Yesterday I got an email from the local running store/race organizer. A lot of it was advertising fluff that I didn't care about, but it also had upcoming races. There's a Jingle Bell 5K on Saturday December 1, at a community college not far from where I live. And there's a Reindeer Run 5K on Saturday December 15, close to where I pay to park by the month. After Thanksgiving's successful 10K and solo runs Saturday and Tuesday, I had visions of entering both of these.

This morning reality set in. While doing my light jogging up and down the hallway, the good news was that my sore thigh is enough better that I wouldn't even notice it if I weren't trying to evaluate its status. The bad news was that my bad foot was a bit worse than it was on Tuesday. I could probably run on it; but it's time to admit that running 3 times in 7 days has aggravated the foot, and it's best to give it a rest today.

I briefly considered doing run/walk intervals, before good sense took over and I admitted that I'd take the day off intervals if the foot felt this way. I thought about just deferring today's run till tomorrow. Then I thought back to a past blog where I wrote that it would be best to just skip a run and take a bit more rest, rather than messing up my Tuesday-Thursday-Saturday schedule. So I decided that tomorrow will also be a non-running day.

Like the quote says, discipline is remembering what you want. I want to be able to run 3 days a week. I want it bad enough to not do it now, so that I can get to where I can do it consistently. That's not the answer I want, but it's my reality right now.

So today my cardio was just walking. I may have walked more vigorously at lunch than I should, but it wasn't a terribly long walk. Tomorrow will be more of the same, plus errands on my Friday off.

The happy part of reality is, I have free weights in my basement. ON2VICTORY said some nice things about my setup, and that got me to appreciate it more than I had. After I quit the paid work and before dinner, I went downstairs and got a nice weight lifting session in. That helped me feel like I'm not a total slacker today.

Tomorrow will need to be a non-lifting day, or at least no heavy lifts. I also need to make tomorrow a non-running day. But because I have tomorrow off, I can be leisurely about my breakfast routine and be sure to get some kettlebell work in addition to the normal pullups and pushups. That, plus walking, will have to be good enough for tomorrow.

Saturday it will be time to evaluate whether the foot will let me run or I need yet another day off. I still *might* be able to do the Reindeer Run 5K; but I don't have to make that decision this week. If I don't do an organized race, it's OK. Being able to run regularly is more important to me than being able to run in an organized event, even if that event gives me decorative antlers to wear.

And that's my reality right now. I'm close to being back to running regularly, but not quite there yet. I'll get there; I just don't know precisely when I will.