so I was (it's back)

Burlington waterfront

Happy with my run last night. I ran (?) with Second Wind Conditioning from the beach house, I love the beach house. I even did about 2km more than was on my sched. Nice

Wondering what my legs will think of another short run tonight.

Bummed that my Garmin seems to have died.

Looking for the reset button to see if that helps.

Shocked that I managed to score a bike trainer from a friend, he really is far too nice. Here begins the construction of the pain cave.

Not shocked that John tried to outbid me when he saw the offer on twitter.. bugger.

Excited that this weekend is Thanksgiving which means a long weekend and sleep.

Making plans with friends cause my family is busy so we are pushing dinner plans to another weekend. 

Going to make turkey with mashed sweet/white potatoes, gravy, veggies. I'll have lunches for a week!!!!

Loving my new Rocketfish wireless headphones.

Craving homemade strawberry jam, yup the high sugar, old school kind that your grandma used to make.

Noting that my grandma didn't make homemade strawberry jam, she made stewed rhubarb and I loved it.

EXTRA excited that Kona is this weekend, (it is this weekend right?) because my friend Jackie is competing again this year.  GO JACKIE!!!

that's all I got...

that's creepy

I've got my eye on you...

The jury is out on whether this picture is creepy or cool. I dunno, I'm working my way towards a pic of all of me but let's start here ok? Next week, the other eye.

So I'm back at it.. Coach and I devised a plan for October which is reasonable and doable and puts my mindset into "well it's only a short one" in the hopes that I keep the momentum going. I remember John telling me last season before I started, just get out there, get used to doing the workouts, don't over do it.. So here I am again. I'm calling it training season 2012 cause 2011 can just frig off already, I've had enough of 2011. This year I'm starting a few months earlier than last year but that is GOOD. The motto for the month is "ouch', that is all". Run tonight.. Yay.. (did I just say yay?)

Now that the spreadsheet is back I hopped on the scale this morning to get my starting weight. Remember last month when I hopped on the scale to check in and I was 8lbs lighter than I thought. This morning I was certain I had gained back at least those 8lbs so I stripped nekkid and gingerly stepped on. My eyes were squeezed tight until I heard the 'beep beep beep' and I looked down and guess what, down another pound from where I was the last time. I think my scale is broken. If this is a true weight this means I'll hit my weight goal 2 months earlier than planned. I've planned to lose 5lbs a month.  See, reasonable.

In other news I'm going away on Oct 20 for 4 days with my bestie for some R&R and I won't be required to dig a hole and poop in it. There will be beds and real toilets and breakfast and lots of hiking and hopefully beautiful changing colours and sunshine and water somewhere to look at. And wine.. Of course there will be wine and good food and laughs. I'm taking the entire week off because my nephew has surgery on the Tuesday and I want to be there for that. I haven't had any significant time off since Hunter died and boy am I ready.

that's all I got...

hiding under water - beth hart...

I got a note from a fellow blogger (who is awesome) and she mentioned that I wasn't posting a lot these days and it's true. I don't really feel like I should be posting because I didn't accomplish anything this past season and am not back into full on training yet.

As my boss put it, I've been a big disappointment, a let down this past season and I really felt those words. While I'm sure loads of people have been thinking it he's been the only one to say it out loud, to my face, but I have felt them the whole time, known it every single day, yet I couldn't muster any motivation to do anything about it.

Rather than focus on that I'm trying to just move forward. I see that lots of people are already planning their 2012 season so I thought I'd get in on the action. Coach Nancy is putting together team IronCanucks training for both a half and full this year. The half will be for Peterborogh and the full will be for Mont Tremblant as well as the schedule of other races to support our goals. My 2012 is shaping up (loosely) like this:

December - Santa Claus 5km run - I get to run while wearing a Santa suit.. so sexy! 
March - chilly half marathon NOT! No way am I running in that crappy weather. We'll see if she can talk me into this one
April - triathlon training camp with the coach and teammates. I've not been away for any reason in years, looking forward to this.
May - Mississauga half marathon - ahhh more my style, spring time, not too hot, flat course
May - Brian Smith charity ride. I can choose to do either the 75km or 140km distance. I suspect it'll be 140km
June - early month sprint - While I prefer swimming without a wetsuit I'll have to get one for this race
June - late month Olympic distance (Guelph) I think
July - Peterborough half Iron
August - Warrior dash or something like that. A couple of friends and I decided to do a Tough Mudder in 2013 and thought this would be fun as a warm up (why I agreed to this I'll never know).
August - Ironman Mont Tremblant cheering/support team. I can list it, it's going to be epic!! I cannot wait for this one, not only will my local friends (John, Fran etc) be racing, but my IronCanucks will be there AND some bloggers I've been dying to meet (coughMandyHeatherMattKevinwhodidimisscough)! My best friend is coming with me and I'm looking to see if we can volunteer on race day as well.. SO MUCH FUN!
September - women's only sprint triathlon in Milton (Kelso)
October - Scotia bank half marathon.  It will be fun to compare my times between May and Oct.

I need to buy my own trainer this year and set up a real honest to goodness 'pain cave'. I have an extra TV, just need a DVD player which I assume I can get for cheap at Walmart. I expect that I'll be much more comfortable downstairs and make less noise on concrete than I do in the dining room. Any and all suggestions for the pain cave are welcome. I don't have anything in my basement other than a washer/dryer and some boxes that never got unpacked when I moved 4years ago. Oh please like you never!

In other news we found out that Hunter passed away from ARVD, and we now know that my nephew has it too. I should be thankful, his situation can be managed (not cured) with surgery, they have to implant a defibrillator into his chest. How frigging scary is that? I feel for him, am worried about him but I can't do a damn thing about it. I found out that with this condition you can't exercise, exercise can kill him. While I understand it in laymans terms at a high level it just seems so weird, a heart condtion where exercise can kill you, even walking. I'm unsure if the rest of the family needs to be/will be tested, we're waiting to hear more from the doctors on that.

that's all I got...

check out these two hot babes

My sister sent me a scanned photo of her and I from our childhood and it made me laugh.  Love the curtains mom!!  I don't even know how old we were.

Sue is on the left, that's me on the right

I've got some fun stuff in the hopper, more on that as it materializes.

that's all I got..

weekend update

finally!

I meant to get another update in about the race last weekend but didn't get there.  It's kind of how my entire summer has been, 'I meant to but didn't'.. oh well  

Racing season is over and the Mommies / Babes in Motion kicked ass this past weekend!  I'm so proud of all of them. I wanted to go and watch them race, sadly I slept right through the TWO alarm clocks I had set. I do this all the time on a workday but have never slept through a cheering event.

I was going to race this one but decided a few weeks ago not to. I have been enjoying not having any pressure, and training when/how I wanted. To be honest for me race day is my least favourite day on the schedule so this year was the racing season that never started.  It's ok.  It's what I wanted, what I needed. Theres been alot of internal bullshit to get through and I think I may be having a mid-life crisis. I'm ok with that but if that's the case where are the young men and sportscars??!! I thought these things went hand in hand with a mid-life crisis? At any rate, I'm relieved because no one will be asking me "are you going to race?" anymore. The season is over and I'm back to training and things will only go up from here. Coach is keeping me on track for next season and from what I have seen, training for that starts um NOW?!  jeez

This past weekend I went to visit a friend, she lives north of me and in the same location where my family had our cottage growing up. I went there most weekends into my teenage years and at least once or twice a year until they sold it a few years ago. I love the area. It's left me remembering my grandparents with a smile and Finnish coffeecake and Danish meatballs and badly sung Finnish sauna songs that they taught us.

our cottage was on this island

bliss

That's all I got...

ps - does anyone else automatically think "Jane you ignorant sl..." when you hear "weekend update"?