The Week After

After a weekend like last weekend, this week was fairly uneventful. I make it a habit to take a week (or sometimes a month) off from training after a race. It allows me mental and physical recovery. And more sleep.  Which I never argue about.  Anyway. we sort of committed on race day that we'd do a full marathon this spring. We'd been kicking it around for months and the high of a personal victory on race day caused me to temporarily lose my sanity and officially agree to running 26.2 miles this April. Because I hate my life, I guess.  E is a great motivator but sometimes he gets a little overzealous. On the ride home all he wanted to talk about was our running plan for the week. In reality, the only running plan I had for this week was running to the grocery store to restock our fridge. With anything I wanted. So I placated him by letting him talk, having no intentions of actually running at all this week.

I did set my alarm on Monday. I even laid out clothes. But I whined and in the end I won. We slept in the extra hour. By Tuesday, I told him my evil plan: we weren't going to run this week. We were going to take a week off. He protested. He tried to motivate, encourage, complain. But I won. He didn't even attempt persuasion by Thursday.

He does have a calm persistence about him, though, which is one of the reasons I married him. That sounds bad. He only had to ask once, ladies, and three months later, we were husband and wife. So the quality is why I married him--not because he literally was persistent. Anywho, he convinced me today we'd go on a run. In his head, it was a 10 mile run. In my head, it was 7. His head won. Which explains why two hours later I was crouched over at Hobby Lobby begging the cashier to just hand me my receipt so my BFF and I could go get water and make my life seem worth living again. OK, that's a little dramatic. The run itself was not so bad. Good, in fact. It was the whole, "oh I will just jump in the shower and run to get some Christmas gifts without thinking about drinking any water" thing that really got me. But I have an understanding friend who did manage to get me water and didn't complain at all when I was all crouching Jess, hidden stomachache at Hobby Lobby. It worked out. I got two frames for grandparent presents at half off.

If you are wondering if I am seriously going to talk about running for this entire post and if you should just skip it because no one cares, I am officially done. Read on, Sister. The rest of the week's events could be summarized quickly: I worked a lot, some people hit my car (see two posts ago) during the first snow, and we did some fun things. Because I am all about words, I will spell out those fun things.

Wednesday night was Family Christmas Celebration night at our church. E and I have volunteered with it for the past three years and it is just a hoot. Our children's ministry staff is so very creative and knows exactly how to tap into the hearts and minds of kids. I can't wait until our little ones can attend these events because they have the amazing capacity to draw kids in, make them feel whimsical and fun, and still drive home the true meaning of Christmas (or Easter, when it's an Easter event obviously). This year was spy themed. So, of course, we dressed in all black. Luckily, we were given the easiest, best job ever: we managed the dessert tables. This meant two awesome things: 1. we got to greet all the families and see the adorable children and their excitement 2. we got first dibs on all the food. Kind of kidding on the second one. But seriously, tons of great desserts there. The kids learned that Jesus came as a spy in enemy territory to save the enemy (that's us folks). Such a cool way to put it and I had more than one family tell me how much their kids loved it and how it may have been their favorite event ever. I'd say that's a win for sure.

Thursday we spent in our favorite Thursday night position: parked in front of the couch to watch Thursday night TV. I made a pretty delicious dinner (if I do say so myself. Am I allowed to even say that?) and then we just chilled til bedtime. Wow. So needed.

Which brings me to yesterday evening. I got off work just a tad bit early and E surprised me at the dry cleaner. That's an odd sentence but it is 100% true. From the dry cleaner, we went to Starbucks, had some coffee and bought my new favorite Christmas mug (which I plan to use all year) and checked movie times. And then we saw a movie I have been waiting to see for approximately a month.  I have been DYING to see it. I have asked every weekend. Take your guesses. Are you ready, people?

It was...

THE MUPPETS!

Seriously. I love me some Muppets. We carried in our favorite candies (rulebreakers--I know) and laughed our little heads off for the entire movie. It was adorable!! It was cheesy enough to know it was cheesy and it made fun of itself. Every character you can imagine made an appearance. Plus, there were tons of cameos. I laughed all the way through the credits (where they sang my FAVORITE) Muppet song. I am definitely going to have to buy it.

If you are wondering on the content, I would say it's fairly appropriate. There's some violence--punching to be specific--in a couple of scenes. They make reference at one point to a TV show called "Punch Teacher" and then show a kid punch a teacher. And there are some "fart shoes" which make farting noises in a couple of scenes. All in all though, I would say it's fairly child-appropriate. You might need to talk about why punching isn't a good choice.

So yes, if you had any question as to whether or not we were just big kids at heart, worry no longer. It was just the best date night ever! I would say I'm way past my word limit so I am going to rest up for E's work Christmas party. Enjoy your weekend. Go see the Muppets:).