Glad yinz liked my post about my attitude adjustment towards running! I hope that if you ever feel warn out and sick of running that you STOP and reevaluate it! And in the meantime…read Born to Run! I promise to give some more detailed reviews of the book, for those of you who either don’t want to read it or don’t have the time. It gave a lot of information on many different subjects, and some were very thought provoking. I promise to share!

Also, I decided not to run the Philly marathon. There are a number of reasons. A big reason is that my cousin Julie is going to be visiting for Thanksgiving and the marathon is the weekend before. Since I’ll have to take off work for the marathon and for my cousin’s visit, it just isn’t very practical.

And anytime I get to spend with my cousins I cherish! My five cousins on my mom’s side were all raised in Asia, so time with them is so precious! And this week, in between the beach and home, I got to see Julie! I haven’t seen her for 3 and 1/2 years!

My cousin Julie is about three years younger than me and we are “twin cousins”. Apparently it’s not an original idea and Patty Duke had some show about identical cousins (?!!).

Not only is Jules my look-a-like, but she’s also a runner! And a much better runner than I am. In high school she was ranked 1st in her age group in her cross country district. I remember hearing stories of her pushing through “the wall” by saying to herself, “Jesus is running with me.” I’ve tried that method too, although comforting and encouraging, I was never ranked in the top of my age group. But then again I never ran in high school, and I’m also not known for my ability to finish the races I train for!

Anyhow, we both agreed to run the Turkey Trot together over Thanksgiving! I’m super excited, but I gotta get my speed on! Just kidding, no pressure…no pressure…

We did get to go on a hike during the precious 36 hours we had together! Dave and I took Julie and her boyfriend, Matt, to Trough Creek state park. There are swinging bridges and trodden paths. I wore my Vibrams FiveFingers for half of it. It was so interesting to feel absolutely everything that I stepped on. The mud felt the strangest, but the sharp rocks weren’t pleasant. I changed into my Brooks when we started to head back.

My feet are a little sore today. Not a bad sore, but I can tell that I’m working muscles, tendons and ligaments that haven’t been worked before. My feet are getting stronger!

In other news, I think I need another vacation…pronto.

Yesterday, after 2 hours of driving and less than 1/2 hour from our apartment, we realized we left our apartment keys at my parents house. Nice. We had to wait in our car for almost an hour until the maintenance man let us in!

Then shortly after we unpacked and kicked up our feet, a man knocked on our door and said that his apartment was on fire and the police were evacuating the entire building. Great. Thankfully the thunderstorms had passed and it was only drizzling.

By the time we were going to bed, it seemed like we had jumped through hoops to make it there. Sleep never felt so good.

You know, vacation is great, but there is sometime so refreshing about returning to your routine. And by returning to your routine, I’m not including the fried alternator in David’s Jeep. Yea, he discovered that this morning and is currently in the process of fixing it.

So like I said, I need another vacation right now. And when I come back, I want to return to my routine and not a series of unfortunate events.

But at least I got to see my cousin. So I really wouldn’t change a thing about the weekend!

So here’s the fun question of the day: Who’s your doppelganger?

Julie and I and some of the other family were discussing our doppelgangers. Julie and I are each others’ , but as for celebrity doppelgangers, we’re not sure. We’ve heard Keira Knightly and Julia Roberts, but no one really stands out.