Chili Powder

Slideshow of the Day 5/19/07

Track and Field

Catching up

Yeah, it's been a while since I last posted! I have been keeping up with the Brown Socks blog, but have been neglecting ol' Chili Powder. So...what have we been doing in the past 2 weeks..? Nothing crazy really- here's what we've been up to...

• Rock! is literally destroying everything in his path. He has destroyed the hose in the backyard (we found in in 5 pieces), 2 stuffed animals, a Homer Simpson slipper, the corner of the shag rug (which I repaired with a crochet hook), the YARD, Marcel's sock, and 2 blankets. You cant take your eye off of him for a second, cuz all he needs is that long to destroy something. I'm ready for him to grow out of this destroying phase (if Salado can, he surely will)...I'm running our of dog blankets.

• We have been watching some major cable. We went years without it, and we are making up for lost time now. Some of the house favorites include: Intervention, Dirty Jobs, Deadliest Catch (Mar and Zack) and all of my crime and serial killer documentaries. Marcel is really into Iron Chef, and shows his skills with hamburger artistry in this photo:

• Marcel is learning Sudoku. Last week when Zack told him that he had to do some chores, he asked if Sudoku could be one of them.

• This outfit of Marcel's didn't pass the Mom or Dad inspection. It has to be pretty bad to get a thumbs down, but we had to draw the line at the sandal/sneaker combo.

• I finally painted that "accent wall" that I primed a month ago. And the color was totally wrong! It didn't look like the paint card at all and didn't give the room an accent at all. The dining room is a bright Marigold color, and the accent wall was supposed to be 2 shades lighter than Marigold...instead it looked more like Marigold Dreamsicle. So, I had to go back and cover it all up again. I went back to the store and asked what happened to the paint...I basically got a big "duh" answer from the paint dude. So I asked him if he could guarantee me that the next shade lighter (Stucco) would look exactly as it did on the paint card. His answer, "Uh, that stucco has been giving us problems, it keeps shooting out the wrong color". Needless to say, I didn't buy the paint and the wall is back to its primer-y self again.

• As  far as family running goes- Zack just ran a half marathon in San Antonio and on his way back to Austin as I type. He had to run through a downpour for the last 4 miles (as he did for the last race in SA) but stayed focused (as much as he could, he said he couldn't even see in front of him!) was very happy with his time. I am supposed to run a 30K trail race tomorrow, but have been have some trouble with my shin and I'm not sure if I am going to take the chance of making it worse...
• And lastly, our recliner is finally coming today! We ordered it about 10 freaking weeks ago, they said it would take 6-8 weeks. Now we finally have a complete living room, now it is time to tackle the other rooms. The living room needs to be painted and the ugly brocade valence thing needs to be destroyed, so once it is all in order I will post a photo.

Jennifer

WAH!

So here we are in our new house with plenty of House-y projects on our plate- we have a bookshelf primed and a wall primed- and both ready for paint... and have been for quite a while. Not to mention the backyard (oh my!) that needs a serious overhaul...I bought a shovel and some mulch, and that's about as far as I got on that one. Oh, and our special order chair came in last week and we haven't even gone to pick it up. And some art that we had framed is ready for us to pick up as well...And did I mention the guest bedroom which is still full of boxes. Garage too. Ugh.

It's not that we have been lazy, in fact it is kinda the opposite. For the past 5 weeks we had at least one race per weekend, and some of them have been out of town. And this weekend was the topper- 2 races; one for Marcel and one for me. The decision to register Marcel for his kids race was a last minute thing- on Friday I read that there would be a race the next morning in which all kids would receive capes to run in. Well, I mentioned it to Marcel,  he didn't want to pass up the cape thing. He loves running in races without the lure of a cape- add the cape and he is so there.

So this weekend ended the 5 week stretch of racing- and hopefully the next few weeks we can get back to some of those house projects...

And of course, we've had some other excitement- swimming, biking, checking out the neighborhood parks, registering Marcel for Kindergarten (gulp) and an aftercare program. But, instead of posting all of the pictures of the last few weeks in this post- Check out the the Current Photos link. But I just had to post this one below.

My Superhero in his running cape at the Family Miracle Mile.

Jennifer

Pirates of the Storm

Did we mention that Zack ran a race in San Antonio last week? In the pouring rain? Starting the race about 20 minutes after a hailstorm? Probably not, because we barely blogged in the past month. Well, long story short:

• It storms in Austin for 3 days straight, uprooting trees and showering the city with hail every night.
• On Saturday morning, storms still in the forecast for Austin and San Antonio, we head to San Antonion bright an early for Zack to run the 10 mile Prickly Pear race.
• We get there and the weather looks promsing, though there is mud everywhere, and it looks like all three of us have already run a trail race within a few minutes of bring there.
• As we head from packet picket to the car for Zack to grab some supplies, it begins to rain.
• Then pour.
• Then hail.
• Zack runs to the shelter of the park pavillion, near the race start, and Marcel and I head to the car.

As you can imagine, Marcel was pretty freaked out. Before getting in the car the wind became so strong he almost lost his grip on his umbrella. By the time the hail started to pelt the windows he was scared. Hell, I was scared! We couldn't see a thing out of the windows, had no idea where Zack was and if he was OK, and it seemed like the windows were going to bust at any moment. Poor Marcel cried out "I want to go home now!". I had to explain that there was nothing we could do, we were stuck in that car together, cold and covered in mud.

So what does a Mom do when her son is terrified of a hailstorm? Pull out the Pirate things. Now, this only works if you just happen to be driving around with a Pirate hat on your dashboard, as I did. And you also have to have brought a bandana with you to control your hair that you didn't wash because you had to get up too early to drive to San Antonio. So- with a Pirate hat and bandana and a camera you've got the perfect distraction from the scary storm. Here is an example.

Moms and Dads- it worked! Before we knew it, the rain stopped and we were able to catch up with Zack before his race started. Hey, sometimes having a messy car can me a good thing- can you say Pirate Hat!

As for the rest of the race- mud, mud, and more mud. We played frisbee and ran around in the mud while Zack ran around in the mud, running through trails with waist high water. Thankfully we have the good old Element for these occasions.

Muddy kid legs....

Muddy guy legs.

Muddy guy feet.

Bringing the Juice

Check out Mar heading to the finish line at the Jr. Dillo last week! And another.

3 Years of Dillo

Marcel ran his 3rd Jr Dillo yesterday, and he rocked!

2006:

in 2005:

 

And in 2004:

 

Geez- time flies...

Bagelfest/powerline

Jen and Marcel ran the Bagelfest 5K/kid's K this morning.  We were tired because we spent the evening drinking wine with friends, which is not the traditional way for us to prep for a run.  But to hell with tradition, we had a great time!

Yesterday Jen and I ran the powerline loop, an 8 mile hilly trip around the greenbelt.  Salado came too!  He was the man, dragging his big dog butt around the trails.

Crappy race start leads to...Half Marahon PR!

So, after the crappy pre-race traffic and stress- Zack made it to the start line of the race, about 15 minutes after it started (along with many others...). I'll let him tell the story- but the good news is that he had a great run and PR'ed.

Oh man!

(Cross posted from my Brown Socks Blog...)

So, Zack is running the Freescale Half- Marathon.  He woke up this morning at4:30, got his stuff together and let the dogs out, and was out of the house by 5:30. 

I woke up at 5:30 because Rock!, the new puppy, was crying. I turned on the TV to check out the weather because there were concerns of an overnight freeze.  They reported many accidents and freezing conditions on the overpasses. Great! Around 6AM they started the marathon coverage- interviewing nervous first-time marathoners about the upcoming race, etc... All seemed to be well at the marathon start.  About a half hour later, they reported that due to weather conditions, the marathon would be starting at 7:30 instead. Good deal, give the folks some extra time to get there...

At 6:45 Zack called. Remember he left before 5:30 and he was only going  18 miles. HE WAS STILL IN THE CAR in major marathon traffic due to the weather conditions! He did not know that the start time was changed to 7:30 and everyone was stressing- many runners were abandoning their cars on the side of the road and trying to run the 2 miles to the start-line.  He was a bit irritated, but still in good spirits.

It is now 7:39 and Zack just called. He is still in traffic trying to get to the race. The race started almost 10 minutes ago (I guess..?).  There are still hundreds of people on foot and in cars trying to get to the start line.  He said people are slipping and sliding across an icy bridge, and everyone is peeing on the side of the road. He is more than a bit irritated, and no longer in "good spirits". He was listening to KGSR to hear updates about the marathon start time, and it started to play smooth jazz. I think the smooth jazz pushed him over the edge, can't get psyched up listening to smooth jazz.

It is now 7:50, and I am crossing my fingers that he made it to the start and this days gets batter. What a freakin' bummer.

Jennifer

So, Zack is running the Freescale Half- Marathon.  He woke up this morning at4:30, got his stuff together and let the dogs out, and was out of the house by 5:30. 

I woke up at 5:30 because Rock!, the new puppy, was crying. I turned on the TV to check out the weather because there were concerns of an overnight freeze.  They reported many accidents and freezing conditions on the overpasses. Great! Around 6AM they started the marathon coverage- interviewing nervous first-time marathoners about the upcoming race, etc... All seemed to be well at the marathon start.  About a half hour later, they reported that due to weather conditions, the marathon would be starting at 7:30 instead. Good deal, give the folks some extra time to get there...

At 6:45 Zack called. Remember he left before 5:30 and he was only going  18 miles. HE WAS STILL IN THE CAR in major marathon traffic due to the weather conditions! He did not know that the start time was changed to 7:30 and everyone was stressing- many runners were abandoning their cars on the side of the road and trying to run the 2 miles to the start-line.  He was a bit irritated, but still in good spirits.

It is now 7:39 and Zack just called. He is still in traffic trying to get to the race. The race started almost 10 minutes ago (I guess..?).  There are still hundreds of people on foot and in cars trying to get to the start line.  He said people are slipping and sliding across an icy bridge, and everyone is peeing on the side of the road. He is more than a bit irritated, and no longer in "good spirits". He was listening to KGSR to hear updates about the marathon start time, and it started to play smooth jazz. I think the smooth jazz pushed him over the edge, can't get psyched up listening to smooth jazz.

It is now 7:50, and I am crossing my fingers that he made it to the start and this days gets batter. What a freakin' bummer.

Jennifer

GLTZ

Zack is running the Freescale Half Marathon tomorrow. We will be spectating at the 12 mile mark...and It is going to be COLD. Well, not cold by most of y'all's* standards, but COLD for us Texas weenies! I will never forget one of the first really cold races that we went to a few years ago...We only had one car so Marcel and I had to drive into Buda (about a 30 minute drive from Austin) with Zack to be able to see him finish. We got there so dang early, we were like the fifth car to arrive. It was so cold that Marcel was crying. I wrapped him up with all of the stray clothing items that were in the car- but the poor dude was still miserable...Tomorrow we will sporting a thermos of hot cocoa and many, many layers. We will be prepared- we are troopers.

Good Luck to Zack!

*Did I really write Y'all's? Y'all's standards? I think I have moved to the next level of Texan.

Jennifer

Marathon Weather

Sun Feb 19 Showers 53°/50° 40%

53°F

It's gonna be SOGGY on Freescale marathon day!  My humps are gonna be cold, my humps my humps my humps.  I better put band-aids on my humps so they don't bleed.

Why I run

Why do people run?  I know people running to get their groove back after (or during) a heinous divorce, people running to deal with loved ones' medical situations, people running to deal with past addictions, people running because they're just so damn weird that they don't fit in anywhere else...the list goes on and on. 

Why do I run?  It's the people.  It's gotta be the people.  Case in point:

I'm at work this afternoon, getting ready for our weekly training with our coach from RunTex.  We've got this awesome deal set up where RunTex comes out to our campus once a week and runs us through drills, and we in turn spend lots of money in their stores.  So we're out there stretching and our coach comes up and we're talking and then this other guy comes up too.  We started talking; he was kinda big and I'd never seen him at RunTex before but they're all about EOE so what the hell.  Turns out this guy is not a competitive runner...he's a competitive EATER.  He holds the world's championship for tamale eating.  He's ranked 21 in the WORLD.  Levi Oliver.  He's the MAN! 

Oh my God I was so stoked because I'm way into the IFOCE and Sonya Thomas, Kobayashi, and all that, so we start talking about Kobayashi's 'Solomon technique', which is how he eats his hot dogs and I asked Levi if he uses the Solomon technique for hie tamales but he said no, he goes traditional.

And then this big dude and my crew, we spend the next half hour running 200s.  I mean, that is perfect.  Running 200s with a full on professional gurgitator.  I'm wicked stoked.  That's why I run.  Levi!

Superbowl Sunday....at the greenbelt

We thought we were being rebellious by going down to the greenbelt this afternoon instead of watching the Superbowl. We didn't realize that the Superbowl didn't start until this evening, and we didn't "miss" anything. We realized this when we were returning back home from our trek- when we saw a small pick-up truck headed up Lamar with two dudes in the bed of the truck holding onto a large screen TV. Apparently the large-screen TV owner didn't feel like having company at his place, and they were transporting the TV to some other dude's small-screen house. You should have seen those guys desperately holding onto that huge TV as they drove along the boulevard at 40 mph...it was one of those times when you just had to say aloud "people are funny"...Well, actually I say that a half dozen times a day, but this was especially funny.

So, the greenbelt- we had fun skipping stones, taking pictures (you know me!), eating bark of logs (the dog, of course), getting our feet wet (water, yay!) and running down and up the Hill of Life. Marcel is turning out to be one tough hiker, taking on the Hill without stopping once- pretty amazing for a little dude.

Greenbelt + Salado = crazy delicious

Bachelor Sunday dominated.  We took the dog to the Greenbelt -- I made Marcel do the Hill Of Life, which he hates -- and took him down to splash in the water and chase rocks.  Oh my god he was cracking us up because he was getting super pissed at all the splashes; the evil splashes always disappeared and submerged again before Salado could eat them, and he could not figure out where they were going.  We had hot dogs and watched basketball, then when Mar napped I watched Hustle and Flow, whoop that trick whoop whoop that trick!

I've got two big runs coming up, the Freescale 1/2 thon on Feb 19 and the Blue Norther Duathlon on Mar 5.  Jen has me back up to a 1/2 thon endurance level but I have no idea how to train for the duathlon.  Never done one before.  Don't even have a bike.  My friend is loaning me his at the end of the week, and I need to buy a helmet.  It's a 5k on foot, then 14 miles on the bike, then another 5k on foot.  Then I throw up and die.  Today at the gym I rode 9 miles on stationary bike, did a circuit of lunges, then ran a 5k.  I guess this is how I should train for it.  I have no idea what I'm doing!  But I'm stoked for the race.  Both of them I guess. 

Two signs of bachelorhood today:

1. I fried Salado some bacon.
2. We got in a yelling match over hot dogs:  "NASH!  LEBRON!  NASH!  LEBRON!"

 

Austin Hills

RunTex posted a list of its top 10 Austin hills.  I'm happy to say that Jen and I have conquered at least half of these, and now will have to skool the other five as soon as we can.

Speaking of Jen, she's off to North Carolina in the land of business cards and continental breakfasts until next Thursday, so Marcel and I went to the grocery store to properly stock up on bachelor eats.

A partial list:

Three cans of Vienna sausages, hot dogs, ketchup, bacon, and I forgot beer.  Dammit.  Marcel is bacheloring it up tonight, sleeping on the couch amid a movie marathon.  He watched X-Men and is now on his fifth episode of Teen Titans.  I'm going to make him some salsa for breakfast.

Greenbelt w/ Jen

One week ago we're building snowmen and getting cars stuck in slush, and now we're home running an 8 miler at the Greenbelt.  Go figure.  Today Jen and I dropped Mar off at daycare and ran a long run at the Greenbelt.  We parked one car at the bottom of the trail path, then drove up to the Hill of Life, left my car there and ran down the length of the Greenbelt to the other car.  It was a very fun run, I got to cross the fabled chain.  Here I am looking thuggy post-chain:

I'm not sure why I had to stand there and make a Ghostface Killah face.  See the chain behind me?

I was TIRED by this point, almost at the end.  It's been a while since I ran 8 miles, and this was a rocky run.  But I stole some of Jen's gummiworms so it's all good. 

After the run we cleaned up and went to Brokeback Mountain -- which was pretty good.  It's still a stumble in Lee's career -- it's not as good as The Hulk of course -- but Ang Lee might redeem himself yet.  (Gyllenhall does sport the fresh mustashio!)  Jen's still pondering all the nuances of Brokeback Mountain, but I'm like Hello, no gamma rays?!    

Sunmart, here we come!

Jen's probably gonna key my car for posting about her race (she's way nervous).  Saturday morning she's running Sunmart 50K!  Tomorrow we are driving out to Houston first for packet pick-up and pasta dinner, then we're driving to Huntsville.  Saturday morning Jen will run 31 miles in the state park while Mar and I play soccer and su doku, and then we'll hang out and cheer in her friends who are running the 50 miler.  I'm buying us a ton of Shiner for Saturday night after the race.  In fewer than two days my wife will be an ultramarathoner.  Very cool.     

Decker is done

Putting on this 20K wiped me out.  I'm still sore, believe it or not -- and I didn't even run!  We had a great team, no runners got hurt (or lost, as has happened in years past).  In all we had about 1,300 runners, and it looks like everyone had a great time.  Here's a slideshow from RunTex.

We had an outstanding run committee.  I just had no idea how much work truly goes into putting a race together.  I hope to have another opportunity like this.  I drove the 20K course SO many times over the weekend.  How people course marshall a marathon is beyond me.  Based on what I learned over the past six months, I feel I could -- with help! -- direct a 5K race.  Jen and I have talked about putting a trail run together before... 

Mar's Edith Hamilton moment

Marcel and I were walking Salado around Town Lake this morning, and Mar saw that my shadow was overlapping with Salado's shadow, and he says, "Hey Dad, your shadow makes you look like a centaur."

These kids today, with their Greek mythological references.

Mo' Hikin

Jen took off for a conference at Padre Island, so Mar and I took the dawg back to the trails this morning -- this time to a bend in the greenbelt, roughly from the 360 entrance to Gus Fruh and back.  Salado's getting way better with the butt-sniffing dog social scene, and Mar's mellowing out with the dog some too -- as of just two weeks ago he was convinced that all dogs were agents of hell -- his interest in the Greek underworld, guarded by Cerberus probably hadn't helped much.

Yesterday morning Salado somehow found a pink frozen waffle on the road during our run.  He ran with it in his mouth for a 1/2 mile, then we stopped and he ate it.  Since then he's had the ill poops.  I even had a bag to pick up the turd today but he copped a squat and, in the words of William Blake, "it did usher forth warmly, not unlike a fount of Thous'nd Isl'nd dressing"... no more pink Eggos for Salado.   

(Van Halen's 'Eruption' is on the radio!  My hair farmer radio station plays Van Halen EVERY Sunday, without fail.  Then it segues into the live "You Really Got Me'.  I love Van Halen.)

On today's walk Marcel fed Salado a nut.  Salado likes to crunch nuts.  Yesterday I bought Marcel a can of mixed nuts because a week back he ate that bad pecan and barfed, so I told him I'd get him some good nuts if he stopped eating the sludgy ones from school.  So today while Salado crunched up this acorn but good, Marcel told me they were brothers who both liked nuts.  He said they were the Nut Brothers.

We are off to go see Zathura. 

Doggie Hike

 

Rocky Raccoon 25K

Pictures of Jen running the Rocky Raccoon 25k.  Where were YOU at 7am October 22nd?

my wife, Seth Brundle

So Jen is in the bathtub right now, the evening after her 20 miler and then her following 10 miler, and she's reading a book on an Internet sex crime stalker, and I hear her making gross-out sounds Aggh and Ugggh and so on.  I figure it's a good chapter.  Then she says, You gotta come check this out.

And when I go in there, she has her old calloused foot in front of her face, and she is gleefully picking a toenail off of her foot.  Not the top of her toenail.  The whole damn nail.  It just stretches the skin into little strings, then pops right off.  And she lays it down on the side of the tub and goes to work on another one. 

I'm married to Brundlefly.

Komen 5K

Marcel and I ran the Komen today.  He is now napping the nap of kings and I am about to do the same.  I'll try to get him to post a race report if he ever wakes up.  Until then, enjoy the photos!

King of the Valley

Yesterday,  while Zack was attending a race committee meeting,  Marcel and I went hiking. I gave Marcel the choice of any park he wanted and he chose Turkey Creek. 

We decided call it Turkey Gravy Creek- perhaps you can see why. Yes, that fuzzy brown stuff behind Marcel is the "water" in the creek. Pass the stuffing!

Marcel then found a big rock to climb up on- and declared that he was

King of the Valley!

 

And Marcel took a few photos on the trail:

 

The little white baggies in the above picture are 2 little bags of dog poo.  Marcel thought it would make a good photo.  I am assuming that the dog owners were going to pass by and grab them on the way back around...

And some branches...

And one I took... Mar crossing the Turkey Gravy Creek,  thankfully it was dry in this part...

Running Madness trailer

View the trailer for Running Madness, a documentary about the Western States 100.  The guy with the goatee is Scott Jurek -- Jen's hero -- who is vegan and eats nothing but avocado tacos and yarn.

De-Crutching

Yesterday was my first day of Sunmart training.  It was quite the adventure- check out my long-winded story here.  I'm afraid there will be many more to come...

And yesterday, following a rather impressive round of horseshoes con crutch on Saturday, Zack de-crutched.  Yes, he is back to wearing two shoes again, though one is dirty and the other is brand spankin' new.  He learned many impressive tricks on the crutches, such as locking the door with the end of the crutch and carrying a plate of pizza while "chicken winging" the crutch, but it is time to say "good-bye". 

Jennifer

(short) Road-trip

T0day we headed over to Bastrop State Park for the holiday.  The park is fantastic- pine trees, pine-needles, pine cones.. pinch me!  Am I still in Texas?  

   

The Man Got Me Down

After a couple of conversations with work homeys about a potential easy Guinness world record for running on crutches, I thought I'd check out their criteria on the website.  The mile last week was hard but I'd suck it up for untold fame and fortune, as well as the chance to be a peer of these ultracrawlers (see the bit on methylated spirits).

But damn!  After a few minutes on the site I found this:

We tend to focus on absolute or overall records rather than those that are qualified in some way. For example, for the 100 m sprint we publish only the absolute men’s and women’s records, but cannot publish 100 m records for juniors, veterans, seniors, or runs at altitude or on various types of road surface. [...]  For this reason, we are unable to recognize any records that are based on disability.

Examples of proposals we do not accept:
Longest sailboat journey by a paraplegic
Climbing Everest after triple heart bypass surgery
Fastest marathon with a broken foot

They let this buster in but no running on crutches.  (Monsieur Mangetout is the man though, I gotta say.)

Guinness is some punks.

zack

"Journey" in the park

So, if you were hiking around a State Park and came upon a 4-year old boy singing " Street light- people- la la la la la la la. Don't -stop- believing- la la la la"  Would you think it was weird? 

Luckily, no one was around to witness this.  It would have been more embarrassing than the time he was singing Xanadu in the line in the grocery store. 

Anyway this photo here is called "Marcel in the Lord of the Rings Land". For more photos, and Marcel's descriptions of our surroundings (such as "diarrhea tree"),  see here.  Oh, and we saw 4 deer out there, some serious excitement for Marcel.

Jennifer

Russ & Trans Gaule

Here's a good article on Russ' run across France.  Go dude go.

z

One Mile and Running

Today I ran (crutched?  crutchran?) a mile at the gym.  Thirteen times around the indoor track.  I felt like a violinist after playing the complete Brahms catalog in double time.  I wanted to see if I could do it, because I'd love to be able to run a 5K using my crutches sometime soon here.  Especially after I had a few naysayers over this idea, even coming from other ultramarathoners!  But it's certainly possible.  Painful, but possible.  I kept my eyeglasses in the car so that I couldn't see anybody watching me.  Usually I get props at the gym for the boot and crutches -- this one trainer calls me Trooper -- but I was a bit self-conscious about the crutches.  I bet nobody even cared.  We've seen way pregnant ladies making the rounds on the track before and it's all good.  Also there's this bugged out yeti who walks the track, a Wo-Man as my old roommates used to say.  But I was the only oddity making the rounds today. 

A mile on the crutches, my dudes.  Not bad for the first four days on these things.  I felt like a skiier...albeit a skiier with uberchapped pits.  My wifey drew me a bath, so I'll go float now.

zack    

Bon Voyage Russ!

Our main man Russ ships out tomorrow morning for the Trans Gaule 2005!  He intends to update this blog at night from his Treo while he ices down and eats baguette.  All you runners and family friends be thinking of him. 

zack   

ankle update

I just got back from the surgeon and he thinks no surgery/ankle scoping is required, only a non-weight bearing state and relxation for the foot so the bone and cartilage can heal.  So I now have a larger boot, one with metal rod supports, and crutches.   I'm going back to the surgeon in a month for evaluation.

I need stickers for the crutches!  SEND ME COOL STICKERS! 

I'm really glad no surgery is needed.  We'll document the crutches activity as it evolves.  I just may need my own running blog called Brown Crutches...

pictures to come.

zack

Volunteering

Living in Austin (and with these two crazies) its not like I can close my eyes and pretend there's no running going on just because I'm injured.  There's plenty of places and terrains I can't walk on right now, and that's how it is, but there's definitely a little bit of running going on in this city of ours.

I want to stay connected to the scene and also to keep doing the things that I can with my wife.  We do share a hobby after all, which is pretty badass.  Sitting still is out of the question for any of us.  So it's time to volunteer at more races.  Jennifer is running her 25k trail run at the end of this month, and the night before the run we three are going to go out and stuff bags for the event.  I can't wait!  The ground at these runs is limiting for the aircast, but I can still support the event and the wifey by volunteering, then maybe clap for her from the car the following day.

My workplace is also very, very involved in the local running/tri/biking community.  Our team is about to have its budget renewed, and I'm talking up some increased participation at the Special Olympics this year.  I work with TONS of amazing athletes, but now that I'll be out of action for a season we have an opportunity to do more volunteering and behind the scenes stuff at these runs, the annual Fall 'Distance Challenge', a series of Austin runs culminating in the Freescale Marathon.  I love organizing stuff for our team; I had good success with our RunTex 30k waterstop efforts this year.

One of my amazing work homeys is running this year's Transe Gaule: 40 miles a day for 18 days, across France.  This old boy, who is so my hero (and who is so awesome with Marcel), has recruited me for a committee role in thie year's Decker Challenge 20k, which happens to be Jen's favorite run in the Distance Challenge.  (Mine is the Motive Bison stampede.) 

My first decree as soon-to-be Decker committee member:  more hills.  The women runners are not challenged enough, and require more hills. 

zack

   

O.C.D.

No, not that OCD.  This OCD.  "Osteochondral defect", which is what I have in my right ankle.  But technically in my tibia and talus, being the end of the leg and the start of the foot. 

Runners, take note:  I was symptom-free when I went to the doctor shortly after my ultra.  Just a little pinch of tendonitis, but I wanted to see basically how soon it would take before I trained for my next run, and my next run, and my next.  And as I've posted before, I ended up in an aircast after the doctor saw a bone lesion on my MRI.  This was not from the ultra.  31 miles of running, but it was not from the ultra.  Quoth the doctor.  It's just something that happened somewhere along the line, but rather than heal, the bone in the joint decayed instead.  Of course, my wife thinks I'm a superthug for running an ultra on this kind of crappy ankle.

So that was the beginning of May.  May comes and goes; I'm in the aircast; I'm hella pissed off all the time; I have no idea what's going on; I'm confused and I get insomnia all the time and it just sucks.  SUCKS!  No physical therapy, no counseling, nothing.  One minute I can run 31 miles and be just fine and the next it's Strap this on your foot, Don't do a damn thing, See you in a month.  I went crazy.  No doubt, I really went crazy.  Way beyond cold turkey.  I went cold wolverine, cold T. Rex.  Crazy.

And I can wait things out and be patient, provided there's some type of progress.  But there was NOTHING with this.  I wasn't even working towards anything.  I was in the doctor's words "being conservative".  This is not the approach that makes me happy in life.  Understatement.

June comes around.  I'm getting a lot of reading and writing done, short story finished and out the door, draft of my novel is picked back up, dusted off and reexamined with vigor.  But that just doesn't compare to a human leg.  The doctor sees me for an update.  I'm a raging asshole in his office, like Popeye Doyle from the French Connection on speed.  He tells me to be conservative and sends me to a month of physical therapy. 

I always make friends with my physical therapists and this is no exception, but while I get in there and do my calf raises and my theraband stretches and my electrostim and ultrasound and rotating foot board, the foot is getting worse.  July comes around, and I'm still in the aircast of course, but it's now getting swollen at night, very sore and red and painful and scary.  The only thing worse than doing nothing and staying static is doing the right things and then regressing.  The doctor had told me I could do elliptical but it made my foot SUPER sore the third time or so that I did it.  Other than lifting weights (which I am thankful for) I'm doing nothing else, no cardiovascular activity whatsoever.  See cold wolverine above.

Last week I wanted to skip physical therapy, to rage and go off and get a second opinion, a third opinion, SOMETHING.  Something happen that resembles progress PLEASE!!!  So I went to physical therapy and we had a long realistic talk about how the pain was getting worse and was coming directly from the spot that we identified time and time again (courtesy of his strong probing thumb goddammit), the spot in my bone. 

My therapist recommended crutches.  I'll do crutches if it means I'm getting better, so I called my doctor to see how I can score some crutches on the cheap (I am always having guilty visions of our home-buying nest egg sprouting wings and flying out the window of our bank, off into the expensive skies of PPO-ville...).  The doctor said My Conservative Friend, let's see that foot as soon as possible.  I guess "crutch" was the magic word.

This morning the doctor and I talk Foot over my deflated aircast and grey work socks.  He pokes that awfulsonofabitchsuperpain spot and yup! still hurts.  So it's finally gonna happen.  Senor Forever-and-a-Dayito says I should go to the surgeon.  FINALLY.  Fix this damn thing. 

So I am scheduled to go to the surgeon's office August 11th.  I've got my quiver of MRI transparencies at the ready.  The plan is to discuss 'scoping' my ankle.  That means Opening the ankle up, Scraping/Boring/Zapping (?) the decayed lesiony parts off the tibia and the talus, also checking for any fractures or deformities of the talus while open, Sewing me up and slapping me in a real cast this time.  And being "Non-Weight Bearing" for many weeks, as Snail put it.  For those of you who don't know, "Non-Weight Bearing" is a fancy way of saying "learning to drive with my left foot because being homebound drives me psycho".

Two things I'm sure of:

1. I'm about to be able to heal and finally get back to normal and understand once again what's happening to my leg.
2. I will run another ultramarathon one day.
3. As I'm out for another 12-16 weeks at least, I have no excuse: I WILL finish my novel this year.  I should title it Silver Lining too.

Oh wait, that's three.  See there: counting.  I told you I was OCD.

zack               

You Dance

Today on our little hike at Shoal Creek,  Marcel found that the bench he was sitting on had been tagged.  He read the "instructions" - (you) dance - and then proceeded to do so.

Chasing Waterfalls

Zack has informed me the name of my post is awful! I know it is! You know I love to get songs stuck in your head now, don't you?

Yesterday, while Zack went with a friend to see Batman, Marcel and I headed down to the Greenbelt again so we could check out the upper part that still has water. He insisted that we start at the "end" of the Greenbelt, where the descent and subsequent ascent can be tricky; a gain of 300 feet in 1/3 mile (or so I have read).  I tried to convince him to choose another place, but he was set on seeing that hill. I think he got it in his head the the "Hill of Life", as it is called, would be like the Lion King "Circle of Life" .  Don't exactly know what that is exactly, but I figured he would be disappointed when he actually saw it.

We decided to do the hill to Twin Falls (with Sculpture Falls in between), which is about a 4 mile hike round trip. Our mission was to find the falls and climb on them, they are dry right now.  We made it to to Sculpture falls and found some people hanging out, getting some sun. There was just a little bit of water, none of which was flowing anywhere near the falls area.  We hiked around on the smooth, ridged rocks, found The notorious "cave under the waterfall" that everyone talks about, and then headed on to Twin Falls.   

After about 20 times of me saying "Marcel, save your energy, we still have quite a trip back!" because he was running, we made it to Twin Falls. We hiked out to the area where the water drops off, and had a mini-picnic consisting of water and Clif Bar. Twin Falls is such a fantastic place with water (despite the crowding), but is also pretty cool without it. The picture below shows the waterless waterfall.

 

We headed back to the car with the promise that we would put our feet in the water at the top of the trail, where we started. That area still had quite a bit of water, and we had seen some folks hanging out there on our way out.  The idea of soaking our feet in cool water was very inviting.  We soaked out feet in the water and prepared for our climb up the hill. Marcel did very well on the way up, but did comment that the hill "wasn't the best idea".

On the way home we witnessed some "road rage" occur, a battle between 3 cars which included a bunch of swerving, breaking, and "Shut the F%$# Up You Stupid Mother F%$#er!" yelled out of a sunroof, multiple times, at a stop light.  A bit freaky to say the least, and of course LOVELY for Marcel to clearly hear, even with the windows  up. Marcel said "Mommy, those people are saying bad words! They are saying STUPID!".  Well, at least for now, I guess he didn't pick up on the other "bad" words.... We arrived safely at home despite being caught in the middle of the teenage road-rage episode.  Oh, and we stopped by Sonic for a slush to cool off. Can't beat that!

Once again, a great day hiking with my bud.

Jennifer

Afternoon hike... or should I say RUN?

Today Marcel and I headed over to the Blunn Creek Preserve to check out the trail offerings. I am trying to find some decent trails for more technical trail running, and Marcel is coming along for the adventures. Hey, his sense of direction is better than mine, so he is quite a help when exploring new areas.

So, what started as a "hike" ended up as a run, and I ran behind Marcel as he dodged branches, navigated water crossings, and powered up rocky climbs. This was pretty much my view the entire time-

 

I was extremely impressed with his footing on this climb (below), but of course I was yelling "Be careful- that's rock!" the entire time. Whatever, Mom.

Had to stop a get a photo with some cactus. That's pretty much an obligatory thing around here.

And one more of Marcel at the overlook; my college, St Edward's, is in the background there to the right.  Marcel calls it "Squidwards".

Fun afternoon!

Jennifer

Project for Dad

Friday night Marcel and I headed down to the Greenbelt to take some photos for Zack's Father's Day gift. Every year, Marcel and I put together some sort of framed gift (of Marcel's choice) for Zack; framed hand prints, art, or photos. This year, we decided to take pictures of Marcel out in "nature" at the Greenbelt and make a action collage.

We got to the Greenbelt and found that it was completely dry. I heard that it was drying up, but didn't know that it was dry already. I've never seen it like that before- it was bizarre to think that just a few months ago the water was deep enough to swim in. My plan to take pictures Marcel sitting in a mini waterfall - foiled! Bummer. But, we found a lot of great places to take photos, including some graffiti under the overpass.

We put the photos in one of those collage frames with 8 picture slots. Looks pretty darn good, if I say so myself. In addition, we got Zack a Good Luck money candle, and we are going to take him out on the town today (i.e. kayaking around Town Lake) and then to lunch somewhere yummy.

Jennifer

5 Day Weekend

Marcel had his last day of school yesterday. They went to Radijazz in the morning and had pizza party for lunch. I tried to take photos of the kids, but I couldn't any clear shots. By the time the camera "clicked",  my photo would only contain an arm, or some sweaty hair.  They were running, tumbling, jumping, and rolling down the "hills" and didn't stop moving the entire time. It was a great way to end the school year. His teacher, Ms T, collected all of his school work, photos, and drawings for the entire school year and placed it in a giant "journal". It is an amazing keepsake. Marcel also made a stepping stone for Ms. T's garden that we will deliver to the school today.

So, now after a few extremely busy weeks, Marcel and I are chillin' for the next 2 days (and then 3 more days with Zack too!). We have a few things planned; Napoleon Dynamite in the Park, hiking at one of the local state parks, and going to see Madagascar...And being lazy...And making many trips to Sno-Beach (it is in the 90s here already). And perhaps swimming at Barton Springs...

Jennifer

Go Ashley!

Marcel and I will be heading up to Cedar Park tomorrow morning to watch the 1 mile race