It's been a month?

Wow - it's been exactly a month since I posted anything on my blog. Sad, eh?
I've been busy, I suppose. So, what's been going on?

Well, I celebrated another year of life (just a nice way of saying I'm older). I sold one of my bicycles. I watched the Tour of Missouri come through town! I completed my 3rd Half Ironman race. Yes, that's right, another half ironman is in the books. In fact, while we're on that subject, let's just hear the race update, shall we?

(September 18th)
Redman Triathlon races were in Oklahoma City. There were 2 days of racing: Saturday- Half and Full Ironman distance races, and Sunday - Sprint and Olympic distances. I'd been talking about these races early in the year, and knew of a few other KC folks going to race. Tiernan decided to race the Olympic distance and we made plans to trek to OKC together. We left KC Thursday evening, chatting all the way. It was a quick drive and we were in Edmond, OK before we knew it. Ya see, we didn't actually book a hotel room for Thursday night because the hotel we had set up for Fri/Sat didn't have anything left (well, except for smoking - not really an option). So, we were winging it. Thanks to my dad, we had a map of Edmond with several hotel options plotted out. First stop - Holiday Inn Express. Mind you, it was a bit after midnight, and we were greeted by Patrick. Patrick was a rather chipper chap, but we were happily entertained as we discussed rates, perks, etc. We got him to come down a whole $4 on the rate. Yee haw! His talk of a "free" hot breakfast, and seeing the fruit and Otis Spunk muffins strewn through the lobby, and we were SOLD! Sign us up. Give us our key. We're in!

I had no idea my little buddy Tiernan enjoyed the free treats so much. Here is a pic of all the food she collected in our 6, maybe 7 hours at that hotel.

Too funny! We had a great laugh about that!

We decided to sleep in a little bit, got up, dressed, and headed down for our free, hot breakfast. Mmmm. We checked out shortly after that and thought we'd go check in to our other hotel and get that all settled. When we arrived at the Extended Stay America (yes, it was cheap and had a kitchen, so we thought it was a good option), we were told that our room wasn't ready and we should check back at 1. So, we went to find the lake for a swim. Ooops, we can't swim again till 2. We needed to get some things at Target, and by the time we finished up there and wandered around town, we ended up back at the ESA to attempt check in. Well, the hotel smelled funny when we walked in, but we were both game to give it a shot. We again asked at the desk...the gal told us someone would go finish up our room now and we could check in. She then said, "it's 2 double beds, smoking, right?" To which we both replied...uh, nope. It should be non-smoking and that's pretty important. A few minutes later she tells us that it's a non-smoking room, but it's on the smoking floor. Hmmmm. Well, let us check it out and we'll let you know if we're staying. We went up to the 3rd floor to assess the situation. It took all of about 3 minutes to determine that it wasn't gonna happen. For starters, one of the beds was tilted all cock-eyed. Not really sure how anyone would sleep on that. The room wreaked of smoke (and the spray they used to try to make it a non-smoking room!). And, we all know there wasn't a chance that I would be storing anything in that refrigerater, let alone cooking a dinner in the pots/pans they provide. BARF!!! We turned in the key, hopped in the car and took off.

We found a great little Italian place and ordered some DELICIOUS grilled chicken pizza. While we were chowing down on pizza, Tiernan had her laptop going, trying to find another hotel option. Bingo! We found a room at the Crowne Plaza...just a few minutes from the race site. Our room was poolside, with two VERY comfy beds...white bedding that actually looked like it had been laundered, and a good sized refrigerator in the room. Ahhhhh. We were happy! Now, on to the race site.

We changed clothes, grabbed our wetsuits and such, and headed over to Lake Hefner. When we arrived, we opted to go through the check in lines first, and collect all our race loot. The line for the Half check in was pretty long. First thing was the race bracelet. Then on to the packet. For the half, we got a really nice carryall bag with our stuff in it, that was cool. Pink caps for the ladies. Medical form turned in. Maps picked up. Medium t-shirt...cute. I think that's it. We're done. We zipped through the expo too, but didn't find much we needed/wanted. So, over to the lake we went. Getting into a wetsuit is always a little challenging. It's especially fun when you have an audience. Well, fun for them! :-) Once in the wetsuits, we made our way down to the water, where they had a pre-race course set up, with lifeguards and all! The water was a little chilly initially, but as we got going, it felt good. We swam for 15-20 minutes and called it done.

Time to check in the bike. I threw on some dry clothes at the car, put the race stickers on my bike, and rode it up to transition. This race was so well organized, and the volunteers - across the board - were excellent! Bike check in took me no time, as they had all the bike racks labeled with your name and number. I noticed that I was in a sea of bikes from KC area and around...that's cool!

We're done here - well, until tomorrow. Now, it's off to find some dinner and get ready to race! We landed at the Olive Garden, and as suspected, there were tons of athletes waiting to load up on pre-race pasta dinners. While we waited, I re-packed my transition bag with all my gear for the race. It was kind of a relief to get that done now, so I wouldn't have so much to do back at the hotel.

Surprisingly enough, we only waited about 10 minutes before they called us in. Woohoo. We ate it up on salad, breadsticks, pasta....Mmmmm. Back to the hotel we went. It didn't take long for me to get everything set out for the next morning, shower, and hop into bed. Ahhhh. We set like 5 alarms to make sure we were up and at 'em eeeeeeeaaaaarrrrrrrlllllyyy! (to be continued in the next post. Pics will also follow when I get around to downloading them)