Xterra

I'm no runner but the idea of trail running holds a fraction of interest in the furthest recess of my brain.  Candace was looking for running events to back up her effort in the Levin off-road half marathon and pointed out the Xterra trail running series.

As it happened there was a 10km night race on the 10th anniversary of mums death, sold.  As a non runner surely I could do 10km.  If not, well at least I could put some serious MTB light power on to the trail.

Got underway but it soon was apparent that there were a lot of people trying to squeeze into a little track, thus it was super slow climbing with a solid line of traffic, only spreading out on the four wheel drive tracks near the top.

Stunning views from the summit ridge looking down over Lower Hutt and Petone on one side, and down to Wainuiomata on the other.  Image below pilfered from the interweb but it looked pretty much like this.

Great run all told, more like 12km than 10 but damn good fun for a non runner.

10 years

Gone 10 years.  Nana Maureen would have been a great Grandma, wish she could have met our kids.

Spiders.....

As I walk through the garage, balancing a "way too big" stack of wood to carry upstairs, I notice a GIGANTOR spider flirting with my elbow and working his way up my arm. I start to dance, high knees trying to shake him off, until the thought hits me that dropping the wood would be more effective, so that I can access the use of my arms. I forget to move my foot out of the way first though. As I am dealing with the enormous pain on my toe I don't see the spider on the floor, so I strip my long sleeve shirt off in a flash, while yelling out to no one, "It's on me, it's on me!" I stand there in my tanktop/singlet freaking out and starting to really feel the pain of my toe. I cant relax though until I see the spider. I feel like its on every inch of me. I instinctively check in my shirt and guess who smiles back at me? So within about 2 minutes I was walking with a stack of wood, to being fully topless with a full on bruised toe, after having danced and yelled all to myself. At least I got to see that spider leave my body and KNOW its got nowhere else to hide. Not good enough though; I'm sure I'll be feeling the creepy-crawly feeling on my skin all night. Yuck!
P.S.  Don't worry Mom, it wasn't a white tail.