Dog Days

I thought we had an adoptive home for our foster Emmy and that I would be transporting her to her new home today, but they changed their minds at the last minute. She appears to be part pit bull and they decided that was not something they wanted in a dog. I'm very sad for her (and for us!) because she deserves a family of her own to love her, and we are ready to move forward with some other aspects of our lives that are on hold until we are no longer fostering. We had asked the rescue to move her to another foster home if she wasn't adopted by the end of February, but things just haven't fallen into place for her yet. She is a handful and needs someone who knows what they are doing with dogs and is not good with small animls, in other words...she needs an experienced foster home with no small dogs or cats, and probably no small kids...not the easiet to find. So she is still with us. I don't want to send her anywhere until I feel like she will be in better hands than she is with us, and that hasn't come along just yet. My fingers are still crossed that the perfect forever home will come along for her in the next few weeks. She has some issues with other dogs. She did so wonderfully with our 3 when we brought her in that we thought she was fine with other big dogs but it turns out she does have some dog aggression. I have called a trainer who has agreed to meet with us for a free consultation. I know she can be okay with friendly dogs her own size, she just needs more socialization and will need her new owners to understand her and be willing to take their time and do introductions properly. I just want the best for her and for her to be the best dog she can be.


Yesterday before work, I transported a dog from the Charleston Animal Society to Orangeburg, SC on a leg of a long transport to get her to a vet and new foster home in North Carolina. Her story is a sad one. She was found by animal control officers chained under a shed, her owners had left her there to die. She had been in the shelter for 10 days and had gained several pounds by the time I got her, but she is still severely emaciated. She is dirty, has a broken tail and many cuts and scrapes on her bony body. Her spirits, amazingly, couldn't be better. She is such a happy dog, she literally drug me out of the shelter and jumped right up into the back of the Xterra like "Get me the heck outta here, and feed me a cheeseburger!" (I did both:)) It is so wonderful to know that she will never be alone and hungry again. She will get all the vet care she needs to get her body healthy and she will be adopted by a family that she can actually live inside with and be a part of. The rescue named her Charleston in honor of her roots.

Here is skinny-minny Charleston, 10 days after animal control brought her to the shelter.

Such a sweet baby girl,

but painfully thin. I was afraid I would hurt her when I petted her.

Look at that face, how could anyone chain her up and leave her with no food or water.

Today before work I did another transport, but this one was a little different. The dog is Penny, a stunning 8 month old flashy fawn female, who belonged to a twenty-something single guy living in Charleston. I don't know the whole background, but I think basically he was just working a lot and didn't have the time to devote to an energetic, needy boxer puppy. He did a great thing by contacting the rescue instead of just neglecting her or giving her to a bad home or taking her to a shelter. A family in upstate SC recently lost their 3 year old boxer to cancer and were looking for a new dog when they ran across our website and Miss Penny. While it was sad when the guy dropped her off this morning, it was awesome to see how happy her new family was to get her. They immediately got down on the ground and started loving on her, and they've already sent a long email about how much they love her and how happy they are to have her in their lives. That's what rescue is all about, and I am honored to have been a part of their special day. Here is a pic of Penny and her new mom and dad, isn't that the sweetest thing!

The Action Shots from Myrtle

Prerace the photographer caught us in the porta pottie line.

Still smiling, this must have been around mile 5 if I remember correctly.

At least I look like I'm moving fast:)

That's Rob in the neon yellow shirt, the nice guy who chatted me up the last half mile. I look really happy to see that finish line!

I made it!

Rich found me in time for a pic together.

Race Report: Myrtle Beach Half Marathon 2/14/09

Warning: Extremely long post, you may require coffee refills and bathroom breaks before you get to the end.
The night before: We got home from work, loaded the car with our bags and all 4 dogs and headed to the kennel. We got the pups dropped off and then hit the road from Charleston to MB. It's about a 2 hour drive, and we got to the convention center hotel/expo around 8pm. We picked up our packets and made a quick loop through the expo. I got some new shorts, we each had a free beer, then we went up to the room to order pizza. The pizza was delivered about half an hour later, Rich had beef and I had cheese. We have always been a fan of pizza and a beer the night before long runs. I think I was asleep by 10:30, and actually didn't wake up until the alarm went of at 4:30 which suprised me because Thursday night I woke up every hour thinking about the weekend.
. This pic is me modeling my new shorts, tech tee(very nice but I felt wrong wearing one that said "marathon" across the front even though it was a different color from the full marathon shirts), and our free beach towel, which living near the beach with a houseful of dogs always comes in handy.

The morning of: We got up at 4:30, and I immediately brewed a pot of coffee. We each ate a Cliff bar and chugged a cup of coffee and sat around watching the weather channel trying to see if we were going to get drenched or not (turned out it stayed dry til about 3.5 hours in, so we were fine). After 15 or 20 minutes we both realize that the coffee isn't doing it's job. Rich says "It's not decaf is it?" Me out loud "Um, noooo why would I make decaf" Me in my head "Oh sh^$ I bet I picked up the wrong packet of coffee, the hotel wasn't kind enough to give us 2 packs, they gave us a regular and a decaf, doh!" So I remade the coffee and we each chugged a cup of the leaded version. It never kicked in for me, which I hoped would not result in a bathroom break during the race (just in case you were wondering, it didn't, I never had to stop.) We both got dressed, Rich applied his NipGuards (which he now loves by the way), we both got BodyGlided up (for all you non-runners who might read this, that is in no way dirty), I made sure the Ipod and Garmin were charged and functioning, we got our various nutrition packs (I like gels, he likes beans and bloks) and we walked the 0.7ish miles to the start. There were lots of porta-potties, although the lines were pretty long. There was a band, and dancing Chic-fil-A cows for our entertainment. The start is on a road with 2 lanes going each direction with a median, so the halfers started on one side and the full on the other and it merged half a mile or so in.

Here we have sleepy 5am Richard not looking very excited that I have the camera out.

Who has two thumbs and loves her new running skirt? Amanda!!

We're getting excited, it's almost time! What a way to celebrate our 7th Valentine's Day together.

Now he's ready, the Nips are Guarded. I'm not really sure what the chipmunk face is about. While I was going for the jungle cat runner girl look, Rich was going for more of an 80's clashing shades of red look, nice headband:)

The 13.1: We started off together, with the plan that we would each go at our own pace and meet up at the finish. While I truly love my new skirt, I hate it for the first couple miles of a run because it is just a bit big and feel like it is falling down, ok..I don't just feel like it is, it really IS falling down, especially with pockets full of chapstick/id/gels/etc. So I spent the first couple miles yanking it up every few minutes which was supremely annoying. After you get a little sweaty it "sticks" in place and the slipping is no longer a problem. I started out with the Ipod and Rich let me run with Gary (the Garmin) since I wouldn't have him as my pacer. In my previous 2 half marathons, I didn't even feel like I was running the first 3 or 4 miles, but with the electronic gear I had for this one, I was acutely aware I was running from the first step. I was afraid this was a bad sign, but it turned out just fine. I decided not to wear my fuel belt and just drink at the aid stations every 2 miles, but I was thirsty from the start. The stations were well-manned and stocked with water and red Powerade. Thanks Volunteers, you did great!! We did the first mile in around 10:40 which is faster than I planned, so I slowed down a bit and Rich went ahead.

It turned out to be a great run, with no major aches/pains/emergencies. I had my virtual trainer set for a 10:55 pace, but I don't think I had a single mile at that pace, they were all in the 10:30s-10:40s. During the first half I debated with myself about whether I should slow down or keep up the pace. I was worried about crashing in the 2nd half, but decided I would rather have that happen than finish and feel like I could have gone faster. Luckily it worked, and I was able to do the entire thing much faster than I expected. I never had a point where I doubted if I could finish, and after the first few miles I realized that if nothing changed I should be on pace for a nice PR.

Now here's a part where I would like to know ya'lls opinion: At mile 12, I walked a few steps to sip water and this nice guy (late 40's I would guess), looks at me and says something like "only 1 more to go." I stay probably 10 steps or so behind him for the next half mile, then with about half a mile to go I realize that I am going to get my PR, finish strong and feel a huge relief. I let out a big sigh, and he heard me and slowed down and turned around. I think he, we'll call him Rob, thought that my big sigh was a sign that I was struggling and about to give up whereas it was really just the opposite. It was my sigh of "yes, this is almost over, I did it, let everything go and just run as hard as you can to the finish." So misguided, kind Rob decides to be nice and "help" me by slowing down to run beside me and chat...we are in the home stretch here people...but I don't know how to handle this. I have to take my Ipod earphones out to hear him, and run with them in my hand. He asks me my name, says he heard lots of people just yelling at me calling me "leopard girl" which I never heard because of the Ipod, tells me that I should smile and finish strong (thanks for that, I would have never come up with that on my own). So I find myself slowing down from the pace I could have been running at this stage to talk to this guy, who thinks he is slowing down to encourage me. I speed up, but he didn't really speed up with me but was still talking. So what do you do? I finally pulled ahead and crossed ahead of him, but I'm pretty sure he slowed down on purpose so we wouldn't cross exactly together. My final time was 2:20:02 (chip time, not clock time) but I am 99% sure had Rob not been so kind as to help me get through the last half mile, I would have finished under 2:20. Grrr!! My question to you is, how would you have handled this situation? Rich said I should have just semi-ignored him and done my own thing, but I guess I felt bad doing that since Rob thought he was helping me. Afterwards he told me Congrats and that I finished strong, he really was being nice, but it was an aggravating situation to be hijacked there at the end.
Post-Race: Rich met me for a picture, then we grabbed waters and free beer and stretched. Then we walked back to the hotel, had a little champagne and trailmix, showered then took a nice long nap. We woke up around 3 starving, but most restaurants weren't open yet, so we wound up having steaks at Lone Star steakhouse at 4pm. There was a marathon sponsored postrace party at the House of Blues from 5-7, so we hit that next. There was plenty of food (had we known we would have waited and not gone to dinner before) and more free beer, kudos to race officals for all the free beer! They were playing videos on all the TV's of the various races and finish lines (5K, full, half). There were 6 marriage proposals so that was fun to watch a few of those. What a great story to say you got engaged at the finish line of a marathon you ran together, that's pretty deep and stuff...embarking on the metaphorical marathon of marriage together while finishing a literal marathon. Anyway, it made me tear up at the sweet guys and gals that got engaged. Next we made one last stop on the romance train....Hooters. Yes, my husband took me to Hooters on Valentine's Day. I didn't really mind, we weren't quite ready to call it a night (it was only 7pm) and Hooters happened to be right on the way back to the hotel. After a quick drink there, it was back to the Sheraton for a long night's sleep. We had brunch the next morning, drove back to Charleston, went to see Confessions of a Shopaholic (payback for Hooters), picked up the dogs from the kennel and took them home and went to our favorite Mexican restaurant to celebrate the end of a wonderful weekend.

Here I am resting after we got back to our room, my legs were tired!

Rich and his free beer, and some champagne, still rocking the headband.

Mmmm.tasty

Ok, ok, maybe Gatorade would be a better idea than all champagne.

Rich hearts NipGuards, no bleeding this time!

This is me before our hot night on the town at the steakhouse, House of Blues, and Hooters. Don't be jealous ladies if your man didn't treat you this nice on V-day, there's always next year;)

Aww, he loves me.

This is me and Melanie, our Hooters waitress. You can't see it in this pic but it always cracks me up how there is way more fabric in their big white scrunchy socks than in those orange shorts.

I think we have decided to run the half at the ING Atlanta marathon at the end of March!!

PR's For Both Of Us!

Full race report and pics to follow, but just wanted to let ya'll know that Rich finished in 2:14:41 and I finished in 2:20:02, both PR's from our 2:24:40 last March!

Uh Oh, I'm Not Feeling So Hot

Last night I made my list of things to pack for the weekend in Myrtle Beach, fine-tuned my ultimate half-marathon playlist, bought a bottle of celebratory champagne to have after the race, and tried to get in bed early. This morning I woke up and while driving to work I think to myself, "I don't feel all that great." My throat is a little sore, my head hurts, I feel the tiniest bit chilled, my ears are a little achy. Nooooooooooo!! It is one of those feelings where it could totally go away soon, or it could turn into something bad. I'm hoping it is just the start of a very mild head cold. I am going to drink a couple Emergen-C packs, and I have already started on Zicam nasal swabs. I am usually a baby about running when I don't feel well, aka...I don't run when I don't feel well. It's not like I am going out there to win any prizes, or be top in my age group (heck, even to be in the top half of my age group). My 2 previous half times have been 2:40 and 2:24:40, BUT STILL, I'd like to not feel like hooey in the morning.
I should have known better than to sign up for a race on Valentine's day. As a child, I really can't remember a Valentine's day that I wasn't sick. It's not that I'm a sickly person, I really only get sick once or twice a year, but it always seems to fall on V-Day. I always missed my elementary school V-day parties, and a friend would have to drop my little white sack of Valentine Card's at my house for me after school. I'm not sure why this is, but I seem to have some kind of perverse Cupid's Curse that ensures I will not be feeling my best on Feb 14th.
So please send some healthy vibes to South Carolina today, both myself and Carolina John are in need of some!
With all that said, I'm not sure what my goal for the race is. I would of course love a PR (anything faster than 2:24:40), but if that doesn't happen I'm not going to worry about it. For now my cop-out goal is just to finish with a time and effort I feel proud of, whatever time that may wind up being.
Oh, and just for added fun a giant pimple decided to take up residence right between my eyes cyclops-style, should look great in the race pics.

(almost) Wordless Wednesday

I couldn't find a logo for the just the half since we are not running the full , but only 3 days until....

Lipstick Review: MAC Lavender Whip + Ever So Rich Gloss

One of the blogs in my google reader is Blogdorf Goodman, which has tons of makeup, fragrance, and fashion reviews/info. I am a beauty product junkie, and I love makeup in shades of purple so when I saw this product I had to head to the MAC counter and check it out. In the tube it definitley looks lavender, and once I put it on it did give the vague impression of corpse lips. It is not opaque however, it is very creamy and smooth and feels great on. I tried it on with the Ever so Rich cremesheen glass lipgloss on top and that sealed the deal for me. I had on a maroonish red shirt when I sampled this, and that was not a good combo. It goes much better with black, white or lighter springy colors.

Here I am modeling Lavender Whip/Ever So Rich combo. In person it looks just a bit more purple than it appears in this picture. Don't laugh at my face, it's my best America's Next Top Model face....somehow I don't think Tyra will be calling me for a contract anytime soon;)

The lipstick is moderately long lasting, probably a few hours without eating or drinking. I'm not a huge fan of the long-wear lipsticks so that is fine with me. I don't mind reapplying throughout the day. The exact shade of lavender can be varied by how much you wear, one coat will be very sheer or you can layer several coats for a truer lavender shade.

I don't like to shell out the cash for department store brand cosmetics, especially lipsticks, when there are so many great and more affordable options out there at drugstores and other discount retailers, but this duo from MAC captured my heart and I had to make it mine!

Quick running update: I went for the 6 miles for my last long run over the weekend, today is either 3 or 4, then tomorrow is 2, then a couple rest days before Saturday's half. I'm getting excited!