Europe Part 2: Paris

Where did I leave off?!  Oh yes, our last day in London.  Well, we woke up and finally were up, showered, and dressed in time for the free breakfast (thanks Accenture for making me a Hilton Gold member).  And man, did we regret being lazy in the morning and missing the amazing spread!?  I couldn't believe the free breakfast was so good.  Oh well... we will blame the jet lag. 

We then hopped in a cab to the train station to catch a train to take us to Paris via the chunnel!  G$ and I (well more G$) were very excited to take a train through the chunnel.  Was it that exciting?  Nope, not at all (in my opinion) and maybe that's because I'm jaded from over a year of training up to Philadelphia or New York City for work (again, thanks Accenture).

Once we arrived in France, we took a taxi to our hotel, which was a little further out from central Paris, but since it was right on both a metro and rail line, it made getting into the heart of Paris super easy.  This is where I'll go on my speel about how absolutely wonderful Paris's public transportation system is.  They had metro lines all across the city and the trains came about ever three minutes even at night!  I know, everyone in DC is shocked, I had a ten minute metro wait just last week during rush hour.  Paris's system really put DC to shame (not that it's a difficult task to do so).

Once we checked into the hotel, we headed to see the Arc de Triomphe, which was within walking distance of our hotel.   Saw some street dancers performing outside the metro stop.  Then metroed into central Paris.

Croissants.  Ahhhh, French croissants.  Need I say more?!  We ate entirely too many, but boy were they delicoius.  I am personally more favorable to the chocolate filled ones, also known as Pain Au Chocolat, because who wouldn't want chocolatey goodness inside their buttery goodness?  :)

Sunset with the Eiffel Tower

After eating a late lunch, we walked to Notre Dame, where we waited in line to get in, once on the inside, walked around the outer perimeter, which was open to tourists, then found a seat for an evening Sunday mass. 

View from Outside

Inside Shot

Gargoyles

On our first night in our hotel, we stopped by the concierge desk and ask about the best way to get tickets to The Louvre and the concierge man said, well right here.  So we paid for the tickets in advance, which ended up being one of the best decisions of the trip!  The Louvre was closed on Mondays, so we had planned to go on Tuesday.  The Louvre has two entrances - one underground and then the infamous pyramid.  We came in underground from the train and saw that the line was looong. 

We had planned to grab a quick bite at a street vendor, but since we were already underground, we stopped at the most convenient place, which was sadly Starbucks.  And it will likely be the most memorable Starbucks trips we've ever taken.  First off, have I mentioned I don't speak French?  And for those who know me, I have been known to be a little awkward from time to time, especially when I'm uncomfortable (shocker, right?).  Well, I butchered my order.  I knew the basics in French: hello, thanks, please, but neglected to learn, I'll have, or may I please have.  Then the barista responded with a question, and I had no. idea. what. she. said.  Of course, G$ was just standing by watching me struggle.  Then she asked if we spoke English, then asked the question in English, but due to the accent, I still couldn't understand her.  Finally, I figured out if she was asking if we were staying or going.  Whoops.  Then it was time to pay and this is where this Starbucks trip becomes so memborable.  G$ and I ordered coffees and breakfast sandwiches and the grand total came to over 20 Euros!  Which if you do the exchange, was about a $30 breakfast at Starbucks!  My coffee alone (a Caramel Macchiato) was about $8! 


Then it was off to get in line.  We found the end, but then asked a lady who worked there and she said that with our tickets, we could go upstairs to the pyramid and didn't have to wait in line!  Sweeeeet!  So we made our way out to the inner courtyard with the pyramid and basically just walked right up, showed our tickets, and were inside! 

Yes, yes we did. :)

Our first order of business was seeing the Mona Lisa.  Don't get me wrong, I know how famous this painting is, but I just wasn't wowed.  For one thing, it was well protected behind a glass barrier and then it was roped off so you couldn't even get that close.  Not to mention, the lines and crowd.  G$ and I talked about it afterwards and came to the conclusion that with the internet and books available in this day of age, we both have already been able to see the Mona Lisa, and more up close and personal online than were were in person.  So, it was cool to say we did it and maybe my lack of excitement was also in part from not being a super art person, but I wasn't overly impressed. 

A horrible picture of me with the Mona Lisa in the background.  

 Then we spent a couple hours wandering around the rest of the Louvre and boy was it a huge museum!  Saw a lot of pretty incredible pieces!  Took a ton of pictures, which I will spare you, with the exception of this little gem (pun intended):

Princess Kara.

The Pariasan cafe.  I loooved it.  I had so much fun sitting outside in the cafes, eating a relaxing (and by relaxing, I mean sloooow service) meal with a bottle of wine.  Unfortunately, I didn't take a single picture of a cafe.  :(

Since our vacation was taken almost three months ago, I honestly cannot remember which day we went to see the Panthéon (not to be confused with the Pantheon in Rome). 

On our last day, we decided to take the train out to Versailles.  Or as G$ would call it "Ver-Suck."  In Versailles defense, it was raining that day and we had to wait in a loooooong line in pouring rain.  We got off the train and luckily were able to snag a Paris umbrella from a shop, but our umbrella didn't quite open all the way, so water accumulated on the top, then you would move and the umbrella would dump water down your side or back.  By the time we got inside, one entire side of my jacket was completed drenched.  We did the inside tour, but since it was raining, we opted not to walk through the millions of gardens, which was kind of a shame. 

Me in the Sun Room.

We had saved the best for last by planning to go up in the Eiffel Tower at night on our last day there.  

Yes, he did. :)

I think I may have told G$ I wouldn't put this little mishap on the blog, but since everything turned out just fine, I think it's fine to share.  While we were in London, we G$ went online and bought tickets to go up in the Eiffel Tower on our last evening there.  We had tickets for 5:30.  After our long day of Versailles and walking, we had ended up at the Eiffel Tower early (around 4ish) and were just hanging out waiting.  We were taking in everything, especially the long lines to buy the tickets and we said to each other, "Definitely was smart for us to buy these in advance."  The ticket holder line wasn't really even a line.  Since we were there early, we asked the ticket collectors if it was possible to go up early, but they said no dice.  5:30 finally came around, so we get into our short line for ticket holders, give the collector our tickets, only to hear him say, these tickets are for 6:30, not 5:30.  WHAT?!?!  We had somehow gotten it in our heads that our tickets were for 5:30.  If this was my fault, it must have been due to the tickets being in military time.  What's G$'s excuse?!  :)  At this point, the sun is going down and it's getting colder.  Neither of us is wearing a warm enough jacket to be out at night, so we opt to quickly run back to the hotel to change since we now had an hour to kill.  Back at the Eiffel Tower at 6:30, we again go to our short line for tickets holders, give the collector our tickets, only to hear him say, these are for tomorrow night.  WHAT!?!?!  G$ bought them for the wrong day!  And, even worse, for a day that we won't even be in Paris!!  Ugh.  We couldn't NOT go up in the Eiffel Tower while in Paris!  So... you know that line that we were both so glad we had planned ahead and bought tickets in advance so we could avoid it?  Yup, that where we had to park it!  Since it was dinner time, the ticket line was definitely shorter than it had been earlier in the day, so all in all, it probably only put us back about 30 or so minutes.  Not too shabby.  So we took the elevator up to the second platform, then another elevator to the top, peaked around outside for a bit (it was freezing)...

If you can't read it, it says "Washington 6,175 km"

Quick shot with the Paris lights in the back

Me fake looking through the telescope.

Then we elevatored back down to the second platform.  At this point, we opted to walk down to the first platform (which was only accessible via the stairs).  While walking down, we saw signs for the restaurant in the Eiffel Tower and decided that it was totally worth spending a little bit more on dinner that night to eat in the Eiffel Tower.  Plus it was November 1, five days before our one-year anniversary, so we called it our anniversary dinner.  The dinner started with a glass of champagne while we were reviewing the menu.  While reading it, I noticed they had a little line at the bottom saying that they only accept Visas and American Express cards.  I started freaking out - we only had a MasterCard!  Before ordering, we verified with the server and all was ok.  The meal was definitely more on the extravagant side than G$'s and my normal means, but it was nice to end our great vacation with something like that!

The next day we woke up, took a cab to the airport, and had pretty uneventful plane ride home.  We I really lucked out in that we had the entire row to ourselves, which ended up being a blessing in disguise since the headphone jack for the TV in the back of the seat in front of us was broken on tmy assigned seat.  Luckily, I realized this and was able to move to the aisle seat before the plan took off - phew!  I'm sure the plane ride would have seemed muuuuch longer without being able to watch three movies.  Yup, I said three.  Ha!  I got in some girly movies that G$ isn't always the biggest fan of!

And there you have it, a quick summary of the final leg of our Europe trip! 

In summary: we loooved Paris and would definitely go back there in the future!

Hope everyone has a great weekend!


<3
K$

Merry Christmas and Happy 2012!

I, unlike everyone else in blogland (yes, I purposely did not use the term 'blogosphere'), did not do a Merry Christmas or Happy New Year post.  And frankly, I doubt many of my faithful readers are surprised, since I'm not usually on top of my posts... But, I did want to post a quick recap on a few holiday related items before we got too far into 2012. 

First off, our Christmas card!  I didn't order enough cards, so if you got one, consider yourself lucky.  If you didn't, well, neither did I, meaning I didn't save one for myself...  So I wanted to post a digital copy of our card on the ole blog so I could have it stored as a keepsake.  Lame, I know.  Plus apparently that's just what you do when you have a blog.  



We received mixed feedback on the picture we chose for the front.  I'll be honest, it probably wasn't my first choice, but...

• I wanted to do a more recent picture of Kairo, rather than a puppy picture
• We didn't have many super cute headshots of Kairo while he was older and a more landscape-y full body shot didn't work as well with the card layout (I even brought my camera hiking to get a cute picture of Kairo perched on a giant log, but it just didn't pan out...)
• I was down to the wire on placing the order before my Groupon expired

Thus... we got what some thought was cute, while others thought was weird face shot of the K-Man.  Personally, I love his expression.  It's so Kairo.  His inquisitive look with his lip caught on his teeth.  Awww, makes me smile just thinking about it.  The back consisted of a two smaller pics of Kairo as a puppy and then one of G$ and I with the Eiffel Tower behind us (don't worry, you'll see that picture when I recap Part 2 of our Europe trip).  

Christmas was great!  The whole long weekend was unseasonably warm - in the 60s - which was absolutely wonderful! 

On Christmas Eve Eve, Kairo and I met my Mom, Hunter, and Abby to go hiking at Hemlock (remember the ropes course when we were in school!), which is right near their house.  I didn't bring my phone or my camera, so no pictures to share there, but Kairo enjoyed hiking with other dogs and I enjoyed some quality mother-daughter time with my momma.  :)  After hiking, we went back to my parents' house for lunch and hanging out.  And even had the opportunity of meeting my parents' neighbors who have a 4 month old Vizsla named Otto.  He was so cute and little.  Really hard to believe Kairo was the little only a few months ago! 

We spent Christmas Eve at my parents' house, doing a brunch then lounging around with the family in a very relaxed setting, which I loved.  My brothers and I didn't exchange gifts this year (which made Christmas shopping a lot easier!  And together the kids bought my parents a group gift, so the present opening mainly consisted of watching Brandon, my nephew.  And as most children are, he was more interested in the paper than the presents!  So cute!  The best part of Christmas was that there was no rushing to get to another family's house, no feeling like it was getting late, it was perfect.  We even managed to get an impromptu family picture taken:




Christmas Day was spent with G$'s family.  We grabbed a quick bite at G$'s parents' house (homemade cinnamon rolls, yum!), then went to church.  After church, G$ and I swung home, changed, picked up Kairo and headed back to G$'s parents' house for present opening, walking/playing with Kairo outside, followed by an early dinner and an overexcited (ok, at least on my part) game of CatchPhrase.  What's my favorite 2011 Christmas gift you ask!?  Why it's the newest addition to my desk at work from G$'s brother:



Yes, a ceramic squirrel skull with gold teeth!

G$ and I went all out and super crazy for New Year's Eve this year... Ha!   Come on, you guys know us...  We didn't do anything. :)  Well, anything out of the ordinary that is. 

Best wishes for 2012!

<3
 K$

Europe Part 1: London

For our one year anniversary, G$ and I decided to take a trip to celebrate.  Since we met back in 2007, we have taken our fair share of beach vacations, including Hawaii with G$’s family, Captiva Island, FL for Christmas with my family, the Riviera Maya in Mexico the week after we got engaged, multiple trips to the Outer Banks, NC, and Ocho Rios, Jamaica for our honeymoon.  All right, maybe “our fair share” is not quite putting it correctly.  Maybe… technically… all our week+ long vacations have been to beach destinations.  Maybe.  But, in my opinion, nothing says vacation like relaxing and doing nothing on a beach.  However…G$ a certain someone is not the most keen on the beach vacation.  He prefers to be active, stay busy, and see the sites.  Case and point:  us going to the Wright Brothers Museum when we were in the Outer Banks last May.  So, I figured it was time for me to suck it up and take one for the team.  Plus, there are so many non-beach destinations that I haven’t been to that also happen to be on my long list of places to visit – London and Paris to name a couple.  So that’s where we headed off to for an eight day action-packed, tourist adventure.

Between the two of us, we took over 500+ pictures!  I didn’t think that was possible, but I can be a little trigger happy, what can I say.  Due to the high volume of pictures, I’m going to break this post down into parts – Part 1 is London, the first stop on our eight day action-packed, tourist adventure and Part 2 will be Paris. 

Overall Take:  It was great to see the sites and go to a country with so much history; however, we were slightly (and I use that term loosely) disappointed in how commercialized/Americanized this city-with-so-much-history was.  You could not walk a block without seeing a chain restaurant that we have here in the States.  Case and point - across the street from the Tower of London - England's oldest structure - we encountered the following:

Starbucks next to a Subway next to a Ben & Jerry's

Here’s a picture montage of some of the sites:

G$ checking his watch in front of Big Ben

St. James Park - All we could think was: Karo would loove to stalk the birds.  We I was missing our pup.

Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace

One of the coolest things (ok, maybe cool is not the best word) was that at ever intersection, they had painted "Look Right" or "Look Left" so you knew which way traffic was going to be coming from since they drive on the "wrong" side of the street over there:

It took us two days to finally get into the Tower of London due to timing.  On the first, day we walk across the Thames, hit up Shakespeare’s Globe Theater (which oh by the way, is not the original, but was built as exact replica). 

Then continued strolling down (or up?) the river banks to the London Bridge.

See London Bridge there in the back?

But, by the time we got to the Tower of London, it was about an hour until closing and there was a long line to get in, so we opted to buy tickets for the next day and do it first thing in the morning before the place got too crowded.  We then decided to walk back to our hotel on the other side of the Thames with a stop into St Paul's Cathedral. 

Outside the cathedral steps were some Occupy protesters camped out with their tents:

The next day we woke up and attempted to take the Underground (also referred to as The Tube) back up to the Tower of London.  However, the station closest to our hotel was closed for maintenance, so we followed the Thames River path up to the next one, only to find that it had been closed permanently.  We. Could. Not. Catch. A. Break.  Especially when it came to public transportation in London.  So we decided just to continue walking up the Thames River Path.  Right before we got to the Tower, there was this area right near the Thames that was completely underwater the day before when we left the tower.  And by underwater, I mean, we had to climb on the blue fence since the water was complete covering the path.  However, that morning, the tide had brought the water down no joke about 15 feet.  See, we were unable to walk where those people were walking:

We got the Tower of London, followed a tour by a Yeoman Wanderer, also referred to as a Beefeater, who provided a lot of the history of the tower and some fun, sometimes creepy, stories about the folks who came there to be imprisoned or killed.

One of the towers inside the Tower

View from outside the Tower.  The grass used to be the moat.

Saw the crown jewels, where, unfortunately, cameras were forbidden and sorry folks, I’m a rule follower… Went through a few other “museum” buildings and got our learn on.

The stars did not align to let us go into Westminster Abbey.  The first day we were in that area, the Abbey was already closed.  After actually seeing the Tower, we had plans to get back down to the Abbey, which we were expecting to be open until at least 3:00 or 4:00, so we rushed to get there.  Since the Underground station near the Tower of London was also closed for maintenance, we hopped on a bus (no unfortunately, the only time we took a bus during our stay, it was not a double-decker bus.  What a shame, I know…), and then sprinted from the bus stop across a bridge to get the Abbey, only to find out that it closed at 2:00 that day.  Wah waaaaahhhh.  It just wasn’t meant to be.  Maybe a blessing in disguise since tickets were about $18 pounds person.  Kind of outrageous for a church. But...we did get some pictures of the outside:

We did make a visit to Harrods, the department store situated on a 5-acre site with over one million square feet of selling space in over 330 departments, just to see what it’s all about.  We mainly stayed on the first floor and were in awe by the prepared foods section, which put Wegmans to shame!  We got a few snacks and went back the hotel to eat and relax a little before dinner that night. 

One of the very cool things that we learned in a taxi back from Harrods is that being a taxi driver in London is a super prestigious, life-long occupation that can take more than a year to prepare for (i.e. pass the required tests).  Apparently they make you learn and memorize hundreds of routes throughout the city (keep in mind this is an old city, with confusing roads, so we’re not talking about DC’s perfectly constructed grid system).  It took our taxi driver 2+ years to pass the test and he said that whenever you see guys driving around on scooters with maps clipped to the front, they are learning the routes or what he referred to as "gaining the knowledge." 

On our last night there, we had tickets to go up into the London Eye.  We had heard from our driver from the airport that going at night was the best way to see London.  I guess it’s one of those things you have to do, but wasn’t all that spectacular.  The coolest thing was more how the eye worked.  Yes, I just said that and plan to geek out…  Ok, guess I’ll spare you, but I thought it was very cool how it never stops (unless it absolutely has to).  It moves so slowly, that they are able to unload a 20 person car, and reload it all at the base of the wheel.  Pretty cool. 

View of Big Ben and Parliament from the Eye.

Would We Go Back?  Probably not.  Definitely not anytime soon.  Although I hear the English countryside is beautiful and that we missed out by not exploring outside of downtown London, I’m still not sold.

<3
K$

And the verdict!?!

...the red, more fun, more out-of-my-comfort-zone dress!  My company had a photographer at the event, let me tell you, she caught a few “good” poses:

Hard to see the red in the dress here, but I promise, it's there! 

Someone must have said something REALLY funny...  or not, because I laugh at almost every joke thrown my way.

Yes, these photos are all available for the entire company to view on our internal website...

I was debating whether or not to post my dress decision as some of you may or may not see this dress again for Christmas… TBD.  :)  If I choose to wear it again, don’t judge. 

<3
K$

Oh Thank Heaven

When I try to get witty with the post titles, it either turns out great or is a complete bust.  The title of this post most certainly falls into the latter category, but it does remind me of the Seven-11 jingle...

Anyways, I wanted to provide you all with a recap of the Thanksgiving weekend.

For me, it started a little earlier than expected as my client directed told everyone to leave at 1pm.  We (the contractors) stayed until around 2pm, when the last Federal employee left, then we had no option but to leave since contractors are not allowed to be in the building without a Federal employee.  A rule that pseudo-frustrated me when they announced it, but worked to my advantage this time around! :)  So I was picking G$ up at work by 3pm and we started our Thanksgiving weekend a few hours early.  Sweet deal.

For Thanksgiving Day, my parents hosted an extended family gathering at their house.  To include my immediate family, G$'s parents, G$'s sister, brother-in-law, and nephew, and my sister-in-law's parents.  We brought Kairo, who had a blast running with my parents' dogs in their backyard.  Yes, a fenced backyard separated from the house only by a sliding glass door - also known as an apartment-dwelling-dog-owner's dream! :)  Potty trips could not have been simpler.  Whenever we get a house, we will need to work on where Kairo is allowed to tinkle.  We may or may not have had a tinkle-on-deck situation... 

We did a pseudo-potluck for Thanksigiving where my mom handled the turkey and some veggie dishes, and the other families brought appetizers, veggies, homemade rolls, and desserts.  Everything was delicious!  I tag teamed appetizers with my sister in-law A$.  I made two recipes which were both very simple and very easy to make, so I thought I'd share them with you. 


Bacon Wrapped Dates

Recipe modified slightly from here.

 Ingredients

• 1 (8-10 ounce) package pitted dates
• 4 ounces almonds
• 1 pound sliced bacon, thick-cut or applewood smoked (I actually used the center-cut, maple flavored bacon.  Apologies, I'm drawing a blank on the brand.)

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
2. Slit dates. Place one almond inside each date. Wrap dates with a half to a third piece of bacon, using toothpicks to hold them together.
3. Bake for about 17+ minutes, or until bacon is evenly brown and crisp.

Baked Brie with Honey and Pecans

Recipe modified from here.

 Ingredients:

• Brie - I cut off the white stuff since it's bitter tasting
• Pillsbury Crescent Rolls
• Honey
• Pecans or walnuts, chopped
• Apples, slice - I prefer Gala

Directions

1. Preheat oven to temperature on package. 
2. Place half the crescent roll piece on the bottom of an oven-safe dish - sealing the perforated lines.  
3. Place brie on top.  
4. Sprinkle pecans over the top of the brie then pour honey over the pecans.  
5. Use the other pieces of the crescent rolls to wrap them to "seal" the brie inside.  
6. Bake according to the package directions - may need another few minutes to brown the crescent roll.  

Easy peasy.  And both were huge hits!

<3
K$

Outfit Planning

My company has two major social gatherings each year: (1) the Summer Event - which I did not attend this past summer - that is usually family oriented at a ranch/park with fun activities and games and (2) the Winter Event - which is this Saturday! - that is a nice cocktail hour and sit-down dinner for you and your significant other.

This year's Winter Event is black tie optional and will be at The Willard in downtown DC.  I got the scoop from a few ladies, and they said most men wear suits, with the exception of a few who actually own tuxes and want to get more wears out of them.  I also confirmed that with the exception of a few of the older partners' wives, no one wears long dresses.  Phew.  

I did a little Black Friday shopping online last week and purchased two dresses as potential outfits for the Winter Event.  They arrive in the mail today, so fingers crossed that both fit well and I just get to choose between:

Option Numero Uno

Option Numero Dos

Both are from Banana Republic and I scored them for 35% off, making them $91 each.  What a steal!  I'm leaning towards the top one - the navy Jacquard shift dress.  But, part of me wants to live a little and go for the red print.  Thoughts?!  


And now that I posted on the blog, my guess is that neither will fit and I'll be scrambling to find a dress tomorrow after work...  I'll keep you posted! 


<3
K$

I am a TOUGH MUDDER!

What's a tough mudder you may ask?!  Well, it's someone who completes what is touted as "Probably the Toughest Event on the Planet."  That's right, baby, the toughest event on the planet!  Boo-yah! 

Here's the official 2011 Virginia video:

It was at the Wintergreen Ski Resort - yes, a ski resort!  Which can only mean we had to climb up and back down not one, not two, but SEVEN hills ski slopes.  One of which was over 1000 feet in elevation.  Shoot. Me. Now.  There were about 20 other obstacles, which did not even begin to compare to this monstrous climb called the Death March. 

I started this post shortly after the run, but was holding off on posting until I had more digital pics to post.  However, after looking into the picture options earlier today, I'm not sure I'm willing to shell out $79.99 for the 15 digital pics they have of me.  G$'s mom, sister, and nephew came out to cheer us on, so I'm going to stick to the few free pictures I have from her.  Here's a link to the official site with our pictures (Bib  #9353, #9354, and #9355 if you want to see pictures of G$ and J$). And yes, we did have to have our numbers written on our foreheads and legs with permanent marker... 

Here's our picture after finishing.  They don't hand out finisher medals, they hand out finisher orange headbands.  I know, kind of weird...  

Here's a brief recap on a few of the obstacles that really stick out in my mind: 

Chernobyl Jacuzzi.  Despite being described on the website as an icy mixture, I somehow missed that while reading, so I was not quite prepared.  As we were running up to this obstacle, I saw pallets of bags of ice and thought OH NO, this isn't just a water obstacle!  This was by far, probably the worst of the obstacles and I'm not sure the video below does it justice.  I didn't calmly get into the water.  I jumped (per G$'s instructions), but didn't jump far enough, so I went under. Came up.  And then had to go under again to get under the barrier in the middle.  Oh. My. Goodness.  It was cold!

Mystery Obstacle.  At the registration area, there was a sign stating that the mystery obstacle involved smoke and spiders.  I immediately said, uh-uh, not doing it if there are live spiders.  We get to the mystery obstacle about three-quarters of the way through the entire race, and I climb up the ladder and into a tunnel where I can't put my feet on the ground, nor could I see the bottom, so I had to just drop and trust that there were no spiders.  I sucked it up and dropped.  I lucked out, no spiders.  

Please forgive my horrible hunch and awkward facial expression.  I was in serious pain. :)

Monkey Bars.  This is the first obstacle where I got to feel how cold the water was and this also happens to be one of G$'s favorite story to tell.  I get both my hands on the first bar, then while attempting to move one hand to the next bar, I immediately drop into water.  Yup, epic fail.  And let me tell you... the water was cold. 

J$ and G$ with me slightly behind. 

Did I mention that G$ and I didn't quite train for this?!?! Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. G$'s brother, who had been training and running about 30+ miles a week was a good sport throughout the run, very encouraging, so thanks, John, that was much appreciated.  However, after the run was over, he apparently spent the entire drive back to DC complaining about how we didn't train...  whoops.  John - you had every right to complain and I'm certainly not holding that against you.  We let you down.  Big time.

That being said, we finished!!  And I'm very glad we did it!  There is a 2012 Tough Mudder tentatively scheduled in DC and as long as it is not taking place at a ski slope, I'm hoping to do it.  I'll keep everyone posted on the details as it's officially announced in case anyone is interested in signing up!