The first week of marathon training is done. I ran 8 miles today with my dad, after doing 5 miles and going climbing yesterday with Kev. The run yesterday felt a bit rough and when I woke up this morning I was exhausted. My dad has the phrase 'courage to start, strength to finish' on his running ID tag and he encouraged me to get out today and run. I felt really good for almost all of the run so I'm glad he got my ass moving.

Total number of runs: 5
Total number of miles: 24.95
Total time: 3 hours, 9 minutes, 23 seconds

Climbing yesterday went really well. I've been to this gym a few times before and never really enjoyed myself, but yesterday I was on some really interesting V4's and V5's. There were a lot of really interesting heel hooks in these climbs, and a lot of stuff that required me to focus and use my core.

I preordered the Ork codex so I hope to have it on January 10th. I'm really excited to have an Ork army, and I've also been giving some thought to starting a small Imperial Guard army. I really like the Vostroyan models and I think that having a 500 - 1000 point army would be fun. My only concern is having to paint that many models, but if I break it all up with my Marines and Orks I think it is pretty manageable.

Marathon training has begun! The past three days have been icy and cold, but I have persevered and I'm feeling good about the whole thing. I'm going to be keeping some stats.

Total number of runs: 3
Total number of miles: 11.79
Total time: 1 hour, 41 minutes, 17 seconds

I am going home today after work, and tomorrow I have another 5 mile run followed by an 8 mile run on Sunday. That's a bit terrifying, since I haven't run more than 7 miles since I was in high school, but also quite exciting.

I finished my Glade Riders and mounted Noble last night. The riders look pretty good, but I'm very happy with the Noble; I think he is the best mini I have painted. His horse was incredibly frustrating to paint, but it looks passable.

Work has been pretty slow this week and I've spent a lot of time surfing the internets looking for diversion. There are a lot of MMA news sites I've been browsing, as well as various Warhammer sites.

The new Halo3 maps are fun, although I'm not thrilled with the 6v6, social format. Spoony and I mostly just dick around on them and I'm hoping they get more competitive when they enter full rotation on the ranked playlists.

I wanted to go on my third run of the week yesterday, but there was a huge snow storm in Boston that rolled in around 1pm and didn't let up until sometime after 8pm. In total, we got about 6 inches of snow and everything is now covered in a cold, wet, and heavy blanket of white.

The two runs I did take were 4 milers that felt very good. I can't recall what the first one was, but I know that the second one was done at an 8 minute mile pace.

Tonight Spoony and I are going to play poker with some of Dar's friends. I haven't played poker in a damn long time, so I anticipate this being an evening where I had a stranger a bunch of my money. The only reason I'm going to go is because it has also been a damn long time since I've seen Dar or Lauren (who is also rumored to be going).

Saturday Laura and I (and maybe Spoon) are going to see I am Legend, and then hopefully I'm going to work on my Warhammer table. Last night I put the basecoat on my last three Glade Riders, so I need to start working on the highlights and flesh to get them done for the end of December.

Laura and I making cookies.

The cookie army.

I've gone on two fantastic runs in the past few days. On Monday I went out for my 5+ mile run. It had snowed over the weekend, and Monday had seen more snow and rain until the late afternoon, so the sidewalks were icy and slushy. Combined with the bitter cold I wasn't terribly excited to get out and spend time running. But I dressed warmly and set out at a slow pace so as not to slip on the ice and it turned into a fantastic run. My clothes kept me warm and my pace kept my breathing easy. It ended up being a 50 minute run (10 minute miles or a 4:22 marathon) and I felt like I could have run the whole thing over.

Yesterday was another cold day, although thankfully most of the ice and slush had been cleared away. I had a 4 mile run planned and I wanted to take it a bit faster than Monday. I reached the 2 mile mark at about 17 minutes (8:30 miles) and felt so good that I picked up the pace to try and get a negative split on the way home. Apparently I was dead on my original pace, because I came home in almost exactly 34 minutes, which translates into about a 3:45 marathon. If I could train to run 8:30 minute miles for the marathon I would be very happy with my time.

After the run, I was so inspired by my success and feeling really good, so I sat down and polished off two of the Glade Riders I had sitting on my desk. I tried a few new things on them, including a less start highlighting scheme on their cloaks and some different techniques for painting the skin. I'm not sure how I feel about the cloaks, but the skin looks a lot better than my first tries (except the faces, which still need work). Overall I am happy with the paint, and they look good on the horses, but the models themselves don't look fantastic. The kits were a bit hard to assemble and these two riders (and probably the other four as well) are looking down, not forward. Oh well.

Laura, Spoony, Steve, Beth, and some other people went to a show on Tuesday night hosted by the Boston's alternative radio station WFNX (I assume this is what they are, I never listen to the radio unless I'm in Spoony's car). The show was a strange collection of bands and took place in a theater, which meant that we were sitting down the whole time.

The first band (whose name escapes me) was pretty good. They were tight and played some solid, if not terribly interesting songs. Mute Math was next. Their sound was definitely something I hadn't heard before, but they had a stage presence that I'm not sure I bought into. After Mute Math was Against Me! who were the reason I was there. They sounded really good, but the performance itself was not what I had hoped; they aren't a band you should see sitting down in a theater with a bunch of people who don't know the words. The penultimate band was The Cold War Kids, and apparently everyone was there to see them. I found their music incredibly boring and unoriginal (they sounded like Radiohead, OK Go, and Maroon Five at various points). Laura, Steve, and I spend most of their set identifying recycled drum and guitar parts and trying to figure out why this band was popular at all. Last to go up was Spoon, who is a very solid band. Despite this, I was ready to leave after The Cold War Kids and didn't really enjoy their set.

I am thinking about going for another quick run after work today, and I'm really excited for a Die Hard Christmas on Monday.

The photo is a bit dark, but these are the first two completed Glade Riders.

My parents come to Boston this weekend to hang out and see my new place. Spoony's parents joined my parents for dinner on Saturday night. The house got a good cleaning, Laura and Christina made two different lasagnas, salad, and cheese cake, and Spoony and I ran around town picking up things. The dinner was delicious and I think everyone had a good time, so I guess we won the dinner party.

The weather has become hostile to biking. There is a ton of very wet snow that means my ride to and from work is a freezing cold, soaking wet affair. I planning on running when I get home, so I don't think I'll be warm or dry until around 7:30pm tonight.

I went climbing at Metro yesterday afternoon but didn't have a very good day. We spent about 15 minutes in the cold at the T station waiting for the shuttle to pick us up and I didn't warm up very well, so I never found my stride. I was working on some cool V4's in the new cave but my arms weren't really into it.