We're going to be so popular!

So yeah.

This whole trying to graduate thing kinda puts a damper on blogging.

But I'm alive.

I am still lumbering through 3-4 mile runs.

Getting ready for the Wild West Relay. We still need three runners or so, so if anyone in the blogosphere wants to run with us, let me know!

My defense has been set for 8/20, but there is a chance it won't happen that day due to field work. Unfortunately, this cold spell we've been having means that my lake is not staying stratified. No stratification = no internal waves = no research.

In other news, last night I watched Twister for the first time in a very long time, at least since I started grad school.

As someone whose research now requires her to mobilize a team quickly in response to weather, I found a whole new appreciation for the movie.

But my favorite line was at the end when they finally get their instrument to be sucked up into the tornado so that they can get the measurements they are trying to get. Everything comes together and they start getting one-of-a-kind data back from the sensors and it is making pretty plots on their computer and everyone is cheering and one of the nerdy grad students/lab techs exclaims:

"We're going to be so popular!"

So needless to say, the other grad students and I plan on exclaiming "We're going to be so popular!" every time we successfully collect data.

I suck at blogging

So, as you might have guessed, things are a little crazy around here.

I got back from San Francisco a week and a half ago, suffered from crazy jet lag/sleeping schedule readjustment (hello 4am!) and then spent all last weekend madly trying to write a conference abstract so that I can go gallivanting around Germany spend three days trapped on an island in the Baltic with a whole bunch of scientists in September.

(Note to LtK, take the job in Berlin! I have been to Paris way too many times (okay, twice). I know this is a tough problem to have, but all my friends keep moving to Paris and really I'd like to go other places in Europe before I return there).

I had to pull an all-nighter since I didn't get my hook for the abstract until 2:30pm. Which happened to be a half hour before I had to leave to go see these boys in MSP (and left a little bit sad I wasn't moving to NZ):

(This particular link is for Lisa)

Flight of the Conchords Ep 8 'Foux Da Fa Fa'
by Just1Kiet

So part of the reason I love science is that I actually do get excited about it. So I spent the drive up to MSP silently laying out my abstract while my friends chatted. We got back like at 2am and I got to work and busted it out. Stupid Germans and their being 7 time zones ahead meant that mofo had to be in by 10am.

So after that fun, I got ready to move to my new summer home at the lake.

We went up on Tuesday, are back for the weekend, but go up through June starting Monday.

Seriously people, I have the sweetest lakeside house EVAR. We have a spare bed. Come visit. Without meaning to be, I am up every morning as the sun is rising over the lake. This is going to be the dissertation writing retreat.

I'm living with the two other grad students, two 23 year old boys. After living with 23 boys for a month, this should be cake. We are currently in the disclosure phase of living with new people:

Me to J: You might as well just let me organize the kitchen instead of trying to be helpful, since I will reorganize anything you do because I am OCD like that.

M to me: I might as well tell you now. I swallow my toothpaste.

I only know this because we are both toothbrushing wanderers who stroll around the house while brushing our teeth, so yeah, I would notice.

Anyway...

Running.

I am trying to get back into the swing of things.

I am not signed up for anything so I have all the time in the world (well, except the Wild West Relay, but I'm captain so I get to pick which legs I run).

Taking six weeks off hurts.

The "Danielle doesn't have a spontaneous bone in her body so she either needs a training plan or a mathematical way to decide how far to run" plan goes as follows (it worked for National!):

During the week, I run short. The short runs are a distance a half mile farther than what I can run at a sub ten minute pace. I can do 1.5 miles now at that pace, so next week they will be 2 mile runs.

On the weekend, I run "long." This distance is twice the distance I can run at a sub ten minute pace. So, for the math incompetents out there, this means I ran three miles today. I do my long runs using heart rate and keep it in Zone 2 (146-156 for me).

I'm not going to lie. This week hurt. I got in four runs (for a total of 7 miles - ha!). My first run was the most painful mile ever. My lungs were searing, my legs hurt. It was not pretty. I PRed at a HM six weeks ago! What is this! At the lake, running will be easy, but boring. Given the location, there are two directions to go - north or south. One side of the road are fields. On the other is the lake (but hidden from site). There are no turns really. And it is exposed so my runs are going to have to be early morning.

Anyway, I might as well track my progress here, at least for my long runs:

Today: 3 miles (10:59 min/mile @ 154 avg HR)
Week: 7 miles

Running song of the day: Islands in the Stream (Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers. Rock on!)

She emerges from the sea, windburned and pudgier than before...

It seems like I can't leave anything to Joe.

Can he post once in the month I was gone?

Nooo. He is too involved with "healing" and shit.

Whatever man.

Anyway, I'm on land! Of course, this morning I swear my luxury king sized bed was moving up and down. In fact I am pretty sure I might be swaying still. No, I KNOW I am still swaying. The big question is whether or not I am swaying so obviously that people think I am crazy.

So now we summarize the month in bullet points:

1. The herp is gone! And I am pretty sure I didn't infect anyone.


2. Being the only girl was actually barely noticeable. And I am pretty amazed that the bathrooms stayed as clean as they did. Because seriously, moving target!


3. And unlike when I spent all day working with only men in my two jobs before grad school, I didn't have to spend the day being hit on and/or listening to stories about visits to the strip club.


4. Unfortunately, I did not get my own room but instead shared with the other postdoc (who may or may not have been a boy with a cute accent). But we were on opposite 12 hour watches, so we actually barely saw each other.


5. We saw (in no particular order): orcas, humpbacks, gray whales, seals, sea lions, sea otters, and dolphins. Orcas kinda are the assholes of the ocean world though (as we all know from watching the Planet Earth series on PBS). About a mile away from us a pod took down a baby gray whale while its mom stood by helpless. And apparently they just eat the tongue.


6. My favorite part was running one of the instruments off the back of the boat because half the time seals or sea lions would hang out flipping around and just generally being cute. To all the jaded west coasters they were like "Argh! They'll bite the line!" To me, I just think "Aw, cutest menace to science EVAR!"


7. My least favorite part was running one of the instruments off the back of the boat because half the time it was at night and the swell was huge and I swore there would be a headline "Iowa girl falls overboard chasing science."


8. There was bacon EVERY SINGLE DAY. I'm only human. Oh and homemade desserts. And candy bars. My willpower was not sufficient.


9. Except for fried food - I skipped many a lunch because I couldn't even go near the galley. It would be useful if this disgust of fried food would stay on now that I am on land, but I am pretty sure that won't happen.


10. There was no exercise the entire time. The boat was too small for running.


11. On the plus side, it probably means my calf has atrophied healed!

Okay, now I have three months to run my way back into shape for the Wild West Relay!

Dear DC, I owe you an aplogy.

Dear DC,

I know last time we spoke, I may have maligned you and suggested that I might have possibly gotten the herp from having to drink water from the same jugs as 8000 other runners, without cups.

But apparently, *I* am the one who brought the herp to DC.

Yes sir.

I have am having a bout of herpes zoster.

Or as known to most of the world: Shingles.

I was just getting the beginnings of an itchy spot on my back right before I went to DC.

The good news is that Shingles isn't contagious, so you don't have to worry too much.

Unless you haven't had chicken pox yet, in which case, I am sorry.

I'm blaming the Scottish dude since stress can wake up one's dormant chicken pox virus.

On the plus side, since it has now been confirmed that I will be the only girl on this boat, there will be no pregnant women around for me to infect in especially bad ways.

Anyway DC, I'm sorry for implying that you might possibly be a dirty ho, when really that ho is me.

From Iowa with love (and herpes),
Danielle

Sugar Induced Coma

So I have pretty much zero time, since I go to sea on THURSDAY, but I thought a race report was in order. At least before I pass out because of the sugar coursing through my system...

It was Donut Run Day!

I ran a 41 minute 5k and ate 8 Krispy Kremes.

My donut time deductions were nowhere near the time I lost eating donuts.

And once you commit to 8 donuts (one at each stop - my goal for my final time doing this race), speedy thoughts go out the window (well for me at least - Steve in a Speedo is the very obvious exception to this rule). You find yourself in a certain cohort of others that have similar plans so are at the donut stops at the same time as you and you end up chatting while eating your doughnuts.

It's really like a leisurely run where you feel like you might throw up with every donut you eat and you ask yourself "why am I doing this again?" and then you remember "oh yeah, because it's awesome!"

Seriously, I don't need another Krispy Kreme for a loooong time.

And, even more importantly, I finally have my set of 4 Donut Run pint glasses, which was the real motivation for signing up again this year...

This is short, but mostly because I really think I might crash from this sugar infusion. I'm barely holding on here!!!

It was like making out with every runner in DC.

I think Joe's sister summarized it perfectly (to paraphrase):

"So you PRed, but you also got the herp. It all about balances out."

Now that I have teased you into reading a long rambling race report, I probably should start.

Friday, we had a little bloggy runner meetup and it was good times people. Since I am a lazy linker, I will link to Audrey, who posted a photo and linked to all the bloggers in it. It was fun to meet everyone in person, even if I have been a blogging slacker in the last month and don't really deserve the title of "blogger."

So like Jeanne, I made Ray tell me how I should run this race and then kind of ignored it. What I didn't ignore, was the advice to lay off the Adams Morgan hill. Anyway, who ignores advice that says "Go ahead, be lazy."

Definitely not this girl.

Joe was kind enough to drop me off at the start around 6:20ish. After hitting the portapottie line, begging the med tent for some motrin, which I had forgotten to take, I found my corral and bumped into Jeanne.

And then we were off! I tried to ease into things and lay off a little on the first mile and ended up with a 10:30, which was NOT in the plan. So then with the help of a downhill I ran mile 2 in like 9:40 to even it out. Then I managed to settle into a pretty regular pace through mile 6, coming through there at 61 minutes. Then the big hill began and I laid off, yielding me a nice 11 minute mile for mile 7.

So at this point, I kinda thought my chances of PRing were slim. I'd have to run 10 minute miles for the last six miles to get in under previous PR. And that seemed highly unlikely given my fitness theses days.

But you know what? Apparently that first half really was quite uphill even if it didn't feel that way too badly. Miles 8-11 I was easily cruising at like 9:45 pace. There was another uphill getting to Mile 12, but it was mostly downhill to the finish after that. Those downhills mentally saved me, since I knew I could handle running downhill for a mile at the end.

I hit Mile 12 at 2:02 and I realized I just needed to pull out an 11 min pace for the rest to PR, which seemed totally doable given the downhill (although I was fading fast). At that moment a little Beyonce came on the ipod and I got my groove on and finished this baby up in 2:12:58, about a minute PR. Looking at the race results, I averaged 10:14 through the first 10k and then 10:09 overall.

I finished at almost the same exact time as the marathon winner. For the life of me I couldn't figure out why there were police motorcycles blocking my way as I tried to get down the finisher's chute. Didn't they know I had a PR to get?!!!

And so now you may ask, where on earth do diseases come into this?

So I loved the course, but srsly National, get some effing cups. I got water at Mile 3 and took two clif blocks. I was going to take a swig of gatorade at Mile 5 but there were no cups so I just decided to hold out until Mile 7. I got to Mile 7 and there were no cups there either.

Ruh-roh.

So I followed suit with every other runner and chugged water straight out of gallon water bottles they had out. There was a concerted effort to not touch the bottle at all with one's mouth, but we are talking 8000 runners. Someone at some point hit the bottle.

Mile 9, still no cups.

Mile 11, STILL no cups.

Seriously, you would think that after they ran out of cups, someone would have gotten their ass to ANYWHERE that sells cups and bought a boatload and gotten them to the aid stations. Fortunately the weather was cool so there wasn't as much of a need for water, but I personally needed it to get my nutrition down.

So yeah, I was swigging left and right. If I end up with some weird ass disease, I'm totally sending my bill to the race director.

Quote of the day

The best things in life are beyond money; their price is agony and sweat and devotion.
- Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers

5 Week Follow-up with Doc

Had my latest post-op with my doc on Friday. Overall, he is pretty pleased with my progress. I still have a little swelling, which he wants me to work on, and I can't quite straighten my leg all the way out (probably about 5 degrees short of straight), which he also wants me to specifically focus on.

Other than that, he told me to lose the knee brace, and wean off the crutches. It's going to take a few days to get my normal gait back, and it'll take probably a week or two before I have the strength to get through a whole normal day, so I'll probably not be back at work in the office for a few weeks yet, but I'm making progress.

I'll probably be in physical therapy for a few more months, but now that I can really start to bend and put weight on the leg, things will step up and really begin to move forward.

Swimming update

Just wanted to post a quick note (since apparently I don't have much else to do these days, as I've been laying on my couch for the last 5 weeks). I went swimming the other night again (second post-surgery swim). You might remember from my post last week about my first swim, I had a frustrating time. This time, though, It was so much better. I swam 200m warming up, then managed to do 500m. My leg didn't hurt, and I was able to actually stabilize it in the water so it wasn't flopping around like a dead fish. I felt fine in the pool, though when I got done and got out, I was completely spent. It actually took all my energy to make it back up to my sister's apartment. I kept tripping on the crutches, and almost fell a couple of times because I had no energy (I must have looked drunk). But anyway, the swimming felt good, so I am happy. I'll be happier when I can drive myself over to the pool again, so I can swim whenever I want, rather than being a burden on Sherri, but happiness from being able to swim without any real pain. :)

Crunch Time

So Danielle in Iowa needs descend deep down into a writing cave before she leaves in April to go to sea for a month. I haven't logged into google reader IN A WEEK so I haven't been around the internet leaving lovely pearls in the comments section of other blogs. I hope you'll all be able to bear my absence for the next couple of weeks.

A paper came out THIS MORNING that scoops a few elements of my dissertation (and several elements I of the paper I have been working my ass off to submit in the next couple of weeks). Since the paper is in a "rapid announcement" journal, the idea hasn't been fleshed out yet completely (it is essentially a 4 pager saying "we did this!") but it probably means a longer paper is in the works which means my paper needs to be out ASAP so alas I must go away for a bit.

Because I still procrastinate, so you can find me rambling on Twitter still.

So in running news, I did my last long run before National last night. It was only 10 miles, but it was a good run. It was a gorgeous 40-50 degree evening with a bright moon and I felt great the entire time. I did it at 10:14 pace in HR Zone 2, which is faster than any of my other long runs to date this season and is also PR pace for the half-mary distance, although I am not sure I could hold on for another 5k. What a difference actually taking gus does! I didn't bonk at all.

So yeah, training for National hasn't been ideal, but I have been trying to work on consistency and not ramping up miles too fast, which I was pretty successful at. I was getting in at least 20 miles a week, usually consisting of two 6-8 mile runs and 2-3 hard 3-4 mile runs.

Unfortunately, this did not work. My stupid injury prone self is having calf issues again. This feels almost exactly the same as the injury that sidelined me for Chicago 2005. It's on the base of my calf on the inside and calf stretches don't get at it. It can be sore all day and hurt right a lot when I start running, but once it is warmed up it is fine (last night it didn't bother me after the first mile).

So I am trying to figure out the game plan for the next two weeks. How often and far do I run so I don't irritate the calf yet don't lose fitness?

Anyway, sorry for the most boring post ever. My motivation to amuse others has been completely sucked away. I'll be back for sure, but I gotta take care of business so that I can force you all to call me Dr. Danielle in Iowa.

In the meantime:

1. Hey if you are running National, I think we are having a bloggy carb loading dinner the night before!

2. Hey, if you like doughnuts, come run the Doughnut Run!

3. Hey, if you like crazy races, come join our team for the Wild West Relay! Seriously, we only have 5 runners now so we need you! At least if you live below 2000 ft.