HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Happy Halloween y'all!!! So, as everyone knows Bella the cocker spaniel is the mascot of Mate TV. Actually, I just made that up, but mate, I think that Bella should be our mascot. She is so cute and happy, just as the mascot of our blog should be. I digress, on Sunday Aaron and I bought Bella a costume!!! We weren't planning on buying a costume but this little Bumble Bee just jumped out at us and we couldn't pass it up. So, for one day instead of a dog, we have a bumble bee as a pet. Check it out!! I've also included a picture of Aaron and myself from our engagement party on Saturday night. I'm putting this up because the other picture of me in the marathon photo looks like poop. In this picture, Aaron and I look pretty :)

Frigid 26.2

I ran the Chicago Marathon. It took me 5 hours 51 minutes and 7 seconds. I got to run beside my best friend, MATE (her real name is Alison). We had fun...for the first 17 miles. Or maybe 13 miles, then we got mean. We ran to 12 miles, then we instituted a run a mile, walk a mile routine. This seems do-able, but you try it. We started bitching at each other and even at the "nice" people cheering us on. Little did we know that the winner of the marathon had suffered an injury upon crossing the finish line. Actually he slipped on the mat (that records your time) and fell backwards on his head. Click on the video on this link (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15391743/)to see his fall. He actually never crossed the ceremonial banner, BUT HE STILL WON. His time was almost 4 hours shorter than mine. Way to go, Kenya. For me, the race highlights were the following: feeling pain at mile 6, dropping my hoodie at 12K and realizing later how cold I was, my ipod dying at mile 12, almost not making it through 15-16 because of my hunger (powerbar was frozen), slurping up GU at mile 17.5 and then gagging, having to stop and walk several times to avoid pooping my pants, trying to be nice to my running partner even though I felt like I hated the world, finally making it past mile 20, seeing amazing people with injuries, disabilities, and real reasons for running keep on going, and finally realizing that I had just checked off something on my list of life goals!! After we got done, we were freezing cold, hungry, but relieved...and LAUGHING!! We hobbled to the subway, which was at least a 10 minute walk away. I honestly think that the worst part of running a marathon was how horrible I felt afterwards. After sitting on "the EL" train for an hour, I was so stiff that I almost started crying. Then I got up and walked to the hotel, went to sleep at 6:30PM and woke up the next morning at 9AM. I'm still tired. Enough for now.

To see pictures of me running, go to www.marathonfoto.com and my bib number is 36116. You know my last name.

-Faris

Chickadees in Cheecago

Holy crap. Lovers and haters, these Mates are traveling to Chicago on Friday. To. Run. A. Marathon. That's 26.2 miles, folks. So, we've been chatting it up all week about how excited we are about this weekend. Alison, my best friend from high school Drew, another friend Courtney, and I are taking our girl selves to Chicago for a weekend of running and mostly shopping and going out. There won't be any blogging from vacation because of the lack of computer access and the fact that I will be too busy. However, if you guys want to track our progress during the race on Sunday morning (starts at 8AM), you can go to the Lasalle Chicago Marathon website at www.chicagomarathon.com. Okay, here's the website if you want to track us the day of via email or phone. http://www.doitsports.com/results/MSG-signup.tcl?sub_event_id=2161 By the way, you aren't allowed to laugh when it takes us the entire 6.5 hours and we don't even finish the race. We might have just stopped at the American Girl store or something. HAHAHA.

Let's get Campy!

Hey peeps. So, last week Aaron and I decided to go camping before all of the campgrounds were closed for the winter. We also wanted to take our cute dog Bella with us and see how she reacted to the great outdoors. Everyone warned us that it was going to be cold and we were like, yeah, we know, but not only was it cold, we woke up this morning and there was frost on the ground. But, obviously since I am writing this post, we made it through the cold mountain nights. Bella was a little overwhelmed with her first camping experience. When we got to our site she started barking at everyone walking by and we were afraid we were going to get kicked out of the campground, but luckily she calmed down. Then she was just so excited that we were all outside. Although, sleeping in a tent really confused her. By the end of the night she was in Aaron's sleeping bag with him. Saturday, we went on a hike with about a 47,000 other people and we were a little disappointed in the hike, because it wasn't even a mile!! It was more like a stroll. There were people out there with heels on. WEIRD. But everyone said Bella was a cute dog, which made us happy. After the hike, Bella was POOPED and from about 3 p.m on, she slept in the tent. Actually, she's still sleeping. Aaron is a camp-master might I add. He was an eagle scout, so he knows how to make a good fire. And, I know how to make good s'mores. Enjoy the pictures.

Hooray for Relay!

Today 5 miles became a disappointment. Today was supposed to be my last long run (10.5 miles)...actually I should still be running as I type. Instead, I'm back, sitting at my computer all sweaty, and feel the urgent need to blog. I couldn't do it today...my tummy was hurting and mentally I couldn't get excited about running for 2 hours and then spending the subsequent hours feeling like shit. Let me tell you why I'm mentally losing it with this training...

When we signed up for the Chicago marathon, I was healthy and optimistic. I googled training programs and all. At the time, I was already training for my all-time favorite race, the Cooper River Bridge Run in Charleston. Well, as some/most of you in blog world know, the world/blogworld came to an end when I sprained my ankle both ways the Wednesday before the race. I decided to train for the half-marathon instead because of the long recovery period that ensued with the damn ankle (about 5 months). And I've been doing great with training. Last week I did a 9.5 mile long run. Until my guy friend Drew (former Chicago marathoner himself) dropped the BOMB on me: THERE IS NO CHICAGO HALF MARATHON. I REPEAT: THERE IS NO HALF MARATHON IN CHICAGO. I feel misled, scared, angry, unprepared, nervous, and stupid for not having checked this out before my training. Now I am faced with an impossible task: 26.2 miles. I can be successful running 13.1 miles; but that's not an option. The LaSalle Chicago Marathon is not allowing me to succeed. I just want to go up there, run a half-marathon, be in the paper, and say I did it. Now I'm afraid of failing because I'm just not ready. They are forcing me to flounder around in a race that is so completely daunting that I don't know what to do!

Until we thought of the RELAY idea. Faris runs 8.75 miles and passes the chip/number to Alison who runs 8.75 miles and passes the chip/number to Drew who runs like hell to the finish line! Team Faris Drew Alison hopefully finishes the marathon in under 5 hours! (...so we can continue shopping and enjoying Chicago of course ;)

Body Modifications

Hey there blog--So a couple weeks ago I was just feeling frisky and after church I said to my fiance, Aaron: "Aaron take me to the body piercing studio" That's right, I said body piercing studio. So off we went in search of a body piercing place and and I got my nose pierced!! It's so cute, I love it. A lot of people have asked why at the age of 25 do I decide to get my nose pierced, and I think I just wanted to shake things up a bit. Because, I ALWAYS follow the rules and do everything I'm supposed to and so that day I decided to do something different that would not be too drastic/dramatic for my conservative work environment. Speaking of work, there's this one guy there who is the office gossip and he like flipped out when I showed up with my new body adornment and asked me if I had checked the dress code and did I think it would affect my business??!! It was totally annoying, especially since my bosses didn't care AT ALL. He's such a busy body, mind yo' bidness. Anyhow. It was cold in Charlotte this weekend, and I loved it! I'm ready for fall weather. As soon as I charge up the camera, I will take a picture of my new nose piercing :) Oh, the reason it took a couple of weeks for me to post this is because I wanted my parents to experience my little rebellion first hand and not read it on the blog. My mom's reaction was funny "AHHHHHHHHHH, YOU ARE RETARDED!!!! AARON WHY DID YOU LET HER DO THAT??? Oh well, let's go shopping" Then my dad didn't even notice it, how disappointing, I had to point it out to him. But, very typical of my dad he said in a very succint manner, "Alison, that's stupid"