First Crash

I have finally joined the club? I had my first bike crash today!

2.5 hours easy was the plan. We started with a small group at IOS and people peeled away as necessary because of time commitments and wanting to do different routes. It ended up being me, Marty, Dan and Jerry and we were having a nice time on the bike. Marty started to bonk a bit and was lagging behind for awhile. I was riding on the inside of Jerry and wasn't paying attention (I was talking too much) and ran off the shoulder. If it hadn't been so rainy here recently I probably would've been fine, but the clay was mud and I slipped immediately when I tried to get back on the road. Hit Jerry's back wheel (and luckily didn't take him down with me) and then overcorrected again only to smack on the pavement. I scurried up quickly to get out of traffic and was very embarrassed! Jerry and Dan were very nice and made sure I was okay, which I was. Falling in the winter is much safer than the summer - I took the brunt of the fall on my left hip, which had 3 layers covering it so I didn't even brake the skin (might have a bruise later on), and skinned my knee. The unfortunate part of that was I now have a nice hole in my new leg warmers (2nd time wearing them). It's also a bit swollen and looks like a small egg on the side of my knee. My ego hurts the most for being such a fred on the bike!

Marty didn't see any of it and just thought we were waiting for him on the side of the road when he rode up. And of course, the most important -- bike seems fine!!

Another Clinic

We had another great clinic at TAC this morning - good group of participants, lots of questions and a fun time (at least I hope everyone had a fun time!) Base training is in full swing and I'm doing pretty good. Definitely sore right now but hopefully that will subside after another week or so of being 'back at it.' Now I need to get outside and do my long run, something I would've much rather have done this morning, but short of me getting up before 5am (which I'm NOT doing on a Saturday!) my only option is to do it now. Tonight we're meeting friends for dinner and I'm very excited because I haven't seen any of them for over a month and they are all fun people to be with.

So about the bike - I'm thinking I'm probably not going to get it even though the unanimous vote from you all was GET THE BIKE! I didn't realize that we would have to order it and then I have no idea how long it will take to get here...the point of me getting a cross bike was to ride more outside in the winter but if it doesn't get here until the spring, well then, there goes the point. :( :(

No Lifting for Me

Plans of lifting at work yesterday were spoiled when I realized, standing in the locker room half undressed, that I had forgotten shorts. ARGHH. This was made more painful by the fact that I had traipsed across campus in the cold rain. I briefly (very briefly I might add) thought about lifting in my work clothes. I was after all, wearing jeans and had a sports bra, t-shirt and sneakers, but did not want to be one of THOSE people. I see them occasionally – they are usually upper management and they waltz into the weight room and do some bench press and a few other machines before waltzing out. Seems odd to me. Even odder is the one guy I’ve seen hop on the stationary bike in work clothes (and these are not jeans). To each his own – hope they don’t have any meetings in close quarters after that.

Marty is tempting me with saying maybe we can buy me a cross bike. We can get a good deal at Inside Out, but I waffle between wanting it and wanting to save all the money we can. What to do, what to do.

Enough travel!

I'm sitting in the passenger seat of our car somewhere in the middle of Georgia while we make our way back to North Carolina. I don't have internet access but figured this would be a good time to type up a blog catch-up post from the past few days.

I left a very quiet work day on Wednesday just after lunch to head to the airport so I could fly down to Orlando. I had a layover in Charlotte - so the quick flight from Raleigh to Charlotte was on a small commuter jet. It was VERY windy that day, so we bumped our way up to cruising altitude, stayed there for like 1 minute, and then bumped our way down to Charlotte. Not fun. I know I have flown all over the world but I have never gotten used to turbulence. I got into Orlando a little late, but Marty hit horrible traffic on I-95 so our friend Dan ended up picking me up. He threw a fun party (of course). It was nice to see old friends, especially one of my very oldest friends Katy Rad. We had a lot of fun.

The next day we saw Marty's family, I took a much needed nap, we went for a short half-hearted run and then had a low-key dinner with Dan. We all needed to recharge from the night before!

Friday was busy - had breaky at our favorite greasy spoon near our old condo, then we drove to UCF to do a run. We hadn't been there since they built the new stadium and WOW it looks different! What a fun college to live on campus now! Luckily, they still left some of the trails we used to run on, something I was worried about would be all gone from all the new building that had gone on. These trails are the place where Marty and I had our first date, 8.5 years ago! In the rain no less. I figured if this guy liked me in running clothes soaking wet and disgusting we may have something here :) Next up we met one of my athletes for lunch, then off to Sanford so Marty could give a swim lesson, and then to Ormond Beach to stay with another friend for the next two days.

We had fun in Ormond - went for a gorgeous bike ride on Saturday morning through Tomoka State Park and down A1A - watching the beautiful calm Atlantic to our left. Then we went out on the boat and then to an Oyster Roast. It was a busy weekend filled with bad (good) food, beer and not great sleep.

So I'm pretty ready to just hunker down and get back on a normal schedule of training, working and eating better. December has been pretty much a prep phase training-wise and I'm definitely looking forward to building that base back up with more consistent training. Races loom in the distance!

And 2008? Eh, I'm glad it's gone. Not one of my favorite years for sure for many different reasons and although I know each day is really a new slate to work with, it's nice to have the number change and really wipe it clean. I'm looking forward to making this year MUCH better than the last and I have many ideas on how I'm going to do that.

Here Come's 2009!

I'm back at work for 2.5 days before some more time off. I actually only have New Year's off, but who is really going to come in on Friday and how much work could possibly get done? Anyways, we are headed to Florida so I won't be anywhere near the office. I'm flying down tomorrow afternoon and Marty is driving down in the morning. If he doesn't drive like a grandpa and doesn't stop too much he will be arriving at the Orlando airport right in time to pick me up. The one way ticket to Orlando was pretty cheap and this way I don't have to burn too much vacation time. I'll drive back up with him on Sunday.

The big catalyst for us going down there was our friend Dan having a New Year's Eve party, and we haven't been to Orlando in over a year now so it's time to see our friend's and family there. Dan always throws great parties - in the past he had a very fun pimps n' ho's party and a homecoming (Marty and I were voted king and queen, awww, but I think that had more to do with the fact we were checking out a couple of weeks later and we got the 'going away and maybe never see them again vote').

In other news, I moved up to medium on guitar hero over the holiday. I only play when I'm up in Virginia, so I think I'm doing pretty good. I'm definitely glad we don't have one or I would never get anything done. Here's a picture of me and my niece playing - she's almost 4. They have a 'beginner' level on the World Tour where you only have to strum - she rocks! And she'll tell you that, too :)

O Christmas Tree!

Marty and I didn't have a Christmas tree and had big plans to buy a good one after Christmas so we could get a deal. We struck out today though, hitting two different Lowes, a Home Depot and a Target with NOTHING left. Bummer...until I went to Kroger to get some groceries and there it was! A 7.5 foot with lights for 50% off! Who would've thought Kroger?! We may be the only people in the world who just put up our Christmas tree. Ta da!

Christmas Catchup

We had a nice time celebrating with my family in Virginia over the past few days. Marty and I managed to get in two runs while we there - to try and balance out all the eating we did. We ran on the Virginia Beach boardwalk on Christmas morning and I was able to sniff out some trails for us the next day (trails are hard to come by up there). Yesterday we bummed around after driving home and then watched FSU slaughter Wisconsin in their bowl game. And today we got in a nice 2 hr ride in short sleeves. Every warm day in the winter just means one less cold one, right?

After our healthy ride, we decided to head to a local pizza place (Brooklyn Brothers) where we stuffed ourselves with garlic knots and sausage pizza. They have a couple of tables outside so we decided to take Tassie with us since she loves going with us anywhere. I tied her to my chair and watched her shiver, shake and keep her tail between her legs the entire time. I guess Chair-Gate 08 really left an impression on her - it was pitiful and although we thought we should make her stay the course so she could get past her demons, we caved pretty quickly and put her back in the car (where she proceeded to fall asleep).

Anyways, here are a few pictures from the holidays.

That's me in between my two sisters, my mom, and my two nieces.

The Gaal's (Tassie is a very sloppy-sitter)

And this is what she looked like Christmas morning after playing and rolling around in the mud.