Countdown to Kentucky

Whew. I think I mentioned in my last post that I only had 4 weeks to train for the next half marathon - the Kentucky Derby Mini-Marathon... Well, now I am down to...4 days. Ouch. Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on how you look at it, I spent a total non-fitness week at the beach last week, where the closest thing I did to "training" was to walk to the cooler for a beer or to the water to cool down.

Having said that, I have not done a very good job at training this time around (if you can even call it that at all!) However, it will be interesting to see how I do on Saturday. Perhaps I will finally prove that training is not the answer! But then what would I do for the next few months?

After this is over, I have decided to do a couple of things:

1. Next vacation: ACTIVE vacation - aka. hiking, biking, rafting, kayaking, tree climbing or all of the above.
2. Run the NY City Half (if they will have me - this is done as a lottery) on August 5th
3. Triathlon - still TBD

If anyone knows of any fun activities I have overlooked, let me know!

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Going Swimmingly

When I got in the pool, I was not sure what I was doing. I have swum before. I can swim. But I had no idea how far or how long I could swim. I didn't even know how far you could go in what amount of time. In an attempt to find out, two weeks ago I started swimming at the gym.

The first time, I swam for 10 minutes. It went something like this. Minute one through minute five was easy. During minutes six to eight I had a little difficulty because my arms were getting tired (damn useless sticks!). I struggled with my tired arms as well as my breathing through minutes nine and ten and finally came to a stop at the end of the pool. I had done 10 laps. Ten long laps. I felt like I had swum miles. In fact, I had only swum about a third of a mile.

I have a long way to go still.

I have always been a swimmer; I grew up by the river; we swam every day in the summer time and even some days in the spring and fall. My cousins and I would race each other from one side of the river to the other, often going back and forth many times. I have swum far; we used to see how far up the river we could swim. However, I have never swum for an extended amount of time. And I have never had to swim while being timed, or when it mattered at all. I recently decided to train for a (so far un-chosen) triathlon and so now am swimming not only for fun but for braggin rights.

Luckily, I am getting better.

I went back to the pool last week (I am only going once a week right now) and swam for 17 minutes. 16 laps. 800 meters. HALF A MILE! Which is what I will need to do (if not more) for a sprint triathlon. So...all is not lost. Now I just have to try and build my endurance. And figure out how to get from the lake to the bike to the road without hurting anyone or myself... I guess I still have a long way to go.

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And They are Off!!!

Next Up: Louisville, KY
What: Derby Mini-Marathon
When: Saturday, April 28, 2007

This half marathon marks the beginning of Derby season. The first Kentucky Derby will be on May 6th with many to follow after that. Before the weekend of the Derby, there are week long festivities, one of them being...the mini-marathon.

Part of the race, and the most exciting part for me, is run around the track at Churchill Downs!!

This time I only have four weeks to train, rather than twelve like last time...So I have kicked it up a notch, am running more and am trying to clock as many miles as possible in the next four (well, more like three from today) weeks. Which is hard because for the last month, I have been completely slacking.

So we shall see how it goes, shant we?

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So Much To Say

I feel like I should have a lot to say, but I don't. I have actually been so busy that I cannot think about anything other than my next run, my next trip or what is going on at work tomorrow/next week/this weekend...

First of all, I have been taking advantage of the fact that we are allowed to travel on the weekends by...traveling on the weekends. Every weekend. As fun at it has been, I am getting tired... I have been to Pensacola, San Francisco and Baltimore in the last 3 weekends, and this weekend I am going to Grayton Beach, FL for some Easter weekend fun in the sun with some friends.

Secondly, I am training to run another half marathon. This one takes place in Louisville, KY. I am very excited about it, because we get to run through Churchill Downs as part of the course. Afterwards, there is beer and free tickets to a horse race, which I have never been to before. And at...Churchill Downs! That is pretty cool.

After that, I am planning on doing a triathlon, so am also trying to train for that at the same time. I just started swimming today and it is kicking my ass! I only swam about a third of a mile - it took me 10 mins - it zapped all my arm strength (haha - WHAT arm strength you say?) and it took my breath away...Literally! For the race, I will have to swim at least a half mile, if not more. Whew.

So, the rest of my time is spent working (which is good but I recently switched positions and so have been trying to learn the ropes etc.), eating (I tend to do a lot of that!) and sleeping. Pretty much in that order.

So...that is the reason I have nothing to say.

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St. Pat's: What we Have to Look Forward To..

I had a really good video from St. Pat's, but I can't get it to load on here for some reason. Youtube hates me. So... Here are a few pictures of our wild and crazy day. We started off with breakfast at Atchafalaya, then went to the Bulldog on Magazine for some cider, green beer and nasty green jello shots. I think I was ready for bed by 8 p.m. I almost forgot - we also went to the French Quarter and we were starving but everywhere was

PACKED, so we went to Wendy's (yeah the first time in a LONG TIME I have had fast food!) thinking it would be fast. It wasn't. We waited for a long time with a lot of drunk people and finally got up to the front just to be served by a girl who was wearing her visor so low there was no way she could have been able to see us (or anyone) at all. Then we watched a guy get kicked out by the rent-a-cop for calling Wendy's a Dick or some sort of nasty word. What an adventure!

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Road Map Tasmania Photos

3/14 - 3/22 Tasmania




Hobart, Cradle Mountain, Bay of Fires, Freycinet Peninsula, Mt. Wellington, Bruny Island, Huon Trail, Richmond



Tasmania back to Mooloolaba & Billabong:

3/22/07 - 4/21/07

On March 22, 2007 we flew from Hobart, Tasmania to Sydney, where we stayed with our friends until the 28th (in their lovely house in Pittwater).  On the 28th and 29th we drove like crazy, covering over 1,000 km in the two days.  We only intended to stay with Steve for a week, but before we knew it three weeks had flown by!!!  Finally, on the 22nd we returned to Billabong for good, spending the next week getting her back in shape and ready to go.

By the way Steve is a great boat builder -- check out his website at: www.marshalldesign.blogspot.com .

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March Madness

I don't follow college basketball like I used to.

I was an undergrad at Duke University from 1975 to 1979. Nowadays, Duke is bigtime basketball, but it wasn't always so. The Duke Blue Devils' record in conference play my first three years there was 7-29, and they pretty consistently finished at the bottom of the Atlantic Coast Conference.

But I was a fan. I bet I didn't miss more than a handful of home games.

And then in my senior year, the team turned things around. After six seasons of not winning a single ACC tournament game, the Blue Devils swept the tournament. As conference champs, they went to the NCAA tournament and kept winning until the final game, which they lost to the University of Kentucky.

We loved our team. Duke is a small school. My freshman class had about 1200 students (Kennesaw's total enrollment is close to 20,000), so we knew these guys. And they had taken us from the bottom to the top in one season.

Things are different at Duke now. A whole generation of students has come to think of winning as almost a birthright. For us, winning wasn’t a birthright, but that doesn’t mean we were any less enthusiastic than the current “Cameron Crazies.” At many schools, students get game tickets ahead of time. At Duke, there were no advance tickets; we lined up outside Cameron Indoor Stadium, and when the doors opened, we flashed our student IDs and went in. After waiting outside in the cold for a few hours, doing whatever we could to stay warm, we weren’t inclined to be especially friendly to the opposing team.

And since students got every seat in the lower level--the wealthiest and most generous alumni had to settle for good seats above--the noise on the floor could be deafening.

Not long after I graduated, the students began to get out of hand. Their chants, which had begun to cross the line from fanatic to obscene, prompted Duke president Terry Sanford to send a letter to the student body about the growing problem. “Crudeness, profanity, and cheapness should not be our reputation,” he said, “but it is.”

I was so proud to hear that at the very next game--against arch rival University of North Carolina!--Duke students, instead of chanting “Go to hell, Carolina, go to hell [clap clap],” as we did, held up signs that said “Welcome Fellow Scholars.” And the first time the ref blew his whistle against the Blue Devils, instead of the usual obscene chant that was all too audible over the radio and television, the students chanted, “We beg to differ! We beg to differ!”

After my time at Duke, I moved down the road to Chapel Hill for two more degrees. I loved Chapel Hill--everything except Tar Heel basketball. I tried, Lord knows I tried, but I just couldn’t make myself do it, and after a season or two I gave up the effort.

I shared this story with Ralph Luker, who is also of both Duke and UNC, and readers of my old newspaper column a few years ago, but I think again about those years every time March rolls around.

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Road Trip Sydney to Melbourne Photos

3/5/07 - 3/13/07



3/5 - 3/9 Sydney to Wilson Promontory

Kiama, Jamberoo & Kangaroo Valley, Jervis Bay, Depot Beach, Narooma, Tilba Tilba, Bermagui & Moon Bay, Eden / Boyd's Tower, Buchan Caves, Lakes Entrance, Wilson Promontory


3/10 - 3/13 Phillip Island to Melbourne

Phillip Island, Great Ocean Road & Otway National Park, Melbourne

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Mammon

Click on image for readable version.

from Uncommon Descent, via Tom McMahon.

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