Languid but Lucid

Oh mercy...well, wouldn't ya know...it's T-minus 11 days (8 business days) until the TIR. Right now, I'm feeling a little nauseous and under-prepared, but at the same time ready...to get it over with. I lost some sleep this last weekend due to having too much fun, and I still haven't recovered. That is to say, every morning this week so far, I've laid in bed for an additional 30 minutes, drifting in and out of consciousness, trying to disguise the laziness by "mentally preparing" for the day.

I'm nauseous because of nerves. I'm nervous because of several things going on in my life right now, and one of those "things" is about my race pace during the TIR. I haven't worked on quickening my speed at all. Last year, I was nervous about my knees and how they would hold up. I was also concerned about pulling a muscle. Those things are still on my mind, but now I've added sloth-like pace worries to the list. I guess this is all normal stuff for a runner, except that I knew I wasn't pushing myself from day one of my training, and I still continued the same languid pattern. Silly human.

Why would anyone get the 'buttock backpack?'

I'm under-prepared in that I haven't exactly packed anything for the race, yet (yowza, I don't even have a backpack!). I have been "mentally preparing" for how I would pack my bag and what clothes I would wear. I always collect little toiletries here and there in case of weekend trips, vacations, and long-a$@&% relay races, so I know I'll have some stock of bare essentials. It's important to have everything organized and laid out in such a way that your clothes and race stuff are easy to find. This cannot be more true than when you run a weekend-long relay race! Last year, I had a Ziplock bag for each outfit I ran in, more Ziplocks organized by toiletry type, and what I thought was an easy breezy sport clutch for my money/license. My pseudo-purse ended up breaking (the zipper, that is), and the the bag I replaced it with broke, too (zipper be damned!). I think I ended up carrying around my money in yet another Ziplock bag.