Happy New Year

Happy New Year to everyone.
Having the week off work has been strange. Today I spent the day in a coffee shop, not having the nerve to talk to the woman at the table next to me. Then I babysat my friends Matt and Jen's kids (Ben (5), Madigan (6), and Joe (1.5)) for about an hour. Then Matt and the kids had dinner, watched Wall-E, and the kids went to bed. Now me and Matt are hanging. I think it will be a quiet NYE, unless something comes up in the next few hours.
I have some pictures from Christmas at my dad's house that I am going to post eventually. The pictures are of the Christmas tree, the cats, and the strange weather. Strange weather being heavy snow December 24th, it looked like half a foot on the ground, and then temperature above 50 degrees and raining on the 26th and 27th. Just strange. I did not workout the whole week of Christmas, had two pretty hard workouts so far this week. Monday was 30 minutes on the bike and one hour on the treadmill and Tuesday was 30 minutes on the bike and an hour and a half on the treadmill. Hour and a half on the treadmill is too long. I am pretty sore. Some more running, a little swimming, and some spinning to finish off the week.

Cathartic

On Saturday morning I did the tri-club weekly spin group, it was just me and another guy, which was fine.  I felt so much better after spinning.  Today there was no tri-club group run because it was too cold (-10 without wind chill, -30 to -40 with, ugh) so I ran for an hour on the treadmill at Bally's.  Again, it felt great.  I still feel stressed, anxious about stuff, but the workouts really helped.  I spent about 8 months working out almost every day, and I was so much more relaxed, there was less stress then, but now that I am working out less, when I do workout, I realize how helpful it is.  I have always known how helpful it is, I guess sometimes I need to remind myself.

The way things are

The last two weeks have been very busy, mainly with work.  Business is very bad, as it is everywhere.  I have been abnormally busy.  Which makes everything even stranger.  I am not afraid to admit I am frightened, about my job and the future.  The unknown.  I know that I, we, have no control over many things, and I should only worry about those things that I can control. My day to day.  Sometimes it is hard to maintain that focus.  There was a time I had a horrible time focusing on the present.  I have become much, much better at it.  Thankfully.  

Whatever job I have had, whatever task I have been assigned, if people rely on me I do the best job I can.  I have to realize and accept that no matter how hard I work, how many hours I put in, how perfect I try to do things, it might not matter at all.  In the end someone else is making the decisions.  So that begs the question, "Should I keep putting all the effort and time in?".  I think that answer is "Yes", because that is who I am.  

Check out Trijuice and the Holiday Giveaway

Check out Trijuice and the Holiday Giveaway and yes I am trying to win a prize

http://www.trijuice.com/2008/12/2008_trijuice_holiday_giveaway.htm

Weight, Training, and some other stuff

It has been awhile, I have been busy (not a good excuse), and I have been forgetful (not a good excuse either). I finished taking the LSAT yesterday, and I am glad to be done with that. It has been a long time since I studied that much and since I took such a long test. If I decide to go back to school it is going to be rough at first. Now that I have both the GMAT and LSAT out of the way I can think about if and when I want to go back.

On the right I posted my summaries for training, with and without races, for the last couple of years plus the offseason so far this year. This offseason would be a lot more relaxing if work was not so scary, with the economy and all.

I also put my weight trending for the last 12 months. Pretty interesting to me. Not too suprising I am starting to uptick a bit. That is what happens when you slow down training in the cold winter of MN, weight goes up.

I registered for St. Anthony's in late April, so I will doing that as my first race again this year. I am going to do two half-ironmans but no IM 70.3, at least not at the moment. Mainly a money thing. If I end with more money than I think, maybe I will add a late one on the schedule. Maybe Longhorn or something.