alternative medicine

a friend of mine who just finished acupuncture training was in town today. after telling her about my leg pain in casual conversation, she offered to stick my leg. i have never had acupuncture before and was totally curious about it, so i thought as long as it doesn't make my pain worse, why not?

the sticks didn't really hurt, actually, i could barely feel it, except the one that went into my foot. that one didn't hurt like flu shot or anything, but i could feel the "qi" flowing. righteous.

i'm curious to see if it helps at all. i just had to take pictures to share. isn't it kind of freaky looking?

taper and texting

so i am officially in my "taper" mode. and everyone says this is a hard time for marathon trainers, because of the reduced mileage they feel like they are not training enough, they gain weight, or they feel little pangs of injury.

i do not really have a problem with running less miles, and i'm ok with being a little fat, but i cannot deal with the pangs! i don't think this is totally psychosomatic, but i've been having this little pain in my lower leg, just above my ankle. i can feel it when i walk and i can feel it when i run. it doesn't hurt, but it doesn't feel normal and i'm worried if i run more then i may exacerbate the "injury." my worst fear is that it's a stress fracture, but how can i really tell? i don't want to be one of those runners who runs a marathon on an injury and then ruins her running career forever. that would just blow. plus, it would just make the marathon much less enjoyable. gawd, i really hope it feels better soon.

anyone have any advice?

switching gears slightly, technology is just so cool these days. it's not unusual to be able to check a runner's progress through the marathon online, but now you can have split times texted to you. so, all you aars who want to follow my progress can sign up to have instant text messages or emails sent to you with my splits. in the words of ever annoying rachel ray, how cool is that??

baby steps lead to baby runs

now that i'm no longer in ann arbor, it didn't feel right to post here unless i was doing something about the "road" part (the scholars part was done on june 29th :). and after a LONG hiatus, i am happy to say i have rejoined all you runners! true, i think that means p-funk only at this point but still!! i didn't want to over do it, so just ran an easy breezy 30 min jog on "america's most celebrated bike path" (which i also use for my 10 min bike ride to work). the run was great, mostly because i kept it real slow...no PB anytime soon for me.

yeah, so nothing too dramatic to report - the fact that i finally ran again is news enough! - but i hope the other AARS are getting the fall fever for running, too!