Category Archives: Travel

Phoenix, Travel

Vacation continues

I promise I will do a better race recap soon—I am just waiting until I get home. 

I’m still in Phoenix visiting my sister Leslie.  It’s been a pleasant few days, just relaxing and doing a bit of sightseeing.  I had hoped to hang out more with some friends, but I suppose it’s a busy time of year for people.  My sister has a few more days off work though, which is the main reason I chose to visit now. 

I think as people get older, whatever personality traits they had when they were younger become more pronounced.  I’m sure that’s true with me as well.  It’s interesting when you only see people every now and again—so often what you remember most about them, well, that seems to be even more pronounced each time you see them.  For bad or for good, really. 

I haven’t been keeping to my diet very well the past few days.  It’s always tough on vacation, between eating out more and not having as much control over one’s food choices.  I know I will need to buckle down when I get home—less carbs, more veggies, more protein.  I’ve been more lethargic the past few days, and I’m sure that’s a big reason, in addition to perhaps a few too many glasses of wine.  I also haven’t really gotten enough workouts in—even though I just ran a half-marathon race, I feel like I’m a bit out of shape! 

The weather has been great though.  It’s a nice reprieve from winter in St. Louis.  When Leslie first moved to Phoenix, I visited more often, and loved the winters.  As we’ve gotten older, I haven’t come out as much, but that aspect is still really nice.  It’ll be much easier to face the cold weather again…

Well, I will conclude this, the world’s most boring blog entry.  I blame all the carbs!

Phoenix, Running

Finished in 2:46:07

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I was too tired to blog yesterday…and I will do a longer, more detailed race recap later, but…we all finished!

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I didn’t go as fast as I’d hoped, but I improved my time, ran considerably more of the race than my previous one, and had a great time!

My sister Leslie finished the marathon(her first!) in 4:15:50.  I don’t know my friend Sarah’s time but it was a little after me (her first half!).  Everybody was proud and happy.

Phoenix, Running, Travel

Phoenix Rocks

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I’m in Phoenix now, on the eve of my second half marathon.  I’m meeting a friend shortly so I will just give you all a brief recap.

My flight yesterday was great.  The funny thing was that some women were talking in the waiting area to board the plane, and it turns out that of about five people in one area, three of us were flying to Phoenix to run the race.  I guess I’m not the only crazy one!  I arrived in the mid-afternoon and my sister Leslie picked me up at the airport.  We went directly to the expo for the race (where you pick up your race number.)

I haven’t run a race with an expo before so this was a new experience to me.  We picked up our numbers, t-shirts, and goody bags, then we walked around.  There were tons of booths for a variety of products related to running—clothes, shoes, drinks, snacks, lotions, even paper jackets to buy for “throwaway” clothing.  We picked up some free samples (though the Lara bar table was being very stingy) and were probably there about an hour. 

Dinner was at Cibo in Phoenix, and then I went to the Phoenix Symphony concert (my sister is a violinist in the symphony).  The concert was in Tempe at the Tempe Center for the Arts, a relatively new place, I am told.  The symphony played all six of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos.  I ran into my friend Karen, (also a violinist in the symphony, but not playing that night) and we sat together.  (Karen is a good friend of mine from when we lived in Cleveland).  It was cool to see Leslie perform along with a few other friends in the symphony! 

Today I spent an hour wandering around “Old Town Scottsdale” while Leslie was in a rehearsal.  I bought a souvenir mug and got a really nice leather bag!  We had lunch at the Orange Table and then relaxed in the afternoon—wanted to rest our legs, especially as Leslie is running the full marathon tomorrow.  Dinner was homemade pasta and salmon…and now it’s time to meet up with my friend Sarah for a short while and then early to bed, early to rise, tomorrow it will be time to run!

I promise I’ll have pictures soon—I just haven’t taken any yet Sad smile

Cruise, Running

Carnival Splendor part the third

So the Splendor has been towed to San Diego.  Here’s a nice collection of video links from a variety of sources.  Naturally the media has turned this into a “why cruising is unsafe” incident, though no one was hurt.  Thank you media for always overreacting to things.

Today I went for another park run.  Ugh.  Rough run!  I’ll blame the near 70 degree temperatures…how can it be so warm and yet these gorgeous fall photos?  And how come some days running is so easy and others I struggle so much?   Is it just the weather?  Maybe I’m tired?

 

 

 

I hope Saturday is cooler than today (it looks to be cooler and no longer rainy!).

Now it’s time for a workout with Mike followed by 8 students at my house and a rehearsal for a program on Sunday.  My 8 students at Good Shepherd are postponed until tomorrow due to Veteran’s Day today.

 

Cruise

Carnival Splendor update

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Here’s a link to cruisecritic’s round up of the days news about the Carnival Splendor (I posted about this yesterday).  For those of you new to my blog, I am a big fan of cruising.  I’ve been on three cruises, two on Carnival and one on Royal Caribbean.  My most recent cruise was over the summer on Carnival Legend.

Seriously, I love cruising.  I love being pampered, I love being on the open sea, I love visiting a bunch of ports in one vacation.  I love everything about it!  Which brings us to today’s THANKS.  I am THANKFUL that I have been so lucky to go on wonderful cruises, and that nothing unfortunate has happened on my cruise vacations!  I know people that swear they would hate cruising, and point to stories like this as reasons why.  However, thousands of people have wonderful, uneventful cruises each year, and I am so very thankful I am one of those people.  I hope to go again soon 🙂  I would love to go on a cruise to Alaska next…

 

Posing with a towel animal from my last cruise!
Cruise

Carnival Splendor

As a cruise aficionado, I was startled today when I heard the news that the Carnival Splendor had had a fire in the engine room and was stranded off the coast of Ensenada, Mexico.  I hope all the people are doing ok–it seems as if no one was hurt but that the power and PLUMBING was out.  Sounds like a potential nightmare!

I hadn’t been to my favorite cruising site (cruisecritic.com) in awhile, but naturally I went there to check things out.  I’m sure there will be more information after the fact from poor folks who were on the ship.  Will it be a small consolation that they get offered a future free cruise?  I don’t know how bad a ship like that could get without power or flushing toilets…pretty bad, I imagine!!