Amateur Hour

Er, Amateur 3 and a half hours.

First off, a happy new year to all.  2008 was easily the best year of my life.  Had a kid, changed careers, got a house, and picked up my new nutty, expensive hobby of marathon running.

It shouldn't come as a surprise then that I rang in the new year with the Texas Marathon on Jan 1 at 8am in Kingwood, Texas.  (a suburb northeast of Houston.)  If my preparation for this race is to be any indication, 2009 may not go as smoothly as last year.

1. I forgot my watch.  Imagine running 26 miles with absolutely no data as to how fast or slow you're going.  In an event where pacing is everything, going without a watch is like driving across the desert without a working gas gauge on your car.  Not a good idea.
2. Didn't cut my toenails.  Newbie error.
3. Missed the start of the race.  Well, I heard the start of the race, but that was from my seat in a porta potty about 100 yards away.  So I started in the very back, behind the people I will charitably call "joggers", but are probably best described as "walkers".  It was a narrow path too, so getting around them took some doing.

That said, I had a great time, and would recommend this race highly to anyone in Texas.  If you've considered doing the Houston or Austin marathons, you may want to go for this option instead:

• Family atmosphere.  Lots of kids around with free refreshments and playground equipment.  I'm looking forward to bringing my little munchkin back next year.  Natalie, who was on feeding and diaper duty for the duration, may be less interested.
• Personal touch.  It's a smaller race, with only a couple hundred entries, so it's not as, er, industrial as the big city marathons.  Every entrant had a sign with their name and words of encouragement hanging up along the course.  Most of the runners were quick to offer encouragement to each other also.  Just a great bunch of people really.
• Great goody bag.  Nice shirt and some decent freebies in there.
• Pretty course - I was a bit skeptical about a course of 4 loops through a suburb, but it was very nice.  Good views of lakes and nice woods to run through.
• If you sign up for the marathon, but just aren't feeling it that day, you can drop down to the half marathon distance and still get a finishers medal for that distance.  A nice consolation prize and a good safety net for beginners.
• Cheaper than a big city marathon.  Half the price, but better refreshments and better goodie bag.
• The medal.  I'll post a picture of the finishers' medal.  You won't believe it.

The whole thing is organized by the heads of the 50 states marathon club.  It makes sense that they would put on a great race, since they and their members have seen tons of races all over the world.  They know what people like.  The same race director is doing another race in April, and I think I'll go for it after this experience.  The Davy Crockett Bear Chase.  Lemmie know if you're interested.  We can carpool.

Oh, and here's me with my number one fan.  You can't really read it here, but he's got on a shirt that says "Future Marathoner".  We can only hope he finds something more worthwhile to do with his time when he grows up.

UPDATE: Here's that medal.  It's a monster.  You could serve dinner on this thing.  They also gave out those stuffed bats to everybody.  The 21 means I finished in 21st place.

The finisher medal arms race began with the Disney Marathon, which had the first premium medal.  It was well made, in color, and twice as large as anything else out there.  Soon other races, most notably the Little Rock marathon, started beefing up their medals.  For those of us trying to display these things on a shelf, it's start to get out of hand.

New Parent Observation

Three Discoveries

1.

First a little background before I get to the first discovery.  We’ve changed around our car usage a bit now that we have the new baby in the house.  As the most expendable member of our family, I am now driving our tiny Honda Fit.  As mom and the baby glide through town in a still-relatively-small Civic, I’m zipping around in a car that would be considered small even among some of the pygmy tribes of central Africa.

The upside to driving the Fit is that’s our car with XM satellite radio.  When I grow weary of my normal eclectic mix of NPR and Rush Limbaugh, I now have a hundred channels to browse.  This leads to the discovery…

I’m not sure how I found it, or more importantly what made me turn to it and start listening, but they have an ABBA station.  All they play is ABBA.  ABBA ABBA ABBA.  All day.

Now I know some people are hugely devoted to ABBA.  I am not one of those people.  I’ve heard most of their catchy pop songs, but I wouldn’t say I’m a fan.  But man I keep listening to that station.  It’s jus t so cheerful.  It’s song after song of happy, Sesame Street-style music, without even the slightest tinge of irony or angst.  Basically, when listening to this station, I’m giving myself a mild lobotomy during my commute.  So that’s discovery number one.  I’m perfectly fine with driving a tiny European-style car around a relatively conservative Texas town while singing along to ABBA.  This may end badly.

2.

Discovery number two is Redbox.  We let our Netflix subscription lapse recently.  You’d think the extra time at home with the baby would give us more time to watch movies, but it hasn’t worked out like that.  We rarely get an uninterrupted couple hours to watch anything.  It happens occasionally, but not with enough frequency to justify a Netflix subscription.

So recently a guy at work told me about Redbox, which is a movie rental business with a bunch of kiosks at McDonalds.  You push some buttons, swipe a card, and it spits out a DVD.  And it’s a dollar a day.  That checks two major boxes for me.  Cheap and no human interaction.  Nice.  And this guy at work digs up promo codes for free rentals on Mondays.  So now I’ll be watching movies on Mondays for zero dollars.  Discovery number two.

3.

Michelob Pale Ale.  Since we moved back to the US in the Summer of 2007, I have been on a quest to find the perfect cheap beer.  My goal was to find the most units of yumminess per unit of price.  I tried a number of things, most recently that new Budweiser American Ale.  None of it worked.  Most cheap beer is cheap for a reason.

Well, along came Michelob Pale Ale.  At just over $6 for a six-pack, it’s cheaper than all the micros.  At my local Kroger, it’s cheaper even than Budweiser American Ale.  And here’s the kicker: It’s very good.  Not just cheap beer good, but genuinely good.  Better than your Fat Tire or St Arnolds or whatever.  If you’re a beer snob, please purchase it.  Don’t let them discontinue this beer.