Weather Obsession

When we take on something new in our lives, we can usually guess the ways our lives will change. For instance, when I had a baby, of course I knew I would love being a mom and find it incredibly rewarding. I also figured that I would be changing diapers, cleaning up bodily fluids and losing a lot of sleep. Same thing with training for a marathon, I figured I would feel stronger and healthier, as well as feel sore and tired.

Some things, however, hit you by surprise. I never, in my wildest dreams, would have guessed how much laundry a family of four could generate. Seriously, you would think that we are all changing clothes every 5 minutes given how much laundry I have to wash and put away each day.

In the case of training, being on a training schedule has brought about a severe case of Weather Obsession. Checking the weather and then worrying about it is one of my top priorities. I guess I would have to put keeping the children alive and keeping my husband happy enough not to leave me higher on my priority list, but Weather Obsession has been steadily climbing the charts.

To satisfy my obsession, I have a thermometer by my bed that tells me the temperature outside. I have another one in my bathroom so I can consult it while I'm getting ready. I have to check the weather forecast before I go to bed each night during which I tend to moan and gnash my teeth when when the forecast doesn't compliment my running schedule. I celebrate when it is my day off and it rains, and I can't sleep at night if I have a long run scheduled and it's supposed to snow or storm. The worst of all my fears... wind. I can't stand running when it's really windy.

I know I'm not alone in my Weather Obsession because Mark H. had a nifty link on his blog to a great National Weather Service site for the Twin Cities. It gives so much hour by hour information that you may need a meteorological degree to figure it all out. I am now addicted to that site. Thanks, Mark.

My husband likes to pretend that he doesn't care about the weather. He likes to act like this is all my problem. But then, right before we go to bed, he'll ask if I want to check the weather. He laughs like he's just humoring me, but I know that secretly he wants to know the forecast just as badly as I do. He's not fooling anyone.

Thanks to my Weather Obsession, I can happily report that, not only is today an incredibly beautiful day, but that Thursday looks like a great day for my last 20 miler before the race. It's going to be 43 degrees when I start and in the mid 50's when I'm done. There is less than 10% chance of rain and the winds will be 10-13 mph (a little windy for me, but hey... not too bad).

Did I mention that I get really angry when the weather forecast is wrong? Well, I guess I'll tell you about that another day. For right now, I'm just so happy that Spring is finally here!