Starting my taper

Yesterday afternoon I ran my last long training run before next month's half-marathon - 13.1 miles. My first time running that far all in one day. I didn't exactly have to, since my training plan gave me some wiggle room by suggesting 11-13 miles, but I wanted to. I am (finally?) learning that I do much better in a competition situation if I have already proven I can do it, whatever it is. In tennis, that means I have more confidence coming back from being down in a game or a set now that I have done precisely that several times; I know it can be done, that I have done it, and that takes away some of the nerves. In running, it means that I feel better about running a distance in a race when I have done it at least once in practice and have a baseline PR to shoot for. The first time I ran a race as an adult (ie not in junior high track), it was a 5K, and I hadn't really run that far yet, and never outdoors in the weather conditions that we had on race day. That meant I was miserable during the last half of the race, because the high humidity and temperature were nothing like the gym, and while I knew I could finish, I wasn't able to stay as strong as I wanted to all the way to the end. So, now that I have run 13.1 miles, in weather that could very well be the way it will be on race day, I feel pretty good.

Not from my 13.1 run yesterday - I wasn't smiling that much at the end!

Now I start to taper, which means progressively less running for the next few weeks, so that my legs are fresher for the start of the race. I hope I don't get too grouchy now that I am running less!

All this is the long way to say that I am still fundraising for brain cancer research, and you can still contribute. I am running with team #NotToday, which was set up by my friends Charlee and Jeremy Hinton as a way to make a difference after Jeremy was diagnosed with a glioblastoma multiforme brain tumor in April 2014. You can find more information and donate here. Just make sure to use the blue and yellow "Make a Donation" button so your donation goes to our team.

Thank you!

Helping Haiti

The blogosphere and traditional news are full of appeals and information about how to give money to help Haiti. We have given money to two of our favorite charities: Doctors Without Borders and Heifer International. It is important to make sure that the charities you give to will use your money wisely, not just now in a time of crisis, but on a regular basis. There are several places online that you can go that evaluate charities. My favorite is Charity Navigator. From their website:

Charity Navigator's rating system examines two broad areas of a charity's financial health -- how responsibly it functions day to day as well as how well positioned it is to sustain its programs over time. Each charity is then awarded an overall rating, ranging from zero to four stars. To help donors avoid becoming victims of mailing-list appeals, each charity's commitment to keeping donors' personal information confidential is assessed.

This information includes the CEO pay, how much money goes to fund-raising and operational costs, versus how much goes to actually doing their charitable work.

The Better Business Bureau also has a database with information about charities for donors.

It's that time of year

Christmas is starting to pop up everywhere. At the grocery store today, the sound system was playing bad versions of Christmas carols. Yesterday at Barnes & Noble, there were large tables full of gift ideas and cards and calendars. The catalogs have started to arrive. I am trying to ignore Christmas for now - it is easier now that I am working - but I have to admit I did do a little shopping this weekend. I bought two new sets of Christmas lights - LED lights that are supposed to use about 90% less energy than traditional lights. The last time I bought lights was back in college, when I had my first apartment and my first tree! I also bought a box of cards, since I found one that I liked. But that is it. I know what I will be getting Benjamin, and most of what I am getting my parents, but I haven't done the shopping. Actually, I won't be doing much shopping anyway, since I hope to be giving things that I have made myself for the most part. And no-one I know really needs any more stuff anyway.

Which brings me to the answer to the question, "What do you get the person who has everything?" - something for someone else! Every year, we make it a point to give money to one of a few charities in honor of our friends and families. A couple of our favorites are Heifer International, Habitat for Humanity, and any local food banks. Whatever group you use, you can check to see how well they use your money at Charity Navigator - they rate groups based on a set of criteria that include how much money actually goes to the people they claim to serve, how much the CEO gets paid, etc.