Where's Heather Been? (Friday Five Edition)

I know it's been forever since I have posted.  Work gets really busy and then when I get home, I just don't have the energy to concentrate on writing a post.  I also haven't been running, so I feel like I don't have a lot to share.  It's funny as when I run, I come up with so many things to post about that I forget half of them by the time I am finished.  These things rarely come to me while I'm doing other things.  So no running, means no thoughts on new posts.  So here are some things that I have been up to.



1. While I hadn't run a single mile since the Baltimore Relay, I finally got out there on Thanksgiving morning.  I didn't do a Turkey Trot, I just got out and ran in my neighborhood.  It was a cool morning, so I was bundled up.  I took it slow and things felt good.  I was glad to get out there again.  I have since run a couple more times so hopefully I’ll be getting back to it regularly.

My next race is Princess in February so I got to get my but into gear and start training.  I just pulled up the training guide from the runDisney site and it looks like I'm 5 weeks behind (3 if I cut out the 14 mile week, which I usually do).  I will have to see what other training guides I have and morph something together.

2. I was in a Parade!

I'm not one to go to a parade and have never been in one.  The weekend before Thanksgiving there is a local parade that happens every year.  Our bicycle group has had a spot in the parade for many years now.  A couple weeks before, there was an email that went out requesting volunteers to be in the parade.  I thought about doing it but wanted to wait till it was closer to that weekend to see what the weather was like.  And then I forgot all about it.  Two days before a friend of mine asked me to do it with her.  How can I say no?

On that Sunday it was supposed to start at 2 and we got there a couple hours before. The weather was beautiful!  It got to be in the mid-60's with a sky full of sun.  As we were getting to our staging area I noticed that people were already out and setting up chairs along the route.  We met up with everyone and decorated our bikes with Christmas lights, bows, and bells.


We had a pretty good turn out with about 15 people in our group.  We chatted with everyone while we waited and watched all the other groups get together.  At the last moment, the stars of our group showed up.  A father-son duo who had high wheels.  They were even dressed in old-fashioned clothing to match.


As we started out, we had two people walking with the bike club sign in front, the guys on regular bikes behind them, our stars, and the ladies brought up the back.  Us ladies were in the back to give the high wheelers plenty of space to be able to circle round and round without having to stop when the parade got backed up.  I loved being behind them to watch them work the crowd.  They were the hit of the parade.  Everyone was pointing to them and getting photos as we rode by.


I couldn't believe how many people were there to watch this parade.  I think a lot of it was the beautiful weather, but still couldn't believe all of the people there.  I was glad that we were one of the first groups to go.  When we were heading back to our cars we past the staging area and there were still groups waiting to go.  We all were glad that we were done.  A few of us then went on to get some pizza from a local restaurant to continue the fun.  It really turned out to be a fun day.

3.  With my longer commute I have been getting into Podcasts.  I've been totally into true crime ones lately.  The latest one that I've been listening to is "Someone Knows Something".  Each season he looks into a cold case of a missing or unsolved murdered person.  I feel like it's very well done and brings you into the investigation with him.  I'm on the last episode of his latest season and am already missing it.  I'll need to find a new one.

4.  My Old Lady cat got pretty sick.  Brianna is 18 years old, so if something is off with her, even just a little bit, I get very worried.  This time around she had diarrhea.  She has never had diarrhea in her life, so this was a big deal for her.  At first I thought it was constipation as she would just squat in the litter box (or somewhere outside the litter box) for a very long time.  She also wasn't eating or drinking anything.  I took her to the vet the next day and he confirmed it was diarrhea.  We also saw that she lost another pound since February and is down to 4 pounds (she was only 6 pounds at her heaviest).  They gave her liquids and said that if she isn't better in a few days to come back.

Well, a few days later she was starting to eat and drink a little, but she was still squatting here and there.  I wanted her to get another round of fluid so I took her into the vet again.  He didn't do any blood work the first time we were there since her dehydration would throw her numbers off.  This time he did.  While we waited, he showed me how to give her fluids so that I could do it at home if needed.  I did it a few years back for her brother when he was sick, it's not too hard.  Once the blood work was done, I heard the vet go "Wow!" from the back area.  My baby girl has had issues with her kidneys.  A year ago, her numbers were in the red.  In February they were barely in the green.  They are now fully in the middle of the green and she is doing great with all her other numbers.

We were sent on our way and told to get her to eat as much as possible to get her weight back up.  If she was still having diarrhea issues, it might be something more then a bug and we would put her on steroids.  A couple weeks later, she is good and gets to eat whatever she wants to eat.  She loves chicken in a can and the left over turkey I saved her.



5.  I saved the best for last......

I got a new job!!  I will be a full time Scrum Master for a smaller company.  And, yes, I still want to get a post out there on what that really means.  My last day of my current job is Thursday 12/7 and I start the next Monday 12/11.  I am very excited for this new adventure in my life and hope it's half as good as I think it can be.  One of the best parts is, is it's closer to home.  No more commute into the city!

What have you been up to? Did you have a good Thanksgiving?  Any true crime/unsolved mystery podcast recommendations?

I'm linking up with Fairytales and Fitness and Running on Happy for Friday Five 2.0