Continuing from yesterday’s entry, I did indeed purchase a personal ($4/month) WordPress site plan. It came with a domain name that doesn’t include .wordpress, which was the only selling point, honestly. I’ll probably be messing around trying to figure out how to use it for a while. I’d like to create something that looks halfway decent, as I’m not trying to showcase my design skills, or lack thereof, but when I look at this site, I want to be invited in by something visually appealing at least. It’s something to work towards for sure. And it’ll get me taking more photos.
Today’s run was good. I usually do what I call a tempo run on Wednesdays. Maybe other people have different definitions of tempo run, but mine is a half mile warm-up of just easy running, not super slow, but a pace I’m able to talk through easily, then at least half an hour of slightly uncomfortable pace. I’ve been doing 8 miles on Wednesdays for the past month and today was no exception. Overall, I went 8 miles at 8:21 pace, negative splitting. I probably could have pushed more in the beginning of the run, but after this past weekend, I wanted to finish strong rather than burn out. I wore Lunartempo 2s. No water bottle. No dehydration today, most likely because I got out before the sun was really baking.
Today was the first day I’ve seen other runners on the Pinellas Trail since I’ve been back in Florida. I think it’s too hot and there’s so little shade available out there. But the two dudes I saw looked like they were having fun.
Listened to City and Colour for the first three quarters of the run, then Strung Out for the last quarter.
Where I get on the Trail, roughly at 46th Street, there is nothing remarkable happening visually. It’s basically ditches on both sides, some bushes, fences, and then some parking lots for the first mile and a half. Then the Trail goes over 34th Street and I get to act like I’m running in a place that has some elevation change, at least for a minute or two. Once over the pedestrian bridge, my high school alma mater Gibbs is on the right hand side. Every single time I pass it I think the same thing – that was a pretty good time and also a really, really shitty time. Crossing 31st Street, Tropicana Field comes into view and I’m reminded how much of an eyesore it is, but I don’t think about it that way every time, only most of the time. Other times I think about how lucky this city is to have a major league baseball team and how crazy it is that it’s taken for granted as much at it is. The other thing I think about is living in this city and how awesome it is. I think it’s the silhouettes of the buildings downtown that evoke this feeling. I like being able to identify cities by their skylines. Cities have personalities and their skylines are like their faces. St. Pete doesn’t have much of one, though. We could have moved to Denver, whose skyline I recognize, or Asheville, which doesn’t really have a skyline, but this is home. We don’t know why but this is home. My eyes seeing palm trees, my back feeling sunshine, I’m home.
runjournal 