Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Mom's Visit Includes the Oklahoma City Marathon, Lion King and Arts Festival


A great 6 day visit from my Mom ended this morning but not before we were able to take in an arts festival, musical and the Oklahoma City Marathon.











My Mom arrived on Wednesday around 2pm so we immediately needed to grab lunch and figured we would head downtown and eat at the Oklahoma City Arts Festival. It was day 1 of the festival and the weather was in the low 90s. We grabbed a bite to eat and spent a little time walking around the various tents. On our way back to the car we passed some interesting larger art on the lawn so I decided that we should pose for a few pictures which are included on the blog.











Thursday we went to watch the musical The Lion King and all I can say is WOW!! I had heard from a friend that it is a great show but I still was blown away by the massive production. The costumes were incredible and the way that some of the actors handled the large puppets were amazing. Definite recommendation for anyone who likes great entertainment. The only complaint about the evening was the dinner at Trattoria Il Centro which is an Italian restaurant a couple blocks away for the Civic Center Music Hall. The food was good but the servings wouldn't have filled me up when I was in pre school. My Mom and I laughed about it all week.











Friday we didn't do much unless you consider a trip to Bed Bath and Beyond exciting. I did go for a quick massage that morning since I was two days away from my marathon. Saturday we headed downtown for the Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon Expo at the Cox Convention Center. They offered a free bus ride that toured the marathon course so we took that which made for a long morning/early afternoon. The bus was running 30 minutes late and then the tour ended up taking around 2 hours. It was fun to hear the race director talk about the course and how he and his friend created the marathon 9 years ago. We then went home and relaxed a little and I got to watch the NFL draft while helping my Mom discover Facebook (my Cousin talked her into signing up so I helped her get some pics downloaded). By the way, Aaron Curry was the player I was hoping for the Seahawks to draft and I was excited to see how they were able to get the Broncos 1st round pick in next year's draft. NICE JOB HAWKS!!










Sunday morning we got up nice and early for the marathon, correction........I was already up. We had to wake up at 4am as the marathon started at 6:30. At 10:30 pm on Saturday night I decided that I needed to start adding new songs to my ipod and didn't get into bed until midnight. I think that knowing I was getting to bed that late created more anxiety than I was ready to deal with so I tossed, turned, read, watched TV and couldn't get to sleep. I did dose off for about 5 minutes at around 1:30 but that was it. I got to the starting line of the marathon with 5 minutes of sleep and that didn't do a lot for my confidence. Did enjoy the time leading up to the marathon. My Mom wanted to get there by 5:30 so that she could attend the church service that was held at the base of the survivor tree which is right next to the starting line. They also sang the National Anthem before the run and then had 168 seconds of silence to honor the victims of the bombing. The Memorial does not receive federal or state funding and the marathon is their #1 fundraiser.
















The starting gun went off at 6:30 and it was already around 65 degrees. About 3 miles into the run I noticed that I was sweating a lot more than I normally do and thought that it might be that my body was overtired from the lack of sleep. I wasn't overly fast as I ran the first half of the marathon in 2 hours and 6 minutes (usually run the 1st half of marathons in 1:50-1:55 range). Thought at that point that I was probably going to run a 4:16-4:18 marathon but then things started to turn. My knee started to get sore around mile 14 right as we headed south into the 30 MPH wind along Lake Hefner and by mile 17 my right leg cramped up. I ended up combining running and walking for the last 9 miles as I kept having to stop to stretch out my leg. I did start to notice that for the final few miles there were more walkers than runners and that everyone was starting to cramp up. Turns out that I was sweating so early in the run because it was incredibly humid on Sunday and that many of the marathon participants were in the same boat. Final time was 4 hours 47 minutes and 37 seconds which is the slowest of the 9 marathons that I have completed. My Mom drove my car to two different points on the course to cheer me on, one was at around the8.5 mile mark and the other was after the 20 mile mark. She took pictures which I also included.












All week I was thinking about my favorite OKC restaurant, Iron Starr and how I couldn't wait to eat there as a post marathon reward. Headed over there after going home for an ice bath and nap only to find out that they are closed on Sundays. No worries as my Mom and I instead headed for Cattlemen's for a great little steak dinner. We ended up going to Iron Starr for lunch yesterday.










Drove my Mom to the airport this morning and then went for a post race massage. Discovered a Massage Therapist last week named Julie who is very good at what she does. Julie lived in the Seattle area from the last 80s to the mid 90s so it was fun to hear someone from the Midwest talk about her northwest experiences. Julie has volunteered at the first aid tent of the marathon for the past 6 or 7 years and told me that she has never seen so many people coming in for treatment after a run. Said that this was the worst humidity they have had during any of the marathons she has attended. Gave my legs a good rub down so I am feeling pretty good other than my left foot which is still very sore (has been on again off again all day, felt great earlier but is sore again tonight). Don't think I will be running for at least a few more days :-)
























Monday, April 20, 2009

April 19th- Celebration Time: Final Group Run and End of Season Thunder Promo Crew Gathering















April 19th was a day of a few memorable experiences so I am going to do two posts as my experience at the ceremony for the bombing victims deserves a spot by itself. This post involves happier moments from yesterday.








Started off yesterday by heading over to Lake Hefner for one final 6:30 am group run before next week's OKC Memorial Marathon. This time we ran 8 miles. The temperature was around 50 degrees but the wind made it initally feel like it was closer to 35 when we started. We were fortunate in that it was raining fairly hard when I woke up at 5:30 but had stopped in time for the run. We started our run at the south end of the lake and ran off into a neighborhood that I had never been to. These group runs have become great ways for me to see places around town that I had never been. I would guess that about 150 people showed up for the run and I was even somewhat impressed with my time (don't have many great ways to know exactly how far I am running these days as I usually estimate and don't have an exact gage of how fast I am going). I ran the 8.1 mile course in 68:54 which isn't as fast as I was a couple of years ago but I am weighing around 190 lbs right now which is about 10-15 pounds heavier than I was before. Still much better than when I first moved to OKC, I weighed closer to 200 lbs then and was running even slower. Afterward there was food and beverages laid out on a table in the parking lot at the lake which is always a welcome sight. Thought it was kind of funny that the radio that someone had placed on the table was playing "Running on Empty" by Jackson Browne as I headed to my car. Was kind of feeling that way at that point but will hopefully be running on a full tank next weekend :-)

I did include some pictures that I snapped after completing the run. In the picture of me smiling(not to be confused with the other picture that the guy snapped of me as I was trying to get out of the way of a moving car), I am trying to figure out if the guy behind me is enjoying a sports drink or if some sort of running governing body was conducting a drug test that day. What on earth is in his bottle???




















Last night I met up with members of the Thunder Promo Crew for a get together at the local Buffalo Wild Wings. A couple members of the crew mentioned at the end of the season that none of us ever hang out away from work and that it is hard for crew members to get to know each other (Sonics crews had more down time and all hung out together quite a bit in a designated break area at the arena). I probably should have set something up during the season but thought it still might be fun for us to have an end of the year get together. 10 people ( 8 crew members, myself and our Events Manager Todd) showed up last night and we had a good time hanging out away from work for a couple hours. Many of them mentioned that we should do another get together later on this summer. They are a great group of people and as disappointed as I have been with many things this season, there are definitely some positives to build on as we look toward next season.

April 19th- A Day to Remember: 14th Anniversary of Federal Building Bombing















After my group run (mentioned in my other post regarding yesterday's events) I had just enough time to drive downtown to the site of the National Memorial. Yesterday was the 14th anniversary of that terrible day when the federal building was bombed, killing 168 people. The bombing took place at 9:02 am and I knew that there was going to be a ceremony to remember the victims and wanted to attend.
















The service started at 9:oo and at 9:02 there was 168 seconds of silence to honor the victims. At 9:05 the silence was broken by church bells from nearby St. Joseph's First Church and St. Paul's First Lutheran. The rest of the ceremony lasted for almost an hour and included a singing of the Star Spangled Banner (color guard provided by OKC Fire and Police Departments), scripture readings by people prominent in the civic and religious community, music and concluded with the reading of the 168 names.









13 different people took part in reading the names as they were read in groups based on what department they worked for or what floor they were presumed located on at the time of the bombing. The people reading the names were all either rescue workers, survivors or family members of those that passed away on April 19, 1995. One of the last groups of names was the children that were in the daycare. That is always the part that I find to be the most emotional. One of the name readers for that group was Bella Kok, a girl that was born after the bombing who read names, the final one being "my big sister Baylee Almon". Baylee was the one year old that was immortalized in the famous picture in which her lifeless body is being caried away from the building by a local fire fighter. Hard to believe that many of the children in that daycare would have been already driving on the local freeways or would be starting to think about things like driver's permits had it not been for the evil person that parked the rental truck on 5th Avenue that horrible morning. One other thing that stood out to me was how long it took to read the entire list of names. I remember at one point thinking "how many more names are there". Just one more prespective as to how tragic that day was.













After the ceremony, many family and friends started to make their way to the Field of Empty Chairs of which there are 168 bronze chairs, each with a name of one of the victims. People were placing flowers on the chairs of loved ones and tying them to the chairs with cable ties as it was very windy out. The hard thing was watching people place toys and stuffed animals at the chairs of the children. I can't imagine what all of these people must have gone through and imagine that April 19th is a difficult date every year.













I walked over to the field and kept looking at the chairs that didn't have anything on them and wondered what their stories were. If perhaps their family and friends had moved away from the area or if they just choose to remember the date in their own way. I'm sure coming back to the site every year is just too painful for some people. I'm sure those people represented in the chairs with no flowers are not forgotten but it was hard not to wonder about the individual stories when you see a chair with many flowers next to a chair with nothing. I had to remind myself that these aren't their grave sites and that the chairs and the location have different meanings to different people.











The wind made it physically uncomfortable to be outside watching the ceremony but it was something that I will never forget and am so glad I attended.











The picture above is of a family that was saying a group prayer around one of the child chairs. I have been inside the Memorial Museum a couple of times but seeing these people that were directly affected by the bombing is what really drives home how real the event was. The other picture is of 3 little kids that were posing for a picture in front of another child chair of someone that was either a relative or a family friend. I felt akward taking these pictures as I didn't want to be disrespectful knowing the meaning that this date holds for these people. There were a few members of the media snapping pictures of the kids so I just kind of snapped one at the same time.

Friday, April 17, 2009

New Job and Trip to Kansas















On Monday I accepted a new sales job with a company based in Kansas that has decided to expand into Oklahoma and hired me to be their OKC Rep. I will be selling promotional products as well as full line print jobs to companies and organizations . My business cards are on order so for now I am starting to get organized as I will operate out of my apartment and hope to get things truly rolling shortly (my Mom is in town next week so I probably won't really get started until the following week). This will not affect my position with the Thunder as I have had sales jobs while working for the basketball team for quite a few years.





The company is based out of Great Bend which is a small town located in the middle of Kansas (about 275 miles from me) so I drove up there on Wednesday and spent all day and part of yesterday meeting with my new co-workers, getting software installed onto my computer and going over some of our offered products. They also hired a guy to work in Missouri so they showed both of us the ropes at the same time. Nice people, good trip and lots of driving.

I took my camera with me and thought I would get some pictures however I was fairly busy and didn't think about it until I was on my way home. I did have the camera with me in the front seat and decided to snap some pictures when I had a chance (for the record, I only did it when there weren't any cars too close to me and I snapped quickly. I also didn't look into the eye hole so I wasn't endangering myself or others). Not real exciting pictures but they were midwest freeways so what would you expect. One of the pictures at the end of this blog shows some of the vegetation damage from the fires we experienced last week when there were heavy winds.











I did find a great place to eat on the way home. Had lunch at a really good BBQ place in Wichita called Hog Wild BBQ Pit and highly recommend it to anyone passing through. After I crossed back into Oklahoma I came across a Conoco Gas Station/Dairy Queen combo building. I was too stuffed from my BBQ lunch so I wasn't able to enjoy a delicious DQ burger but I did get some ice cream. At least I know that there is a DQ option for my next trip :-)










Not my most exciting blog. My next one will be better.














Monday, April 13, 2009

Final Thunder Home Game, OU Spring Football and Easter Sunday















Today is the 6 month anniversary of my move to OKC. Hard to believe I have been out here for half of a year now. Time flies.








Watched the Thunder lose by 30 points tonight at Portland. I'm sure some of my Thunder hating friends were happy to see their "new" team beat their "old" team. I still think the Thunder have shown a lot of progress this season and look forward to seeing how much they improve next season.









Friday was our final home game of the season and the team was able to beat the Charlotte Bobcats 84-81. We had quite a bit of activity going on before the game as we shut off Reno Ave. at 2pm and turned the street into a carnival like atmosphere complete with plenty of things for people to do (inflatable toys, basketball sport court for free throw shooting, prize table, live music, etc). I've included some of the pictures. The guy on stilts is Chester and he usually is average height and makes balloon animals but took it up a notch with the legs and basketball hoop for the final game. The rock band is Metal Shop and when I took this picture at 5pm they were doing a cover of "Cherry Pie" by Warrant. The rest of the bands were of more mellow genres but these guys were fun to check out.











After the game many of us headed for one of our favorite post game establishments for a couple of drinks before heading up to the Skky Bar, a nightclub that reserved their VIP Room for the Thunder Staff. Probably about 75 of us showed up and hung out until close to 2am before 9 of us headed down the street for a final game meal at IHOP. Good times.










Saturday my co-worker Tyler and I headed down to Norman to watch the Oklahoma University Red and White football game. Almost every major college in the country has a spring intrasquad game that is open to the public but it is definitely a bigger deal in Oklahoma then at most other schools. Around 25,000 people showed up to check out the 2009 Sooners football team that is expected to be one of the best teams in the country again this year. Tickets for the game were $6.












We had a great time at the football outing. Heisman Trophy winner Sam Bradford ran onto the field right before the first play of the game and got a huge ovation which was fun. Bradford didn't play very much but when he did he looked really good (not exactly a surprise). They kept score but it was a strange scoring system as it was the offense against the defense. For instance the offense got so many points for a 1st down or a long play, the defense got points for forcing punts and turnovers. In the end the defense won the game 63-36 and as a whole looked better than the offense.











Halftime of the game was fun. The university decided to have a Heisman Trophy presentation for Bradford since it was the first time that he had been suited up at Owen Field since winning the award. It gave the crowd a chance to aplaud him for winning the trophy last year which is awarded to the best college football player in the nation. They also had all of the attending football alumni come onto the field at halftime, line up and introduce themselves with a microphone that was passed right down the line. Probably over 100 players. Some players definitely got bigger cheers than others (Brian Bosworth got the loudest cheers).












I ended up going for a walk around the stadium in the 2nd half and made my way down to the Sooner Schooner which goes out onto the field after every OU score. Washington Huskies fans remember the Sooner Schooner from the 1985 Orange Bowl when it cost Oklahoma a crucial field goal that helped the UW win one of its biggest games ever (4th quarter and score was tied 14-14, the Schooner trotted onto the field after a field goal however there was a penalty that nullified the kick and the referees gave a 15 yard penalty for unsportmanlike conduct to the Schooner taking the Sooners out of field goal range. UW went down on next possession and scored the go ahead touchdown and never looked back). Got to get my picture taken with the Schooner which was fun. Also managed to have my picture taken with the common man statue on the way back to the car.










Easter Sunday was a great day but I have to admit that I don't have any pictures to show for it. I met up at a great church with my friends the Taylors as well as my friend JB and his family that were visiting from out of town and took in a great Easter Service. I think the church had a couple thousand people inside and the special guest was Ben Utecht, a pro football player (Tight End that played for the Indianapolis Colts over the last few years but will be playing for the Cincinnati Bengals this year). He spoke of his faith and then talked about how he is also an aspiring Christian singer. He then mentioned that his good friend was in attendance and called her up to the stage. His friend was Sandy Patty who is a multi grammy winner and is considered one of the legends of Christian Gospel music. She moved to OKC back in January when her husband took a job with one of the large energy companies. Ben and Sandy sang a very nice duet together and the service was outstanding.


We then all headed over to the Taylors beautiful home for Easter lunch. There were about 20 people at the house and I was fortunate to have an outstanding meal with wonderful people. Went home afterward and ended up talking to both of my parents on the phone for an extended time. Easter was a great day and I thank everyone that was a part of it.