19 Down

We should start from the very beginning, it's a very good place to start. We had 6 different Christmas celebrations with this huge family thing. Tuesday saw me running the girls to charlotte to drop them off with her dad (1) then I met them the next day in Biscoe NC (2) which is sort of in the dead center of the state. That was all of Wifey's dad's side of the family. Charlotte's about a 2 hour drive for us, and Biscoe is about 3.5 hours. so that's 11 hours in the car so far, round trip. We got back home with kids at about 1 am christmas eve, and quickly got them in the bed. Santa came overnight (3) and Bigun got her first bike. Evil Genius got a dollhouse. The bike is the same brand (Javis) as my racing bike, and was on sale at the bike store christmas eve while Wifey was out of town. Wifey and Bigun were both surprised that Santa brought a bike!

And just as the kids were starting to really play with the new toys, we had to pack them up to have breakfast with my folks (4). Luckily, they are here in Greenville. My folks always go overboard on Christmas stuff for the girls. You can't blame my mom, though. After having 3 sons, now she has 2 grand-daughters to get girly stuff for. Christmas night found us at Wifey's mom's place (5) about 1.5 hours from Greenville in a really really small town in the middle of SC. We had to come back here on friday. so that totalled the car time up to 14 hours. Saturday was the final Christmas with all of my mom's side of the family (6) at my parent's house. My dad is an only child, so mom get's the whole family together with all of her sisters (and brother) and all of their kids. it was a big old time. the kids were worn out by the time it was all over. we all slept really well. I haven't pulled the pics off of the camera yet, but i'll post some later this week.

Wifey finally got to clean up some yesterday, so when Bigun woke up this morning, she came in crying that all of her new toys were gone. Why would santa take them back, daddy? just breaks your heart. And proves that we should never clean the house again.

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Long Run

So sunday (yesterday) Wifey's mom & stepdad & our neice came up to keep the kids while we ran for the first time since tuesday.

19 miles

on the treadmill

yep, i thought i was going to die too.

the gym is only open from 12 - 6 on sundays (stupid blue laws) so we were there from 12 - 5 getting the run and accompanying travel/shower/recovery time. it was raining pretty good, and pretty cold too. so I didn't want to try running that far outside in those conditions. And it was the final week of the NFL that I didn't want to miss. At my gym, they have big TV's for all the cardio people to share, and small tv's on the individual machines. The small tv's don't get fox or espn2, that sucks. But the big TV had the Panther's game on Fox. I was 18.4 miles in when Casey kicked that game winning field goal with :01 left. That was so exciting I didn't even realize I was 18.4 miles into the run. And I got to watch the entire Patriots/Bills game on CBS. it wasn't nearly as exciting, but did keep me going through the entire run.

With Wifey's mom watching the kids, we both went in there together. She got started about 10 mins before I did. I don't think she had quite enough hydration, so she still had 1/2 mile left when I finished. Here's my splits:

Miles * Calories * Time
5 * 780 * 52:15
5 * 760 * 54:43
5 * 764 * 54:20
4 * 600 * 46:36

Totals
19 * 2904 * 207:26 ** 3:27:26

Now an actual 10 minute pace would have been 190 minutes instead of 207, but I think that pace will still break 5 hours over the marathon. I felt strong the whole way, no knee pain, no leg pain, and I stayed hydrated. I drank 5 20 oz bottles of liquid (2 gatorade, 3 water), 1 gel, some PowerShots, 2 granola bars. it added up to about 700 calories, which is where I wanted to be. that's 200 calories per hour. I still didn't have to pee when I was done, so maybe I could have used another bottle of water. But it's amazing how much better you feel during a long run when you actually follow a hydration and nutrition plan.

We've only got 2 more long runs before the marathon, 20 and 22 miles. I mean long like over 15 miles. Next saturday Jan 3 is the Traveler's Rest Half Marathon race, and that counts as our "long run" next weekend. I still can't believe that 2009 is here.

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ONE YEAR

It was December 28, 2007 when I stopped smoking. So yesterday was one year exactly since I put down the cigs. I couldn't have kept it up without my training replacement addiction. Running keeps the demons at bay, and I really thought I was going to start again last week. The holiday's make it tough to get all the work done, get some training in, keep the family happy, and over the entire year I have yet to WANT to start smoking again like I did last week. Boy, that was tough. But crossing the one year line is a really big deal for me. I've only made it past the one year mark once before. I really got into heavy weightlifting and we were trying to have a baby.

So that is really cool! Beating down an addiction is certainly one of the most difficult things I've ever tried to do.

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New Video

Michael put a new video up on YouTube. I saw it sunday and he's now off of the babysitting list. Basically, they take one of Bigun's baby dolls and work it over mafia style. Here's a link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHLTLZmA3rs

You can search YouTube for "Baby Doll Gets WORKED" if the link doesn't work. My abs were sore from laughing so hard. You have been warned.

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Boy, I think that's it for now. Hope all of you had as good of a holiday as we did. I'll put some pics up soon of the christmas stuff. Today I'm sitting a lot. My legs are really sore. I can't walk downstairs normally, I'm having to turn around and walk down backwards. crazy. so sore! and i've got a ton of work to catch up on. Have fun this week, it's about time to start losing those holiday pounds.....