Listen carefully... hear that sound of laughter?

That's my mom, half-way across the country, after I called to complain about my daughter springing the need for a full costume for a school presentation on me, the day before it was due... when she hadn't even started the speech yet.

Mom was kind enough to refrain from reminding me of all the times I did the same thing, since that would have kept us on the phone way too long to have started the project.

The family that runs together... is a pretty cranky bunch by 10 am

First off:

Look. At. This. Photo.

My eyes are open. I'm not obviously huffing and puffing... in fact, I'm almost smiling. No double chin mysteriously appeared, or odd flashes of stretchmarks from a shirt/safety pin/belt conflict. Better still, it looks like I'm running, not race-walking. (Granted, my legs look AWESOME in the other photo with the horrifying items mentioned above, but I'm going to look at this photo as almost as big of a WIN as running the 13.1 miles.)

Halloween was quite fun this year. Wet, cold and tiring too, but fun.

The Silver Comet Half Marathon & Fun Run were on October 31, and we all went. I ran the Half; kids ran in the 2 mile Fun Run - in just a little over 20 mins - and Dad supplied children with hot cocoa and crackers while they waited in the rain for me to finish.

Everyone was up and eating breakfast shortly after 5 am, and we made it out to Mableton with plenty of time to get a parking space at the race start this year. (Last year, we were half way along the shuttle route between start and finish, and had to walk a mile... and figure out which neighborhood side street we'd been directed down hours before, when it was too dark to see street signs.)

Other than the race starting 15-20 minutes after 7:30, I think it went so much better than last year. Number and chip pickup was speedy and well organized. The lines for the last minute pitstop were moving quickly - though that could just be my choice of the line that had to be short, since it was in the parking traffic pattern.

There were volunteers spread out with pace times, which helped the initial crush tremendously. Instructions for the fun run participants were called out with the HM race info from the "witches' station", which made getting family to the shuttle buses much less confusing than in 2008.

The rain started just about the same time as the race. Not droplets, drizzle or heavy mist. 20 minutes of actual rain. And it kept raining off-and-on, as the temperatures dropped.

Managed to maintain a pretty solid 10:00 pace, which I was pretty happy about. My watch time was 2:12. Chip time - 2:17:59. The 5-1/2 min difference was due to the line for the potty after the turnaround. (I didn't actually spend that much time in line, but saying it was a long line is better than talking about the struggle to pull up a wringing wet spandex running skort in the small space of a portalet... without bumping into anything too horrifying.)

Met my long suffering family members at the finish, lined up for food... and the rain started back up. At this point, we decided to stop at Starbucks on the way home, and headed for the shuttle bus.

By 11:00, we were all warm, dry, and very, VERY irritable. Fortunately, the kids were too tired to do any bickering, so we curled up with blankets on the sofas for television viewing and naps. By 6:30, they were fully recharged for an evening of trick-or-treating in the drizzle... a little over two hours of walking. Amazing, what kids will do for candy. (And what parents will do for their kids.)

My toes have (mostly) recovered from 13 miles in wet socks and squishy shoes, so this Sunday will be the Zooma Atlanta Women's Half Marathon & 5k. Just the half marathon though, and just me. I figure everyone else deserves to sleep in this weekend.

Seriously though... for as awesome as my legs look in this 2nd photo, the rest of me looks like there's some combination of seizure, violent death, asthma attack, and imminent explosion about to happen all at once.