Today’s morning tour brought us to the Vatican Museum. We had a very good tour guide who used something that comes in very handy in Rome---the microphone that transmits to individual radios held by each tourist. It was a little crackly but an excellent way of communicating in a place like the Vatican, where there are just too many tour groups for people to be shouting over each other.
As far as most people are concerned, the Vatican Museum tour might as well be called “The Sistine Chapel and a Bunch of Other Stuff.” But much of what is in the “other stuff” is quite fascinating and does a good job of illustrating the artistic and political relationship between the Catholic Church and Rome.
One thing you notice a lot going through Rome is that along with the date in Roman numerals, most buildings of a certain age have a pope’s name, preceded by “PM” or “Pont. Max.” This goes back to the Latin for “high priest” and originated in Pagan times, but the title was carried over for the reigning pope, most notably in the 16th through 19th century. Even buildings like the Colosseum carry the names of Popes who undertook restoration projects (which, to me, kind of goes against the idea of restoration). At the Vatican, you see over and over again the great art that was commissioned during the Renaissance by powerful popes as well as the impressive collections they amassed from previous periods.
The Vatican’s Official Shooshers have a daunting task: to keep people quiet. Though you’re reminded numerous times that there is no talking or photography of any kind allowed in the Sistine Chapel, it turns out to be a rather loud room with a number of flashes going off. However I must point that it is rather easy to forget the no talking rule as I found out when we first entered the Sistine Chapel. I was so awed that I kept looking up and then at Daniel and couldn’t help but say I can’t believe we are actually here! So a handful of men in suits walk around saying, “Shhh!” and giving scornful looks to people who take pictures. And really, it’s not like you’re going to take a better picture of the chapel than one that could be found on a post card. Your time is best spent just taking it all in.
Michaelangelo’s nine scenes from Genesis on the ceiling and final judgment on a short wall are absolutely magnificent, but the two long walls, painted by well-known artists from the same time period, are great as well. One side shows six scenes from the life of Moses, while the other shows six scenes from the life of Jesus. They are not chronological---I think they are meant to parallel each other, or at least that’s what the Latin verbiage around them seems to suggest. That’s right, he even knows a little Latin which is definitely another plus in Italy. That’s three languages that he works his way around if you are paying attention. Like me.
A quick aside, one of my favorite things to see plastered all over the place was four little letters, SPQR. I learned in Latin class that this stands for Senatus Populusque Romanus, which stresses the link between the Roman people and the government in the old Roman Republic. SPQR was on a purple shield that was in the back of the classroom, and it was burned into my brain. It is really cool to see it all over Rome.
Lunch was good but not great. Brandi had a buffet that included mostly vegetables, and I had fried veggies and a cheese pizza. I would like to point out that my half bottle of wine and Daniel’s Coke were each 3 euros which is good enough excuse as any for me to have a drink at lunch. We took an afternoon break in the hotel room, and Brandi got in touch with her parents, closing the last chapter on the uncertainty under which we started the trip. They are without power, but they’re all right, which is pretty much the story with all of our families. Brandi also took a nap, her second in as many days, but she wants to make it clear that this was not due to jet lag. Nope, no jet lag, I was just enjoying the opportunity to sleep during the day, thank you very much for the clarification!
For dinner we decided to try Il Posto Accanto, a restaurant a decent distance away that was recommended by Lonely Planet. Despite some pretty hard rain, we decided to walk it, and I ended up getting us lost in a not so great part of town. We did have one umbrella that we tried to share but it was interesting (read: near impossible) with the tiny height difference between us. But it definitely felt like an adventure which is worth getting a little wet for any day. Rome can be tough to navigate because a) the roads tend to be short, at odd angles, and prone to changing names every couple blocks, b) street names are not always displayed where you would want them to be, and c) landmarks are not entirely helpful. They provide a good visual cue, but they often have ten or so streets radiating out from them, and you sometimes have to travel a couple blocks to discover you’re gone down the wrong one.
The restaurant is basically a little house with seating for about 20, and the waiter told us the menu verbally but did give us a hard copy when we requested one. We surveyed the unconventional menu and started with a pumpkin ravioli, thinking that we might leave and have a more traditional “second dinner” at a nearby place. But we were impressed with the homemade quality and decided to stay, finishing with pumpkin-covered pork and a side of eggplant. Now reading this it sounds funny that we ate more pumpkin in one meal than I usually eat in Thanksgiving, but it was delicious! We then walked to the Colosseum, which is incredibly beautiful (romantic) at night, and back to our hotel via the Trevi Fountain and Spanish Steps. We left the Spanish Steps just in time---a crazy man broke a bottle in some sort of dispute and started yelling random craziness.
We got up at about 6:00 and headed down to our hotel breakfast at about 7:00. Many American breakfast favorites, like eggs and bacon, were not available, but there were some breakfast cereals there to cater to American tastes. Italians don’t eat big breakfasts---a typical breakfast consists of a cappuccino and a pastry which isn’t really my cup of tea so I decided the protein bars I brought would be the way to go for me on most mornings!
Our morning tour today was called “Classical Rome,” and it picked up at 8:00. While Brandi waited inside, I stood outside and looked around. A woman came up and asked me (in Italian) where something was, and I told her, “Non parlo italiano, mi dispiace.” That was my most complete Italian sentence so far this trip! I also saw a big tour bus loading up with people from our hotel. There seem to be two activities that occupy the guests at our hotel: getting onto and off of tour buses during the day and sitting at our hotel’s bar and chatting with each other at night. It could be a generational thing, but it seems like a lot of the adventure of going to a new place comes from getting lost, screwing up the language, and otherwise making yourself uncomfortable. Of course, there’s a spectrum along which people are going to immerse themselves into a culture, but I would say that saying “buon giorno” and “grazie” is pretty much a bare minimum. Surprisingly, they’re not in everyone’s game plan.
Anyway, I was very excited when our ride pulled up and it was not a giant bus but a smallish van, with a couple of British couples and a Spanish couple. So I was a little disappointed to find out that this van was just shuttling us to a bigger bus, and that English speakers and Spanish speakers were segregated onto different buses. Oh well---it was good for tour logistics, if not for my dreams of a United Nations tour of Rome.
The tour was a great one, filled with lots of information and amazing views. We first saw the Trevi Fountain, which we had already seen, but I was more than happy to visit again. I had a nice mini-conversation with a man from Spain. His English was very limited, but he knew enough to tell me he had been to New York and DC in the spring. Just a little tidbit, it was especially sexy to watch and hear Daniel attempt to speak two different languages in one day. His Spanish is not bad and he understands a lot more than he lets on. It was great to see the Trevi Fountain again, and I know it is cliché but the pictures don’t do it justice. We took pictures during both visits to the Trevi Fountain, but you can’t really tell because we’re wearing the same clothes!
We then walked to the Pantheon, which was another pleasant surprise. To be walking in and around something as old and storied as the Pantheon felt like stepping through time. I’ve visited some really old historical sites, like Aztec pyramids and Hindu temples, but nothing that’s part of the narrative of Western civilization like the Pantheon. And that, to me, is what Rome is all about. I tried on the flight over to describe to Brandi how BIG the visit to Rome is to me, but nothing can make it hit home like the Pantheon.
It was really incredible to see---I hardly even knew it existed before I got here and to see it really was the first artifact that made me catch my breath and say, wow, we really are in Rome. The original Pantheon was built in 31 BC and was destroyed in a fire in 80 AD, and the one we saw was then rebuilt in 125AD. (How often do you get to use BC vs AD in a sentence, so I took the opportunity!) The current Pantheon is mostly intact and is sitting in the middle of a courtyard. Since the 7th century it has been used as a church. In fact, we had to time our visit to fit around the mass schedule. Also, having Raphael’s tomb there is a nice bonus.
We next walked to Piazza Navona, a picturesque square with all sorts of restaurants and artists and people watching. Then we got back on the bus to head to the Vatican. Vatican City is so small that if you wanted to fit the world’s one billion Catholics comfortably within its boundaries, you would need to stack them 75 feet high (made-up statistic). St. Peter’s Square is huge, however, with hundreds of columns on either side of the huge basilica.
We had a relatively short wait that included our only view of the Swiss Guard, and once we got past the metal detectors and the dress code enforcers we were in the church. Built in the 16th century and decorated in the 17th, the “new” basilica is built on an absolutely massive scale, with more statues than you can take in, plus seven-foot lettering going around the top representing every quote Jesus spoke to Peter in the Bible. Pretty much the first thing you see, off to the right in the back of the church, is Michaelangelo’s Pieta, created when he was 23, or 24, or 25 (the guide books and tour guides are not in agreement). I snapped a couple pictures of the Pieta and then put away the camera. The basilica is really too big to do justice to, plus for me there was a very spiritual aspect of being there, and it took away from it a little bit to have people treating it as just a tourist destination. Seeing a girl having her picture taken next to a big, stone holy water container was especially bizarre.
We attended 12:15 Mass at the basilica. I’m hoping that Alitalia, the official airline of the Pope, CC’d God on their decision not to return our luggage, because otherwise He probably would have been pretty disappointed with our appearance. The staff had the whole front of the church blocked off for the (almost hourly) services, and they were being very strict about letting in only the people who were headed for Mass as well as hurrying along the people coming from Mass so they wouldn’t stick around to take pictures.
Mass was very nice, though it was in Italian with a little Latin thrown in. A few “moles” did happen to slip in however. A guy right in front of us was taking pictures (with flash) of every part of the Mass. And as I was taking part in Holy Communion, another woman tried to take the communion home with her as a souvenir. She walked up in line, grabbed the host and tried to leave with it, and was told by a server to put it in her mouth. This is quite a weird exchange for a cradle Catholic to see, maybe even slightly weirder than being in church in clothes I’d been wearing for three days.
The recommendation our tour guide gave us for lunch was Il Matriciano, a restaurant almost on the way to our hotel from the Vatican. It was very good---we had an antipasto plate with all sorts of fried veggies, and I had linguini funghi while Brandi had tortellini soup followed by prosciutto with figs. When we arrived, every table was speaking Italian (the ladies next to us were conversing with the waiter in both French and Italian for some reason). We felt like the Americans who had found the local hotspot. Even better, it began to rain, I mean pour, as we were sitting outside under the awning, almost as if Italy were convincing us to have our second three-hour traditional meal and not without again meeting great people along the way. As the rain started to slow we met a couple vacationing from London—she was British and he was American. They were super nice—they asked us all sorts of questions about our trip, and he was especially keen to find out the scoop on Sarah Palin and the presidential race. The British woman gave us some good advice on our luggage but I never caught her name as I’m afraid we never introduced ourselves. She also happened to be event planner as I am. Oddly enough, so was Jill, the woman from our flight to Rome. Anyway, she gave us good advice on our luggage: we should call American Airlines since our flight originated with them and we have points with them. Of course, why hadn’t I thought of this, being the recent past frequent flyer with American! They also said that nothing was likely to happen today, because nothing happens on Sunday in Italy, and tomorrow could be tough as well.
The rain dried up and after picking up some gelato and walking to the hotel, the front desk told us that one of our bags had arrived and had been brought up. They did not know whose bag it was. Now, when today began I thought of the four luggage possibilities and ranked them. I think if you’re married you can understand the preferences I came up with:
1) Both bags arrive. 2) Brandi’s bag arrives but Daniel’s does not. 3) Neither bag arrives. 4) Daniel’s bag arrives but Brandi’s does not.
Thankfully, we got the second best outcome instead of the worst outcome. I hated to be overly celebratory when Daniel was still in a bind, but WHOO-HOOO!!!!
I called American Airlines, at the exorbitant international-call-from-the-hotel-room rate, to find out about the bag. The number for lost baggage is a toll-free number, unreachable internationally, so I called an 817 number and was transferred a couple times (on hold a few minutes each time) before getting disconnected (we think the hotel puts a time limit on the calls). The second time around we reached Tina, a representative whose sarcasm and rudeness knows no bounds. Brandi explained our predicament to her, and Tina explained her side, something about an agreement among airlines that the destination airline would be wholly responsible for the luggage. Then she said that if we couldn’t speak Italian well enough to get our bags back from Alitalia then we shouldn’t have come to Italy. I took the phone, and she said that no information on a bag becomes available until it reaches its destination. I asked, from the perspective of American Airlines, whether that would be Paris or Rome. She responded, curtly, “Excuse me, sir, where are you right now? Did you not land in Rome?” I reminded her that Alitalia was not an airline we had asked to be put on, and she was unfazed, saying that if I was going to be uncomfortable with the baggage policies of the airline then I shouldn’t have accepted the connection. (Just writing it down here makes me so mad all over again---AAAHHHH!!! SERENITY NOW!!!!) So the next time you have an international flight, be sure to thoroughly research the baggage records and policies of every major airline in case you have to make a quick decision while running through an airline terminal.
So we headed to dinner, Brandi in clothes she had been wearing for five minutes and me in the clothes I had been in for 53 hours. There we toasted to never worrying another minute about luggage.
Le Coppelli Taverna is a perfect little pizza place not too far from Piazza Navona. It’s situated off of a little cobblestone alleyway, with checkered tablecloths and a large, grey-haired man working a wood-fired oven in the back. I couldn’t believe my eyes when we first saw the restaurant. Seriously, it was the cutest pizza joint I’ve ever seen anywhere and I’m not just anywhere at this moment, I am IN Italy (and in clean clothes). We had bruschetta (with olive oil and with tomatoes) and fried mozzarella (theirs is in balls instead of sticks) before splitting a great, super thin sausage pizza (with a cheap but good bottle of wine, of course). Strangely, my credit card was denied, another thing you don’t want to have to deal with 5000 miles from home. (It was working the next day, thankfully, after a second denial later in the evening.)
After dinner we happened along this great gelato shop (Della Palma) that had just about every flavor you could imagine, along with a bunch of interesting candies. Brandi had "after eight" (mint chocolate chip) and spicy chocolate, and I had peach, strawberry crème, and banana. We walked back and stopped at the Pantheon and hung out on the steps of the fountain across from it, watching all the teens and tourists while eating some of the best ice cream we’ve ever had.
When we got back to the room, my luggage had arrived! I had all my stuff, but I had lost an airtight excuse for being a slob. The first two days of our trip were wonderful even with a giant cloud hanging over them, so we couldn’t wait for what the rest of the week would bring.
Though I’ve never been to Paris, I’ve been through its airport twice before, though I got to see much more of it this time around. We landed and were met by a shuttle, which pulled up to a little entrance where we waited, and waited, and waited. The woman taking us around was having a fairly spirited argument with the shuttle driver, we think about whether to let us through. But enough people started trickling off the bus that she finally gave up, so we all poured off the bus and into the airport. Once our passports were looked at, we met back up with Jill (our new friend from Austin) and started searching for our Alitalia flight to Rome.
Arriving at 8:30 for a 10:10 flight seems like plenty of time, but by the time we went outside security, got our tickets and came back inside security, the plane had already been boarding for ten minutes. And by "boarding" I mean sending people down a jetway to climb on a shuttle bus and wait. The flight was pretty uneventful---we both slept for about the last half of it, and we got a great view of the Italian countryside and the Mediterranean sea on our approach.
We wound our way down to the baggage claim with Jill, and along the way we asked her if she knew a good place for lunch near the Spanish Steps. She recommended Mario's, a place that has a family tie to a couple Italian restaurants in Austin. When the baggage carousel stopped circling, there were three people waiting for their luggage: Jill, Brandi, and me. The Alitalia baggage people were fairly helpful, explaining that our bags were in Paris and that they would be in on the next flight and at our hotel by 5:30 that afternoon. A customs checkpoint beyond the baggage area was surprisingly nonexistent. We found a taxi service that offered us a flat rate of 50 euros to our hotel, so we took it. I spent much of the ride calculating our distance, converting it into miles, and converting euros into dollars to see if we were getting hosed—I don't think we were, but who knows. Our driver was very nice---he knew a little English and a little Spanish and kept apologizing for his language skills and for taking a phone call while he was driving.
Our hotel, Visconti Palace, obviously caters to English-speaking clientele: all of the guests speak English to each other, and even the staff immediately break into English after a token “buon giorno” or “buona sera.” The guy we met at the counter was about as quintessential an English-speaking Italian as I could have imagined. Not the pizzeria proprietor with a mustache and bushy hair, but a little bit more of the Roberto Benigni type. He was short, thin, and eager to please, with greasy hair held against his scalp with lots of product, including a Superman-like curl cemented to his forehead. With the characteristic “-a” punctuating every word out of his mouth, he pointed us the way to the “Spanish-a Steps-a.” Without any clothes to change into, we immediately took to the streets.
The buildings around our hotel could easily be found in New York or a dozen other cities, but once we crossed the Tiber (about three blocks away) we were in a different world. For two people who have never been in a really, really old city, Rome is so impressive and such an overload for the eyes that it defies description. A few of the things we noticed on our walk: there are no street signs, but the names of the streets are carved into stone on the sides of buildings; for many buildings the year it was built is found in Roman numerals (along with the name of the reigning pope in most cases) across the front; in a few places around town you’ll find a faucet of constantly running water feeding out of a building into a tub or simply coming up from the ground, and people will stick a water bottle or a bucket under there and use it for drinking and cooking.
The Spanish Steps were pretty cool. Looking up at them from the plaza beneath is impressive, but climbing the steps and looking out among the Roman rooftops (and the crowds of people below) is pretty amazing.
After some initial difficulty in finding the right street (streets veer off in all different angles and have names that run together, and the map tends to omit some streets, as you have to when there are a billion of them), we found Mario’s. Brandi ordered buffalo mozzarella and tomato salad, and I had rigatoni amatriciano. Right after our food arrived, Brandi looked right over my head and smiled as if she recognized somebody. Her eyes got really big, and I thought, “Who on earth could she know here?” I turned around and saw Jill (from the flight) and her husband Michael. We sat for a long time and talked about our trips (Michael had had a similarly frustrating time getting in via Continental) and our plans. We also talked about the travel habits of our fellow Americans. Michael is very good at painting a picture with his hands, which is one of the recommendations of the Italy travel books. They also tell you to a) make an attempt to speak the language and b) not be loud and obnoxious, and you can see why. Most everyone is very nice and interested in immersing themselves into the Italian experience, but it seems there is a brand of visitor here determined not to speak a word of Italian, and unfortunately they tend to come from the States.
Our meal was one of those three-hour lunches you hear about being so common in Italy. Michael and Jill let us have some of their antipasti, which had great prosciutto, white beans in olive oil, and seasoned zucchini. For dessert, we had a passable crème caramel (basically flan), and Brandi had a cappuccino that she was delighted with. We enjoyed our time with our fellow Austinites---they were even nice enough to loan us a phone for me to try and call my family, though I couldn't get through. Soon we said our goodbyes and were on our way to more Italian adventures.
Our trip back to the hotel took us by Trevi Fountain. Like many major landmarks in Rome, the fountain is in among many narrow alleys and newer buildings, so it comes up as if out of nowhere. And the Trevi Fountain is unique in that no street approaches it directly, so you always hear it before you see it. We came upon it from behind, so it kind of revealed itself bit by bit. The fact that the fountain appears out of the side of a building is part of its mystique. Lots of people crowded around, trying to throw their coin in to assure another trip to Roma! We only had a euro, so we threw in 100 times the money of most visitors. That should purchase a return trip for us, plus a couple generations of our offspring.
The last word from Alitalia was that the luggage didn’t make it on either of the flights from Paris, but they were hoping to get it on the 5:30 flight, which would get it to our hotel at about 8:30.
Our hotel room is pretty nice---apart from a shower that would fit about 1 ¼ of me, there’s not too much to separate it from what we’re used to. The TV has CNN International and Sky News (both in English), plus about 10 Italian stations, a French channel, and a German channel. We got little bits of news about the hurricane, and we tried to call our families but didn’t get an answer.
Dinner was at Grotto Azzurra, a restaurant a few blocks from our hotel. We sat outside on the sidewalk, and the waiter was very friendly. We started off with a bottle of their house wine (8 euros---are you kidding me???). They brought out a basket of bread, but Brandi was disappointed with the lack of olive oil. Of course this was due to the Americanization of the Italian meal, but it proved not to be a staple at the table in Italy. I had half moon pasta with sausage and mushrooms, which was great. My gnocchi, on the other hand, was just okay. I didn’t realize how unsavory it was until Florence, but I'll tell you more about that later...
With a little effort, we found our way back to the hotel, but our luggage still hadn’t. I went downstairs to try and make some sense of the situation, but there was no sense to be had. The latest update was that our luggage would be on the first flight in the morning and at the hotel shortly after that. I tried to question the guy at the desk about Alitalia’s lack of certainty about our bags, but I didn’t get a straight answer. I started getting frustrated with the hotel staff, but I think that the staff just can’t get a straight answer from Alitalia. We’ve had different hotel employees tell us different stories about airline strikes and customs delays, and it seems like it’s something they have come to accept is not very reliable. After giving up on the hotel staff, I tried calling Alitalia directly but couldn’t get someone who spoke English. I’ve had my luggage lost before, but only for a few hours as the airport has usually delivered it to my hotel within a few hours. My most recent experience was on the way home, which make a big difference. Without our luggage, not only can we not change clothes tomorrow; we also can’t recharge our camera battery, so we are limited in the number of pictures we can take. Oh yeah, and Alitalia is basically going day-to-day in terms of whether they will continue to operate, so I’m sure getting our luggage back to us is not at the top of our list. I was asleep by 9:30PM (since we had now been up for 24 hours) dreaming about what our next day in Rome would like!
Traveling abroad is an amazing experience, but it can be tough to leave the good old USA. An adventure awaits, but you might feel a little sad leaving behind the creature comforts of home for more than a little while. Of course, it’s tough to feel bittersweet about leaving America when the final kick out the door is provided by Chicago’s O’Hare Airport.
After waking up at 5:00 a.m. (to try and prepare ourselves to sleep on the flight), Brandi and I finished packing, went to the gym, got ready, and made it to the airport at 10:00. Despite concerns about hurricane traffic causing problems at the airport, we got through security without any problems, and we were all ready for our 12:00 flight.
Make that 12:40.
Make that 1:30.
So Chicago, apparently jealous of all the weather attention that Texas was getting, decided to have a little storm of its own, pushing much of the incoming traffic back a little. We were assured that our connections would be pushed back as well.
But that wasn’t the story once we got into the air—Rome was not listed among the connecting gates, and we asked a couple flight attendants about our flight. They didn’t have much information, but they were doubtful about our being able to connect. We apparently made quite a stink, because when the plane landed several people around us were wishing us luck and telling us to go ahead of them. One pretty old man said to me, “I hope you make your flight, and [turning to Brandi] I hope you miss it so you can stay with me tonight.”
Our flight had left when we got off the plane. The solution ended up being a flight to Paris (itself half an hour late) and an Alitalia flight to Rome. Brandi and I were given seats two rows apart, but we were able to get someone to move so we could sit together. Not only that, but the other person in our middle section never showed up. The woman seated right behind us was also on the flight to Chicago---we talked briefly about our struggles and our plans in Italy. She was planning on meeting her husband in Rome.
Once we got in the air and had some dinner, our little game of musical chairs began. We kept squirming around and switching seats to try and get comfortable, but even with three seats it was really difficult.
Almost halfway through our flight, when we were close to the southern tip of Greenland and the outside temperature was -65 degrees Fahrenheit, we decided to break down and take our sleeping pills. The pills were some sort of off brand that had these impenetrable security features built in---I think the idea is that you expend so much energy opening the pills that you are too tired to actually need them. But they helped---we slept okay on the second half of the flight.
You may notice, faithful reader, that the appearance of the pictures is a little different. My photo gallery upload tool has quit working, so I'm switching to Picasa for the time being. I will switch to something else if I get enough complaints.
Our trip to Italy was incredible! The pictures (and the travel journal that will follow over the next few days) can't possibly do it justice, but we've done our best to capture the best (and worst) of our week in Rome and Florence. Enjoy!
Getting into better shape has its advantages, and for Brandi and me, our increased running schedule allowed us to participate in the world's largest product placement exposition, the Nike Human Race 10K. We first found out about it at Niketown in Chicago---Chicago was one of 25 host cities around the world to hold a 10K on August 31, and Austin was another one. In the following weeks we trained on treadmills, at Town Lake, and in the neighborhood, eventually working our way up to a little over 5 miles.
On the day of the race, our friends Amber and Jed Comeaux and their daughters Kaylin and Madison arrived in their flight from hurricane Gustav. The race was at 6:30 p.m., and we ended up going to Macaroni Grill at about 2:00 for lunch. Pasta is full of carbohydrates, right? (Well, yeah, but apparently Daniel and Brandi can't be trusted to go to an Italian restaurant without loading up on oils and spicy sauces and having a few bites of a few different desserts.)
The Comeauxs dropped us off near 6th and Congress before heading off to Zilker Park. Brandi and I took our places among the 15,000 racers stretched along five city blocks.
Brandi's Race Daniel and I headed to the start line, and I immediately had the thought that that Nike was genius for creating our shirts as our bibs---Congress was red all over! I also think the race shirt was the best I've ever gotten. It is dry fit material and will be more useful to me than the oversized tees they usually give away.
The race began and for the first couple of minutes we waited to walk to the front of the start line and I could feel the itch to run coming on. Daniel stayed with me to start the race but I wanted him to get going and have a chance at his own personal best. We quickly kissed bye and I had the thought as he sped away "don't go too fast in the beginning baby!" but I resisted the urge and began focusing on the race ahead of me.
Earlier in the afternoon Daniel had helped me create my race mix on my iPod and I have to say it was exactly what I needed. I'll never forget the warm up speed of "Lebanese Blonde" mixed with the hot and steamy Sunday afternoon start. After turning the corner onto Red River I picked up speed to the cheesey 1980s rock song "Hit Me with Your Best Shot". But once I was about two miles in (all uphill by the way) I hit a little bit of an opposition to what began as an otherwise usual run--my lunch. With the Human Race starting at 6:30PM we weren't sure what to eat. Most people have heard of carb-loading before a race. Let's just say that I figured out the reason why runners do that the night before and races start at 7AM.
I was on Dean Keaton with the stadium behind me and crossing Wichita when I realized I could probably walk up the hill faster than I was able to run. With the overcrowded water stations contributing to my dehydration and my lunch weighing me down I walked just long enough to get accross Wichita to reach the water station and waited as the poor volunteers tried to keep up with pouring hundreds of cups as easily packs of 300 runners tried to grab a cup and go.
By the time I got to Guadaloupe I started to feel a little better and the trail started to get a little easier with the turn downhill. I even remember a distinct breeze as Eminem's "Loose Yourself" caused me to pick up the pace a little.
But just before the 6 mile mark I started bargaining with myself to quit. I was so exhausted that I felt emotional and I almost convinced myself that it wouldn't be that terrible if I just walked the rest of the way. As usual I must have been wearing my heart on my sleeve as this guy looked back and saw me struggling. Within a moment he was ready to rally the troops. "No way!" he said, "You are not quiting now, you've gone this far, you can do this! Come on!" as he waved me in. I felt as if he was talking to me, but several people were around all benefited from it. I was able to sprint to the end, moaning in pain the last 528 feet of the race. He gave me a High-5 and I turned around to find Daniel behind me and before I could turn around again to introduce them he was gone.
Daniel's Race I decided to start the race with Brandi (starting in the 11-minute mile zone), even though I planned on running a little faster during the race (my five-mile training runs were a little under nine minutes per mile). So once things got going, I zigged and zagged through the crowd to get ahead, though I quickly discovered that running past a lot of people doesn't get you in the clear; I was in a crowd for pretty much the entire race.
I started feeling a need for water pretty early, like in the second mile. So at the end of mile three, after the second of two big hills, I decided to get as much water as I could. The volunteers at all water stops, and especially at mile three, couldn't serve water and Gatorade as fast as runners were coming by, and at the third water stop they had simply left jugs of water on the grass alongside Red River. I grabbed a jug from someone who had just finished, drank from it for 10 or so seconds, then got a cup of Gatorade, then had another big drink from another jug. At that point, I knew that mile four was not going to be a terribly fast one.
The fourth mile was where things got pretty painful. I started re-tasting my lunch, and I encountered another decent hill after thinking the rest of the race would be downhill. After about four and a half miles, I was really slowing and looking for water. I walked along Guadalupe for about 50 yards, frustrated that I couldn't see the fifth mile marker yet. At that point, I recognized that my goal of 58 minutes was basically out of reach, and I set a new goal of finishing the race without walking. The last mile and a half were super grueling, as the chart of my race can attest. Compared to everyone else, who sped up through the last quarter of the race, I crawled to the finish. At 1:02:55, I found myself a bit disappointed with the result and regretful about the preparation, but I was elated about the experience.
A minor perk associated with having the Comeauxs in town was that it facilitated a Pickleheads reunion. The Pickleheads were the Rock Band persona that we created the last time we visited Nederland, and this time we shook off the rust, learned some new tunes, and rocked out on Sunday and Monday. Brandi mastered singing Blondie's "Call Me," I got 99% on vocals for Radiohead's "Creep," Jed did double duty on Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Simple Man," and Brent learned the ropes on numerous songs, most notably "Baba O'Riley."
We had a great time with the Comeaux family enjoying Austin, shopping, cooking, and having them join us after we finished the race. Luckily Hurricane Gustav kind of fizzled out and headed north, but it was a great excuse to see our friends again over the Labor Day Weekend.
The summer was fast approaching when I realized that my parents' 60th birthday was a big deal. Not that I didn't know it was a milestone, but when Dad and I were talking about it one day it dawned on me that it was kind of a lot for him to swallow, too. Never had a birthday really given my Dad pause---he's always been the kind of guy to believe that age is just a number, and he's been active at every age. He didn't even want to talk about it! Well, I started thinking that maybe the best way to address the big day would be to invite family and friends to help us celebrate during my parents' yearly vacation in Crystal Beach. I figured an invasion of birthdayness would force Mom and Dad to celebrate their lives with those who love them. And that's just what we did.
We all had a great weekend of relaxation and sun in Crystal Beach, Texas, with a very different atmosphere but the same strong family fellowship as our Lauve family weekend in Chicago, Illinois. In fact, the Lauves made it to the surprise birthday party for Mom and Dad, along with my mom's sisters, many of the Domecs, a few Breauxs, and the Heberts. All in all, there were 55 people in attendance to help Mom and Dad celebrate!
