The 4th

The 4th of July is quickly becoming one of my favorite days of the year.  And I don’t even like fireworks.

First off, they line the entire main street in town with these little tiny American flags.  I have no idea how long it took someone to do this.

Secondly, Wednesday off work.  WHATTUP.

Then of course was the BG 10K.

I ran the race last year as part of an 11 mile training run.  This year, my long training runs are over (YESS!!) and I haven’t done a very good job at keeping my running up to par, so this time around it was just for fun.

To make things even more fun, it was almost 80 degrees with 87% humidity at 7am.

My entire in-law family did the race.  Paul ran with his dad, and my sister-in-law and ran with their mom.  I ran with my friend J whose goal was to not walk at all (she has been known to take this race out a little too fast) or barf before mile 4.

I absolutely love love love this race.  To me, it embodies the all of the good things about living in small-town America.  Most of the run is through downtown and on one main tree-lined road.  Everybody and their mother is out, either running or hungover on the side of the road supporting somebody.  The entire course is lined with people cheering and little kids holding signs and the owners of the houses along the route hosing you down.  There is a band at mile 4 wearing boating hats and that plays When the Saints Go Marching In.  Everyone is in a good mood.  Every time I run this I feel like I’m in a movie.

Anyway, J and I made our way down the vomit-lined chute (the heat was a problem) without walking once.  There was also no barfing, and she PRed by like 2 minutes.  Win.

For my sister-in-law, 10K was the furthest distance she had ever run by like 2 miles.  She came in at just over an hour…and ralphed at the finish line.  Another win.

Because the temperature just kept going up and up, after the run we headed over my sister-in-law’s boyfriend’s mother’s pool (get that?) where we lounged around and his mom served us post-race spiked lemonade and snacks.  It was…amazing.

And of course the evening ended with America-inspired dessert.

Special shout out to my sister who is serving over in Afghanistan and celebrated the 4th by getting beat in a 5K run by a bunch of Spaniards at her base.  I asked her how it was and she said, “Hot.”   Which probably trumps the hot we felt here.