After yesterday's good walk, I had a good run this morning. Back to the schedule of alternating running and walking -- this time, 0.25 miles running followed by 1 minute walking. It worked well. There was a bit of pain in my back when I started, but it cleared up quickly once I got going and hasn't bothered me any more yet today. My running form was terrible when I started, but probably pretty OK by the time I finished.

I've got an excused absence from my training tomorrow. It's scheduled to be a walking day, so that's OK. I'm looking forward to another good run on Thursday.

As promised, I resumed my marathon training in earnest this morning. I had a few things going against me -- I stayed up too late last night, I overslept, and I am somewhat sore from yesterday's geocaching. It would have been real easy to skip today.

Discipline. I said I'd do it, so I made myself get up and do it.

It was my easy routine: a two mile walk. It took me 33 minutes to do it. I practically swam through it -- it's so humid. It was good to be back on the greenway again, though.

As far as how my body felt: I'm definitely out of shape again -- the walk had me breathing hard by the end. It's going to be a slow climb back up to where I was three months ago -- still out of shape, but not completely embarrassing so. My back didn't hurt at all during the walk. It let me know that there was something going on a few times, but I'd classify it as discomfort, not pain. I was also reminded that my right ankle is weak. I don't know how long it's been weak -- for the past several years, I always remember kinda having to "baby" it as I walk/hike/run. Again, no pain, just a feeling of weakness. I don't think I've mentioned it before, so I'm mentioning it now just in case it gets better or worse while I continue my training -- it'll be nice to have some sort of record that I've known it was weak for a while.

I looked at my training log. It's effectively been three months since I've trained. Two months ago, I had three days of training, but I'm not counting them since I just let it drop. But that was when the doctor gave me the OK to resume my training. It's embarrassing that I waited two months to resume. And, with only one day of training under my belt now, it's somewhat optimistic to think that I've really resumed my training. Check back in a couple of weeks and see if I'm still training.

Anyway, a fun walk. I saw a duck flying, which was pretty cool. Time for me to take a shower and head to work.

Well, I hiked the Nat Greene Trail from one end to the other. It's reported as under 4 miles, but with my side trips for geocaches (including a detour on the Lake Brandt Greenway) and a little back-tracking a few times, I manged to make it a 6.31 mile trip, in just about 4 hours. I think I picked up four caches that I hadn't previously found. I also got more information on 2 multi-caches that I haven't found. For one of them, the next stage simply wasn't convenient to the trail I was on, so I'll pick it up another time when I'm on another trail. For the other, I'm going to have to do some geometry to figure out where the final cache is. I didn't have the time to do the geometry on the trail, with the tools I had available, so I pressed on to make sure I'd make it to the car before it got dark. So I'll do the geometry later tonight or tomorrow and go pick up that one next time I'm on the trail again.

It was a good workout. I think I'm going to officially call it the resumption of my marathon training. I didn't do any running, so I'll call it a walk day. I've already got my running shoes and socks out -- I need to find my shorts -- so I'll be able to get up tomorrow morning and go out, no excuses (unless I oversleep). My back didn't bother me at all during my hike today, even with a somewhat uncomfortable daypack on.

Allrighty. Time for a shower, some food, and to do enough laundry so that I have something to wear to work tomorrow.