The moment of truth

I think I might have finally made up my mind to do it. Forget talking about it and thinking about it. I'm going to throw my hat in the ring. I found a marathon up in Washington in April that just looks gorgeous. It's the Yakima River Canyon Marathon, and basically the course just follows along the river at the bottom of an amazing high desert canyon. It's smallish, about 500 runners, with a good mix of fast and slow runners. As an added bonus there aren't a lot of spectators, which I think will be fine with me. That marathon is on April 5. I copied Hal Higdon's training schedule into an Excel spreadsheet and compared it to my upcoming schedule. I'd have to start following his calendar the week of December 3, meaning I have a good six weeks to work on getting my mileage up over twenty and my long run to 8+ miles. Totally doable. I might have a slight hiccup in the middle, since I'm flying back to NY end of December, but luckily the flight out is on a rest day and the flight back is at 7:20 PM, so I shouldn't have a problem fitting in a run in the AM. I am a tad concerned RE: snow at home. It hasn't been terribly snowy the past couple of years, but it easily could snow which would, of course, drive me inside. And I don't think the Vassar indoor track is open during Christmas week. Hmmm. I guess that is something to worry about closer to the date. Maybe I could find an open gym and just get a temp membership or something.