today is a very important day.
it’s the week anniversary (weekiversary?) of several very important things:
yes, that’s right. some how we went from this…
to this….
i honestly have no idea how it happened. one minute we were going about our normal wednesday night routine. and the next minute the doors were flung open, gear was brought out…
and the trucks were our playground…
for her birthday, i arranged for lauren to drive a fire engine!!!
JUST kidding. we weren’t really driving the trucks….
…but they did help us get over our bocce loss…
another successful night outside engine co. 21.
what can i say? it was an epic night.
another team fatty member, noodle (who is hilarious by the way) (oh, and ridiculously generous to boot, she contributed to me during my 100 miles of nowhere), is doing a pretty amazing fundraiser for LIVESTRONG.
i was going to wait to link to her, but i can’t contain it anymore…you MUST check out precious.
noodle is riding across the country on precious (her bike) and precious has been given a brain (yes, like the scare crow)! precious tweets and reports back to his website all day long. its actually quite impressive and provides a fun way to keep up with noodle while she is actually riding. holds me over til i get to read her (almost) daily post.
mashable just posted an article about them that sums the duo up nicely.
yay, noodle! we’re rooting for you guys!
i need to simplify. and do this. a lot bit.
this weekend’s long ride was…long.
but pretty fucking awesome.
but long.
got that? long, but fucking awesome.
moving on…it tuns out that i ride 86 miles alone at about 15 mph on average. not so much in the 16-19 range i was hoping for. but i haul ass on downhill and go faster than expected on uphill, partially due to said ass hauling, but partially bc i see hills as bite size challenges and i let my legs hurt like hell bc i know there is an end and it feels gooooooood to work hard, knowing its not forever, knowing i can…and the flats are boring, but i’m better than i thought at times and slower than i’d like to be at times. so hopefully it will all still work out.
sunday i spent a little under 6 hours in the saddle. to get to the 100 mile mark, probably add another hour. that’s 7 hours. giving me about 1.5 hr cushion for those damn killer hills before the sag wagon informs my slowness that i’ll be on four wheels from here on out.
i was spent at the end of my ride, but i also had in my head that i was ending at 85. (it was lonely too. not bad lonely, my tunes (100% franti) and many friendly riders made for great company, but i look forward to philly and the other livestrong and team fatty riders.) i think had i been mentally preparing the whole time for 100 i would have made it, still smiling, feverishly reaching for beer by the end (obvious, no?). spirits were high. i stopped by the bar on my way home, motivated by a text received around mile 65 that good friends and a shady patio were calling my post-ride name, for a beer, to wash down the fried cheese (duh) and a pitcher of the most amazing and delicious ice cold water known to man.
confidence is up. from here on out, a little speed work, a few hills and some relaxing should get me and my mental game primed for an awesome ride in philly.
all and all, couldn’t have asked for a better last long ride.
EDIT: i just reread this post and its all over the place. and horribly written. but that’s what it’s like to be inside my head right now so i’m not even sure i COULD edit it if i wanted…so, welcome to my brain.
ALSO: just checked my elevation gain from yesterday’s ride…few hundred feet more than next weekend…think i’m gunna make it!
i few weeks ago i was in colorado. alone. with a bike. and a car.
and i was at peace for the first time in a very very very long time. in fact, i didn’t really know i wasn’t at peace until a few days into that trip and i felt something in my heart and soul that i almost didn’t recognize.
and i tried very hard to hold onto that upon my return.
but it’s slipped away.
i look at the pictures, of which there are few, and i can remember a peace, but i can’t get it back.
and its starting to affect me physically.
never has emotion or stress changed how i feel or used my health as a means to get out.
so today i’m flooding myself with calm.
and ridding myself of toxins.
or trying to.
i’m trying to get back on the road to peace.
and dreaming of when i can once again find my home.
I have written about operation beautiful before, but that was quite some time ago. Since then, Caitlin turned it into its own website and written a book. Yesterday the book was officially released and this morning she appeared on the today show at 8:35 promoting the book. i can’t wait to read it.
amazing woman.
amazing concept.
bravo.
im guilty of fat talk. i’m reeeeeeeeeeeeally guilty of it. like woah. but i work on it and will continue to work on it probably for ever. but caitlin has absolutely turned my attention to it and her inspirational movement is well worth sharing over an over again.
i challenge you to put a note up where ever you are now. work, home, wherever. i promise it will bring a smile to the face of the person who finds it (even you!) and i promise you’ll find yourself smiling as you post it.
I call this:
lauren turns 28 today: a photo essay
i met lauren on the interwebs.
craigslist to be exact.
see, i lured her into my perfect mt pleasant home, only to get us evicted just 50 days later.
actually, that’s just my dramatic side, we left, last minute, according to the terms of our lease, which lauren was not yet on. damn fine print.
this is lauren exactly 1 year ago today.
lauren and i have many aspirations.
one of them is to one day take a picture in front of every fire house in dc.
so far, we have one. but we have lots of pictures with it. in fact, i could probably have used only pictures in front of fire house no. 21 and had a full and varied post.
but my very dear friend lauren and i have many interests in common. boxed wine for one…
hot tubs and jameson for another…
i need to take a few minutes and be serious here before i go any further…
lauren is absolutely one of my very best friends. though we met as roommates, that was a tragically short chapter in our lives. probably for the best though as we might have had a little too much fun. if that is even possible. when we learned of our impending eviction, we decided to consciously cut through the awkward ‘getting to know you stage’ and pursue friendship. somehow we knew it had to be done.
and i can’t say how thankful i am that she answered my housing ad. and that she too thought it was important to make friends. she is a shoulder that i’m certain will always be there when called upon and knows more about what’s inside my head and heart than i do half the time. we share a common understanding and common experiences that have done much to shape who we are. it’s a bond i wish we didn’t have, but i’m thankful lauren is in my corner.
lauren is always willing to call me out on my bullshit, laugh with me, laugh at me, play rummy, drink wine (or jameson) (or beer) (or…), stay up unnecessarily late, over analyze with me, hike old rag (seriously, never have i met someone who loved old rag as much as she), try new things, hot glue gun…anything, dress up like an idiot, share custody of the most precious of personal belongings,..
and most importantly, support me.
lauren, thank you for being you. i hope i’m half the friend to you that you are to me. i’m so glad we stumbled upon each other. its only been a few short years, but i feel like i have known you forever. i hope 28 is a fantastic year that brings you laughter, joy and a wee bit of debauchery.
okay, a lot of debauchery.
now where was i?
right, in addition to hot tubs and jameson, there is also beer and patios…and aviators.
and cards…
and torturing pets…
and crafting…
and bocce ball, eeeerr, flare week…
did i mention crafting?
and friends (and aviators)…
and dressing the part…
and old rag (shit, she LOVES old rag)…
and garrison keillor/champagne cocktails (and aviators)…
and ladies night/laminating things…
and once in a lifetime, dc adventures.
yes we can.
and we did.
perhaps this is an appropriate time to wish president obama a very happy birthday as well. happy birthday, president obama.
lauren also seems to tolerate being my personal photography subject…seriously, she’ll take a picture anywhere…
…just leave her alone with the camera for 5 seconds and you’ll find a series of 20 or so self portraits…this particular day the camera was upside down. it’s unclear if that was on purpose or not, but i didn’t want to flip it and ruin the artist’s vision.
she’s always the first to lend a helping hand (as long as she gets to wear aviators).
loyal to the bone, supportive, hilarious and a helluva bocce baller.
lauren.
so, i’m at the stage where i can’t stop thinking about philly…so, i’m probably going to do a lot of babbling about it in the next 18 days. don’t hate.
back in may when i did the 100 miles of nowhere, i convinced myself that if i could do that silly loop 30 whatever times with all the wind and none of the training, that i could do 100 miles in philly no problem. well, not no problem, but you know what i mean.
but…there are hills in philly.
like, real hills. 4337ft worth of hills to be exact.
and my habit of not checking elevation profiles or course maps until its too late to matter (or, like, EVER) for races might not be the greatest strategy for you know, FINISHING (withOUT the help of the sag wagon).
i have taken a close look at what i’m up against. and its got me a tad freaked out. what i didn’t take into account when i rode around in circles back in may was that i had all the time in the world to do so. i lounged for lunch and took MANY breaks. i finished in…well, i finished and that’s what mattered then - that i finished.
this time though, i don’t get to lounge around and ride in circles at my own pace, with friendly faces holding up signs of encouragement along the way. oops, i mean, here they are…not sleeping. this is a solo journey. and has a time limit.
i have 8.5 hours to finish.
if i’m not on pace to finish within the hour at the 7.5 hour mark, i’ll be
‘politely asked by staff to allow a SAG vehicle to take me to a safe location near the finish line where I’ll be allowed to ride through the finish and enjoy the post event party.’
that sounds like a load or horse crap to me. if i get picked up by a SAG wagon, i want it to take me to the back of the building where nobody is watching so i can quietly sulk away back to dc. i know, its a touch dramatic (i have a knack for that), but i’ll be disappointed. severely disappointed. and i’ll feel a little bit like a cheater magee by crossing the finish line unearned. so…
8.5 hours to finish.
now, if i look at my time in may, this should be more than manageable. i finished in less time and sat around some. i also had not been riding long distances at all prior to that and had a few mechanical difficulties that have since been worked out.
so, no problem, 8.5 hours. that’s a pace of roughly 12 miles per hour, including breaks. my goal is to hammer out a 16-18 mph pace for the duration. assuming the hills don’t totally rule me, i should be able to make up any lost time on the downhill and keep pace.
oh, but what about those hills?!?! enter, hill training.
in dc, there are no hills. so, once a week (well, that’s what i for the past several months, i try to spend an hour hunting hills in dc. what that actually translates to is going up and down the same 5 mile loop a few times. (i think the construction workers and bus drivers on park road think i’m mad.) plus a few spin classes a week that i crank the resistance up on.
this is all fine and dandy, except i’m not feeling the hills in these rides after 6 hours of riding. i’m feeling them on totally fresh legs. there’s a good chance of system failure here, folks. a very good chance, indeed.
my response, totally illogical, is to do hills before work every day for the next two weeks. (squeeze, you will be happy to know this means the garden gets a regular drink for the next few weeks as well.) this will likely do nothing for my overall ability to ride up and down hills at the desired pace, but will hopefully bring my confidence up a notch or two. or down…err, that would be UNdesirable.
Dear friends and family…
Holy smokes, when I went to count the days remaining for the subject line of this update, I’ll admit it gave my heart a bit of a jolt…19 days until 100 miles in Philly!
I thought I’d pass along another update…I’m pretty excited. I just mapped out my last long training ride - 85 miles - for this weekend, then I’ll tapper a little (not much though cause I love being out on my bike and tapering is BORING), and on Friday, August 20, I’ll put my 2-wheeler in the car and head on up to Philly for the big ride!
I’m a bit of a Tour de France junkie too, so July was heaven for me. For those of you who don’t watch, Lance Armstrong, who was in for his last tour as a professional cyclist, was expected to be a top competitor, had the most rotten luck. In the early stages, he kept getting wrapped up in other people’s crashes and lost more time that he would ever be able to make up even in his best year riding. When many would just skip out on the rest of the ride, he stayed all the way through the final stage in Paris. While winning is of course the primary goal of any professional athlete, or team of athletes, Team RadioShack demonstrated that there was absolutely a more important fight aside from that of 1st place. Armstrong’s team supported each other and the LIVESTRONG mission until the very last day, taking first in the team competition and sporting new jerseys and bikes with the number 28, for the 28 million people living with cancer. (Check out some pictures here.)
28. Million People. Living with Cancer.
And that doesn’t count all the caretakers, friends and families affected by this nasty disease.
When I set out in the beginning of the year, I set a goal to push myself, to take advantage of my health, to remember my mom in a productive way and to hopefully raise awareness and money for a cause that is so in our face each day, that I think sometimes we think everyone else is already doing something about it so we don’t need to.
I have had tremendous support by so many in so many ways. And I am SO THANKFUL for that. Now I’m asking you to help me continue to fight cancer. Forget about me, this is about those 28 million who are fighting cancer, of so many varieties, right now, and for their families and friends, many of whom are also their caretakers. I have passed my original goal of $2500 and I’m now shooting for $5000. I still have $1349 to go and I plan to keep going until I reach it, even if it is not by August 22.
Thank you for what you have already donated in supportive words and dollars either here or at the Tour de Pint Happy Hour!! To help me reach my goal, check out my fundraising page: philly2010.livestrong.org/annejuliet
THANK YOU!
Love,
Anne
Edit: by the end of the work day, i’m stoked to report the title should be revised: “19 days, $950 to go…”
and at bedtime…”19 days, $550 to go…”
and after only one more day, i am overwhelmed to report that i have reached my goal. of course, the more the better, but i feel successful and stoked that along with so many friends and family, i have helped bring $5000 to LIVESTRONG.
woo woo!!
when i was in colorado i traveled further south than i ever have. it’s a whole different world in southern colorado.
durango.
it was real pretty.
you know what wasn’t pretty though?
the ex-cons.
actually, he was kind of cute.
my first flavor of southern colorado was when i was just getting into the outskirts of durango. it was getting dark and i didn’t want to miss main street because that’s where my directions to my friend’s house started. plus, getting dark in colorado in july means that cocktail hour had come and gone without me and it was nearing drinking-with-reckless-abandon hour. and i was dry. naturally i stopped at the first big liquor store along the highway that i came across.
map in hand, i walked right up to the cashier and asked him to make sure i was on the right track before selling me my beer and wine. while i was at the counter, a nice enough guy said that he knew where main street was and that he was headed in that same direction. he’d be happy to show me the way if i wouldn’t mind giving him a lift, though he’d understand if i didn’t want to.
well, good. i’m glad he understood.
a girl. alone. with a map.
i don’t think so.
he handed the cashier back his phone and went on his merry way.
that’s when the friendly cashier told me i probably (probably?!?!) made a good decision, that the gentleman who just left had just been released from jail and was trying to get back to town. his store was a common stop for ex-cons in need of a phone to call for a lift.
apparently my face gave my urban shock away because he then informed me that i needn’t worry, he had a shot gun behind the counter for just these types of situations and that if anything had not gone as planned, he was a pretty good shot so he usually just let the guys use the phone. so far so good.
uh, okay.
“in that case, would you please walk me to my car”
“sure thing,” he says, “i was just about to suggest the same thing myself.”
it wasn’t all shotguns and ex-cons though.
the next day otis and i hopped in the car lookin for adventure.
what we found was a ridiculously awesome hike about halfway between durango and silverton along called purgatory flats in the san juan national forest. its a friggin awesome hike. and otis couldn’t have been happier.
you basically just hike down for a mile or so to the flats, which lead to a few rivers that you hike along for 2-3 miles. when you can’t really imagine the beauty getting any better, you turn around and hike back out.
i think i could have lived down there.
and holy shit was otis a happy, happy dog.
not much better than a gorgeous hike and a happy dog.
he’s a BIG dog too.
so, when he got all wet and muddy he had to eventually get cleaned up (he was the best man, you know). and that meant i was going to bathe him.
ha!
now that sure was an adventure to be watched.
thank goodness i have no photographic evidence of that dog RULING me at the dog wash. but i do have a lovely picture of the wedding party. the clean wedding party.
