Wednesday, April 1, 2026

Week in Review (March 24 - March 30)

Tuesday (17,503 steps) - Olive walk before going to work. Went to the gym at lunch to get in my StairMaster workout.
45 minutes is a long time... Got a little bit of work done and then went for a walk, just to get outside. Work is so horrible right now with an additional attorney on my desk. After work headed home and took Olive for a walk. We had to work on A's car for a bit to see if we could figure out why her car seems to be leaking oil still. 
Dinner and Good Wife.
Wednesday (18,239 steps) - Having to deal with Ariel's car meant that I switched my in office days. I had no idea how I was going to be able to squeeze in my run. Much to my surprise, I found out that the Boulder trailheads open at 5 am daily? What??? I never knew... I had made plans to actually run before work, which I hate doing. I will say that this run was rather enjoyable. Perfect weather, felt good and saw basically no one until I was on the way back to my car.









Got started on my work. Ariel headed to Big O first to get her tire replaced and then I drove down to pick her up after she dropped her car off at Black Canyon. Ariel joined me and Olive for our walk to the lake. We ended up doing Torchy's, which was definitely a change for us. Good Wife.
Thursday (10,421 steps) - Peloton before taking Olive for a walk and going to work. Another insanely busy day and it was weird being in office on a Thursday. Gym at lunch.
Took Olive for a walk when I got home. We didn't know what to do for food and since Ben had to run out for some errands he picked us up Chili's for dinner.
We definitely seem to eat out more with Ariel not being at home. Good Wife.
Friday (10,296 steps) - Olive walk before going to work. Took her for a walk late morning while I was waiting for a big appellate filing.
Unfortunately, most of the day ended up being a disaster. So busy and things were not ready on time.
While I knew I was going to have a tough time with the filing, we ran into SO many issues. I am normally off work at 4:30 and Olive and I were still at the office after 5! Ariel's car ended up not being ready (UGH), so I headed home after I finally got off work. Ben and I went down to Parry's for dinner.
As a random aside, this marked 100 days since the last time I had alcohol. Am I quitting for good? Who knows, but after hitting triple digits I am definitely thinking more about if I'll have it again. It would have to be something absolute amazing. Good Wife.
Saturday (38,249 steps) - With a big workout on schedule, Ben and I were going to be on our own. I took Olive for a walk before we headed up to Boulder for a long vert day. It was already feeling relatively warm, which wasn't great news since I expected to be out for five-ish hours. We started near our normal spot at the base of NCAR/Skunk.
A large number of people on the trails. With this being my last big effort before my next race, we were doing a lot more hiking than running. I also was carrying my full pack - complete with extra water/snacks for Ben since he isn't using a pack right now.

Did a detour up Fern and down Shanahan Ridge before continuing on Mesa toward Shadow Canyon. 
I feel like we do this climb once or twice a year and it is ALWAYS a kick in the ass. It is hot and STEEP. According to Strava, we climb over 1300' in one mile. ROUGH.
We took a break at the saddle to have something to eat and mentally prepare for almost half our route still remaining. 

I also always seem to forget how much I loathe a steep and technical descent. At least at this point we finally had some cloud cover and a slight breeze - making things much more manageable.


By the time we got off the really steep stuff I could tell that our run/hike was going to be taking about an hour longer than I had planned. I was trying to get Ben to do some occasional running just so we could be done with it but he wasn't really having it.
When we got down to the Bear service road I finally decided to just run to the truck. He knew where I would be! We made plans to meet up with Tyler, Terri and Larry at Murphy's for a drink and a snack. We didn't stay too long because Larry and Terri both had plans. Tyler joined me and Ben at 4 Noses for a little bit more socializing before we went home. Took Olive for a walk and Ben ordered in Thai food for dinner.
Good Wife.
Sunday (20,469 steps) - Did some things around the house while Ben went to pick up Dutch Bros. before Ariel went to work. Up to Boulder for another vert day! 

On the way down we talked to a volunteer and he gave us some good information about who to contact about Olive's voice/sight tag. It's been nearly a month and we still haven't received it. We stopped at Rails End for a snack. The new, slow guy was working so didn't stay as long as we planned. We did have a good snack/lunch though.
Dropped Olive off for her grooming appointment and went to Costco to get our weekly shopping done. Had just enough time to shower and walk to Emily's to pick her up. She looks very cute!
No recollection of what did later. I assume dinner at some point (leftover Thai?) and Good Wife.
Monday (16,729 steps) - Thankfully, a work from home day. Crazy busy trying to get caught up with everything I did not get to on Friday.
Took Olive for a walk to the lake at lunch.
Then I got my run in. I just love taper so much. 45 minutes just flew by. Ariel showed up right as I was making lunch (flautas in the air fryer) with bad news about her car - turns out the minor problem is back up to being a bigger problem again. After work we headed down to Black Canyon to pick her car up and scheduled the bigger work for two weeks out while I am gone so she can use my car. Will it never end? I got a few minutes from the house when she called to say she had to pull off the highway because her car was overheating. OF COURSE IT WAS. Waited for Ben to get home and then we drove down to Golden (in separate cars in case she needed mine back) to figure out the issue. It was seemingly an easy fix - she just happened to be out of coolant. Sigh. We went to New Terrain since we were just down the street before getting home and having an incredibly late dinner of Panda delivered. Barely time for an episode of Good Wife before bed. 

Stats:
  • 131,906 steps
  • 27.3 miles run
  • 12.86 miles walked
  • 75 minutes of cardio
  • 55 minutes of strength
  • 0 minutes of sauna

Tuesday, March 24, 2026

Week in Review (March 17 - March 23)

Tuesday (16,888 steps) - Olive walk before going to work. I had to go to the gym early to do the StairMaster since it was Erica's last day (sob) and we had plans to go to lunch. 
As soon as I got upstairs to drop off my gym bag it was time to head out. We went across the street to Syrup - a breakfast(ish) place that I've never been to. Lunch was fabulous!
Did a delivery on my way home. Ben and I took Olive for a walk to the lake. Ben ordered in Panda for dinner (yum). Good Wife.
Wednesday (22,295 steps) - Olive walk before work. Busy busy busy day at work with one of Erica's attorneys on my desk (hopefully just temporarily). I had to drop off a settlement check and decided to just incorporate an additional walk while I was already out.
Headed up to Boulder after work for my hill repeats. 

Thankfully this is the workout where the intervals get shorter as the workout continues, so once I got through the first few, it wasn't terrible. I was in the middle of my last repeat when the run club started barreling towards me. Wow, they are all really fast! I briefly stopped by the store to say hi to Tyler and Trish - I haven't been in a LONG time and there were SO many people - most of the club was outside, which I'm not used to. Good Wife.
Thursday (14,724 steps) - Got my Peloton ride and shower in before I clocked in for work. Took Olive for a  nice, long walk at lunch. VERY warm day.
Strength training in the afternoon. Did a few deliveries after work since Ben was a little late getting out of the office before we met at Torchy's for dinner. Took Olive for a walk after we got back home. Good Wife.
Friday (13,341 steps) - Wash Park! Was a beautiful morning and glad that I had brought a bit of a heavier jacket since it was a little chilly. 
Took Olive for our regular walk at lunch. After work we went to 4 Noses. Randomly ran into Doug and Kristin. Food truck was running behind so we headed home and ordered Chili's for dinner. More Good Wife.
Saturday (39,638 steps) - Took Olive for a walk. Everyone else bailed on our weekend run so Ben and I headed up to Boulder for the planned route of Walker Ranch. I had plans on also doing some of Eldorado Canyon for more time/vert and Ben was just going to do the 7.8(ish) mile loop. We parked just after 9 and it was already very warm. We managed to run into someone that had run Summit 200 in the parking lot and chatted very briefly with him. Definitely was concerned by how warm it already felt and we had just started.



I split off from Ben at just about 5 miles. I was regretting my decision to do extra almost immediately, but then I thought I remembered that the lower part was the "hardest" and most vert. I told him I would only be an hour behind him, all while knowing I was going to probably do more than that.

I turned around at the same place Ben and I did the last time, the sign requiring a permit to go into Eldorado Canyon. 


By the time I got back to the Walker Ranch loop, I was BEAT. I was really hot and I was running out of water. Randomly ran into Rebecca when I had just a couple miles left. I finally was able to get some more running in towards the end. Got back to the truck and Ben was definitely concerned since I ended up being about 90 minutes behind him. We stopped at Murphy's to get lunch.
Planned on taking Olive just for a short walk and she tricked me into taking her to the lake - I assume she wanted to go swimming since it was nearly 90 degrees. Zero recollection of the rest of the evening, but I assume we watched Good Wife.
Sunday (15,979 steps) - Up to Boulder for our vert day. Since it was a nice day and we were up later than usual, we went back to our usual route where we don't have to fight for parking. All of us were a little tired on this one and apparently this was the only picture I took the whole day.
Rails End on the way home and Ben ordered in Little Caesar's stuffed pretzel crust pizza for a snack since we didn't like the food truck. We watched Roofman - which I actually really liked, and then a bit of Good Wife.
Monday (22,402 steps) - Blah, how is it Monday already?? A cool morning and I was very busy right off the bat with work. Ariel said she was coming over late morning so I took Olive for a long walk to the lake. She brought Dutch with her when she showed up and made us cheesy eggs for breakfast. I went for my run at lunch and she took her car to the shop since the oil leak is bad. Couldn't get the leak fixed but found out she has air bubbles in a tire and had to order a new one. Always something. 
After work I met Ben at Costco to pick up food for dinner. More Good Wife.

Stats:
  • 145,267 steps
  • 29.55 miles run
  • 19.49 miles walked
  • 91 minutes of cardio, 
  • 40 minutes of strength
  • 0 minutes of sauna (I guess I'll use very rarely when the temps are high)

Week in Review (March 24 - March 30)

Tuesday  (17,503 steps) - Olive walk before going to work. Went to the gym at lunch to get in my StairMaster workout. 45 minutes is a long t...