Monday, February 20, 2017

Putting the brakes on my enthusiasm

This won't be my usual light hearted post, but it's important. I post a lot of pictures of me at finish lines, holding medals and happily succeeding. There's another side to training you don't normally see. 


This is me after a training ride yesterday, feeling completely broken. I'll skip to the end, turns out the whole 30km, the front brake mechanism was broken, and partially engaged. But I didn't know that while I was riding. I thought since I'd given up alcohol, and been drinking so much water (thanks Jon) I'd be a gazzel! It was a route we do often, and usually as a reprieve in our training. I made the same breakfast mistake I thought I'd learned from last year, but even eating didn't help. I was sluggish, and it was all I could do to make my bike go forward. It was our first ride since the snow, and it was cold and wet. With every fibre of my being Grams, I wanted to stop, throw my bike and cry. 

But I learned more than if I'd nailed that ride.

1. Regular bike maintance is imperative. 

2. Keep pedalling. Even when it sucks. 

3. My cousin, life coach, mentor, riding buddy and cheerleader Cindy is irrefutably one of the most important people in my life. I hope one day I get the chance to encourage her like she did for me yesterday.

4. Jon is as optimistic as me, if not more so, with unwavering faith in my abilities. "You got the best work out of your life!" 

In true form of this experience, this is my second time writing this post, the first time I left the page to find the link to my fundraising and it disappeared. Hopefully I wrote it better the second time. Here's the link: 

http://www.conquercancer.ca/site/TR/Events?px=4156398&pg=personal&fr_id=1593&s_src=boundlessfundraising&s_subsrc=:sub_source

Friday, February 17, 2017

Whistlered right

For family day Whistler had half priced tickets for BC residents, so Serena, Shaun, Jon and I drove up for skiing/boarding. A series of mini events had us up and skiing by noon. Our first priority was taking as many chair lifts as we could to get to the top. We miandered our way down, stopping for a snacky lunch on one of the runs. While eating we even commented, "where is everyone? Feels like we have the mountain to ourselves..." When we finally got to the bottom, we headed over to the Blackcomb side to take the gondola. We all hopped off with our gear at the midstation, and laughing like hyena's rushed back into another gondola with only one guy in it. He turned to us when we settled and composed ourselves and said, "did you guys get stuck on Whistler when it shut down?" And we said, "whatever do you speak of?" Turns out, the whole Whistler side of the mountain was shut down for a couple hours in the middle of the day, some people were stuck on lifts for 45 minutes before they got running again. We missed it. Completely. Let's be clear, I have a healthy fear of heights, and being on a chair lift is one thing, but they swing when they stop, and then dangling there for 45 minutes? I'd have freaked. My friend at work told me about a movie "Frozen" where people got left on a chair lift for a weekend, one got their face stuck to the pole, one froze, one jumped off and got eaten by wolves...sounds like only one got out alive. Lucky bugger. We even lucked out and took our last chair at 3:40pm, and got the most out of our day. Hit up the Longhorn for dinner, I'd recommend it, their poutine is delicious. That's right, I gave in - whole heartedly and I don't regret it. We had an amazing day, and that we avoided a mess made it even better. 



 

Tuesday, February 14, 2017

Casual ring

A friend of mine at work got a ring from her boyfriend and said, "it's not an engagement ring though guys, it's just a casual ring"  


Despite scooping ice cream for a customer, I said to her, "I think what you're looking for is 'promise ring' what you said sounds much worse" that's when said customer piped in, "yea, this is my friends with benefits ring" I laughed so hard I practically fell into the ice cream cooler. 

Found that when I was looking for my picture and I barfed in my mouth a little. Okay, a lot. Here it comes again...


 
 

Friday, February 10, 2017

Drunkless

I set out some pretty lofty goals going into 2017, including not eating poutine, not dying my hair, and not drinking. How long I'll be able to keep any of these up, I'm not sure, but there's $100 riding on the drinking if I make it a year. I'll be honest, I kinda like not drinking. There's been times I wanted a glass of wine, on stressful work days like today, or out for dinner and at the bar. But I never have to worry about a ride home. And I'm productive when I get home after, and in the morning. I can make sure my friends get home safe. I'm sure I'm saving money. I bought a round of shots for my dodgeball team, no one cared if I drank one or not. I take responsibility for all my actions, always, without drinking as a fall girl. To nip it in the butt straight away (I know it should be "bud" I'm referencing a previous post) I'm not pregnant. I can see it on some of your faces, you've considered it. No. I just wanted to take a wee break. I foresee some concerns on the horizon, like my sisters wedding, my birthday...but it might be kinda fun to try all those things sober too. Give a wicked speech on sheer lady balls, without the liquid courage! Part of my incentive was all the training I'll do for the Ride, and the half marathon I signed up for in June. I also lost my minions hat while drinking, and it meant a whole lot to me. Of all the stupid things I've done drunk, the handmade minions hat was the last straw. I miss it. 


We'll see how long I can ride this out.  #poutine4life