All About Brian

Today's post is dedicated to Brian:

(Goofing off at the Cracker Barrel in Smithfield waiting for a table.)

The last three months have been very good to Brian. Very good.

As most of you know, for the past few years Brian had been hosting the "Saturday Evening Request Program" a few times a month at the local classical music station. As he was talking with people there, he found out that they were integrating a new computer system to help improve the efficiency of the station and the program that they would be using was one that he was very familiar with from his "real" job. So Brian worked for about two months on that project and helped get everything set up.

As the project began coming to an end, it became evident that they would need someone on a more than part time basis to run a section of the system and Brian was offered a full-time job there (his official title is Traffic Manager).

YAY, BRIAN! This was very, very exciting because Brian has always wanted to end back up there working full time. He loves the station's mission and loves the music. In addition to the technical aspects of the job, he's also the permanent on-air substitute announcer and still hosts the request program on Saturday nights twice a month.

He LOVES his new job and the work he's doing. (It's been so nice to have him come home from work EXCITED about what he did during the day, rather than talking about how bored he was all day.)

He also continues to "moonlight" as the Hurricanes press box and locker room reporter.

In other exciting news, Brian is going back to school to finish his degree. He'll be back at THE North Carolina State University and working to finish his B.A. in English (journalism concentration). He'll take 3 classes during the semesters and probably 2–3 classes during the summer sessions and should be done in Fall 2012 (assuming, of course, that he can get all the classes he needs, when he needs them).

He'll be supplementing his on-campus classes with distance education courses. In spring 2011, he'll be taking Introduction to Spanish (FLS 101) and History of the Word Since 1750 (HI 233) on the Web and then Introduction to Editing (ENG 214) on campus on Tuesday and Thursday mornings. His new employer is very supportive of him finishing his degree and doesn't have any problems if he takes classes during the work day, as long as he still works 40 hours each week (which is really easy since he hosts SERP twice a month).

He's excited to get back in the "school" groove and is definitely looking forward to wrapping up his degree. (I, as the resident school geek, am very excited to buy new books and school supplies and find out everything he's learning.) :-)

Yay, Brian!!!

Marine Corps Marathon Photos

http://picasaweb.google.com/lsleblanc82/MarineCorpsMarathon

That is all.

OORAH!

[I hope y'all are having a boring day at work because this is going to be long!]

Marine Corps Marathon? DONE!

I took Friday off from work so that I'd have plenty of time to pack and I got up right about 8 a.m. I had to do some laundry, run the sprinklers (7 sprinklers x 15 mins. each), and pack for me and Brian and then make it to lunch at noon for my friend Maggie's bridal lunch and bridesmaid dress shopping (more on that in a future post). I got all that accomplished and then made it off to lunch in time.

My dad was set to arrive at our house at 4:15 p.m. So when I got home around 4, I packed up the food and drink cooler and got Gatsby packed for Suite Paws and the kitties' room ready for their home alone weekend. When dad got here, we packed all our stuff into his car, loaded Gatsby in the backseat, dropped Gatsby off at Suite Paws, and then headed to WCPE's studios in Wake Forest to pickup Brian.

[I should also mention here that my brother-in-law Clay wasn't able to run the marathon. He started having knee problems about a month out from the marathon and had to pull himself out. Pretty crappy timing, but he's concentrating on rehabbing his knee and hopes to run the Myrtle Beach Marathon in February.]

We got to Richmond around 8 p.m. and picked up my uncle at his house and then headed out to a local Italian restaurant for dinner. We spent the night in Richmond (going to bed pretty early) and then left Saturday morning for D.C. around 10 a.m.

We stayed at a Hampton Inn in Alexandria and after checking into our rooms, we headed to downtown D.C. to the MCM Expo. The expo itself was crowded, but very well organized. Getting to the expo was absolute hell. It was occurring at the same time as the Comedy Central rally with Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart and it was a huge pain in the ass. There were so many flippin' people in D.C.--pedestrians, cars, traffic cops, and not nearly enough parking spaces. Thank goodness we had Brian who was driving and knows D.C. very well. After about AN HOUR we found a parking space in a parking garage and then walked to the expo. We picked up our bibs, shirts, and goodie bags and then walked through some of the vendor booths. Then we bailed because we were starving and eventually found a ridiculously packed (tiny!) Quiznos where we waited about 20 minutes to get our sandwiches and then sat at a table in the corner by the bathrooms. Yuck.

After lunch, Brian took us out to the course start and we drove as much of the course as we could. We drove most of it, but had to cut out a few places because of the the crazy crowds. Driving the course was REALLY helpful. While we were driving, we also had dad's iPhone on speakerphone and we were listening to the Appalachian game via a phone call to mom who had her phone by the computer speakers. It worked wonderfully!

We eventually made it back to the hotel to decompress for a bit and then headed out to pick up Brian's parents and go out to dinner (Italian, again!). Dinner was really good! Afterward, we took Mike and Barb back to the Metro station, bought our passes for Sunday, and then headed to Harris Teeter to buy a few things for Sunday morning breakfast. When we got back to the hotel, I laid out everything I needed for in the morning and packed my "checked" bag for after the race.

I went to bed around 10:30 and laid there until about 11. Then I fell asleep and didn't wake up until my alarm went off at 4:50! I woke right up and got dressed. I wore black capri tights, a gold Livestrong longsleeve shirt, and a custom-made (yay, CafePress!) black t-shirt (and a bright pink headband). The t-shirt said "Breathe In, Breathe Out, Keep Running" on the front and "Laura" and "Marine Corps Marathon 10.31.2010" on the back. I purposely wanted my name on the shirt so that people could cheer for me by name (though, when I make another one, I will have my name on the front AND the back). I also wore bright red velour pants and a red snowflake sweatshirt that I bought from Goodwill over my running outfit to keep warm before the race. I discarded those (purposely hideous) clothes right before the start and the MCM people picked them up and donated them to charity.

After I got dressed I ate breakfast, which consisted of a whole wheat bagel smeared with peanut butter, a banana, and some Gatorade. I also took two Endurolyte pills, which are filled with electrolytes to help reduce cramping. (I've had calf cramping during some of my longer runs, especially when it was hot.) We left the hotel at 5:30 a.m. and Brian dropped us off at the Metro. Brian told us exactly where to go and a train arrived right as we got to the platform. We hopped on and then it dawned on us that we didn't double check that it was the right train (fortunately it was!). We rode a few stops and then got off at the Pentagon. We then had to walk about 20 minutes in the dark around the Pentagon to get to the parking lot where the Runner's Village was located; we also had to go through security at this point.

The marathon gave us a clear bag that we put a sticker on that had our bib number on it that allowed us to check our post-race clothes. We went to UPS truck no. 27 and checked our bags. The UPS drivers drove the trucks to the finish where we were able to pick up our belongings. This worked WONDERFULLY. It allowed Brian to have to bring minimal stuff with him for us (just our cell phones and wallets).

After we checked our bags, we walked to start line (at Arlington) to find our corral (you line up based on expected finish time) and we waited. When we got to the start line it was still completely dark, but fairly shortly the sun started to rise. It was BEAUTIFUL. A great sunrise on a crisp Sunday morning. (It was about 45°.) I drank another Gatorade and ate a Strawberry Yogurt Zone Perfect Bar (about 200 calories). More and more runners started arriving and eventually it was time to lineup. We heard the national anthem (I cried) and chatted with some of the people around us. Then we heard the start cannon (how bad ass is that?) and off we went.

Haha. Just kidding. There were 31,000 runners and we were probably three quarters of the way back in the start crowd, so it took us about 20 minutes to cross the start line. Dad and I walked to the start in a big mass of people, gave each other a final hug, wished each other luck, and then off we went for real!!!

I crossed the start. I was running a marathon. Holy crap, what was I thinking!?!? :-) I was SO excited. Then, I looked to the right and saw the backs of probably 15 runner guys peeing in the woods (a mere 50 yards from the start line). Sentimental personal moment over. HAHAHA. Some lady beside me commented, "That's totally just nerves!" Me, "Yup, but it sure does suck to be a girl."

The first 8 miles or so are mostly flat, but do have 3 pretty serious hills. I ran the first few hills conservatively, killed it on the downhills, and enjoyed the run. There were TONS of spectators and even more runners and lots of people shedding excess clothes.

Between miles 3 and 4, there was a big hill. I decided to walk up it and take one of my GU gels and drink some of my Gatorade/water mix (from my $1 Hello Kitty water bottle that I bought from Target). After I was fueled, I crossed a bridge that took us from Arlington into Georgetown.

Oh my goodness. There were SO many spectators in Georgetown and they were going crazy. It was incredible. It actually made me choke up to think that they were cheering for me. We turned left and headed into a wooded area that followed the Potomac. The crowds thinned out and as I was running out, other runners were heading back in---they were about 2-4 miles ahead of me. And I heard one of them shout, "HEY! LOOK AT THE TURTLES!" OMG, I thought, what a complete jackass. Who the hell says that? Usually runners are so nice. And then three guys dressed as Ninja Turtles ran past me (it was Halloween afterall). HA! The runner community was redeemed.

We made a sharp turn, ran/walked up a big hill, and headed back through Georgetown where the crowds were just as insane. The Georgetown Hoyas cheerleaders were out in full uniform and pompoms! People were BLASTING music and it was like a huge block party. There were also a lot of fraternities out cheering. Tons of great signs. One of the stores had a two story banner hanging down that said, "RUN LIKE YOU STOLE YOUR SHOES!" It was awesome and I felt GREAT. (I also abandoned my Hello Kitty water bottle in Georgetown.)

Then we started moving into downtown D.C. (running by the Watergate Hotel) and I took another gel. The crowds thinned out a bit, but there were still some good, loud spectators. I then turned my focus to Brian because I knew I'd see him at mile 10. Well, mile 10 came and no Brian and I was bummed and then I remembered he said it would be BETWEEN miles 10 and 11, so I kept looking for him and then I saw him in his BRIGHT orange Cleveland Browns shirt. He was looking for me, but didn't see me, so I screamed LEBLANC and he looked over. I slowed down to a walk and he encouraged me and told me that he had missed  seeing my dad, but that he was tracking us both on his laptop and that we were doing great! It was so wonderful to see him. It really kept my spirits up. We said goodbye and I told him I'd see him at mile 16.

Then the course went out on this LONG-ASS peninsula thing that was BORING. It was gorgeous, but there weren't a ton of spectators. I crossed a water station and took another gel. After I finished my water, I remembered that I needed to take more Endurolytes, but I was 3 miles away from a water stop. So (at a risk of TMI) I sucked up as much spit as I could and swallowed each vitamin-sized, chalky pill sans water. Fortunately, I can do this really easily. I was definitely starting to get a bit tired, so I started walking and running. (The race has a 14 minute/mile pace requirement until you get to mile 20 because you have to "beat the bridge" and make it over an Interstate bridge by a certain time so that they can reopen it to traffic.) I was running at about an 11:30 pace, so I knew I could afford to walk some, though I tried to  keep my pace right around 14 minutes. I'd make deals with myself like, "OK, run until you get to the next water station(or mile marker, or whatever)." I got to the half-marathon point right around 2 hours and 30 minutes and tried to figure out what my finish time could be. I knew it wouldn't be under 5 hours, but I thought under 5:30 was plausible. At the end of the peninsula, as I was turning back toward the National Mall, we saw Marine One heading toward the White House and some guy screamed, "OBAMA, I LOVE YOU MAN." I was also near this older lady who looked to be in her late 60s/early 70s. We kept passing each other as we were walking and running at different intervals. She was rocking it!

As we would go past different 5K splits, there would be a clock that was based on the gun time (remember I started 20 minutes after the gun) and then I started freaking out because I knew I had been walking and I was scared that the "beat the bridge" pace was based on the gun time and that I wasn't going to make it and not get to finish. So I really focused. I tried to run as much as I could and looked forward to seeing Brian at mile 16. When I found him, he was with his parents and there was a HUGE crowd of people. So I stopped and talked to them for about a minute. They told me that my dad was about 5 minutes ahead of me and was looking good. Then off I went!

At this point, I was running around the National Mall and I swear to y'all we passed that dang Washington Monument 11ty-billion times. Miles 16-20 took FOREVER as I alternated between walking and jogging. The crowds were great, but I didn't think it would ever end and I was so focused on that damn bridge time that I really didn't enjoy the sights. At each water stop, I'd take a Powerade cup and two water cups and take a gel. I also took two more Endurolytes. I also saw some lady bawling at one point and screaming "I CAN'T GO ON!" and her husband (who was pacing her) was trying to encourage her. I felt really bad for her. I ran pretty solidly from mile 18 to mile 19 and then ran/walked to mile 20 (I knew this point that I was going to make the bridge).

When the bridge started there was a huge sign that said, "THIS BRIDGE IS YOUR BITCH!" and that made me laugh out loud. I also cheered for myself and everyone else. I KNEW at this point that I was going to finish. My left hip hurt and my feet were on fire, but I knew I was going to finish. The bridge took about 2 miles and pretty much never seemed to end. And, I'm not going to like y'all, I knew I was going to finish, so I pretty much walked that whole bridge. I may have jogged for maybe 3 minutes total. Everyone else was walking too. There was no energy and no spectators (it's literally an Interstate HOV bridge) with Interstate traffic on each side.

When the bridge ended, we were in Crystal City and there was a two mile out and back. And this part also took a very long time and it was frustrating on the "out" b/c you could see all the people ahead of you coming "back." The one thing that really kept me going was that I knew I should see my dad because he was ahead of me. There were good crowds here. Finally, I saw my dad and he saw me at the exact same time. We were so happy to see each other. It was awesome. We KNEW we were both going to finish and that was the most important thing. I gave him a quick hug and when I lifted up to hug him my left calf started cramping. We said goodbye and I popped some more Endurolytes (sans water) and continued onward. The "back" portion was a lot more fun because I was able to see all of the people behind me.

I got to the mile 24 marker and water stop and had to decide if I could make it in under 5:30. I did some mental math and knew that I'd have to run the rest of the way at an 11 min/mile pace. I probably could have done it, but I didn't have enough will. I think somewhere back on that bridge, I had subconsciously decided that finishing was enough for me that day and time wasn't important. So, I continued walking and jogging. I should also point out that the course is measured on straight lines at the shortest distance you could possibly run, so because of all the people and the weaving you have to do, I actually ran 26.4 miles (dad actually ran 26.6!). As I got to the last 0.5-0.75 of a mile I busted ass until I hit 26.2 on my Garmin and then I hit stop. Then I walked for a few seconds and came into the entrance of Arlington, which is a big hill and is the last .2 miles of the race. There were tons of crowds and bleachers set up at the finish. There was also a Comcast video camera filming people on a HUGE screen. I summoned all my energy, ran as hard as I could, and crossed the finish.

I was smiling, I was happy, and I WAS DONE. And I saw my dad waiting.

I was given a foil blanket to help keep warm and we walked through a finisher chute where a Marine put a finisher medal around my neck and we went up to the Marine War Memorial where we got our finisher photos made. We took a picture separately and then one together. We walked over to the grass, sat down, and did some stretching. We walked toward the Finish Festival and saw Brian and his parents, all the while deconstructing the race.

At the Finish Festival we picked up our checked bags and went into a building lobby to change.

**DISCLAIMER: If you're easily nauseated by blood, etc., skip this next paragraph.**

I took off my shoes and socks and holy moly did my feet look bad. Fortunately for y'all, I didn't take a picture (I thought Brian was going to puke.) I had 4 blisters, two of of which were the size of a quarter (and one of those was filled with water and blood). My two "index" toes were in bad, bad shape. They had blood blisters all over them and the two toenails had completely worked themselves loose. One is now completely dislocated from my toe bed (held in only by a blister at the top) and the other one will fall out at any time. Both will be gone very soon. (Don't worry, I'm taking good care of everything and keeping it wrapped up.) The blisters are all almost healed, but the toes are still quite painful.

**DISCLAIMER OVER**

After changing, we walked around a bit and saw the seriously long line for the Metro (a block and a half long). We decided to grab something to eat at the festival and dad wanted to do some shopping, so Brian and I camped out on a bench. After about an hour, the Metro lines thinned out and we headed back to the hotel. We each took a long bath and then went out to dinner at a place called Hops (interestingly, I wasn't too hungry), but my meal was delicious. We also went to Baskin Robbins for ice cream!

Monday morning we slept in, ate breakfast in the hotel, and then headed home, stopping in Richmond at the Cracker Barrel. YUM!

Final Thoughts


This race was incredible. The coolest thing I've ever done. We're definitely planning to run it again next year! Now that we know what to expect and all of the logistics involved, dad and I know exactly what we need to do to train (hill workouts and speed runs!). We also both need to lose more weight. I HAVE to lose at least 25 lbs. before I'll be at a really good weight for running.

The United States Marine Corps is awesome. This race was so well organized. The water stations were well-manned and never empty. The Marines were so encouraging, as were all the spectators. It was amazing to have a Marine tell you how inspirational you were or how great you were doing.

It's amazing how many different types of people I saw running the race. Many different shapes, sizes, and ages. And lots of people running for charity or for fallen or active duty military. My dad even saw a lady with a shirt that said, "10/15/2010: Finished Chemo; 10/31/2010: Running Marine Corps Marathon." This race was a true testament of the human spirit and what the body can do!

It sucks to be a girl. Guys just peeled off at will during the race and peed wherever they wanted! Some girls did too, but I figured that I would pee all over myself! I was so worried about my time during the first 20 miles that I wasn't going to stop until I crossed the bridge (all of the portapotty lines were long!). When I got done with the bridge, I just had 4.2 miles left, so I figured I'd just hold it. At the end, it wasn't easy to find a portapotty so I ended up waiting until about 1.5 hours after I finished before I found a bathroom. So I didn't pee from 7:15 a.m. until about 3 p.m. and I drank A LOT of water and Propel. Pretty crazy!

Brian was incredible. He drove us around all day Saturday, spent all day Sunday on his feet cheering and tracking us, and then drove us home on Monday. It really helped to have him there. He was an A#1 crew member.

It was so very nice of Mike and Barb to come up and cheer for us. They also had to do a lot of walking and waiting on Sunday and it really meant a lot. They were excellent cheerleaders and so supportive!

The professional photographers on the course were everywhere! I'll have lots of pictures to post when I'm able to download them!!

I pretty much was a hobbling mess the rest of Sunday, all day Monday, and all day Tuesday. Today, my quads are still sore, but I can walk normally. My toes are definitely still sore and I won't be able to run until they heal a bit more. I'm hoping to take a short walk tomorrow.

Final Numbers


Gun Time: 5:54:53 | Chip Time: 5:37:01 | Garmin 26.2 Time: 5:33:46

Garmin Stats: http://bit.ly/dq4S3r

I can't wait until next year! I will be ready to rock out a strong PR!

Posts forthcoming, topics within

I have pretty much been the worst blogger in the history of blogging for the past few months. I want to get back into the swing of things, so in the next few weeks I'm planning to do some serious blogging. We have been BUSY. Topics I plan to cover (in no particular order) are as follows:

• Two new additions to the family: our kitties Copland and Mozart
• Summer beach trips
• Marine Corps Marathon (this Sunday--OMG!)
• What's next after MCM (did someone say doughnuts?)
• Brian's new job at WCPE (YAY!)
• Aerating and overseeding our lawn
• App. football games
• Kickball and two softball seasons (and why chips and salsa are bad news)
• Our good friends Adam and Maggie who just moved into our neighborhood (and who are getting married next October--Brian and I have been honored to be included in their wedding!)
• Upcoming Thanksgiving cruise to Key West and Cozumel with Brian's parents
• High school class reunions
• New treadmill
• New church and denomination change--we are Lutheran now

And probably a few more that I forgot about...

HELL NO, HE WON'T GO!!!

Do you see a resemblance?

Sally Field playing Norma Rae, a textile worker who tried to unionize her mill, in the 1979 movie.

Gatsby LeBlanc, a dog who stayed at Suite Paws while his mommy and daddy went on vacation over Memorial Day who got mad that he had to eat out the Suite Paws issued food bowl and went on hunger strike.

Yes, that's right. Our little Gatsby did not eat ONE meal (though the peeps at SPs did hook him up with tons of treats) from Friday night to Tuesday night because he didn't like the metal food bowl. When Brian picked him up and brought him home, he came in and ate dinner like it was no problem.

Point taken, Gatsby LeBlanc. Next time you go to Suite Paws your blue bowl will go as well. 

Clearly Master LeBlanc has been taking lessons from his Aunt Callie who tried to launch a kindergarten insurrection in Mrs. Wofford's class at Clyde Campbell Elementary School when she refused to take the fluoride swish and had to be forcefully removed from the classroom when her teacher was fearful that all of the kindergartners would revolt and cavities would rule the planet.

Like his influential role model some 20 years before, Gatsby LeBlanc was removed from the Suite Paws premises before other doggies could be so dangerously influenced by his hunger strike.

IAMS and Purina One are most grateful.

And Aunt Callie hasn't swished since.

May has been good to the LeBlancs!

Ten years ago Brian and I graduated from high school (Brian's reunion is next weekend [super excited for a good opportunity to wear my hot blue dress!] and mine is in August).

My best friend Shannon, my good friend Mary (St. Stephens High School '00 valedictorian), and me after our high school graduation. I was ranked no. 8. Not that I remember or have my transcript upstairs in plastic covering or anything. Just sayin'.


Brian didn't have any digitized high school graduation pics. Don't worry...he looked just as silly as I did in those dumb robes.

Seven years ago I was fixin' to hop on a plane and head to France for 5 weeks:

Atop the Eiffel Tower. Realizing for the first time that I was homesick for a boy and not my parents. (Sorry mom and dad.)

Four years ago today, we were walking down the aisle at our cute little Oak Island chapel:

And then driving home the next day for Game 5 of the NHL Eastern Conference Finals.


This next picture wasn't taken in May, but here we are with the Stanley Cup one month later, right after we got back from our honeymoon (I'd show you a picture from our honeymoon, but someone dropped the camera during the lifeboat drill):

One year and 363 days ago we went from:

to:

I sure hope everything doesn't go to hell when our two year "Fit and Finish Warranty" expires Saturday.

And, one year and five days ago, my baby sister got married and Brian and I were both honored to be a part of it:

I hope all of our future Mays are this good!

Kick and Softballs

Another kickball season has come and gone and we doubled our success. Yes, sir! Last season, we had 1 win. This season, we had 2 wins!!!!!

Hahahahaha. So, we suck, but we had a great time and a fantastic team. A lot of our people are planning to come back next season (in the fall), so we're hoping that not having too much turnover will help us for season 3.

The last few games of the season, Coach Brian moved me from the outfield to the infield (second and third bases) and I really started enjoying playing defense. I made some good, solid plays (catching line drives and popflys) and now I'm really pumped for next season.

I also got better at kicking and did well at sacrificing myself to advance the boys who were already on base in front of me.

Brian also got a lot better. He had some great kicks and got on base quite a bit.

I got so into it that I bought some cleats! I found them at Target; they're actually for girls (they're black and pink) and were on clearance for $4.75!

So, all that kickball nonsuccess got in my blood and after a trip to the Frankie's Fun Park batting cages, my friend Adam convinced me to sign up to play on his coed softball team (also with the Town of Knightdale).

I became a proud member of Team Get Dirty, even though I'm scared of getting hit by the ball.

And tonight was our first game.

And I got hit by the ball.

On a ground ball in the shin, not too hard. And it hurt. Hurt really bad. But I didn't cry and I didn't die and I picked up the ball and threw it in and that was that (except my shin still hurts; really bad).

So, now I'm not quite so scared of the ball. In fact, I even caught a popup that made it to me in the outfield. I even surprised myself. In fact, after I caught it, I said "OH-MY-GOD-I-CAUGHT-IT!!!" :-) I'm such a lame girl.

My first at bat I hit it into the infield and got out running to first. My second at bat I struck out on foul balls. And my third at bat I got a base hit! And actually got cycled around on the bases to third! That was very exciting!!!

So my goals for softball are to continue improving my fielding and throwing speed. (After my popup catch, I dropped one that I shouldn't have.) I also want to improve my base running speed. Oh yeah, and I'm still keeping my goal of "Don't Die." I think that's the best one.

I'd also like to not get hit by the ball again, so I think I'll buy knee-high socks so that I'll look like a real softball player and the other teams will be so intimidated that they'll hit it away from me. ;-)

Sure, that will work.

MCM training officially started this past weekend with a six mile run. I also became a crazy person and agreed to do a 208-mile relay in the mountains of NC and VA with 11 other people in September. You can read about that race on my running blog.

That's pretty much my life.

Gatsby Dog!

Brian and I have always talked about how we wanted to find a good, spacious place to take Gatsby where he could run around off-leash. We can take him to a dog park and he does fine there, but he still gets a little intimidated by the other dogs, so we wanted a place where we could take him where he could run around solo. It also needed to be a place that's fenced in because he would definitely make a break for it if he saw a pepperoni truck drive by. :-)

So, when we started playing kickball, we realized that the field that we play on would be perfect as an impromptu, massive dog run. It's completely gated and usually pretty desolate on the weekends. (It's also not a super incredibly nice field, so it's not like we're taking him out at Knightdale High School or something.)

We took him this afternoon and he had the BEST time. He ran around so fast and played fetch with Brian. After about 20 minutes of crazy-fast running, he collapsed into the grass and just rolled around. It was too cute. He also drank a TON of water from this cool water bottle that we bought at REI last month.

We took a few pictures (http://picasaweb.google.com/lsleblanc82/GatsbyAtEWMS) and two good videos:






It was a fantastic Sunday afternoon!

Fleming's | Southern Ideal Home Show | Kickball

Friday night, Brian and I decided that we wanted to go out to a fancy schmancy dinner because we hadn't been on one as a date in a very long time and it's always fun to spoil yourselves! So, we decided to go to Fleming's (one of the new restaurants at Crabtree). It was VERY good. Though, honestly, I would have probably loved it no matter what because the hostess totally made my week when we got there. I was wearing my cute blue dress that I bought in New York with a half-sweater and my favorite heels. Anyways, the hostess was like "girl, you look beautiful. I just love that dress." And then said it again when we got to the table. She might be my most favorite person in the whole world this week. It was just such an unexpected compliment and totally made my night. The dress is kinda short, so I was feeling a little bit weird (I'm just not used to showing that much skin) and I annoyed poor Brian like 3 times before we left to make sure it looked OK.

So, anyway, the dinner was delicious. They served really good bread and I started with the Fleming's Salad (seasonal greens, candied walnuts, dried cranberries, tomatoes, and croutons with a lemon vinaigrette). My main entrée was a tuna mignon (cooked rare) served with a vinaigrette, halved cherry tomatoes, and three (yes, three) asparaguses. Brian had a prime ribeye and we split some parmesan peppercorn mashed potatoes (all sides are served à la carte). For dessert, we split the chocolate lava cake (rich chocolate cake with a molten chocolate center, served with vanilla ice cream and homemade whipped cream). So yummy. I very much love food. :-)

***

This afternoon, I went with Mike and Barb to the Southern Ideal Home Show at the State Fairgrounds.

I had a good time with them and we even saw Kevin's girlfriend Blair, who was wo-maning the TWC booth.

Other than that, I have to say that I was unimpressed. There were a ton of vendors, but I really didn't see anything new or exciting. There were some cool landscaping stands and some fun swinging hammock things, but everything else had all been done before.

And no one really had any good tips or ideas: it was mostly just here's our product and here's what it looks like installed. :-/

I think Mike and Barb got some good contacts on some different things that they want to do around their house and I wasn't really looking for anything specific, so maybe that's why I was unimpressed. However, I was looking for some cool ideas on landscaping the plant beds in our front yard, but there really wasn't a ton of that kinda stuff. Most of the outdoor stuff was on building patios. I also would have liked to see more cool organization stuff (closet and kitchen organizers, etc.), but there were only a couple booths on that and they were pretty weak.

Maybe I'm just more a fan of going to concept and idea homes to get ideas. Maybe I need the presentation inside the home to get the full effect!

This was the first time I'd ever been in any of the buildings at the fairgrounds (Dorton Arena, the Jim Graham Building, and the Exposition Center), so that was pretty cool.

Oh yeah and evidently I live in a utopia because it never even dawned on my that I might have to pay get in (I'm an idiot). Fortunately, Brian's parents spotted me $9. The sucky thing is that I had a ton of cash yesterday (from winning my March Madness bracket pool at work!), but used it all at the Teeter last night because I hate carrying cash!

***

We are playing kickball again with the Town of Knightdale. We have almost a completely different team (only 2 people from last season are back). I really like our team this time. Lots of really friendly people and we're all trying very hard. Bless our hearts.

Basically, we suck. We're 2-4 on the season at the halfway point. We may improve for the second half of the season, but if we don't, "oh well." It's fun and good exercise.

Thursday I caught a popfly in the outfield (catching popflys is actually more difficult than it seems). I'm pretty sure no one thought I'd catch it. Even the other team complimented me on the catch! It also was a damn good thing I caught it because there were two people on base who definitely would have scored! I also had a good kick to get on base. Yay, me.

New Running Blog!

Just a quick update to let y'all know that I started a new blog:

Runnin' Southern - http://runninsouthern.blogspot.com/

To my 4 readers on this blog: Don't worry! I'm still keeping this one going, but I'm hoping to not bore y'all to tears about running minutia. (If you want to be bored to tears, definitely subscribe to my other blog!)

I figure this way I can focus this blog on personal things going on in life and keep the new blog just for running.

I want to get more involved in the running blogging community and don't want those folks to have to filter through personal posts about Brian and I jetting off to the beach or to App. games.

Go big or go home!

That's what my sister told me when I solicited comments from my Twitter and Facebook friends a few weeks ago about the Marine Corps Marathon.

So, this morning, at 11:36, I went big (and stayed home): I am officially registered for the 35th Annual Marine Corps Marathon on 10/31/2010 and I am SO PUMPED about it. Dad and brother (-in-law) Clay are also registered!

Technically, registration wasn't supposed to start until noon, but because I'm a fantastically OCD fool about this kinda stuff, I knew when it opened early at 11:30! (I clicked that refresh button a lot!) While I was registering, I was e-mailing and texting Dad and Clay so that they could get their registrations in early.

The MCM had 30,000 spots open today (they've already filled other spots with military registration and other early qualifiers) and it does typically sell out, although it usually takes a week or so, so I wasn't really worried that we weren't going to get in, but we all wanted to make sure we got in as soon as possible. It's the 5th largest marathon in the country. More than 11,000 people had signed up by 8 p.m. tonight!

Twenty of the 26 miles are flat and nearly all of the hills are within the first 8 miles. Unfortunately, it ends going uphill, but I've heard that it's a short hill and that you're so pumped by the crowd that your adrenaline pulls you through.

The course starts in Arlington and hugs the Potomac River for a lot of it. It goes by the National Mall and hits up a lot of the major D.C. sites, ending at the Iwo Jima Memorial. Because it's run by the Marines, it has really good organization and the Marines staff the course and the aid stations, which is very cool. Official Course Map.

Each runner is also "trackable" with technology. Spectators can sign up for e-mail or text message alerts that track the start and finish times as well as each 5K during the race. There's also an online map that tracks runners in real-time on a course map. Very cool stuff!

I am so incredibly excited to have my first marathon as a big time one. I'm really looking forward to having a big crowd of spectators through a lot of the course. Hopefully the weather will be good. The average high is 63° and the average low is 44° for October 31, which is an ideal temperature range for running.

The three of us are using the same training schedule and it was created by running coach Jeff Galloway (a former member of the U.S. Olympic Track Team and a contributor to Runner's World). This is the same guy who created the half-marathon training schedule that I used and that worked wonderfully. It's not too time intensive: just two 3-4 mile runs during the week and then a long run on the weekend. As the training distances get closer to marathon distance, the longest runs are three weeks apart. Long (and HOT) runs will be as follows:

• July 10: 12 miles
• July 24: 14 miles
• Aug. 7: 17 miles
• Aug 28: 20 miles
• Sept. 18: 23 miles
• Oct. 9: 26 miles

Because I'll be looking at long runs (2-4 hours at a time) in the hottest part of the summer, I'm planning to get up early on those Saturday (or Sunday) mornings to get the runs in (starting at like 6 a.m.). There's no way I could get through those during the day and no one wants to wait around all day to run 20 miles at 7 p.m. on a Saturday night! :-) I'll then spend the rest of the day floating in the pool or laying on the beach (I'm thinking there's a good chance that we'll be on the coast of NC on July 10, July 24, Aug. 7, and Aug. 28; completely coincidental, of course)! I'll definitely be glad not to have any 20° training runs or roads completely covered in ice and snow!

My ultimate goal is to finish and, of course, stay injury free while training. But I'm thinking right now that my time goal is to finish in under 4:30. That would involve keeping the same pace that I kept in the half marathon, but I expect to be significantly stronger and more fit by October 31, so it should be doable. I'll definitely know more about reasonable pace goals by the end of the summer. (The MCM has a 14 minute/mile pace requirement, which shouldn't be a problem barring any major crises.)

So, that's it for now. It's definitely marathon fever in my little corner of the globe! :-)

Posted Results for Half Marathon

Laura
Overall
Place: 854 out of 1173
Chip Time: 2:15:32 (10:22/mile)
Gun Time: 2:15:51 (19 second difference)

Age Group (25-29)
Place: 109 out of 160

Jay
Overall

Place: 650 out of 1173

Chip Time: 2:06:24 (9:40/mile)

Gun Time: 2:06:53 (18 second difference)

Age Group (50-54)

Place: 24 out of 35

Not bad at all for a couple rookies!

Overall: http://www.ncraces.com/media/OA.HTM

Age Groups: http://www.ncraces.com/media/AG.HTM

Assuming I get in, up next in the distance circuit will be the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington, D.C., on October 31. Registration starts April 7, so I should know more next week! Looking like dad is planning to do this too (peer pressure is tough when you're competitive)! :-)

I had given serious thought to the doing the WDW Marathon in January 2011, but decided against it because I don't want to be doing long training runs in the freezing cold in November and December when everyone else is eating turkey and bonbons by the Christmas tree!

I'm also going to kick my ass into gear with losing weight. (I've been plateaued for a few months and I'm sooo over it!) The plan is to be at least at 125 lbs. by the marathon (22 lbs. down) but ideally I'd like to lose 1 lb./week and get to 118 lbs., which would require some serious diligence, but would pay great dividends in my marathon performance.

On the positive, I've been doing a lot of strength training lately and I'm really starting to see some good definition in my shoulders, chest, and upper arms. Even Brian noticed it yesterday! 

Mom (5K), dad (10K), Clay (10K), Brian (5K), and I (10K) are also doing the Oak Island Lighthouse Race on April 17. This should be a GREAT course. The only hill is over the bridge on the Intracoastal (in the first mile) and everything else is completely flat. We're all very much looking forward to it. I want to finish in at least 60 minutes. Brian's goal is 45 minutes.

Run, run, run!

So, today was the half marathon.

You may have heard something about me running it. I know I haven't mentioned it much.

;-)

The race went soooo well for me and my dad! My Garmin profile of it is online. I ran 2:15:31 (or 10:17/mile) and dad ran 2:06. We were both extremely pleased with our times.

Race day started early and cold! The alarm went off at 5 a.m. because the pickup time for timing chips started at 6 a.m. and dad and I wanted to make sure we had plenty of time to park and figure out where everything was, etc. (The race started at 8 a.m.)

Dad and I each wore our running clothes and over them oversized sweatshirts and sweatpants from when we weighed a lot more! (We both looked kinda ridiculous!) The plan was to have these to keep warm pre-race and then dump them right before the race started. We were just going to throw them off to side and figure that we'd never see them again (that's why we had such old/big clothes)!

The chip pickup was in the Raleigh Convention Center (which is connected to the Marriott) and we were both really familiar with the area because dad's company had a show a few months back in the convention center and he had stayed at the Marriott.

We parked in the garage connected to the convention center, got our chips, checked out the start line outside, and then spent the rest of the morning hanging out in the Marriott lobby. It was PERFECT! There were tons of chairs to sit on, heat, very nice bathrooms, and we were about 30 feet away from the start line, so we didn't have to go outside until 10 minutes before the race started (and were able to put all our excess clothes back in the car).

Right before the race started, dad and I gave each other a hug, commented on how cool it was that we were doing this, and said goodbye. Then the cowbell clanged and off we went!

As I started running, I felt a little emotional; I actually teared up a bit. I was so excited to get going and thought about how 14 months and 2 days ago I weighed 205 lbs. and had never even considered running a half marathon and then today I was feeling great and confident. The emotion passed pretty quickly and I got down to concentrating on my breathing and establishing rhythm and pace.

I ran the first 2 miles pretty quickly for me (under 10 minutes/mile). Running up Hillsborough Street was a challenge. Lots of slight rolling hills and lots of people that were passing me (pretty common at the beginning of a race). When I ran past Tompkins Hall (the English building at NCSU), I thought about all the time I spent there and how hard it used to be for me to trek around campus with all my extra weight and books and laptop. It felt good to be cruising and healthy! When I got to mile 3, a lady beside me said (to no one in particular), "Only 10 more to go." And I replied with, "Actually, 10.1!" That got a few chuckles.

Right after that, I came up to the 2nd water/gatorade stop and I took one of my GU gels. I wanted water, but ended up on the Gatorade side. The cup was super full and I spilled red Gatorade all over my face, neck, and hands. Pretty awesome! Fortunately, mile 4 also had a water stop, so I got a new cup, drank a bit, and then poured the rest all over my hands to keep them from getting sticky! Success!

Between miles 3 and 4, there was a section of the course where the runners farther along double backed along where I was and I was thinking "Damn them for being so fast!" :-) When I got back to that point, there were still a few people on the beginning part of the course and that made me kinda happy because I knew I wouldn't be the last one to finish!

As I was continuing down Hillsborough Street (toward Blue Ridge), we had to stay to the left of the cones on the road because the right of the cones was another part of the course for the way back. Well, all of the sudden, I saw a guy speeding by on a bike making sure everyone was staying left and then a dude running like really fast! Well, it turns out that he was the leader! He was flying! Whereas I was on mile 5, this guy was on mile 9! He had already ran down toward Blue Ridge, through the Museum of Art greenways, over the pedestrian bridge on the Beltline, and back out through Meredith College. Turns out the dude finished in like 1:05. That's like REALLY FAST. He ran less than 5 minute miles!! Everyone on the left the cones clapped for him as he went by. It was pretty cool to see!

When I started going up Blue Ridge Road, I looked back down Hillsborough and there were lots of people behind me! There's a decent hill at that point and it was right at 9 o'clock. I thought of Brian and how his alarm was just going off! When I got to 6.55 miles (halfway), my time was 1:05 and I spent about .25 mile trying to figure out what my time goal should be. 2:10 would be incredible, but I knew that there were serious hills on the greenway portion of the course, so I decided that 2:15 would be my goal.

I took another GU at 7.25 miles at another water stop and then trudged on through the greenway. I tried to accelerate on the downhill portions and then just do my best on the uphills. I had heard another runner (on a blog that I read) say that when she gets to tough hills that she gets really mad at them and tries to use that to her advantage. So, that's what I did. I gritted my teeth and HATED those hills and just pushed through. The stretch of the race my mile time was 11:02, which I thought was pretty fantastic. (That was the only split that I had above the 10s.)

At mile 9.8, I heard someone ask how far we'd gone, so I told her. Other than that and the mention of "10.1" back at mile 3, and thanking a few cheering spectators along the course, I didn't say anything else the whole race!

Mentally, the hardest part of the race was probably miles 10-12. I thought of my best friend Shannon at mile 11 because she told me to think of her when I got there. And then I remembered that she in South Beach visiting a friend, so then I had to stop thinking about her, considering it was 45° and I was at mile 11. :-)

Around that time, I ended up with 2 really obnoxious, super loud girls right behind me. They kept complaining about how much different parts of their bodies hurt and I was trying so hard to stay positive and not let anything negative pop into my mind and I knew that if I kicked it in high gear with 3 miles to go to leave them that I'd run out of steam before the end. So, I listened to them for about another .5 mile, but they must have really been slowing down because eventually I couldn't hear them anymore.

I started counting down the tenths of miles at about mile 11 and that's when I started giving myself pep talks. ("C'mon, girl, you can do it." "You're strong." "Almost done." "You couldn't pay me to stop and walk at this point." "You're a badass." "This is the last hill." "2.1 to go, 2.1, 2.1, 2.1, 2.1. 2 miles to go, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2 etc. OK, we're in the 1s now. 1.9 to go, etc.")

The last little hill (where Hillsborough and Morgan streets split), I felt my legs getting heavy and I was like "NO NO NO. GO. GO. GO. 2 hours 15 minutes. Don't slow. Go" and then I worried that I was running out of energy and should have taken another GU, but once that hill passed, I could hear the crowd at the finish and I kicked it up and the next thing I knew was coming up to the Capitol and then immediately I was at Fayetteville Street for the last down hill into the finish. I was rocking at that point. Running as fast as I could go.

At mile 13, I pushed my lap button (which measures mile split times). And at mile 13.1 I hit it  again. WTF? I still wasn't done! The finish ended up being .06 miles farther (probably due to me running not in a straight line the whole time, which is how they measure courses).

I saw Brian with the camera and tried not to look like a complete moron while he was snapping pictures and my dad was standing there with his medal on and I saw Brian's mom and dad and my mom and I heard them cheering and I was just running (and thinking that I didn't know we got medals and that it was really cool and that I was excited to get a medal).

I crossed the finish, mashed stop on the Garmin, slowed down to a jog/walk, got my medal, and stood there while some volunteer cut the chip off my shoe (thank God you don't have to do that yourself)!

I felt so incredible! I caught my breath and then turned around to find my family!

After the race, I had a banana and a Powerade, we got some 13.1 car stickers and magnets, stretched a bit, and then went home. IT WAS FREEZING!

That hot shower felt SO GOOD!

Lunch was at the Cracker Barrel in Clayton (mom and dad had to head back home today) and it was SO GOOD. It was so fun to have a meal that I didn't care about calories! Biscuits, chicken and dumplins, corn, collard greens, and fried apples. DELICIOUS!

I spent the rest of the afternoon chilling on the couch and then met Brian's mom at Pei Wei for dinner. I had the dan dan noodles, which were SO GOOD. They were so salty and I was craving the salt.

A really awesome, incredible first half marathon!

My knees and hips are a little sore when I go up the stairs and a few of my toenails are nice and purple and painful, but other than that, I'm not doing too badly!

Pictures are up on Picasa.

Tomorrow, I'm planning to take it easy (should be a good day for it; supposed to be cold and rainy). Probably going to do 15-20 easy, easy minutes on the elliptical to get the legs moving (usually, Brian, Gatsby, and I take an easy walk on the day after long runs) and then maybe do some yoga to stretch or upper body strength training.

The Curt Schilling of Half Marathons

Saturday I went to Lassiter Mill for my last weekend run before next weekend's half marathon. The run was 5 miles and went really well (49:47). I was super stoked to average under 10 minutes per mile. It was actually a little hot! There aren't any leaves on the trees yet, so there was absolutely no shade. I think it was about 75°. Regardless, it was a great day to be out.

After my run, I crawled down on the rocks right at Lassiter Mill Dam and did all my stretching. The rocks were super nice and cold and it was so pretty:

After my run, I had to stop by the store to pick up some laundry detergent. While I was there, I looked down at my left shoe and saw that it was pinkish-red in one place. After looking at it for a bit I realized that it was blood.

Awesome.

So after stopping by Subway, I got home to check out the damage. (Don't worry! No photos!)

I have never seen so much blood! The entire top of my sock was completely red from the tip to the ankle and the bottom of the sock was covered from the tip to the arch.

Unsurprisingly, my foot looked about the same. (I was so glad Brian wasn't home; he would have fainted!)

So I stuck my feet in the bathtub to wash them off and to figure out what was up. Turns out, one of my toenails grew a bit weird and was like a millimeter too long and the edge rubbed up against the next toe. After I got it all washed up, I looked at it and the "injury" was no bigger than if you stuck yourself with a pin!! And it doesn't hurt. It's so crazy that it caused so much blood!!

I put my shoes in the washer and they came out looking pretty good. You can still see a little bit of pink if you look hard, but I figure that's OK since they're just running shoes.

I put the shoes out in the sun to dry out and I spent the rest of the afternoon laying in the sun reading a magazine. We went out to Crabtree Tavern with Brian's family for dinner.

Last night, after dinner, we heard Gatsby going crazy upstairs. When Brian went up to check, Gatsby had my (washed) bloody shoe out and was wrestling it around. He's never paid attention to our shoes before, but I guess the blood scent still remains! Pretty funny! (Fortunately, the shoe wasn't messed up!)

Today, I did pretty much nothing except work on a jigsaw puzzle and put away my "winter" (aka Christmas) village. Last year I left it up all year because I forgot about it until the middle of the summer and by that point there was no reason to take it down! This year I was determined to get it down once winter was over! :-)

Yummy supper!

I was very badly craving some pad thai from Pei Wei tonight, but couldn't justify going out to get it because I've been feeling pretty run down today and decided to take a rest day from working out. I searched around on the Internet for some type of noodle dish and then took a few ingredients from one of the recipes and made a super yummy spicy peanut sauce chicken and veggie noodle stir fry. I didn't really measure anything out...just kinda combined ingredients until it tasted good.

Noodles
Boil water and then add noodles. (I used whole wheat linguine.) When they're at the appropriate level of doneness, drain and set aside.


Peanut Sauce
In a small sauce pan over low heat, add a little bit of water and a spoonful of crunchy, natural peanut butter and a dollop of honey. Add some reduced sodium soy sauce, olive oil, garlic powder, ground ginger, lemon (or lime) juice, red pepper flakes (I like heat, so I used a lot of these!), black pepper and stir. Once it heats up, give it a little taste and adjust ingredients as necessary.

Chicken and Veggies
While the sauce is heating up, saute a boneless chicken breast in a bit of olive oil until it's cooked through. Set aside and chop up into bite-size pieces. In the same pan, saute a lot of vegetables (I used Harris Teeter frozen Chinese StirFry vegetables and some mushrooms). Once the veggies are pretty much done, add the sauce, chicken, and noodles and stir and heat everything up.

The whole meal took about 30 minutes to prepare and it's easy to clean nearly everything while it's mixing together at the end.

It was so yummy and not too bad for you if you go easy on the olive oil and peanut butter. The perfect combo of spicy and sweet!

Twelve and a half miles.

(Is 1.5 miles farther than 11 miles.) :-)

Today was my last long training run before the March 27th half marathon. And it went pretty well! All of the stats are up on the Garmin site. My average time was 11:19 minutes per mile and I'm pretty pleased with that because on my last long run (11 miles), I averaged 11:49 minutes per mile (on roughly the same course). My overall time today was 2:21:32.

I'm know now that (barring an injury) I won't have any issues finishing the half. I'm also incredibly stoked because I've finally found the perfect pre-run breakfast to give me sufficient energy without upsetting my stomach. (I won't go into detail, but it's fairly common for endurance runners to have intestinal issues if they don't have the perfect food combos because you're bouncing around your insides for so long.)

Brian and I slept in today until 11 (which was GLORIOUS). So right after I got up, I had breakfast. I had a banana, fat free greek yogurt (with honey on the bottom) (incredible protein source!), 24 (yes I counted!) Cinnamon Streusel Frosted Mini-Wheats (dry), and a bottle of Propel. I watched Friday's Young & The Restless while I ate and afterward went upstairs for a quick bath to shave my legs! (COMPLETELY LOVING non-long-pants season!) Afterwards, I got dressed in the new running outfit I bought last weekend (black Nike capri-length running tights and blue short sleeved Reebok shirt [I can't find a picture online of the shirt!]) and then headed downstairs to mix up some Crystal Light into my water bottles for the Amphipod hydration belt. I also took a Vanilla Bean GU gel.

GU gels are my new favorite thing! In addition to tasting delicious, they really do work! You take one 15 minutes before you start running and then every 45 minutes while you run. They're basically just 100 calories of carbs and sodium to help you sustain energy and replace your electrolytes (if you're sweating like crazy and only drinking water, then your salt balance can get way off). It's amazing how you can feel your body change after taking one. You can also take one at the end of your run to help with recovery. (Sports nutrition science is so interesting!)

I started running at Shelley Lake and then headed south (hoping to end up somewhere around Anderson Drive for my turnaround). This was also my previous plan for my 11 miles; however, I got "lost" on that run and ended up not where I wanted. Well, today, I followed the signs and still wasn't exactly sure where to go and didn't want to waste a lot of time figuring it out (although I did take one spur that ended up being STRAIGHT UP HILL to end up in a damn parking lot!) So I turned around, flew down the hill, and then ran down the Crabtree Creek trail down behind the mall. It was a really good trail and I was able to turn around at 7.5 miles and distanced-it perfectly to finish up right back where I started at Shelley Lake. (GO ME! Completely lucky!)

The weather today was great! Lots of cloud cover and a slight breeze and I felt great all run. At the very end, my butt was a little sore and a few times my toes felt weird, but, all-in-all, I felt fantastic. The hilarious part of the run was the last 1.5 miles back around Shelley Lake. I ended up with these two teenage boys in front of me who would run as fast as they could for  a minute and then end up completely out of breath and walk. They repeated this over and over and would start running right as I was catching up to them. It was clear they weren't doing intervals; they just couldn't pace themselves at all. (I was thinking, "look dudes, I'm at 11.8 miles, I could care less what you're doing.") So anyway, toward the end, they were completely gassed out and then I blew right past them. It was fairly awesome...pretty much like something out of a movie. My motivation song, "Don't Stop Believin'," was blasting on my iPOD and as I was running by, I so, SO, SO wanted to say "ahaha suckers, you got chicked by a slightly overweight 27 year old who just ran 12.5 miles." But I didn't, because I didn't want them to kick my ass. ;-)

So, after I finished running, I found a picnic table and did my cool down stretches and then hopped in the car and drove straight to the Subway in Knightdale for a turkey sub. It was so delicious!

I've pretty much just spent the rest of the day hanging out around the house watching TV. I cooked some whole wheat penne with peppers, mushrooms, and turkey sausage in a balsamic glaze sauce for supper. It was super good.

Oh yeah, and then I made some granola.

A really fantastic day!

Eleven miles ...

• is a long way.
• will make your toes hurt for being in your running shoes for 2 hours and 10 minutes.
• will make your brain stop telling your legs what to do so that when you stop running, it will make you wonder if you're going to collapse and take a good five minutes for the walking to feel normal.
• will make your legs hurt, and your hip, and your knees, and your lower back, and your stomach, and your breasts.
• will make your calves sexy.
• will make you so grateful for the energy gels that you bought at Dick's.
• will make you wish you had bought some type of hydration pack.
• will make you hate the people in front of you at Shelley Lake who are walking six wide with no concept of the fact that people are trying to pass them.
• will make you mad at the City of Raleigh for not marking their trails clearly such that you end up on some random street inside the Beltline or don't take the trail that you wanted and end up on the steepest hill (by Root Elementary School) east of the Eastern Continental Divide.
• will make you feel like crying between miles 9.75 and 10.5.
• will make you simultaneously love and hate running.
• is completely worth it, despite everything.
• will make you so proud of what you can push your body to do.

Today's Run on the Garmin

¡La Biblia Dice Así!

So, if you were to think of adjectives to describe me, I'm pretty sure that religious probably wouldn't appear until somewhere after adjective no. 100. (BTW, hopefully, adjective no. 1 would be humble; hahaha...yeah right!).

Don't get me wrong...I'm not agnostic or athiest or anything, I'm just not the kinda girl who will be citing you Bible verses. In fact, the four years I spent in my high school Sunday school class consisted of walking to the McDonald's and Bojangles or playing Bible Baseball. And let me just tell you, no one wanted me on his or her team for Bible Baseball because everyone realized I knew jack about Bible trivia. In fact, there was only one kid that knew anything about Bible trivia, so everyone wanted to be on his team. By about the middle of my sophomore year, we all pretty much figured out we were screwed if that kid wasn't on our team, so we just said to heck with the teams and read questions out loud while this other kid answered the questions. This probably explains why I suck with religion. :-)

So anyway, I have to say that I was a little concerned when I realized that one of the books on my reading list was the Bible. I knew that there wasn't anyway that I was going to sit down and read it cover to cover, so I sought out my friend Google for help. (The last 15 times I tried to read the Bible cover-to-cover the furthest I got was God smiting Cain.) Mr. Google informed me that there were many ways to read the Bible: cover-to-cover; chronologically in the order that the books were written; or thematically (i.e., pairing an Old Testament, New Testament, and Psalm reading). The English major in me (who firmly believes in how the author's lifetime has an effect on the narrative) led me to decide to go with the chronological order and I'm using the following reading plan:

www.gribblenation.com/personal/laura/Bible_Reading_One_Year.pdf

I should be finished with the whole thing by February 14, 2011. The readings only take about 10 minutes each day, but I'm also reading all of the supplementary material in my Catholic Study Bible as I go (that is, front matter, footnotes, reading guides, and so on). These supplements are really critical to my understanding of everything. It's fascinating to see how different books became part of the canon and how nuances in the Hebrew affect the meaning of the English translation. I'm also particularly struck how each book was formed. Most of the books are pieced together from various sources (down to the verse level), which is incredibly impressive as a literary and historical piece.

One of my history electives at N.C. State was the History of the Old Testament. A lot of what I did in that class is starting to come back to me. I just wish I had kept my notes and essays.

Spiritually, I'm very much enjoying it. It's definitely healthier than Bo-berry biscuits and cajun fries.

BTW, I'm doing all this concurrently with reading Nineteen Eighty Four. And once that's done, I'll be moving on to Vanity Fair.

The Catcher in the Rye

So, the night before we left for New York, I finished reading The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger.

I'm not going to do a full book report or anything, but I will say that I am so happy that I reread it. It is very, very good! Everyone should read it; it's very short.

The book follows the protagonist as he travels around New York City alone for a few days after failing out of his fourth prep school. It was published in 1951.

Holden's problem (aside from being mentally ill and possibly sexually abused) is that he can only see people as black or white. He wants to like everyone, but whenever he comes across a negative character trait, he completely writes off the person and considers him or her a phony. Unsurprisingly, he doesn't really like anyone except for his dead brother and his little sister.

I got a lot out of the book. I'm not going to lie, though, I felt incredibly lonely after finishing it. Like more lonely than I've ever felt after reading a book. Most of the book is just Holden's thoughts and although there are some human interactions, it's mostly just Holden.

As a side note, it was very cool to go to the city right after reading it!

Up next on the list is Nineteen Eighty Four by George Orwell, which I've also already read. I've started reading the first 5 pages and I'm already depressed again. After I finish this one, maybe I can find one that isn't so damn depressing. I also need to go to the library so that I can read some books that aren't already on my bookshelf!

The List

No place in the world that can compare | Final Thoughts

• If you're not up on the hip hop/rap scene, my blog titles are lines from Jay-Z and Alicia Keys' song "Empire State of Mind," which is all about New York City. It's a really good song, but if you're not all about rap, go download just Alicia Keys' R&B version. It's absolutely beautiful and a lot of the lyrics are the same. Her voice is incredible and the piano part is unreal.
• I love my husband. Brian has probably had NYC roads memorized since he was 3 months in utero and, with the help of his Blackberry, he knew all the pertinent subway trains that we needed. We never got lost and the dude is a freaking genius. He knows which routes in and fro the city require tolls, he knows which subway stairwell to take to come up on the right side of the street, and he knows exactly how to tell the cabbie to get to our hotel so that he doesn't drive all over the place and charge us a fortune. It was fantastic for me. I just followed along and went where Brian told me to go with no stress.
• My first actual experience with Manhattan was incredible. We came up from the subway at night right in Times Square. It was complete sensory overload: everything right and wrong with America simultaneously. My head was probably spinning 360°! I haven't been to a lot of places, but I have been to some big cities (namely, London, Paris, and Sydney) and I haven't ever seen anything like New York. The sheer number of skyscrapers is incredible. The only places I can even imagine having a similar phenomenon would be Tokyo, Hong Kong, or Shanghai. Whether they do compare, I have no idea.
• The city didn't feel nearly as dangerous as I would have thought. We never felt weird, not even on the subway at night. I would have been 100% comfortable going around the subway and the city (at least to the places we went) by myself during the day.
• I still don't want to live there. It would be a major pain to have to deal with public transportation every day. I like my car, thankyouverymuch.
• It snowed A LOT in D.C. and Baltimore.
• Smart phones can be very helpful.
• Every Top 40 station in America is playing Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" and Ke$ha's "TiK ToK" four times an hour. Fortunately, we liked both songs.
• I do regret not getting to run while I was up there, but it was absolutely freezing and we did so much walking that I was completely exhausted each morning.
• I do wish we had seen the NYC Public Library building and visited the Natural History Museum. We'll definitely be doing both on our next trip.
• We are incredibly lucky. It snowed 2 feet in Washington 2 hours after we left the area, never snowed a flake in NYC while we were there, and tomorrow they're calling for 18 inches in NYC. Go us!

Yellow cab, gypsy cab, dollar cab, holla back | Sunday & Monday

Sunday

Sunday was our appointed touristy day. We made reservations for a bus tour around Midtown and Downtown. It was very cool! You get on the tour bus at Times Square and then it goes all around the city, stopping at different places. You can hop off at any of the stops and then when you're done, you just head back to the bus stop you got off at and continue the tour with a new bus! Very smart! Our tour went to the following places:

• Times Square
• Greenwich Village
• Empire State Building
• Union Square
• SoHo
• Chinatown
• Little Italy
• East Village
• Rockefeller Center
• World Trade Center Site
• United Nations

So, we started the tour and then hopped off at Little Italy for lunch. We had the most incredible lunch ever. The only time I've ever had better Italian was in Italy. Brian had spaghetti and meatballs and I had eggplant parmesan. It was the real-deal-Italian!

When we got back on the bus, we made it around to the United Nations and then hopped off so that we could walk up to Grand Central Station. The G.C. is very cool in that old school way that just makes train stations so romanticized. A few months ago we watched a History Channel special on Grand Central, so it was very cool to see what we had watched on the show.

As we were heading back to the bus stop, we came across a cool coffee shop: Aroma Espresso Bar, where we sat and chilled for a while. One hot chocolate and one mocha later, we finished our tour and then took the subway to one of the areas around NYU to a nice little bookstore: Shakespeare & Co. We spent a lot of time there decompressing and flipping through books.

Afterward, we went back to Times Square and found an Irish Pub to eat dinner and watch the Super Bowl. Our dinner was fair and the bar scene was completely lame, so we decided to go to a free improv comedy show that I had come across in one of the books I read at the bookstore. The show was the Upright Citizens Brigade and it was supposed to start at 9:30 p.m. and we were supposed to get there at 8:15 p.m. to get free tickets. Well, for some reason, they weren't doing a 9:30 show, but we were able to go in to the 7:30 show that was already in progress and watch the rest of it. We got there around 8:05 and then saw about 2 hours of the show, so I really don't think we missed much and it was FREE! It was incredibly offensive, perverted, and over the top, so, naturally, we loved it! We laughed so hard. I highly recommend it if you're not one to get offended.

After the show, we were tired and it was cold, so we decided to splurge and take a cab back from Manhattan to our hotel. It was about $35, including the tip, so it was expensive, but completely worth it!

Monday

Monday was basically a driving day, but we weren't in too much of a hurry to get back (we picked Gatsby up Tuesday after work), so we slept late and then headed out to find a good pizza place for lunch. We ended up at Nick's Pizza in Queens. It was very, very good and the area in Queens was really cool. We were able to get half the pizza my way and half Brian's way and each ended up bringing home two slices, so it was very excellent to get two meals out of it!

After lunch, we drove through Manhattan so that we could see Central Park West and Harlem and then The Bronx (so that we could hit up all five boroughs). There were SO MANY dog walkers out in CPW. It was sooo funny. If I was rich and lived in NYC, I would definitely be a CPW kinda girl. Gatsby is absolutely a CPW kinda doggie!

After that, it was pretty much just driving until we got to Baltimore and D.C. where it was pretty much just driving with 5 feet snow walls lining the roads! :-)

We ate dinner at the Max and Erma's in Richmond (one of our favorite Ohio restaurants) and then got back to Knightdale around 11 p.m.

These streets will make you feel brand new | Saturday

OR POOR! ;-)

Saturday

Saturday was our shopping day!!! It was also supposed to snow 3-5 inches in the city. We shopped, but, thankfully, it didn't snow! In fact, we didn't see one single flake descend from the heavens the entire trip!!

We woke up Saturday morning, got ready, and headed to Fifth Avenue. We came up out of the subway right by Central Park and the Plaza. Very, very pretty and cool. We started out at the Apple Store, which is basically like every other Apple Store, except it's very I.M. Pei-like with the huge clear cube and an elevator descent into the store.

After Apple, we went to FAO Schwarz. Brian wasn't really psyched about the FAO until he realized that they have a huge, yummy candy section! ;-) I just loved walking through and looking at all the toys. It kinda made me wish that we had a kid to buy for, until I realized that we wouldn't be able to afford to go to NYC if we had a kid, so that feeling passed pretty quickly. ;-) While there, they were having a big sale on holiday-inspired Madame Alexander dolls (of which I have collected since I was a very wee tot!) so I was able to score a cute Raggedy Andy doll for $15! I would have rather had Raggedy Ann, but I guess all the other little girls in America would rather have Raggedy Ann too, so there weren't any left!

After FAO, we found the promised land: Tiffany & Co., Louis Vuitton, Prada, Gucci, and Saks. I found a beautiful pair of $1,200 boots in Gucci that Brian wouldn't let me get. He said something about it being comparable to a mortgage payment, but I didn't really hear him... After that, I was jaded. We walked into Nine West and those shoes looked like crap to me. Ironically, I was wearing shoes from Kohl's, so it's not like I'm really a big spender when it comes to shoes! It's amazing how when you see something that's made really, really well, the others just don't compare. It's probably a good thing that I didn't try them on because they were totally prêt-a-porter and I was prêt to porter them! :-D

We had lunch at a little grille in Trump Tower and it was INCREDIBLE. I had a smoked salmon salad and Brian had a BBQ brisket sandwich. Mad props to Mr. Trump!

After lunch, we hit up a five floor Nike store, Nintendo World, and American Girl Place. I just had to see AGP. All those little girls with their dolls were so cute! Brian's mouth actually dropped when I pointed out to him that the girls were taking their dolls to the "salon" to get the doll's hair styled. I would have been IN HEAVEN if I had been little. Callie would probably pee in her pants. (She still gets baby dolls for Christmas and has the whole American girl ensemble for Molly.) Our last purchase on Fifth Avenue was at Sephora. I got a nice, subtle lipgloss and bought Callie some BeneTint: Rose-tinted lip and cheek stain. I don't actually know what it is, but that's what she wanted. It looks like a vial of blood. Ironically, the Sephora is in the old Charles Scribner's Sons building, which was the publishing house of Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Wolfe, et al. Very cool!

After we were done shopping, we went to 30 Rock and took the elevator to the top. We saw some amazing views and then we eventually happened across the building of my company's NYC office, which was very exciting!

After that, we went back to the hotel and then headed out to Long Island for Brian's hockey game. During the game, I went to a mall and did some shopping (for items I could actually afford!) and I'm not going to lie: I was nervous as hell about driving to the mall by myself and not getting lost. Fortunately, driving on Long Island is nothing like driving in the city and our GPS was awesome. It pinpointed the exact gate where I dropped Brian off, so I was able to go back to the exact same place and it took me right to a parking deck in the mall.

It was success for all. I didn't get lost and the Hurricanes won! While at the mall, I was shopping for an outfit to wear out next weekend when I go visit my friends Shannon and Mandy in Charlotte. I found a very cute dress (in blue) at Express and then headed over to Victoria's Secret to get a strapless bra. While I was there, I FINALLY got around to get my bra fitting done that I'd been wanting to do for forever and I got a bra that I'd been thinking about getting: the BioFit 7-Way, which is very awesome. It's designed to be able to be worn with seven types of tops (strapless, classic, halter, one-strap, crisscross, v-front, and crossback). As you can see, very exciting! BTW, I totally look like the chick on that Web page when I put it on. It's THAT good. ;-) I also got a new body spray: Coconut Passion! Even Brian likes it!

After the game, I picked Brian up and we went to a diner on Long Island with two of Brian's roadgeek friends (Doug and Steve) who Brian ran into at the game. Our diner dinner was very good and the diner was really nice!

Afterward, we kinda wanted to drive around for a bit so we decided to drive over to New Jersey to get gas (which is a heck of a lot cheaper than gas in New York). As an added bonus, it's illegal to pump your own gas in NJ, so Brian didn't have to get out into the freezing cold! We also drove a lot around Manhattan--down to Grand Central Station and all over the place. It was like 1:30 in the morning, but you would have thought it was 9:30 at night! Fortunately, there wasn't much traffic, so it was a great time to drive around!

One hand in the air for the big city | Thursday & Friday

So we survived New York without getting lost, mugged, or pushed in front of a subway train! Haha!

Pictures from our trip are up on Facebook; they should be visible to everyone!

Thursday Night and Friday

I left work on Thursday and headed straight to Lowe's Foods to pick up some granola bars and soft drinks for our cooler (I am the granola bar queen on trips!). When Brian got home, we quickly got the car loaded and headed out. (Brian had taken Gatsby to Suite Paws Thursday morning before work.) We had decided that we would eat dinner at the IHOP in Knightdale because it's close by, good, and usually quick. Well, Thursday night it was good, but not quick. We got stuck with chick who was working her first week at the IHOP and she took for-freaking-ever. I'm not kidding. It took us an HOUR AND A HALF to eat dinner. All we could do was sit back, laugh, and enjoy the lengthy dinner. It was pretty hilarious considering we were driving to Baltimore.

As we left the restaurant, Brian realized that he had left his phone at home, so we had to swing by the house to pick it up. Helluva portent for our trip!! :-) The rest of the drive was very uneventful. We basically just blasted the iPod through most of North Carolina and Virginia until we got into the listening area for WTOP (our favorite FM newsradio station in D.C.).

Our hotel in Baltimore was really cool. It was just a Holiday Inn Express, but it was in an old bank building from the early 1920s. The building had been completely redone, but they kept a lot of the architecture from the original building. It still had the vault and the old elevator shaft visible. One of the hotel employees told me at breakfast that the bank was the only bank in Baltimore to survive the Great Depression.

Friday morning we got up around 9 a.m. to leave the area before the snowpocalypse arrived. We headed to Philly to get cheesesteaks. Well, Brian had a cheesesteak and I had a chicken philly (yes, I forsook my pescetarian diet twice on this trip!). We went to this place called Jim's Steaks and it was pretty good. It came as a recommendation from one of Brian's coworkers; we were trying to avoid the super touristy cheesesteak places because those places typically only have cheesesteaks and I really didn't want to eat beef.

After lunch, we were NYC bound! Oh yeah, and we screwed the state of Delaware by hopping off the interstate before the toll plaza and then getting back on an exit later. Power to the people! We had some traffic coming into the city, but really not too bad for a Friday afternoon. We got to our hotel (another Holiday Inn Express, in Queens) and checked in. Our room was on the first floor, which is actually like the basement. We walked in and there was an A/C unit in the window and I was bummed. Brian was also bummed. So he went back to the front desk and we were able to switch rooms to the third floor. I felt a lot safer being off the ground and our new room had so much more sunlight and a stunning view of the Long Island Expressway! ;-)

After we decompressed for a bit, we got dressed up and caught the (free!) shuttle from our hotel to the subway station, which we took directly to Times Square. We went to the TKTS booth and bought tickets for the off-Broadway show Newsical: The Musical. We only had about an hour before the show started, so we decided to hit up a deli that was down the street from our theatre. I had some huge avocado, cucumber, sprouts, carrots wrap-deal and Brian had an Italian sandwich. Both of them were HUGE; neither of us could finish our meals.

We got to the theatre and we were the first ones there! We were kind worried that maybe it was going to suck because the theatre wasn't too big and no one was there yet, but pretty quickly thereafter it started to fill up and the show was HILARIOUS. It was so funny. It spoofed current events as a musical and we were laughing so hard! (Our favorite was "Hillary Clinton" singing "Who the Hell is Barack?")

After the show, we went back to Times Square and had dessert at ESPN Zone. Really yummy and we got to catch the end of the Canes/Sabres game!

Then we took the subway back to our hotel and waited out in the freezing cold for 15 minutes for the hotel shuttle to pick us up! :-)