2008 in books...

As usual, here's 2008 in books read...

# of books read: 24
total pages read: 8205
avg. pages/day: 22.5

top three books: the corner, three cups of tea, there are no children here

Chicago 10

I just finished watching the movie Chicago 10, about the Abbie Hoffman trial and the '68 Chicago convention. I can't put into words how awesome this movie was. I had known a bit about what had happened that week as I grew up in Chicago and my dad was down there working while it was going on. I had heard stories and seen an occasional photo or two of what had happened. But the movie was just so compelling with the actual footage from the protests and marches, video of police savagely beating people just sitting in the streets or standing on a sidewalk or in a park.

I highly recommend everyone rents this movie and watches it, and shows their kids (it is R rated, ironically enough due to the police acts of violence) the real power of like-minded people joining together.

And in seeing this movie I'm saddened...not just with Daley Sr. and what happened in Chicago that day, but with my own generation and how we really failed to come together against the current wars and the horrible acts conducted by our current leaders all over the world. Sure we had protests and marches here and there, but there was no voice that really brought everyone together (maybe Michael Moore, but he was a bit too outspoken to be taken very seriously). I just wish we could have done more and done it sooner.

Let's hope Barack can take us into a new America. An America that cares about its people and people all over the world and respects all human life.

running and amazing weather!

Yesterday I returned from a wonderful 9 day vacation in Florida. The weather was perfect the whole time with temperatures in the 80s on most days. Of course I did all of the normal retirement-community activities with my parents - bocce, shuffleboard, driving the golf cart, etc. but I also got in 38 miles of running.

The runs were 4, 20, 4, and 10 which all went so amazingly well. I definitely feel ready for the marathon in less than two weeks! For the 20 and the 10, my dad followed along in the golf cart with water/powerade every two miles or so to approximate conditions of the race. It was all very fun and so fantastic to be able to be outside for all of that time running in the sunshine.

Christmas down there was fun as well. I cooked up a little vegan feast to accompany the ham and other meat-based items my mom was cooking. The vegan menu included a banana bread, a baked pasta dish with soy meat, and some vegan mashed potatoes. All quite yummy!

Now I'm back up in the cold in Chicago (although it's really not that cold out) for another 11 days when I head back to FL for the marathon!!

electric "car"

I never thought I'd see the day when my dad was driving a fully electric vehicle...much less to have that day come before I was driving one!

So as many of you know, my parents retired to FL last year. And they live in this community where you can drive a golf cart everywhere you need to go...to the town square, grocery store, theater, restaurants, walmart, etc. So he decided to get an electric golf cart and now uses that as his primary mode of transportation.

I'm so proud :)

covering their (moon) bases...

So I just got the waiver for the Disney Marathon (which is a month and a day away!) and found this section particularly entertaining...

"I further grant the Released Parties the right to photograph and/or videotape me and further to display, use, and or otherwise exploit my likeness, voice, and appearance forever and throughout the world in all media, whether now known or hereafter devised, throughout the universe in perpetuity."

running in SF

Early last week I saw the weather for Chicago this weekend and realized that there was no way that I was about to be doing an 18 mile run here over the weekend. There were highs around 20 with lows way down in the single digits with negative windchills.

So I booked a quick trip to San Francisco, home of perfect marathon-training-weather year round. With highs in the low 60s you really can't beat it. So I left the land of this:




For the land of this:



I had a very wonderful weekend in the warm weather including dinner at The Plant (formerly Lettus), lunch at Naan-N-Curry, lots of holiday shopping, and of course the run.

For the run I left Union Square and headed up Market towards the bay, followed the bay all the way to the Golden Gate Bridge, ran across and came back to Union Square the same way. A wonderful 18 mile run. The fog was still in as I ran out to the bridge, but by the time I made it to the other side it had lifted and I had a wonderful view of the city as I came back into town. The weather was perfect and I felt great all the way through. Which is a relief. I didn't really know what to expect as my previous long runs had all been cut short with knee pain. I was doing this one with some new shoes and thankfully all was great!

Here's the route:



And because I'm in a data-centric mood today, here's the nike+ graph. As you can see I was quite consistent except for a little walk break up a big hill :) And I finished sub-3-hours which was my goal. Well, my goal was to finish, but that was a nice stretch goal that I made! :)



So now I feel like I'm totally ready for the marathon in a month. Just another 20 mile long run and a three week taper and it's time for the big day! I can't wait to have evenings and weekends back after months and months of running, but I'm really looking forward to the actual race day and running through all of the parks at Disney! :)

friends doing amazing things...

This past week I was able to see two friends doing very amazing things. One friend was in an opera at the Lyric Opera House! And another friend was an associate producer on a wonderful documentary about the Chicago lakefront.

Both were very wonderful and it's so great to see friends making such wonderful works of art.

(If you check out the chicago lakefront website above, make sure to do the interactive map. It lets you see parts of the shows by clicking on flags on a google map...very very cool!)