Thursday July 17, 2008 I ran the Jim Kane Sugar Bowl 5 miler for the 2nd year in a row. Even though my running had been shitty, I wanted to compare time to the previous year. Went w/ Funshine (new nickname for db) and Cleo. We drove which sucked because traffic was a bitch and I didn't think I'd make the race. Luckily Jake got there before me and had picked up my race packet. Funshine dropped me off to find Jake and he went to park. Found Jake and got my number on, made a trip to the bathroom even though the lines seemed too long, seemed plenty of time to spare. Saw some other CRCers, Jake's whole family was there, mom and brother were racing too, dad was snappin' photos. Didn't start that close to the start, this race has no chip so gun time is all there is. Wouldn't matter in the end, I slowed down. It was fucking hot that Tuesday night, too hot for me! Funshine and Cleo ran next to me at the start and then when they couldn't get further apparently Cleo was howling away, though I didn't seem to hear it. Maintained an okay pace for most of the race but I don't have any way to time myself right now, never got another watch after losing mine in Australia. Had to rely on mile splits which was better than nothing but harder to judge my pace. Started slowing down in the last mile and eventually got passed by Jake's brother and some CRC girls. Picked it up for the finish and finished less than a minute behind them so not that bad. Stuck around a little bit at the end for post-race food and stuff. But it was hot, I was drenched and we had Cleo.

476 out of 1124
42:52 for 5 miles
8:34 minutes/mile
7 out of 37 athena

Been bad posting if anyone is still listening. Life keeps changing. It'll be one way for a long time then change to something different and then again transform into something else. Not sure how I feel about the way it is now. It's better in some ways, worse in others.

Was in Bar Harbor for 2 long weeks and thought I would be glad to get back to Boston. But then I enter my apt. and see the mess I live in. Still haven't done a good deep cleaning of my place since moving in. It was supposed to be cleaned before I moved in but wasn't and even though it's only one room, it's hard to clean w/ stuff all over the place. Maybe I should just hire a maid. How much can it cost to clean a studio?

Got back to work though and started doing things, experiments. It's actually fun when I'm doing things, even though I make plenty of mistakes. I love the bacteria I work with. It can really be a great time doing my thing in the lab, most of the time I'm doing my own thing w/ little direction and feel like a mad scientist, especially since I'm working w/ human pathogenic stuff that can at least give you some pretty cool diarrhea or at worst kill you. I took it as a compliment today when at the department picnic I was asked if I contaminated the picnic. Haha! just don't get me fired for those insinuations. It would be a thrill though to have a major foodborne disease outbreak on your hands and have to find the culprit, testing all the food and stool samples, would have been a great episode of Scooby Doo or Encyclopedia Brown mystery.

Some of my experiments need lots of planning to get things right the first time so it takes me a long time to get things done. And I've spent several unproductive months so now I'm in a crunch w/ several projects going on at once. I also need to decide if I should take a class in the fall. I'm required by my program to take 4 grad level classes and I've already done that but I know my boss wants me to take more. In his mind, they're free so why not but to me it's just more work and not only am I already a doctor, I'm not getting any kind of degree for taking these extra classes, I'm not a PhD student, I'm a postdoc. I do feel a bit guilty though for not jumping at the opportunity.

So I think life is better right now when I'm getting work done. I just need to keep it up and hopefully have a couple great, productive months coming up to feel better about things.

My social life seems lacking compared to what it was the past year. Don't hang out w/ the girls as much as I used to. Things got all out of whack and never got back into our usual things. Makes me sad that we're not as close and don't have as much consistent fun as before. Running was what seemed to bring us all together initially and now I'm crapping out w/ that too. Have a good week then a bad. No consistent schedule anymore. Don't go to track, don't go to long runs. Don't run w/ anyone. I have no consistent schedule w/ anything right now and makes life hard to live.

Just saw a really good friend's daughter for the first time tonight and she turned 2 a couple months ago. Seems retarded it took so long since we've both been here the whole time. Would have liked to see her as an infant. Oh well.

My mom is in Martha's Vineyard this weekend and asked me to come but I couldn't get things to work out w/ Cleo so I'm staying here for the weekend alone. db's in Maine and it didn't work out to be there either. maybe at home alone is where i should be right now anyway. kinda had a crap day.

Pre-weekend started off okay w/ me getting my butt back to track for the first time since before Australia, end of March! Though I was late and barely did much of the workout, it was great to be back on the track w/ Tara and Jake. Too bad I had to take the next 2 weeks off because I was in Bar Harbor.

So Friday July 11th was Joslynn's 24th birthday and she mapped out a pub crawl from Central to Harvard complete w/ 80s theme! I've already showed some pics from the night but I'll post a little more and link to Johnny's little video, that I did hear he wasn't too thrilled about after the fact, sorry Johnny!

I ended up at the crawl late because I had to hit the mall first for my 80s outfit and then home to run a few miles before showering up and getting decked out in my blue eyeshadow, plus it started pretty early. Finally made it and lasted the rest of the night. Didn't get too crazy luckily.

Took Cleo to get her bath at Hotel Marlowe on Saturday which she was great about. Stood there perfectly, venturing to her happy place so she could take it, while they soaped her up and rinsed her off. Only got one picture because I forgot to charge up the camera battery after the pub crawl the night before.

Yes I know I've been bad as usual w/ the weekend recaps. They take so much work. Yes rr, smaller more frequent posts would be better than no posts but anyway I will try a bit tonight to get caught up.

So going back to the Fourth of July weekend. I was real excited to go to the Pops rehearsal after work that Thursday the 3rd but as me, db and beaky were walking there it started pouring and so we never made it. Not even sure if the rehearsal even happened anyway w/ the storm. Oh well, missed the Rascal Flatts, yuck :0)

Friday the Fourth db and i hung out around Faneuil Hall/Quincy Market eating bad food. Check out this lovely video of db playing in the fountains at the North End Parks across from Hanover St.

That night went w/ beaky and db to a barbecue at db's friend's house. stayed for a bit watching them play cards then headed to tara's new apt. near davis to meet up w/ all the girls. we hit a bar in davis for a little bit, it was dead, then drove down mass ave. to get closer to the fireworks. on the way, we were driving next to a boy in a convertible bmw that db asked if he wanted to take some of the girls in our car, we had 4 people in the back, too crowded, this boy was a bit shy and seemed a little uptight.

a couple lights later we convinced jos to get in his car. they drove behind us for a bit and then jos gave her number and got back in our car. (they have since gone out a couple times but i don't think he's turning out to be the one, though they did have good stuff in common) we eventually made it to main st. in kendall to watch fireworks. beaky was w/ us and freaking out real bad the whole time.

i hope to never bring her to fireworks again. i thought it would be better than leaving her home alone. after fireworks went to move the car and meet the girls at a bar but w/ the traffic after the fireworks it was a nightmare and just ended up going home.

had to work the weekend, primary rounds both sat. and sun. i was also my own backup. it was a last minute decision because the girl that was supposed to do it had left the dpt. for grad school and no one was paying attention to assign someone else to her duties. i decided to take it because they offered me no weekend primary duties for the next year. sweet deal! hope they don't renig.

sunday night after work went to jake and danny's new apt. they actually live in the condos where i used to live w/ rr when i first moved to boston in brighton. we had wonderful watermelon martinis and i brought some yummy stuff from trader joe's to eat.

I'm here for 2 weeks for the Jackson Lab mammalian genetics class, almost done w/ the first week, we do have lectures tomorrow (Saturday), boo! I'm here w/ another postdoc from my program. So far the class is not really for us, it's mostly MDs and mostly genetics people which I am not. Today's lectures were actually the best for me to follow, more background and clinical relevance versus the specific, too-detailed work from the presenters' own labs that I have no basis to really understand.

I thought I would like Bar Harbor but I can't say I'm very thrilled w/ it. My hotel is a disaster, the Bar Harbor Regency. The website makes it look all resorty when it is nothing like that. The staff is bad, I witnessed the crow old lady bartender that spends half her year in Florida yelling at the young kid waiters and watched them cower from her, later only to have the young waitresses come tell the crow what the boys were saying to fuel the drama. This bartender was yelling and giving attitude to customers that were ordering from her as well. Wireless isn't working, cell phone service only outside, rooms moldy, smelly, more bad service for what I think is a discounted rate for the conference of about $160 per night. I should have stayed in a nice bed n breakfast for the same rate.

Businesses in town aren't much better. A bunch of reject kids it seems doing these service jobs crappily. The kid that made our smoothies I hope was high and not just dumb. We got fudge at a place that we had to return because it was so dry and brittle and the guy tried to tell us it was okay. I had to return my crab-stuffed haddock another day because it was cold in the middle and the sauce tasted 'funny' in one area. That woman was nice about it though.

Yesterday was a good day here in that respect. I found out Aunt Margaret died yesterday morning. She was 85 and living in a rehab place, awful quality of life, she had told my Aunt last week she wanted to jump out the window, so it's good she died, it was just bad because she was awake and had a heart attack and was DNR so the nurses just watched her die. Doesn't sound pleasant. Also, my dad's dog has renal insufficiency and it's pretty serious and I called the vet to talk to him and told my dad he should move his dog to an emergency clinic but he didn't want to insult the doctor basically by removing his dog. Hope Bailey doesn't die because of this.

Anyway all that is crappy news but then last night we went back to Acadia and I ran on the Ocean Trail. It was so awesome, along the ocean, sometimes on crazy rocks and through the best scenery. Trail running is a better workout than regular running and I never do it, especially on such awesome trails. After that we ate at the Jordan Pond Restaurant. Best service and food I've had so far. Only $25 for popover, soup or salad, entree, and dessert. Food was all good, totally recommend. If I could run on those trails and eat there a lot maybe I could live here and work at Jackson. Good biking here too, road and mountain. I'd just stay away from the little town probably and potentially go more crazy.

Tara, Ban and Me

Me and the personal digital communicator

Joslynn, B-day girl

Tara, Val and the little boombox watching down Mass Ave.

More to come...

db and i are supposed to be doing pushups everyday and working up to 50 in a row. i confess i haven't been doing them EVERYday but i did do 17 yesterday. i started w/ 15 and stayed at 15 working on my form, it was kinda bad, and then yesterday added a couple, though my form was bad at the end.

you should try too, even if you have to start w/ girl ones.

c'mon jenn

So this weekend I was supposed to go somewhere out of town w/ db because it was my only weekend that I'm not on some kind of call at work. We didn't have a good plan so while we did get out of town, it wasn't what I expected. I saw on Friday that Natasha Bedingfield was playing at Hampton Beach Casino on Sunday night in NH so wanted to go. I asked db if we could go, he said yes (points!) and i got the tickets. i should have checked first if she was playing in boston but i was too focused on the sunday show so after getting those tickets i saw she was playing the paradise this tuesday, i'd rather see her there, but when i looked for tickets none were available so i didn't have to feel bad for getting tickets for sunday. it would be something different at least. never seen a show at hampton beach casino.

i'm already forgetting how things went. i met db at my place after work on friday. hadn't seen him in a week so was happy to see him again. we ended up waiting until real late to eat dinner so didn't have lots of choice. took beaky-woo and walked over to shangri-la since they're open until 2. got some yucky fried food for myself and db's spicy stuff. met some weathered but lovely people while waiting outside for the food. beaky is always the conversation starter. we ate our food on the bench in front of the fire station on cambridge st while people watching. then to cvs for candy. got wildly cherry m&ms, not a big fan usually but these were limited edition or something and on sale so i thought i'd try them, and some sour patch kids, and 2L diet cokes were b1g1, perfect! made it home feeling yucky after the food and then bed.

saturday was a really hot nice day but didn't get out until the afternoon. took beaky running while db rollerbladed. she was exhausted to do 3 miles in the heat and i was dying after my 7 miles. it was tough! at least i had db's butt to keep me going. i was totally drained after that but managed to clean up and take a walk down near the pru. we stopped in lord n taylor so i could try on some expensive dresses. found a great nicole miller but $400+ was well out of my budget unfortunately. looked for it online elsewhere but no success at all. went to lir for a beer and more fried stuff, just fries for me. what happened to the usual bartenders?? not a good food day, especially after running 7 miles in that heat but i would make up for it on sunday. after lir walked back to the common and sat for a bit then home and eventually to bed.

sunday morning got to go to the paramount. db's first time. it was good but not great. i made the mistake of getting a cheese omelet since i hadn't tried one yet but your money is better spent on the pancakes or belgian waffles. that's two times in a row now i've screwed up. after the paramount we headed up to nh w/ beaky-woo, the weather was now crappy and rainy. we hung out w/ cb watching the red sox, eating more fried food: fish n chips, ice cream: cotton candy and fluffernutter flavors for me, blah! yes i felt sick, db warned us but it seemed like the right thing to do. after a little nap on cb's couch and the red sox winning in extra innings, boo! we left for the concert. made it there w/ time to spare, missed the opening band but i wanted to anyway, had time to find parking, get cleo to poop and have a drink before natasha came out. i didn't expect much from the show since it was in a bad location and i usually don't go to pop shows like this but i do love both her cds so it couldn't be that bad i figured. she sounded great and it was lots of fun. i would still like to see her at the paradise though since it's more intimate. made the drive home from nh, beaky stayed in the car for the show, we got more food on the way home and then to bed too late for a work night as usual. i'm tired. db took some videos from the show. i'll have to post one if he gives me.

spreading peace and love all around Boston :0)

C'mon guys, follow me!

Man this train was crowded. I had no space and some chick kept saying I was licking her leg. I think it was just my wet nose.

C'mon train, where are you? I want to get home before the riots.

Celtics fans post-finals game

It's still not here. Sometimes the T sucks, but it does let me on for free. 'Cause I'm 'America's Dog.'