The Butterfly Effect

Today I had what was supposed to be a 2 hour meeting turn into a 5 ½ hour marathon. So, unfortunately, this has basically pushed my entire evening plans back by 2 hours. That means that in a feeble attempt to still do everything I will end up doing everything pretty much half-assed…including this blog! So, just like the movie The Butterfly Effect some small decisions, made by just a few people here in Paris will, in turn, affect my reader’s enjoyment all the way over in North America.

This week is a 0.9 x peak mileage week. I have defined my peak mileage to be 60 miles, which makes this a 54 mile week. Not wanting my extended meeting to put me in a mileage hole on the first day of the week I took off with a little more “purpose” than what was required for an Easy-paced run. I settled into a nice tempo and it just felt good so I decided to entertain the little Jack Daniel’s devil in my mind and sequester my “common sense” Jack Daniels for another day. I cruised the paths of the Bois de Boulogne as follows:

6:54*/7:14/7:14/7:18/7:12/7:11/7:08/6:44** min/mile

* This was, infact, a 7:25 min/mile. Mr. Garmin was acting a little crazy.
** This accelerated pace was caused by the usual sprint across the Champs d’Alysee and my constant desire to get ahead of the pedestrian on the sidewalk who is smoking just ahead of me…unfortunately, just as soon as I pass one pedestrian, I find that I have a new smoker just ahead of me who is violating my right to clean air!

The Bois was alive tonight as I saw an unusually high count of trannys – 5! I guess they are there for all the people who are having a “case of the Mondays” (if you can, recall Office Space for the proper way that line should be said!)

Now going back to my extra long meeting today, I want to capture a key lesson that I learned so I can remember it in the future. Now that I have been in Paris for awhile I am starting to figure out how these business meetings go. If the schedule says 2 hours, it WILL be 4+ hours. If you are presenting first, you better have TONS of slides to show because everyone is still fresh and there WILL be lots of heated debate and discussion. If you are presenting last, prepare a presentation no more than 5 slides and everyone will thank you for letting them go home (FINALLY) for dinner. Today, my presentation was scheduled as one of the last ones. So instead of my usual 0.5-3 hour talk (duration depending on whether or not I present first or last), I prepared 4 slides. Yep, just 4 slides and nobody questioned anything and it was well received! What is the moral of the story here? Why do 100% of the work when you can still look awesome by just doing 10%?!! Ok, that statement is not entirely true...it is just true for work! For running, you will only get out what you put in! (Mom, I know you are reading and I know that you know I am kidding!)

I guess this blog turned out to be OK afterall! Tomorrow is my off day so that means I will be on the Pilates mat being painfully reminded of muscles I never knew that I had.
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