Puff Daddy....Puff on This.

Check another one off the list. The 40th running (and my first) of the New York City Marathon is done and Bloggerman crossed the line (this time!). A little sore but very happy to have had such a great experience for marathon #18.

The trip was a blast from rocking the rental Ford Flex (nice Mexican car!) to the great place that Amy hooked us up with (YOU ROCK!). I also want to thank everybody who came out for dinner on Saturday (Mom and Dad, George, Leo, Annie, Elliot...also thanks for the cookies, Stef, Rebecca, and Josh). Actually, my Dad met James Gandolfini outside the restaurant just before we got there...cool. (more on celebs later).

The morning of the race was also really cool as I got to meet up with one of my Pacers Fun Runners, Danielle, after a trip on the Staten Island Ferry. I couldn’t believe that after living in/near NYC all the years growing up that I never had been on the Ferry until now.

As for the race itself...Brooklyn had huge crowds as always and I took off on a PR pace. Unfortunately NYC is not the race to try and set a record as I learned the hard way in ’05. This year, even though I was hurting, I had the pull to finish the whole way through and just kept smiling all the way through the finish line.

While my time of 4:05:38 didn’t set a PR it was really cool to beat a few of the “celebrities” who were running including Anthony Edwards, Alanis Morissette, and Tara Costa from the “Biggest Looser.” Actually I got to meet Tara on First Ave and the 70’s and we chatted for a while before I took off toward the Bronx. She caught me in Central Park and gave me a “pat of encouragement” before yelling, “Com’on Diamond.....Let’s go!” Sweet Kid...I’m very happy for her. Speaking of Puff Daddy...I also smoked (see there’s a pun there!) his 2003 time too.

I can’t thank everybody that helped me this weekend as much as I want but single out Debbie and Eric for watching the Mooks and the Boigs for helping to make the weekend special. Extra Special Thanks goes to Mrs. Bloggerman who not only had directions for everywhere we went but organized the better part of the trip including my mobile cheering section at 12.5, 18, 23 and at the finish. You Rock Honey!

Today’s Topic: Things That Are Lost

Yes we’re going to talk about LOST and the kick ass season finale but that will come in just a moment.

Topic One: Snub the President? Calling the IRS!
First I want to touch on our esteemed President, Mr. Obama. It seems that he had graciously accepted the invitation that Arizona State University extended to him. President Obama did not HAVE to go to ASU. He could have accepted any one of hundreds (if not thousands) of invitations to other universities and colleges around the country, including his alma maters (at this point I won’t yet get into the Notre Dame fiasco...although we do have to thank Alan Keys for making the GOP look even more backwards!) But POTUS did decide to go to Tempe, Arizona and give the commencement address to the thousands of students gathered at the football field. He opens with a great joke,

"I learned to never again pick another team over the Sun Devils in my NCAA bracket. And your university President and Board of Regents will soon learn all about being audited by the IRS."

And continued on to give the typical speech you’d expect...

Blah, blah, blah. The economy is tough, blah, blah, blah. Consider community service, blah, blah, blah, thank you and good luck.”

Ok the speech didn’t go quite like that (see the speech video here) but the bottom line was that all the students (should have been) were honored to have him there. That sentiment may not have been felt by the regents of the school however as they refused to confer an honorary degree upon the President saying in effect “he hasn’t accomplished enough yet.”. Um...he’s the freakin’ leader of the free world. So other then being the first black man elected president and other then bringing a sense of hope and change to most Americans and other then being an accomplished lawyer, community organizer, local, state, and federal politician yeah he really hasn’t accomplished that much.

Always the diplomat, Obama simply played it off and said (again to the effect of), Yeah I really haven’t done much yet. In effect he’s saying, just you wait. If they snub him again I wouldn’t be surprised to really see the IRS paying the school a visit.

Topic Two: Stop Flapping Your Arms.
Congratulations go to Jerry and Helen for winning their respective categories on the latest season of NBC’s The Biggest Loser. Helen kicked but and beat out Tara and Mike who were the two toughest people on the show. BTW: Tara, if you’re not doing anything next Saturday give me a call. (just kidding Mrs. Bloggerman!) But the real story was Jerry, who, as the oldest contestant ever (65) lost 170 pounds with most of them coming away from the “ranch”. He is a role model for all older people trying to loose weight but now that he has all that prize money I’m urging him to spend a few dollars and get those arms tightened up. They were flapping so much with extra skin that I was worried he was going to fly away and hit the lights in the tv studio they were filming in.



Topic 3: WTF!
What a great episode of Lost last night. I want to tell you all about it but I’m not sure of what I saw...plus there are those of you who read this who haven’t seen it yet (known as American Idol or Capitols Game 7 Suckas) so in deference to those two hate mongering groups I’ll simply point you to Jen and Liz’ Weekly Dueling Analysis in the Washington Post.

As a side note to that topic we went to the WaPo’s LOST Happy Hour at the Reef where we got to meet Jen and Liz and have a Jin and Tonic, Sex (with Sawyer) on the Beach, and Jughead Juice. No Dharma-tini’s though. Brendan is a light drinker.