This week, I had one main thing going against me: I started a new internship. Gone was my home-all-the-time, lazy-bum, sleeping-in, run-whenever-you-feel-like lifestyle of my month-long winter break. Now it’s back to 5 am wake-up calls and running in the dark, just like I did way back when I had a Real Job with Real Hours (i.e., before I moved to Seattle, where nothing in software/technology happens before 9 am). On the plus side, the internship has been awesome so far, if not a little exhausting. I’m constantly on my feet and moving, so the day passes incredibly fast, but I’m completely fried by the time I get home. I’m hoping this will get a bit better as I get used to the schedule and, in theory, start falling asleep before 11 pm.

Surprisingly, that wasn’t the biggest barrier to getting my runs in this week. Sure, I oversnoozed on Tuesday, which was the first day I was supposed to run this week, but after that? I was up and out of bed at 5 am or shortly after, ready to go. Unfortunately, the only day a run actually happened was Wednesday. Which was in the pouring rain. Then it got cold (like, below freezing cold) that night, and every other morning the roads were covered with a thin sheet of ice. Wednesday afternoon’s rain turned into Wednesday night’s wintry mix, and it was just a hot mess outside after that. Add black ice to pitch black darkness and a bare minimum of street lights, and you have conditions that I just wasn’t willing to even try running in.

Things were mostly dried out by the weekend, but Saturday and Sunday still saw overnight temperatures in the 20s with daytime highs just barely above freezing. Sure, the roads were clear, but what about the shoulders? And sidewalks? This is Seattle, where it’s rare for snow and ice to stick around for more than a day, which means we don’t have salt trucks. So I used that as an excuse to be lazy rest up from my first week of work and be ready to hit next week with enthusiasm.

I’m just really hoping things warm up like they’re supposed to so I don’t have to start taking my runs to the treadmill. I’m willing going to do it, since I really can’t take more than a week off in my current training plan, but I’m not going to be happy about it.

Monday: Rest

Tuesday: Rest via the snooze button… oops

Wednesday: 4 soaking wet miles

Thursday: Rest via ice

Friday: More ice

Saturday: Still icy!

Sunday: ENOUGH WITH THE COLD AND ICE ALREADY

Total for the week: 4. Ugh.