Friday Five - 12/6

Happy Friday!  In case you missed last week, you can check out my very first ever Friday Five post here.  So let's get right into this week because I have some great things to share!

Five Tweets:

My cousin Erin will be tweeting a different Christmas movie quote every day of December and this is one of my favorites from Christmas Vacation.  It doesn't quite give the voice inflection of this quote credit though, so I hope you're saying it correctly in your head.

Dayton is ranked #25 and that means that Siri is a huge Dayton fan! (For the time being at least...until we move up in the rankings.)

I am too, Shannon.  I don't think I'll ever know.  Except blogging, I like blogging.  And running.

My brother lives in Ohio now, so he is proud to call himself an OSU fan.

And now take a minute to read just a few of DiGiorno Pizza's tweets during last night's The Sound of Music Live with Carrie Underwood:

Five Articles

Philadelphia Marathon On Cheating - Who Cares

10 Personal Finance Tips From Hip Hop Lyrics

The Dumbest Things That Happened This Year 

Why ING Broke Up With The Marathon

Holiday-Themed Workout Playlist

Five Things I Ate This Week:

Gingerbread Latte - I guess I didn't "eat" this, but it has calories and tastes awesome, so it counts for my list.

Sushi - I hadn't had sushi in quite awhile but, Mac and I needed to catch up on life since now we don't run together anymore.  I suppose we could, but it's cold, sooooo that doesn't happen quite as much.

SweetTarts - I moved desks at work this week and now where I sit in unbelievably close to a HUGE bag of SweetTarts.  I was able to avoid them easily at my old desk, but now at this new one, I find myself grabbing a bit each time I get up!

Pesto Pizza - The extended Smith family had a Christmas trolley ride last Saturday and afterwards we ordered pizza.  I realized that after the half marathon earlier that morning (full recap coming tomorrow!), I really didn't eat much the whole day except for a few snacks.  So by the time that pizza came, I went to town on the pesto pizza.  Pesto has become one of my favorite things and ever ytime I have it on pizza, I am in LOVE.  And truthfully, the only other time I had a pesto pizza was last St. Patrick's Day when I was also mildly under the influence.  I can guarantee it'd be good sober too though.

Ham - I usually have turkey on my super awesome salad that I've been taking to work for lunch most days.  But this week I decided to switch things up a little and go with ham in my salad.  I figured I was eating turkey every day in either a sandwich or a salad and then ate a lot of turkey on Thanksgiving, so it was time for a change.  Back to turkey next week though.

Five Quotes from Pinterest:

And I'll leave you with some words of inspiration/fun:

So I guess I picked all the super-girly Pinterest quotes for this week.  I really like glitter and champagne.  Therefore, I wish people always acted like it's New Year's Eve.  Wouldn't that be a good idea?

Don't forget to be awesome today :)

Friday Five - 11/29

Happy Black Friday!!  And a belated Happy Thanksgiving!  Something I've seen on a lot of blogs is a Friday favorite/week round-up post and I decided to join in on the fun!  There's all sorts of ways I've seen it done, but I'm going to try to pick some categories that I most often think about sharing.  And I'll be doing a link-up with Clare's blog (Fitting It All In) - she has been doing these Friday posts forever and are always my favorite posts of the week to read!

Five Tweets: 

There were lots of good tweets this week (especially about the UD basketball games), but here are my favorites!

*Dayton upsets Gonzaga, classic mix-up.  Apparently they know about the annual Dayton 2 Daytona trip!  And even though I didn't stay up late for the game, it was fun to wake up to all the exciting tweets and Facebook posts.

Those clever marketers!

The Little Drummer Boy is my favorite Christmas song!

Just tweeting with Bart Yasso, Chief Running Officer of Runner's World!  He's just as funny in person too.  The snow he was talking about was the whopping 1/2 inch we got earlier this week.

Classic Toy Story.

Five Articles:

New College Running Group Will Offer Prize Money
Be Careful What You Tweet, Fox News Is Watching!  --> And so am I...see above tweets.
Bernard Lagat and Nick Willis Take On Speedgolf  --> Sounds like a fun sport.
It's Thanksgiving So We Asked Some Brits To Label The US States  --> Hilarious.
8 Tips You Need To Know Before You Start Weight Training


Five Books I Want to Read:

The Invisible Line: Three American Families and the Secret Journey from Black to White

Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen

A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future.

The Happiness Project: Or Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun

Restaurant Man


Five Things on my Christmas List (since it's Black Friday):

Garmin Forerunner 220 - It's time I became a real runner and got a Garmin.

Mattress topper - To make my bed even comfier than it already is.  So practical.

Race registration for the Phoenix Half Marathon - I already booked my flight but haven't registered yet.  Races are expensive!

Nike Flyknit Free shoes - They are sweet and so light.  I've never ran in "minimalist" shoes, but I figure the winter on the treadmill would be a great time to give them a try.

Really warm running spandex - I only have one pair of really warm spandex.  The rest I have are a lot thinner.

I have a few other things on the list too...and yes, some non-running related things, but those are all more general.


Have an idea for a Friday Five category?  I'll try to always share 5 tweets and 5 articles, but then I'll probably pick another 1 or 2 random categories each week based on the time of year or what I have to share!

Have you read any of those books?  Thoughts on them?

What is on your Christmas list? 

Denver - Hot Chocolate, Hot Tub, Cold Hike, Cold Beer

I am back down to a normal elevation.  Get ready for a lot of pictures from Denver!

Friday evening we went downtown to explore 16th street, which is an outdoor pedestrian mall, blocked off to all traffic except free buses and pedicabs.  Chicago would be a much greater place if Michigan Ave was for solely for pedestrians and FREE buses.  We went in a few cliche souvenir shops, but unfortunately did not buy anything.

We had dinner reservations at a Mexican restaurant called Rio Grande, known for their margaritas.  Anne and I got frozen mixed strawberry and mango - on the receipt that comes up as "Manberry."

For my meal, I had tequila shrimp tacos, which were good, but a little too spicy for me.  We were super tired and had big plans for the rest of the weekend, so we called it a night after 2 margaritas and A LOT of chips and salsa.

First up for Saturday was the Celestial Seasonings tea factory.  We didn't take the tour, but we took advantage of all the free tea samples.  I think I tried 4 different kinds, and then we bought a few boxes from the gift shop.

The main event on Saturday though was our hike!!

Anne and I met up with her friend Darja (who also went to UD!) and set out to climb Bear Peak in Boulder.  The beginning was a little bit of both up and down as we made our way up and around the mountain.

Then it started to get steeper the further we got and was more like climbing than just hiking along a trail.  It also got a lot colder the higher we went!  At one point we made quick conversation with a couple on their way down and they warned us of the cold and wind that we would be approaching soon.  I didn't really believe that it could be such a drastic change in conditions, but it was!  I couldn't take any more pictures because my fingers were numb.  But 2.5 hours after starting, we finally made it to the top!

We quickly turned to head back down since it was so cold up there.  One of my favorite signs along the route warned hikers about bears and mountain lions and one tip said, "If attacked, fight back."

The return trip only took 1.5 hours, which was good since we were all a little cold by this point and darkness was approaching.  We headed to a pizza place in Boulder and then to a coffee shop for a toasty cup of hot chocolate.

 

Despite being so cold, we talked an awful lot about ice cream and made a fro yo trip in the evening.  But before the fro yo, we sat in the hot tub outside for awhile, which was perfect on a cold night, until it started raining a little.

My flight home was not until Sunday evening (luckily, or else I probably wouldn't have made it back to Chicago until super late due to the bad storms yesterday), which meant we had another full day of activity on the schedule.

First up was a trail run!  Anne, her friend Jodie, and I set out on our run and I really didn't know what to expect or how far we were going to g.

It was still hard to breathe in the higher altitude and after just a little while I was really hurting going up, up, up.  But they were powering through so I just followed along!  We made it to the top in about 35 minutes, and then back downhill (not the same way, it was a loop), for a total time of 59 minutes.  It was super hard, but surprisingly went by really fast.  Running for an hour here in Chicago seems like forever, probably because I am usually alone and bored, and Anne said it goeso by faster when you're concentrating on where to put your foot next, going up or down hill, making sure you don't fall, etc.  I wish I could do runs like this all the time, but I sure am sore today!

To re-fuel after the run, we went to a restaurant in Golden, CO that had an awesome salad and pizza buffet.  I had to take a picture of my salad (one of them, you can't have just one when it's a buffet), because it had the very secret ingredient that makes all salads a million times better.

GOLDFISH!!  There's also some pepperoni in there, I wasn't a huge fan of that.  Save the pepperoni for the pizza.  I think the only other place that has had goldfish at a salad bar has been my beloved Pennellwood.

After salad and pizza, it was time for beer!  (Actually, Justin and I each had a beer with lunch too.)  We headed to the Coors Brewery and learned all sorts of great stuff about how the beer was made.  Adolf Coors started the brewery when he was 26 years old...makes me think I need to do something more meaningful/awesome with my life.

The end of the tour meant it was time for sampling.  I had a Blue Moon and a Colorado Native.  Hoppy, hoppy, hoppy.  I learned what hops are, not that I needed to go to a brewery to do so in our age of Wikipedia.  Anne and Justin had been on this tour multiple times, so I'm glad they were willing to go again with me!

I would like to go back to Denver soon, but I'll at least wait until winter is over because now they are going to start getting snow!  I do not like winter.

What is your favorite type of margarita?  Favorite type of beer? 

How long was your longest hike?

Weekend Running and a Video Chat

First of all, I'll tell you about my runs the last few days, and then some other random fun things I have to share.

I ran again on Friday evening, but only 3 miles because my legs still felt really weird, like during Wednesday's workout. I don't really know how to describe the way they have been feeling, but they are very tight and just don't feel "right." I am going to try getting back into running in the mornings and hope that will help a little.

Today's run was supposed to be 18 miles, but I cut it a little short.  Actually a lot short. I went to the Elk Grove Forest Preserve and Mac was supposed to meet me there, but he overslept. I debated going back home and then doing the run on streets instead of the trail and to get my iPod, but decided to stay there and get it done. The loop is 7.7 miles and then there is another trail that shoots off and is 2 miles. So I started the loop and then when I was at about 27 minutes, I split off onto the other trail and did the 2 miles out and then back. So then I was at almost an hour (I didn't have my Garmin but I used the trail markers to time a few of my miles and they were all pretty much exactly 8 minute pace.) I continued running the loop, but after a little longer I knew I wasn't going to be able to force myself to do another loop. So at 1 hour and 20 minutes, I stopped and walked the rest of the way back.

I was a little disappointed in myself, but I guess it has just been an off week. My legs did feel better this morning though. I have 4 weeks left before I have to taper, so I figure I can get in an 18-20 mile run each of the next 2 weekends, then a step back week, then another 20 mile run.

But now for something fun, this was the highlight of my weekend:

A Google Hangout with some of my very best friends!! We were all group texting during the day and apparently very few of us had plans on a Saturday night, so why not do a video power hour with each other? My excuse for staying in was legit though since I had to do a long run in the morning, so I also couldn't actually participate in the power hour, but it was still a boatload of fun. It has been determined that this needs to happen once a week.  I really miss this group.  And because they expressed interest in me writing about this/being in pictures, this is one of my favorite picture of some of us:

Another person who really loves this blog and being in pictures My dad. Remember when he wanted lots of pictures of him? This weekend, he shot an 81 at his golf league.  He was hoping for a 78, but I think he was still happy with it.  He would love if I gave you all an analysis of his game and which holes he pared, etc., but I don't remember.  He did give me a few good ideas for future posts though, so I'll get those in soon enough. And to be fair, my mom did a 10 mile bike ride this morning.  Unfortunately, we did not coordinate her bike ride with my run, but maybe we can for another long run.

Do you ever video chat with your friends that live far away?

Why I Love UD

A few weeks ago I posted about one of my two favorite places in the whole wide world.  Well, my other favorite place is the University of Dayton.  All the recent Facebook posts about students moving back to campus or their younger siblings moving to campus makes me wish I could go back (for college again, not just to visit...visits are nice too though).  Today is the first day of classes, so what better day to post about UD?!  I'm really not sure I can convey all of the awesomeness in just this blog post, but I'll do my best to give the highlights.  :)

- Community! - How could I not start with the cliche reason everyone loves UD?  I don't even know how to describe it, but it's there.  One of the things I remember hearing in one of the videos shown at an event about the community is how EVERYONE holds doors opens for people behind them, no matter what or how far behind you that person is.  I realized that was so true around campus.  Everyone is so friendly and kind to each other, in little and big ways.  Even now in real life when someone doesn't hold a door for me, I automatically think "that person definitely did not go to UD."

- Friends! - Some of my very best friends are the ones I made while at UD. We have the best memories ever and will continue to for years to come :) (after we force all our own kids to go to UD so that we have an extra excuse to go back all the time)

- Basketball! - The UD Arena is consistently ranked as one of the best arenas in college basketball with the best fans. Basketball is also a great excuse to go back to campus.  This past winter, my friends and I went back for the game against Xavier.   We will have to figure out a different game to go back for this year though due to all of the conference re-alignment business going on.  Also, the Dayton Flyers fight song is awesome.  And I really like the fact that it's not one of the super big, popular schools that everyone has a t-shirt from.  So if I see someone walking around Chicago (or anywhere) with a UD t-shirt or driving with a UD sticker on their car, I know they almost surely went there (or have kids that do/did).  There is even a bar in Chicago with UD affiliation to go watch the basketball games at with other fans!  (This photo below was taken at Milano's at UD though)

- Tim's! - Most UD students either love Tim's to no end, or hate it and usually refuse to go. It's one of the dirtiest most college-like bars out there I'm sure.  I'm on the love end of the spectrum.  I really like to dance (not well, but everyone there is too drunk to notice anyways) and Tim's facilitates my love for dancing.  There are never good pictures taken at Tim's because nobody is capable of decent pictures by that time, so this is me and one of my favorite people to go to Tim's with, Brigitte - a Tim's VIP.

- Dining Halls! - UD had some pretty great dining halls. I don't have much else to compare them to though except the few times I visited ND (also great dining halls).  The fact that I could eat whatever I wanted and not gain a pound was pretty great too. If I went back to that lifestyle, I would gain at least 50 pounds in a week. Through my sophomore year, VWK was all-you-can eat and despite being in my picky eating stage still, I ate as much grilled cheese and pasta as I could.  Pita pizzas from KU, ice cream from The Galley, and chicken tender wraps from VWK and Marycrest were all my favorites.  I think I ate the exact same thing for lunch every day freshman year at the Empo - a turkey sandwich and a Crunch bar. The dining halls were also a great place to just sit with friends for awhile and chat and people watch.

- Ghetto! - I guess this goes back up to the part about the community.  For anyone who isn't familiar with UD, juniors and seniors (and 5th years) can live in the student neighborhood lovingly referred to as the Ghetto. Some of the houses even have their own names. When the weather is nice, everyone is outside on the porch or in the yard. Sometimes you can bring your couch in the yard...

- Dayton 2 Daytona! - This is the greatest vacation ever created...for college students; nobody else would survive this. It is also the unhealthiest trip ever created. There really isn't any other way to spin this besides a very cheap vacation with all UD students drinking all day long at the pool, beach, and the local hotspots for 6 days. I went 2 years and as much fun as it was, my body would not be able to handle something like that ever again.

The UDXC Team! -Probably the best group of girls ever.  I only competed on the team my senior year, but it made the year so enjoyable and I became friends with the best people!  Actually I was friends with the majority of them before senior year, but then running together every day brought us even closer.  I think it was during my training to try out for the team and then competing with the team that has made me realize my potential as a runner.

There's so much more I could say about UD and stories I could tell, but those are the parts that are most memorable to me.  Obviously, it's the people that make it so memorable, not just the place.  Oh, and I learned a lot and got a couple degrees.  That part is important too!

I'd like to especially wish a happy first day of classes to my brother Kyle and to the siblings of some of my best friends.  It's a family school.  GO FLYERS!!

UD Friends - Why do YOU love UD??

Why do you love YOUR school?

Halfway Through August

Since we are halfway through August, I thought I'd give another little graphical analysis of my training mileage.  See my end of July post for my first Excel analysis.

Here's a graph showing mileage for May through 8/15 this year and in 2010.

I know it's not always good to compare myself to the shape I was in previously, especially 3 whole years ago, but I figure that is at least a good baseline.  I don't know how to show the quality of miles in an Excel graph, but I know it's been better this year than in 2010, so you'll just have to take my word for it.  I've been glad to actually get in some speed training this summer!  Here's a picture from the UDXC camping trip in August of 2010.  We were playing freeze dance :)

As far as August mileage, I'm at about 62 miles for half of the month.  This included more days than planned as off days last week, so I'm hoping the 2nd half of this month and the first half of September will really be much higher mileage with less days off per week!  I think I should be able to get close to 150 for the month which I'd be happy with.

Another way I can tell that I am in much better shape is how I felt after my runs Wednesday and yesterday.  I did 5 miles Wednesday at a more tempo-ish pace and felt surprisingly good and strong during it.  Yesterday morning, I woke up and did 2 miles easy and then some foam rolling before starting my morning.  I did this because I knew I would be a little sore from the faster run and thought it'd be a good way to just get stretched out in the morning, especially because it was a little cooler outside.

Then in the evening, I did 5 miles normal and felt awesome.  I didn't bring a watch with me because I didn't want to worry about my pace, but if I had to guess I would think I was going 7:45-8:00 pace.  When I finished, I felt happy with the fact that I felt like it was a great normal run without worrying about pace, just listening to my music, and running finally didn't feel like a chore that I just had to get done.  It's been feeling like that a lot recently because I just can never seem to really feel good while running, but last night was different.

And here's a picture from earlier this week when my mom and I went out for sushi.  I had just gotten my hair cut and dyed a wee bit blonder.

How is your August going?

Do you ever feel like working out is just a chore instead of fun?

Things I Love: Part 1

I recently made a list called "Things I Love" in a journal.  It was easy to come up with a few things but also kind of hard too.  I tried to think of little things that make me happy.  I decided I'll share them here and I plan to continue adding to my list regularly, so I'll post the things I love in small groups.  I can't overwhelm you with too much love and happiness all at once!  I tried to steer away from putting any food or people on the list because obviously I like a lot of different foods and a lot of people and I wanted it to be more like situations or things I can do that make me happy.

Group dance songs, like the YMCA, the Macarena, the Cha Cha slide - These songs are just plain fun to dance to.  I like them because they force people to dance that wouldn't normally get up and dance themselves to any other random song.

Wearing matching outfits with someone - This is probably the best thing ever. Especially to races. Catherine and I wear matching outfits in the turkey trot every year. Rachel and I wore matching outfits in the Green Bay Half Marathon - slightly different though because hers was Packers and mine was Bears. And this picture is when Sherm and I wore matching outfits for the Tim's Cornhkle tournament.

Making up my own words to songs - I really like doing this.  I have a great version of "Last Friday Night" about staying in and studying for the CPA exam. This is also a really big practice in the Smith family for birthdays and special occasions.

Chocolate milk - I can and do drink insane amounts of chocolate milk. It goes well with anything.

Glitter - I know some people don't like glitter because it can be messy. But really, glitter adds so much to any craft.

The University of Dayton - Such an amazing place. For so many reasons. Number 1 probably being all the super cool people. The cliche reason to love UD is the community, and it's the truth. Per Grace's request, I will do a whole post on UD sometime.

Afternoon naps - Just another reason to miss college.

Watches - I really like wearing them. Running watches or regular watches. My favorite is my gold Fossil watch.

I ran 4.5 miles yesterday, just a normal run.  There really wasn't anything too exciting about it.  I ran south down the lakefront path for a bit and then back north through the city.  I really need to stop running on the city streets because it is really annoying and slows me down a lot. And people are rude and walk 2 or 3 people wide and don't move out of my way.

Last night I tried a Banana Bread Beer.  It was actually pretty good even though I don't like bananas (I realize this is very bizzare for a runner not to like bananas) or banana-flavored things usually.  I would recommend it.  I didn't look at the name of the brewery on the menu, but just Googled and concluded it is Wells Banana Bread Beer.

Do you love any of these things too?

Have you tried any good beers lately?