Day 1 of My Quest for a Smaller Chest AND Hot Marines!!

Gosh, CG, helps if you don't hit "Publish" immediately after writing the title of the post.  *facepalm*

I survived my second busiest deadline of the year and followed it up with four blissful days in Bend with great friends, great food, fabulous scenery and critters.  Lots and lots and lots of critters.  Ready?

First, there are two of my favorite dogs in the whole wide world, Kip and Lily.  I have known Kip for about ten years now, ever since he came into my friend S's world; I rode shotgun down to Medford to pick him up from his foster mom.  Kip not only is extremely smart with an amazing personality, he only has three legs -- all the better to get belly rubs with.  I like to tell people he lost his leg in a skydiving accident.   Lily is a total love sponge to those she knows, so we spent some quality snuggle time.

Then, there were kittehs!  Three to be exact, about six or seven weeks old.  They were the "J" litter -- my friends are fostering them -- so their preliminary names are Jolene, Justin and Jack.  Jack rapidly became Captain Jack or just Captain.  I decided pretty earlier on that Jolene and Justin were the kittehs for me. 

Jolene.  Can you stand the cute?

Jolene is a total diva and will be the boss. 

Justin.  Please ignore my huge tube neck.  It was an awkward position.

Justin is a big galoot and we think he'll be a fairly big cat with a laid back personality. 

It took three days and about two hours of romping the kittens to get these pictures.  I couldn't get any really decent shots of Captain.  He's black and white but with really cool stripey markings.  He is incredibly smart and I know I didn't want to do two intelligent beasties.  I really prefer my cats to be sweet but not overly bright.  Kind of like my dogs.  We have a strong suspicion that my friend's husband may want to keep Captain.  He'll have to make the call in about a week and a half. 

So.....  In other news, today officially begins Marine Corps Marathon training!  And did I get up and go run and not talk myself out of it because I was tired?  You bet your camoflauged ass I did!!  Is that how you spell camoflauge?  I'm too lazy to look it up.  Because I was up early to RUN.

You'll remember that I am doing this as part of Runner World's annual Runner World Challenge.  Which means that I spent a crapload of money but I also get coaching support from people like Bart Yasso plus a free RW training program.  I chose the marathon program for beginners, even though this will be my third.  I just don't have the base miles.  Even the "this will be my first marathon" program had more miles per week.  Which seemed counterintuitive but whatever.  

The program has me running four times a week; I haven't looked past the second week but it seems like it will be a lot like what I did for the past two marathons.   So overall I like the plan but don't like the days.  They have scheduled run days as being Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday for long runs.  Um, no thanks, I like to have one weekend day off.  I plan to do Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.  Hopefully Julie will want to do long runs with me again.  Seattle is just around the corner you know!!

How was your Fourth of July?

Cheers,
the CilleyGirl