Living a Teenage Dream

This past weekend I went home to San Francisco to go see a concert with some of my high school friends.

Girls Night High School Reunion

Which concert did we see you ask? This video should give you a hint:

Yes, we did go see NKOTBSB! We were all huge fans of NKOTB as 'kids' and there was no way we could pass up a chance to see them again live in concert!

NKOTB Back in the Day

My best friend and I actually saw NKOTB perform back in October 2008 when they first returned to the concert circuit. We loved the show and screamed our heart out like little girls. It was so much fun and made me feel like a starry eyed 12 year old again. 

Waiting in Line for Shirts

I've seen girls/women on TV before at concerts/celeb sightings screaming and jumping up and down when they saw their star crushes. I never thought I'd be one of those girls. But guess what, at this concert I was. Something between the energy of the concert and the crowd, being with my best friend of 20+ years and other good high school friends, and remembering how I felt when I listened to these songs as a little girl on my cassette tape player (old school!) turned me into a screaming giddy girl .. and it was fun! The appeal of this concert and the way it brought me back to those pre-teen feelings reminded me a lot of why I love the Twilight books. For a moment if you close your eyes, you can remember what it feels like to have your first crush. Real or celebrity, its a warm fuzzy feeling. (More about my Twilight obsession on my blog "I admit it, I'm a Twihard.)

Being "Gidiots" (aka Giddy Idiots)

NKOTB Sure Has the RIGHT STUFF!

NKOTB Making Grown Women Scream!

When we saw NKOTB a few years ago we got the cheapest seats that they had and sat in the very last row in the upper balcony. This time we got better seats and were much closer, but not close enough!

View From our Seats

When the concert started we had a pretty good view of the stage and the screens, but we weren't close enough for my pictures to turn out too well.

Concert Views

This View Definitely Requires a Closer Seat

Video of Donnie for the Ladies

Before this concert I didn't consider myself a huge Backstreet Boys fan. I bought the album years ago but always preferred N'SYNC. I was surprised though to realize I knew the words to almost every song they performed!

Backstreet's Back!

The show was set up so NKOTB would perform on one stage (front or back) and then as their song ended it would blend right into a BSB song with those guys on another stage. Rinse repeat.

NKOTB on the Closer Stage

BSB Serenading Ladies from the Crowd

The concert was great and a few times I looked around and was amazed to see that the whole stadium (filled with my fellow middle aged women) had everyone standing up in their seat screaming and singing at the top of their lungs. Well, everyone but the guy sitting in front of us. I can't believe this guy's girlfriend couldn't find a companion who actually wanted to be at the concert!

Seriously? Why Even Come?

NKOTB Still Has the Moves!

 The concert was pretty long and covered all of the songs I really liked from both groups, and I figured that the two most popular songs had to be saved for last. For the second to last song BSB performed "I Want it That Way" and NKOTB performed "Hanging Tough". 

My Fave BSB Song - I Want it That Way

Have you ever seen the HP Pavilion full of girls all waving one arm over their head back and forth? I have!

NKOTB's Iconic Song - Hangin Tough

After two hours of screaming, singing, and jumping around, the concert sadly came to an end. I found that my voice was hoarse and I was exhausted. This old lady usually goes to bed by 10pm and the concert didn't wrap up until about 11pm. 

Finally the Finale - Aww!

My best-boyfriend-in-the-world David had dropped Garley and I off at the concert, and was planning to pick us back up at a corner behind HP Pavilion. When we walked out there right after the concert we saw a big crowd, and realized that all the people were waiting for the tour buses to leave with the groups! We waited on the corner with the crowd for David to pick us up (with me mentally willing him to be late enough that we'd see a bus leave.)  Turns out David got stuck in traffic and road closures and he pulled up right after we saw the first bus leave with the Backstreet Boys. Great timing!

Tour Buses Out Back

 

Here Comes the Backstreet Boys!

We all had a great time at the concert and Garley and I agreed that "next time" we go, we get even better seats. I joked that as we got older and older we'd be able to afford better and better seats and that finally when we're 40 we'll be one of the lucky ladies in the first row who got picked to go up on stage. Haha. Guess we'll see what happens if they tour again!

There's No Place Like Home

Last weekend I went home to San Francisco. Sigh! I miss San Francisco! :o( The occasion for the visit was to throw my BFF Garley's baby shower celebrating the upcoming arrival of her second son.  I flew home for a change since I lucked out on flights and found a flight deal for $90 round trip on United! Only negative was that I'd have to travel Saturday/Monday instead of Friday/Sunday. Oh well, no biggie.

Congratulations Nick & Garley!

Garley's Shower

To prepare for Garley's shower I put together a team that consisted of me, her sister, and her sister-in-law. I took on favors, games, and a memory book, her sister took on decorations, and her sister-in-law covered dessert. The event was set for 11:30am on Saturday morning, just three hours after I'd be getting off the plane from San Diego! (Yes, that did mean I was up at 4am to get to the airport at 5am for the 5am flights. *yawn*)

My Crafts in Action - Shower Favors!

We got to the restaurant, set up the decorations and cupcake table, put out the favors, and then the party started! It was a nice little event for Garley and a great way for her to get to see all of her friends and family before she dove into the role of a two-child parent. As a non-mother, I have to admit I haven't enjoyed many of the baby showers I've gone to. Watching someone open 100 gifts that all look the same (ohh!  a towel! Oh! A pink onesie! Oh! Another towel! yeah ...) and playing gross games like "guess what type of chocolate is melted into this diaper" or "taste the baby food to guess the flavor" really aren't my favorite things to do on a weekend. I don't mean to be a baby scrooge, but seriously - melted chocolate in a diaper is just plain gross. Don't even get me started on Lentil baby food! Ick!

Best Friends for 24 Years :o)

For Garley's shower I found two fun games online. One was "How well do you know the mom & dad?" trivia, and the other was "Match the celebrity couple to the baby name". Both games turned out to be pretty challenging, but we found two winners who each got an iTunes giftcard.

The Happy Couple

Russian Hill

Later that night I had a "date" with Jenny. We were going to go get dinner in her new neighborhood (Russian Hill) and then meet up with her boyfriend and his friend for a drink. We had dinner at Rex's Cafe which was good, nothing to write home about, and then went across the street to Tonic for a drink. After getting up at 4am that day to make my early flight, I was in no condition to close the bar down. Let's be honest, halfway through my first drink and I was tired and wanted to go to bed!

Drinks at Tonic

Hoppers Hands Run

I needed to get up early anyways because the next day I had a running date with Jojo from the San Francisco Marathon! We were going to meet down at the Marina and run out to Hoppers Hands and back. Jojo brought along her ADORABLE  Cavalier King Charles Spaniel puppy who was just a doll. He waited patiently in the car while we ran out to the Golden Gate Bridge and back, on a surprisingly beautiful sunny Fall San Francisco day.
  

Cooper - San Francisco Marathon Dog

During our run we bumped into the race course for the Mermaid Run. So cute! This race series has races in San Francisco, Alameda, Santa Cruz, and Mountain View, and one of their races was held in San Diego and was co-promoted with Girls on the Run. One of the girls I currently coach actually did the last Mini Mermaid Run.
 

Lunch at Luna Park

After the run I had to quickly get ready and head down to the Mission to meet up with some college friends for lunch. Gaucho Girls unite! I was leery of the location and worried about parking, but found parking on the street about a block away from the restaurant! wow! I quickly parked my hamster car (the rental Kia Soul) and walked over to the restaurant.

Lunch at Luna Park

After brunch Christina and I had originally talked about going to see a movie, but ended up hanging out on the patio of a Mediterranean restaurant called Ziryab down the street from her. We hung out here for a while enjoying the fruity hookah smells of our table neighbors before I was off for dinner with my dad. Yes, all I do is eat apparently!

An Afternoon of Wine & Hummus

My dad and I met a friend of his at a Chinese restaurant and dined on several courses of mysterious dishes. The whole menu was on the wall in Chinese, so I said I liked shrimp and chicken and waited to see what was in store! We had several incredible dishes and plenty to take home. I'm pretty sure I got tricked into eating jellyfish at one point (what else is clear and thin and rubbery? errr..) which didn't really taste like much, and all I could think was that the jellyfish on the table was not unlike what could be found swimming in La Jolla Cove. ack.

After dinner I headed over to my friend Danny's house to watch some Jeopardy. We watched two episodes while keeping score, and not to brag or anything... but guess who won? Oh yeah! This girl! I couldn't stay out to late and had to leave and get to bed  with yet another 4am wake-up for a 6am flight on the horizon. *yawn*. I got into San Diego about 7:30am the next day and headed straight into work. Amazingly I wasn't that tired! The trip was short but sweet, and I'm excited to head back home this week for Thanksgiving. For some reason I'm not sure I can ever see myself returning to San Francisco even though I love the city dearly. Because of this I cherish my weekends at home, and I'm so grateful to have a network of friends and family who always make me remember that there's no place like home.

Sharing My Obsession

I am very excited to announce that David's brother Ken is now the fourth person to complete my world famous half-marathon training program! Okay, so its not really world famous or even famous at all ... but Ken did just successfully complete his first distance race this past weekend in Baltimore, MD - the Baltimore Half Marathon!

Ken - Half-Marathon Conqueror!

I put together a 12-week training plan for Ken that he actually started two weeks early. What an overachiever! The schedule was loosely based on Hal Higdon's Half Marathon training program which I also used for my first half marathon in Phoenix in January 2005. Variations of this schedule are also what I gave my three other running protegees David, Kris, and Jenna!

Ken's Half - Baltimore Half-Marathon - Oct '09

Several months ago David and I were talking about distance running and I told him that I had a feeling that his brother Ken would want to do a half-marathon at some point. Ken had never expressed an interest in racing to David so he dismissed the idea immediately as crazy talk! Much like many of my other predictions to David though, this one came true! Only a week or two after we had this conversation Ken told David that he'd signed up for the Baltimore Half-Marathon along with a few friends. Ken immediately turned to the mother of marathon training for a schedule ... me! ;o)

There are many half-marathon training plans out there but I think its hard for a newbie to choose one that will fit their fitness level, training availability, and life scheduling without some help. I found out how many days a week Ken wanted to run, what days he wanted to run, and made a simple schedule. His schedule had him running 4 days a week with a long run on Saturday starting at 4 miles and progressing to to 10 miles. I also looked up a few local 5Ks and 10Ks to try to work into his schedule to get him experienced at "racing". In the end those races didn't work out so he just stuck to his regular training run.

About six weeks ago when I was in Maryland David and I took Ken to a local running store to get him fitted for running shoes. He'd been complaining about knee pain and my first thought was that the culprit was his shoes. When we got to the store a shoe expert had him walk about 15 feet out and back and immediately noticed that from the overpronation of his left foot, his right knee probably hurt. Bingo! She was right! She fitted him with a pair of stability shoes which he thought felt better almost immediately, and which then helped him continue on with his training.

Ken logged his miles on dailymile.com (which I'm also a member of) so I got to see his training progression along with commentary throughout his training plan. He did really great with staying on schedule and steadily logged his miles. By the time he did his 9 and then 10 mile run I knew he'd do great.

Congrats again K-dog! Looking forward to running a full marathon with you in the future! :o)

My Other Three Protegees

David - Austin Half-Marathon - Feb '09

The next most recent person I've trained to a half-marathon was David. We ran our first half back in February of this year in Austin, TX. Not long after finishing that race David had the running bug and had his sights set on a full marathon!

Before the Austin Half-Marathon

We looked at races on both the east and west coast and decided upon the Marine Corps Marathon which we are training for now. 13 days to go! Along the way with our training we also ran a second half-marathon together in Plymouth, MA. On this weekend we were actually scheduled for 20 miles, so we ran the half-marathon (in the rain) and then chugged on for 7 more miles. Now THAT is dedication! (More details here in my last blog post.)

After the Plymouth Half-Marathon
(before the last 7 miles to get to 20)

Kris - America's Finest City Half-Marathon - Aug' 06

My dear friend Kris was the second person I talked into racing with me. Kris had always been a workout buff and a casual runner (2-3 miles regularly), but had never raced further than a 5k or 10k turkey trot. I can't remember how it was that I got Kris to agree to run a half-marathon, but I'm glad I did! I think I enticed him with the idea of a weekend in sunny San Diego! (Don't be confused, this was years before I even lived here, and a bunch of us from CA/AZ were planning on meeting in San Diego for a weekend getaway.)

I sent a copy of my half-marathon training schedule to Kris and he started doing his training in Michigan while I ran in Arizona. It was ironic when we'd get together and compare training notes. I was running through the miserable desert heat of a Phoenix summer while Kris went through fluctuating Mid-West temperature swings from nice, to hot and humid, to rainy.

I was a little worried about running with Kris since the few times in the past we've tried to run together it didn't go well. I run about a minute pace slower than him and it was taxing for both of us to slow down or speed up. For the race though we decided that we'd try to stick together and for some cheesy reason we even decided to high-five at every mile.

High Five Kris!

The high-fiving for all its silliness and simplicity actually made the race a lot of run. We managed to high-five at every mile marker up until mile 12 (the big hill up to Balboa Park). After mile 12 Kris charged on up the hill and I slowed down to a walk. Ironically by the time I got to the top of the hill I was recharged and plowed towards the finish line. Kris on the other hand was fairly taxed and slowed down a bit.. and we ended up finishing only 10 seconds apart! Unfortunately we didn't get to high-five across the finish line, but the race was still a lot of fun.

Jenna - PF Chang's Rock N Roll Half-Marathon - Jan '06

Jenna and I ran our first race together not too long after we started working together. Our first race was the Susan G. Komen 5K in Phoenix. We ended up arriving late to the start, not being able to find parking, and having to run through the second wave of walkers to break through to the running pack. We were so late for the race that our finish time wasn't even recorded because we started so late! Oh well, it was still a lot of fun and the start of our tardy racing career!

We next ran the Lost Dutchman 10K in Apache Junction, AZ and we both placed in our divisions! And there were hundreds in each division! Ha ha, okay, there weren't, but we still beat out a number of slower chicks in each of our age groups. We then ran the Cave Creek Luminaria run which is a cool night race through hills where the path is lit up by Luminarias. By this race Jenna was hooked and she wanted to go for a half-marathon! I gave her a copy of my previous year's training schedule and she started training for the half while I trained for the full. We unfortunately didn't get to see each other the day of the race but it was still fun to do the run together in spirit.

Cave Creek Luminaria Run

Gnomer Simpson & Gnomeo Watching the Race

We ran the Lost Dutchman and the Cave Creek runs the following year, along with the New Times 10K, Iron Girl 10 Miler, and the Pat Tillman run a couple times. Throughout my my years in AZ Jenna was my constant racing buddy! I kept hoping that she'd get the marathon bug and want to train for a full with me, but I guess insanity doesn't bite all of us. :o)

New Times 10K - Phoenix

Over the years it has been so much fun for me to see my friends start to get into distance running the way I have. Running (and racing specifically) is one of the things that I enjoy most in life, and I'm so happy to share that joy with other people.

Next Up - Christina - Nike Women's Half-Marathon - Oct'09

Another good friend of mine is actually about to run her first half-marathon this coming weekend. Christina started training with a group in San Francisco (she missed out on my world famous plan!) and is preparing to run the Nike Women's Half-Marathon on October 18th!

Good luck Christina!

For anyone else who has ever thought about training for a half-marathon, I totally encourage it! Before I started training for my first race I had never run more than a few miles. Running even 10 miles seemed crazy to me. Running 13 seemed even crazier, and running a full marathon was beyond my comprehension. With the right training plan and support though, I think its possible for anyone who dedicates themselves to be able to complete a full or half marathon. The training is long and takes a lot of dedication, but when you cross the finish line the first time (or second, or third), its really an amazing feeling and I truly think it changes your life.