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December 9, 2007
Where to Start?
Well a lot has been happening the past two days!
Yesterday I was quite excited because my "mystery gift" to O was finally going to take place! I started planning this surprise Christmas/thank you gift about 2 months ago and I was very excited about not having to keep it a secret any longer! I tell O everything, so keeping my lips sealed was tough.
Unfortunately, my mystery gift turned out to be quite a bust!
Now that O knows, I can tell you all, my mystery gift was a airplane tour ride over Pittsburgh. Probably doesn't thrill everyone but O would absolutely love this! He's the one fighting for the window seat on any flight so that he can watch the landscape out the window. This is his type of thing. So anyway, all week I was really worried it would get cancelled because of our weather. I called Saturday morning just to check and make sure it was still a go and it was! But then, about 30 minutes later, I got a call back saying the pilot had a family emergency and would be cancelling all his flights for the day and all the other pilots were booked. Major bummer! At this point I had to tell O - couldn't keep it secret any more! He was pretty excited and so we rescheduled for a January weekend. Oh well - I tried. Maybe next time I will really surprise him with something good. :)
So after all that excitement I did my 2 hour trainer ride and then we watched a movie and hung out the rest of the afternoon until it was time for my work Christmas party that night.
This morning O, Roxy and I all went for a run. It actually wasn't that cold! In the low 30s, high 20s, but that is already starting to feel much warmer than it did even a week ago. It's a good thing the body adapts.
After church and lunch we went Christmas crazy! We finished our shopping (online of course :), wrapped the gifts we've already purchased, decorated the house and wrote out Christmas cards. It was fun to get the Christmas music on and the decorations up and also (of course) to get all our shopping and cards done and taken care of! Christmas will be here before we know it.
And then, after all the festivities, O and I headed to the pool to do the swim that I was supposed to do yesterday but couldn't since the pool was closed for a swim meet. It was just a short moderate workout but the real fun begin after I was done when I asked the lifeguard if I could try diving off the blocks. Must start practicing for my big meet in February you know! O was laughing at me already before I even started!
The lifeguard was so nice. After explaining that I didn't know what to do, she actually showed me (must have been a swimmer herself). Those blocks are actually pretty high up there! I was sort of scared I was going to do a big belly flop but it turned out okay...except for the fact that my goggles ended up around my neck!!! I inquired of my new swim instructor how to keep my goggles on and she just sort of shook her head and said "just really tighten them up." Hmmm... I tried one more practice dive with tightened goggles and just about the same thing happened. So - all you swimmers out there - how does one keep their goggles on while going off the blocks? I assume all benefit gained from going off the blocks would be immediately lost if I had to take the time to fix my goggles. :)
And so it goes! My first full week back of structured training and it felt really good. It didn't add up to be much - maybe only 10 hours total but it was nice to get back in the groove. This upcoming week will be much of the same - maybe a little more but not much.
Hope everyone has a great start to their weeks!
Posted by beth at December 9, 2007 6:11 PM
Comments
Goggles... when I started doing block-work, I cinched them so tight the nose-piece cut my nose and I looked like I'd been on the losing end of a fight. Tightening them up too much is not the way to go, particularly if you're going to be racing a 1650.
First: don't worry too much. You're going to be in the water for twenty minutes or so; if you lose your goggles at the start, tread water at the end of the first length, re-seal 'em, and pick right back up. The time you'll gain by getting them re-set will more than make up for the time you spend re-setting them.
Second: about getting in the water with them on. It's actually a little counter-intuitive, but when you're heading in to the water, tuck your chin in as much as you can and look at the bottom of the pool (straight down under your starting position.) It feels like you should be looking forward to where you're headed, but you'll have plenty of time for that once you're in the water. After four years of masters swimming, I finally had a full set of good starts this past March by hitting the water for every race telling myself, "Head down, look down."
Posted by: pjm at December 9, 2007 8:15 PM