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Showing posts from 2011

Don't Mess With Sunday

Here's my typical Sunday: Morning: 8am-master's swim practice or 9am-yoga or sleep in and let husband make breakfast, drink lots of coffee and embrace robe culture. Afternoon: Catch up on what I blew off all week which may include: grocery store, laundry, bill paying, house tidying and aggravating Trudy by not letting her sleep. Evening: Prep for upcoming week by getting lunch food organized, cleaning the gum wrappers from my purse, grouping workout clothes together, planning meals for the week and then stealing away to read a magazine while Husband watches a cartoon extravaganza of which I want no part. Besides noticing that I'm horribly Type A, you will also notice something else -- nowhere in the plan is a dinner party included. That is because Sunday night dinner parties suck. Please note that I am not saying the people at dinner parties suck, I'm saying planning crap on a Sunday night frustrates the hell out of me. Especially when it's thrown together last min

A little something sweet

Oh, sugar. I love you so. It’s been a magical last few days as your abundance was celebrated. At home, at work, even in my car. (That’s what happens when you open a bag of Hershey bars on your drive home.) My love affair with sugar started young and was heavily influenced by my father. Every lunch, dinner or spoonful of savory was followed by a little something sweet. Consequently, our house was littered with random piles of candy, usually purchased at a gas station since he traveled for work. He kept a stash of taffy in the living room clock, cookies behind the phone books and butterscotch candies in the drawer next to his bed. And yes, I sought them all out. (My giant appetite was the reason he had to hide food in the first place, but that’s another story.) Always the supporter of the underdog, my dad applied that philosophy to candy, as well. Really awful candy, my dad bought in bulk as if to say, “Don’t worry strange strawberry hard candy with a soft center, I’l

More Trudy Trials

The inevitable happened. Trudy's day care called on Wednesday and oh-so-kindly recommended she get more training before returning. So technically, she was not kicked out, but it may be awhile before she's welcomed back. While disappointed, this incident clearly indicates we're doing something wrong. Trudy is fantastic. It's fairly disgusting how much we love her and when you love a dog that much, it's difficult to discipline them. (All you with kids are saying, "duh.") We have not done a good job of positioning ourselves as the pack leaders, so she's confused. Therefore, her aggression comes out at random times. Coincidentally, she is more aggressive when she's regularly attending daycare. So no more day care for Trudy, which saddens me mostly because the burden then falls on us to wear this dog out. When Boyfriend's out of town, all three walks per day with some park time fall to me. While I enjoy this interaction with Trudy, sometimes you hav

My lats are bigger than yours

Maybe. Maybe not. I do know that as a swimmer, there are a few muscle groups of which I can be proud. Lats. Triceps. Flexible ankles. Okay, so flexibility is not a muscle group, but I'm still counting it. Where am I going with this rambling post? Here's the deal. If there was some sort of award for working out a lot, I may be in contention. Swimming, running, yoga, cardio....I can knock it out fairly easily. However, throw intensity in there and I have a problem. Not to mention a definite lack of strength. Ask my stepbrother about me try to do a pull-up. Singular. It was really more of me just hanging from the monkey bars and him laughing. So I decide to mix it up. Try something new. $40 for six Bootcamp classes. Real Bootcamp, not YMCA Bootcamp. (Sorry, Y.) Monday, 4:45pm, a male instructor named Dana. Don't let the name fool you. For sixty minutes, I had my ass handed to me. As I'm struggling to do the ring push-ups - on my knees no less - it hits me. I suck at this.

Reunion 101

Last night was the kick-off of my twenty year high school reunion. A school tour was planned (I was too late), a home football game was scheduled (I didn't make into the bleachers), and a follow-up gathering took place at a hole-in-the-wall bar. (I was one of the first to arrive.) So my priorities are clear. It was a more intimate gathering than I expected -- around 25 people. Fortunately, I liked everyone there and let's be honest, this is all about my good time. Though the celebration continues tonight with a more formal and hopefully highly attended event, here are some tidbits that fall into the Reunion 101 curriculum. 1. You'll be nervous. (I speak for the women.) It doesn't matter if you're married, single, skinny, fat, successful or struggling. There's something about being faced with people that knew you at the most awkward stage in your life. You could now be a CEO of a Fortune 500, but just think about high school and you can feel your chin break out a

The Not-So-Elegant Canine

This is Trudy. More specifically, this is Trudy's butt. Her preferred sleeping method is head half under the bed, butt half out. This is not all that unusual for dogs, but it still makes me laugh. In the two months since adopting Trudy, we have laughed many times at her antics. Getting asked not to return to dog daycare was not one of those times. The Elegant Canine (TEC) was Trudy's first venture into daycare, as well as some one-on-one obedience training classes with the owner. The training classes went fine. The daycare did not. As with most rescue dogs, we are clueless as to Trudy's life prior to being Trudy. She was found trotting through the neighborhood by a kind neighbor who rescued and fostered her until she was eventually initiated into the Saab household. Truth is, we suspect she was kind of a badass dog. Weighing in at a svelte 45 pounds, she doesn't cower from any one or any animal. I have this vision of her roaming the streets with nun chucks, s

Happy, happy

I was perusing yoga blogs when I came across this gem. So if you see a crazy lady doing yoga on a mountaintop with a glass of sangria next to her mat, come say hi. I'll appreciate the break. Things that make me happy: 1) Watching my dog run off-leash. 2) My own lane at the pool. 3) A bat-free night. 4) Mountains. 5) Yoga class. 6) New magazine. 7) Above mentioned sangria. 8) Donuts. 9) Movie previews. 10) Tailwinds. (I realize doing a list as a blog entry is kind of cheating. But I just don't care.)

Hello Mountains

Boyfriend and I are four days into our Colorado trek and just like last year are wondering why the hell we live in Kansas City. My exact words were, "If you get any job offer in Colorado, take it." I'd make a fine barista. After the lovely Tour De Kansas, we stopped in Denver for the night. Then next day we headed to Leadville to watch the Leadville 100 Trail Bike Race. Leadville is not much of a tourist attraction, which is fine. It's an old mining town turned endurance mecca. Fortunately, Boyfriend's aunt is a resident and kindly loaned us her apartment for the weekend. Doubly fortunately her apartment is literally right at the start of the race. We spent Saturday ogling fine mountain bikes. I'm never sure what I'm looking at, so we have a code: "green" means a bike he'd love to have, "yellow" is a maybe and "red" means his current steed is nicer. I like to simplify things. My favorite part of the race was watching

The Softride Has Left The Building

Today I bid adieu to my first triathlon bike – a Softride Rocket TT named Sally. (“Ride, Sally, Ride...”) While technically still mine until the ebay auction ends tomorrow, she has been dropped off at the bike store for clean up and packing. We’ll ship her off to the new owner this weekend and that will be the end of my beam bike era. A Softride is considered old school in the triathlon world and is mocked mercilessly by roadies. Sally has a carbon beam, no down tube and 650 wheels – basically the low-rider Cadillac of bikes. While it doesn’t have a stiff suspension or a brag-worthy weight, it has one thing – comfort. This is something I desperately needed when training for my first Ironman. Sally raced at Kona in 2001 and Wisconsin in 2003. She was dependable and attention-getting. Like riding a motorcycle, Softride enthusiasts also offered the casual hand wave when you encountered another one on the road. However, there are fewer out there these days. The Softride company

No Love for Sci-Fi

The furniture has been rearranged; pictures adjusted; trash bags unpacked and closet organized. (My closet; not Boyfriend’s. I’m not allowed to mess with his clothes. Yet.) Knowing the move would be stressful we rewarded ourselves with cable. We reasoned cable is needed to watch the Tour de France. But really, I was missing Millionaire Matchmaker and House Hunters. What I didn’t account for is the avalanche of sci-fi programming that is on 24/7. Here’s the thing, boys. Regardless of what a girl indicates when you start dating, she does not enjoy watching science fiction. She may watch it with you, but it is only an effort to impress you. She is really praying it’s a thirty-minute show verses a full hour. This is not unlike when boy first has girl over to his house, apologizing that it’s messy when the truth is, this is the cleanest it’s been in six months. It’s all about first impressions. As with all broad statements, there are exceptions. But I am speaking for t

Post-move Relief

Did you hear the wind blowing through Kansas City on Monday morning? That was actually my sigh of relief. The moving is done. (We laughed. We cried. It was better than Cats.) Actually, it was as bad as moving always seems to be, regardless of the preparation. Moving is like a false-flat, for any cyclists that read this. You do the heavy lifting, drive, unload, return the truck, drink a beer and breathe a sigh of relief. Then you look around the new digs and realize all the unpacking and furniture placement that must takes place and the relief dissipates. So let's just chalk it up to a long couple weeks. Moving always makes me nostalgic about the place I'm leaving. I love my house. (As a rental, it's still technically mine.) It was the only real estate I ever owned by myself. It was a little shoebox refuge where I honed my house upkeep capabilities - oftentimes with help - and learned to be okay with being alone. As my mood turned mopey about leaving Ash Drive, Boyfriend tri

The purge and merge

Here's how the impending move is going. Boyfriend is purging. I am merging. You can see the rub. I have stuff. Boyfriend has stuff. We have to stuff the stuff under one roof. We are no longer young-ens that move lightly. Our middle age accumulation is evident in the number of moving boxes at my house and the items that must be removed from his house. It's tons of fun. Remember the wagon wheel coffee table scene from "When Harry Met Sally"? Those conversations are simmering on the horizon. (To be fair, his coffee table is actually fine and will go in our newly rented storage unit.) Fortunately, Boyfriend realizes he has to make concessions. Many of them will be made this weekend while he's out of town. (Less painful.) It could have been worse. I had a dumpster scheduled to be dropped off in his driveway, but canceled after realizing my inability to lift by myself many of the items that need to go. Lucky man. So maybe the picture is confusing, but it should be docu

Bring on the crazy.

When Boyfriend proposed, the tail end of the conversation was, “By giving you the ring I’m also handing over the stress.” The comment didn’t bother me at the time. Hell, I’d just got engaged to a fantastic guy. This is great. I couldn’t be happier. Yay me. Two weeks later and euphoria is gone. Maybe not gone, but buried deep under renting my house, reorganizing his house, moving my stuff, planning a wedding (that’s another story), working, coaching and supposedly studying for the GRE. Right. I was also supposed to race last weekend, but lack of training and Boyfriend’s comment that the water would cause hypothermia made me decide otherwise. Wimp. I’m not proud. I’ve decided no more races until the move is complete, which should be July 1. Oh, but that’s when we get our new dog. (She’s currently being treated for heartworm, poor thing.) I’ve created the “Master List” which entails all to be done at both houses, as well as preliminary wedding planning. It’s at three

My humble abode...

has been rented. It took 24 hours, a Craigslist ad and four photos. I was completely unprepared for the response. Ten people in one day. Everyone that saw it filled out an application. It threw me into a tailspin. There's something about renting a house that's been your home. I want someone that will care about it the way that I do, which is nearly impossible. I labored over who should be the renter of choice, checking references and verifying employment. It caused much emotional distress. Finally, Boyfriend (now fiance) said, are you expecting the renter to be your new best friend? Um, no. Sheepishly I decided on the girl that responded first to the ad. So in six weeks, my cute little house will be inhabited by someone else and I'll be merging my things with a man who has been living solo for several decades. There is much purging to be done and not nearly enough time to do it. And we're planning a reception. Sometime in the fall, hopefully October. And the first race

Otherwise engaged.

Ring criteria: Mine: simple, classic, not too fancy. Boyfriend: sturdy, usable to aid in escape if ever trapped inside something made of glass. Win-win.

Zack, the Smiths and a Gift Card

I’ve lived in my house for three years. Apparently, some guy named Zack has also lived in my house for the past year. Or at least Bill and Annie Smith (not their real names) in Overland Park, Kansas think he lives at my address. They send him a lot of cards – thank you notes, just for fun cards and yesterday, I received Zack’s birthday card. Obviously for me to know what kind of cards they send, I open them. The first time I received one, I “Returned to Sender,” but not since then. They keep on coming and I keep on opening them. It’s like reality TV, but through the mail. I’m not proud of my actions and suspect it’s illegal for me to keep opening Zack’s mail. But now I’m genuinely interested in how he’s doing. Zack got a new job last fall (Attaboy card), gave the Smiths Big 12 Tournament tickets (thank you note), and he had a birthday this week. Until yesterday, there was nothing of value in the cards besides sweet sentiment. But in the birthday card there was a Pla

Underachiever

My college transcript came in the mail today. My dad doesn't read my blog, so I'll admit it - I did not apply myself in college. Twenty years ago I would have argued that point (and probably did), but at age 38 it is clear - I was an underachieving undergrad. More appalling than my grades are the classes. It is amazing Drake awarded me a degree at all. Of course, I did pick the school because there was no math requirement for a journalism degree. I'm not kidding. Some of the classes I received A's in: History of Rock and Roll (taught by a morning DJ who let us go after 45 minutes), Drugs in Society (where I learned what works best for treating hangovers), Deviance (what?) and Intro to Theater (clearly, I missed my calling.) Classes I earned C's in: Intro to Economics (8 a.m. on MWF is just stupid), Logic and Critical Thinking (I have no recollection of this class), and Intro to Women's Studies (how does that happen when you're a girl?). My grades also reflec

I Want To Ride My Bicycle

Yesterday was my first outside ride of 2011. True cyclists will find that ridiculous, as there has been ample opportunity to get outside before now. Just not for me. I’m a ideal-weather cyclist. Criteria for riding outside includes: sunny with no chance of rain, winds less than 15 miles per hour, a location of either the downtown airport or country roads and the time of day must be low traffic. That leaves me with approximately eight hours of outdoor riding time per year. They say cyclists fall into two categories – those who have wrecked and those who are going to. I’ve only had one minor incident, which was hitting a road-closed sign because I wasn’t paying attention. (It’s easy to space out riding 80 miles on a 3.7-mile loop.) Fortunately, the injuries were minor. So that means the big wreck is still looming. This fear leads me to riding indoors on the trainer more often than not. Boyfriend, who is more cyclist than triathlete, finds this absurd. He does a ride s

Grace: What is it and how do I get some?

On my 38 th birthday, I listed some goals for the upcoming year. They included easy things like drinking more lattes, getting more massages and wearing a lot of hats. (Literally, not figuratively.) Easy stuff. Setting the bar low, if you will. One I did not mention is to be a better person. Vague? Yes. Achievable? Hopefully. But defining what exactly I mean proves challenging. Do I want to be nicer? Lots of room to improve there. More patient? Um-hum. Let the people who speed past and then want to cut over at the merge go in front of me? Even I have my limits. So last night I was rereading a sweet note my childhood minister had sent me. He had known my mom quite well and continues, 20 years later, to still mention her in one of his sermons. He wrote, “Your mother’s kindness and grace has always stayed with me.” A-ha! That’s what I’m talking about. Grace. Sadly, the only time someone has referred to me grace-wise was in sarcasm. (As in, “Way to go, grace” when

The "Shoulds"

Like most women, I'm a worrier. The "shoulds" constantly nag at me. I should clean out the basement. I should seal the grout in my kitchen. I should eat less sugar. These little annoyances swirl around me like dirt around Pigpen. And then one day a switch flips and I actually do it. (Though the flip can be a long time coming.) I've lived in my house almost three years with my predecessor's bathroom decor choices. Some friends have called it the Fragglerock bathroom, others think it's a Miami Dolphins motif. Naming rights aside, it was bright teal with a lime green and bird covered valence over the shower. I mocked the bathroom upon first viewing. "Wow," I told my realtor. "That has to be changed immediately." In my world, immediately means two years, nine months. Last night, I heard angels sing as the valence came down. I patched, sanded and painted. Ta-da! I have a grown-up bathroom. Finally. Touch up paint is another fun "should.&quo

Just Say No To Marshmallow Hearts

It all started a couple weeks ago at the Hallmark Store. Driven by my chronic need for a "little something sweet", I impulse bought an overpriced chocolate marshmallow heart. ($4 for a little piece of candy! Really, Hallmark? Has the card biz gotten that bad?) Anyway, I sat down with a good book to read while eating it. Three bites in and there's a noise in my mouth, followed by the feeling I just bit into tin foil. What the hell? It's a marshmallow. There's no sediment in marshmallow. I immediately know something's wrong as both the upper and lower tooth are screaming at me to quit chewing. Damn. Damn, damn, damn. This cannot be good. The lower tooth is actually a crown and the upper has a filling. (Yes, I do brush my teeth regularly.) If either or both are cracked this is gonna be bad. So I do what any normal person would do and ignore it. Maybe it will go away on it's own, I hope. If I don't acknowledge it, maybe nothing's really wrong. Except

Double Funk

I'm sitting in my living room chair under a blanket, half surfing the web and half watching mindless television. .001 percent of me is debating some sort of workout. But then I would have to actually get up and move. February should be renamed Funkuary. The cold, the ridiculous amount of snow and lack of sunlight make getting to the gym at 5:30 a.m. difficult. If I do drag myself out of the warm covers, it seems to be later and later. Friday I didn't finish my workout until 8 a.m., putting me at work by 8:45. Good thing they don't give out tardy passes. The double funk comes from an entire month off of swimming and yoga. A whole month. That's seven months in Jen-years. The funk was spiraling out of control. I had to do something. I needed a new mindset, damn it. So I decided to do what I should have done long ago and work on my weaknesses. The last two weeks have included lots of trainer and treadmill time. My legs are sore. I'm groaning a bit upon standing. But I&

Snow Day

Besides Christmas vacation, the best thing about working in education is a snow day. It makes it perfectly acceptable to stay in pajamas the entire day. Which I did, with the exception of venturing out to shovel. With a bum arm. I'm stupid. I'm also now under the influence of pain medication. I'd like to say the day was productive and all sorts of chores were accomplished, but that would be a lie. The highlight was I managed s short workout and did laundry. If you don't have cable, there's not much on during the day, so I relived high school by watching The Cosby Show. It was horrible. But I remember loving it at the time. Mostly, I just coveted Vanessa's wardrobe. I'm hoping for no snow day tomorrow. Cabin fever is setting in and another day with the Huxtable's would be too much.

Pain Management

This week has been about one thing -- pain management. It really started last Saturday (New Year's Day) when I ended up with a nasty hangover. Boyfriend and I met friends in Lawrence for festivities which began with a shot of whiskey at 7 p.m. That set the expectation for the rest of the night, which I strived valiantly to uphold. The celebration ended with the eating of cheese bread and pizza crust at 3 a.m. (I napped through the actual pizza.) I'll admit it. I'm an amateur. I kept hearing people mutter "amateur night" about those choosing to ring in 2011. Hell yes, it's amateur night. So these people pride themselves of being professionals? Professional drinkers? Am I the only one who thinks this smacks of alcoholism?No thanks. Amateur is just fine with me even if I end up eating a giant bag of potato chips the next day. (Nothing soothes my hangover like Lay's chips and onion dip.) Next on the pain management tour was my arm surgery on Monday. I won'