"I've never known anybody to achieve anything without overcoming adversity." ---Lou Holtz

1.25 hrs of core/strength this a.m.  My arms are pleasantly pooped.  Pool run on the schedule for tonight.

I've been thinking about getting a chin up bar and am leaning toward one that attaches to the ceiling.  Anybody have one of these?  Use one of these in the past?  Have any comments?  I'm looking for something under $100, if possible.  I've been doing a lot of extra transcription work at home and deserve to treat myself.

Speaking of treating myself - Not counting the pool membership I've been coughing  up each month (and it kills me to do it), yesterday I went out and did my first "splurge" on myself since this whole thing with The Hub started.  Bought a few plants for my very bare and depressing-looking flower pots.  Just $20, but my yard is starting to look happy again, which makes me happy.    Couldn't carry the stuff around very easily, so I did a lot of crawling.  Crawling = Sore Gluteus Maximus! Now if I can just stop Wilson the Wonder Kitty from using the pots as his personal toilet.

Hey Joe - Where're you headed "out west"?  I posted a question about pull up bars over the cross training forum.  A guy posted a link for a standing unit that provides the capability of other exercises.  It would be a matter of whether or not I have the floor space in my little workout shed.

1 hr pool run tonight.  I'm pooped, and my arms are exhausted after my strength training this morning.  I was doing my "run as fast as I can with my arms at the sides of my head " routine.  After I finished a round, one of the swim instructors commented it was a hard exercise, and it is.  I had a hard time catching my breath at the end.  I do it for a minute, and my goal has been to get to 80 "steps" (L/R = 1 step), and I tried hard to keep my chin out of the water (which means I really have to churn my legs).  I made it!  Three out of 4 times, and twice I hit 82.  Sweet!  I pointed out one of the other swim instructors and told her I'd seen him do it, but he had half his body out of the water and that was without a flotation belt.  She said two words, "Water polo."  Ah!  I see.

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Morning Addition:

40 min of stationary cycling with about 5 min of core this a.m.  My arms are still tired.

The Hub comes home today for two nights.  In the last two days, I've spoken to two of his friends about what's going on. Both made me cry in a good way.  They're extremely supportive of his recovery, and both said it doesn't matter to them re the other issues we are dealing with.  What matters is Shorty, he's their friend, they love him, and they'll do whatever they can to support him/us.  I told him about the one friend, but am looking forward to telling him about the other today.

Had a lovely trail run over the weekend, but with a looooong and steep downhill (about 5 miles of it) that really has the ol' quads sore - but not as bad as if I'd done the same thing a year ago.

This is my jealous face:  

So what's next on your schedule??

I was having a full blown pity party for myself this morning (Week 11).  When I went home at lunch to see Shorty, I told him he was lucky he wasn't home this morning because even a "good morning" probably would have resulted in my bashing him with a crutch.  Him: "Step 10, hon.  Gratitude."  Me: "Sometimes you can take Step 10 and shove it where the sun don't shine." Him (eyebrows lifted): "Not sure that'd go over real well in rehab."  Yeah, probably not.     

Have another sprint in July, and can't figure out what posessed me to sign up for the US Open as my first olympic distance in the fall.  Oh well, being scared keeps me motivated! 

Woo hoo, Carol!  Good for you!

As for the FIL - I just learned that in CA you can anonymously write to the Department of Motor Vehicles, tell them you have doubts about a person's ability to drive, and DMV will contact them to go in for a driving test.  If the person fails to show up 2x in a row or, of course, fails the driving test, his/her license is revoked.  Maybe TX has something along those lines.

And Aruba sounds wonderful.

I got up, fed the cats, then went back to bed, must to lay there for another hour with the chorus Elton John's "Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me" running through my head over and over.  I had intended to work out, but I forgot I needed to be in to work by 7:00 since I'm leaving at 3:30.  I know, I know - excuses are like . . . well, yeah.  I'm stickin' with it, though.

I got home last night to a vacuumed house, a mowed lawn, completed laundry - lawdy!  Where has this man been all my life?!?

Have an excellent Hump Day, folks ~

Joe - Your trip sounds fun!  Face north and wave when you get to San Fran.  Believe it or not, I can see that from where I am, six hours north of there. 

And yes, there is still a ton of snow up in the mountains.  Karen and her sister, Kate, were at the Western States training camp over Memorial Day Weekend.  Days 1 and 2 that had to be repeats (run one way one day, the other way the next) because there was too much snow on the trails.  WS has developed 3 runs for the actually race.  The big concern is there will still be too much snow come June 25-26, 2011, and they'll have to resort to Run #3. (Last year they had to run Run #2 because of the amount of snow.)

Had a very interesting lunch with my boss and my co-worker, Denise.  Things are about to change around here big time.  I'm not worried about my job - yet.  Keeping my fingers crossed.  Two unemployed peeps in one household would be devastating, to say the least.

Hi guys. Taper week here for Sandhills this weekend, just doing a few short runs with tempos. Had an irrigation well go down tuesday, hopefully get it fixed and restarted in time to make the race. Also went in for routine teeth cleaning (with the hygenist from hell and not my usual) and had an abcess showed up so am on amoxycillan, my family doc told me not to race, WTF!!! My dentist who knows I ran thru all my dental reconstruction and thought that was a silly recommendation, Sh!t I have done all my hard workouts probably with that infection for my hardest training. (root canaled tooth so never felt discomfort). Needless to say I was not much fun to be around about Tuesday night. Ready to fire dentist, doc and hygenist. So race is still in limbo.

Joe sounds like a nice trip. Yes a lot of snow still out west, would still like to get up and ski this month. I think I could get 1000 contiuous vertical Jun/jul/ aug this yr if so inclined. Hope you have some nice runs in Tahoe and great sail in the Bay.

Arla you are turning in a trail running machine, so cool. You ought to come to CO sometime and try out the mtns here and meet up with the mtn peeps and us.

Carol your FIL seems like quite the challenge, I think of the things my grandma did when she got older and now see dad doing the same, guess I am probably doomed to do the same thing ;-). Congrats on continuing with tri training and progress on the open water confidence factor on the ocean/lake swims.

Leslie as Ev said you have not missed a beat in the workout dept, just a different venue! Gotta admire your perseverance! BTW I have one of those doorway chinup bars and it actually works quite well, my pt had me get it to do some hanging pt exercises but it will easily hold my lard butt if I use it as a chinup bar.

OM hope the recovery is progressing well. With that positive energy you are exuding it has to!

Ev hope you guys cool off, front went thru here yest and knocked us down from 100 to 60-70 in about a day. I heard the wheat down there is basically toast . Article in the new RT about heat acclimation I need to read.

Hope to see the mtn peeps this weekend in Valentine. Will post the last minute instructions for the race, Found them entertaining, as all the hazards are kinda the norm here. Not exactly what you get at a Rock and Roll marathon, lol!

Sandhillers,

As we've said, you are about to run a race that will
challenger your mental and physical toughness -- even more than most marathons
do!  We'll have aid stations with water and Gatorade -- and gels later in the
race -- but the air in the Sand Hills is dry, the wind is known to blow, the sun
to shine, and there ain't a lot of shade.  Come well hydrated, drink plenty as
you run and please take heed for the other following precautions...

• Stay on the road and off the shoulder.  There are rattlesnakes, sand-burrs
  and cactus on the shoulders and in the ditches.  If you have to step onto the
  shoulder or into the ditch, watch your step carefully.
• Do NOT cross the right-of-way fence under any circumstances.
• Watch for snakes on the road.  They may be sunning themselves at that hour
  of the morning.
• Watch and listen for vehicles.  There will be some traffic on the road.
• We strongly DISCOURAGE you from wearing headphones.  This is a one-lane
  road, and you must be able to hear approaching vehicles.  If you think you must
  wear headphones, keep the volume low so you can hear other sounds.
• No strollers.  Pets are strongly discouraged.
• Run on the LEFT side of the road.
• Do NOT run more than two across.  The road is windy, and vehicles may be
  hard to see until the last moment. 
• Run single file around blind corners and over hills.
• Mile Markers: Each mile will be marked with signs and yellow paint on the
  road.  Watch for those markers if you are concerned about your split times. 
  There will not be volunteers at the mile markers calling out splits. 
• Water stations: Most will have attendants, but if you see a cooler beside
  the road without an attendant, please feel free to stop and open it (though
  we'll try to keep them open) and grab yourself a cold water or Gatorade.
• Bring and wear SUNSCREEN.  Again, there is not much shade!  Insect repellent
  is recommended, too.

Ok, enough with the rules!  
Come and have a
great time!!

Leslie - hooray for your foot progress. Ssshhhh...don't let Shorty know just yet, let him finish with the housework and gardening... Better than whacking him with your crutches.

Jim - they mentioned snakes TWICE in those race instructions!! I'm not buyin' the don't race with an abscess thing, but I'm not that kind of doc!

Carol - nothing gets me to be consistent in my training than being scared, bet you're going to be in amazing shape come race day this fall. Olympic distance is how far? ...ok looked it up, 1.5K/40K/10K. It's that swim that gets me, but you've been so good working on that, yeah, you'll be fine!

Joe - snowpack is almost 400% of normal up there...got snowshoes? Dumb question: do you carry a camelbak so you have enough water to pour on your head? Use water fountains along the way?

Ev - I completely agree with you about running as the sun goes down - makes 90+ feel not all that bad. Funny but it works.

Easy 6 this am, going for a fun 3 mi run with a friend tonight just to socialize. I love those little social runs. Sort of tapering but not for Grandma's Marathon, which is on the 18th - after all, it's going to just be a social run, although a LOOONG one!

 

 

I posted a couple of song references in an earlier post.  Can anyone name the two songs and artists?

 

Scott McKenzie - "San Francisco"

I have no idea on the second one.  Although when I tried to look it up on the 'net, I got rather interesting results.

Arla - You running Grandma's??

1 hr of stationary biking for me this a.m.  Forced myself to go that long since I couldn't do my pool run last night.  This weekend will be comprised of helping Karen move (not sure what I'll be doing since I can't function on two legs) and getting control of the transcription I've acquired over the past couple of weeks.

Oh - I'm one-crutching it today to see how things go.  Keep your fingers crossed.

Have a great Friday ~