I can’t sleep so figured I’d better finish this up and get it posted!  Last Friday was the big day, the day I was scheduled to take the Nursing Home Administrator Licensing Examination: State Based Examination for Texas.  While I am already licensed in the great State of Kansas, Texas will give you a temporary license; but you have 6 months to take a test on things like room temperatures, how many days worth of non-perishable food items you need to keep on hand, and how quickly your generator needs to kick on if you lose power, (71-81 degrees F, 7 Days, & 10 Seconds).  I was a little nervous going in as most of this stuff I know, but sometimes the way the question is asked can trip you up.  Needless to say – 100 questions & 30 minutes I was out of there with this, I PASSED:    So with that behind me & it being Friday afternoon and all, I definitely deserved a little celebration and I did manage a lovely dinner with the family at a local Mexican joint, which resulted in the consumption of 2 of these beautiful and delicious beverages. And for those of you that know me really well, I’m sure you’re shocked that I only had 2!  But with a 5 year old in tow and a sister and brother in-law that don’t share my love for hooch it was a pretty calm night for AuntJen.  Besides I had yet another test waiting for me on Saturday morning – my long run…yes I had an 18 Miler on the schedule and knew the weather gods were not going to be kind to us.

No we’re not lost, traffic light somewhere around mile 13.

 So Saturday morning, I was up and out the door before the crack of dawn, ready to hit the streets of Dallas with my friends from the 4:40 Pace Group from the Dallas Running Club.  The car said it was 78 at 5:50 am and the sun wasn’t even up yet!  Never mind the humidity in the low 80s. 

This was another tough run, and I wasn’t really looking forward to it, but I had good company and we had a new route and really the miles seemed to fly by.  I will confess that at about mile 15 I was cursing running and ready to quit, but then I made it to mile 16 and it just didn’t seem to make sense to stop!

I did try out my new Injinji Compression Socks and I think I might be in love.

So I’ve passed my test with a month and a half left on the provisional license – the fact that I’m not taking my test on December 6, the day before it expires is a really coup for me a master procrastinator – and I’ve got a solid 18 miler in the books for this training cycle.  I passed the test!

Now, I’m headed to Kansas City this weekend to visit some friends and I’m planning to run the Kansas City Half.  Hard to believe this was my very first race 3 years ago, but more on that later.