First Post, on Friday the 13th!

Happy Friday the 13th, ironically the day I decide to create a blog. I've been regularly reading running blogs and I thought I might enjoy this. I really like how I decided this unlucky day was THE day to start. Honestly, 13 is my lucky number as of right now, so I do not mind one bit.

I enjoy running, to say the least. I may not be the best, and I am definitely not the fastest. I will probably never win a race, and I almost always have bad technique. But I started off in January 2011 struggling to run half of a mile, and now that concept seems silly to me. Like I said, I'm not fast. I don't have sub-8:00 miles or even sub-10:00 miles. Some days are better than others. I may never have those "easy" miles a lot of runners talk about. And (as of now) I've only done 2 races: one 5K and one 10K. I made it a New Years Resolution to do a half marathon in 2012. I have my sights set on October 14, 2012.

Sidenote: I haven't registered yet.

Want to know why?

Well this blog is called "Running Across the Pond". We've established I like to run, so the other part of the title can't be that tricky.

I'm in the process of moving to England! My long term boyfriend (now fiance) is from England and I just started the process of applying for my settlement visa to move there. It's hard not knowing which continent I'm going to live on in any given month. I can't register for races too far into the future because I might not be in that location! And that's frustrating. But I'm ecstatic for my life to finally be coming together! Applying for a settlement visa was hard work. I'm now waiting for it to (hopefully) get approved, which could take weeks.

And that is why this blog was created! I want to track the trials and tribulations of my running and my process of moving to England. Maybe I can help someone trying to move to England, or even just make some running friends from both sides of the pond. Who knows, this time next year I could be blogging from England writing about running in cold weather (I'm from Florida. Everything is cold.) and trying not to get run over crossing the street! (England drives on the other side of the road... and the other side of the car).

But it's nice to finally become part of this online community!

In running related news, today was a rest day (aka getting frozen yogurt with best friend and not feeling guilty about not running). It was a good choice not to run because it was HOT. Although, it's Florida in the summertime; it's hot 24/7. Surprise! And I'm a Florida native (no I didn't move here from New York or New Jersey or Massachusetts or Pennsylvania or Ontario or any other place people move to Florida from. I know. I'm a rare breed) so that means I should be used to this, right? Wrong. There is no getting used to the humidity, lack of breeze, and pure heat that is south Florida.
I ran 3 miles yesterday. I would attempt to show the splits but I don't like my current GPS system that tracks my runs. I don't think it's calibrated correct and it really throws everything off (the Nike+ chip with iPod touch... if anybody wants to talk gadgets with me, I'm totally for that). I will say that bugs flew into my face for the entire 3 miles. I felt like I was in a road swamp death trap of some sort. The little tiny gnats would just fly into me and stick to my sweat. I know, I'm painting an attractive picture for my first post. But I'm not really the type to sensor these things.
Long story short: 3 miles, first 2 were great (besides the bugs), the 3rd was very sluggish. I did it. I sweat a lot. It was a grand ol' time.

Thanks for stopping by! And it was lovely to "meet" you!