Hamburger by Train

It’s Friday. It’s Friday before I leave for a weeklong vacation. Hooray! I chose to take next week off because 2 girls are pregnant in my department and due to leave on maternity next month, so we’ll be short-staffed for awhile. One of those girls was set to do all my testing next week while I’m out (there are only 3 of us that know this particular testing). Her water broke on Tuesday and she delivered her son Wednesday morning- 3 weeks early. Uh, what do I do? Well, I go on vacation anyway and hope they don’t call me in overwhelmed. Hopefully it will be a slow week! I will think of them while I’m sipping my coffee, snuggling with my family in my jammies at 9:00am. Actually, maybe I won’t.

Tomorrow is my race, for which I don’t expect a great time since I’ve lost all my motivation. I’ve only run 2 or 3 times a week the last month. The half marathon was more about endurance than time; the 5K is all about time. And I’m no jackrabbit. Oh well, we’ll see. It should be a fun morning regardless. Yesterday Hattie and I went down to Crown Center to pick up my race packet and timing chip. I parked on the wrong side of the complex, and we had about a 10-15 minute walk over to the expo hall. It was a nice stroll- we raced part of the way (Hattie loves ‘fast’. Every time we go for a walk she runs and tells me, ‘Mama, fast’, so we have to jog together.). We got our packet, walked around the expo and then went back to the shops. There’s a cute toy store we walked through, and a Crayola store where we drew pictures. By the time I checked the time it was 5:30, and we were 20 minutes from home without rush hour traffic. So we decided to have dinner at Fritz’. It’s a burger joint where the food comes delivered by a train overhead. Hattie’s eyes were huge when that first train came! It was so cute, she was craning her neck to see where it was going and kept telling me ‘choo choo!’ We sat, ate our burgers and enjoyed the trains. With as terrible as the food was (really, the burgers there are NOT great), it was probably one of the best meals I’ve ever had. I truly loved sitting side by side with my daughter, enjoying each other’s company and relaxing - just the two of us. I love that she will sit and enjoy things and not have to be running full-tilt at all times. I love that she offered me one of her fries. I love that it took her a few minutes to get the hang of her straw and the look of joy on her face when she did. I love that she donned the engineer’s hat for a bit before offering it to me. Mostly, I just love her. More than anyone else knows.