Run Like An Egyptian

As I slightly indicated in an earlier post (which some of you may not have caught), one of the classes I am taking this semester in my graduate program is Middle Egyptian. Yes, that means hieroglyphs. I'm learning how to read (and write) hieroglyphs. You know what this means:

---> COOL PERSON WALKING! <----

One of the first homework assignments our professor gave us was to write our names in Middle Egyptian (FYI - there are 5 phases of the Egyptian language and Middle Egyptian is considered the "classical" form).

I know what you're all thinking - why wasn't I an artist?! I clearly have great, untapped talent in the drawing area.

It reads something like this:

The figure on the end, under which I wrote "woman," is called a determinative. A determinative essentially gives you an idea about what the preceding word could mean. In this case it's identifying me a person, in particular a female person.

Middle Egyptian has lots of determinatives for all kinds of categories. One particular determinative that caught my eye was this one:

I know you're all ignoring the yellow box and looking right at the "testicles" and "vulva." Perverts! But seriously, the Egyptians derived their hieroglyphs from what they saw in the world around them. I guess now we can be sure that ancient Egyptians had balls (phew!).

Back to what I was saying though...the "walking legs" caught my attention because they indicate "motion." This determinative usually goes after a verb of motion (ie. to run), but I thought I'd start being extra cool and hip and add it to my name:

To be read: Kristin - runner!

I told you I was cool. I'm going to sign my name like this from now on. People won't know what hit 'em!

In actual running news, I had my second session of Yasso 800s today. Almost two weeks ago I had my first session, which ended up going really well. This time it went ehh (shoulder shrug). For one, it was ridiculously hot out (I thought 87 degrees was behind us!). For another, I had to go during my lunch since that is the only time the track is open to the public, so the sun was fully blazing. And, lastly, with all the class and homework and general craziness of my schedule this last week, I haven't fallen into a good eating routine and I really haven't been eating enough.

I did five repeats. I meant to do six, but didn't have enough energy. I'm not too upset because the first session was supposed to be four and I did five instead, so this second session would have normally been five anyway.

800 m warm up

5 Yassos, 400 m recovery jogs in between

800 m cool down

Splits: 3:51, 3:56, 3:53, 3:55, 3:55

Final Stats: 4.5 miles, 39:17, 8:43 average pace


My repeats were a little faster last time, but they were more consistent this time, which I think is more important. And, I'm still under 4 minutes, which is fine since I'm shooting for a sub 4 hour marathon.

I'm going to try to do this every Wednesday at my lunch hour every week until the marathon. According to the 10 day forecast we may be saying goodbye to the 80s for good, which means I will be slightly less sweaty and disgusting when I go back to work afterwards!