Lessons in endurance

As most of you reading this know, I've been training for a marathon the last few months--the race is only 3 weeks from tomorrow. Today I ran 20 miles, the most I plan to do before the actual marathon. I made the decision (mistake?) to play some soccer yesterday, so I was already sore. I don't think that made the run any easier today :).

Thankfully, the weather was nice, and I ran in the evening cool, so in that regard things were peachy. Still, though, by mile 16 or 17 things were starting to get pretty rough. When I passed by any little store selling fruit or sweet drinks, I started just imagining what it would be like to stop the race and partake. Finally, I stopped and grabbed a pastry and a liter of juice. I sat down next to a nearby intersection, scarfed down the food and guzzled the juice, and got back up and kept running, this time with a half-full glass bottle of juice in my hands instead of the two mostly spent water bottles I carried before.

My time was 2:58, two minutes within the 3 hour goal that I had set for myself. I was pretty happy, but also pretty dead. I managed to walk to the park next door and lay in the grass for awhile, trying not to think of doing this again in three weeks.

Here's a little picture of what happens when you have a toenail that doesn't keep to itself. I hope you're not eating right now. :S


And finally, a picture of how beautiful I looked in the aftermath--thankfully for you, after I showered.


Now it's to bed, to bed for this sleepyhead. Good night :)

The Earthquake

It's been almost two weeks since the historic earthquake devastated much of Chile. However, while things are mostly back to normal here in Santiago, the tragedy is still playing out in full force in many of the places that were hit hardest. Also, today we have had a string of quite strong tremors, so a post on the earthquake is still very relevant.

Most of you have probably seen, heard, or read something of the massive quake here, so I'm not going to spend a lot of time explaining about that (in fact, most of you have even heard from me what my experience was like). I will just show a few of the pictures I took detailing the effects here at my home.

Here's my brother's bedroom:


The pastor's office:


The dining room:


The kitchen:




And finally, the only real structural damage, a crumbled wall outside:



I'm thankful to be safe and in good health--God definitely protected me. However, I want to be able to help in whatever ways I can in the rebuilding and recovery effort. Even if this stops making the news, the effects of this quake will not be over for a long, long time.

Back at it

Well, it's been awhile since I've written--I have internet again, and I have to start settling into a more regular schedule, as school starts on Monday. I hope to blog more consistently, but time will tell.

I suppose to be chronologically logical, I'll show a bit of my stay in Boston. It was wonderful to stay with David and Kelsea, and to get a taste of their daily life. Some of the highlights were eating at John Harvard's and Regina's Pizzeria and visiting the Gardner museum. And--how could I neglect to say--the meals we had every night were quite exquisite. Kelsea is quite the cook, and I certainly availed myself of that fact.

As I review the photos of the week and a half out east, I see that we had a little trouble behaving ourselves. I think the first two speak for themselves.



This last one is of Kelsea scratching off a lotto card.


David and I had some fun in CVS too. Note the name of the item I'm holding in the first two photos.





It was also really fun to be able to hang out with Dave Rojas for a day, who drove all the out from New Haven, Connecticut.



And finally, we have a nice shot of Kelsea and David at the aforementioned museum,


and the bros about to devour some killer floats.


Overall, it was an excellent finish to my wonderful few months spent back in the US, and I'm grateful to God for all the opportunities I had to spend time with family and friends during that time.

The photos

A few photos from my outdoor antics in the past couple of days are in order. Timo and I had lots of fun shoveling and working on a snow fort together.



I don't think I wrote about the 13 Christmas snowmen in the first place, but here is the site of their massacre.





The boys got to go sledding together after dark, which was really a blast. It's kind of funny that the pictures that worked out here are mostly of us wiping out. I guess that goes to show how hardcore the experience was.

O'er the hills we went

Tonight Joseph, Daniel, Timo, and I went to Battle Creek Park to sled. After google maps directed us to some forlorn corner of the (huge) park with the hill nowhere in sight, we were lost about 20 minutes trying to find the sledding hill. Eventually we found it, and although the lights were off (it was past 10 pm), we decided to sled a bit anyway.

It was quite entertaining. For one thing, every able-bodied Minnesotan should probably go sledding at least once a year just to keep it in the blood. Also, the couple inches of fresh powder over more packed snow gave perfect conditions for hitting the slope. We all tried to make it down in one piece and without fracturing our tailbones, and we succeeded fairly well in both of those. It was kind of funny when a couple other late night sledders showed up and one of them popped their inner tube the first time down the hill. I couldn't help but laugh. We finished by all linking arms and going down the hill side by side. We all crashed, as we knew we would, and most of us went down together, but somehow Timo escaped and made it to the bottom. Overall, we sustained only minor injuries, and the experience was satisfactorily exhilarating.

Unfortunately my ailing computer is not wanting to read my SD card, so the inclusion of the few pictures I took will have to be postponed indefinitely.

Why I Blog

Looking at my blogging record for the past couple of months, I must stop and ask myself, "Why am I doing this anyway?" I am well aware of the fact that my blog is no state-of-the-art publication, and I'm pretty sure it's not revolutionizing too many people's lives, or even keeping people up on what I'm up to--certainly not when I publish something once a month.

I write for several reasons. For one thing, I like to think, and even if my thoughts are crazy, I like to share them with others. Along that vein, blogging about something makes me think more concretely about it. I think about a lot of things, but putting them down on "paper" makes me think of them in a more concrete way. In addition, I love language, and I'd like to learn how to express myself better in a variety of media. I will never become a better writer if I never write.

My final reason for writing, if my boldest, is that I believe I have something to contribute to the world. I don't say this because of who I am, but more because of who God is, and who people are in light of that. God has created us in His image. True, we are fallen people. However, we still can learn so much from the perspectives of those around us, through the relationships we have with them. In the academic community, I hear a lot about the benefits of collaboration and interdisciplinarity. At the heart of those sometimes lofty-sounding ideas is the simple truth that ideas grow into meaningful thoughts, words, and actions when you share them with those with whom you have contact. I suppose the best way to ensure that your life will not matter much is to stay to yourself and keep your notions in your own head.

Having said all that, no one really likes to read a blog that doesn't have a healthy dose of pictures, videos, or other more visually attractive elements. Since that's the case, I'd love to share a few pictures to capture a few of the highlights of my last several weeks.

The family enjoyed the puzzle that I got free from church and gave to them. :)

After a fun time bowling with CEF oldies, we made it to Annie's with the Lee clan.

We had to strut our gangsta-ness just a little.

I got to hang out with my former roomie Mike in Madison. Here he is in front of the seat of Wisconsin's glorious government.

At Northwestern, I was able to attend my first NU basketball game--all the more fun since we beat the University of Illinois 73-68.

I spent a little time in my beloved city of Chicago.

I also got to travel back on megabus with family, which was a new treat.

Here Dad and I stand next to the majestic bus itself.

Evanston

It is good to be back at Northwestern. I think that "absence makes the heart grow fonder" may be proving true here. So far I have not done much, nor seen many people, but I think this will be a great time of reconnecting with old friends and meeting new ones. I also enjoyed seeing Mike in his new environment in Madison on the way over here. More on that at a more decent hour of the day. :)