Chicago Marathon
As many of you already know, this weekend I ran in the Chicago Marathon. Before I begin to write about the weekend, I would like to thank all of those people who in one way or another were there for me throughout the whole marathon experience, including those months of hard training for the marathon. A special thanks to Aimee, who provided a place for me to stay; Jackie, who went to root me on at the marathon; Andrea, who came up from Cincinnati with us to root me on; Madeline and Eduardo, who came all the way from Wisconsin to have lunch with me after the race; My sister, who has been there for me since day 1. So on Friday I departed Cincy around 5:30 pm with my sister and Andrea. On our way to Chicago we stopped in West Lafayette to grab some dinner and decided to call my sister Rose to see if she was around and we could stop by to see her. As is turns out, she was home, so we swung by her place and spent some quality time with her. Although this delayed our trip to Chicago by 2 hours, it didn't bother us. So we got to Chicago at Midnight (Chicago time) and were lucky to find a parking spot in 5 minutes and close to Becky's (Alice's friend, whom we were going to stay with) house. That night some friends stopped by for a while. Thank God they left quickly because I was really tired and wanted to get to bed. I went to sleep shortly there after and didn't wake up until 6 am the next morning when someone decided to send Andrea a text message on her phone. Since there were 4 cell phones in the living room, I couldn't figure out which one it was so I tried to ignore it and get back to sleep. Finally, I decided to try and figure out which one it was and put an end to it cause it was annoying me. So I got back to sleep and woke up at 9 am to go meet Aimee at her place. When I got there, she wasn't home, so I waited outside for a bit until she showed up. She finally got home and we went inside. I got to meet her parents and sister. They are all very nice people and made sure I felt right at home. Her mom even made me some breakfast. After breakfast Aimee and I caught a bus to McCormick place for the Health and Fitness Expo. We were supposed to take 2 buses, but when we got to the first stop there was this Chinese parade in Chinatown so we had to walk the rest of the way to McCormick. It really didn't bother me, cause I was in the company of a good friend. So we finally got to the Health and Fitness Expo (thanks to a nice guy who pointed us in the right direction). At the health and Fitness Expo I picked up my race packet and we looked around at all the interesting stuff that they had. There was this booth that was giving out stress balls and as a joke, I decided to tell the lady that I would need a whole box of them since I was so stressed out, and she actually gave it to me. So I'm walking around the Expo with a box of stress balls, bags with a lot of shit in it, and a sweater and coat which were annoying the fuck out of me cause they kept falling off my shoulder. So after a while we got tired of walking around and went back to Aimee's place where we hung out for a bit. At around 6 we met up with Jackie and Tim and headed to Borinquen Restaurant to have dinner with my sister and the rest of the gang. The food was great, and the service was even better. After some good food, and some laughs Aimee, Jackie, Tim and I went to Jackie's apartment to chill for a bit, while the rest of the group went to a party. It was nice hanging out at Jackie's. It was very chill and we had a lot of great laughs. So at around 11 pm Aimee and I headed to her place where we chilled in her room for a bit. Well actually, we were trying to figure out how we were going to get to the marathon and what not, but it took us more than an hour. I tried to catch some zzz's in her bed, while she tried to figure out the plans for Sunday, but she wouldn't let me. After finally figuring it all out, she kicked me out of her room! Apparently she didn't think the bed was big enough for the both of us. So I headed downstairs and went to sleep. The next morning I got up at 4:00 am to get ready for the marathon. Aimee woke up at 4:30 and made me some great breakfast (Thanks a lot, I really appreciate it. Your cooking is always great! You know, they say that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach!!! Are you trying to get to my heart???). So after breakfast I headed on my merry way to Grant Park for the marathon while Aimee went back to bed. The bus trip over to Grant Park was a little odd. The bus driver was a total bitch and had a nasty attitude. After a while she settled down though, and even wished me luck. So I am downtown and I walk past this guy who asks me if I am running in a race today. I thought it was odd, cause I figured everyone knew that the Chicago Marathon was going on. So I say yes and he asks me: Are you running it right now? I'm thinking, WTF is up with this guy. So I tell him that it doesn't start until 8 am and keep walking. I ran into another man who was gonna be running and we start talking for a bit. He was very nice and told me that I could run with him and his friend since we were all thinking about running the same pace. So I started out running with him but somewhere along the way I lost him. The marathon was great and there were a lot people cheering the runners on. I didn't get to see anyone that I knew while I was running, but I got to see them after the race. So my first 20 miles of the race went great. I actually went a lot faster than my training. I even ran next to this guy who had body paint on and a sign that said: Go White Sox. After a while I left him behind also cause he was slowing me down. The last 6.2 miles was another story. I was struggling through them. I had to stop on like 5 different occasions and just walk cause my legs were killing me. Fortunately I was able to muster enough energy to get through it and complete my goal. I even finished in under 4 hours, just like I wanted. To be a little more exact, I finished in 3:43:28. If you wanna take a look at my race results go to the following link: (http://results.doitsports.com/lasalle/?event=&posted_p=t&refresh=3600&bib_list=&bib=38050&last_name=&first_names=&x=28&y=10). So after the race I met up with Aimee, Jackie, Andrea and my sister and took some pictures. Unfortunately we lost Jackie along the way, and she didn't appear in the pictures. So my sister and Andrea went to Becky's to pick up their shit and Aimee, Jackie and I took the El to Jackie's place. When we got there, Jackie took Aimee and I to Aimee's place where we would wait for Madeline and Eduardo who were driving down from Wisconsin to see me, and for Andrea and my sister so that we could all grab some lunch. We went to this Mexican restaurant which had some good food and after eating and some laughs everyone headed on their merry way. The long ride back home was good. I pretty much slept through most of it. So I got to Cincy at around 10:30 pm and pretty much went to bed shortly there after. All in all, it was a great weekend and I had so much fun spending time with friends and family. Thanks again, to all who helped make this a memorable moment. I will always rememeber it, for the rest of my life!!!