I came, I saw . . . I finished.

So it turns out I don't have ESP. Funny, considering those are my initials. But really. I believe I am anti-clairvoyant, and here's why:

In twelve weeks of running, I have failed to predict the next song to come up on my iPod 100% of the time. That's right, folks. My record stands perfect at zero hits, a bazillion misses.

Futile attempts to develop some degree of musical prescience only made up a fraction of the time I spent on the treadmill, trail, or road over the last three months. I also counted the bricks in my basement fireplace, and may have even, one groggy early morning, confused the complete lack of pattern in their placement for an image of Hugh Jackman. I made grocery lists in my head, air-viola-ed (left hand only, of course), and played the games I use to get myself to sleep at night (ready . . . name a world river starting with each letter of the alphabet . . . Go! Okay, now shoe manufacturers! Good! How about vegetables? Colors? Authors? Car models? Famous actors who can actually act? I could go on . . .) Best of all, I calculated what percentage of my run was complete, and extrapolated calories to have been burned by the finish line.

Anything to pass the time, right? I love to run, I really do, but sometimes I need something mind-numbing to push my body past the point I was sure I could never reach.

This past January, we spent some time at DisneyWorld, and as we headed in to the Magic Kingdom for the day, we caught the tail end of racers competing in the Disney Half Marathon. I surprised myself by tearing up a little -- these people came in all shapes and sizes, ages, and degrees of mobility, and I was utterly inspired. I surprised myself even more when I heard these words come out of my mouth: "I can do that."

My race was this past Saturday. On the registration website, there's a sweet little exit clause for the half-marathoners: no charge to do a last-minute switch to the 10K race, run concurrently on the same course. So when I checked the weather for race day, and saw 100% chance of rain and strong thunderstorms, I was grateful for a back-up plan.

I will not lie: as all of the short-distance runners began peeling away from the pack at 3.5 miles to finish off their race and I realized I had ten more to go, I wanted, as badly as I wanted a baby to FINALLY EXIT MY LOINS ALREADY, to be done. I wanted to pretend I took a wrong turn and ended up at the finish line an hour and a half early. My sweat-and-rain-water-soaked gear (which may never be the same again) would have been no less soaked from the shorter distance.

And I still can't tell you why I didn't. Extreme amounts of will power? Probably not. Mind numbed by a horrid combination of persistent rain, runner's trots (TMI, but thank my lucky stars for gas station bathrooms), and a total lack of pop/rock/hip hop ESP? Perhaps. The prospect of lunch (ahem -- dessert) at the Cheesecake Factory to replenish 1700 calories burned instead of a mere 750? A definite possibility. But after 200 miles run, twelve pounds lost, a (self-diagnosed) bruised metatarsal, a sprained ankle, and a broken (I'm pretty darn sure because otherwise it wouldn't have hurt so darn much) pinky toe, I don't know how I kept going -- I can only quote my effervescent and inimitable LaneyKate, who's first uttered phrase was this: "I did it."

Sleepiness

On the InkMom Scale of Alertness, one being comatose and ten being caffeinated, I wake up every morning at a solid 2. The twins wake up at an 11. They launch from their beds as though shot from a cannon, their little springloaded bodies that have been tightly coiled in sleep all night long finally releasing all the accumulated potential energy into kinetic, bounding, noisy BEING.

Sigh.

It makes me a little crazy. They wake up MayDay, who needs more sleep than they do, before he really should be up. They crawl up in my bed and have loud conversations about whose turn it is to talk. They run laps down the hallway. They operate with all cylinders firing but no direction, something akin to a bouncy ball in a racquetball court: random, crazy, unpredictable, and a little painful if you accidentally cross paths.

I know I should be grateful that they're that excited to go to school -- I mean, I guess I'd rather have to focus their energies enough to get out the door than have to cajole and convince and bribe them into their carseats. By the time they get to school, they have been sufficiently wiggly to expend surplus energy, and, miracle of miracles, they're both actually able to focus on learning/playing. But my goodness! Some sympathy for the sleepy one over here, please!

If the big boys have a good week at school, they get to go camping with Daddy on Friday night. I am thankfully exempt from attendance at this exciting event due to my extremely gravid state. Pregnant women, according to CPod, especially ones with only five weeks remaining, are precluded from sleeping anywhere but a real bed. Which, keep your fingers crossed, means I will get to sleep . . . until I wake up. All by myself. Oh, my goodness. I don't remember the last time I just got to sleep until my internal timer decided to acknowledge daylight.

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So I've been thinking about what it would take for me to wake up as alert and happy as my children are upon their reentry to consciousness. Twelve hours of sleep every night? A gradual transition from sleep to wakefulness instead of the full throttle launch forced on me by the big boys? How about intentionally waking up an hour before the boys do so I can have a period of quiet time in which I am not required to interact with others? Yeah. That will happen.

I just don't think it's in the cards.

They must get it from CPod.

When I was in high school, attending early morning seminary, I was a monster. My mom would come in my room to wake me up at her own physical and emotional peril, because she never knew if I would be throwing verbal projectiles or real ones. I'm better now, but only just -- no more rudeness, unless you count scowling.

My mom maintains that she wasn't a morning person until she taught early-morning seminary. It is her fervent prayer that each of her children will have the same opportunity. I ask her to please refrain from calling such curses down upon my head, because I could seriously curl up in a fetal position right now just thinking about a 5AM alarm every day.

Oh, well. I'll count my blessings. My kids are obviously getting enough sleep, and they love school, and they wake up happy to start the day. I'll try not to put a damper on their enthusiasm with my lack of morning cheer. Let's just hope they don't grow into an attitude as dismal as mine!

I am Gulliver . . .

. . . and today, despite Herculean efforts, the Lilliputians did not win. They had me nearly tied to the floor, but thanks to a rescue from CPod, I wrangled my way out and even put them to bed an hour earlier than usual.

The silence is deafening.