The Sister Has Spoken

She responded! My sister responded to my CHALLENGE (you can read her response here) and when I called her tonight she said she would make a decision by this weekend! Yayayayay! I'm so excited to hear what she says!


I'm also excited because I get to see my fiance this weekend! He told me he'd help me find training plans and running success stories to inundate (oh, man, I love that word but I don't know how to spell it!) her inbox with to help her make a decision.


I'm a little nervous because although I have a ticket to Virginia (Sam and I are meeting there to attend his fraternity brother's wedding) I'm going to try to go standby on an earlier flight...this means I'll have to carry on my luggage. Firstly, I never carry anything in the airport except my purse because I am really irresponsible and sincerely hate keeping track of a ton of stuff. Secondly, I'm a chronic overpacker and have been my whole life. Even in high school I took between 3 and 4 pairs of underwear and at least 3 pairs of shoes just to spend the night at my best friends' houses. My new carry-on suitcase is about the size of what I normally pack my face/hair stuff in!

Anyway, enough babblings...I'll take pictures this week AND keep you updated on my packing AND (most importantly!) let you know what my sister decides! :-)

CHALLENGE

I am hereby challenging my sister, Amanda at Serenity Now, to train for and FINISH the Disney Princess Half Marathon with me on Sunday, March 7, 2010.

She recently wrote this post about running because I had the {amazing} idea to get all my bridesmaids to run a 5K with me before the bachelorette party. Sadly, I can't find a race in Virginia that is convenient to all the other things going on that weekend AND all the girls' schedule.

BUT THEN SOMETHING AMAZING HAPPENED! I was watching television the other day and saw this girl wearing a wonderful pink shirt kissing a medal hanging around her neck that looked like a tiara...I watched as the screen panned out and holey moley there was Cinderella's castle as the lady on the commercial invited me to a princess weekend at Disneyland! I never knew there was such a thing! aldfa;lfjj!

Anyway, here are the reasons that this is an amazing idea for my sister and I to plan for/train for/save money for this amazing princess-y event:

1. It's something to look forward to...everyone needs something to look forward to!
2. It's my birthday weekend and you could race with me as a present (You're cheap, you admit it, it's ok.)
3. We can get in better shape so that,
4. We will look amazing in our new PINK SHIRTS
5. Family vacay afterwards?
6. We can be a team and get our names on our bibs!
7. You can blog about it!
8. Mom will pay your entry fee (heh heh she doesn't know this yet, but I'll break it to her tonight.)
9. It's only 13.1 miles and regardless of if it takes 2 or 6 hours - it will feel so good to do it!

So, here it is Manda - do you accept my challenge?!?!?!

{Picture is from DisneyWorldSports.com}

This could be us (but you can wear the heinous pink running skirt :-)

Chaskis 8K

Yesterday I met Stacey bright and early to run the Chaskis 8K in Helotes and then walk around the festival after. I was really nervous because since I have been getting used to Crossfit workouts - I haven't run more than a half mile in almost a month. For anyone that has never run with me - I am SLOW. My dream times are usually 10min/mile paces but what I make for my goals are usually around 11 or 12. Today being my first run back I decided to make my goal 60 minutes (a pretty generous time for 4.96 miles!) I walked through the water stops (something Sam taught me a while ago) and definitely walked up this monster hill on the third mile but other than that I jogged/ran the whole thing! And in less than my goal time! According to my Garmin (one of the best investments I ever made) I ran 5.07 miles in 56:36. Stacey, of course, was gone and out of my site within 2 miles and finished the race in about 40 minutes (she is really, really fast.)




Afterwards we walked around the festival until Stace had to leave for puppy class with Sugar. We found out the festival is actually a recurring thing that happens every first Saturday and we are definitely going back! I bought Sam some Strawberry Habenero preserves from a fruit stand man and myself a scallop squash because I've never seen them before and the vegetable man said they were delish.







Question: Has anyone ever done Team in Training or a similar marathon/half-marathon training program? Stacey and I were thinking about doing one but wanted some advice...

Peeves.

As in pets. Pet peeves. Today my preceptor at work must have said at least three times "that's one of my biggest pet peeves." (She was of course talking about impatient, needy surgeons that constantly point out the 5 seconds it took to fetch whatever it is they asked for adds up to hours over the course of their careers - that's annoying.) Anyway, once the surgery got started and I was just wandering around the operating room (I was too short to see the surgical field and the video monitors were turned away from me) I started thinking about my own pet peeves. I actually narrowed it down to five (and not surprisingly most of them have to do with driving.)

1. Very slow drivers in the very fast lane. What the alajkdfl;adjfl; do you think it's called the fast lane for!?!? I have been followed by a black cloud of curse words all the way to and from work several times over the past 3 years of driving in San Antonio because of these slow people making me sooooo furious!


2. People decelerating on the highway instead of in the deceleration lane. Samuel has been the victim of my wrath over this many times...please turn on your blinker and negotiate your vehicle into the deceleration lane in order to slow down and turn. (P.S. I actually don't even know if that's the real name of this turning lane or if that's how you spell it...it may just be that Samuel has feared correcting me when I start yelling about it:-)


3. People who do not do the customary "thank you" wave after you do something nice for them on the road. If I slow down and let you merge in or I stop traffic in order to let you turn across an intersection - just let me see your hand give a little wave, it's not hard.


4. My fourth pet peeve is when people in apartment complexes (I don't live in a house) do not put their dogs on leashes. THE SIGN SAYS KEEP YOUR DOG ON THE LEASH AT ALL TIMES. I love my sweet baby Amber Judith but she's rude and has bad manners and when someone's poodle comes rushing around the corner baring it's teeth - someone's gonna lose an eye or part of an ear and it's probably not my junk yard baby!


5. My last and final and perhaps my worst peeve is when people make comments about other people's food. "Wow, you ate all that?" or "What is that? It smells weird." are just not nice things to say...maybe I'm weird but I've been known to throw away a whole meal because someone made me really self-conscious about the smell/amount/look of what I was lunching on!

Ok, wow, I sound so rude! Haha..help me out here, what are some of your biggest pet peeves? I've made the next 24 hours judgement free - you can say whatever bothers you and there will be no judgement or consequences (plus it will make me feel better for complaing so much.) Sometimes, like a good cry or scream at the top of your lungs, it just feels so good to let it all out:-)

{Just for grins - and because I love blogs with pictures - this is a picture of my Amber with her Stacey's cat, Oreo}