whatever

what?? so my 2:00:30.8 1/2 marathon time, apparently isn't really 2:00:30.8 which is totally annoying. not only did they update the website but the results magazine they sent out has some new time, that isn't even close to being under 2 hrs. what i don't understand is that they had me at some higher chip number before then dropped me down to the 2:00:30.8 and now, NOW they tear away my pr and throw it in the toilet. suposed new time is 2:01:12.3. i don't buy it. GET IT RIGHT PEOPLE.
so, ther used to be a massage lady at work. at my old job they would subsidize it so it was $10 for a 1/2 hr. the lady was pretty good and would even put you on the floor and do all kinds of stuff, and for $10 it was a good deal. then at my new company they had a lady. it was $22 for 1/2 hr and i went a few times. she was pretty good and i was like whatever. then she left and they brought in a guy. i was hesitant to go because not only was he charging $35 for a 1/2 hr (what is that?) but he is a senstive pony tail guy and i wasn't sure i like that. but last week i was going crazy with work and sleeping poorly and just feeling terrible so i decided to for over the cash and try it. so, somehow the chair was adjusted perfectly. i hadn't ever been able to relax in one of those things, they always felt weird and i was always a little tense. this time, it was a perfect fit. i told him what hurt and he started right up. at one point he asked how the pressure was, i told him it was good, to which he replied "thank you." this was weirdness number 1. it made me wonder what i might have actually said, did i say something other then what i thot i did? real weird. then he started working on my neck and was more effective then any other neck massage i think i have ever had. then he helped with some shoulder and peck stretches which he followed with an awkward "peck" massage. i think it was innocent. we started talking about running and various things that hurt because of it at which point he started rubbing my arse. now, there is nothing wrong with a good arse massage, especially when ones arse is tight and the other massage lady's had done it in the past, but they would just kind of do it then move on. this dude hung out on my arse for so long that i was laughing to myself thinking that yeah, i was possibly getting molested, right there, and i was paying for it, too. but man, i felt a hell of a lot better after, i might go back in another few weeks.
we are going out for new years this year. i am very excited. we are going to stay at a hotel and have dinner with friends then go to a rock n roll show. did i mention that? the last time we went out for new years we went to the same rock n roll show. same situation, we were out with people who knew people in the band apparently. that new years was at the EMP, we drank way too much and rode on the rides and got sick. all day the next day, so much so that i cried and cried that i had ruined seamus's first new years day. well, this year, we will stay down town at the hotel. anyway, i was going to wear the dress i mentioned last time. the one where the spanks wasn't working. until today. i went to the fabulous james dean down town to get a hair cut. i told the manager that james dean had changed my life. so i was down town without a car and i walked around. and i made the mistake of going to betsy johnson. and i accidentally bought a dress. but the whole thing was weird. i went in just to try stuff on since i already had a betsey johnson dress lined up for the evening but then i just had to try something or 5 on. there was a girl there with her boyfriend/husband/male person, and he was bringing her stuff to try on. well, they don't have mirrors in the dressing rooms, so you have to come out infront of everyone, which i did. all wsa fine and good until the man friend of the lady turned to me and commented on the dress i had on. all he said was that he liked the color because it was an amazing blue, but then it all got weird. the sales lady helping those people kept standing in front of me so i couldn't see in the mirror AND SHE WOULDN'T MOVE. it was really strange. i bought a different dress though but as i was leaving the girl was trying on the blue dress. ha! then eric and the kids came to pick me up.
i paused for a few days just then, now its the end of december, almost. our last water billed showed that by changing our shower head we saved $34 over our last bill. it's the lowest water bill we have had since sirus was born, which kind of conincides with the bathroom remodel with the awesome showerhead that is no longer.
i'll have to write about christmas and the rock band marathon at a later date.

appalation

i am so excigted. yesterday was the company party. it was during the day and sirus came for a little bit. seamus was in preschool so she couldn't make it. santa was there for a bit, but sadly sirus had alreayd left by the time he made his appearance, it was way into sirus's nap time.
the company party is known for the generous raffle that takes place. everyone is given tickets and then each person gets to put their tickets into their choice of drawings. there were some computer games, a few play station 3s, a Wii, some guitar hero 3 and some rock bands. can you tell i work for a game company? there were also some ipods, iphones, nintendo ds's and then some gift certificates for less geeky things, too, like william sonoma, coach and nordstrom. i put our tickets in for the ipod nano, the $500 for the Herb Farm resturant, and for Rock Band. I had already toyed with the idea of getting rock band for eric for xmas, but since its more of a family acitivity since it comes with the guitar, drums and microphone and i have visions of the family rocking out to nirvana and faith no more, i decided that i would get eric something more appropriate for just him. BUT THEN, it was in the raffle and i said what could be more perfect. the guy that runs the company looooves christmas! he finally got to rock band and said that there were 3 to give away - 1 for the ps3, at which point i put my arms in the air and made a big whoohoo noise. so big that he looked over at me wondering what i was doing acting as though i had won even though he hadn't picked the numbers yet, and the other two were xbox or whatever - something we couldn't use. so then he drew the first number, and it was MY NUMBER!! so i whoohooed again and went and picked up my prize!!
then i came home and eric and i at the entire bag of the tastiest kettle corn i have ever experienced. we did wait until the kids were in bed, we didn't really want to share. dude, the kids are going to get to be in our rock band, they don't need kettle corn. AND eric is apparently so excited, even though he didn't realize it, that he dreamt about rock band last night.
twice in the past week people have told me about how they drove in their cars with their little kids (under two) not in car seats. its hard to listen to someone try to tell you how really, its ok. it was only during a snow storm and no one else was on the road, and the other was on the trecherous road to hana in maui. COME ON PEOPLE. luckily everyone turned out ok, but sheesh!!!
spanx. i went and got some. we are going out for new years and i am going to wear a gold betsy johnson dress i got i 2000 but have never worn. it is body hugging. i had actually given it away at one point because i had determined after having the kids i would never be able to fit in it. but now i can. i did just now realize that i think its longer now then it used to be. i think gravity has taken its toll on the knitted nature of the dress and its much longer, but i am ok with that. anyway, i went and got me some spanx because i hear about how they are all the rage. well, yeah, hmm. i don't know. they didnt work for me and made the dress look bad and unnatural. so i will go spank free. okokok, to give the spankx some credit, i got the donna karan version because the sales lade told me that if my dress was at all klingy that the DK would be better. there was no kling, but it wasn't good anyway.
now i am debating going for a run. eric was debating going for a bike ride but easily abandoned the idea when is aid i would go for a run. we are both trying to out laze each other.
we both might win.

celebrity gossip, and then some

Britney's Teen Sister Jamie Lynn Spears Pregnant and apparently Chris Odonnel who i personally hate, well his wife just had their FIFTH baby! that is crazy to me.

there is more, i know it. i just can't deal right now.

totally lame

so, my total favorite show used to be america's next top model. i fell in love with it when adrienne curry won way back when and have watched every eposide since. but now, i might rethink my dedication to it. first, why, WHY did they give that girl that terrible hair, and then WHY did they make her win? aaron illustrated how wrong her hair was best:

also, i hate kiera knightly. i don't know if i mentioned that before. we watched the 3rd pirates of the caribean. its a good movie, better then the 2nd one, the one that made me really hate kiera knightly because she was terrible in it. it really annoys me that she got to hang out with johnny depp that much. really that is what annoys me as much as it does. it doesn't make it any better that she likely had millions of dollars. apparantly she is talented, and i actually think she is quite pretty and she occasionally says something clever. the whole thing annoys me.

best comment ever

Comment from bigdimo2624
im seeing too many "youre so good comments" and not enough "wow youre really gay comments."

i'm not sure what the deal with the song is but the comment made me laugh.

the dentist

today we took the family trip to the dentist. i went first, then eric and then the kids. sirus was in no mood for it, but he is still really young for the dentist. seamus on the otherhand got right into the chair and went through the whole process. she had her teeth counted, 10 on top and 10 on bottom, she had her little teeth polished with cookie dough flavored tooth paste. then she flossed and the dentist came in to see her. he checked her teeth out, and no cavities!! she was such a big girl answering all of the dentists questions and sitting so patiently.

this weekend we took a trip to santa's house to sit on his lap. seamus thought this was great, sirus not so much. seamus went right over to Santa and got up on his lap. this was a little different then last year when she did the army crawl over and gradually approached santa. sirus was very hesitant. we eventually made our way over and only when santa started asking sirus about cars and trucks did sirus decide that this santa guy might be ok. so ok even that sirus made a point to show him that he had cars on both of his shoes. he never did sit on his lap but he did stand infront and we got a decent photo with no parents in it this time.

good day

its raining like crazy in the pacNW. crazy rain. state of emergency. an 1:15 morning commute, 54 minutes of which was the 3.5 miles from the house to the freeway. BS is what i call that. the drive home on the other hand was only 31 minutes, which was good since many people weren't able to make it home. crazy flooding every where.
today on my drive in i saw a bald eagle flying overhead. it was an amazing sight to see. i have seen several in the time that i have lived in the area, although the others were all in renton or near seward park. this one was right as montlake merged onto 520. i feel lucky to have gotten to see something so great, but at the same time it makes me sad to see such things in the city.
babies are better today! after getting sick in the night last night and needing a total bed change over, seamus didn't get sick any more througout the day and was practically bouncing off the walls when i got home. it is great to see her and sirus back to normal!! and i think, just maybe, i missed the whole sickness. there is still time but i migt just be ok.

another victim

poor seamus! she has it now! we are just dropping like flies over here. she was fine when she went to bed but at about midnight i awoke the the sound of seamus feet running around. i got up to find her in the bathroom washing her hands and trying to clean up what had happened. poor little girl. i finished cleaning her up, the floor up and her bed up, put clean sheets on her bed. while doing this she needed to get sick again and i took her right into the bathroom. when she was done she looked at me with the hugest, most proud smile and told me how she didn't get any on the floor!! so we put her back into bed and i brought out a giant plastic storage box that was almost as high as her bed. i set it next to her bed and told her to try to aim for it if she got sick again. i made a bed on the living room floor so i could keep an ear out for her. sure enough she started up again, but once again was so excited that she didnt get any on the floor! such a sweet heart!
now i am counting down the hours until i get it. eric managed to drop 8 pounds, not good pounds, but still impressive. at this point i might actaully die if i dropped 8 pounds. our kids usually have cute little pot bellies, but poor sirus is skinny as a rail! hope they get better soon.

woe is the family

so saturday morning i had a drs appointment because i thought maybe i had a sinus infection. after sirus's spewing on friday i thot maybe i would take him instead. but he seemed fine in the morning and although i felt better i went anyway. so apparently all of my simptoms all the way to the point of how my teeth ache and how i was planning on talkng to the dentist about it at my up coming appointment made my dr beleive that maybe i need some antibiotics. interesting to me though is that i have fluid build up in my right ear and maybe even some scar tissue she said. yes, the ear that i can't really hear out of, the ear that plugs up at mile 3 of any cold-ish weather run, the ear that when i had the vertigo back in the early days of seamus's pregnancy the doctor then said maybe i should get that checked out, but yeah, i didn't. so yeah, maybe i might now. probably not.
but i got me some antibiotics then went home. then it started to snow. big huge flakes! then it was time to take seamus to a preschool friend's birthday party and sit in traffic for an hour and park miles away and slop through the slush, but she had fun and i got a migraine.
we came home and had some dinner. my head hurt so much that when i took seamus to bed she wanted to sleep in the lid of a giant under the bed storage box, so i let her. i went to bed at 8. seamus was apparently still in the box when eric checked on her at 10. he moved her onto her bed. i was passed out until i was so rudely awoken by eric puking. first thought - was it the stubby beer he had with dinner or maybe the margarhita he was drinking when i went to bed? 2nd thot since i felt terrible was that it was food poisoning. he was up for most of the night puking. nice. i got out of be at almost 8 in the morning. seamus was up but sirus was still asleep. i went in to check on him and he had thrown up all over. poor little guy, why didn't he let us know? i tossed him in the tub and cleaned up his room. i had a super model gig to go to but i canceled because with the total male population throwing up all over the house, there was no way i would leave eric alone with 2 kids like that. so instead, we called the doctor, the same one i went to see the day before and told her about sirus. stomach virus that has been going around was the diagnosis. poor little guy was miserable. he and eric just layed on the couch which was missing some cushions since they are at the dry cleaners costing $160 t be cleaned after friday's throw up fest. at least it wasn't the carpet!!
seamus and i, on the other hand, jumped into the car to go to bellevue square which for some reason she kept calling barbie square. we had a lot of fun. we shopped and shopped and shopped. she was hilarious. at nordstrom i tried on a crazy sequin betsy johnson dress. seamus was having fun with the mirrors in the dressing room but stopped long enough to tell me i looked like a rock star. then, there are two tall pillars that are probably 18inches apart and they both have mirrors on all four sides. seamus was playing inbetween them checking her self out and noticing that there were infinity of her in there. at one point she hopped out and said "mom!! there are a bunch of seamus's in there!!" it was the funniest thing i think i have ever heard her say. after we looked at all of the seamus's, we went and had lunch at the cheesecake factory. we split a plate of sliders which are little hamburgers which i now love after having them in new york. seamus thought they were pretty neat because they were just her size.
we got in the car to come home but seamus wasn't done shopping yet. she said she wanted to go to uvillage, so we went. she was losing interest pretty quickly even though she said she didnt want to go home yet.
at home, poor eric and sirus. they were exactly where we left them, all sprawled out on the couch, only now there were waterproof matress pads all over the couch and on the floor by it and the affectionatly named puke bowl. sirus did seem better by the time he went to bed, but yesterday he seemed totally fine. lets hope that he is all better now and that eric has a speedy recovery as well. oh and yeah, that no one else gets it! yikes!

relapse

so, sunday was the race. monday i went to work fyt felt like arse, headed home early with a fever. tuesday i just stayed home with the fever but by the end of the day i was feeling better. i did work on tuesday but just being home and being able to take a nap in the afternoon did me wonders. another plus to staying home was that i was able to take seamus to preschool and pick her up. i made eric and sirus go with me and i made them go inside to drop her off since i wasn't sure what all needed to be done, but it was fun and she was cute. she did have a complete meltdown before we left the house because i made her change out of her pink tights with flowers, camoflauge shorts and brown dress and gasp! i made her put on some pants!! she kept screaming that those were 4 year old pants and that she couldn't wear them until she was 4 and then she would flail and throw her body all over the place. apparently she has said this to eric before, too but he just ignored it and got out something else for her to wear. only after it all settled down did i realize the problem. when she first got the pants they were way too big on her, and i do remember saying that maybe they would fit her when she was 4.
wednesday i still felt like crap and thursday i felt like crapola. i don't remember anything about either of those days at work and i don't remember anything about those evenings either. today i was still feeling a little arse like and my head was full of snot. my sinuses were killing me and my head hurt so i called the doctor to make an appointment. i got in on a saturday but now that i am home i am feeling better so i wonder if i will go in there totally healthy. don't know.
when i came home from work i could see eric through the window in just a t-shirt and boxer shorts running around the house. apparently eric had sat down at the kids little table to try to get sirus to eat since he hadn't eaten any of his dinner. sirus walked up to him and just threw up on him. he then threw up again. then i came home. i picked him up and cuddled him. he was resting on my shoulder and threw up all down my back then another time on the tile floor. i then took him up to his room and we sat on the rocking chair and watched his biker lamp for a while. i asked him if he wanted to lay in his bed and he quietly said yeah. i asked if he wanted me to lie down with him and he quietly said yeah. then i asked him if he wanted me to sing to him and he quietly said yeah which was shocking because he usually screams nonono when i sing. he made himself laugh a little bit and then he just kind of relaxed. i asked him if it was ok if i turned out the light and he quietly said yeah. the little guy is such a sweetheart, its so sad that he isn't feeling well. hopefully he will be better in the morning.
my body on the otherhand has been dealing with my sickness in some weird ways. the other day all of my organs felt like they were going to fall out of my body. thank godness that passed. now i am just dealing with how my body is ridding itself of all the toxins - by giant crazy zits on my chin. GIANT. like, i don't even know what these things are and am a little concerned about even going to the doctors tomorrow with them because i am pretty sure, me, the zits and the doctor won't all fit in that little examination room. HUGE i tell you.
eric asked me to stop at the likker store on the way home from work. in this house we get our tequilia by the gallon. when i went to the cashier, the guy paused and looked at me. i could tell he was thinking - ok, so this lady looks like she is 40 but she has the remains of what looks to have been a great hairdoo and those zits! could she be? hmm, i don't know. do i card her? and no, he didn't, instead he said credit or debit? and off i went with the gallon of tequilla.

knocked up

saturday i decided to go for a little jog outside to test two things - how i was feeling and my sweet new gear. it was so cold out but my choice in clothing was pretty good. i love my new knickers and my apparently anatomically left and right socks, which i bought by accident work great, too. i went further and harder then i prolly should have but it was so cold and i wanted to get in a 1/2 hr. i decided that i could at least start the race on sunday and that i could wear the knickers and shirt since i would have worn them and washed them avoiding the no new on race day. i would not wear the new socks though since i forgot to wash them.
we loaded the kids in the car and took a trip to blockbuster. seamus picked out peter pan and i picked out knocked up. i had heard from several people and had read several reviews that it was a good movie. for the most part it was but it was the longest movie ever. that could have been because we apparently picked out the version that had 25 extra minutes in it. i also felt that a lot of the improvization betwen seth whoever and paul rudd felt really forced and over used. i really lkes katherine heigel in it despite really not liking her very much and i am srry, she would have never tried to make it work with that guy in real life. despite all of this, twice, yes two times during the movie i was brought to tears. NO ONE expected that. once when the sister was telling whats his name that she likes spiderman, too and the other was at the end. i am struggling every day as to what to do about our baby situation and i just bawled and bawled. i had thrown out the bottle sterilizer on saturday too which was weird and made me sad. i just don't think i am done yet.
saturday night i couldn't fall asleep. at all. the alarm went off at 545 and everyone started to wake up and get ready to go. there was no traffic like there was last year and there was no rain either, but it was cold. eric and i made a plan that he would be at mile 4 with various clothing items incase i needed to adjust what i was wearing and/or if i needed to stop racing. i got out at the EMP and stood on the vent with about 30 other people since it was about 1/2 a degree warmer. then the walkers went off. we all started lining up, and mashed with the thousands of other people at the start i was feeling pretty much ok. i threw out the garbage bag i had brought but did keep on eric's ratty old 2002 team cliff bar work shirt. then the horn blew and off we went. i stuck to the 1:45 pace guy for a while. at around mile 2 in the international district, i saw eric and the kids. they had my stuff but i didn't need any of it. i can't remember when i ditched the cliff bar shirt, but i did drape it on the side of trash can by a bus stop, so i hope someone who needs a shirt found it and put it on. i stayed on that 1:45 guy until we hit a hill somewhere between 2 and 3 and he dropped his sign down into the crowd somewhere and i never saw it again. the tunnel was warm and then at the water station at mile 6 a girl slipped on an empty cup and fell flat on her face. she got up and kept running for a little bit and then stopped. i don't know what happened to her after that. i was still doing ok but was really starting to think about stopping. it was cold along the water and you could see everyone's breath. i had worn my ipod and was glad i did. it covered up my heavy breathing and made me unaware of the inevitable ear clog i get at mile 3 of every run that is even slightly cold. i was getting worried about the steep uphill on galer and then the forever hill of madison because i knew it was coming soon. during the summer eric and i drove it and i was amazed. i had told him i was an animal for being able run it last year. this year i was worried but then i saw eric and the kids sitting on the side of the road freezing their arses off just to cheer me on! when i got to galer i took tiny tiny steps and i don't think my breathing changed at all. the turn onto madison went well, too. it went by super quick and i was suprised to see specators on the sidelines with big bins of pretzels and gummy bears. at the top it was time to head down the arboretum. i was thinking about stopping. vere left onto interlaken and the foreverness of interlaken goes on and on. it is brutal since its all sort of up hill and it is FOREVER. the kids had hiked into it somewhere and i got a hand slap from seamus which was fun!! when the interlaken was done at around mile 10 there is a slight downhill to a water stop and i did stop to walk. for a while. it was becoming very obvious that i really do need new shoes and in looking at my watch i knew i wasn't going to break 2hrs, so i said i wouldn't kill myself. i even entertained the idea of walking the last three miles but since there wouldn't be an * next to my name point out that i was sick, i knew i could be a little above 2 but not like 1/2 hr above it. i started to run again. for a little bit. at mile 11 i walked again. but i ran all the uphills and all the down hills. at mile 12 i walked some more. a lot. i couldn't believe i was walking in the last mile. then i passed a volunteer who said .4 mile to go. i started to run and i started to run pretty fast and i felt good!! my breathing wasn't stressed and my legs felt awesome. i passed the finish line and the clocked said 2:01:59.5. I was ok with that despite it not being under 2. the recovery area was a mess. they just mashed thousands of people in that hot stuffy room. there was no traffic control in that room so i had to leave. i was meeting eric and the kids and mcdonalds and managed to find my way there pretty easily but just as i was 20 feet away i saw a black passat pulling out. i checked the license plate and was like, how many can there be that end in those three letters!! i ran towards them - what are you doing??? they had far exceeded the time limit there. he said they were going to drive around. yikes! i told him if i would have seen him drive away the world would have opened up and swallowed us all, it would have been that bad.
went home, showered, napped and then we all went for a drive.
today i feel like arse. i am way sicker then i was last week. i found out that my official chip time was 2:00:30.8 a PR but NOT UNDER 2. totaly messing with me. i did learn a few things at the race though. apparently when my legs start hurting more then anything and i feel like i have to walk, i just really need to speed it up a bit like i did at the end of this race. HAD I REALIZED THAT earlier i would have been under 2. eric said when i saw him in interlaken i was on pace to do 1:55 which i believe since i did all the walking after that point. next time i will not be so sick, i will have shoes that aren't so worn out, i will have traveled less in the weeks prior to race day and i will continue to do more longer runs on the weekends. i might also not give up on the speed workouts!

dude, i am sick

but i am getting better.
wednesday at work it started. or maybe it was tuesday evening i am not sure, but wedensday evening it was certain that i had a 100 degree fever and i couldn't fall asleep. and i kept eric awake all night because of it. thursday was thanksgiving. we went to eric's sister's house. she is getting ready to move to vegas and boy seamus sure isn't goin to know what to do when reality sets in about that one. seamus and triniti held hands the entire time we were there. dinner was tasty and i fell asleep on the couch despite 6 kids running around screaming, football blaring and everyone yapping all over the place. when we got home i found i had a 101.4 fever. sweet. i took some tylonol pm at 9 but couldn't fall asleep. at 1230 i asked eric to rub my one leg since it was what was keeping me awake. he did and i passed right out. and he slept on the couch so he could get some sleep in. morning time came and i felt better. seamus and i went down town to to pick up my race packet (race shirt is BRIGHT YELLOW, and to do some shopping. i love the nike store. i love their running clothes. i held back and only purchsed a fraction of what i was looking at. then i came home and sorted through all my stuff and put a bunch in the trash or into the goodwill pile. i threw out a bunch of underpants, too. eric grabbed a white pair out of the trash and said i couldn't throw them away. i said yes i can and back in they went. then seamus started freaking out yelling "don't throw away my ghost! i want my ghost! don't throw it away". funny.
we are watching the movie elf, one of my favorites. i hope i feel better.

mis-representing

after i got home from NYC i spent a day in the office here then got up at 4am on thursday to head to LA. they called my name to the podium and i was hoping my upgrade went through, but it didn't. instead they wanted to move me further back in the plane so that a family could sit together. i was fine with that, but what is it with people?? once again i was traveling with a collegue. we boarded at the same time although my seat was now way in the back of the plane. when she got to her row she started to put her laptop bag in the overhead compartment when some dude essentially pushed her out of the way and was like "uh uh. that spot is taken. he then put his totally open suitcase up in there and messed around with it. totally lame. the family that bumped me out of my seat made space for her, so that was nice of them. i fell asleep pretty much as soon as i sat down. an hour later i woke up and the woman and guy next to me were having the most boring conversation ever. not only that but while i was sleeping the lady put all her garbage under my legs in my seat area. she also put her arm way over the arm rest border. she was a normal sized woman and didnt need the space so i was totally annoyed. we got to la, got the car and got to the office. its always great to see the LA team and it was my first time to their office. they have internet for everyone. we had a huge chinese lunch and then hung at the office. we then had some great margarhitas and i had a totally crazy delicious chocolate box filled with white chocolate mousse and berries. SO TASTY. i wonder why i came back feeling like crap? i could barely stay awake long enough to watch survivor!! kelly picked me up in the morning and we went for a run along the beach in manhattan beach and saw the beverly 90210 beach house. i was now feeling considerably better. the LA team convinced us to catch and earlier flight so after lunch we headed to the airport. i got on the plane, went to my row and WHO was sitting there in the middle seat? the boring guy from the boring conversation from my first flight. he recognized me and we had a laugh. i told him it must be fate because the first flight that wasn't even my seat. he said it wasn't his either - he got moved so a family could sit together. weird. then i told him i wasn't even supposed to be on that flight home, and he said he had caught an earlier flight as well. weird. then we chatted and he gave me all the same lines he had given the boring lady on the way down. it was weird. he was a nice guy, i will give him that, but it was weird.
i got home in time to give sirus a kiss good night and to take seamus to bed.
saturday i took seamus to see Disney Princess Wishes ON ICE. it was fun. before the show we walked through seattle center. there are some fun carnival rides, so i stuck seamus on one and round and round she went. later we met up with the cousins and seamus wsa on cloud 9. the show was entertaining, but i hate to admit that Dancing with the Stars on Tour was more entertaining but seamus really liked it and that is what is important. she got some binoculars, too, which is good because she has always wanted some.
i am totally upset and embarrassed. i have been going around telling people that i like the show nip/tuck. i watched two episodes in a row, the first two of the new season i think where the docotrs had just moved to LA. i thought the show was great and told everyone. but then today. TODAY!! we watched a tivo'ed episode. and IT WAS NOT GOOD. eric said he was suprised when i said i liked the show becaus he KNEW WHAT IT WAS ABOUT. i didn't know. now i need to track down every person that i may have told that i liked it to and told them i had no idea what i was talking about.
the seattle 1/2 marathon is next sunday. i have not been running as much as i should, or maybe i have been tapering really well?
and now it is late and i have to go to bed so that i can go to work tomorrow.

NYC + maui part 3

the ny trip was good. sunday at 345 am the phone rang and someone was leaving a message. i couldn't hear it but figured that if it was important they would call back. no call back. i got up at 6 and was about ready to leave the house at 615 when i checked the message. it was the airline saying my flight was delayed 2 hrs. nice. through all my message playing and subsequent airline calling, seamus woke up. i told her to get her clothes on, we were going out for breakfast. we drove around for 45 minutes - out to the u district, eastlake, capitol hill - nothing was open!! we wound up at starbucks. seamus was irritated because i told her she could eat cereal at a resturant but the chocolte donut eased the pain. but as soon as we got home she wanted cereal. then i went to the airport. the flight was good, i think. i do'nt remember. we caught a cab, checked in then went looking fro dinner. and the start of my terrible week of gourging and weight gain began. we had some of the best indian food i have had in a long time. it was damn tasty. the next morning i overcame my fear and went running in central park. i did two laps around the south portion of the park. it is not scary. i was imagining that i would come up to ben afleck and run with him for a bit. but i didn't see him.
work was work but it was good to see the team. they took us out for crazy tasty dinner and i ATE mini hamburgers. i was getting fatter by the second. tuesday i slept in at the urging of eric. we got into the office, had no internet and whatever. i think on monday i went to the american girl place and got seamus and her doll matching shirts and got the doll a hair care kit. tuesday i got to see liz!! so fun. we had some lunch although we forgot to get her sandwich although we paid for it. we went to fao schwartz. it was scary in there. i imagined taking the kids, their heads would have spun on top of their little bodies but there really are some scary things going on in that store. but it was fun and i appreciated that liz let me do my touristy thing. the flight home - i fell asleep on the plane as it started to taxi. but get this - the plane returned to the gate and we all had to get off. one of the engines wouldn't start. so i met up with my collegue when we were off the plane and she told me about her boarding story. she got to her seat and a woman was in it. the lady basically just told my friend to sit in the seat accross the aisle. she was fine with that until the lady whose seat that was came up to her. she went back to the lady who stole her seat and was like hey - thats not cool. and the lady turned away and totally ignored her. the lady who came into the picture last, got really uncomfortable and told my friend to go ahead and take the isle seat, she is pregnant after all. my friend graciously accepted but felt really abd about it. then we deplaned. i told her that if the first lady was in her seat when we got back on that she should call the flight attendant right off the bat. the nerve of it all, but the lady took my friends seat!! again!! the third lady interjected right away and said she really didnt mind the middle seat and it was no biggie. i was annoyed by the whole thing. we started to taxi and the captain got on and said we were 10th in line to take off. but eventually we did get home and i rolled into bed around 1am.
now, backtrack a week or so and we are at day 3 of the maui trip and the day of the Xterra! eric got up really early and went with charles to the race site. the rest of us slept in a bit, had some breakfast and then CHERI met us at the condo! it was so great to see her! she looks like a million bucks!! totally amazing!! we all piled into the car and went down to the race site. cheri, seamus and i went down to the beach to watch the race start, grandma and sirus hung up a little higher up and walked around some. seamus was happy as a clam playing in the sand while we waited for things to get going. the race start was very exciting, with a helecopter and the beautiful view. the swim consisted of two laps, with a short beach run between the laps. eric said he saw some fish on the second lap. i followed eric out of the water and over to transition. off on the bike he went. cheri and i took the kids to the beach for a while. when we met back up with grandma, sirus was all about laying on the ground so we packed everyone up in the car and took grandma and sirus back to the condo. then off to the race site again. we hung out and watched people continue to come in from the bike and head out on the run. i figured we missed eric which it turns out we did, i think. i can't quite figure it out. it was hot and i kept trying to get seamus into the shade and to wear a hat and to drink some water. cheri doesn't get tired and spent the whole day tossing seamus in the air, twirling her around and playing with her non stop. seamus loved it! i suggested that maybe she would like to go slap some hands. she was diligent and kept her hand out, but no one slapped her hand. okokokok, maybe because it was the world championships and maybe because these people were working on winning world championship titles, but you'd thing someone would slap a little girls hand? well, no one did, but she did get her photo taken by the local press and her photo was in both the printed paper and the online version with her name and everything. at some point eric came up to us to say hey. he looked terrible. his shorts and jersey were white from all the salt. his eyes were sunken he looked aweful. he didnt finish the race. he got a mile or so into the run and then had to lay down for a while. the heat, the bike portion, the fact that the first few miles of the run were all up hill, all of it was just oo much. he decided that we were on vacation and that he would rather not wind up in the hospital which i think was a wise decision. so he layed down in the shade for a while and then back tracked down the hill. had he continued on and gotten to the top of the hill he probably would have felt ok since the next mile is all down hill, but if he hit big beach feeling the way he was, he would have been stranded on that beach feeling as though he had been stranded by a ship wreck onto a deserted island. we found out that many of the people we knew who raced had problems with the race and that all of them finished close to an hour longer then expected.
we packed up and went back to the condo. eric took a shower then he and i went to get some dinner. he made the right decision to stop when he did since he was able to eat and rehydrate without getting really sick, so we were all happy. i think we even took the kids to the pool later that evening. and that was sunday.

busy busy and maui - day two

so tomorrow i head to ny for a few days, fly back to seattle then go to LA for the next few days, THEN on saturday i am taking seamus to see disney princess wishes on ice!!

went for an 11 mile run today with feather and dave. it was all uphill it seemed. but it was actually pretty good, although now i feel a little bit like i am getting a cold.

so on saturday morning seamus woke up telling us that we weren't in hawaii. we had told her that hawaii had the beach and sand and she didn't see any of that so we must not be in hawaii. eric took her to the lanai and said, see over those buildings, thats hawaii. she was good with that.
so i was racing in the makena 10k. after planning the trip and coordinating flights and cars, condos and directions, i did not check to see what the race start time was. eric said 9, the neighbor said 9 i said, ok 9 sounds good. we took our time, did our thing and mosied over to the race. passing the hotel grounds while looking for parking it sure seemed strange that so many people were already lined up when there was still an hour before the start. they took me to athlete drop off, i jumped out and asked some volunteers when the race wsa to start. 8am. what time was it? 7:55. i ran towards the crowd saw a dude with a number and asked him were registration was. it was closed! but there were people there, they ran with me over to a lady who ran with me to a guy, i signed some paper they handed me a number, someone else handed me some pins and i asked if there were potties on the course. no. damn. where was one? waaaaaay over there. i thought and thought and thought, quickly. and i decided i would wind up totally a mess if i didn't do it, so i went, did my business and made it to the start with enough time to stand for about a second and the cannon went off. this was all actually good because it meant i didn't have to sit around waiting, getting thirsty and getting worried.
i decided to start off slow since it was so hot and i had no idea what the course was like. it was a lot of road at first. then it turned and went on some gravel road. but all of it was up hill. 20 minutes in, the 5kers caught up and we got to the split. i thought, i could go that route and be done in 10 minutes. but i stayed my route. lots of people were walking, and i stopped to walk some, too. i walked at each of the aide stations getting some gatorade and water and mixing them together. i walked through any tiny bit of shade i could find, really there wasn't any. i talked to a guy who was pasty white who was coming from honolulu. i don't know how that happens, but he said while although it was actually considerably cooler then last week, the heat was killing him. it made me feel better. it felt like we were at altitude and it was killing me, i was prepping myself for a 1:30 time. then we started down hill. and we just went down hill for a really long time. i passed a few people which was good and i was feeling considerably better. then we went into the woods, i think the spooky forest maybe, i don't know. then it was to big beach. and it was long, but beautiful. i tried to stay by the water since the sand is easier to run but i got hit by a wave and now was stuck with wet, heavy sandy shoes. and the end no where in sight. note to self, don't get your shoes wet in the sand. but i ran the whole beach which was impressive for me. then into some more woods for a bit then out onto another shorter rockier beach. i picked off 4 women and one man during this time. i was pretty stoked and felt like i was racing. at one point i adjusted my finish time to 1:05. but then during the last stretch, maybe a 1/4 mile to go one of the women picked me back off. i told her good job as she passed but then i thought to myself, what??? so i sat on her for a bit and once in the finish shoot i sprinted her at the end. then i sat in the shade for a bit.
i met up with eric and the kids and grandma. eric picked up his race registration and i went to get my registration packet and shirt since i dind't get it before the race. we saw eric's friend jason and they chatted and eric got some tri shorts to race in. then we hiked to the car and loaded up. eric went off on his bike for a bit and the rest of us went back to the condo. sirus wanted to nap but seamus wanted to go to the pool so we did. then eric came home and we took the kids to the beach for a bit. by this time i was started to get what i thought might be a migraine. we decided to go to dinner and sho'nuff in the car thank goodness i had the where with all to bring a bag because i spewed all over. the kids were all freaking out patting me on the back since i was wedged between them. everyone got out except me, i handed the bag to seamus and could hear her asking whats that whats that? eric's response - soup. dinner out was nixed, groceries and dinner back at the condo were in. i went back and slept for a few hours and felt waaaaay better.
that was saturday.

maui update - getting there

our flight was 1pmish on friday. we got to the airport with plenty of time, checked in at the sky cap, got through security and went to the gate. then they changed the gate. then it was delayed. then we got on the plane and found out that not only must car seats be by the window (which ruined all my seating arangements plans) but they stuck us in a row on the wing. apparently no car seats on the wing either.
the flight was good. at one point we hit some turbulance and seamus told me all about how it made her tummy hurt.
as we started to descend sirus fell asleep.
our layover had gone from 1 hr down to 15 minutes. we had to get off the plane, catch a shuttle, transfer to a different shuttle, change terminals, and run run run!! grandma was dragging poor little sirus, which was quite funny because his legs are just so short. but we got there and got on the plane and took off. this flight was good, too.
once again as we started to descend, sirus fell asleep.
then we got off the plane and headed to baggage claim where we saw charles the neighbor who was also coming out for the race and we saw bruce from bend, who was there for the race, too. charles took eric's bike, eric went to get the car and the kids, grandma and i gathered all the luggage and waited. the computers were down at car rental, so we had to wait an extra forever.
5 seconds into the car ride and both kids were OUT.
got to the condo and it was about 3042387 degrees. the kids slept through it all, got them in their jammies and put them in their beds.
eric went to the grocery store and spent $45 on milk, eggs, pb&j, bread. milk was $6.00!!! Bread was $5.00. I had to yell a little asking if he went to the 7-11 or something but no, hawaii is expensive.
grandma and sirus bunked together, seamus, eric and i shared. we all went to sleep.

since i'm not embarassed

eric is funny. ya know in that way that isn't so funny, ya know that way where a birthday hickey is only funny to the one who doesn't have to go to work with it. so, i was out in the ocean there in hawaii and he grabbed the camera to get some bikini shots. oh joy. just what i love more then anything.
but because i am not embarrassed, here is the photo:
but the best part and what makes me ok with the whole thing is when you zoom in, this is what is happening up close:

sirus

chocolate cake

so, earlier in the month, before becoming part of the throughth3wallchallenge, i had made a quick food log to document the crap that i eat on a daily basis. i mentioned some chocolate cake. the reason there was chocolate cake was because a guy i work with not only had an incredible marathon pr of 2:18 but at the same time qualified for the olympic trials in NYC this past weekend. so absolutley amazing. as i grow older i find it fascinating and reassuring that people who are amazing athletes or who hold high power positions in the corporate world are just like me. and you even. they are normal ordinary people. i have met my share of both types and ya know, they are just normal people who do interesting things. i try to do my best in both of those areas so it gives me reassurance that while people do have special gifts that may help them be extra amazing, they are normal, too. realizing this has helped me imensly in the past year to overcome HUGE obsticales at work. i am now public speaker extraordinare. ok, maybe not, but really, i can do it and i am fine.
on that note, i did some super modeling this past weekend. i was feeling old when i showed up there and the people doing hair and makeup didn't want to do my hair since it was short, until this lady came along and put in pin curls and made it all 1940's which i loved, then when all the girls were wearing grey and black and red with leather hand bags, they put me in this super frumpy mustard yellow dress with a canvas bag that said to kiss my canvas. all outfit changes after that were good though. i am going to try to dig up some photos from it.
there is lots to tell about the trip to hawaii. a few quick comments though, it was hot, the kids had a blast at the beach, we got to see cheri and we want to go back. even the redeye flight back was ok. we managed back to the house by noonishon saturday and sirus went down for a nap probably around 3pm and didn't wake up until 8am on sunday! he was a tired little guy! more about the trip and the races later.

hawaii was fun

way fun. lots to tell, but not right now.

short cut not so short

so my commute sucks. balls. the suck ballsiest part of it is the first 2.5 miles of it in the morning. at my old job, i still had to do that same first2.5 miles but i left considerably earlier and had no traffic woes. but ya know, i am just too damn tired to get up and leave the house by 6:15 every morning. so now i sleep in until 7 which is nice because that is when everyone at the house is up. its much better to start my day with some baby hugs and kisses. because i leave later when everyone else is leaving, i sit in traffic trying to get onto the freeway. so i have come up with a short cut that actually adds an extra 3/4 mile or so to the trip but if its gets me there quicker then hey. so today i have found that at least today, my short cut is no quicker. just as i was changing lanes to go toward the short cut i saw a lime green honda element stuck in the traffic. i said, ewww, why would someone get one of those in that color? then i went on my merry way. as i was finlly merging onto the freeway the honda element came right up beside me. hmmm. i don't know how i feel about that.

throughth3wallchallenge

i am participating in a keep fit over the winter challenge. its being run by iron wil who i am totally loving right now. i discovered her blog a month or so ago and got totally sucked into her account of her experience with ironman. so i signed up for the challenge, only days after talking about how a food log is a bad idea for me since i eat so much crap all the time. well, having a public log is much more effective then putting it in excel or somewhere where no one would ever look. as a result i have managed to realy curb the poopy chocolate consumption. i'll tell you what will really curb it will be when all the kids are all potty trained and go poopy in the potty because that is part of life and not going poopy in the potty just for some chocolate. eric brings home the big 1/2 pound bars ALL the time. he did before there was any potty training to be had but back then i was never tempted. now its totally pavlovian for me, any time a kid poops, i need some chocolate, too.
i have been sick and having the insomnia all week. tylonol pm is my new friend, but i was able to fall asleep on my own last night. i contribute my insomnia to a several things, because it hit about this same time last year, too. its either the time of year, work or my cloggs.
today i ran a 10k race. i wasn't sure what to expect. i did as well as i was hoping to - hit my goal, not my super stretch goal but my goal which was good. a few times i was thinking that maybe i should just stop. but i kept going and even managed to run the 6th mile in 7:15 which i was pretty suprised by! i am exhausted now though, partially because of the race and partially because we walked the two miles to the race, then i warmed up for about 1.5 miles then we walked the two miles home, UP HILL.
now i've got seamus on my lap, she is not wanting to take a nap but she really really needs to.
oh, we are heading to hawaii here pretty soon, which is pretty exhausting, too, but exciting none the less.

food log

i read a lot on fitness and health and diet sites that keeping a food log is a good idea. i will show you why this is not a god idea when it comes to me as this is what i had today:
1 peanut butter and jelly sandwich
1 americano
1 venti water
four (4) 4! pieces of pizza with giant roasted garlic cloves on them. tasty but stinky
1 venti water
another venti water
2 brautworsts
a coffee cup of granola cereal with mostly water but a splash of 2 days over the "best before" date of skim milk for color
way more poopy chocolate than anyone should really have
i thought i was done, but thenn eric and the kids came home with icecream. so i had to have some of that.

that was today. yesterday was even better:
1 peanut butter and jelly sandwich
1 americano
1 venti water
1 granola bar
1 giant slice of chocolate cake that someone brought to work and left on the table outside my office
1 venti water
1 and 1/2 grilled chicken breasts with lots o garlic
4 pieces of the tastiest bacon ever
1 and 1/2 bowls of rasin bran/granola cereal mix with mostly water but a splash of 1 day over the "best before" date of skim milk for color
dude, too much poopy chocolate
did i have a beer? i don't remember but i did have another venti water that when eric brought it to me he said he had put the straw up his arse, ya know, for flavor.

it might be a good idea to lay off the poopy chocolate, the way fattening cured meat products and maybe have a veggie or two other than garlic. its a good thing that i at least drink a decent amount of water.

baby boy isn't a baby any mo'

today is sirus's 2nd bday. do you remember this? i barely do. i can go on an on how much of a cutie he but he just is. we had a little bday party for him over the weekend and invited the cousins. it was a pirate themed party but he had a car shaped cake. then today for his actual birthday eric brought the kids out to my work and we went for a run together. in the rain. in the cold. in the wind. it kicked my arse. the guy at the grocery store told me it snowed 7 inches in the mountains today. that is no suprise, especially not to any of those stuck in the rediculous traffic today. apparently its hard to drive when it is cold out. i tried heading out of work at 4 but didn't get out until after 5 then rolled into the door at 630. we had some ballons and an icecream cake and a few presents, it is his birthday afterall.
what else? work is totally stressing me out. its good, but its exhausting.
and we head to hawaii in 23 days!! that stresses me out a little, too. when i reminded eric of is he puffed out his stomach and made the comment of how he is oh so ready to race at the world championships, which is funny. he will race and he will finish and hopefully it wil be fun for him. i am thinking of doing the 10k trail run the day before which goes through a "spooky forest". we will be in maui for halloween, so we are taking the kid's costumes and they will do their halloween action all maui style.
eric got a playstation 3 which i don't know how i feel about it. he rented fantastic 4 the silver surfer, but it wasn't. it was the first one. so he returned it and rented the real silver surfer. i have never had any interest in seeing this movie.
i do however like the show house. i am quite tickled that kumar is going to be on house's team. they are planning a harold and kumar go to white castle sequel which when i tried to reference NPH i said JHK instead. eric laughed at me.

posting some more

so last night i had a dream where i was trying to fly to detroit. there were no direct flights so i had a layover in some place that then should have been only a 45 minute commuter flight to detroit, but the whole thing was going to be 12 hrs. the one part of the trip that was all fine and good was that tommy lee was on the flight. he was wearing a mint green camisole and had a a matching sweater but wasn't wearing it. when i asked him about why he was wearing a camilsole he said someone had given it to him, someone who was important to him but who was sick or who had died or something and he said, hey, it fits, he will wear it. he was still damn hot, even in a mint green camisole with a built in shelf bra.

stupid movie part 2

when resident evil came out how ever many years back i agreed to go see it with eric because i wanted to see mila jovavich or whatever kick some ass. i wanted to see some totally kick ass bitch be a total bad ass. yeah, so the movie was terrible, gore for the sake of gore and just terrible. so terrible that i wanted to walk out of it. right now eric turned on resident evil part two (so the one coming out in theaters now is part 3? i can't even beleive it) and i had to make the comment of - wow, if i have the time to strap on all hose guns and ammo and stuff, i sure would take the time to put on some pants and probably a more functional top then a tub top. eric quickly came to the lady's defense saying that she was a cop and wasn't expecting to have to go to work that day, so of course she was going to wear that.
now, i really liked Shaun of the Dead. that was a good zombie movie.

eric

eric gets mad at me when i eat cereal for dinner. so tonight i had a chocolate chip cookie heated in the microwave with vanilla ice cream on top of it. i feel like i have ice cream residue all over my mouth and reached over to my sleeve to wipe it off, but thne had a second thought - this shirt is clean and i plan on wearing it to sleep in, i better not start wiping residues on it yet. i will save that for tomorrow. now eric is eating the cookie with ice cream.
we went to yakima for the weekend. i like yakima, its eastern washington and its warm and in the county. while driving home today i had to think, maybe i should quit my job (what is wrong with charlie sheen's hair on the emmy's?) that totlally stresses me out and just get a normal job and eric can get a normal job too and we can go and get a house out in the middle of no where and just not care any more. it would be so nice. (what is wring with connan obrian's hair on the emmy's?) (why are they in such uncomfortable looking chairs?) it doesn't help that as soon as we got up into the mountains the weather got all crappy again.
seamus started preschool. she seems like she is liking it but i am not so sure how i feel about it. she and sirus also both started playing soccer. that they both seem to love. they get little uniforms which i think is funny. sirus is almost two which is crazy and i can't beleive it. he is growing up so fast, he and seamus both.
triathlon season for me is over for the year but i am trying to figure out what i am going to do over the winter and for next year. i ran the woodinville 1/2 marathon the other weekend, but did not break the 2 hr mark. i ws off by 56 seconds. but now i am going to actually train for a 1/2, meaning actually go on some training runs longer then 30 minutes. its all part of a master plan that i'm not ready to talk about right now. last year i ran seattle in 2:02, this year i will break 2 hrs and get over that mental road block then start planning the races to start chipping off the minutes. now if i just didn't have that pesky thing called work to get in the way of all my running. i also want to make sure to keep my swimming up over the winter. i haven't swam any since the lake sammamish tri but i am looking forward to a good season next year and probably another lake stevens 1/2 ironman.
and mezzie made my day, i think you are right about that lame lady at the playground.

not sure

so i have been getting up on the wrong side of the bed lately it seems. this past week, although it was a short week, i sure was having a bad day on thursday i think it may have been. or was it wednesday? i' not sure.
then there was today. everything was going well. we went for a family jog with feather and dave and gumball. the kids looooved that gumball was along for the run. they kept an eye on her the entire time and laughed and laughed. when we got home, eric took off to meet up with his buddies for a bike ride and the kids and i hung out and ust did our thing. they had lunch and then a little later everyone was ready for nap time. myself included.
when eric got home we went for a walk to the uvillage to get out of the house for a little and get some dinner. the kids and i went to the playground while eric went to get us dinner. now, granted i had done a 1/2 arsed job trying to put myself together before heading down there and i was just in shorts and a baggy sweatshirt but i did try to cover up all my zits and i tried to calm down my hair a bit (damn the hair and the awesome new doo. i need it cut again, its getting poofy and out of control, this is going to be an expensive upkeep) buti was there helping sirus climb the ladder, he is becoming quite the impressive ladder climber and then trying to remind seamus to take her turn when i caught some woman giving me a look. all of a sudden i got very self conscious, i cant even spell it. she was one of those east side women with the bleach blonde hair, fake tan, probably late 30s, maybe even early 30s but she was sut giving me the stare down. for some reason it made me feel very bad about myself and ruined the rest of the time there for me. eventually she left and i couldn't rationalize my feelings about the whole thing. finally when we were leaving, eric got me a hot chocolate from starbucks and the bad feelings started to leave. i told eric the whole thing and he said the only reason the lady was giving me the looks was because she couldnt beleive that i had two kids and was as damn hot as i am. ha. he makes me laugh. i did decide to agree with him, because he is probably right.
seamus and sirus started soccer this past week. i guess its pretty cute and they were both having a great time. seamus also started preschool on thursday. i took the morning off from work so that i could be there to drop her off. she started to cry on the way there because she didn't want us to walk her in, she just wanted us to drop her off and then leave. but we took her in, she found her very own cubby, put her snack in it and then went into the classroom. iwish i could be there to watch what she is up to all day. she didn't say much about preschool that evening other then that there were two slides, a kitchen and a shopping cart. she did bring home a painting which i hung on her wall for her.
sirus is talking more, still not a whole lot and most of it i can barely tell, but he is so funny. he loves wheres waldo, especially the pages with cars on them.
we are going to go for a family bike ride tomorrow. that wll be fun i think!

and more

catch up

whoa! havne't posted since aug 4? has it been that long since i got my fabulous haircut? what all has been going on. work? more work? oh, yeah, and some more. i went to new mexico for work. which was way fun. it was for a conference at a fancy resort outside of albequrue. i got off the plane, got in a car, got dropped off, checked in then went for a run in the 32485293 degree heat at about 24232 feet elevation. needless to day, it about put me on my arse! but then i went to the pool and hung out. never got into the water because it felt too cold but rested and relaxed. it was sooo luxurious. by the end of the conference, it was rumored that caroline rheah, oprah, kevin costner, dennis hopper, and benji and the gang from so you think you can dance were all at the resort. good fun. cocktail reception that evening was lovely. had some margahitas but they about killed me. i felt totally hammered in the morning but i got up and ran on the treadmill in the morning then off to the conference. i have never been to anything where everyone was so friendly! it was really quite pleasant!! at some point in the day eric got there! horray!! it was so fun to have him there even tho i was working pretty much the whole time!! tuesday eric and i got up and went for a run together. it wasn't too hot so it was fun. tuesday was only a 1/2 day because there were off site activities. eric and i took this as sit by the pool, go down the water slide 100 times and then head to santa fe. we walked all around there and then i eventually went to the conference dinner while eric headed out and then hung at the bar. wednesday at the conference i lead a session which was not very well attended but then i had to get on the microphone and give a summary to the whole group. that was exciting. i couldn't wait for wednesday to be over but that also meant we would be heading home. the flight was uneventful, except for the girl from tampa who sat next to eric who had the magic bag of food that she managed to pull an entire pizza out of and a hogie and apparently some other things. i slept through most of it. i knew it was dry in new mexico, but i had no idea until i got him and when i pulled the covers back to get into bed the bedding felt damp. weird.

friday allie came to visit, which was very exciting!!! she brought her husband and little boy and we had so much fun!! i did a triathlon saturday morning which was exciting, my swim was 2 minutes faster then the same race last year and my run was almost 5 minutes faster, i think. i was really please with the swim, even before i knew the time, i felt really like i had tried pretty hard. it was short but i was happy. i always feel like i am working sort of on the bike and can't figure out why my time is so slow. i was about 3 seconds slower on the bike then last year, but ya know, when you don't train on the bike, you can't really expect anything. allie met me on the run and ran with me. it was very funny because allie was telling me stories about the people as we passed them, such as "she got back from the bike two minutes before you" and "you were 23 in your wave out of the water but ya know that girl with the amazing abs and the broad shoulders was 21 out of the water in her wave" or something of that nature. it was all fun.
after the race we met up with the rest of the crew in the mini van and headed down town. we went to pikes place market and then to the aquarium, which was a huge hit. the kids LOVED it. sirus was laughing and yelling and just so excitied. seamus was so interested in everything!! the two families split up, but i hear that zach enjoyed it just as much as our kids!
everyone came home and napped and then i don't really remember any more of saturday.
sunday allie and eric went for a 12 mile run, then we headed out on a hike. the kids were amazing! they hiked and hiked and hiked! up hill and down hill and running every where! i can't wait to go again.

so much

a lot has happened since the last post.
a family triathlon at seafair in which i was talking to a woman in the transition area who was telling me how a friend of hers said ironmans were like childbirth and had to say - yes! that is exaclty what i posted about the other day.
a trip to san diego to see jen in which the beach was so cold that we sat in the car and looked at it instead of sitting on it. we were planing on a detox cleansing thing but wound up gettting too drunk the night i got in and we decided it would be unsafe to detox all hung over. we spent most of the weekend at the outlet mall which was way fun and even funnier is that we both showed up at the cash register with the same exact outfits in our arms.
a 1st place, yes i said 1st place finish in my age group 5k run and pr at the torch light run. 60 people in my age group, unbeleiveable!!
a trip to nyc which was scary and fun and exciting all at the same time. i got to meet liz which was loooooong over due and i am so excited to have gotten the opportunity! and i got to see dug, too, which is always a treat! and i disovered what might just be a cult, The American Girl Place. I got one of the dolls for Seamus and i can't wait to visit one of the stores with her some day so we can get the doll's hair done.
and i got a hair cut. my curl is mostly gone and my last hair in march was terrible. i hadn't had what i would call a bad hair day in probably years but boy after that cut i had one almost every day. i hadn't gone to the fabulous team of richard and james dean downtown, but instead opted for a random person in redmond who trnaslated i want something young and hip into lame soccer mom. lo and behold - james dean saved the day! he is my hero. i was trying to take some photos of my sweet new dooo and this one came out of the camera. i love it. click on it and check out the eyes. no photo shopping that one, looking like a cyborg.

what am i, velvet?

so, its only been a few days and already i have forgotten the pain and am thinking about doing my next 1/2 ironman. i have told a few people that the race is just like labor and childbirth. you anticipate the event for months and months, go through periods of excitement, worry, self doubt and sickness, then you get to the actual event and its exiciting but scary and it hurts and you wonder if it will ever be over, you cramp and you worry and you want it to be over and then it is and you vow to never go through it again.

then a few days go by, the pain subsides, you feel better, you reflect on your accomplishement and you say - wow that is amazing! i think i want to do it again!

of course there are a few main differences between the two events though: during the race you are allowed to eat. during labor and child birth you get to lay down. during the race you get to wear pants. during labor and child birth you can chose to have your lower 1/2 totally numb - during the race it just happens.

i have told eric about a billion times how proud of us i am. and to give myself a little credit i have told sirus and seamus about a billion times that i love them.

i went swimming on wednesday and felt really good! i was going to ride my bike into work this morning since eric and the kids picked me up from work yesterday and i left my car here, but it seemed pretty miserable in the morning and there wound up being thunderstorms so it was good that i didn't do it. but the seafair tri is on sunday and i am doing the swim, xtie is biking and my mom will run! i will do the run portion with her. i am excited but don't want to "can't wait" my whole weekend away!!!

its over!! finally! it has come and gone and now i don't have to worry about it or ver do anything like it again!
i have been a nervous wreck about this race for the past few months. two months ago even i told eric that i was just not going to do it because there was no way i would be ready in time for it. thatis when he committed to helping me get ready. i trained and did some running and some biking and swimming, a lot more then i had been doing and much more then i had last summer but i dind't feel ready at all. part of that was because i had no idea what to expect. i was planning 1 hr swim, 4 hr bike and 3 hr run with transition times biked into all of that.
saturdya we went to pick up registration and to rack our bikes. the mandatory pre-race meeting rhoroughly freaked me out. going to the race site made things a little better and it was nice because each racer was given a designated spot to rack their bike. i was 495. then we scoped out the swim start and then exits and entrances to transition. then we went home.
friday we had pizza for dinner. saturday we had the obligatory pasta dinner and it was damn tasty. with all of that carbo loading and all the carbo loading i had been doing for the past week i was feeling ok. grandma came over in the evening on saturday since she was going to watch the kids on sunday and we would be leaving for the race site before 430am.
it was next to impossible for me to fall asleep and i tossed and turned. i checked the clock and it was 135. next thing i knew the alarm was going off and it was 345. i had to poke eric to get up. we loaded into the car and picked up the neigbor and then we were off! we got an awesome parking spot, got our bodies marked then each went and set up our spots. then off to the honey bucket. the one i was so lucky to get was ALL THE WAY FULL. i was concerned that this would hamper my abilities to do what needed to be done, but oh no. everything worked out perfectly. then back to the car to drop off some stuff and to change. we then went and picked up or timing chips and got back into the potty line. 20 minutes later and it was time to go get suited up! the first wave of elite men went off at 630. eric's wave was 644 i think and i stood on the hill and watched him stage. it was the weirdest thing to watch because the waves were staged in the grass right by the dock. when your wave was called you walked out on the dock then down onto this other myster dock and then you got in the water there. it was weird to watch eric line up with these other dudes all in black with orange hats and then for them all to walk as though they were being sheppharded to the meat factory. real weird. my wave went off at 656. by the time we were on the dock i wasn't nervous. i slipped into the water which was really warm and tried to figure out my goggles.
then the race started. dare i say that the swim was actually good? and enjoyable? i was totally relaxed and just went on my way. i swam the crawl stroke more then i ever have before and wasn't getting tired. i did a lot of the breast stroke but on the home stretch i crawled more and i even crawled the last several minutes to make a good showing coming out of the water. i wsa caught by 4 if not 5 other colors of caps but everyone kept their own lines and it wasn't scary like it can be in the sprints. it was even inspiring. expected swim time 1 hr, actual swim time: 51:08
T1 - the neighbor and i came out of the water at the same time but he was out before i was, which isn't suprising since i took 3:30. funny thing, i finished 50 in my age group in the swim, so did eric, my t1 was 3:30 and so was erics. but he made a stop at the honey bucket, i was just slow.
onto the bike. i was worried about the bike. i knew it was hilly and long and i hand't ridden more the 35 miles in one ride since before i was pregnant with seamus. the bike started out good with a good stretch of slightly down hill. this was good because i was having weird upper hamstrong issues that i was quite worreid by. but before i knew it i passed the 5 mile sign and i was stoked. 33 minutes into the bike, i was lapped by the elite men. they were cool to watch go by with the disk wheels and all. i had a powerbar and would take a big bite out every 20 minutes for the first two hours. gu every 40 minutes was it after. i drank one big bottle and two little bottles of water. the time just ticked along. at one point i thought to my self that i wasn't so sure i wou;d be able to completed a 2nd lap and the run but i kept going. i passed the bottle exchange area at mile 14 and the course started to get fun. after a giant awesome long downhill section my odometer magnet and thingy were hitting each other going ding with each turn of the wheel. i was going crazy so i stopped and fixed it. then i finished lap one! i had spent more time out of the saddle and in my big ring then i imagined i ever would. lap two was good and seemed to go much faster. at 220 i decided to totally move my odometer away since it had started dinging again. maybe this helped? but i was having fun and at 40 miles into the bike course i was feeling great and felt like i owned the bike! ha! i went up the last big hill and the rest was smooth sailing along the lake. the bike was done! expected bike time 4 hrs - actual bike time 3:41.
i rolled into t2 for a whopping 4:23 stop. but, to give myself a little credit, i did a complete costume change including shorts and shirt, had some banana, put on a hat and then some body glide in the old arm pits and squirted some sunblock in my hand. i rubbed in the sunscreen as i ran out - spf 50!
the first mile was hard. i had to pee. i was going to pee in transition but thot that if i did i might stay in there. i got to the first aid station at mile 1, was amazed by the buffet of snacks, grabbed some gatorade, walked over to the potty and saw that the potty was occupied. imagine my supirse wne i looked at my watch and it said 9 minutes! so off to aid station #2. got there, got some water, the gatorade was too strong, went potty and was feeling really good. almsot too good. so i kept going. i then figured out that if i took both water and gatorade i could mix them and it would be perfect, so would get to the aid station, mix my beverage, drink it and walk to the last trash can. the course went through town twice with each lap. the 2nd half of each lap was along the lake and had a giant hill. on my way down the hil our neigbor was running up the hill. as i was coming into town to head out on lap two, eric was on the side of the course in his normal clothes! he was already finished! lap two was tougher but i was still feeling good. i dind' tmention that on the bike lap two my right something or another right below the back of my knee started to really hurt and kept hurting. it hurt through the run but i kep going. with only 3 miles to go i had that terrible hill and the last time into town. finaly i got to the 12 mile mark and i picked up the pace. when i got back into town i ran as fast as i could to the finish. expected run time 3hrs - actual run time 2:11.

total time: 6:52:03 i was THRILLED!!

eric met me at the finish and i was so excited!!! we sat on the ground and he brougt me some cookies and a banana and water. we sat there for quite a while.

while i was super happy with my results, eric pulled a 4:55!! while he was 50th in his group out of the water he was 3rd on the bike and 17 on the run - a 1:39 when he hasn't ever run more then 11 miles. i am very proud of him! he finshed 13th in his age group which i think is fantastic!! he is amazing! he finished so fast that he had some of the pizza they had at the finish line. it was all gone by the time i got there but i was ok with that!

awesome day but now we are both totally thrashed i am icing the back of my knee since i think it might snap any second now and we are both concerned about how we will feel tomorrow.

what wll the next goal? mine is to run 13.1 in less then 2 hrs which i thinki can probably do!

zits, fungus and good times

so, lets see, 6 days until the 1/2 iron man. my taper has been a good two months or so long so i should arrive pretty well rested. and i have been doing some serious carob loading this past weekend so i should be nice and full of carbohydrates that have turned them into a substatial but jiggle. eric and i are both looking forward to this being over. our crazy neighbor is doing the race too. he went and rode the bike course yesterday and said it was beautiful. we had driven it and yes it was quite lovely in a car, and maybe it will be lovely to go around once. i don't know why i am nervous. if eric were to say to me lets go for a 56 mile bike ride today i would whine about it but i would be able to do it.
i have got some what is likely athletes foot working itself onto my right baby toe. i put the tough actin tenactin on it, so hopfully it will stop being irritated here pretty soon. long time ago i had accidentally gotten my tough actin tenactin mixed up with my clearsil zit cream and before i knew it i was treating the athletes foot on my face. i feel a littel deja vu right now.
i did go to the aveda store to get something different for my face. i am still breaking out despite suposedly using this stuff that is supposed to be great. imagine my suprise when the guy pointed me to the stuff that combats aging. but it suposedly oh so gentle, maybe i have sensitive skin is that they are thinking. so now i am going through that nasty adjustment stage again where all the tiny zits come out to see everyone.
seamus told us the other day that he bike goes fast and her bike goes slow. she said she has a fast and slow bike. it was very funny.

ow

i am tired. way tired. tday was the mountains to sound race and i am disapointed in how terrible i feel right now. i got the hand off from the paddlers whom i hadn't ever met, gave them my cell phone and keys to my car, and then was off. i was feeling really good! i was picking people off all over the place. it was fun! i was worried about running 13.5 miles along the burke gilamn trail but it was actualy pretty nice. i had made myself a scrug from an old pumpkin push shirt. my arms get so cold and its just my skin that gets cold. so i cut it off real short and made it into a little jacket. it worked great! but only a few miles in i took it off and my shirt, too. i was feeling really good! they said there were two water stations, 1/3 of the way in and then 2/3s. but an hour in i knew i was more then 1/3 in and no water. just then it appeared but i think it was too late. i stopped and drank a whole cup but my mouth was instantly dry. it was all down hill from here on out. this is about when i got passed by the barefoot girl! she had little bootie things on but still. then i got passed by some really fast people, and i was ok with that. then we got to where we go for the family jogs and i started to fall apart. my knees, my back, my neck, all of it. plus i started to get worried that maybe there wouldn't be a 2nd water station and whatever. a mile or two went by and i eventaully came to the 2nd water station but it didn't help my knees or hammys. they said it was about 3 more miles to go. i got totally bummed out that the stop light changed at 25th so i could go. i really wanted to rest. i did eventually stop to stretch. and walk. a few times. it really bummed me out that i was feeling so terrible and that i had to walk as much as i did. then the temperature dropped by 5 degrees or even more, the sun went away and i had to put all my shirts back on. good that i did because it started to rain. and not yer typical seattle drizzle, but it rained some good old cats and dogs. insult to injury. but it did make me feel a little better. then i got passed by someone i had passed early on. then i got passed by two other girls that i had passed way back, but i caught on them and hung on. i wasn't able to catch and take them back, but i was able to run to the finish. my watch said 2:05, which was 5 minutes faster then i was looking to do, but 5 minutes slower then i was hoping to do. had it not been for all that walking. and i feel terrible. i have to figure out what i am going to do about the half ironman. no good is that that is going to be. i might just have to walk the whole thing.

little bugger

oh dear. poor sirus!! little guy, he's not even two and just made his 2nd trip to the er!! last time was in february when he was working on being a beach nurse. this time he went to children's hospital which is like not even a mile from our house. i was supposed to go swimming after werk but it took me an hour 15 to get home which meant that by the time i got to the pool i would have only 1/2 hour there and whatever i blew it off. eric was vacuuming when i got home and we were all getting ready to go for a walk. eric was stll vacuuming and seamus and i were in the bathroom when i heard it... the scuffle of the bike as we referr to the 4 wheeled plastic ride on toy of the kids, then the solid bump, then the cries. i ran right out to see poor little sirus with his hands on his face standing in a pool of blood!! i grabbed him and took him to eric right away. litle guy had bt his lip and was bleeding all over the place. i never saw anything like it. i had eric call the doctor and they said that although it likely was fine, its better to be safe especially since he fell on tile and we didn't actually see what happened. poor little guy's shirt was by this time covered in blood and tears and snot from his runny nose. i was worried about going to children's hospital because i was afraid of seeing sick or hurt little kids but it was quiet there and everyone was so incredibly nice. sirus got a bracelet and then seamus eric and i all got stickers saying we belonged to sirus. sirus was called right back into triage and then right into a room. not even 2 minutes later the doctor came in. sirus sat on my lap and was really cooperative. seamus wanted in on the action even, telling him how she hurt her foot yesterday but when the doctor asked to see it she shyed away. the doctor then tld us that he was a jr doctor and the other doctor would be in. not even 2 minutes later the senior doctor came in. wow, these doctors are so nice! ad they do such a great job! this doctors even put a tongue depresser in sirus's mouth, poked around on his teeth and everything and sirus just sat there. his teeth were ok although one on top was bleeding, and he had a hurt on his chin but he didn't seem to have a concussion and everything else seemed fine. they say that they try to avoid stitching up lips on little kids for several reasons, the main one being that it doesn't really do any good and the kids wind up tearing the stitches out anyway. plus they would have to put him under general anesthetic to do it and i just wouldn't be able to handle that at all! so, the doctor gave both seamus and sirus popsicles and sent us on our way. little guy needs to stop it!!
other news, at the 5k the other weekend, i forgot to mention that i saw my obgyn - the doctor that delivered sirus and that i went to for all the prenatal checkups for both kids. i wanted to say hi but wasn't sure if that was ok or not.

cascade edge

hot damn, that was tough. i was totally concerned since i was so sick this week. i was really really sick. rarely am i put on my arse like that. but i managed a comeback, a short run on saturday and then off to the races.
i slept terribly. have been all week. my leg has been hurting, the old snowboard injury. i thot it was gone but i think its from the cycling. it didn't bother me at all last summer, but then again, last summer the only biking i did was on race day.
woke up early and it was cold and drizzly. not fun. charity called to see if we wanted anything from the starbucks and OFCOURSE we did. so then we were off to enumclaw. it got colder and wetter. i was freezing! when i was changing into my wetsuit it was sprinkling and i really started freezing with the shivers and everything. i almost broke down crying. really. but then i would have been the cryer. but i was concerned because although i was feeling ok, i was so sick just 3 dys earlier and had i really recovered?
as eric's race was about to start he went into the water. i watched him and he seemed ok. he even looked back and said it wasn't too cold. i felt a little better. then he was off and i saw him get dunked twice in his first 10 strokes. then it was time to line up for my race. thank goodness charity was there. we went in and really the water wasn't that bad. ok, yes actually it was terrible and eric is a lier, which he admitted to later. i went under and i about passed out. but my spirits had gone up a little since getting in was the worst part. then i did something i have NEVER done, i pulled out the neck of my wetsuit and went under and filled it up. good lord i almost passed out again!! then the race was off. i was doing pretty well, going at a nice and even pace just swimming along then i crashed into the person a head of me and it was all over. rounded the first buoy and headed to the second. the nice man in the kayak came over to see if i was ok and i said i was fine, just slow. he said that its ok to be slow. around the horn i went and down the other side. then i started getting lapped by the guys who started 5 minutes ahead. then down around the bottom buoy and off for lap 2. by now i was, dare i say, almost kind of enjoying the swim. i was going slower then slow and alternating between crawl and breast but i recently learned to wear my goggles not so tight and to spit in them to keep out the fog and the lake was really nice. then the kayaker came by and asked if i was ok, yes, still slow. i decided to crawl for a while and was totally on a roll just going along feeling like i was totally kicking arse out there in the lake by myself at this point. when i finally looked up i was totally off course and the dude on the jetski was watching me. WHEN was he going to come stop me i wonder? i was all mad. finaly around the horn and back in. by the time i was headed in the water was so still. i was no longer freezing. there was a weird currant in the water tho it seemed because i didn't seem to be making any progress. FINALLY i got out of the water! and i RAN up the hill to transition!! i am pretty sure i was 2nd to last out of the water but there were still lots of ppl getting ready for the bike.
i was pretty warm from the swim and was having a tough time figuring out what to wear on the bke. i opted for arm warmers and vest but no knee warmers.
44 minutes into the race, according to my watch i was on the bike and on my way. i quickly decided that i really would have liked those knee warmers. the first few miles went by quickly but there was this one part that was down hill but i really had to work really hard to get down that hill. i thought it was me until i came up on someone and she commented the same thing that i was thinking. at mile 9 the course started to be fun! i was frozen at this point with ice blocks for feet but i was having some fun and i started catching some people even! i also witnessed someone get called out by officials for drafting but they just got a warning.
according to my watch i made it back to transition at 1:38. ERIC WAS ALREADY DONE! and standing right there. i put on my shoes, took off the vest and put on my hat. the run was a 4 lap trail run which turned out to be pretty fun. starting off i was actually pretty happy with my frozen solid feet but they and the rest of me quickly heated up but boy did i have to pee. i just chugged along and the first lap flew by! i learned later that at this point eric was getting a massage.... i tossed off my arm warmers but i was never going to get through another 4.5 miles having to pee so i jumped into the bushes and squatted right there. ahhhh, much better. i quickly caught some of the people that passed me while i was peeing and then i really started picking them off. it was tricky to tell if i was picking them off since we were doing 4 laps, but i was passing people and i was pretty excited. heading out to lap 4 they called my name over the speakers as i headed out and off i went. i felt pretty good and picked up some speed and then finally i was done! my watch said 52:54, that included the bike to run transition, i think. but regardless i was happy with my run and i was even more happy to be done. but when i crossed the line and saw eric the first thing i told him was that i am pretty sure i won't be able to do the 1/2 iron man.
now thati think about it though, i just need to slow it down. yes, even slower then today, i am worried about the bike. we drove the course yesterday and i just don't know. but its laps... and hopefully it won't be 2 degrees like today and maybe it won't be 90 like it apparantly was last year.
the kids got eric a hammock for father's day. its portable and has a stand to it so we put it up in the house. it was very relaxing but EVERYONE wants to be on the hammock so we had to put it away. :( maybe we will get some nice weather and we can take it outside!!