A few months back, my running Thunder Buddy, Amy, had convinced me to do what's called "The Triple Crown Challenge."  Essentially, you run two half marathons in Kentucky and a third half marathon of your choice and BOOM!  Bonus medal.  It didn't seem like a big deal at the time, but as the deadline to pick that third half got closer and closer, I was struggling to decide what my mysterious third half would be.

A friend on facebook posted about her planned trip up to Nashville, Indiana to run the Dances With Dirt 50k and once I realized they had a half, I was in.  And, I managed to convince fellow trail runner and coworker Lauren along for the ride!  Plus, the promotional video made it seem so enticing...

I've told the story before on this blog about my many failed attempts to follow a training plan.  I've rationalized it as a stubborn streak, a need for independence, or that following a set plan would ruin my very basic love of running for the sake of running.

Well, I finally figured out how to get me to follow a training plan:

Make someone I run with follow one.

And this is the story of how my friend Jen tricked me in to doing speed work.

So I haven't had a blog post in eons...
Or three months. 
One or the other. 

No one ever said I didn't have a flair for the dramatic.

And a lot has happened in that three months.  So I guess it's time for an update to my running journal, eh?  MORE AFTER THE JUMP! 

(Doesn't that just sound dramatic?!?!)

As I prepare to tackle 2015 head on, I thought I should take a look back at where I was one year ago. 

What goals had I set for myself back last January? 
Had I accomplished all of my goals? 
Were there any worth repeating?

So let's do a side by side comparison...

I have a feeling this is gonna hurt my pride a bit.

In case any of you out there are last minute Christmas shoppers like myself.

I mean, no, that wasn't me you saw out at the mall this morning at 8am...  Must have been my evil twin.

Or in case the big Santa man is still listening, I have put together a list of things I wouldn't mind seeing under my tree this Christmas.

I mean, I already have my two front teeth and a hippopotamus wouldn't fit well in my apartment, so a girl has to come up with some other suggestions.

So in what has become the most hip of hip things to do, I spent a large part of my time in this past week wearing my most ugly of sweaters.

It warranted such comments as "I don't want to offend you, but is that your ugly sweater?" and "I just LOVE your sweater!"

In the last case, the woman was serious and thought it was actually a cute sweater and I have serious questions about her fashion sense and also her sanity.

But the most fun time I wore my ugly sweater was when I wore it without pants.

Isn't that always the way it goes?