Madison Weekend

I have been looking forward to my weekend in Madison for the past 7 months! Less so for the actual 26.2 miles, but more for all of the fun with all my favesies Wisconsin chicks! After consulting google maps the day before I left, I learned that Madison was actually 7 hours away instead of the 5 1/2 that I originally thought.  Woof.

Friday

I started out at 8am on Friday morning after a quick stop at Starbucks for caffeine and ice water. Hydration FTW. Armed with 5 audiobooks for a 14 hour round trip drive, I was ready to go!

Roughly a bazillion hours later (and 2 confusing roundabouts later, seriously, roundabouts?? I don't *get* the point of you) I arrived on Krista's doorstep. We decided to head to the expo and then grab some dinner.

Great pic and backdrop, wind you're a turd.

Next up was dinner. Amazing beer and cheese curds? Yes please. This trip is already off to a great start.



After dinner it was back to Chateau Kbug for pajamas and NaNoWriMo time.



While hydrating.



Saturday
Saturday we woke up, Krista went for a shake out run like a good little PR star (check out her recap, dare you not to get teary eyed) and I hit the foam roller with coffee in hand. I like to think that Krista had this green mug on hand just for this Team Green member.

We had big plans Saturday afternoon to see the newly remodeled downtown public library (squeeeee!), do some more NaNo writing, and just see some of the sites.

Our first stop was Panera for lunch #1. Technically it could be considered breakfast, but I had a cookie, so let's pretend it was lunch #1, ok? Then it was off to the library. Gorgeous gorgeous library. Poor kbug was hauling around a 97 pound laptop so she wasn't enjoying the 5 story library (!!!) tour nearly as much as I was, and I was trying to limit my time on my feet, so I didn't spend nearly as much time gawking and photographing as I would've liked on a non-marathon eve day. There was an entire FLOOR for the Children's department, and that alone was bigger than my ENTIRE LIBRARY. Just amazing.

We wrote for quite awhile (or I did, Krista showed her ragey side via twitter of all the loud and obnoxious people in the library, hah) and I finally hit 10k+ words! Days late, but still! MILESTONES!

We swung by the expo again to again contemplate buying merchandise, and paused to enjoy the Capital a bit on the way there.

This little cheese store caught my eye and after laughing out loud I had to snap a pic. #genius



Yes, <3 WI



After our tour of downtown, we went back to Krista's to wait for Anne's arrival! We had plans to go to a neighbor's apartment and cook a big pasta feed for dinner. Meanwhile, to settle my pre-race nervous stomach, when in Wisconsin, amiright?



Dinner was amazing and so much fun to spend an evening with a bunch of runner girls without having to wait an hour for a table and another hour and a half for dinner, all the while panicking about eating far too late the night before a marathon (yes this happens to me every time!)

Sunday

Race Recap

Immediately after the race, Renee and Jen went to grab us a table at a nearby restaurant, while we went to grab non-sweaty clothes out of Krista's car. I have no problem doing some post-race celebrating without a shower in this kind of weather, but on a normal weather day?? No. Freakin'. Way. A quick changeroo and we were off to lunch and to watch the PACKERS game. I was on such a post-race high that Jen and Renee were kind enough to shield me from our updated quarterback situation, thanks gals, much appreciated.




























We sat down and I had been thinking about a bloody mary and a spotted cow the entire race, so I had to order both, and double fist. Mmmm. Unfortunately the food tasted really off to me, so the drinks were the most enjoyable part of the meal. But the company more than made up for it!




My twin Anne.



Rest assured, I did have the meal of my lifetime later Sunday night when Kbug and I hit up a Mexican food place and had a life changing chimichanga and an entire trough of guacamole. Mmmm.... I'm still dreaming about it.

Best race host everrrrrrr.

Monday

I was lucky to have Monday off from work to start to make my trek back to SoDak. I almost had a major accident when I tried to leave without all of my delicious Wisconsin beers in Kbug's fridge! Luckily we both remembered at the same time, and we were reunited. I also had the genius idea to grab some beers on my way out of town while fueling up. So I was that girl getting 12 beers at 10am on a Monday morning. NBD.

Until next time Wisconsin!

10k Race Pics and En Route to Madison

Today I'm en route to Madison, Wisconsin for the Madison Marathon, and more importantly TO SEE KRISTA, RENEE, AND JEN! I feel like I've known Krista and Renee for roughly a million years, but we've never actually met in person, which is weird, I guess. Jen and I met up in Vegas a few years back, and she's so sweet and awesome, she would've been even more awesome if she had come and talked to me at Curly's Pub when I was eating at the bar all by my lonesome for my first marathon, but whatevs, I've totally forgiven her for that (#stillholdingagrudge).

I've always felt like I belong in Wisconsin (or Oregon, if we're being completely honest), and prior to landing my current job at my dream South Dakota library, I was constantly following Wisconsin library job postings. I'd like to think that if I someday get my wish and end up in Packers country, I'll get to run with these girls (and watch many Packers games whilst drinking Spotted Cow and eating cheese curds, yes I am 20 lbs. heavier in this scenario, thanks for asking!) as much as I'd want, aka all the time.

Krista is going to dominate the full and is sweet enough to let me crash at her place and be my "host" for the weekend. She's also NaNoWriMo-ing so there may be moments of writing furiously while I'm there. There's also talks of visiting a newly remodeled library, be still my beating heart! (P.S. Ask me post-race what my finishing prediction time is for K-bug, I don't want to jinx anything, but I'm pretty sure I'm right!)

Jen and Renee are going to be spectators extraordinaire, and I've already put in a bazillion requests to Renee, they are as follows:

1) Jordy Nelson
2) Your garmin, in the event it's a cloudy day and my battery dies asap
3) Spotted Cow beer (preferably snuck in to the post-race finishers chute. The post-race beer selection is less than appealing. Bonus points for dixie cups of it along the course...just sayin'....)

I think that was it! Just a small list... NBD.

I've also analyzed the course map and written down mile markers that I plan to "suggest" that they cheer at. I'M BOSSY THIS IS WHAT I DO. But really I did it with them in mind as well, I wanted them to be at spots that I *think* would be easy to see us quickly at another spot on the course as well. We'll see since they obviously know the area a lot better than I do. I'm just looking forward to having race spectators on the course for a full this has never happened before!! 

Ok, that's enough race obsessing.

No wait! It isn't. I have a cold. That should be neat. It was knocking on my immune systems door last week and I finally came down with it on Saturday, basically thought I was dying. I said, that's cool, make yourself at home for 72 hours, and then you're out on your ass, cold. Well, unless this cold is TERRIBLE AT MATH, it has severely overstayed its welcome. Thank goodness I'm not in PR shape, or I'd be freaking the eff out.

Ok, now THAT'S enough race obsessing. On to the pics!

The 10k race I did 2 weekends ago posted 500 photos to their facebook page this week. I decided to pan through them to see if I could spot a flash of green. Even better than a green frog were these two:

I die of preciousness.

Even more so if Kyle had been dressed as a storm trooper or darth vader or something.

You can almost see the "Go Mom Go #teamgreen" Conversation bubble hovering over their heads, right??!?!?

This one was shortly after the start, and I look fast, which is neat. This was certainly the portion when I was all "Wheeee sub 7 pace is super eeeeeeeasy!" lolz.

And then you might end up letting Pi beat you to the finish because of that sub 7 pace start. But in my defense, this chick passed me around mile 4, and I reeled her in big time that last mile and a half. She's actually the reason I hit sub 7 paces at the finish. Competitive Jeri FTW (except not the win, obvs.)

And this is just all sorts of LOLZ. Running hard is hard, you guys....