My Life, As Told Between (Baby Cakes') Naps

I finally found the motivation to do a long run by myself on Saturday!  T and his partner met up with me around the first mile of my run (which happens to cross through T’s patrol area), so I stopped and chatted for a bit.  I managed to do the other 9 miles at a relatively constant (if slow) pace, although, unfortunately, my ankle started bothering me so I only did 10 rather than the 11 miles I had planned

Later that night, we had our friends S and K over for dinner.  I made hoisin-honey pork riblets, which are super easy and delicious, with white rice and green beans.  For dessert, S made fantastic chocolate chip, oatmeal, walnut, coconut cookies.  I love dinner parties, especially dinner parties where the guests bring fabulous desserts!  =)

Sunday, I met up with T and his softball team at Piknic, our local restaurant, for brunch after their big game (as it started pretty early in the morning, I slept through the actual game).  It was great getting to know the members of the team better. It’s a community team, so they’re all essentially our neighbors.  After brunch, and a short nap, we headed out to the Will Rogers State Park for a real picnic with Alfie and our friends L and E.  It was a beautiful day for a picnic and a relaxing way to spend a Sunday.  We had wine and an assortment of bread and cheese, fruit and other munchies.  They tossed the frisbee around while I tried to keep Alfie from jumping into the mix.

That night we saw Monsters v. Aliens in 3D.  I, naturally, loved it.  It was the perfect way to top off a great weekend.

Yay!  T surprised me with a Kindle for our 6 month anniversary!  He’s either incredibly sweet…or incredibly tired of me whining about how much I wanted one.  =)  I have been wanting a Kindle forever but have been too cheap to buy one for myself.  As much as we’re trying to be practical about money, I can’t return an anniversary gift, so I guess I HAVE to keep it.

I love the idea of having virtually any book I want to read at my disposal at all times.  And not clogging up my bookshelf with books I bought for a short plane ride and never plan to read again.  And being able to read the NY Times in bed.  Best gift ever.

LOL.  Yeah, I’m all sorts of dorky.

Back from a very short trip to Vegas for T’s race, the Baker to Vegas Relay.  It’s a 120-mile relay race for law enforcement personnel.  There were hundreds of teams (each with 20 runners) representing all aspects of law enforcement – police officers, sheriffs, FBI agents, correctional officers, district attorneys, etc.  Most of them were from California, but we saw some teams from Canada and one from Hamburg, Germany.

The race began at 9am on Saturday morning for the slowest team (the teams started based on their projected finish time) and ended at 9am for everyone on Sunday.  T’s team started at 5pm on Saturday evening but T’s portion of the race (5.3 miles with a 2% incline) didn’t start until 10pm Saturday night, so we headed out at 7:30 for a small town 60 miles west of Las Vegas, where T’s leg started.

It was  unlike any race I’d ever participated in or seen, not only because it was extremely long, and a relay, but because the roads weren’t closed for the race.  Instead, runners run along the shoulder of the road with “follow vehicles” behind them to protect them from traffic and to provide light (as parts of the race take place in desolate areas in the middle of the night).  It was really neat to see runners and their follow vehicles along the road as we drove past.  The logistics of getting that many people out there and coordinating that many vehicles for that long a race is mind-boggling.  It was amazing how well they pulled it off.

We, on the other hand, did not do such a great job pulling off our trip.  We made the trip too short (given the timing of T’s leg of the race, we weren’t able to do much in Vegas), spent too much on airfare (we both should have taken a day off and driven) and then waited too long to rent a car (they are so expensive to rent in Vegas!).  Plus, T was sick leading up to the race.  All in all, we weren’t particularly looking forward to the trip or the race, but we had a great time when we got there!