Wallpaper & The Hill...way more than you wanted to know...

This week will test my mental toughness. It's supposed to be cold and snowy all week. And when it's not going to be snowing, it'll be raining. No sun in the forecast until next Monday. Great. April is about the only month when I wish I lived below the Mason-Dixon Line. For the rest of the year, it's all good up here in my little corner of the country. I'm sitting at my desk sipping hot cocoa... I suppose it could be worse, right? Well, okay...

Had a great weekend warrior kind of weekend. Some running, some raking, some riding, some more raking, some dog walking, some wallpaper scraping...you name it, I think we did it. I discovered that I'm totally allergic to the solution we've been using to scrape wallpaper - it gives me a serious cough with very deep lung pain - which is quite unfortunate since every room in the house except for the bathroom has at least one layer of paper to scrape - and the rest have up to 5 (yes, FIVE) layers. Get this: In one bedroom, we noticed that one of the four walls only had 4 layers and after careful scrutiny and a detailed analysis of overlapping layer relationships (the structural geologist in me comes out at very strange times...) we discovered that that one wall was missing the bottom most layer. The Leading Theory: they scraped one wall and got so completely incensed by such a HORRIFYINGLY AWFUL project that they exclaimed, "F*&% it!" and went ahead and papered over the first layer on the remaining 3 walls...and kept going 4 more times over the course of the last 50 years. Totally fun work, let me tell you. Whoever invented wallpaper AND wallpaper paste should be tarred and feathered. Just.....NO!!!

So, THAT was fun...and I'm sure you're glad to have read all about it! Onward...

I took my mountain bike, Pebbles (don't ask), out for a spin on Sunday afternoon. There's a KILLER hill on the north side of the lake (see map - again, it's the geologist...) and I've been thinking about hill repeats on it for building some strength...but Amelia the Cervélo only has two rings on the front which means I need a whole lot more muscle before I can attempt this hill with her. So Pebbles, with the thousands of granny gears, was the bike of choice....plus they haven't swept the lake road yet...so, 2.5 miles to the start of the hill (point A at approx 416 ft. of elevation) and then about a mile UP to 750 ft. above sea level - (pt. B).



I'm happy to report that it went better than I expected...except that the shifters on Pebbles are opposite from the shifters on Amelia and things got kind of dicey in the middle there when I went to downshift and accidentally shifted up. AaaYYYE!! Then it took approximately a minute and a half to descend and I finished off with another 2 miles the rest of the way around the lake. Excellent ride. Next time I'll do the hill twice. Actually the best part about it was realizing how uncomfortable I was on Pebbles compared to Amelia, who is fine tuned in every way to my body. Bike fitting is the way to go, of this I am SOLD... Might be time to take Pebbles in for a fit. We'll see...

Had a great run last evening too - after missing the bus at 5:30-am-that-felt-like-4:30-am. Listened to GYGO Podcast #11 and giggled the whole time. Had planned only 30-40 minutes and ended up at 50 mins. - just a nice, slow, easy plod that felt great. Things are coming together. I know the biking will help my running so much too. Now if it would just stop snowing...

And amazingly, the meet last weekend left me with somewhat of a training effect this past week and I had a strong week in the pool. Weasel Boy pointed out some things to me about my freestyle stroke at the meet and he actually got some video footage of it so once I get that file from Karen, I'll post it for you all and point out what I'm doing wrong. Been working the problem and I think it's getting better because I'm getting faster already. Sweet.

OH, and don't forget to visit Trimama's Shop for your TEAM TRI-GEEK DREAMS 2006 uniform. The deadline is tomorrow (that's WEDNESDAY) so get your orders in ASAP!!! Here's what you're missing if you haven't already ordered!! GET ON IT!!! (Oh, and don't be confused - the graphic on the shorts is on the FRONT and the graphic on the shirts is on the BACK - I have them kinda screwy weird here - but you get the idea...)



OK friends, train hard!!! And would someone please enjoy the cherry blossoms for me today...I won't be seeing them for at least another few weeks...if I'm lucky... thanks!!