My Last Yoga Class and Ugh, I Washed My Shoes

Yesterday, was my last day as a yoga teacher in Sydney. I boarded the 6:15 train to the city, and was delighted to see the sunrise--the first time after days and days of endless rain.

It was a 7 AM Ashtanga class that went quite well. After class, I did my own practice in the beautiful city studio and then made my way home to start my day with Steven.

Steven took the day off work so we had planned to get our tourist jeans on and explore the city.

Our tourist jeans look a lot like our new skinny jeans by the way.

We took the bus to a quaint nearby neighbourhood called Neutral Bay. It has a small town feel on a heavily trafficked road. We had a morning coffee in the sunshine (oh how we have missed you, dear sunshine).

We strolled along Military Road to Mossman, a larger suburb in North Sydney. Boy, is Mossman ever POSH. Lining the streets were little boutique fashion stores, coffee shops, furniture stores, etc. Soccer moms pushing baby carriages walked along these streets as Porches drove by. And I'm NOT EVEN JOKING. All we needed were some Desperate Housewives running naked down the residential streets.

We found a busy little lane-way off the main strip, and decided to have lunch here. The restaurant is called The Mews, and was actually a bit disappointing. 

Most of the meals were pre-made in the display cabinets, which would be OK, except they didn't even heat my vegetarian lasagne through. It was so heavy and filling that I felt overly stuffed afterwards. Though The Mews is a beautifully presented restaurant, I was quite disappointed with its food.

We did a bit more wandering around the extremely beautiful Mossman area (some of the houses literally looked like CASTLES). Then, we hit up the Chatswood shopping mall to look for new shoes for me. After my beautiful hike on Monday, I was seriously considering scrapping my shoes completely and getting some new kicks. Unfortunately, the shopping malls really couldn't offer me anything I liked enough. 

So when I got home, I rolled up my sleeves and got to work. 

Do you ever get that feeling of satisfaction when you suck every last bit of use out of something? The smug righteousness that happens when you've used these things really properly and well? Like you've wrung out every lasting ounce of value from a product, and you therefore win? Well, I'm clearly winning with these shoes.

I've had these Nikes for over 3 years now. They've journeyed with me to several countries, often multiple times, and hiked and walked and ran so many miles I can't even begin to estimate. These puppies sitting out in the sun now, and I'm excited to bring them back on the road.

You and me, babe, we'll go far.

The Rain, Oh, the Bloody Non-Stop Rain

The last few days here in Sydney have been pretty rainy. In fact, it's honest-to-goodness been raining for a full week, no breaks.

Unfortunately, it's not supposed to stop any time soon.

Rain has brought out the worst in me. On a good day, I spend most of my time squirreled away indoors, reading The Internet and watching too much TV. On days where it rains non-stop? All productivity grinds to a halt. Let me tell you, Steven's lucky I'm still showering (and I'm only doing so because it's the warmest place in the house! Humidity + no indoor heating = really cold house).

Yesterday, I fell to a new low.

I began watching Bachelor Pad 2012. That's right, I'm watching reality show RERUNS, and I'm hooked.

This morning, however, there was a break in the clouds.

Suddenly I got my mojo back! I was more active in these few hours of sunshine than in the past 5 days!

I took a homemade wrap down to Steven during his lunch hour.

We had some Starbucks until he had to go back to the office. Then, I went home, and decided I wasn't going to wait on my run this week. I had sunshine NOW, so I had better haul ass.

It was the muddiest run in my life.

That water was literally FLOWING down the steps, creating muddy puddles everywhere.

However, I don't think I've ever had so much fun on a run before. I was dodging puddles left and right, leaping, jumping, cross stepping like a pro. I loved the patches of sunshine and new green grass on lawns. I even loved the huge hills and massive downhills. I'm definitely going to miss these neighbourhood runs, especially those bush-walky / trail bits that are just so beautiful.

I'm lucky my Vibrams are lightweight, water-happy shoes because I got them soaked.

Post run, I did some stretching, drank about 3 glasses of juice, and showered. Does anyone know how to gracefully get out of sweaty, sticky work-out clothes without pulling a muscle? I need some sort of shoe horn for workout clothes.

My stats:
4.45 miles in 55:07
Average pace 12:22 min / mile