Guess Who’s Back, Back Again

No joke – this was taken in a 200 year old insane asylum. Appropriate, I’m sure.

Hello Blog people. The other month I wrote my first post in like a year and a year and a half. I went from posting here 5 days a week to 0 days a week in one swift act of cold turkey, right after the 2015 Chicago Marathon. And in my latest post I mentioned that I had never forgotten you, and I wanted to start dipping my toes back in. Well, that’s what I’ve been doing…slowly…dipping…one pinky…at a time.

However, I now want to come back full frontal force. And I’m going to. But this time I won’t be alone. I’ve been working on starting a new blog. I’m really excited about it. I don’t want to give to much away right now, but hopefully you’ll like it.

It will be sad to leave this site and all my amazing followers, but I need to start anew. Hopefully some of you will follow me over. I’ll post a post on how to follow in the coming days. I really hope you come over.

Without getting into details, just know that my life has changed completely in the past couple years.It’s all for the better, but my transition required my full attention, thus the blog suffered.

To quote the mortal Will Smith:

“My life got flipped, turned upside down” – The Fresh Prince of Bel Air

I know some of you still follow my Instagram and Twitter and Snapchat accounts (all are @piratebobcat). I’ve never stopped posting there (particularly IG). So I’m glad I haven’t lost touch with everyone I met through this blog world. In fact, quite the opposite…but I’ll get to that at a later time.

For now, it feels great to be coming back, back again. Scotty’s back, tell a friend.

Question: How’s your life been? 

Chicago Marathon Pt. 1 – Lost Wallet & Expo, No Flat Runners & We Bean Runnin!

So the trip got off to a rocky road start. As in my ride to the airport arrived at 5 a.m. (thanks for the ride dad!) and as I was walking out the door, I realized I didn’t have my wallet. It was nowhere to be found. It was frustrating. It was stressful. It caused me and my friend to miss our flight. I felt awful about that. And any hope to getting to the Expo early was dashed.

Too many people. Too much stimulation. Please don’t make me go in there.

Luckily I’m one of the few Americans who actually has a passport. I grabbed it. My pops let me borrow his credit card. I thanked him. Finally got to the airport and sweated out the standby process.

Three happy people. One miserable one.

Luckily there was a loooooong security line that caused many a people to miss their flights. Thanks TSA. But their loss, my gain. I took one of those poor suckers seats on the next flight. Standby success!

Next stop, Chi-Town!

First sight off the L train. A sign that we were in the right spot.

Then it was off to the Expo. Luckily there was a shuttle from our hotel. And by shuttle, I mean a real live school bus. Okie dokie.

Snapchat fun: @piratebobcat

I personally don’t like expos much. Too overwhelming for me. But I sucked it up and tried to enjoy it. Luckily they had free beer to help endure it.

We found the beer bus!

Do we really have to run that far?

Bibs got.

Hoping I will be like the sign says.

You see that Chicago? I own you!

With the expo out of the way, we were free to do a bit of light sight seeing.

Who us? No, we’re not tourists.

Heck of a town.

I see you, camera person.

And of course, we ate. A lot. We ate a lot. Ate a lot, we did.

Homemade past? Yes. Wine? Double yes.

And did I mention I was running this race for charity? I had raised funds for Alzheimers, and the group was cool enough give us a pre race dinner! They rule!

And it was all purple.

But the best part of the pre race shenanigans was meeting up with my old college buddy, Rexy. We were on the cheerleading team at Ohio University and have remained close ever since. She’s the bomb biggie…and one heck of a runner. We met up with her for a two+ mile shakeout run the day before the race.

Lisa Lisa, why ya buggin?

Where did we run? To the Bean of course! And we weren’t the only ones with that idea. I think every other shakeout runner was there too.

Have you ever ‘bean’ to Chicago?

That’s always a good spot for pictures, and I’m glad we got it out of the way early as it would be packed later on in the weekend.

Just hanging around.

And since I refuse to take a #flatrunner picture the night before a race…all that was left was to wait for the 3 a.m. alarm to go off. While I did, I went back and read all the supportive comments you bloggers have been making on my posts the past few weeks (I still promise to respond to each of them). I also checked out all the supportive messages on the Facebook as well as the kind texts I received. Thanks again urrbody!

Time to sleep. Months and months of preparation was over. In the morning we race 26.2 miles across CHI.

Good night, sweet city.

One heck of a town.

Come Monday I will post my recap of the race. Stay tuned folks! Spoiler alert – I ran a PR!!!!

How bout you? What’s your pre-race ritual? Do you like expos? Ever bean to Chicago?

-Scott

Running in “Da Hood”, Becoming Fashion/Yoga Expert & Free Lululemon Gear!!!

I’ve been cray cray bizzay. Let’s catch up, shall we?

Chicago Marathon training has kicked in and I’m pretty excited about it. For this, I’m going to continue to do my long runs whenever I can with WRRC. Solid folks.

Last week’s subtle group.

It’s summer now, and that means they do a lil’ thang called “Run My Hood”. Basically, each week we meet at the house of a different runner and run their favorite neighborhood course. It’s pretty cool. I’ve often thought on my own neighborhood runs how I’d like to show other people “my route”.

Anyway, the best part of the run is the after-run. Hey hey, pool part-ay today-hey!

Lounge.

Chill.

Fresh.  BTW, Snapchat – @piratebobcat – hit me up, fool!

As always, I like to incorporate cross training into my…well, uh, training. The trails are all flooded in North Texas, so that’s a no-go. But it can’t rain in yoga class (well, except maybe rain sweat).

My elf friend and I finally mastered “Partner Chair Pose”.

And I gots to give a big shout out to Lululemon. At yoga practice the other day, the employees called me up to the front. They said they wanted to thank me for being a regular yogi, “Go pick out any yoga mat…it’s yours!” I was so surprised and honored…and PUMPED!

The mat my foot finally chose.

It was so cool of them to do that. And I gotta say, this mat is like night and day compared to my old one…or is it like day and night, IDK. What I do know is the quality of this mat is top notch. No slipping when I sweat, good padding, solid construction – just incredible.

And bonus, my looooooong time friend (you can see her in a couple group run pics above) has been at these yoga seshes because the studio she goes to and teaches at is putting on the classes!

Meet Virginia. She never compromises. Loves babies and surprises. Wears high heels when she exercises. Ain’t it beautiful?

Other than that it’s been sweaty doggy walks. And seeing as I’m an fashion expert, I made a quick tutorial on how to look good as you walk the hound.

Of course there’s lots of other stuff goings on, but I’ll save it for the next post…I don’t want to tire your pretty little heads too much today. Have a great weekend, hombres y mujeres!

How bout you? Ever get to run someone else’s “hood”? Ever been rewarded by a business you regular (other than the corner pub)? Ever Meet Virginia?

-Scott

PS – Best of luck to everyone running Grandma Marathon this weekend! I have a few Dallas friends there – Look for them – They’ll probably be in tops with “WRRC” on the front and “Run Free” on the back. Slap em on the backside for me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!