Halloween 2006

After bidding a sad farewell to our Spanish friends (Dani, Jaime, and Ricardo) with whom we had spent the entire last week carving pumpkins, having home-cooked Spanish meals picnic style on our living room floor, and an assortment of other fun tradition exchanges.

Lish and I headed out for a night on the town - well, a night on Kalakaua for Halloween. For those of you not in Hawaii, Kalakaua street can be likened to State Street in Madison for Halloween, but minus the $5 cover I heard they charged this year and add a whole lot of Asian tourists! This year Lish and I had a hard time coming up with what we wanted to dress up as and last minute threw together an assortment of odd neon and 80's style clothes. I was told I looked a lot like "Desperately Seeking Susan." So for all intents and purposes, that is who I was supposed to be - BUT we worked it=)


We met a lot of interesting characters (figuratively and literally) and barely recognized some typically friendly and familiar faces=)



In addition, it was Johnny's (Lish's brother) next to last night in town before he moved back to Denver - tear=(


Happy Halloween!!!

Kona Ironman 2006

I took a break from the Waikiki scene and headed over to the Big Island for the Ironman World Championships in Kona, Hawaii. It was an amazing and completely inspirational experience. I flew over on a Thursday and spent the long weekend with my friend Janell who qualified for this year's race and worked at the expo to help defer the cost of my trip a bit. Check out the view from our condo!!!

The insprirational weekend began with signing people up for the Louisville Ironman. It was there I met people who had competed in double-digit numbers of Ironmen competitions and who encouraged me to someday give it a go! I also met great people from Active.com who made the weekend even more interesting and fun! Thursday night Janell, Rowdy and I we went to the carbo-load dinner heard inspirational stories, were treated to a luau and yummy desserts!

Friday we were joined by more wonderful friends including Eric, Adam, Christa, Trina, Brian, and Arlene. We spent the day touring the expo - where we raked in free stuff, made signs for Janell, and enjoyed eachother's company. It was wonderful getting to know more sports-minded people. In fact, during the Ironman dinner one of the athletes made a comment about how the entire year he feels like a freak, but the Ironman is the one time of year he does not...although I am certainly no Ironman (YET!!!) people often call me crazy for participating in all the physical activities and races that I do!

When race day finally arrived Janell was in amazing spririts and more calm than I could ever imagine being. Eric, Trina, and I watched the swim start in amazement as the calm water turned into a human blender of over 1500 pairs of flailing arms and kicking legs!



We then made our way to the bike area and waited for Janell to come by...She was all smiles



We drove up to Hawi to see her again at the half way point on the bike...

Still smiling=)

And then waited to see her in the marathon - cheering from a friends balcony the first time

and the second I jumped in and ran along side her for a bit of motivation!!!

I volunteered to be at the end of the race to "catch" and escort athletes to the medics, pictures, massages, etc. As I was coming back from helping one athlete I heard the announcer call out "And with a big smile Janell!" I made my way to her and was fortunate enough to be there as she came through the finishing chute! I almost cried! She is my inspriration=)

We capped off the weekend at the awards ceremony dinner where my new and amazingly funny friend Robe met up with us. We then were treated to a VIP party with all of the top athletes courtesy of Robe!
Adam even got his picture taken with the 2 winners!

Hopefully someday I too will have pictures as amazing as these!

Boat Cruise

Recently 2 of our friends had their birthday's on the same exact day - Chris and Jonathan. Needless to say they all planned a big bash together. Sadly, the only part I could participate in was the boat cruise along Waikiki. Regardless, it was a great time and a reason to get out in the sun and relax for awhile. Jonathan got a little crazy and ended up pouring an entire bottle of champaign all over me in celebration...he thought it was funny and for a minute, until the humidity and sweat turned it into a sticky mess, so did I!

(excuse the vulgarity in the picture!!!)


We (Lish and I) of course gave Jonathan his birthday kiss


and then took time to enjoy the waves, water, and sun.