After bowing out of the 10K that I had registered for, I was looking forward to my first 5K this past Saturday. I ran it with one of the girls, Katie, from the ice cream shop who’s 10 years older than me but we’ve always been close. Her kids are my favorite kids. (She, like me, has a real job but works there on the weekends.)

Prior to this race, I hadn’t run in ~two weeks because of my own stupidity. Two Wednesdays ago I went walking on campus in shoes that aren’t made for walking around campus for an hour, so I was suffering from some nasty blisters on the skin where my big toes meet my feet. I had to wear sensible shoes to work for about a week and wrapped my feet with gauze pads and that tan athletic tape that sticks to itself. By Wednesday of last week, I stopped wrapping my feet, wore flat shoes to work, and kept an eye on the blisters.

I also got new running sneakers! I was suffering from blisters from running over the last few months, and since the last time I got new sneakers was four years ago, I was due for a new pair. These are the ones I got. I was originally looking to get Asics, like my other pair, but the Karrimor pair felt good, plus I loved the colors. My old running sneakers are now in my office as my walking-around-campus-shoes to prevent any future unnecessary blisters.

So on Saturday morning, I drove over to Katie’s house and then she drove us over to the race; it was in a few towns over from me and started at the high school. It had a similar feeling to the race I ran in September. There was a 5K and 10K race, and there were about 500 people running in the 5K. The race started at 10:00 a.m., and we got to the high school around 9:40 a.m.; she had picked up our bibs and t-shirts the night before, so we didn’t have to worry about that. We met up with Katie’s husband and her kids who were there to work the race, blocking off one of the side roads from traffic.

I saw SO MANY DOGS there. I only got to pet one, but a lot of people brought their dogs to watch the race. The race allows you to run with a stroller, and although I didn’t see anyone running with a stroller and a baby, a woman who was around my pace was running with her dog in a stroller. And it kept barking.

Come 10:00 a.m., we were off. And I honestly felt pretty good. It was about 50 degrees and cloudy, but the sun peaked out every now and then to make it warmer. The course was through a neighborhood, so people were out in their driveways cheering you on. It’s always nice encouragement. I listened to last week’s episode of Brunch. Katie and I didn’t run together but I was a little ahead of her for most of the race.

I stopped for water during the second mile. I stopped to drink and then walked a little bit. Katie had warned me about a hill toward the end, and she wasn’t lying. I ran up a little bit of it but then walked most of it until the road flattened out. It was then when Katie passed me and ultimately finished four spots a head of me. I ran the last .60 of the race and crossed the finish line with my best 5K race time yet: 33:53. I placed 222 out of 514 runners, and I’m proud of myself for running most of it. One of these days I’ll beat a hill.

We met up with Katie’s family and then Katie, myself, and her son went out for breakfast. We went to a little place in town, and I got french toast and home fries. Post-race meals just taste so much better. And it was cool to see some of the other runners in there, too.

I went to the library after before coming home to shower and watch Netflix, aka, nap while Netflix is on in the background causing me to rewatch an episode or two. And then I went to work at the ice cream shop and was on my feet for four and a half hours because there was a line the entire night.

My thighs were sore yesterday, so I’ve been rolling them out and sitting with the heating pad. My blisters look good; I still need to clean up some of the extra skin but they’re not getting worse. Hopefully they’ll heal up soon.

My next 5K is in June, which I’m running with another girl from the shop. She’s like six feet tall and used to play field hockey and basketball, so she can definitely run faster than me. But I like that I have friends who I can run with; it makes signing up for a run a lot more fun.