Polar Bears & Silly String

Welcome 2008!

Camille and her friend Hannah made the front page of the Seattle P.I. Here's the photo, headline and caption that was published:

AND IT'S MY BIRTHDAY, TOO!
Hannah Tyler, right, the first baby born at Virginia Mason Hospital on Jan. 1, 1996, joyfully applies silly string to her friend Camille Pierson, left, as Hannah's dad Jeff counterattacks during Hannah's birthday celebration at the Seattle Center. (December 31, 2007)
Mike Urban/Seattle Post-Intelligencer


Camille will be 12 on her birthday coming up in a few weeks. I hope she won't compare New Year's Eve festivities and fireworks with the modest (yet sincere) celebration I have to offer.

Resolution Run 5K
23:54 (~7:43 pace)
1st in AG (for "Trip & Drip" Division)

As for me, I did the Resolution Run on January 1, a 5K race offering an optional "Trip and Drip" detour into Lake Washington where you enter the water, totally submerge, exit and then finish the final 30 yards or so of the run. It's sort of the runner's version of a Polar Bear Dip, I guess. I've run very little in the past month, so didn't know what to expect on this one. I managed a nice pace of 6:55 for the first mile, but sure couldn't hang onto that. 7:35 was my 2nd mile and that should have been where I should have stayed. But I'm out of shape and fell apart for the last mile-plus, got passed by women I normally finish just in front of and had a pokey 9:25 pace for the final segment that included the dip in the lake. Oh well. It's just January and there is room for improvement. Oops! Did the camera catch me dealing with a runny nose there?

Other than a gasp and a bit of spluttering, the water actually felt good. Hanging around afterward in wet gear felt fine, almost normal too. So I re-entered the lake down the beach maybe 100 yards away from where runners continued their plunges and headed out for a real Polar Bear open water swim of my own (this time taking my running shoes off first). I swam only 20 yards or so until the brain-freeze and painfully cold feet started so did what most sensible people would do and got the hell out. I guess those extra couple pounds I gained over the holidays weren't really enough to insulate me for this sort of thing.

Biking a little over an hour rounded out the afternoon, giving me a sort of triathlon workout (albeit with a super short swim) and good start to 2008!