Basketball: up close and ageless

I'm  not a huge football fan. I'm just not.

It may stem from never having a great team to cheer for. KU football has never been awesome, and then you have the Kansas City Chiefs. Please. The Chiefs are literally the worst team in the NFL. Without good teams to cheer for, I just have never been transformed into a football fan. Cory has his K-State football team, and I don't begrudge them any wins, I just have very little interest in watching it.

I don't even watch the Superbowl unless we happen to be at a party with delicious snacks to eat. (FYI, delicious snacks include, but are not limited to chips, dips, cookies and cupcakes. Yum.) And, even then, I'm probably paying more attention to the commercials.

Buuuuuuut, if you want to talk about basketball, and specifically, KU Basketball. I'm your gal. I love it. I know it may sound cliche to say that I love KU basketball but not football, but, it's the truth. I find basketball more exciting to watch and much easier to follow. I'm not going to apologize for that.

So, when my dad called me up a couple weeks ago to tell me that he had tickets to the KU basketball game that he couldn't use, I jumped at the chance to go. Even if it was a to a pre-season exhibition game. I still love going up to Allen Fieldhouse and getting the experience of college basketball in person.

I had four tickets to the Monday night game, so Cory and I made it a date night with my friend Terah and her husband Nathan. Terah and I met at KU and always went to games together as students, so it was a fun time to reminisce.

Well, it turns out the tickets that my dad had but couldn't use were INCREDIBLE. Fourth row back, right across from the home bench. We could actually hear the words Bill Self used when he was yelling at the team. (A lot of "Wake up!") Even as a student, I was never that close to the floor.

Dang! Look how close we are!

One thing we noticed being so close: everyone else seems so young. The cheerleaders, the dancers, the players. They all look like babies up close. I sure don't really feel like I've aged all that much in the 14 years since I was a freshman living in the dorms camping out for basketball games, so I'm not sure why the students look so much younger now.

It's like the reverse of the Fast Times of Ridgemont High effect. I feel the same age, but everyone else keeps getting younger.

A wicked night

This was our family on Halloween:

Now, let me explain how I (a non-dresser-upper) ended up wearing a full face of green paint.

It all started a little over a month ago. My friend Tara threw a Wizard of Oz-themed 1st birthday party for her daughter, Priya. My girls had never seen The Wizard of Oz and to be honest, I couldn't remember the last time I had watched it, either. So, Tara invited us over for a screening of the movie in advance of the birthday party.

Charlotte, Molly, Kevi and Kiran watching intently.

I wasn't sure how the girls were going to like it. I remember being terrified of the flying monkeys when I was little. But, other than hiding for the "scary" parts, the girls actually really liked it. Molly even started dancing around like she was on the yellow brick road. And, from that, came the idea of the Halloween costume.

Molly wanted to be Glinda, the Good Witch. Because, although she is not the main character of the movie, she does have the poofiest dress and wears a crown. As a 5-year-old, it is hard to top that. Then, because the girls like to coordinate, Molly decided Charlotte should be Dorothy. And, Charlotte jumped on that bandwagon like it was made out of chocolate. She was decided.

After coming up with the idea, we needed costumes. Do you realize how frightening it is to Google "Girl Wizard of Oz Halloween Costume?" Everything that is sweet and innocent about the characters can also be made "Sexy." Personally, I didn't know that it was possible to be both the Tin Man AND sexy, but, apparently, you can. Yikes. Luckily, my sister can sew, so she was able to make the dresses for the girls' costumes. No sexy needed, thankyouverymuch.

So, how did Cory and I get involved in this, you may ask. Well, it turns out that the girls are still young enough to want to do things with their parents. Molly and Charlotte thought I needed to dress up, and they decided I should be the Bad Witch. I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this decision. I'm choosing to believe it is solely because she's the only other girl in the movie. And, Cory, they decided, should be the scarecrow.

Now, this isn't to say that we were totally on board with this idea. We smiled and joked and said, "Oh, wouldn't that be funny." But, I never actually thought I would be dressing up. I don't dress up. I've never been one to do it as an adult. But, then they kept talking about it. On Halloween morning, Charlotte said, "Mommy, where is your costume?" I realized, at that point, that this was something they REALLY wanted to happen.

Halfway around Kansas City

As any regular reader of my blog knows, I love me some race bling. I just really enjoy getting big shiny medals placed around my neck after completing a good race. Maybe it borders on crazy, but I don't really care. It makes me happy.

I ran the Kansas City half in 2010 and 2011. Both times, while the course was fine, and I had a good time, the bling definitely left a lot to be desired. Small, plain medals. Nothing to write home about. Well, this year, the KC Marathon majorly upped it's game. It seems to be a trend in races. I know I'm not the only one who runs for medals because races keep improving their medal designs. There are even competitions for the best race medals.

So, this year, when the medal was announced, I knew I had to do the race once again. The medals were so much better. They had color, they were bigger, they had a cool design, they had a custom ribbon. All the things you want in a good medal.

Check out the difference from 2010 to 2012 (You can't really tell the size difference in these pics, but it is significant):

Many friends of mine planned to run this race. Kelli and Ally were running the full marathon, but despite Kelli's many times of asking me, I never agreed to it. I stuck with the half. Anne was going to do the full as well, but injured her IT band and ended up dropping out. Katie was running it with her friend. Kelly was pacing it. My running partner, Sarah, and I planned to run it together.

The KC Marathon had a big expo downtown where you picked up your packet before the race. Ally went on Thursday and posted a picture on Facebook. When we finished Hospital Hill in June, a photographer from the race had taken a picture while Kelli, Ally, Anne and I were posing in front of the fountains at Crown Center. Unbeknownst to us, Hospital Hill was using that picture on their marketing for next year's 40th anniversary race: "A party 40 years in the making."

How cool is this? 

We were super excited to be on a sticker with all those running legends.

We're thinking being on the marketing material should get us free entry to next year's race ...

Anyway, back to the KC Half: For the last couple weeks before the race, my runs hadn't been feeling that great. I was feeling sluggish, and my legs felt heavy. I'm not really sure what was going on, but on the morning of the race, I was a little concerned and apprehensive about how I was going to do. And, although I didn't technically have a time goal, I knew about where I would want to finish.