Shaina In New York: July 2012

Meet the Matriarch of Mike's family - Roz Rosenblum.

Believe it or not, this woman turned 80 years old, and, as always, she threw a party you definitely did not want to miss.

I frequently tell people about Mike's grandma. Usually it comes up when I am complimented on a beautiful piece of clothing and I have to confess that it was a hand me down from Grandma Rozi. "A Grandma gave you that?" is always the question I get. And I have to tell everyone that she is no ordinary grandma.

For her 80th birthday party, this fashionista decided to throw her party at the Lotos Club. This is an extremely fancy literary club where we have had many Rosenblum family occasions like Thanksgiving where we relax in suits and ties and eat traditional Thanksgiving fare such as wild boar gnocchi and smoked salmon.

Okay, I tease, but it is a beautiful location and the perfect spot for an 80th birthday party. The room was exquisitely decorated with gorgeous flower bouquets, waiters serving elegant cocktails and appetizers, and a piano player singing beautifully in the corner.

We were all excited about the dinner,

But first, there was dancing to do!

Mike's Parents

Grandma Rozi and Grandpa Bob (he's almost 90)!

Lee and Gail

Silly kids

Dancing with his mom!

The dinner was fabulous, but the real reason for the night came out over and over again in the speeches. Friends from all over came to celebrate and the sentiments about what a wonderful woman Grandma Rozi is unified the crowd.

Everyone at the party talked about how lucky we were to be in Roz's life. I think one of her son's said it best, "You're all here because you're my mother's friend. And when Roz is your friend, you don't need a lot of friends."

It's true. She has taken care of all of us. In return, we put her on a chair and swung her up and down!

After some wine induced group singing,

and playing in the library

(The picture hanging on the wall is actually of Mike)

we had to go home. But, the 80-year-olds raged on into the night. I hope to be half as vivacious as this group when I'm 80!

Happy birthday, Grandma Rozi! We love you!

I am a maniac!

I want to be rugged!

In true Shaina form of taking on things that I am not equipped to handle, I decided it was a great idea to run the rugged maniac 5K obstacle mudilicious race! I've always wanted to do something like this but mostly because I like mud. My Summer Associate mentee, Nick, was running the race and his roommate went out of town at the last minute, so with two days notice, I was in without asking any questions. http://www.ruggedmaniac.com/home.html

For example, I might have asked, "where's the race?" It turned out to be in Brooklyn, but not really. It was all the way at the very end of the 5 line, which happened not to be running the day of the race. We took the 4 to the 2 all the way to the very end! At this point we had to get on a school bus to shuttle us to the very edge of Brooklyn - believe me, there were no hipsters in sight.

After paying an extra $10 and pinky swearing that I was Shaina Stahl from Hawaii instead of Anne Ford from Michigan, I found myself at the start line feeling really excited and a little nervous. All was well until Nick looked at me and said, "You can set the pace and I'll run with you." What? I don't know a lot about Nick, but I do know that he is a runner. Like, a real runner. He came in 5th overall in a much harder warrior dash. I, on the other hand, am decidedly not a runner. Ever since eighth grade where I faked sick every time we had to run in P.E., I have tried to find every possible way of exercising that does not include running. "Please don't run with me?" I murmured and wondered how I would handle the race.

I didn't have much more time to think before the air horn sounded and we were off! The first 30 seconds were great and I was very excited. Quickly, the course turned and we bounded up and down over 5 foot hills of dirt. The pack of runners created a dirt cloud so massive I've only seen one like it when demolishing buildings at Disney.

I didn't realize the effects until I took in a deep breath of dirt. My eyes began to sting, my lungs started to burn, and the dirt sucked all the moisture from my already drying mouth. Oh dear. It's only the first 2 minutes of this race! I bounded up another hurdle, and sharply inhaled when I saw a deep pool of mud at the bottom. I closed my eyes and jumped in. Unfortunately, I left my mouth open, and the mud entered it quickly. Using my tongue to assess just how much dirt was in my teeth, I heard a teasing voice next to me, "you hesitated!" Nick laughed.

"Please go," I pleaded with him. His eyes widened, "you really want me to?" he asked. I nodded and smiled and he dashed off with ease passing everyone in sight. He even managed to still finish first in our heat!

Now I was alone and understood that my mouth was unacceptably dry and I could barely breathe without coughing because of all the dirt I had inhaled. The long road of pavement ahead of me now looked like it stretched on forever. I realized I had a horrible side pain and began to notice the heat. It was another one of New York's 95 degree days - the kind that's perfect for long stretches of running on black asphalt.

With all of this happening so early in the race, I wanted to look inside myself for some encouragement. "Dig Deeper" I heard Tony Horton's voice in the back of my mind. For those who don't know, Tony Horton is the super fit, narcissistic, and silly man behind the P90X workouts. The three mile course ahead of me seemed daunting. I had an overwhelming longing to do all of the exercises I have always hated. I would have loved to plank for a few minutes on stability balls, make me do those extra pull ups, I will warrior 2 like it's my job! Anything but this! What's the difference?

Then Shawn T's words popped into my head. Shawn T is the coach for the insanity workouts. During one of my favorite workouts he looks at one of the panting men and says, "you run marathons, don't you. How does this compare?" The man barely gets out, "it doesn't." While insanity is tough, gets your heart rate up like crazy, and has no mercy, I'd say the first 10 minutes of my rugged maniac didn't compare.

Fortunately, all this thought meant that I had advanced significantly on the course. I began to get to some of the obstacles. Mostly, I was climbing over a lot of pieces of wood in various configurations. Then I ran through tires. Then it was back over some wood. Where was the mud?

I struggled and continued to jog and walk just to make it to each new obstacle. Getting over the obstacles was definitely fun and what I was hoping for in the race. It was just a little more difficult without really being able to breathe. Finally, I saw the halfway point! There were girls there with water! Fresh glasses of room temperature water! This was the best thing ever. I quickly downed one and hung out in case I wanted a second. Four glasses later, I felt like I could breathe a little better and went running through the woods. This was much nicer than the pavement and most of the silly obstacles reminded me of high school camp ropes courses.

It wasn't until the final mile that the fun really started. I wasn't really feeling any better but the obstacles became more interesting. I enjoyed pulling myself over walls and was overjoyed to see a giant TANK of mud. I scrambled up and into the mud bath. Once inside, I realized to make it through, I had to duck under planks of wood, which meant submerging my entire body in the muddy water. "I don't want to get pink eye!" I heard a girl scream. Then don't open your eyes? I thought. The sweet muddy water was cold and energizing! I was really excited to continue the race. The girl in front of me was struggling to get out of the tank and before I knew what I was doing, my hand was on her behind pushing her over the ledge. Was that really inappropriate? She looked embarrassed as we both got out of the tank. "Sorry." was all I managed to squeak out before I put my head down and continued.

I was so close to the finish when I saw more mud! I excitedly got on my hands and knees and crawled through the mud under the un-barbed wire. What, they think we couldn't have handled barbed? I probably would have ended up with tetanus.

Next it was in and out of muddy tubes before I reached the water slide! Weeeeeeee! There was one last obstacle in the race. I climbed up the largest of the wooden frames and looked down at the rope net below me. I had been told what I had to do. I closed my eyes and just....rolled! It was like rolling down a hill. "Weeeeee!" I'm pretty sure I audibly exclaimed again. I climbed up the other side and down the wood frame and was met with a great unexpected surprise. Nick darted out from the crowd at the finish line and I lept at him in the air. "I did it!" I managed to squeal before promptly crumbling to the floor littered with empty water cups and orange peels.

"I started to get worried about you 20 minutes ago." Sigh. I tried to respond but pretty much all I could do was cough for the next five minutes.