I live with a family of them! Okay 2 of them and I don’t mean like Michael Jackson sickos, I mean like cough, cough sickos. Thankfully, I haven’t been infected. I have done some preventitive maintenance and that has helped.

As a result, I have not worked very much this week because of it. Monday, we had an appointment for The Elder (not sick related) in the morning. After his appointment, I stayed home because Jennifer was out of it. Tuesday I went into work a little late, but had a dentist appointment at 2pm, so that afternoon was shot.

I was going to go into work today, but Jennifer and The Younger were both not 100%, so I stayed home with them. The Younger was like at 90% because we took him to gymnastics. Jennifer, however, crashed hard afterwards.

It also seems that we have a 100% (because the forecaster says so) chance of getting snow/freezing rain/rain up to 3 inches! The radar map has the Knoxville dot covered in blue. Cool… I mean cold.

As a result of all this sickness stuff… I haven’t ran since Saturday and with the yucky weather, I might not run until Friday or Saturday!

I might be getting a new(er) computer at work. If that happens, I will be happy because then I can do some stuff on there that my current computer can’t handle very well… stupid virtual memory.

Oh yeah… and I have to introduce you all to Stella.

I am going to write up a quick semi-detailed race report here since this race the subject of episode 008 of my podcast. So, let’s get going…

I knew that I was going to be working as a volunteer before race start. I also knew that specifically, it would be with registration. Registration is pretty easy and warm. Pre-registration is the easiest part since all the hard work is done for you. There is some (but only minor) stress with Day of Race since everything is happening all at once.

My report time was to be 6:30. My actual arrival time was 6:35. Not a big deal. Since I had ran the race before, I parked in a location that was away from the finish with easy access to get on the road after the race. My babysitter needed to get to work that day and so I was trying to ablige.

I checked in and sure enough, I was on Day of Race Registration. Here’s how Day of Race works… people come up to you either with a complete form or ask where the forms are located (on the far table over there). Next you grab a blank racing bib and write their name and age on the tear away part of the bib. Next, you check their form to make sure that they have signed and dated their waiver. For me… I eyeball the guys that are in the 35-39 age group and size them up… will they be a factor? will they finish ahead of me?

I just love looking at the female form because they have to put their age…. it’s like reading banned literature… As one husband/boyfriend said… “Today’s she’s 31, every other day she’s 29″

After checking all this, you write their number on the form (VERY IMPORTANT!). While you are doing this, you see if they want a shirt… if they do you call out the size “Can I have a Large please” and then shake the runner down for their money… “that’ll be $20, please” or if they didn’t get a shirt you just say “that’ll be $15, please”

Then. my trademark sending them off into great wide open is “Okay, here’s your shirt, here’s your bib, I have your money, grab some safety pins and have a great race”

At 7:50, I finally got out of my duties and ran over to my van where I needed to enrobe myself in the proper attire to thwart the little cold molecules that seemed to be all over the place (about 31F). I grabbed my energy bar (since I forgot my pre-race breakfast) and was trying to stuff that in my mouth while holding my bib, safety pins. I take off back to the start when I realized that I didn’t have my hat and gloves. Damn. So back I go… get my hat and gloves… start back to the starting line. Now I have my key, my bib, safety pins, hat and gloves with half of my energy bar hanging out of my mouth.

I reach the starting line and thankfully they haven’t played the national anthem yet. I am frantically try to get my bib on while trying to eat this thick (because of the cold) bar and thinking that a glass of water would be awesome right now!

The national anthem starts playing and I am trying to arrange my bib so that it’s not going to bother the crap out of me during the run. Oh crap, I still have my hat on… so I take that off. Then while trying to get my bib on right, I see this image of Marianna waving that index finger of her so disapproving right at me… “not at attention during the national anthem,” I hear her imaginary form say. “how rude…” she blabbers. My inner dialogue with her confers that she is right, show some respect to Da Colors. I stop what I am doing and pay closer attention. On the podcast, if I don’t edit it, you might hear me try to sign the National Anthem… pretty bad though… no-talent-american-idol bad.

In the 30 seconds between the cheering at the end of the national anthem and the firing of the pistol (funny that they follow each other). I get my bib on, my shoe retied, finished my energy bar, tucked my key away and found a place for my GU pack. Oh, I forgot that I was carrying my GU pack while running to the starting line.

I had found my friend Marty before the National Anthem and we decided that we’d stick together for most of the race. So the gun goes off and we are running… YAY!

Mile 1 9:30
At the 3/4 mark in mile one, there is this steep hill… It’s a big hill but it’s short compared to to the downhill portion (which you have to run back up). Now, I don’t know if this is a result of the race or just coincidence, but there is a cemetary at the crest of this hill. I did some grade analysis on this hill in the past, maybe I was smart enough to have saved it somewhere…

Mile 2 9:03
We are running in the full sun, with no clouds to be seen. The wind isn’t too bad and I am starting to regulate my temperature by taking off my gloves or my hat or both.

Mile 3 9:12
At pretty much realize at this point that a 1:30 is not going be possible. Give the fact that we are running slower than last year and thata 1:30 finish time is an even 9:00 pace…

Mile 4 9:22
Not sure why we are still running this slow of a time. It doesn’t feel slow nor does it feel fast. We have little protection for the sun, and it’s still cold.

Mile 5 9:20
No more sun! YAY! That right there was nice. I’m a little tired but I feel fine at this point. I plan on taking my GU at the next water stop

Mile 6 9:07
It didn’t feel like we picked up the pace that much, but we dropped closer to 9. Now that it’s around 9am or so there is more traffic around. There are patches of construction here and there that give a small clue onto a reason of the increased traffic.

Mile 7 8:49
Marty and I picked up a gentlemen by the name of (I think) either Ken or Roy… not sure which… you can tell that we picked up the pace a little and it was nice. I could begin to feel that I was getting fatigued. Ken-Roy did a great job up one of the larger hills out on the course… for 61 he was quite a speedy fellow. The three of us talked about a bunch of different stuff while we ran.

Mile 8 9:03
Some where here, my body go over the little plateau of feeling fatigued and I had a little surge of energy. I knew that I was going to need plenty of strength and energy to make it back up the big hill at Mile 9.

Mile 9 9:03
The last 0.5 mile of mile 9 is a small hill, a decent downhill, then you turn and go back up the big hill you ran earlier, except going in this direction is worse. Not only is it late in the race, the hill is much longer. The only reprieve that you have is that it’s not as steep and there are about 3 different grade during the course of the hill.

Mile 10 7:41
Fast huh? After coming off the downhill, we just kept the pace up a bit. At this point, I knew that I wasn’t going to keep that pace very well, it was just too fast for me. At the 1/4 mile mark, the course levels out and actually has a little descent slope as you round to the finish. I was about 3 strides behind Marty in the final turn and we both were approaching this woman (who I found out is just 14).

I had in my mind that we might make 1:30 somehow, if we were close I would go all out for it. However, my in-race strategy changed a bit… as I pulled up even with Marty, we passed the female runner. We are in the parking lot now and have maybe a tenth of a mile or something. I am already at full speed just to match up with Marty when the female runner starts to make a surge.

Not today Missy. As I “feel” her trying to catch up… I find an extra gear and take a couple of longer strides. I can now see the clock and it say 1:29:51. I know that technically (apart from teleportation) there is no way that I can be sub 1:30 but it’ll be close. I tell Marty something to effect “Let’s break 1:30, come on” and I take off… where I found the extra boost… I have NO idea. Perhaps Sunday when my legs are aching I will know… but I fly through the finish chute in (officially) 1:30:08. Marty was 2 seconds behind me and Lily Hope Winchester was 6 seconds behind me.

My lungs were on fire. The first thing I thought of was pneumonia… that’s what it felt like, when they have to work extra hard and there is all that gunk in there. Thankfully it was just a lack of oxygen, because as I regained my breathing it went away. The line for outside water was too long and they were running out as well.

I went inside for the big breakfast spread, grabbed some stuff and headed to the van. 2007 Calhouns was in the record books. Next race: Strawberry Plains Half Marathon February 17th…

Unofficial finish time 1:30:05

[] LS Coolmax Shirt
[] SS Coolmax Shirt
[] Coolmax Skivvies
[] Compression Shorts
[] Umbros
[] coolmax Socks
[] Vitruvian Harmony Shoes
[] Hat
[] Gloves
[] 2 Bandaids
[] Breathe Right Strip
[] 1 GU

[] iRiver
[] microphone
[] New Battery

[] Chocolate Milk (I have heard lots of praise that Chocolate Milk is an excellent post workout beverage… right proportion of protien and yummy and cheap)

[] Race Bag full of lots of other things that I might forget

I have a little editor right now in my lap… it’s The Younger. The Elder sleeps in the backroom. Eventually we will be going to the grocery store tonight. I took the day off since Jen is traveling to Hendersonville, TN for an event this evening. So far, we have been to visit a new school for The Elder, new lenses for the elder, shot records for The Younger and a stop by your friendly neighborhood post office.

I had thought that Jen was going to be leaving in the morning, but I was wrong. Just in the afternoon.

So I have the race in the morning. I confirmed that Marty is going to be there for the race tomorrow, so I should have a guest on my podcast for a few miles. YAY! I still need to get my race bag together and check the weather so that I can dress properly for the weather. Here is what the weather wassaying when I check Thursday afternoon.

I am still thinking of what I am going to do with the Kids tomorrow afternoon… perhaps we can go to a local park and I can have a photoshoot with them or something. we will see…

The race that I am running this Saturday is the 16th Annual Calhoun’s Ten Miler located in Lenoir City, TN. So here is a little bit about the Calhoun’s Race:

Major Sponsor: Calhoun’s (http://www.calhouns.com/)
Calhoun’s is a small chain of restaurants here in East Tennessee known for their ribs and home crafted beer. If there ever is a place that you take visitors, Calhoun’s is one of the top two restaurants. In addition to having fabulous food they also have an on site microbrewery at two of the restaurants in the family chain. The brewmeister for these beverages is non other than Runner Extraordinaire Marty Velas. You will find Marty’s name in more than one location among my blog entries. In fact, last year we ran Calhouns for most of the race.

Race Facts:
Calhoun’s is the first of 4 races in the  Long Distance Series sponsored by the Knoxville Track Club. Completion of running 3 of the races and volunteering at 1  qualifies you for an extra special award and at a chance for LDS awards. Last year’s LDS memento was a embroidered windbreaker.

The race starts and finishes in the parking lot of the Calhoun’s restaurant near the Tellico Dam on the Tennessee River. A Map to the race course can be found here (http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=664233). USATF CERTIFICATION #TN 95004 RH

Bill Kabasenche set the course in 2006 with a time of 52:19.
Tere Stouffer set the course in 2006 with a time of 1:00:37

Number of Finishers:
1998 (167); 1999 (139); 2000 (187); 2001 (199); 2002 (272); 2003 (185); 2004 (243); 2005 (212); 2006 (326).

Terry’s Race Facts:
I have run the race 4 times:
2000 1:34:40
2004 1:49:47
2006 1:26:08 (Official PR time for 10 miles, although I have a faster uncertified PR time from Chickamauga 2005) Link to my 2006 Race Report (http://www.planet3rry.com/2006/01/30/calhouns-10m-race-report/)

Live is easier when you follow directions… I have been working to “fix” my WordPress upgrade because I felt it was unnecessary to read the upgrade instructions and upgraded at my whim. Upgrading WP is really easy, even if you don’t follow the steps. But they have these things called “instructions” which make things go more smoothly. I guess my Y chromosone blocked that from my conscious thinking.

Anyway, so I am in the middle of going back and getting WP to be how it should. Thankfully, I know enough techie stuff to get myself out of these situations! And who would be one of the saving graces for me… IE7. I know! It lets me work on my slow ass computer at work while FireFox FTPs the files that I need. The FireFTP is so much easier and more inuitive than WiseFTP and is more reliable than DreamWeaver. So, I’ll give IE7 a workout for it’s money, at least today.

Well, as a result of a short day yesterday (Elder’s Eye Exam), I have a lot of little stuff that I want to get out there:

Unorthodox Race Week
I did not run Tuesday nor did I run Wednesday. I typically take a 2 day Taper (rest period) before race day. However, I don’t think that is going to work today. I think what I may do is run an easy 4 or 5 today without Tempo, then take Friday off for a 1 day Taper. I do need to check no the weather for Saturday morning so I know what to plan to wear

That Damned Podcast
Episode 007 (That’s 1053… Gravity@1053) is up an running. My goodness… please accept my humble apologies on the lateness of getting it together. It was partially edited before I even went to San Diego, but with everything else going on, it sat there and sat there. Last Night I was able to frankenstien it together. I was hoping to add some fun new segments, but that will have to be in the upcoming episodes. Episode 008 is going to be my Calhoun’s Volunteering and Running.

Cadbury Eggs
Like Bags, I have a Cadbury fetish… and so I had my first egg last weekend and it was GOOD! Did I tell you that Cadbury had a miniegg-esque Christmas candy? THey were the same structure as the Mini Eggs, just not the girth of a real Mini Egg and as you women can attest… size (usually) matters.

If you were around last spring (or want to check out the Spring months of 2006), you know that I kept up with the Cadbury chocolate and the number of calories that I consumed while eating Mini Eggs, Cadbury Eggs and Reese PB eggs. I doubt that I will do that this year, but perhaps just mention how good they are from time to time…

Whoops… I never hit publish on this post! YIKES!

Hello People out there it’s race week here in Tennessee!

This Saturday I have the Calhoun’s 10 miler set for Saturday morning right near the Tellico Dam on the Mighty Tennessee. And I am so unprepared for this race. It’s not funny. OKay, maybe it is a little funny… haha with a little “h”.

Once again, I missed my opportunity to do a long run over the weekend. It was my intention to run a 8.something course on Sunday morning, but the sleep bug took a big bite out of my ass and kept me in bed. Zzzz. Despite the fact that we overslept, until our kids came to wake us up, we still made it to church and Sunday school, stuff that we have been, eh-um, a little slack on the past few weeks.

Okay, a sad little mention here before I get back to the running. You know that BlackHawk Helicopter that went down the other day taking out like 13 people? Well, I found out today that our Sunday school class, Partners in Christ, have been gathering supplies (soap, candy, etc) to make care packages for the soldiers overseas. Well, some how our class and the chaplain whose unit lost those men are connected. I don’t know if we were going to be sending them packages to that specific unit or if he’s just the overseas contact. Anyway, a news story hits close to home.

Now back to our feel good story of the day. Despite the fact that I did not run either on Saturday Nor sunday. I did run on Friday… 5 miles to be exact. I ran my Back to the Tracks 5 mile course through downtown Knoxville. It’s actually a hybrid of my Market Square Fab 4 course, so it’s comfortable. On Friday I ran the course in 44:20 and was a little worn out after it. I can’t say that I was excited at my pace seeing that the 8:52 (average) pace was really getting to me. Especially after my Thanksgiving race of 5 miles was a 7:30ish pace at race pace. Remember, I have a 10 miler this weekend.

So today, I ran again. This time, I ran the Back to the Tracks course again. I didn’t really know that I was going to do this course, but I went ahead and decided to do it even though I knew I would be cutting it close with my lunchtime. Today, I did much better. I finished the 5 miles in 42:57 an 8:35 average pace and I had enough energy to finish the last 0.2 of a mile strong. Basically, the Fast Finish technique if you listen to the Dump Runner’s Club.

I used an online race predictor to forecast what my 10 mile time should be before the race and it was a 9:01 pace of 1:30:12. I’d say that is about right. I’d give you all the ugly stats about the Calhoun’s 10 miler in a post closer to race day, but for now I am going to shoot for a goal time of 1:29:30, with a stretch goal of 1:27:30. Current PR for the course is 1:26:08.

How many of us have dreams (hands raise)

I learned quite a bit during my time in San Diego. Despite that I was very cold in Southern California, I had a chance to do some inner processing of myself, I think that’s why I love, no… LOVE MK events like this. Not only only am I surrounded by hundreds (sometimes thousands) of Sharp women (a good number that make more money than I do) but I get to ride on my wife’s coattails and get free training and free stuff as well.

If you were around in July, I talked about it “Raining Firemen” (if that interests you, there ARE pictures, just go back to the July 2006/August 2006 archives), that MK event is called Seminar and is in Dallas every July. In January, the MK Directors have a conference in mid January called Leadership and is held at different cities around the Nation: Nashville (2004), New Orleans (2005), Atlanta (2006), San Diego (2007) and Houston (2008). Leadership is for Sales Directors only and is a time of cleansing with the new year as well as focusing on goals for the rest of the MK Year (July-June).

This year, a few of the National Sales Directors got together and had a Power Day, the day before Leadership actually started. It was this day that had the biggest impact. I’m writing most of this without looking at my notes, but if I don’t do it now, I’ll be way far behind…

But I figured out what my Dream job would be (which after saying it outloud, it seemed rather obvious):

To have a photography business where people could contract me to preferably fly me various places (with my family) around the world to take pictures for them, in whatever capacity they needed. I would be given time to explore the area with my family as well as on foot while running.

I still I have a few things to work out, but I am going to start on my dream job right now. In the next few days, I will be unveiling my new camera, but what I need to focus on is my W.O.W.

What is a W.O.W.? you ask. Well, the guest speaker for the Power Day was Marcia Wieder, America’s Dream Coach. I didn’t know who she was either until that day, but you know what… Oprah knows who she is. She was personally chosen to be on the Big O’s show about dreams ( not the ZZZZzzz kind).

Marcia expertise about dreams and we were treated to a short course on her normal workshop that she holds. I’ll give you two stories that Marcia talked about, one that a 70 year old lady and I have in common as well as a story about her dreams.

Marcia spoke about a 70 year old woman who had an aspiration of being a professional photographer. Do you know what the difference between an Amateur photographer and a Professional photographer? You guessed it… cold hard cash!

So at the ripe young age of 70, this woman wanted to be a professional photographer, but everyone around her told her that she was too old, too this, too that. Despite all the negative talk, she considered submitting one of her photos to a contest being held by Kodak (remember my Staples photo contest from a while back). She eventually did submit a photo and it won 1st place and for her reward, she was PAID $10,000 and her photograph traveled the nation in an art exhibit. I could not believe the similarities between us, except for the age and gender differences. You better believe that I am going to enter that Staples contest!

The other story is about Ms. Wieder herself. At an event that Marcia was attending, a women asked her to name one of her dreams, after all, she does have dreams too. Marcia’s dream was to spend time on a Greek isle writing a book. The women immediately whips out her card and says that she owns a home on the island and that it would be vacant all summer long. Talk about a mind trip.

The lesson here is to speak your dream to anyone and everyone. You are going to have discouragers and encouragers but you are also are going to have people who can do things to move along or catapult your dreams. You remember the tagline, “A mind is a Terrible thing to waste”, “Dreams are terrible things to waste” too.

So, I’ve told you my dream in a raw form. I will be sharing more about my dream and what steps I am taking to reach my dream and I hope that in some shape way or form, this will help you as well. In the beginning of March, we are going back to San Diego to attend her weekend conference.

But what’s the W.O.W. thing… it stands for Within One Week and it’s an action step that you take to reach your dreams. To use marathoning as an example, we don’t just go out and run a marathon. We map out a schedule (hopefully stick to it) but our goal of running a marathon starts with a short small success. It might be walk a mile, it might be run a mile, it might be walk/run 4 miles. Whatever it is, it’s a step toward the dream of finishing a marathon.

So my WOW task is to create a portfolio of my work. I used to have (it’s still there ) a photoblog of some of the stuff that I thought was decent, and scattered within it was stuff that I really liked. I abandoned updating that photoblog from the shear amount of spam that I was receiving. Since December, I have started another photoblog, which is not updated, with special thanks to Leesa for cluing me in on it. In addition to an online portfolio, I am also going to be making a real life portfolio, one that I can carry…

about being gone for so long without internet access is that emails and schtuff piles up!

work emails, personal emails… YIKES! Well, it’s okay for the most part… it’s mostly junk/spam anyway. I’ve worked through all but a couple of emails, so that’s good.

I am trying to work through the blogs now, trying to figure out what you have been up to while I have been gone. Then there is what I have been doing while I have been gone.

I can say that our trip to San Diego was phenomenal… remember back to my Morphing post back on Jan 2? I talked about things in my life… well, I had some great foundation forming these past few days.

Hopefully, I can make “my rounds” in the next few days and check up on everybody. I do have a podcast episode that’s a couple of days old now that needs to go out. It’s recorded, but not edited or anything like that…