Morning!
You guys knew I wouldn’t be home in the D.C. area for long without heading to one of my favorite spots — the C&O Canal Trail!
I headed out there on Saturday morning before Matt and I drove to Richmond to see his brother’s play (which was great, btw).
I know you’ve missed my sweaty mid-run self portraits
It’s been a bit cloudy and gray here in D.C. since I arrived — what’s the deal?! I miss that NC sunshine and blue skies!
I set out to cover a casual 6 miles — no thoughts about pace, just 3 miles out and 3 miles back. Numerous glasses of red wine on Friday night did not lead to a fast (for me) pace, but this was perfect and just what I was in the mood for.
Splits:
- Mile 1: 9:20
- Mile 2: 9:30
- Mile 3: 9:32
- Mile 4: 9:28
- Mile 5: 9:26
- Mile 6: 9:14
Total time: 56:32. Average pace: 9:25. Good times!
There were a lot of people out doing their long Saturday runs with various hydration belts, running groups, etc., so I had fun people watching.
After my run, I raced home, showered, and headed back out to meet miss Gena for lunch at Sweetgreen in Georgetown!
Photo pilfered from Gena
Since the Gtown Sweetgreen has no indoor seating, we got our salads to go and headed over to Dean & Deluca for some hot drinks and warm indoor seats. Perfect!
It was wonderful to see Gena — we hadn’t seen each other since August so we had a lot to catch up on! She just finished up with fall classes as well; she’s doing a post-bacc so we were commiserating about lots of science classes. 🙂
As for lunch, I ordered one of my favorite Sweetgreen salads — the Sabzi. It’s a vegan salad of mixed greens and baby spinach with spicy quinoa, white beans, raw beets, radish, basil, sprouts, and dried cranberries. I also added avocado to the mix and got it topped with balsamic vinaigrette. Delish!
After lunch, Gena and I continued chatting with a short walk over to the Key Bridge. I love this area of the city.
Gena also surprised me with a cute gift — some homemade holiday macaroons! These are raw, vegan, and gluten- and soy-free. And also AMAZINGLY delicious!
The orange ones are pumpkin spice (!) and the darker ones are mocha chip. YUM! Matt and I demolished half the bag just on our drive to Richmond! The recipes are up on Gena’s blog — I might need to recreate these when I get back to NC. 🙂
The show in Richmond on Saturday night was great and it was fun catching up with Matt’s brothers Drew and Chris and Chris’s wife Jess. We drove back from Richmond yesterday morning; we hit up brunch with my mom and grandmother and then spent the day doing Christmas shopping with my mom. My brother arrives in town this morning — I can’t wait to see him!
Catch you later, friends!
