Hippos, Pandas, and Elephants, Oh my!

Of course I woke up early this morning and decided to make the most of the day by getting in a quick 4 mile run here on Shelter Island while the girls continued sleeping. Instead of the usual deer and squirrels I see on my usual Twinsburg runs, I was treated to sea lions barking and the thrill of watching a naval destroyer pull into the harbor. All the sailors were lined up along the deck and I took a moment to stop and watch the ship as it passed by. There is a nice path along the shoreline that I did two laps of.

We spent the majority of the day at the San Diego Zoo. We arrived just as the park opened at 9am and were able to get some really great views of most of the animals. The highlights were watching the orangutans roll out of bed and start their day, the hippoes swimming around their 150,000 gallon pool, and the beautiful pandas eating bamboo and literally "hanging out" in the trees. Weather was perfect and we all agreed it was an awesome place to explore for five hours!

We then headed to the convention center for the marathon expo and packet pick-up. The parking garage was extremely full and there was a ton of traffic, but surprisingly the expo did not seem very crowded. There was no line at packet pick-up and we moved swiftly through the stops for timing chip and t-shirt. We bought a few goodies and sampled a few products and were back in the car to let DaveDave show us the way back to the hotel!




The girls swam in the pool and then it was Subway for dinner which we ate near the beach across the street from the hotel. To date the girls have each snapped 250 photos on their cameras.

Tomorrow we hope to have a low key day exploring Coronado Island. We will also do a dry run of how to get to the marathon start, parking lot, trolley stops for spectating and finish line. Oh yeah, and I'm going to get up early again and run towards downtown along the harbor and enjoy the sights and sounds of morning along the ocean.

Planes and Palm Trees

Well, I am writing this from San Diego, CA after our first family plane flight! The almost 5 hour flight did not feel too bad since I had managed a 10 mile run yesterday morning commencing at 5am. A 8:40am departure this morning had us waking up at normal school time. BUT, school is over for this year and I now have an eighth grader and a sixth grader. To say that they were/are excited about our trip to California is putting it mildly.

Gina's trip to Cedar Point on tuesday with her class prepared her for the sensation of lift-off. Abby was big-eyed but enjoyed the experience once we were off of the ground. Great flight with clear skies and we actually arrived in Los Angeles on time. We retrieved our luggage and then waited for the rental car shuttle. And waited... It arrived and we loaded the car with our luggage. Many many thanks to Dave for letting us borrow his TomTom navigation unit. We have affectionatly renamed it to DaveDave, even though the voice does not match the name! It managed to get us to the hotel without missing a beat! We tried to fool it with an off-highway excursion to look for a beach access, but DaveDave was patient and let us have some fun exploring before entering "Nag" mode.

Great mexican dinner tonight and we are all ready for a good night of rest. I hope to run a few miles tomorrow morning along the harbor and then we are off to the zoo. We will head to the marathon expo for race packet pickup and more exploration.

The girls are amazed at all of the palm trees that line the streets. Some look like giant pineapples and there are lots of very beautiful plants and trees around! I understand why people want to live here.

Hope to post some photos tomorrow... good night!

Grand Marshall

Denise and I had decided to take the girls to the Memorial Day Parade in Twinsburg this morning. We always like to watch the marching band and there was supposed to be C130 cargo plane fly-over. As we prepared to go, the dogs always sense that we are about to leave and usually start making their way towards their crates. Forrest, feeling fluffy and spunky, has having no part of this. He was bouncing and running back and forth, trying to get outside and into the van. He wanted to go where ever we were going! Denise and I tried a few times to get him into his crate and then gave in. Outside he ran and almost make it into the back of the van unassisted. I provided the extra boost for him to get into the back and off we went!

We parked at the library and staked out a spot at the end of the driveway. Forrest was looking so 'stately' and proud as he sat and watched the people and parade. People would walk by and pet him and tell him how handsome he looked! He really likes the attention. As the band approached, the drums sounded a bit too much like thunder for his liking and he was a little nervous. Forrest however really enjoyed the kids throwing candy! A couple of people in the parade even came over to say hello to him. He was stealing the show!

The parade was over much too quickly and I started scanning the sky for the plane. We started to gather our things and walk back to the van when I looked up and saw the C-130 flying low right over Ravenna road! (It was pretty hard to miss!) It was pretty cool to see as he make a big left hand banking turn over the square. Almost as impressive as the F16s a couple of years ago...

Fun morning out. Mia, our golden has pouted all day about not going along... We are about to take her out for a walk. That should help.

Holiday Weekend

Memorial weekend is here and the temperatures are finally starting to climb back up to where they should be. I had to wear gloves friday morning for my run...40 degrees was a bit cool.

We gave Forrest a bath yesterday and he looks and smells a whole lot better! His fur always gets so fluffly after we dry him and he looks twice as large as normal! The medication that he is taking now is really working. He is starting to act like a much younger dog than he is.

Abby, Gina, and Kelly had a raucous water fight last evening and I then built a fire to help them 'warm-up'. The fact that there were s'mores too helped a lot! It was a perfect end to a perfect day for all of us!

I sit here typing, listening to the approaching thunderstorm, trying to keep Forrest calm. He is very thunder-phobic and will probably at any minute bolt for the "protection" of the upstairs shower... He is a funny boy..

I had a great running week. 47 miles total with a 25 mile run saturday followed with 10 miles with Paul yesterday! I completed a nice 6 this morning while the rest of the family was sleeping. I figured that I could run and then make pancakes with Abby when she wakes up. They are still asleep but the storm is close... Time to rescue Forrest!

Magic Carpet Ride

Forrest gave us quite a scare sunday/monday. He was trying to go up the stairs sunday afternoon when he suddenly went 'splat' on the third step. He could not get back up or move. We managed to get him onto the floor where he was able to stand, although very wobbly.

He rested the remainder of the afternoon. I carried him outside to "water the grass" and I told Denise that I can't do that too often. A 100 lb dog is a bit much to carry by myself. He was not able to stand for long by himself and we thought that he may have broken something but he did not seem to be distressed, just wobbly. We decided to see what monday would bring.

We slept downstairs with him sunday night. Actually, we didn't sleep with all of the possible outcomes going through our heads. We awoke to him even less mobile, if that was possible. We took him to the Vet where they proceeded to check him out. Neurologically, he was fine. His hips were creaky, but we already knew that. The vet asked what kind of arthritis meds he was on. "What meds?" we replied. "No one here has ever said anything about medication for his creaky bones!"

The vet gave us some anti-inflammatory meds and some pain meds. We took him home and made our own little stretcher from a blanket. The photo above is of us bringing him back inside. We went to Gina's band concert and when we came home, he was sitting up and then tried to walk outside! We were pretty excited to say the least.

This morning when I came downstairs, he was standing in the dining room, tail just a wagging like nothing was wrong! He made it outside by himself, but need help getting back inside.

I came home from work and he was just as happy as can be.... Good drugs! I want some of those for the race in August!!!

We are very thankful that he is on the mend so quickly! We had a wake-up call and now we are in the "Bonus Round" with Forrest.

It sounds so cliche, but really, "Make every day count..."

Aqua Running

I awoke this morning to the sound of rain hitting the roof. I wanted to run 10 today but really did not want to run in the rain. After a quick look at the weather map, I realized that if I wanted to run this morning, it would be in the rain.

I changed and started. As I entered the woods, there was not really a trail, it was a small creek with water flowing into the mud holes. Oh well, I just slopped through and had a blast!!! It was really fun and I got pretty muddy. It was funny, no one else was out enjoying this with me...hmmmm

The rain stopped after a while and I decided to stop at 8 miles. I did not want to go too far even though it felt good. As I returned home, I met Denise as she started her run. She asked "4 more?" I thought why not?! I ran in the grass along the bike path with Denise. It was wet, of course, but I was already pretty muddy so it did not matter. At one point, I stepped into a hole and created a huge splash. Again, big fun! Denise was not amused, but I was having a good time.

I completed 11.5 miles for the day. 46.5 miles total for the week, making this the biggest week since early April. It feels good to be back!