Long run! 16 miles

Finally, after multiple weeks of other obligations (races, weekend plans and a tropical storm) I got in my long run, in this case a 16 miler around the house. In order to enable multiple water stops on the course without having to drop bottles ahead of time, I did 4 loops around our house to either side, meaning I repeated two different 4 mile loops twice. I started off at 6AM in a light drizzle, but with Betsy, Cole and I leaving to drive to Georgia this afternoon to start our vacation, I had to get the run in or risk missing it all together. I got going, maintaining about 9 min/mile, which was my goal. It really is amazing the amount of wildlife out that early, even in a heavily populated area like where we live! I came across multiple deer, a few rabbits and the wildest were the two miniature dobermans who "chased" after me after loop 3 (causing me to miss 0.4 miles in the course). I finished the first loop with a starting rash, so I ran inside briefly and put on some body glide and had some water before heading out for loop two (I also took a second to give the little Cole-monster a kiss). The second loop saw me getting a bit of tightness and pain again in my right hip this time. Then compensating for that, by loop 3 my left knee started to get sore. But none of it was too terrible, so I kept on going heading into loop 4. Before starting the fourth lap, I ran inside and grabbed Betsy and Cole as they were joining me! We finished the final lap passing the time laughing at Sarah Palin's interview with Katie Couric last night and happily discussing our upcoming vacation! Finished with a total of 16.27 miles, averaging 9:01 min/mile overall. My mile times were 8:50, 9:08, 9:03, 8:54, 8:52, 8:54, 8:53, 9:084, 8:58, 9:16, 9:04, 8:54, 9:08, 9:00, 9:17, 7:46 min/mile.