Expo Day

I’ve had a fun and busy day!

I took the day off from work, as I have for the past three or four years. Since my birthday always falls on marathon weekend, it’s a good excuse to use a vacation day, and I can avoid the Saturday crowds at the Expo.

I got to the convention center around 11:30 and made a beeline to packet pickup. Joy! It was my first time to claim my packet since 2001! I had a fine time wandering the expo, buying socks and caps and gels, getting a free massage and eating samples. Lots of samples. In fact, samples were my only source of food until dinner today. But hey—some of the samples were liquid vitamins, so it’s all good, right?

And then I went out to run some other errands. I went to one of my favorite thrift shops, where I did very well and *ahem* donated about $130 to charity. . . in return for clothes, books and other things. I’m always amazed at how many designer clothing items end up in the nicer thrifts, unworn and with tags still attached. I guess that’s the advantage of going thrifting a few blocks from River Oaks!

The rest of my day was filled with dumb little errands—pick up a bag of bunny litter, deposit my birthday check from my dad, go to a few shops in the Village, and things like that. I had to do some creative re-bagging to consolidate all my stuff so I could get it upstairs to my apartment in one trip, and then it was time to do laundry, since Friday is nearly always Laundry Day around here.

The weather forecasts for Sunday remain inconsistent. For awhile they were saying it would just be cloudy, not much chance of rain. But now weather.com is back to saying 30% chance of thunderstorms. The temps shouldn’t be too bad, though, and I have a new wicking rain jacket with plenty of vents, should it be a stormy day after all.

So now I wait. Wait and do what prep I can, with the weather still so uncertain. But I do know this much—if nothing goes drastically wrong in the next 24 hours, I’ll be running the Houston Marathon on Sunday for the second time, and after five years of being jinxed.

Crossing my fingers. . .