St. Jude’s Music City Half Marathon

If running for hours (3 hours, 1 minute, and 18 seconds in my case) trying to finish 13.1 or 26.2 miles is your thing, you might as well do it at a fun place and for a good cause. That’s why I recommend running the St. Jude’s Marathon in Nashville Tennessee, part of the Rock ‘n Roll Marathon Series.

I don’t, however, recommend running it at 4 weeks pregnant. You will have no energy and nausea will likely be your running-mate. All that aside… It was still so much fun!

There are plenty of distraction to get you through, including a competition for cheer sections throughout the race course. Awards are given for creativity with signs, encouragement, and snacks.

In addition to the standard water and Gatorade fuel stops, people were handing out doughnuts, pizza, mimosas, coffee, fruits, and GU energy packs. All of these things help contribute to you getting those necessary second, third and fourth winds…

Nashville is a beautiful city, so even if you only (ONLY?!) do the half marathon, you’ll still get to see plenty of beautiful neighborhoods, parks, and historical buildings. The Nashville Downtown Hostel happens to be right across from the finishing point of the race, so in addition to being fun and unique place to stay, it’s also super convenient!

Keep in mind that a “short walk home” across the bridge is one thing, but a short walk across the bridge after running 13 miles isn’t really all that short at all. Probably the longest, “short” walk you’ll ever take…

There’s also a free post race concert for the runners! Last year it had several stars from the TV show Nashville. If you can find the energy to roll out of bed, it’s a really fun time.

Last, but not least… you get a fancy medal too.

So if you’re thinking of doing a distance run, try this one. It’s not that bad (It’s that bad), but it’s worth it! 🙂

If You Lack The Hospitality Gene Like I Do…

In my post about traveling with only a carry-on, I mentioned packing hotel toiletries instead of buying them at your destination or packing full size bottles. Another great use for them is in your guest bathroom…

I keep a jar filled with all kinds of hotel goodies and disposable razors, in case I have friends or family over and they have forgotten something. It’s convenient for them because they don’t have to ask for anything or waste ten minutes in the shower (while the hot water runs out) trying to squeeze the last few drops out of a shampoo bottle that I keep forgetting to replace. Cold, half-washed guests are much less cheerful, I’ve found.

I don’t get credit for this idea, though. I stayed with my cousin in her student flat and when I went to use the shower she said, “Here is my shampoo and if you need anything else, you can probably find it in here.” Then she opened a little jar filled with an assortment of whatever toiletries anyone could ever need. Brilliant! She’s a smart one, that cousin of mine. There are a lot of benefits to doing this.. It makes you seem like a much better host than you might actually be. It gives a purpose to any empty jars lying around your house. Most importantly though, it dresses up your horrendously peachy, 1960’s style bathroom… OK, maybe those three things are directed mostly at me and my hospitality ineptness, obsession for ground glass jars and my out-dated bathroom… but you get the idea…

I’m still looking for the best way to dress this bathroom up and the jars are a good start. If anyone else has any suggestions, I would love to hear them!

Take your dog to the Keys they said..

It will be fun they said…

My parents have taken our dog, Keen, to the Keys several times and it really is a lot of fun having him there. So much fun in fact that I decided to go with them on their next trip. Instead of us all cramming in one room or spending a ton of money on an extra hotel room, we decided to look for a rental house or condo. It started off so well! We found plenty of houses that accepted pets and had really good prices. I e-mailed my favorites so that I could verify availability and book. Easy, right? Not. At. All. There are so many restrictions on dogs! I had no idea it would be so complicated!

Our first choice wouldn’t allow huskies because of the insurance. I work in insurance and I know how the insurance companies can be, so it was hard to argue that one. No problem because I had several back-ups! Then the next place wouldn’t accept dogs that were over 25 lbs, then another place had a 30lb limit. After that it was no fluffy dogs. UGH! I finally found one place that was all the way out on Cudjoe Key, which is about 23mi from Key West, that was available and didn’t hold grudges against 50lb, fluffy puppies.

That was just too far, so after spending a few days feeling like a hamster running in a wheel, we finally ended back at the original plan. They’re going to stay at the same hotel that they always use and I’m going to book a place for myself. All that effort for nothing! So for anyone out there that’s wondering, if you’re traveling with a dog that’s larger or hairier than a chihuahua, it might be hard to find a place to stay, apart from the large hotel chains. You should also be prepared to pay extra pet fees, regardless of your dog breed.

If anyone has any recommendations or alternative options, I would love to hear them!

So Apparently I’ve been to Paris…

My mom and I were going to the Netherlands to visit family, and we decided to tack on a trip in the beginning to Paris. Mom was coming from Costa Rica and I was coming from Florida. We managed to get flights that would meet up in New York, so we could do the last legs together. That sounds all well and good, except I had to leave Florida at 6 AM and then wait in JFK for 6 hours until she got there, then another 2 hours wait for the flight to Amsterdam and then connection to Paris. Needless to say, it was and long day and I maybe slept 1 hour the whole time. I am not one of those people that is blessed with the ability to sleep on planes. It was around 8AM when we arrived in Paris and we couldn’t check into the hotel until 1PM! Thankfully, we were allowed to drop our luggage there, so we at least didn’t have to walk around the city with them! You can see bags the size of the Boeing airplanes under our eyes in the pictures from that morning…

It was such a gorgeous day and we tried to enjoy it to the best of our abilities. After a few hours of dragging ourselves around, we saw a cute little park that was full of people sitting in the sun, having picnics. We found an empty bench and thought we would sit for just a few minutes… HA!… We. Passed. Out. In the middle of all the bustling activity of a gorgeous Parisian morning, there were two tourists, mouths agape, heads fallen backwards, probably drooling and oblivious to the world. After about 45 minutes we became conscious again (maybe the locals had made a game of hitting us with bread crumbs or something), had a good laugh and shrugged it off by saying we’d never see these people again. This pretty much sums up our first day, besides a marathon nap (actually in our hotel this time) and a nice dinner at a street cafe. There is much more to say about Paris, but that’s for another post 🙂