Sparklinglady

swimming blows

2012-01-26T09:26:00.000-08:00

oh, i got myself into such a swimming pity party this morning that i almost started to cry. not while swimming, but after, while sitting at my desk at work. woe is me and how sucky of a swimmer i am. as for the aqua jogger - she wasn't using a floating device, the pool is shallow so she was moving along touching the bottom.
today i thought was going well, i was kicking and keeping up with the old lady doing butterfly in the lane next to me. maybe i was even gaining on her occasionally.
but then everything fell apart after that. lots of drills, but its not helping, hence the almost cry and the pity party. maybe i need a new swim suit.
i did wear my new top to the gym last night while i ran. i was looking good in it, too. i left work at 5 and didn't get home until 7:50, but only ran for 1:10. how is that possible? what was i doing that other hour and 50 minutes?
lets break it down:
5pm - leave work
5:04 - arrive at the gym and get a quick parking spot which is pretty impressive!
5:06 - waiting in line for them to check me in.
5:07 - duck into the pool area to avoid being blocked behind the slow walkers on the way to the locker room.
5:08 - arrive in the locker room before the slow walkers, yay!! hit the jon and change my clothes.
5:24 - check the cinema room for open treadmill, none available, but hang out long enough to see that Hanna is playing.
5:27 - get on a treadmill out in the open, tune into a show about Tupac, Biggie and Suge and start my 20 minute warm up.
5:47 - get a drink, pee again, head into the cinema room to do some drills and watch some Hanna.
6:03 - manage to get back on a treadmill because somehow ALL of them were occupied when i was done with my drills and stuff. ALL of them, with a line even. 3 were broken, too.
6:04 - tune into Toddlers and Tiara's and start up my workout.
6:34 - intervals done
6:35 - head to the locker room because i decided i needed to change back to my old orthotics
6:38 - stop at the water fountain and stand there waiting as two girls just stood there infront of them
6:41 - found a free treadmill, tunned back into toddlers and tiara's and started 20 min cool down.
7:01 - done! whew! finally
7:02 - see that the stretching area is totally full so head to the "ladies only!" section and just lay there for a few minutes
7:06 - start stretching and doing some PT
7:20 - head to the locker room to shower
7:35 - get in the car and start the drive home
7:50 - arrive home
gracious. that was a long 1:10 run.

so today, for lunch, i had this:

because i knew i was going to have this directly after:

what is that you ask? its a carmelita from Whole foods. Unfortunately i love them. and like the poptarts in the vending machine, once i start thinking about them, there is a certain gravitational like pull that puts them in my mouth.
oh dear. well, at least i managed to not also take down my afternoon snacks.
but i got on the trainer when i got home and eric made a penne bake which is da'bomb so i ate two big bowls of that. when he first started making it back in the day he would use the good sausage, im talking the good stuff, and we would easily go through it in a night. until i did some math and figured it has like 100 grams of fat and 1200 calories in that package.

i do like on the jimmy dean site, right above this image there is the following:

gross, right?? anyway, eric uses some sort of turkey sausage now which is still not good for us but better.
now i am patiently waiting for the kids to go to bed so i can have the last of the pinckney cookies that the evil eric brought home yesterday, or maybe a bowl of cereal. i think my metabolism is finally kicking back in, or something.

skiing

2012-01-22T18:15:00.000-08:00

we went skate skiing again today. it is exhausting. so fun but wow, i am really tired. eric was trying to tell me that for every hour of skate skiing, its the same as 3 hours of cycling. not sure that is right, but considering i have yet been able to manage 2hrs of actual ski time, its probably not too far off.

yesterday was uber productive! despite having imbibed lemony goodness friday night, and dreaming about sodas all night long and when eric woke up in the morning i asked him to get me a coke and he said no but sho' nuffs when i did get out of bed eventually i got a coke which while i was drinking it the kids were like - omg what are you doing!! since they haven't ever seen me drink the coca colas before. but i got out the door and swam for an hour. man, i am the slowest swimmer in all of the universe. how do i know this you ask? because i was doing a hard 100 and the aqua jogger in the lane next to me was keeping up. :(
but then i got on the treadmill and ran for 1:10. i was tired of running in the snow and slush and since i had escaped the cul de sac, i decided to take advantage of the treadmill. it was a good run, nice and easy, trucking along.
after i had to head into seattle to get my eyelashes did but did some shopping while i was there. i picked up this tank:http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

only in black with black camo underneath. maybe i will look cute next time i go to the gym. or maybe when i am out running this summer? i normally wear my old race shirts, and i tend to get those shirts in big big sizes, so i think maybe this will do a good job.
then i picked up a pair of jeans. they are one step away from jeggings i am afraid. i think, maybe.
but today while i was out skiing i thought of my new favorite blog, from the land of cheese and sunkist. she is working on improving her backside and has named it operation booty pop. well, while i was hiking it up yet another one of those hills, all i could think was too bad she lives in florida because i am pretty sure my booty is popping from today.
back to work and reality tomorrow.

its goes a little like this

2012-01-20T21:14:00.001-08:00

i was just bragging about my 20 days on the wagon when i fell off. whoops!

a little bit of being snowed in, a little bit of loss of electricity, heat and internets. omg, beyblades are going to be the death of me. hot water was on, so that was good, and it all came on today, but add that to a rest day, an attempt at escaping only to high center the car on a block of ice/snow and then to have the brush guard broken and torn off (how much is that going to cost?) followed by jumping into the most giant monster truck imaginable and then hours and hours of waiting, well that results in the consumption of the strongest lemon drops ever, along with the tastiest mucho macho nochos and bbq burger followed by ice cream with 8yr old hot fudge. oh yummy, or something.

20 days was a good run, but it was, one could say, our anniversary celebration, right. we'll see how i feel in the morning. gotta swim, gotta run. omg, let's see if i gained 1000lbs. ah, joy. i have to get my eyelashes fixed. my right eye is almost eyelash free while my left eye still has them all. i am looking good, kinda like this, only opposite.

snowblast 2012

2012-01-20T10:36:00.000-08:00

first, this is me getting the tiny, invisible E.

we spent our anniversary at home. we tried to go out but we couldn't get out of our hood. plus, we're pretty sure the place we were heading was closed due to the weather. i was on a business trip for our 5yr, and for 10yrs we are snowed in, which was nice after all.
next, this is fuzy laying on the Sky Mall rug. he loves it. he just walks right into the kitchen then falls onto his side with a thud. plop. he has one of his pompoms there with him. he loves them and carries them all over. yesterday i found about 10 of his toys in the fireplace in the living room.

today is day 3.5 of being snowed in. yesterday was exciting because there was no electricity, no heat, no internets, no cell receptions. good times. eric had the fire going all day which was nice. i went for a run outside which was nice, and then got on the trainer. i warmed my chamwow butter by the fire since it was so so chilly from being in the garage.

later we tossed both kids into sirus's bed, each in their sleeping bags with flannel sheet, quilt, blanket, and another quilt and of course footie jammies. we had our flannel sheets, down comforter, blanket, blanket, blanket. eric reminded me that although it was chilly in the house, we have been camping in much colder. the toughest part for me was no internets!!! we were lucky though that it was only for a day and that we had so much firewood. eric also moved all of our perishables out onto the deck, and while i was worried that the bears would come drink all of his beers and eat our yogurt, but alas, they did not.
speaking of which, today is day 20. i have not had any lemon drops, margaritas or beers in all of those days. wow, that was uber tough last night when eric pulled one of the beers from the back deck and began to chug it, all super frosty and super, omagosh, i wanted a sip. but i held strong, but he is very mean.

Sky Mall

2012-01-17T18:45:00.000-08:00

i love it. it brings hours of entertainment with every flight.
i have even made two purchases from the sky mall catalog! TWO.

one was this rug a long long time ago. possibly pre-eric even. the color here is bad, but you can get the idea of what is going on. darling kitties drinking milk all at the same time. i like that some of them are laying flat on their bellies with their feet sprawled right behind them.

the other this the garden yeti. this was a father's day present for eric. the yeti is proving to be a little bit of a wuss as he isn't holding up too well in the severe weather of the pac nw. now he is wintering in the garage.

but today the catalog showed up and the cover totally grossed me out. i can't find it online, but its of a waterproof keyboard with coffee being spilled on it. only the coffee has cream in it, so its kind of that yucky coffee color and it looks terrible and gross on that cover. they should have dumped a soda or a black coffee or something. totally grosses me out. but i am thankful for that cover because i decided to look for a photo on line and although i couldn't, i found this which you may purchase from the catalog.

could you imagine pulling that thing out and blowing it up? better yet, at the end of your flight, deflating it, blowing all that stale air all over your row mates? ew, makes me shiver and laugh each time.

AND then for some reason while looking for the coffee spill cover photo, these photos came up and they are my very new most favorite favorites ever:

you never see football players doing this. or race car drivers, or not even golfers. i love cyclists, but they just need to stop doing this to themselves, although it does bring me great joy, so carry on, boys! carry on!

tilda

2012-01-15T19:53:00.000-08:00

today janet braved snowblast 2012 to join me in the garage for some riding of the bikes. we did her favorite workout full of ILT, Spin Ups and Spin Outs. I was convinced she was going to be snowed in and live with us forever after but she must be an expert snow driver because she drove away with ease. however, i showed her my tattoo. she let out her awesome laugh to the point at which i thought she might begin to cry. then she semi composed herself, and asked, was that the wrong response? no, it was definitely not the wrong response, it was perfect. when i showed it to my mom, she couldn't even see it. i had to be like - right here, right here where i am pointing. oooh, now i see it.
the kids and i then went to the gym and then to get seamus's hair cut. she has been growing it out and it was a little past her shoulders. i loved it when she would let me put it in pig tails or most recently in one big pony tail in the back, i love when it is off of her adorable face, but she prefers to have it hang down, not even ever tucking it behind her ears. it drives me crazy. finally on friday she had a little breakdown, because brushing her hair twice a day is too much for her. so i scheduled an appointment and we got it cute. super short and stacked in the back, angling towards the front to a max length of right below her earlobes, and of course her bangs, she loves her bangs.
on the way to the hair cut, sirus was singing i'm sexy and i know it. seamus of course had to burst his bubble by telling him how he didn't even know what sexy meant. so of course he asked her. she said it was the same thing as sixty but he wouldn't buy it. she didn't know either, so he asked me if i knew what it meant, good lord. i said it was when people think you look good, so he continued to go on and on about he was sexy and he knew it.
i am fascinated with tilda swinton. here she is at the golden globes, fascinating!!!

40yrs and going strong

2012-01-12T20:31:00.000-08:00

back in ohio there was a german deli right by our house. the deli always smelled weird, like terrible but there were always interesting things to look at in there. plus, the deli had two of the most tasty things every - first was a sandwich, kind of a sub i guess. i remember that it had some sort of pickle on it, i think. can't remember much more than that, but i remember that it was tasty and i could go for one right now.
but most notable is that they had a nut roll. what is that? its tasty goodness. my mom would send them to me when i went away to college and every time i came home to visit after moving away i would buy one or 4 to bring home with me.
sadly the german deli went out of business. so sad, it was where tasty goodness came from.
xtie found a nutroll once at a farmers market. she gave me some and i thought she told me where it was from, but i never went there. but i look for them. i figured we would find it in leavenworth but alas, there is none there. we even asked the people in the bakeries and none of them even knew where we could find it.
but yesterday, because eric hates me and loves me, made the nut roll.

apparently, when he picked sirus up from school, the crossing guard had a plate full of international treats. eric spotted a nut roll on that plate and instantly asked her about it. apparently one of the parents had made it for international day at school! she got the recipe for eric and then he made it!! 1st attempt was good, but not really right. i still ate the whole thing. for those of you who don't know. its like a loaf of bread. the whole loaf of bread. but then today when i came home, he had made another one! and this one is perfect!!! and i am trying not to eat the whole thing so i can share it with xtie and my mom this weekend. it might not make it, he might need to make another one. and begin mass production so we can sell them and make our millions. SO TASTY!!!

so last night when i was brushing my teeth before going to bed i decided that maybe i would get another letter of eric's name tattooed on me every 10 years. so his name will be complete on our 40th anniversary. when i told him this plan, i paused and was like, but then he'd would probably leave me when his name was complete. but he said no, he would leave me right after i get the I, so i would have just ERI. today, i was thinking, really i should have gotten a C and then just added the letters backwards. that would have worked, too.

i was like, wow. stop it.

2012-01-11T21:10:00.000-08:00

haha!! so happy!! someone found my blog by searching for janet jackson armpits. i gag a little every time i think about those pits.

today sirus cleaned up the playroom. he did it by himself without being asked. but tonight, i overheard him tell eric that it was almost too big of a job for one man to handle. luckily, sirus is quite the man and was able to take care of it. he has been wearing his handsome vest the past two days. today he wore it with his handsome pants, which is kind of funny. he's got style.

other news. today i got a tattoo. i already had one. i got it in like 1997 i think. its been a long time and i forget that i have it. but! when i was having kids it was good because it points right to where the anesthesiologist plugs in the epidural! i was thinking ahead!

i had planned to get the new tattoo last april when i was in the SF area. we were down there for team summit which is always fun, but doubley fun was that i got to hang out with allie. never mind that she has moved into the deep deep south way far away and i won't get to see her this year, but she did all kinds of research and calling around to get me a tattoo appointment while i was there, only to discover that you really shouldn't swim with a new tattoo. what? who would have thunk it. so it was canceled. when in the world would i get around to it again?

if i would have been quick on my feet, i would have taken the opportunity when i first was getting treatment for my back and wound up taking some time off from training all together, but it didn't occur to me then.

then i could have gotten it done with i had my most recent surgeries since seeing as i wound up not swimming for like two weeks do to the resulting blood and guts, but again, i didn't think of it.

so, the tattoo was an anniversary present. to eric. from me.on me. really to retaliate against him for getting my name tattooed on his shoulder. he's had it on there for a long long time. not sure if it was before we were married or not, can't remember, that was a long time ago, but i do remember it was when he was at a race in wisconsin. he came home and was like ta-daaaaa! and i was like, wow! um, wow! i had told him i'd never get his name on me. not because i didn't love him, but just because, why would you do that? so for our 10yr anniversary i decided that the letter E would suffice. the size of a penny, in white, on my hip.

i went today at lunch and had it done and wow, it really hurt. i remember my other one being more of a buzzing, but this one, i was like, wow. stop it. luckily it is very small and it really didn't take any time at all.

when i came home i showed it to eric. he was like, huh? you got a scar? and i was just like, see, its a little awkward when someone gets a tattoo for you. and he was like, but its just an E. That could be an E for anything. to which i responded with, exactly, and E in almost see through invisableness. so we had a few laughs. he thinks its cute. it is pretty cute.

i showed it to seamus and she said she won't ever get a tattoo. internets - here it is, documentation of her saying that on 1/11/2012. please internets don't become technologically obsolete before she is 18!

speaking of technologically obsolete, while watching the star wars movies with the kids, eric had a good point. how is it possible that c3po and r2d2 remained functional and relevant for all those years and years when my phone is like only a year old and is totally obsolete already?

trying really hard!

2012-01-09T18:57:00.001-08:00

really i am! i am trying to stay on track but alas, it is very difficult. especially when faced not just with a rest day but an entire rest week! the week still involves plenty of activity but not enough to warrant the pinckney cookie (at least now they are all gone) and trader joe's candy cane jojos (yikes, there is still an entire row of them left!!)that were just consumed. a bit of a binge today since there were some reese's peanut butter cups taken down earlier PLUS two hershey kisses, each propped on it's own spoonful of peanut butter. gah!!! at this rate, i might as well drink the entire bottle of patron that has been taunting me.
at least i had no resolution about sweets, only the alcohol, and i am doing pretty good with that one.

while looking for the candy cane jojo image, there was this photo of a mini cheesecake that was was made sitting on top of a jojo. we have made those where you put the nilla waffer under there, but an oreo like cookie would be wonderful!

while searching for images of hershey kisses sitting on their own spoon of peanut butter i found these totally cute hershey kiss acorns!

i also found this example of nipple cookies gone bad.
and THESE! i am totally going to make these.
but this is what the pinckney cookies look like: totally delish.

save me! save me!!!

pits

2012-01-08T18:33:00.000-08:00

i don't want the chef's table entrees even if they are free.

more??

2012-01-07T18:31:00.001-08:00

this trend has got to stop.

its a good think i like armpits

2012-01-05T21:48:00.000-08:00

what is this?? who in their right mind thought that this was a good photo to use? COME ON. i will admit that i did click on it, but just to see if there were more photos of janet jackson's armpits and you KNOW those nasty things were totally photoshopped. tyra is always telling the top models to stop showing us the pits, no one wants to see them but apparently everyone at nurtisystem thinks that we do and that we must in order to be a success.

progress

2012-01-04T21:06:00.000-08:00

making progress i am!! yahoo. hope to stay on this path for a while.

today at work i thought i was having an appendicitis. oh it was horrible. so horrible i started getting dizzy and i was going to throw up and all i wanted to do was lay down. i called eric and was all woe is me. i was almost headed to the hospital and then i felt better and i no longer had an appendicitis. so i went for an hour run. now i feel fine but i think i need to roll around on the tennis ball for a bit. eric thinks its from my new favorite beverage of choice, hot water with lemon.

i ran on the treadmill at the gym. i was at they gym yesterday as well. its crazy there, every treadmill is taken, i watched 10 cars pull into the totally full parking lot as i was trying to turn out of it. new years resolutions in full swim. except for at the pool. yesterday i showed up and there was 1 guy in there. i stood on the side of the pool and was like, eww, its pretty foggy in there. he said yeah, and chilly, but he said he was pretty sure it was totally safe. ha. doubtful, but i got in and swam anyway. today i walked by the pool, only today there wasn't anyone in it except a few little kids sitting on the side with their feet in. but it wasn't foggy any more. so that was good. hoping its clear and not so cold tomorrow morning. gotta get back on the morning training train. today while on the treadmill, i was watching 24. the last time i was there and they were showing 24 jack's wife and daughter were being held captive. this time the wife and daughter were fine, but jack was held captive and then they got his daughter again. i'd be so mad if i were his wife and daughter.

we're watching cowboys and aliens. i sure do like daniel craig. but why does harrison ford talk like that now that he is old?

at the end of the first star wars when princess leia was giving luke and han solo their medals, sirus said that really she was just trying to decide which of them she was going to marry. he also said that darth vader doesn't have a gun like the rest of his team.

progress people. progress!!! moving in a positive direction!

Sparklinglady's Blog Star Date: 2012

2012-01-02T21:43:00.000-08:00

the new year is off to a good start.
only 2 of my eye lashes have fallen out which, seems pretty good to me considering the lady was telling me i needed $50 of lash care products and another appointment by the end of next week. i passed on all of that. let's keep these lashes the way they are. although, i haven' yet swam with them, i wonder if they will fit in my goggles. tomorrow is the day to find out.
yesterday we went skate skiing. it was so fun. it was so nice to be out in the fresh cold air, but still so warm and working so hard. what i want to know is why did we feel like we were going so fast when really we were going at what would equate to a slow run pace? my pace was improved from friday, and i don't know what a good pace is, but i was happy with the workout, the weather was fantastic, eric was fun and i am excited to have gotten to try it. now i am trying to figure out when i can go again. apparently it is ok to swap out any bike ride for some skate skiing, but i must continue to run, ya know, to continue to adapt to the pounding. apparently i need to get some new shoes, too.
i wanted to get my haircut today. its a mess. but the guy wasn't in today. now i will likely wait another several months. i am starting to realize why he keeps trying to give me bangs. my hairline is rediculous and i guess he is trying to cover up my non-botoxed forehead. they used to tease me in college that i had a squishy forehead. i dont really remember it being squishy, but now, some days, its so squishy that i a wrinkle it up and then it sticks like that! and in the summer time! i swear it winds up being striped! good thing i live some place where there isn't any sun.
i have come to realize that maybe i am having a bit of a reaction to the neosporin that i have been using on my surgery site. what is strange is that i am less self conscious over the giant red oozing blob that is now there than the red bump that was there before. maybe its my lovely eyelashes.
i go back to work tomorrow, which after a long vacation is always a little scary, mainly because i'm never quite sure if any of my pants will fit. i have worn my house uniform pretty much the past 17 days and that is it. fingers crossed!

we be illin'

2011-12-30T20:03:00.000-08:00

yeah, so. the end of 2011 is headed out with a bunch of sneezes and sinus pressure. maybe a little fever, too. ugh.
luckily most of my 17 day vacation has been healthy, although i did spend most of it in bed, sleeping and napping. but this week i felt like i was making some progress and then bam, like sick. which after taking a week off from swimming to let my plastic surgery heal, the one swim i did do on tuesday felt as though i hadn't swam in like ever, like it was my very first swim evar. and then i skipped the swim yesterday and now i will likely skip it tomorrow too. yesterday because i felt some arse coming on. today was a rest day unless i was feeling antsy then i was to go on an easy run. SO we picked up my skate skiis and i tried it out to get in some practice for sunday, assumming we are better by then. it was so fun. maybe not the most brilliant thing to do considering i wasn't feeling so awesome, but it was way fun. then we came home, watched empire strikes back with the kids, drank three mugs of hot water with lemon and then had a bunch of ice cream.
we watched star wars with the kids yesterday and today empire strikes back. today was awesome because as darth vader was kneeling down talking to the emperor and sirus asked "why is darth vader sitting criss cross applesauce?" what a funny thing to imagine. oh i wish i could remember some of the funny things he was saying while we were watching star wars though. he got r2ds, c3po, chewbaca and darth vader for xmas. he of course referred to that peanut butter guy and seamus was excited to say she knew who chewbacwa was. love it.
now i am counting down the moments until i can take a few swigs of the nyquil and hit the hay.

if i could turn back time

2011-12-27T20:31:00.001-08:00

ok, cher, you can lay off..

so back in august amazon local had a deal for lash extensions! after seeing a friend with beautiful, natural, lovely looking lashes i jumped on that opportunity!!
so i finally got in to have them installed. she put some cooling pads on my lower eyes which were nice since i was uber puffy from two days of ham dinners, and an hour of swimming right before. then she taped my lower lashes down! and thank goodness i got to have the whole thing done with my eyes closed, i really hadn't thought about how they would be installed until i go there but was pretty sure i did not want to have my eyes open for the 2hrs that it was going to take. then she taped my upper lids up? but not open, but up enough to have the lashes point up or something. i told her it was all clock work orange and stuff. AND THEN!!! i fell asleep. for like an hour and 1/2!! how funny is that?? every once in a while i woke up because she'd be tugging on something but mostly i was just asleep. when i woke up though, my hands had fallen asleep and the back of my head was killing me!!! so she let me roll my head a little and i bent my knees up some and shook my hands some and then, bam i was done.
wow. so yeah. hmm. mixed feelings about the results. crayz! a bit crazyier than expected. my friend's were so pretty an natural. mine, not so much. i went into it as an experiment, to see if i might want to do them again for a special occasion, not really with the intention of all the upkeep, but wow, did not expect the craziness that ensured. i went to gym after and felt like everyone was staring at me! ok, so normally they do stare because they are amazed at my extreme athleticism and all, but this time, i was like, hmm, they really are staring. when i got home, sirus said he wished i had my normal lashes back. and seamus didn't even notice until i stared at her and then she said she wanted her real mommy back. good lord. so they are on there until they fall out with my normal lash shedding pattern. maybe i will get to wear my NEW dress with my NEW lashes sometime before they fall out?? oh yeah, i accidentally got a new dress.
the kids and i went down town and i tried on a bunch of dresses at betsey johnson and everyone knows that is a terrible idea and sirus was so funny! as the girl was hanging the dress and pulling a lovely pink bag over it, he was pretty much narrating what she was doing with the giant bag to the point where he told her she was doing a really great job. she paused and stared at him and then just kind of giggled. but OMG on the drive to the gym after the lashes, OMG OMG a GIGANTIC spider crawled across the ceiling of the car!! right overtop of me!! i almost crashed like 8706 times while i watched it make its journey until it got to the other side AND THEN!! spun a web and lowered itself down to the floor where it disappeared!! totally forgot about the spider by the time i got back into the car after the run until i was about 1/2 way home, and it was dark and couldn't see it even if the spider was dangling right in front of my face.

this is my before look, totally eastern european, goggle remnants from the morning swim, dermatologist healings, bad hair, you know. kind of what i look like on a daily basis. good lord is that really what I look like on a daily basis?? wow TMZ and the paparazzi are going to love this!!!

and the after look - less puffy eyes, doe eyed deer look, possible anime, still no makeup. better? not sure. oh, i got my eye brows done, too.

and the new dress!! can't wait to wear it!! i will wear heels with it though. no flats here. and the feathery thing is detachable, so might just detach it and mix in something else.

surgeried upon parts trois and quatre

2011-12-20T20:55:00.000-08:00

oh the lemon drop has gone straight to my legs. i love that feeling. but the legs, she are tired. sunday i did a fun run with some of the goils. then thank goodness it was raining so we skipped sledding and i hung for some coffee talk then went to the gym. good gracious, i did some step ups and bulgarian split squats, both with weights an omg, days and days later i am still suffering!! ok, it was only a day ago, sort of, depending on how you count.
but this mornign i went to the dermatoligist. i was surgeried upon for dermatology relates issues in 2006 and in 2009. 2006 was abnormal but they got it all. 2009 was all displasiaed and stuff and i had to go back again to get it dug out even more. so anyway, i got back every year and every year, she takes my butt cheeks and looks between them. this year was no different. but also this time i got that thing on my leg frozen off and then the thing on face cut off. chop chop. slipped outta there in sunglasses and a hat pulled down low all movie starlet pastic surgeried like. i say i had an exorcism performed upon me, i am no longer a witch! and sirus was happy to hear it! and then there is a spot on my head that i need to keep an eye on. sweet. wrinkles, pimples, grey hairs and stuff on my face that i need to get cut off. awesome. i am aging gracefully.

dream

2011-12-08T15:32:00.000-08:00

last night i had a dream about my dad. that doesn't happen very often, i think i can only remember having dreamt about him a few times before. but last night he came to move in with us, which was a little odd. he was friends with one of my co-workers and they would hang out. my co-worker would refer to him as an old man, because he was 67, and then i said to my co-worker that he was pretty much an old man himself. he had all his mail forwarded to our house. i went to get the mail and there was a "make your own pair of shoes" kit for me, but then a huge stack of business reply cards for my dad. i went through them and noticed that he was doing a lot of business with my current work. how did i not know that? did he know i worked there too?

it was late december 1997 when i was back in Ohio visiting my mom for xmas, when i had gone to Eat N' Park with Cary for coffee. we were supposed to go to lisa's after and when we got to her house, lisa came out crying. it is such a weird thing to see your friends crying, you don't want it to happen and i instantly wanted to console her. i didn't understand what was going on but she told me i had to call home right away. my brother was at the house and he told me what had happened and that i needed to come home. dad had been out running while on vacation in mexico and he had been hit by a truck. of course my initial reaction was - but he's ok, right? he was not ok.
i can't remember if i cried then. it was a really weird, sureal feeling. i probably cried but it was also almost too big to comprehend, and what if i misunderstood what my brother had told me. i got home and what i had heard was confirmed to be true. he was not ok. he wasn't coming back. he was only 53. then i cried a lot.
my initial selfish thought was - who is going to walk me down the isle when i get married? i also remembered that i hadn't spoken to him since november, and that when i got off the phone after that call, i had remembered thinking how it was probably the best phone conversation i had ever had with him. he had moved to mexico for work not even a year before. i remember him calling me at school and even though my parents had been divorced for 10 years already, when he said he was moving to mexico, it was really the first time i ever felt like he was leaving. i didn't really want him to go, even though i saw him maybe once or twice a year, but i also thought it was a pretty great opportunity and i was hoping to get the chance to visit someday. we weren't going to get together over xmas because we were planning a family trip to all meet up in las vegas in february. he was going to run the marathon which was in february back then and us kids were going to head out there to see him and to hang out. we hadn't ever had a vacation like that before, so we were all looking forward to it. i was also excited to show him my bleach blonde hair, my newly pierced nose and tell him more about my exciting (cough cough) job at a successful internet start up. i was a success!! and i wanted to tell him all about it.
but on december 21 1997, that opportunity was taken away.
those first few years were weird. i had a lot of growing up to do so this only added to the turmoil i was already experiencing. the blonde hair grew out, the exciting job at the start up turned into a trip to thailand, to london, to morocco and then 2 months in costa rica. after the trip to costa rica i was a different person. i swear that that trip saved my life.
i started mountain biking, i was taking better care of myself, i adopted a 3rd cat and i met eric.
i think about my dad quite a bit. when i have tough times at work, and really don't know what to do, i really wish he was here to talk to. once i asked him what he did for work and after like 45 minutes of explaining, i really couldn't tell you what it was. but now so often i would really like to bounce some ideas of off him and get his advice.
i think about him when i run. he was a great runner. he had run on and off for as long as i can remember, i even remember all piling in the car with my mom to go track him down when he was caught in a torrential down pour and asking him why he walked to the end of the driveway before starting to run. but when he was like 45 he started running more regularly. he ran, and he ran, he ran some more. i didn't understand his accomplishments, and i fear that none of us in the family did. he had a personal best of just under 3hrs for a marathon, he placed top 5 in his age group in many races, one year he ran 11 marathons in 12 months. again, i would love to be able to talk him about running, to find out how he could run so fast and what drove him to run the many miles he did. its also so sad that he never got to have a garmin!! he would have loved a garmin!!!
i also think about him when i look at my kids. he never got to meet my kids. i can't even imagine what he would have been like with them. i don't think i had ever seen him even interact with kids. i think he would have liked them. i get the weepiest about that, even 14 years later.

sunday sunday, la la, la la la la

2011-11-27T19:49:00.000-08:00

today is the last day of my staycation. so sad. it was glorious but it went by so very quickly. but ever since friday i kept thinking it was sunday. but now, it is.
we took the kids up to go sledding up at snoqualmie pass for some sledding the other day. it was so fun. we didn't know what we were doing, so we wound up parked by some sign that said sno park, but there really wasn't any that we were expecting. but we hiked up this hill, we think it must be a snowshoe or maybe even xc skiing trail, but we went up about a mile, every 5th step dropping in at least knee deep if not further, but it was up up up. so fresh, and clear and brisk. it was sunny and i even started to build up a little sweat even. i was impressed that the kids kept trucking forward, too. there was some complaining but not a ton, but enough. eventually, we put the kids on the sleds and then pushed them down the hill. i was on sirus's sled for a while until he kicked me off saying that i was too big and i was slowing him down. this turned out to be true, because once he was by himself, he was going going going! screaming and yelling the entire time. it was very funny. when we got to the bottom they wanted to do it again, but we needed to get home, it was late.
today i was on the trainer for a few hours. i really do like the trainer. i like a controlled environment and numbers and stuff. plus i would rather drip sweat than be rained on in the cold.
i have gotten all caught up with dexter, season 5 was so good!!! season 3 and 4 were ok but not great but season 5 was awesome. then based on the advice of my boss i decided to start watching breaking bad which i am almost all the way through season 1 of (are there more seasons?) but i am very much enjoying it!
the other night eric and i watched this show called being human. its brittish, about a vampire and warewolf who live together in a house that is occupied by a ghost. it was actually quite good.
today at the mall, i bought a pair of leggings. goodness, i don't know if i will have the balls to wear them out of the house, especially with no boots to wear them with! but then i came home and ordered a few things from my new favorite store Splendid! love it.
.

fine line

2011-11-26T18:47:00.000-08:00

there is a fine line between feeling quite good and feeling hammered. that is all i have to say about that.
things have been pretty good lately. my back and ass have been on and off again, i got a "medical" bike fit, so i may look like a barney on my bike but it is allowing me to heal. allegedly. it does feel better for sure, but it needs some lubey, too. and i ran today! i've run a few times, on the treadmill, with a walk break here and there but today was the first run i have done where it was run the whole 50 minutes! hooray! and i felt ok after even! i swam after and i could have been swimming in place for all it was worth but still, it was pretty good.
i had the whole week off from work which was totally delux. except i started it off totally sick which in hind site was fine since i slept like 36 hours with a few wake breaks in there, but then i was better! hooray!!
i did an indoor tri a few weeks back, can't remember if i mentioned that. it was super short but super tough. i haven't done any intensity since like august so it totally kicked my butt. thankfully i hadn't done any straight running yet eihttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifther so i took some walk breaks during my 1.5 mile run. haha, yes, 1.5 miles. walk breaks. multiple walk breaks. sweet. i was dying. it was fun though.
what else? every since my shopping excursion with brooke, ive been doing some more shopping on my own. i have to calm it down here pretty soon. i have had no luck with boots, even had two pairs at home recently which i thought were pretty good but decided that i wouldn'tactaully ever wear, at least not as often as i would like, so back they went. these crocs sandals are going to have to be replaced for the winter here real soon though. real soon. but i have total insecurities about the boots! i have two pairs of boots that i already own that i totally love! the one pair that i bought a bout a year ago which i thought were quite sensible, i got rid of those because i am convinced they are at the root of my problem. but i have my stupid favorite boots, that are perfect in every single way, i got them right after i had sirus and they are perfect!!! except i can't wear them any more because of the heel, at least not for every day wear. but if they had a flat heel, then we would be talking!! then i have some other boots that have a totally sensible square heel which are perfect except that that square heel is too tall for my messed up feet, legs and back these days. ugh. two pairs of perfect boots, that i already own even, that i can't really wear. :( so i am trying to get something that measures up to their awesomeness. i do have some sweet motorcycle boots but because brooke worked with me to find the perfect skinny jeans, i can't wear them unless i wear my boot cuts, and if i am going to wear the boot cuts, i am going to wear the danskos, because they are comfortable. and awesome. and great. and i love them.
trying to figure out xmas presents for the kids. i want sirus to have a very star wars xmas, but he is only sort of into star wars. so i will only force a little bit of star wars on him - got him some sheets and going to get him some action figures - that he will love!!! and seamus, good grief, what do the almost 8 year olds want these days?? from what i can gather, teeny tiny things that they can leave all over the house. she is growing out her hair! its cute! but long, but not really yet. her one front tooth that she has lost has now grown back in and is HUGE compared to all the baby teeth around it. i think the only reason she lost it was because she banged her face on sirus's head. but she has lost only 4 teeth. pretty sure she should have lost more than that by now. sirus hasn't lost any! she had a wiggly tooth a few weeks ago, i jsut asked her about it, she said it is less wiggly than it was, she says she doesn't have time to always be remembering to wiggle it.
feeling pretty good these days, a little more on the optimistic side of things!

damnt it

2011-11-11T21:05:00.001-08:00

i want to go to bed but eric just put in a movie and i am intrigued.
other news, the new twilight movie is comign out soon and i haven't even cracked the cover of the last book despite eric running all over the airport looking for it over a month ago. i need to start reading it so i can get 1/2 way through so i can see the movie.
but i need to go to sleep BUT eric put in this stupid movie and now i must watch.
despite recently confessing on facebook that i like justin timberlake, i am not particularly fond of cameron diaz, but this is one of her movies. gah!!!
when i put sirus to bed tonight, i was overly chatty. he told me about how he would like it if i wore different earings sometimes and maybe a flower shaped nose ring. then he told me he was really tired and wished i would leave. nice.
ok, need at least 8hrs!!!

punishment

2011-11-11T17:51:00.000-08:00

my punishment for bragging to the internets about my lower level of stress is that my car broke down!! at whole foods!! in the rain!! and it forced me to eat a camelita!!!
gah!!

stress

2011-11-11T11:05:00.000-08:00

i have been doing pretty well in the stress department lately. not much of it happening, one of the biggest stressors right not really is why can't i find a descent pair of boots that don't make me look like a pirate? i have narrow calves i guess but its not like they are abnormally so, but its impossible. i went to nordstrom the other day, i asked the nice man, i said, i am looking for black, flat heel, narrow calf. he came back with a pair of uggs, a pair of stilettos, a pair of 3inch heels and a pair of Ivanka Trump's with a bunch of gold all over them.
what i don't understand about my lack of significant stress is that i have begun to have my stress dreams again. lots of people dream about falling, or public speaking all nekkid or whatever, i dream about tsunamis. and there have been a lot of them lately. that dream also involved an orca swallowing a swimmer in one piece. and fuzzy stripe playing in the toilet while it was flushing and getting sucked down the pipe! but i was able to get him out so that was good. anyway, tsunami dreams.
but i am sad to report that my back isn't feeling so great today, it was kind of bothering me yesterday, too. but then it kind of really bothers me today. i don't know what to do.

on the road

2011-11-06T11:51:00.000-08:00

so i was having a total downward spiral into depression, obesity and beyond. but luckily halloween came and i ate a cupcake and 6 giant cookies (that were really delicious at the time) and it was the first time ever that i was like, omg, i'm like dizzy and i think i am going to be sick.
the next day, i had another cupcake, a leftover from the at work halloween party and i felt dizzy and sick again. i have not had the sweets since then, unless you call the sugar rim of a few lemon drops the sweets. but its a big accomplishment. i was avoiding going to the main floor at work because i didn't think i could pass by the receptionists desk without stopping. i have since had a meeting or two up there and have been able to avoid it. i even go up there sometimes to use the ladies room because the mirror is better up there, and sometimes you need to not see a reflection of you being all squished. but also, i haven't had any of the kids halloween candy. i just haven't wanted any. we picked up full sized bars to hand out to the kids for halloween. 30 of them from costco. we have like 22 of them left. ugh, we had only 3 groups of kids, one group was only one little Dorothy and that was it.
but i feel like i am getting back on track which is good. plus my training is coming back nicely. i've been swimming, although i did have a heart to heart with my coach about how kicking is really overrated and that we should really consider not doing it. he said ixnay on the no ickingkay. but i convinved him to at least let me kick on my back for a while, which has been waaaay better. a few of the drills i have been doing are starting to stick, too, making sense in my normal stroke, so i think things are good there. still doing a good amount with the buoy but that is good. i've also done a few 2hr rides! ok, indoors on the trainer because i am the biggest woose in the world. yesterday i had the kids, so it was all i could do, but the the previous week it was beautiful out. but i was woosy. but about 50 indoor miles this week which is pretty good for me right now.
and, AND i have been running. like not in the water. again i am a woose, ok, i am just realizing that its probably wuss, but woose is kinda funny. but i did 10 indoor miles! my run intervals have increased to 4 minutes, walk intervals have decreased to 1 minute and pacing has dropped to 8:20. of course not for the whole thing but for 2 of the 4's. i am soooo out of shape. but feeling good and feeling happy.
and other good things are going on too. so right now, stuff is good. looking forward to the rest of 2011 and i think 2012 will be a good year, hoping to keep this injury at bay though. i can still feel it, but as long as i get in there and do some pt right after any activity it seems to be ok.

yesterday and today

2011-10-25T19:05:00.000-07:00

ugh, so last night i had 3 cookies! and the beer and 2 slices of the caramel apple. :(
i have no ability to control myself. i didn't go to the candy dish, but did i pay for it after work? today i didn't go to the candy dish either, but its still early, plenty o dammage to be done still.
help me!! help me help me!!!

pjs

2011-10-24T17:57:00.000-07:00

the other day when i was putting sirus to bed, he wanted to wear his brand new transformers that allie and z sent to him for his birthday. i told him he should really wear different jammies because the transformers were starting to smell a little like farts. he replied with - all of my jammies smell like farts because i fart when i sleep.
im on a diet. but i am drinking a beer. did i mention that the other night while settling into bed after some good old lemon drops i resolved to not drink so much, maybe take some time off. that lasted until the next evening. ugh. BUT, really i need to drop a few. i read somewhere that its ok to gain up to 12% of your weight in the off season. holy smokes, thats a lot, and i certainly don't want to do that. but my premature off season surely jumpstarted the off season weight gain. oh and increase in bodyfat. bleck. gross. i fought all day long to not go to the candy dish at the resceptionists desk. because of this, i didn't even go upstairs during the day for fear i wouldn't be able to get past that damn dish!! so i made it all day without hitting the candy dish, and i got through lunch with some good choices - quinuio or however its spelled mixed with some crap, tasty and allegendyly good for me crap but still. i think there was pumpkin in it, billed as squash. but i am pretty sure it was raw pumpkin. and then some other stuff, like bulgar or something and crap and some spinach.
so yeah, dinner was good, nothing too terrible about that when the oven beeped stating that it had reached the desired temp. what was going into it? eric was baking cookies. WHAT THE HELL. we still have two caramel apples in the fridge - we made them the other day and they are the BOMB. but which is the smarter choice - beer, cookies or caramel apples? i bet its the caramel apples, so i am having beer.
oh baby jesus, help me to not eat too many cookies when they are done cooling!!!

whoaaa!!!!

2011-10-23T14:06:00.000-07:00

omg, so just like last year i am sitting here watching the posts on twitter and facebook of the xterra worlds championships. the suspense is KILLING ME!! my very best boyfriend dan hugo is bouncing around in like 2nd and 3rd since somewhere on the bike and now 3 miles into the run is still holding his own. but the twitter updates are a bit tough to follow, or maybe the race really is as close and they are making it, with the order constantly changing? conrad stoltz dropped out at mile 2 of the run due to asthma, which is crazy. he must be really messed up to drop out with only a few miles to go. hope he is ok. but dan, oh my lovely dan!! i am rooting for you!!!
anxiously waiting to hear how danelle kabush is doing as well as cori and swim coach matt!!!
aaaak!!!!

oh good grief

2011-10-22T18:23:00.000-07:00

good stuff going on! i went for a run yesterday!! granted it was for 2 minutes but still i was running! ok, so i got to repeat it 4 times, so 8 minutes total. during that first 2 minutes i thought i was going to die. huffing and puffing and all, how did i ever do this before? i'll never be able to be a runner again! but then by the 3rd one i was feeling much better but at the same time happy that there was only 1 more to do. i had done some aqua jogging in the shallow pool the day before and my calves were killing me. so i decided to wear the compression socks for the run, to reduce the jiggle and in the past they have helped. but i decided to do this ground breaking run at the gym, and i had an internal conflict - do i walk though the gym looking like a total tool with my compression socks pulled all the way up and hop on the treadmill for 2 minutes? or do i push them down and show off my uber hairy beast-like legs? what at dilema! so i pushed them down, walked quikly through the gym, and jumped into the room where they have the big screen tv and the lights turned down. http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
then today was another ground breaking day - i rode OUTSIDE!! omg. i almost passed out just typing it. it was kind of like the injured girls ride, which was perfect because no one was pushing the pace. my back seemed ok, and still as of right now it feels ok, too. before i left for the ride i was sorta of having an anxiety attack or something where all i wanted to do was clean and organize. and when i got home that was totally what i did. went through my medicine cabinet and bathroom drawers and threw out all of the expired makeup, lotions, cleansers and other crap that i've been holding onto for some unknown reason. then i moved onto some drawers of crap that needed sorted out and i got ride of a bunch of that stuff. its so nice to clean! wow, i could do more, i want to do more! pitch it all!!!
tomorrow is the xterra world championships. i had planned on going. i was all set to go all the way up until the beginning of august when i decided i just didn't want to ride my mtn bike and i canceled my registration. i had spent most of the first part of the summer on my road bike and my sweet new tri bike, and then i went on two mtn bike rides and had two laaaame crashes. and that is when i decided. the not two weeks later i hurt my back. wtf. but now the race is tomorrow and i am sad that i am not going. so many fun people are out there right now, getting ready for the race. all without me!! waaah!!! how can they be having so much fun without me there? but at least i got to ride my bike outside with some of my fav peeps and it didn't rain on us and it was on the warmer side.
internets can you desipher my dream for me? i went to the dermitologist because i wanted her to look at this thing on my leg, kind of like by my ankle. she told me to take a shower then wrap up in some big fluffy white towels. then she told me to play family feud with these other doctor and nurse people. and i did. then like after about an hour and a 1/2 and me getting worried that eric was going to get annoyed for having to wait for me so long, i finally was like, when can you look at the thing on my ankle? she took a peek, said ooooh, yeah, well, hmm. let me get ready to work on that. then she went to take a shower and then the people i was playing family feud with said she had been drinking wine and needed to sober up. then the dream sorta drifted out into something else.
fuzy stripe got neutered yesterday. big news right there. hoping he calms down and leaves nadj alone a little bit.

i'm watching you

2011-10-12T21:05:00.001-07:00

ok, not really, i am watching xfactor. something weird is going on with it. its nutty. simon is getting all pist because they are making the songs their own. he doesn't like it.
on another note, i have been getting in a bit more exercise. had a 50 minute trainer workout yesterday. got up into the zone3. i even broke a but of a sweat. it was awesome. this morning janet took me to samena! i didn't go in the outside pool although i am kind of craving some cool crisp, clean water! but i was toasty warm in the inside and my intervals were hard. janet joined me for the last 10 minutes and i can see why the old ladies kind of just hang out in the pool floating around chatting. and then when i got home i did another 20 minutes on the trainer and OMG i better start some super long fat burning workouts soon!! gaaahh!!!! its baaaad!
what else? work is good!
we went to oktoberfest this past weekend. it was SO FUN. exactly what i needed. there was some beers, some chicken dancing, a little bit of a brat. ya know. good stuff.

but now i have to get my act together. make a plan and get this show back on the road.
BUT we are looking at remodeling the house! like BIG remodel! like, omg it will probably be under construction for like 5+ years but damn will it be nice when its done (i hope!) whoa!! we've been talking about it for a long time but meetings are being set up with architechts and ideas are being thrown around! let there be light! lots and lots of light!!

mid life crisis

2011-10-06T21:34:00.000-07:00

if i am having a midlife crisis, does that mean i will only wind up being 74?
its been rough lately. i had a total breakdown when we got back from ogden. i am tired of looking like ass all the time, tired of bad hair, bad skin, ever increasing body fat % due to lack of exercise, always being tired. so i had my breakdown, and then i went shopping. totally a risky move when feeling so horrible, but i went to nordstrom and found one of the sales girls there, brooke and told her i needed an overhaul. SHE WAS AWESOME. we picked out some jeans to start with, then she asked me what i was looking for in tops. i said nothing clingy and nothign that needed dry cleaning. she said i was really testing her fabric knowledge, but we looked at all the tags. she didn't discourage me from picking things out to try, but funny how the things i picked looked like ASS but the things she picked were super cute. but first we started with the denim, as she put it. she told me to try them on in a certain order. she got me different sizes and when i tried the smaller size and was freaking out by all the ass rolls, i asked her to come in the room and look. she said the ass rolls are exactly what they want to see! who knew??? so i picked out two pairs of skinny jeans. omg, yes, TWO. SKINNY jeans. i tried on some leggings and they looked horrible, but the skinny jeans were good.
then the tops. she brought me things to layer them all with and when i said i didn't like something she didn't try to convince me otherwise and instead just took it away and brought something else. it was awesome. i wound up with a TON of stuff, including a poncho?? what? when she was ringing me up, i asked her if she could go to shoes with me. she said she couldn't but called down there to see if her favorite shoe guy was there. he wasn't but that was ok. i did get a pair of boots but after determining they were too big around the calves i have since returned them. now i want to go back and see brooke again and see if i can hire her to be my stylist, at least for a day. go through my stuff and my shoes and all that stuff and help me put some stuff together. i did get some accessories, too, which i have been trying to encorporate every day. its been fun. NOW if only i could get my hair and face under control.
i did put my fake bangs on the other day and looked into some hair extensions. working on it. and so excited that i picked up the groupon for eyelash extenstions! cannot wait!! hate to be so obsessed with how i look, but i'm not getting any younger. and OMG the gray hairs!! wtf.
but PT is going pretty well. i have some set backs every once in a while, like yesterday i wore soem totally sensible old lady boots to work. they are aersoles for goodness sake!! low, very sensible heel, totally safe. until about 90 minutes into the work day and i realized i really really needed to take them off. luckily i brought my sandals and i changed out of them, and almost instantly the acute discomfort i was having in my back went away. i was sitting the whole time - how does that happen? anyway, those boots are going away, especially since i suspected them of sabotauging me in the past!!!. then i sat weird on the couch while using the computer and while that was ok, unfolding from it was not ok. thorough back agitation. but PT this morning fixed it. i rode on the trainer the other day!! how hooray is that? big time hooray!! and i was happy to figure out that the reason the 20 minutes i did the other day were so hard was because eric had cranked up the resistance! but i was happy to be spinning again. and swimming is going awesome. still with the pull buoy but that is more to my liking anyway. i can feel swim improvement happening! but serious lack of motivation it me the other day and i did nothing but be grumpy. i am on a leg shaving strike!! its really gross. when the PT did some work on my IT band i appologized for the extreme fur on my legs, i am not sure i have ever let it get this long, but i am protesting my injury. ok, so i did shave them before going to ogden - couldn't let dan hugo see them in that shape!! but they are baad. eric said, hmph, not a big deal, his are hairier. but still its gross.
but some good stuff going on. getting through it. not thrilled with the winter approaching but looking forward to progressing to a run here someday soon.

so what else is new?

2011-10-03T20:59:00.000-07:00

omagosh! so much!!!
we went to ogden! good times at xterra usa championships! we decided to take the kids which turned out to be very fun. we flew out friday and got a MONSTER huge 11 person passenger van. best van ever!! sirus sat in the very backest back and seamus sat right behind us.
we went straight to ogden, the kids and i checked into the hotel then went over to the expo area. eric put his bike together and then met up with his buddy troy, who i had forgotten was the one who gave me all the pointers on which coffee grinder to get eric for xmas 6 or so years ago. the kids started running around all over the place in the kids zone. crazy non stop at altitude in the heat running around. i thought they were going to wear themselves out before the kids race, but they got some snow cones, met xterra world champ shonny vanlandingham and then were off. the xterra peeps did a great job with the kids race. it was one of the best kids races ever. the run was actually pretty far but then after, the called each kid up to get their medals. they used old number plates and medals from races all over which was super cool. then we went to the dinner - eric was regional champ! the dinner options were odd, and had i been racing i would have been like, uh, not nearly enough... it was all gluten free except the bread they had, and totally unfilling. anyway, it wound up being pretty expensive for the kids to each eat a plate of pineapple, strawberries and grapes, but whatever.
in the morning we all piled into the giant van, dropped erics shoes at t1 and then headed down to t2. eric stood in line for a million minutes for packet pickup and then finally got things going.
lance armstrong was there, he had an entourage and stuff. it was kind of cool to see him and the hubub and all that. he looked like a normal dude, only all of his stuff matched. all his nike live strong gear, all perfectly laid out. he was wearing the brand new TYR Freak of Nature wetsuit and had a really good swim. bff matt from high school came out for the race, so we hung out during the bike and run legs. seamus made some signs for all of her favorite racers! Daddy, Mat, Shonny, Danelle, Cori, Ashlie, Marci, Jason and Dan Hugo. we cheered as they all passed by on the bike and then rearranged ourselves a little up the hill to see them on the run. it was cool because we could see them coming down the mountain, head into and out of the switchbacks and then head up the hill again right before heading back down to the finish. i brought my outside voice and yelled for alls of them when we saw them on the switch backs, and then when they passed right by us. sirus even told me i was being too loud which is funny. lots of really great races going on out there! matt and jason both won their age groups, danelle came in 3rd overall for the women's, shonny, i don't know how she does it but she raced with a torn acl coming in 7th, and Dan Hugo came in 2nd! super stellar racing by these guys and everyone else. i was a little sad not racing and being part of the fun, but i really did have a good time watching and cheering.
later we took sirus to iFly Utah. seamus didn't want to do it but sirus was hilarious, bringing down the house with how funny he was!
what else?
omg, sirus turned 6 today. my sweet little baby is a big grown up 6. how in the world did that happen. makes me want to cry!!

ready

2011-09-19T17:58:00.000-07:00

dude, if it weren't for the fact that the window is only 4 inches off the ground, i would totally jump out of it!! it took every iota of will power i had today to not visit the candy dish at work a 2nd time. now i am anxiously waiting for the kids to get themselves busy something so i can snag one of the last donuts.
the other night, the kids were all giving pointers as to what eric should do. i said i knew of something he should do but that i couldn't say it out loud. reason being is that i thot he should go to the store and get some stuff to make brownies and i didn't think the kids needed brownies. just me. but seamus wanted to guess what it was, so she asked if i wanted him to do an underwear fashion show. it was not, instead eric went on to display how either loves me or hates me by going to the store and getting the stuff to make the brownies, plus the extra chocolate chips and walnuts to load into them. they were geeeewwwddd. but those brownies are long gone, and now instead of that donut i am eyeing, which very well might not even be in the box sitting on the counter, i might instead go for a handful or two of chocolate chips and walnuts, or better yet, get a giant spoonful of peanut butter and toss chocolate chips on top of that.

OMG what is wrong with me???

and even more, i am facing quite the dilemma right now. eclipse just showed up from netflix. i want to watch it. BUT tonight is the first show of 2 and 1/2 men with ashton kutcher. i hate that show. but gawwdamitall, sometimes erci flips around and lands on the reruns and every single time i laugh at least once and it pisses me off!! but anyway, i kinda want to see what happens.

i ran on sunday! hooray! i am running tomorrow too! still walk 2 run 1. easy easy. lookin forward to it!!

appendicitis

2011-09-15T18:52:00.001-07:00

so i am having one. right now. i must be! what else could it be? no wonder i have been feeling weird lately. whew, glad to have that figured out. i had an appendicitis last week soemtime, too. seems like i just keep getting them.
ugh.
so excited that i have been cleared to start running on saturday! 1 mile!! 2 min walk / 1 min run for that 1 mile. IF i feel ok, i can continue on for another mile.
omagosh - i am SO stuck in Twilight. i totally love it, i'm most of the way through the 3rd book, then i'll see the movie and i am hoping to get far enough along in Breaking Dawn by the time that movie comes out so i can see it in the theater. i have been cheating by looking at photos and watching the previews and trailers and stuff. SO excited about it. its rediculous. I'M rediculous.
i have been having interesting conversations with people about the movies. eric says he is team jacob. mat says so is he. i can't decide! i know its totally superficial and lame of me, but i really don't like that Edward has a big butt and it bothers me that jacob is supposed to be like 6'7" and he is only a little taller than Bella. Eric says the reason that none of the vampire's powers like being able to read her mind, or see her memories work is because there is nothing in there for them to see. she is a rock. totally empty. i want to know why we can call jacob, Jake but we can't call Edward, Ed. janet wants to know why edward doesn't turn into a bat. i asked eric this question. he said its because that is silly, but janet insists that it makes more sense for edward to turn into a bat then it does for him to be in love with bella. but bella smells delicious. i once worked with a girl names delicia, and my bf at the time called her delicious. she wore blue stirrup pants that were too small. she was nice but she was not delicious.
i want to know what would have happened if bella hadn't have gone to forks in the first place. i also want to know, other than his big butt/pear shape, why isn't edward a little more muscularly defined? she goes on and one about he is hard as stone but yet he looks kinda squishy. and why doesn't her mother love her and why can't her dad fix himself dinner? and was it career limiting that i told one of the sales people at work that the instant he walked into the office i was just like - OMG, its Edward! not because he reminds me of robert pattinson or whoever, but because he is sorta more like what i expected edward to be.
eric went to costco today. he called me to ask if there was anything i wanted him to get. i said NO GRANOLA! so i came home from work and there was granola. he said the woman in line in front of him had nothing but 6 boxes of the granola in her cart. well, DUH, its THAT good. i do wonder if my appendicitises are because of all the granola and blueberries i have been eating.

the kids and i are watching old school smurf cartoons.

AND eric is going to be racing against lance armstrong at xterra nationals. since its a mass start he will be right up there with him. THAT is kind of bad ass.

this is me pist off

2011-09-14T20:15:00.000-07:00

see! pist! super pist! its morning! my pancakes are almost gone! i have to go to work! i have been sitting on my ass far too long! the 72 pounds of "muscle" i gained in the past year have turned into fat along with the extra 47 pounds i have gained while i am recovering. wow, no wonder my back hurts!!! uuuggghhh!!
but no really, this was the first test photo we took using the camera after it made its appearance in the canadian toilet. the camera is actually focusing now, too! the camera is actually quite old, i want to say like 4-5years maybe? we got it at walmart in vernal utah. gah! so many trips to walmart!! dude, when we were in portland i wasn't wearing my wedding rings. i had actually stopped wearing them quite often because its bad to swim in them, and whatever else, and i totally stopped racing in them. but i was feeling all lovey dovey about eric while we were on our way to that portland race. i can't remember why we stopped at walmart, but i said - i want a wedding ring. so right then and there, we went to the walmart jewelry counter and i got one! a nice, white gold band that i totally love. i like my fancy rings too, but this one is good, too. so lightweight, its like wearing nothing at all.
in las vegas, i had forgotten my ear plugs. so we went to the walmart there and i got some. US Divers, professional series or something like that. i wound up not wearing ear plugs at that race. i would prefer to find a k-mart but they aren't as pleantiful.
i'm getting a new wetsuit - hooray!!
i've been down in the dumps, i was super in those dumps the other day, but today i am feeling better. strangely dizzy and kind of sick to my stomach, but not so dumpy! tomorrow is thursday and i go to the PT again. i am almost on the healed list! i have been out of commission for so long now i can't even remember what it feels like to sweat and i can't imagine being active every day, sometimes TWICE in a day?? omg.

purge

2011-09-11T15:01:00.000-07:00

i totally just purged all my drawers and the closet. everything that needs to be drycleaned is going to be donated. most things i haven't worn in the last year are going to be donated, too. shoes that i have tried to wear but can't stand being in for the 8hrs required at work - out. birkenstocks i've had since 1986 - staying! can't part with those!!
organized my shoes, most of which i can't wear or don't wear often but will keep for eternity because they are awesome. some i should get rid of. maybe next time around.
i would like to go through the entire house and just pitch EVERYTHING, i'm in that kind of mood, but the kids have most of their stuff confined to their rooms, so i will let it slide.
i swam. twice! yesterday and today. it was amazing. i have been so starved for some sort of physical activity that i am beside myself with its wonderfulness. i felt good, an i felt good after. well, yesterday things started to hurt on the drive back home but today, i have been feeling really good, even able to pick up the giant thing of cat food, the aforementioned purging. feeling good! what will i do tomorrow?
should i even bother mentioning how i slept in until 930 yesterday and then stayed in bed until 2:30 before finally getting up to swim? i was/am a little sick, so it was good for me!
my back has been a pain in my ass. PT all the time, no doing anything. standing is getting better but sitting pretty much blows. the one night i was in so much pain, it was a new horrible pain i didn't understand it, it had progressivly gotten worse during the day at work, but by the time i was home all i could do was lay on the floor. so that is what i did. eventually i got up and lasted about 20 seconds before i wanted to lay back down. standing on my right foot brought me to tears and just standing in general was horrible. laying down wasn't much better, i could feel my quads gradually tightening up, on the verge of cramping and then moving to my calves. it was horrible. i eventually called the nurse on call because there was no way i was going to make it through the night. we talked for a long time and she had me take some aleve and get on some ice. after a few hours i fell asleep and then in the morning, like most mornings, i was totally cured. until an hour or so later... but thank goodness that pain hasn't come back. it was horrible!
i've spent the weekend reading the 3rd of the twilight books and just chilling out. it was a sorta rough week so its been nice to just relax. can't believe its gone so fast, though.
we went to whistler!! for the xterra! i did not race. even if i was healthy i wouldn't have raced, are you kidding me? i am smart enough to know that whistler is not a place for me to be racing. mat went with us, he sat in the back seat with the kids an they loved it. he is good with them. the weekend itself was good, too. got to see friends and cheer on all the racers. it was exciting and eric did fantastic! mat did well, too, but eric broke mat's winning streak seeing as eric beat him at vashon by like 30 seconds, then mat beat eric at black diamond and portland both by about 30 seconds, so eric won this one. nationals will be an interesting one - who will win there i wonder?
everythign else has been ok i guess. i was sad to miss the two races that i had to cancel my registration for, the weather has been so amazing that its totally lame that i have not done anything! but the open water swim was delicious this morning! at least I got that in!

self medicating

2011-08-30T21:01:00.000-07:00

ugh. that is almost all i can say. but lemme tell you more.
ugh my back.
let start with friday. i called eric friday afternoon for no real reason and asked him what he was up to. he said he was on his way to taking sirus to the doctor. oh? why, what's wrong. well, he can't breathe. oh he seemed fine this morning, except when he sneezed and spewed giant snot globule all over his arm. yeah, but he got worse and now he sounds terrible.
so i come home from work, and sirus is all huffing and puffing while sitting on the couch. he had gotten two breathing treatments at the doctor's office and then started on some steroids.
i jumped on the trainer, the first bit of activity in a few days since my back had been killing me. it felt good, although i was going light and wound up averaging less than 14mph, which on the trainer is really light. nothing hurt! horray!
i went back in the house. hung out with sirus, and we decided we needed to take him to the ER.
seamus wasn't so thrilled with the idea of going, so i called around to see if someone could come watch her. the swim coach said he could, so on the way we dropped her off with him, they went out to dinner and then hung out.
we took sirus in. they took him in right away. he is such a sweet little guy. they asked him what was going on. in between puffs of air he sweetly replied with "not...much". they clipped the thing on his finger and hooked him up to oxygen. all he wanted was to lie there and have me rub his belly but he had to sit up right so he could get more oxygen in. the doctor came in, took a look at him and then started him on more breathing treatments. after the first two there was no change, so they gave him more steroids, a giant cup of apple juice, the doctor talked about more treatments and what would happen if he had to be admitted, and then started up a 3rd breathing treatment. this one seemed to start kicking in. he was becoming more alert, and started talking in full sentences, poking the doctor in the face with the finger clip while he listened to his heart, telling the nurse all about the home made black berry pie he helped make and asking her to take a look at his belly button since it was the deepest belly button in existence. the 4th breathing treatment got him to the point where the doctor finally felt comfortable with letting us go home. he said he could sirus's chatter and laughter from down the hall, and took that as a good sign. we are now the proud owner of a nebulizer, so we could give him treatments at home, and were given explicit instructions on when to bring him back or when to call an ambulance. he seemed to sleep fine, but seemed to stay the same on saturday and until sunday morning. but then he got a little active, running around like crazy on sunday. i asked him to stop and relax some. he said he couldn't breathe very well, but then hacked a few times and then was practically perfect ever since! he goes in for a follow up appointment tomorrow, hopefully all is as good as it seems!
oh that little guy tires me out, but soooo glad he is better.
my back on the other hand is not better. i swam saturday morning, did about 600yds before determining that kicking wasn't going to cut it, but with the pull buoy everything was dandy. then i came home and napped for 2 hrs! 2HRS!! had i lost that much fitness that after 1500yds i needed a 2hr nap? no, it couldn't be. then i remembered that we didn't get home from the hospital until midnight and then i got up at 5am to go volunteer at the lake sammamish triathlon, ya know, the race i was already registered for and super excited about doing but couldn't do because of my back. yeah that one. volunteering was way fun though, it was a perfect day, and it was so great to be in transition to watch all the different expressions as the racers left and came back from the bike leg. so, ok, the 2hr nap sorta made sense.
i wont mention the 1hr nap from before the swim.
then a bit later i got on the trainer for an easy 40 minutes. no pain. nothing, felt great. was able to push it a little more than the day before but still surprised by the lack of wattage. shower and then uuugh, the pain! for the rest of the evening.
sunday i felt not awesome, but i took the kids school shoe shopping. i forced seamus to get the cutest purple mary jane danskos!! SO CUTE! and then sirus said he needed sketchers. and they needed to light up. the ones he wanted were ugly and expensive so i said no and suggested some others and then, he did the funniest thing i have ever seen him do. in a funny voice, he scrunched up his nose and asked "what, are they too 'expensive'?" putting his little fingers up in quotes while saying expensive. yes, snotty of him, but he caught me off guard and it was pretty darn cute, but i said yes, too expensive. so we went to JC Pennys and found him some sketchers there that were on sale AND lit up AND weren't not totally butt ugly. he was happy. then i took them to build a bear workshop. sirus got mad because he said i was giving him too many choices!! but he decided on getting a friend for Sirus Wirus, a camoflauge bear like the one grandpa has, and he named it Wirus. sirus decided to get Wirus instead of the many accessories he was thinking of because he thought Sirus Wirus needed a friend. seamus got another cat that looks like fuzy stripe and she named it stripe. by this time my back was KILLING me, so we went home. again i got on the trainer and felt great, nothing hurt, it was relief, i felt so good just riding along watching Underworld. when i was done i still felt great. i was healed hallelujah! and then an hour later it hit me and i was just as bad off as before.
monday was a rest day and then today i went to PT. i told her everything that happened and she said that i seem to be having some increase neural tension, which she said was apparent based on how i felt fine but then an hour or so after activity it got worse. i was possibly doing more damage from riding even though it felt good and provided temporary relief. no activity for me for a week. canceled my season closer oly tri race entry for september 10 and tried to not feel sorry for myself. so for lunch i went to baskin robins and had a scoop of peanut butter n' chocolate ice cream and a scoop of chocolate fudge. then i went to the party store and looked at halloween costumes.

oh joy! so now, other cool things coming up, i'm prematurely officially in the off season so there ya go.

internets, its been so long

2011-08-21T20:16:00.000-07:00

that's a lie. actually, the ability to come up with something interesting to tell the internets has been my problem. lets see, what has happened since the last post? oh, i guess quite a bit actually!
a few days before xterra blackdiamond i decided i didn't want to do it. not only did i not want to do it, i decided i didn't want to do any xterra racing. and not really that, i just realized i didn't want to ride my mountain bike at all. so i canceled my registration for xterra worlds and almost begged to be taken back when i got their reply saying they took me off the start list. :( but then i changed my black diamond registration into a relay and then did not register for portland.
the relay at blackdiamond was SO MUCH FUN. i decided to go out on the swim and actually try to race the swim. it was a crazy swim start, the whole field together at once, guys and girls, nutty. it was tough but i didn't get kicked at all so that was good. i think i raced it but looking at my time, it wasn't any faster than any previous swims, so who knows. my friend rick was my biker and he headed out. he had been xterra and tri curious for some time now, but he doesn't swim. he has become quite the runner though. he did a killer job out on the bike and i was headed out on the run. so i felt like i was cheating every time i caught someone and then when i heard someone ask if i was the first woman as i ran by. but i had the big R on the leg so there ya go. i did run all of the hills which was the first time i had done that on an xterra but seeing as i didn't do the bike part, i better have run the hills and i managed to get stung at least 3 times by bees or some other stinging like thing. once in my lady parts and it really started to hurt so i went to the paramedics. later tho wow, it totally swelled into a horrible welt, itched like a mo fo, turned dark purple, all kinds of horror. after about a week, the itching and swelling calmed down, thank goodness but the big purple spot was still there. yuck, gotta see what's up with my bee reactions these days. the two on my feet however didn't bother me.
the following weekend we drove down to hagg lake for xterra portland. eric went to pre-ride, i went for a run. we had dinner with mat,. i had a beer sampler, and something for dinner?? i think?? after a few cookies back at the hotel, a good nights rest, we got up so i could volunteer at the race site and eric could get ready to race. i was parking enforcement, one might call it. i had my giant volunteer shirt on over top my puffy coat. i looked good. once the race started i headed out on the course to make sure the one place where there was two way traffic that the biker heading back stayed on the sidewalk so they wouldn't crash into the other peeps. it was quite fun being out there, i liked seeing the racers and watching them and all of their different racing personalities.
eventually i was done and jumped in the lake for a swim, then headed out on a 9mile run. eric managed 4th overall despite breaking his chain and having to fix it, mat was 3rd overall, beating eric for the 2nd race in a row by only 30 seconds. it was a pretty fun day i'd say. volunteering is good.
but then we got in the car for 4hrs to go to yakima and that was bad news. uuuugggh!! my back! by the time we got to yakima i could barely move. so the next day we went on a alsmost 3hr ride by acciendt and i took seamus out to run with me since i ws hurting a bit. ow my back! then back in the car again for 3hrs.
monday i could barely move so i went to the chiro. i love him, he is awesome. i skipped my run on tuesday but did swim and then on wednesday we did the swim for life, 2.5 mile swim accross lake washington! it was SO different than last year since it was a) warm, b) sunny, c) no white caps, d) we had eric as our kayaker! i was so relaxed this year compared to last year when i was pretty sure i was going to die. although the swim was totally fine last year, this year was so awesome. we went to fast, not because we swam fast but because we should have just floated around in the lake more since it was so beautiful. it made me want to do more swims like that!!
then thursday i went back to the chiro because i am a complete mess. he strapped me into the stretcher, ya know, the ancient torture device they use where they pull you into pieces. yeah, one of those. the whole time he was strapping me in i was just like, dude, yeah, so uh, is this going to hurt? this is really weird. i don't know about this. yeah,. no, don't turn the light off, and yeah, keep the door open. will you be able to hear me if i yell for help? oh, ok, emergency shut oswitch. that's great, thanks. good fun!

hate, love and don't understand

2011-08-04T21:19:00.001-07:00

hate:
people. okok, that is pretty broad. how about people who are a-holes. people who you go out of your way to help, and then when you are done, they are lame to you. people who get all aggro on you because you are going the speed limit. people who farking don't know how to park their cars or don't know how to pull their car out of a parking spot.

love:
people. okok, that is pretty broad. how about people at the gym who wear khaki pants and dress shoes on the treadmill. or blue jeans on the stair master. or flip flops on the recumbent bike. there is one dude who wears his clogs at the gym, and i would be him if i could. i also have come to the conclusion that i like it when some dudes wear flip flops with the blue jeans. some dudes can't pull it off, but some can, and when they can, i think its a good thing.

don't understand:
if you are bald, you can't have bad hair days. so do you have bad head days? i know i have bad face days, but what do the bald people have? and whats the deal with the hipster's hair? is it really THAT dirty? or do they just put so much stuff in their clean hair to make it look dirty?

eric

2011-07-28T20:14:00.000-07:00

tonight eric gave me a hall pass and said he would take both kids to bed so i can blog. not sure what he was thinking i would be blogging about but i guess after about an hour of us sitting at the kitchen table chit chatting over margaritas he had enough of me.
today i went to the chiropractor. i was going to try to get through a whole week without seeing him but i decided this morning that i wanted to see him. so i went. he did is usual elbow in the ass routine that i long for on a regular basis. did some hip flexor pain inducers, some it band horror and then pulled put the scraper. omg, i don't know what this scraper thing is for. something to do with fascia and whatever but i am also pretty sure it was designed for pain induction. its a funny blue thing, he puts some lubey stuff on it, he says its emollient, and then tries to scrape my skin off. dude, there are easier and less painful ways to get my DNA!! he did it on my back once and that sucked, so when he pulled it out this time, i was just like, dude, i dunno if you need to be going to such extremes. then he got all aggro on my side hip. wtf. while he was doing it he was like," uh, yeah, you are going to have a bruise from this. wow, yeah, its going to be pretty bad. hmm, you should try and ice this when you have the chance." scrape scrape scrape!!!! dude, so yeah, when i got to work i took a peek and it was all red and swollen and a mess, and by the time i got home sho-nuffs it was all black and blue. please internets, tell me if you have experienced the scraper and if you have, what was your experience like? so, i definitely felt better when i left his office, but dude. i do'nt want to do that again.
none of these are of my chiropractor. but they illustrate my experiences:
I am pretty sure this is the look my guy has when he is using that scraper and i am secreting my face juices on that paper:

I often wear my navy blue dockers, brown belt and heather blue polo shirt when i am getting a good cracking. today i wasn't able to crack to the right.
and this is a perfect illustration of my too toned ass. remember when my PT told me i had too much tone in my ass? that's because it looked like this:

not really.

chips ahoys

2011-07-27T21:11:00.001-07:00

everything has changed! i have made some big decisions and made some drastic moves but i am feeling quite good about it all. whew. big plans! big plans i tell you! but i won't tell those plans just yet. patience grasshopper. soon. maybe.

eric and i have also been discussing all along the changes we want to make to the house. especially this year with this super crappy summer, all i want is more light. he cleared out some of the crazy over grown bushes and underbrush around the house and that has allowed more light in but i'm talking needing waaay more. so today i almost popped another blood vessel just thinking about the lack of light and just now told eric to start working on the plans for how we're going to get some of this stuff done. we aren't ones for fancy furniture and details like that, especially right now since the kids are small and the cats are cats. eventually we will get to that but hot damn do i need more light!!! its probably just a phase and i'll get over it, especially when he comes to me with an estimate of $200k or whatever to get it done. ugh.

one of the best things i have found for when i am feeling particularly obese is to do some planks. a few days of some serious planks and everything is better. not totally but somewhat. omg, tonight i was trying really hard to not have a margarita so i had a bunch of chips ahoys and oreos. aak. but dude, eric is da'man. he fixes dinner every night. he does all the cooking. but tonight i got home from running and it smelled mighty good in the house. but as i got closer to the kitchen it started smelling somewhat fishy and i was like bleck, not in the mood for that. but i opened up the dish and what did i see? salmon with bratwursts!!! yeah!!! the brats were sliced thin and layered over top of the salmon with some zucchini, too. at first i was like, this is going to probably not taste very good but it was awesome. totally perfect. i paired that up with a giant, super juicy nectarine and i was totally in business. until i ate the chips ahoys and oreos. :(

headed to the pool tomorrow am. my swim on tuesday was actually quite nice. i do like to swim. it feels good and i like what it does to my body, but that doesn't keep me from being a sucky swimmer. back when i used to go back home each year for xmas or thanksgiving or something, my friends would make fun of me because i would always plan a trip to the local pool. even though i couldn't swim worth a hill of beans, i had fond memories of that pool and i always enjoyed going back there. i even made eric go with me the few times he went back there with me, and seamus even made an appearance the one time she went back there, too. and i used to always have dreams about being on the swim team in HS. too bad i wasn't ON the swim team, seeing as that would maybe help me now. but whatever, ya know, and stuff.

things and stuff

2011-07-21T18:43:00.000-07:00

wow am i tired. i was going to go do a 10 mile trail race tonight, just for mellow and just for fun but wow, yeah, the 5am wake up yesterday followed by the 1am bed time last night and 8am arrival at work this morning all started to catch up with me and i HAD TO TAKE A NAP.
tuesday night janet invited me to masters on wednesday morning. in the middle of my 2nd margarita I thought that would be a fantastic idea! i hadn't been since prepping for the swim meet back in feb or whenever it was and even that was just for diving. but i was excited to swim with janet and to see my swim friends. i had even agreed knowing it was IM wednesday. lucky for me the swim coach didnt show up! so we did our own workout but yeah, they go a lot faster than me. i had to work pretty hard for them to still even open a big gap on me with each set. but the water was lovely and i was happy to catch up with everyone! after work was a work party. actually, work was a big sponsor at big event and hosted a big party. that didn't start until 9pm. 9PM. what? so i put on my sweet betsey johnson shoes and headed out to party to the wee hours of the night. i had quite a good time but realized two things: i must really look like ASS all the time because so many of the people i work with commented that i looked nice, and it really makes people uncomfortable if you are taller than them. i am tall. always a head or more taller than my friends or folks in photos. but i normally don't stand next to people i work with. i am usually sitting and slouching and if i am standing i am wearing flats, at most danskos. but the high heels were very alarming for many people.

Chelanman

2011-07-18T18:31:00.000-07:00

this weekend we went to chelan to race in the chelanman olympic distance triathlon.

i didn't have any alcohol since the pre-race champagne fiasco the previous weekend, but i was tired all week, borderline exhausted.

friday we headed out, registered and racked my bike. the forecast was looking like rain, and the water was looking super choppy. i had been eating pasta for the past two days non stop and was going to hurl if i had it again, so i had french toast and eggs for dinner. and i started hydrating.

i slept ok and got up at 4:30, before my Groupon email arrived even, to have pbj and some heed but since everyone else was still asleep i laid back down until 5:20. then i headed over to the race site with friends and got everything set up.

after the start of the 1/2 iron swim I futzed around, did a short warm up which i am pretty sure didn't really qualify as a warm up, then tried to stay relaxed and have some fun with my friends. took the first clif shot and got ready to race.

the swim:
i stayed left at the start to avoid the mad dash to watch the rope. there was a ton of contact for the whole swim. i think it wound up being more draft like then distracting or hampering. i tried to stick to people as much as i could, and just swam. i felt good the entire time. my arms didn't feel tired or weak like they have been lately, and other than a few minutes where i got super tight between my shoulder blades and the creepy seaweed from the deep stuck to my face, the swim was was good. i was happy with it, i loved the shallow water at the end.
it wound up being my fastest race swim at this distance!

nothing thrilling or interesting happened in T1.

the bike:
i love my bike. i felt strong, i felt fast, i had a ton of fun. nothing was hurting, which is a big deal! i got caught up in some car traffic at the turn around but made it through ok. at the 20 mile sign i was shocked to see on my bike computer that i was at 58 minutes. i don't set it to speed ever so i had no idea i was going over 20mph and wondering if i was even doing the math right, but that's pretty simple math right there. i was shocked and excited and amazed. so i kept going. hit some rain but welcomed it. i got caught in more car traffic at the end but ran it into T2. i took 2 clif shots on the bike and about 3 sips of heed.
this was my fastest bike time at this distance!

nothing thrilling happened in T2, thank goodness!

the run:
right away i had to pee. i looked longingly at the line of porta potties as i left transition. they were taped off from transition, so kept going. i was taking tiny steps since that seemed to work two races ago. i kept them quick, tried to think about form, but pretty sure it wasn't pretty, eric even let me know so after the race. the porta potties at the first aid station were full so i kept going. mile 2-3 was horrible, boring, omg its never going to end. but eventually i made it. i was able to pick up the pace after that, i started to feel better, my form felt better and i was more relaxed. i started looking for mini landmarks and accelerating to them and then settling in for a bit after each. i noticed my settled in pace was getting faster, but as it did, i was less inclined to accelerate again, but tried. AND THEN my tri top started to feel super tight. i folded it up to expose my belly but kids started crying, ladies started fainting, men started screaming that their eyes were burning, so i folded it back down. my shorts were tied too tight, too, but i couldn't untie them, so i just continued to suffocate in my kit. i took water twice on the run and 1 clif shot at mile 4.
this was my fastest run in an olympic tri, also a 10k PR had it been a stand alone race (even though that 8 miler i did was actually faster).

3 good things about this race:
1) i had fun the entire race. at no point did i want to quit, slow down, question why i was racing, not even during the swim! i was excited to start each leg of the race and was surprised how fast and "easy" they were going by.
2) I didn't stop to pee and i don't think it really effected my run. this was the first time ever that i have not stopped to pee during this distance.
3) this was the first race this distance where i didn't wear socks. but now i say - screw socks, who needs them. please don't tell them i said that!

3 things to work on:
1) i need to work on being comfortable in the aero position on the downhills. i took most of those hills out of aero. i was pedaling like crazy but i was too sketched out to not have easy access to my brakes.
2) i need to watch my fluid intake. i was well hydrated before the race but wonder if my lack of fluid on the bike affected anything. some of that was not being totally comfortable with the set up, and the other is not wanting to pee.
3) i could have run harder i think.

all in all this was a great race. i was happy when i crossed the finish line, knowing i had raced hard and felt good the entire time. i don't want to rain on my own parade, but i am pretty sure this is a super fast course, but i am still super psyched that this was 12 minutes faster than my fastest prior olympic distance. a big part of what made the race and whole weekend so fun was that so many of my LUNA teammates and ladies from our workouts were there. the 3rd place AG finish was gravy on top of all of that. i definitely want to do this race again next year. SO FUN.

pokemon

2011-07-11T18:45:00.000-07:00

we've got a pokemon craze going on here in the house. non stop.
we also have a pain in my arse. mostly non stop. sometimes in my back.
last week we went to chelan and it was hot and glorious and relaxing and fun. i had a run analysis done. i look terrible when i run. i look like i am 85. i also look like my ass has gotten huge. has it? my mid section too. gawd i hate video. luckily he cut my head off in the video.
i had a race yesterday. i won my age group but i feel weird about the race. i had a sucky swim. ok, pity party going on right here. i am a sucky swimmer and its totally sucky. why bother swimming so much when i know people who haven't ever swam, or who have swum only a few times and then they get in and kick my ass? ugh.
oh, i had too much champagne the night before, too. and some wine. but just a little bit of wine. but it was a lot of champagne.
my bike was pretty good but i had mixed feelings about my run. maybe the booze affected it, i hope, or maybe it was the hills. i don't mean to be ungrateful for my age group placing, but man, i am going to have to figure out this swim situation.
i also have to figure out why i weigh like a thousand pounds. i think its because i am like super old and my metabolism has slowed down. or something.
my ART guy last week was just like WTF?!!?? why are you so messed up? he couldn't believe how i managed to get all messed up since the last time i had seen him, like a few days earlier. he's going to have a field day with me tomorrow, that's for sure. i am going to have to start booking him for double appointments or something. at the run analysis, that guy looked at me in horror as i couldn't touch my toes. i now have to stretch for 10 minutes a night, all in capital letters even.
maybe that will help me to get rid of my giant gut.

houston

2011-07-04T14:52:00.000-07:00

we've got a problem. dude, so i am totally getting old. remember how not too long ago i hurt my neck getting back in bed? seems i have magically hurt my mothra effing back. essentially just the same. gaahh!!!! i am even more pist that i was yesterday! it actually happened yesterday, like last night. i'd say it happened while i was cleaning and disinfecting litter boxes. eric thinks it happened from me sitting incorrectly on the couch. it could be because i changed from drinking lemon drops to drinking lemonade. i am totally annoyed because i even stretched after my run yesterday, like a lot. ugh.
so i tried to sleep normal last night instead of the screwed up way i normally sleep. i laid in bed for a while this morning then got up only to go to they gym to sit in the hot tub there. eric got me this crazy heating pad thing that wraps around my waist, with velcro, totally funny but i think its helping, i don't know. its annoying. the gait analysis i have planned for wednesday isn't going to be very helpful if i am all tweeked and even worse the car ride to it is going to be a biatch.

so pist!!!

2011-07-03T20:35:00.000-07:00

OMG!!! how can netflix do this to me!!!! i settled down already to get my dexter on and what? its not there? what do you mean i can't watch it? you must be joking, here, give that to me, let me check. what?? waaaaahhhhh!!!! now what am i going to watch. so apparently netflix every once in a while will just add and drop things from their instant queue. thank goodness eric and i stayed up till all hours of the night watching the last several episodes of season 1 instead of calling it a night. wow, i would have been really mad then. instead now i just ordered season 2 disk 1 to show up in the mail and i can't remember what we did yesterday but it was not watch dexter.
this has been an awesome week. awesome i tell you. each day since i have taken off from work i have taken at least one nap, sometimes two!! i wake up, i eat breakfast and then i take a nap for a few more hours. delux. D-E-lux. then i do some running, or biking or like on saturday we called up the babysitter, ok, who am i kidding, we texted the babysitter and went for an open water swim and out on the mountain bikes. the swim was nice. although on the way back in i told eric that wow, he has really gotten to be much faster this year. to which he made the HUGE mistake of replying with, no, i don't think i am actually any faster. to which i said Ok, so you just said that i got considerably slower then since you dropped my ass out in the middle of the lake. to which he said, on the way out there i stopped and looked around and saw you back there but figured you must have stopped to fix your goggles or something, which i didn't. to which finally he decided on,that he has been putting on a lot of swimming muscle mass and that is must what it be. we did comment on how apparently my armpits have totally leaned out because my wetsuit is all baggy and stuff in my front and back arm pits.
the mtn biking was fun. i haven't been on the mtn bike in a while. it was quite fun. my handling was going pretty well, and i was having fun. nothing we did was technical even slightly but i was finally leaning into the turns for once, i think??
somehow i totally hurt my back cleaning out the damn litter boxes tonight. dude, last night that fuzy stripe got on our bed and ran up and down it all night until eric picked him up and put him on the floor. then he just ran around like a madman the rest of the night and then the kids came in and decided they needed to crawl all over us and then fuzy stripe and nadj felt they needed to "play" and fuzy stripe needed to play with the ball with the bell in it, and OMG can you just go in the other room? so i got out of bed at some ungodly hour and chased that ginger kitty all over the place, finally grabbed him and tossed him in seamus's room and shut the door. and then he meowed all morning, but only between the kids poking eric in the face asking him when they could have breakfast. so eric told them tonight, if you wake up and want to crawl into our bed just to fall back asleep - stay in your own bed because apparently you are still tired. usually they don't wind up with us until like 630 or so but dude, eric gets yelled at if he wakes me up at 659 when my alarm goes off at 7. luckily for all of them, i can just take a nap or two later in the day!
eric brought home some ice cream the other day. and this is a very rare and strange thing that i am about to say but it is super gross ice cream. its breyers Whoppers ice cream. makes me gag just thinking about it. first, whoppers are nasty. terrible nasty little buggers and then the ice cream itself is like a nasty whopper flavor. at least he is helping me to not eat ice cream i guess.

today i said holly shart

2011-06-30T20:44:00.000-07:00

i was wound up so tight this morning that i was pretty sure i was going to pop a blood vessel or something. now that i think about it, i did look in the mirror at one point at work and my left eye was so totally bloodshot for no apparent reason. i checked my calendar for the next few days and said - dude, i am taking a vacation. omg, that felt so good. the day went by ok but by the end i was so excited to set my out of office and gt outta there! whew!! i have the next 6 days as work free!
dudes, my ass has been killing me. the chiropractor guy, man i love him has been ARTing on me and i've been loving that and he's been cracking me all over the place and it has been delicious. the arse is better indeed, i just have to learn to sit correctly and sleep like a normal person. ok and maybe drink a bit more water too.
over the weekend we went to my friends wedding. we hired the swim coach's younger brother to watch the kids. they loooove him so they couldn't wait to get rid of us. i had so much fun at the wedding. i totally let loose, drank a ton, danced like a fool even getting a few zn4 intervals out there on the dance floor and looked totally awesome doing it. i wore my new awesome dress and shoes and my feet and legs didn't hurt at all. even with all the dancing!!
fuzy stripe is getting so big these days. he is actually quite often called fuzy kitty or just kitty. he's a chewer and he loooves nadj. he will follow her around the house. she will walk slowly allowing him to bat at her tail and get close but then she will turn and hiss at him every once in a while, i assume just for shits and giggles. she will sit all like a loaf of bread and then he will get so close that she'll make her skin crawl and then he will run away. then he will sneak up on her again, be getting ready to pounce and before he does, she'll turn and his and he will run away sideways! they aren't cuddling yet, but soon i imagine, soon i hope. seamus mccat on the other hand is not amuzed. she just hisses at him. she doesn't move or swat or anything, she just hisses the most horrible sounding hiss.
what else?? i am being punished with a rest week, although this rest week i really really am enjoying and actually feel like i am getting something out of it. normally i am a total mess while trying to rest but this week i am managing, at least so far a total i don't give a fark, i'll do whatever i want. AND my new tri shoes showed up!! oooooh! they are white and pearly! and pretty and i can't wait to get some cleats on those bad bears!!
and you know what? i know its june because i wore a skirt today. i also know its june because i wore my puffy coat with that skirt. we're all like, what the hell? it claims its like 70 out but its cold as balls. doesn't make sense.
at least the water is warmer these days.
gettin in some good training in the next few weeks and after mid july will start with the xterra training. i was thinking i'd like to go on a trail run tomorrow or mtn biking or something but gotta wait and see!!!
yay!!! going to watch some dexter now!!

Fuzzy Stripe

2011-06-24T22:13:00.000-07:00

i think i love the little guy. i told him i didn't know him very well yet but that i think i might love him anyway. he is starting to explore the house and mix with the other cats, even having the kitty balls to go up to the cat tree, with nadj sitting right under it, and start scratching it.
i took today as a rest day. it was a rough week. re-org, reviews - giving and receiving, crappy and nice weather. you name it we had it. i wanted to lay on the floor in my office at around 3pm and take a nap. instead i came home after work and slept instead of running.
tomorrow is a tough long swim + a long, semi tough run. my calves hurt from some calf raises and possibly from running on the treadmill while watching Twilight: New Moon yesteday. so i needed the rest. i need to work better on my hydration and recovery, too.
kitty is on my shoulder! horray!
i got some spray tan stuff. i normally use this lotion stuff that smells pretty terrible but while standing in line at target to buy a wedding hat, OMG let me tell you about the HAT! they had the spray on stuff right there, so i bought it.
as a joke i totally sprayed on some abs. i can't wait to see if they show up at all - cannot wait!!
so we are going to a wedding tomorrow. sooo excited! while on jury duty i went to betsy johnson and got a new dress and finally some shoes!!! so i am going to wear the new dress and shoes and i figured i needed something fancy for my hair. so i got this feather and pearl and rinestone thing - like a hat, all royal wedding style and i am totally going to wear it. i cannot wait!! i am not going to wear it all victoria beckham pregnant style
or Eugennie style either,
but i am totally going to wear it, cannot wait. super excited. first i gotta git through that swim which i am somewhat looking forward to and then the run. hoping the leg is better by then.
hooray! TGIF.

5 mile lake women's triathlon

2011-06-19T09:00:00.001-07:00

the week leading up to this race kind of blew. i had a bad tuesday and didn't get any of my workouts in. we had our mini tri tuesday night and traffic was horrible and i had high hopes of getting in the water to at least make up for some of the fact that i slept through all of my alarms in the morning, but i got there late and the ladies were already out there and pretty much on their way back in. i guess i was lucky to have gotten there late since the water was about 4 degrees and they were all frozen solid when they got out. i did get in a nice bike ride but could barely function when it was time to run, so i didn't. the rest of the week was ok, went to see the ART guy - love him!! rest day on thursday and then a good swim on friday morning! so excited to be feeling good and effective!! and i wore one of my new swim suits! i have finally figured out what size i am, too! i wont even mention work and then it was hot and sunny in the evening, so i got in run. everything hurt, a lot. i wondered how in the world i'd be able to race the next day! i was starving by the time i got home so i chowed down like 6 bbq chicken legs from the big green egg and a recovery smoothie then we headed out to meet some friends at the pine lake alehouse. i was looking good - one step up from the house uniform piled on top of all my sweat and filth - it was awesome. we didn't get home until late, i started packing up my stuff, tried to work on my hydration and then eventually got into bed around 10:30. oh i slept horribly. my left leg and ass were hurting so bad, every time i rolled and stretched it would cramp up and i was thinking the race would be terrible. and then of course i woke up before my alarm went off at 4:50 to the sound of rain. awesome.
i got up, ate my breakfast, finished the last bit of packing and out the door i went.
it was dumping so much rain and the car was hydroplaning on the freeway and there were times when i couldn't see out the windshield. awesome again.
i got to the race site super early and was happy to see one of the girls from our workouts and that made me instantly feel better. eventually i gathered up my towel and running stuff, put it in a garbage bag and set it in my spot in transition.
then i geared up in knee warmers, my tri kit, a long sleeve jersey and rain jacket to head out on a warm up. i was supposed to be out for a 1/2 hr and i wondered if i would be able to do a whole loop or not but after about 12 minutes or so i just turned around and came back. i was moving in and out of my big ring and then all of s sudden it stopped working! i stopped 3 times to try to fix it but couldn't. i started to panic, i got lost, got back on track and then booked it back to transition. i found all the girls, and jenny's husband fiddled with the bike, eventually we all decided it would be best if we just got it into the big ring and left it there. so that is what we did. then i ran my bike in to rack it and people put their bikes on my stuff. :( we had assigned racks and there were to be 8 bikes to a rack. i feel bad because i totally bit this one woman's head off about how there are supposed to be 8 to the rack when she said there wasn't any room, but i was totally running late and panicking and i should have just chilled out, so i appologize! but we got the bikes moved around and i set up my transition with my run stuff and took all my biking stuff off. then i ran to the car in my socks to put on my wetsuit. i decided to try something new on race day! i decided i was going to wear both my knee warmers and arm warmers under my wetsuit. i spent 5 minutes in transition at onionman fiddling with that stuff, so this time i decided i'd try it out and see how it went.
i was finally all set with wet suit, booties, two caps, goggles and ear plugs and headed down to the water. found jenny, kate and kristina and we stepped in the water and were all like - oooh! the water is really nice! so sad considering it was 63 degrees but totally warmer than anything else we had been in this year.
it was a 3 wave start where they blew this crazy horn thing, but the swim started out good. it was definitely crowded but i wouldn't say super aggressive. not a lot of pushing or kicking, just a lot of closeness. after the 1st buoy it spread out a bit and then the 2nd buoy in was totally fine. i was super happy with how i was swimming. i was able to decide pretty quickly that maybe i wouldn't do the arm warmers under the wet suit again since my arms were getting super tired but the knee warmers were feeling great. my swim time wasn't stellar but i was still really happy that i felt as good as i did.
t1 was so much better than my last race since i had everything on already pretty much and skipped the socks! i was in and out of there in just over a minute!
i was so happy to have those arm and knee warmers out on the bike! even though they were wet the were warm. my hands were frozen and when i tried to pull my clif shot off my top tube i could barely grasp it. i laughed a little. i was having fun, pushing hard and hoping i wouldn't need that smaller ring up front. the course is pretty much rolling so i was all set although there was one point i would have like to have been able to shift down. the first lap was done pretty quickly and the 2nd one went well, too. next thing ya know i was back at transition, trying to go in the run exit. :( i had to back it up and then go the correct way - better pay more attention to that stuff next time.
t2 was fast, the biggest issue was pulling off the knee warmers, especially with hands that couldn't move. i did discover that my hand was bleeding for some mysterious reason.
i took off on the run and wow, everything was super tight. i threw my arm warmers to jenny's husband and then took teeny weeny super fast steps. like tiny, like i swear my stride was microscopic and i am pretty sure i looked rediculous. but i did pass a few people with that funny stride and i kept going. i didn't have my garmin so i didn't know how fast i was going but i kept on keeping on. again, the course was rolling and i was able to lengthen it out a little on some of the downhills but the uphills and flats it was tiny stride again. the fun flew by and next thing i knew i was crossing the finish line.
i wound up being 11th overall, 3rd in my AG.
i was super happy with this race for a few reasons - this course was the 2nd triathlon i had ever done back in 2006 so it was fun to come back and do it again.
i felt good on the swim!
so excited to discover the knee warmers under the wetsuit trick - awesome!
and i think most of all i was so happy to have friends there, it definitely made the miserableness of the day much less miserable!

blowing

2011-06-14T21:19:00.000-07:00

today blew. ok that is all i am going to say about that.
wow, the kitten is so cute!! i can hardly stand it. i went in to check on seamus when i got home tonight and she was still awake, the kitty had crawled under the blanket and was purring up a storm cuddled against her.
we took the kitty to the vet yesterday to make sure he is a-ok. he seemed a-ok, but still he should go to the vet to be sure.
the vet said that kitty is probably about 5 weeks old. although the kitty is super young i think we did the right thing bringing him home with us. the mama cat wasn't looking very good and i don't think she was able to feed those kittens very much. maybe that is why he practically dove into the food dish when he first got to our house. but now his belly is all round and full and he purrs non stop. he weighed 1.2 pounds! so tiny! the vet fussed over him and when she took him into the back to draw some blood and give him a shot she said they were all gushing over him. i told eric that i thought this was funny considering how many kittens they must see and all he could say is kittens are cute. everyone loves kittens. cats are another story. i'll take the opportunity to remind everyone how i had 3 cats when eric first met me. he jokes now that i was easy pickings, but really, he just liked cats, ha! ok i had just cut off all my hair and was wearing a monster truck rally t-shirt too. oh and it was at a mountain bike race too...
but i digress. i hadn't even thought about the possibility of the kitty having FIV or any of that stuff, but the vet said it was good that i hadn't introduced him yet to the others and then i was all in a panic. he turned out to be negative which is good. and what i thought was ear mites weren't, it was just dirt. and he looked flee less, but we gave him a flea treatment anyway.
seamus was super excited this morning that the kitty hadn't woken her up during the night so hoping that will continue and she is doing such a good job feeding him and getting him water and OMG wow!!! scooping kitty litter is so much fun, everyone wants to do it!!
there are so many cute things about this kitty! one being that at the vet the kitty was very scared, seamus said that maybe the mommy should comfort the kitty - the mommy being seamus. we got her settled and then i put the kitty on her lap and seamus held him and spoke to him in the cutest, softest, caring voice, oh kitty, its going to be ok, kitty, its alright. so cute! and then at some point i called the kitty Fuzzy Stripe and her face lit up! that is the kitty's name and she was so happy to hear it!
when we got home, since the vet said it was ok, i took the kitty in to visit nadj. this didn't go quite as i expected. nadj came over and sniffed him, hissed a little hiss then the kitty totally hissed!! he hissed and hissed and growled and oh he was not happy! i thought maybe he would be happy to see another cat but hmm, wondering how this will go. nadj really wasn't very interested in him. we'll have to introduce him again, but he is so tiny i'm not sure when we might want to let him out to explore the whole house.
and then!! eric told me about how he went in to check on the kitty during the day while the kids were at school, ya know, just to check. not because he thinks kittens are cute or anything, but when he went into seamus's room he couldn't find the kitty any where! he said it took about 3 minutes until he spotted him all curled up with the stuffed animals! so cute!! kittens are awesome!

new kitty

2011-06-12T16:23:00.000-07:00

oh this week. what can i say about you.
we were supposed to go to chelan, eric was supposed to race some 60 mile mtn bike race, i was going to ride the chelanman tri course plus some exciting extra part with lots of climbing plus a tunnel where i would get to push a button to make a light flash, but alas, eric called around 330 on friday saying that seamus was sick, had a fever of 102 and how he was feeling quite terrible, considering he had been not feeling his best the previous few days and sirus was so full of snot it was coming out of his ears. we decided to bail on the trip.
sirus and i went out to dinner while eric and seamus went home to relax. we had a perfectly good date night, but they sat us at a table for 6, even though the place was crowded and there was a line. i told the waitress to let any other groups of 2 or 3 know that we would be willing to share but no one wanted to, although they did seem perfectly fine with hanging over the wall from the bar, leaning on our table staring at us.
on saturday i got up to go right the 45 mile route of the flywheels summer century. as i drove down to the start, i was getting more and more excited looking at all of the cyclist riding up the big hill and along the lake. i haven't done an organized ride like this since i did STP in like 2001 i think it was. there had to have been thousands of cyclists out there, it was nutty. i needed to register and found that unless you are able to pick up your packet early, you should register for this event day of. the packet pickup line had probably 150 or more people in line and it wasn't moving. the registration tent had 4 people in line and was super quick. janet, kristi and i found each other in line, then we stood in the potty line for ever, chatted with jenny and then finally headed out.
while it wasn't sunny, it wound up being somewhat warm. we each took a jacket with us in case of rain, but it never rained, although at one point we all tried to figure out if we should put them on anyway since it had gotten a little chilly. we opted out and continued on.
not too long after the start is the first big hill, up Inglewood hill Rd. ok, so i will totally out myself here, while i live kind of at the top of this hill, this was only the 3rd time i had ridden up it in the 3 years we have lived here. and the first time - i had to stop 3 times!! yes! 3 times!!! while the hill isn't too long, about 1/2 mile or so, it is about 12% grade and i had no idea how to get up it. now i have a better idea. eric and i laugh about how i stopped 3 times because the 3rd stop was like 20 ft from the top. no joke, but i didn't know and really, i wasn't sure i would have been able to get up those last 20ft anyway! we all made it up this time and it seemed like many more of the riders were making it up this year compared to years passed, not too many walking this time around.
a short while we rolled past our neighborhood and there was eric in his Plants vs Zombies shirt and leider hosen doing a little jig with the kids running around cheering.
we hit a round about and it was clear that we are not very euro because the mix of cars and cyclists was a complete mess. i'm surprised it wasn't worse. then down 244th which at the bottom is a totally steep, sketchy descent which is fine but i was totally amazed how despite the route turning right onto a very busy, totally small shouldered road, people were not slowing down or stopping and instead were flying right into traffic. it was so sketchy, i couldn't believe it. we later heard that there was a crash at the bottom of that hill. yeah, not surprised.
the rest of the ride was fun and even though i have ridden all of those roads before it was just way fun.
later when i got home, we started making some phone calls then we hopped into the car and headed to burien to check out some kittens! and OMG!! we brought one home!!! so cute!! big name discussions though. we got this kitten for seamus because even though we lost pawpi back in december, there are still some nights when after she has settled into bed for the night we can hear here in the crying. when we ask he why she is crying she always tells us how much she misses pawpi. she never asked for a new kitten and when we first asked her if she wanted to get one she wasn't sure she wanted one. but we decided to take the leap, lord help me if that cat poos and pees on the carpet!!! seamus picked out the orange one and i instantly started suggesting names for him (i haven't ever had an orange cat and haven' had a boy cat since the first family cat we had when i was little - snowie. he was a good cat!). but i suggested naming the cat Dan after my boyfriend Dan Hugo, then i suggested naming him Jason Jablonski, and i even suggested naming him Antoine after the baby sitter. all were no gos. we suggested Jean-Luc and Sedgewick and Seeley (Booth), all names we had lined up in case of more kids someday, but no gos there either. she considered Sunset, and Totorro and i really liked Honey Senpai, but she wasn't too into it. i have settled on calling him The Doctor from Dr Who, eric likes that one, too. sirus suggested the totally awesome name of grilled cheese but she was adamant no people names and no food names. it looks like the kitty's name is Fuzy Stripe - at least that is what was on the sign she made in her room.
seamus had did an amazing job of cleaning her room in anticipation of the kitty, so when we got home, we found a place for the tiny litter box, and a place for his food and water dishes. we let him walk around and he was HUNGRY! he practically jumped in his food dish and chomped away. when he was done i dipped his paw in his water dish so he would know it was in there and i'm not sure he had ever drank water because he just kept dipping his face in it and then licking it off. after a few dips he seemed to get a better hang of it.
the people we got him from said they weren't sure he was litter trained. i'm not sure what that was about but i was worried but remembered when we had kittens when i was little, they seemed to know what to do. so i put him in the litter box and then told seamus that whenever he woke up from naps and stuff that she should try to put him in there, too. and do you know what? he used it! hooray!
we gave him a bath and got him nice and clean and wrapped him up in a warm towel until he was dry. he slept in the bed with seamus, she said he even cuddled on her chest and walked on her face while she slept, or tried too.
this morning he was a totally different kitty! he was running around her room playing with everything! tumbling around and jumping and chasing and being cute cute cute!! he'll go to the vets this week and then next weekend we'll introduce him to the other cats. as of right now they are not interested in him. they have to be able to hear him meowing some, and even after i play with him i go pet them so they will get used to his smell, but they don't seem interested. hopefully the transition with go well!

one of those days

2011-06-06T20:25:00.000-07:00

ever have one of those days that isn't too bad but isn't great? where kinda the best part of the day is when your new BFF the chiropractor cracks yer lower back and hips and stuff into a million pieces? where he sticks his elbow way into yer side ass, tweaks yer leg off to the side so that you are in so much pain you are paralyzed and then he cracks a few jokes and the only way you can respond is to whimper?
other stuff is kind of shitty and blah today too. its warm which is nice!

compliments that aren't compliments and can't be warped or twisted in any way to make them into compliments

2011-06-05T15:01:00.000-07:00

DUDE, someone today asked me if i was pregnant. :(
and they yesterday, a certain husband who shall remain nameless told me that my new haircut makes my head look smaller. he said that he even tried to make that one not sound bad but he couldn't think of any way to do it.
just for that i won't tell all of the internets how that nameless husband accidentally wore my cycling shorts out for a ride on thursday. he said they felt funny and that they seemed pretty short when he put them on but assumed that it was because he had done a bunch of quad exercises earlier in the day. so there.

chop chop tupe top

2011-06-04T21:36:00.000-07:00

today i had about 11-12 inches of my hairs cut off. all of it. not totally on a whim, but sorta, kinda. i also got my hairs colored. but before doing so, my absolute favorite hair cutter James Dean at the downtown GeneJuarez did some precutting. he put my hair in 4 ponytails, grabbed the clippers and chopped it all off. he put the ponies in a bag, and i filled out a form and the hairs are now on their way to locks of love. although i read a blog post poo-poohing the locks of love program for selling all the donated hair that they can't use to wig makers, all in all, even if that is true, that's fine. the hairs were getting cut off anywhere and if there is even a tiny chance they will make someone in need happy then no harm in trying.
i haven't colored my hair i don't think since before i was pregnant with seamus so like a million years and the color girl was super excited since i told her to do whatever she wanted. she picked darker! which i was excited about. she even mentioned that it would nicely take care of my sparkles. and i was like - did you just call my gray hairs sparkles? and she was like, i like to call them sparkles. i apparently had more sparkles than i knew about. scary thing - what if when all this awesome dark brown grows out its all gray underneath?
so i told mr dean who he himself is growing out is hair and is looking quite handsome these days that i was embarrassed to say that i kinda wanted a cut similar to ashlee simpson's new short do. he said, he asked if i might have a photo since he wasn't quite up to date on what was going on with her hair, and then was quite surprised when i went on to tell him about her recent divorce, since he didn't know she was married and a little shocked that she had a baby.
anyway, i walked out of there looking lovely, i even stopped in at betsey johnson and they all gushed over the lovely short hairs. i did not however buy anything in there this time, although i did go in there with the intent to purchase a belt and that they no longer had.
that was the big surprise or the something exciting that i mentioned for saturday.
and OMG it was sunny and warm! so sunny and warm that OMG i wore a tube top! whoa!!

compliments that aren't really, part deux

2011-06-01T21:51:00.000-07:00

i am a big fan of compliments that aren't really compliments. like here and here.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
yesterday i thought i got a compliment that's not really but maybe it was an insult that wasn't really?
i went to a sports chiropractor for the first time. i had gone to a normal chiropractor a few years ago and she totally freaked me out. although she had used her little popper to pop a few joint in my chest which actually felt amazingly good, she had me lay on some crazy ass table that made horrible noises and jarred my noggin so hard i saw stars. that and she tried to get me to commit to some crazy treatment plan for the next year. i couldn't do that, plus she scared me so i never went back.
but after the race the other weekend when i had the ART done, it has been all i can think about. i called my insurance and it didn't seem like it was covered but then i called the place anyway and talked to them and we got it all figured out and it is covered after all! i made an appointment and i was so excited to go!
i already had a history with the guy since he worked on me at the race, but we talked some more and then we got to work. i told him about all my aches and pains. he asked some health history questions and i should have known that the compliments (insults?) would be coming when he said i was healthy as a horse.
so the obturator inturnus came up so of course, there i was all laying face down on the table when he said we were going to get all personal and yep, right up in there. not invasive by any means but yeah, maybe i will wear pants next time instead of shorts. he did some awesomely painful things to my hips, so awesomely painful that i could barely talk or move but it was totally awesome. he had me stand there and he looked at my back, he poked me a few times and was like, oh yeah, these muscles are hard as rock. then he hurt me again, but it was so good, i was sad when it was done. there was some strength testing in which he was giving me crap about being weak, not bad crap but joking crap and then wow, my right hip, to quote him, has got nothing. i could hardly push any resistance against him. then more hurting then on that crazy table that was weaving me back and forth. i flat out was just like, whoa! what is going on?? then he cracked my lover back which was awesome. loved it. then we talked some at which point he said i was a solid girl. ok, girl is good, solid, i am not so keen on. solid is right up there with sturdy or thick. but he followed it with , you know, not full of flab and all that other stuff. what other stuff??? anyway, when i had walked in there i was in quite a bit of pain, but when i walked out i felt 100%. it was awesome.
after work i did a track workout, hitting times between 5:58 and 7:20 for the various distances and wow, i didn't hurt at all! later that evening, yeah, i was a little out of sorts, but man, feeling quite helpful about this whole ART thing!!
something exciting is going to happen on saturday! whoowhoo!!

I survived the rapture, it's name was Onionman.

2011-05-30T19:15:00.000-07:00

lets start with jury duty. as per the last post, it kicked my ass.
it was exhausting. listening to the witnesses, all the testimony, all the waiting around, all the not being allowed to talk about it was utterly exhausting!!!
and then we started with deliberations. good grief! that was even MORE exhausting. but we finally were done with it before lunch on friday. after lunch we read the verdict and then we were dismissed, but only after receiving our participation certificates???

saturday morning i got up and did a 50 minute trainer workout and 15 minute run. then we packed up the car with my mom and the kids and started on our way to Walla Walla.
i've done this race 4 times: 2008, 2009, 2010 and then this year. last year was a disaster so i was looking forward to kicking some ass this year.
the week had been so exhausting, and the drive was long. i slept for an hour when we got there and then had dinner then went to bed. i slept terribly that night but got up pretty easily.
i headed out early to get a good parking spot and it started to rain on the way there. :( i put a bunch of my stuff in a garbage bag and took it into transition to mark my spot. when i came back with my bike, SOMEONE HAD PARKED THEIR BIKE ON MY SPOT. WTF, who does that??
so i picked up my bad of stuff and moved. lame. i still got an end spot but whatever, it was lame. it was so cold but i was going to go out on a warm up on the bike - first time i had ever done that! so i put on the knee warmers, the arm warmers, the fleece jacket, the vest, the jacket and the gloves and headed out. i got rained on but the warm up was pretty good, but it was so cold i barely broke a sweat. when i got back to transition, the guy across the rack from me said he had to turn several people away who had tried to take my spot, even though my stuff was RIGHT THERE!! the stuff i was wearing was all wet, but i shook it off and put it into transition. i got on my wetsuit, put on my booties, two swim caps, ear plugs, you name it, i put it on. i was surprised to feel that the suit was a bit loose around the middle, but pleased at the same time! it still fit perfectly everywhere else. the pre-race meeting took forever. it wasn't terrible, just really long although i was there for the part where they said they consulted with the medical staff and agreed with the recommendation of cutting the swim in 1/2 because of the water temp and air temp. i said hooray and then started to leave and head down to the water because i wanted to at least get in the water for a bit before the start. i put my feet in and a shiver went right up me and i couldn't stop shivering! so i got out and started to panic a little, trying to figure out how i was going to get out of doing this race. i had already called eric hoping he would talk me out of it but he didn't answer his phone. the men went first and then the women. i waded out to waste deep and kept looking back wondering what could i do to get out of this, just pack it up and go back to the hotel!!!
but then it was time to start.

The Swim:
30 seconds before the start i splashed the water on my face and that did the trick. actually getting in after that was ok. the water wasn't too bad, cold yes, but tolerable. there was some pushing and shoving. i saw some feet, i did a lot of http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifsighting. i was happy with how i was feeling out there in the water. it was turning out to be a pretty good first open water swim of the season! i passed a few of the men before we even got to the first buoy and then passed a few more on the way to the 2nd and then on the way back into shore. my shoulders were getting tired but i kept sighting and kept swimming, all the way to shore.
My time was not awesome, but i was happy with how i swam and how i felt.

T1:
i got out of the water and easily ran up the boat launch to transition. it was crazy in there. people were all over the place, they were sitting and all sprawled out. i looked around and it seemed to be because everyone was putting on extra layers. i struggled through knee warmers, arm warmers, a vest and jacket. i even put on gloves. i could have possibly skipped the gloves but was not sorry at all that i had everything else on. i did not want to relive cascade edge 2008. i headed out on the bike and right away started to pass some people. it was raining but it eventually stopped. i was enjoying the bike and happy to be on my sweet new argon 18 tri bike. i felt good in the aero position and was riding along well until i discovered i couldn't shift into the big ring up front. i tried, i tried and fiddled and tried some more. i eventually came to terms with the fact that it wasn't going to shift so i did what i could with what i had. this made the fast, fun part on the way back not as fast as it could have been. i was still catching people but i got passed by a few on that fast section. i caught some of them back when it flattened and started up hill again, but my overall bike time was slower than the previous two years, even when i got all injured last year. :( i was disappointed but then also realized had i had that big ring this likely would not have been the case.

t2:
longer than normal since i had to take all the cold weather gear off. i kept the arm warmers on but took everything else off.

the RUn:
i headed out feeling not too bad. but i couldn't resist the call of the porta potty. i jumped in there and took waaaay too long. my left foot felt funny, i thought my orthotic might be in my shoe crooked then i wondered if i left a clif shot in there or a hair rubber band. it was really bothering me so i stopped and took off my shoe. there wasn't anything in there, my foot was just frozen solid. i started up again. i was keeping a pretty good pace those first two miles on frozen feet, about an 8min pace. mile 3 was 7:47. then my left calf started hurting. right behind my knee, down a little. biatch. it was hurting. i hit the turn around and slowed down, but was still chugging along. the last part of the run is hard. its trail and up hill and then you can start to see the parking lot and hear the finish line antics and they make you run on this uneven grass and its terrible. but i gave it all i had for that last little bit. my run time was not impressive and i'm ok with it but not super proud. i need to figure out how to not feel the need for the potty breaks. plus i would like to work on working hard on the run instead of just chugging along.
all in all the race was ok, not my best but not my worst. i'm happy i started it! and i was happy that i headed out onto the run before the first place guy finished.
i came in 4th in my age group but got bumped to 3rd and on the podium since the 1st place girl was 2nd overall. More Onionman bling hanging around the house now!

after the race i headed back to the hotel, took a nap, then we walked around walla walla some and then headed to pioneer park to see the birds. we saw some bunnies making more bunnies and then went to a playground. my mom and i met a nice guy who was there with his grandson. he's a cattle farmer from oregon and he answered all my questions about being a cattle farmer. everything from how do you get more cows (do you encourage certain cow relationships or do you let them pick their own up in the pastures?) to when you go to check on the cows out there, how do you get to them? and do you brand them? and when they have their babies do you make them come into the barns, and how does the whole slaughtering thing happen? turns out a lot of his cows go to whole foods. he told us all about it but then mentioned that if the cows get sick, or need any medication or anything at any time, they get tagged and then they go to safeway instead since they will have then had steroids or hormones or something. he was awesome and i was so happy to hear all of his stories. he seemed good with me asking, too.
after we went to dinner and then hung out some more. we stayed up late watching iCarly. I slept waaaay better, seamus was super cuddly during the night, too.
unfortunatly i did not sleep IN like i would have like too, but the kids went swimming and then we headed home.

OMG jury duty is kicking my ass

2011-05-25T22:10:00.000-07:00

jury duty consists of a lot of waiting around. but man, it is exhausting. i have had to nap so many times this week when i've gotten home and its only wednesday!!
i managed to NOT go to Cow Chip cookies today which is good because i went last week and then on monday and tuesday. i ran today after jury duty and after my 2hr nap.
i need to go to bed now, too, but i am a little antsy.
so happy to have started reading New Moon, too. its been sitting on my night stand since xmas but i finally cracked it open during all the waiting.
training is going well. my ass still hurts. i need to get in to see the art dude, that was like magic. painful, painful magic!

things i learned at jury duty:
If I go into Betsey Johnson, I will buy something
It is nearly impossible to not eat cow chip cookies everyday
The court house does not like danskos
I miss being in Seattle (but am also somehat glad I'm not here because of 1 and 2 above)
It really doesn't take too long to get to Seattle from the eastside during rush hour, at least not the two weeks i've been on jury duty
Paying such close attention for so long is exhausting
There is a ton of waiting around.

ART

2011-05-21T14:07:00.000-07:00

the race was fun today! 8 miles in 1:01:22. Yahoo! that's a 7:40 pace. good enough for 3rd F overall and 1st in my age group! had this been a 10k it would have been a PR but instead it was a crazy 8 miler. eric was an animal! he pushed seamus in the stroller and still managed a 6:10 pace good for 2nd overall and 1st in his age group.
it was fun to have all the folks from work there and it was quite a nice morning for a race, even if i had a totally nasty JIFF peanut butter sandwich for breakfast and wasn't really feeling like running fast.
after the race my left ass was really hurting. i stopped by to see the ART dudes. and man, they HURT me! but it felt so good. there were times when he asked me to move and i couldn't because it hurt just way too much. we determined that its all because of swimming, well actually all the kicking that i have been doing while swimming. so i am going to go back to them and get it all taken care of!
3hr bike ride tomorrow and a jump in the lake possibly!

super allergies and other gross things

2011-05-20T20:08:00.000-07:00

eric and sirus went to the allergy doctor today. sirus has had non stop runny nose for months and months, maybe years. he just goes about his business like there is nothing wrong but we finally came to the conclusion he must be allergic to something. so eric took him in today. he got the little pokes of all the different things and apparently they found he is allergic to grass and dogs. sirus even told the doctor that he was super allergic to dogs. and maybe we should think twice before letting him roll down the big grass hills again. but he isn't allergic to cats (but eric is!). but we wonder if the remnants of the old owner's dog is still in any of the carpet. so i am pushing even harder now to tear up ALL of the carpet! hooray, that would be so awesome!!
a few months ago, seamus went to the doctors for something, i can't remember what. they said her ear was all plugged up. the doctor tried to pull a chunk out but couldn't so they flushed it out and apparently big giant chunks came out. eric even told the nurse that i would be so upset to have missed it since i love stuff like that.
so all was good and that was that. i am always cleaning the kids ears all the time, because i am obsessed. one time after that doctors appointment, i was cleaning her ear and out came a chunk of something that looked like paper. after that, seamus refused to let me clean her ears. she would cry and say no and tell me it felt weird and would throw a big fit. finally, several months later she finally told me that she had put a piece of paper in her ear and that it had gotten stuck in there. she cried and was so upset, she was afraid of getting in trouble and she didn't want me to tell eric and she didn't want to go to the doctors to take it out because they would get mad. i told her that at most the doctor would likely just tell her to not put paper in her ear again. anyway, somehow we determined that there was no way that the paper could still be in there.
until tonight. i managed to take a peek in there and there it was!!!! and eric managed to pull that sucker out!! it was HUGE! and brown!!! and nasty!! and OMG, don't touch it!! oh grody!! we wanted to keep it but seamus insisted that we throw it away! oh it was so gross! but she did say she felt way better now that it was out and that she could hear better too!!
what else is new? oh my goodness ALOT. but i can't talk about it.
but i am running an 8 mile race tomorrow. should be exciting! my work is sponsoring it for the employees so there will be a bunch of us there, so that will be fun. and eric and seamus are going to come, too!
i've been running a ton, biking some and doing some swimming. and i might even get in the lake on sunday - yikes!

totally tired

2011-05-16T20:23:00.000-07:00

OMG, so i am on jury duty right now. in selection right now, not even called into real selection yet, although they ahve called like a million people in already. i totally fell asleep this afternoon there, too. its pretty cushy actually although they have 11 tv screens but aren't playing any movies which i totally think they should.
during lunch i walked around pioneer square which was a total blast from 1999. i can't remember the last time i had been down there. i had lunch at a pizza place that i am pretty sure took over where soup daddy's was. i walked by the new orleans which always had some kick ass gumbo. the whole thing was totally surreal and weird. but i do miss being downtown. now i get to go again tomorrow.
other things, that 5k i was talking about earlier, i got another PR! hooray!! after hurting my neck, i made an emergency trip to PT, she did yer magic, i made another appointment for friday. i took 3 days off from all physical activity, slept a ton, went to work, ya know, recovered.
friday night we headed up to wenatchee, stayed in a totally craptastic hotel, yes, i even wore flip flops in the shower! and the crappy pillows did nothing for my neck.
at least it was somewhat sorta warm in the morning, and we headed to the race.
i did a warm up, some stretching and then time to go!
i was flying, first mile done in 6:30! whoa! ok, it had a nice long downhill, but still, can't beat that. i was still going quite well through mile 2 and then we hit an out and back and it pretty much fell apart. i looked at my watch at one point and was like, huh? i feel like i am going faster than an 8min pace, how can i only be doing an 8min pace? i ran, i ran i ran. my neck didn't hurt, and i lost my ability to do math. i crossed the line in 22:08 and was like huh. i wasn't thrilled, i was a little disappointed because i thought my previous PR was 21:10 and i couldnt figure out how in that last mile I had really given up THAT much time. then eric told me my time and how it was a PR. a quick check on the internets and lo and behold!! when the results finally came out, finish time was actually 22:07, a 13 second PR! and then today, i got a 1st place age group medal in the mail! hooray!
after the race, we dropped eric off at his mtn bike race and then the kids and i came back into wenatchee, watched the apple blossom parade, got lost and went back to the race site. the kids rolled down the hill a hundred times. then on the way home with a side trip to leavenworth and the munchen haus!!! it was a really great weekend!!
oh, i'll have to give all the details of my hot date sometime soon, too!

waaaah!!!

2011-05-04T19:04:00.000-07:00

i hurt my neck. how did this happen? let me tell you:

I ate salad for dinner two nights in a row.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
I turned thirty something.
I talked to Ryan Iddings last week about how he had to wear a neck brace after hurting his neck.
Its a rest week.
I mailed out the race registration for the 5k on saturday - yesterday.
I am being punished because when my alarm went off i got out of bed to grab my iPhone and then got back in bed to check email.

it was the last one, although i'm not totally ruling out the others and i even tempted fate by having salad again for dinner tonight (but i followed it up with ice cream). this morning my alarm went off. i got out of bed, grabbed my iphone and then got back into bed. this is a normal routine for me when i don't have an AM workout planned, i crawl back in bed, check email, check a few other things then eventually get up and start the day. well, today when i got back into bed, something went terribly wrong. :(
my neck totally geeked. it make a terrible noise and i knew instantly i was a gonner. i was instantly in pain, i went downstairs and asked eric to start trying to massage it out but it just got progressively worse. i went back upstairs took some aleve, pulled out the mystery heat pack thing and got ready for work. as soon as i could i called the PT and made an appointment. no activity for two days, another appointment on friday and we'll see how it goes. she says swimming will likely be out for a while, biking probably too since it will be tough to hold up my giant head but she thinks i should be able to run, as long as i can stand the pain. joy.

this has happened twice before. once in highschool i had fantasy hair, not too different than the fantasy hair i have now. i was putting it in a barrett and then bam! that terrible neck noise. i was like hmm, that's weird. i sat down for breakfast with my mom when all of a sudden horrible pain creeped up my neck and i lost all ability to function. i layed on the couch and that is where i stayed for the next 4 days!! the next time was in college. i had woken up early for crew practice. was fiddling around with stuff and then bam! there it was again. i didn't dare lay down, remembering the high school incident. so i sat there for 3hrs waiting for the trainer to get in. he was just like blah blah blah whatever, you're totally faking it and then he did something, i yelped, he stopped, and then was like, oh, umm, yeah, hmm, ok. here are some muscle relaxers. it wasn't as bad that time as the time in high school but it wasn't awesome let me tell you. this time is worse than the college time.

but waaaah!! wtf.

the end of april

2011-05-01T19:07:00.000-07:00

with the end of april comes me getting old. not quite 40 yet, but no longer early 30s, or even mid 30s any longer. i am no officially in my late 30s.
the week was ok, i had a daunting workout schedule - two big swims, swims that were the longest swims in the history of swimming, topping out at 4000 on saturday morning. this swim went quite well, despite a horrible, horrible swim on friday! that swim was only 1400 but while I did it, i wondered how i could ever get through it, i started to feel sorry for myself and my poor swimming ability and wondered why do i spend so much time in the pool when i just suck swimming ass so badly. i had also woken up friday morning thinking it was my birthday that day, wondering why the kids didn't wish me a happy birthday at all. maybe i was having a pity party because prince william had gotten married and although he is not nearly as cute as he used to be, back when i went to england in 2000, i am pretty sure he had seen me sitting outside of buckingham palace and had decided he wanted to marry me, but instead found this kate chick, because, if you think about it, she is pretty much an exact replica of me and stuff. sheesh. whatever. i remember waking up really early to watch princes dianna mary prince charles back in the day, and yes, i couldn't wait to see the photos of kate's dress and all of it all. but by the time the swim came in the evening i was aggitated and annoyed and waaaah, i am such a sucky swimmer.
but then i woke up on saturday, and the kids were excited to wish me happy birthday, and their favorite babysitter was coming over to watch them so eric and i could swim the whole 4000 and then go mtn biking. the best part about the swim was that eric and i are incredibly immature. the directions for the swim said to take a clif shot 1/2 way through but unfortunately shot was misspelled as shat. so eric and i chuckled non stop about what would happen when i shat in the pool during the swim. would i get kicked out? would we have to wait until the pool totally refiltered? would it feel good? yeah, so lots of laughing about that one. non stop.
but the swim went well and the mtn biking was delux! we went to duthie and it was borderline warm! knee warmers, jersey, arm warmers and vest. NO hat, short fingered gloves! wow! it was fun!
after, we headed home and i took a nap! then got dressed to go out to dinner. i picked out a grey dress to wear but seamus though i should wear a black one instead. i asked her why not the grey one - she said it didn't have enough color. but apparently the black one had enough.
we went to the cactus!!! in kirkland and i had two of their totally amazingly delicious margaritas!!! after we came home and had cake - the cake that eric baked for me exactly to my specifications - white cake, homemade butter cream icing and coconut. i wanted it to taste just like my favorite kind of donuts that have icing and the coconut on them, they call them feather boas at top pot, but i remember them from when i was little when my mom would sometimes bring them home for us from dunkin donuts! we don't have dunkin donuts in seattle. BUT they have dunkin donuts in the atlanta airport. i look for the coconut donuts every time i go through there and they never have them. but my birthday cake was delicious!!! and the day overall was fantastic!
today i headed out somewhat early for an 1:20 trail run. it was sooooo sunny, the sky was soooo clear. i struggled with what to wear because really it wasn't even 50 degrees yet, but the sun was soo amazing! at one point i heard a funny noise and then a GIANT black bear come around the corner! turned out it wasn't a bear but a giant dog. i stopped to talk to its owner, plus their other 3 giant bear like dogs! i told them my initial reaction and we had a few chuckles about it while i petted their dogs. it was funny because all 4 of them came right up to me and sat down right infront of me.
when i got home i rounded up the kids and headed to the gym for some quick lifting and then the kids and i went for a bike ride! we rode to the store to pick up some lunch then rode to the park for a picnic and then we played for a long long while then rode back to the car to head home. oh it was so warm and sunny! oh how i hope we will get some more sun in the coming weeks!! please!!

yakima and beyond

2011-04-30T21:15:00.000-07:00

on the way to yakima we toyed with the idea of stopping for a blizzard but wound up not doing it. got there a bit on the later side, and when i was putting the kids to bed we realized we couldn't find Sirus Wirus!! we triple checked our car and grandma and granpa's car but he was no where to be found. so i called the hotel in ephrata and they said they had him sitting up at the front desk! whew!! i may have been closer to tears about losing Sirus Wirus than Sirus was! I told the hotel we would be there to pick him up tomorrow on our way home. i went and told sirus the news and he cried and cried about how worried he was about sirus wirus but we discussed that he was having his own adventure at the hotel.
in the morning the kids got up and checked out their easter baskets. for some reason the easter bunny didn't bring any jelly beans but no one seemed to miss them so that was good. after breakfast we went outside to start the easter egg hunt. seamus was booking it around the yard picking them up so fast but sirus would stop and enjoy each egg that he found, taking it to seamus to show her or lift it high to show us. he would ooh and aah with each one he found, it was quite cute. after the hunt, eric and i geared up and headed out on an almost 10mile run. we ran by some horses who may have never seen anyone run before because they stopped what they were doing and watched us pass. then there were some sheep who stopped and watched us and then turned and ran way, and then there was a mama cow who was laying on the ground with her two calves. we were probably 100yds a way still and she stood up and just watched us. as we got closer the calves go up too and then as we were even closer they all ran away. apparently people in that part of town don't run by the live stock.
AND THEN! it was time for some egg rolling. eric had told me about the egg rolling and i always thot he was a little bit crazy, but gracious, it was fun! while we were out running, grandpa and the kids went out to the field and started digging the track. we gathered up all the eggs in the baskets and took them to the hill and started rolling. the first few runs were a little hit and miss until eric and his parents smoothed out the edges and got things going, but by the end the eggs would roll the whole way down without stopping, jumping each other and bumping and cracking on each other. eventually, the shells would come completely off, the whites would open up and the yolks would pop out and roll the rest of the way down the hill. the yolks were the fastest and could jump the highest! the kids ran up and down that hill what must have been hundreds of times and there was something funny about how cute the eggs looked as they bopped their way down. its the best easter tradition i have ever experienced and feel lucky that eric shared it with us, even if i still think its a little nutty.
then an important part of the tradition is to cook hotdogs over a fire and make smores, too! then another round of egg rolling until all the eggs were just yolks.
we had decided that it would take an extra 3hrs to go get sirus wirus so we asked to have him shipped home, only after convincing sirus that it was a good idea and more of an adventure!
sirus fell almost instantly asleep in the car and slept the entire 2.5hr drive home!

i love EW

2011-04-27T21:53:00.001-07:00

for easter weekend we went on the eastern washington tour.
we started at home. then we drove to wenatchee to get my bike fit. we were late. we had a little misscommunication on how long it takes to get to wenatchee and when we actually needed to get there, so we were about 40 minutes late. but luckily, we were still able to get in. after discovering again that i have some flexibility challenges (although i do have good shoulder flexibility these days!) i was hooked up to some stuff and started pedaling. after a bit of chit chat, a bit of pedaling and a lot of fitting, it was time to head out.
we drove to ephrata. i really like ephrata. we stayed at the best western and i saw something i am not sure i have ever seen before - eric was totally flirting with the girl at the front desk! he turned on the charm and got us a discount on our room even! and i was standing RIGHT THERE! the girl was super nice but it was pretty cute to see eric's charming side come out. very funny. once in the room i totally passed out while eric and the kids chilled out until it was time for dinner. after dinner we went swimming! the pool was super warm so it was really really nice to hang out in and play with the kids. so warm. after a while we did get in the hot tub and knowing that sirus can be extra sensitive, we warned him to be careful getting in. he got in only to about mid-thigh, but was funny because he stood there protecting his tiny family jewels! i asked him what he was doing and he said he didn't want them to get too hot in the water. we've never talked about this before so it must just be instinct or something. it was funny.
THEN when we were back at the room we decorated easter eggs! eric claims that the only reason he picked up the Hanna Montana egg dye was because it was the only one left, it was a good thing he did, because those eggs were practically glow in the dark they were so bright!
next morning we woke up, had waffles! and then headed to coulee city. we were meeting grandma and grandpa there for a kids fishing derby. i haven't ever been to one before and now i have been to one. the kids have been to a few. despite there being 1700 fish planted in this 50yd netted off area, the kids didn't catch any fish. they got their lines tangled with almost every other kid out there. some of the kids out there were catching 4 and 5 fish, huge ones even!
after the horn sounded and adults were allowed to start fishing, eric and i headed out on a bike ride. when we were out riding though, grandpa and sirus caught a fish.
but the bike ride was AMAZING. we headed out of Coulee City. it was super sunny out, it wasn't really warm, but it was warm enough. we headed south on pinto ridge road, there were some climbs and one super steep ass climb. then lots of rolling through a canyon. we then headed east on hwy 28 until we hit wilson creek. wilson creek is a tiny little town that is super cute. we road through the town, saw a few people out and about and then headed out of town and bam, road closed! we road up to the sign and saw that the road was dirt, gravel, and bumpy. so we turned around and found an old lady with curlers in her hair out on her driveway talking to some older dude on a motor cycle. while eric talked to them, i played fetch with their super friendly rolly polly dog. they talked roads and road closures and how far the road was torn up and alternate route options. i swear the lady hugged eric, the guy asked him if we had water. eric showed him his water bottle and the dude was like "whoa! you are going to need more water than that for where you are going?" the lady said if we went the one direction we would be out in the middle of nowhere. then she went on to say that well, actually we were really out in the middle of no where. no cell reception, because we were in the middle of NOWHERE! so we headed out on the closed road because it was the only one we KNEW would take us to where we wanted to go. never mind that we saw several cars and trucks (and a motorcycle) on that road and not one wanted to give us a lift. ok we didn't ask. but let me tell you, 5 miles, uphill on a road that was dirt, gravel, rocks, bumps and crap, all on a brand new fancy tri bike wasn't the most fun. the best part was when we were riding and eric was just like "yeah, this road is way worse than any of the roads we were on in the grand fondo." i was just like WTF, how does that help me now? we were going sllllowwww. we discussed how it would be nice if we could swap bikes since eric was on his cross bike with cross tires but no pedal match up. after a while we came up on some dude back hoeing. eric stopped to ask him how much longer, 2 miles. he was dead on. then eric got a flat tire. but he kept riding. then i gave him my pump and then kept going. FINALLY we got to pavement. who cares that once we got to it, it went straight up, but whatever, it was pavement.
we got over the the hump and could see for MILES AND MILES down R ave, or R Rd or whatever. it was all down hill too for miles. we could see the town that was like 10 miles away. but then, even though the final destimation was net downhill, there was actually a lot of uphill, too. but it was fast moving and so amazingly beautiful! i love eastern washington. the old lady said that we would know we were at out turn when we got to the big red barn on the left. so apparently the lady hadn't been that direction in a while becuase the barn didn't have a spec of paint left on it and it looked as though it was going to fall at any second. but yay! we turned onto 36th and we headed downhill all the way into coulee city. we estimated we needed to go from R to J-K. We did the count down in reverse alphabetical order, until we got to J.5 and had a chuckle then chuckled some more until we got to I.8.
and then we were back at the car. 48 miles later. this ride was awesome because there were no stop signs, barely any cars, amazing views and sun! we locked the bikes and then went for a run, topping out at a 6:57 pace. yahoo!
then we got into the car and drove to yakima!!

NEW POST!

2011-04-25T19:08:00.000-07:00

so much so much! how can someone who has such a boring life always have so many updates!! time is flying. where does it go? i'll tell you where it goes! it goes into update spreadsheets with data that has nothing to do with how many miles i've ridden my bike or how many yards i have swam. those updates take mere seconds compared to the hours that other spreadsheet updates take!
quick note about my 5k pr - i won! overall lady runner! yahoo! full disclosure, had one of the 10kers been a 5ker, she would have beaten me, but she kept on going, so i won! hooray!
i did my first track workout last week. as always i was a bit stressed about it. i was doing it in the MORNING because i had fancy team photo shoot after werk, but i got up on time, weather was perfect!!! the moon was amazing in the morning sky, positioned just over Great Clips. i got to the HS track and low and behold my key card DID NOT WORK. WTF!! so i got back in the car and drove to the dirt track at the jr high. i did the warm up, did two of the speed intervals and then oh no! disaster was going to strike! i shimmied to the honey bucket only to find that it had a mothra fawking padlock on it!!! so i shimmed to the car and drove home! disaster averted, and then i ran back to the track. was so far behind on time that i got to hear the pledge of allegiance, i got to hear about the two jr high golfers who did great at the tournament, and i skipped one 800 because the PE teachers were out there setting up and they may or may have not been giving me the stink eye. so i ran home. but my times were good, i hit them all, was even under on a few. so excited!
a bunch of other crazy workouts, i posted a contest to see who would like to take me to the school auction. i am pretty sure dan hugo was going to step up and be my date but i am also pretty sure he has a race the next morning.
what else? the other morning i woke up, went to the gym, changed into my swim suit, gathered all my crap, went down to the pool and stood there on the ledge with my cap on and everything. then i put all my crap away and sat in the therapy pool. i could not get into the pool. just a few days earlier i smoked eric's ass in a 25yd sprint. the water was freezing that day. the heater broke a few days earlier and i am pretty sure the pool was wet suit legal, but i couldn't take any chances. i sat in that therapy pool for a long while then got out and went to work. i canceled my evening plans, i didn't do my run, i went home and was passed out in bed before 8pm. it was a good decision!

holey smokes!!

2011-04-12T19:28:00.000-07:00

oh my gosh!!! so much has happened since the last post! SO MUCH
training is nuts. its been fun but long and different. i was so tired last night that i slept for 11 hours! i went to bed at 8 and slept until 7. i slept the whole time!! ahhhh.
other things:
i got a new 5k PR! Hooray!! last time I did that, i was pretty sure i was going to lose control of my bodily functions and i didn't want to repeat that. but this time i felt good the whole time. i was having fun! i went out too fast and then started to fade but was so super excited!
i ran the lake sammamish 1/2 marathon! i ran with janet who had a goal of beating 2hrs. i had so much fun running the race with her! i was nervous about pacing her, i didn't want her to not get her goal because of some mistake that i made, so i printed out detailed split and average pace and elapsed times. the start was funny, back and forth, back and forth a bunch then out onto the trail. i got worried a few times because it looked like they marked the course wrong - turned out they did! but we were passing people the entire time and janet pushed really hard at the end, coming in at under 2hrs! big PR for her, and very exciting! I was super proud of her and super excited! this race was definitely one of my favorites of all time!
and then, OMGOSH!! the masters swim meet. back in feb janet did a swim meet and a bunch of us went to go watch. it was quite exciting and janet did great. after, she started to apply the peer pressure, and i agreed to be on a relay with her and two other girls. i was relatively calm, although when i actually registered for the event, my throat closed up and i couldn't breathe. after a while i felt ok and was only sorta concerned about it. but then i realized i signed up for backstroke and had no idea how to turn. so i went and practiced diving off the blocks and turning from backstroke. so after that, i felt a little better. but then i started doing some math and when i realized i seeded myself for my 50 backstroke at about the same pace i i do 100 free, i started to get really pretty concerned. and i really started to get concerned when they sent out the psych sheet and i was seeded with all the 80 year olds and i decided it would be a good idea to read the US masters swimming rule book and such. what had i gotten myself into?? we got there early, and next thing ya know, the 500 free was starting. it was the first event of the day and my first event. AND i was in the first heat. the rules mentioned all kinds of whistling sequences and i was just like aaak! so when the buzzer finally went, i looked to the side to see if anyone had gone yet, and once i was sure that they had, i dove in, too. lauren was my lap counter and janet was on the other side of the pool doing the 500 at the same time, but she was heat 2 since she is faster. jenny was her counter. 20 laps down and bam, that race was done. from lining up at the blocks to starting to finishing, it was all so quick that there was no time to think about anything or to get nervous or anything. now that the first even was over, i was ready to get going on my next!
50 back was just as fun, a little nutty, this time i was in heat 2! and i was almost 5 seconds faster than my seed time! bam, that even was done. then we hung out and finally got ready for the relay. janet first, then me, lauren and then sarah! so fun! the races were all a ton of fun. it was great to see everyone race and to cheer for everyone and to see them swim! it was also very cool to see the fast swimmers swim and to see how different they look in the water. results came out and i got ribbons for each of my events in m age group:
500 free: 3rd! (and last!)
50 back: 4th! (and last!)
200 free relay: 4th! (and last!)
but really i was super excited regardless because it was something new and exciting to try and it was totally out of my comfort zone. i'd almost like to do another one!
plus i wore one of my fun splish suits and got a ton of compliments on it!
and then i came home, and ran almost 10 miles.
and went to work the next day. but then slept for 11 hours. :)
other exciting things:
i went to SF for the annual Team LUNA Chix Summit. I went a night early and hung out with Allie which was super fun as always. i didn't tell her, but as I was laying there in bed in the morning, i thought that i'd like to just stay there with her the rest of the weekend because she is a ton of fun. i love her perspective on things and i just totally love everything about her! and it was fun to wake up to her little boy so excited to see me!
the rest of the weekend was good, as all LUNA summits are! we got to hang out with all my LUNA teammates, even realizing that both Olga and I were in Morocco for new years 1999 - 2000. we got to hang out with the LUNA pros, too. they are all so friendly and so willing to answer any question we can think of.
what else? time is flying!!!

bathroom break

2011-03-13T23:10:00.000-07:00

It 11 at night and I am sitting in the bathroom on the edge of the tub totally awake. Dude, even though 11 is the new 10 today, I should be at least a little bit tired! The 1:30 run with hill repeats in the down pour? The hour of jumping rope and lifting weights? Why aren't those kicking in yet? Or what about the glass of wine? That should help, right?
Looking back at my day I'm now wondering could it be the two clif shots during the run, each with caffiene? I'm wondering what kind of shots I've been using the previous two weekends since I haven't had this problem in forever. Could it be the venti iced decalf americano that I had after the gym but double checked with them to make sure it was indeed decaf? I haven't had sleep issues with that in the past. Or could it be the brownie, ok 4 brownies I had after dinner? All I know is it better get it's act together real soon because work in the morning is going to get here pretty darn soon.
But in the mean time, the weekend was good, a long swim that included 2x800 neither of which did I beg to be over while doing although I did get kicked in the chest by the old man doing breast stroke kick with a kick board in the lane next to me and wow there were a lot of snorkels in the pool that day. But after was a fun 2hr trainer workout with Leslie and Amy in the garage while watching JackAss and Nip/Tuck. It was quite fun, I hope they will join me again! and then the fun long run in the wind/rain through the flooding and all the hill repeats with Leslie, Heather and Melinda! So happy to have the company on that run, not sure it would have been so sucessful on my own.
But gosh darn it! I want to go to sleep. But I did go shopping on Saturday and although I did pass on the lack sequin short shorts that I know I will someday regret not buying, I did buy a tube top! Can't wait to wear it, might need a 2nd one as I have already planned it out with at least 400 combos with my current wardrobe, of course all paired with and covered by my black puffy coat because it is too damn cold all
the damn time.
ps this entire post had been done on my phone, I am wondering if it will actually publish correctly!

dude, oh so tired

2011-03-07T20:24:00.001-08:00

its monday. the end of monday. the end of monday is better than the beginning of monday, even better than the end of sunday. but i'm still tired.
i'm getting a tan. right now. on the couch at 8:25 pm. mmmm, it smells good. hoping i don't get tan hands, too.
last night i didn't sleep very well. i was cold! burr! and every time i rolled to get warm i got super uncomfortable. hoping i am warmer tonight because i want to be well rested for my 3000yd swim tomorrow. yikes! 3000yds is a lot for me. a lot. and a run tomorrow, too. but i'm taking it easy on my run tomorrow so i can run extra hard on wednesday before i pump some serious iron. what? and jump rope for 10 minutes.
the weekend was really good. lots of workouts, in the sun! not the warm, but beggars can't be choosers. we rode out to the sultan bakery which was fantastic other than the hills. we saw 3 bald eagles, pretty sure two of them were trying to get it on, too. unless they were fighting? but do they do it in the air? if so, still don't know if they were getting it on or fighting, but 3 of them! how cool is that? and a crazy flat rainbow.
and i don't know how i feel about the kids, stepping outside when its 48 degrees and partly sunny and exclaiming "wow! it's so warm out!"

my kids love me, reall they do

2011-03-03T19:30:00.000-08:00

first off, i have tendonitis in my ass and its eric's fault!!

i went to PT today for my back. its feeling better, more like just tight than injured so we are making progress, although she said i wasn't actually injured so much before in my back anyway, just tight. my right ass was sore, she took a feel and was just like, yeah, you've got some tendonitis in there. i was like, what? she says it could even be from just how i always sleep on my right side, hence, why its eric's fault. i sleep on my right side so he will stop breathing in my face while we sleep. and yet another case of sleep related injuries.

which brings me to our romantic evening last night! some people do couples massages, we do couples body fat testing! oooh, so fun! i've gone twice but i am feeling waay fat these days so i said i needed a follow up. and eric agreed to come with me! and bring the kids along, too. why not. so i went first and my fat wasn't nearly as bad as i thought it was going to be. but all those hershey chocolate nuggets with almonds are certainly not going unnoticed. after we went to the cactus and man, the whole family was famished. went through two servings of chips and salsa and everyone cleaned their plates in record time. nice one.

but as i was getting ready to get into the dunk tank, sirus said "this is good because mommy doesn't ever take baths". nice one. this was only a little better than the conversation we all had only a day or two before:
Sirus: some people have hair growing out of their arm pits.
Seamus: yeah! like mommy!
Me: what about daddy?
Sirus: no.
HEY YOU KIDS!!! I AM A SWIMMER! Leave me and my hairy arm pits alone!!

not much but lots

2011-02-25T20:43:00.000-08:00

i've been unmotivated to post anything. i've been training quite a bit, i've had a few really good weeks, one kind of crappy week, another good week and now on a rest week. beginning of the month i went to the pt for my ass, and this was my diagnosis:
L5/S1 facet joint inflammation with weakness in that nerve distribution, left posterior pelvic rotation, adductor magnus and piriformis strain, and sacrotuberous ligament sprain secondary to muscular strain.
so what sucks about this is that was feb 2, and my back still hurts. the periformis stuff is fine, just gotta really stretch it really well and it seems ok, but the back stuff blows. no pain or discomfort AT ALL running or biking, some sorta while swimming which seems odd to me and then mostly just after i have been sitting at my desk for any period of time. i've been going to PT every week and it isn't really getting better. not worse, a little different maybe and but not better. wtf.
AND then, my wrist is totally fawked again. same level of pain and discomfort than before. maybe even more. i have to go back to the surgeon and get it figured out. i told the pt that i was pretty sure the wrist and back were related. she wasn't so sure about that.
i'm trying to be a little healthier. lunch at work has been big spinach salads, with snacks of carrots, apples, grapes and bananas and stuff. and ok, the daily trip to the candy dish. ok, sometimes twice daily trip. grrr. i haven't broken myself of that, but trying. and i have found chia seeds! allie suggested them to me and i love them! i want to eat them all the time, totally trying to figure out what i can mix them into - can i put them on my peanut butter and jelly sandwich? can i accidentally OD on them? i do love them.
i have worn the black skinny jeans/pants a few times and love them. i wore them with my old lady, sensible healed tall boots. i asked the PT if the boots could have caused the back problem since i wore them for the first time around the onset, she said probably not since the heel is sooooo low. and i finally got new clogs! i am keeping the old one as my gardening, mud clogs and the new ones are my work / dress up clogs. the stitching was starting to go, the soles had worn down, and there were big giant holes, which i didn't think was possible, but the new ones feel so good! i know - super exciting news, huh?
the kids have been good, cute as always. sirus is so funny and sweet. he says the funniest things and his reading is coming along. he is super excited about learning and does such a great job. seamus is really into fairies, all her books are about fairies and she draws them non stop. i love her drawings, so much detail and so cute. they remind me of what i used to draw when i was little, i try to save them all!

more compliments that aren't really

2011-02-02T15:36:00.000-08:00

i went to the PT today because my left sit bone has been bothering me and my lower back a little, too.
while she was digging into my arse muscles she said "we have to get rid of some of this muscle tone." to which i said - WHAT?? she said "you have too much tone" to which i said "that's what i want for my arse!" and she said "oh, but sometimes there is bad muscle tone and that is what we need to get rid of." Had she started with "you have too much tone" i would have most certainly replied with "thank you."
I did go on to tell her about my other recent compliments though.
i found out that not only is my arse too toned for my own good, my left big toe is very much weaker than my right big toe. who knew, but apparently its actually related to my super toned arse.

big day!

2011-01-30T16:01:00.000-08:00

yesterday was a big day! not only did i sleep for 11 hours of uninterrupted awesomeness, i got a new dress that has pterodactyls on it, a couple sequins, too! cannot wait to wear it. i saw the dress a few weeks ago, maybe even a month or more, i can't remember when i was downtown with the option of window shopping, but i saw it and ooh and ahhed over it. then yesterday i was headed in for a haircut, the first in over a year, the 2nd in over 2 years. i had 20 minutes, so i checked on my phone to see if the dress was even still potentially available. and yes it was! and it was on sale! so i boogied on over there, the girl came up and asked if she could help me, she was wearing the dress so i said, i have come to get that dress! they don't hold items, so i had to try it on super fast, totally loved it, found out that not only was it on sale but it was an additional 60% off the sale price - HOORAY! so bam - i'll totally take it.
off to get my hair cut! love love love the guy that cuts my hair, awesomest haircutter in the world, although he spent prolly a 1/2 hr or more blow drying it, and then he did some awesome fantasy curls and it looked amazingly lovely! and then i went out in the rain. i continued to do some shopping along, not really looking for anything in particular but wound up taking the leap and getting a pair of black skinny pants. it was scary but its time. until i was heading home and walked through the juniors department at nordstrom and found some even better black skinny jean things for way less! so today i had to go take the other ones back.
friday tow of my gfs were so nice as to take me to costco to get some very important training aides! both are protein related and the body builder guy that was there sampling out some mystery bar called Diabetes or something was chatting me up all about the 6lbs of protein. he was nice, and actually i should have asked him more about it, but sushi was waiting!! should be interesting, but better not get huge, i just bought new pants - they better still fit at the end of the summer.
friday eric and the kids made the trip to go pick up my NEW BIKE! he spent all weekend putting it together since it came in the most tiniest pieces imaginable, but it looks awesome fast AND i rode it for a bit on the trainer. hooray! sooo exciting!
today took a ride around the lake with 9 of the girls! it was cold, hovering at just about 40, but there were a few peaks of sun and no rain! it was a good day, but now i am tired and want to take a nap but along with my bike brought home a bunch of the grandparent's neighbor's cow, so that is what's for dinner.

compliments that aren't really

2011-01-24T17:59:00.000-08:00

lots going on, big changes already made and more coming. a good start to the season, training has kicked in and heading into my first rest week.
today i took the day off from work. i was supposed to have "surgery" today. i was pretty stressed out about it, not knowing exactly how much it might hurt and goodness, what all could possibly go wrong. after taking all the medicines yesterday and all the medicines this morning before heading over and then getting a shot in my ass (i asked her which ass, she said whichever, so i picked my right ass since my left was kind of sore from running yesterday) and then taking some vicodin, i was ready to go. they left me in the procedure room for a while, so i spent the time looking on my iPhone for a 5k to do next weekend. then all the medicines starting to really work and i HAD to lay down. i was feeling pretty darn good. they came in to get started and i was just like, i had to lay down. they laughed and when i tried to sit up they said to just keep laying there. then things got started, one quick look and ya know what, no "surgery" needed after all. hooray. i still wound up with 3 shots of local anesthetic, a couple more shots of some other stuff that despite all the pain stuff already hurt like a mothrafarker and then bam, procedure done and more just laying there.
eventually i was totally done, eric and sirus picked me up, and we headed home. i was feeling so "good" and the weather seemed really nice down town that i kept telling eric that we should hang out and do something. instead we stopped at starbucks for a tall, xtra hot, non-fat, with whip, salted caramel hot chocolate and went home. i tried to read a magazine but instead fell asleep for a good 5hrs! it reminded me of when eric had his lasik's done. i was super pregnant, like seamus was born only a few weeks later, it was so tramatic that while eric was getting his eyes done, the nurse came out to check on me because she said i didn't look so good. i wasn't that is for sure. but on the drive home eric was a super chatty cathy talking about it all, this, that the other and whatever and he didn't think the valium they gave him was working and then bam, he totally fell asleep almost instantly. i got up from sleeping just as eric was finishing dinner which was fantastic since i had only a small breakfast and the hot chocolate earlier in the day. 3 pork chops and 2 huge servings of mashed potatoes later, i am wondering where the cookies are and wondering if it would be ok to drink a beer.
when i was at the doctors he had to press on my abdomen, looking for something, just pushing around and whatever. he told me i needed to relax because he couldn't feel anyhing since my ab muscles were so strong. hooray! seamus's doctor said the same thing about her when she was probably 2, which is kind of funny, too. i took it as a compliment, same as when i got a bike fit and the guy said, well you have really narrow hips, to which i interrupted with thank you!!! he just looked at me like i was crazy. but dude, i don't care, it was a total compliment!! its not every day you get to hear you had strong abs or narrow hips, so i will take it when i can get it!

uninspired

2011-01-17T19:46:00.000-08:00

dude, a lot has been going on but i have be uber uninspired to discuss any of it. could it be because my training has picked up again and all i want to do is eat ice cream, drink beer and stare off into nothingness? or is that because not only did i read twilight but i actually watched the movie?
last week sometime i came home from work and eric had set my bike up on the trainer. he also said he put in a movie for me, that it was a surprise! i couldn't wait to find out what it was and i was super excited to see that it was twilight. i take back all the things i have said about kristen stewart and how i think she doesn't look very smart. ok, so in still photos, i must admit that i still think that, she looks terrible and not smart, but i really liked her in the movie, she was very cute and likeable. but after about 30 minutes on the trainer, eric let me know what he was up to. he had some news he wanted to break to me and was just trying to butter me up. there i was pedaling along, maybe even with only one leg and he gave it to me - he got his own REI membership. what? after all these years togeher and 9 years (tomorrow!) of marriage and NOW he decides he wants his OWN REI membership? i didn't really know what to do at that point.
other news - i'm getting a tri bike! whoa! scary, i know.
and we are trying really hard to not get another cat.
and i've been swimming and actually liking it again but i am slower than ever! sl-o-w.
and i got new cold weather riding gloves - horray!

where does peperoni muscle come from?

2011-01-07T20:22:00.000-08:00

lots? going on. back at work after a few weeks off for the holidays. it was glorious! plus it was great to get in some exercise every day, even heading out for some mtn biking in the snow and 19 degrees - burr!! my water bottle had ice in it by the time we were done.
for new years the kids went to grandmas and eric and i realized we are boring. we had no idea what to do withour selves. so we went to a fancy bar down town. i had to keep my puffy coat on the whole time despite being somewhat warm, which is unusual, but i had to keep it on because yes, i left the house with the top half of my house uniform hidden under my coat and i didn't want to expose that to the fancy bar. we had a few drinks, some totally delish fries with blue cheese fondue and then headed home to get dressed to go out for dinner. i was psyched to wear my new snakeskin print pants and tall boots, and have the fantasy hair out in full glory. unfortunatly the resturant was FREEZING, but the food was good and we had a great time despite there being no hard liquor there (WTF???) and we were forced to drink wine instead. we were home before the new year hit, and actually missed it. we were awake at least this time, but missed it and were like, oh, ok.
monday i went back to work, and it was good. the whole week went quickly, and I got back on the training horse. i did some swimming, concentrating on the drills i learned over the break, lifted some weights, skipped some rope - and OMG that is really hard and wow, its a good way to tell where you have extra fat on yer body. :( now I know. i did some running on the treadmill, even some in just my socks. that was interesting. then i did some other things and then finished up with work and blah blah blah and stuff and stuff.
on to sirus. he is so sweet. he is a funny silly little boy. when he was packing to go to grandmas i asked him if he was going to take his bear Sirus Wirus. He said that daddy said he could only take one toy and he wanted to take his new sack person. i told him he could take the sack person and Sirus Wirus, and he said no. I asked wouldn't he get lonely without Sirus Wirus? And he said no, I will hold his memory in my heart.
this morning we had an interesting conversation. eric made the kids ham and eggs for breakfast. sirus started to get upset because seamus told him that the ham was really muscle. he said no it wasn't and well, yes it is. then we had to tell him that that is what meat is. and he got really upset, and on the verge of tears and said what? meat is muscle? and just on and on, oh no! so we had to explain where all the meat came from, and, wow, hot dogs and chicken nuggets are muscle, too (sorta). he was not pleased.

Tom Cruise

2010-12-31T09:37:00.000-08:00

oh i hate him. i hate him i hate him i hate him! he totally grosses me out and i think he is the worst!!! but we watched Knight and Day yesterday and it was really pretty good. he was funny, and cute (OMG, i i almost threw up right when i typed that) and the movie was entertaining. we saw the previews for it a while back and though it might be pretty good except for gag Tom Cruise gag, but, ugh, it was good, better than expected even. i'm not really a fan of Cameron Diaz either. Like, i think she is the worst part of Shrek, but i can tolerate her and she doesn't make me sick the way Tom Cruise does, but gosh darn it, it was entertaining and i'd suggest putting it in your queue if yer looking for something entertaining.

other news - its the last day of 2010. Wow! that's kind of crazy! i am not going to dedicate the last post of 2010 to just Tom Cruise. Instead, we are trying to figure out our plan for 2011. I've got some exciting plans coming up for the new year as far as training and racing go. can anyone say "tri bike"? oooh!! scary but exciting, and oh so pretty! new mtn bike on the horizon, too! eric got two new bikes last year, and it looks like 2011 will be the year of new bikes for me! i've got xterra worlds on the books again for 2011, only this year eric isn't so sure he is going to come with me, so it might turn into a girls trip! but i think he should come! why would he be so silly as to pass up a week in the sun and on the beach! seamus is turning 7 in feb - yikes! that is coming waaaay to quickly. the two of those kids are so cute - sirus gave me big hugs last night right before i tucked him into bed and he told me he loves me more than anything. apparently i'm ok even if i am bossy!

eric took the kids out sledding this morning. every morning around 8 - can we go sledding??? so we bundle them up and eric take them out. they love it!

i took the 2nd Bar Method class. it was much better than the first. found out that if i get higher on my toes i don't shake as much - hooray! - and then the whole building doesn't shake. this instructor seemed to incorporate a bit more ballet into the mix, too. not a ton by any means, but more. makes me think screw yoga or this class, i should take ballet again to work on core and flexibility. i remember i had a rock solid arse when i was doing all those plies and crap back in the day - chiseled man's ass. gonna have to check into that. just looked it up and wow - there are a lot of offerings locally. will i have to wear a leotard? can i wear a biketard instead?

yesterday we swam - i tried to do some drills and concentrate on everything i learned on tuesday. seemed ok. then i ran for 30 minutes on the treadmill. i was flying along, i felt good and wasn't even working and was pushing a good pace. and gosh darn it, Inception was on the big screen and i hate Leonardo Decaprio right up there with Tom Cruise but ugh, he's aging quite nicely i have to admit.

Happy New Year!!

criss cross apple sauce

2010-12-28T20:01:00.000-08:00

so back when i was a kid, it was called indian style, but now that is not pc. we heard a new variation today, criss cross apple sauce, put your hands in the spaghetti sauce. gracious, kids these days.
we are still all missing pawpi very much, but she is now back with us in a little box on a shelf in the family room. and what was super nice was that the emergency clinic sent us a hand written note expressing their sympathies and then a few days later we received on from the vet clinic in west seattle that did her surgeries and got her well back in july. when i saw the return address on that card, i almost didn't open it because i was worried it was a holiday card, but it was a sympathy card, with a bunch of hand written notes from the vets and vets assistants there. i didn't realize they did that and i thought it was a very nice gesture. we're just not sure how they found out.
i think nadj knows what happened. she has been very sweet and is spending more and more time with me and eric. she even goes into the kids rooms, not sure if she is looking for pawpi, or what the deal is, but something is definitly going on with her.
other news, i have been enjoying my time off from work. oh how wonderful it has been! i have cleaned the house over and over, and have helped with laundry, made the beds every day and making lunch and all kinds of things!
i've even gone swimming a few times, been running a few times and been on the trainer a bit. our DVD player stopped working a week or two a go, so only basic cable tv while on the trainer, unless we take the computer out there, which i have been, which has allowed me to watch Lord of the Rings... again. wow, i don't know how many times i've actually watched that movie, but Sam annoys me in the way he calls frodo, Mr Frodo, and Frodo just annoys the hell out of me, he is so damn lame, and then good gracious, how can Legolas Greenleaf be sooooo much cuter and cooler than Will Turner?? Although Greenleaf is a pretty funny, last name, seems more fitting for a fairy rather than an elf. dude, he walked on snow! but another thing i noticed with the movie, is that once again, i found out that i didn't remember any of it!! makes me wonder what the other two are about, since i've seen them both but can't remember a damn thing, other than the trees fight back. i do know the last one, i think went on and on and on and on. maybe it was the 2nd one, but i know i was super pregnant with seamus and it just went on and on, and every time it was over, it kept going!!
other stuff, i went and had some swim technique work done today which was incredibly helpful AND got my fancy mavic road shoes finally fitted. i've had them for almost a year but stopped wearing them right before the onionman since they didn't feel right and then never put them back on after I got hurt. but today, i think we got them figured out and i'm pretty excited. i also found out i have a pretty smooth pedal stroke which i was happy to hear! Hooray!
tomorrow i am headed to my 2nd and last Bar Method class. good grief. last week i did it and it about killed me. i was sore for days after - DAYS. here's hoping this week is better.
OH! and we had xmas! it was very fun! the kids were great and happy with their presents, and eric liked his lederhosen! sirus was very funny when he noticed that eric and my stockings really didn't have very much in them. he very casually said, as he was walking into the other room, oh, santa must have not left you very much because you are so bossy. nice. and we had a lovely xmas dinner with grandma, xtie and jon, and jon' mom and we used grandma's beautiful china that i have loved since i was a little girl! it was a perfect day!

what happened

2010-12-19T07:52:00.000-08:00

after eric got to the cat ER and pawpi was looked at he gave me a call. she weighed 4.4 pounds and her temperature was 96, when it should have been closer to 100. they did some blood work and when the results came back, apparently complete kidney failure is a 10 and she was a 9.9. pawpi was very very sick. the vet said she could stay the 3 days through the weekend, she would need constant attention and be pumped full of IVs and medicine. they would test her again on Monday and see if there was any improvement. if there was, and if she was well enough to come home, which they were not optimistic about, we would need to give her daily injections of fluids, and bunches of medicines because not only were her kidneys in bad shape, but her thyroid was going too. eric said that every time he would say "year" the vet would correct him and say "month". so eric called me, i cried and cried and cried but we decided it was time. poor poor pawpi, she was so so sick. i knew when we were packing her up to go that night that she wasn't coming back, i knew she was dying. i also knew that if we didn't take her in she likely wouldn't last through the night. eric was with her, he cuddled her, petted her, gave her kisses. then he called me again and i cried and cried some more. i cried the entire time until he got home around 2am and then cried some more, all the way until around 3am when i finally was able to fall asleep.
we decided we weren't going to tell the kids in the morning and then send seamus off to school. we didn't think that was a good idea, but if sirus asked during the day where she was, eric was going to tell him. but he didn't ask. later we had my company holiday party and decided when we got home it was too late to tell them and we would wait until the next day.
saturday morning we sat the kids down and told them what happened. seamus instantly understood and instantly sobbed. sirus looked confused and asked if that meant she wasn't coming home, and then he began to cry, too. we all cuddled and talked about it. seamus asked a lot of questions like how she got sick and what the vet was going to do with her. we told them she would be cremated and turned to ashes, and we will put her little box on the mantle and how she will always be with us. sirus said, ok, so she will be here but we just won't be able to pet her. apparently he didn't totally understand because later in the car seamus was crying and he asked her why. sirus then told me that seamus was crying because she thought pawpi had died. i had to tell him pretty directly that that was what happened. and he cried again, too. he had said earlier how we would miss pawpi but we still had nadj and seamus mccat. even later when seamus was crying again, he tried to comfort her by telling her that it was the normal life cycle, just like the salmon - the salmon lay their eggs, then they die. the eggs turn into fry, the fry turn into fish, then they lay their eggs and it goes on and on. it was pretty cute to listen to a 5 year old try to comfort his older sister like that.
it had already been a rough day, but we headed out, to get some shopping done and to just get out of the house. we went to bellevue square, and much to my surprise, many of the stores were having better sales than last week, so we stopped in a few and got some really great price adjustments.
then we went to the play area. its an indoor play area with a cushy floor and there is a ferry boat and a sand castle and a bunch of other shinny, slippery, slightly squishy things for the kids to climb on. its generally a mad house there, and yesterday was no different. i let the kids play for almost 40 minutes when i started the 5 minute count down. with 2 minutes to go, i saw a woman carrying sirus towards me, with seamus trailing behind. sirus was covered in blood - OMG - what happened? The woman said she didn't see, sirus was too upset to say anything. because he was so upset i knew it wasn't just a normal, no reason bloody nose, but i couldn't tell where the blood was coming from - nose, mouth, where? what happened? so i thanked the lady, picked sirus up and grabbed seamus and we headed out, blood gushing the entire time! we saw mall security and they took us into the mall security lair. he got the first aid kit, asked if i wanted them to call 911 and then i cleaned sirus up. while i was cleaning him, trying to find out what happened, seamus stepped up and told me that she accidentally kicked him in the face. i was proud of her for telling the truth and told her how very important it is to always tell the truth because when someone is hurt its very important for grownups to know what happened so they know how to help the hurt person. i was very proud of her because i am sure she was scared she was going to get in trouble. eventually the bleeding stopped and we headed back to the play area to get the kids shoes and then to finish up what we needed to do and go home. the lady who had helped came over and we talked a little, she said that at first, seamus was trying to pick sirus up and carry him to me, which is very sweet of her, and explains why seamus's dress was covered in blood. i was wearing my black puffy jacket and seemed like i was clean, but it was awkward walking through the mall with two kids with blood all over their clothes. :(
we made a quick stop at starbucks for some hot chocolates, and then sirus sneezed and a big deep red bloody snot rocket shot down all the way to his chin! i gasped in horror and quickly cleaned him up! then we stopped in one last store at the mall and headed to fred meyer. we got our business done there and headed home. only then did i finally go into the bathroom and look in the mirror and see that i had blood splattered ALL OVER MY FACE!!! OMG, dude, walking around, holding two bloody kids hands, with my face totally splattered, we must have been a sight, and WTF, why didn't anyone tell me????
around 4pm, seamus came to give me hugs and said, mommy it feels like its night time. she had a rough day, that is for sure.

ER

2010-12-16T22:49:00.000-08:00

we spent the evening watching Scott Pilgrem vs the World. It was quite entertaining, not at all what i expected. i'd recommend it to anyone wanting a kind of funny movie that isn't going to be what they expect, unless of course you already know about it. we also watched From Paris with Love. I liked this movie too. Eric kept saying we got it from netflix and that we should watch it but i kept thinking it was a romantic comedy because he does like the rom-coms, but finally i was like, ok, lets watch it and it was good! not a rom-com at all. highly entertaining.
we watched the Wizard of Oz with the kids yesterday. It was the first time they had seen it. sirus was all pist because he wanted to play a video game but no, mom and dad are so mean we made him watch the wizard of oz! he moaned and groaned that it was in black and white, then started freaking out when the tornado came but then laughed as soon as the house lifted up into the air and everything was flying by her window. and when she opened the door and everything was in color he gasped! it was quite cute. he did not like the munchkins at all, and although both kids sat there glued to the screen the entire time, not looking away for even a moment, after it was done, sirus said it was only ok. he said he liked the girl but that was about it.
so tonight we watched the movie and after as we were heading to bed we noticed pawpi just sitting there in the hall way, staring at eric's shoes. this is common behavior for her, so it wasn't that alarming, but eric made the comment that she was looking quite thin, and usually she at least looks around if we call her name or walk by, but she was just staring. he petted her some, her back legs slipped from under her and she just left them there, all spread out to the sides. after a while she worked really hard to pull them back up under her. she walked a few steps and clearly something wasn't right with her hips and legs. we got down on our hands and knees, and saw that her nose was bleeding. not gushing, but there was blood there and it looked like her nose collapsed on the one side. just like even though she is so puffy we were able to tell when her cheek was swollen, this time, even though her face is squished, we could tell something was wrong with her nose.
so even though its late, eric called the emergency vets clinic and is taking her there right now. there is no way we could have gone to sleep knowing she is not right like that. something is terribly wrong.

pineapple express

2010-12-12T08:35:00.000-08:00

dude i was so mad that i actually thought that movie was kind of funny.

but we are having one right now! rain rain and MORE rain. apparently pineapple express is a real weather phenomenon but really here in the PNW anything weather related is blown way out of proportion by the new stations an given silly names.

the after effects of the shot seem to now be wearing off but the discomfort and pain that the shot caused was alarming. "flipping the pancake" and "scrubbing the kitty puke out of the carpet" both caused pain yesterday when in the past both were ok. this morning "flipping the french toast" is still a bit of a concern and typing is actually bothering me for the first time. i haven't yet tested the actual injury itself but think baking a pie might be necessary soon to test it out. i wore the wrist brace on the trainer last night which i don't ever do but the brace just feels good and so i did it and it kept my wrist in line and it all worked out. i'm keeping the spiderman band aides on the injection site although i am pretty sure i can go without them by now.
other news, i have a new way of testing out my swimming fitness without actually getting into the pool! hooray. sort of. i have determined that i have at least two dressy dress up dresses that if i am in good swimming shape i can get them up over my ass but cannot zip them up the back. if i am not in swimming shape, they can still get up over my ass but i CAN zip them up. currently both of these dresses can be zipped up. that means i better get my ass in the pool ASAP!!! but i might wait until after the holiday party i am going to next weekend, so i can wear one of the dresses!

omg

2010-12-10T19:20:00.000-08:00

NOW the pain is setting in. WTF! dude, if it had been hurting this bad all along i would have totally gone to the doctors waaaay sooner. this is no good.

today i got a manicure

2010-12-10T16:29:00.000-08:00

not really, but it sure looked like i was going to get one.
i went to the hand surgeon. i was nervous about going, i was pretty confident that i would not be needing surgery but at the same time, i didn't know what to expect. on the intake form it asked me how far i could comfortably walk. i didn't know what to put down, i almost wrote that I knew I could comfortably run 13miles but instead i just put in 20??? wondering what that had to do with hands.
the exam room looked just like a nail salon. it had one of those little nail salon tables with a stool on one side and a chair on the other for me. there was a little lamp on it and then a bunch of liquids and crap over where the manicure peeps keep all their liquids and crap. weird!
as i sat there i heard the same weird suctioning noise i had heard when i was getting the MRI. after a bit, there was all the super loud banging and clanging from the other parts of the MRI. turns out there is an MRI place right next door which made me wondering if i was being exposed to something that maybe i didn't want to be.
the doctor came in, i sorta expected him to shake hands but he didn't but maybe since he is a hand doctor that doesn't work out so well a lot of times so he just doesn't do it.
he started doing the exam and writing a ton of stuff. i told him the whole history of it all and tried to lighten the mood by telling him that although a life without push ups would be bearable, a life without pie would not be, since making pie crust hurts. he didn't comment or react. he left the room a few times and came back, he looked at the MRI stuff somewhere else, he grabbed the grabber mesurer and had me squeeze it with both hands, he left the room. he came back and moved my bones around and stuff. then he left and got a hand skeleton. he said, this is where the torn cartilage is, this is where the cyst is and this is where the pain is. none of it is near the other. sweet. he said there are two bones that in some people are fused but for me are not and he suspects they are smashing into each other. so he said he'd toss a cortisone shot in there and have me come back in 4 weeks.
so he left the room and i started to worry about this shot. in my joint. in my hand. and OMG it is going to hurt because he is going to dig around in there with the giant needle and omg its going to be terrible. i started to sweat and feel a little not good. then the nurse came in and started prepping everything, the sterile gloves, the alcohol wipe, the bandaide, the syringes!! i asked her how much it was going to hurt and she didn't say, but the after affects can hurt more than the injury itself, at least for a while. it depends on the person, blah blah blah but some people it really really hurts. she left.
i rested my head on my left hand which was sweating profusely, with my hurt wrist sitting on the manicure table. and just waited.
the doctor came back and got to work. i felt one stick which was for the numbing stuff. that didn't hurt much at all. then i felt that he was putting in another one. next thing i know he was like ok see you in 4 weeks. what? that was it? that was easy! nothing to it. i assumed the numbing stuff would be like the dentist where they stick you over and over a hundred times, but nope. totally easy. makes me wonder how bad the cortisone shot would have hurt with no numbing stuff? i was so over joyed with the lack of pain that i almost told the receptionist about how awesome it was. then i assumed she probably either knew it really wasn't a big deal or really just didn't care so i kept it to myself. but wow, i was really happy. now to wait if its going to start hurting during the next 48 hrs and also to see if the shot possibly cures the whole thing for good!

M to the R to the I

2010-12-03T18:59:00.000-08:00

i went for an xray on my wrist the other day. the people are so funny. they just look at me and are like, whats wrong with you? i tell them my wrist hurts and then they just look at me funny. i wonder if its because when i go in for stuff i am walking and talking? there was the time eric tried to kill me by feeding me salmon that still had bones in it. i was 8 weeks pregnant with sirus and there i was eating this amazing salmon when i totally started choking. it was terrible. i remember gagging and gagging and eric just sitting there, not even paying attention. i went into the bathroom because i was sure i was going to puke but instead i just gagged and gagged and my eyes were burning and watering and my mascara was all down my face. finally i composed myself a bit and asked eric to keep an eye on me all night, ya know, in case i died. in the morning a friend at work convinced me to call the doctor who told me to go to the ER right away, so I did. they did that horrible horrible thing where they shove the scope up yer nose and down yer throat but they couldn't see anything. even tho i was all preggo they did an xray which turned out to be an adventure. the girl doing it was new or something and someone said to double me up on lead barriers since i was pregnant, so i had on the normal apron like thing then she took this lead sheet like thing and rolled me up in it all burrito style. when the first person came back, they were just like, oh, ok, i guess that will work. anyway, they went on to take a billion xrays because the lady kept putting in slides that had no film in them or something like that. and once the ER doctor took a look at the xrays he came rushing in, OMG how are you not just screaming in pain! you have a 2 inch bone vertically wedged in your throat, OMG, why can't we see it? so they called in the ENT doctor to take a look. everyone who came into check on me was just like WTF, you have a fishbone stuck in your throat and yer just hanging out? so the ENT doctor and i looked at the xray together, he made a funny face and then i said - that's not a bone! that is my retainer! but then he found the bone on the xray, they took it back to the radiologist to confirm and then yeah, it was small, but it was stuck in there. the ENT dr insisted on putting the damn scope up my nose again but then they put me under general anethetic and went in to get the bone out. but alas, it wasn't there! they saw where it had been but it was gone by the time all was said and done. when i was getting prepped to go in for "surgery" i asked if i could keep my clothes on. they said sure, and i told them while i was starting to get all happy that i was going to be really pissed if i didn't have my pants on when i woke up. sure enough when i was being wheeled into recovery and was starting to wake up i heard one of the nurses ask "why does she have pants on?" people coming out of "surgery" and general anesthetic, normally don't have on pants i guess. i won't even go into how eric went to the wrong hospital when he came to pick me up and wound up driving all over the place in the middle of the night or how he always has to one up me.
so on friday i went in for an MRI on my hand. the people were nice but at the same time, totally like what's wrong with you? dude, my wrist really hurts! really it does. i haven't ever had an MRI so it was a little exciting but scary, too. i got to wear all my normal clothes but had to take off all of my jewels and assure them any lotions or makeup did not have any silver in it. i had to wear ear plugs, and lay on my stomach with my hand above my head. then in went my hand and head! dude, it was really freaking loud and would get louder and then louder at times, too. and it kept going on and on. what i don't understand is why does something that is so amazingly high tech live in a room that looks like a storage closet and why can't they make it not so loud? really, what is all that noise about?
on monday i got an email from my doctor with the results - a tear in the cartilage and a cyst all up in there somewhere. along with this was a referral to a hang surgeon. yikes! no me gusta! so of course i started doing all kinds of research on the things that were wrong and saw all kinds of horrible horrible photos and read many horrible stories about botched surgeries and such. so not cool!
so on friday i'll go see what is up with all of that. yikes!!!

Seattle 1/2 Marathon 2010

2010-11-28T16:21:00.000-08:00

this week has been interesting. to start off, the "big" snow storm on sunday and monday caused the short work week to be more disruptive than normal. it was fine, i got a lot of work done, but now, with work looming again on the horizon, i wish i would have gotten more done.
wednesday night we headed to yakima to spend with the in laws. the drive was fine although dark and a little scary because of the snow, and it took a really really long time. once there we discovered that it was very very cold in yakima.
when i finally crawled into bed i realized i forgot my romance killer, damnit. i know all you ladies wish you had one, and ugh, i forgot mine. really, the romance killer is just a mouth guard to help with my jaw clenching i do at night time, but eric named it that because he knows that once it goes in at night, he doesn't have a chance in the world.
luckily i was able to fall asleep without it but slept terrible and wow, i really do clench my jaw when i sleep because when i woke up, my face hurt, and my neck and shoulders were killing me. ugh. the last time i did the seattle 1/2 I had just been diagnosed with too much romance and was prescribed the romance killer and was taking muscle relaxers because i was in so much pain!
on thanksgiving day we went for what was supposed to be a 30 minute tempo run. we headed out on a loop that turned out to be a 40 minute tempo run + 15 minute walk in the snow and freaking 14 degrees. burr. i had on some fancy hincapie gear that kept me toasty warm which was pleasant but running all geared up and in the snow is hard to do. it made me worry a bit for the race, although the website assured me that the weather would be nice.
after the run we went sledding some with the kids, ate way too much turkey and pie and then chilled out.
another night with no romance killer and in the morning we headed back home.
the passes were scary but clear, ok, not clear but the roads weren't bad. ok, they were bad but not un-driveable. it was crazy to see all the semi trucks on the side of the road putting in their chains. we managed without them but i was happy to be on the west side where the roads were just wet, not covered in snow.
we drove directly downtown to pick up my race packet and then headed home.
i don't know how eric does it but as i sat on my ass, he went right to work finishing painting sirus's room and installing the remaining trim work on the windows. have i mentioned lately how awesome the windows look? seamus's very pink room is very cute! and sirus's very blue rooms look great! no one is totally moved in yet, i think sirus is in for one more night sleeping in seamus's room. he keeps complaining that she keeps crawling in his bed with him but then last night when i went to check on them, he was in her bed all snuggled up next to her in her bed. silly.
when the alarm went off at 5, i was thinking hmm, it wouldn't be too bad to just bail on this race, right? maybe i'll just go pick up melinda, drop her off at the start and then pick her up after, letting eric and the kids sleep in and allowing myself to not run. i had prepped for this race a little differently in that i wanted to start out hydrated. i think i have been very dehydrated lately so i made sure to get lots of water the day before. i wound up pretty darn bloated in the morning, but maybe that is what hydrated feels like? ugh.
there was almost zero traffic and we got a parking space like a block away. then we sat there. eric and seamus walked over to the start, then eric and sirus took a trip to the potty. i decided to switch from long sleeve running shirt and light weight cycling jacket to short sleeve shirt, arm warmers and vest. knickers were the way to go and i tossed on a trash bag for good luck.
we headed to the start, stood in the very long and strange potty line. luckily i made my visit really count because by the time we were out it was like 5 minutes to start and there was no time for a 2nd visit.
i tried something else new which was that i took a clif shot right then and then jumped over the fence and looked around for the pacers. i saw the sign for 1:45 and was pleasantly surprised that my friend stephanie was the pacer! we hugged and chatted a little and then we were off! i had already taken off my trash bag and tucked it into my vest pocket but managed to toss it in a trash can somewhere in mile 2 i think. weaving in and out for those first two miles was tough, but stephanie did a great job getting the group up to pace. i held on until we started up on to i-90, and then watched the gap open until i totally fell off by the time we were in the tunnel. i was sorta bummed but man, according to my garmin, that 2nd mile was at a 6:56 pace and yeah it might have been a little too much for me heading into that I-90 hill.
but then i was also bummed because i was all excited that i set my garmin to show average pace, but then didn't unset it for auto pause!! so when i went into the tunnel it totally shut off!! so when i came out of the tunnel my average pace was 6:44 or something which i knew was not even close to what was going on. so i was sort of on my own then. i tried to keep track of each mile, and keeping splits and it seemed like it was all going to work out but still it was a bit of a crap shoot since really I had no idea and ya'lls know i can't do math when i run.
all along the lake was fine although i don't remember too much. there was a hill i remember riding on my bike but not running before and at one of the parks there were a bunch of people with big american flags which was kind of neat.
finally we got to galer and OMG i walked. ugh. just for a bit, because it flattened out then i had to walk a little more when it got steep again. ugh. i thought i had run it in the past, but just at that moment i totally thought, wow, the treadmill sure doesn't have many hills - need to run more hills!
madison was fine but i think i slowed it down quite a bit, but then down the arboretum. last time i was hurting pretty bad at this point but i was ok here. i really didn't start feeling good at this race until mile 5 or 6 or later, but by the time i was at mile 8 and 9, i was like, hey - almost done!
interlaken went well, it wasn't nearly as bad as in the past - seemed flatter and less as though it was going on and on which was a pleasant surprise.
i hit mile 10 and was surprised i felt as good as i did. every other time i walked, and pretty much gave up, not being able to do math and just almost throwing in the towel, but i was almost done, so other than a quick stop at the water station to wash down the 2nd clif shot, i kept on running.
again, i didn't remember that there was an uphill on lakeview but seeing the kids made mile 11 better than ever and off i went down, down to the finish. i even managed to run that horrible hill on mercer or whatever that is.
i was able to pick up the pace to the finish, although i almost had to stop to tell the girl in the bright, shiny gold ugg like boots that they were pretty bad ass but instead i kept on going.
they had soldiers in their army gear giving out medals which i thought was pretty cool, and then i met up with stephanie to chit chat about the run. she wound up finishing about 4 minutes ahead and had a good race as a pacer. she said i was totally under since she said it took 2 minutes to get to the starting line. still i wouldn't believe it until i saw it.
the kids and eric were awesome spectators, showing up at uwajimia, although I didn't see them there, but they were also down by leshi, up on interlaken AND at mile 11. i told eric that someday maybe the kids will run the race and i can be a spectator and see how he manages to be in so many places!
when i crossed the line the clock said 1:50:55. i was pretty happy but wasn't sure if that really meant i was under 1:50 or not. on the drive home i was able to look up the time and my chip time came in at 1:49:20. yahoo! i am pretty darn happy about that. i think some of it is sheer luck especially since i lost track of all my timing stuff, but still pretty good. i ran a pretty even race, 55:18 and 55:50 which i thought was pretty good since the 2nd half is so hilly. i think the first half was hampered by that first mile which was the 2nd slowest behind the galer and madison hill mile. but actually, those splits are based off of the *official time, not chip time, so it wasn't quite as even as i thought. hmph.
after the race, melinda and i chatted and walked together to the car. she had an awesome race beating her 2hr goal! its been a fun couple of months training together!
once home, i put on the compression socks, cleaned the house and then fell asleep!
other news, remember way back in february, around the same time that pawpi's face started falling apart? right about then i hurt my wrist. doing push ups.
so i stopped doing push ups. but then maybe i fell on it, or maybe i would push on the kids' car seats to get them in the car straight, or maybe i would push my bag into the locker at the gym, whatever it was, it continued to hurt like a mofo.
i went to the dr and she said to wear a brace for two weeks. i did, but it still hurt. i wore a brace every time i went mtn biking at every race. it still hurt.
i finally went to PT. i've got 50% of the mobility in it compared to my left wrist and my bones are stuck. so i've gone 4 times and the mobility is better but on tuesday night i was making pie and gosh darn it, pressing the dough down to get ready to roll it with the rolling pin totally hurt. so the PT suggested i go in for an xray. so next week i will go. hoping to get that taken care of!

H.R.RuninStuff

2010-11-20T13:14:00.000-08:00

sitting here on a lovely saturday afternoon. went for a fun 10mile run with the crew in the morning. it started chilly chilly!! but it warmed up quite nicely and was SUNNY. oh it was lovely!! the run itself was fun, i have no idea where we went but it was nice to be with friends and to be out running. i did manage to take a layer off but i am still at a loss as to what i'll actually wear on race day. will have to wait a little bit to see what the weather will actually be that day, they keep threatening us with snow. not cool man, not cool! so the potential for miserable race day conditions is totally there.
i haven't been doing a very good job sticking to my plan, i only got one weekday run in this past week, never mind it was on the treadmill and my iphone earbugs were sending electrical shocks into my left ear and my neck.. at least i think it was a quality run and i should be well rested, right.
yesterday we took the kids to sirus's school for kids night out. we dropped them off for 4hrs and out we went. i tried to look slightly more stylish than normal in my 12+year old betsy johnson velvety pants that sorta don't fit very well, but still they are pretty cool and i even got a compliment on them! we had a good dinner and i had a fabulous vodka martini with blue cheese stuffed olives that i was still feeling this morning at the start of the run.
now i've got on my awesome hincapie compression socks, seamus is in her sleeping beauty princess dress and eric is working on the widnows. they look awesome. he has done a great job, i even got a little misty eyed looking at the one room. we are painting some of the rooms too and i am totally not good with colors. ugh. sirus was red walls with yellow flames, seamus was teal. so none of that is happening for sure.
last week of the swim clinic is tomorrow. hmm, not sure how this thing is going. maybe if i swam more often it would go better.

stuck

2010-11-17T20:49:00.000-08:00

way back in february, around the same time when pawpi's face was first getting infected, i was on a mission to participate in the navy seal challenge. back then i thought the pull ups were going to be the problem... turns out it was the pushups that proved to be the blocker.
i cut out the pushups because my wrist just couldn't take it. ugh, and i like push ups! i went all summer wearing a wrist brace every time i went mtn biking. i wasted precious seconds in t1 of every race putting that thing on.
finally, now in the off season, i am getting it taken care of. turns out my wrist bones are stuck. there may have been trauma at some point, push ups maybe?
then soft tissue (eeewwww) damage and then all my babying of it cause the bones to get all stuck, and i've got 1/2 the mobility in it compared to the other one. sweet. so now the PT is going to get those bones unstuck and make it not hurt anymore, ya know. and stuff.

sometimes i throw my hands up in the air

2010-11-13T16:37:00.000-08:00

yesterday was a terrible day. that is with a t and two r's even.
it started out not so bad, prolly got the only real swimming compliment ever. dude, swimming in the morning was so hard. we were doing breathing stuff, gittin all hypoxic and stuff, is that how its spelled, 100s breathing every 3rd stroke, every 5th and every 7th. then a few 25s with no breathing, the some attempts at 50s breathing once on the way down, twice on the way back. good lawd they were hard and i was only ok with them. i do know my stroke count for 50s is down by about 10 since the clinic last week. amazing what a few laps in the pool will do for you. at the end we practiced flip turns. i never ever do flip turns. ever. there was a week or so early last year i think where i tried to do them somewhat regularly, getting them in about 1/3 of the time. but then i stopped. i said sure, i'll try one, after which the swim coach asked why i don't do them all the time when apparently i do them so well? yeah, so that turned out to be the highlight of my day.
i won't even go into the rest of the day, remember the t and the two r's?
but later, eric and the kids picked me up, we went to the cactus down in madison park, i chugged a couple margaritas. i was bummed my chile relleno wasn't quite as great as the last time we went, but it was still good. better though was that the margaritas were damn good.
after we headed over to the UW. all the years we lived in seattle and even right by the UW we never went. but seamus came home from school last week so excited that her PE teacher had given her tickets to go see women's volleyball at UW. i don't like to play volleyball at all. never liked it. it hurt my wrists and we all know i have gimpy wrists. plus the pressure of having the ball coming at you and having to react quickly, yeah, it really wasn't for me at all. but i want to make sure seamus is exposed to women's sports other than swim/bike/run so we decided to go. it turned out to be really fun! i was surprised the crowd was a big as it was (the photo below was from the warm up and even more people came!), the band was great, the announcers, the score board, and, gasp!!! the cheerleaders!!! there were cheerleaders!! even guy cheerleaders!!!

"Point Huskies!" was sirus's favorite part, always cheering along with the crowd then a point was announced. i appreciated the quiet, barely audible "Point Bears :( " the announcer would make when the other team scored. seamus asked when we'd get to cheer for the bears.
i was surprised at how tall the girls were! they looked regular height but when the introduced the first team's starting line up, and the first girl was 5'11" and shorted than the rest of them I was like whoa. i had no idea volleyball players were so awesome!!! the tallest girl out there was 6'5". yeah! I love it!!
today melinda and i headed out for a super casual 1/2 marathon race out of bothell along the sammamish river trail. i think its odd to do a 1/2 marathon race as a training run for a 1/2 marathon race. but it was fun. we went at a mellow pace, just chillin, happy the weather was cooperative, although chillyish, it was not raining, hooray! i was happy with how we did, but wonder how difficult it will be to shave 15 minutes off of that on race day, especially since today was super flat and race day will be hilly. should be interesting! one more long run to go next weekend, and a handfull of hr longs along the way. yikes!

the horse

2010-11-07T19:34:00.000-08:00

i'm gettin back on it. after nationals i was tired. i took a week off from everything except chowing down. then i started running. the running was going well! i told my self i'd get in the pool a few times but that no need to touch the bike. yeah, well, i didn't get into the pool, so i said, ok, once november hits, i'll start going. yeah, so a week of november has passed. i started to get anxious and worried about what allie had told me last year - not swimming is adictive, so be careful! so i signed up for a 3 week swim clinic. today was the first day it and it kicked my ass.
the guy running it said not to worry, i could totally do my long run in the morning and be fine for the clinic. i even had the bonus of the extra hr of sleep, which turned out to be a wash since i was getting up at 6 anyway, but i did a 10 miler, came home and napped! pawpi has recently discovered multi level living! she hasn't ever been up on the bed, she just can't jump that high. but the other weekend, the kids and i picked up a new cat tree to put in the bedroom and now she gets on the cat tree, walks across the night stand onto the bed. now ALL 3 CATS and suck the life out of me while i sleep. i was pooped. wondering how this whole 13.1er will go when a 10er at an easy pace totally wore me out. whatever. i woke up from the nap and needed a tall, xtra hot, non fat with whip salted caramel hot chocolate from starbucks that very instant. so i got in the car and got one. i saw eric and the kids walking along while i was speeding off to satisfy my craving.
the clinic was good, the water was warm, the sun was shining, it was great conditions for the first swim back. but it tired me out, and my calves and feet were cramping like mo-fo's. but i got it done. two more installments of the clinic to go, the big question is will i get into the pool between them.
AND i went for a mtn bike ride yesterday! it was pouring down rain, but xtie wanted to test out a bike she was lookin to buy, so we were for a nice, wet ride. it was waaay fun and a great first ride back on the bike.
we are getting new windows!! earlier in the summer we looked into getting the windows. i wanted a crew to come in and get them done quickly. turns out that costs millions of dollars, so a few weeks ago i said, screw it, lets get the windows. and eric is putting them in. he did a great job on the ones at the old house and he is doing a great job on these ones! plus i think her looks darn cute when he wears baseball hats, and he only wears them when he is doing construction like work. i can already tell a difference that they are keeping the house warmer. but its getting me anxious about the other things we want to do at the house. we are going to paint everything, but the horror of it all. turns out A LOT of the house used to have wall paper, and actually still does and they just painted over it. what a mess. but we (by we i mean eric) is going to start with the play room and the kids rooms. gracious, the colors they are picking out, oh no! the living room and dining room are already totally ghetto with the partial carpet and plywood flooring, so that room might just have to wait for new paint for some unknown period of time.
halloween happened the other week. work was allowing for dress up on friday. i started out as zombie, but wasn't gray enough, so turned vampire, but seemed too bruised so was worried i was looking like i had gotten beaten up but settled on Ugly Pretty, as in Tyra Banks, America's Next Top Model - can't you see how I smeyes? Yes, I had a little self photo shoot in my office. i couldn't help it, i was looking damn ugly pretty.
This one xtie said I looked like a broken doll. hmm, broken, yes.

this one looks like i am totally strung out on meth or something. maybe it has something to do with the starbucks cup right next to me.

this one is called "eat a sandwich already, damnit!"

and this is the original Ugly Pretty. i really like how all the purple brings out the green in my eyes.

I found this when looking through Seamus's school work. Its her plans for the other weekend!
i love looking through her school work and trying to understand how her brain works. i am pretty sure she just knows everything already.

all on a sunday

2010-10-24T12:28:00.000-07:00

i'm sitting here, watching live updates of the xterra world championships and am about to pass out from the excitement and anticipation of it all. luna pro shonny vanlandingham had an amazing swim and was in the top 3 women into t1 (ok this turned out to not be true - continue). she will kill it on the bike for sure (this turned out to be very true!) and then what will happen on the run? omg, i am going to be glued to this computer until 3pm for sure. ugh. i am sad to not be at the race this year. this week at work was tough, not only because it was just a tough week, but last year I had spent it in maui getting ready to race. after nationals i was pretty burnt out and happy that i didn't have worlds to deal with, but after my week of doing NOTHING i was really kind of sad about not going. i am excited to see how everyone does, super excited for trish who i've been racing with all season - so exciting for all of them!!!

instead of almost 5hrs of xterra racing in tropical paradise today i did the UW Dawgdash in 50 degrees and torrential dowunpour. i did this race last in 2007 and the last stand alone 10k was in january of 2008 when i PR'ed at the Nookachamps Winter Run. i was also super lean back then, right now, not so much, gawddarn, spare tire and all.
after nationals and my 1 second improvement on my run from last year, I was kind of bummed about my whole running situation. granted i had some bad, run hammpering injuries this year that took me out for prolly 2 months of run training right in the middle of the season when i should have been killing it at the track, but still, i was pretty bummed. so decided that i'd start training for the seattle 1/2 marathon in november. i thought about doing it last year because i was so super fit after worlds, but then i realized, i was really tired and wanted to relax. which i did.
this year i found an online plan and have been trying to follow it. not to the letter, but am logging 25 or 26 miles per week and am having fun. i got some new running knickers and new shoes, too. yahoo!
so i shelled over the $105 to enter the dawg dash and the seattle 1/2 and then i was committed.
last night i had the first tsunami dream i'd had in a long long time. apparently i was stressed out. i knew i was a little nervous
(Xterra update - mile 4 of the bike my boy friend Dan Hugo is neck and neck with Conrad Stoltz for the lead!) but i think all the rain i could hear on the sky light all night must have been more powerful than the totally delicious margarita that eric made for me. 630 and the alarm went off. its been a long long time since i had to get up at 630.
and it was raining. :(
we got in the car and it was pouring cats and dogs. i was shivering, whole body convulsions as we walked to the stadium. best part of the race is the stadium start - warm, indoor bathrooms and plenty of them!!! i did a 5 minute warm up, stripped off some clothes and then headed down to the starting line.
i lined up in the 7-8minute range, got a little weepy during the national anthem and then we were off.
first mile was 7:12, omgosh, that was fast. 2nd mile i started thinking the margarita last night wasn't such a good idea, and wow, did i really drink that whole cup of coffee on the way over? wow look, porta potties all over the course - i could really go for one of those right now.
(xterra update - something happened, where is shonny? she is out of the top 5, unless they messed up)
mile 2 was 7:55 and we started heading back against the crowd, and then UP. it wasn't too long but it was sorta steep, and had a roller or two in it. common mistake for me - over dressing. tossed the gloves to the kids, wished i was in shorts. not terribly overdressed but a little on the warmer side of things.
mile 3 was 7:55, then stupid mile 4 which is all UP HILL or something. its terrible. the course weaves all around the UW campus and also weaves in and out of the 5k course. mile 4 was done in a whopping 8:41. mile 5 was better at 7:33 then not sure what the hell happened in mile 6 because it was 8:18 with the last .2 in 1:36, mile 6 was mostly downhill i thought? maybe its the double chin? i've seen this in my photos before, heel striking and putting on the brakes with my face, not attractive and not fast.
there was a lot of dodging around wet leaves, wet man (people?) hole covers and storm drains, and dont' forget about when the course weaved in and out of the 5k race and then all the dogs. for the most part all of that was ok, although i had to fight hard when we mixed with the 5k-ers to not slow down and go with the flow. overall unofficial time was 49:14 which is a PR, not quite what I had hopped for but, it was a really hard course. :) (wow! they have results up already even, 14 in 30-39 and 41 overall Fs. 49:14 is the official time, too!)
after, the sky opened up and the rain really started dumping.
we headed up past our old house to go to top pot donuts. the kids had THE BEST conversation in the car:
Seamus: hey look, its our old house.
Sirus: when we grow up we can live in that brick house again.
Seamus: yeah
Sirus: we can live there together when we get married.
Me: who are you going to marry?
Seamus: Sirus
Sirus: Seamus
Sirus: and we can get some children to live there with us.
Me: where are you going to get the children?
Seamus: from my belly
Sirus: yeah, because when you are a grown up girl you get babies in your belly.

good grief, as long as your brother doesn't put them in there i guess.

the top pot donuts were awesome!! sirus and eric both had pink rainbows, seamus had a chocolate rainbow and i had the pink feather boa! yum!

yesterday we headed to the pumpkin patch right down the road. i actually ran there and eric and the kids followed in the car.

Yeah!!! Xterra Update!! Shonny is in 2nd, 1:40 back, they must have messed up the last update. Boy friend Dan Hugo has fallen off the lead, but I am ok with that. I just hope he isn't too grumpy about it later. :)

ok, so they did mess up the first post after the swim, Shonny was not 3rd into t1, BUT she is totally KILLING it on the bike, in 2nd and gaining! Go Shonny GO!!!!

sexy

2010-10-09T16:13:00.000-07:00

oh what to be for halloween! what to be!!

i think sexy finding NEMO is totally appropriate, family friendly and exactly what i've always wanted to be!!

but then again, i do like history.. and why not, sexy George Washington would be a great tribute. maybe i'll save this one for 4th of july instead.

but really when i think sexy i think tom cruise. ok i just threw up a little bit, but yeah, maverick in top gun was HOT, so yeah, i'll be the sexy girl version!

but really, ya'lls know really i love starwars and princess leia as jabba's slave is so boring and over done. so yeah, why not sexy chewbacca!! nothing says hot like a hair beast! or sexy storm trooper or sexy darth vader. now yer talking!!

but really i want to be this. eric says i can only if it comes with the pompoms. sadly it doesn't.

screw it!! i am going to quit my job and be a sexy construction worker. for real. every day.

the off season

2010-10-06T20:16:00.000-07:00

its the off season and i am celebrating by running! i think i am training for the seattle 1/2, but we'll have to wait and see how this first week or so go. so far so good! its been almost 2 weeks since i've swam or been on a bike. not that interested in doing either of those although i don't want to lose my *love* of swimming.

what i do want to lose is these 40 pounds i've gained, sheesh! and i KNOW that the tasty beer in the frosty glass is not helping but whats a girl to do?

the bed time routine is that eric takes one kid, i take the other, we read a story or two to the kid, tuck them in and then change rooms to tuck in the other kid. last night i had sirus. i read to him, sang a little, cuddled a little then tucked him in. then i went into seamus's room. the light was off and she wasn't in her bed. i started looking for her, and sure enough there she was propped up against the wall, balancing on her head - no hands!!

Highlight Video!!

2010-10-01T21:17:00.001-07:00

Check it !

post posting

2010-10-01T19:47:00.000-07:00

so its come and gone and now what to do? this week has been probably the loveliest we have had all year as far as weather goes but i have zero inspiration to do ANYTHING. i did take my running gear to work with me every day since wednesday but never actually went running. i think that is ok, i'm hoping its ok. my ass and hips think otherwise, but the rest of me is exhausted and needed the rest.
i'm still trying to figure out how i feel about the race, but i know i want to go back.
both eric and matt qualified for worlds which is super exciting. eric isn't going but haven't spoken to matt, so don't know what his plan is.
i'm headed out on an hr 30 run tomorrow. good lawd i wonder how that will go. i'm exhuasted even thinking about it but i'm looking forward to the activity and hoping it will bring my spirits up a bit. and then!!! we have exciting EXCITING plans for sirus's 5th birthday!!
remember when sirus was born?

and how about when he turned 1?
and when he turned 2?
and when he turned 3?
and when he turned 4?
and now he is turning 5, good gracious! how did THAT ever happen!

Xterra USA Chamionships 2010

2010-09-27T15:08:00.000-07:00

aka - i write long race reports. :)

Leading up to the race:
i slept pretty poorly for probably a week or more before the race. Not sure what the deal was with that, but i was really stressed out at work, i was on the tired end of things and just a little overwhelmed by all that i had to get done before heading out of town. i was happy that this was going to be my last race because i wasn't sure if i could put in another month of training. The weather wasn’t helping the situation.
The sore throat was lame. I don't know if it was allergies, totally in my head, or whatever, but earlier in the week i was worried it was turning into something else, but by the time we got to Ogden on Friday it was pretty much ok. The dry air was tough on it though, especially on race day but i don't think it actually factored into anything, i just feels like maybe i've been smoking a few marlboro reds is all.
The travel day was totally relaxed, way more relaxed than last year. i think that had a lot to do with eric being there and him taking care of so much of it all. it was a good trip down, the pre-ride was fun. we met up with trish from Bellingham which was fun. We started at green pond like last year and then tried heading up out of snow basin for like 10 minutes and we all decided yeah, no. the air was getting mighty thin on us so nothing would be gained by us riding that last part, and thank goodness we didn’t.
We went to the dinner which was fun, saw Cori and Mat and his parents. Mat was regional champion again, so that was fun to see.
Eventually we headed back to the hotel. I just chilled out but Eric started to organize his stuff. I finally realized it was pretty late and I should really start organizing my stuff too, but I was still in denial. I was chugging water from the minute we got off the plane until the minute I went to bed but not sure if it was helping me at all.
I had bad dreams all night long then got up at 6am, ½ hr later than last year. I had my normal pre-race PB&J the second I got up to ensure it was about 3hrs before race start and we were off to set up transitions. It was chilly in the morning but the sky was clear so it was pretty obvious it was going to be a beautiful day.
We set up T1 first then drove up to Snow Basin for T2. Mat and his parents gave us a ride back down to T1 so we didn’t have to take the shuttle. When we got back to T1 I found out that Cori and I had racked right next to each other which was a fun surprise! Then I tracked down Shonny, we checked out the bike exit and then went down to the swim start.
The Swim: 1500m, two loops at Pine View Reservoir; about 4800ft above sea level
While I was swimming, I thought the swim was going really well. The start was nutty. I have been trying to be more aggressive in the swim starts, pushing up into the mix so I've gotten more used to all the contact but this was the first time I got hit really hard in the back of the head - pretty sure my brain jiggled loose in there and it was the first time my goggles got kicked off. Luckily only off one eye and thank goodness i didn't totally lose them! I was surprised how aggro people were but then remembered this was the national championships. There was still lots of contact until probably turning after the 2nd buoy. Heading from buoy 2 to the turnaround took FOREVER. I could have been standing still, but more likely I was off course. Once I looked up to site and I saw nothing. No swimmers, no boats, not Xterra arch, no kyakers. Nothing. I was going 100% the wrong way, i was totally confused and disoriented and had no idea where i was! After that i sighted more frequently.
I thought the rest of the swim went pretty well. I didn’t get lapped by any of the pros and only got caught by maybe a handful of the folks in the long course race who started 20 minutes after us and were on their first loop. I was surprised and disappointed to see 35 minutes on my watch when i was coming up out of the water. I swam the whole way and was working pretty well especially on that last lap. I hobbled up onto the pavement, the chip seal really hurt my feet but I got my way to transition even getting called out by the announcer.
T1 was really bad. I couldn't get one of my socks on and had to take it off and mess with it, whatever. Everything else was ok i guess, but i still wear that wrist brace and it’s a pain in my ass. Eric says to ditch it, and i thought about it for this race, but considering i still can't support my weight on it, i didn't want to risk it. In the scheme of things any time savings would have been minimal. but it is one of the things i am going to have checked out more this winter. Total swim and T1 time 39:25; 52 seconds slower than last year.
The Bike: 18.9 miles, 3000ft+ of cumulative elevation gain, climbing up to a max of 7500ft above sea level.
The bike starts off with about 2 miles on the gravel shoulder of the road. I was right on this one girl's wheel and last second she swerved and I almost nailed one of sign poles right off the bat. That would have been a disaster. It got my heart beating a bit and then i was extra cautious as to how close i followed her for the rest of that road section.
Once you cross the spillway, you head up into Wheeler Canyon. I was surprised how chilly it was and only then realized that my feet were pretty much numb from the cold of the water, too. i was working hard, i felt like i was riding well, i was passing lots of people and i don't remember getting passed by anyone, but could have been. that canyon part might just be my favorite part of the race. i was happy to get up to the green pond area and was happy that none of the fast dudes from the next race were up in my business through the descent. i thought i was going pretty fast for me through all that stuff and was happy the leaves along the trail had all been whooshed away by all the faster people since they were kind of freaking me out during our pre-ride.
i had this guy on me for that entire fast fun section and every time we hit a rocky section he was grunting and groaning and i swore he was crashing each time. it made me laugh but at the same time totally worried me.
i tried to stay in my middle ring as much as i could but fell into my little one every once in a while and sometimes for a long time. my right quad was on the verge of cramping and i was having a tough time getting comfortable on my saddle. my left arse was hurting (and still does!) and my left sit bone was getting all wacky, worrying me that my obturator inturnus was on the verge of a freakout again. luckily everything stayed in check. i was happy to get to snow basin and felt like a bad ass when i got to head up the hill while the sport racers turned into transition.
i was riding up up up, and that is when i saw shonny running up the hill. i kept riding because although i was willing to tell her if i walked, i didn't want her to actually see me do it! She was good inspiration at that point because obviously I was able to ride it no problem.
later on though there were two sections i had to walk up. the first about made my calves cramp with every step, then the second was that last final push up a total wall. i was happy to get to the top of that because i thought i was done with the climbing but it turned out we weren’t even close. i started to get a little panicky because we just kept going up and away from snow basin. i was feeling sick, on the verge of puking a few times, and just trying to keep it together. again i almost got off at one point but there was a guy sitting by his truck so i just kept going which was good because there was actually a short downhill once i got passed him.
once i got to the downhill i actually had some fun,. i was happy to get through all of the switch backs and i felt like i was actually getting through them well. i had two people behind me the whole time and they never asked to pass, so i was pretty happy. my right elbow was starting to hurt, which was new but i had to be almost done, really, right? I got to t2 and almost fell over trying to get off my bike - awesome!
i took 2 clif shots on the bike and drank about ½ of a big bottle of electrolyte drink - yeah, only ½. I was not drinking, which is odd for me because i usually drink like crazy. i wasn't thinking about it, and when i did drink i had mixed it too strong and my throat was burning from the air, and i just didn't even want to drink anything the whole time. bad move. my stomach even started to rumble because it felt empty and i just wasn't listening. it was a bad mistake on my part.
T2 was fast and easy and i ran outta there like no one's business. Total Bike and T2 time: 2:29:12, 1:38 faster than last year and on a longer course, too!
The Run: 6.3 miles, starting around 6300ft above sea level, topping out at 7500ft.
The mean thing about the run is that you head away from transition then go STRAIGHT UP HILL, so I ran out then started to walk almost right away. I got passed by some runners and I was passing some too. By the top of the hill i was ready to start drinking again but couldn't believe it when the cup of water I grabbed had only a tiny splash of water in it! Once the course flattened out a bit I was running all the flats and down hills and a few of the smaller up hills. Really i just couldn't breathe. Nothing really hurt, I had a little bit of a side cramp but it went away. I just couldn't get any air. When I got to the 2 mile marker I was convinced that they marked the course wrong. The 2nd aid station seemed like 100 miles away but I took two cups of water there. I was fighting the negative thoughts, trying to enjoy it. I chatted only with one guy for a short time about how I was pretty sure they said the run was only a 9k but he said no it was at least a 10k. so for the rest of it I tried to stay focused on what i was doing. On one terrible uphill i got pretty dizzy and was pretty sure i was going to pass out, and wondered how long i'd lay there before any help would come, but i managed to keep it together. That would have been embarrassing! And THEN my feet cramped up. I haven't ever had my feet cramp while running and it was particularly bad on the downhill. i did manage to run the whole run down the big hil to the finish, fending off the feet cramps the whole time, i couldn't not run that part - sheesh!

I was happy to cross the line. Last year when i crossed the line i was just like, oh, ok. now it’s over. this time, i was like, damn, i am pretty worn out, i want to go lay down somewhere. Total run time: 1:08:28, 1 second faster than last year.
Total race time: 4:17:05, 47 seconds faster than last year.
After sitting in the shade for a little I recovered quickly it seems and was able to get moving and changed my clothes and stuff pretty quickly. I couldn't eat anything for a few hours, and couldn't really drink anything either. Other than that I was in a pretty good mood.

Once indoors i cornered dan hugo and eric took my picture with him. poor guy didn't have his shirt on but that was his fault, not mine. 

so looking at the times and the numbers and stuff. i went into the race saying really that i didn't care if i came in last place, i just wanted a faster time. so, I didn’t come in last place! and i was 47 seconds faster! Hooray! but really I wanted to come in under 4hrs, so i am disappointed in that. i am disappointed in my swim because i don't know why it was so slow and i was disappointed in my run just because it was a disappointing run. on the bike i felt like i worked really hard, i wonder if i could have worked harder, but i am pretty content with how i did there. the last two weeks of training riding with april with her on her single speed 29er and me just trying to hang on on all those hills made me realize that i wasn't working hard enough on my hard mtn bike rides earlier in the season.

Eric on the other hand had a FANTASTIC race coming in 3rd in his age group only 2 minutes behind 1st place! I was so proud of him but knew he would wind up on the podium! He is a amazing!

We headed down the mountain, relaxed, showered, then went out for dinner. I had a frozen strawberry lemonade that with every sip gave me terrible brain freeze.

After we relaxed some more then went out to the Harvest Moon festival where we sat next to a giant great dane who farted non-stop, saw a totally drunk dude who had fallen, was covered in blood and had the Utah police all over him and we watched the highlight video from the race.

After we went to i-Fly Utah for some indoor sky diving then called it a night!

Sunday we chilled out, had some delish banana bread French toast served by the same waiter that served me breakfast last year, packed up then headed over to Matt’s house. Matt was one of my best friends from high school but sadly I hadn’t seen him since December of 1997. His parents and sisters were all in town visiting, too, so I got to catch up with all of them as well which was very fun! It was so great to see Matt again and I hope to see him again soon!

This morning I woke up more refreshed then I have in months. This week is for resting, attending the LUNA Chix end of year auction and planning for Sirus’s 5th birthday on Sunday!

soon, very very soon

2010-09-21T20:10:00.000-07:00

yikes! xterra nationals are only a few days away. i'm excited but a little worried too. i don't feel very well. i was sorta on the verge of being sick for a few days but i seemed ok, saturday i was sorta on the verge but then did that hard workout then went to starcrossed and hung out in the rain. eric and i both realized that we are not built for standing around. if we are going to stay in one place, we best be sitting or better yet laying down. standing doesn't work so well for either of us. sunday was the start of the taper - a rest day with an optional 30' swim. i opted out of it to go watch eric race which i was very happy we did because he did awesome. but later that night i wasn't feeling so great. took my temperature and it was 99 then took it again a short while later and it was 101.8 but then quickly decided that the thermometer was wrong and instead used the kids' and it was normal. thats pretty much what i thot but wanted to be sure, just in case. i had napped both saturday and sunday - sunday being one of those where i'm sitting on the couch in full conversation with eric when oh no, i'm going to fall asleep, it doesn't matter that i am in mid sentence, bam, i'm asleep.
monday i slept through masters swimming, ok, i got up and debated as to whether i was sick or just wimpy or just tired still. i didn't go, went back to bed instead with intentions of going after work. which i did not. i went to bed early but woke up at 330 and couldnt go back to sleep. laid there for a few hours, dozed in and out then got up finally. i felt better this morning but not awesome. i really would just like to take a day off and really not do anything. maybe two days - first day clean the house top to bottom, 2nd day just chill out in a clean house. i'd like it to be sunny both of those days too.
went mtn biking after work with a co-worker which was quite, i felt pretty good. still maybe on the verge of sick. found out my water bottle cage is broken. :(
tomorrow is some swimming and some core, thursday is some running then FRIDAY is some traveling to SLC.

plotting

2010-09-19T20:57:00.000-07:00

seamus is up to something and i don't know what it is. i caught her climbing up the door jam to the play room earlier today. there she was just going up up up. she didn't have anything in her hands but she was just going up. then she jumped down.

later in the day she was climbing the walls in the hallway. again she was going up up up. i just stopped to watch, not letting her know i was there, i wanted to see what she was up to. next thing ya know, she launched off the wall and spun totally around in mid air, landing facing me. i asked her what she was doing and all she replied with was, wow, that was kind of hard. funny.

and sirus, he is a funny guy. i was wearing an old school star wars shirt today. sirus pointed out that it had princess leia and r2d2 on it and also had that peanut butter guy. huh? so when i had taken them to build a bear workshop a week or so ago, they had a display of the new bears and outfits coming in that were star wars themed. i thought i had heard him talking about the peanut butter guy there, too, but didn't think much of it. so i pulled up some photos of r2d2 and c3po and had him come over and tell me who the characters were and sure enough, there was that peanut butter guy. he claims its because c3po looks like peanut butter. seems to me that c3po must need a good buff and polish if that is the case.

everybody's working for the weekend

2010-09-18T16:35:00.000-07:00

wow, i am tired. long week. lots going on, the weather is crappy and last week of tough workouts before tapering for nationals. wasn't sure i was going to make it, and almost didn't!!

wednesday i came to terms with my fear of cyclocross and told my coach i'd rather do zn5s on the trainer than go to the cyclocross practice and race after. so she had me do some zn5s on the trainer. 2min at zn 5 follwed by 5 minutes of zn4 followed by 4 minutes recovery repeat 4 times. twice i thought i was on the verge of puking. eric says it was because i was in the garage. maybe it was because i was watching harry potter, or maybe it was the spider crawling dangerously close to the fan. regardless it was hard but i got it done and felt good about it.

yesterdays track workout... oh where do i start. i think i have a mental block on track workouts. or maybe just thursdays are bad days for them, but whatever it is, it seems like every time there is a track workout i find some reason for something to go wrong with it. yesterday was pouring rain, so i consulted with some friends and the responses included: "WWSVD?" "Suck it up buttercup", "Rule #5 - Harden the F up", and "Rule #9 Do a road ride instead since riding in bad weather means you are a bad ass. Period."
i opted for treadmill. since my car was in the shop eric picked me up from work and dropped me at the gym, and in the locker room i discovered i didn't pack a sports bra. its not that im totally boobalicious, but i am boobalicious enought that i cannot run if there is any bounce. called up eric to come get me since he wasn't too far away yet, drove home, changed into my clothes and drove back to the gym and proceeded to have my ass handed to me while watching the Bear Whisperer. i didn't hit any of the times, i was dying the whole time, and next time will opt to do the workout in the pouring rain because that was NO FUN AT ALL. it was scary though going up to 10 on the treadmill and i think that was part of the reason it went so bad, it was just damn scary.
i did sweat a lot which i like to do, it just didn't go very well. good intentions, poor execution.
friday was a good day! i got to pick my car up at the shop and it looks brand new! they totally detailed the car inside and outside, too! it even has new car smell which kind of made me sick, but it was so nice to have all the dents fixed and have it all so clean!!! also i got my wedding ring back. last weekend while at the mall we stopped into the jewelry store to get my rings cleaned and the discovered that one of the prongs had broken off! so i left it there and eric and the kids picked it up for me. it too looks brand new!!! so happy to have it back!
then today i met up with april. omg, she totally kicked my arse again. she was on her single speed 29er again and we did hills. and wow, she dropped me every time. and then we ran. 30 minutes uphill, 15 down. then i had to come home and GO TO SLEEP. eric got me a new pillow and between it and the flannel sheets i was in heaven!!
tomorrow begins the taper!!

HELLCATS

2010-09-15T21:04:00.000-07:00

ok, so its not a total secret that I LOVE CHEER LEADING MOVIES. Bring it On is of course the best movie ever, and Fired Up was a pleasant surprise and quite funny considering its about guys who quit football to become cheerleaders, whatever. it was entertaining. so i about fell over last week when after America's Next Top Model, HELLCATS was on. I was like, what is this? the only thing that im not quite comfortable with is that its college cheer leading. the story line is a bit dumb and a little unbeleivable and as eric pointed out they covered too much in the first episode and some of what is going to happen is a bit too obvious but as long as they continue to put all the actual cheer leading in it each episode, and then mix in the drama around, it might wind up ok. oh and yeah she wears old school crocheted cycling gloves when she rides her two big 10-speed around with no helmet.
dude, hard workout today - masters swimming in the morning, zn5 intervals on the trainer tonight. ok, so yeah i said i'd rather do zn5s on the trainer then go to cyclocross practice because yeah, cyclocross is damn scary.
taper starts SUNDAY which is forever away it seems.

NW Trail Runs

2010-09-12T20:28:00.000-07:00

So last night i iced my knee for a while, took some aleve, went to sleep.

this morning i woke up and wow, yeah, i really hurt my shoulder! i didn't notice so much while i was sleeping but the sleeping sure didn't help it.

on the schedule was the 5 mile NW trail run race. i had pre-registered so even though i wasn't so sure about my knee and everything i went, figuring i'd take it easy, make sure nothin hurt and then see how things went. i was happy to see janet out on her warm up run before the race and on her way back she sat in my car with me for a bit. then we went to the honey buckets and then sat in her car for a bit. then next thing ya know, the peeps were headed to the start, so we got out and went, too. it was drizzling by now, and we listened to the pre-race meeting, chatted with kristen, looked at mark from afar, and then GO! so my plan of going easy was over in about 4 seconds when i couldn't get through the rocks at the starting line quick enough. so i jumped ahead and then kept going. i felt really good, nothing was hurting and i was having fun. i had a woman in front of me who had a gap on me but i couldn't catch her and i had a dude on my back who i couldn't drop. run run run, i was feeling good, pushing hard. looking back i think there are a few areas where i might have been able to run harder. when i headed out onto the chip path towards the water station i didn't see anyone heading back, but i ran down there, turned around and headed back. that path back is hard. it was better than the last time when it was all mucky and thick mud but its hard, its up hill and sucks the life out of you. i didn't see anyone ahead and no one behind, but i kept going.
finally i got to the 800m mark and was like, yeah, almost done! but man that last 800 took FOREVER!!!! finally i could see the parking lot through the trees and i was done! yahoo!! and as a big surprise i won! 1st place woman, which i don't think i've done before. they don't put any asterixes in the results, and although i am super happy with my race and excited to have won, the super fast people weren't there. that's ok though because you can't win if you don't race. :)
two weeks to nationals!

compare

2010-09-11T15:09:00.000-07:00

i am lucky in that i have a friend at work who is into making stuff like this:

he makes all kinds of cool programs with google earth and stuff and does all kinds of crazy stuff with my ride profiles. he is sorta interested in the actual rides themselves, i think, but mainly he is interested in the data and what can be done with it.
these charts are the elevation profiles taken from google earth from the ride at Paradise and the Mt Baker ride from last weekend. they are lined up with the appropriate starting elevations and it gives a good idea on how the two routes compare. i had been freaking out about the Baker ride, so he put this together so i could get an idea of what i was getting myself into. a few miles longer but really it was only about 10 miles of sustained climbing as opposed to the 18 up paradise, but mt baker had more overall elevation gain. regardless, both were fun, both were challenging and i'd like to do both again sometime when its not 2 degrees at the top of either. paradise i would still like to shuttle down, but the baker descent, other than that first few miles down, isn't so bad.
today i went and rode at tiger mtn with april. i hadn't been there since 2004. i don't know why it has been so long, but i know when i thought of going this year i was afraid of the naked guy and the guy with the taser. we didn't see either of those guys but we did see (barely!) two dudes in full head to toe camo with cross bows and stuff. it was a little freaky to see them out there, not sure what they were up to. but man, april kicked my ass. she was on a single speed 29er and just hammered up the hill and she is an awesome downhiller so she dropped me continuosly then, too. it was really quite fun and i should go there more often. a little late now for this season, but next summer for sure. i did have a crash on the downhill. i was doing pretty well, and happy with my ability to get through the wet and sketchy roots and rocks and then bam. down i went. i think i am ok, my left knee has a big old kitten head sticking out the side of it though. we'll see at tomorrow's trail run race if and how that might affect anything. but it was fun to ride with april, i just have to maybe try being a bit more aggressive and try to stick on her wheel a little. when we were almost done with the ride i remembered a bit more about the last time i had gone. it was prolly september or so, and a girl i worked with invited a few of us out. i hadn't been on a mtn bike in forever since i had had seamus and hadn't come out of retirement yet, but i said what the heck! plus another friend was coming, too. i don't remember that uphill being that difficult and the downhill for the most part was ok, too. the one friend however hadn't ever been mtn biking, was on a full rigid and in running shorts and shoes. given that she did an AMAZING job. but then the sun went down. since we had started after work, and since it was taking a bit more time then expected, the sun went waaaaay down. no lights! pitch black!! a few of the other folks went on ahead, got some lights and brought them back, but there weren't enough for everyone, so we wound up hiking the bikes out a good portion of the lower trail. it was nuts. luckily everyone stuck together and we got out ok, but yikes!

this

2010-09-10T09:26:00.000-07:00