Thank God for AAA

Happy post Labor Day weekend! I hope everyone had a fun and safe Labor Day Weekend!

Friday my boss treated us to a half day :D He didn't have many calls scheduled so he said that we could take off around lunch. I had plans to meet Claudia, Amy and Jeanette for lunch at Whole Foods so I hurried to finish all my work and then met up with them. Claudia had taken the day off and since we had plans to meet some friends in WC for dinner that night, she decided to just hang out in WC with me for the rest of the day, instead of driving out to Oakland and then back later! We killed some time shopping at Target and Ross and then hung out at my place until it was time to meet Brandy and Lindsay for dinner at Stanfords. Our service was crappy but dinner with the girls was fun! We were bad girls though and each had a (few) cocktails with dinner, even though 3 of the 4 of us were running the next day :(

The next morning I was up early so that I could get my run in before leaving for Tahoe. My plan was to get to the Lafayette/Moraga trail at 6:15, go out and back 3 miles and then meet Amy and her group there for 3 out and back at 7:45. That way I'd only have to do 6 by myself. When I got to the little parking lot I saw one of my old mentees Margo, and a couple of her friends. They were going out for a run so Margo asked if I wanted to join them. Of course! That meant I'd have some company for the first 3 miles out! I threw my purse in the trunk, shut it, and then realized that my keys were in my purse... now in the trunk. Whooops, that's not good. I figured since I was already out there, I might as well get my run in and deal with the keys later.

The first three miles went well... leaving from Lafayette, the trail to Moraga is at a slight incline and I could definitely feel it. I felt like I was running pretty hard, but wasn't really going very fast. At least since we started so early, it was nice and cool out. I stuck with Margo and her girls until the trail crosses the road around three miles... I turned around and they continued on with their run. The run back was pretty easy... it was nice to get that slight decline after running uphill for the past three miles. I got back to the beginning of the trail around 7:20 and waited for Amy, Bree, Sandy and Mary Ann to get there. Amy and her girls like to do a run/walk so we did 4 minutes of running and then 1 minute of walking for the next three miles. At this point it was warming up, and I had already done 6 miles, so I didn't mind too much those little walk breaks! The community center is right about at the 3 mile mark so we all stopped there for a potty break and to refill our bottles. I was going to turn around and head back, but most of the girls were going to keep running. I needed to borrow someones phone to call AAA and since Sandy had also done some extra mileage before we started, she turned back with me. The run back was a little harder. Even though we were running downhill, the heat was catching up with us and it was really starting to warm up. My final time for 12 miles was 2:20:59. I felt pretty good... no back problems although my left knee and hip were a little achy. All in all though, it was a good run.

I called AAA, talked to a super nice lady and then Sandy and I sat in the hot sun waiting for him to get there, and the other girls to get back. The AAA guy got there in about a half hour (they gave me an hour window) but had forgotten the tools he needed so he had to go back to his shop in Lafayette to get them. Thankfully I have a trunk release button in the car so he just needed to get one of the doors open. About 10:15 I was FINALLY on my way home! I jumped in the shower, ate a little pasta, picked up a friend at BART (her mom and cousin were up in Tahoe with my parents) and then we were off to Tahoe!

The traffic on the way up wasn't bad at all and we made pretty good time. I think with the Bay Bridge closed there were less people headed up to Tahoe on Sat. morning. We got to Incline around 3:45 and I went straight to the beach to meet up with everyone. The weather was so perfect up there... not windy at all like it usually is in the afternoon. We sat around on the beach for awhile and then went back to the condo to make dinner. I think everyone was pretty tired after the long day so after dinner we just watched some tv and lounged around before going to bed. We weren't sleeping very long before we were woken up by our rowdy neighbors across the way. I think they had been at a wedding so when they came home they were all a little drunk. It was this huge group of people and they were all SUPER loud! Since it was so hot, we all had our windows open and could hear everything they were doing. After a final smoke break on their steps around 1:00AM they were finally ready for bed. Urg. I wasn't taking any chances though so I popped in some earplugs before I went back to sleep. Those earplugs work wonders... I didn't hear anything or woke up until my mom came in my room at 10:30 the next morning to wake me up!

My dad cooked up some yummy pancakes for breakfast and after we all got ready, it was time for the beach again. Since it was earlier in the day, it was a lot warmer out but in the shade it was perfect. We stayed at the beach for a couple hours, and then my mom, dad, and our family friend's niece and I went down to Zephyr Cove for a trip on the Woodwind II. It was a gorgeous day for a sail... they took us down along the shore almost all the way to South Lake and then back up. After the sail we went down to South Lake for dinner. We ate at the Forest Buffet at Harrah's... it was a LONG wait but the food was good and I think we all ate our money's worth! It's on the top floor of the casino and, even though we weren't looking right out over the water (that view was reserved for the pricier restaurant around the corner) the views were still gorgeous! After dinner we walked down to the lake to see the fireworks show. I wasn't really sure what to expect but the fireworks were among the best I've ever seen. The went on for what seemed like forever, and they had a lot of fireworks I'd never seen before-- even some in the shape of dice!

I was looking forward to a quiet night's sleep (figuring the neighbors couldn't be that loud AGAIN) but no such luck. The people in the bedroom directly across from me decided to start a DVD a little after 10 PM. No biggie, except with THEIR window open, and mine open, it sounded like the movie was playing in MY room. There was no way I could put up with this for the whole length of the movie. I tried yelling across the tiny courtyard at them. No luck. Three of us had to walk outside to yell up at them and throw rocks at their window before they finally heard us and shut their window. After that though it was quiet (thanks in part to the earplugs again!).

Then next morning we woke up, ate some breakfast and packed up the car. Our friend's niece (who I was dropping off in Sacramento) and I headed out at 11:00 and by the time I got home it was 4:00. It took my almost 5 hours to get home (including a short stop off in Sac. to eat and drop off Kayla)! Yucky traffic... and not just Labor Day weekend traffic from Tahoe... we also saw a bunch of dusty, dirty, funky cars, most with funky bikes on them. It took me awhile before I figured out that they must be people coming back from Burning Man. Crazy people :D