The weather has finally turned and it is not raining all day which makes getting out and doing things easier. It is still chilly (cold) but at least it is dry now.

I am making headway of Christmas shopping. I have started to buy the gifts that I need for friends in Alexandria. I am still waiting for the Christmas market to open before I can purchase some of the gifts. I do not know why I wait until the last week to do the shopping as I have plenty of time beforehand. I did buy a couple of presents earlier at the Salon Vins.

I went to La Panache for lunch as I want to get in more than one visit before I leave. I always have Friday night dinner there but went for lunch. The formule there is good and the food is always interesting and good. I had butternut squash soup. Butternut squash soup is one of my comfort foods so on a chilly day it was perfect.

The main course was French pot roast. It definitely was comfort food. I am going to miss my meals at La Panache and Toulouse as well when I return to Alexandria.

I will have good meals in Alexandria. They will just be different. I have to say I am looking forward to southern fried chicken at 815 Southside which is just down the street from my house when I return. I am also looking forward to Beignets at Ben Yay’s. I will have those the first morning I am back in Alexandria as I will not have breakfast food in my house.

In the evening, I did the usual run with Run in Toulouse. It is bittersweet as it is the next to last run with the group before my 3 month hiatus in Alexandria. Running in Toulouse is always beautiful, challenging because of the cafes, bollards and other obstacles and fun.

This run was sort of different and not sure as uplifting. I picked the 5:30 pacer 45 minute group. I sort of knew it was not going to be ideal when I saw who was leading it. He is the captain that makes the runs the most difficult. He is somewhat pompous in my opinion. There were 12 of us in the group. For the first part of the run, he ran significantly faster than the posted pace. At one point, I heard a few of the runners complain to him about the pace. He did slow it down some after that. There was one woman who was having trouble keeping up. We did not have a captain at the end of the group so the leader was not always paying attention to the laggards. I decided that I should hold back and run with the woman as I did not want her to feel bad about being at the end. We ended up having a nice Franglish conversation. She is going to the U.S. for a month and will be visiting Charleston. I explained that I lived there and it was a beautiful city. At the end, she thanked me for running with her and I appreciated it.

The end of the ru.. Christmas, Saint Sernin Basilica and exercises. Not something you really see with run groups in DC.