I WON....I won IwoniwonIwonnnwiwon i won!

Wow, wow, and wow! I won something!! ME!!!!! My mailbox was jammed packed today with this enormous package and I just smiled as big as a smile can get; I hadn't purchased any post-holiday sales (darn it!) so I knew it could only be one thing: Inside, was my winnings from Shelly's blog, It's Just One Foot in Front of the Other, where I just casually mentioned in a comment that I thought the penguin socks in the picture were hers - and I WON!!! Here's me (notice the bright highlights from previous blog??) and my new swag above and a close-up of the great gifts below.

Okay, these are horrible pictures, on both, but here's a run-down of all my cool loot:

- Dark Chocolate covered pomegranates. Um, hello - totally yummy!!!!
- Blackberry Vanilla lotion from Bath and Body Works. Smells heavenly!
- Pink bubble gum. Who doesn't love bubble gum??!!??
- 3 pairs of the cutest, and I mean CUTEST, heart socks! All the kids will be envious when I wear these to school next week!
- The most adorable penguin card which reads: Peace.

I must have accidentally made it known that my favorite color is pink or something cuz all these really cool things all have a common theme: PINK! Even the pomegranates are pink, in a sense. I am just the happiest runner in blog land today!! Thank you, my dear - you totally made my day and I am beyond grateful for your over the top generous gift! I'm certain I will be a better runner tomorrow on my long run because I'll think of all these cool things and smile :)!

In other news:

Abbey was home from college for a few brief minutes to get her hair cut. I made her get rid of the snowflakes on my borders because honestly!!!! it's ($*@* Jan. 8th and I am officially DONE with snow and cold; I didn't need my blog border to remind me how cold it is! It was so insanely frigid here the past couple days that I think I'm going to move West and see if I can live in Meg's bathroom or something. This is just nuts! So right now, the blog's looking a little baby shower-ish, which I hope to rectify, but she left before I could say yeah or nay (patience isn't one of her virtues. Wonder where she gets that from?!!? Um, that was a rhetorical question, you didn't need to actually answer). I personally don't mind how pink it is (come on, what's wrong with it??) but I'm certain many of you will be nauseated when you open me up! So hopefully in the next few days she can come back and help me make it all beautiful and not so Pepto Bismol like.

Gradual warm up coming this weekend (YES!!!) but still a lot of snow on the ground - which is going to make long run of 15 tomorrow challenging. Did I mention I'm sick of winter? Spring marathon training is a constant challenge and rearranging of the schedule. I think I need a sponsor so that I can quit my day job and just run my long run whenever the weather is cooperative. Any takers? :).

My weight training on Wed (last blog) left my arms a wee-bit sore. Anytime I'm sore from weight training I gotta consider that a success (unless I pulled something, which I'm not ruling out I could never do because half the time I'm just out there randomly pulling whatever together, but thankfully it wasn't that kind of sore!). I blew off tonight's weight training because I think I need to re-adjust my calendar yet AGAIN - weight training on easy days is not really, um, "easy" so I need to switch those days. ugh. Easy 4 instead of 5 today went well, too, and 11x400's yesterday were smooth sailing also. Took forever and a day to finally GET to them but eventually I did. I am having a tough time adjusting back to the real world after two weeks off and actually took two (count that number, people. One, TWO! ) naps after I got home from work yesterday. Huh? Started intervals at 8:00 p.m. last night when I should have been going to bed. What is wrong with me??? Don't answer that, either!

Marcia, from Running off at the Mouth, tagged me to write about 10 things that make me happy (She's off to Boston, too, Meg!). I'm going to go for my long run tomorrow and think about that list more so going to hold off on that for another day. I could ramble off 10 in a heartbeat but wanna make sure to answer correctly... :). And I'm really tired. So off to bed I go so I'm all rested and ready to run (er, skate? snowshoe?) tomorrow morning!

Thanks again, Shelly, I love each and every gift! And thanks to EVERYONE who'd been so supportive with me lately. Tucson, Boston, loss of trainer, weight training. You guys have been the best pick-me-uppers and have fueled me immensely! Thanks!

btw, the calendar. If you click on the date, it brings up the entire schedule for that day. I've had a few questions. Hope that helps.