I Get It Now

Dear ACLU,

I've been irritated at you for many years now, because you kept sending membership renewals to our daughter based on her one-time donation back in 2007.  I felt that - and I still do, honestly - you spend too much on mass membership mailings, but that's neither here nor there at the moment.  What is important, and what has given me, for the first time since January 20th, a moment of relief and a feeling like maybe we CAN stop the insanity that is coming from the White House, was hearing that you helped to get the immigration ban blocked on Saturday night.

Here's the thing.  I'm not an activist.  I'm not a strongly political person - I believe that most people can work together for the good of our country, regardless of their political party.  I took my status as an American for granted, until last week.  I never realized just how much privilege I had in this country, until the last week.  And I know that the majority of my readers don't come here for political posts; I'm not one to speak out publicly as I feel there are those who are much better at this than I am.  But for today, I just wanted to acknowledge the ACLU with gratitude for standing up to an executive order that goes against human decency.

So rock on, ACLU.  Keep fighting the fight; to help, I made a donation.  I understand now just how much good you do.  No need to mail me any membership reminders, though - email will do just fine.

FMM - Knitting Catch Up

First things first - let me just say that finding these pictures was a challenge, considering I finished this hat in September and all pictures from 2016 are neatly in files that are on an external hard drive and are not easy to find, much less preview.  I love my new Mac Mini computer, but going back to my old pictures isn't simple.  I think these are the last bits I'll need, and now I can focus on my Mac photo folders - although they aren't as organized as I'd like.  I really need a friend who has a Mac to come sit with me and explain how to do what I think I should be able to do with them.  But until that happens, I'm muddling along, and without much in the way of photo collages, because so far I've only been able to do them on my phone, and I'll be honest - my eyes just don't see that well on that tiny of a screen.  One day I'll get it together...but today is not that day.

I made my mom a hat and a pair of socks for Christmas, and I'm glad I did, because they have had a very snowy winter in Oregon, and woolen handknits are surely helping to keep her warm.

Here's the hat:

Pattern is Cables and Twists Beanie, yarn is Madelinetosh DK, colorway is Coquette.

Modeling it - trying to look cool while it was easily 90 degrees that day.

This pattern was very well-written and the hat, while looking a bit complicated, was a really fun knit.  Plus the yarn is one of my favorites, and the color just made me happy to have in my hands. 

Here's the socks:

Pattern is my own basic vanilla sock, although I use the Fish Lips Kiss heel which is a million times easier than knitting a heel flap the old-school way.  Yarn is West Yorkshire Spinners Signature, colorway is Wood Pigeon.  Toe and heel yarn is Lang Jawoll Superwash Solids, colorway is purple.  

I really like starting the toes of my socks with a coordinating color - I think it gives the sock an extra POP of fun.

When knitting with a self-striping/patterning yarn, it's good to use a different color for the heel so you don't get a funky stripe on the heel.  Plus, POP of fun there, too!

I ended up with enough leftover from the sock yarn that I probably could make a hat with it - the only reason I haven't jumped on it is because sock yarn is so much finer than what I normally knit a hat with that I'd have to cast on probably twice as many stitches, and that seems like a lot of work.  Interesting what makes knitting enjoyable vs. tolerable to me - but that's the beauty of knitting for pleasure - you really do get to choose what you want to knit.

I'm sort of in the SQUIRREL! mode of knitting right now - I keep getting distracted by new ideas, which resulted in unearthing this pile of leftover sock yarn:

What are you supposed to do with all the leftovers?  

Here's a start:  mitered squares...which will become a throw blanket in about 10 years or so.

I saw this project on Ravelry and was intrigued - I like my sock yarn, but I'm not sure I'm a patchwork person - usually I like my colors to all coordinate together, and this will be stepping outside of my comfort zone, big time.  But at least I'd get to revisit all of my pretty yarn again, if I made something similar to this:

This could be interesting.  It will be the never ending project, what with all the socks I make.

Here's a peek at one last project that I'm working on - hopefully SQUIRREL! won't distract me too much, and I can get this one finished by next week's FMM:

I. LOVE. THIS. YARN.

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I can't let this post end without a picture of Paco - here's one where I actually was taking a picture of Henry, who was laying in my chair with his foot on the eye of the stuffed Mini bulldog nearby - I just thought it was funny...but then Paco had to run over and lay down directly in view of the camera.  He know's what's what:

Mom.  Mom.  Mommmm.  Don't look at Henry.  Look at meeeeeeee!

Have a great weekend!

WWU - Gump Run!

 

What is a Gump run, you might be asking?  In our running group's case, it's a run modeled after Forrest Gump, who just started running one day because he felt like it.  He didn't have a plan or a distance in mind - he just ran.  After all of our training for Houston, we were ready for a break from our usual running routes, and since a new road just off of our main running street had recently been completed but was not yet open to traffic, we decided to incorporate it into our run on Saturday.

Our group was a little smaller than usual - Cary, Karen, Jeff, and Brian set off one direction, aiming for 5 miles, while Diane and I set off in another direction, aiming for 4 miles.  She and I ran a little jig jag in the neighborhood before setting out for the new road, and we arrived at it with 1.25 miles on our Garmins.  We had no idea how far we'd get to run on the new road - I thought it must intersect at some point with the shortcut road we take through the fancy neighborhood, but how soon that would happen was undetermined.  No worries, we were on our Gump run!

To set the scene, it was still very dark, and while we could see streetlights lining the new road, they weren't lit.  It was also a damp, misty morning, and it was super quiet - there aren't any houses built near the road yet, so it felt a little scary - as Diane kept saying, she wouldn't run this alone, and neither would I.  But we had safety in numbers, plus there was nothing for the boogeyman to be hiding behind; I wasn't that worried.  The road was level and smooth - we ran right down the middle of it, which was pretty freeing.  It was also really nice to just run without dealing with any traffic.  I'm glad we got to take advantage of this while we could...all too soon, the traffic signal will be installed, our private running area will be open to motor vehicles, and we'll be relegated to the sidewalk.

The road hit a T and we made a turn - one way was a dead end, so it was an easy decision as to which way to go.  We ran down the curve a little way and then saw another road on the right, so we turned down it to see where we'd end up.  Again, there were no houses around, just lots of land, trees, and some low shrubbery.  Now, this part felt a little creepier than the other road, but still, there was nothing around us.  Then Diane said "aren't you worried that there might be wild pigs out here?" - my reply?  "well, I wasn't!"  Honestly, I forget that feral pigs are a possibility...I was thinking more along the lines that we might come across some of our deer friends who we see in the area on a regular basis.  Deer, I can take.  Pigs?  They scare me.  We ran faster, needless to say.

We came to a dead end on that road and had to turn around and run past the imaginary wild pigs again.  We hit the new road and turned right, running toward the light...er, lights...of the country club and multi-million dollar houses.  Sure enough, we did end up at the shortcut road, but it was funny - we were a little disoriented as to where exactly we were on that road, so we paused our Garmins for a moment while we stood there and got ourselves situated.  It's interesting how a somewhat familiar area can look so unfamiliar when viewed from a different direction.  Once we were ready to run again, I remembered to not only restart my Garmin (that is a major victory as I'm always forgetting to do that if I pause it) but I also noted the mileage:  we'd run just over a mile on the new road, and what an exhilarating mile it was!  I am looking forward to running on that road again.  By the time we made it back to the clubhouse, we'd hit 4 miles - perfect!

After the run, we headed over to Blue Baker, where our baker friend gave us two loaves of fresh-from-the-oven ciabatta bread:

One loaf - the other was being sliced up as I took this picture.

We had butter for the ciabatta and it was heavenly.  Later on, he also presented us with a plate of brownie ends, but we decimated it too quickly for me to get a picture.  Our appetites had all returned after the half marathon the week before; turns out none of us were able to eat much after the race, but we were ready for some treats on Saturday!

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I'm dealing with some toe pain/toenail issues leftover from the half marathon - I ended up with a blister under the nail bed of the toe next to my big toe, which is really painful, in case you were wondering.  The same toe on the other foot was hurting a lot while I was running on Saturday, but I can't see a blister there.  Epsom salt foot baths are helping, however I suspect it's just going to have to play out over time.  I can still run, but I'm glad that the longest I need to run over the next couple of weeks is 6 miles - my poor toes need some time to recover from what I've put them through!

A Decadent Meal

With a title like that, I bet you were expecting to read about something really high caloric - a diet-buster, to be certain.  Well, no.  Not this time, anyway.  But it's funny how I considered a recent restaurant meal to be decadent...and how I ended up turning it into more of a "treat yo self" meal.

Backstory is that after our vacation last month that included all things butterbeer, and then the holidays that included lots of sweets and treats, and then of course carb loading for our half marathon, well - Jeff and I have been feeling like we want to swing the pendulum around regarding our food choices.  So I've actually cooked a bit - I know, don't faint.  This recipe for an easy Korean beef bowl came out so well that I'm making it again tonight, only I'm doubling the amount of sauce and adding steamed broccoli to make it a little more well-rounded:

I served this over Calrose rice, which is a sticky rice that steamed up beautifully in my little rice cooker.

But that isn't the decadent meal.  Believe it or not, our decadent meal came from a salad restaurant - Salata, to be exact.  Remember back in the day, when I used to make giant salads for our dinner?  I'd chop up veggies and fruit and have everything ready to assemble, and those salads were delicious.  But I've gotten out of the habit of doing much in the way of food prep, and quite honestly, I didn't want to bother with going to the grocery store, much less wash and slice up all of the ingredients - I just wanted to eat a big, healthy salad.  So we decided to try Salata, which is where you stand in line and have your salad built in front of you as you go.  Now, I'm generally opposed to standing in line for my food - if I'm going out, I want it brought to me - but big salad was calling us, and this was the only way it was going to happen that night.

I have to say, there's something about seeing all of the veggies that were available that was so appealing - I had my server add a handful of this and a handful of that, building on my mixed greens base and then we moved to the fruit section, where they had thinly sliced apple pieces, and fresh strawberries and pineapple and I went to town with that, and on it went.  You could add a protein to your salad for an extra three bucks, and I did - the herbed chicken breast was really tasty.  Their dressings were all labeled with calorie amounts, and they let me taste a couple before deciding on one.

All told, our salads were $11 each - which is a lot for a salad, I know.  And it did feel decadent, especially knowing that I could have created a similar salad at home.  However, it ended up accomplishing more than just feeding us.  Along with nourishment, I felt worthy, to use Debby's favorite word.  Worthy of allowing myself to spend more money than really was necessary on a healthy meal for myself.  And once I was finished, I was inspired to make a list of ingredients to buy on my next trip to the grocery store, so that I could recreate that salad at home.  Win-win all around.  While I'm going to work on adding homemade salads to my meal repertoire more often, I'm not opposed to going back to Salata once in a while, because every now and then, you do need to treat yo self to a decadent meal.  Unless, of course, this is happening:

FMM - Houston Marathon Expo

 

After the first year we ran Houston, we learned our lesson about getting to the expo early before everything sells out, so Jeff and I, along with Cary and Diane, drove in on Friday morning and made such good time that as we were walking toward the expo we suddenly had to stop - there was a line, as the doors weren't open yet!  I can't believe we managed to arrive that early, but having two extra navigators to get through the maze of Houston freeways helped immensely:

Long line, but it moved fast once the doors opened, as the expo is huge.

We headed right over to the Sketchers booth, to check out the official race merchandise.  They still don't have nearly as much half marathon stuff as they do for the full, but I managed to find a couple things that needed to come home with me:

Houston skyline shirt, plus some freebie buttons and a dogtag that I'm not sure what I'll do with.  Glad I bought the shirt on Friday, because when Andi came to the expo on Saturday afternoon, they had a grand total of four of this design remaining.  They sell out so fast!

I also bought the blue hat at that booth, and the Run Happy visor at another booth.

I saw this shirt at the Fleet Feet booth from across the floor and made it my mission to get around a bunch of people to see if it said what I thought it said.  It did, I quickly tried it on over what I was wearing to make sure it fit, Jeff snapped a picture, and boom - got in that long line behind me to make my purchase!  This shirt describes me and my running perfectly.

Fun with 13.1 part 1

I feel like an official runner whenever my name is on a sign like this!

 

I came across the BFF Buffer booth, where I met the owner, Josh, in person - I've been emailing with him for nearly two years now.  I had fun talking with him, and ended up helping out a woman who'd come to the booth; pretty sure she ended up purchasing two of them (one for her, one for her daughter).  I swear, these things pretty much sell themselves once you try them.  Anyway, it was entertaining.

In the spirit of the city of Houston embracing their graffiti art downtown, there was a huge "wall" set up just for runners to leave their mark - so naturally, we had to tag it:

 

Cary was our official artist

RRC, represent!

Later on, Karen texted me this picture - Jimmymeow left his signature near our spot, LOL!

Fun with 13.1, part 2

Diane was lucky enough to be at the expo on Saturday when Meb was there...as she was wearing two layers, she managed to do a strip job while in line so she could have him sign her Renegade t-shirt!  

Fun with 13.1, part 3

Because we were staying at the Hilton, it was an easy walk across the skybridge from the hotel to the expo, so we ended up going there several times.  It was entertaining to wander around and people watch, as well as check out the merchandise, although we didn't end up buying very much.  I feel like there might not have been as many vendors as last year, but it was still a good expo, and as always with Houston, packet pickup was a breeze.  This was a good experience, from start to finish.

Have a great weekend!

ABB 5K - Spectator's Report

Unlike the previous two years, I didn't run this race, simply because I wanted to see if not running a 5K the day before a half marathon would make a difference in my performance.  Jeff didn't run it because his foot has been bothering him for months now and he didn't want to stress it before the half marathon.  So that's how we ended up spectating this race alongside Jimmymeow, who is not a runner but most definitely is Karen's biggest supporter. 

 Downtown Houston, right across from Discovery Green park.

After my early morning wake up and freak out - again, WHY would I have race anxiety for a race I wasn't running - we met everyone in the lobby of the Hilton and walked over to the start line.  It was a foggy morning and felt somewhat cool, but the runners were going to warm up quickly once they started moving.  We stopped for a few pictures:

In front of Discovery Green park - Karen, Brian, Cary, Diane, Cristy, and Julia.

And in front of the George R. Brown Convention Center, which is where the expo is held.

And then the Renegades went into the starting corral, while we made our way to the front of the start line.  It was really interesting to see a race that I've run in from this viewpoint!  Did you know there is a lead truck, with race officials in the back, along with a timing clock, ready to roll once the race begins?  Being a back of the race runner, I didn't!  Here's what the starting area looked like, just a few minutes before the race began:

The pickup truck, with an official who held up that flag until the race began.  I worried that his arm was getting sore as he was holding the flag up for at least five minutes that I saw.

The race has begun!  You can see that there is 9 seconds on the race clock, plus there are bikers to lead the runners along the route.

This is where it got interesting - the first runner was moving so fast that the truck had to gun it to stay ahead of him!  Now there are 11 seconds on the race clock.  These runners were FLYING!!!

We always say that for this race, our group needs to not start so far back in the corral, but it's a casual atmosphere where no one is wanting to push it because of the bigger race the next day.  But holy cow, we honestly thought we'd missed seeing everyone come across the starting line, because there were so many walkers mixed in with the runners - nope.  Ten minutes after the race began, we finally saw our peeps!  That was wild - being on this side of the race made me realize how much more our group could move up and not be in the way of other runners, which is always our concern.

There's Julia, Brian, Cary (peeking behind Brian), and Karen - I missed seeing Cristy start.

It's a little blurry, but I like this shot of Diane - it shows the movement of the runners so well.

Once we saw everyone start, we headed over to Starbucks for a cup of coffee - on our way there, we could hear the race announcer calling in the first finishers!

 Overly excited for some coffee at this point!

Caffeine in hand, we made our way to a spot close to the finish line, where I managed to get pictures of some of our group, which was even more challenging than the start, seeing as they were coming in at different times:

By the time I saw Karen she was too far past me to get a picture, but I saw her on the giant screen that we were standing near - she's just behind the man in the white shirt.

Here's Cary and Brian - another slightly blurry, movement shot.  I like it.

This is a very inclusive race with participants of all abilities, including runners, walkers, the visually impaired, and runners on prosthetic legs.  It was really inspiring to watch everyone do their best!

After our group got their medals, we reconvened in the lobby of the hotel and walked to our traditional Saturday morning breakfast-in-Houston spot:

Brothers Taco House.  There always seems to be a line to order your food, but it moves quickly.

They make your breakfast taco right in front of you - this year I had potato, bacon, refried beans, and cheese - carbing up for the half marathon - with freshly made hot sauce (if you go there, get the red...the green sauce is super spicy).  

On our way back, we stopped to look at some graffiti murals.  It's really cool how the city of Houston has embraced and encouraged graffiti art, and we saw a lot of new pieces this year:

 We were going to take a picture on a staircase similar to the one with the chameleon, but realized that there was someone sleeping on it.  This isn't the best area to be in; however, it was daytime and we figured there was safety in numbers...still, I wouldn't go there all by myself.

Houston #1

  

Houston #2

2017 Aramco Houston Half Marathon Race Recap!

I really like this medal.  A LOT.

I ran my tenth half marathon yesterday!  For the third year in a row, I ran the Aramco Houston Half Marathon with my fellow Renegades.  We had another fun-filled weekend, so I'll break it up into a couple of posts, but of course I have to begin with the half marathon.  I'll write about the expo and the ABB 5K later on this week, but I wanted to get the race recap done while it's still fresh in my mind.

As you know, I have been dealing with race anxiety for years now.  No matter how much I try to reason with myself, logic seems to go out the window when it comes to racing and me.  This year, I decided to try something different, and that was to not run the ABB 5K the day before the race; I was hoping that by starting the half marathon out on fresher legs, I might feel better and thus not want to quit at mile two, as I have in previous races.  What was weird, and very telling about the irrational way anxiety manifests itself, is that when I woke up on Saturday morning, the day of the ABB 5K, I felt the all-too-familiar dread, which made no sense because I wasn't racing!  Jeff, Jimmymeow, and I were just going to spectate as the rest of our crew ran.  I was pretty upset at myself for feeling like this, but somehow, watching the race seemed to help.

The next morning, RACE DAY for me, was interesting.  I wasn't super nervous when I woke up, not like I was the day before, and nowhere near how I've been for so many races in the past.  I mean, a little nerves were there, but I was functional.  Maybe I tricked my brain into having its anxiety freakout a day early.  Any case, I got most of it out of my system the day before.

As usual, we got dressed and met in the lobby of the Hilton, which was bustling with runners.  We took a quick group picture:

Left to right:  me, Julia, Karen, Andi, Diane, Cristy, Cary, Brian, and Jeff

You might notice that not only were we not wearing any kind of throwaway sweatshirts, but a lot of the women in our group were wearing tank tops.  That's because Texas is crazy, and it was hot - yes, in January.  The race was under a yellow flag warning:

At the expo - a yellow flag for less-than-ideal race conditions.

Honestly, although it sucked that we weren't going to get good running weather, what the organizers were concerned about (temps in the mid-60s to begin, with 100% humidity) wasn't anything new to us; unfortunately, most of our runs have been in those same conditions.  So while we weren't worried about the conditions, we were disappointed to not get this race with ideal running weather...but oh well - it comes with the territory when you run in Texas.

Anyway.  We took our group picture and then headed out to our corrals.  Brian and Karen went to B, Jeff went to C, and the rest of us went to E.  This year, we were a little concerned about the cut off time - although you have four hours to finish the half marathon, the organizers sent out a notice saying that you needed to maintain a 13:45 pace for the first 8 miles, or you could be swept.  Which made no sense, as that's a three hour half marathon, and like I said, you had four hours.  So we moved closer to the front of the corral than we've ever been, just to be on the safe side.  Interesting note:  we started the race at 7:30; last year we started at 7:37, so it paid off to do that, although we were in a crush of people and at one point I honestly thought I might vomit - could have been a bit of race anxiety, or it could have just been being a short person smushed up against what felt like a gajillion people.

One last selfie before the race began:

Julia, Cristy, me, Diane, Cary, Andi - ready to go!

We wished each other luck, high fives went around, and then the race began!  Diane and I started off doing 1:30/45 intervals.  We'd experimented with dropping down our running interval over the last couple of weeks, and I was glad we made that change with the way the weather turned out.  It was muggy, warm, and foggy.  Rarely, very rarely, we'd get a bit of a breeze, but there would be miles in between that happening, so we were pretty conservative with our running.  I knew I'd spend my first mile trying to get my breathing in check, thanks to the anxiety, but we did really well with keeping ourselves calm, and I felt good.  I think it was partway through the second mile that my breathing got a little ragged and we took an extra walking break, but other than that, things were going as well as they could be, considering the conditions.

The Houston marathon/half marathon is a great race - spectator and volunteer support is amazing.  I have never had my name called out (it was printed on my bib) so many times as I did in this race - and every time, hearing "go Shelley" or "you've got this, Shelley" helped keep me moving.  That said, things did start to hurt - the underside of my middle toe as well as the arch on my left foot, my left hip, and eventually, my back - oooh, my back was killing me for the last four miles!  But I kept thinking that as soon as I got to the finish line, it would all stop hurting (spoiler alert - that was not true...I think I had runner's amnesia regarding that).

Because I've run so many half marathons, I've figured out a thing or two about race pictures, and was hoping to get some good shots along the course.  I suspect that most of mine will be of me walking, as that always seemed to be when we saw a photographer, but there is one spot, just about at the halfway point, where there's an overhead photographer, with a blue carpet that makes for a good picture - if you can get it without a lot of other runners, because invariably they will be blocking you in the picture.  So when Diane and I were approaching that spot, I held us back while a big group went ahead, and then we ran for our great picture - only to see one of the photographers (there were two) flip his camera over to check something - DANG IT!!!  We'll see if that shot came out, but you can't say we didn't try for a good one.

We kept running, but I was starting to want to walk more.  We took some extra walking breaks, and then finally just flipped our intervals - instead of running for 1:30 and walking for 45 seconds, we did the opposite, and this saved me.  I was able to keep doing the intervals instead of walking more and more.  That said, I'd been telling Diane since about mile 4.5 that if she was feeling strong, to go on ahead without me.  I was fine with that, and had originally (like, since last January) been planning on running the race solo, so mentally I was prepared.  Finally, at mile 8.5, she decided to go on ahead - I was glad that she was feeling so good, as I was a hurting fool at that point.

I kept doing my reverse intervals, occasionally chatting with other runners.  I was proud of myself for not doing any extra walking - much as I was ready to be done running, every time my Garmin chimed, I ran that interval.  I also didn't consider quitting like I had during my previous half marathons, nor did I break down in tears, which I'd also done during the previous halfs.  I never went there emotionally, and for that, I'm grateful.  Running a half marathon is hard enough physically, but when you throw the emotional side into it like I seem to do, it just wreaks havoc with every part of my body.  Not having that happen yesterday was really wonderful.  Don't get me wrong, I was still hurting and my back felt like it was going to break in half, but I was able to push through all of that.

The last two miles were interesting.  This is where the full and half meet back up (after splitting off around mile 7.5), and it's exciting to see how the marathoners are doing.  There were a lot of spectators, plus that's the section where several beer companies are handing out Dixie cups of beer to the runners.  It's definitely a party atmosphere, if your party includes guests who look like the walking dead.

My Garmin chimed that I was at mile 12, but I knew I wasn't, according to the route markers - between weaving around slower runners throughout the course, plus we didn't run the tangents, I was off by more than a quarter of a mile.  It was at this point when a woman in an orange tank tapped my arm as she caught up to me and said "we've got this" - and we ended up running together for the rest of the race.  But wait, here's where it gets interesting:  as we were exchanging running stories while we ran/walked, a strong breeze came up, along with some sprinkles, which felt great as it cooled us down.  Then the sprinkles turned into big fat raindrops, and then the skies opened up into a torrential downpour!  It was funny, really - we were about .75 of a mile from the finish, so we knew we wouldn't be out in it for long, and it wasn't cold - but dang, we were getting drenched!

Normally, there are a ton of spectators at this point but they'd all retreated into the cover of building overhangs, so we runners were on our own.  We finally hit the finisher's chute and the timing mats were under water, with big puddles on either side.  Some runners ahead of us were carefully picking their way over them, but at that point my shoes were soaked through, so I just went for it, hitting the mat and splashing through the giant puddles of water.  My finish time was 3:33, but honestly, that is so secondary to the fact that I had a good race, mentally.  Finish times do not always tell the entire story, and that is definitely true in my case.  I'm really proud of myself.

I hugged my new runner friend, Becka, and then we got our medals and made our way inside the convention center, where the race organizers had just brought out an industrial-sized roll of thermal blankets - you pulled them off much like taking a bag off the roll at the product section of the grocery store.  I was happy to get this, seeing as the air conditioning was working very well in the convention center and I was soaked through.  I stopped and had my official finisher's picture taken, and met up with Jeff and the gang.  It was a rough race for most of our group - the hot, muggy weather just takes a toll on you.  But they all finished - and Diane managed to make it to the finish line just as the rain started, so she didn't get too wet, luckily.

You are looking at one happy half marathon finisher!

I got my finisher's shirt:

I like it, plus it's not super fitted, so it actually feels like it's one I'll wear!

And then we headed to the food area to get our breakfast.  Considering I'd run 13.38 miles on just three GU's and some Tailwind drink, I was not very hungry, but I got a biscuit and gravy and one breakfast sausage link, plus a chocolate milk, and chowed down.  We were sitting there, going over how the race went for everyone, when we looked at the clock and realized we only had an hour to get back to the hotel, shower, pack, and check out!  Ack!  The Hilton was not as generous with their late check out time this year, so we had to scramble, and didn't have time to take a group finisher picture with our medals.  That was disappointing, but we're planning on having a post-race victory dinner soon, and will wear our super sweet finisher's shirts and medals and relive our big day...and take some pictures!

Oh - I do have a funny picture to show you.  When we got back to our room, I took off my shoes and socks and discovered that my feet were blue!  Not blue from being cold, but blue because apparently my green shoes had leached color when they were rain-soaked:

Yes I know this is kind of gross - but the blue was too funny not to share.  Oh and after my shower, it was still there, although a little lighter.

OK, I can't end this post with that picture, so here's our participant shirt that we got at packet pickup:

Top is the front, bottom is the back.  Super soft, lightweight cotton shirt, great color - I'll wear this one often.

This was a memorable race - not only because it was my tenth half marathon, but also because I finished it feeling good about my performance.  I haven't been able to say that for a long time!