The Grady Family

Sunday, April 19, 2009

Some of you may have noticed either from the pictures posted on this blog or from seeing Kevin around that he has lost a bunch of weight. 60 pounds...yeah, that's a whole person (a small person I might concede, but a person nonetheless). If you read Kevin's confessions a few posts ago, you learned that we have been dieting since January and have tried, somewhat successfully, to kill our "inner fat guy," as it were - but dieting alone does not bring weight loss.

I hereby introduce to you the half marathon diet! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, weight loss can be yours by simply running disgustingly long distances several times a week in order to train for a half marathon! Well, that's what Kevin has been doing since February to get ready for the Dismal Swamp Stomp Half Marathon in Chesapeake and yesterday was race day (cue "Eye of the Tiger" music). After weeks of training, Kevin competed in his very first half marathon and he is happy and proud to report that he jogged the entire 13.1 miles! I couldn't have have been more proud :)

In order to adequately celebrate this tremendous achievement, I have documented his entire experience this weekend with copious amounts of pictures - enjoy!

Kevin was so nervous that we would miss the race if we tried to drive down in the morning that we got a hotel room just a few minutes from the race.

Here is Kevin holding up his bib the night before the race.

A champion has to eat like a champion! Champions eat delicious hamburgers at Red Robin!

On our way to the race...Kevin was really nervous!

Frantically pacing around waiting for the race to start

Lucky number 335!

Getting into "the zone"

The herd starts to move!

It begins...

Can you still spot Kevin?

This is the guy who won the race - yeah, if you do the math, that's under a 5 minute mile for 13.1 miles. That's insane! It was amazing to watch him finish! Kenyan's sure know how to run!

This was the first woman to cross the finish line - she was also from Kenya.

This was the first white guy to finish...good for him :)

Here comes Kevin!

Running towards the finish line

Go, Kevin, Go!

After Kevin finished, he got a little light headed, but all he needed was some water!

Give the poor man some water!

Much better :)

Back at the hotel and after a nice long shower, Kevin looked triumphant (and skinny, I might add) wearing his medal.

I am so proud of you Kevin! A special thanks to Kelly Crawford for dragging her two boys down through horrible traffic to be there to support Kevin - you're the best, Kelly!

Thursday, April 16, 2009

“Why Are You Makin’ It Complicated?!...It’s Easy!”

Warning: This post may offend all those that are (1) devoid of a sense of humor; (2) uncomfortable with the use of well-crafted hyperbole; or (3) overly sensitive to the plight of the undereducated and their misguided attempts at self-improvement.

To fully understand this post, please follow the link below and watch this sublimely eloquent and thoroughly persuasive advertisement for Everest College:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZipLIoRqm8&feature=related

If you have ever felt lost, I am confident that after having reveled in the genius of this stalwart life-coach you are now found. I don’t know about everyone else out there, but before I saw this commercial I did not have a five year plan, the future seemed bleak and scary, I didn’t know what direction my life should take…now I do.

Before everyone starts thinking I’m uppity, I would like to say that I am sure Everest College is a fine institution. Furthermore, I respect anyone who pursues an education and I am certainly NOT an academic snob who looks down on a person for attending community/online college. That having been said, it’s not the message being offered (get an education) that I find ridiculous—it’s the messenger and the method of delivery. To elucidate my position, I have enumerated several qualms with the aforementioned advertisement:

Qualm 1

Call me crazy, but as a general rule I try not to take career advice from anyone wearing a sideways baseball hat. People who insist on maintaining a drunken frat-boy persona by cleverly tweaking the angle of their hat are morons. I’m not sure if this guy is trying to rebel against an overly burdensome, straight-laced and pernickety society by intentionally looking like a slouch, or if he was cool in high school and just hasn’t been able to let the dream die. Either way, I’m hesitant to blindly follow the academic admonitions of a person who, by twisting his hat, has marked himself with the international symbol for “tool.”

Qualm 2

For me, general rule number two includes questioning the validity of any career advice given by anyone preaching to me at night in what may or may not be “da hood.” I’m not in marketing, but if I were to put together a commercial for Everest College or any institute of higher learning, I would not use as a backdrop a neighborhood reminiscent of where one might acquire fake Prada bags, hot Rolexes, and adult herbs. Again, just me, but I might film the commercial in a school, at a place of business, or in a beautiful park on a sunny afternoon—you know, somewhere I might want to be instead of somewhere I would only find myself if my car broke down while picking up a hooker.

Qualm 3

Has this guy even been to college? If so, is this what I can expect from an Everest College education? I have to assume that as the spokesperson, this guy exemplifies what it means to be an Everest College graduate. I’ll concede that perhaps he received superior marks on his capstone research paper delving into the psychological degradation associated with hat-cocking, but would emulating this man really lead to success?

Qualm 4

For this one you may have to watch the video again and pay particular attention to the body language of this silver-tongued salesman. Is it just me, or does he roll his eyes as he turns away from the camera? Where does this guy get off being disgusted with me? By the end of this commercial not only have I been lambasted for wasting my life, evidently sitting on a couch relentlessly talking on the phone, but by the end, this man can no longer stomach looking into the face of blinding incompetence, aka, the viewer. Fully exasperated and no longer able to feign patience or even mask his broiling condescension for television viewers like myself, he rolls his eyes and turns away having accepted as fact that we viewers are perpetual losers lacking the tenacity to reach for the phone and change our life. I understand it’s this man’s job to motivate us to allow Everest College to help us achieve heights which we could not attain alone, but I’m not sure that this guy has a sufficiently impressive resume to treat all of us humble, late-night television viewers with pure, unadulterated contempt.

In short, despite this man’s undeserved hubris, he’s right; I am making it complicated when it is, in fact, easy. I’ve spent an undisclosed amount of time writing a post in defiance of this commercial, when next time I could just change the channel…but will I? No. Complaining is just too much fun!

Sunday, April 12, 2009

Chronicles of a Fat Man

Many regular readers of the Grady blog have commented on the striking frequency with which our posts involve food, eating food, discussing food, and excitedly discussing eating food. True, Leslie has elected to share with the world our lustful obsession with Five Guys, Sno-2-Go and other fine establishments which exemplify the pinnacle of culinary achievement, but
unfortunately, excessive indulgence cannot be had without consequence.

As a result, for obvious reasons, Leslie and I have fully committed to silence the voice of our inner fat guy and strangle the demons of obesity. Unfortunately, inner fat guy will not go down without a fight! It would be nice if slaying inner fat guy was as easy as karate chopping nameless henchmen in a B-grade 1970’s martial arts movie, but destroying inner fat guy has proved to be more difficult than assassinating Rasputin.

I am happy to report that we are winning the fight. Leslie has thus far lost over 15 pounds, and I’ve lost around 55 pounds since the conclusion of my 13-week gluttonous binge-a-thon, aka, summer internship. Nevertheless, we have noticed that much like Chuck Norris, inner fat guy does not sleep…he waits. You may think you have slain the beast, you may think he is dead, you may be convinced that you have torn inner fat guy to pieces and burned the ashes (Twilight reference), but just like the killer/zombie/ghost in every horror movie ever, inner fat guy will always come back to life for one last heart-stopping scare (cholesterol pun).

Despite the recent success Leslie and I have had combating inner fat guy, I’ve realized that there are some tendencies which may be subdued, but which will never be eviscerated. I’ve included a few of my more shameful and egregious inclinations in the hope that I am not alone—in the hope that someone reading this will understand and possibly validate my shortcomings:

1. Eating Brownie Batter—I better not be alone on this. By “eating brownie batter” I don’t mean that you make brownies and lick the spoon before you cook them…I mean you make brownie batter and eat it. No cooking. I have done this more than once in my life and I really hope I’m not alone. Fortunately, thanks to our friend Hayley Bean, we have discovered “No Pudge” brownie mix at Trader Joe’s. This has further facilitated my life-choice to eat brownie batter but in a more “health-conscious” way.

2. Late Night Food Runs—You know how sometimes at night you’ll think, “Man, I really want a Big Mac.” Well, most people just ignore that and go to bed, but fat people don’t. One night, just before bed, Leslie and I were flipping through the channels and saw a special on the history of McDonald’s. After watching for about 10 minutes or so, we looked at each knowingly and said, “are you thinking what I am thinking?” Instead of going to bed, we got into the car and obediently reported to our nearest McDonald’s for Big Macs and McNuggets. Inner fat guy won that night, but it was delicious!

3. Circling the Parking Lot at the Gym—We’ve all circled the parking lot looking for a closer spot, but recently I caught myself performing this favorite pastime of the obese at the gym. Bear in mind, I had gone to the gym to work out, I wanted to lose weight, but inner fat guy wanted me to make sure that getting inside the gym took the least possible amount of energy. Since then I have noticed countless others doing this as well. Inner fat guy does not want us to realize that when we go to the gym, we can drag our morbidly obese carcasses the length of an additional four parking stalls instead of circling the lot three times hoping to get a closer spot!

This will likely be an ongoing list of tendencies that I’ll add to later. I promise my inner fat guy cannot so easily be summarized in three bullet points. In the meantime, if any of you have any inner fat guy traits, we’d love to hear about them and commiserate. Until then, happy eating!

Friday, April 3, 2009

Sno-2-Go = Happiness

Here in Williamsburg, the coming of spring means many things - the birth of the baby lambs at Colonial Williamsburg, the first ride of Apollo's Chariot at Busch Gardens, the budding of the cherry blossoms, and of course opening day at Sno-2-Go. Ahhh....Sno-2-Go...the pounds that you have given me and the happiness that I derive from your delicious combination of unsurpassed soft serve ice cream and fine shaved ice drenched in such flavors as "Gremlin" and "Tiger's Blood."

My weakness? Double stuffed Coconut and Bahama Mama snow ball....which in layman's terms is a layer of snow cone, soft served ice cream, snow cone, soft served ice cream, snow cone, and then a dollop of soft serve ice cream...oh yeah - it's good!

See that card in my hand...if I fill that card up with stamps, do you know what I get? 2 dollars off my next order...their stuff is SOOOO good they can get away with a card that gives you TWO DOLLARS off. And do I keep the cards? Heck yes!

One stamp closer to slightly cheaper happiness!

April through October is surely the happinest time of the year! How I will miss thee when we move, Sno-2-Go!!

National Marine Museum

Last weekend Kevin and I drove up to Quantico, Virginia to meet up with Kevin's childhood friend and college roommate, Robert, and his wife Jenna. They were in DC visiting family and we were able to sneak some time with them while they toured the National Marine Museum.

The National Marine Museum is the really weird shaped building you see off the freeway on your way to DC...I am not really sure what the shape is supposed to symbolize...any ideas?

Robert trying on a heavy backpack in "basic training"

The museum had some really neat displays - personally, I think tanks are the coolest!

A nice parting thought...

Sunday, March 29, 2009

St. Pattys Day Extravaganza

With a last name like "Grady," you have to go ALL out for St. Patrick's Day! Every year we host a "traditional" St. Patty's Day dinner and it seems that with each year the group gets larger and larger and we love it! With 30+ people in our apartment, it felt more like an Irish pub than our living room!

Before the chaos!

Kevin made both the cupcakes and the shamrock sugar cookies - How I love having a husband that can not only cook but bake (better than I can actually)!

Stirring the potatoes (do I look domestic or what!)

Checking the meat - in my family, we make our corned beef a little differently. After the meat cooks all day in the crock pot, I take it out and put a yummy brown sugar honey mustard glaze on it and then cook it until the glaze caramelizes on the meat...trust met, it is AMAZING!