Friday, July 21, 2006

Yoga Grandma: Helping my grandmother stretch after a rigorous workout involving breakfast and reading the newspaper. Note the dog lying immobile at our feet. On the back deck. Lake Tahoe. West shore. June 2006.


Yo!: I've been back in D.C. for a week and a half. After a week in San Diego for work, I hopped a plane to Sacramento, where E. picked me up and we drove, with the dog, northeast 2 hours to Tahoe. Spent the weekend at his brother's place for a family reunion of sorts.

Full house: For the first time in seemingly forever, (almost) all of E.'s siblings and their families were in the same house: E's sister, her English husband and their two sons, who live in the north of England, in Bronte country; E.'s brother and his wife (they own the house), one of their sons and their daughter; and me and E. Oh yes, and E.'s sister's tennis instructor. Who also flew in from London. No, I'm not joking.

Good thing we had a big, sprawling 2-story house. Or we would have killed each other. After 2 days of hiking, talking, and eating and, oh yes, running 10 miles in the high altitude, I hopped on another plane to Silicon Valley. I spent two days interviewing sources at several high-tech/research firms for a news story, then I boarded a final plane for a red-eye back to Washington, D.C. that Tuesday.

Over that week-and-a-half, I flew in or out of four airports: San Diego, Sacramento, Reno, and Oakland. Whew.

It ain't over ....: And guess what? I'm flying back to Northern California (Oakland) next Thursday evening for a three-day weekend. We'll head up to Tahoe again. It'll be my birthday. I'll fly if I want to.

Burying the lede: Oh, I forgot to tell you that when I was in San Diego in early July for a conference, I ran a 5K. It was a conference event, a fun/run, and about 175 people ran or walked it. It was quite hot (80+) and surprisingly humid that morning by the waterfront.

Race results: I finished 2nd woman and 6th overall, with an unspectacular time of 23:53. Yes, that's a PR. But according to Mcmillan's running calculator, I should have finished 23 seconds faster. I blame the heat.

Tomorrow at 6:30 am (!) is a hilly 16-miler with my marathon training group. Supposedly there are people who are beginners, but all of us range between 6:00 (you read that right) and 9:30/mile on these "slow" long runs. Good times .....

9 comments:

  1. Nice pics. What's not to like in all the dog pics?!

    You know you're in a different league when you PR and you know you should have done better! Congrats on PR nonetheless.

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  2. great photos, cute grandma! and congrats on finishing 2nd!!!!

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  3. So close, yet so far away..... you just keep breezing past me on the way to somewhere else. Sounds like a lot of fun, though. That Tahoe place looks like it is fabulous.

    Don't you need to spend a couple of days in SF??

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  4. Is that *the* skirt that you did the review of months ago? That was the skirt that made me think that skirts were not so bad after all for running. And I do love mine.

    Love the 1st photo of the dog. Cute angle from the mirror.

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  5. Your dog is so cute, and so is grandma!!

    Congrats on the great PR! Enjoy all your traveling!

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  6. Cute dog. He looks like he's having the time of his life! Nice PR--I do think it's a great time.

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  7. What a great race! Congrats on your PR.

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  8. It's been quite a summer for you. I love the doggie pics and all the loose family news of the summer; plus the hot and fast run. How's that MCM training going?

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  9. Your grandmother is beautiful and your dog is so cute!
    Thanks for the positive feedback!

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