Michael & Liz are Bloggable

I started writing a political post tonight but decided to hold it back because I promised not to post political anymore. Instead I wanted to update everyone on the puppies.

Gryffin's pappiloma virus is just about gone. When I posted last, he basically had 3 large pappilomas on the right side of his mouth. They have all but disappeared. In the span of about a week, they started bleeding, they shredded apart, and started deflating in size. Now they are down to little tiny sores that continue to look better and better every day. He is still sensitive about us touching his mouth but I think that's more of a reaction from the past than anything else. It's tough to take a picture of them but we did our best tonight. Here is the best shot:

You can see the one near the front of his mouth and then two small bumps near the back. Soooo close to being gone. The other symptom of watering eyes has also disappeared. He gets a lot less poogies (snot in his eyes) these days. We are so thrilled about it. This means they will let him stay in the kennel over New Years when we go to Atlanta.

Doggy Freedom: Our old routine was when we came downstairs in the morning, Liz and I would each take a crate downstairs and they would stay in crates while we were at work. Then at night when going to bed, we'd carry both crates upstairs so they could sleep in our room in their crates. One day we just decided to start leaving them out of their crates to see how they do. We know they got along with each other but we don't know what havoc it might wreak on our couch or furniture. They have been awesome to say the least. They don't tear things up, and most of the time when I come home, I can go to the couch and feel around, and I will be able to tell where each of them was sleeping. That's all they do during the day is sleep so we like to let them be more comfortable by staying on the couch rather than crates.

We made a mistake last Saturday when we left a foam ball under the coffee table. This is the gloriousness Liz came home to:

Lesson learned on that one.

Last thing, we went to PetSmart the other day to get some dog food and we got Daisy and Gryffin a treat that we thought would be more funny than anything, but they are doing their best to tackle it... here's a picture:

Whenever they finish the bone I'll let you all know.

On our drive home the Monday after the marathon, we were driving down I-85 when all of a sudden a rock flies up from a truck on the highway and hits our windshield. I love how when I tell this story, EVERYONE's response is "Well you shouldn't have been tailgating." At which point I declare "I wasn't tailgating, it was dumb luck."

I believe it was a 3 or 4 lane highway at the time and we were going through Richmond. I was in the second lane over from the left and a truck was passing me in the far left lane. Stupid trucks. It gets about 30 or 40 yards ahead of me, a considerable distance. There were cars in front of me and cars behind it, so it's not like I was the only car on the road. All of a sudden from his lane, a rock comes flying across ours, and hits our windshield. I want to say it was about the size of a golf ball. You ever see something and take a picture of it in your head. Yeah, the picture in my head is golf ball size. It barely clips our windshield, hits the side metal that is holding the windshield in place and of course flies off.

The windshield dent is about a quarter in size and there were 4 cracks going off on either side. Liz was sleeping at the time so it was certailny a sudden awakening. We pulled off to check the damage and it looked manageable to me... manageable meaning I am not stopping in Richmond for this. As we go along we start seeing two cracks get bigger. Liz measures them and basically watches them grow about an inch per 20 miles. By the time we get home their almost a foot long.

Needless to say we got the windshield replaced for a pretty $400 penny. Insurance covers the damage but our deductible isn't low enough so... oh well. Here are some pictures of the damage:

I am putting this post on our main blog because I feel like this isn't just normal running talk. This information is stuff people would actually want to hear about because I finished the goal I was training for.

Before I start writing, you can check out all the pictures on the picture album linked above.

Last weekend we went to Washington D.C. for the Marine Corp Marathon. We had an awesome day in downtown D.C on Friday. We tried to do as much touristy stuff as possible because we realized there probably wasn't much time anywhere else in the weekend. We didn't realize how spread out everything was. They talk about how all the monuments are together and you can walk from one to the other but boy does it wear you out, especially when your goal is to remain somewhat lazy before running a marathon. We had to have walked a good 4 or 5 miles that day which doesn't sound like a lot but it was.

That night we headed to the Brody's house (Mike and Ashley) to stay with them for the weekend. In July they just had their first child, a baby girl named Sophia. For anyone who doesn't know, Mike and I were roommates for a semester in college and they were both in Liz and my fraternity when we pledged. We have remained good friends ever since. We spent all day there on Saturday catching up on their lives and spending time with their sweet girl. She is so curious and wide-eyed all the time. She doesn't cry much but only when the time is right (hunger or exhaustion). I think staying with them put a couple very separate emotions in both Liz and I:

1. It will be amazing to have children. Having known both Mike and Ashley for 6 years now as a couple without children, it's awesome to see this little girl that they have created. I can't really grasp the feeling we'll have when we have our own child but we both agree it's something to look forward to. It also got us thinking about what we'd name our children (granted it's a while away) so that was fun too.
2. Thank goodness for the sleeplessness training Daisy and Gryffin have put us through. A dog having diarrhea for 3 or 4 days straight probably doesn't compare at all but we feel like we got a good mini-crash course in having to wake up a few hours every night during that time. I don't know how they go about their lives with almost no full night sleeps but I have a ton of respect for them. Hopefully we can be just as patient and loving.

On Sunday morning we woke up at 5AM and took the metro into D.C for the race. We were a little stupid on the planning part and arrived at 6:15 for an 8 AM race. It was 45 degrees and we were just standing in the dark and cold in one of the corral areas.

I ran the race with Brandon Embery a friend from college who is also in our fraternity. It was really nice to run with him because we were both on the same page when it came to pace and speed. A steady 4 hour marathon pace was what we started out as and we kept with that up to about the 20 mile mark.

I always do this in marathons and I don't know why. I'll start out fantastic... I'll get to about mile 15 and still feel fantastic... but very quickly after that I will decline and by around mile 20 or 22 my muscles will start spasming and completely give out. This time around that spasming didn't occur until mile 24 so I guess there is something to be said for that. I was on a great pace to beat my best time (4:20). At mile 21, my time was 3:20 so all I had to do was run 5 miles in one hour, which for me is beyond easy compared to what I normally do. So with the spasming muscles my pace slowed to 15 minutes per mile and I finished the race in 4 hours and 32 minutes. That's directly between my two other marathons. Incidently Brandon left me around mile 20 and finished the race in 4:19, he is a beast.

I am pleased with my results but am not satisfied enough. I have decided I am going to run the Flying Pig Marathon in Cincinnati in May. I am far too determined to beat the 4 hour mark and I truly believe I can do it. Between now and then to prepare, I am going to keep up a running regimen but not quite as intense as a training program. I am also going to lift weights in my legs and arms and get as strong as possible and I am hoping to lose about 15 pounds by then. If I don't lose weight, a sub 4 hour marathon is not possible. I can do it. I know I can.

Sunday we spent most of the rest of the day watching football of course and then we made the drive back on Monday. You'll read about the drive home in the next post.

I swear I will post about the marathon trip sometime soon but times are busy busy busy.

Tonight for Halloween I am putting on my Chad Johnson Bengals Jersey... you must be thinking "oh so you're dressing up as a Bengals player"... no I am not, I am going to be a Pathetic Loser for Halloween, capital P capital L.

And one more thing, just had a funny conversation with Liz, she is in the other room reading and I am sitting in the kitchen, so we can't see each other right now:

Me: Hey I'm changing a player on your fantasy team for the weekend.
Liz: My team is fine, who are you changing?!?!
Me: Believe me, you want to make this change.
Liz: We play each other, how do I know I can trust you?
Me: I'm putting in a player who is projected to get 17 points and taking out a player who is projected to get 7 points.
Liz: What are the players?
Me: Matt Forte and Dominic Rhodes.
Liz: Ok... fine.
Me: Forte is playing the worst team in the NFL, he'll do well.
Liz: He's playing the Bengals?
Me: NO!! DETROIT!! HEEEEEYYY!!!

She's right though... Detroit/Cincinnati, it'd be a toss up on who's worse.

I don't know how many people know about this, but over the last month, Gryffin has had a bit of a problem. In mid-September, he developed these bumps on his lips. Oddly enough it is only on one side of his mouth but they are on the top and bottom. They are somewhat large and there are only about 5 or 6 of them but they look like mini-cauliflowers. We looked them up and they were almost identical to a description we found online of something called Canine Viral Papilloma. From what we understand, it's something that is common in puppies or dogs with deficient immune systems, and since Gryffin is only 10 months old, that fits. It says that they last between a couple weeks to several months. So up until this week we just let him deal with them and figured they'd go away.

Well as of this week, they havent "gone away", in fact none of them have gotten smaller but then again, none of them have gotten bigger. I guess I'll post a picture of them.

Gryffin with his mouth closed:

Gryffin with his lip up:

So this week Liz and I have been talking and we felt a little irresponsible about how we have approached Gryffin's bumps. They look terrible. They look like little cancerous tumors. But we found pictures online that look like what he has, and we found descriptions online that sound like what he has. We didn't want to pay $50 for the Vet to tell us what we already know. But we sucked it up, and on Thursday I took him to the Vet to find out what they thought. What does Gryffin have? Canine Viral Papilloma. Fantastic. So it is a big relief to know exactly what's going on and we feel better about our responsibilities as his parents.

Back when we first got Gryffin, Daisy had these 3 extremely small white bumps in her mouth and we figured they were really small cold sores that dogs get. They also disappeared in a matter of a week or two. The Vet said that's probably how Gryffin got the bumps in his mouth and seeing as he is young and we just got him from a rescue, his immune system was bad enough that he was vulnerable to getting it. Every dog gets the bumps in different ways, it just depends on the dog. Daisy's were tiny and white, and Gryffins are huge cauliflowers and are black.

For anyone who is going to see him in the next couple months, here are a few facts to quell your fears:

• To be infected, the dog needs to have a deficient immune system or be a young puppy.
  
• There is no treatment other than time and the development of the dog, they go away on their own.
  
• Humans can't get it.
  
• Typically, it takes 1 to 5 months for papillomas to disappear.
  

We think Gryffin knows he's not 100% healthy. He looks at us in the most depressing "love me anyway" type look. Daisy has been super sweet to him too. We'll often times catch her just lying next to him licking his lips and nibbling the papillomas trying to get rid of them. The Vet told us to keep massaging them to force his immune system to address them. I will keep everyone up to date on when they disappear.

I recently promised myself that I wouldn't post or comment on anything else political... ever. So while this post does have to do with politics, it's less controversial and I felt OK to post about.

I was having a conversation with John(and most of the people who read this blog would remember him as one of my groomsmen) at work today and this part of it was just too hilarious not to post here because the topic has been on my mind so often lately. If it doesn't make sense why his nickname is Mathis Jackson, don't worry about it, it's a long story. Here's the short convo:

Mathis Jackson: yeah...and it also has that horrible side effect we're seeing now
Mathis Jackson: BILL 17432: Resolution to give tax breaks to convicted felons
...
...
Amendment 791462: Funding for soldiers shall increase by $100

Mathis Jackson: Candidate bob: i vote no
Mathis Jackson: later, candidate frank: "CANDIDATE BOB VOTED TO DENY FUNDING FOR OUR TROOPS!"
Me: haha!!!
Me: can i put that on the blog?
Mathis Jackson: haha, sure
Me: awesome
Me: im still laughing
Me: that's a perfect example of how assanine advertising is too

This brings me to the topic that's been on my mind. Anyone who hears a political advertisement and actually believes what is being said, is truly being duped. Never before have I been so informed (and by informed I mean I can usually give a brief overview of the plans of both major candidates when it comes to most issues and I am by no means claiming to be an expert) and the advertising lately has just made me sick. The conversation above is a perfect example of why you should not pay attention to advertising when it comes to politics. The goal of a politician is to win no matter what it takes and that's why politics make me sick. It's never about the truth so never assume you're hearing any.

Today I had to run 20 miles for my training, you can read about it on my running blog. But what I am posting here about has more to do with this blog than that one. It is the amazingness that is Liz. That's not a word, as the red squiggly lines are telling me, but it should be, and Webster should use her face as the definition.

20 miles is not an easy run for anyone. 20 miles is not an easy bike ride for anyone either. Today during my run, Liz strapped on a backpack and rode our bike along with me as I did my 20 miles. I say "our" because, she rides it more than I do. At one point she joked and said "you know, you should really get a bike." There are so many reasons why having her there is helpful, that it is the downright truth that I could not have finished the run without her.

First of all, in her backpack was several Gatorades and a bunch of energy gels for me to use while I run. Every few miles she would break away, and set up a mini water station for me as I ran by. She'd hold out my Gatorade and then hand me some gel to fuel up. After a few swigs and some light stretching, I'd take off, she'd pack up our stuff and head back down the trail after me. That help during a 20 mile run is immeasurable. Why couldn't I have finished the run without her? It is a well known fact that your body needs some sort of replacement for your fluids and energy. I am no science guy, but I've been told that your "wall" that you hit is at about 8 miles without any kind of sustanance. After 8 miles, your muscles start to get fatigued from nothing else other than the lack of nurishment. Of course you can keep going but it's nowhere near as easy. Without her by my side on the run, I am 100% certain I would not have been able to run the 20 miles. I'm convinced of it.

A 20 mile bike ride is not easy, especially when you are biking at the speed of 10 minutes per mile. That's crazy slow for a biker and adds to the difficulty level. She didn't complain about it for one second. There were times when I would say "how are you?" and she would say "my butt hurts from this seat, but other than that, i'm good". She kept trucking along without a complaint. That's amazing to me. Even when I started walking at the end, she got off her bike (see... now I say "her" =P ) and walked along with me. If there was a hill, she'd ride to the top and wait for me with Gatorade in hand. So awesome.

Anyone who has run with me, knows I'm a talker. I won't talk your ear off and I hope it's not obnoxious to those I have run with, but I don't necessarily enjoy completely silent runs. Whether it is to chat about our childhood bike experiences or just to talk about how I'm doing with my heart rate and how my legs feel, it is so wonderful to have her there to just chat with. That's 3 hours of bonding and probably more talking than any date we've ever had.

The constant moral support is immensely helpful. When I started walking at mile 17 and negotiating when I was going to run and when I was going to walk, she gave me challenges like "I'm sure you can make it to that street up there". But it's not only during the difficult stretches but also during the good stretches. Saying things like "you don't look tired, how do your legs feel?" It's just nice to have her there for reinforcement.

We went to something at church last weekend called "Married Life Live", where they talk about things you can do to strengthen your marriage. The message was basically, what can you do to nurture the relationship and the romance by listening to your partners needs and reacting to it without being asked. There are tons of things that can apply to that message, but as far as I'm concerned, there's nothing more nurturing than the support she showed me today. She knows these runs are heavy on my mind and nerve-racking to tackle and did everything she could to help me out. I didn't beg her to come with me, she did it because she knew I needed it.

Today, Liz is the one who's bloggable.