Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

This morning I overslept and my favorite pants weren't clean so I was late and I had to wear the black ones that gather lint. I hate being late.

At work I was scheduled to move to a new desk, close to the window, with one short wall and a glorious view of the outside world. They got my PC and phone moved and I had started unloading my boxes when someone showed up with a bunch of tools and informed me no one was allowed to have short walls anymore. I had to stand by and watch the glorious sunlight be slowly and surely obstructed from my seat. I hate dark cubicles.

Then I had to scrunch all my belongings to one corner while they disassembled my entire desk to put up the new walls, even though no one has been sitting there for weeks and they could have made the change long before all my things had been moved in. I had a lot of work to do and none of it got done because I spent most of the day without a desk or computer or phone. I hate wasting time.

When it was finally time for lunch, I was excited to eat a turkey sandwich with honey mustard. I love honey mustard. When I asked for it, the server told me there was no honey mustard today, only plain old mustard. I'm sure they never run out of plain, stinky mustard. I hate plain mustard.

Then I was late for a meeting, my pen ran out of ink, someone ate the last chocolate, and when they moved the shelf in my cubicle all my books fell on the floor.

I finally got my desk back, sat down, and saw that my phone extension had been changed. They changed it back but acted like I didn't know what I was talking about. I hate when people act like you don't know what you're talking about.

When I got home, the house was cold, I remembered I hadn't cooked chicken to make soup, and I had to eat lima beans for dinner. I hate lima beans.

It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. But I guess some days are like that. Even in Australia.

I did it!

On Saturday I ran the St. George Marathon. It was my first marathon, and I entered the race lottery mostly because I didn't think I'd get in this year. I wasn't really convinced a marathon was something I wanted to do. I love half marathons, but pushing your body 26.2 miles is a whole different level of crazy. I did get in (obviously) and I spent the first two months of training looking for an excuse not to run it. But after running the TOU half in August, I got my race motivation back. I spent the next month worrying that I wouldn't be able to run. (And naturally, because I'm a hypochondriac I found 900 things wrong with myself. I was sure I had a stress fracture when my calf hurt during one run and that I was getting swine flu when my allergies flared up one day.)

I expected a marathon to be hard, but it was even tougher than I expected. I'm kind of proud of that, because I know part of what made it so much more difficult than my past races or training runs was that I pushed myself. So much so that when it was over I didn't have anything left - I just planted myself on a random patch of lawn until I could walk again. But I made my goal of running the whole time - no walking - and I shattered my "reasonable" goal of a 4:15 time. I even broke my "ultimate" goal of 4 hours and finished in 3:53! It was physically painful some of the time and I had to play mental games to keep myself motivated, but I did it. There's such a sense of satisfaction that come from conquering truly tough stuff.

I've had a couple people ask me if I was disappointed in having missed qualifying for Boston by mere minutes (well, 13...that's kind of a lot to shave off, but anyway...). I'm totally not. First of all, 3:53 is way better than I ever expected to do and you bet I'm proud of myself. But second, if you qualified for the Boston Marathon, wouldn't you feel like you should run it? I'm glad I ran this one, but I'm definitely not planning to make a habit of it. Now if you're looking for a half-marathon buddy on the other hand...give me a few weeks and let me know :)

Pink ribbon and kissing

OK, so I haven't actually taught a Primary lesson yet, but I'm completely in love with my class. There's nothing like hearing little voices belt out the first verse of "How Firm a Foundation" (yes, they're like 5 years old) to win your heart. We're going to be just fine. Thanks everyone for the kiddo advice. As a side note, this week the kids taught me that parents have to sleep in the same room because their beds are stuck together. And apparently some parents KISS! Oh the scandal.

Finally, I bought pink ribbon for my hair today and am now officially ready for my first-ever marathon (gotta have that bow)!

Help

I was just thinking the other day about how comfortable I've gotten in the grown-up world. It seems like ages since I worked as a nanny (or any kind of babysitter) and the days at the orphanage in Ecuador seem more a part of my college life than my current one. I have a grown-up job, go to a grown-up ward where I teach a grown-up class...and I like it. I've gotten very comfortable in my adult environment.

...and then they called me to teach Primary. And not just the kids who are practically teenagers already, but the ones who just came from Sunbeams (the youngest kids in Primary). They're 5ish (some are 4 I think) and I am feeling way out of my grown-up realm. For someone who babysat as my high school job and immediately after college ran off to Ecuador to teach some more kids, I'm feeling ridiculously new to this kiddo thing.

I used to be really good with kids. A lot of them even listened to me. But all of a sudden I'm afraid I'll be a total failure and my class will be flying off in all directions out of control and when their parents ask them what they learned in Primary they'll just stare at them blankly.

So, um...ideas for calming wild kids (in English)? Best way to bribe a 5 year old? I never thought I'd be the one to ask advice for teaching a class of pre-school aged kids. I mean, I (mostly) successfully wrangled at least 10 at a time in a certain South American country, right? I'm searching desperately for reassurance here, somebody throw me a bone!

Mailbox

Dear St. George Marathon,

BRING IT.

Sincerely,
Kate

For the weather gods, fortune, luck, etc. etc.,

Please don't jinx me for the above throwdown. I'm well aware the outcome of this race rests on a lot more than my ability to run like a crazy person/utter lack of common sense. I'm just sayin', barring any injuries, catastrophic weather, food poisoning, etc...I AM READY.

Hugs and kisses (and whatever else will prevent ridiculous wind or an ankle twist),
Determined Runner Chick

Dear friends I've made from the running club the past couple weeks,

You rock. Thanks for reminding me how fun running is and pushing me to run faster and farther. And for keeping up more than your share of conversation after mile 15 or so to keep my mind off my legs. Keep running, cheering, pushing, and may all you crazies who want to do this in Boston make your goal.

Thank you,
That One Girl You Ran With That One Time

A plea to city planners everywhere

About once a month at work, I spend a couple of hours addressing birthday cards for our employees. This means I get a very close look at hundreds of addresses, mostly in Utah, and I'm noticing an alarming trend. There are several streets/cul-de-sacs/avenues/etc. that are using multiple types of street identification (for lack of a better term). For example, I would expect to see "Horsetail Trail" or "Horsetail Lane," but "Horsetail Trail Lane?" That's just redundant. What gets really ridiculous is when some city planner (or whoever the heck comes up with this stuff) gets all long-winded naming apartment complex roads. And it's even worse when it's so far south that the street number alone is unusually long. And THEN, the complex comes up with some absurd numbering system

For example: 126077 South Wasatch Rim Trail Avenue #13766 - D (not someone's real address but based on an actual pattern). Are you kidding me? It barely fits on the envelope (and looks really weird if the person's name is something tiny like Cal Brown). And are there really 13,766 units in this complex? Doubtful. Even if there were, I don't think adding the letter "D" is really going to help anyone find it.

People. Coming up with a longer name for your street doesn't make you sound richer or smarter or better educated. If we change the above to 126077 S Wasatch Rim #12 will anyone go to bed hungry? I thought not. Based on the...unusual...habits about naming children we see in Utah, I'm thinking this is a regional thing, am I right?

I realize this is kind of a weird thing to be bothered by, but I think it reflects an unfortunate lack of self-restraint in our modern culture of grammar and naming conventions. Also, I don't want to someday have to buy a ridiculously large mailbox just because I live at 543210 West Crimson Sunset View Point Lane Road.

Blonde bridge blunder

Earlier this month, Steve and I drove to Arizona for a friend's wedding. We decided to go the Vegas route and check out the strip since I hadn't been there in years (and I probably won't go back for years - I know the rest of Vegas is probably a lovely place, but I maintain the strip is just bizarre...like a cracked-out Disneyland). We stayed the night to break up the drive and early the next morning we headed over Hoover Dam and on to Phoenix.

There was construction everywhere, especially driving near the dam (of course during which time I heard every "dam" joke Steve could concoct) where they are building a new bridge. Steve, having passed that way more often than I have, knew all about the bridge construction. When you read the conversation below, you'll understand why, following said conversation, Steve told me I had to blog it. It's only fair, since I have called out some of his more impressive moments here.

Steve: Wow, that's going to be weird to drive over.
Me: What? The bridge?
Steve: Yep.
Me: Drive on that thing? No way! It's way too steep - they can't have cars drive on that!
Steve: Um...
Me: Seriously! You'd never make it up the side.
Steve: Yeah...so that's the support for the bridge. They're going to put the actual bridge on top.

Oh.

Yep, in my foggy early-morning daze, I thought this was the actual BRIDGE (sorry for the weird angle - we were driving):




Good thing I'm not an engineer. You can see my concern though, were this the actual bridge, yes?