Spring Running in New England: Determining the Date You Can Put Away Your Under Armour (HINT: Not Today!)

Spring in New England.  Met my friend on Friday morning for a run – it was 24 degrees out and we were too cold to take a selfie.  Went out on Saturday morning and it was 45 degrees.  And I saw this:

That is a stupid tulip leave coming up because we had some warm days.  I hate tulips.  I’ve spent more hours than I’d like to admit digging up the bulbs of the awful tulips but they keep coming back.  Spring in New England.

For our pre-training training, we are trying to run consistently, 4 days a week.  Maybe 30-45 minutes at a time.  But we always reserve our long runs for Sundays.  As Shalane Flanagan calls it, “The church of long-run Sundays.”  And I can always tell when my dear hubby Billy is thinking of blowing off a run.  After he gets up super early and goes downstairs to have coffee and catch up on shows I don’t watch, I stay in bed and catch up on shows he doesn’t watch (did you see Scandal this week????  Holy crap!!).  When he comes back upstairs and crawls into bed with me I know what he’s doing.  Here is a list of excuses he’s used to get out of Sunday runs:

• I’m sore
• I’m tired
• It looks cold out
• It’s raining (ok, this is really mine)
• Don’t you feel like going out to breakfast?
• It’s February (I had to remind him it was March)
• I think I need new ear buds, someone chewed mine (her name is Bertie)
• I didn’t sleep well
• We still have plenty of time to train
• I don’t have any clean socks (never true)
• I don’t have any clean tights (never true)
• I can’t find my gloves
• I don’t have a hat (never true)
• It’s sunny and I can’t find my shades
• I ran yesterday
• I got three days in
• My knee hurts
• My heel hurts
• My head hurts
• Etc., etc., etc.

But I didn’t let him blow it off this week.  We are pre-training for training!  So we both got in 4 runs during the week and some strength training.

And soon I’ll have to give up the wine.  But I don’t want to discuss that right now.

Thank you for all of your support! I hope you enjoy reading about our ridiculous antics.  Below are our donation links.  Since I have a bigger network than Billy, I would ask that if you are going to donate to see which of us needs the money more and donate there.  It’s all the same cause and will help us to keep our minimum.

Shannon:  https://www.crowdrise.com/the-degregorio-family-foundation-nyc-2017/fundraiser/shannondowney3

Billy:  https://www.crowdrise.com/the-degregorio-family-foundation-nyc-2017/fundraiser/billyhutchinson