time to get serious...

for at least a few minutes.

follow this link.

it will take you to my first ever charity fundraising page.

i am officially running the world's largest marathon (and my *2nd* major one ever) for the MS folks of the world.

in short, i've always wanted to 'give back' to running.

i want to run for *others*, not *me* all the time.

i've had friends say 'jd, it's NOT all about you all the time'. (i think they're usually kidding; i hope they are, but one never knows. running *has* definitely played a role, sometimes negatively, in some of my friendships).

but i digress.

one of my best friends was recently diagnosed, and when that happened, i knew, KNEW that i needed to try and give back to a society that could help her, and millions of other people.

stacy is so much more than just your 'average next door neighbor'. she, travis (the outdoorsy pabst loving husband), maddie (age 3) and baby-dude cooper (7 months) are awesome amazing friends of ours and we seriously wouldn't want to move ever unless they moved too. we cook for each other. we watch each other's houses. we feed each other's dogs when needed. we laugh, we hang out, we eat. you get the gist...

so i am running NYC for stacy. i am also running NYC for my aunt sonny who lives in oregon. she too has MS and has for almost 30 years. she too is doing pretty well thanks to good treatment and the wonders of modern medicine.

so the deal is i need to raise $500 by sept 1, and $1500 total by mid-october. (or else it all gets charged to me to help...)

any amount you're willing to pledge can be sent right from the link above.

if you have any questions, please email me, and treasure each healthy good day.

~jd

sunday laziness...

looks like this.

david stopped by for a little while as i had baked him birthday cookies (knowing he was in town) and he helped me break in my new camping toy that i am stoked about! i made a little more than expected over the weekend and had to have this. for all the running i do, i should lounge. that's my new motto. (ps dad, your belated father's day gift is not forgotten. it's not a hammock. but it's on order...random thought but dad reads the blog and i wanted to be sure he knew i didn't forget..)


started the morning with one of Cora's favoritest people ever coming over.
Aimee and I met about 8 years ago when she had adopted her first greyhound Tipper, and i had adopted Cora. Aimee and Cora got some quality time since her diagnosis to hang out on the deck. examples A B & C....




Cora's making the most of not knowing what the future holds. And we leave again next Friday for yet another place we've never been. Much closer than the previous campsite, this time only about 90 miles north. We have a new tent. The 'old' brand new tent had rain fly issues. So REI (the world's BEST company) exchanged it for a newer modeled tent. Which we did set up last night, and by George, it's actually not as intuitive a design as the 'old' one we took back. But I think we got the hang of what we need to do, so we'll see in less than a week.

Oh, and see what happens once you run a marathon?

You don't blog or talk about running for a solid MONTH after. How is it possible that tomorrow it's been one month since Grandma's?? So the official 'countdown to NYC' is now up. Sigh. Back to training. I'm tired and I haven't even started....

making the most of whatever time is left...

So as most of you know, our older dog, Cora, was diagnosed with osteosarcoma on June 22nd.

in plain english she has bone cancer in her left shoulder.

she started limping on and off on her front left foot, and I took her in to the vet 2 days after I ran my first marathon. I think it will forever be synonymous that those events occurred at pretty much the same time. One, a huge high. The other? Crushing at best.

Cora is still acting like a normal dog, and if a stranger met her (many did this past weekend!) you'd never know she was sick.



The vet gave her a month to two months on June 22nd.

We're almost to the one month mark, and still? A great dog who isn't acting sick at all sleeps a lot like normal around our house. Yes, she needs the pain meds, and yes, she got very tired this past weekend when we took her on a pre-planned 3 night camping trip to Madeline Island, WI. But we made the most of her still being pretty well, and made some great memories with her. And she? LOVED the trip.




Here's the proof in the photos....so for as long as we have Cora around, and as much as it hurts so much I can't help but cry sometimes to think of her not living forever, we're going to make the most of the time she can adventure with us and know we love her as much as she loves us.






we leave a week from Friday for yet another camping trip. a) pending on how well Cora is doing and b) weather permitting since it's much closer to home. The time in the woods, the time with our girl we've had almost 7 years (she's 9 1/2 by the way, which is not quite old for a greyhound) just time to live each day as it comes. There are no guarantees in life. This we all know in some capacity. So here's to more adventures as they come....as long as they can.

hooray for...

neighbors being back home where they belong.

25 feet from us :) YAY NOLLS! Welcome Home! (they were on a week long road trip to Pittsburgh to visit Stacy's side of the family...)

and just in time for us to leave town for 4 days on Friday for Cora's 'Make-a-Wish' camping trip.

she's still doing pretty okay, but it's evident she needs pain meds. She's definitely not as a-okay without them.

but to a stranger? you'd never know she was sick. so that's good.

off to the Apostle Islands this weekend.

(closest vet number in hand just in case. it's good to be prepared).

never been camping with a dog since about 1982. So this should be very interesting.

but I forsee good times and my god, after today's blurring of some major friendship lines, I'm so glad to get the heck out of dodge. It's tough to be stomped on when you're already down. Some days just go that way.

here's to a better tomorrow. and an awesome weekend with my loved ones.

thanks a huge ton to Ally & her Tri-Guy for taking care of our house (and their own!) while we're away...
~jd

it's okay if most of my world feels this way.

i still found this pretty hilarious.

it's an official friends & family ING New York Marathon tshirt graphic.




happy 4th of july!

been pretty quiet around these parts.

next weekend is camping with cora. that should be interesting. good i hope. i'm making the 'plan b' itinerary in case of super inclement weather. (ie doggy lodging with her people) as we still want to have some kind of family-vacation-that-involves-nothing-to-do-with-singing-or-running.

off to our dear friends place soon to celebrate america's birthday...may all of the friends & family near and far be well!

ps, this is a blog lift from my friend ally. it hits dead on how my race went (except for the very end of her post where she clearly never hit her groove and will hopefully someday be okay with that. or not.)

click here