100th post!  Wow, time files when you write a blog!!!

Yesterday was a day of firsts.  It is funny when you lose a lot of weight, you tend to look closer at “firsts”.  My Lovely Wife and I have noticed several firsts, outside of our clothes getting smaller with our waistline.  For instance, actually seeing our collar bone.  Or I noticed I could sit with shorts on and put my knees together and actually see between my legs to the floor.

Well, yesterday I had a couple of firsts.  One, though not weight related, was a neat experience.  I was running my long run (13 grueling miles in the rain) and I heard something coming up behind me.  I looked back and a big black lab was running after me.  Needless to say, I was a bit shocked at first.  But it ran up beside me and just ran with me for a while.  In fact if you saw us running together you would have though it was my dog.  It made my run a bit more fun.  Then I heard someone behind me calling out.  I looked and there was a guy with a leash running after us.  Okay, that made a bit more sense.  So I stopped my run (another first) and the dog stopped also.  The guy caught up and put the leash on the dog and off they went.  So, for a while at least I had someone to run with.

My next “first” was diet related.  No, not the ice cream bonanza we had to celebrate RS’s birthday (nice that I could eat and not worry too much about my weight after running 13 miles).  As I ran, it began to rain.  Not surprising since it was supposed to rain and storm all day.  At one point, it rained so hard that it was hard to keep running.  Finally the rain slowed and stopped for a while and I was left soaked in my 2x teeshirt.  I still wear those double extra large teeshirts to run in for some reason, even though they are huge on me now.  By the time I got to 7 miles, I made a decision.  As I passed by my house, I was going to take off my now heavy, rain soaked shirt.  Knowing it would rain again and that if I went inside to get another shirt, I would have probably stopped my grueling run, I just took off my shirt, threw it in the yard and kept running.

You have to know me to appreciate what I did here.  I ran the last 6 miles shirtless.  I haven’t been outside without a shirt since probably high school.  Frankly, I have been overweight most of my marriage and not one to want to be seen outside without a shirt.  So it was a momentous occasion for me.  I didn’t feel very comfortable and I could still stand to lose 20 lbs, but it was doable and I felt like I lost 20 lbs after taking off that rain soaked shirt.

Needless to say it was a different day in many aspects, including me not posting a blog post.  I think it might have been the first day since I started that I didn’t write anything.  To be honest, I didn’t sleep well and wen’t shopping early in the morning with my Lovely Wife and started my run late, so my schedule was off from the beginning.

All in all it was a great day.  As I mentioned, the run was rather miserable.  As I hit 3 miles, I felt like I had already run 13.  But in my head were all those motivational posters I see on blogs and Twitter.

Anyway – Enjoy your week and keep running (whether you feel like it or not).