I was reading Doglady's blog about missing her puppies and I felt so bad. I thought it might cheer her up to see this pup:



That's Kimber, our adopted rescue pup. We got her in Oct. 2011. She was rescued at 5 weeks old, wandering around a neighboring town. She had had somebody bite off a tip of her right ear and she had a puncture wound in the top of her head.

She was such a pistol, we named her Kimber. :D

She's kind of a slow learner sometimes, which we chalk up to the head wound. It took her nearly 6 months to be completely house trained. She STILL loves to lick, which drives me bastsh-t insane, but she really is learning. She now knows I don't like it, and it helps her. Sometimes!

But she's such a sweet-natured thing, you can't stay mad at her long. Sometimes I know she's also smart at the same time. She ALWAYS knows when it's time for Hub to take her on her walk. She can sit and lie down, though "stay" is out of the question! She managed to eat a hole in my new Pottery Barn rug (bought before our former dog was hit by a car and I had no idea a puppy was going to be in the house again). But I forgave her and turned the rug around.

When the weather gets nice, I'm going to get her a better halter and take her on my runs. She'll need a bit of working up to it, but I know she can do it. She's full of energy.

We think she's a cross between a lab and a terrier, but she could definitely be mistaken for a Basenji.

So, in the meantime, I'm working on the running. Today it was 60 degrees!!! So I had to go to the bike trail and run outside, especially since it was my long run day. I had such a good run. Did my 3/1 walk run thing, to start. Kinda. The plan was 10 min. @ 4.5 (treadmill pace), move to 5 for 30 min., 4.5 for 10 again. Well, I ran 7 minutes straight first, since I felt good. I decided to walk a minute so I didn't get too tired at the end of the run.

Then the 5 kicked in for the 30 min. portion. Every step was killing my hip. Stab. Stab. Stab. Stab. i did 3 walk-one-minute breaks for 12 minutes when suddenly the hip pain stopped. I was also kicking bits of sticks off the path. I don't know if I, like, popped something or if it just finally warmed up, but I was feeling okay!

My breathing is great. No chest-busting out-of-breath gasps. So when the hip pain stopped, I was feeling pretty dang good. I was afraid it would start again if I stopped to walk, so I finished the last 15 minutes of the 5 segment running and just kept going for the last 4.5 speed 10-min. segment. That was 28 minutes of running in a row! I'm getting it back! Legs felt like logs, but that will fade.

So, that was fun. I really stretched well after that. Right this minute: NOTHING HURTS!! That's right, I'm 50 years old, ran 4+ miles and I don't hurt.

[applause pause] :D :D :D

I know I'll hurt again later. But for now, no back pain, no hip pain, no hamstring pain, no foot pain, no between-the-shoulders pain.

Life is sweet. :)