Breakfast with the Devil...

Monday in Austin, we woke up, got a quick run in and decided to head out for breakfast. We headed to a restaraunt and decided to sit on the patio because the line for inside was too long. The patio was enclosed and heated, so even though it was about 50 degrees it was still comfortable.

When we sat down I notice there was a bird that was trapped inside the plastic enclosure and was kind of just chillin watching everybody eat. So the waitress brings our food out and Kristen, Verdo, Ben and I start eating. I ordered these fluffy scrambled eggs, with crispy delicious bacon, tasty potatos and nice buttery pancakes. mmmmmmm, I'm saying as the aroma overwhelms my nostrils. As I'm eating I notice that there is a small hair in my potatos. Yowzers!! I exclaimed. Hmmm??? It was a small hair and I didnt want to be a pain, so I just brushed it aside and was going to eat around that portion of the potatos. So as I'm leaning over and taking a bite of my food that stupid bird flies over and picks a piece of egg off of my plate and flies away. Ok, so that is just disgusting. I'm really not into flying rats eating off the same plate that I am. After that, I had pretty much just lost my appetite completely. When the waitress came over, I had told her about the hair and the bird coming over and taking the food off my plate and just said that I couldn't eat that. I really didn't say it rudely, because honestly it was the bird that I wanted revenge on. Seriously. Below is me pouting. (p.s. this photo was staged) (but the hat is real deal).


The waitress took the plate and shortly after a manager came over and was nice and asked about the bird. I didn't want to ruin the breakfast of others around me so I didn't bring back up the fact that the potatos had a hair in them. So he, in his kindest voice, said "we will take that off for you." That was fine, I had maybe 2 bites of the whole meal and at that point didn't want anything else. Well, when the bill came, I was charged for everything except for the eggs. He ONLY removed the eggs from my tab. Are you kidding me? It was all on the same plate AND there was a hair in my potatos. Isn't it just common business sense that you remove the entire meal? I couldn't believe it.
But as far as that bird...His time is coming.

Austin bound day 3

So I wanted to wrap up a couple things from down in Austin.

The marathon morning was awesome and definitely had that buzz in the air that you just gotta love. Especially when you're are not about to put yourself through 26 miles of torture. But the weather was awesome and 12,000 people (half and full marathon) were out on the streets at 7 a.m. to go do their thing. My thing was to jump in with everyone for a part of their races.

I got a chance to run with Verdo, Michael, Lance, Ken and Ben during the race and had a great time. It was cool to be on the other side of things running with these guys that were out there to run fast. It's impressive to see them endure and push through the same pain that you feel during your marathons no matter how fast ya'll are running. And not just as they pass by, because I ran a lot of miles with these guys in latter parts of the race where the pain is the worst. It was cool guys and I'm glad I was there. Props to everyone on a very tough course. Big Ben brings home a 7 minute marathon PR. Nice work.

We all rested up and Kristen hosted an awesome cookout with all the town's folk. There were probably a good 25 - 30 homosapiens and a good 6 - 7 K9s. It was cool as we celebrated with beer, cornhole, food and cigars. After the cookout we headed to a couple local bars, drank our carbomb, and had a good time talking about our rodeo and barrel racing ventures. One of us, unnamed, also owns a limosine company.

Cowboys & superheros - Austin bound days 1&2

Went down to Austin this past weekend to support and pace some buddies while they ran the Austin marathon and half marathon. We left for Austin on Friday morning.

Friday was fairly relaxed. Verdo, Ben and I were staying with one of Ben's friends, Kristin. Her house was right downtown Austin and she was a great host. We checked in, got a quick run and then grabbed some food and hit up the marathon expo so everyone could pick up their bib numbers and some SWAG. Part of this SWAG were free cases of Zico coconut water which quickly became the drink and addiction of the weekend. Aside from the malt beverages of course. We then went to dinner on the south side of Austin (which is not much like the south side of Chicago) had a couple margaritas, beers, etc...


Saturday morning, Verdo, Lance, Helen and Caroline all went out with me to Texas State to run the big race of the weekend, the Valentine's Day Run for your Heart. Batman was victorious with a 16:10 for a 2.97 course. I did want to actually run this pretty seriously and did have a good time at the race. That went away quickly as the course was a little ridiculous with at least 20 flights, yes flights, of stairs. It was an out and back course completely downhill and 10 flights of stairs to only turn around at the bottom and go back up. I did win by 1 minute and 20 seconds and considering the conditions and effort, I'm fairly satisfied with my time for 2.97 miles (gmapped). First - Second - Third



Whoops...


We just chilled out the rest of the day drinking coconut water and wine. Carbo loaded with pasta to get ready for the big day. Good start to the weekend and trip. more to come.

Austin bound

Austin...Austin, Massachusetts? - Name that movie.

Going down to Austin for the weekend to support some friends for the thon and 1/2 thon. There is also a super competitive 5k that I will be partaking in down in San Marcos. My race is on Saturday morning and is supporting the women's soccer team at Texas State. I've always been a huge supporter of their program and I know that my $12.50 will make a difference. So in honor of the women bobcats I am going to sport my Batman costume during the race. Worst case scenario, T-Bud said it best. I wear this ridiculous costume yet still take the race seriously (this is possible) and lose to some 16 year old in training shoes. I agree, that would be pretty embarrassing. Luckily, my costume comes with a mask and my identity will be protected.

Sunday: I will have some pacing duties throughout and fully expect that I will be covering the 26.2 distance myself. The marathon and half both start at the same time and I will probably just jump in illegally a quarter or half mile into it. I'm going to take Verdo to the crest of one of the larger hills around 3.5 to 4 miles. He will be very aggressively facing off with the half and a long awaited PR in the distance. The plan after that is to just continue dropping back and running with each person that comes up next. This will be a great training run for me but hopefully it is also beneficial to some of these guys and I can take their mind off the race for a short while. Good luck guys...Kick some A.

Also, to make sure that us northerners fit in with all these Texan cow herders we went out and bought the finest and most authentic western wear we could find. By that, I mean we went to Alcala's. Hats, shirts, shoes and most importantly a good belt buckle. Yes, I fully expect that we will not be welcomed with open arms. But don't forget, we're from Chicago...so we don't care. Just kidding. Just kidding. But we are in the works to go shootin' cattle on Monday and that would just be embarrassing without a good hat and buckle. You don't need a permit for that right? Finally, you can't go traveling around Texas wearing the same gear all weekend, so, yes we did buy traveling apparel and multiple buckles.

I'm lovin it

Went to the Bulls game tonight with Michelle, Michael, Carolyn and two of Mike's other friends Mike & Andrea. Ben & Ken were also there but were not in the cool section 304. They surrounded us in sections 306 and 303. I can tell you one thing though, 300s is where it's at. It was a good night out, had a couple beers and the bulls pulled a 17 to 4 run to come back with 2.5 minutes remaining for the "W." Now turn that "W" upside down and the audience is rewarded with...


Since the Bulls scored 100+ points and won everyone gets a free Big Mac. Now if you happen to go with 5 runners, 3 of which are vegetarians, you get.....no, I only got 3 Big Macs. You tell me what those vegetarians are doing with those Big Macs. Also, these must be redeemed within 48 hours so I'm not even sure I will redeem my 3. Has anyone seen Super Size Me? Finally, I'm sort of convinced that this was destiny anyway since I had actually eaten a Big Mac value meal as I was walking to the game.

Half-time show was a tribute to Johnny "RED" Kerr, player, coach and commentator. There were several people there to give him props and say something about Kerr's spirit and passion for the sport. Among them were Scottie Pippen & Michael Jordan. Granted we were 300 feet away it was still pretty cool to see them "live" "in person" or whatever you want to call it. We were supposed to hangout with them at Gibson's upstairs after the game, but we were tired and I needed to get home and blog before Michael snaps at me again. Ironically, I am headed to Whitney Young HS tomorrow for a St. Baldrick's rally where one of Jordan's sons attends. Now, how can I turn that into a large fries and sweet tea?

Global warming what?

*71 miles - 8 runs.
Wednesday workout: 5x1000 - 1.5 min rest(3:12, 3:11, 3:08, 3:08, 3:03) then 4x100. Coach Savage was great to let Claudia, Robert, Verdo and I use the DePaul University indoor track. The entire facility is amazing. The track was good/ok. 200 meters with banked turns in the outside lanes. This would normally not be a problem since we would be running in lane one but at DePaul, slow runners get the inside and faster runners are supposed to use the outside lanes. Luckily everything was marked so I could still get splits and run a great workout but the banked turns gave me a little soreness. Can't complain too much though. Thanks Coach Savage.

Saturday: 19 miles in 60 degree weather with 6 miles of 6:25 ish tempo. This had been the first long run that I have not felt drained for for about a month now. A bunch of us again went out to Barrington and ran the hills and dodged the angry suburban SUV moms. We did not see Sue Cass but had our share of other road ragers.

If I can work things out right, I may be premiering 2009 with a Valentine's Day 5k down in Austin.

*As most midwesterners are experiencing right now we are having a wonderful week of 50 - 60 degree temperatures. Its a nice break but I fully expect another nasty 2.5 months. I've been thinking too much about summer already. I need to stop that.

Be Hungry...

*This past week has been very interesting and much different than my typical week. I backed off on the running, celebrated ole #27 and had a very intense interview situation.

*Running: I had a couple of questionable runs and lost a bit of weight drastically for some reason so I decided to back off this entire week. I continued my workouts and long run as usual but just notched down the "base" runs a few miles and hoped that I would get some of that bounce back. I've been hitting mid-70s and took it down to 51 this week. I'll admit that I felt much fresher for my workouts but my long run yesterday still felt like trash. No real goals still for at least another month or so, so just cruising along for now. I think that I may need to break out the compression socks again. Not the $30-$70 oxy socks but the $14 I bought these at Walgreens because I'm 85 years old compression socks. They make me feel like a kid again.

*When I turned 26, someone told me that their 26th year was their most challenging. So far, I concur.

*Interview: Last week a position with the new PNC was posted on our job board. It was still in Chicago and is the Director of Client and Community Relations. This also includes Marketing, Charitable, Media and will serve as the Chief of Staff to our State President. The position was posted with a VERY short timeline and I had decided to through my name in the bucket with no expectations. I thought maybe my name would show up and they would send me one of those emails "You obviously are an amazing person and have exceptional qualifications BUT....." At least I would have known I didn't miss an opportunity.

On Monday, an interview was set up with the State President and our HR executive here in Chicago. I found out that the Cleveland position was accepted by a very high level executive and I also knew some of the other candidates that had applied for the Chicago position. Of these people they all had a good 10-15 years experience on me. Good times...huh? So, obviously I was pretty nervous about the situation and how the conversations were going to go. Through several conversations with the good people in Cleveland, Milwaukee and Lexington, I convinced myself that it was a great opportunity to sit down with our State President and talk about what I bring to the organization, get some face time and show that I'm a team player, I want to advance and I want to learn this bank. My uncle sent me a very short email but it said something that I think was very important. "Be Hungry." And, you know what. I am hungry. Hungry for a lot of things. And growing in this company and becoming a leader, a go-getter and an expert is something that I am very hungry for.

This story is just dying for me to tell you that I got this position.That is not the case, but that is fine. I did have two great conversations with these executives and who knows where that will go. But at least now they know that I am hungry.