Come See My Show, plus Running Update and Guess What's Back?

I'm sitting in my grandparents' apartment in soggy Delray Beach after a very good week of rehearsals for TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE. It's going to be a really good show. I'm kind of surprised, not because I thought it was going to be a bad show, but because shows like MORRIE aren't my cup of tea. I prefer edgier fare. But I'm really enjoying this production. The actors are really good and the production is not wallowing in the shmaltz and pathos that it could easily play into. We're going in, not the opposite direction, but rather emphasizing the relationship between the men, and the result is a production that is full of emotion, humor and warmth instead of sap and shmaltz.

So if you're in the Boca/Delray area and want to come see, check out the Caldwell Theatre Company's brand new home at the Count deHoernle Theater -- it's still got that new-car smell!

Even though I'm glad to be here among my second family, I'm sad that I'm not in NYC. Laura has officially left the apartment, and her friend Bill has moved in -- he's cat-sitting for us until I get home. I know I'll see Laura before she leaves for parts unknown, but still, it's the end of an era. It's going to be very strange adjusting to the apartment and getting new roommates and learning to live with new people. Not bad, not good, just different. And right now, I'm not a fan of different. I met a really nice woman who I was hoping would be able to rent Laura's room, but her lease runs out in May, and because I have a summer roomie through the beginning of August she was not able to take the spot. So any of you NYC runners looking for a nice midtown location to share with a slightly crazy runner and two adorable cats...you know who to call.

Speaking of running...some revelations to share. First off, if you've been following my sidebar in the days when I'm not blogging (and really, why wouldn't you check here every day?) you may have noticed that since returning to Florida my times had been getting slower and slower. It was really frustrating to me because I wasn't feeling any slower. I know I tend to be slower in the heat, but it wasn't that hot here, and even with it being warmer here than in NY I was pulling times closer to a 9-minute mile than an 8:30. Not that that's anything to sneeze at, but I've been training at closer to an 8:30 pace for these distances (up to a 10K; I couldn't hold that pace over a long distance at this point) and didn't feel I was moving any slower. Anyway, it was really discouraging.

After three incredibly bad runs in a row, with one of them at a 9:11 pace, I started thinking that maybe it isn't me, maybe it's the calibration on the Nike+. Don't know why it would un-calibrate (de-calibrate?) but it was worth a shot. Couldn't get any worse. So I mapped out a mile and re-calibrated it, and turns out that what was a mile on the map was only .93 on the Nike+. Doesn't seem like much, but over 5 miles -- okay, let me try to do some math (not easy for me!) Over 5 miles, that's a difference of .35 miles. If it takes me 8 1/2 minutes to run a mile, then it takes me 51 seconds to run a tenth of a mile, just short of 3 minutes to run .35 of a mile, and 42:30 to run a full five miles. So if the odometer was .35 off -- for a five-miler that would change the pace per mile to 9:06. Wow. I was so happy to see that it was the Nike+ and not me that I ran the mile home (after stopping at the Walgreens and toting a shopping bag with stuff in it) in 7:45. So saith the Nike+!

After that, I've had a couple of amazing runs. Not necessarily scenic or anything, I just felt so damn good, everything was working, my breathing was great, my legs felt great, no pain anywhere -- they were just the definition of "good runs."

Y'all remember that strange sofa cushion that I mentioned kept popping up on Military Trail? IT CAME BACK!! WHAT IS GOING ON DOWN HERE?

I'm hoping that, like it's been in the past, there's a correllation between my speed on the road and my steno speed. I haven't been practicing as much as I should be (rehearsals and all,) but when I'm on the machine I just feel faster, like there's been a breakthrough. I won't know until I get back to school in May, but fingers crossed.

Okay, must concentrate on "Rock of Love II." Twice as skanky as Part I. Love it!! I especially love how Amber -- excuse me, Ambre -- is right now comparing herself to Daisy, who's a dancer, and saying how she's much better than Daisy because she's got a stable job and an income. So throwing yourself at a B-grade rock star on reality television, that's not skanky or sleazy at all. Nope. Ah, television!