Give Me Whiskey

It’s coming, I can feel it.  The germs are taking over.  I’m losing the battle.  Blah.  I hate getting sick.  I’m feeling drained of energy and can’t seem to get a good night’s sleep.  My throat is sore this morning.  My head is congested.  And my chest hurts, which is odd because I haven’t been coughing or anything.  If I could hit replay on last night, I may have taken a shot or two of whiskey.  Maybe tonight?

Feeling blah and the impending doom of some horrid sickness seems right inline with my week.  Ever since returning from vacation I can’t seem to get back to my routine.  All I want to do is sleep but I can’t.  I’ve been running but they haven’t been all that wonderful of runs.  

I was planning on running this morning until I woke up and couldn’t swallow.  I want coffee but have no creamer.  I may have to stop at Starbucks.  It is National Coffee Day so that should allow me a guilt-free latte, right?  

When I get home from work I plan to do this...

Good food and great views

Our stay in Chicago could be summed up at as eating good food and then taking in the great view.

Good Food - Brent and I caught the bus to Lou Mitchell’s for breakfast on our first morning.  We knew we had a lot of walking ahead of us so we decided to save ourselves 15-20 minutes.  Lou Mitchell’s was recommended by Keith as a hidden Chicago gem.  This must-see was pretty darn cool.  It was a little Mom and Pop diner located at the very start of Route 66.  Yes, THAT Route 66!  Insert history geek squee here.  I enjoyed a bacon and pecan belgian waffle and Brent had pancakes and ham.  Notice the Milk Duds in the photo??  A fun size box is given to every woman that walks in the door.  Why?  Not sure.  Warm donut holes are also handed out while you’re being seated.  Big basket of donut holes?? Don’t mind if I do, thank you!  

Great view - After eating some yummy breakfast food, we made our way through Union Station.  The main area was closed for renovation.  I was kind of bummed about that - I was looking for dramatic shots of me waiting on a big wooden bench.  We got to see where the Amtrak trains come in.  Damn Nebraska crane operator!  Anywho, check out the stairs...see next to the railing - the marble is worn down and warped from the millions of people stomping up and down them for decades upon decades!  Cool.

We followed up our visit to Union Station with an elevator ride to the top of the Sears Willis Tower.  It was so quick that we felt like we needed our ears popped by the time we were half way up.  The view was pretty darn cool!  It was kind of gray and polluted but it was still a good view.  We could see the Chase building, which houses the Chase Bank Auditorium where NPR’s Wait, Wait...Don’t Tell Me is recorded!

For some reason, I don’t have many pictures from the top of the tower.  A few, but not many.  It was kind of busy up at the top.  We did walk out on the glass ledge to look down.  I was a little hesitant at first - inside I’m still the teenager who refused to walk across the Royal Gorge Bridge.  It was a cool view!  We were suckered into buying the tourist photo ... Christmas card material???

                                

After scratching off the Sears Tower from our Bucket Lists, we headed down Franklin St to the Chicago Sun Times building to meet up with Keith.  He gave us a tour of his company’s office, which was really cool.  I don’t have pictures but just trust me, it was really cool.  There were stock traders making lots of cash at their desks, super fancy hardware making it all tick, a massive wall of TVs, and a gym to die for!!  We also wandered through the Merchandise Mart, two city blocks worth of shopping.  Brent drooled over the last plumbing fashions.  After working an update while touring the buildings, we headed off for more good food!

Good food - We walked about a block to Perry’s Deli, another suggestion by Keith.  The food was DELICIOUS!!  The sandwiches were bigger than our heads!  I had a Peter Panski, which included mayo, peanut butter, lettuce, tomato, ham, and bacon!  It was unreal!  And as a random side note - I ate half of mine the next day on the day to Ohio and it was even better the second day!!  I may have to try making one at home!!  I can’t remember what the boys had but they demolished their sandwiches and didn’t have leftovers!

After stuffing ourselves once again, we headed back towards the river.  We said goodbye to Keith and then wandered the Merchandise Mart again so Brent could drool some more over all of the latest and greatest plumbing fashions.  One quick stop at the hotel and we were off to take in more great views!

Great view - Brent and I decided the best way to view a lot of Chicago without exerting a lot of energy would be to take a boat ride.  Before we left on our trip I’d looked into the various boat companies and different tours.  From what I could find, the cheaper sunset tours ended on Labor Day.  We picked the Wendella Combined River and Boat tour, which was exactly that.  The Wendellla dock was a five minute walk from our hotel.  We travelled west down the river and then did a U-turn and went east down the river, through the lock, and out into Lake Michigan.

Along the way our tour guide gave us tons of architectural tidbits about the buildings lining the river.  We got a great view of the skyline and the Navy Pier while we were out on Lake Michigan.  

North To Alaska

It’s as official as it’s going to get - Brent is working in the oilfield again.  I dropped him off at the airport yesterday.  After a half day of traveling, he made into Anchorage in the wee hours of the morning.  He’ll have a few more days of training before he finally makes it to the north slope and starts getting his boots dirty.

It’s always seemed kind of inevitable that Brent would return to the life he had before we met.  All of his other jobs turned into his trying to fitting a square peg in a round hole.  Now it’s back to shoving explosives down a round hole, something Brent would much rather do.

It may be a while before we get in the groove of hitch, home, hitch, home.  We’ll actual have more time together than we ever have before.  He’ll get 12 two-week vacations each year so we should be able to do a lot of the things we’ve wanted to do but couldn’t because our schedules never jived.

Life at home with Brink and Milo will be weird at first.  It’s been a while since it was just the three of us.  I’ve got plans in mind to keep me occupied and productive while Brent is gone.  Friends, family, and pets will certainly help with that!

Work will help with that too - I picked up an overtime shift today so I’m off to work here shortly.  It shortens my weekend but I’ll survive, and laugh all the way to the bank.  Mwa ha ha!

Happy Monday y’all.  

Chicago Run

I really liked Chicago.  It was brighter and cleaner to me than other cities I’ve visited.  I’m sure there are areas for bums, but we only saw a few crazies while we were there.  It was nothing like San Francisco’s beggar problem.  

I liked that in the midst of concrete and steal, there was the water.  While you couldn’t pay me a years salary to jump into it, there was something soothing about having a river nearby.  I never had that big city, “I’m lost and out of my bubble” feeling.  The river and lake made navigation easy!!  

Much to Brent’s dismay, I got up and went running the first morning we were there.  And I’m glad I did - it was the fastest run of the year, even if unintentional.  I held my small camera and headed off at slow trot down the Riverfront trail.  I was aiming for a mile and half.  I jogged and stopped every once in a while to snap a quick picture and then ran some more.  I made it all the way down the trail to the marina and continued south down the Lakefront trail.  

I got a great morning view of the marina and the skyline.  Running was a piece of cake.  I was a little overdressed and a bit toasty but the running part was easy!  At what I thought was my turn around point I checked my GPS tracker to make sure I was close to a ¾ mile and I was at 1.25 miles!  I turned around and headed back to the hotel.  2.55 miles in 27 minutes.  A ten and half minute mile, including  stopping to snap a dozen pictures or so.  I think it’s safe to say I could shave two minutes off the overall time due to pictures and checking my GPS.  That would make my time 25 minutes and a 9.8 minute mile!! NEVER in my life have I ran that fast!

I chalked it up to having a good week of running before traveling and a few days of rest.  I think running at sea level certainly made a difference too!  It had me thinking about tackling the Chicago Marathon or Half Marathon some day.  I may just have to add that to my running life list!!

Chicago or Bust

I’m going to approach the vacation recap a little differently than I have done in the past.  Rather than the day by day, chronological recap, I’m going to hit the highlights...randomly.  Structure of any kind seems to be lead me nowhere in the blog world.  The 365 project seems to have dropped off into the abyss.  I missed one day and the whole rope started to unravel.  

Anywho, I’m glad to be home.  I could have used a few more days of recovery before heading back to work but oh well.  The animals were happy to see us and have been extra social lately.  Milo has been friendlier than usual.  This is entertaining and I’ve been enjoying it while it lasts.

So I figured I would start off with Chicago.  This was the first big stop on the trip.  The road trip to Chicago was largely uneventful... kind of.  We had a problem wheel before getting out of the complex.  Horrible metal grinding noise from the front tire had us looking at each other in panic.  Thinking it may be brakes, we did what any other vacation bound people would do... we carried on.  When we stopped for gas in Cheyenne, we wised up and thought we should have the tire looked at before hitting the long straight away through Nebraska.  

Goodyear tires saved the day!  An asphalt rock was yanked out of the brake and we were on the road still in good spirits after a minimal delay.

Nebraska was boring.  Iowa brought hot air balloons, dinner at a pizza buffet, and free drinks at the hotel bar!  We had a great night at the Radisson in Des Moines.  Sleep number beds are the way to go!

The second day we went through our usual routine while watching the original 9/11 footage by the minute on the History Channel.  It was just as gut wrenching to watch on the ten year anniversary as it was the day it happened.  It was eerie to watch so many police and firefighters streaming into the area and into the buildings while the thousands of civilians evacuated.  After breakfast, we tore ourselves away and hit the road for Chicago!

We stopped at a Harley shop on the way out of Iowa.  It was one of many Harley stops!  We have a very odd fascination with checking out Harley shops.  The Hawkeye shop wasn’t all that impressive.  It lacked character.  

A million cornfields and soybean fields later, we made it to Aurora, Illinois.  My second-cousin Keith lives in Aurora so we stopped by to say Hi and take a break from the road.  He gave us a quick tour of his place and then we headed to a nearby restaurant for dinner.  I got to ride in his new Porsche!  It was fun!!!  It’s a sweet ride!

We ate dinner at a neat restaurant called The Turf Room.  It had old barn wood siding and a rustic themed interior.  Gas lanterns, saddles, tack, and more barn wood graced the interior.  We ate out on the patio, which had two fireplaces!  It was nice to get out of the car and take in the sunshine.  Brent had a 1lb burger and I tried a pesto flatbread.  It was so good!  I may have to try to make flatbread at home it was that good!  Flat, to me, implies no yeast so I may be able to manage that!!

A few hours slipped right by and it was time for us to hit the road once again.  Before leaving we hit up the restrooms, which were horse stalls!  I wish I would have taken pictures but I didn’t want to come across as too freakish.  There were four or five doors to non-gendered bathrooms.  The doors looked like the individual doors to horse stalls with name plaques for each and tack hanging by the door.  It was really neat!!  A restaurant themed like that would be a hit in Ft. Fun.  There was also a room behind the bar for betting on horse races.  You could watch any race in the world and place bets. 

Within an hour of hitting the road we were entering Chicago as the sun was setting.  It was cool to see the buildings reflecting the sunset!  It was uncool because it’s hard to take good photos from the car!!  We managed to find our hotel and only had to go around the block once to be on the right side of the building!!

Chicago Monaco was our hotel for two days.  It’s located right off the Chicago river and smack in the middle of tourist central!  It worked out great for us...even if Brent was super uncomfortable giving up his car keys to the valet.  The room was beautiful and super clean!  The room included a safe and a whole variety of treats and drinks below the TV.  One of my favorite parts of the room were the massive window seats.  I climbed up there like a monkey multiple times to take in the sights.  

Once we got settled in the room, we headed down to the Riverfront to explore.  We ended up walking along the river to the marina by Lake Michigan.  It was really neat to see all of the buildings lit up.  I didn’t take my camera with me (say what?) so I was left with iPhone photos of our jaunt down the Riverfront.  The skyline at night was amazing!!  I understand why Chicagoans think they have they prettiest skyline.  I’ve been to Seattle, Vancouver, and San Francisco this year - Chicago wins hands down for skyline!

The architecture was amazing!  I loved how old and new were mixed in together.  We walked past the riverboat docks, saw men fishing, and watched a few party yachts cruise down the river.  It was a peaceful walk in the dark.  We were out for a couple of hours.  It was nice to stretch our legs after a day and half of driving!!

We hit the hay at a decent hour with only a rough game plan for our only full day in the city!!

We're Home

The long trip is over.  We arrived home this afternoon.  Once the car was unloaded we hopped in mine to go to pick up Milo and Brinkley!!  I was so happy to see them!!  I missed my boys.  

Milo is currently plopped in the middle of the living room like he owns the place.  His tail is contently swishing back and forth.  He seems at peace.  Brinkley is asleep on the carpet near where his kennel normally sits.

The place looks like a tornado went through here.  I’m relieved to have one more day off so I can try to get some things in order before going back to work on Friday.  First thing tomorrow I have an orthodontist appointment.  I’m looking forward to this because my mouth has been hurting for a week or so and I’m really hoping they can bend a wire or sand it down so that it stops ripping my mouth apart.  

I’ll probably get a short easy run in at some point tomorrow.  I did a lot of running while on vacation but the last three days have been driving so I feel sluggish and fat.  I’m terrified to know how much weight I’ve gained in the last week and a half.  Eeeck.

My eye lids are heavy and my bed is calling my name.  This should be a peaceful night’s sleep!  As always, the trip was fun and exhausting but I’m SOOOO very happy to be home again!!

A Whole Lot of Scrappin'

There’s been a whole lot of scrappin’ going on around these parts.  First, the most of the obvious scrappin’ ... scrapbooking!!  I got to spend all day Sunday scrappin’ at Bryn’s house.  We watched New In Town and then watched all of season four of Friends!!

I was still working on my Washinton D.C. photos.  I made way more progress than i expected to.  I managed to get 13 pages done.  I still have a lot of the Washinton D.C. trip to go but I’m much further along now than I was a few days ago!!  Two of my favorite pages...

In addition to creating pages, I’ve also managed to add to my Cricut cartridge options.  I’ve been using the wonder of Ebay to track down cheap cartridges.  I’ve gotten four new ones for the half the price of a new one in the store.  But I’m cutting myself off.  No more Ebay for a while.  2nd mortgage, 2nd mortgage, 2nd mortgage...

Anywho, I also scrapped my Colorado Run 5k plans.  (He he, scrapped...get it?  Oh, I crack myself up somedays).  I decided I’d much rather spend the evening scrappin’ with the girls than driving back home late to wake up early and run in the 5k, which I hadn’t even registered for.  So, I saved myself $40 and ran my own Labor Day 5k when I got home.  It was quite a bit warmer than we are both used to so it wasn’t a super enjoyable run.

In totally other news, because Amtrak scrapped our train trip for this upcoming Saturday, Brent and I have been figuring out our Plan B.  Step One - track down the son of monkey’s uncle who parked his train near the tracks in Nebraska and caused the California Zephyr line to derail.  Bastard!  Step Two - we’re road trippin’ it to Chicago and then Ohio.

Plan B may not be so bad after all.  We’ll get a little bit more time in Chicago and save money on the trip overall.  I scrapped the plane tickets this afternoon.  Frontier has a non-refundable policy so we have Frontier credit for a future flight.  It’s a good thing I don’t plan on squashing the traveling bug any time soon!

I have a few errands to get done before we leave on our trip and, of course, last minute packing to do!  Like always, I won’t be able to blog from the road.  Maybe someday I’ll have a Mac laptop so I can carry iWeb around with me.  I think this vacation may have  a bit slower of a pace so I can actually write as I go and just upload when we return.

As I type this blog, I’m waiting for Brent to get home.  We’re going out to dinner...something that hasn’t happened in forever!!  I’ve been dressed and waiting for a few hours.  I’m sure I’ll wait a few more.  Ho hum.  No better way to kill time than blogging!

Happy Labor Day, all!

The Four Mile Run

The other morning Brinkley and I took off on our run like any other day.  I wasn’t overly thrilled with the idea of running but I told myself we’d do the lake route and call it good enough.  We hadn’t run the lake route since the horrible run back in July so I figured we’d just take it nice and easy.

By the mile mark I knew it was going to be a good run.  A mile went by quickly with random thoughts jumping around in my head and distracting me from the task at hand.  I was thinking about scrapbooking and how I needed to organize my mess as I cleaned it up.  Then I started daydreaming about a scrapbook room of my own.  

At the two mile mark, I convinced myself to run for three miles.  Another mile filled with random thoughts flew right by and I was approaching a fork in the road.  If I chose to take a right, it would take me right up next to the lake.  If I chose to take a left, it would keep me along the main road.  I wavered - settle for getting by and doing the usual or taking advantage of the busy mind and rested legs and shoot for more.  

I decided to shoot for more.  I stayed along the main road and eventually linked up with the bike path.  Brink and I stopped at the water hut by the golf course and got a quick drink.  That was about mile 3 and by then I was convinced I could run the rest of the way home, possibly making it a 4 mile run.

I refused to look at my phone to see how far I’d gone.  I wanted to keep going until I was back to where I started.  Mile 3 to 3.5 was all uphill.  We conquered it!  I was not even breathing hard and my legs didn’t feel even a tiny bit tired.  Brinkley was having a ball.  He must have been feeding off my good vibes.  He had a bounce to his step and his chest puffed out as he trotted along next to me.  

We reached the finish line that I’d set in my head and I glanced at the GPS tracking on my phone - 3.98 miles! I told Brink to keep running and we did.  As soon as the tracker switched to 4.01 miles, we walked.  I walked with no ache, no pain, and no panting.  It was AWESOME!

I have a method to each run.  Same shoes, shorts, shirt.  My phone w/ headphones goes in the left pocket.  The keys and [empty] poop bags go in my right pocket.  Around my waist is the buddy leash with Brinkley on about a 3.5 foot lead.  He keeps pace with me on my right side.

He knows when I say “off the sidewalk,” he needs to get off the sidewalk so we can run around someone or allow another person on the sidewalk more room.  When we see anything that’s doggie delicious (rabbits, squirrels, small dogs, and small children) I say “leave it” and “be good” and 99% of the time, he does just that.

He scans all around while we run.  I can tell when something catches his eye because he’ll try to keep scanning while continuing to jerk his head back to whatever is he wants to keep an eye on...a squirrel, another person on the bike trail, someone on a bench, etc.  He’s got my back!

We make a good team out there conquering each mile.  Hopefully it’s as good for his health as it is for mine.  Now that running is becoming easy again, I don’t plan on stopping any time soon.  I learned that lesson once before!  I’m already looking at running tights to help getting me through the cold winter mornings!

Anywho, enough rambling - the four mile run was awesome!  I’m proud of us!!