Levi and Family

Namur and Family
Originally uploaded by tabita.

My little nephew Levi was dedicated in his church last Sunday. Here he is. Isn't he the cutest???

Speaking of that family, Levi's dad, David, aka Namur, recently released his 3rd album. Please buy it. It is awesome.

usorder@namur.nu

Peace.

Training

We ran 10 miles today... Actually 10.34 miles to be exact. Whew. I'm exhausted. Need a Frappuccino. Todd is going to go get one after he wakes up from his nap. Yay!

East Coast to West Coast

So we finished up our romantic weekend in New York with more shopping and walking and eating. All good things. Flew back to Nashville on Monday evening. Re-packed and slept for a few hours. Got up at 4 AM and said goodbye to my mom (she was going to leave before I got back) and headed out to the airport. Many hours later I landed in SF and got shuttled to the Hyatt Regency at San Francisco Airport. "What's going on there?", you may wonder. Well, let me tell you:

A gathering of nerds for the 29th Internationalization and Unicode Conference. Wow! These people are into their stuff. I learned lots and made a new friend: a Finnish guy working for Nokia. I asked him a ton of questions about I18n and testing and other fun things. Very smart. I like smart people.

Last night I had dinner with some friends that we knew when we lived here in the late 70s/early 80s. It was a lot of fun to see them and find out what is going on with all their kids (who were my age and older).

Had an awesome run this morning. Recovery time really does make you stronger. I'm on this 1/2 marathon plan where you only run 3 days a week, but the workouts are very focused (and intense). Today it was speed training (3 x 1600 at 9:30). I felt like I could've gone on forever. I love that feeling!!!

OK - time to head out to the airport for the fun-filled flight(s) home. It takes all day!

One big highlight

Todd asked last night: "What was the highlight of the day?" I started rattling off the various things we had done and realized: "It's all one big highlight!"

So here is the highlight broken down:

6 mile run in the hotel gym (yes - we're losers... we didn't feel like weathering the cold at Central Park - next time).

Breakfast at Ess-a-Bagel - yum.

Walking around in the Village and browsing hand-made jewelry. I *love* that stuff.

Lunch at a mediocre Thai restaurant. Ok - not a highlight, but it taught us that breaking out of our research and planning mode even for one small meal can be disastrous... :)

A loooong afternoon stroll in Central Park. Whew - I bet we walked 6 miles or more over the course of the day (not counting the morning run, of course). I particularly enjoyed the breaks on the bench parts.

Dinner at a cozy Italian restaurant on 44th Street - Osteria Al Doge. We got to sit on the second floor overlooking the rest of the restaurant, so that was cool. I felt like I was in "Love Actually".

Running from the restaurant to the subway station to our hotel back to the subway station back to Broadway - just so I could change into nice outfit for the show. Rent was awesome. The performers were awesome. The twizzlers I ate during the show were awesome. The trip back to the hotel was awesome (because we weren't running).

Falling asleep to the end of the Oscars. Why do I even watch? Todd already knows ahead of time who is going to win every category.

Now we're getting ready to check out before we head out for some final shopping. Yay for shopping!

The Big Apple

Yes - we actually saw one walking around today during the first day of our 3-day mini vacation to New York City. It's awesome to be here together - first time in almost 12 years.

Todd did some high quality research on what to do and where to eat before we left and we have been using his "report" extensively. Some highlights of the day:

NOT waking up at 5 AM to leave for the airport...

Eating pizza at John's Pizzeria (church turned restaurant - nice stained glass dome) after a *very* cold walk from the hotel (Omni Berkshire) to 44th Street.

Browsing Macy's on 5th Street and buying the best charcoal wool/cashmere coat ever (I've been looking for a good winter coat most of my adult life). I was on a buying high for several hours after that purchase.

Walking through Central Park on the way to DT-UT, a totally cozy coffee house on the upper east side of NY.

Making (and eating) s'mores at above mentioned coffee house and reading a good book curled up in a cozy chair.

And the fun continues... Stay tuned.