Races...Ready or Not, Here They Come

I had a minor freakout this past weekend when I read on facebook that my next race was only 3 weeks away! YIKES! I'm running a half marathon in three weeks. Uh Oh. I'm not ready. With getting sick and having a project that runs me ragged, I haven't had the proper time to prepare. I was doing good with training but then I stopped. I decided to get up off my butt and put on my running gear right then and there. I was only going to run about 8 miles but then I had the harebrained idea that I should run 12. I was feeling good until about the 6th mile, then ok until the 9th mile, but then from 9 to 12 was killer. My knees hurt and my hips hurt. When I finished I kept thinking how hard the other 1.1 miles was going to be. This could have been because I haven't been exercising and haven't run 12 miles oh in about 2 years. Oh well, sometimes I don't make the smartest decisions sometimes.

I am running the Shamrock Half Marathon in Virginia Beach on March 18th at 7am. This is the 7th anniversary of the half marathon. This is the race's 40th anniversary. I have run this race before, it was actually my first ever half marathon. This race is special because not only is there beer at the end of the race, BUT THERE IS BEER ON THE COURSE!!! Yes! As glorious as it sounds, its actually disgusting. Its on the 3rd and 10th mile (you run out and then run back) so by the 10th mile everything smells disgusting because runners take a sip of the cup then throw down the rest on the ground. So it reeks of beer. My main goal of this race is to be able to finish the race and actually be able to drink the beer. I've finished my half marathons between 2:14 and 2:29 so as long as I get sometime in that range I'll be happy.



Last year, I volunteered at the Cherry Blossom 10 miler with two sorority sisters and I remember it being SO.FREAKING.COLD. But by volunteering, I was now automatically able to run this year! Yay on being able to skip the lottery system but boo on it being so soon after the half marathon :( This is the 40th anniversary of Cherry Blossom 10 Miler and its on April 1st at 7:30 am.

So True, Thank You Pintrest

I saw this on pintrest, this is SO SO SO true. That's one of the things I loved about London the most and miss it terribly, British men KNOW.HOW.TO.DRESS. Like OMG I wanted to drool over everyone. Tight fitting, well tailored suits. Not just suits but suspenders (hot), bow ties (super hot), vests (omfg take me home NOW hot). They just get it. They can mix fabrics, patterns, and accessories unlike anything I've ever seen. Unlike (most) American men in their schlumpy suits that are way too big and wtf is up with having a baggy dress shirt?

That's Right Betty, Sing it

A little Friday humor.

That's a lot of Beans Spent on Beans

Geesh. Did you know the American consumer spends on average $1,100 on coffee a year? Good god. That's a lot of beans (money) spent on beans (coffee)! I mean, I too like expensive coffee like Starbucks.

B-U-T usually when I go to Starbucks, I spend $2.25 on an iced coffee then diligently bring it back to the office and add my own creamer (currently york peppermint-patty flavored right know thank.you.very.much!) And I bring in my own re-usable cup for my $2 joe and get .10 cents off! 10 cents isn't much but it all adds up. On rare occassion, usually when I get my free coffee coupon from Starbucks, will I splurge on a $5 grande java chip frappachino.

According to the article, "American worker is shelling out more than $20 a week on coffee, for a yearly average of $1,092. Whereas commuting costs for the average worker come out to around $1,476 per year." WOW, only spending $384 more a year on commuting costs versus coffee? That's some serious addiction!!

This Day in History v.26

As part of my Mountbatten programme when I lived in London was taking occasional trips around England. One of our trips was out to Dorset, England. The purpose of the event was to learn about working with different people and personalities via a classroom setting and also do a whole bunch of team building events. We stayed in cabins and did fun things such as singing by the campfire and hiking/sight seeing. What I remember was that it was freaking cold and windy since it was right by the coast. The highlight was really rock climbing along the coast!

Dorset, England is a county in South West England along the English Channel coast. We took a train out to Dorset and took a bus to our cottage out in the country. We saw old castles, old villages, and lots of cows.

The main cottage where we ate

Sitting on the train with my roomie, Nayeli

An old village

We did a bunch of team building events, this one we climbed up a
bunch of logs up a rope having to use each other for help. It was scary
as shit at the top!

Team event. Our team was called "Team Proper"

Maura helped gather twigs for our campfire!

Beginning of a campfire!

Roomies! Beth and Nayeli

Rock climbing! Haleigh helped me out and held my ropes!

Finally reached the top! My hands hurt so badly by the end!

Such pretty landscapes

Cows!!!

An old castle!

Don't let all of these pictures fool you, we did a lot of this too!

London Phi Mus Reunite!

Will and Dana are coming down from NYC for the weekend! I can't wait to meet up with Dana, a Phi Mu sister I met in London and her British boyfriend Will. You may remember that Hannah and I went to go visit D&W back in late Fall last year. The only thing that is missing is Lara!

I'm super excited for all the fun that will surely ensue!

Game of Thrones

In honor of V-day yesterday, I had to post this. If you follow Game of Thrones (and if you don't, you totally should!) you'll get a kick out of this! Can you tell who each of the drawings are for?

(Click on the image to enlarge)

Cabo San Lucas

Best part of the trip: successfully not sunburning every inch of my body. For those who know me, I will usually come back from vacation a total lobster. Or at least lobster over 75% of my body (one time I burned so bad my skin was purplish/black...ouch). Its not that I don't wear sunscreen, its usually I don't diligently apply every hour on the hour or I miss random spots....like right behind my knee caps. Yep, I burned that SO bad the first day of a beach trip I couldn't sit down for a week straight. Ok, Ok, that's not necessarily the best part of the trip, but it was an added bonus!

I had a GREAT time on vacation and it was SUCH a needed break from work! I literally was about to snap before I left and I'm in such a better place at work. Not to mention I got back to work and the shit hit the fan and I got told I had to start a new project...but ANYWAYS besides that, vacation was great! The place was beautiful and I met so many people that his family knew from going to the resort for over 15 years...crazy!

At first I was really nervous about spending a week with my boyfriend and his family. I don't know WHY I worried about it because his family is AMAZING. They kept asking me if I was having a good time and if I needed anything. And I swear if I wasn't eating they were asking me if I was hungry. Ha, I ate SO much sometimes I felt ill. I've never gone somewhere warm when it was cold at home. I need to do that every year! It was so sad to leave!

We relaxed, hiked, swam in the Pacific, and even kayaked! We kayaked to this site! You can see the rocks from some of my pictures and it took like 15 minutes to kayak over there to see the arch thing and the beach.

Have fun looking at my pictures:

I found a quatrafoil!!!

This was the resort. It was beautiful!

We woke up one morning to watch the sun rise...I've
NEVER seen so much color and my camera didn't do it justice!!

Wow, just WOW!!

The villa that the bf and I stayed at
it was a 2 bedroom/ 2 bath for just the 2 of us for most of the week!!!!

We went into a villa that was under construction. Get this, it costs $150,000 to rent this house for ONE WEEK every year from 2017-2067 PLUS its like 3K a year for the maintenance fees

The view from his grandparent's villa

I could sit here every day!

Performers on the beach

Sunsets were just as beautiful as sunrises!

During our hike, we came across the marina with so many beautiful boats!

So many pretty flowers here!

There seemed to always be a cruise liner blocking my view!!

This was a HUGE house we saw on our hike

The next few pictures are from our hike

We saw a road runner!!! It was so small and I thought it was supposed to be bigger!! EWW I saw it snatch up a smaller bird, beat it to death by slamming it down on the ground repeatedly, and then eat it...GROSS!!!

This was the resident owl on the resort!!