Grand Rapids Bridge Run 2006

Saif and I finished the 10 mile Bridge Run yesterday. It was an awesome run under some excellent weather. Saif, of course, finished with vey good time; completeing the run in ~1hr 16min. Not only did I finish…yeah… but I also made my goal of averaging a 10 minute mile.I kinda knew I would be able to finish the race but, damn, was it hard. Between the 7 and 8 mile markers, I thought my quads were going to explode off of my legs. Oh my lord! There not much you can do but simply deal with it. From a respitory standpoint, I was money. It was just the pain in my legs that I struggled with. Something for me to work on…Kristen took some photos so I’ll be tossing a couple of pics up shortly.

Reeds Lake Triathalon 2006

Kristen and Saif both successfully kicked butt in their first triathalon. They were 2 out of a 1000+ participants in the Reeds Lake Triathalon…and it was cold. We arrived at ~6:30am in order to find a decent staging spot. It was still dark, a bit drizzily, and freezing (~60 degrees). There was a wide spectrum of people participanting in the race and everyone was supportive and gun-ho. It made for an awesome atmosphere. After seeing how the event works and how awesome everybody was…I’m pysched to do a triathalon. So, next goal is to start training on the swimming, becasue that by far seemed to be the most difficult for everyone. I’ll be putting more photo up on the Schaveyhaus Flickr site.

Weekend In Washington

Man, we had a blast hanging out and clubbin’ in D.C. area this weekend. We took Saif and Sara down to with us to meet up with the Doug and Tysen (a.k.a. The Magic Man and El Diablo). Check out the photo set.Kristen was able to get us a room at the Beacon Hotel which is within walking distance of a ton of clubs in the Dupont District. We also took advantage of their penthouse martini bar while we waited for Tysen and Doug to meet us.That weekend was “Restaurant Week” in Washington D.C. Apparently a bunch of restaurants create specific menus that offer a variety of the chefs best dishes…but at a cheaper prices than usual. We definitely took advantage of all those good eats. On Friday night, Tysen was able to reserve a table this swank mezze restaurant named ‘Zaytinya’. Wow, this was excellent. It was a completely different atmosphere than the mezze restarant next to San Chez in G.R. The drinks, food and service were outstanding.Then we headed up to Dupont Circle for club action. First we went to the 18th Street Lounge, where Doug was chatting it with some married chick. However, her was a massage therapist…word. We mostly lounged on the roof patio. The night air was a very comfortable ~73 degrees.Next we headed across the street to MCCXXIII (1223). Yeah, apparently all the bars in DC are named after numbers. This place was okay I guess. Not really my scene and place was kinda dead for being after midnight. So we decided to go next door to ‘ANZU’. I have no idea if that is an acronym for something or what. All I know is that this place was a blast. There were a bunch of people dancin’ and the DJ was great. We stayed at this place and got blitzed. No seriously, I’m talkin’ hammered. Don’t worry mom, our hotel was only 5 block away. So, after two guys got into some sissy fight…we all decided to call it a night.The next morning, well, afternoon, Tysen arrived to take Kristen and I over to Georgetown. Yeah, he’s drivin’ a frickin’ 2006 BMW M3 Convertible. I’m still droolin’ as I write this. What a puke. Meanwhile, Saif and Sara decided to take the Metro down to the Smithsonian and check out the museums. Sara has been to DC once but Saifs was a DC virgin. Later, our rendezvous was a new fusion restaurant name ‘Lima’. It was a fusion of South American entires with a modern twist I guess. All I know is that there seafood and fish were outstanding and the service was….terrible. It was kind of a buzz kill, really.Finally, after waiting for an eternity to get the bill, we made our way down into their dance club. After a couple of Red Bulls, we were back on top. This club was all techno and beautiful people. Wanting to see more clubs we headed back to Dupont Circle area. The only place that looked tempting was this place called FIVE but it had a line that was enormous. So we decided to go back to MCCXXIII which turn out to be an excellent choice. Somehow Tysen got us all into the VIP club on the third floor and damn was that place sweet. The techno was really up beat and everyone was pretty cool.We finished the weekend by having another leisure day of museums and driving out to Annapolis’ waterfront to enjoy some famous Maryland crab and oysters on the half shell.