A visit to New York
As difficult as it was, I had to leave my new condo this week, though for a very good reason. As part of my Speedo contract, I was invited to visit two awesome teams in New Jersey; Montclair YMCA and X-Cel Swim Team at Princeton. I really enjoyed talking with the kids. It’s so great to be able to share my story with them and help inspire them. Every Olympian has a story about success, and I think it’s so important for kids to understand you can succeed from anywhere and prevail through any setbacks as long as you are willing to work hard. I got to spend a few hours with each team talking and signing autographs. Some kids even brought pictures of my puppy Lilly they found online! I thought that was especially cute.
I spent my nights in New York at the Hudson Hotel really close to my agent, Amy. She took me to some great restaurants in the city and a cute nail salon called Pinki’s. On Monday, to cap off a great weekend, I had a meeting with NBC to discuss marketing strategy for the upcoming Olympics. They shared some really interesting ideas for next summer in Beijing.
That was cool, but the best part of my weekend had to be a near run- in with Matt Lauer of the Today Show. I am probably the biggest Today Show fan ever! I watch it every morning and was devastated when Katie Couric left for CBS. A true fan, I stayed tuned and am now very accepting of Meredith Vieira. Anyway… so I was standing outside of the NBC studios and none other than Matt Lauer walked RIGHT by me!! Naturally I was speechless and only watched as he breezed by with his body guard.