DC Marathon

I had a good experience with the Baltimore marathon, and this experience prompted me to look for another marathon.  My brothers also wanted in on the action, as competitiveness runs deep with my brothers.  So we found the DC marathon.  It came down to DC vs. SLC and DC narrowly won, mainly because SLC would have taken place during our transition from DC to El Sal, and it turns out we didn't even make it up to Utah during that break.

So the four us (two of whom had never run a marathon before) put our minds to training.  People started rolling in Thursday for the Saturday race.  

Checking out the race shirt

We had our pre-race dinner at the Olive Garden, with my parents, who came out to see their boys in action.  My mom actually took most of the pictures on this post, since Sheralie was under the weather.  We followed up Olive Garden with Jeffrey's last pack meeting in VA:

The race started Saturday morning at 7 am.  We made the poor decision to drive ourselves to the race, which seemed logical at the time, but we didn't count on the obscene levels of traffic all trying to get through the same narrow streets.  It seemed like we were going to miss the starting gun, so my brothers all jumped out while I tried to find a parking lot for the car.  Fortunately, I made a few correct turns and parked on a median in the parking lot and made it to the starting line with plenty of time.  Shuffling 10,000+ people through the starting gates takes some time.  Unfortunately, in my haste I forgot both my MP3 player and my race snacks. 

Still feeling good

The race was cold.  Forecasts had been for lows in the mid 30s and highs in the mid 40s, with a slight northern breeze.  The first time I stopped for a drink at about mile 6 the water was shockingly cold, like recently melted snow.  Generally as long as I was moving it was fine, but if I ever stopped to walk, I could definitely feel the cold.

I decided to start slow.  My reasoning was that if I started slow I could preserve some energy for the last half of the race, which in my first marathon, was a lot slower (1:57 v. 2:32).  My reasoning was flawed though, because it wasn't so much that I lacked energy the last half of the race; it was more that everything hurt - feet, knees, chest, etc.  So really I think I should have pushed myself more at the beginning, when things didn't hurt, and then I would have less distance to run while things did hurt.

Steve and I at mile 15

So most of the runners were just doing the half marathon, and there was a sizable fraction doing a relay for the half marathon.  So at the halfway point we lost about 4/5 of the runners.  This made the race a lot quieter (especially as I did not have my MP3 player).  Steve and I ran together from about mile 13 to mile 22, which included a lot of pioneer running (i.e. - let's run to that bridge and then we can go no further).  

Gloves were a must

Pain - lots of pain (we were across the river from miles 20 to 25)

The last couple miles were so painful.  It was cold, my feet and joints really hurt and there was a decent amount of uphill.  I didn't even notice my family supporters cheering me on a stone's throw from the finish.

My loyal fan club

Lucy with her sign

Staying busy in the leaves during the (long) wait for runners

Overall, I finished at 4:36.  My splits were closer than Baltimore (2:05, 2:31), but the overall time was longer. I finished #2150 out of 3096 marathoners, and #247 out of 305 in my age/gender group.  It was a hard race, but it was a lot of fun, especially with my brothers.  It may have been a singular event, as I didn't hear a tremendous amount of enthusiasm for another one.  Perhaps next time we'll just do a half.

So We're Here

If you are reading this in the month of June then you must have been surprised to see us pop on your blog reader.  Surely Pete and Sheralie have dropped off the face of the blogosphere, you might have said to yourself. And yes, over the last year, I have not blogged much.  But that changes right....now.

So despite our lack of blogging, things have been happening in our lives.  We finished March with me and my brothers running the DC National Marathon (post to come), then in April packed everything up and went on a little vacation to San Diego and then Houston (also posts to come).  It was great being back in Houston after almost exactly three years of being gone.  But to start us at the present and work backward:

We now are here - in San Salvador.

San Salvador is up in the mountains (elevation 2200 feet) in the shadow of a volcano, which has not erupted since 1917.

This is the view of the city from the neighborhood playground.  The city itself has a lot of hills and our neighborhood especially is on a very steep hill.  The grade is so steep I really didn't know if my car would make it up the first few times.

Lucy sliding down the hill.  They just built the slide into the steep slope.  Pretty neat.

James learned to walk just before we left Virginia and he has been on a tear ever since.

Jeffrey showing some real helpfulness around the house.

Lucy definitely wants to be helpful around the house - and in a few years she will be making us dinner.

Laird and Jeff having fun with forts in their room. 

Some initial observations about San Salvador:

1. There are a lot of round-abouts.  Takes some getting used to.

2. In the Philippines, people were always thrilled that I could speak Tagalog.  It was like a party trick that never got old.  Here, you are considered abnormal if you don't speak Spanish.  And indeed, everything is in Spanish! (though within the Embassy it is 50/50).  In the Philippines more than half official functions were in English, and I figured the % would be lower here, but I was naively hoping it would be above zero.  And since my Spanish is not quite up to my Tagalog level, it has been very humbling.  Like a green missionary without a senior companion to bail him out.  Well, that's not entirely true - usually when I go out of the embassy I go with a local employee who does bail me out.  But he's only with me during working hours - after work and on weekends, I'm on my own.  Whew.

3. My office is great.  I can't touch all four walls at once like I used to be able to.

4. You need to be careful when you are in another country and getting used to the germs.  Almost all of us took turns getting sick and feeling lousy.

5. I have an understanding and amazing wife, who loves her new calling in church as primary chorister, even though she has to learn all the songs in Spanish.  Fortunately, there are two other American families in the ward.

6. The kids have been real champs.  Moving around and being on a long vacation and being without a lot of our stuff for a really long time (we will move into our house in a couple weeks and see the majority of our "stuff" for the first time since last August) has been tough, but they have been great.  Probably better than I have been!

Who wouldn't love these kids?

Stay tuned for more adventures - past and future.