Zeitgeist!

I know what you are thinking - what the heck is Zeitgeist? Well first of all let me give you a pronunciation guide its said Zeit - like Z-ite (as in kite)-guy-st. Wikipedia says "Zeitgeist- is originally a German expression that means "the spirit of the age", literally translated as "time (Zeit) spirit (Geist)".

What does Zeitgeist mean to me? Well its 13.1 miles of craziness including two hills with total elevation change of 1,180 ft. Why do I do it? I don't even know. But it was the 2nd year in a row so I must like it I guess!

This year was really fun because I had a great group of friends run it with me, which included one of my favorite old roommates Sara who came down from UofI to run it with me. Sara actually did awesome and finished 3rd in our age group. As for me? Well unfortunately I was sick all week and didn't run and admittedly really had no business being out there - but I beat my time from last year and crossed that line!

Resourcesfullness!

Forget hints from Heloise, bring on super duper useful hints from Abbey! OK, so it might not be so useful to most people, because lets face it, most of you probably have a decent vacuum. And those of you who don't probably at least have good carpet. Well, unfortunately we have neither. So what happens on a Friday night when your trying to clean and you can't get these stupid green fibers left over from your roommates Halloween costumes off the floor? You say to your roommate "Hey Mary, do you think if I put duct tape on my feet and stomped around it would come up" "Yeah probably, " she says. So I think about it some more and finally decide to give it a shot. So here are my handy dandy instructions for removing crappy fibers that are ground into crappy carpet:



Step 1: Wrap your foot in tape. OK, so I was hoping for duct tape, but I had to resort to whatever I could find. Oh and make sure you have scissors in hand.









Step 2: Stomp all over the floor. Hint -Stay on your tiptoes where there isn't stuff you want to pick up.












Step 3: Check out all the stuff you've picked up! If the tape starts not to stick anymore, start over at Step 1.

Halloween!

Well I must admit that I don't generally get too excited about dressing up for Halloween. I guess I have a fear of looking foolish. However, this year it looked like I didn't have much of a choice. For some reason there seemed to be an extra abundant supply of activities and parties where dressing up was required. But still, with my general hesitation to dress up, its no wonder it took me up until the day before to figure out what I was going to do.

So it wasn't too original, but I figured I would just use what I got and that's how I ended up a disco star. Yeah, turns out my hair can actually make a pretty decent afro with enough gel, hairspray, some serious blow drying and some treacherous teasing. Normally I don't have a tender head, but let me tell you trying to pick that mess out was brutal! I was somewhat worried about the hair because the whole outfit kinda depended on it, but it worked out great don't ya think!

Anyway, I also took some old cords from the DI and added some "vents" to them and used the extra fabric for a headband. My roommate Jordan did my makeup and with some jewelry the outfit was complete! It was actually a lot of fun - but I think I'll stick to my normal everyday hair from now on.

OPERATION PUMPKIN

So my cute roommate, Mary, has pumpkin decorations all over the house... 14 of them to be exact. They are the cute type of Halloween decorations, not the scary ones, and they make our apartment look pretty festive. Well, a few weeks ago our friend Adam was over and he made some comments about our pumpkins, although he insisted he wasn't making fun of them. The next week he was back and this time he walks in and the first thing he says is "Oh, lets count how many pumpkins there are!" (That's how I know there are 14, and lets be honest some of them are collages of pumpkins and they are all small so its not like a pumpkin patch in our apartment.)

Well, so having a slightly devious mind, I start to vision putting pumpkins all over his house. The next day as we were driving over there to watch the football game, I tell Mary "I wish we knew where his outlet switch was outside because it would be funny to hang up pumpkin lights". Well we walk up to the house, and there in plain sight is the outlet! SCORE!

So all week I search and search for pumpkin lights and we end up with a nice stash of goods; pumpkin lights on a string, one that hangs on the window, some real mini-pumpkins, and some little pumpkin candy holders - a total of 20 pumpkins in all.

Tonight was the night.. Operation Pumpkin! We knew Adam and his roommate, Dan, would be playing basketball and it was our perfect opening. So off we went! From the pictures you can't really tell how many pumpkins are there, but its pretty cute. And now we wait to hear the reaction.... I can't wait!

Orthotics

For some reason that seems to make me think of old people... yet today, I was fitted for orthotics. Yes I laid on a doctors table while he made a plaster cast of my feet so that I could turn over $380 for some insoles that are supposed to make me run better. OK well let me back up, why do I even need orthotics? Well one of the after effects of running a marathon, for me, was shooting pains in my right foot. The pains came and went and some days I could run fine, but the next day I would hobble around. So I broke down and went to the foot doctor. The result? He tells me I have high arches. Duh. I could have told you that. You might think by looking at the picture of my calves that I lift weights, but that would be untrue. I was gifted with high arches and the consequence? Huge, tight calves that I want to shoot off after just about every run I go on! Now I should say that all this running definitely helped define my calves and they weren't like that before running. And don't get me wrong, I have grown to love them - except when I can't find hooker boots to fit and my jeans won't pull on cause they won't go over my calves. Other than that its great getting referred to as calf girl. A friend (male) was even over a couple of weeks ago and we had to measure to see who's was biggest. I won by 1/2 an inch (ps he is a rugby dude, biker, pretty decently fit guy).

So what happens now? I get orthotics. Will my calves shrink? Probably. So I take a picture and say goodbye (hey a girls gotta have proof so one day when my teenage sons start thinking they are all that I can show them the picture and say, "oh yeah, well back in the day your mom had 17 1/2 inch calves!"

So my adventure of letting my body "learn" how to walk or whatever will begin in a few weeks. I'll keep ya updated.....