Gone to the dogs!

We had a wonderful time in Louisiana! The time went by way too quickly, but we were grateful for the opportunity to spend a week with our families. I'll have a few posts of pictures, and then I will post about my upcoming triathlon - it is in just 3 days...yikes!

One of the most entertaining aspects of our time at the Brooks' house was the amount of dogs that were at the house at any given time. The Brooks' have three dogs - Dana, Copper, and Murphy. Copper and Murphy are outside dogs, while Dana is an inside dog and truly the "queen bee" of the household.

We added Emma into the mix, my sister brought her Chihuaua named Pod, and Chad's sister Payton and her husband Jay brought their German Shepherd, Miles, to round out the total number of dogs present at any given time to six. It was so much fun! Dana, Emma and Pod were all roughly the same size, and anyone who came to the door was immediately greeted by a little troupe of excited small dogs. Here are some pictures!

Emma, relaxing in an "Emma cave"

Emma and Dana, struggling to sit still for the camera!

Me with Emma and Dana - Emma is so cute with that yawn!

Dana, sniffing on the patio

Murphy, the Brooks' sweet, aged Springer Spaniel. My sister remarked that he looks like a Supreme Court Justice - I think it is the bushy, gray eyebrows!

My niece Brittany with Dana and Emma

I didn't get any pictures of Miles or Pod, so I took these from Facebook:

Miles, with Payton

Pod, posing for the camera in L.A.

Not pictured: Copper - and he is one of the cutest of the bunch! I will have to get pictures of him at Christmas.

Vacation!!

We are packing up and shipping off for a week of vacation in lovely Louisiana. Every summer since we have moved to Kentucky we have gone back home to Louisiana to spend a week with family and relax. The two parts of the year I most look forward to are Christmas and our summer trip to Louisiana - because we are able to be surrounded by our families.

While we have made wonderful friends here in Kentucky and have really built up a family here, there is nothing like being home. I mean home home. I tentatively call our address here in Kentucky home, but Texas and Louisiana will always be home home.

So, tomorrow morning me, Chad and Emma will embark on a 14-hour drive to Alexandria, Louisiana to Chad's parents house. During our trip I plan to swim, float in the pool, lay by the pool, read by the pool, play with Emma in the pool...you get the drift!

I also plan to get some good transition training in, since I will have readily available access to a pool. I am going to work on my swim to ride transition, as well as my ride to run transition. My triathlon is less than 4 weeks away and doubts and nervousness and excitement is really starting to set in. I feel well prepared for the distance, but I will feel better after doing a mock tri next week.

I am also very excited about getting to see my side of the family next week. Last summer I was able to see my grandmother, aunt and cousin on my dad's side, and this summer I will get to see my grandparents, aunt, cousins and family on my mom's side. I wish there was a way I could see everyone each summer. I can't wait to reunite with my cousins Emily and Amy - we've been partners in crime since birth. And now Amy and her husband Tim have a beautiful baby boy that I will get to meet.

The other great thing about the trip is that my family (my mom, dad, sisters Megan and Michelle and niece Brittany) will be driving over from Houston to spend three days with us in Alexandria. Brittany will be turning 10 (which I just cannot believe) on July 31st, so we will get to celebrate her birthday with her a few days early.

Brittany w/ Emma - 4 years ago. My little babies are just growing up so fast!

My sister Megan has really gotten into Crossfit, so I am going to do a few "WOD's" (workout of the day) with her. These will likely leave me in a heap, but I am going to give it a try.

I hope to have a lot of pictures to post after the vacation. I will also be "live tweeting" our trip down to Alexandria and back. You can follow my Twitter feed on the side bar here, or at twitter.com/meremawbrooks

We have a plethora of items to keep us entertained on the way down. We just picked up a Griffin iTrip so that we can listen to podcasts. I have some episodes of the The Stay Tuned Report, Triathletes Coffee Shop, and Zen and the Art of Triathlon stored up to listen to, and Chad has some Bigfoot podcasts that he has downloaded. You can guess which part of the drive I will be sleeping through!

I also recently picked up David Sedaris' most recent book "When You are Engulfed in Flames" to read on the trip. I am also working my way through John Grisham's "The Client" for the second time. After watching the Ultramarathon Man dvd about Dean Karnazes, I am considering re-reading "50/50: Secrets I Learned Running 50 Marathons in 50 Days."

Well, happy trails (and tails, in honor of Emma)! I will post when we are back in Kentucky with vacation pictures and training updates.

Life and Training Updates

Life Update:
Emma is getting her teeth cleaned today. We dropped her off at 8:00am this morning, and we will be able to pick her up around 3:30 or 4:00 this afternoon. I have the day off of work, so I am spending the day preparing for her return. I am going to make a large pallet in the living room for us to sleep on tonight. The vet tech warned me that Emma should not do any jumping once she is home tonight, so I am going to bring our bed down to her level, rather than making her sleep alone on the floor after a kind of scary day.

Dachshunds have notorious tartar build up problems, so we wanted to get her teeth cleaned while she's still relatively young, so as to prevent future internal problems from the tartar. She will probably need to get another cleaning when she is 8 or so. They are also clipping her nails while she is knocked out, so that will be nice! She hates getting her nails clipped.

When Chad and I dropped her off at the vet this morning I did a lot better than I thought I would. When we had her spayed when she was one, I couldn't even make it through the check in process. I handed her over to Chad and went outside, sat on the curb, and cried. This morning I made it through the check in process and the consultation, reserving my tears for the car ride home. I know it is pretty ridiculous, but I just worry so much about her. I take great comfort in knowing that she isn't having major surgery or having any organs removed - she's just having a routine cleaning. This is why I'm not ready to have kids yet. I can just see it now - "what's that doctor? He needs to have his finger pricked?" as I fall to the floor in a heap of sobs. Nope, just not quite ready yet!

Training Update:
Triathlon training is FUN! I have had 3 weeks of really good training, and I am really enjoying each leg of the sport. The only thing I have been lagging in is my swimming, and the pool I use is going to be closed for the next two weeks, so that kind of sucks. But, we are going to Louisiana in two weeks for a week long vacation at Chad's parents house and I plan to swim in their pool every day. Here is my workout log for the past few weeks:

6/15 Mon: 2. 0 mile run in 19:47
6/16 Tues: 3.0 mile run in 28:38
6/17 Wed: 25 minute swim
6/18 Thurs: AM- 2.0 mile run in 18:57; PM- 22.2 mile ride in 1:39:06 (experienced my 1st flat!)
6/19 Fri: Rest
6/20 Sat: Brick - 7.12 mile run in 1:14:05; 650 yard swim in 15:55
6/21 Sun: Brick - 9.5 mile bike in 38:55; 2.0 mile run in 19:00 (2 minutes in transition)

6/22 Mon: Rest
6/23 Tues: Rest (overslept for a.m. run, too stormy for p.m. ride)
6/24 Wed: Rest (overslept for a.m. run)
6/25 Thurs: 2 mile run in 20:23
6/26 Fri: 12 mile ride in 47:21 with a 15.5 average mph
6/27 Sat: 5k road race in 26:12
6/28 Sun: Brick - 9.5 mile bike in 37:33; 2 mile run in 19:00 (1.5 minutes in transition)

6/29 Mon: 900 yd swim in 21:00
6/30 Tues: AM- 3.0 mile run in 30:02; PM- 16.5 mile ride in 1:05:29
7/1 Wed: Rest
7/2 Thurs: 26 mile ride in 1:5o:37
7/3 Fri: Rest
7/4 Sat: 10k road race (time TBD)
7/5 Sun: Brick - 12 mile bike, 4 mile run (times TBD)

I feel like I still have a lot of work to do in each area, but for my first tri in August my goal is just to finish and have fun. I've really enjoyed my brick workouts, and I feel like they really give me an idea of how race day might go. Two things I really would like to work on are increasing my average miles per hour on my rides, and improving on my running times.

I ran the RJ Corman 5k in Wilmore last Saturday in 26:12, which was good enough for me to take 1st place in the women's 24-29 age group. While I would have like to have finished in 25:30 or so, I was happy with the 26:12 time because it was HOT. My favorite part of this race is that they have iced down watermelon at the finish line. I practically dunked my head in the big ice bucket. That watermelon was so good. I didn't think I would place, so I was happy to learn that I had taken 1st place in my age group. Like I've said before, it's all about the size of the field folks!

Tomorrow morning I am running the Bluegrass 10k. I ran this race year before last, and I remember it as a fast, flat course. There are normally about 3,000 or so participants, so that will be fun to participate in a larger race. Readers who have been with me for awhile may remember that I was verbally assaulted by a homeless woman the last time I ran this race!

Well, I am going to get back to preparing the house for an afternoon with one groggy miniature dachshund.

Crawfish Boil '09

This post is about a month late, but on Memorial Day we went over to our friend Cody's house for a crawfish boil. Cody is my cycling coach/trainer extraordinaire. He lives just a few blocks from us, so after getting back from the Mutt Strutt with Emma, we headed over to eat some crawfish.

Cody, our friends Justin and Charis, and Chad and myself are all from Louisiana, so it was nice to be able to enjoy a Louisiana tradition all the way up in Kentucky. We all pitched in a little bit and Cody had 40 pounds of crawfish shipped in from www.lacrawfish.com.

These pictures have been posted on Facebook and on Chad's Flickr account, but I figured I would round up a few of them to post here!

Boiling the crawfish with corn, potatoes, and mushrooms

Don't worry mom, this was staged!

Charis, with baby Ruby

Justin, with baby Ruby and friend (the crawfish)

My meal for the afternoon: corn, potatoes, mushrooms and 2 crawfish

Justin, Cody and Chad performing a strange hook-arm crawfish eating act

The group

"Happy" Chad

"Sassy" Chad

"I've eaten too much" Chad

and "I've eaten too much" Justin

Pictures from 5k

Official pictures from the Skelter for the Shelter 5k were just posted on the race website. I found a few good ones of our family!

Chad with Emma, and two of her fans! Chad's mom and dad are right behind him.

This was at about the half-way point. I'm in the far right hand corner.

Over in the right hand corner again. My legs look so long!

Mr. David, in the yellow shirt and white hat.

Skelter for the Shelter 5k Race Report

A few weekends ago, I ran the Skelter for the Shelter 5k here in Nicholasville with my father-in-law, David (or Mr. David, as I like to call him).

The area had been deluged with rain Monday-Thursday, but the weather really cleared up and dried out on Friday and Saturday. Race morning was warm and clear, with not a cloud in the sky. Me, Chad, Emma, Mr. David and Mrs. Suzy loaded up and got to the race site about 30 minutes before the race start. The nice thing is that the site was only about 5 minutes from our house. I love this race because it is local, fairly small, and it raises funds for the Jessamine County Humane Society. Emma loved being at the race because she was able to sniff all kinds of new scents and meet new dogs...and ham it up for the crowd a little bit!

I had high hopes for myself for this race. The first year of the race, I placed 2nd in my age group and last year, I placed first in my age group. So I hoped to at least place in my age group this year, but I knew going into the race that my training wasn't really where I would have liked for it to be. At that point I really had been focusing on swimming and cycling, letting my running fall to the wayside a little bit. This race was definitely a wake-up call for me, and I'm now I'm really sticking to my running schedule and getting in good, consistent runs.

The field seemed to be a lot larger this year, which is great. I love when local races become more and more successful each year. Mr. David found out a few days before the race that his number had been picked in the New York Marathon lottery system, so we were all really excited for him. He was hoping that this 5k would be a good indicator of where he was, training wise.

At 9:00am we toed the line and then headed out onto the course. I was hoping to go under 25:00. The course is a fairly simple out and back, and I felt pretty good at the half-way point when I ran by and saw Chad, Emma, and Mrs. Suzy cheering for me. The course was moderately hilly, but nothing too extreme. The sun was out in full force and I was getting hot. I was wearing a dark gray t-shirt which was a mistake, but oh well. I finished in 26:15, which I was happy with. A ton of younger women finished in front of me, so I was pretty sure I wouldn't place in my age group. Mr. David had a good race, but he did say he was unprepared for the hills. Central Louisiana is extremely flat, so the Kentucky hills were new to him! He finished in right around 30:00 minutes - a great time!

After getting some water and cooling down a bit, we headed home to get cleaned up for the day. A few days after the race I got an e-mail from the race director, letting me know that Mr. David had placed 3rd in his age group! Chad called him to let him know and Mr. David was so excited - he said that he has never won anything in his life! We picked up his trophy last week and we will get to deliver it to him when we go down to Louisiana in July. Overall, it was a great race! It was definitely a good kick in my butt to make me get back in line with training!

A pretty good photo of a fairly un-photogenic duo!

Lining up before the race - me and Mr. David are right in the middle of this group.

This was at about the half-way mark - I'm just to the left of the photographer in the gray shirt

Happy finishers! (Emma didn't run, though!)

Old Friends Horse Farm

Here are a few pictures from Old Friends:

Dan the Bluegrass Man, shaking his head for the crowd.

This mini-horse was so cute. His name is Little Silver Charm.
People Magazine did a piece on the farm last summer and featured this little guy (he's the owner's family pet) and he became a celebrity in his own right!

They keep The Wicked North in the barn during the day because he has ankle problems and they don't want him running around all day on it. The tour guide said that he is the gentlest and sweetest horse he has ever met.