I'm famous!

Ok, maybe not really. Last night, we went to the Real game. Which, by the way, was a total freaking disappointment. You know me, I love my boys in red, but lately, I'm so angry at the way they're playing. It's like, they forgot how good a team they are, and now want to play like the Real of '06, the worst of the worst. I'm hoping they'll get over this and start to play like champs, because just watching them lose over and over again (we're currently on a 4 game losing streak!) is not at all fun.
So we're at the game last night, and they're announcing the starting line up for Real. As always, PJ and I were the only people standing in our section, screaming our hearts out. I noticed after a while that a cameraman has his camera pointed at us, and he left it there for a like, a full two minutes. I didn't see ourselves on the jumbo screen (which, yes, we were on that earlier, too!) I wasn't sure what was going on. After the game started, I got some texts from my familia, all telling me they had just seen me on tv! That's right, PJ and I were on tv! Luckily, my parents had kept it on their Tivo, so I got to see it too! We're standing up, cheering and yelling, then I yell at another friend we had sitting by us to stand up, she gets up, we cheer a bit more, and then they cut away from us. It's not a big deal or anything, but it's pretty cool.
The next day, PJ got a text from her cousin saying she saw us on the news last night, and that's pretty cool that we were on the news!
Also, I was perusing the internets at Real sites, just for funsies, and I saw this picture on one of them! I don't know if you can see us, but, if you look for us, you can see us.So there you have it. We're all over the place! So now, I have been on tv, and on the internets. So yes, I am famous. And no, you can't have my autograph.

Days that make you go aaaahhhh....

It seems to me that I work all the time. I never have any time, and on top of that, I swear, every moment for me lately has been planned, as soon as one thing ends, another has to start. But anyway. At work one day, Chelle and I were contemplating how awesome it would be to have a mental health day. You know, take a day off of work, when you're not going anywhere, you're not sick, you just have a day for yourself. We decided that we should totally do that. I took this day on Thursday a few days ago.
It was awesome! I loved it-I totally want to take more of these. I woke up at a leisurely pace, took my time getting up. I finished a lot of my Tivo (which was so full, but now that season finales of everything have run, I have no tv! It's fantastic!) and ran, took Sarge into the vet (where he got some shots, nothing major) and finished off the day watching my Thursday night tv. I didn't have to be anywhere, I didn't have to do anything that I didn't want to. There was nobody around to answer to. I think it should be a requirement to have to take one of these a month. I don't think that's something that'll catch on, but holy cow, how awesome that would be. Take notes, those of you who have employees. Give those people some much needed time off, for no good reason.

Like I don't have enough already!

Ok, everyone, brace yourself for some exciting news. I got a new puppy this weekend! We'd been talking about getting one for a while, my sister wanted to get a Lab, I wanted a smaller dog, we couldn't ever decide on getting one. Finally, this weekend, we had some time, so we just decided to go for it. We hopped in the car and went on down to the animal shelter.
We looked at the dogs they had there, and they were not that many choices. We knew roughly the animal we wanted to get, but not for sure, depending on what we found there. We saw a few ones that were cute, but not really what we were looking for. We saw this one little fella-a border collie mix dog, which is one we wanted, but it was a male-and for some reason, Pops doesn't like the male dogs. But he was so cute, we got dad to bend after sending him some pictures of the dog. We made our choice, and adopted him!
We even knew his name after a few minutes with him. We named him Sergeant. Well, his full name is Sergeant Spots, and we call him Sarge for short. He is a live wire. He jumps around all over the place, he bites all the time (ok, it's just puppy playful bites, so they don't hurt) and he is just generally so much more energetic than our other dogs. He's only 5 months old, so I imagine he'll calm down after a bit. We took him on a walk today, and he got tired after a while, I'll have to work his stamina up a little.
He's a fun little dog, and I'm glad we got him. I can't wait until he's acclimated into the family, and the other dogs are still getting used to him, and I think jealousies are getting smaller between all of them. I'll keep everyone updated on any goings on with him.

When it rains, it pours

Well, I'm back! Ok, not everybody even knew I was gone, but here I am again! (I really should update this thing more often) So this past Friday, I flew out (on a jet plane...) to the fabulous state of Colorado. Real had a game there this weekend, and since it's the only there of the season, of course we had to go. It was very late minute-we literally decided during church last weekend. We quickly booked everything that afternoon, and the hotel we chose to stay in is the same one the team stays in. I like when we stay in the hotel, we get to see them. I wouldn't say I stalk them, I'd say...we're friends. From a distance. That they don't know about. But we got to the hotel safe and sound, and late, so we pretty much just went to sleep when we got there.
We awoke pretty early the next day, which sucked, after being in so late, but that's ok. We were going to hit the gym (yes, I'm one of those people that uses the gym and exercies on vacations) so I was getting ready for that. The time was about 7:30-8:00, and all of a sudden, the fire alarm goes off. Luckily, since I was a quick dresser, I had my running clothes on already, but PJ was still in her PJ's (ha ha!) but when the fire alarm told us all (yes, it talked) to go outside, using the stairs, we listened, and started making our way down.
Unfortunately, our room was on the ninth floor, so going down took a little bit of time. I, being helpful, called out the floor we were on every time we got to one, and I don't know if the half-asleep people on the stairwell liked that, but whatever. I really don't care what strangers think of me. We finally made it downstairs, and outside, where there were groups of people, all huddled together in the cold. We had been outside for maybe a minute, when they told us it was safe, and we could go back to our rooms. We all went in, waited for elevators together, and went about our business. There was one person I felt bad for, a girl who had been called out of the shower, and was in a robe. Yeesh.
The weekend had no good events for us almost! Real lost the game, 2-0, which just sucked. We didn't play that well, and the ref hated us I think, but it was fun cheering with all of the other fans. It rained during most of the game, which made it cold, but not freezing, thank goodness. And, as it turns out, the team wasn't even staying at our hotel!! The entire reason we were staying there, and it didn't even happen! I was so disappointed by this. I didn't even get to see any of them outside of the game. Plus, our goalie was injured in the game, so our third-stringer had to come in, and our best defender was thrown out of the game. Not our night!
Besides those bad events, the weekend was a lot of fun. Riding an airplane is always fun for me, and I got home early enough to do my laundry, so that was awesome. Hey, I take pleasure in the little things! And hopefully, Real will kick some LA butt when we take them on on Wednesday.

Result!

Ok, I know it's been a really long time since I've posted, but things have been so busy. There are many a thing I need to blog about, but I'll just go from the last thing I've posted about. I did indeed run the SLC 1/2 marathon. 13.1 miles of running, sprinting for some of it, and by the end, I was pretty dead. For those of you who haven't heard of my results yet, here they are: I finished the marathon in 2 hours even. Ok, to be perfectly precise, 2 hours, 0 minutes, and 42 seconds. Not bad for my first one, I think. My placing was 1504 out of 4139. Top half! I was a little proud of myself for that. A bit of trivia, I was 171th place out of 557 in my age group. I'm not sure why I'd need to know that, but I do. Nice.
Some stories from the race...I got to the starting line after the race had actually started. I took Trax up from my hotel to the start line, and it ended up taking forever to get up there. We (when I say we, I mean myself and the other random people who happened to be on Trax with me) ran from the station to the start line, then started the race. I had a really good pace for the first few miles, I finished the first 4 miles in 32 minutes, which, for me, is a super good pace. I kept going at that for the next few miles, then started to get a little tired and my pace slowed a little. It wasn't until mile 10 that I started to wear down, and then, mile 11, we started to go uphill. It wasn't a slight hill, like I'd been told, it was a big one, and I slowed waaay down going up it. When I reached the top, though, I was so happy. I picked up the pace a little at the top, and after another mile (so now, we're at mile 12) I noticed how close I was to the end. A really fast-paced song started on my iPod, (the best kind!) and I ran along with it, which put me at sprinting. There were people all along the sides of the streets, cheering for everyone coming in. This pumped me up also, so I sprinted the last mile in as fast as I could. My lungs were burning, I felt like my legs were going to die, but I did it, I finished!
The people that met me at the finish line (my fam and PJ) all told me how angry I looked coming into the finish line, and having seen the pictures now, yeah, I look totally pissed off. Unfortunately, you guys can't see the pictures, because I can't figure out how to get them to save here. I think I have to buy them before I do that, and I don't think I want to buy them. But at least I finished, and I hit my goal of finishing in 2 hours, so I was happy. I got some really good looking blisters on my toes, one of them a blood blister, which actually finally popped today. Gross. It took me a few days to recover, and now, I'm finally doing some good runs again. I will do anothe 1/2 marathon-in September. At Disneyland!

I've got nerves of steel...

Right now, I actually don't feel like I have nerves of steel. I'm nervous. There, I said it. I'll admit it. I know it's dumb to be nervous now, but I am. Tomorrow, Saturday, I will be running in my first ever (and maybe my last, let's see) half marathon. I am both excited and totally completely dreading it. I think I can do it. I have done the distance once before, so I know it's been done, but I feel like tomorrow my body will freeze up, or after a few miles, just give out. But in my logical brain (the one that rarely comes out) I know that probably will not happen. I'm going to think positively now, and know that I can do it.
I pretty much just have one goal. Well, two. My first is to finish, and my second is to beat the other people that I know that are running the race. I think I might be able to do that, and that's what will push me over the finish line. I don't care if I have to crawl over it, I will finish this. I love being competitive, I'm glad that I found something in this race to compete with someone about, even if they don't necessarily know about that.
Well, wish me luck, everyone. I'm sure things will go well, and I'll post the results at some point tomorrow (if I find them out myself) so you can see that I've at least finished the race. I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

The difference between a jogger and a runner is an entry blank

Spring is (sorta) here! Along with the warmer weather and the soccer season starting, it's also the start of racing season. I had my first race of the year yesterday, the Provo City Half-Marathon & 5K. For this race, I chose to do the 5K. PJ was originally going to race with me, but due to an injury, she was forced to sit this one out.
We showed up to the race Saturday morning, bright and early, since the race started at 8:10. PJ came with me for moral support, to cheer me along, which was awesome of her. The half-marathoners race started at 8:00, so as soon as they took off, we all lined up in the chute. The starting gun (or maybe it was a cannon? I'm still not sure) went off, and off we went. I started off with a really good pace, and was doing pretty good. I decided to follow the pace of this guy in front of me, but when we went up a hill, I passed him, so that ended up not being the smartest move. I kept going and kept passing a bunch of people, which was a new thing for me.
I finished with a time of 27 minutes 26 seconds, which is my fastest 5K to date. I was 88th overall and 29th in the women's overall, which I consider to be pretty awesome. I was glad to have gotten this out of the way, so that I'll be all ready for my next race, which is in 2 weeks, which I'll write more about later. And today, I'm just dealing with being sore-which I am just a little, so I'll just rest up.