parlez vous anglais?

Sorry for the hiatus, turns out I'm not so good at this posting thing, but I will try and be a bit more consistent as we are in the final countdown for the marathon. April 25. T-20 days.

At least the delay has a sort of logical explanation this time. One of the great perks of being a school teacher

AND living in a Catholic country means that I get an insane amount of time off work around the Easter holidays. I was fortunate enough to have two of my Hockaday friends, Taylor and Amy, come over and wander around Spain and Morocco for a while. It was really nice to be a tourist in Madrid again and experience Spain with fresh eyes.

We spent a few days in Madrid (with a day trip to Toledo) before heading over to Marrakech for three days. I don't really know what I was expecting to find there but it was way more crazy than I could have imagined. I didn't really think I could find a place that could

compete with the smells of New Delhi but Marrakech's streets challenged my senses from the first morning we arrived. Donkeys, freshly slaughtered meat, stale pee, vegetables, spices, fruit, bread. It was crazy. We were all a little hesitant about negotiating the crazy streets of Marrakech but adjusted after a few hours.

I'll update later with some details and pictures of the trip, but I'll leave you for now with a summary of recent runs.

14 last week: one of the most horrible runs ever. OUCH

10 mile this past Friday: actually really great (especially with some help from Amy) and a nice surprise considering I took a 3 day break in Morocco

20 miler on Sunday: the BIG run. It was big. And painful. All of that optimism from the 10 mile pretty much went out the window in the first twenty minutes. Even though I was grandma running near the end, I did finish. My legs aren't really working properly today which is a precursor for how fun it will be to run after children the day after the marathon. Ouch.

Talk soon, Whit