Yes, I know it’s Wednesday.

But this weekend was still phenomenal.  My little sister Stephanie graduated from Texas A&M University – Commerce as a Bachelor of Science in Interdisciplinary Studies.  I couldn’t be prouder of her!  She passed her teaching certification exam, her PPR, and is ESL certified – totally ready to teach kindergarten!  She won’t find out til this summer if she has a job at the school district she’s been working at, but with her awesome recommendation letters and teachers/administrators backing her, I am thinking/hoping it won’t be a problem.

“I did it!”

“Look over there…”

And just a picture I love.  We got some funnier pics that are on my mom’s iPad too.

Afterward, we had family and friends over to the house to celebrate.  It was so great getting everyone together to congratulate Steph!  My friend Merritt came with her 11-month-old son Mason, so I got to be baby-crazy for most of the afternoon.

–Also… a big congratulations to my friend Terra on her graduation this weekend too!!  You ROCK.

Met up with Kristen, Valerie, J, and a couple of significant others for drinks at The Cedars Social in South Dallas.  Despite being born and raised in the Metroplex and living there for a year after college, I haven’t spent much time in this area and was more than a little apprehensive.  Texts I sent to J while sitting in the parking lot:

However, once inside, the place is pretty hip; we all agreed it was a scene straight out of Boogie Nights!  Their cocktail list was very extensive.  Of course, I’m STILL not drinking so I settled for the food menu.  Val and I split the deviled eggs and artisan cheese tray.  Delicious!  I would absolutely go back to try some of their tasty looking drinks.  I left early, unfortunately – love spending time with those ladies (and gentlemen)! – had to get back and see what was going on at the house, since I had left Shane their on his study group call.  Hung out with Steph and her friends in the hot tub til midnight or so.  Great day.

We had full intentions of taking my mom out for brunch on Mother’s Day, but she instead insisted on making waffles.  Twist my arm, right?  It was nice being able to spend Mother’s Day at home for a change.  After gifting her our tokens, we packed up the stuff and the dogs and headed back to Houston.  I went for a ride with Crystal (very short ride – 20 miles, thank God for tapering) at Bear Creek before tending to the laundry and crashing.  All in all, an awesome weekend.

May 19th is only 3 days away – you know what my next post will be about!!

Say that like Pauly D from Jersey Shore – t-shirt tiiiiiime!  No?  Just me?

Here’s what we got ourselves into this weekend! 

Friday night was spent at Sherlock’s for my CapTex team’s fundraiser.  It was a $10 donation at the door and $1 drinks til 7pm….I’m actually surprised we didn’t get a bigger turnout - $1 drinks, people!  And I’m still in Oktsoberfest (now it’s Day 19) and it was like my own personal hell.  BUT we raked in around $300 for the cause, so it was an evening well spent.

Saturday I woke up at 5:30 and got ready for Bike for Mike in Fulshear (about 45 minutes west of Houston, nice flat place for riding).  It was a really nice ~70 mile ride.  Ended up riding with a couple of friends for most of the way.  My only complaint would be the headwind when traveling south (standard anywhere right now, with the wind coming off the gulf) and lack of coverage.  That’s what’s nice about the IMTX bike course – it might be 112 miles, but it has a lot of shade, especially riding through Sam Houston National Forest!  Anyway, Bike for Mike was my first sponsored ride and it was AWESOME to have rest stops – the food was awesome (especially the smoothies at the 30 mile stop!).  We stopped at mile 30 and mile 56 for refill and snack breaks.  It was pretty hot out and I was ready to call it a day.  Jess was flying with her new Gatorskins tyres and I think I’ll have to procure some for myself.  It makes it harder to get a flat, so even though it’s a heavier tyre, it would still be worth it for the time it would take me to change a flat.  I don’t want to risk that on race day.  I ran 2 miles just to shake out my legs, and then Jess and I headed over to 288 Lake for a 2 mile open water swim.  It took us 1:16, which would put us at about 1:30 for the 2.4 mile swim at IM.  That’s my goal time!

Shane had been at class all day and after he got home we went back out to Katy for a Cinco de Mayo dinner at our friends Lori and Zach’s house.  The more time I spend in the suburbs, the more I love it.  It’s nice being close to all the ‘Houstonian’ stuff – like the locally owned restaurants & bars, and being close to my friends and Memorial Park, but city living is just that.  Our backyard is pocket-sized, there’s a crackhouse on the corner (every corner, not just ours), traffic is horrendous at all times.  So moving out the ‘burbs would be a huge change and yes, it’s far (~30 miles), but what’s so bad about holing up in the house or eating at the local Chili’s?  Nothing, that’s what.  So I was pointing out all the cool stuff when we were driving: “Oh, look, running trails!  Katy has nice running trails!  You know where else has nice running trails?”  Shane, dejectedly: “The Woodlands.”  Me: “Damn right, The Woodlands!”  Since doing all of our training up there (30 min north, that’s where IMTX is held), I’ve become mildly obsessed with this particular suburb.  IT’S GORGEOUS. 

I digress. 

So we had fun with our friends on Cinco – even though I couldn’t have the margs.  BUT I was introduced to mojito flavored Crystal Light…delicious!  Some of the gals were just adding rum to it, but it also tasted fine on its own – very refreshing. 

I was supposed to wake up at 5:30 for a 5K; I had lofty goals of beating my time from the last one.  But then I realized I would probably expend all of my energy for the day and I kinda needed the rest.  So when my alarm went off, I just said NOPE.  Instead I woke up at 7:30 and met some friends for a long run.  It was a nice day – overcast, not too bad.  We lucked out.  Ran from Memorial along Allen Parkway through downtown and back, and then I did an extra loop or so to add up to 16 miles.  Phew!

Strongarmed Jordann into going to 288 Lake, where we swam 1.5 miles with Erin and Julie.  Ok….now it’s taper time.  I will keep my swim volume up but am really backing off the bike and the run.  Next weekend is my sister’s college graduation!!!  So I’ll bike 40 miles either when we get back or before we leave and run 10-12 on Sunday morning. 

Love tapering.  Love it.  More time at home, more time to EAT ALL THE FOOD, more time in general.

Off to a new week.

This past weekend I headed up to Dallas to race my 2nd FULL MARATHON!  I knew weather conditions were going to be pretty daunting (by Texas standards): high of 42 degrees and rain.  I don’t know why, but it always rains when I go to Dallas!

I honestly thought the race would be postponed or cancelled, or that we’d defer to the half.  So Kristen and I enjoyed a pre-race meal of champagne (thanks for hosting us for girls’ night, Marisa!) and homemade pizza!

It was indeed pretty miserable.  For gear I wore NorthFace running tights, a Nike dri-fit long-sleeved shirt, my TNT singlet, an Adidas purple running jacket, an Asics headband/earwarmer, Asics gloves, and Puma socks.  And of course my trusty Sauconys.   The race director said that all you’d need was a long-sleeved shirt and some shorts but I don’t think so, dude.

We walked a mile from the car at Fair Park….and only had to wait 5 minutes for the port-o-let – MIRACLE!

We waited even longer than that to crowd into our corral (hint: not A-1).  The first group took off promptly at 8am.

They had assured us that all racers would have crossed the start line by 8:30, but we were middle-of-the-pack and were exactly 30 minutes after gun time…yikes.  Little did we know that my family was waiting at the start line to see us begin our race.  Steph was leaning over the gate and I heard, “There she is!  Go Christa!” as we ran by.  Fun way to start!

Wellllllll, to make a long (very long) story short:  we held a steady 10:30 pace and got to the split (mile 8.5) a little over an hour and a half into the race.  It didn’t feel like almost 9 miles and we saw the sign above Granada Theater on Greenville Avenue that said Half Marathoners Turn Right, Full Marathoners Turn Left.  I looked at Kristen and said, “Ok, last chance,” and she replied, “Let’s go for it!”  Ah, so we did.  Left turn, and no going back.

Miles 12-21 around White Rock Lake were the worst.  Cold, lots of wind, and zero spectators.  I tried to just stay upbeat and be that crazy girl on the course who yells random things to keep everybody happy.  Yknow, stuff like, “ONLY TWO MORE MILES TO THE HOOTERS WATER STOP!  I SWEAR I ONLY STOP THERE FOR THE WINGS!”

Mile 20.5.  The Hooters girls passing out water, Gatorade, and – you guessed it – wings.  In case some runners want a nosh, I suppose.  Oh…and I took a PowerBar gel (tangerine flavor) at miles 6, 12, and 19.

They have a Start sign because they say this is where “the race begins.”  After this, you hit the “Dolly Parton Hills” – complete with impersonators.

We had a hard time those last few miles.  And apparently missed my dad waiting for us at mile 25 – and he missed us too!

Here’s a great shot my sis caught of us crossing the finish line – matching chip times, 5:07:18.  Not bad, all things considered.

Splits:

And that’s all, folks.  A little sore on Monday and Tuesday but nothing like after San Diego.  Plus – NO SUNBURN!! Love those overcast winter races.

Gunning for 4:40 in Houston on January 15th.  We shall see….

Why a 70.3?  Because a 70.4 would just be silly!

I can’t believe it – I finished my first half ironman on Sunday!  That’s right, you sillies.  I swam 1.2 miles, biked 56 miles, and ran 13.1 miles (a half marathon, mind you) – and, unbelievably to me, I did it within the official time limit of 8 hours. HAH.

Oilman Texas (formerly Iron Star) was held in Montgomery, Texas – about an hour north of Houston.  I stayed in a hotel in Conroe 10 miles away the night before so I wouldn’t have to drive 50 in the morning instead.  Luckily for me, it was TIME CHANGE – hallelujah, an extra hour of sleep on race day!  My parents came in town and I was also giving them an evaluated tour of the Holocaust Museum (my Junior League placement) – that took up a few hours.  We went to Yia Yia Mary’s for dinner, which turned out to be the perfect pre-race fuel.  Those Greeks know how to do it.

I didn’t even have time to get nervous.  I took half a Benadryl at the hotel and was knocked out til 5am, when I got my wakeup call and packed up my gear to head to the race site.  I took an anti-stress tablet and those things must work because I was shockingly cavalier about the entire thing.  I kept saying to myself…ok, go for a swim, and then you’ll go for a long bike ride, and then a run.  I wasn’t concerned about my time.  Goal 1 was to finish.  Goal 2 was to finish in under 8 hours.  And my final goal was to finish in under 7 hours (spoiler: didn’t happen).

Walking out of transition to the swim start – ready to go!

Ok, ok, prayer, national anthem, blah blah – let’s go!  I’m somewhere in there with the rest of my pink-capped friends…

Swim (49:30): I wish I had a long-sleeved wetsuit.  The officials said it was 70 degrees, but there’s no way – it had to be at least 65.  It was SO COLD – I didn’t warm up the entire time.  I felt really bad for the girls not wearing a wetsuit at all.  Compared with previous races and yards/minute, this was a rather slow swim for me.  Eh, well – whatya gonna do?

Done with the swim!

T1 (6:06): Wetsuit strippers did their thing – first time I’ve had my wetsuit stripped off of me, that was weird.  And it works!  That thing flew off! Then, socks, cycling shoes, and I was off on the bike.

Bike (3:53:25):  Well…since I was shooting for 3:30 on the bike…we can see that didn’t happen.  Yes, this is a pretty bad time.  Keep in mind I could barely ride a bike in June, when I joined the TNT Tri team.  At least a vast improvement?  Also…I fell at mile 52.  Ah, I was so close!  I knew if I could just finish the bike, I would finish the race no problem.  One foot in front of the other for the run (read: jog/walk). The bike course was a big loop in Montgomery and Grimes counties, with a short out and back near the halfway point.  Approximately 10 miles of new chip seal – my teeth almost rattled out of my skull.  No matter.  Glad I didn’t get a flat at least.  That would have taken more time than the fall.

This photo was taken about a mile after I got back on the bike – spot the war wounds.  Dangit.

T2 (4:24): Had to take a potty break.  I’m sure my mother was very proud that despite my deliberate attempts, I couldn’t pee while riding a bike.  It isn’t ladylike, after all. The whole time on the bike, I kept saying to myself, “Run=race belt, run=race belt.”  I have a tendency to forget about my race belt, which you’re supposed to wear or something.  Change shoes, Garmin on.  Why I felt the need to check and make sure that I was indeed at a snail’s pace, I don’t know.

Run (2:56:02): While this pace is laughable for me, I take heart in the fact that it would be a pretty decent half marathon for a lot of people.  I cut myself some slack – I really felt like I was giving it everything I had after that bike.

I look pretty stoked to be running a half marathon.  Stupid.

Mile 13 behind me.  Ironic foreshadowing.

It was a 3-loop course, so I passed my adoring fans several times – The Shanester, my parents, and Patrizia and her boyfriend Scott came too!  They kept me pumped up.  I’m not gonna play it cool – I walked a LOT, esp through the gravel area.  So silly.  And here I am running through grass – just a midday frolic. Random terrain, it was.

Finally, FINALLY – I clocked in at 7:49:29. Much like my first marathon…YES, I could have pushed harder…but I just wanted to finish.  That’s it.  Guaranteed PR.  Next time I’ll be quicker.  And well, I obviously need more training on a bike.  Hook ‘em!

I finished 16 out of 19 in my category, exactly like at the US Open Tri – and two of these were DNFs.  I was the next-to-last finisher out of females age 25-29.  Oh wait, hold on – I don’t care.

It was a great day.  I did every single one of those 70.3 miles and I’m a half ironman!

This race recap is long overdue (like a month), but cut me some slack, I’ve been working on my super fun new blog that’s gonna be allllll about races and TNT and my quest to maybe one day be faster and not fall smack in the middle of my division all the time. Or, if it’s this particular race – at the bottom of my division.

Anyslow, let’s talk about the Toyota US Open Tri.  It was in my hometown of ROCKWALL, TX!  It was pretty strange because the high school dance team I was on(the Stingerettes) was volunteering – all of the girls looked so young, and I swear I did not feel that young – or even feel like I looked that young – back then.  It’s strange to think I’m 8-10 years older than all of them; sometimes it feels like yesterday.

They were tickled when I told them I was a former ‘rette.  One of them even recognized my name because, “Your sister was a senior when my older sister was a new girl!” Great, that doesn’t make me feel old at all.  So my sister, who is 4 years younger than I am, was a senior when your OLDER sister was a sophomore.  Super.

I digress again.  Let’s race.

Pre-race – This was the first time I haven’t had to drive over half an hour to get to a race!  It was only a few miles from my parents’ house, at the gorgeous Rockwall Harbor. Thank goodness I got to leave a little later, because this was also the first race for which I did not get good sleep the night before.  It felt like I woke up every half hour and looked at the clock.  My stomach was also in knots, so I only ate half of a Clif bar for breakfast (mistake).  I got to transition to set up my stuff, and chatted with TNT gals Jessica and Jordann – I was really glad I knew a couple of people there because it helps to chit-chat and be distracted before the race.  This was the last race of the Toyota series, and while there were quite a few pros present, there were only 19 in our division (female age 25-29).  We were in the 5^th wave, and before I knew it – we were off! 

Swim (36:59) – If you’ll remember, the 1.5k (almost a mile) swim was cancelled at Nation’s Tri, due to the Potomac being a dirty post-hurricane mess.  So while I had swum the Olympic distance quite a few times in practice, this was the first time in a race!  There were boats out on Lake Ray Hubbard and the chop was pretty bad.  Almost every time I went to take a breath, a wave gave me a mouthful of water.  I was feeling pretty bloated towards the end.  The lake is down so much from the drought that people were walking the last 100 yards.  That was hard.  I realized I was expending more energy trying to march through the mud – sucks. 

I was allowing myself 45 minutes to finish the swim.  I knew a sprint swim took me between 13 and 14 minutes, so I just multiplied that by 3 (since the Olympic distance is 3x the distance of the sprints I had done) and gave myself a little padding.  Imagine my surprise to learn it only took me 37 minutes!

Super sexy photo of me in a wetsuit!  Hope you weren’t eating lunch.

T1 (4:13) – That’s actually a pretty slow transition.  Granted, I had to get out of my wetsuit.  I putzed around with my bike gear; why’d I do that?  Oh well.  Then Jordann got to the rack just as I was leaving with my bike (of course she passed me on the bike – I think most people do). 

Bike (1:46:15) – The 40k (~24 mile) bike course kicked my ass.  It chewed me up and spit me out.  Immediately coming out of transition, there’s a steep hill to ride up to get on the course – everyone was falling.  I tried to get my bike going and of course fell, so I hung my head and walked my bike like several others were doing. Between the hills and the wind, I just could not pick up any speed.  This time is a full 15 minutes and then some longer than my bike time at Nation’s.  Some of the roads were rough – gravel and potholes, railroad tracks.  But it was the hills that got me.  I might have driven those roads every day in high school, but somehow you don’t notice the hills when you’re in a car. It didn’t help that on one stretch of the road, we rode downhill, U-turned, cranked up the hill and then had to loop around and do it again!  What were they thinking? That sucked.  I was spent.  My dad caught a picture of me coming back to transition and about to dismount.  I was DONE with the bike.  The last 5 miles I was just saying to myself, “Get me the hell off this course!”

T2 (2:26) – Pretty fast transition – I was ready for this race to be over. 

Run (1:13:43) – A slow run for me – at this point, I knew my times sucked so I was mostly concentrating on having fun and talking to the other racers. Of course, what’s the first thing you have to do?  Just like the bike – straight up a hill out of transition.  I had started to run but once I hit that hill, my legs were like…um, no.  My family was waiting at the top of the hill and I heard my sister saying, “Can you at least pretend to run?  We’re taking pictures.”

Before I hit the hill:

After:

Does that look like the face of someone who wants to run 6.2 miles? Luckily, I was enjoying the run/walk and talking to other people.  This one guy was hilarious.  He was decked out in his University of North Texas Tri Team gear and I caught up to him so he started running faster and pulled ahead.  Then he slowed to a walk.  Again, I caught up to him – and again, he took off.  I was thinking, “Wow, this guy REALLY doesn’t want to get chicked.”  I guess what he didn’t realize was that he was in a wave before me, so even if he was physically AHEAD of me, I was still AHEAD of him.  Finally he turned around and said, “Want to run the rest of the race together?” Sure!  So we jogged the last couple of miles together – here we are crossing the finish line.

Time – 3:43:38.  I finished 14 out of 16 finishers in my division.  2 DNF’ed (did not finish).  I don’t know what happened to #19.

Hmph.  Welp.  That sucks. But I still had a great time and I’d rather be DFL (dead….last) than not finish, any day!

This race was hard.  The bike really mentally got to me.  Yes, my legs were burning (definitely need more hill training) – but my mind was like WTF?! These hills suck!  This wind is blowing people off their bikes! DO NOT WANT.  At the end of the day though, it was fun, I repped TNT, and I got a taste of a tough course.  Huzzah!

So I better suck it up and have fun at Oilman this weekend, because I’m gonna be stuck on that bike for a loooong time.  Coming soon.

Post race shower, trip to Grandma’s house where I pretended I wasn’t so hungry that I was about to eat her furniture, then to SNUFFER’S to have some cheese fries and beer.  Delicious.

The morning after BeachPalooza, I woke up bright and early at 4:45am to grab my stuff and drive to Cypress for Houston Tri.  I decided on the sprint (good call, in the end) since I knew I’d be doing Olympic at US Open Tri the next weekend.  I was so dehydrated (and sunburned) from BP.  I tried chugging water and Gatorade, but it was a little late.

The 500m swim was easy, and I breezed through in 14:17.  That’s fast for me!

Bike leg – fine except for a) a lot of wind, and b) the triple loop of down, back, down where you could see all the cyclists ahead of you.  Mean.

Obviously, I wasn’t impressed.

Run: I forgot sunscreen.  How do I forget sunscreen?  I was still sunburned from the day before!  Sunscreen is now my #1 priority in life.  Swearsies.  BUT a) I finished and b) I beat my time from Clear Lake Tri (not surprising since I had a flat at CLI but let’s ignore that, a PR is a PR).

So glad that my sis Steph came in town and that this was the first tri my husband and sister-in-law got to attend!  It’s a lot of fun, huh, guys?!  Kinda makes you wanna tri?  Yes??

*For the n00bs….why do I do triathlons, marathons, fundraising events?  Check it out here. Gimme your lunch moneyz.

This weekend was certainly a whirlwind, one that started Friday after work when I started packing my bag for the Clear Lake International Triathlon, about 45 minutes south of Houston.  I knew I had to wake up at 4am (note to self – stay at the hotel next time)  and was starting to get really worked up.

Overheard by my husband:

“I don’t know how this stupid race belt works.”  Shane figured it out.

“I want to put the new computer on my bike, but I’m too tired.”  Shane figured it out.

“Why am I in the first wave? Why the hell do the waves start only 4 minutes apart?  I’m sure the next group will be swimming over me.”  They didn’t.

A highlight was getting to meet Dave Scott.  He asked me if I was wearing enough sunscreen.  That’s like Tiger Woods asking someone if…they’re wearing enough sunscreen.  Heh.

The water was disgusting.  I swear someone had emptied a port-a-potty in there.  It smelled like dead fish and urine.  It was salty and made my throat dry.  My place in the transition area was right next to the bike out and in area so that was nice.  The bike went well until I ran over a nail and had to fix a flat rear tire.  Boo.  So I lost a bit of time on that but I was still ok with just finishing.

I spent the rest of the day entertaining my sis-in-law Aimee for her 30th birthday!  We went to Tiny Boxwoods for lunch – delicious!  Leah made red velvet cake balls that were to die for.  Aimee, Kristen, and I tried to go see The Help but it was the only movie and time slot in the entire theater that was sold out.  Insteeeaaad we went to Tasting Room and did their Saturday Seven wine tasting – YUM.

The party was great.  Michael had gotten Fajita Pete’s and Ben & Jerry’s to cater – the theme was fiesta, with paper lanterns, a pinata, and of course Mollie made the dessert (ice cream cupcakes).   We saw this sign at Starbucks.  Happy 30th, Aimee! #nobrainshrinkage

So, downer.  Saturday after the party I was exhausted.  I was so stressed and delirious and sleep-deprived!  I also had a case of the sads.  It was like now that the day was over, I could finally let out some emotion.  There was lots of crying.  Lots.

Then I woke up early again, at 5am, to volunteer at the Dave Scott Tri Clinic out at Houston Oaks (which is gorgeous, incidentally).  It was fun getting some really good tips and acting as a water buoy on a hydro bike!  I peaced out early since I was NOT feeling well and got 3 more hours of sleep before we met up with friends at Boneyard Drinkery (but I accidentally slept through my blogger meetup – I hope they understand!!).

I hope this week is easier. No plans for next weekend, and I intend to keep it that way.

Hah. In response to my BiSC roommate Katherine’s post.

I honestly don’t understand how people have time to post every day.  Multiple times a day.  Don’t get me wrong.  I wish I could, I WISH I could.  I would be so much more interesting if I could.

But I can’t anymore.  Between work (all day, on my feet, running around, meetings, talking to employees, lunches, meetings, research, answering emails, meetings, did I mention the meetings???), running OH THE RUNNING, maintaining a marriage, parenting two canines, I. JUST. CAN’T.  There’s like….moments for TV, oh sweet TV.  And also, my life feels like a never-ending cycle of laundry, so that’s awesome.

Let’s talk about the things getting me through.  Well actually, the things I get through for.  We threw my sister-in-law Aimee her bachelorette party in Austin last weekend, and it was a blast and a half!

Can we help it that we’re hot?  No, we cannot.

The bride and her hostesses!

Mollie and I got voted into the trunk – and I’m pretty sure we were the only ones in dresses, wtf??

We took a burlesque class, and it was the best experience ever.

If you didn’t want to be featured in my blog and you’re in this picture well then – sucks to be you.

Basically,  a great time was had.

And in about a month, Shane’s sis will no longer be a Ginsburg.  Sadsies. Except for on the inside.  And we’re all ready for the BIG DAY!  So happy for you, Aims.

Now that we’ve established I’m not dead – stay tuned for my next post….about…running.

I’ll start with the most important sentence: The Purple Shirt Pub Crawl, after donations to join and donations made from strangers, raised just shy of $1,000.00. That’s 1/3 of my fundraising goal. I’m flabbergasted.

I’m ecstatic to announce that the crawl this past Saturday was a complete success!  I knew we’d have even a bigger turnout that I’d imagined, which was why I ordered extra shirts – but we even ran out of those.  Seriously yall.  Incredible.

Another big shoutout to Houston Screen Print for the discounted shirts – I appreciate the support, truly.

Here’s a shot of the group heading out!

I spent a couple of hours that morning putting together the gift bags – putting the right T-shirts in everyone’s bag, with lists of bar specials, the scavenger hunt, awards I’d be giving out, and upcoming events (other ways to support TNT – that blog post is forthcoming).  Those lucky dogs even got a NutriGrain bar and a bottle of water for hydration – it’s for a marathon, after all.

It was a lot easier to organize than I thought, considering how many pub crawls occur on Washington Ave every year – I can only imagine.  The bar owners and managers were so nice and accommodating!  List o’ bars:

Lori was scribbling how much money she was raising from donations FROM COMPLETE STRANGERS.  Do you see that total in the bottom right corner?!  That’s right: $205.46.  Are you kidding me?  Obviously she won the Biggest Donation Award, along with Most Spirited.  She and our MVB (Most Valuable Boozer), Cousin Matt, were both looking fierce:

Let’s see if we can find some pics of the teams, shall we?  Here we have the Bone Marrow Bandits (the boys wanted to leave their classy polos on) – oh and Jacob, our bartender at Max’s, is on the right:

The Purple Bridezillas (although for some reason I heard BREADzilla and was calling them that all night….I don’t know why my brain went to bread) aka A-mazing.  With Jacob.

The Curing Crawlers (you fancy, huh):

The Mathletes!:

I’ll Make Your Sham Rock:

I couldn’t find one of all of you? Send in!

And the WINNERS (no really, that’s their name -  Shane and Best Friend J, in town from Chicago):

Enough of the team pics.  We had a GREAT night of $2 “Texas Wine” (aka Lone Star), beer pong at the Pearl Bar patio, Lot shots and Sheen Dream shots, marriage proposals at The Dubliner, martinis at Wash Ave Drinkery, and the hottest hottest hottest hot wings I’ve ever eaten at BWW, sneakily pawned off on us from a table of 15-year-olds.  Nice one, guys.

A great pic of some great girls – Leah, Mollie, Aimee, Me, and Kristen – aw!

Of course one with Lori – my biggest fan (um, except for Shane..and my parents…) – and biggest fundraiser.  PROM PIC:

I am extraordinarily lucky to have these awesome people in my life who are so supportive of such an amazing cause.  YALL ARE THE BEST.

And don’t forget where to go if you’d like to make a contribution!  The Team in Training badge on that left sidebar will take you directly to my site. 

And business.

This past week and a half has been so crazy.  First, we moved into the house.  Hooray!  Boxes EVERYWHERE. It’s just now starting to be cleared out.  A little.

This past weekend, Lori and I went to Shreveport with my mom and Aunt Becky.  This is not a leisurely ladies’ trip.  They mean business. Busy-ness.  Intense gambling and drinking.  Lori and I were obviously IN.  Unfortunately, I used up all of my luck on the 4-hour drive there.  Got pulled over.  Oh, OOPS.

Officer:  Hi ladies, any reason for your speed?  I clocked you doing 73 in a 60.
Me:  Er, hmm…no sir, I just thought I was going with the flow of traffic.  (I’m on an empty state road in Lufkin, Texas).
Officer:  Where are you headed?
Me:  Shreveport, we’re meeting my mom and aunt.  (Translation: I’m a gambler and a drunk, and so is the rest of my family).
Officer:  Can I have your license and insurance please?
Me: *hands over TX insurance to go with NC license* (….nice.)

Lori was near tears…I was calm, I was just thinking that I would need to win enough money to cover this darned speeding ticket.  I reapplied my lipstick.  The officer started walking back towards my car, and I saw in my mirror that he was doing so SANS TICKET-WRITING NOTEBOOK.  I whispered excitedly to Lori, “I think he’s gonna let me off!”

Officer:  Alright, well you need to slow down.  I’m gonna let you go with a warning.
Lori: Oh thank you so much, officer!  That woulda really put a damper on our girls’ weekend!

She reached over to shake his hand, made totally akward by the fact that I TRUST NO ONE and had barely inched the window open.  I follow suit. 

Then, I open my mouth.

Me:  Oh, I totally forgot it’s Round Up Weekend!
Officer:  What do you mean?
Me:  Yknow…where the police forces in Texas are rounding up everyone with outstanding warrants for Class C misdemeanors…

At this point, he’s giving me a really weird look.

Officer:  Where did you hear that? 
Me:  I read it.  In the news.   (Translation: I like to keep abreast of when you’ll be apprehending criminals)

It looked like he was starting to regret his decision, so I wished him good day and off we went.  At the speed limit, this time.

THEN when we arrived at the hotel (Boomtown), my car was starting to overheat.  HUH?  Never done that before.  Thank God Lori had AAA (not AA, that cult).  They determined my thermostat was sticking – whatever that means – and put more anti-freeze in it. 

Cue 8 straight hours of gambling and rum-and-diets.  My liver was absolutely pickled.  I lost $50 but Lori brought back $100.  Hey, at least I lost less than what that ticket would cost, right?  Hah.

The nice thing about hanging out with Lori (one of them…there are many!) is that I NEVER have to remember to bring my camera.  Hers is permanently attached to her hand and she even got some stealth ones of us playing slots!  I’ll post once she gets em on her Picasa page.

The weekend was a blast but took a LOT out of me.  I am STILL recovering.  I’ll just have to rally for pub crawl this weekend!