Mother's Day Run

Didja notice? I tied in Sunday's long run with Mother's Day, to create the impression that it had something to do with Mother's Day. Like honoring my mother, or something.

Here's the primary connection—I had to get my run in early enough in the day to allow to get home and shower and dressed in time to go out for a 4:00 Mother's Day dinner. So no lolling in bed till noon then taking a leisurely afternoon run, followed by the rest of the afternoon lolling in bed (again) to "recover."

And I wanted to do a longish run, at least 10 miles, so that meant starting out sometime in the morning.

Actually, I came up with a good plan that allowed me to lounge in bed a bit, have a nice long run, finish at Starbucks, and meet my parents to go pick out new glasses for my dad (in hopes of getting him into some mildly fashionable frames instead of his usual goggle-eyed geek frames). On Friday (during, ahem, work) I sketched out a couple of possible routes on MapMyRun. On Saturday I decided on the variation that would take me around Everett and into Marysville, ending up at the 88th Street Starbucks with a total of about 11 miles. Not too short, not too long (one version had me at 13 miles but I didn't want to go that far this weekend).

So on Sunday morning I woke up at about 6:30 (that's sleeping in?) and made myself a good breakfast which I took back to bed. (Here's where the lounging comes in.) I watched the Food Network for a while, thinking I would get up around 9:00 and leave at 9:30. But Boy Meets Grill was on at 9! (I love Bobby Flay.) So I watched that and then got up.

I ended up leaving around 10:00. Still enough time for an easy run (with bathroom stops) and a destination time of noon.

The weather Sunday morning was misty, threatening rain (and in fact did rain lightly for a bit), so I wore the new Nike water resistant jacket I'd bought at the Bloomsday expo. I'm a little paranoid about water resistant fabrics—what's the point of keeping off the outside water if you're sweating inside the jacket—but this one had breathable panels and it worked pretty well, I think. I never got a downpour and I didn't get real hot, so I didn't fully test it either way.

I headed out west toward Grand, then over to 25th to cross the pedestrian overpass onto Marine View Drive. Then I just headed north on MVD, taking the Marina Village loop past Anthony's and so forth. Marina Village also has a number of good public restrooms, and I took advantage of one of them before leaving the area. Then I just continued on MVD northward.

I wasn't sure about following the on ramp onto the old highway (also know as Highway 529), so I cut up to Broadway and dashed across it to get onto 529 that way. The first section of the highway is bridges, and I like running across them because there are separate pedestrian walkways. But once you're off the bridges it's just shoulder almost all the way into Marysville.

It's just a couple of miles, but I call that stretch of highway the wasteland. (I have now spent several minutes scanning over T.S. Eliot's poem The Wasteland, hoping to find an appropriate phrase to throw out, but alas—it is too deep to yield a casual running metaphor.) It's just a long flat ribbon of highway, luckily with a wide shoulder, and I have never felt so slow as I did plodding along at about 6 mph (if I'm lucky) with cars zooming by me at 60.

When I finally got into Marysville, my attitude improved immensely, as I returned to civilized streets and blocks and sidewalks. Distance passes so much more happily when it's divided into blocks.

Instead of running directly northward on State Street, I extended my distance a little bit by turning eastward on 4th Street, then following 47th and eventually Armar Road to where Armar meets Grove. Then I returned to State Street for the final couple of miles to Starbucks. As I crossed State and headed west on 88th for the final piece, I picked up the pace a little bit—I like to finish well!

Then it was time for a latte and coffee cake at Starbucks while I waited for my ride. Eleven miles for the runner's journal—not a bad Sunday morning.