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Off to the races

August 23, 2010 By Tom 1 Comment

Kristie has gotten back into her running routine, which I figured would happen pretty quick. But last night at 11:00pm she looked over at me from her laptop and announced that she’d found a 10k race that she’d like to register for. I thought, “sure, fine…get a race on the calendar, have something to train for…sounds good.”

Then she told me, “it’s tomorrow night at 6:00.”

Ah man.

Apparently she ready for it, because she showed up, ran it, took 1st in the women’s division and 2nd overall. Granted, it was a pretty small race, but she had a pretty strong showing for someone that just had a baby a couple months ago. I think she’s crazy awesome, and probably equal parts of both.

Filed Under: exercise/sport

Owlz Games

August 9, 2010 By Tom 1 Comment


Back when we attended the Orem Summerfest, I got a free ticket to an Orem Owlz minor-league baseball game. So last Thursday we decided to catch a game. Upon arriving at the ticket office, however, one of Kristie’s old friends was just walking out to give away a pair of extra tickets that he didn’t need. So we got in totally free, and had so much fun that we decided to go again with Ryan and Mandy tonight. Here are a few pictures from both games:

Friday vs. Raptors

Clover and Lilah

Thursday vs. Chukars

Filed Under: entertainment, exercise/sport, friends

Y Hike

May 30, 2010 By Tom 4 Comments

Today Kristie and I decided to go for a hike to see if we couldn’t dislodge this baby of ours a little bit. Destination: Y mountain. During the 1,100 feet of switchbacks, almost everyone we passed reached out to Kristie–conveying everything from words of admiration, to unsolicited tips on other labor-inducing techniques. I think she’s reached the point where people that see her being active assume it’s labor-inducing activity, and not her daily routine. Ha.

No baby yet!

Filed Under: exercise/sport, outdoors

Real Salt Lake Cameo

May 8, 2010 By Tom 1 Comment

When Kristie headed off to her baby shower, Jeremy and I headed up to a Real Salt Lake game with these:

How’d we get the all-access passes? Well, we got it in exchange for participating in a little halftime skit with Real’s mascot, Leo the Lion.

Here’s how it went down. At 10 minutes to halftime we left our complementary seats and headed down to the locker room of the stadium. There we met up with Leo, who gave us our props. To me, an old Leo suit, a dress, a bow and a purse. To Jeremy, a jersey of the opposing team (Philadelphia). In honor of Mother’s Day, I was to dress up as Leona (Leo’s mom), and get introduced at half field. So yeah, this is me:

There Leo would present me with flowers–which was Jeremy’s cue to jump out of the stands, run on the field and start acting like an obnoxious fan from the rival team (while the police chased him around). At that point I’d see Jeremy, run full-tilt at him, and deliver a crushing tackle (as any die-hard fan — and mascot-mom — would do) .

Then I was instructed to beat him with my purse till Leo caught up and dragged me off him.

The skit went according to plan and had some great play-by-play narration from the stadium announcer. I was told that the fans in attendance thought it was a riot.

Cross-dressing as a lioness was a bit weird for me (hold your jokes), but getting to lay a solid hit on Jer in front of the whole stadium was awesome.

Many thanks to Tyler at RealSoccerNation.com for the awesome photos, and Leo, who got us the best seats in the house.

Filed Under: entertainment, exercise/sport

Canyon runs

May 8, 2010 By Tom 1 Comment

The past few weekends Kristie and I have gotten in the habit of heading up Provo canyon for Saturday runs. Today was no exception, and the weather was beautiful.

The trail I took this morning was a 6 mile loop that starts in the parking lot of Timpanogos Park and threads up and around the foothills. The elevation always kills me. Here’s a couple pictures I snapped with my phone at my favorite lookout spot (trust me, they don’t do it justice):

Filed Under: exercise/sport

15k Race

February 27, 2010 By Tom 6 Comments

This weekend Kristie ran the last installment of the Salt Lake City Track Club’s winter series, a 15k (9.3 mile) race out by the Saltair Pavilion in Magna. Her doctor figured that since she’s been running 5 miles a day since she was a fetus, she’s probably just fine doing it now. Kristie told me she had no interest in running fast, she just wanted to run. Well, she certainly surprised me.

Not bad for a girl that’s almost 6 months pregnant!

The race atmosphere was pretty exciting, and it was so funny to walk behind Kristie and watch people steal sideways glances at her belly.

According to Kristie, the toughest part of running 9 miles in her condition has been not peeing her pants. (I apologize, probably TMI.) I think it’s those little things that get lost on us guys.

And a special thanks to Grandma Hiller for putting us up in SLC the night before the race. She’s an angel, and the world’s biggest Jazz fan.

Filed Under: exercise/sport

Weekend at Solitude

February 15, 2010 By Tom 4 Comments

The Wagstaffs (family friends of the Tanners) invited us up to their beautiful cabin at Solitude ski resort this weekend. Being the ski bum that I am, I was beyond excited for another opportunity to get out this season. So Friday night we picked up Houston and made our way up a snowy Big Cottonwood Canyon, arriving at our destination just after dark. It wasn’t long before we settled into deep couches to watch the Vancouver Olympic opening ceremonies with a big group of family and friends.

The next morning a bunch of us struck out early to the lifts, hoping to get in as many runs as possible. It had snowed a bunch the evening before, and it snowed the entire day…so conditions were perhaps the best I’ve ever skied. Since Denny had been coming to Solitude his entire life, he and his son Drew were able to take us directly to the best stashes of thigh-to-waist deep powder. I decided to forgo lunch and ended up skiing for seven straight hours. Pure bliss.

Kristie “I Don’t Want to Squish the Baby” McConnon wasn’t feeling quite up to skiing, so she decided to run 9 miles at their home gym and play with Therese’s adorable nieces back at the cabin instead. That night we watched moguls, short-track, luge, biathlon and a bunch of other awesome Olympic competitions, taking a few breaks to play Scatagories and some other fun games. Watching Apollo and Kearney take silver and gold respectively were certainly highlights.

[check out that gnarly curling iron burn on Kristie's neck. That has to be some kind of record, poor girl]

On Sunday we went to church at the Brighton Branch, which was literally at the base of a ski hill. It was one of the prettiest churches I’d ever attended. Later on we had a big family dinner and dessert, complete with a Valentines Day party put on by the little kids.

We were planning on heading back that evening, but one of Kristie’s client’s rescheduled and I didn’t have work, so we didn’t have to take off till this morning. All in all it was a wonderful weekend escape with great skiing, great activities and really great company.

Filed Under: exercise/sport, family, holidays, out of town, outdoors Tagged With: cabin, skiing, solitude

Moving On

January 27, 2010 By Tom 13 Comments

Friday was the last day of work at my previous job. It had been a terrific 3 years, and I’m really proud of the things I learned and accomplished. My decision to move on came about when I received a job offer from another company–but then within days of that first offer, I was given a second, even better one that I couldn’t pass up. As a result, I’ve accepted the position as Director of Marketing at Qualtrics Labs,  a really awesome survey software company based in Provo. The people I’m working with are terrific, and I can’t say enough about the unique company culture.

As a result of this shift, I had a week of unemployment that I spent most judiciously. Skiing became priority #1, since I received a few complimentary lift passes as a gift from my new employer. If any of you have skied Deer Valley, you’ll know why it’s been rated the best ski resort in the nation 3 years running. I was lucky enough to have the company of Jer and Nathan for two of the trips. The picture below is of some of the amazing terrain we got to ski.

I can’t wait to get rockin’ and rollin’ at Qualtrics this next week…

Filed Under: exercise/sport, work Tagged With: deer valley, qualtrics

BYU vs. CSU at the Marriott

January 20, 2010 By Tom Leave a Comment

Our new friends Jared and Kayleen gave us some extra tickets to the men’s hoops game on Wednesday and it was a blast. BYU’s team has had a killer season so far [watch me jinx it], and they’re playing lights out. Maybe we’ll finally make it past round one of the big dance this year..

Filed Under: exercise/sport Tagged With: byu basketball

BYU 26, Utah 23

November 30, 2009 By Tom 1 Comment

Andrew George, breaking a Ute “tackle” to win in overtime. Glorious bragging rights for a full year. Loving it.

tackling

(P.S. – Hey Max, you sound like me last year)

Filed Under: entertainment, exercise/sport, holidays Tagged With: utah sucks
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