Happy Valentine's Day from ATX

AM: 36 mins.
5 miles
PM: 62 mins.
8.5 miles

I touched down for my super secret surprise trip to Austin late last night and was greeted by Owen and his friend Brian Hanley, my gracious hosts for the weekend. After a late night dinner/breakfast at the Star Seeds Cafe we headed back to Chez Hanley and called it a night. I woke up earlier than I'd hoped the following morning, which was a tad frustrating, but I tooled around on the computer for a few hours before our group was ready to go out for a run. Brian had over half a dozen friends from college in town for the weekend (and including himself and Owen, there were almost 10 people in our party who were to run the marathon the following day), so we assembled a pretty solid group for an easy pre-race run on Saturday morning.

After the run and a shower, Owen and I headed back to the airport to pick up Jordan, who had no idea I was in town. Fortunately he didn't invite his other girlfriend for the weekend because that would've been pretty awkward. I'd received several suggestions about how to stage my big reveal, including locking myself in the trunk of the car and waiting on the baby changing table in the family bathroom, but I opted for none of those and instead just rode up with Owen in the front seat. Those of you who know Jordan know that he is probably the least excitable person ever, so his "surprised" reaction was about on par with what Owen and I had expected, but nonetheless it was satisfying knowing we had pulled the whole thing off without him suspecting anything.

I had another run on tap for the afternoon, so Jordan borrowed Brian's bike and rode along with me. We headed west from his neighborhood past the UT campus and then just meandered around the local neighborhoods. Jordan found some rec fields tucked in among the houses, so we took a spin on the soft grass for a few minutes. Jordan even dropped the bike and tested out the achilles for a lap. It was a pleasant afternoon and there were plenty of people milling around, and I was content having Jordan along for the ride with me.


Manly men readying the pit for the pig roast

There wasn't too much excitement on tap for the evening, as everyone in the house was either running or spectating the marathon early the next morning, so for the most part we just relaxed and hung out and enjoyed a few friendly games of pong. Oh, and readied the pig for tomorrow's pig roast. Basically the actual marathon is a very small part of this weekend and is just an excuse to indulge in an afternoon of meat eating and beer ponging.


Wilbur prepares to meet his delicious end