Summer Camp!

Ben is back from camp! Looks like he had fun!

I Love Where I Live

The End

Like you didn't know this post was coming.

So, it's officially over. My favorite TV show of all time has come to a close. And I of course have some thoughts about how it all went down.

At 11:30 on Sunday night, I was sitting in front of the TV with my chin in my hands thinking "WTF?" Which is a very normal pose and thought for me to have at the conclusion of any episode of LOST. But this was different, because it was the last one. No tuning in next week to find out what all that was about. And so I was left to figure it all out.

Some things immediately stood out. The sideways was amazing. I have loved the sideways storylines all season. I loved seeing the characters interact with one another in a totally different set of circumstances. In the very first episode, Jack and Locke had that discussion at the lost baggage desk and it hit me "In a different world, these two people might have had a completely different relationship." And so they did. And so did everyone else. It was a real treat to watch. Ben and Locke were my favorites.

But in the finale, the sideways took on a whole new life. The scenes where the characters found each other were so well written and so well acted - possibly the best scenes in the history of the show. I loved Sun and Jin looking at Sawyer when they had it figured out and he didn't. I loved that Kate's touchstone was neither Jack nor Sawyer, but Aaron. And I LOVED the scene with Ben and Locke outside the church. LOST has always been about the characters for me, and the finale was ALL about the characters.

As far as the resolution went, it took me about 24-hours, but I was finally OK with it. I'm comfortable that I understand the ending (and clearly, many viewers didn't) and I like it. A Lot. Not what I wanted and not at all what I expected, but a good ending. It really seemed more like a finale to season six, and maybe not to the whole series, but season six stood apart from the others anyway, and so it is what it is.

I was disappointed that so few questions were answered in the end, but I can see how it would be nearly impossible to go back and touch on all the mysteries from where they were in the story at this point. They would have had to resort to monologuing, and that would have sucked. The thing I was most disappointed to not know was the origin of the statue and the Egyptian influence. I remember getting chills - chills on top of chills - in season five when we saw the completed statue for the first time. To still not know how it got there was a real disappointment.

Other things worth noting:

1. As always, the music was phenomenal. I especially liked the light-hearted "ting" at the end (in contrast to the usual "thunk".)
2. Jimmy Kimmel's alternate endings were awesome, although I didn't get the second one until it was explained later.
3. Even in the sideways, Ben gets beaten up. How great is that?
4. Didn't catch it at the time, but at the very beginning of season six, Rose tells Jack "You can let go now." Indeed you can.

And all those Losties out there can let go too. As they said in The Truman Show, wonder what else is on?

Race Day!

Saturday was the big day! The Foot RX 5K! (Foot RX is a running shoe/accessory store in town, and they partner with our Wellness Center to sponsor a road race every year). Back in March, the four of us committed to train together and run the race. We all agreed to set a goal for ourselves and train to meet that goal by race day. Ben and I both decided to run the entire race. Mark was still coming off the DL with a foot injury (the one that sidelined him for Chasing Snakes) and has some soreness in his knee, so his goal was just to finish the race - run as much as he felt good about, and walk the rest. DP never got around to setting a goal because almost immediately, he got invited to a sleepover the night before the race (where activities included seeing Iron Man 2 at the drive-in). He agreed to keep training with us if he could skip the race and go to the party. We agreed.

And then there were three.

Ben really impressed me in our training. We ran on a 1/2 mile track, and we added distance every time we trained - trying to run more and walk less each time. Ben got to where he could run all six laps well before me. For our last training run, we ran the actual race route, which is around the park where our office is. There is a steep hill at the start, then it's level street running for a couple of miles, then we move to a greenway (paved path off-road) which is a very steady incline. It's a hard course, especially for beginners. The night we ran it pre-race, it was 80 degrees. I thought I might die. But I ran the entire route. I was really jacked for the race.

Here we are on race morning:




Aren't the shirts cool?

We didn't want to tote a camera around, so we didn't get any actual race pictures. If any get posted by the sponsors, I'll re-post.

We had awesome weather. Lots of our friends were there. The mood was upbeat. Lots of encouragement on all fronts.

And we did it! Ben ran the whole race and finished in 25 minutes on the nose. He finished in sixth place for his age group and 81st overall (out of a total 316)!! I was so proud of him!

I finished in 27:02 and I ran the entire race - no walking! But I wanted to quit so badly. I think I felt worse during the race than on the 80-degree training run. Maybe I didn't eat enough breakfast or needed more water, but I struggled. I didn't quit though! I was 128th overall, so I finished in the top half. I was pleased.

Mark finished in 31:08, 214th overall. He was worried he would be dead last, but there were 102 people still behind him! I think he was pleased with himself as well - he didn't get injured, and he made a good showing. He ran more than he walked, and ran more than he had in any of our training runs, I think.

I was the one who didn't feel so great afterward - I think my BP must have dropped because right after I stopped running and stood around for a few minutes, I got really light-headed. I got water and oranges, and sat down for while. I finally walked it off on the way to the car and felt fine after.

There is another race coming up in June, and Ben has already committed to running it. I have volunteered to help with it, so I will be behind-the-scenes for that one (I hope I get to be on the course and direct the runners or call out times or something - I think that would be fun.) Not sure about Mark and Daniel at this point.

Ben has really enjoyed himself. He plans to go out for cross country next year. Who knew this would be a new hobby for him? And a new hobby that gets him outside and active. Good times. Very, very good times.

Court of Honor

Last night, Troop 37 held its Spring Court of Honor - Daniel's first as an official Boy Scout.

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Ben was one of five boys recognized for completing a 15-mile backpacking adventure over Spring Break.

Daniel earned his Boy Scout badge.

And Ben earned the merit badge for Emergency Preparedness.

Good times.

What I'm Reading Now

A Suitable Boy, by Vikram Seth.

A little back story. I was in Barnes and Noble a year or so back and was perusing the staff favorites. Someone had put out this behemoth of a book called A Suitable Boy and just went on and on and on about how good it was. The thing that stood out to me the most was its sheer size - it was 1400 pages long. Epically long books can be a life-changing experience, like when I read Les Miserables in high school. You get immersed, you get attached, you miss it when it's gone - you know the drill. I made a mental note to read A Suitable Boy "some time down the road - some time when I have time to read such a tome."

Flash forward to late summer, early fall of last year.

My mom sends me newspaper clippings. Always has. It's just what she does. (In an interesting side note, my college roommate Jennifer and I had a major bonding experience when I learned that her mom was also a little freakish about sending her newspaper clippings, but I digress.) Mom sends me an editorial written by a woman who couldn't finish a book. She loved to read - read all the time in fact - but had discovered lately that she had started a number of books and hadn't been able to finish a one of them. Her fear was that Facebook status updates and tweets and even blogs, while all perfectly fine things to read, had ruined her for reading anything of any length or substance. She feared she was no longer reading fresh produce, if you will, but was only reading junk food.

Her solution? She drug out some huge favorite book from her formative years like Crime and Punishment or Little Dorrit (can't remember exactly what book it was) and forced herself to re-read it. But she didn't have to force herself for long - once she got into it, it was smooth sailing. The avid book-lover in her took over and she never even thought about giving up. She considered herself cured.

I read this little blurb about the same time I had given up reading a Pat Conroy, an Anne Rivers Siddons, and a handful of other authors so forgettable that I've already forgotten them. I had started many a book, and put down many a book, unfinished. Nothing grabbed me. So this harmless little newspaper clipping disturbed me a little.

Maybe it wasn't the books, maybe it was me. Maybe I just couldn't focus long enough to finish a book anymore. Maybe this brave new world of instant information had ruined my attention span. Maybe irreparably.

And while this disturbed me, I didn't really do much about it. I kept reading, finished some books, and put down some books too. But I kept having this nagging feeling that I really needed to read something epic. Something life changing. In short, something long.

And then I remembered A Suitable Boy. I bought it and got to reading. I'm about a third of the way in and liking it. It's set in India, and I have learned that I don't know anything at all about India. I'm enjoying discovering how little I know. And I like the characters. And the writing style.

And I especially like having a really long book, one that I enjoy, one that just sort of sits there, week after week, waiting for me to come by and enjoy it for a few minutes. It may take me a while to read it, but I'm OK with that. I'm reading it. And that's a good thing.

First Day of Spring on the AT

We had a great first day of spring! We got up early and met the scout troop for a hike on the AT across Watauga Dam. We hiked four miles, all around Watauga lake - it was a GORGEOUS day.

Boys who are planning to go on a backpacking trip over spring break had to carry 20 pounds of water in their packs as a training exercise. Ben was up for it; Daniel not so much. We gave Ben 24 bottles of water, which he carried the whole way. (When we got home, I weighed one bottle and I think he carried more like 28 pounds of water!) He was a LIMP noodle when we got done, but he managed two baseball scrimmages and a practice that afternoon, so it obviously didn't kill him!

(Why is he so tired? His pack was practically empty.)

(Ben looks a lot better than he feels at this point.)

It was a great day to be outside!

Chasing Snakes* 2010

Well folks, yesterday was the day. The day I had been training for for the past six weeks. My first ever 10K road race: The 2010 Chasing Snakes* 10K Road Race, sponsored by St. John's Episcopal Church. The race raises money for the Interfaith Hospitality Network, and sports a festive St. Patrick's Day theme.

My goal was to run half and walk half, and I mapped out the course in half-mile segments. I ran a half-mile, then walked a half-mile, ran a half-mile, walked a half-mile, for 6.2 miles. That was the plan anyway.

And I did it! I did all my training on a track, and the race was run on a fairly hilly course. So it hurt a little. And I really thought I would quit a few times. But I didn't. I did everything that I promised myself I would do. And I can't describe to you what that feels like.


Me, Mark, and Showtime before the race. Mark planned to do the 10K too, but he just came off of the DL with a sore foot - he had to be at a conference for work the very next day and didn't want to risk re-injury. He and Michelle (aka Mrs. Showtime) did the 4k Fitness Walk instead. (Mrs. Showtime is not pictured as she is the one with the camera.)


Here I am right after my big finish. 1:10:36. I finished number 281 out of 333. There were 52 people slower than me!! Mark, Ben, and Daniel were at the finish line cheering me on. (Ben and Daniel also served me water a third of way through with the scout troop as a service project.)

Showtime finished in 1:02 and came back to the 6 mile mark to encourage me to run to the end. Which I did. : )
Me and my cheerleading peeps. I think they're proud of me. Ben said he now wants to train for a road race too. Maybe we'll do a 5K and train to run the whole thing. Who knows.

Here's what I do know: It is an amazingly wonderful thing to not be able to do something, work hard, and then do it. And do it with your loving family, good friends, and even total strangers cheering you on. I encourage you to challenge yourself, some way, some how. You'll be glad you did!

*No snakes were injured in the running of this race.

Blue and Gold 2010

Friday night Pack 37 held their Blue and Gold banquet. Daniel was the man of the hour, earning the Arrow of Light, being recognized for earning every single Webelos activity badge, and last but not least, crossing over into Boy Scouts.

Mark and I got to participate in that last part as parents, and Ben as a member of the Troop the scouts are crossing over to. Three grandparents came to see the big event as well. It was a great family event!

We are very proud of both of our Boy Scouts!









Humorous anecdote - in the fifth photo, you see Daniel being welcomed by his new Troop, and a Life Scout from that Troop tying his new neckerchief. In a moment of great irony, the Life Scout was not able to tie the square knot needed for the neckchief tying. This went on several moments before the Troop leader leaned in and said "Jesus, Chris, you're a Boy Scout." Good times.

Here's What You've Been Missing

I apologize for my lack of posting. I've had enough good intentions to pave the road to hell and back again, but nothing has really gelled into a good blog. So in the absence of one good idea, I thought I'd share a collection of smaller ideas that never made the cut. Enjoy.

1. The Olympics. Had a good discussion at work about curling. A friend thinks that any sport where you can drink a few beers and still compete shouldn't be an Olympic sport. Another friend is going to Dick's today to ask where they keep their curling stones. I just enjoy watching the guy who glides across the ice to get the stone going.

2. Speaking of the Olympics.....did you see me? I was in the women's downhill. I was the one who fell right out of the gate and then couldn't get out of the way for the event to continue for the really good skiers. That was so me.

3. New season of Lost. Good times. Such very, very good times. I hope Sawyer becomes the new protector of the island. Can you imagine what his cave of candidate names would look like? "Jumbo-tron." "Tokyo Rose." "Moonbeam."

4. "Keep your hands off my mama. Keep your hands off my Doritos." Funny stuff.

5. Had a George Costanza moment yesterday. Got cut off by not one, but two moms in the car line dropping Daniel off. After asking where the freaking fire was, I found myself yelling "We're living in a SOCIETY!"

6. Back to the Olympics. Hey McDonald's: Olympic athletes don't sit around eating McNuggets. No one's buying that. Not even the ones who think the athletes have time for a righteous snowball fight in the village.

7. Made butternut squash soup this week. Made my own curry powder by combining coriander, cumin, ginger, mustard, and saffron. Wish the finished product had been more butternutty and less curried, but it was good stuff. Didn't take pictures.

8. Just started reading a new book. A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth. It's 1400+ pages. It's the first time I remember choosing a book for the sheer size of it. Hope it's good. A 1400 page book can either be the best, most engrossing thing you've ever read, or it could be a ginormous waste of twenty bucks and shelf space. Cross your fingers.

That just about sums up my creative juices over the last week or so. Sorry I couldn't do more with any of these. Here's hoping the drought will end soon.

What I'm Reading Now

The Blue Zones, by Dan Buettner

Ok, so I'm not reading this RIGHT now, but I did just finish it. It was a quick read, and I didn't take time to blog in the middle.

A Blue Zone is an area of the world where people live to be 100 and up at an uncommon rate. And they are a healthy, active 100. Dan Buettner began studying Blue Zones for National Geographic as part of a study on longevity and has now started a whole community of sorts based on his findings. He has a website, resources, and yes, a book.

The book talks about the original four Blue Zones that were studied as part of the National Geographic project: Sardinia, Italy; Okinawa, Japan; Lorma Linda, California; and a region in Costa Rica whose name is escaping me right now. The purpose of the book is to analyze the lifestyle of the people in these areas and see what lessons can be learned from the way they live.

The biggest ones were obvious: eat a plant-based diet and stay active.

The California Blue Zone is made up of Seventh Day Adventists who don't eat meat because they don't believe it is Biblical. The others aren't strictly vegetarian, necessarily, they just don't eat meat every day as part of their culture. Meat is a "special occasion" kind of thing. And when you don't eat meat, you have to eat lots of other things, all of which usually come from plants. Hmmmm.

As far as staying active, most of the Blue Zoners don't do anything more strenuous than walking. But they walk a lot. They don't really set out to "exercise" exactly, walking is just part of how they do what they need to do - in Sardinia, lots of men are shepherds and they walk upwards of five miles a day just doing their job, for example.

Eat right and exercise. Nothing ground-breaking here. But some of the other lessons gave me more pause for thought.

"Have a purpose." And your purpose doesn't have to be particularly grandiose - you just need something to get you out of bed in the morning - a hobby, a friendship, a responsibility. According to this book, there was a spike in death rates among the elderly after December 31, 1999. After finding no other explanation, it was chalked up to people just promising themselves they would see the new millennium. Once that was done, they lost their purpose.

"Find the right tribe." I love the way this is worded. This just means that you will be like the people you surround yourself with. Pick friends who are active, positive, and healthy, and guess what?? You just might live to be 100.

In the end, the author put together nine life lessons that came out of their longevity study. Some of them are common sense, but as I said, others are quite thought-provoking. And the entire book is interesting. Definitely worth your time.


When I finished The Blue Zones, I immediately started New York, by Edward Rutherford. I have been really stoked about this book.

Rutherford wrote one of my favorite books of all time: London. He also wrote Sarum (which I loved), The Forest (which I liked a whole lot) Russka (which I really wanted to like and tried to read twice), and a series on Ireland (which just didn't do it for me). But since I love New York, I have high hopes that I will love New York.

Rutherford is a British James Michener. He creates family lines that extend for generations upon generations in one place, and he uses these characters and their experiences to tell the story of that place. He does a LOT of research, and his books are LONG. New York begins with the Dutch settlements in the 1600s, and goes all the way to September 11, 2001. I'm only two chapters in, but so far, so good.

I'm looking forward to taking my time and getting immersed in this one.