It’s Wednesday here at rungineered. And you know what that means???

Power Core Wednesday. Or as I like to call it pre-sore core Thursday. Wednesday is a combination of cross training and then planks, Russian twists, and v-ups. V-ups are the devil. But damn if I don’t feel like a rock star when I can pull of a couple of good ones.

Oh. My. Lanta. was I cranky on Tuesday. At one point I referred to myself as a Crankasaurus Rex stomping all over my office, crushing the happiness of the people around me. I even whined to someone “tell me something funny” and she did. And it helped. Temporarily. But by 4:30 I could have put any two year old missing snack time’s pout to shame. Shame I tell you!

I couldn’t figure it out. Yes, I had spent a better part of my morning at the dealership finding out just how much money it would take to make my check engine light go away. But the waiting area was suuuuuuper swanky. And I wasn’t cranky in the morning. I ate lunch. I had a meeting. And then BAM! Crank.

I thought maybe I needed a snack – nothing. Caffeine – nothing. A funny story – nothing. Whining via email – nothing. Meanwhile, on the same day that I scheduled my car to be fixed my phone decided it would no longer accept chargers. Of any kind. Unless I plugged it in and out 14 times, stood on one foot, and held my breath. So I knew a new phone was also in order. Damn.

The Verizon store is one mile away. My scheduled run was 2ish. I thought I’d run there, buy the phone, and run back. I got home and out of the car and it was kind of cold and raining hard and I thought “eff it. I’ll just drive over” and then I stood in the rain and thought about it. And thought about it. And probably looked like a crazy person in the movies – standing in the rain. But the more I thought about it, the more I convinced myself that I would feel better. I changed, grabbed Senor Garmin, and hit the streets. Even walking down to where I wanted to start and waiting for the satellites I was cranky. And then I thought about it a little more and if I ran half, bought the phone, and ran home, my hands would be full. And after stopping I wouldn’t want to start again. So I made a game time decision and picked a 2 mile loop that would land me a little bit before Verizon at 2 miles.

Absolutely no exaggeration (boy did I butcher the spelling of that word. Let’s all give a cheer for spell check) in anyway. 10 steps into my run, the cranky just floated away. Like it was a physical thing that just got up and left.My body said “you are no longer wanted here. GTFO”. The whole run was good. I waved to my favorite bakery. I waved to my friends’ house (they’re married. How do I refer to their house? friends’, friend’s, friend’s’s’s?) I bombed straight up a hill. I ran face first into windy rain and even offered an “I’m gritting it out grimace”. I wrapped it up in front of the Coolidge Corner movie theatre which is such a cool sign. I snapped my accountability photo for my running group, finished off the last two and half minutes of the GymPact. Stretched a little. And then proceeded to stand in the Verizon store for an hour soaked in my own sweat and drenched in rain. (Sorry customer service dude!)

But. BUT! No crank. Even when he struggled and we had to redo some stuff. I just thought – hey whatever, as long as I’m able to come home with a phone that will charge when I tell it to.

I had always heard about people that find running to be a great mind clearer. But my mind is always focused on “OMG dont throw up. Don’t fall. Is this too easy? (bahahahaha) Is this too hard? Could you do better? Why can’t I breathe? I regret all the beer I drank last week, And the chocolate. I do not regret those tacos, though. I can never get my brain to cool it. And suddenly, I did. I just went about kicking my run’s ass.