My Birthday Week

I love the fact that Wiley, Erin and I all have birthdays in the same week. It gives the entire week a kind of celebratory feel, and it gives me a good, guilt-free excuse to hang out with friends. It also gave me good reason to do a pub run and try two new activities I'd never done before.

The Pub Run

Thursday night was the pub run, the first one I've been on in 11 months--wow! I need to make it to more of these, I forget how fun they are. The big highlights for me:

• Erin's Snoopy dance at the Driskill
• Ping pong at La Zona Rosa
• Talking with Jane as we jogged/walked/drove to Uncle Billy's.

The "Adventure Quest" Race

At some point on Thursday night, Panther and I came to the conclusion that we needed a strategy for the adventure race on Saturday, but that we really had no idea when we could meet. We wound up going to NXNW late on Friday afternoon. In no time, we had what we thought was a pretty sound race strategy (and it turns out it would have been...if we had followed it). Here's what the plan was:

• Brush Park for the stilt walk
• Up to secret checkpoint #1 on Brazos & 6th
• Up to the wheelbarrows at 9th & Congress
• Frisbee toss at 6th & Congress
• Rock wall at 5th & Colorado
• Remote control boats at 3rd & Colorado
• Zoob puzzle at the Four Seasons
• Rubber duck thing, obstacle course and bean bags at 1st & Congress
• Big wheels.

Of course, we knew there would be secret checkpoints that would throw us off, but since we couldn't plan for them, we figured we had the best strategy we were going to get, and we'd make gametime decisions as needed. More important than having a solid race plan, the cornerstone of our strategy was to rely on our athleticism. In fact, we thought we had a reasonable shot at winning. And then Paul and Meredith showed up. And Wiley and Nedra. Oh, and Tim S. is really anal retentive about these races, it's all about efficiency for this guy (and I say that with love, Tim, in case you read this!). Fine, but come on, we still had a shot, right?

No. Winning time: 43 minutes (attained by Wiley and Nedra). Our time: 80 minutes. Having had some time to analyze the situation, here are the six things that brought about our downfall:

1) My utter lack of athleticism. It helps to do training runs if you're going to race. Who knew?

2) We did NOT follow our plan. Not only did we go on an ill-advised wild goose chase over to Waterloo Park, we stood in line three times for the wheelbarrow thing, each time with the line getting longer.

3) We ran to Waterloo Park. Don't ask.

4) We didn't have a phone, much less anyone on standby to google stuff for us.

5) We finished the race with 16 beads instead of 15.

6) We're retarded.

But, it was really, really fun. Erin puts on a good race!

The Trail Race

Sunday morning was The Loop trail race out at Emma Long Park. I've done a little bit of trail running, but not a lot, even though I've really liked it every time I've gone. And I'd never done a trail race until yesterday. Kerry had told me a little over a week ago that I should try it, so I signed up. The distances were 10k (one loop) or 30k (three loops). Given that I haven't been training at all for anything, it should be pretty obvious that I did the 10k.

Jeff and I got out to the park at a little after 6 a.m. and hung out with Wiley, Kerry and a guy named John that I seem to remember meeting maybe once before. Anyway, Wiley had a good spot in the trees next to the start/finish. He and Kerry went off at 7 a.m. to do the 30k. Jeff, JoDee, Gina and I started the 10k at 7:30. I have to say, in spite of how tough the course was (at least for me), that's the funnest 10k I've ever done. I had no idea where I was or how far I'd gone, and it didn't really matter, given that it was all about paying attention to where my next step would be, or how I was going to get around the person in front of me, and when I wasn't doing that, I was taking in the pretty scenery. JoDee was the fourth place women's finisher overall--wow! Me? Not so much. I have some serious work to do before the San Antonio marathon.

After the race, we hung out and enjoyed some refreshing adult beverages. And after that, I took a nap.

Then it was off to Uncle Billy's for the AD board meeting. After Tim and Stacy left, Ostrich and Thor joined Panther and me, and we hung out there until it was time for me to go to McCormick & Schmick's for birthday dinner with my parents. The food was awesome, as usual, but there was maybe a little too much garlic in the risotto--I mean, it's bad when I can still taste it the next morning, right? Blech!

And now I'm working, even though I don't want to be--I never work on my birthday as a matter of principle. But, since I had such a fun weekend and didn't finish any of the stuff I promised myself I'd finish over the weekend, I'm chained to my computer. Boo! Oh well, it's a small price to pay for having had such an awesome birthday week.