A) Driving is just as fun as I remember it... I like driving fast with the windows down and the radio up. Now I just need to get to Detroit next week and pick up my car. I'll be cruising back through South Bend, Chicago and Madison on 80-90... Sweet! 10 hours of rock out drive time.
B) Prices in MN strike me as so much more reasonable than in Dublin. Perhaps it's the lack of exchange rate, but I'm glad I can afford to buy coffee from Caribou every now and again.
C) American news is as self-centered as I remember it, and that makes it somewhat hilarious. And the dominating news story is whatever the latest media outing of the presidential candidates produced, which is normally very little and pointless.
D) Burgers, Pizza, Hot Dogs... Done better here than in Ireland. Guinness... totally not drinkable here. I feel that this is a balanced trade.
E) 4th of July - a national holiday where we grill burgers, drink beer (my family plays "extreme" croquette and boccie on our very hilly front lawn) and then we light shit on fire! "Celebrate the freedom of your country by blowing up a small piece of it!" Canada has a similar celebration on the 1st. But I'm not totally sure what they're celebrating. The 4th is about throwing off the oppressive shackles of the British (especially their obsession with Tea... seriously... wtf). Now, since Canada never actually distanced themselves from England, I suppose it's a celebration of... being not quite British, not quite American, but just all-around nice buggers.
F) Red Sox Baseball... that is all.
Ok. Random picture time. Here's the my cousin and her new husband in their first dance. She looks amazing! This is what I want in my wedding, cause let's face it, I won't get married until I'm in my 30s either. But it was one of those great, elegant events. And the black and whit just adds an excellent touch.I had a really fun 4th of July. It's rare that all 6 of us are together for anything, but we did our annual Extreme Games on the front lawn. There a little bit of casual competition involved, but it's "Extreme"
because the lawn generally isn't cut for the week leading up to the 4th (it gets rather long and rough... and it's impossible to see the Boccie jack when it's tossed), plus the steepness of the slopes makes the croquette a bit of a challenge. And as always, the games are complicated or made better by what my brother refers to as "Talent Juice" which comes in a wide variety of flavors. Anyway. 2 hours of games then off to ICC for dinner and fireworks. The fireworks this year were expressly impressive with the addition of a rotating firework turret. Bill was quite brave to join us, but it made the teams fair... even though I apparently suck at croquette.
Marathon Week #2: 6/30-7/6
This week went well. I covered 25 of the 27 miles I was supposed to, running 5 days, resting one, and xtraining the other. It's pretty much all on schedule. The weather was perfect for running, except for today (hence the 2mile deficit). There was no way I could run the 11 miles. It was nearly 95 degrees when I left the house, but I'm sure the heat index was much higher. It was humid and perfectly still with absolutely no cloud cover. I don't want to say how long it took me to cover the 9 miles, but it was a brutal with a bunch of walking involved. One week of running and I've already gotten all my freckles back (I have yet to rid myself of the stupid biking tan-line though).
I mentioned a hill last week that I thought was evil... well I have one here that I'm going to call Brenda. Brenda is a bitch. She's demanding and inconvenient and in the middle of every run. Eyeballing it, she's about 250 yards at a 45-50 degree incline, and appears around the corner of a gradual 300 yard uphill. I hate Brenda. And this week, she has been in every run. That'll change next week, but my overall goal is to make it up without stopping. The tough part is that it's up hill on my way back, so always about a mile before the end of my run. I'm sure my hatred for Brenda will grow over the course of the summer.
I suppose I should mention that I'm training with Hal Higdon's Intermediate II program (if you're curious you can find it at www.halhigdon.com ). He's of the philosophy that you need to clock the miles to finish the marathon. I like that policy. I don't like struggling with times and strange workouts. Plus, it helps me prove to myself that I can do the distance... and after 18 weeks of running, you can be damn sure I'll finish that marathon (more because I've been running so much to do it than because I'm prepared).
Week #2: Good week. Not a 5-star performance but I hit all the runs, and the distance will come with time. Goals for Week #3 = cover all the miles (even though I'm traveling).
USMLE Update:
I've set my test date for August 29th. I sortof started to study this week... like, I opened a book a few times, but I was still stressed over the OSCE (which I passed). Now that I can safely assume I'm headed for Senior Cycle 1, the USMLE is the only thing on my plate. Study starts tomorrow with some biochemistry for about 3-4 days. I'm going to need some time with that one, Micro, and Pharm most of all. Then I'll hit up the systems. I'll keep you in the loop as I go.
Summer Soundtrack:
- Life in a Nutshell - Barenaked Ladies
- Girlfriend - Avril Lavigne (This had popped up on my shuffle almost everyday this week, and I've had it in my head during all of my runs... it has a good beat, right? I'm sure it won't be the most shameful thing that ends up on this list)
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