Nine

That is the magic number of days a runner can go without running. Yesterday was the ninth day. I went for a super easy treadmill run/really fast-walk two Thursdays ago, but nothing since then.

And why is this the threshold?

1. It's difficult to tell people you're a marathoner when you haven't run a thing in past 1.5 weeks. One week is fine--you have emergencies, you work late, life happens. But 1.5 is excessive.
2. It's harder to sleep at night. For the past few days I've noticed that I don't sleep as well as I did during training (not that I got a lot of sleep during training, but it was higher quality sleep).
3. It gets harder to breathe (yes, a tip to Maroon 5 for that one). My nose has been getting stuffier and I've been finding it more difficult, overall, to breathe.
4. You read all these running blogs and start to lose your solidarity with them.
5. You can't find your peanut butter because it has retreated to back of the pantry--rather it has been pushed there by all the other food you've been eating while you haven't had to whip it out before a run.
6. You have to start passing up desserts. Anyone who knows me knows that I have never met dessert/baked good/sugar encrusted concoction that I didn't like. But since I'm not burning 3000+ calories a week any more, I'm feeling really bad about that scoop of ice cream after dinner.

But I'm getting back on the wagon TODAY. It is an absolutely perfect day:

• It'll be in the high 50s for the whole run
• There is beautifully sunny
• The only race in Central park today will be over by the time I start running
• I don't have to run at a specific pace
• I didn't have to wake up at 7am this morning to run

Its going to be a great day.