Rock 'n' Roll!

My mom called this morning, and the first thing she asked was, "What were you doing a week ago right now?" Readers, she knew the answer. And although she didn't specifically mention that I hadn't blogged about it, I figure I should probably try to catch up here. Also, I put it on my To Do List, which means that when I publish this, I can check off a box less challenging than "Register for Milwaukee" or "Call Dell."

So one week ago right now, I was running the Phoenix Rock 'n' Roll Marathon. My parents and I drove out through the middle of the desert on Saturday afternoon, arriving in time to experience a gloriously soft, purple sunset; to briefly explore the exquisitely surreal Scottsdale "Old Town"; and then to celebrate my cousin's birthday in high-carb fashion. I slept for a few hours before popping to the airport to retrieve David, who had surprised me Thursday by saying he had a ticket to come out and cheer! He hadn't wanted to disturb my pre-race sleep, but I assured him that this way, if the race went poorly, I had a built-in excuse (and that I'd learned whilst training for my first marathon that as long as you sleep well Friday, Saturday night doesn't actually matter that much).

As it turned out, I didn't need the excuse, because Sunday was more or less perfect. You may not have picked this up from my last post, but I was genuinely worried about how this race might go, mostly because I hadn't really trained. Yet, somewhat miraculously--and thanks in large part to my spectacular support team!--I had my most enjoyable race yet. Early on, I fell in with an Italian and a German, both from Chicago, who were aiming for a 4:30 finish. I told them I didn't know how long I'd be able to keep up with them, but that I'd stick it out as long as I could. As it turned out, I was able to run with them for quite a while, though we lost Roland when he made a pit stop and then I lost Joanna when I stopped for one. I caught up with Roland, though, with whom I ran until, his knee giving him trouble at about mile 19, he (very politely) cut me loose and told me to run ahead. I was quickly able to catch up with a Utahan couple who'd been running at about our pace, and yakked with them through the last few miles.

And this is slightly unbelievable, even to me, but I had a really fantastic time. I remember saying to Roland, at about mile 18, "I feel so good! So good!" That's just not right... especially if you're under-trained. The heat was making him sweat (apparently it was about 75° by the time I finished), but there was a nice breeze (which my dad described later as a vicious headwind) and it felt perfect to me. The course was flat, beautiful, and filled with enjoyable people (around that pace, there seems to be a lot of camaraderie; the runners are generally adequately trained, so comfortable but not competitive). Even better was what I called My People: once my uncle and crew, and at least eight other times along the route, my parents and David (waving signs!). That was a marvelous experience.

When I crossed the finish line, two separate volunteers remarked to me that I looked too good to have just run 26.2 miles. When my neighbor asked me Monday night, driving me home from the train station, how I felt, she laughed at me when I responded that my right calf was a little tight. Actually, I did have some fairly impressive blisters, and will probably lose a couple of toenails, but I do--still!--feel amazingly good.

On the light rail back from the airport, standing by the suitcases I'd wrestled onto the train and staring bleakly at the mountains of snow visible out the window, I thought, "Ugh, snow. Why do I live in Minneapolis?" And then, weirdly, I felt it change, in my head, to "Awwww, snow. I live in Minneapolis." It suddenly felt so good, being there, and thinking that, that I got all misty.

So. I don't know if it was the holidays, or the travel, or the family and friends, or the Integratron, or the marathon, or what. Perhaps the latter released a veritable tide of endorphins that are still crashing through my system. The sound bath might have left me persistently aligned. I don't know, but I feel good--way too good for a Minnesotan January. But I'll take it.

Pictures my mom took (plus a few from my camera phone) are here:


David's album is here:

Weekend

Pretty much every weekend since I've been on the west coast has been an amazing one, but this past weekend was especially epic. It started Friday night with a celebratory birthday dinner with friends and a round of a new board game that had me weeping with laughter. Saturday Jon and Lauren arrived from Santa Rosa, and we spent a glorious day out at Joshua Tree, scrambling on the rocks, taking lots of pictures, and trying to feel the spirit of U2. Sunday Mandy and Erin drove out from Loma Linda and we enjoyed a Sound Bath at the Integratron (activating various chakras and balancing our brains!), a pilgrimage to Giant Rock (former home of the Giant Rock Interplanetary Airport), lunch at the Park Rock Cafe, and a windy sunset at Keys View in Joshua Tree.

Here are a few of the many pictures that were taken; as always, you can click to watch the slideshow and double-click to go to the galleries (where you can see larger versions, read the captions, and make comments).

Joshua Tree pictures:


Integratron/Giant Rock/Joshua Tree pictures:


Next weekend, of course, will be the marathon, which is always exciting. I am nervous, as always, though perhaps especially so this time around. I very much have the sensation of living in a marathoner's body, but the last time I ran any distance greater than 10 miles was at the Twin Cities Marathon in October! Granted, I've run many miles since then, in shorter increments, and I've toughed out runs in single-digit temperatures and, since I've been out here, ones up substantial hills and at elevated altitudes. Phoenix will also mark the first time I've run a marathon in a city where neither I nor an immediate family member lives, which increases the drama slightly. It will be an adventure!

Failing

So remember how in Be Kind, Rewind Jack Black's character gets magnetized and thus wreaks the havoc that propels the film? Well, recently I've been wondering if I may have stumbled into some sort of unfortunate field that is currently causing the failure of my personal electronics.

The first to go was my cell phone. For months its battery life had been steadily diminishing, until a brief phone call or two and a few text messages were all it could handle before beginning to beep at me. Last week, however, the screen began to go out. I could receive calls and text messages, but until the screen decided to reappear (which could occasionally be prompted by plugging it in, unplugging it, turning it off and on, removing the battery, or having someone nearby call me) I could neither place outgoing calls nor read my text messages.

I loved my Red Razr (I knew it was cool, because my junior high students who had to use it to call their parents last summer told me so, or breathed its name in a sort of awe), but Sprint doesn't seem to offer it anymore. Yesterday I bought the only other shiny red phone they were offering, the Samsung Rant. It's slightly bulkier and heavier than the Razr, but it does have a nifty slide-out keyboard, and should have a longer battery life than the Razr did even at its peak. Hopefully I'll even be able to figure out soon how to stop it from defaulting to speakerphone on incoming calls.

Next up was my camera. I've mentioned before that the flash stopped working a few weeks ago, but on the trip back from Santa Rosa it started doing a new thing where the display--and resulting photos--are smeary blue and purple blurs. Thankfully, I've discovered that a smart tap on the side returns it to normal; I hope that this solution holds.

Finally, the ailments of my beloved Lappy have been well chronicled here, from its asthmatic wheezing and fuscia-tinged screen to its mouse drift. Even in its top running condition, the letters are still worn off the keys, a sizeable patch of the touchpad coating has worn off, the screen is scratched, and the plastic around the power button likes to snap out of place and gape alarmingly. ("Hasn't your computer been in hospice for the past year and a half?" my sister asked.)

Yesterday, however, I thought I had lost it for good. The screen flashed off and on as I was booting up, and I eventually encountered the Blue Screen of Death (I gave my camera a whack and took a picture). I was able to get back in after starting in safe mode, but only managed about ten minutes of work before the screen went black in the middle of attempting to Google, for my dad, the new version of NEWSTART.* Thereafter, I couldn't get back in at all...

...until this morning! This morning my computer let me boot up in safe mode, and I transferred a few files to my flash drive. I wanted to burn a back-up CD, but my disc drive didn't seem to be working. I thought I'd try restarting in "safe mode with networking," but it wouldn't turn on again. It remained locked up this afternoon, but later this evening I was able to get back in in safe mode. I am, in fact, typing on said Lappy, having transferred the last of the files I wanted to be sure to save, and having downloaded Nvidia drivers in the hopes of installing them and eking a few more useful hours or days from this very old, very tired machine.

I don't think there's a moral to this story. I'm thinking about buying another Dell laptop; thoughts or suggestions?

*This is one of those things that's basically impossible to Google; can any of you Alert Readers answer this question? If you have no idea what I'm talking about, just ignore this.

Holiday Wrap-up

So after nine hours in the car yesterday, which followed another 14 or so on Tuesday, I am back in the desert. My parents and I had headed north on Christmas Eve, arriving at my sister and brother-in-law's house Christmas afternoon, having survived a scary spin off the road just south of Roseburg, Oregon and having been semi-miraculously still able to drive the damaged vehicle the rest of the way north to Port Orchard, Washington--despite snow for much of the way, including a nasty storm around Portland. Due to weather and The Spin, we arrived approximately seven hours after our most optimistic estimate, but still had a festive evening, opening some of the Christmas presents even though we'd planned to do the tree after New Year's, and not all of us had finished our shopping (ahem).

We spent a few days there before heading over the mountains to Walla Walla, where I had a fantastic time eating delicious food, jogging with the aunts, being silly with my eight-year old cousin, and visiting friends (Ted and Heather hadn't managed to talk Veronica out yet, but I did get to see, among others, the blogging types boy-Lorin, Kuyler, Burtmiah, and David).

We returned to the we(s)t side in time for New Year's Eve, which I celebrated in Seattle with a variety of friends and relatives, first at The Rockstar's* CD-release party in Pike Place and then at a smattering of festive locations around the city.

On New Year's day we did Zoo Lights at Point Defiance, and Friday my mom, sister, and I met another aunt in Tacoma for lunch. On Saturday Joel ferried over from Seattle and we did a big dinner and the second round of the Christmas tree.

Sunday, Abraham were playing another show at a little cafe in the U District, so we headed over the waters again, where I thoroughly enjoyed not only an awesome show, but meeting up with both a high school friend I hadn't seen in a decade (adorable as always, and especially so at eight months pregnant), and with David, who'd made the trip up from Portland after hearing the band New Year's Eve. A few flakes had started to fall during the show, but by the time we'd finished a big dinner afterward, it was snowing in earnest, making the drive home adventuresome and stranding David on the west side of the mountains. By Tuesday it was gone, so he, my sister and I tripped to Tacoma to meet up with another friend at the Antique Sandwich Company before he had to head back to the east side; my mom was also able to fly back to Palm Springs that morning.

Wednesday, my dad and I drove as far as Santa Rosa, getting lost briefly in wine country, before staying with the inimitable Jonathan and Lauren, about whom I have blogged before and whom I see far too infrequently and miss terribly--although it looks like, through the most serendipitous of circumstances, they will be coming out to the desert this weekend!

I posted a random and lopsided but large selection of photos from the past two weeks here. My flash is broken, so lots of the indoor shots are a bit blurry. And somehow I ended up with about a ton and a half of pictures of cats and car-window landscapes--and none of plenty of important people, places, and events. Still, they give you an idea of the holiday adventures.

And now, I am back at my parents', where, as I was typing this, I just felt an earthquake** that shook the kitchen table from side to side and made things on the wall rattle. I also just realized that I am sunburned from this morning's (74 degree) run. Viva la California!

*If you're on Facebook, I recommend that you become a fan!
**Speaking of Facebook, I love that people's statuses were updated almost immediately to reflect the tremor.

More Reviewing

First, yesterday's promised meme: first sentences from the first posts of each month of the year.

January: So someone in the blogosphere posted a list of Books Read in 2007, and I wish I could find it, because that list was far more impressive than mine will be, even though it inspired me to post my own.

February: I shot this video Sunday, the first of our two-day thaw, on which we hit 37 degrees.

March: Well, Internets, my stomach, love handles, and shoulders are covered in a smattering of tiny red bumps.

April: Friday: While working at the coffee shop, saw this guy cutting the sidewalk and later saw Critical Mass, accompanied by lots of cops on bikes and a few in cruisers--in solidarity, I think.

May: So as promised, I attended my 10-year reunion last weekend.

June: I write from the Seattle Central Library, where rain is running down the fancy diamond-paned high-tech glass above and around me here on the 10th floor.

July: Breakfast: Oatmeal with raisins and soy milk [remember those three weeks where I posted everything I ate? FASCINATING.]

August: Some of you are dying to know what my exam questions are.

September: Hello again, Internets.

October: Here's my new hair (and a few of my books):

November: Today is Day One of NaBloPoMo!

December: I somehow didn't realize until after I posted yesterday that it was my last post of NaBloPoMo!

Next, Books of 2008:
1. Umberto Eco, The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana
2. Nick Hornby, How to Be Good
3. C.S. Lewis, The Magician's Nephew
4. C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
5. C.S. Lewis, The Horse and His Boy
6. C.S. Lewis, Prince Caspian
7. C.S. Lewis, The Voyage of the "Dawn Treader"
8. C.S. Lewis, The Silver Chair
9. C.S. Lewis, The Last Battle
10. Eli Gottlieb, Now You See Him
11. Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
12. John Steinbeck, Of Mice and Men
13. Willa Cather, My Antonia
14. Richard Morgan, Altered Carbon
15. Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love
16. William Gibson, Neuromancer
17. Douglas Preston & Mario Spezi, The Monster of Florence
18. Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina
19. Richard Morgan, Broken Angels
20. Richard Morgan, Woken Furies
21. Janet Fitch, White Oleander
22. Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart
23. Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Love in the Time of Cholera
24. Rohinton Mistry, A Fine Balance
25. Kate DiCamillo, The Tale of Despereaux
26. William S. Burroughs, Naked Lunch (mostly... thanks to his cut-up method, it's pretty repetitive, so I think I read pretty much everything at least once, though I didn't soldier through to the bitter end)

You can keep up with what I'm reading over at my book blog.

Year in Review: 2008

Remember this? I know the cool kids are doing a new meme, which I'll probably get to eventually, but for now I'm sticking with this old one--you know, for continuity.

1) Where did you begin 2007?
On Deanna's couch!

2) What was your status by Valentine's Day?
Thinking we were working things out, but mistaken.

3) Did you travel?
To Vegas and Palm Springs for Spring Break; to L.A. for Jeni's wedding; to Seattle for my 10-year reunion; to Honolulu for vacation; to DHS and Yucca for the summer (with San Diego and Hollywood); to Lincoln for kicks; to Chicago for Thanksgiving; from Palm Springs to Seattle for the holidays.

4) Did you lose someone or something you love?
Well, yes--not least, the Bruise. In retrospect, I probably kind of loved it.

5) Did you have to go to the hospital?
This year, no, thankfully.

6) Did you have any encounters with the police?
A cute cop came to make sure I was okay when the Bruise broke down. And one who looked almost young enough to be my son came to check us out on this last trip.

7) Did you start dating someone new?
No, but I did accept a few dates--an accomplishment for me.

8) What did you purchase that was over $1000?
Again, no objects. But, again, lots of school fees and rent. Lots of travel, if I count everything.

9) Did you know anybody who got married?
Yes! Jeni got married... and probably other people, though I can't remember them now.

10) Did you get in any car accidents?
Yes. I'll probably write about that later.

11) Did you attend any sporting events?
Hmmmm. Does the Twin Cities Marathon count? I was definitely there.

12) Did you move anywhere?
No moves!

13) Did you keep your new year's resolution?
Again, I don't think I made any.

14) What concerts/shows did you go to?
Nice Work Leroy, Mel Gibson and the Pants (sort of), Abraham... could that be all? A bunch of theater, especially Fringe Festival.

15) What movies did you go see in the theater?
Michael Clayton; Atonement; The Golden Compass; Be Kind, Rewind; Iron Man (x2); Made of Honor (cringe; would expunge if possible...); Shine a Light; Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull; Sex and the City; Mongol; Get Smart; Wall-E; Wanted; The Dark Knight (x2); Transsiberian (walked out); Pineapple Express; Tropic Thunder; Vicky Christina Barcelona; Burn After Reading; Quantum of Solace (x2); Australia. (Maybe more? I had help from this list.)

16) Did your hair color change?
Several semi-permanent shades, and Feria permanent once, with rather disappointing results.

17) Did you get any taller?
Nope--still 5'6.75" if I stand up really straight.

18) Describe your birthday?
Barrio and Town Talk downtown with a crowd; Labor Day festivities later in the weekend.

19) Did you get any new pets?
None.

20) What has been your favorite moment?
It might actually have been seeing my friends at about mile 17 on the TCM, holding a banner with my name. That was pretty amazing.

21) What's something you learned about yourself?
I can totally live without a car! (In Minneapolis, anyway...)

22) What has been your biggest worry?
Probably passing my PhD exams. Thank goodness that's over!

23) What was your best month?
Last year, I guess December trumped. This year, probably June--Hawaii! Other fun things, despite studying for my prelims!

24) What music will you remember 2007 by?
Probably my brother's music, again--Given the Time and Past the Future.

25) Who has been your best drinking buddy?
E? L? Seester?

26) Have you had to call the police on anyone?
I called the police when the Bruise was hit.

27) Have you gone skiing?
None this year, sadly.

28) Did you miss work due to illness?
Not that I recall.

29) Any like/love interests?
My lips are sealed.

30) Get anything new?
Some clothes--notably, a few jackets and a pair of rockin' boots. Ooh, and a new-to-me camera!