Did You Know About My First Half Marathon?

Did you know about my first half marathon?

This morning I rang in the New Year by running my first half marathon! Marathon Bird and I got up early to travel to Kingwood, TX.



The weather was mild, no wind, no rain! We met another couple of friends there and were excited for the race to begin.

I think there were about 400 runners for both the half and full marathon. I was really anxious/antsy/jittery this morning. I had to go to the bathroom twice before the race, just to make sure! The race began at 8 am so it was good and light and the weather was just right-not too hot, not too cold. The course was concrete trails through a greenbelt area near Lake Houston. We were to complete two 6.55 loops for the half marathon.

The beginning of the race reminded me of the triathlon-a stampede of everyone crammed together. I did not like the first mile or so. I was getting frustrated that we had to start out so slow, but it had to be that way with so many people and by the first mile or so everyone spread out and it was not too bad. I stuck with my five minute run/one minute walk intervals. I was very tempted to skip the first walk and just get out of the crowd, but my friend had told me to stick with what I had trained. I am really glad I listened to her.

I knew I was going pretty fast but I was feeling good and wanted to keep on a good pace. I never checked the actual time but just kept to the five minute/one minute schedule. As I headed back to the turn around I noticed on one of the trees my friend's name posted. I remembered that when we started I overheard someone say "Watch for your name on the trees." I thought maybe some folks had posted encouraging messages to friends. Then, I noticed my other friend's name, and then his wife's. So I guessed they had posted every participant's name and I was looking for mine by then. As I came to the turn around I was really happy and feeling good. A little ways back I notice my own name posted on one of the trees! That was fun!

I had a hard time keeping track of the mileage, I think I would miss seeing the appropriate mile marker some times. By the time I got back around to mile ten I was really happy. I was feeling good and decided I would go ahead and eat my gel pack to sustain me through the end of the race. (I had at first decided not to eat it, but as I got that far I felt I needed it.)

Beginning at about mile eight I got to where I was clapping every time I saw a mile marker! Mile eleven again proved to be the hardest for me, but not too very bad. I think doing the run/walk system and getting sips of water every so often really helped.

I finished with a good time of 2:14:41. This beat the goal I had set for myself by 15 minutes! I was really pleased when they handed me a little stuffed bat (why a bat? don't know!) with my finishing place marked on it!!



I also loved the giant medals we got! We could not hear well when they were being shown off before the race, but apparently this was the ten year anniversary for this race and so they wanted them bigger and better!



I really, really enjoyed doing this half marathon. I love how it is held on New Year's Day. I love how it is open to everyone, elite runners (it's a Boston qualifier) all the way to the walkers (the course time limit is dusk!) The volunteer staff was great! We got great goodies. And they did not even limit me on how much pizza I could eat after the race!! :)

Did You Know There Is One Lady at Comcast Who Has Helped Us?

Did you know there is one lady at Comcast who has helped us?

I do just want to state for the record that one of the supervisors at Comcast has been responsive to us. Her name is Tanesha and she has returned calls and done what she can to help resolve our situation. I just wanted to be fair to her for her efforts.

There was actually one other customer support staff who really tried to help my husband a few weeks ago, but you know they can't do much. And one of the techs who has been here more than once, Anthony, hates coming back here. He said it makes him look bad and he doesn't like that. (Getting it fixed would really help him to look good!) So for what it's worth, out of four aggravating, frustrating, maddening months of problems, there are a couple of folks who are at least trying to do what they can...

Did You Know We Are Still Having Connection Problems?

Did you know we are still having connection problems?

At the moment, our internet connection is working. The time it works is about equivalent to or less than the amount of time it is out. We have been using Comcast since they took over for Roadrunner. We have not been really happy with their service at all. You can read back through my old posts to get some background as to why.

We continue to have problems. No one knows what the problem is and we continue to have "band aid efforts" applied until the next outage! For example, yesterday there were three line techs at our left side neighbor's house. They are scheduled for our right side neighbor's house today. And our house on Friday. Uh, this seems foolish to me. Why not take care of it all at once???!!! I know there are some there who have tried, and some who don't care, and one co-supervisor who even said that the customer support tech lied to me!

Needless to say, the loss of connection has indeed been an interruption to lifestyle. Yes, we love to play on the computer, but we also have necessary things to do online as well. For example, my son's AP History course has a mandatory website student's must access regularly. This is difficult when our internet is out. He has gone to friend's and neighbor's houses to get his homework done. We try to utilize the library when possible, but that is hard to do. My son also writes articles for a community newsletter. He writes them and then emails them in. This is also impossible with no connection. This last time he was scrambling around for some sort of memory card or flash drive so he could take his saved article somewhere to email it in!

My husband has been prodding me again and again to continue to blog about Comcast's poor quality and inept service. So, this is the latest vent!

Did You Know You Can Keep Spices Up to Two Years?

Did you know you can keep spices up to two years?

I was watching the Early Show yesterday and they were talking about how long you can keep spices in the pantry. She said most would keep well for a couple of years, but after that, it is time to throw them out. They lose their flavor and you can apparently tell a difference just by smelling the old one and a new one. I went through my spices and only have a few I need to replace and only one that I rarely use and won't replace.

Did You Know My Son Gets His License Next Month?

Did you know my son gets his license next month?

My son will be sixteen in just a few weeks. He is anxious to get his driver's license. We are anxious for many reasons! One of these reasons (though not really the biggest) is the amount our insurance will rise. But in getting the auto insurance quote for him as driver, we were surprised that it would be a little over half of what we expected. That is with him listed as a secondary driver and not a primary driver. We also are looking at all the discounts possible: the savings for the driver's ed. course, the savings for the drug and alcohol awareness certification and the good grades discount. Every little bit helps!

Did You Know About The Day the Earth Stood Still?

Did you know about The Day The Earth Stood Still?

We went to see this movie for my birthday this week. We did take both our kids. The movie was pretty good. We all enjoyed it though my 12 year old daughter thought it was a little scary and pretty weird. There were some weird parts but it was pretty good. My cousin said that he has asked several folks about it. In his "surveying" he has found that everyone who has seen the original movie did not like this one and that those who had not seen the original (like us) like the new movie.

I would say that it is a pretty clean movie. The violence was not over the top but the theme of the end of the world is pretty intense for some kids. I think the PG 13 rating is appropriate. My daughter found it more weird than scary, though during the movie was a little unsure.

Did You Know We Have Lived Most of Our Married Life Without Insurance?

Did you know we have lived most of our married life without insurance?

I am not bragging when I say that. I know that we have tempted fate quite often. We have been very blessed not to have any major catastrophes strike our family. We had insurance when I was pregnant with my son. I was very sick during that pregnancy and had to be hospitalized. The insurance did not cover any of it. So as soon as our son was born and we saw that he was healthy and everything was as it should be, we dropped our insurance.

We also have not had wind storm and hail insurance since we have lived in this house. When Ike blew over this summer, we knew that we were blessed with no damage. Too many around us had damage of some sort.

We know that we are living on the edge this way. It is just nearly impossible for us to see how we can afford these things every month. But for 2009 we are looking at resolving some of these things. Getting hail and wind, health and term life insurance quotes are very important steps for us to look into in the new year.