Independence Day

This year I celebrated our independence by running a 10 K race as part of the Provo Freedom Festival. It was a lot of fun. I thought a lot of race psychology while I was running. There was a big sign at the 1 mile mark. Soon thereafter we ran along the parade route, so there were a lot of people cheering us on. Just after we passed the last crowd of people, there was a sing marking mile 4. Mile 5 was also marked, then nothing until we had .2 left. I was about ready to walk, due to an aching IT band, then asked someone with a spiffy watch how much of the course we had left. She told me we had about half a mile left, so I was able to keep going until the end. It was interesting to see how much of making it through the race was mental, not physical. They gave each runner a little computer chip to hook to our shoe to start clocking our time when we crossed the starting line. According to that clock, I finished in 1:06, which was pretty close to my goal of finishing in 1:10. Darryl brought the kids to the Flower Basket to watch the parade, and I met them there after the run. The parade was weird this year. A lot of the boring stuff came first, so you couldn't leave early and miss it. The high school bands were really small--music budget cuts were visible AND audible--except American Fork. And a lot of the floats had corporate sponsor labels all over. Bleh! My favorite was the U.S. Marines float that had a big "Thank-you Wal-Mart" banner front and center. Um...does Wal-Mart own the Marines now too? After the Parade we went back to Grandma Betty-Jo's for the annual fried chicken and doughnut fest. Fun fun fun!

I lifted these pictures from my cousin KJ's blog. Will licked my face for a LONG TIME. I think he liked the salt. Yuck!