"...Running away from what you don't understand..."

This was my run for today. It took me 65 minutes to go just less than six miles, which is not that great of a time, but not too terrible either. I was slowed down a bit by trying to fix the Marathonator, which spontaneously expired (a fairly common problem, sadly, for Rio Forges) when I attempted to skip a song, as it had done yesterday when I attempted to adjust the volume . Yesterday I unhappily ran my last three (of four!) miles without musical accompaniment, but today, after having sought wisdom on the internets and fixing it yesterday, I was able to resuscitate it by putting the battery in backward and then correctly. Technology and its mysterious ways.

One of the nicest things about training in Minneapolis is that I have an incredible variety of routes from which to choose. I can run through a wide selection of parks or beautiful old neighborhoods, downtown, uptown, along the river, or, as I chose today, around lakes. There are miles and miles of bike and pedestrian trails, which means I also have the company of fellow crazy runners and bikers (even today, when it was 26 degrees!). Pretty much the only thing I don't have is trail stretching for miles through unending fields. And maybe a little bit of warmth.

Since I no longer have the fancy web-surfing plan on my new phone (since it's no longer free...), I can't provide photographic documentation of the brownies I just pulled from the oven. They are made from scratch, and now I am going to eat them. Runners need a lot of calories.