If you’ve come around here more than once or twice, you know I’m head-over-heels in love with my wife, Tiffany. Well, today marks 16 years to the day since I took her out on a date for the first time, so we celebrate this as an anniversary. So, I figured I’d dedicate this blog to her.

Real quick, just in case you’ve never been here, click here to see why I’m trying to run 61 full marathons this year for a great charity I’m a part of called Train 4 Autism.

OK, so here’s the quick rundown of how we started dating. We met on the newspaper at college. I was the sports editor, she was a good-looking newbie reporter. I tricked her into taking a women’s volleyball story so I could get to know her. The trick worked. We spent a lot of time working on that story and eventually, I worked up the courage to ask her out on a date on Sept. 21, 1994.

We went out on a date the next night, to a restaurant called Buffalo Ranch. I spilled my salad on my lap, but she didn’t really notice and I brushed it on the ground. We went down to Thalia Street in Laguna Beach for a walk on the beach. And then we went for a second walk on the beach, because I was too nervous to try to kiss her during the first walk. She forced the issue. Lucky me!

Anyways, I figure that for today, I’ll write down one quick memory, hopefully mostly funny, from each year we’ve been together.

1994: Meeting Her Parents
We had been dating a week or two. I went over to her house (she lived at home) to pick her up to go to a party. She had a midnight curfew, which I thought was funny since she was in college, but I respected that. She was very embarrassed about that and tried to talk her parents into easing that up.

Anyways, I got to the door and she told me to come in, because her parents wanted to meet me. That was fine with me — how bad could that be? The house was fairly dark, with just one lamp on at night time. She introduced me to her mom and I said hello. Then she said, “And this is my dad, Andy.”

So the first words he grumbles are, “So you’re the guy my daughter thinks she shouldn’t have a curfew for, huh?” Yeah, that’s me. Nice to meet you, too!

1995: She Followed Me To Kansas
At the time, my perspective was that she was moving out to Kansas, where I had transferred to go to Kansas State University, and she needed help finding a place. So, I called all the ads of people looking for roommates, I went and talked to people and I had her all set up. When she got to Kansas, she didn’t have a car, so I just gave her mine even though she didn’t know how to drive a stick shift. And she didn’t have any money, so I put her on my credit cards. I lived in my fraternity house and went to class. She worked two jobs.

Of course, from her parents’ perspective, she quit both her jobs, dropped out of school and bought a one-way plane ticket to Kansas, all in the course of a day. I was glad she was nearby. But I don’t think her parents were too big on me back then.

1996: Her 21st Birthday
Her birthday (December 16) was on a Sunday night, so I told her I was trying to get people together to go out, but I wasn’t having much luck because it was a work night. She was waiting at her parents’ house for me and the three other people who were going out to show up.

One by one, all of our friends called her up to apologize that they wouldn’t be able to make it out that night because it was a Sunday. Thank goodness that was before the days of caller ID, because she would have known that they were all calling from the pre-party at my parents’ house. She was beyond shocked when 18 of us piled out of two limousines to pick her up. Her parents were beyond shocked when about 10 of us piled into their house to use the bathrooms.

We had a great time that night. I think. I got cut off and then kicked out of the place we went to. I’m not going to say why.

1997: Frequent Flyer Miles
We left Kansas after 1995 and lived in Las Vegas in 1996. But I went back to finish up school in 1997 and we agreed to do the long-distance thing. I needed to focus and finish up my degree. We lived pretty far apart the entire year, and it was pretty tough. But we flew frequently. I’d fly west and she came to Kansas a few times.

One of those times she flew out was 13 years ago right now. On our September 22 anniversary in 1997, she was out there in Manhattan, Kan. with me, and we ate dinner at our favorite place in town, Harry’s Uptown. We ate there again in 1998, but we haven’t been back. One of these days we will.

1998: Surprise Visit!
I graduated from Kansas State University in December 1998. My brother, my parents and my grandparents all came out to visit. Tiffany couldn’t get the time off of work and was really upset that she couldn’t make it.

She called me up the night before my brother flew out and was crying on the phone, upset that she couldn’t be there. She was roommates with my brother in Las Vegas, so she put him on the phone after she was done talking to me. He was coming in on a redeye and renting a car, so he told me to leave my apartment unlocked so he could get in when he got there at 6 a.m.

No problem. I went out the night before, got my drink on, then crashed at about 2 a.m. I woke up at 6 a.m. to see Tiffany standing right there. What a great surprise! I was so glad she made it. We struggled so much to make it through those two long distance years and I’m glad she was able to see me graduate.

1999: May 23, Our Wedding Day
What more can I really say? I guess I have one quick anecdote. I lost 40 pounds in the three months before the wedding so I would look good for our pictures. Two nights before the wedding, I got a black eye. So much for the pictures, huh?

If you’re wondering what the other guy looked like, it was a doorknob. Two of my buddies were also a little drunk when they carried me in at the end of the night.

2000: Finding Out She Was Pregnant For The First Time!
I was the sports information director at a college and I was chit-chatting during halftime of a football game. I asked one of my co-workers about how the health care benefits were for when I had kids some day. They asked if there was something they should know, and I swore that no, there wasn’t. I wasn’t going to advertise that we were trying, but I figured Tiff would be pregnant within six months or so.

No more than three minutes later, she called me up screaming with excitement. Yes, she was pregnant! My co-workers thought I set the whole thing up. No, not at all. I was completely surprised! After the game, one of my student assistants asked me if I wanted a boy or a girl. That’s when I realized that after the whole “pregnancy” thing, there would be a baby as a party favor! Yikes! Me! A dad!

2001: A Romantic Valentine’s Dinner
So she’s about five months pregnant with our first child. I had planned on going out to Maggiano’s with her for Italian food. But on the way there, she changed her mind and said she wanted crab legs. I’m not a big crab legs guy, so I didn’t really know where to go. Red Lobster? I was going to make a call and find out where to go, but she knew where she wanted to go. She knew who made crab legs exactly to her liking. No matter what I said or where I suggested, she was dead set on where to eat for that Valentine’s Dinner when she was pregnant with our first child.

Yes, we went to Hooters.

2002: Wrong Restaurant In Puerta Vallarta
We were on a seven-day cruise and we stopped in Puerta Vallarta and had lunch at a restaurant the cruise ship recommended. While we were waiting for our food, a roach that was about two inches long walked across our table. We wanted to cancel our order, but the waiter wouldn’t let us. We were going to have to pay $40 to get out of there, so we decided to just eat anyways. We hoped it would be OK.

We went on a horseback riding excursion later that day. I got, hmmmmm, sick while we were out on that excursion in the middle of nowhere. I’ll just leave it at that. Tiff is probably laughing as she reads this.

2003: Tiff Can’t Surprise Me
Tiff called me up at work three times one morning about a month before my birthday asking for me to try to get in touch with one of my good friends for her. Then about an hour later, my mother-in-law called me from Tiff’s phone asking a question about seller integrity on eBay. I asked her what the seller’s star rating was, and she had no clue about what the eBay website looked like. When I asked her what she bought, she hesitated before saying, “Uh, a lamp?” I had used eBay a few times to buy and sell event tickets, and I knew my Chiefs were playing in San Diego the week after my birthday, so I knew what my present was. I told Tiff to be smarter about things and she got upset because she felt like she can never surprise me.

For that same birthday, we were talking and she was talking aloud to me, wondering how somebody was going to make it to my surprise birthday dinner at a restaurant called Javier’s. I reminded her that she was speaking out loud, and she got upset again about not being able to surprise me. I told her to pick a new restaurant and surprise me. The next day, I cleaned up all the files on the desktop on my computer. I took Benjamin to the park and when I came back, there was a menu downloaded to the desktop of a different restaurant. I told her to do that kind of stuff under her user account!

So a week later, it’s my birthday, and I’m hanging out at home by myself, watching Michigan-Ohio State. The phone rings and the caller ID says it’s that second restaurant, so I just let the call go. Somebody leaves a message confirming the party of 16 for 6:30 p.m. Oops, she did it again!

2004: OK, She Snuck One By Me
I was expecting a surprise party for my 30th birthday party, which fell on a Monday. The Friday before, right when I was on my way out the door from work, my dad called me up with a ridiculous request for computer help. I called up Tiff and she was way more willing than normal to let me go over there and help.

He stalled me with stupid questions for a good two hours. Finally, Tiff called over there and asked me to come home, and my dad dropped everything and ushered me out the door. My stomach was in knots. I thought I was going home to a party and I was on edge when I opened up the door.

Benjamin, who was 3 at the time, was sitting on the couch as I opened the door. He had a noisemaker and yelled, “Surprise Daddy!” as I walked in. Tiff was sitting there cracking up, because the house was calm and quiet.

She got me. The party ended up being the next night.

2005: Her 30th Birthday
For her 30th birthday, we had it all planned out. We were going to drive down to San Diego and have a nice night, sans kids. We had babysitting all lined up and were really looking forward to it. Unfortunately, all three kids were sick.

So we changed that to dinner out. We went to Fleming’s, a nice steak restaurant. We had never been to a nice restaurant like that. Those kind of things are way too expensive for us, but the food was great and we had a great time talking with each other for about three hours that night. It was the best meal we had ever enjoyed together, and to this day, it still probably is.

2006: I Was Hard On Myself Back Then, Too
I’ll always remember June 4, 2006, the day I ran my first marathon. It was in San Diego and Tiff and the kids came down to see me finish. I really wanted to run a sub-4, and Tiff knew that was my goal, but I knew by about mile 21 that it wasn’t going to happen. I got upset and just about started crying, because I felt like I was letting them down.

But then I pulled out a strip of pictures Tiff gave me to carry and started thinking about how fortunate I was to have them, because if I would have been paralyzed when I broke my neck when I was 16, I would have never met Tiff and there would be no Ben, Jack and Ava. I bucked up because I realized I didn’t let them down.

2007: One Proud Husband!
She trained for a 5K on July 4 and wanted to run it in 27 minutes, but paced it poorly and ran a 29. She wanted revenge two weeks later and ran another 5K, aiming for that 27-minute mark again. I hung out at the finish line with the kids, and hoped to see her reach her goal.

I saw her come around more than a minute early and go 25:40. I’ll never forget seeing her come around the corner right before the finish, her face red as she obviously labored through a tough run. I don’t really care how fast she runs. But to see her go out and reach for a goal and kill it with authority? I was so proud of her and I’ll never forget that feeling.

2008: A Tough Year
She’ll probably kill me for saying this, but 2008 was our toughest year ever. And I’m to blame. But we went out to dinner two years ago tonight and permanently resolved every issue we had. I feel like we’ve never been stronger than we’ve been the past two years. That dinner was the turning point. We’ve always been madly in love, but our relationship reached new levels for strength at that dinner.

We have plenty of memories, and that dinner is another one I’ll never forget.

2009: Long Beach Marathon
Best date ever! We went for 26.2 together! I trained her for her first marathon, and it was so wonderful to do that with her. As a marathon runner, I’d say that there’s nothing quite as enjoyable as running a marathon with your spouse. It was an awesome experience. She’s battled a lot of injuries, so I’m hopeful we can do that again. Maybe even just a half-marathon. I don’t care. I love running with her.

2010: We are BROKE!
For our wedding anniversary this year, she bought me a coffee mug that she was able to write her own message on. The message is “It’s our 11-year anniversary and all I could afford is this mug!” It’s my favorite coffee mug — I used it this morning. I love it, and someday we’re going to look back on it and laugh. I don’t care that we can’t afford anything. I have her, she has me, and we get to ride this roller coaster together.

Tiff, I know you packed that pasta for me today, but I can eat that for lunch tomorrow and meet you at Chipotle in the Spectrum at about 11:45 so you can get back to the Ranch on time! I love you!

Oh, and for everybody else, if you read all the way to here, that means you must have liked what I wrote. If so, can you do me a favor? Click to my St. Jude Children’s Hospital page and donate a dollar to help me reach my goal?

That’s all! Have a great September 22 everybody!

Happy Tuesday everybody! I wrote my blog, then went back to write an intro, but I don’t have time and need to get this posted. So I have stuff in here about a great race in Memphis, Jack, football, prescription costs and a killer cheeseburger. Keep reading!

Real quick, just in case you’ve never been here before, I’m a father of three and a marathon runner. My middle child, 7-year-old Jack, is severely autistic and I’m trying to run 61 marathons this year to raise money and awareness for a great charity called Train 4 Autism. So far, I’m on target, through 43 with a couple of ultramarathons. 18 to go!

I Need Your Help!
OK, so I added Memphis St. Jude’s onto the schedule as my 61st race and I was really looking forward to running this race. It benefits such a great cause — the St. Jude Chidren’s Research Hospital, which does an amazing job with pediatric cancer research and treatment.

Well, last week I got a text from Operation Jack supporter Laura Sullivan letting me know that registration was full. And I hadn’t registered! I was so bummed. I contacted the race and explained to them what I was doing and asked if they had any extra entries allocated for exceptions that they’d sell me — I’ve lucked out that way a couple of times.

Unfortunately, they didn’t have any. But, they have a program called Heroes and if I participated in that and guaranteed to raise $500, then I could purchase an entry. I thought about it for about 60 seconds and decided to do it. I registered for the race and personally guaranteed that I’d raise the $500. In a way, I feel like it’s meant to be.

Autism is my cause. It still is, and it always will be. But now I take a tiny hiatus and use this base I’ve built to raise some money for pediatric cancer research and treatment. There are a lot of terrible things in this world that harm innocent kids. I’m really excited to be able to help this cause.

So, I’m going to push a little bit towards this until I reach my goal. I have a fundraising page that you can reach at operationjack.org/stjude. The sooner we hit this, the sooner I’ll stop begging you with every blog! Let’s get this done!

Quick Jack Update
Tiff is taking Jack to the DAN doctor today. Poor little guy has no idea what’s in store for him. He has to get blood drawn for testing, which I’m pretty angry about, because we went through this ordeal in June and it was miserable for him. For whatever reason, though, the lab couldn’t use the sample and we need to have blood drawn again. We had to restrain him and he was withdrawn the rest of the day. I’m pretty sure he’ll be that way again today, which kills me, because this was so avoidable. How does a lab ruin a sample?

On a side note, one of his prescriptions was ready yesterday. The co-pay through our insurance was $122. But if we just paid out of pocket for it (which we did), it was $109. I don’t talk about politics here, and I’m not going to say anything about either party, but I think that’s a pretty good indictment of the health care system. I don’t know what the solution is, but with those numbers, there’s certainly something wrong.

Maybe I Should Stick To Running, Not Football
We have an NFL pick-em pool for Operation Jack and of the people who have made their picks both weeks, I’m in last place. It’s terrible. I’m going to rewind 11 years with a quick anecdote.

I have a Super Bowl bet every year with my grandma and she dictates the terms. In 1999, when Denver beat Atlanta, she won the bet. At the time, I was working for The Associated Press and I had to get her a custom-made shirt that said, “I proved I know more about football than my grandson, and he’s a professional sportswriter!” I might need to get a shirt made for my 4 1/2-year-old daughter Ava, too.

I only picked five winners through Sunday’s games. I wanted to see how I would have done if I would have let her pick for me. So, I went down the list of games, reading the visiting team and then the home team, telling her to pick one. Sure enough, she picked seven. I tried it again, going with the home team first and then the visiting team, and she picked nine right. I said the winning team first the third time through, and she picked six. Then I went with the losers first and she picked 11.

Four different attempts, four times she beat me. Oh well.

Great Call Gaye Beckman!
I wanted to meet up with Operation Jack supporter Gaye Beckman on Sunday, so I threw out Five Guys as a suggestion. It’s good stuff and there’s no In-N-Out in Denver. She recommended a place called Smashburger instead, though. I trusted her judgment, plus I like trying places I can’t get to anywhere else.

This was dinner:

This was some kind of barbecue bacon cheeseburger with onion strings, plus an order of fried pickles. I was looking down the options for fries and saw fried pickles and it was a no-brainer. Good stuff. Good call.

For the record, I know it seems like I live on cheeseburgers, but last night for dinner, I had baked salmon, cous cous and squash. For lunch I had a turkey sandwich, banana, apple and some soy energy blend trail mix stuff that Tiff picked up at Costco.

That’s All For Today
Have a great Tuesday, everybody. See you back here tomorrow!

Seven years ago today, my wife Tiffany answered a furniture saleswoman’s question with a completely unexpected response. We were couch shopping and Tiff was very obviously pregnant. You never want to ask a woman when she’s due, because maybe she’s just overweight, but in looking at Tiff that day, that saleswoman was pretty certain she was expecting.

“So, when are you giving birth?” she asked.

“In about an hour,” Tiff told her. “We have a little bit of time before we have to be at the hospital.”

Now, she was not in labor. It was a scheduled c-section. But sure enough, we were on our way to the hospital and we needed a couch so we stopped off at a furniture store that was on the way. And less than two hours later, we welcomed little Jack, who turns 7 today, into the world. I’ll never forget that week. We were finishing up on an addition to our house (we had a floor dropped in to add a playroom) and the crew finished it the day after Jack was born.

I shuttled back and forth between the house and the hospital, painting everything while nobody was staying at home, and then moving (and re-moving) all the furniture upstairs because we had new carpet put in. At the same time, I was doing the best I could to regulate visitors at the hospital, because we made the mistake of allowing too many when Benjamin was born two years earlier.

There was a chair next to her bed that I slept in for the four nights of her stay, which wasn’t particularly comfortable, but it was a whole lot better than recovering from a c-section. On Saturday the 20th, we went home with little Jack, our precious newborn.

As you know if you’ve been here before, we had no idea we were holding a baby who had autism. We didn’t live in denial as he developed very slowly, though, and he’s been in intensive therapy for more than five years now. If there’s one thing I would stress to parents of slow-developing children, it’s that denial might do you some good, but it won’t help your child.

Last year, when I wrote a blog on his birthday, I was pretty upset. I could remember my sixth birthday and he was nowhere near where I was on that day. He was so far behind typical, calling me “Miss Anne” instead of “Daddy,” still in diapers and obviously headed towards a not-at-all-typical childhood.

This year, though, it’s different. He’s still in diapers. And his speech is limited. But he’s really made a lot of progress since last year. I think some of the biggest changes have come from this DAN protocol we have him on. His insides are clearly getting better and as a result, he’s been happier. Way fewer meltdowns and much more Happy Jack. He’s been more responsive in therapy and he’s doing a lot of little things better.

I was just talking to Tiff about this the other night, and I think the biggest improvement that I’m excited about is that he realizes he’s a part of the family and he wants to be with us. He has his own unusual ways of interacting with us, which is fine. One of the key components of autism is social awkwardness. But he interacts with us. We’re not just trees in his world like we used to be.

He likes to be with his brother and sister and he’s clingy with Tiff and I. I kid you not, two years ago, I wasn’t really sure that he understood we were his parents. We’ve always accepted him, but I’ve always had some doubt about his future. I’ve always held out hope that he’ll be able to mainstream, but I haven’t really had anything to make me truly believe that other than my faith that things will get better.

We know that he understands a lot of what we’re saying and we know the speech is going to come. And this might sound bad, but it’s a lot easier on us emotionally when we get feedback and reciprocation from him. So last year his birthday was upsetting for me, because I compared him to myself as a 6-year-old. But this year, I’m comparing 7-year-old Jack to 6-year-old Jack and I’m pretty excited. I’m really looking forward to 8-year-old Jack.

I’m glad he had a lot of fun at his party on Sunday. I’m glad he’s skipping school and going with Tiff to Disneyland. And really, while I’m glad he’s going to Disneyland with her, I’m also glad she’s going to Disneyland with him. I view the kids’ birthdays as a big day for her, because she gave birth to them after carrying them for nine months.

That’s why this morning, after I went by the gym, I stopped off to pick up some flowers for her. That’s something I always do and she wasn’t surprised. I’m glad they’re going to enjoy a special day together. They both deserve it.

Happy Wednesday y’all! I have nothing clever or catchy to start this blog out with and I need to get out the door to take Jack to school (and then go to work). So here you go — a bunch of stuff. Read it and see a picture of the most ridiculous bling I’ve ever gotten from a race!

Real quick, just in case you’ve never been here before, I’m a father of three and a marathon runner. Take a look and see why I’m trying to run 61 marathons this year for Train 4 Autism.

Got A Surprise In The Mail
I got this in the mail the other day, apparently for running four Rock ‘N Roll Marathons this year — Arizona, Nashville, San Diego and Seattle.

Now really, what am I supposed to do with this? I posed the question on Facebook and Twitter and got quite a few responses.

– Get a huge gold chain and grill and wear it at the San Antonio and Las Vegas Rock ‘N Roll marathons.
– Carry it with me at all times so that if I see Chris Rock or Dwayne Johnson, I can give it to them.
– Put it on a chain and wear it everywhere I went just so everyone would know what a bada– I was.
– Wear it every day and tell people my name is Rock.
– Get finger holes added and wear it as jewelry.
– Encrust my teeth with it.

I kind of like the thought of wearing it every day and telling people my name is Rock.

My Current Facebook Status
Sam Felsenfeld picked the wrong week to stop eating peanut m&ms.

Very Important Question For Those Of You In Southern California
Marathon No. 61 this year, the final race of Operation Jack, will be in Southern California. If you have any interest in attending the finish or participating in the marathon or half-marathon, do you have a preference between Sunday, December 26, or Monday, December 27? The Sunday is the day after Christmas but the Monday is a Monday. It’s holiday time, though.

Let me know what you think, especially if you’d be interested in showing up. I’m going to be making a decision on this very, very soon!

Los Angeles Marathon Anybody?
Anybody in Southern California interested in running the 2011 Los Angeles Marathon with Train 4 Autism? We’re an official charity for the race and we’re looking for runners! We have people heading groups in different areas of Southern California. I’m the leader for Orange County and will be entertaining folks with my terrible humor on group runs.

We don’t have any fundraising minimums, but if you raise $300, we’ll cover your race entry fee and I think we’ll hook you up with some gear. I know we’ll provide coaching if you at least try. No matter what happens, you’ll be under zero obligation. And if you go beyond $300 with fundraising (and we’ll help you with that), 85 percent of what you raise will go to the autism-related charity of your choice.

So, I’m looking for folks who are interested in running the race. If that’s, email me and let me know! This program by Train 4 Autism inspired a program I’m doing called Race 4 Free. That’s my cheesy transition into the next item.

First Free Racer!
I have a program I just launched called Race 4 Free where if you raise $300, we’ll reimburse you for a race entry fee and send you some Operation Jack gear. Now, I can’t do this for previous fundraising, but I can going forward. The race entry should be any Operation Jack race, but it can be any race you’re doing with an entry fee up to $150. If you have any questions, contact us!

Anyways, we got our first free racer! Mackenzie Smith went after it and raised the money with his free fundraising page in about two days. I’ll admit it, I’m pretty excited to have my first pioneer hit this goal. I know a lot of you lurk and follow along and support what I’m doing … if I can get enough of you to be like him, or to even try to be like him, you’ll make a huge difference in this mission.

To set up a fundraising page, it’s REALLY simple and there’s NO obligation. Just click here and it’ll take you about two minutes. And there’s no obligation! I ran for more than nine hours in the hot Kansas sun last weekend to try to do my part. All you need to do is be like Mackenzine and take two minutes to set up a page — that’s a whole lot easier than doing what I did!

Runner’s World Update
I’ve mentioned Runner’s World a little bit in the past and I thought I was going to be in the November issue, but I got confirmation yesterday that it’s definitely the December issue, which will be out in November. Now you know.

That’s All For Today
I’d say something clever to close this out, but I wrote this last night and I was really sleepy! Have a great Wednesday!

I don’t normally get into politics here, because that’s a really stupid thing to do while representing a charity. But I do have one semi-related thing that I will get into today. I love America. I love this country, and I don’t care if there are better countries out there or if people don’t like this country. Like my family, this is what I was born into, and I’m proud to be a part of it, and it will always be my favorite. Yeah, this is a September 11 thing.

Real quick, if you’ve never been here before, click here to see why I’m running 61 marathons and an ultramarathon this year to raise money for Train 4 Autism.

Anyways, back to the point, September 11 was only nine years ago, so we all remember where we were and what we were doing on September 11. I won’t bore you to tears with what I was doing. We were all stunned beyond belief when we found out.

But I do want to say that I’m grateful that our military and government have prevented subsequent terrorist attacks on our soil in the past nine years. I’m grateful for our troops and our police officers and our firefighters, who put their lives on the line every day to keep us safe. I’m glad that no innocent civilians have lost their lives here since 9/11. It kills me to really think about the people that lost their lives on those planes and in those buildings.

I wish our country could be unified again like we were after 9/11, but I hope it doesn’t take such a devastating tragedy to make that happen. I’m running a race that’s a marathon/9:11 timed race on Saturday in Olathe, Kan. That’s one of my favorite areas of the country. It will be nice to be there. And really, that’s about all I have to say today. Do something American on Saturday.