March 2006 Archives
One of the joys of training for a June Ironman in this part of the country is spring time long rides. Because I was still sore from my two hour run yesterday, when we had PERFECT weather, we decided to do our long ride today. Its NEVER good around here when you pull up the Weather Channel page and see "WINDY" as the description for the day.
The boyfriend and I rode for almost three hours today straight into a 26 mph headwind. And I'm not gonna lie, it SUCKED. When you are pedaling downhill in your aerobars and still only going 14 mph, you know its a windy day. We did an out and back and the trip home was pretty damn fun but my legs were so toasted from going into that damn wind that I couldn't even put that much pressure on the pedals. Blaah.
The worst part of the wind for me is always the noise. I don't think I ever appreciated just how loud wind was until I became a cyclist. At 26 mph (gusting to 35!) its deafening. I'm considering getting ear plugs, seeing as when its that windy, you can't hear cars anyway.
Not a bad ride tho. Saw a bunch of cool dogs including not one but TWO harlequin Great Danes which are my favorite. They are SO cool. This ride is so funny because there are SO many dogs off leash roaming around out there but it is very rare that we actually get chased. I think its something in the water. The dogs usually are lounging in the yard, lift their head up to watch us go by, and then go back to sleep, which is good, seeing as I'm NOT fan of dog sprints.
Anyway, 65 WINDY miles followed by a (very) short little run and I'm spent. Not a bad day really.
Tomorrow is the last day of my second to last spring break. After enjoying spring break for the last (lets see ... two years of law school ... six years of college ... thirteen years of K-12 ... ) twenty one years, its weird to think that after next year, I won't have that glorious week off in the middle of march.
True to form, the weather this year has been dismal. It seems that every spring break is the same thing: perfect weather leading up to that week, perfect weather the week after, and cold/rainy/snowy/windy crap during the break itself.
Today the weather cleared a bit and I headed out for my longest run of the season. A nice little two hour out and back along much of the same route as my really long runs. It was sunny and 40something with that ever present springtime wind. When I was running south, I was hot in all my layers, but heading north, I was shivering. But it was sunny and quiet and I was running in the middle of the day on a Thursday. And I felt GREAT. Maybe my premature rest week did me some good. Maybe I should consider doing a 2 week hard/1 week easy schedule. Its worth pondering ...
Spent the rest of the day lazing around the apartment with the cuddlemutt. Drank some coffee, did some cleaning, went to the store. And now I'm about to curl up in my bed and read my book.
I wish spring break never had to end.
So I just got off the phone with a guy who works for the advertising agency that works with Keen. He said they are thinking about using my story as part of a bigger ad campaign (think glossies in Outside Mag!!!!!). He needs me to send them a couple pictures so they can "see what they're working with visually".
Now I have NO idea what pictures to send them! Most the pics we have of me from the last four years or so involve triathlons, playing outdoors, and/or the dog. None of them are especially flattering. There's some that are ok, but they're not the kind of pics that you would think would land you in a national magazine.
If only I were one of those girls that got all gussied up on a regular basis ... but then, I suppose, I wouldn't have this Keen thing going on would I? ;)
I have a bad Petfinder addiction. Before we got Maddie, a.k.a. Hope, I would spend hours searching Petfinder for the perfect dog. Its an addiction that runs in the family, as my mom does the same thing.
We have pretty much decided that when I graduate next year and get ready to enter the real world (and we have another income, and an actual house) it will be time to get the Madadore a buddy - which means that my dog search has begun anew.
Before getting Maddie we had thought long and hard about adopting a retired greyhound. We poured over greyhound books and spent a long time talking to the greyhound rescue people. We fell in love with the dogs. What many people don't know is that retired racing greyhounds make fabulous pets. They are calm and gentle and sweet and goofy. They are very low energy once they are "retired" and want nothing more to lay on the couch. They don't need a ton of exercise.
We decided against one as our first dog because they really don't make good running partners, which was what we wanted in a dog. Now that we have our running dog, we want our next dog to be a couch potato. Enter the greyhound.
So now my search has begun anew. I realize it will be well over a year before we get another dog, but its really fun to think about and plan for. I can't wait to get Madder a buddy.
Two years in a row. Un-friggin-believable.
For the record: Halfway through the game I was yelling (literally) at my buddy Bill to put Jeff Hawkins in. He never listens to me.
Now I will go resume crying in my Pale Ale. It hurts.
Yesterday was perfect weather. We put our long ride off till today because both the boyfriend and I's legs were still feeling pretty trashed from our hard workouts on Thursday (my long run, his spinning class). The weather was supposed to be warm and sunny so it made sense.
This morning I woke to the thunder and lightning and hail and before I even knew what was going on the tornado sirens started going off. All before 8 a.m.
My part of town is fine, but others are completely trashed. The storm has passed but its still looking way ominous outside and there is no way I'm heading out for a 4 hour ride. So, I will be stuck on the trainer. For 4 hours. Bloody hell.
The good news is that my beloved basketball team plays in the championship game of the Big 12 Tournament this afternoon and I'm sure there will be all sorts of cool Selection Sunday stuff to watch.
ITS MARCH MADNESS BABY!!!!
Edited to add:
I'm glad I stayed home to watch the game. We flat out ROCKED and I'm so happy I was able to witness it. On to the Big Dance as a # 4 seed. None too shabby for a team whose top seven or eight scorers from today's game are freshman and sophomores.
The weather event (noone's quite sure yet whether it was actually a tornado) turned out to be far worse than we had thought. I drove through downtown this evening and there are trees and powerlines and signs down everywhere. Windows were boarded up everywhere and a whole bunch of businesses were closed. I'm convinced this was the work of the Nothing.
Anyway, because of all this stormy madness, classes at Looneyville University were actually CANCELLED tomorrow. Yes folks, that's right NO SCHOOL tomorrow. This is the school that didn't cancel class for 9-11, that makes us go to school in snow storms. In my 8 years here, this is only the second time we've not had class. And I am NOT complaining!
This afternoon the boytoy and I finally got out for a long-ish ride on the real live road. I had 3-4 hours scheduled - we ended up doing 3:45 and probably around 57 or 58 miles - I screwed up my computer so its hard to know for sure. It was a beautiful day and I was riding without leg OR arm warmers. The wind picked up so that we had a much stronger headwind coming back than we did a tailwind going out. Not fair. But all in all it was a fantastic day for a ride.
So anyway, there I am huffing and puffing my way up one of the last hills on the ride, into the bloody wind, when I see these two little girls standing on the road ahead of me. I was going slow enough at this point that they were able to run along next to me at which point one says "DID YOU CUSS AT MY MOM?" I looked at her and said "umm ... what?". She repeated her question and I assured her that I did no such thing. She said "Well SOMEONE on a bike cussed at my mom" and again I said "well, I'm very sorry ... but I'm sure it wasn't me" (at least not today ...).
I couldn't help but wonder ... what if I had said yes???? Would she have jumped in front of me forcing me to stop and then given me a lecture on how rude it is to cuss at a complete stranger who comes dangerously close to running you off the road?? Would she have stuck a stick in my spokes??? Would she have run home and told her dad that she found the dirty rotten cyclist scum that had cursed at his darling wife and then would we have been in REAL trouble?
It was a bit of an odd encounter to say the least.
This evening I was chatting with a friend of mine when the subject of summer jobs came up. He told me that he STILL has yet to acquire gainful employment for the summer and he's incredibly frustrated. I understand his frustration. He's in the top ten or fifteen percent of the class, on moot court, in a clinic, and incredibly intelligent. He did a full round of OCIs last semester, had probably ten screening interviews, one callback, and no job offers. He's had several interviews since then and still no luck. He announced to me today that he would be trying to write on to law review for next year because he 'can't get a job' so he obviously needs SOMETHING else to stand out, make him a more attractive candidate, etc.
I couldn't help but think "Not being on law review ISN'T your problem". Sure, a good number of the people he's competing with for these gigs ARE on law reivew, but I don't think thats going to help him. It will only make his resume look even more like everyone else's. What he needs is passion, excitement, enthusiasm, maybe a new interview strategy. For someone with his qualifications, at least as they appear on paper, to be having this much trouble finding summer employment, I have a hard time believing it has anything to do with how his resume looks. This guy is mellooooow - way mellow. To the point of seeming apathetic, even though he's not. I can't help but think that this must come across when he interviews. I can't think of why else he hasn't found employment yet.
I'm not saying I'm an expert at the interview process, but seeing as I'm one for one internship wise, I must have done SOMETHING right. When I had my interview for my summer gig, I went in there having made the decision that I was going to be myself (well, the professional version of myself). No faking interest in things I wasn't interested in, but also, no holding back enthusiasm for the things I was. I have a feeling that I came across as incredibly dorky and wide-eyed and naive, but it worked. And I didn't project myself as someone that I'm not. They know what they're getting in me and I feel very comfortable knowing that.
I want to sit my friend down and tell him "look ... you're ranked a zillion times higher, your GPA is probably a full grade point better ... but you need to listen to me... find something you're excited about and follow it. Employers can see right through that fake bullshit. And for the love of god, don't do law review just because you feel like you NEED to."
This will be my last post on my trusty beat of a laptop. I've had this thing for over three years and its been dieing a very slow and painful death for the last twelve months or so. I can deal with the fact that I've typed the keys so much that they are smooth, that my "m" and "n"s have rubbed off and the fact that this thing weighs more than my dog. Unfortunately, though, those are not its only problems. It now takes a good ten minutes to turn on, which isn't good when you have less than ten minutes between classes. I am missing notes from the first five minutes of just about every class this semester. It freezes up whenever it feels like it and I find myself frustratedly tapping on the keys trying to get it to unlock. The battery hasn't worked for the last year and a half, so that it ALWAYS has to be plugged in - no mobility here.
My new MacBook Pro, which the boyfriend is telling me is incredibly hott (yes, with two t's) is on its way and within the next twenty minutes will be here.
Its a bit bittersweet as I have come to love my old decrepit Dell. But I think I will get over it. Fast.
