Fartleks, hills and shin splints, oh my.

Yes I said Fartleks. Or typed Fartleks, rather. You may laugh, I'll wait....
Feel better now? Ok, let's move on.
I went for my run this morning and a whopping EIGHT minutes into it, I was demoted back to 'walker' status due to some off-the-charts shin splints. NO idea why I got them this morning versus any other.
I tried to walk slow, run fast, run slow, nothing seemed to help. So I turned around and started for home.
I figured if I couldnt get my normal distance in, I could at least do some fartleks. Real word people, look it up. Lessons 1 that I learned about fartleks: fartleks and fanny packs do not always marry well together. May have to leave my beloved fanny pack at home next time *sigh*
Then I ran up the hill on what would normally be my home stretch on my normal route and for some reason that seemed to make the shin splints a lot better. So I tried it again.... yep, the shins seems to relish in the deliciousness of the hills. So I ended up doing 7 hill repeats today (run up a hill hard, run down easy, rinse and repeat).
It was quite rock star-ish of me actually, I felt quite invinsible. Save for the out of this world breathlessness and gasping for air at the top of each hill like a fish out of water. I am sure the neighbors got quite a chuckle out of watching me.
The out of shape momma running with an overstuffed, out of control fanny pack.

I am the queen of fashion and fartleks, people. Deal with it.