NYC 4th of July Celebration

Fourth of July in New York = Amazing! Happy 4th everyone! I hope that you all had a good time and were able to eat good food, make lots of memories and see good fireworks. So yesterday will go down as one of the coolest things that Cea and I ever did in New York. So...just a little background. The Macy's 4th of July Celebration is supposed to be one of the biggest fireworks shows in the nation. I heard somewhere that it launches about 4-5 times more fireworks than any other show, shooting off about 120,000 fireworks from three different barges in the East River. It's pretty amazing, they actually shut down the FDR and allow spectators to walk onto the freeway and view the show from there.

So Cea and I decided that it would probably be a once in a lifetime shot for us to go and view it. Wanting to get good seats for the show, we went a little early. The show started at 9:20, and we were seated at about 3:30. It was relaxing. We sat up against a small wall with the FDR to our backs on a brick walkway that bordered the river. We were lucky that we got there so early, because at about 5:00 they shut down the walkway and only let those who were already there view the show from there. Everyone who came after 5:00 were told that they had to view it from the FDR behind us. Later in the evening we actually had some friends come and meet us so we talked the cops into letting them through to sit with us....one of the cops asked Cea, "What did you do to get VIP tickets?"

Our friends who came with us were the Binghams, friends from Utah. Malia and Cea went to "Live with Regis and Kelly" together early barges that the fireworks were shot off....we were so close. To be festive, one fountain was red, one was blue, and the other were white. Ryan joked, "That'll be the only blue water we'll see in the river!" The fountains were followed by fly-bys by the NYPD helicopters. They flew really low and it was fun to watch four of them flying together around the river. When the fireworks started, we were blown away. One barge was like last month, and we've wanted to get together with them for we spent the evening catching up and talking about oura while. They brought their daughter Macy (huh..funny, watching the Macy's fireworks show with Macy), and we all had a good time. They arrived at around 6:30 or so, so internships. Ryan is doing an internship in HR with American Express, so they are in the same situation we are in New York. At around 7:30ish or so, there were "pre-show activities". We felt so lucky to have the seats that we did. Needless to say it was the most amazing fireworks show that I've ever seen. It was even better than the one I saw last year in Redlands when we went to visit Ron and Jacki....and trust me, that is a pretty amazing show. I'll let the rest of the pictures tell the story. We were so close that our bodies shook with each blow and we had ash falling on us. After the show, we went to pick up a cheesecake for Cea's sister (Mandee....you can never say I don't love you......:)..........), got lost on the subway on our way home and got home around 1:00 AM.

Cea left this morning for a family reunion and will be gone for a week...I'll miss her, but I'm glad that we were able to do something awesome before she left! Thanks for Wundering with us...I hope you enjoy the pictures.

My new obsession...

So you know how you're always told that when you set a goal, you should write it down to be a reminder to you. So I've done that numerous times, and it hasn't really worked for me. What I've decided to do, is to write a few of them down in a public setting to provide more pressure for me to fulfill them.

As some of you will already know, last year, my wife, myself and a few of our friends decided that we were going to run a half-marathon. Upon beginning my training, I had the unfortunate (well maybe fortunate depending on who you ask) event of spraining my knee in a snowboarding accident. Ever since then, I haven't been anywhere near as active as I have been in the past. I'll also blame the Ad Lab a little for that too, I spend a heck of a lot of my time in their. Anyways, I have a new obsession, and I think that it's going to help me with my goals.....I love Nike+..... I recently realized something about myself. I love building stats! Ask my wife, I used to spend hours late at night playing NCAA football on my PS2....it even got to the point where no matter what, the teams weren't a challenge anymore, it was simply for me to build the stats on one of my players. Well Nike+ lets me be that player.

Anyways...here are my goals that I expect all of you to hold me to.
1. I am going to run the Moab half-marathon in March in under 2:30:00...I know that sounds slow, but if you've ever seen me run you'll know why.
2. I am going to drop my weight down to 210....right now I could be anywhere between 230-250...I haven't had a scale here in NYC.

I know, I know.... it's kind of lame for me to put this out in front of everyone (especially after I've failed on both initial tries for these goals), but I hope that at least some of you will hold me liable. And hey, if there are any of you out there on Nike+..... send me a challenge! Plus, I've got the coolest Nike+ mini!