Trying to keep it together

Pulling an all nighter is all about perseverance, will power, and personal pride. No one pulls all nighter's for fun. Sure, you might "stay up all night" working on something, but you still went to bed at 7AM to get an hour or two of sleep before going into work or class. A real all nighter takes a drive to do something truly silly for a goal that is never really worth it, but you do it anyway so you can wear it like a badge of honor. Those who have been there are inviting in conversation and discuss it with you like a combat veteran. Those that have tried and failed look on with awe and bewilderment, asking themselves the questions that haunt you during the long hours of the night: was it really worth it? How did they do it? Why are they that dumb to submit themselves to it?

It all began when my advisor convinced these technicians to come show us a piece of equipment. Now I had used this at other schools, but we were doing a "demo" to see how it worked so that my advisor could write a better grant to buy one and so we could get the machine to ourselves to run samples.

The goal was to convince them to let us keep it overnight to run samples. Other people in my department weren't optimistic, I admit even I had my doubts, but when the time came they came up with the idea to let us have it overnight to run the samples we wanted to run.

We finished that batch five hours ago, and now my lab assistant and I are working straight through the night to run as many of our samples as possible so she has data for her poster session next week...and so we can avoid a four hour road trip to and from Boston next week (which we still might need).

This is a little easier than my last all nighter in the fact that I haven't caffeinated yet...yet. Last time I had a red bull around 2AM and another around 4AM or 5AM and then coffee and other high caffeine drinks throughout the day. By the time I finally went to bed I had been up for over 40 hours and woke up into caffeine withdrawal and haven't had coffee since.

I'll probably take a 5-hour Energy at some point to make it through the morning/day. I foresee and early crash on this Thursday night and hating myself on Friday. But at least the samples will be finished.

104 days til Acadia: Heat running and some musings

Short run today, around two and three quarters miles (quarter miles?) and boy is it HOT! It was well into the 90's all day long. I was thinking that maybe I would take the day off, but since I already took Sunday off, I knew I just had to get out there and put some miles down...even if it wasn't even 3.

Now, according to some websites, the royal "they" say that 2 weeks is the appropriate amount of time to adjust to running in extreme heat. This of course doesn't mean it doesn't suck any less! The run was fine, and I think tomorrow I will extend it a bit by making it a loop, because it does feel like it goes by fast.

I haven't run this little in a while, though I do seem to run at a more even and consistent pace now, as opposed to before when I would essentially sprint the first mile and half or so, then crash for the second mile before I finally settled into a good pace. I'm running around 9 to 9:30 miles, which isn't fast at all, but it what it is is comfortable and feels like something I can maintain indefinitely...which I think I will need for Acadia...I think.

Also I realized today that most of my underwear is some shade of grey or blue. I don't know how this happened or how I didn't realize until now, but they are. I don't find this to be an issue of any sort...just interesting.

Now I have to pay my electric bill...

107 days til Acadia: Hot stuff and Lazy days

So last week I never went on that long run...I went to happy hour instead, and had a great time thank you very much! This then continued as a trip to NYC for the weekend (in which i did a lot of walking around...mostly ending up on the East side of Central Park and have to walk to the West side only to realize there is a giant lake in the middle...yeah, i missed that on the map) and then home on Monday.

And thus Tuesday was the end of my extended break. 4 miles Tuesday, 4 miles Wednesday, (break Thursday) and then 4 grueling miles today in which I realized the importance of continued hydration: i. e. DO IT! Today was warmer than it has been and I admit that I haven't been hydrating myself very well the past few days. This is something I will rectify for this weekend!

Other than that I have yet to breach 8 miles in one run and haven't done more than 15ish in a week so I've still got a lot of work to do before I am anywhere near ready for October.