Oh, brother.

It's been a while since I updated you on several of my bajillion brothers. Wouldn't you love to know how they're fairing?
Johnny is settled in to his new home and school in Kentucky, a-studying away. He's not a-working away because he hasn't found a job. His qualifications ("I can do tai kwon do and have a bachelors in Bible and bench press 450") are hard to match in this troubled economy, but his wife has found work.
Nate is not only a graduate student in PA now, but he is also teaching freshman classes. This is a terrifying thought to me. If I walked in and saw this youngster with lunatic hair at the front of the room I'd march right down to the registrar's with a drop slip. He loves the area and his classes, but I think the teaching is more time-consuming than he thought. to my surprise, hasn't died at his own hand yet, but he has changed cell phone providers twice and locked himself out of the house once. That child is a walking disaster. I forgot how stressful it was having him around until our last phone call - then I was fretting for his safety again. He definitely brings out the mother hen in me.
I don't know how Joey is because his free minutes start at 9 and I often get out of work at 10. I can't coordinate calls. I hope he's still alive.
Abe's last cross country meet was last week, and he has more free time now which he is spending with strep throat. Remarkably, he came over to my house and asked in passing where he should get his prescription filled. Um, Abe? I'm a pharmacist! By the way, he saw the nurse practitioner on campus and she wrote his prescription with, you guessed it, an error. A biggie - she dosed penicillin twice daily, which essentially makes it ineffective (I will not go into detail about which antibiotics depend on TIME the minimum killing concentration is exceeded versus LEVEL by which killing concentration is exceeded, but it matters). I was able to call and correct it, and she was sweet about it and actually thanked me since she had no idea that the dosing interval mattered, but I stand by my opinion of nurse practitioners. In general, they do not have enough training to write prescriptions.
Sam, Izzy, and Matthew are all hanging at the house doing school and other growing-up things, I presume. I asked them to join me for an upcoming race and got snubbed. Stinkers.
I think that's everyone. Sometimes I leave one or two out.
Now I'm off to pack for our trip. I wish all the right clothes would just hop in my suitcase by themselves!

I'm Gonna Be a Part of It!!!!!!!!!!

Imagine me singing this loudly in the late evening hours in my best attempt to get the neighbors back for throwing up in our mutual alley.

This week we're headed to NYC! Our trip will include a visit to some dear friends in Phillie, a marathon in Pennsylvania (Here is the website. Sweet long sleeved T!), and several days in New York City.
Does anyone have any must-do or must-eat suggestions? I'm a little obsessed with food so restaurant recommendations would be appreciated. We don't have much of a schedule yet, but we have statue of liberty tickets and some Broadway plans.
I'll be doing lots of walking (obviously) and recovering from a marathon, so I

decided that comfortable shoes were in order. I went to Target to buy comfortable, sensible shoes - the kind that feature shapeless toes and some kind of elastic section in the upper. you know the type. Instead I got these boots, which are very comfy. They are also the largest size shoe I have ever owned, running shoes included. I wear an 8.5 shoe and a 9.5 running shoe. These boots are TENS. They must run really small!



Now that I'm all shoe'd up for the trip, your tips and hints would be great so I'm all ears for your NYC stories! Thanks!

Fall back!

I lied about my outfit for this weekend. I am actually wearing this:

(From here)
It's freezing up in here! But I can't turn the heat on because I dropped a battery down the furnace last June and I'm pretty sure if I turn on the heat we'll all die in a fiery explosion.
*****
The daylight savings time has distressed and confused my dear father in law, who sent me the following email:

"Dr. Grace:

My wife of almost forty years (not counting six years of too lengthy courtship) and I were having an important conversation this morning. We know that it is "Spring Forward--Fall Back", but we were having a hard time figuring out how we would be feeling when we woke up Sunday morning. Would we feel like we had awakened too early, or would we feel overly sleepy? We processed it for a good while and then we went back to sleep. Please, tell us the answer to how we will feel when we wake up on Sunday morning.

Chief"

Any answers for the man? It sounds like global amnesia might be setting in again.

What are you wearing this weekend?

Me? For once I'm not wearing spandex and a slightly stinky T. That's right, no race this weekend.
So instead I'm going to wear one of these cute outfits:
Old-fashioned twill house dress, paired with almond-toe pumps (or maryjanes if I feel like going all-out 1940's). This dress begs for pearls, and I might wear one of my regular strings of pearls, or this double coral strand I wore all summer. See those wrinkles? That's straight out of the dryer. If I tumble it for a minute they'll go away. Love it.
The dress was $10 at my local 5 and dime.

I also have this cozy sweater dress with my favorite cowl neckline. Unfortunately you probably can't see the neckline because it looks like I took this photo in a dungeon. It's short enough to need tights, and I'll probably wear these kind of cowboy suede boots. Yes, I'm mixing brown and black. I'm a big fan of mixing the two - it prevents a monochromatic nightmare (for some reason this only afflicts dark-haired people; blonds automatically have color relief. Brunettes? Watch the all-black or all-brown scenario!). I have stacks of gold-tone bangles and some pretty gold earrings. I got this dress at the same store, same price.

Because I'm cheap, people!
What are you wearing this weekend...and for what event? Do you dress up on weekends or schlep around the house in sweats and your oldest T-shirt?

It's catching!

I have succeeded in persuading not one, but TWO of my coworkers to run an upcoming half marathon with me. One started with a baseline of four miles. The other? Just one! That's as far as she could go comfortably. Her schedule is also complicated because she is in school and working, so time is limited. She can only run three days a week. I started her out with one mile as her long run and walk-run combos for the other two days. By now she's up to seven miles this weekend, but she skipped last week (I have already voiced my anger...). We'll see how she progresses!
My other coworker shouldn't have too much of a problem. She's run before as part of a boot-camp style workout; they incorporate running at least once a week. But this is only her second race and the first one was a slow trail 3 miler that she finished in over 45 minutes. So a half marathon is still a step up.
I made training schedules for both and now I get to harass them about it at work every single day!
We're a running pharmacy now!
Did you start running in order to complete a race? Or did you start racing 'cause you already ran? Or do you not run and wish I'd shut up about it?

New Orleans Politics

You know you live in New Orleans when...
- The fact that there are two - count them, TWO - Republicans on the ballot is cause for shock, outrage, protest, and a beer.
- Your husband prompts you to vote early because "This is a really important election because I grew up with that judge and we have to vote for her."
- "Vote early, vote often" is a rule to live by, and nobody is being sarcastic.
- If your name's not French or vaguely Spanish you might as well just hang it up.
- Your dog is a registered voter.
- Your candidate for city council takes his kids to Cooter Brown's to watch the game.
- A woman is voting topless because they took her Obama shirt away.
- There are ten amendments to the state constitution on the ballot. Crazy civil law.
- The ladies at your polling station recognize you and motion you over to their table.
- You're unsure about your voting precinct, but you sure as hell know your ward!!
- There aren't any registered Republicans anywhere because only Democrats and independents can vote in the primaries. Because there are only Democrat primaries. Because there are only Democratic politicians.
- A customer at work fervently presses your hand and tells you to send Bush home. This happened today.
- Someone is "helpfully" showing illiterate adults how to vote using a sample ballot just blocks from the polling sight.
- Your neighbor has a suspicious number of "I voted" stickers on his lapel.
- At least a dozen people wrote Drew Brees in.

Got to love it. Now, like the rest of the city, I'm watching results with a glass of something strong ;)

I hope you voted IF YOU RESEARCHED AND UNDERSTOOD THE ISSUES. And if you didn't, I hope you prudently stayed home.
Did you vote? Were there any particularly important issues for you this year?

Jazz Half recap...and language learning!

Saturday I proved my insanity by running the Jazz Half marathon two days after a 20 miler. Oh, and I ran TO the race. Yeah. That was somewhere around 5.5 miles so I ran about 18.5 on Saturday. In costume. 
Race review: I really like the Jazz Half. It is a pretty course, flat (duh), lots of spectators, and since it is Halloween weekend some runners are in costume. The after party features excellent live music and the race benefits Children's Hospital. My only complaint is that the start is really crowded and slow for such a small race. It took me 2 minutes to get to the start and much of my first mile was walking/dodging. But that's really no big deal.
Race recap: Felt like crap the whole way. Super slow, upset tummy, exhausted. I think my muscles were fine; I was just actually tired! I hadn't gotten a full nights sleep all week and I woke up at 4:15 the morning of the race. I was hoping to go slow and have fun in costume, but I didn't have as much fun as I could have since I was trying not to throw up for 13 miles. Oh well, poor planning. I knew my time wouldn't be good (wasn't running for time), but I don't like running a marathon after a bad race. It'll make me nervous!
*** I take a break from scheduled blogging to report that my neighbors, who got in a street brawl with a passer-by yesterday who called the cops on them, are now in our shared alley barfing their brains out. I love my college neighborhood.***
So anyway (I am now typing as loudly as I can to block out the sounds of retching) I came to a decision on a language to learn: French it is! I picked French because I visited my brothers and stole a "French for Dummies" book they had. I'm using Rosetta Stone because it's free for my husband to use with his work, but I like to have a phrase book as back up. I've have learned exactly nothing yet, but you can expect posts to be in French in a few days. Ha! Not!
Off to work for me. How was everyone's Halloween?