The Paris Marathon is only 17 days away (thank you, Paris Marathon website for the countdown clock that constantly reminds us). Just us and 38,998 other folks running through the streets of Paris. What’s awesome about the course (hello, LA Marathon organizers, take note!) – the course passes several Metro stops along the way so if you poop out, you can hop on the Metro and head to the finish. Sweet!

Possessed by demons, we spent three weeks doing madcap running & racing in preparation for the race. We broke all sorts of running rules (don’t increase your mileage by more than 10% a week, don’t introduce lots of uphill or downhill all at once, stretch regularly, blah, blah, blah). So we paid the price. In Chuck’s case, it’s an achy hip, a tight IT band, and tired legs. In my case it’s a recurrence of my old friend plantar fasciitis. Argh! But a bit of rest and recuperation (and in Chuck’s case some physical therapy) and we are both back on the road running but treating our various achy bits a tad more kindly. I went to a foot guy today just to be on the safe side and got a clean bill of health to run the marathon. he came in , took one look at my feet and exclaimed, “What size are your feet?!” in a kind of amazed voice. I was torn between being flattered and embarrassed, but admitted that I’m a size 11. Happily, though large,  they are not suffering from stress fractures, arthritis or any other maladies.

So now we are officially in the “getting really excited” phase and aside from training are also prepping to pack smart. We went to REI this past weekend and spent our entire dividend on travel stuff. Chuck bought a new bag (an Osprey 28″) that weighs just 11 pounds!! We’re being careful, since our bag Lose Weight Exercise limit is 44 pounds because we are flying from Paris to Bristol and the Lose Weight Exercise limit is lower than from the US to Europe. We both also bought nifty REI carry on bags for our cameras, iPods, iPad (!), running clothes, toothbrushes (in case disaster happens and our luggage is lost), and paperwork. Our itinerary at the moment is to arrive in Paris a few days before the marathon to get over jet lag and get acclimated, do some sightseeing with our other friends who are running the marathon, then spend two days post-marathon seeing Paris and learning to walk again (joke!). Then we fly to Bristol to spend 5 days with our good friend Meagan and her oh-so-cute British boyfriend Jock seeing Wales, Stonehenge, Oxford, and going on – get this! – a pub crawl! We also will get to participate in a pub quiz, which sounds a lot like NTN Trivia (it’s called Buzztime now) which we used to play a lot, and meet Jock’s parents (we will do our best to be respectable and not burp or fart in front of them,  Meagan and Judy). Fun times!