First "Official" Training Walk

I had my first "official" training walk, outside, walking from my house on a specific route through the park, yesterday afternoon. I put official in quotes because, although I did carry a fanny pack and a bottle of water, I listened to headphones, which you are not supposed to do during the 3-day. But, I was alone and tend to get bored with no one to talk to, so I put them on.

I ended up logging 5 miles, in about 90 minutes. So a pretty good pace, even a little faster than a 3-day pace, which I learned on Thursday night at my Get Started meeting, is 20 minutes/1 mile.

The best thing about the walk was the perfect weather. A slight breeze, sunny, and not too hot. I hope the weather is like this for the 3-day! In fact, the walk was totally uneventful except for the end, when I walked back into my own neighborhood, past a neighbor's house. She was sitting on her front porch with her dog, an ancient-looking black pug. When I say ancient, I mean he was old as the hills, he had a gray muzzle, and was pretty overweight. Anyway, as I walked past, this decepit-looking old dog sees me, and literally sprints across his front yard towards me, barking the entire time. I very nearly froze with fear (I had a dog growing up who used to chase me and my brothers and bite us) and at the last minute, stepped off the sidewalk and into the road to avoid him. The little bugger chased me into the road! The neighbor was running after him, apologizing profusely. Luckily, for some odd reason, he became distracted by something else and retreated before he reached me.

I always wonder how our four-legged friends would respond to having a whole bunch of people walk past their houses during the 3-day. I guess I'm lucky that they aren't holding the 3-day in my neighborhood! There are several dogs in my neighborhood that bark if the wind blows in the wrong direction, so I can only imagine how they would react to the 3-day.

Yesterday I received 2 donations, so this brings my total amount raised to just over $2100. I am less than $200 away from my goal of $2300. A big thanks to everyone who has been helping me reach my goal.

And a big happy birthday to my youngest daughter Chloe. She turned 4 today!

Faith, Hope and Love,

Angela