the extra miles to the car at this church where the "large" group of 20 mile runners were supposedly meeting instead.  Also, this was 5:30 in the morning and it was still dark and we were meeting in an area that I feel isn't the safest.  It's kind of creepy when it's dark, but it's near Ms. Harry's apartment and I also think that she prefers to run from her apartment rather than drive somewhere.  Besides, she and the Nazi love running from there think the area is safe and that I'm just being a paranoid baby.

The Nazi already knows I don't care to run in this area of town alone, early in the morning, when it's still dark or with just the 3 of us women running alone, in the dark, at an ungodly hour.  Did I say it was dark?  I didn't like parking my car there and leaving it either.  Before I could even protest the place or the hour, The Nazi offered to pick me up and drive me to the meeting place and assured me that there was going to be a lot of people at this church to run with us.  I asked her how many people, who they were,  names, addresses, social security numbers (just joking on the last three).  She didn't know, but Ms. Harry assured her that there was going to be A LOT of people.

I reluctantly agreed, but had serious doubts about it all.

The Nazi picked me up and we headed to the church to meet the large 20 miler group near Ms. Harry's place.  We get there, it's pitch black, the place looks deserted, no runners at the church.  Surprise!  We park and see Ms. Harry running toward us.  She tells us to come on and we'll just keep running on by the church if we don't see anybody there.  NOBODY was there.  It was dark, it was creepy.   We had 3 miles to run, in the dark, all alone, to get to where the real large group of runners were beginning.  I'm looking around for thugs, crazy people, rabid dogs, who knows what could be out there in the dark around the corner to grab us.

It's barely 6 a.m and I am out of my cozy bed where I would've been snuggling next to Ken with little Cadence curled up next to me, purring and instead I am in the freezing cold, dark, scary streets running with a Running Nazi and Ms. Harry Potter, who I am starting to suspect to be two crazy nut cases.  These crazies were running and chit chatting like they were having the best time, catching up, girl talk and I'm looking around, thinking we were going to get mugged any minute, even though all I had on me was some chap stick and a couple GU.

When we finally got to the place where the REAL large group was starting, I was extremely happy.  I can't begin to tell you how happy I was.  Civilization!   I told The Running Nazi I was going to blog bad things about her.  Not to mention the fact that she kept trying to add more miles to our 20 miler.  I was keeping count of the mileage though.  If not we would've run 24 or 25 miles today.  She said she really, really, really didn't know that nobody would show up for the 20 miler.  That Ms. Harry had told her there was going to be people running with us.  A LOT of them.  I have my doubts.  Now I think The Nazi and Ms. Harry have a conspiracy going to get me up to run at ungodly hours just to scare the shit out of me.  I'm onto them now.