Don’t you just love it when you can relax on a Sunday night and feel healthy and happy and be able to look back on the past two days and think, “Man, this was really a great weekend, and I crammed in so much fun and productive stuff?” Yeah…me too. And I so needed this.
For starters, my Saturday morning running attempt went sooooo much better than I expected. Thanks for the prayers — they were certainly felt! I set out with rather low expectations and just wanted to see if my leg could sustain even a couple of miles…and ten miles later, I was still almost entirely pain-free and thrilled with that nice surprise. Still not positive I’ll make it 26.2 next Sunday, but hey — 10 miles on a beautiful Saturday morning without the insistent knife-like sensation in my calf is pretty darn near an Autumn miracle and certainly a reason to be thankful. Not gonna lie — I was getting pretty upset and totally stressing about my inability to run.
I ran in a different pair of sneakers (another pair of newer and more minimalist New Balances), so that seemed to make a difference, and I think the days off helped. It definitely boosted my mental state and cheered me up, knowing I wasn’t going to be an invalid forever and be stuck watching other people run while crying on a yoga mat (if I ever learn to use one). It’s crazy how easily we can psych ourselves out and blow a little setback up into a catastrophe.
This seemed to foreshadow the way in which the rest of the weekend would go, as it was a stellar one. I got out of the city yesterday and went apple picking with friends at Whightman’s Farms in Bernardsville, NJ.
apple happy
Anyone ever used those apple picker baskets with teeth before? This was my first time, and man, those things are deceivingly rough to use. I’m pretty sure I took down a couple of branches and sent apples showering down every time, not to mention almost got taken out by the kids who swung them around like farmer’s swords. Gotta watch out for the dangers of apple picking; it’s a wild world out there in the orchard.
Despite the fact that it was 80+ degrees and everyone was melting, it was a lovely, harvesty Fall day full of silliness and sunshine and the biggest pumpkins imaginable. Seriously, these things were mammoth.
They had pumpkins and gourds (what a weird word, right??) galore, in all ridiculous shapes and sizes. I had to snag one of the hilarious green Goose Gourds as a souvenir — these babies were way too good to pass up. He’s sitting tight on my kitchen counter right now and I am loving it. It’s probably the funniest looking thing I’ve ever seen.
One of the best parts was when I walked out of the farm stand with this guy, a woman stopped me and goes, “What exactly do you do with those? How do you cook them? They’re gorgeous.” I was like, “Errr…to be honest, I have no idea if you even do cook them. I just thought it was so ridiculous I had to get it.” Cook it? I was thinking more along the lines of “Rub it until a genie pops out and ships me off to spend the rest of my days independently wealthy on a beach in California.” Nobody’s doing any cooking here.
Then today was full of one nice event in NYC after another: a good workout at an essentially dead gym this morning,
a lively, inspiring Hillsong service at the lovely Hammerstein Ballroom for a change,
followed by Mexican food and football with wonderful friends in Chelsea.
Kinda makes Sunday night that much more bearable, when your weekend has been so terrific. Hope you all had lovely days as well!
runthisapple.wordpress.com 
Sometimes when you totally expect the running pain to be too much, the sky clears! awesome
Sounds like an absolutely terrific weekend 🙂 And SO glad your run went so well!! I’ll be waiting to hear if/WHEN the marathon happens! 😉