Hahahahaha!

Congratulations on finishing the Stonewall Jackson 20 Miler on October 11, 2008. For your records, the weather that day was sunny, 50 degrees F, calm wind.

There were 9 finishers in the Female 40 to 49 age group and 118 finishers in the Open Division.

Your overall finish place was 118, your gender finish place was 41 and your age group finish place was 9. Your overall finish percentile was 100 while your age group percentile was 100. Your time of 4:01:46.10 gave you a 11:55 pace per mile.

Well. I came in last in every category. I somehow managed to do better than the required 12 minute per mile pace...just barely!

I'm sore and tired today, but I think less than I might have been due to the huge surprise birthday party I went to after! It seems there have been plotters in my midst for some time, from my sister to my daughters to my friends.

I thought I was going to some business function with Lynne; she asked me to go about a week ago and I said okay (even though I wondered why I was being asked and not her BFF Thull). The timing fit in with the race: we'd run, clean up at her house, then go. Attire was business casual, no problem there. Where was the event? She said it was at some yacht club in Northern Virginia--further probing revealed it was very near where my sister and brother-in-law dock their boat, so I had a general idea where we were going. On the way I asked if she'd brought directions, and thought it very uncharacteristic of her when she said no. Lynne is always uber-organized so this was odd. I still thought nothing of it and asked questions about who it was the event was honoring, yadda yadda, and said I was glad I'd brought some business cards, you never know, etc. etc.

After one wrong turn we got back on track and pulled down the drive to the yacht club. Saw a kid fall off his scooter, talked briefly about where to park, and then I noticed all these people out front. I said aloud I wondered what all those people were doing when I recognized Mike Sweet. Then Nancy, then others. It hit me like a two by four--I couldn't believe I'd been totally unaware of this plan that involved so many of my family and friends. It was great! John, the girls, my sister, her family, my cousin and her family, friends from all my little worlds--all were there. And none of them, not one, ever gave the least little hint.

It was a fabulous party, too. Plenty to eat (thank you Laura), plenty to drink, perfect venue, perfect weather. I'm told people started to arrive around 2 and we got there at 2:30. I don't remember what time we left, but people stayed a nice long time.

Post-party analysis resulted in this conclusion: Despite all my semi-joking comments about being royally feted on my 50th birthday, I had no real expectation that there would actually BE a party so I wasn't looking for any indications. I never EVER doubt anything Lynne tells me so I fully trusted this was a work event. I know Wendy and Mike are not the only people who dock their boat at this marina so I didn't question that someone else docked there, too.

Thank you, Wendy, Laura, Jenny, Becky, Lynne and everyone else who worked to put this together. I had a super fantastic time and I am grateful and I love you.