Things.

The half marathon training has officially begun. On the first day, the cold wind was making my eyes water, and then the tears froze on my face. So you could say things are going well so far. The schedule, for those of you who want to play along at home:


If any seasoned runners have advice or suggestions to share, please let me know. Last time around, my goals were twofold:

1. Don't die.
2. Don't come in last.
This year, I want a finish time of 2:00:00. I'm pretty good at endurance over long distances, so speed is the main issue that I need to work on. Anyway, we'll see how that goes.

My training might get temporarily derailed this weekend, though, as I'm going to North Carolina to see The Whitleys and meet baby Annabelle.


I was talking to Allison earlier, graciously offering to help with some things while I was there, and she acknowledged that she would "put me to work". She further explained that to mean keeping Emaline entertained. I don't think she understands what "work" is, because I'm pretty sure it doesn't normally include playing dress-ups and having a 4-year-old draw pictures of you and give you hugs. Challenge accepted.

I'm going to stick my finger in her dimple.

Round two.

Well, I had so much fun last year that I'm going back for more. The New York City Half Marathon is in two months, and I just found out that I got accepted out of the lottery drawing for entry. The race I did last year was in Brooklyn, but this is the big one--it starts in Central Park, then goes through Times Square, and finishes downtown. I think it will be awesome, and I'm trying to keep that in mind as I contemplate training in 20-degree weather.

New Year.

The holiday roundup:


More pictures here.

Degrees of average temperature higher than NYC: 35
Delicious dinners eaten: 9
Movies seen: 6
Hours spent playing Wii Super Mario: countless
Varieties of pajama pants worn: 3
Old friends caught up with: 6
Peppermint bark eaten: at least half a tin
Hugs: thousands
New nieces born: 1


Annabelle Hope Whitley made her debut on New Year's Eve. Welcome to the family, little girl. You have no idea how many people are in love with you already!

Staying warm.

Well, it appears to be winter. You know how I know? Because yesterday I saw a dog wearing shoes. I also saw some pigeons eating a slice of pizza, but I'm not really sure what that means. In any case, our lovely mild Fall left us rather abruptly, with the average temperature dropping 40 degrees within about two days. It was sad.

Thankfully, there are ways to stay warm that don't necessarily involve watching Glee in my pajamas and eating ice cream (not that I have a problem with that). For example, a couple weekends ago our stake had our annual YSA film festival. Most of the entries were predictably mediocre, but one stood out as a crowd pleaser and won the final prize:

Twilight Years from Tom on Vimeo.

It's also party season, which I happen to be a fan of. In addition to our company holiday soiree and various dinner engagements, we went to a Roaring 20s themed Christmas party recently. Pretty much everyone got decked out and looked fabulous, which was a lot of fun. Our friend Joshua has his own photography business and was there taking glamour shots:



All shots can be found here.
And a week from tomorrow I can look forward to thawing out a bit more (and eating my weight in homemade candy) when I fly back to California for a week and a half. Until then, I'll be keeping a close eye on the behavior of the neighborhood animals.

Running for pie.

At the beginning of October, around the time I discovered I would get to go home for Thanksgiving, Sarah and I talked about finding a race to do together while we were there. Others caught on and things got a little out of hand, with the end result being that last Thursday morning, 8 of us participated in the Silicon Valley Turkey Trot. Most of us did the 10K race, while Sarah's husband Joel ran the 5K and two mini-redheads rocked the kids' races (and got MEDALS, which I am totally not at all jealous about).

The weeks leading up to the race included many mass emails back and forth with updates on mileage and training. It was fun getting each other hyped up and also talking trash (obligatory). It all culminated in the glory of Thanksgiving day, running alongside some of my faves with the promise of major gluttony later on.



Totally gangsta.
Disgustingly, David smoked all of us and finished first despite not having trained at all (unless you count going on one 2-mile run a few weeks before the race, which I do not). But we all finished under our goal time of an hour and looked fabulous doing it. Special props to my dad who, though he is in a two-man biker gang with my mom, had never run more than a couple miles before he started training for this race.

We were rewarded handsomely with a little of this action:


There may also have been mass quantities of pie involved. My stomach had been training for this day just as much as my legs had. Life is about balance, right?

More pictures here.

Quarter century.

In my first week of being 25, I got called "ma'am" by an NYU student. In my second week of being 25, I'm going to see this.

So I guess you could say it's basically a wash so far.


Birthday week kicked off with a ladies' brunch followed by mani-pedis. It also featured some lovely gifts and cards, as well as listening to small children shout at me on the telephone. Another highlight was the church speed dating activity, in which I managed to talk to at least two guys about Lord of the Rings, and told another one about the Titanic website I had when I was 13. One guy was in grad school for Mapmaking, so be aware that that is still apparently a thing.

The next weekend, Birthdaypalooza was rounded out with a joint party with my roommates, who are also November babies. It was really fun and we got to spend the rest of the weekend eating leftover chips and dip. It was a birthday miracle!


Getting older is kind of a fire hazard.

Central Park in Fall.

Last weekend my friend Zach and I went to watch the New York Marathon. I'd kept hearing about how cool it was, and how it was such an event--it goes through all the boroughs, and people in every neighborhood come out to the streets to watch. Apparently in Brooklyn, people start getting drunk at like 10am and then go cheer on the runners.

Also, I really liked the ad campaign that ran in the weeks leading up to it:




We had a great spot on Fifth Avenue, right at the Mile 23 marker. Since there are 40,000 people who run the marathon, they break it into several waves of runners. The wheelchair racers start first, followed by the professional women, then the professional men, and then three waves of regular runners. No spectators are even allowed at the start because there are so many people, but I can't imagine how much energy and adrenaline there must be there.


We got there in time to see some of the lead runners come through, including the two first place men (pictured above), who were neck and neck at mile 23. The American guy (on the left) ended up winning. USA! By the way, these guys are running 5-minute miles. For 26 MILES. I doubt I could have kept up with them for ONE if I'd just started running alongside them.

My fave.

At first, the runners were sparse, so Zach and I used the lag time in between to wax poetic about athleticism and the triumph of the human spirit. We were also amused by the people who had brought Red Vines to hand out to the runners.

The masses.

Lots of people had their names and/or countries on their shirts, so we had fun shouting things like "Way to be, Tom!" and "Jennifer, you are very good-looking!" to random strangers. Anyway, it was awesome, and this is definitely a new tradition I want to keep. We've already got big plans for next year, including camp chairs, snacks, and a boom box playing "The Final Countdown" to get the runners through the home stretch.

Afterwards, I wandered through Central Park for a while, enjoying the fall colors.




I can't say it was an entirely terrible way to spend a Sunday morning.