My bike got put back together just fine (most of the work done by me thank you very much!), and on Wednesday I took it out for a ride. This was the first ride in a long time, and my first real training ride ever in Massachusetts. Here are some sights and thoughts from my ride:
I had 2 major squirrel encounters. #1) I was riding on one of those rail-to-trail deals that had a fair
number of road crossings. At one of these intersections I had to stop to let some cars go by. While I was waiting I heard a rustle, rustle, rustle getting closer and closer. Then I heard THWACK! as a squirrel fell out of a tree about one foot from my right shoulder and scrambled off. #2) About 20 minutes later, a little farther up the road I saw an albino squirrel, complete with red eyes and everything. It ran away before I could take a picture, so it's not a really interesting story, but don't criticize unless you have a better story about an albino squirrel.
Why is it that colors are so much brighter in the afternoon when you have sunglasses on? Right now the leaves are all these bright reds and oranges and greens. On top of that, the sun was starting to set and there were some bright blues and pinks in the sky. Right before this picture was taken a wedge of Canada geese flew south overhead. I took out my new handy-dandy camera phone (the day after I bought it I saw that Marie Claire magazine called it "So 2005") and snapped a picture. The picture just makes it look old and faded and all the bright colors I was seeing in my sunglasses just look kind of pukey here.
I saw a whole pack of shirtless, skeletal high school cross country runners bounding by. I was so
Be careful with Polar bike computer sensors (the part that goes on the spoke). You might think that the reason the computer isn't working is that you need to move the sensor. Then you might decide that perhaps it is moving around on the spoke and the screw needs to be tightened. (Here is where you must be careful) If you tighten that screw super-tight you might crack the plastic. When you realize that you've put the sensor on one of the spokes leaning away from the sensor you'll feel like an idiot, but not as much of an idiot as you'll feel like 10 seconds later when you take it back off and a piece of the sensor falls on the ground. Black is not an easy color to find in little tufts of grass at the side of the path, especially when it's a 1/8th of an inch piece of plastic. You will then realize that your sensor, and hence your bike computer are useless. You will ride away cursing the bike shop and writing the compelling speech you will make the next day to the manager which will result in a new, free bike computer. You will be riding along at 80 miles per hour, fueled by anger when you will tuck your head down to catch your breath and notice that the quick release is not on the side it is usually on. Then you might finally realize why the sensor wasn't working. You will feel like a complete idiot as you put together that when you took the bike out of the car, you put the front wheel on backwards; and had you NOT done that you wouldn't have broken your computer, which now you are going to have to replace out of your own pocket. And you would be right in feeling like a fool.
Sorry I don't have much else to talk about. I've been a bit uninspired recently as job searching has taken up much of my mental energy.
On a side note: does anyone know any blogger cyclists or triathletes in the Boston area? I really need a training partner, or at least someone who knows where the common routs are. I can't seem to think of anything more than a few miles that doesn't take me on a highway. At the very least if I spy on a fellow blogger I might be able to find some cool places to go. Any suggestions?
Sunday, September 30, 2007
First *real* ride in New England
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Nobody read Bob's blog anymore
Some bloggers just don't know how to act. This is my official response to Bob Almighty's comment from my last post, which read:
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and yes to answer the big question the Red Sox still suck.
I realize that I have a lot of misguided New Yorkers who might read my blog, but let me clarify an important point that Bob has confused.
Yankees Suck!
Like I said, it's not about baseball. New York, you think you're so great down there with your millions of people, with your tall buildings, with your sand-wich-es, with your Wall Street and Broadway and 5th Avenue, China Town and Little Italy, but you're not so special. We have tall buildings too, we have lobster rolls, we have a financial district and a theater district just like you, we have Newbury Street, our very own China Town, and the North End. Does a Green Monster have your back in Yankees Stadium? And have you ever had a tea party? Do you have New Kids on the Block? Do you have David E. Kelly?! Yeah, no, I didn't think so.
But I can understand a New Yorker who's a Yankees fan. It would be like someone born into the Jehovah's Witnesses, it's not your fault that your people are annoying. What I think is pathetic is when someone from Connecticut (Bob Almighty), or New Jersey (my dad), or God forbid BOSTON (my best friend's sister's boyfriend) can't find a better team to rout for.
(Unfortunately I couldn't find the clip where NOMAAAAAH guest starred on a Sully & Denise sketch, so we're stuck with Britney).
Note: Things have been kind of crazy with the move and the job search. Blogs will continue, but not with the same regularity until I have more to talk about.
It's not about baseball, I don't even like baseball. It's about pride. It's about how if you go to a Dropkick Murphys concert in Boston instead of just screaming for an encore the audience will bust into a chant of "YAN-KEES-SUCK! YANK-EES-SUCK!" It's about principles. It's about how the agents of players who weren't going to be traded or who were promised to the Red Sox disappear into back rooms with Steinbrenner's people and suddenly are traded to the Yankees. It's about waiting till a Sox player makes it big, and then sucking him into the Yankees just as he's peaking. It started with Babe Ruth, almost 100 years ago, and then Clemens (who's still going strong thanks to *ehem* the wonders of modern medicine), A-rod, and others I can't remember right now because I don't really follow baseball. It's about how the Yankees always blow the first half of the season because their in-season doping regimen hasn't kicked in yet, and then they overtake the Red Socks come playoff time because the Red Sox are clean and play every game with a shining halo over their head. Yeah, I said it!
Like I said, it's not about baseball. New York, you think you're so great down there with your millions of people, with your tall buildings, with your sand-wich-es, with your Wall Street and Broadway and 5th Avenue, China Town and Little Italy, but you're not so special. We have tall buildings too, we have lobster rolls, we have a financial district and a theater district just like you, we have Newbury Street, our very own China Town, and the North End. Does a Green Monster have your back in Yankees Stadium? And have you ever had a tea party? Do you have New Kids on the Block? Do you have David E. Kelly?! Yeah, no, I didn't think so.But I can understand a New Yorker who's a Yankees fan. It would be like someone born into the Jehovah's Witnesses, it's not your fault that your people are annoying. What I think is pathetic is when someone from Connecticut (Bob Almighty), or New Jersey (my dad), or God forbid BOSTON (my best friend's sister's boyfriend) can't find a better team to rout for.(Unfortunately I couldn't find the clip where NOMAAAAAH guest starred on a Sully & Denise sketch, so we're stuck with Britney).Note: Things have been kind of crazy with the move and the job search. Blogs will continue, but not with the same regularity until I have more to talk about.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Bubble wrap!
There were less than 2 days to go before I had to get all my worldly posessions onto a plane to fly back to the US. I couldn't put it off anymore, so I went to Mailboxes, Etc. (yes there are some here in Spain, and they old name has managed to survive the UPS takeover) and got 8 meters of bubble wrap (about 26.2 feet, I didn't do that on purpose).
When Shane was here he'd happened upon a huge box in the street and carried it the 6+ blocks to my house. Upon inspection he said, "Once you take the wheels, pedals, handlebars and downfork off it'll fit perfectly!" Shane builds his own bikes from parts that he buys on ebay and knows how these things work. I am not as mechanically gifted, I have problems with pencil sharpeners. I'd taken off my seatpost before, adjusted my handlebars, gotten my wheels off all by myself, and even seen someone changing a pedal; but that fork thing I wasn't so sure about. I thought, It doesn't add that much more length, I can just leave it on. In typical me fashion I didn't ASK how to take the fork off. I think that's called hubris.
The wheels came off with relatively little effort. The quick release levers put up a little fight and I realized that the open/close lever on my front brakes had been open for God knows how long (probably why my brakes weren't working), but I was off to a good start.
Next the seat post. Came right off with a little help from my handy, dandy bike tool. I'm an ace.
Now for the handlebars. I opened the little screws on the front of the bike and pulled off the handlebars. But the brake and gear cables were still attached to the bike, so they just kind of hung there looking kind of grotesque. Hm, I hadn't thought of that. I decided to just tuck them back against the frame. I knew better than to fuck with cables.
Next, the pedals. I examined the pedals and the crank arm until I found the little screw on the
inside of the crank arm that releases the pedals. It took me awhile to find the size allen wrench that fit in perfectly. I stuck the wrench in the little eyelet and pushed. Nothing happened. I pushed even harder and the pedal swung away from me. I braced the pedal with my leg and pushed as hard as I could. The whole frame skidded across the floor. I kept trying to push, occasionally having the allen wrench slip out of its spot and occasionally pausing to look for a different screw to get this damn thing off. I tried the other pedal, same deal. I went and found some WD40 and sprayed the screw like I had a grudge, but to no avail.
Finally I called Silvia. She told me where the tools were kept (9 months living here, and I'd never so much as needed a screw driver!) and I found a standard allen wrench of the right size. "You don't know any boys, do you?"
"What?"
"You know, guys? With big strong hands?"
"No."
"Me neither." This gave me pause, perhaps I am missing something with my preferred lifestyle.
I went back to the bike and spent several more minutes fighting the pedals with my whole body, legs holding bike in place, shin bracing crank arm, and anything above that pressing every ounce of my strength onto that damn allen wrench. I paused to gather my composure. Okay, Claire, I says to myself I says, Okay Claire, you are going to put every ounce of your strength into that allen wrench and it is going to turn. I visualized it turning, then I checked my body position to make sure nothing was going to slip mid-attack, and pushed like my life depended on it. Finally the screw ceded! I rejoyced, filled with self confidence. I believed I could get off that second pedal. I set to work pushing with all my might on the second screw. I was a little scared of the sharp teeth of my chain ring menacing to slice my fingers open if I slipped, but I was lucky. After several minutes and trying several different bike and body positions I heaved a giant grunt and something moved! I thought I'd gotten it past that first big umph and now I just had to twirl it out. I tried to line up the allen wrench in its place again, but it kept falling out. Upon closer inspection of the tip of the tool I saw that my sheer superhuman strength had seared the little corners off the metal. The pedal had BROKEN the allen wrench. ("Allen" seems to be a bad luck word for me this week).
Fuck it, I thought and went to see if the bike would fit in the box with one pedal on. It left a friction dent in the card board, but I could make it fit. I tucked the handlebars (as you will remember were hanging by a thread) under my top tube and pushed it all the way down into the box. Just like Shane said, the damn fork was peeking several inches out of the top of the box. Dammit, how do you take the fork off?
I took a couple of screws out of the handlebar stem and pulled. Nothing happened. I tried pushing. Nothing. I looked for more screws all along the stem. Nope. I turned over the bike. There was a screw that went all the way through holding my brake release in place. That's it! I said, and took out the screw, washer, casing, and all kinds of other things I don't know the name
of. The brakes hung down limp like the handlebars. Push, nothing. Pull, nothing. What the FUCK?! I wanted to call Shane but it was only 2:00 am in California, too early, so I went on the internet. I read God-knows-what about using a rubber mallet, which didn't sound too wise to me. Then I read something that said that that little disk at the top of my steering column would come off.
(Mine looks a bit different from the picture, it as a little nipple-like circle in the middle and is slightly raised from the ring-thingys with the screws). Eureka!
So I went back to try to get that thing off. It wouldn't be easy, so I took a screw driver. I tried twisting it, nope. I tried prying it up with a screw driver. I tried shoving the screw driver in the little ring-y thing and pushing it up from underneath. I was so frustrated. I don't know what made me focus my attention on the nipple. I thought it was just there for decoration, but just out of curiosity I poked it with the screwdriver, then I prodded and pried underneath and the most amazing thing happened, it came off and there was a SCREW underneath!!! I felt like I'd discovered burried treasure. I unscrewed the screw and the fork finally came off with a whoe bunch of little pieces (including a steering thing with ball bearings that I was afraid to touch). It seemed like it was covered with more vasaline than a triathlete trying to fit into a too-small wetsuit, but it was OUT! I put back all the little pieces of the steering column and took a break for lunch.
The next step was, as Benson had suggested, getting some bubble wrap and packing tape and going to town. I wrapped up each individual piece in about 2 layers of bubble wrap and closed it up tight with the tape. The frame was hard, especialy bubblewraping the gears and that one damn pedal sticking out, but in the end I got it bubbled up.
For some extra protection I planned to mummify my frame and cover every inch with packing tape. This also seemed like a good idea since the bubble wrap was adding width and I wanted to compress every millimeter that I could. I would be a really bad candidate for an engineering degree, I know. When I finished my bike looked like a giant sting ray.
Please fit, please fit, please fit! It did! I was so excited! I was celebrating my victory and throwing saddles and forks and all sorts of things in the empty slots when I turned around and saw... SHIT! THE WHEELS! I had no bubble wrap left, but I stuck them in just to see if they would fit. Not a snowball's chance in hell. I took off the tires and tubes, but they were still sticking 6 inches out of the top of the box. I wanted to cry. I wanted a beer. I needed more bubble wrap.
After buying the bubble wrap I stopped in at a bike shop to see if they could sell me a bigger box. "Do you have a box that's bigger than 96x74x25?" I asked. The guy showed me the boxes that he had. They were long, sleek, and WAY narrower than my box. "I need something wider," I explained, I couldn't get one of the pedals off and now it's wrapped in about 6 meters of bubble wrap and packing tape."
"You know the left pedal screws off backwards right?" he said. "So that it doesn't come loose while you're pedaling." There are no words for how I felt after that. Stupid? Frustrated? Angry? All of those and then some. Why didn't I just pay someone to do this for me?
"Well anway, the handlebars are thick too," I defended. I explained that they drop bars were sticking off a bit in one direction while the brake hoods stuck out almost as far as the pedal in the other direction.
'What did you do?" He seemed confused. "Well you just need to turn the handlebars all the way to the right and then lower the angle so they fit around your top tube."
"Well I took off the downfork, so it should be even more compact..." I tried to explain.
"You did what?!" It was like I'd told him I'd sawed the thing in half. "Here, let me show you how we pack our bikes." He whipped out a box cutter and opened up a brand new bike. There it was, with the fork still on, handlebars still on (arranged like a U, not in a C like mine), back wheel still on, and the front wheel, seat, and pedals stuglled comfortably along side. It was like watching my own death, looking my own stupidity in the face like that. My heart sank and I promised myself I would never, ever try to figure something out on my own again for as long as I live. I didn't know whether to buy a separate box for my wheels or what. I decided not to think about it any more today.
The next day I wrapped up the wheels and stared at the box sullenly. Then I set to trying all possible wheel-frame combinations. Just when i thought I'd tried everything, I finally found a way to get both wheels in on the bottom and then shove the frame in. I may have killed a couple of spokes, but it fit! Well, sort of... the box was bowing pretty heavily, but it was in there and I could close it! There was even room for my pump!
I stuffed crumpled up newspaper into all the little nooks and crannies to keep stuff from moving around too much. The only thing left to do was to close up the box. The industrial staples were giving in several places and the top wasn't squarely closed, so I thought the safest bet would be to mummify the whole thing like I had the frame. The end result (finished only 3 hours before I had to wake up for my flight) was this:
(Coke can added for size comparison)
When Shane was here he'd happened upon a huge box in the street and carried it the 6+ blocks to my house. Upon inspection he said, "Once you take the wheels, pedals, handlebars and downfork off it'll fit perfectly!" Shane builds his own bikes from parts that he buys on ebay and knows how these things work. I am not as mechanically gifted, I have problems with pencil sharpeners. I'd taken off my seatpost before, adjusted my handlebars, gotten my wheels off all by myself, and even seen someone changing a pedal; but that fork thing I wasn't so sure about. I thought, It doesn't add that much more length, I can just leave it on. In typical me fashion I didn't ASK how to take the fork off. I think that's called hubris.
The wheels came off with relatively little effort. The quick release levers put up a little fight and I realized that the open/close lever on my front brakes had been open for God knows how long (probably why my brakes weren't working), but I was off to a good start.
Next the seat post. Came right off with a little help from my handy, dandy bike tool. I'm an ace.
Now for the handlebars. I opened the little screws on the front of the bike and pulled off the handlebars. But the brake and gear cables were still attached to the bike, so they just kind of hung there looking kind of grotesque. Hm, I hadn't thought of that. I decided to just tuck them back against the frame. I knew better than to fuck with cables.
Next, the pedals. I examined the pedals and the crank arm until I found the little screw on the
inside of the crank arm that releases the pedals. It took me awhile to find the size allen wrench that fit in perfectly. I stuck the wrench in the little eyelet and pushed. Nothing happened. I pushed even harder and the pedal swung away from me. I braced the pedal with my leg and pushed as hard as I could. The whole frame skidded across the floor. I kept trying to push, occasionally having the allen wrench slip out of its spot and occasionally pausing to look for a different screw to get this damn thing off. I tried the other pedal, same deal. I went and found some WD40 and sprayed the screw like I had a grudge, but to no avail.Finally I called Silvia. She told me where the tools were kept (9 months living here, and I'd never so much as needed a screw driver!) and I found a standard allen wrench of the right size. "You don't know any boys, do you?"
"What?"
"You know, guys? With big strong hands?"
"No."
"Me neither." This gave me pause, perhaps I am missing something with my preferred lifestyle.
I went back to the bike and spent several more minutes fighting the pedals with my whole body, legs holding bike in place, shin bracing crank arm, and anything above that pressing every ounce of my strength onto that damn allen wrench. I paused to gather my composure. Okay, Claire, I says to myself I says, Okay Claire, you are going to put every ounce of your strength into that allen wrench and it is going to turn. I visualized it turning, then I checked my body position to make sure nothing was going to slip mid-attack, and pushed like my life depended on it. Finally the screw ceded! I rejoyced, filled with self confidence. I believed I could get off that second pedal. I set to work pushing with all my might on the second screw. I was a little scared of the sharp teeth of my chain ring menacing to slice my fingers open if I slipped, but I was lucky. After several minutes and trying several different bike and body positions I heaved a giant grunt and something moved! I thought I'd gotten it past that first big umph and now I just had to twirl it out. I tried to line up the allen wrench in its place again, but it kept falling out. Upon closer inspection of the tip of the tool I saw that my sheer superhuman strength had seared the little corners off the metal. The pedal had BROKEN the allen wrench. ("Allen" seems to be a bad luck word for me this week).
Fuck it, I thought and went to see if the bike would fit in the box with one pedal on. It left a friction dent in the card board, but I could make it fit. I tucked the handlebars (as you will remember were hanging by a thread) under my top tube and pushed it all the way down into the box. Just like Shane said, the damn fork was peeking several inches out of the top of the box. Dammit, how do you take the fork off?
I took a couple of screws out of the handlebar stem and pulled. Nothing happened. I tried pushing. Nothing. I looked for more screws all along the stem. Nope. I turned over the bike. There was a screw that went all the way through holding my brake release in place. That's it! I said, and took out the screw, washer, casing, and all kinds of other things I don't know the name
of. The brakes hung down limp like the handlebars. Push, nothing. Pull, nothing. What the FUCK?! I wanted to call Shane but it was only 2:00 am in California, too early, so I went on the internet. I read God-knows-what about using a rubber mallet, which didn't sound too wise to me. Then I read something that said that that little disk at the top of my steering column would come off.(Mine looks a bit different from the picture, it as a little nipple-like circle in the middle and is slightly raised from the ring-thingys with the screws). Eureka!
So I went back to try to get that thing off. It wouldn't be easy, so I took a screw driver. I tried twisting it, nope. I tried prying it up with a screw driver. I tried shoving the screw driver in the little ring-y thing and pushing it up from underneath. I was so frustrated. I don't know what made me focus my attention on the nipple. I thought it was just there for decoration, but just out of curiosity I poked it with the screwdriver, then I prodded and pried underneath and the most amazing thing happened, it came off and there was a SCREW underneath!!! I felt like I'd discovered burried treasure. I unscrewed the screw and the fork finally came off with a whoe bunch of little pieces (including a steering thing with ball bearings that I was afraid to touch). It seemed like it was covered with more vasaline than a triathlete trying to fit into a too-small wetsuit, but it was OUT! I put back all the little pieces of the steering column and took a break for lunch.
The next step was, as Benson had suggested, getting some bubble wrap and packing tape and going to town. I wrapped up each individual piece in about 2 layers of bubble wrap and closed it up tight with the tape. The frame was hard, especialy bubblewraping the gears and that one damn pedal sticking out, but in the end I got it bubbled up.
For some extra protection I planned to mummify my frame and cover every inch with packing tape. This also seemed like a good idea since the bubble wrap was adding width and I wanted to compress every millimeter that I could. I would be a really bad candidate for an engineering degree, I know. When I finished my bike looked like a giant sting ray.
Please fit, please fit, please fit! It did! I was so excited! I was celebrating my victory and throwing saddles and forks and all sorts of things in the empty slots when I turned around and saw... SHIT! THE WHEELS! I had no bubble wrap left, but I stuck them in just to see if they would fit. Not a snowball's chance in hell. I took off the tires and tubes, but they were still sticking 6 inches out of the top of the box. I wanted to cry. I wanted a beer. I needed more bubble wrap.After buying the bubble wrap I stopped in at a bike shop to see if they could sell me a bigger box. "Do you have a box that's bigger than 96x74x25?" I asked. The guy showed me the boxes that he had. They were long, sleek, and WAY narrower than my box. "I need something wider," I explained, I couldn't get one of the pedals off and now it's wrapped in about 6 meters of bubble wrap and packing tape."
"You know the left pedal screws off backwards right?" he said. "So that it doesn't come loose while you're pedaling." There are no words for how I felt after that. Stupid? Frustrated? Angry? All of those and then some. Why didn't I just pay someone to do this for me?
"Well anway, the handlebars are thick too," I defended. I explained that they drop bars were sticking off a bit in one direction while the brake hoods stuck out almost as far as the pedal in the other direction.
'What did you do?" He seemed confused. "Well you just need to turn the handlebars all the way to the right and then lower the angle so they fit around your top tube."
"Well I took off the downfork, so it should be even more compact..." I tried to explain.
"You did what?!" It was like I'd told him I'd sawed the thing in half. "Here, let me show you how we pack our bikes." He whipped out a box cutter and opened up a brand new bike. There it was, with the fork still on, handlebars still on (arranged like a U, not in a C like mine), back wheel still on, and the front wheel, seat, and pedals stuglled comfortably along side. It was like watching my own death, looking my own stupidity in the face like that. My heart sank and I promised myself I would never, ever try to figure something out on my own again for as long as I live. I didn't know whether to buy a separate box for my wheels or what. I decided not to think about it any more today.
The next day I wrapped up the wheels and stared at the box sullenly. Then I set to trying all possible wheel-frame combinations. Just when i thought I'd tried everything, I finally found a way to get both wheels in on the bottom and then shove the frame in. I may have killed a couple of spokes, but it fit! Well, sort of... the box was bowing pretty heavily, but it was in there and I could close it! There was even room for my pump!
I stuffed crumpled up newspaper into all the little nooks and crannies to keep stuff from moving around too much. The only thing left to do was to close up the box. The industrial staples were giving in several places and the top wasn't squarely closed, so I thought the safest bet would be to mummify the whole thing like I had the frame. The end result (finished only 3 hours before I had to wake up for my flight) was this:
(Coke can added for size comparison)It took some six hours or more when all was said and done, but I packed up my bike ALL by myself. I might even rebuild it myself, but I think I'll let a mechanic take a good hard look at it before I try to ride anywhere!
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Foreshadowing
Last March I wrote this post about pre-season anxiety, wondering whether or not my friends' visiting was going to affect my training and racing. It's all in there, premonitions about how if my whole parade of friends came I wouldn't be able to train enough, and forewarning about how I would eventually fall off the wagon and miss some important races. Sorry to give mandatory homework, but this post is not going to make sense unless you read the old post. If you don't have much time, just read the paragraph about my terribly insightful dream. You can find it by just looking for the Mark Allen icon 
which tells you to "start reading here".
Ok, so did you read it? Are you back? If you didn't read it, then parts of this post are going to make no sense. So did you really read it? Ok, good.
Well anywho the other night I couldn't sleep again and I got to thinking and feeling pretty miserable about all the races that I flaked out on. I was thinking about the nasty club captain that didn't hold up his end of the bargain about keeping me informed about logistical and transportation issues, and then got all mad at me for disappearing from so many races. And then I remembered my dream from last March and how in my dream Mark Allen made me feel just like Jerk Triathlon Guy made me feel, even though (and because) it was all my fault. Both in my dream and in real life I wanted to do the races, but I just couldn't stop getting in my own way and in the end lack of focus made me let down my triathlon team, and Dream Mark Allen.
So then I started thinking about Mark Allen, not the legend, not the guy who ran shoulder-to-shoulder with Dave Scott in 1989 only to outwit him in the last couple of miles; not the giant who won the following 4 championships in Hawaii; not the God who was 13 minutes down on Thomas Helreigel (spelling?) in 1995 and ran him down in the marathon to win his last race ever. I was thinking about the Mark Allen I'd met a couple of times and had "seen around" (e.g. hung back in a corner staring out of the corner of my eye) several times while I was living in Santa Cruz. You see, Mark Allen was a member of the gym I worked at and was a bit of a legend on his own in the Spa Fitness Center world. He was a real athlete, and as far as I know the only professional we had at Spa. Receptionists, instructors and salespeople would whisper about him when he walked through the door. One of the instructors was a member of his Shamanistic spiritual group, so pamphlets about Shamanistic seminars led by Mark Allen were always all over the brake room and on all the bulletin boards. So even though Mark Allen rarely walked through the door (he was usually off either coaching world-class athletes or giving self-help speeches in wigwams), he was always a presence around the place all the same.At the time I was in my first season of triathlon training for a couple of Olympic distance races and a half ironman. I used to pester the manager (a bona fide ultraendurance athlete and ironman with a masters in Exercise Science) about training tips and questions. One day he said to me, "Why don't you ask Mark Allen for some tips?"
"Who?" I said. "You mean the crazy guy with the peyote and the tee pees?"
And then Bill explained to me WHO Mark Allen WAS. I'd heard of him, but I'm not so good with names, so I'd never put together the "Peyote Guy" together with the guy that all my triathlon books talked about.
"I can't talk to THAT GUY!"
"Aw no, he's really nice, really down to earth. I bet he could give you a few tips," Bill encouraged.
So after that I started to watch Mark Allen to see if he was really an approachable guy like Bill
said he was. He was real quiet and kind of kept to himself. He would come in, do a few weights for a little while, not really speak to anyone, and then just leave. The thing is, he never came in alone. He was always with a guy (right), I think his name is Brant, but we'll call him The Voice. Brant was not only Mr. Allen's spiritual guide or Shamanistic partner or whatever, but while Mark is quiet and soft spoken (I think the word here is "zen"), The Voice never shut up and did all the talking for him. The Voice made sure that everyone knew who was gracing them with His presence. "This is Mark Allen! The best triathlete in history! Six time winner of the Ironman world championships in Hawaii!" The Voice announced at least once a day. And the worst part is that The Voice's voice is high-pitched, nasal, really, really loud (maybe you've heard it on interviews?), and I think he does something funny with his Rs. In short, The Voice's voice really sticks to your ears, even after he's done speaking. I decided that there was no way I was going to talk to Mark Allen if I had to talk through The Voice.
said he was. He was real quiet and kind of kept to himself. He would come in, do a few weights for a little while, not really speak to anyone, and then just leave. The thing is, he never came in alone. He was always with a guy (right), I think his name is Brant, but we'll call him The Voice. Brant was not only Mr. Allen's spiritual guide or Shamanistic partner or whatever, but while Mark is quiet and soft spoken (I think the word here is "zen"), The Voice never shut up and did all the talking for him. The Voice made sure that everyone knew who was gracing them with His presence. "This is Mark Allen! The best triathlete in history! Six time winner of the Ironman world championships in Hawaii!" The Voice announced at least once a day. And the worst part is that The Voice's voice is high-pitched, nasal, really, really loud (maybe you've heard it on interviews?), and I think he does something funny with his Rs. In short, The Voice's voice really sticks to your ears, even after he's done speaking. I decided that there was no way I was going to talk to Mark Allen if I had to talk through The Voice.And here's where we start to get to the real reason I'm telling this story and how it ties in with my life. I swear, I'm not trying to name-drop, and there is a reason for all this.
One day Mark Allen came in by himself and sat down in one of the chairs next to reception. He was sitting there alone for a couple of minutes and I decided that this was my chance to ask him a couple of questions. But how do you start a conversation with Mark Allen, The Greatest Triathlete In History? Like I always do, I said something completely inappropriate and a little bit insulting (I don't mean to do it, it just happens!). "Hey, you don't get in shape by just sitting there," I said with a big smile on my face, which I hoped would give off that I was kidding. "You have to actually use the equipment."
"I'm waiting for someone," said Mark Allen with a little snicker or a sneer.
"Okay, I was just making sure you weren't being lazy," I said, and wished I could disappear. "But when he gets here, get to work!" Then The Voice came in."She called me lazy," Mark Allen told him with a little sly smile in the corner of his mouth.
"Oh yeah?" said The Voice. "Do you know who this man is?!"
"I know exactly who he is, I was trying to be funny," I mumbled, but The Voice continued talking over me.
"This is Mark Allen! The world's greatest triathlete! The fittest man alive!"
"I know," I mumbled, but I don't know if either of them heard me.
"You're an idiot," said my co-worker when they'd both gone to work out.
I was absolutely mortified by the experience. I'd made a complete ass of myself in front of The Greatest Triathlete in History and called him lazy. I tried talking to him one more time to try to prove that I wasn't a complete idiot, but I had no idea what to say and just wound up looking like more of a driveling, well, idiot. You don't ask Mark Allen what his strongest event is. He's Mark Allen, he doesn't have weaknesses. After that, Mark Allen started to haunt my nightmares, telling me I was weak. Whenever I started feeling like my best wasn't good enough, Mark Allen would stop by in my dreams. The fact that I'd made a horse's ass of myself in front of him seemed to justify this feeling. I suck, and Mark Allen knows it. I swore after that day never to talk to a famous person again for as long as I lived.So when I missed 3 races this season (despite my good intentions) and the guy from my triathlon club started to give me a hard time I started to feel like Mark Allen makes me feel. "What the hell is wrong with you? I thought you wanted this!" the Mark Allen in my head yelled in harmony with the tri club guy. So the other night when I couldn't sleep and I was feeling miserable yet again about my crappy season I remembered the Mark Allen dream again. Then I remembered a conversation that Lorraine and I had when she was here visiting that made me think, "Why am I letting these people make me feel bad?"
You see, Lorraine does ultramarathons, 100 milers, etc. and works at the same gym I used to work at. We were talking one day about Mark Allen and The Voice's presence at the gym and I told her my story. "That guy's a jerk," she said. WHAT?! You do not insult The Great Mark Allen. (There's more name-dropping to be done here, but it does have a point). "I used to train with what's-her-face... Julie... uh... Julie Moss. You know, his ex-wife." Ohmygod! Julie Moss, who crawled across the finish line in 1982 immortalizing Ironman forever, Julie Moss?! I didn't even realize they'd ever been married. "Yeah, she said he was a self-important jerk. Don't worry about it, it is funny that you called Mark Allen lazy." Well I can't insult The Great Mark Allen, but if another triathlon giant like Julie Moss calls him a jerk, maybe he's not perfect after all.
Now it is not my intention to insult Mark Allen, nor defame his character. All ex-wives are bitter towards their ex-husbands, and Lorraine, who's on her third husband, would be sympathetic to that. I'm merely talking about how someone you look up to can really make you feel like shit about yourself if you don't live up. We all want to be Mark Allen sometimes, or at least I do, and when I do something particularly non-Mark Allen-ish I feel pretty bad about it. To have someone come along and say, he's just a guy, he has faults too, and you don't have to like him was like a breath of fresh air. I guess sometimes I just get carried away thinking that famous people are a whole different class of people, a race that's better than I am. If I can't live up, I'm clearly a piece of shit.
Now it is not my intention to insult Mark Allen, nor defame his character. All ex-wives are bitter towards their ex-husbands, and Lorraine, who's on her third husband, would be sympathetic to that. I'm merely talking about how someone you look up to can really make you feel like shit about yourself if you don't live up. We all want to be Mark Allen sometimes, or at least I do, and when I do something particularly non-Mark Allen-ish I feel pretty bad about it. To have someone come along and say, he's just a guy, he has faults too, and you don't have to like him was like a breath of fresh air. I guess sometimes I just get carried away thinking that famous people are a whole different class of people, a race that's better than I am. If I can't live up, I'm clearly a piece of shit.
So back to me and Lorraine. Lorraine's got this workout partner, Michelle, who's a bit weird. She talks loud, laughs at weird times, and rides a unicycle on mountain bike trails. One day Lorraine and Michelle are doing upper body work and The Voice comes up to Michelle, "Can he work in with you?"
"I've only got one set left," said Michelle. "I'll be done in a minute. It'll be easier than racking and re-racking the weights."
"Do you know who this man is?!" The Voice started in. "He's Mark Allen, the greatest triathlete in history, six-time winner of the Ironman world championships!"
"Oh yeah?" said Michelle. "I'm Santa Cruz County's number one ranked female unicyclist. I'm Michelle, nice to meet you." And she went back to her set.
Like I said, just a guy. He has every right to be proud of his achievements, as Michelle does to be proud of hers, as I do to be proud of mine. So, if Mark Allen doesn't get my sense of humor, if my triathlon club doesn't want to help me out when I ask, I can't control that. Screw 'em.
Like I said, just a guy. He has every right to be proud of his achievements, as Michelle does to be proud of hers, as I do to be proud of mine. So, if Mark Allen doesn't get my sense of humor, if my triathlon club doesn't want to help me out when I ask, I can't control that. Screw 'em.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Owwwww-ch!
Now that I'm officially in my off-season I decided to skip a cardio workout yesterday and spend the morning pumping some iron to get the definition back in my muscles after a season of spotty training and strength training that's been half-assed at best. Now, I'm not unfamiliar with the inside of a weight room since for a year it was my job to teach people how to use one. In Santa Cruz it was my job to spend 40 hours a week teaching fat old housewives to do bicep curls, low back extensions, leg presses (always re-rack your weights, thank you), and the like. It was also my job to stop the following women from hurting themselves:
- The woman who would arch so far back doing bicep curls that gravity would bring the bar the last 45 degrees to her shoulder.
- The woman who risked neck injury in addition to massive head trauma by crashing the lat pull bar behind her neck.
- The ladies who would do back extensions so far back that they surpassed the cobra pose and held their arms out, back arched far enough back to look like some strange worshiping ceremony of the fluorescent lights behind them.
- The woman who always wore sunglasses (actually a really cool lady) and said that the fluorescent lights made her sick so we would drag the bench to a fire exit and I would spot her doing skull crushers with her eyes closed, telling her where the bar was and if her arms were even before each set.
- The women who would do endless sets of leg presses with their toes on the bottom-most edge of the sled, sticking their knees out 8 inches or more over their toes and shredding their meniscus to bits.
- Telling the woman who wanted to hang upside down on the Smith bar that that was
absolutely prohibited; that, no, ma'am, you're going to have to get down now, can I give you a hand? And then finally finding the manager to talk to her and coming back to see her her doing the butt blaster with two legs at once.
So back to yesterday when I spent an hour or more in the weight end of the exercise floor (more time than I'd spent there in the whole year combined up until now) doing a full body strength workout, complete with even a bit of stretching. Not to be one to admit that I might not be as strong as I used to be I picked up one shade less than I used to lift in the name of "starting off easy". I did the ab machine (ball was taken), the captain's chair for low abs, 3 minutes of plank, oblique side bends, low back extensions, bicep curls, hammer curls, cable tricep extensions, low rows, overhead shoulder presses, pec flies, lunges, calf raises, and finished off the whole thing leg presses with 85 kilos (187 lb) plus the sled. When I got off the leg press machine I was woozy and needed to sit down for a minute.
Down in the showers I still felt like I was floating a bit. It was kind of cool, a kind of tired that I
hadn't felt in awhile. Since I only have about a week left I decided to cancel my membership starting in October on the way out. I started explaining myself to the plucky receptionist who always wants to speak Spanglish with me. "Let me go get the form," he said."I just lifted weights for the first time in a long time, am I going to have to write a lot?" I asked, showing him my trembling hands.
"No, just sign your name. Don't worry, that happens to me too after I lift weights," he said, but he was looking pretty concerned or serious and I don't know if I believed him. He got the sheet and filled out all the fields and then handed me the pen. "Sign here".
I got a shaky C out and took a deep breath. "Don't worry, take your time, I'll be back in a minute," he said. Some 20 seconds later I'd squeezed out something that looked like an abstract interpretation of my signature and floated down the hill home. It was like my body weighed half of what it normally did, but somehow I knew that this feeling was not because I was stronger, yet.
I did everything I was supposed to do: ate lots of carbohydrates right after my workout and loaded up on protein all day. And I felt pretty good...
...until I woke up this morning! My arms feel like someone tried to rip them from their sockets, my low back is only bending in a rusty 2 degrees at a time, my lower abs feel like I'm giving birth, my hamstrings straight down through my calves to my ankle are one giant river of sore, my quads burn if I try to flex them (I haven't tried stairs yet), and my adductors (inner thighs) feel like someone tried to make my heels touch my ears. Even my left eyeball hurts, but I have a feeling that that's unrelated. And the worst part of Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS)? It's going to be worse tomorrow!!!
To conclude I will leave you with the following clip. You're going to have to watch till the end to see the relevance (start at 4:20)...
Saturday, September 8, 2007
Wasn't meant to be
My friend Dipika (who is not from California, but does do yoga) believes that if you want something bad enough, The Universe will align itself so that you will get what you want. But, if you don't in fact get what you want, The Universe has other plans for you, and in the end you'll understand why. I pick and choose pieces of this philosophy as they're convenient to my life, but since I value her opinion, I at least give it some thought when I've been disappointed.
Today, The Universe didn't want me to go to my race (today, as usual, the part of The Universe will be played by public transportation). I was slated to do a little Aquathlon (Aquathon? I swear I've heard the word in English, but have no idea what it is???) in the town of El Prat de Llobregat right next to Barcelona. El Prat is far and away THE ugliest place in all of northeastern Spain. It is home to little more than the airport, the shipyards, the industrial areas and warehouses, drug dealers who decide to live where there is little police surveillance, and empty lots left over from when it was a farming town and Barcelona had no industry. It's so ugly that I can't even find an image on google to give you an idea of what a dump the place is. But they have a tri club who put on an Aqu... a triathlon minus the biking, and I'd committed to go.
I wasn't too pumped to do the race, especially since Shane showed up on my doorstep Tuesday morning (8 days early) after spending all his money in Italy and it was all I could do to get ONE training session in all week. But I'd sworn up and down to my club that there was absolutely, positively no reason I would not be at this race. I meant it. I'm sick of flaking.
But then The Universe made her debut, this time dressed in the costume of Iberia airlines. Shane wanted to change his ticket and go home as soon as possible since he was broke. We went to the Iberia headquarters to make arrangements where The Universe told him that there were no available seats from Chicago to San Francisco until the 11. "I don't want to fly on September 11," Shane said gravely.
"Ah, si, es veritat" (Oh yeah, that's right), said The Universe, who in this scene was being played by a middle-aged Catalan woman. The Universe told us that we would have to talk to American Airlines to try to change the itinerary since his ticket wouldn't allow him to change his rout via Iberia. The Universe spent the next day hopping back and forth around American Airlines, Iberia, and Expedia.com (making some stops to fuck us over by not putting us through on some international phone calls) until finally she settled down in El Prat at the Barcelona Airport. Finally, face to face, The Universe granted Shane a ticket for Saturday morning, just in time to take off at the same time as my race started.
Now the plan was for Shane to carry a suitcase home for me which my dad would pick up on his business trip to San Francisco in a couple of weeks. However, The Universe quickly changed costumes in order to play the part of the board of executives at my dad's job, which was in the midst of major layoffs. Dad got the axe, which meant no trip to San Francisco, which meant that instead of a suitcase I would be sending a self-addressed box home with Shane. I bought a box and packed it up with winter clothes, CDs, and a couple of trophies I couldn't bring myself to part with. When I picked it up it was HEAVY (16.6kg/36.6lb) and unwieldy. I figured if I made a handle out of packing tape the box wouldn't make it a block. I figured I would either have to cough up cab fare to the airport or go with Shane myself.
That night I sat down to look at the race's web site and figure out how long I would need to get there. I figured I could just take my race stuff to the airport and go directly from there. However, The Universe (possessing the body of the El Prat Triathlon Club's webmaster) made the site really hard to navigate. When I looked to find directions to the start, all I could find was a screenshot of a close-up satellite image of the beach.
From top left to bottom right: "Transition Area 1, 2, 3, Triathlete parking, swim start".This was not a link. I looked all over the web site for an address and there was none. Finally I was reduced to zooming in all the way on google maps and looking at the El Prat coast200m at a time until I found something that matched my picture. After a little more investigation I found out that where I was looking was in the extreme northwestern corner tucked under the airport (Barcelona is southeast). In order to get there, I was going to have to cross all of Barcelona, all of downtown El Prat, all of industrial El Prat, and go around the airport. On top of that, neither of the town's train stations were anywhere close, that is, unless I wanted to walk around the airport. Here is a crude map to give you an idea:
I plunked a virtual stickpin on where the start was and looked for driving directions to my little stickpin from my house. The first directions I got told me to take a ferry. I found this even a bit over the top for The Universe, but then I realized that it was directions from the street Sant Antoni Maria Claret 121 (my address) on the island of Mallorca. I looked at the Sant Antoni Maria Claret 121s that there were all over the world, but none of them were my street (it's a main street!!!). Finally I got working directions which ended in the following instructions, "Take a left, take a right, take a right, take a left, take a left," there were no street names of ANYTHING in the last 6 directions or so! I took a few more looks at the map and figured I could do it on my bike... until I saw the freeways that made up about half of the rout. Crap, there's got to be another way around this! I went to bed and decided I'd deal with it in the morning.
"I just need to rest a little more!" He whined. At 5:45 I finally got him to get his ass out of bed. I'd already put on clean pants and sat down to read my email and drink coffee while I waited. Only he didn't tell me when he was almost ready, and I rushed to put on my shoes and get out the door while he held the elevator for me. We walked down to the metro station, taking turns heaving the huge box and his suitcase filled with wine past all kinds of drunk people and a couple of whores ("yoo-hoo, guapo!" a whore cooed, waving her hand in front of the box that was perched on my shoulder to try to get Shane's attention). Meanwhile, The Universe was settling in 3 stops away in the station that goes to the airport. We schlepped with the box through the longest transfer in all of Barcelona (a half kilometer hike underground) and went to buy our special tickets for the airport.
When we got to the ticket machine The Universe was cleverly hidden inside. I reached into my pockets, "Shit! Shane! I left all my money in my pants from yesterday!" I tried with my debit card: DE-nied! I went to another machine, where The Universe was also waiting for me: DE-nied! I went up to the window, where The Universe said, "We only take cash. If the machine won't take your credit card, we can't either." Shane only had enough money on him to get his own ticket. We tried my American credit card and also Shane's even though I knew it wasn't going to work, "We are unable to process your request," paaaa-tewey! it spit the cards out at us. Finally I just had to bum the money and we went down to wait for the train (when we got to the airport I found some money in my wallet, so that took care of that).
The Universe finally delivered us at the airport at about 7:00 for Shane's 9:30 flight, but we still
had to wait in line to get the box wrapped in a huge sheet of Saran Wrap. I'll never understand why Europeans are so keen on this practice since customs is likely to rip it off anyway, but my precious box needed a little extra padding since it was already dinged up pretty good. The Universe (back in its comfortable Iberia Airlines uniform) had arranged for some 6 (huge) flights all going to the American Continent to leave at the same time, and allotted them only 4 check-in desks, so the line spanned the width of the terminal. While Shane waited in line I went to buy him some water and a sandwich and looked at my watch. 7:30. The transition area was to open at 9:15 for a 9:45 start. It would take me an hour to get home (in the end I didn't bring my race stuff with me) and another hour or so to get to the start, that is, if I didn't get lost.What kind of jerk sends their friend half way around the world with a box that weighs a ton so he can pay to ship it half way back again and then leaves him in the check-in line? I counted all the good excuses that I had not to go: friend unexpectedly needs to go to the airport, no transportation, lousy and dangerous bike commute, the chance that I'd get lost anyway, the fact that my club doesn't seem to give a rat's ass about me, my glands that felt kind of swolen... and decided to wait it out with Shane. On the way home I thought about the online conversation I'd had with my cousin last night while I was looking for directions. "It's not worth it," she said. "Your directions are telling you to take ferries and unnamed streets, of course you're going to get lost. You only have 2 weeks left and those guys kind of sound like jerks. Screw 'em." All the good reasons didn't keep me from feeling like The Universe was being a bit of a bitch though. I'd DNSed in more triathlons than I actually participated in!
My stats for this year:
Catalan duathlon champs: Did Not Start because of travel issues.
Tri-Trials Barcelona: Did it, but no results were recorded because I didn't get my chip.
Witch City Triathlon (Salem, MA): Done and dusted.
Nutmeg State Sprint (Washington, CT): Got there late, but managed to pull it off.
Banyoles Olympic Triathlon: Did Not Start because of travel issues.
El Prat Aqua... Thingy: Did Not Start.
When I came home I thought, I'm ready for an off-season anyway, and climbed back into bed.
Monday, September 3, 2007
Flying with my bike
No, that's not what I mean!So the moving prep is starting. I've decided to fly home with my bike checked on the plane instead of shipping it. This way I can have it right up until the end, and since I'm not going to have a car in the states I'll only have to re-assemble it (and maybe give it some new brakes, tires, cables, a true, and a bath) and it'll be commuter and training ready. I called Aer Lingus (No, it's not THAT, it's the Irish national airline! Pervert.) and advised them I'd be travelling with a bike. I asked if the bike would be included in my weight limit, and she said, "No you're paying 30 extra euros for the bike supplement... You have 36 kilos..." What wasn't clear was whether my bike figured into my 36 kilo limit or not. Maybe I should have spoken in English, since each language requires its own etiquette and Irish people are nice, while the Spanish give you as little information as possible. Does anyone have any suggestions for flying with a bike? Box or bike bag? Has anyone ever done this on a European airline (with their 20k/44lb weight limit) and can give me any clues to the weight limit thing?
You should know that I just include these Youtube links to be background
music to my posts and don't actually expect you to watch them. The important thing
is the lyrics
The day after I told Silvia I was moving back home I woke up to an email from my dad with my flight confirmation for September 21. Game Over, Press Start to Begin. While I was writing a few-line response to my dad, I got an email from a company that I interviewed for a year ago. It said, "We will be beginning another recruiting campaign this fall and were wondering whether, since we were quite enthusiastic about hiring you but were not able to due to your the incompleteness of your documentation last year, if your working permit had been arranged at this current date. If so, would you be available to come participate in the next training cycle?" This was a REAL job at a consultants agency, with great pay (by Barcelona standards), a good schedule, doing exactly what I wanted to do (translation). It had kind of been my beacon to stick out all the passport bullshit and put up with teaching for another year. It nearly broke my heart to write back saying that I was sorry, but that I would not be available to accept the position. So, in a matter of hours, a matter of minutes, the idea of leaving my prospects and life in Barcelona went from Theoretical and Exciting to Real, Scary, and Sad. It's just like the Shawn Colvin song (above) where she says, "Everything changed in a matter of minutes, nothing was saved in time..."
WARNING, THE FOLLOWING PARAGRAPH CONTAINS W A Y TOO MUCH INFORMATION. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK.
I have less than 3 weeks left in Barcelona, and am trying to enjoy it for what it is, but my body's telling me otherwise. My organism is reacting to stress in its usual way: insomnia, but this time it's brought 2 friends along: Constipation and lack of Menstruation. My tits are as big as 2 houses and my back hurts because I haven't shit right for weeks...
IT IS SAFE TO PICK UP YOUR READING HERE.
It's like my body is holding its breath for something; whether it is waiting for something good or bracing itself for something bad I don't know. Silvia and I have decided to continue on as usual and enjoy the time we have left together (said like that, it sounds like I'm dying) and we keep reminding/begging each other, "don't cry". In the supermarket the other day she asked, "Do we need bulgar?"
"No, no one's allowed to buy bulgar, or quinua, or brown rice, or white rice, or basmati rice, or sushi rice until we eat all the grains in the house," I said.
"But by then you'll be gone."
I sniffed, choked on the lump in my throat, and changed the subject, "Do we need taco seasoning?"
But then, the next day something happened that reaffirmed why I'm putting us through this. I was signed up to do an olympic triathlon in Bumbledeefuck, Girona with my club. I wasn't too psyched about doing it, but I was determined to prove that I hadn't completely turned my back on the tri club's 5 race minimum. Race day: Saturday, 3:30pm (weird, I know), it's like it was arranged for those of us from the city without access to a car. Wednesday I wrote to the team captain asking about transportation, times, and where to get my chip (wouldn't want to forget THAT again!). Thursday, 10:30 pm, the team captain gets in touch with me, "There's no room in my car, I don't think there is in anyone else's either" ("I don't think", thanks for asking around for me, jerk!). Friday, 1:30 pm, go to pick up chip, have a stroke of good luck that the federation HQ is still open since usually they close at 1:00. Friday, 2:00 pm, Silvia calls the bus line (I'm afraid of phones) and asks about bike regulations and schedules. She throws a notebook and a pen at me and repeats what I should write down, "Disassembled" (dammit), "Packed up" (shit), "Buses leave Barcelona at 9:30 am and 2:30 pm" (crap, gotta leave at 9:30 for a 3:30 race). "Buses leave Banyoles at 10:30, 12:30, and 5:30". "Shit," I said out loud, and she gave me a 'sorry, I know' look. If the race started at 3:30, not even the fastest triathlete in the world could finish the race, disassemble their bike, shove it in a box, and dash back to the bus station in 2 hours. "There are no later buses?" Silvia asked, she listened and shook her head. Yet again, my lack of connections, and the Catalan tradition of not being kind to strangers had won out on my good intentions.
That night I got drunk. Like really, really drunk. Like the bad kind of drunk of people who have given up. The kind of drunk where you black out and do stupid shit kind of drunk. Like say something incoherent kind of drunk. Like don't even want to get out of bed in the morning, or afternoon kind of drunk. Like a hangover so severe that I couldn't even sign my name on a credit card receipt because of the tremors kind of hangover. It brought me back to one of The Angry Runner's posts from awhile back (which I can't find right now, but it's okay since his situation when he wrote it actually has nothing to do with my current situation) where he said, "If you don't run, you do stupid things". That post hit me like a kick in the heart and continues to reverberate through my head.
IF YOU DON'T RUN, YOU DO STUPID THINGS.
You DO NOT use alcohol, or any substance for that matter, to deal with your emotions, no matter how much they may hurt. You DO NOT, under any circumstances hit people, even if it doesn't actually hurt and you were joking anyway, especially the people you love, no matter how "minuscule" or "responsible" you see their role in your fall from grace. You DO NOT get so drunk that you can't get out of bed the next day. You DO NOT allow these kinds of things to hurt your loved ones and ruin your life if you can help it. I just gotta remember that. If I don't train I do stupid things.
No more pawning off responsibility and letting other people give me excuses. THAT'S why I'm moving home, to run away, to get a clean start. If I don't run away now, I WILL do stupid things. If I don't make it a priority to train, and I let other things get in my way, I WILL do stupid things.
I haven't drunk since then, by the way.
music to my posts and don't actually expect you to watch them. The important thing
is the lyrics
The day after I told Silvia I was moving back home I woke up to an email from my dad with my flight confirmation for September 21. Game Over, Press Start to Begin. While I was writing a few-line response to my dad, I got an email from a company that I interviewed for a year ago. It said, "We will be beginning another recruiting campaign this fall and were wondering whether, since we were quite enthusiastic about hiring you but were not able to due to your the incompleteness of your documentation last year, if your working permit had been arranged at this current date. If so, would you be available to come participate in the next training cycle?" This was a REAL job at a consultants agency, with great pay (by Barcelona standards), a good schedule, doing exactly what I wanted to do (translation). It had kind of been my beacon to stick out all the passport bullshit and put up with teaching for another year. It nearly broke my heart to write back saying that I was sorry, but that I would not be available to accept the position. So, in a matter of hours, a matter of minutes, the idea of leaving my prospects and life in Barcelona went from Theoretical and Exciting to Real, Scary, and Sad. It's just like the Shawn Colvin song (above) where she says, "Everything changed in a matter of minutes, nothing was saved in time..."
WARNING, THE FOLLOWING PARAGRAPH CONTAINS W A Y TOO MUCH INFORMATION. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK.
I have less than 3 weeks left in Barcelona, and am trying to enjoy it for what it is, but my body's telling me otherwise. My organism is reacting to stress in its usual way: insomnia, but this time it's brought 2 friends along: Constipation and lack of Menstruation. My tits are as big as 2 houses and my back hurts because I haven't shit right for weeks...
IT IS SAFE TO PICK UP YOUR READING HERE.
It's like my body is holding its breath for something; whether it is waiting for something good or bracing itself for something bad I don't know. Silvia and I have decided to continue on as usual and enjoy the time we have left together (said like that, it sounds like I'm dying) and we keep reminding/begging each other, "don't cry". In the supermarket the other day she asked, "Do we need bulgar?"
"No, no one's allowed to buy bulgar, or quinua, or brown rice, or white rice, or basmati rice, or sushi rice until we eat all the grains in the house," I said.
"But by then you'll be gone."
I sniffed, choked on the lump in my throat, and changed the subject, "Do we need taco seasoning?"
But then, the next day something happened that reaffirmed why I'm putting us through this. I was signed up to do an olympic triathlon in Bumbledeefuck, Girona with my club. I wasn't too psyched about doing it, but I was determined to prove that I hadn't completely turned my back on the tri club's 5 race minimum. Race day: Saturday, 3:30pm (weird, I know), it's like it was arranged for those of us from the city without access to a car. Wednesday I wrote to the team captain asking about transportation, times, and where to get my chip (wouldn't want to forget THAT again!). Thursday, 10:30 pm, the team captain gets in touch with me, "There's no room in my car, I don't think there is in anyone else's either" ("I don't think", thanks for asking around for me, jerk!). Friday, 1:30 pm, go to pick up chip, have a stroke of good luck that the federation HQ is still open since usually they close at 1:00. Friday, 2:00 pm, Silvia calls the bus line (I'm afraid of phones) and asks about bike regulations and schedules. She throws a notebook and a pen at me and repeats what I should write down, "Disassembled" (dammit), "Packed up" (shit), "Buses leave Barcelona at 9:30 am and 2:30 pm" (crap, gotta leave at 9:30 for a 3:30 race). "Buses leave Banyoles at 10:30, 12:30, and 5:30". "Shit," I said out loud, and she gave me a 'sorry, I know' look. If the race started at 3:30, not even the fastest triathlete in the world could finish the race, disassemble their bike, shove it in a box, and dash back to the bus station in 2 hours. "There are no later buses?" Silvia asked, she listened and shook her head. Yet again, my lack of connections, and the Catalan tradition of not being kind to strangers had won out on my good intentions.
That night I got drunk. Like really, really drunk. Like the bad kind of drunk of people who have given up. The kind of drunk where you black out and do stupid shit kind of drunk. Like say something incoherent kind of drunk. Like don't even want to get out of bed in the morning, or afternoon kind of drunk. Like a hangover so severe that I couldn't even sign my name on a credit card receipt because of the tremors kind of hangover. It brought me back to one of The Angry Runner's posts from awhile back (which I can't find right now, but it's okay since his situation when he wrote it actually has nothing to do with my current situation) where he said, "If you don't run, you do stupid things". That post hit me like a kick in the heart and continues to reverberate through my head.
IF YOU DON'T RUN, YOU DO STUPID THINGS.
You DO NOT use alcohol, or any substance for that matter, to deal with your emotions, no matter how much they may hurt. You DO NOT, under any circumstances hit people, even if it doesn't actually hurt and you were joking anyway, especially the people you love, no matter how "minuscule" or "responsible" you see their role in your fall from grace. You DO NOT get so drunk that you can't get out of bed the next day. You DO NOT allow these kinds of things to hurt your loved ones and ruin your life if you can help it. I just gotta remember that. If I don't train I do stupid things.
No more pawning off responsibility and letting other people give me excuses. THAT'S why I'm moving home, to run away, to get a clean start. If I don't run away now, I WILL do stupid things. If I don't make it a priority to train, and I let other things get in my way, I WILL do stupid things.
I haven't drunk since then, by the way.
"Out to Lunch"
Things are kind of crazy in Claireland lately, and I haven't had much of a heart for writing. The No Wetsuit Blog and more regular comments will be back soon (look for a new post at least by next week). In the meantime, take a minute to check out Angry Runner's fundraising page for the Team In Training Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and Bob Almighty's fundraising page for the Blazeman ALS Foundation.
See you all soon.
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