October 08, 2007

It's a marathon not a sprint

Of course, I'm speaking of the Baby, You're a Star photo contest sponsored by baby gear manufacturer, Evenflo. As you may or may not know, I entered Claire in the contest that runs through October 14th. Whichever baby receives the most online votes wins! So, I've been voting for Claire everyday, and I'm assuming y'all are doing the same. That is, unless you are a (very) special someone who dined on fish tacos last Friday with Stew & Claire at Pepitos, the award-winning Minneapolis Tex-Mex bar & grill (www.pepitosrestaurant.com). Perhaps some of you didn't realize you can vote EVERYDAY until October 15th. So... click HERE to vote now!

MARATHON MOMMA
In other news... Momma's our hero! She ran the 2007 Twin Cities Marathon on Sunday and finished the race despite numerous injuries. You see, Momma stubbed one of her middle toes last Friday. It turned black and blue-ish, and Momma kept making Stew "look at it!"... which made Stew cry out, "but I don't want to anymore!" In addition to Momma's discolored toe, she also suffers from Iliotibial Band Syndrome (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iliotibial_band_syndrome). The link will tell you more about the "i.t. band" ailment, but I can summarize it for you. The i.t. band runs from your knee to your brain and transports the message "running a marathon is illogical and harmful to your health." However, inflamation of the i.t. band prevents this message from reaching the brain and causes the afflicted to ignore the severe pain in their knee and happily run along like a lemming off the edge of a cliff. Anyway, despite a bad knee and a busted toe, Momma still ran the marathon. But no big surprise. Anyone who knows Momma knows her determination is unmatched. So, Stew and Claire spent the day cheering her on at various points along the route. They met up with Aunt Susan, Uncle Kermit and The Erickson Boyz (Berkley & Ole) to watch Momma run past the 10 mile marker. She was reportedly in good spirits and had a big smile on her face, no doubt because she was using the shirtless Asian man - who had a striking resemblance to a hairy Buddha - to draft behind (no offense to any Buddhists out there... or chubby, hairy Asian men for that matter). Momma was right on target for her 11 minute/mile pace. The next location Stew & Claire stopped to see Momma was the 21 mile mark. Here's a picture of Claire playing in the grass while they awaited Momma's arrival. They got there about an hour before Momma's pace would have her there, so Claire enjoyed a liquid lunch of delicious baby formula before playing with leaves and learning about ants. After seeing the shirtless Buddha guy run by, Claire and Papa moved closer to the roadway to cheer for Momma. Several minutes ticked by... 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 30 minutes... then fear set in. Momma should've been there by now, so Stew was trying his best to conceal his worry. Eventually, Claire fell asleep in the stroller... just before Momma appeared at the top of a small hill. She was limping along badly as if dragging one leg behind her. According to Stew, it scared the heck out of him. But Momma stopped when she reached them to tell Stew that while her knee was in severe pain, she was "almost to the end." And like an idiot, Stew replied, "but you've got more than five miles to go! Your leg is going to fall off or something. Dang, that's gotta hurt and you look like hell!" Momma looked at him with a disturbed look on her face and said, "I've just got to keep moving..." and off she limped. On the way back to their vehicle, Claire decided she had had enough and started whining. So, they headed for home while Momma finished the race. But, Claire got her second wind and stopped crying while they were stuck in traffic, so they decided to meet up with Aunt Julie at the 24.5 mile mark to cheer for Momma one last time. Upon their arrival, Stew prepared Julie to expect the worse. At the 21 mile mark, Momma had told Stew that an EMT almost removed her from the race out of concern for her wellbeing, but she told him to "back off, Jack!" I'm not sure how she knew his name was "Jack," but perhaps he had his name embroidered on his shirt. Who knows? Anyway, when Momma appeared at the 24.5 mile mark, her limp wasn't as bad as before, plus she was actually smiling! Again, she stopped for just a second to say she couldn't feel her knee but that she recently decided to use a running style different from the "limping pirate" she was using a few miles back. Momma eventually finished the race, and Aunt Julie gave her a ride to her (Momma's) car while Claire & Stew picked up chicken strips and cole slaw from the grocery store. On a side note, congratulations to our friend, Bev, for also finishing the marathon and winning a medal! Momma and Bev trained together, so way to go, Bev!

Claire made a sign to take along to help cheer on Momma. We took pictures of the sign this morning, and I got to wear Momma's medal for the photo. Despite severe knee pain, a nearly broken toe and a sore back, Momma finished in a time of 5 hrs 44 minutes (which equates to a 13 minute per mile pace)... ahead of nearly 600 other finishers. I'm not good enough with words to describe how proud we all our of Momma. She's our inspiration on so many levels, and we love her more than I can begin to say. We're proud of you, Momma... you're our rock!

3 comments:

Anonymous 1:20 PM  

Great job Linda! Nice sign B & C : )

Anonymous 1:38 PM  

I have to share Julie's favorite Twin Cities Marathon story of all time. You see, Julie, Dee and Linda used to be marathon spectators, enjoying the event with a nice big cup of caribou coffee while cheering on the crazy runners. A few years back, after watching for an hour or so, the ladies were complaining that their rear ends hurt from sitting on the hard ground, so they bailed on the race and went to a nice restaurant for lunch. Really, they have come a long way. While Linda joined the crazies running this year, Julie had the foresight to bring along a comfy stool to sit upon. And Dee's lounging on a beach somewhere in S. Carolina. Nice work, ladies!

Bogart 1:41 PM  

Lily - Aren't you forgetting a little bit of info about the blister Julie sprouted from a hard day of standing? That's dedication... or something like that.

Bogart

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Commentary from a stay-at-home dad on daily happenings and misadventures while helping raise a wonderful little girl. The goal is to employ wit, sarcasm and/or humor to make the blog pseudo-entertaining. Then again, setting goals never really worked for me, but maybe you'll chuckle anyway.

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