Three Things Thursday, Busy as Heck Edition

Wow, just three things.  I'll probably have a crazy mess within each one so I can fit in all of our happenings of the past week.  So, bear with me.

1.  We found a place to live!!!  We spent the last five days in NC looking at houses, driving through neighborhoods, exploring, eating, going to museums, and seeing old friends.  It turns out that we think we'll really love it there.  Charlotte is a cool town with seemingly plenty to do.  It bums me out that it's not very walkable, and it also bums me out that I have to drive 10-40 minutes to get anywhere in the city.  I can drive across a NY town in five minutes tops, and find all my shopping needs on the way.  But such is the southern way, and I'll relearn it all soon.  Our townhouse (which is friggin awesome) is a 10-minute drive from excellent shopping, a new and fancy YMCA, and a wonderful greenway.  We already joined the local kids' museum there and plan on going often, it looks that the kiddo will have an excellent school, and I'm already looking into finding classes for both youngins.  Things are coming together!

Happily plotting her takeover of our fancy new jacuzzi tub.

Pretty new living room with hardwood and SPACE!

 2.  I think I'm going to love the running scene in Charlotte.  I had actually planned on meeting some people for a Sunday morning 10-miler, but unfortunately it was a rough morning coming off of our first hotel night.  The boy didn't take to well to a different place, and I stayed in another 15 minutes trying to coax him back to sleep so daddy could sleep in.  It worked, but I got there too late and only saw them once on their return.  But they seemed friendly, and the greenway was fantastic!  It is a mix of wide sidewalk, boardwalk, and pressed dirt.  It's beautifully maintained, extremely safe and frequented, very few hills (which is good and bad),, and surrounded by beautiful streams and wetlands.  I was in heaven.  I plan on going there often with and without the kids.  I'm already envisioning the need for a fourth stroller--single jogger.  Because one can never have too many child-moving apparatuses!

On the running note, I also got a good laugh on a short run.  I walked into the hotel cardio room to see a musclehead who looked to just be passing the time moving slowly on the bike.  As he sees me walk in wearing four different pinks and hopping on the treadmill, he gave me the "I can beat you" look.  So he got on the neighboring treadmill and I got ready to play his game.  And I won.  The more he huffed and puffed, the more I sped up.  He spent most of his time standing on the sides or holding himself up with his arms.  It was fairly hilarious.  I quit after a simple 5k, and old boy looked rough.  And I knew his pride didn't feel any better.  Score one for the girls!

3.  Now that everything is coming together on the move, life is getting crazy.  We have to be prepared to move on the 26th, and we haven't even started cleaning.  We fortunately have movers do the packing, but I still need to get it all in order so they're not just unloading unorganized dirtiness into our pretty new place.  I have a garage full of insanity, about 4,502 boxes that need to go to Goodwill, Christmas decorations everywhere, and a ton of business stuff to take care of on top of it all.  And then I somehow need to continue marathon training.  Fortunately I'm early in the process, but I can't slack up.  I have two back-to-back half marathons planned in April, and along with the full in May, I simply can't afford to try to play catchup.  And of course, we're all sick now.  Because airplane germs are awesome.  So yeah, good times ahead.  I picture my next days spent frantically cleaning and organizing our stuff and my nights spent with the neighbor kids getting their last time in with us and destroying all of my previous hard work.  But it'll all be worth it in the end.  And if I have the energy, I'll push out all my stress into my running.  Which should lead to some pretty fabulous speedwork!