Sunday, March 04, 2007

Balancing blinders and eyes wide open

Sometimes when I think about what I'm about to do, I'm stunned by the enormity of it all.

Most of the time, I just think about the next day's run, finding the best route from the Chippewa River Trail to the Mountain-Bay Trail in Wisconsin, which Chamber of Commerce to write to, whether I have enough clean socks without doing another load of laundry, where to take a bicycle maintenance class, how to meet up with running buddies if I want to run 25 miles on Saturday, yada yada yada, and just keep plugging merrily along.

And sometimes my brain fills with trivia. For example, Debby (who's been my logistical/tactical angel for this endeavor) asked me today how many miles I'm running in each state. What a great question! And here's the answer (at least with today's version of the route):
* Colorado: 201 miles
* Nebraska: 374 miles
* Iowa: 138 miles
* Minnesota: 180 miles
* Wisconsin: 289 miles
* Michigan: 238 miles

The mountains will be my backdrop as I leave Colorado, I'll have river crossings in every state, I'll be visiting trails in every state, and I'll be following the Lake Michigan shoreline from the eastern edge of Wisconsin off and on all the way to Petoskey. My husband also pointed out that I'll undoubtedly experience a number of grasshopper encounters along the way. He's always thinking of something ;-)

No comments: