::cough, cough, gag, cough::

What's with the coughing and gagging? Oh that would be me trying to get my stomach out of my throat. I have no idea what on Earth motivates cars to honk at people who are running (ON the sidewalk, at least 3 feet from the road) but please, for-the-love-of-not-making-someone-die-of-a-coronary-as-they-are-finishing-the-last-leg-of-their-run, STOP IT. I don't particularly care for the Adam's-appleish look that a stomach-in-the-throat gives me.

Oh and as a side note, I WILL remember your license plate number to report you as I fall to the ground, convulsing.

Sweet

So twice this past week, a friend of mine popped into my head, very randomly...you know that whole "hey I've haven't talked with so-and-so in awhile, I wonder how she is doing?"...then on Wednesday, she popped into my head yet again and I got this feeling like "hmm, okay God, maybe you are trying to tell me something"...so I emailed her and asked her how I could be praying for her. I got a response pretty quickly. Turns out, she had prayed specifically twice this week for someone to pray FOR her, as she is going through a pretty rough patch. How cool is that? It's so neat when God uses us as tools in someone else's life...He blesses the person who requested the prayer, and He also blesses the person whom He uses...quite sweet. Lesson learned: think twice when someone "randomly" pops into my head...it may not be as random as I think :)

Really? No, no...I mean REALLY!?

Do you ever shock yourself with your dorkiness? Be honest (please, I am trying to console myself here; I need some friendly commiseration).

Here's what happened:

A co-worker came by my desk to high-five me for something. I returned the high-five...or rather, almost returned it. Somewhere between my desk (where my hand was resting) and his hand (which I was supposed to high five), my hand encountered an obstacle. My face. That's right, I somehow smacked myself in the face (and almost poked out my right eye). Kinda hard too... The look on my co-worker's face was priceless...roughly translated it was probably something like "who ARE you?". I vacillated between mortification over my own dorkiness and hysterical laughter for a split second...the hysterical laughter won out.

Really? Who DOES that!? I mean, seriously, how does one lose track of the distance between her face and her hand? I think I should be studied.

Oh yeah and to top it off...I got back from a run this evening and made a nice big salad with broccoli and zucchini, all healthy and stuff, and I went to pour dressing on it and guess what? The dressing bottle top was different than all our other dressing bottles and it was the completely open type. Yeah...I dumped almost an entire bottle of Italian dressing on my salad....while Claire stood there cracking up at me. I still ate most of the salad...and left about an inch and a half of dressing in the bottom of the bowl.

I think this day should be over now...

Blog facelift

So everyone seems to be giving their blog a facelift...so I caved to the trend and updated mine as well. What do you think?

Sporty Goals

So, as promised, I said that would blog about my athletic goals for this year. Now that the leg is healed, I feel like I can finally start actively pursuing these- there are really only two big goals, and a LOT of training that will need to happen in between!

1. Compete in the Clear Lake International Triathlon-Olympic distance (swim 1500m, bike 24.9 miles, run 6.2 miles)
2. Run in the San Antonio Rock and Roll Half-Marathon in November (13.1 miles)- (Lisa and I are both gunning for this one, since we missed out on the Houston Half)

I'm doing a sprint tri in May, I am hoping to find a short course (a distance between a sprint and Olympic- although I've only found one in Texas...I may have to hold my own practice short course tri if that's that case!) and the CL tri is towards the end of August. I'll probably thrown in another sprint tri or two before then as well...we'll see...

Anyways, there are my goals. Bring it on! :)

Recap

Ah, home sweet home.

I ate Blue Bell ice cream for breakfast :D. I love America.

Interesting flight back...we hit bad weather coming into Houston and were put into a holding pattern...for about 1.5hrs...lots o' people felt quite sick- thank God I took my Dramamine...we ended up running out of fuel and landing in New Orleans to get some more (my first time to the Big Easy...the airport tarmac is quite lovely). I made it home about 3.5hrs after I had planned to...but yay to a super great roomie who had Mexican food from Gringo's waiting! Yummm, enchiladas (I've heard of one Mexican food restaurant in Moscow called Pancho Villas...and I have heard that it is awful :) )

Oh yeah and the Moscow Book List? I got through 5 of them! Yay for reducing the stack.

Laundry time.

Last Day

Before my last shift, I headed over to the Fisher's for one last visit. Jude was in school, but Amy and Angus were ready to go with their HUGE imaginations! I spent a couple of hours being the servant who had to clean the entire palace and the mean step-mother...and then I got to be a fisherman who was pulling in my catch (Amy and Angus lying on a blanket in the dining room and me dragging them around (they were whales and dolphins...oh and a mermaid at one point...). In between the crazy make-believe, Emily and I had a chance to chat. A great start to my last day in Moscow!

Angus deep in though after showing me pictures of the Dolphinarium they went to


Amy, post ballerina costume, now a mermaid


Angus as Batman (who later became Prince Batman)



Me and Amy (who was being distract by Angus, but she still managed to put a winning smiling on her face :) )