5k Slog

I ran my 2nd race on Friday, a 5k in Crystal City. If I had run this 5k first, I would never ever have run the 10 mile race. The 5k seemed harder, for some reason. It was raining the whole time. I stomped in puddles, with my $6 Forever 21 red dress purchased for the Red Dress Run hidden behind my raincoat.

Plus the pace was so much faster and I am not a fast runner. A fat Labrador wearing a red t-shirt passed me at one point.

Here's me looking sad in a pic posted with my results (29:09 minutes, way better than my high school gym class 11 minute miles). In the end, I was glad I tried it and finished. Phew! On to the next.

Here are the girls I was struggling to keep up with:

Linda in fierce mode!

Earth Day 2011

A few weekends ago, I volunteered at my office's river cleanup event at Gravelly Point Park. Everyone picked up a pair of gloves and a grabber-picker-upper-thingy (as seen on TV). I looked around and all I saw was pristine park land. "Do we even need to be here? Is this all for show?" I thought as I picked up individual cigarette butts off the ground to look busy.

Then we got closer to the river - plastic and glass bottles dotted the shore line, along with all sorts of debris. A small patch of woods nearby looked like this:

Disheartening, to say the least. Why do people walk away and leave their trash without a second thought? Maybe they think, "Oh, those helpful corporate volunteers will clean this bottle up next year. No worries."

The woods near Hains Point must be a party spot. I felt like an archaeologist. I would clean up a pile of Heineken bottles, below that there would be remnants of the Corona era. Then a layer of leaves, and I'd discover the Coors Light eon. Artifacts from parties past.

Joe's Apartment: Denouement

Breaking news! Joe got a couch!

That sentence implies he took an active role in the acquiring of said couch. To be more specific, a generous benefactor gifted a nice little loveseat to the basement apartment. My pro-couch campaign did not factor into this victory at all.

This is a huge step forward. Looks great, huh? I'm worried about what we will have to talk about now though. My complaining about the lack of a couch was always a good fallback for conversational lulls.

Me (while sitting on the couch): "What am I going to bitch about now?"

Camera Question

I don't know how to top the last post. Can't be done. Unless I bowl at the Parthenon or something.

So I'll pose a question: I'm toying with the idea of getting a digital SLR camera but I never even bother to bring my little point-and-shoot with me anywhere, just the iPhone. I'm wondering whether it is worth paying the money for a nice camera if the thing is too big to tote around.

What do you all think? Any camera recommendations for a beginner are also appreciated! Thanks!

10 Miler = Finished!

Turns out the Cherry Blossom 10 Mile race on Sunday was nowhere near as scary as I imagined. The first three miles were the toughest for me, but then the rest was fine. It was a beautiful day, and when I got to the finish line I was glad to be done but I felt like I could have run farther.That's a crazy statement for me, since I am not a runner at all, and I never even imagined I would ever be able to run 10 miles. But earlier in the fall, I talked to my friend Linda about running and she said if you can run 5 miles, you can run 10 miles.

I once ran 5 miles on the treadmill during a particularly engrossing episode of "Real Housewives," so I thought perhaps 10 miles was possible. And it was! So this is for everyone who said I could finish the race, and for the few who said I couldn't - mainly my dad, whose exact words were "You'll never do that."OK, so my family was skeptical, as their main memories are me parked on the couch eating fruit snacks. But I'm telling you, if I can run the Cherry Blossom 10-Miler, anyone who puts their mind to it can run it too!