TRIMAMA

You can find me here now....

2010-07-07T07:15:00.001-05:00

Hi all my blog peeps- you can find me here now

Grandma's Attic

2009-08-11T09:15:00.008-05:00

My Grandma was a second generation immigrant of German heritage. She arrived in the first quarter of the last century, being born into a large catholic family. Five days a week she arose at 4am to feed her family and pack them off to work and school before herself commuting to her job at the factory. She stuffed widgets 8 hours a day, returned home, cleaned, laundered, cooked, slept and arose to do it all over again. I seriously doubt she slept more then 5-6 hours a night in her entire life. Even when she had gone on to retire and just be Grandma. Right about 1968, having saved their pennies and milk money, my grandparents were able to invest in a lake place up in Small Town, MN. They would venture up on weekends to build during the day and fish in the evening and in short time they had a lovely second home affectionately referred to as "Nord" in deference to the lakeshore it was nestled upon.

Right about this time, I came into the world but would know little of Nord for years to come. Transplanted by a corporate transfer, the hustle, smog and bustle of Southern California is a world away from the pristine shores of Nord. Fortunately, the corporation was headquartered in Minneapolis which afforded at least one annual trek up north. We travelled by train, plane and automobile over the years and covered the two thousand odd miles multiple times. There was nothing quite like the news to my little ears that we were traveling to Grandma's house. I loved my grandma and my grandma loved me. Which was not a luxury shared by all family members. A phenomena difficult to quantify, my grandma seemed to hold favorites when it came to her clan. Speculation ran wild, from the ghastly to the inert, but in the end, it might just be possible that she preferred those who wanted nothing from her. It was rumored that Grandma had wealth and treasure in abundance; in reality, Grandma worked hard, saved with frugality and loved generously. In a family system which defined affection by "what can you give me?" some wanted her money and other's her love. I fell into the later category. I was a constant shadow to grandma. Baking, snapping peas, working the garden, traveling to town to "wash and set" the nursing home ladies hair, Pink Ladies, Catholic Mass, Ladies Auxiliary, trips to the bakery and quietly stolen games of gin were all woven into the fabric of life with Grandma; a rich tapestry indeed. It wasn't until later in my adult life that I learned I really wasn't all that great at gin, and all of those quarter payouts for losses were Grandma's way of giving me some spending money without ruffling the feathers of the body politic.

There were two classes of citizen at the Nord compound; those allowed in the kitchen and those shooed away with insult and indignation. The kitchen was Grandma's domain. While it was an elite class that held an all access pass, the true "piece d triumph" was an invitation to venture up into Grandma's attic. No one was allowed in Grandma's attic. A dictate which only served to heighten the speculation that great riches and treasure were cached in the crevices and corners of the domicile. In the fertile mind of my imagination the attic was a treasure trove. Boxes of costume jewelry, old straw hats, piles of crusty old paperbacks, and mounds of partially finished boutique crafts, a pair of broken snowshoes, some old pottery and white gloves! Right about the time I hit the age of teen girl romance, I discovered the white gloves. No fantastical point in a drama is better punctuated then by smarmy removal of white gloves, one- finger- at -a -time. I being my grandma's shadow, packratted my straw hat and white gloves away, stored right next to the little pile of coins I won in a fishing contest with my grandpa. (first fish in the boat, most fish and biggest fish netted 79 cents. The fact that it was the only fish we landed that night due in large part to the squeals and commotion my sister and I caused in the boat through most of the evening, notwithstanding)

Truly, the only thing of genuine worth in that entire attic was a mink stole. Not to be confused with Mink Stole of John Water's fame. No, this was the real deal, soft, strokable and infinitely valuable in the venue of theatrical drama. I had no mind for high society, but if I could have any one thing from my grandma, this swath of fur would be it. And Grandma knew this, and we discussed it often enough. She amused by my infatuation, me finding this the perfect complement to add to the drama that played out in my life.

A fitting complement it was. As I mentioned above, the politics of the family would not allow for Grandma to give me something that wasn't equally and exponentially distributed to all family members, but she would find a way to leave little blessings here or there. A bag of quarters tucked among the other treasures hidden beneath my bed; a Vegas jackpot that kept me supplied with grape slushies at the local pool for the entire summer. Or, a parcel of her most treasured "See's Candies" tucked into the pocket of my letter jacket, only to be discovered while standing in the dark cold of late fall, me starving and waiting for the after school activity bus to take me home. See's Candies were imported from the west coast and ferreted away from the hoardes that would consume them with no appreciation whatsoever, until the hoardes left and Grandma could repose to her chair for much needed rest. Her See's and a Harlequin as reward for those weeks of service. Those four candies melted in my mouth and warmed my soul that dark night.

The years passed and I married and a difficult estrangement ensued, which for me included the most grievous loss of my grandma in my life. While circumstances prevented me from visiting her in person, the imprint of her on my life was indelible. Last winter I received word that Grandma was dying. It was time to go see her again. Ironically, she spent her last days in the same nursing home we would visit to hand out water, deliver mail and work in the beauty salon. Now she was dying. There was so much to discuss and talk about, but in the end little was said as Grandma had suffered multiple strokes which left her speech disabled. Her ability to communicate was not completely thwarted and after all, I had brought her a pan of fudge, so we enjoyed our afternoon together. She desperately wanted to return to her home on the lake, but this was not to be. When she learned her medical complications would keep her in the nursing home until she passed, Grandma decided she was through with her time here and passed away three weeks ago yesterday.

It is a strange thing to grieve 18 years or so of your life that occurred two decades prior and my heart seemed short circuited by the convolution of the not so pleasant memories of those years. That was until last week when we packed up The Tribe and ventured to the Great Western Playground of the Greyhounds for a week of high altitude fun. As part of this week I dragged my reasonably enthusiastic family back along the memory lane of my youth, visiting every house, park and school of my young Colorado years. I regaled them with stories and vignettes of my life, all the while a fierce electrical stormed snapped and sparked all around us. Everything seemed so much more compact, smaller then what I remembered, yet exactly the same. And it thrilled me. We ventured on to Parker and dined with my sister, brother in law and nephews, an encounter made briefly awkward by the introduction, "hello, here are the cousins you have never met, and oh, hi brother-in-law whom I haven't seen in 16 years" But the more things change the more they stay the same, and family remains infinitely valuable, so in no time the kids were playing and the adults were enjoying beverages and the electrical storm raged on. As we lingered on the deck following dinner, I began to realize something happening deep in my soul. A sense of restoration was occurring. A new memory was forming, and all of the good things were coming back to me. For years I have contended with the dark, nightmare images of my youth; the places and things serving only as a backdrop to this drama. But now, returning with The Tribe, a representation of all of the good in my life, I was given the gift of seeing the whole picture again. The happy memories returned. I was able to see fully the gift of God's mercies that sustained me through all of the hell, bringing me to this point in history. Awe inspiring mountain ranges, land to roam and lose myself in, friendships to experience and above all, a Grandma that loved me dearly.

As we closed our dinner conversation, my sister bound from the table intent on showing me some little trinkets and costume jewelry she had been given by our uncle who is now the proprietor of Grandma's estate. Sitting with my back to the door I didn't notice her return until she had draped something warm and wonderful around my shoulders. It was Grandma's stole. In awe, I was speechless as I felt my grandma wrap her arms around me from an eternity away.

And now, the tears flow, and I end this story of Grandma's Attic

Mom, what was your favorite part of puberty?

2009-04-19T06:01:00.004-05:00

Hmm, when it ended? Spring is the season of crocuses pushing up through the soil, the green haze of buds on winter dormant trees and sex; or at least Family Education at the kids school. The second daughter inconceivably gave birth to a 10 pound bag of sugar (although, if it could be accomplished, this would be the kid to do so) which she named "Frank" and which she fed, diapered and cared for during 72 hours of "Family Life". SD received an "A" and we got a 10 pound bag of sugar that is just a little creepy to consume. The second daughter is now growing hair in strange places and so it's time for "car talk" to begin. Turns out that in a small house with 12 ears, the most conducive venue for "talk" is the car. Car talk generally begins with "mom I've got a question" and ends with us circumnavigating the neighborhood. I believe the record is 25 rotations which ended with a sigh of relief and "whew, we finally had the sex talk". You mean there is more to the most wonderful gift on earth then just making babies? Happily, gratefully, yes. Which brings us back to the puberty question. My answer to which was the sense of female bonding. There was just something about walking through that time with girl friends, reading "Are you there God, it's me Margaret" and then someone inadvertently got hold of a bootlegged copy of "Forever". That was still the age, at least in my family, where we learned about sex from novels and copies of "The Joy of Sex" at sleepovers. I traversed puberty at a snails pace and joined the wistful ranks of those in the locker room hiding behind a locker door. In actuality, it took pregnancy to bestow me with hips and mammary glands. (they really didn't become breasts again until the ten constant years of pregnancy or nursing concluded) Tac and I recently listened to an audio study of the Song of Solomon and came away with an entirely new vocabulary for the human body and the ways of a man and his bride. A new language comes in handy with two offspring in the "car talk" camp and the "spelling things out" code long since exhausted. They tend to shy away from reading the Song of Songs so we are safe for now.

We are, as ever, a busy household with Soccer/Rugby, Soccer, Fencing and Soccer. And golf! I joined a golf league and will play for the first time in about 12 years. I went to the shed yesterday to retrieve my garage sale clubs I picked up a couple of decades ago, only to discover rust pocked and peeling shafts and heads. I see great liability with those on the driving range with those, so off to Craig's list I go. I took golf in college, being ever so executive minded at the time, and to this day I don't regret it a moment. At one of Tac's swank cocktail parties I was invited to join an executive women's golf league; an invitation I may indulge once I regain my swing. I also took fencing in college, which came in handy when the parents were summoned to the floor to help fill out the ranks in Oldest Sons first fencing class. The rust knocked off quick enough, as we learned to parlay and joust, albeit my opponent was perhaps five years old. Fencing is an amazing sport of strategy, precision and absolutely butt kicking aerobic conditioning.

Since this is a triathlon blog, it seems right to update: One sprint (two weeks hence) Grandma's Marathon (a PR on the radar) and possibly a trip to the Big Pig Gig in August with someone who is training for a little thing we call Kona. I secretly am hoping to get the ok to go Iron myself this year, but I have a hunch that will have to yield to the "only one crazy parent training at a time" rule.

So, there it is, a long overdue post made possible by the fervent request of the two most likely to want to peek inside the Trimama brain and the two most likely to wash an extra pile of dishes to make it possible.

Regards

Hey mom, do I have hot lunch today?

2009-02-07T08:24:00.000-06:00

Yes

Oh, man I could have slept in.

Exactly how long does it take to pack a sack lunch? It apparently takes substantial "sleep- in" time. How wonderful to have the perception of time of an 8 year-old.

I confess my boys are perplexing to me at times. Gumball machines were on the must have list for Christmas this year and Grandma came through handily; not just with the glistening orb of childhood delight, but an extra canister of refills. Which most likely explains the behavior of the ten year old. There was simply more gum then he could chew, although he gave it a noble effort. His pragmatic mind was not to be undone with the logistical nightmare of disposing of dozens of pieces of gum exhausted of it’s flavor and high fructose corn syrupy goodness, no of course not! What else are pockets for, if not to serve as a bio-waste repository? Which is precisely why I tend to let the washing machine clean the pockets out. Cell phones and ipods take heed. In this way I can be assured that whatever the pockets yield is by all accounts bleached, scrubbed, softened, dried and most important, dead. Rest in peace oh 17 pieces of chewing gum. You will have a proper burial permanently enshrined in denim.

It’s days like these that moms just need to grab a snow shovel and attack the icy world. The snow veritably melting away peavance, when the neighbor kid happened along.

“You know, the best way to get rid of ice, and you can really only do it out in the country, but the best way is about 7 sticks of dynamite.”

The utter desecration of my driveway would certainly ensure no future shoveling

There will be a scent of spring in the air this weekend as the mercury tops 40 for the first time since last November. I am so going out for a run- a really long run. I have been nursing several injuries including a constantly swelling/gummy knee and tendonitis in my elbow-all right side injuries. My friend who is an energy healer asked me if I am holding on to any anger. Hmmm, yes! But isn’t that fairly common. I’m going on a quest to understand what angers me and let it go. In my mind there are good things to get angry about and pretty pointless things to just hold on to and stew over. Stewing just make you mushy and when it goes on too long it pretty much cooks you to death. I did come to the realization that I’m rehabbing a second injury. I guess I was just going forward taking care of things as I had with bike crash #1, not really thinking about the difference in dynamics caused by bike crash #2. #2 has it’s own challenges. I’m so glad you can’t crash a Lemond Spin bike. BTW I love teaching spin class! Love it! People, my music and bending crank arms, whooot!

I’m going to focus my season on running, perhaps a string of half marathons, but I’m hoping to cross train my way to a pr. That’s the plan for this week anyhow. I’ll throw in a tri if the summer permits, and I seriously hope it does, and we will see.

Off to basketball, housecleaning, laundry and …..

Oh yea, it

2008-12-21T19:37:00.001-06:00

Ironman;it's supposed to be fun

2008-11-24T10:41:00.002-06:00

And it was! I'm standing in the town home hot tub re warming myself after icing my legs in the pool, realizing I'm returning home to the Tribe in full Holiday mode. There won't be time for posting, so while it's still vacation, here goes.

First off, a huge, huge thanks to Tac and The Tribe, and my family and friends. You don't do Ironman alone, and I have the best group around me anyone could ask for, I love you guys and thought of each of you many times throughout the day. Thanks especially to Commodore, Suplinds, Big J, Shane and Krista, Fe Lady, my local tri buddies (Steve, Helen, KY, Tim and Karen) for hanging out and helping Tac through the day-you guys were awesome support!

On to the race. As I had mentioned last week, I've been fighting a chest cold that just didn't want to go away and settled deeper into my chest as the week progressed. I was hoping I had turned the corner by race day but it was not to be. I woke up in a heavy sweat about 2 race morning with a fit of coughing spasms-blah. Overall, I felt strong and pretty well rested, so I couldn't see any reason to not start the day, and this is Ironman. How many shots do you get at this in a lifetime?

Everything about the day just felt right, I felt light, not too anxious, not scared, just ready to take on the day. I dressed, tattoo'd my arms with Tribe tat's (courtesy of the local Tribe Multisport-how handy was that. If you are ever in Scottsdale and need something or just want to hang out and talk racing, go there, they are awesome!) Breakfast went down a little hard as it always does on a big race morning and we were off in the beautiful pre dawn of Tempe.

The race was phenomenally staffed and it was pretty quick work checking in with body marking, bag drop etc. I had picked up a small speaker system for my bike (the size of a roll of quarters) that plugged into my shuffle so I quick taped my set up in place. No headphones in ears=perfectly course legal- learned that at Florida. I had tuneage on the bike-so awesome. Off to the porta potties, the coffee was talking and I knew it was going to be a good race day! whew. Into the wetsuit, one last bear hug from Tac and it was time to go to the water.

I was surprised by how many athletes were standing on the dock just staring at the water waiting to get in. It was 6:55 and we had a 200 yd swim to the start line. Having seen a large group of athletes stranded on the shore at Madison when the canon sounded I had no intention of not being at the start when the canon sounded. C'mon people, you have to swim 2.4 in this, what's an extra 5 minutes? Of course I'm a hardy minnesotoan and I thought the water was balmy. I was really warm race morning, shedding clothes like a hard luck poker player. I arrived at the start just to hear the final notes of our countries anthem and a huge cheer go up from the crowd. AZ is a fantastic spectator venue and the bridge above us was thick with people cheering. My strategy was to swim to the left side of the very large swim lane and make my way to the right at the end of the first 2000 yds. Clockwork. I couldn't believe how fast those first 1000 ticked off, building, building, stadium, bridge. I was moving easy through the water and barely encountered other athletes. A few pulls, one dunk that ticked me off because the guy had brushed my feet 3 or 4 times and knew I was there, but nothing major. I swam a little off course here and there, but overall, once I found my line I held it to the bridge and beyond. I did notice my arm turnover was not quite as strong, and I could feel my chest tight. Just not quite enough oxygen making it's way through those lungs. Go past the bridge, turn and head back home. about halfway back my right calf began to tighten and I knew I had to keep moving quick as it was definitely going to cramp. And it did with about 200 yards to go. I couldn't flex my foot it was so frozen in place. I paused and willed it to bend and ouch it did. I just wanted to get to the ramp. A lot of people were converging on that ramp at the same time and it was a little like a polo match during that last 100 yards. Bring it on, this is Ironman. I had to swim with one foot flexed to keep it from cramping, nothing like a little drag. haha.Great volunteers hauled you out of the water and I ran-yes ran- to the wet suit stripping area where Tac and Fe Lady were ready to go. Bear hug, down! Down! they had me stripped and I was on my way. Why was I running? I have no idea. The clock said 1:26- matching my Florida time and at that point it was time to reassess my goals. One lovely note, all of the athletes departed the water with a crazy mustache/beard thing- hmm sediment is good for you. I'm good for minerals for about 6 months.

I wanted to hit a 13:15 finish time, but could just feel that I had to move that off the table, because while I felt solid, I didn't feel as though I would have the air capacity to kick in my speed work.

The AZ bike is a 3 loop deal where you weave through town and then head up into the foothills. When we biked our practice bike it had been windy which made the climb slow and the return wickedly fast. 40 up, 20 down kind of thing. I held off on my music so I could just take in the day. The morning was clean and fantastic, the mountains breathtaking(in more ways then one) My plan was to go 75 percent on loop 1, 80 on loop 2 and 85 on loop 3. My plan was working like clockwork. I felt confident and strong returning to town, fueled up at The Big J rest stop, with my goldfish I'd brought along, and headed out for loop 2. About 5 miles in mental fatigue began to hit so on with the tunes and down with the bag of mini M&M's I brought. Great brain food for a race course. MMMM, and crunch happiness for the mouth that is getting sick of just drinking. I rolled up the hill a little faster the second lap and was making good time on the return. Stop at special needs, scarf the ham sandwhich, pick up the uber expensive spare tube I didn't want to lose and shove it in my back pocket, pop in another cough drop and roll on down the hill. I was rolling at a good clip, feeling pretty strong for the mileage. About 2 miles out from the turnaround I rolled through an aid station and pulled to the right for water. I had slowed to about 12 mph and was filling my aero bottle when all of a sudden I heard a "S*%#!" and then a crunch and in slow motion I thought, "hey there's the ground- I don't think I'm supposed to be flying over my handle bars headed for the ground" Then smack on my head, my bad hip and worse on my bum knee. Crack went the knee. I'd felt that same crack about 14 months before, same searing pain and I thought, damn! my race just ended. My left foot had unclipped but the the right was was twisted around still attached. "ok, is anything broke?" Please don't say broke. The uber intense Age Group Kona wanna be who had swiped me, had landed hard and was up and swearing. Hm, excuse me, you ran into me, and there was more then enough room to go around clean. But how are you, are you ok. He didn't pause to answer, swore at the aid workers who tried to help him out and rolled off. Alrighty then, I'm fine thanks for asking. But the aid workers were fantastic. My water spilled and for some reason that seemed relevant at the time. I think my brain was still catching up. I could feel something seeping through my bike shorts on my hip but decided it would be worse to look then to not know. I stood up, my head hurt, but my legs seemed to be working. They did a quick once over of my bike, and it was good, so I mounted and rolled on. Hmm. Ok 14 months of rehab and now I may or may not be able to use this leg for running. It seemed like a pretty good time to have a good freak out cry, so I did-going about 95 mph on adrenaline alone. I rolled into the turn around and the gang was all there cheering. Tac was at the end taking pictures and I was trying to hold it together. I was shaking pretty bad though. Tac lifted my bike short up to reveal a lovely oozing raspberry. I think I need more M&M's. I told him I have no idea if I will be able to run. "Hey, we've got all night, you can walk it if you need to." Apparently my brain did not hear him when he yelled, just dial it back a little, because I was moving. Back to the hill, up the hill, and look here, the wind had shifted. We were blown up the hill, so up and back the speeds were much closer. 30 decent on the first loop, 22 on the 3rd. I was pretty much done with the bike by mile 100, so I was glad those last 12 went so fast. I have one quirk with Ironman. My odometer on my bike read 122 miles when I was finished. This odometer is always spot on when I ride at home on pre measured distances. According to my Avs, I had knocked out an 18- but of course the bike clock stops when I do, so I ended up with a 16 ish. I was a little bummed, and yet, in the back of my mind, I'm going to keep that faster pace as a trophy- just because somewhere between what was and is lies the truth. :-)

I had good energy and felt mentally ready to run. Unlike Florida, where I ran one mile at a time and added up, this race I decided to count down. I have no idea why, except that I liked the idea of the miles melting away. AZ is a crazy weird run where you go out and back and up and down and round and round. Someone said it is like a butterfly, I was thinking more drunk Irishman. Most awesome thing, they had a massage tent at the second aid station. My calves were so tight I was having trouble running, so I pulled over. 5 quick minutes later and wow, I could move my feet again. I wasn't feeling any pain from the crash, and things were holding up well, so I ran. Here though is where the stupid cold kicked in, I think all the dusty air of the bike showed up, so if my heart went over 150 I started wheezing and couldn't breathe. I generally run at at 160-5 HR, so I needed to moderate it quite a bit. I ran until I started to wheez and then I would walk. By mile 6 I had figured out a good pace and that is when things really started to move. I ran with Tac across the bridge going into the final loop and was amazed at how trained and how good I felt. One loop to go and I was a happy camper. Most awesome of awesome, I was rapidly passing all of those bikers who had out gunned me. He who laughs last boys. I chatted with a lot of runners, joked with the volunteers and kicked off the miles. I thought about Commodore who had never had the chance to run this run, and Kahuna who was down with bad feet. I thought about how awesome it was as a Minnesotoan how wonderful it was to run in late October in shorts, I thought about the Tribe. When times got anywhere near funky, I thought about all the kids and folks who never get a chance to do what I am doing, and I smiled and said a prayer for them. Last fall after my crash, I strung a "Miracles Happen" pendant around my neck. It was a souvenir from the MIracles of Mitch Kid's Triathlon. It hasn't left my neck, and on this night I was proof to that statement. I negative split the second loop and was running strong when I met up with Tac at the 20 mile bridge. I had a lot of energy and a 10 K to do. I thought a sub 14 would be a great finish, but it was going to be close. One most awesome moment on the run, it must have been after about my 15th shot of Coke, I was flying and I cruised by a couple of guys walking- "Geez" was all I heard. Can you still be running at mile 20 of an Ironman? Oh, yea baby. One more negative split and I was rounding the shoot to the finish line. About a quarter mile out I realized I wasn't going to break the 14 mark, so I slowed up and savored. This was it! The end of long year, and I wanted to soak up every sight, smell and flavor. Ok, not flavor- I was a sweaty mess.

I adjusted my hat and arm warmers for the finish photo and cruised the finish shoot. I high fived both sides of the corral and whooped! (One note for spectators, you really need to flex that arm on a high five-one guy stiff armed me and I almost went down, but I regained composure- quick bow to the crowd, more high fives and "Trimama, you are an Ironman!" Break that tape and hang that metal around my neck. How cool it's a cactus-yea!

I felt amazing! I felt light. I felt like me. No tears at this finish, no burden to unload, just triumph. Wow! I met up with Duane and he gave me the biggest bear hug! Love it. Then Tac was there and it was all good.

The rest of the story is just pizza and sprite and beer and Taco Bell and a call home to let them know I was done. Oh, and then about 10 minutes of spasmodic coughing that threatened to send my pizza into the outer stratosphere. But it was all ok, because we had reached the end..........

Ironman one week out

2008-11-16T09:47:00.002-06:00

With a chest cold keeping me home for the morning (Coach Taconite insisted) I thought I'd catch all two of you still reading the travails of "Trimama's blog" up to date on life with The Tribe. I am one of those of the persuasion that we make time for the things that are important to us, so I can't really say that my reluctance to blog is strictly time related. No, I'd attribute it more to a long season of keeping life closer to the vest, or chest as it might be. I believe now there are seasons for healing and growth which are precious and tender and private in contrast to those that are meant to be lived out loud and with more public support and input. I've enjoyed this season, focused on friends close at hand, virtually and proximally. It's been a long but fruitful struggle from broken body to restored faith, and someday I might share more of it out loud, but for now I am content to prepare myself for this punctuation mark of a race. In terms of grammar and racing, I would love an exclamation point, but feel as though I am more poised for a period; merely the end of one chapter and the start of another. I sort of prefer periods to exclamation points, they are easier on the soul. It does seem as though there should be something in between. I suppose that is why they invented fonts. Life lived in Arial is so much preferred to Times New Roman. It would be fun to be all Chalkboard all the time, but enough of that, although it is curious that Blogger defaults to Lucinda Grande. Blogger, the Grande ultimate in narcissism. Of course saying that tongue in cheek as Blogger has been a fantastic means of finding wonderful friends and soulmates.

Tac and I met up with Ironmom Jenny, Laura, Nick and many others at our annual Tri Night Banquet. Very fun and good to see friends in clothing that is not spandex. With the exception of Jenny who was modeling some of the greatest race wear I have yet to see. Hopefully I’ll be able to sport some on the AZ race course ☺. Tac actually told me that I need to spend a few minutes in transition fixing my hair and looking nice for the run. He’s that worried I am going to best his time- I saw him packing lipstick in with my transition gear. I’m not sure a race photo would be complete without my hair spazzing out of my braides from every side, but I’ll see what I can do. I am planning to wear my sexy socks on the run- they made a huge difference at Whistlestop, I love em! And that is explanation point worthy.

We returned home to find Chopper asleep in our bed. He is insisting that he only sleeps well in our bed, and needs to repose right between Tac and I. I have taken great pains to explain to him that though he is small he really doesn’t fit. He wants another mattress, I think we will comply soon. He gave me a long hug on his way up to bed and it occurred to me that it will be a miserable week when my little boy no longer wants a hug from mom. He is my snuggly one and life will be very empty without that. One more plus to fostering and adoption.

That is what I am liking about this race, it is a period. It is the end of one thing and the beginning of another. Florida was a much needed exclamation point. It was the closing of something greater, a relief, a celebration of how far I’d come. There is something to be said when you don’t have to travel quite so far to go 140.6. There is something very tranquil in a period. Something wonderful when there is room in your mind to do something you love, and still have space for exclamation points. How blessed am I?

We arrive in Arizona on Thursday, looking forward to seeing Commodore et al, Momo, Fe Lady (perhaps) and many others. Shoot us an email so we know who to look for and contact with dinner plans etc. We have a pool and plan to use it accordingly-especially Monday after the race.

Until then....(how wonderful, a string of periods that says precisely what I mean)

IMFL-Go Bloggie Friends

2008-11-01T08:54:00.000-05:00

Lana, Tim, Michelle and Ryan

HAVE A FANTASTIC DAY!!!!!!!!!

The stories of our lives

2008-10-21T09:07:00.002-05:00

"I love Mom's stories about her life. They're funny and interesting. I'm never going to have stories to tell like hers." So came the innocent whims of my ten year old. Fast forward five years, and now she has stories. Good stories, happy stories and sadly, the kind of stories you wish your kids never have to tell. The stories of how politics can sharpen a friends tongue into a steely knife that wounds with accusations like "racist" and "fanatic" when nothing in your character supports that claim. How mutually assured boundaries around conversations can be breached without warning with a fire of arrows meant to wound and bring death; said in full confidence or ignorance, the blood is still red and the wounds bring pain and distrust, bewildering to a 15 year old-mostly comprehensible to a 40 year old, even in the case when the knife is intended to bring death by a thousand cuts. The cuts hurt, and yet you turn to the one you know can heal. The one who says "love is patient, love is kind, love suffers long and love keeps no record of wrongs." You love deeper, knowing full well that to do so means you will be hurt again. You will be slandered and skewered, mostly for your fundamental beliefs. You love as completely as you are able, and in such, you are only slightly able to comprehend what was meant by "forgive them Father, for they do not know what they are doing", and also "there is no greater love than this, but that a man would lay down his life for his friend". I want the story of my life to be one of laying down, of setting aside pride, of love. My tongue is the smallest part of my being and yet the most capable of wounding, therefore I pray that god would give me grace to be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry.

Keep writing daughter, in the end, your stories will be too wonderful to tell

26.2 miles to Ironman

2008-10-12T18:29:00.002-05:00

The Trimama Road to Ironman

Scope AZ course Jan 2008- Check mental image in place

Learn to run again-check

Apple Blossom Half Mary- suck it up and go May 2008 - prove to yourself that you can start slow, run in last place, finish strong, let that broken knee carry you and be happy - check

Learn to bike again- Check

Buffalo Olympic Tri- June 2008- back in the saddle- conquer the fear and lovin it- check

Chisago Half Ironman-Bike freakin pr and conquer the mental demons- check

Whistlestop Marathon Oct 2008- sorry Dr. Gulli-but a girl's got to do what a girls got to do, and this girl has to prove to herself that she still has what it takes to go the distance- 26.2 holy freakin cow miles (were those shotgun blasts? why yes, it's duck opener, that's right) had a number of bail out moments- but I shuffled on not unlike the Energizer Bunny (the one who's been sitting in Rover's dog house for a number of months, stuffing falling out, springs popping in back, missing an ear, and yet she keeps on going) The woman with cookies at mile 18 gets an automatic pass to heaven in my book.

58 degree ice water never felt so soothing (and yes I brought my wet suit and went for an early morning swim), tequila never went down so smooth, sweet friendships have rarely meant so much, fall colors have not looked so brilliant; leaving just one thing to say

Let's get it on!

I waited patiently for the Lord, he inclined and heard my cry. He lifted me up out of the pits, out of the miry clay. I will sing, sing a new song. How long to sing this song? He set my feet upon a rock, made my footsteps firm. Many will see, many will see and hear

-40

Fe Lady asks, and Fe Lady gets.....

2008-09-28T19:31:00.004-05:00

There is nothing quite like an IM training- huge omelet (with mushrooms, feta, scallions and Gruyere with a side of hash browns topped with home made salsa)-beer- induced Sunday nap. aaaawwwww. Just enough exhaustion to ignore the pile of clothes waiting to be folded, the dishes that need to be washed and ......

Training for a second Ironman is mentally so much easier. There is no wondering, can I do this? I know I can. And, I know I can again. The pressure falls off when it's "just do". The miles are adding up fast and happily sans injury, more or less. I have a massage therapist and a chiropractor to thank for this. One year ago I broke my tibia and tore my ACL. The doctor wasn't terribly optimistic about my iron endeavour. He said it takes six months to a year to recover just to walking with an injury like mine. He explained the MRI doesn't lie. He doesn't know Trimama. It's been a long 12 months, the first 6 were quite hellish, but here we are. I figured if Adrian Pederson can do it, so can I. It's not like I want to play running back in the NFL, I just want to race an Ironman :-)

Tac has worked his sexy little backside off making work, work in a staggering economy, so as we approach the October 1 abort date, we are both satisfied that we can go forward with our little trip in November. We've been on the fence all summer trying to arrange priorities and playing the financial guessing game, waiting to decide if we should go or not go. We are almost to the point of no return; we've reached iron giddy. What is it about this race that just excites one to participate? It is fantastically unique, and perhaps that is explanation enough. I doubt it. Something to ponder as I train this week. It's a long bike week, so I will do a spin, a short bike and a century ride (Friday) Then the next week I will run a marathon because I need another endurance challenge before Arizona to shake out any mental obstacles that might be waiting. Then a few more weeks of alternating 4 mid distance brick training days and the sprint/century week right on up to taper. I swim 2500 in intervals in a pool once a week and do 3600-4000 yards in the old lake once a week. Might I add that this weeks low temps in the 40's is going to make that lake swim rather gritty this Thursday. Uggh. Can you say polar cap? She was right at 61ish this past Friday.

Friday is Homecoming! Go Skippers! The High Schooler (as HG shall henceforth be named) is going with a group of friends to the dance-gulp. At least that was the plan. And I need to go dress shopping-holy cow when is that going to fit into the week? Pictures to post on Face Book- because Blogger just stinks for pictures now.

So, that is it in a nutshell.

Poke me or ping me or in some other way let me know if you are going to be in Arizona- I can't wait to see old friends and meet up with new ones.

Thanks for asking and have a good one.

I know, I haven't been posting.....

2008-09-25T07:55:00.002-05:00

I've written a lot in my head- but that doesn't count. Just not enough minutes in a day to tap on the keyboard. When I poke around, looks like everyone is transitioning out of tri season well- so here is a little bug in your ear for next summer

Bigun and Blink are going Iron Jenny, Tac and I are teaming with the Bigun as a team

Anyone else?

I figured if I pull the covers over my eyes and roll over

2008-09-02T06:13:00.003-05:00

I'd never have to get out of bed and take my baby off to high school today. But, the world doesn't work that way, and our kids grow up and we nudge them along, albeit begrudgingly at times, to adulthood. Outwardly I can be the supportive mom, but inwardly tears are flowing. I'm proud of my girl, already so much an adult. She is going to be fine in that vast, echoing building, that holds one of the best high schools in our state, it's just going to take a few days to convince me of that.

We concluded our wonderful summer last night with the annual "night before the first day of school mani/pedi" watching Finding Nemo. There are few things that right our little world better then a nice manicure and foot massage. Chopper stored up an entire days worth of hugs as Marlin pursued Nemo.

The sun is rising in a post Gustav ball of flame, and the shower beckons, just not quite as loud as the covers....

My baby is growing up

2008-08-04T20:01:00.003-05:00

Today I dropped HG off at soccer practice, she was reviewing her driving skills as we went along. Next year she won't need me to drop her off. She'll be like her teammates who showed up on their own. Tomorrow we go and pick up her schedule and find her locker. Next year locker combinations and high school id's will be so "last year". I relish this time of firsts, knowing full well that this is what they are. It's an amazing transition to watch as your kids go from "need" to "want" I trust that we've nurtured our relationship so that want will grow as need recedes in this final cycle. I see my friends with older children and I relish that thought.

I made my monthly sojourn to middle americana again today. I don't know why small towns and vast farmlands are so cathartic to me. There is something about the slow, methodical process of planting and growing and harvesting. The movement of time, constant and dependable. Crops that failed this year, will grow next; there is always tomorrow. The county fairs are in full swing, replete with tractor pulls and local bands "that actually auditioned for Star Search", FFA and livestock competitions. I really want to go to a rodeo with the Tribe, so we might make one yet. Aaahh, the waning days of summer.

Dutifully marked by the trek to Target for school supplies. Only one "you have 4 children" comments this year. The Tribe is getting quieter. This year I tried a new tactic, they all got their own basket. We went through the lists, then I had them each lay out their supplies, one at at time (yes, right there on the floor at Target) But we made it home with everything, and funny, no extras this year. I think I have 7 bags of forgotten "extras" under my bed currently. School supplies are met with a combination of excitement and trepidation. Soap spent dinner cartooning her worst fears of pending middle school which included an 8th grade pterydactyl devouring a "sixlet" But there were muffins for everyone, so it must have worked out ok in the end.

And one final note (because I am still getting over whatever ill bacteria inhabited my gut during Saturday's lake swim-please God, send rain!)

Quench Gum. Six degrees of separation allows me to proudly say my childhood friend was the friend of the inventor of Quench Gum. If you haven't tried it, it's a worthwhile sensory experience. Get ready to pucker. It was meant to be a sort of electrolyte replacement gum, I have no notion of it's nutritional impact. I do know that 6 girls in a backyard tent playing "truth or dare" can get whipped up into hysterics as they see who can shove the most pieces in their mouth. Bear in mind, one is more then enough to make your salivary glands seize up. I believe 12 was the record, for all you uber competitive types.

Tac and I are enjoying the sounds of summer on the front step, kids playing, cicadias buzzing, cold beer in hand (which only makes a sound if you slurp, or burb), and whatever new application Tac is playing on his 3G.

I love summer

"I just digested the bad guy"

2008-07-30T17:16:00.003-05:00

You got your TomKat, you got your Bradjolina and now, Tacmama. Thanks to Steve in a bowl full of sunshine for the pic.

It's midseason for most in Triworld, however, for us racing in November the year is just getting started. Especially for me, who spent the early season with Tac in training and the family vacation etc. So life went flying along to the end of July and my first significant race in 20 months. And I trained how? Sporadically at best. Some weeks focused, others working like a dog and racing kids all over town. For six months I've been rehabbing my knee, every little workout a new discovery in how I could push those tendons and muscles. I looked at Chisago Half as a marker for where my training was at. I'd won the entry at a banquet last fall, which was providential- I needed to do this race and I wouldn't have done it on my own volition. Tac sensing how totally jacked I was racing this distance signed up to be my rabbit. We raced side by side pretty much through the entire day. Cool. My plan was to apply constant pressure like an accelerator on a road trip (you see, I have that down) watch my nutrition (why does every race burp make me think of that line from Innerspace?) and secretly hope to secure a pr on the bike.

Check, check and check.

Swim 40 ish minutes including my waterside wetsuit strip and run up the grassy knoll. Pretty much the usual here-2000 yards, fairly straight and to course. Chatted with some HIM newby's including a friends hubby from work. The water was beautiful and the race vibe was there. When I hit the turn around my mind had still not settled into racing, so I spent the final 1000 yards counting up and down to 100. You do what you gotta do.

Transition I had a great run up from the water- that always makes me feel like I'm racing even on days when I am just finishing. A couple minutes- more clothes then a shorter race. Swigged some nutrition and we were off.

BUM BUM BUUUUUUUUMMMMMM

Bike 3:02 18:49 avs PR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I broke 18 for the first time ever and that just plain rocks. Nutritioned well, geared well, not much else to say. The course is flatter then anything around her, and therefore fast. Oh, yea, except anyone who happens to find themselves in Arizona in November, feel free to come up and say "Chamois Butter" if five or so hundred people remind me, I might actually remember. There were several moments I was certain I would never enjoy marital bliss again, so Chamois Butter is the key word here. Especially on hot and humid days. Blah. I did groan at mile 40 with the thought we still had 16 miles to go. My bike computer wasn't working and I thought we were closer. Then it occurred to me that I would still have 72 miles to go in an Ironman and I sighed (darn I have a lot of training to go).

In MInnesota we repair our roads by A) tear the whole thing up and start over thus creating a season entirely unto itself (fall, winter, spring and road construction) B) repeatedly fill in the cracks with tar goo C) let the road go to hell until A is necessary thus securing the state of the unions for decades to come.

The final five miles of the bike road were "C" and really made me wish I'd gotten that cracked tooth/filling fixed before the race. Although it was handy that it had shook completely loose-made the dentist job easier on Monday.

I've always wondered (and feared) what would happen if the fatigue and stress of racing threw me into a PTSD state. I've come close many times racing and training, but always regained control, it's not great. Had I respected the distance and nature of this race, if I had thought longer about mental training, if I'd seen the warning signs of a week of intense nightmares and subtle daytime detachment I might have had a better run and avoided the total meltdown that ensued.

I didn't

Run 2:33 (mind you a 2:10 would have PR'd my HIM time-was that asking too much?)

Block 1: Ok, let's go, yea! Let's PR

Block 2: I feel like crap. I want to puke, my calves are cramped and my legs feel like lead and I'm tired of racing.

Mile 2: I don't want to do this run Tac

Mile 3: I'm ready to quit. Ok, let's get to mile 6

Mile 4: Pretty much no nutrition is getting to my brain, and my race focus is shot. (not that it was there all along) We had gone out in the last wave of the HIM'ers so there weren't a whole lot of folks out on the run with us. That stunk, especially as I am a race talked. I need stimulation and Tac didn't feel like talking-the entire time. Too much quiet and too much brain activity is not a good idea.

I told Tac I was definitely entering a zone where this is no longer profitable. I don't think he understood me. He was busy scooping his jaw off the ground. It never occurred to him that I would bail. I had a sense mentally things were getting a little dicey.

Miles 5-7 not so bad- we picked up speed and we'd made the all important turn around point of no return. I mean, you're standing in the middle of a cornfield six miles from town, there's not a lot you can do but move forward. Unless of course you have to "go" in which case you dive into a ditch and water the weeds.

PSA brought to you by me.

There is a lovely roadside grass that looks not unlike the stuff that grows in your yard, only longer and taller. Handy cover when you need to "go". It's called "sawgrass" That name was not by mistake. It's not particularly helpful if you carry a few blades in your spandex either. Mary Kay Extra Emollient Night Cream in my new best friend.

And now back to this weeks Lifetime Drama (damn I wish my life didn't read like a chick flick sometimes)

I was fueling as best I could, but the brain needs carbs and the muscles need carbs and since moving forward as fast as you can is the goal when you really suck as a runner the muscles got priority. So the brain says, all right, fine you want to roll that way, how about a nice movie? And that is PTSD in a nutshell.

I started crying at mile 7- cried to mile 8

Got mad. Sucked it up, ate some jelly beans, stopped crying.

Mile 9 started crying again. Couldn't stop. It sucked.

Miles 10-11 must have got some sugar to my brain- the gatorade, jelly beans, and Quench gum must have worked.

Miles 12-13 Good side- we are almost there-finally. Bad news, my brain wasn't finished. Blah. I was getting angry now. I didn't want to be crying at the finish line, hell I didn't want to be crying at all. Tac was doing his best keeping me moving. I just needed to get food. Solid food.

Saw Jumper again (he just plained rocked the day cheering all over the course) He could tell I wasn't doing so good. He thought it was my knee.

Very Bright moment-my body felt awesome. No knee pain, no hip pain, no nothing. Yea!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love my massage therapist, she is a miracle worker.

Finally finished

6:2XX something. Not my best HIM, not my worst. Could have been better. I'm sure I learned something- like bring your own buffet, bring your ipod and above all else, get in some mental training before November.

Ate PB & J, talked with Training and Bloggie friends like IronJenny (second AG hardware woo hoo) Erin and Mark (their first HIM-Awesome) and I met Ironmom who flattened the course with a 45 minute PR enroute to IM Louisville next month.

I apologize to my friends who thought it was my knee. I needed to focus on something other then what was going on in my head, so the knee was an easy default. You all helped immensely, being out there, cheering and I refocused quickly. I love you guys.

So, that's my race report. I'm feeling pretty good about what I can get done between now and Novemeber. I feel great about the first 2/3rds of the race, especially sustaining a rocking good speed on the bike for 56 miles.

The run is the run and it will get better. Now I know what PTSD racing looks like it, and I got through it. I supposed the imagery of sawgrass kept me from going all fetal in the weeds :-)

A little parenting help, please

2008-07-21T18:16:00.004-05:00

I realize I begin most posts with "wow, I can't believe how long it's been since I posted" Realizing that I have a lot to say and not very much time to say it. Since I started this blog in 2005, there is clearly a correlation with the aging of my kids and my decline of writing time. And they aren't even that busy, compared to the month to come.

That being said, here are some insights into the Tribe household this summer, in no particular order. By all means, comment and help as necessary.

Would someone please, for the love of god, tell me that when you were 10 and purchased your first "nut cup" you used it to tell yourself "knock, knock" jokes. And for that matter, your 11 year old sister went screaming around the neighborhood on her bike yelling, "NUT CUP! NUT CUP! Urp got a NUT CUP ewwwww......"

I had no idea.

and that your 8 year old brother categorically denied any future involvement in a sport which includes said "nut cup" He will be sticking to golf and soccer. I think we need to have a little conversation about male protection.

So, yes, the older boy has a new set of cleats, a mouth guard and a nut cup, pursuant to playing football. Yea!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Ok, I didn't say that. He is built for football, but had consistently insisted on not playing a team sport. It took a lot of convincing for him to embrace my philosophy that most team sports are nothing like the recess scrums involving one player dominating the game as a ball hog; The LA Lakers notwithstanding. He cleated up and went to the combine and came away with a huge smile.

"Mom, you were right, I love football" whew. His league has some great coaches, including Bigun's brother, only with
"this huge roll of muscle on his shoulders"

I can't think of many things more enjoyable then the crisp smell of fall in the air, the kaleidoscope of color in the foliage and the boys suited up to throw around the pigskin. Substitute the girls with a soccer ball and Trimama will be fully competitorized this fall.

But Trimama, aren't you training for an Ironman?

Why yes. Yes I am. And the training is going slow but sure. We race a 70.3 this Sunday in Chisago. It feels to get back in the saddle, the asphalt and the lake again. We have been exclusively swimming in lakes so far, no pool = a happy Trimama.

Speaking of lakes. If your absolutely beautiful swimming hole occasionally yields a looming dark shadow below follow these handy tri tips.

1) Repeat the Tac Boy mantra: My foot is larger then most predatory fish in this lake, they should swim the other way. It works and extra bonus: you swim faster.

2) Paint your toenails. Don't just paint them, paint them black or dark blue, bearing in mind that most lures include colors such as red, bright pink and orange for a reason.

3) Swim in a larger person's wake-you end up looking like the freaking Loch Ness Monster to the poisson below.

4) As you navigate the trail around the local nature center and you are startled by one of these, and he flairs up and hisses at you, and you jump and scream, calm yourself with thoughts of this which is currently available in "all you care to eat" style at IKEA. I care to eat exactly "0". I can hardly imagine a food which takes so much effort and yields so little reward. Sunflower seeds have more meat.

Onward.

The Tribe minus HG is at camp this week. The result of too much work for me which equals too much time alone together for them. They start picking on each other when they go unsupervised by an adult for too long. Returning home today they were peacefully wiped out. I don't recall so tranquil a night here since last Christmas night.

August is a month of birthdays and it's hard to say who frets more over their "list" HG or Chopper. Chopper is in the 5th edition of his list, so I think he wins this year.

It's also the month we celebrate the big 18. That's not so bad, 18 years is pleasantly close to 20 years of marriage; a milestone.

I'm currently rounding out my training plan for the rest of the season. Much to my surprise, I added a marathon Oct 10th. It's not just flat, it's downhill, so I figure I will run with friends and use it as a final long training. I'll walk if I feel like I'm going to blow up my legs. I have a few century rides and just keep swimming in mind. All the parts are staying in tact thanks to my phenom of a massage therapist and my chiropractor.

Happy Trails

Tac's Two timing me!

2008-07-05T11:09:00.005-05:00

I've heard a mid life crisis can vex a typically faithful man, lure him away to a younger mistress; I never thought he would fall to an Ironmaiden. But alas, it has happened.

"Do you know I did an Ironman? Twice?" I've taken to asking him if he works for Ford. That didn't go over so well. But he is helping me train, pushing me on the bike, joining me for my swims across Bush Lake.

"So, by coaching you, I'm actually defeating myself?" Oops he's figured it out. I think there is an ulterior motive though. Seems like the cheering section at IMAZ is growing with soon to be '09 ers. I'm never sure if Race Intentions should be treated like expectant pregnancies, where you let the bearer bring the news in their time, but let's just say, Tac's goading his Pod Partner as well so I feel a bit of a throw down coming on. Tac is already angling for a Morning After Slip.

"I just want to finish" has hit the back burner. November 23rd is locked into the iphone.

Start 7:00 am- canon fires and the wake wash down the gutter commences.

8:13 pm Tac Boy will be de throned!

Of course, I have my virtual training partner She Ra (or is it Fe Ra) pulling me out of bed most mornings-I'm actually following my BT Training plan, so far. I've ramped up the massage therapy in hopes I can figure out the swelling of my knee and ankles and I plan to do a whole lot of back of the pack biking to push my speed.

I'm training for 8:13 (which I just figured out is 13:13-am I tempting some kind of fate?-good thing I'm not superstitious)

We had a rockin' good Somewhat Annual 4th of July Party, great fun with pictures and report to follow.

Happy Weekend, now go celebrate your Freedom!

Ever wonder what happens to a tree that doesn't stretch it's roots deep?

2008-06-28T08:32:00.005-05:00

This behemoth climbed to great heights, fully confident in his footing. Until the storms blew, and the saturated grounds softened and reality sent him crashing to the ground. Sorrowfully, he took a few down with him, scarring many others. This vacation has been a profound time to reflect on my roots as I marvel at the creation that has literally soared above us. How deeply vested am I in my faith, an immovable God, my friends, my family, my convictions and the loved ones I hold dear? On vacation, when all else is pulled away, and life is put on hold, it is simple to embrace and know all that is dear to me. I am profoundly grateful for this time.

By now you've read several race reports and know that Ironman lived up to all it's promises.

We departed mid Tuesday morning for Washington and Canada, only after a brief errand to Kmart to secure another car top carrier. A certain Schwag whore was now accompanying us and we needed more space aloft. If I didn't think it would ensure a short decade in a canadian lockup, I would have snapped a photo of the Customs officer who looked with incredulity into the cavern of the Tacmobile, fully loaded with 7 travelers plus luggage and supplies. I sincerely doubt you could have wedged an apple into the Tacmobile at this point. Although, we did wedge in a lime which was dutifully confiscated at the American border. I secretly think they had confiscated a case of Coronas earlier and now the party was complete.

It would be a cinch to settle down in any of the localities we have visited thus far, but I think the front runners would certainly be Coeur D Alene and Billings. We loved CdA so much we decided to defer the trek to Glacier for another vacation and settled in for one last evening along the big lake. Lovely. Tac wrapped up his mental race report as we strolled along the run route and dined on the water front. Snagging the last two hotel rooms in town, we enjoyed one last, lovely night of rest before the long haul home.

But not before a stop at Tac's T1 spot.

Chatting with the .Bigun the desire to move was concensus; do I sense a relocation of the year round training grounds for the Dots?

3200 miles of adventure in the can, 900 to go. Wish us well and send a shoe horn if you've got one,

Trimama out.

There are a few things in life the Good Lord must have intended me to see

2008-06-21T09:00:00.004-05:00

and this is one of them. How else could I explain my flat tire 13 miles outside of Harlowton, Montana? Sure enough, the gauge reading tire pressure began winking at me and I watched as 40 psi went to 30, to 20 to 10 until I finally found a place to pull over on the two lane road. Now, I had contemplated what I would do with a car emergency, as a single mom with my five children, out in the middle of no where, and I was comforted in knowing that Mrs. Greyhound was my escort. How lucky for us that the car rental company neglected to include a drivers manual with the tire iron. But the Good Lord was at work, and somehow we figured out how to lower the doughnut from it's nest in the undercarriage, jacked up the car with the help of Urp and Chopper, and reloaded. That manual would have come in handy as we reconfigured the interior of the car trying to lift out the spare, only to discover a wee small hole in the bumper that the tire iron slipped through, to turn a bolt to lower the spare. (I know, I'm amazing)

Back to Harlowton, back to the "Testy Festy". Two nice young men fix our tire, we lunch and reload and head back out of town, at peace with the universe for having experienced the TF.

However, I am not at peace with the world of never ending beans. About 200 miles out of Billings I met with a local as I surveyed the filling station map.

"Where ya headed?"

Roundup.

"Take the interstate to 12 and turn off. The first town you meet up you gotta stop for some beans"

Beans?

"Yup. 100 year old pot. They never cleaned it out. Just add new beans everyday. Best beans anywhere."

Now for some odd reason, 100 year old beans appealed to me. You can't beat a good pot of beans. If nothing else, I needed a picture of the magic pot. But bean town never materialized. There was an exit on 12, I kept looking for a town. No town, just a barn. Cue the Twilight Zone music. Is it possible only those with the raw faith to heed a stranger's summon, who will actually take the exit, get to experience the magic beans. Damn.

On the plus side, most people never got to leave those TZ towns, and we had a dude ranch to find.

We landed safely in Coeur D Alene around 6:00 local time, a little crusty, a lot dusty and in great delight at our home for the next several days.

DiLicious has her Sherpa Shack prepped and ready to party. The athletes are wrapping up their preparations. There is a blogger swim at 9 this morning. Then off to the amusement park with The Tribe, Big J and company, and the Greyhounds. Then tomorrow it's the big dance. Sherpa Di and I are taking over the microphone from the boys, so be ready to banter when we shove the mic in your face.

More from the party so big only the West could host it, later.

Even the Rainbows are bigger here

2008-06-19T11:00:00.006-05:00

Two Montana evenings, two gorgeous thunderstorms rolling across the plains. Mrs. Greyhound and I sat on the screen porch drinking wine, listening to the coyotes hunting, (thank goodness no bears yet) and watching the lightening flash.

Our new best friends

11 year old horse heaven

Ready to ride Urp, Chopper and I headed out on a guided ATV adventure up into the hills. We met up with the rest of the group who arrived by horseback.

We are staying at a working cattle ranch. The yearlings are being made ready for market, which entails a lot of wrangling and moving of cattle. In spite of all our current technology, it remains that the best way to wrangle cattle is by horse. Western poetry unfolding as you watch the men, their horses and the work dogs drive the cattle. I could live here.

So that is day one of our Great West Adventure!

You know it's time for vacation when....

2008-06-15T20:31:00.002-05:00

...you've broken the last of your souvenir mugs from the previous vacation

.....you can't shake the vacation songs from your head- I am so downloading Van Halen's Diver Down album, especially their rendition of Happy Trails.

I'd give you more, but there is laundry, packing, shopping, mapping and wow left to get done before O dark hundred Tuesday Morning. I'm a morning driver and I want the day at least 2/3rds done by lunch time.

See you all in CdA!!!!

I hate Steve Jobs

2008-06-10T06:42:00.002-05:00

Well, actually, I have a working iphone and therefore was not home from work throughout the day checking status reports on the release of 2. But we are a collective unit here in the Trimama household, so if one of us hates Steve Jobs, we all hate Steve Jobs. The man clearly has no idea how important "Monkeyball" is to a family vacation or else he would have had the minions working overtime to produce. Oh well.

"Mom, you got new shoes". This being the third Tribe member to notice the nifty pair of hiking sandals I grabbed from the clearance rack at REI caused me to realize one of two things: I need to get out and shop more; one new pair of shoes a year (that aren't tri intended) probably puts my merit as a woman at risk. And two, It's summertime! These are my annual summertime shoes. Last years REI summertime shoes held up extremely well, they will continue to represent good times.

We were at REI to find more neoprene for Tac. He is now so sufficiently bedecked in neoprene he could perform a moonwalk undeterred. If we had been this mindful of protection years ago there would be no Tribe. "How are you going to even know you have swam if you never feel the water?"

"Stop humming Darth Vadar music!" How can I help myself. We are on the hourly countdown to CdA, and since each pronouncement has an air of angst, DV music seemed suitable.

Try it. See, it works.

But Ironman isn't doom, it's adventure. So the new theme music, heretofore will be, Bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Steve Jobs gets Darth Vadar.

We are ironing out the post- school stress and depression wrinkles from the Tribe. Some acclimate to summer better then others, and I am giving them all a wide berth to be chippy and short; family needs to be a safe place to vent, so long as no gratuitous damage is done in the venting. Vacation will be a good remedy for all.

"Mom, we need the guy who fixes the front door to come."

The guy who fixes the front door was currently making cookies, but has otherwise been detained by training and keeping a roof over our head.

The handle has fallen off of the front, glass, storm door. That has nothing to do with the constant slamming of that door by the Tribe et al.

It certainly has nothing to do with the Soapinator's Pied Piper effect in the neighborhood. Every time I glance outside there is some new kid in my yard.

"Who is that?"

"So and so"

"Where is he from?"

"I don't know, but he's nice"

Add one more Little Neighbor Kid to the mix and it's all good. Off, to Costco I go, Little Neighbor Kids get hungry. But I'm hiding the water canons before I leave. Last time I returned to find a nice trail of grass, mud and water going in the front door and out the back. Apparently they figured out the shortest distance between two points, say the front yard to the back yard, is through the house. Not to mention the nice launching pad off the back steps.

Training is going well. For the amusement of al I am going to the "speed" workout with my Local Tri Club tonight. I'm really only going because, A) I can-finally and B) there are a number of people I haven't seen all winter and I look forward to catching up with them. Verbally, not physically. Who knows, I might shave a few seconds off my 5K.

I trained 7 clients in 6 hours yesterday. Whew. Collectively, I probably completed a few hundred squats, lunges, ab curls and plank minutes.

So, that's a wrap. By this time next week, if all goes according to plan, I'll be eating breakfast in Fargo.

Not your average race report

2008-06-01T18:41:00.003-05:00

But first a little chat about Trimama's bootay. I've noticed a mysterious trend of pictures lately, with an unusual emphasis on my posterior. I thought I was being paranoid until I was looking through "Highlight" pictures with Little Neighbor Boy (LNB) last night. I was showing him pics from the kids Miracles of Mitch tri last summer. 60 highlight photos including this. (sorry you've got to scroll to pic 41) I've long threatened to rent the space. I'd prefer Iron Jenny sponsorship with Immodium. I'd be proud to wear an Immodium singlet so long as "We don't run" could be emblazoned on my back side. I'm on the wrong computer to post more derierre pics to prove my point, and that would be gratuitous for this family friendly blog.

So, on to the Buffalo Triathlon race report. Let me just say, it feels great to be a triathlete. I wrote my buddy Kahuna an email yesterday following an early morning lake swim, it just doesn't get much sweeter then this. And it's sweet because I have family and friends and a sense of humor (which becomes essential as the race unfolds) but let's go back a week or so shall we.

For any of you readers who track back a few years with me, you know I carry a certain amount of baggage in my brain that pops up in PTSD symptoms. Generally, healthy living, good meds, a great support system, a rock solid faith and a cold beer at the end of the day all keep the nightmares in check. But some weeks, the nightmares win and decide to pop up during the day. I hate these weeks because there is a decisive shift from my controlling the nightmares to the nightmares controlling me. My brain gets tired, I have to sleep more, and I definitely need to go at it on auto pilot a little more. Flashbacks are weird. They tug at your emotions for a good deal of time, reaching out for your conscious mind, like a splinter festering. Eventually whatever event is driving the wreck makes it's way to the mental video room and all hell breaks loose. Blah. Strangely, this nightmare made a full blown appearance while I was out on a training run with Taconite. (Now Tac isn't all that scary to run with, by contrast, he knows well how to sit quietly in the car while I tremble, and hold my hand until all is well) It's not all that uncommon for nightmares to pop while I train-training builds seratonin-seratonin is one of the complex chemicals of memory. Exercise has been an essential tool toward a healthy, integrated life for me. So, there I was running, brain freaking out, and I could feel my blood sugar plummet. My brain was working overtime. I made it back to the car, drank some water, ate a cookie and sat there and trembled until the thoughts passed. Tac arrived, and waited with me. Tac's the only one I let in on this part of my life. I tend to be pretty reticent about talking about my life. One might think talking would help, but by contrast, it's more like turning out the lights and waiting for the monsters to come out from under the bed. I tread carefully. There's enough toxin in the world anyhow. So, why share now, Trimama?

Because, sharing what my week was about gives you a little insight into how freakin awesome it was to be back to racing again!

Now the bummer of PTSD is that you can contain it but you really (at least that I know) can't control it. In the back of my mind I'm always aware (and a little cautious) of the potential on the race course. Racing seems to have it's own compartment in my brain- I think it's because it's so darn fun! So, let's get on with the race.

I bought a new wet suit on Ebay-long sleeve. As of Saturday, time and weather had not permitted me to hit the open water in this suit. So, Saturday morning, 0600, with fog lifting off the chilly lakes, Tac, TriThunderboy and I hit our favorite training lake. The suit worked like a dream How can you go wrong swimming with the rising sun? I hit the sand after a good 30 minute training swim and dolphined out of the water, practicing for T1. The suit was a bit tough to pull off the legs, they were too long. But here in lies my dilemma, I didn't want to alter the suit before racing in it because if the legs are in the wrong place my calves cramp on the swim. So I left it long. And here is were a sense of humor becomes important.

Race morning was beautiful and the rubber ducky's were towed into position. I bantered with my fellow athletes, met up with friends I knew and made my way to the lake. A fellow IMAZ athlete, Robert met me lakeside and we zipped each other up. Or at least I thought we did. The horn blew, I took off, and about 150 yards out I felt a sudden chill down my back. Hmm. I don't recall that feeling, and I know my wet suit was toasty when I took off. Robert had missed the top of the zipper and my back opened. I made my way to a lifeguard for help getting zipped back up. 3 or so minutes later I was back in the water. The rest of the swim was uneventful until I hit the shore. I can strip in 15 seconds on shore with help from the water. Not today. The wet suit that didn't want to stay on, didn't want to come off. Several of my friends, Nick, Laura, Tac, as well as the crowd were there cheering. Go, Trimama, Go. "I can't get my da*& wet suit off!" Nick had some good advice, standup and push at it with my legs. Ok, then I went down. And my knee screamed at me. And for a brief moment I thought that was the end of the season. "Don't panic. Stand up" "Ok, I can stand" Finally, after 4-5 minutes wrestling with it, I finally pulled my left leg out. The crowd cheered. That was a little embarassing. And riotously funny at the same time. I mean what are you going to do. (Note to self: scissors, body glide and practice)

Swim 34:XX Now, when I subtract my buffoonery, that is a Trimama PR!! And I never felt like I was swimming hard, just nice easy strokes. (at the risk of sounding like a chronically injured person, I think I have even more swim in me- I'd had a chiropractic appointment and the doc dislocated my left arm Friday. I got HG to relocate it Saturday, but it was tender from swimming Sat morning, so I favored it- I need to do some PT and get those interior shoulder muscles stronger)

Bike: No FEAR! I Flew! I past people and I rocked the course with another PR! My cyclocomputer hadn't been working, but bubble bike must have known it was time to race, because, when I needed it, I looked down expecting to see blank and was pleased to see 22's often enough. Got a lot of inquiries about my tattoo. I think it made folks feel better as I past them. Oh, she's and Ironman, she can pass me. I like making folks feel better about themselves, so I'm upgrading the tattoo to an M-Dot with a Yellow winking smiley face in the circle, after Arizona. I don't know my final time, but my bike computer had me at 18 over 24.5 miles. So, while my knee can be jacked up on the bike at times, giving me no power whatsoever, all of the squats and lunges seems to have built some other power that engages at opportune time. That, or it was the "fast" air I had the race mechanic put into the tires pre race. Finally, aerobottles- use them, love them. They make nutrition simple and constant.

Run: uggh. Well, not really. It's just that it takes me 2 miles to warm up, this race no exception. My goal was to do the 10K in an hour. I felt great overall. I never bonked and I had a strong final 3 miles, surprising Tac. But it still took me 1:04 to finish. I'd forgotten the hills on the run. The very good thing was that the hip junk that plagued my half mary was no where to be found and my legs felt good, albeit slow. Maybe I need to do Trisaratops blood doping technique :-)

So, 3:07 total time. My goal was to break 3:10. My previous time on this course was a 2:57-but I knew that was elusive considering the knee and the continued rehab. I finished strong and ecstatic.

I am so ready to train again. Next up, Chisago Half in July.

The Tribe wraps up school this week, with the big 8th grade graduation. One final week of a quiet house. I'm going to need training this summer :-)

3 weeks to Coeur D Alene!

Well, Al didn't drown

2008-05-24T20:16:00.004-05:00

He actually bought a training pack, so it will be back to the pool with the hopes that my lip enunciation will be sufficient. Did I mention Al speaks only broken english. Shows how articulate Trimama truly is; I am wicked at charades though.

I took half The Tribe on the weekly sojourn to Costco, an atypical Saturday errand, and I instantly recalled why when I hit the parking lot. Costco, the random labyrinth where strawberries stocked next to sunglasses makes perfect sense to some supply chain manager. I'm clueless, except in my own Costco, which makes perfect sense to me, therefore, I can never move. What makes little sense to me is shoppers who discard unwanted items several aisles from their pick up point. I am also clueless as to what compelled the patron with the dual melons to leave them in the toilet paper aisle. What forces of nature prevailed upon a person to drop the melons for the tp? I entertained myself with a tale of woe for the duration of my shopping excursion. At some point she will meet up with the fellow who was carting 6 quarts of blueberries, and only 6 quarts of blueberries, through the parking lot when we arrived. I hope he is making cordial.

Spring has sprung in all it's glory, lilacs, cherry and apple blossoms, hmmmmm. The Tribe pitched a tent in the backyard and intends to sleep under the stars tonight. I'll leave the back door open. Last Saturday I biked 45 miles up hill and into the wind with Tac. Sunday I ran 13 miles up hill and into the wind at the Hastings Apple Blossom run. Today I met up with IronJenny, Iron Nick, Jumper, Robert, Iron Steve and Greg and about 150 other local cyclists to do the first supported century of our tri club. My plan was to do 50. 25 more miles up hill and into the wind and it finally occurred to meet that maybe we should ride the loop backward. Ahhh. Downhill with a tail wind is nice. We were riding a circle, as Iron Jenny pointed out, but there is something to be said for "into the wind to start", "back to the wind to finish."

I rode most of the time with Jumper as my wingman, what a great guy. Our legs were toast when we made the final turn, falling short of the 50 mile goal, but pleased with the overall ride. My new motto "Suck it up Trimama and just do it" I've had to say that to myself a lot lately as I've come to realize that my days of 8:xx min miles and strength on the hills are a thing of the past. 4 months of atrophied quadriceps is tougher to overcome then I could have imagined. So, when I think I suck and feel like quitting, especially when I feel like the anchor around everyone's neck on a group ride, I just say "suck it up and go". It's not going to get better whining about it. It certainly isn't going to improve by quitting on myself. So, I take every opportunity and see it as a building process. With my first tri i(n almost a year) next weekend, I think I'm going to be saying that a lot. This whole Tri thing is a tremendous opportunity that a very small minority have a chance to partake in, I don't want to shame myself by complaining that it's not precisely what I want it to be.

That includes the water temperature. You won't hear a single murmur out me about 52 degree water. Not a peep. My lips will be chattering too hard to say anything at all.

HG just returned from a week in Chicago with her class. It's an 8th grade rite of passage that manages to pack every site seeing adventure in the windy city into 3 days. I was pooped reading the itinary. They had a great time and came back with memories for a lifetime.

School is wrapping up for the year, yea. I find the pace of summer very agreeable. We depart for CdA mid June-totally psyched! Our plans include a dude ranch in Montana, Ironman of course (we are the finish line), Orca Island in the San Juans and wrapping the whole thing up in Glacier National. Road trip baby! I'm looking forward to meeting all the bloggie folks.

I want to compile a map of arrival dates and lodging for everyone so we can make a plan of meeting attack. Shoot me an email and I'll see what I can do to put it all together.

For those of you training, enjoy the final push and for us Sherpa folks, hang in there, it's almost here :-)!

Happy and blessed Memorial Weekend

Redefining Snuggle Time

2008-05-13T07:34:00.004-05:00

With me arising at 4 am two days a week to work, and Tac going out at 4 am on the two opposing days, our morning snuggle time has waned. We could adapt if we wanted to rouse earlier, but sleep time is already a commodity. So, this morning, a Tac swim morning, I decided we needed to redefine snuggle time. Not like this though, that's just odd. I don't want to snuggle a perfect stranger. If I wanted to snuggle a stranger, I'd work 80 hours a week. This morning I showed for a rare early am swim session. Sharing a lane as swim support=snuggle time, well sort of. I'm sure Tac was delighted to see me, except he wasn't wearing his contacts so I could just as easily been the 80 year old in the lane next to him. That would have been preferable I'm sure, when I scooped down like the mom that I am and picked up his towel that was lying in the gutter getting wet. The towel that enfolded his beloved iphone. Hey look, an iphone sinks, good thing it's in a waterproof case.

Apparently there is no such thing as a waterproof case for an iphone. Steve Jobs is a moron. (I have to blame someone, it certainly wouldn't fall on the person who brings their non waterproof iphone to the side of a pool, or for that matter the person who carries their phone around in a pocket without protection) I know, I am evil.

I get a chance to redeem myself tomorrow with a new client. New client is hearing impaired but assured me he sort of reads lips and his aides would be in a ziploc bag by the side of the pool if he needed to hear me. I fail to understand how that will help him as he goes down for the third time. I sincerely think if you get Trimama in the pool in her swimsuit you should have to pay more, if for no other reason then my liability insurance is going to skyrocket after this. " Trimama I didn't know you were a swim instructor." I didn't either, but I did a triathlon, so close enough in my managers mind. I get the deaf, drowning guy.

Tac and HG just returned from rugby, so it's dinner time

Put your money where your values are

2008-05-06T06:39:00.004-05:00

I travelled to small town americana yesterday on an errand. The Twin Cities are a uniquely vibrant town where a 30 minute drive puts you smack in the middle of no where. Not quite so much "no where" as it was 150 years ago when fellows like Blakely settled in with their ox and families to conjure an existence from a rich but unforgiving land. Blakely must have been a decent fellow as eventually others settled by the Blakely place and now he is a town. I would like to be a town someday. Comfrey was a town as well, until the '98 tornado swept it off the map. Amazing how a force of nature can stop history in it's tracks. My few bucks and prayers go out to the citizens of Myanmar who certainly have a renewed respect for the forces of nature.

I chatted with a client yesterday about events unfolding in the world. We were breaking it down to our level; what can I do? He sells eco friendly cleaning supplies. I suggested he sell "put your money where your values are". I expect a residual check in the mail. I also proffered the idea that if every person in America ate only the calories they needed to sustain their life for one day, perhaps a week; no more then you need, no waste, a definite impact could be made. Consider your latest walk through a restaurant, I see a lot of waste on plates. Multiply that by 300 million. A lean america would conserve immensely. Fuel, health care, food costs, waste, my goodness add it all up. I don't suspect an obese nation will go lean for the sake of humanity anytime soon, but I can dream. The law of unintended consequences leads me to think I'm not a big fan of the new light bulbs. I can't eat native bred fish for the mercury concentration in the water. How about if I only use the lights I need, and turn them off when I leave the room? What if we all only used what we needed?

The law of unintended consequences hit closer to home Sunday afternoon. Tac was gone for the weekend and Chopper takes that as a license to whine and back talk. I'm not a big fan of back talk. More to the point, I'm not a big fan of kids disrespecting their elders. He went to his room. I went to mine for an afternoon recovery from my morning LSD run. Before I succumbed to that delicious sleep of fatigue, I told the Soapinator to free Chopper from his penance in ten minutes. An hour later I awoke, vaguely aware that a voice was missing from the murmur in the living room. Chopper must have fallen into a much needed nap. Good, except for the pile of paper airplanes accumulating at the bottom of the stairs. "mom, cin i com don now?" a dozen times. Perhaps he could have put a finer point on his question if he had landed a plane against the head of his forgetful sister. Chopper is our industrious one.

"Oh, I don't care".
Mom, you say that a lot lately. demanding an explanation. Well, there are questions that require a definitive no, such as, "Mom can I cut Soapinator's hair?" and some that earn an immediate "yes" Mom, do you want a backrub?" Then there are the ones I really want to say "no" to, but for lack of a moral or immediate threat to life or limb or school pictures, I have to relent and say yes. Such as, "mom, can we build a fort in the living room?" Knowing full well that in spite of well meaning promises to clean up after themselves, there will be an aftermath. The Tribe is afterall their own act of nature. Here is where my two interests collide. I don't want more work, but I also want them to play and create and explore. So, in counting the costs, my resignation generally falls with "oh, I don't care"

I had an awesome birthday, primarily because of all the phone calls, texts, comments and etc. Thanks friends and family!

Tac is back, tan and rejuvenated by his time away- huge thanks to Kahuna, Grayhound and Curly Sue for hanging with the Big guy!

I declare the war on global warming over-we won!

2008-04-29T07:08:00.002-05:00

I began this year, (with Minnesota's coldest winter in recent history,) joking that this was God's Job-like response to Al Gore.

It's not funny anymore.

For Minneapolis, MN 55426

Temp
23.8°F

So Far Today
Lo: 21°FRain: 0.00"Hi: 25°FGust: NE 0
Wind Chill: 24°F

Your Forecast for Minneapolis, MN
Today
Hi: 55 °F Lo: 38 °F
Partly Cloudy... more
Wednesday
Hi: 63 °FLo: 47 °F
Partly Cloudy... more

I have yet to see a tulip or crocus and nary a leaf on a tree. Aaaaaaggggghhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ok, I'm done.

Not much of a prelude to Happy Birthday to Me!

I turn 40 tomorrow. (long philosophical post to follow)

In honor of 40, I'll be doing

4000 yard swim (4 miles? You're freakin kidding me-my arms would pop out of their sockets)
40 mile bike
4 mile run.

Then I'm going to go watch HG play rugby and go to dinner, where in true Rugby fashion, I will drink 40 ounces of beer.

Finally,

where is Fe Lady? Her blog disappeared! A little help here?

When baby steps make you feel 10 feet tall

2008-04-23T20:47:00.002-05:00

It's like learning to ride a bike....

Weeks of apprehension. Will I be able to bike again?
A morning of anxiety. I sincerely doubt my clients walked upright and pain free Tuesday as I put them through the workout I generally would do at this point, if not for them.
I shook as I prepped. If my knee fails, just how bad will it hurt.
I stood on the driveway for 5 minutes, maybe longer. Our driveway turns out onto a subtle, but climbable hill, and I'm not keen on zero mph crashes.
I rolled my bike to the top of the hill, knowing eventually I was going to have to suck it up and just do this. Maybe I should go back and switch out my cleats and pedals, I'm not so sure it's a good idea to do this maiden voyage on the new ones. Excuses. Just go.

And I went. Slowly at first, clipping out numerous times and stopping just to be sure I could do so in the oft time necessary instant.

And a funny thing happened on the way to mile 2. I remembered. All the miles, all the rides, all the times clipping in and out. And once you remember you know what happens, you soar. Rolling along I watched the final remains of winter breaking up in tiny chunks along the shore of Cedar Lake and I marveled at all of the stored potential of spring. So caught up in the moment was I that I missed the fact that I was standing in my pedals, until I sat back down. 6 weeks ago I couldn't stand.

18 miles of rolling pavement. In the grand scheme of things, baby steps, I know. But sometimes it's the baby steps that make you feel 10 feet tall.

Trimama is back!

In other news, I scoped a new client today-in the event all of Monday's folks quit on me. Nice gal, we got to talking tri's. Turns out she has a co worker who lives in Oregon who does tri s and as it happens also blogs. He had suggested she go to My Local Bike shop to check out a new road bike. Of course, I heard blog and my ears perked up. Who was this blogging Oregonian? and how did he know about My Local Bike shop? I questioned this potential client and tri training buddy.

Well he knows this guy named Taconite Boy who is all about Triathlon.

I busted out laughing.

Do I tell the big guy he is almost famous?

The pillow is calling, cheers to you all

Maybe worm poo is the answer to all things

2008-04-13T18:20:00.003-05:00

It sure isn't spittle. Which brings us to,

The Question of the Week

You are at work, when you notice a person having difficulty working the new, "technically sophisticated" storage lockers. Being the fab, phenom employee that you are, you go to the assist; because life is more then wiping sweat and dust off of treadmills.

"Yes, mam, you have to close the locker before you lock it. That's it." Conversation ensues. But conversation doesn't matter as the only salient point is that spittle is flying. Everywhere. Um hm, I trained you. Yes, you should follow up with me.......eeeeee."

Spittle on the cheek? Ok. Spittle on the chin? Well a little precarious, but we are still ok. But then that flagrant, foul drop hits a perfect trajectory...and lands on your lip.

You:

A) Run screaming to the eye wash fountain in the janitor closet, only to be retarded mid stride by the recollection that the eyewash is merely that- water to wash the eyes. And this isn't your eye, this is your lip, which guards the orafice by which all things travel to and from your body. You opt for chugging bleach instead.

B) Grow up Trimama, you exchange bodily fluids with Tac Boy all the time.

C) But this isn't Tac Boy, where's the bleach?

D) Did you know that, like, 70% of dust we inhale and exhale every day is really skin cells that have sloughed off of other people?

E) I'm going permanent SARS mask from this point forward

F) How can this be coming from a woman who has wiped butts and noses for more then a decade?

G) Go ahead, fill in the blank

I saw in a documentary that worm poo is really great for growing marijuana....and other things. I'm not sure what "other" things are, but the guy from Princeton who invented worm poo is making a lot of money turning other folks garbage into fertilizer. Not a bad gig if you can get it.

Enough about poo, for I have sinned. Perhaps not mortal, but certainly grievous. What? Did I miss the latest download of The Tac Boy and Bigun show? No, worse. Leaving the feverish Tac (who happens to be an Ironman) at home, I bundled up (bundling because it is still so cold here that I switched my iphone weather gauge to celcius; somehow 1 degree here isn't quite so awful when it is only 28 in Tempe- so long as we are all freezing I'm good) The Tribe and departed for the local burger joint. For no odd reason, I donned my Ironman Finisher fleece. Now, in the Tac Boy/Trimama life of yin and yang, I am the IM recluse to Tac Boy's Schwag Whore. My tattoo remains hidden, and my schwag wear is limited, apparently to blustery days out with The Tribe. I sit my "single mom" arse down at the burger joint and proceed to dine with The Tribe. At some point in the evening, I catch a glimpse of the bright red "M" across the room. Just a simple white shirt, on a handsome, athlete, age grouper of a guy. Now we are easily within each other's eye shot. He could no more miss my "M" as I could miss his. And I knew, at some point it would happen. Our eyes would meet, a slight nod, and in typical Minnesota fashion, the subtle wave. We just acknowledge people in our clans up here. And we were in each other's 140.6 miles clan. You know it's coming. It's a sixth sense understanding. I glanced up, our eyes brushed in contact.....and I balked! I looked away! I denied this fellow athlete his due. At that one moment, feeling much more conscious of mama then Trimama, I felt sub iron. I felt that to put myself in this guys league was to defame the name and spirit of the athlete. I really need to get out more. Perhaps I really need to get out on my bike more. So, white shirt Ironman Guy at local burger joint, I'm sorry, really, truly sorry. Wave, wave. (was that second wave overkill?)

Ok, so I stopped by my local bike shop to pick up new cleats and shades. It's 65 wonderful degrees tomorrow and other then the fact that it is bloody tax day, I have no excuse for not getting my skittish, ridiculous self out on a bike tomorrow. Wish me luck, and if you encounter me on the trail, well, don't worry if I don't wave, I'll be white knuckling this maiden voyage of the new knee until it's done. I'm such a wuss.

I'm perplexed by the pickle thing...

2008-04-02T18:40:00.004-05:00

As it lingers. But on to other things. 8 inches of snow are currently melting in torrents down the street. Question, what do you get when you take two really stressed out men, give them a microphone and a recording program? The Tac Boy and Bigun Show! All I know is that I got two stress calls from Tac at work, he passed on dinner, opting for a glass of wine and the next thing I knew he was down in the lower wing of the Tribe castle (read basement) laughing his backside off. Is that a good sign? You be the judge. I think the episode is due to release next Tuesday.

We spent the weekend up on Lake Gitcheegumee. Just saying the word makes me relax. I think every state should have a city like Duluth, where just by leaving your own air space and traveling there makes you feel relaxed. "We are far too easily amused" I mentioned to Tac, after realizing we had spent 15 or so minutes trying to drop rocks through the thin layer of ice on the canal. Flip the rock and it skittered along the surface, give it a good, crushing chuck, and it plunked through the ice and spiraled to the bottom. Clear, ice cold water. Into which we chucked several dozen rocks. Either exclaiming or sighing after each one. We are far too easily amused. I'm not bothered at all by that, HG, in "almost" 15 year old apathy has a different disposition. Ok, some new stores were our collective destination, so she didn't appreciate the detour quite as much. Not until we reached the stores and she realized the value of her younger siblings having exhausted their squirrely nature along the beach shore. Sometimes, but not very often, moms are wise.

We hiked around a state park on Saturday. The beavers were hard at work aaah potential.

Gotta run, Tac is waiting for some post run refreshment at the local pub. That must be Wildflower training

I'm craving pickles right now

2008-03-26T10:56:00.004-05:00

and I have no idea why. I don't even like pickles. I like the marinated cucumbers that they put on a sandwich at Subway. But I don't like Subway, so I have no intention of meeting that craving with a bad sandwich. Sorry Jared.

I booked our hotel room for Ironman Arizona yesterday. That's fairly optimistic considering how between my knee, the wretched flu and the kids on Spring Break, my training has been shot to heck. I plan to do the Trail Mix 25k in 3 weeks and a 62 mile bike ride in 4. I think.

I wonder if some mental deficiency is contributing to the pickle problem. That might explain why I think I can run 15 miles on trails when I can barely run 8 on a flat, paved trail.

American Idol is way too much fun this year. I would buy Brooke White's album tomorrow.

I arrived at work Monday with a commendation letter on my desk and posted throughout the Y. Two weeks ago I helped to save a life. One of our older members went into to cardiac arrest, and I was one of two first responders. In first response, training is everything and I am incredibly grateful for mine being current and for giving me the confidence to know what to do and how to keep a cool head. If you don't know how to perform CPR go get certified. It's cheap, it's easy and it might make the difference between life and death for someone, someday.

The Tribe is on Spring break this week, but it hardly feels like spring at a whopping 34 degrees. I've heard promise of 60 next week, we'll see. They are having a great week, sleeping in, staying up late, etc.

Gotta run and meet up with Tac for a business meeting.

Happy Spring

2008-03-19T19:52:00.002-05:00

Lana has a wonderful post today, to which I hesitate to add, except for that I had the best worst run of my recent career today. Near 50 degrees, snow melting in waterfalls down the gutters and street, birds singing, and caterpillars! Little black, fuzzy caterpillars. Now the run was poor at best, my leg was sore from my long run this weekend, and I knew I should have gone for a swim, but how can you not run when spring is out your door. I still have crud in my lungs, which didn't effect Saturdays run, but it seemed to give me shallow breathing- what's the saying? A bad day running is always better then a good day at the office, I'll take the run. Tomorrow I will go swim and bike, it's supposed to snow. We are hosting Easter this year, so the weekend training gets amended a little. Tac and Bigun are working on another podcast-it should be available soon.

That's my quick update...now off to see what is happening in your corners of the universe

And I thought I was sick of snow

2008-03-13T07:09:00.003-05:00

My poor friends in Canada must really be feeling it, if if comes to this

Our snow is melting fast and dirty, and it feels wonderful to have radiant sun! Outdoor season is closing fast, yea! Tac and I went out for a quick reconnect dinner last night, followed by a drive around the local lakes, past boob beach, and other noted landmarks. You can almost hear the ice beginning to melt. In the meantime, Tac continues to train for Wildflower and CDA, and I don't feel much like a triathlete at all. I was telling Tac, I want my 2006 legs back. Maybe I need to have a baby :-) I was telling Tac last night, I still feel every step I take-I have to think of the biomechanics every time I walk because my leg still feels like "other". Then the flu hits and I'm still recovering. Today will be my first workout in over a week. I need to get my mojo back. I miss the honeymoon years of triathlon where everything is an adventure and nothing really hurts. But, you have to train what you've got, so I plan to spin for an hour before work today, and we'll take it from there- November is a long way off-thank goodness!

Someone shut the door, we aren't heating the neighborhood!

2008-03-04T18:07:00.004-06:00

Tuesday
Lo: 18°Snow
Wednesday
Hi: 25°Lo: 6°Snow
Thursday
Hi: 15°Lo: 1°Partly Cloudy
Friday
Hi: 16°Lo: 1°Mostly Sunny
Saturday
Hi: 20°Lo: 13°Partly Cloudy
Sunday
Hi: 35°Lo: 20°Partly Cloudy
Monday
Hi: 38°Lo: 20°Partly Cloudy

My brothers and sisters in the south need to stop rolling over and hogging all the blankets-it's cold up here. I mean, do you really need 80 degrees the first week of March? What are you doing in bed anyhow, shouldn't you be out training? The Tac and The .Bigun have knocked another podcast in the can, I take no responsibility whatsoever.

HG wants to know, if theoretically she likes Boy and theoretically if Boy likes her can they be dating. I told her to theoretically ask me again when she is 16. Tac and I see no reason to awaken love before it's time. Beyond that, I think a lot of poor decisions are made in the midst of break up angst. I don't think the majority of today's 14 year olds are adequate in consequential thinking and see no reason for her to be "dating" right now. Beyond all of this, she and Boy are good friends, and I think that friendship is better preserved by not adding teen romance to the mix. Case in point, Boy has "dated" and broken up with numerous girls in the past year, none of which currently speak to him. Old fashioned, I know. But modern thinking has produced a lot of divorces, teen pregnancies and catastrophic STD's. If we are wrong, we've just delayed her dating by a few months, but if we are right, well, there is no "I told you so".

I came home from work Monday with 3 inches of water in the basement. Fortunately it was a main drain and not the "main". Huh? 45 minutes of noise, 24 hours of stink and she's running clear. Now, hopefully the flood dries out without ruining the Pergo.

Tuesday morning dawned with Y laid out with a sore throat and fever- so off to the Urgent Care. I think it's strep. The doc says strep is a minor possibility. I say its' strep. Doc returns with prescription. So, 48 hours of mandated home care and the Y is good as new with the exception of thick, throaty healing voice.

Wednesday dawn very early with a fresh blanket of snow. Open at the Y 5am. Train, train train. Yea! By 9 my throat is feeling thick and my ears are burning. Fast forward, this evening. Yep, I'm sick with something. Blah. HG makes dinner, while I oversee from the bedroom as Tac is spinning away in the basement. Want to know what is going on with your kids, pay attention when they are playing "Truth, dare, double dare, promise or repeat" I have no clue what "Promise, or Repeat" means but it has something to do with vague promises of marrying movie stars so long as they fit X and Y criteria. Oh, boy. It's good to pay attention because eventually the dares go to toilet water and dog food. That's when I intervened. The last thing I need is toilet water induced stomach flu.

So, it's a crazy week, with record breaking cold on the way. Any warm, healing wishes would be welcome up here, time to give some of those blankets back!

Monday, Monday

2008-02-25T20:08:00.003-06:00

I picked The Tribe up at school last week intent on making the most of single digit high temps and blowing off some steam at the Y. I was immediately informed that the Y was not on the to do list as there was a lunar eclipse to observe. Since a lunar eclipse necessarily involves a moon, I suggested we had a few hours to burn, literally, until the eclipse would begin. Soap joined me on the trainers and we plugged away, only to be completely delighted by the rising of the full moon with the setting of the sun. Lovely. We monitored the progress of the moon, intent on arriving home long before the eclipse began, anticipation rising with the great ruler of the night sky. Dinner was a hasty mess, homework was an afterthought as they took turns watching and reporting.

Along about half past bed time, and the moon in partial eclipse, I informed them that it was time to head to bed. Aaarrgggg. No argument, up to bed. There is a stairwell that rises up from our living room, and at the top of the stair well is an east facing window. There was a day when a certain members of the tribe would lie at the top of the stairwell, silently watching mom and dad's movie, until an exclamation gave her away and she was sent permamently to bed. Little wonder that at 9:32 CST I heard a great cheer and hurrah from the top of the stairs.

We've seen our first Lunar Eclipse! Yes! Then the scamper of 8 feet. A good night's sleep is a reasonable sacrifice for awe and scientific discovery. There must be a profound statement in there to the effect that sleepers sleep while dreamers soar. Soapinator was dismayed at missing her front row seat to the Apocalypse that she was secretly hoping the eclipse would commence, until I informed her that catastrophic destruction might dampen her plans to attend horse camp this summer.

Dreams of triathlon primarily interrupt our sleep presently. Early morning training sessions. Sunday naps cut short to run or swim. But with the coming advent of spring, a Sunday afternoon run in the sunshine is equally as refreshing as a winter's nap, and plodding patiently towards a goal is worth the throwing off of blankets in the crush of morning cold.

I need a theme song. "Let's get it on" carried me through my last monumental season. Last season was more "It's my party and I'll cry if I want to". I compiling a soundtrack. Lucky me, my A race is in the heart of the southwest and cowboys and country western. If I didn't lose you on that last sentence, and you have song ideas, let me know.

"Things That Never Cross a Man's Mind" by Kellie Pickle of American Idol fame is one of my current favorites.

a sampling
I need to go shopping
These shoes are all wrong
Just look in my closet
Not a thing to put on
I wonder how these jeans make me look from behind
Things that never cross a man's mind

Lets turn off the TV
Now can't we just talk
Lets lay here and cuddle
Till we both drift off
If we don't make love
That'll be just fine
Things that never cross a man's mind

That joke is too dirty
This steak is too thick
Ain't no way in the world I'll ever finish it
That car is too fast
This beer is too cold
And watching all this football is sure getting old
Wish I was working this weekend
Not on the lake wetting my line
Things that never cross a man's mind

Her lips are too red
Her skirt is too tight
Her legs are too long
And her heels are too high
Boy, she looks like the marrying kind
Things that never cross a man's mind

Feel free to add your own.

If you haven't voted for EVO Tri, go do it- just for fun.

More importantly, go vote for Lana to get out of the Tomb of Shame and vote Tridummy's backside in (scroll down to "perfume slick".) although I gotta say, it made me laugh.

It's wine and Tac time

it's as political as I'll get

2008-02-19T20:07:00.002-06:00

Vote for Commodore!!!!!!!!

A vote for Comm is a vote for the Common Man!

Mom, make me look like a Rock Star!

2008-02-15T08:21:00.003-06:00

Buy a nine year old a guitar for christmas, have his dad teach him a couple cords, and suddenly he wants to be a Rock Star! Egged on by his oldest sister, Y (formerly the Urp) decided his normal bowl cut no longer sufficed, he needed to look like a rock star, a la The Jonas Brothers. For the record, the only barber the boys have known is Salon de Trimama. Hair cutting is not rocket science, most of the time. And when it is, there is always the saving redemption of the buzzy. When Y was three-ish, the buzzy vibrated wildly against his head, sending him into fits of laughter and giggles. It might take an entire morning to even him out, but in the end, high and tight and entirely rub able. He used to charge a quarter. He's outgrown quarters and now it's on to rock star. Fortunately his hair grows naturally forward, so the whole long hair, shaggy thing isn't so difficult. His problem is that he doesn't like his hair in his eyes, so we'll see how it goes.

New rule in the Trimama household. If you want to use your mouth to cut someone, you stop the bleeding. In other words, you say something mean to someone, you now say something kind. Creativity knows no bounds, and has fallen just short of "if I was a fly you'd be the first poop I'd swarm." I was hoping for, "I like your smile". There is always the throwback, "you're nice". I want genuine, so we are working on it. I'm of the belief that home should be the place where you sit by the fire and cut the chill, find good conversation and friendship and on most nights a warm meal. But even on cold cereal nights, I want my family to be able to find home an escape from the harsh reality of the world. I certainly don't want home to be the fridge you pass by on the way to your "own" room. I don't think you should ever feel alone in your own family.

"Look what I can do! I'm a genius. It's a skill that took years to perfect. Actually it only too 10 minutes but it's still cool." At times it's good to listen to your kids, really listen, and at times it's good to just let the 90 mile per hour prattle roll off your ears. That's why I've installed state of the art filtering hardware in my brain. The state department has nothing on me with it's ability to filter out "dirty bomb" and "safe house". My hardware discerns inflection and cadence. Not quite on the level of national security, but to me it's essential to know when to nod and uh hmm, and when to interject. It's a working science that I suspect will take years to perfect.

I suspect school will be sullen and grouchy today, the side effects of 7 below and indoor recess, and the cataclysmic sugar crash hangover from Valentine's day. I think we are going to lick salt cubes for dinner. HG has an organizational meeting for Rugby tonight. Rugby is football without pads. I value my baby's brain cells. We'll see. We are working on ways to make her 2000 plus kid very large high school, smaller. Sub groups of friends is the best tactic I know.

Someone bowed down to me and asked to touch my Ironman swim cap at the pool yesterday. I see a future training client. God has blessed me richly, I'm the second highest sales person in our branch this month, next only to my boss. Not bad for a semi part time stay at home mom. Let's just keep getting healthy people!

Tonight I get to make my weekly rounds of the blogosphere- I love Fridays. Glass of wine, virtually connecting with friends. That's a pretty good happy hour. See you at the bar.

Iron Widowed...once again

2008-02-06T20:11:00.000-06:00

Someone has been stealing my razors, leaving me to find long, black, comeover like hairs on the back of my knees caps. While a little drag is nice, if it's hairy, it's scary, so I stopped by Target on the way to the Y for my recent 3000 yd swim. (did I mention it's good to be training again?) There is nothing like the clean shave of a new razor, and to verify I hoisted my leg up on the kitchen counter for Tac to inspect. "Look how smooth my legs are?" I say, flirtatiously. Tac runs his hand up my leg with a dreamy look on his face and it's on. Almost. "I really need to shave too." and he wanders off.

I'm an Iron Widow once again...sigh.

But I am glad I shaved. Boy am I glad I shaved. Because we went to a local technical college at the behest of a friend who instructs up and coming massage therapists as they needed bodies. Cosmotology school, I presumed women. Then Michael walked in. Not Michelle, Mike-al. Cute, adorable Michael. Tac and I have been together for 20 years and in all those years I've never encountered more then a casual hug from fellow guy friends. So, awkward. But, I could just about be Michael's mom, and he was very professional and gave a darn good massage. Left me thinking I really need to get on the foam roller a lot more often.

Massage is essential in a northern climes during winter; we tend to forget what human touch feels like for all the layers. Which possibly explains why, when I sit on the big comfy chair, legs draped over the side, I quickly have a bundle of legs and arms joining me as each of The Tribe squeezes in to "their" spot. Four of us still fit on the big, comfy chair. Glancing across the room I see the eye rolls of Tac and HG, tapping wildly on their lap tops, discussing the latest in music and culture-they don't like the pterodactyl screams coming from the mass of body parts on the comfy chairs but they accept it as a part of the normal ebb and flo of our household. If it wasn't their, they'd miss it.

I enrolled HG in our local high school today. Hmmm. My baby's going to high school. I drove the long way home and picked up a bottle of wine. Actually two. Red Bicycle and Red Truck. They were out of Red Guitar. But now I need to get my red eyes to bed so I can get up and make some green cash tomorrow.

It's a spin-lift day with a nice run on Friday. Happy hump day

Tac's new Boot-aaaay

2008-01-31T05:54:00.002-06:00

Tac Boy's got a new aphrodisiac and there's going to be all kinds of lovin' going on in the Trimama household. I mean nothing says night time romance like one of these bad boys

Now it's offseason, and Tac's not quite up to shaving year round, so das boot won't look quite so sexy on him just yet, but spring is coming.

Speaking of shaving, and falling under totally too much information, I found a run away hair yesterday. On my leg. Don't know how it got there, but holy mother of sasquatch. Just goes to show you

1) I should probably use a mirror when I shave behind my knees

2) aging hormones can be a beyotch

3) Arctic cold really can speed up the evolutionary process

Thanks for all of your kind words this past week. I'm feeling better-but needed a good cry. So I rented "Away from her" last night and no longer need a good cry. My eyes look like I went a few rounds with poison ivy- I hope the cucumbers work.

It's a swimming day, with work tonight- the premier of "Lost" which I will Tivo if I can actually figure out how to work the darn thing.

Bike/run tomorrow continuing to build base and maybe just maybe it won't hurt to go outside.

Tac's new

2008-01-31T05:54:00.001-06:00

Ash or Iron

2008-01-25T05:08:00.000-06:00

"There are two types of people in this world, the wooden ones and the metal ones. We all pass through fire;the wooden ones, they turn to ash. But the ones who embrace the fire, allow it to transform them, they come through as steele!" and so concluded my introduction to Paul who knew Dietrich who had survived the concentration camps of Poland. Paul was expounding on his life's creed by quoting his friend Dietrich, who viewed life as a series of challenges meant to refine and polish, strengthen and mold, in essence, it's the fire that defines your core. Paul's eyes danced and his splash of white whiskers flew wildly around his face as he went on to explain his own precarious foothold on life, having been a 16 year survivor of prostate cancer. "God looked down and saw this goofy guy and said 'look at this one, he's kind of fun to watch, I think we'll keep him around for a while', so here I am. The ones who turn to ash have to scoop themselves into a suit of armor and walk around wary and self protected, or worse yet bitter, they don't embrace life. After almost dying by the time I could vote, I opened my eyes and began to see every tree and hear every bird, life's too short to not be iron. And off Paul walked to complete his workout.

As Paul talked I was reminded of another saying "count it all joy my brothers when you meet various trials and difficulties, for you know the testing of your faith produces patience, and let your patience fully grow and develop so that you may be perfect and complete, not lacking anything." By not "lacking anything" I don't suspect they mean a new De Soto 2 piece wet suit, although I'd be willing to work on patience in exchange for that. No, I think they mean embrace the difficulties and trials because they fan the fire that makes you who you are. At least that's what the doc said when I suggested yesterday that it would be nice to have a selective amnesia pill that blots out things you don't want to keep. "You could erase your past, or at least your memory you don't want, but then you wouldn't be the person you are today".

Twice in one day? I think someone is trying to tell me something. Something like, hang in there, you'll get through this week just like every other one. It's hard, but hard is what makes you who you are. Hard gives you patience and compassion, and a deep love for your kids, your husband, your friends and your life.

But hard, at times, gives me a brain overstocked with chemicals it doesn't know what to do with. Memory and experience all seemed to be stored in these barrels of chemicals generally interconnected by an electrical current. When you remember something, your present moment- cognitive mind flows on a current through that barrel of memory and is re experienced by the cognitive thought. That is why we can remember a day at the ocean and smell the salt, taste the brine, hear the seagulls etc. It's all stored in the barrels for our thoughtful mind to access. When the experience is trying, or traumatizing, there are additional chemicals that come into to play, like adrenaline. Which explains why you will feel anxious when recalling an accident, or emergency etc. It's a wonderfully complex system, that's a a beyotch when it begins to short circuit.

I knew I was in short circuit Arizona weekend. I couldn't complete sentences or even words for that matter. Very frustrating for the listener I'm sure, irritating to me as I watch words trail along in sentences and then simply disappear in my mind. I hold the thought, so I know what I mean to say, I just can't hold the words long enough to get them to my voicebox. That's why, for so many reasons, it was great to have Commodore around, because between the two of us you always got a complete sentence :-) Commodore had his memory erased in an accident when he was 16 and essentially had to teach himself to read, write etc again. He's an ironman, and a very articulate one at that- a classic affront to all of those who think they can't do something. So for all of you I hung out with in Arizona, thank you for your pati....

I'm going to be a senile grandma long before age gives me an excuse, my grandkids are going to love me.

So, where was I, losing thoughts. That's where it begins. The breaking of the electric current that carries thoughts to words. It acts somewhat like ocean waves crashing through those rooms filled with barrels and stuff begins to spill out. Random thoughts, memory flashes, feelings. The worst of it all is the anxiety. Fear really. The worst kind of fear is the kind that has nothing to anchor upon. My life is stable, but the fear chemicals are flooding my system. So, I create objects of fear. An IRS audit was my target of choice this time. I can tell myself our taxes are tight. There might be a minor error here or there, but income wise, it's all recorded, expense wise, it's all accounted for. Yet I lay awake at night anxious over a very unlikely audit. This time I felt like I was burning a hole in my stomach. I thought I could shake this off, a lot of times I can. But other stresses in life continued to fuel the fire. My greatest concern is that I sustain so large an upset of my brain chemistry as to turn suicidal. That is without a doubt the most difficult battle to wage. We have two friends and know many others who have fought suicide and lost. It is ugly. And most of the time it is brain chemistry. Thankfully, I've never come close, and my Doc assures me that past behavior is a good predictor of future outcomes. I feel for folks who fall into those chemically induced, deep dark slumps of depression and anxiety. I count myself enormously blessed to have remained at the outer edge of that abyss. Last spring I stopped taking my SSI drug. and I felt great. I was on such a low dosage that it seemed a good idea to let my body coast on it's own for a while. But some significant changes have occurred in my life, such as an ongoing conversation with my sister via email, and so it's time for the old Trimama brain to get a little help again and right the barrels.

Y yes, my cartoon bubble has little guys in HAZMAT suits mopping up inside my brain- only to discover the little worker who wasn't properly dressed when the chemical spill occured-nice skeleton though. I think my work comp just skyrocketed.

I've slept soundly now for the first time in a long time, and that does wonders. Now time to just let the meds work, keep up the exercise and eating well, hug The Tribe often and thank God everyday for another sunrise and another fire to make me who I'm meant to be.

Go hug a friend today and train safe

I suppose I could tell you it's cold here

2008-01-21T16:27:00.000-06:00

But that would be redundant and boring. So, how cold is it? Well, my basement registered roughly 47 degrees when I went for a 1:45 spin yesterday. That would be the same temp that registered in sunny south Florida, where my buddy and aspiring Ironman, Bigun, sat on his ahem, refusing to go out into the cold. In the infamous words of our former governor "I ain't got time to bleed" and I also don't have time to complain about the weather. But I do it anyway. Because it's what we do here in the great white north when we aren't sucking down near beer and exchanging hot dish recipes. It's a balmy 8 today, but spring hits this weekend when we see the mid 20's again. I'll be stalking Steve in a Speedo just to let him know there are other crazies out there. For the record, my coldest outdoor run involved snow shoes, 12 below for the daytime high and a good deal of vaseline.

Knee update. It's still attached to my thigh-although there are days I swear someone replaced it with a wooden joint. I don't quite understand the mechanics of that one, but so long as I can swim, bike and run we're good. And, I can swim (5000 yards last week) bike (3:30) and run (I forgot to count- but one run involved oranges and lemons so who cares)

I love Ironman training. Even if the race is 11 months away. It's just the right focus to make workouts fun again. I have a goal. I like goals. I like having a strategy and a focus. It's a relief to move in a straight line in a world where everything spins.

I set my branch's record for averaging the most training sessions each month last year. A podium finish, oh yea! I'm hoping to blow that pace away this year-more people achieving their health goals-yea! Speaking of which, my contingent of newbies continues to grow for the Chain of Lakes Triathlon. I've recruited 7 people to try this race.

The Tribe has the day off from school, so it's back to mom-ing. and yes, they practice their "Stewie" impersonation constantly-oh joy

2008-01-15T18:32:00.000-06:00

If you watched Tac's video of The Tribe's Christmas you saw the near hysteria of The Tribe as they opened their presents. Might make one think the poor kids only receive gifts at Christmas time. To the contrary, we intentionally give to them throughout the year and somewhat minimize Christmas so we can focus on faith and family. So, I was thinking about this over the weekend, and somewhere during my 65 degree citrus tree infused run it occurred to me that I really could get used to being a snow bird, which has absolutely nothing to do with The Tribe, except that I thought about how nice it would be to live close to bloggie friends like Commodore and Momo and that's when it hit me; my kids weren't yelling and screaming because of what they received, but rather who they received it from. Chopper was ecstatic to receive a gift from the Soapinator. I don't think he even took in what it was before he set off screaming with joy. It's all about the relationship.

My kids love people and they love having people love them. Which explains why the Soap came home crying from school yesterday. The Tribe's school has a concentrated study focus each year and this year the focus was India. They learned of the caste system yesterday by role playing and as fate would have it, both Urp and Soap were assigned to the dahlit caste-the untouchables. They were allowed to be teased, they had to clean up for everyone, they could not have milk with lunch, they were only allowed to leave for the restroom once in the day and they couldn't speak to anyone not in their caste. Pretty much devastation for Soap who lives for her friends at school.

This past weekend in Arizona was Trimama's Christmas morning. It's not the gift, it's the giver. I had an awesome time with Commodore who took the day off work to chauffeur me and my crew around Tempe/Scottsdale scoping out the Ironman course. He even took us to his favorite Tribe store and his Fitness Empire. The gift of time and laughter.

Then it was on to the expo Saturday with a meet up with Momo, Dummy, Eric, Jumper, Tri Shannon, IronJenny and of course Lana- the gift of friendship and authenticity

And dinner with Iron Jenny, Iron Girl Nyhus, Greg and Mistress and the Mighty Mo- the gift of family

The gift of food and spirits with friends

and race morning, the gift of inspiration and achievement.

Thanks friends, I had a great time with all of you

but now, duty calls

The Poptart dilemma

2008-01-05T06:15:00.000-06:00

Britney be damned, a far more urgent scandal has broken in the Taconite household. For time immemorial, Tac has dined on his pastry of choice each morning-two slabs of lard laced cardboard compressed around a slather of sucrose infused goop. He swears by, even worships at the morning altar of the Pop Tart to the extent that the dawning sun dims greatly when he ventures to the cupboard only to find an empty box. As a side note, I have long since given up on visual inventory control and adhere to a straight static purchase model; which explains why there are 14 bags of Honeynut Cheerios in the pantry. The Tribe apparently doesn't like HNC's. But they are on the shopping list, so I buy them. I love them, but I rarely eat cereal. HNC's were the late night-post date- teen angst food of choice for my older sister and I in the days of our youth. We'd collude at the center island just past curfew to chew and chat and move past whatever the night had held. Obviously there is not enough stress in the life of The Tribe, alas no HNC moments yet. I'll take it for now, content with their post school day devouring of tutti fruttis-mere child's play. But I digress. Poptarts. I despise them. I find no nutritional value in them whatsoever. This in spite of the fact that they fueled Tac's ironman training. He swears by them, I swear at them.

Until yesterday. The moons of Venus hit an improper alignment, my hormones leaked precariously, a bag of cheerios fell from the cupboard and knocked me senseless, for whatever reason I threw a Cinnamon Roll Pop Tart into the toaster. I was headed to the Y for a much needed cardio/strength session and toast with PB just wasn't singing my tune, no I was all Pop Tart yesterday. Arriving 40 minutes later to the Y then I'd anticipated, I went straight to the treadmill with no cross trainer warmup, and I ran 45 minutes, without stopping, utilizing the final 15 minutes to incrementally increase my pace to sub 8 min miles. Damn Poptarts. Perhaps I can blame Britney, so ridiculous her trials they've torn a crease in the social fabric of the universe.

Pop tarts morning 2. After all, I need a good 2 hour spin on the trainer today. I've descended into the depths of taste less hell. What's next cheeze whiz on saltines? Cocktail wienies smothered in Kraft bar b que sauce? I need to re-retro back to the future.

And I was on my way, until I went to the Big Box office store with the Tribe. We needed calenders, glue sticks and glue. (I've yet to understand how the Soapinator depleted the gallon jug of glue she purchased at the start of the school year. She doesn't seem to be the nefarious, corner locker, glue junkie type, but perhaps Elmer's has qualities unbeknownst to most adults) There, in the back of the store, along the clearance wall I found a lone symbol of my school days past. The Pee Chee All Sport Portfolio. No semester commenced without a fresh restock of the Pee Chee. I loved those heady first days of school; no grades yet recorded, no sense of urgency in mountains of unfinished work. A clean Pee Chee was a mental restart. Like the dawning of a year where you've signed up for a Great Race after passing through a forgettable season.

I bought a Pee Chee to store my training plans and calender. Well, why not borrow on the optimism of youth to train and an older and broken body to go long. 2008 dawns and there are Pop Tarts in the cupboard, life is good.

2007 draws to a close

2007-12-30T10:56:00.001-06:00

A family of six falling like dominos to the stomach flu over the holidays isn't exactly what Norman Rockwell had in mind. A family of six where everyone makes it to the bathroom for the first time ever proves timing counts more in reality.

Teaching the Tribe to do laundry is an essential and a relief most of the time.
Shrinking Trimama's one and only wool/angora holiday sweater from the Gap does not count as one of those times-sigh

Glitter is not good for the washer unit. Neither is too much detergent or underloading the tub. So says Mr. Washing Machine repair man when asked what we can do to keep from destroying the new HE machine. Apparently he missed the mountains surrounding him as he went about his work which would explain how he would speculate that we under loaded the machine- ever.

A white winter is infinitely better then a frozen brown one any day, especially when the temps hover in the mid 20's.

28, 27, 29, 30, 25, 14, 12, 32, 30, 45

What's wrong with those numbers? Nothing except that they are the average day time temps for this week. The 14 and the 12 are New Years Eve and New Year's Day. Making the decision to jump in the New Year a difficult one. What's at stake is a move up the food chain from minnow to pike. With a lot of open water swimming to do this summer, I have about 48 hours to decide what type of bait fish I want to be for the season. E coli being the number 1 predator in these parts, I'm not convinced it will make a difference.

I love my Otter Box for swimming. I really need to work on where to hold it during my workouts though. Indoor training season requires a split suit, and I love my Tyr Tankini as well. O-box holds well in the top- no problem. Until handsome young swim team coach asks to see it. Awkward moment as I turned to fish it out. I really need to learn to keep some things to myself. That is one disadvantage of having 4 kids, you tend to lose your dignity with your perspective of seeing things as the world sees them. oops. I should have been clued in when Tac kept asking to see the box.

Is there a difference between sensual and sexual. In my mind yes. I parse them along the lines of romance and lust, relationship with another and relationship with self. Sensual is just so much more appealing in my mind because it is both costly and valuable. Sex is cheap. Sensual can be sexy, and generally is without even trying. And this whole divergent conversation was brought to you by what is currently on my ipod, not by cute swim team coach. I'm very close to being old enough to be his mother.

I can't imagine the world without the gift of music. I love how music gives expression to our thoughts and completes and compliments our psyche. There are those songs that make you smile every time you hear them. Or the set you play when different moods hit. I pretty much always have a song playing in my head, I'm a singer too. At work, in the shower, making dinner, always have been, most likely always will be.

So, that's my ramble before I go back to bed- being the 6th domino in the stack, it seems like a good "stay in bed and get better day"

Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas

2007-12-24T06:57:00.000-06:00

Peace on Earth

Good will toward man?

The presents are bought...almost

The ground is white....completely (blinding snowstorm Sunday took care of that- but we still shopped)

The Yule log is burning, or is that the turkey? and all is well.

Merry Christmas to all!

Trimama's coming to town

2007-12-20T06:09:00.000-06:00

Which town is it? One of my all time favorites, I'll give you a hint

And one more

Oh, I know you know I'm going in November, but in my estimation, if you add November + Friggin Freezin need to thaw + a little recon is nice + girls weekend away!!!!! + friends running in a Rockin race and I think it all adds up nicely to a weekend getaway for Trimama. I will have a car, I will travel, and I don't plan to sleep much. Afterall, if you are going to leave your hibernation, you might as well take advantage of it and thaw completely. So, if you've figured out where I am going, let me know I'd love to meet up with my 'zona friends.

Reason

2007-12-17T07:04:00.000-06:00

"My daughter's not going to have children, the world is too terrible a place to raise them." commented one of my clients at the Y. Of note, this client has lived through the Great Depression, a world war, multiple "police actions", a cold war, food shortages, gas lines, communists threats and plague and pestilence. Perhaps a more fitting statement is, "I'm not going to have children because I don't have the guts to work hard and prevail as you did mom, and I've pretty much given up on the world and insulated myself into my lonely but safe little cocoon. " In my estimate, we have children for the very reason of the state of the world today; we fight back. In my own little microcosm, my children bring me great joy and make each day worth living. They make me want to be a better person. They and their counterparts are why I steward my resources, why I recycle, why I conserve, why I vote and remain politically active, why I volunteer at school and why I notice all of the other children around me and one of the reasons I have great hope that the future is bright. I suspect my client wants grandchildren and her daughter, having the sense to know she doesn't want to reproduce and is quite content owning her own business, has thrown her mom the only bone she might gnaw on and carry around to all of her luncheons and bridge outings. What disappoints me is my client is content to gnaw. And beyond gnawing, to encourage others to join her at the carcass. I expect better from her generation. I expect better from my generation-both those who choose to reproduce and those who choose to not. Clearly you don't have to have children to be a good citizen, my client proves that point, you just have to be willing to look beyond today. Is it as simple a choice as the eagle and the vulture?

End of soap box.

Christmas is coming, yea! Christmas break, yea! Too much to do, too little time, always. But, I managed to squeak in a 5 mile run (yes run, albeit slow) and a 2500 yard swim and 400 yard aqua run. The Otterbox is awesome, with one exception-where to put the darn thing. Right now it goes inside the front of my suit- a little awkward, especially at the end of my swim when I have to choose between walking around the pool deck with a third bulge and fishing the thing out discreetly.

Have a Merry week

Put some back into it men!

2007-12-11T03:37:00.000-06:00

The Tribe's recon mission that began with a low speed tumble out the side door of the mini van and a roll down a snow covered embankment, followed by an all out sprint into the neighborhood playground, had turned into a full on search and recovery operation. The neighborhood Christmas party was Friday night and there were tokens from a treasure hunt to find. Unfortunately, in the days following the hiding of the tokens, 6 inches of snow had fallen. I joined in the mission with a shovel and proceeded to move .72 acres of snow by hand. Eureka! we found a silver ticket! Only three to go. But it was cold and it was Friday and The Tribe was tired, so one by one they left for home and hot chocolate, with the promise that if we uncover more treasure all who hunted will have a stake in the claim. A promise is a promise, no matter how dubious the merit. I, already being declared evil for falling into a state of chocolate madness and eating candy #7 from the advent calender (on day 4 nonetheless- I thought they'd never notice before I could replace it), am held in scrutiny as the prize for each silver ticket is a cupcake from one of the greatest bakeries known to man. But alas, no more silver tickets as the early departure of the sun left the search for another day. Five cupcakes remain encrusted in snow, possibly until spring, or until chocolate madness besets my brain and I rent a bulldozer.

The annual Toys For Tots Christmas party was a success on all levels. I departed from my lite beer restrictions and indulged in a splash of Bailey's, quite possibly the greatest liquor known to Trimama. I figured I had negative calories in the bank following the treasure hunt. We met the new neighbors, a single mom with 5 kids at home and 3 that have moved on. New companions for The Tribe at the park. The average age at the party was in the vicinity of 82, not including The Tribe, but including a young couple from up the block and recent Jeopardy champion.

Best news of all, no surgery. Turns out Trimama scars easily. One look at my Grand Central Station stomach and anyone could have told you that. Scarring worked to my advantage here, as any part of the ACL that tore away was now held in place by... that's right scar tissue. Good news/bad news. The scar tissue is what makes the rehab so tedious and painful, have to break it down. I've dealt with scar tissue all my life, so I see it as a challenge. Turns out I also bruised my femur and cracked the head of my tibia, all which are healing fine, but will no doubt lead to arthritis down the road. "And there is nothing you can do about that" assured the doc. So, the rehab continues. I am done with the cross trainer. Ugh. Back to the treadmill and the track, but I actually managed a 10 min mile on the treadmill, so improvement is on the horizon. I am a cardiovascular mess. But, I've been here at least four times before, following the advent of The Tribe, I know how to come back.

Added incentive, while we were stripping at Florida, I managed to recover a pro swim cap from the sand. I presumed that wasn't worthy of "lost and found" and ferreted it home. Visions of Bella or Chrissy swirled in my head, but it was not to be. Turns out the cap belonged to a Dutch pro who turned in a personal best 11:37 at Florida. A pro who's just like you and me. Sort of. Inspiring all the same, as I train to swim like a pro for Arizona. Which explains why the swim instructor at the Y was amazed when I informed him I had only recently dropped into the pool, in spite of his insistence that I had been swimming for "someone"- as in team- for some time. He said I had great form. I swooned right there on the deck. Not really, but I did take it to heart until Tac pointed out that the guy probably just thought I was cute and wanted to ask me out. Jealousy is so ugly.

My rehab includes a lot of water jogging, so Tac and I bought each other an otter box with waterproof earphones. Yea. Imagine the mystery when an otterbox showed up for the iphone. So, I got an otterbox, an otterbox and ear phones for Christmas. Go figure. The box fits a shuffle, which is great. My shuffle is programmed the Trimama way and then some. There might need to be another shuffle under the tree because as they say, "I'm a little bit country, he's a little bit really off the wall and behind the corner rock and roll". The Bird and the Bee, who comes up with this stuff?

We've also reinstituted the advent family gift tradition. Instead of making Christmas day a mass spectacle of presents, we extend the holiday to include the four Sundays of Advent. Each Sunday a family present is unveiled. So far, Dance Dance Revolution for the Wii, a must for every holiday party, well except the neighborhood one, and a state of the art ice cream maker. Tac and the Tribe have been busy challenging Ben and Jerry for superiority rights. I am not an ice cream eater so the diet remains intact for now. Did I mention the machine can make margaritas? One more item to pack for IMCdA.

Speaking of which. I'm in the process of securing clients and therefore vacation budgets for 2008. I sincerely hope there are motivated weight loss folks in January as I will be unrolling a new program the end of this month. Who wouldn't want to be trained by a PT, Dietitian and Ironman Triathlete to get in shape and lose weight? We'll see.

So that's a wrap, although I by no means meant to cross the picket line.

Train safe and train smart.

Random Ramble

2007-12-06T05:28:00.000-06:00

Wheels were down and rolling at 4:45 yesterday morning, the 4X4 engaged on the Blue Bean, heater blasting to roll back 4 degrees of deep freeze, I was off to work. Crunching down the barely plowed road, mind adrift in a quasi caffeine haze, a sound began to ebb it's way into my conscience. (or is it conscious- actually I believe in this case you can apply either) Squeak, squeak squeak, squeaky, squeak. Now, I swear I heard, scratch, scratch, scratch, let me out, let me out! I wanted to think new Jeep commercial and even began to sing "Rock me gently,..." hoping my little friend would jump in and harmonize. However, whatever critter has been taking up residence in my car is not so intent on friendship- he ate my stash of almonds. All of them. And these weren't the co-op bundle bag of almonds. These were the can of buttery delicious goodness, perfectly salted almonds. Not only that, he left a mess of chewed lid all over the floor boards. Moving 45 miles per hour on icy, pre plowed roads did not exactly invite a visit from my back seat friend. I sang louder, with the outside hope that whoever was squeaking would realize my size and considerable singing advantage and make a departure out the crack in the back door. He was a trooper, or more precisely, a paratrooper, as the squeaker departed, albeit with no chute deployment.

R.I.P. little buddy.

That's when it hit me. I don't have recess duty today. I don't have recess duty tomorrow either. In fact, I don't have recess duty all year. "No" is such a lovely word. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed recess duty in the early fall and late spring, but 2 frosty hours mid winter, no thanks. Which got me thinking about the game of tag. In a dog eat dog world, is tag really all that advantageous a game to be teaching. Think about it, everyone yells "not it" and runs away. Ok, maybe it is good CYA training for corporate America. But, really, everyone wants to be the hunted? Ok, you make a good point, in the dating world that's not a bad angle. I always try a twist on tag. Sidling up to an unsuspecting participant who queries, "who's it?" I respond, "I am", and "tag you're it!". I do this until everyone playing thinks they are "it", and in mass confusion they give up and go swing.

I visit the ortho surg today for a consult about the leg. I'm hoping he takes one look at my uber sexy tri legs and immediately insists on cutting edge bionics to fix my knee. Chances are better I get a graft from a middle age couch potato besought with commonmansyndrome who takes over at every race and compels me to sit at the side of the road eating chips. Good thing I'm a personal trainer, I'll whip em into shape. I'm hosting a contest for The Tribe and all takers to "Name the Knee" It's my best defense against my inner conflict of having someone else articulate my joint. Of course, 75 percent will still be all Trimama, but if the 25 percent is at all like The Tribe, I'm doomed and will spend the rest of my life biking and running in circles.

More snow today and Saturday, is this the year to break down and finally buy skiis? We'll see what the surgeon says. Ride safe

A Declaration of Intent

2007-12-03T06:51:00.000-06:00

An Ode to Bolder:

The Boldest when it comes to making a declaration of intent.

And now my declaration of intent.

This past year has been a tough one athletically and mentally speaking for Trimama. In May I put up a vacancy sign to my brain and fear came in and took up residence. Wildflower spread it's seed and it's grown like a weed in my brain and I regressed to fearing pain. While 2006 was a year of purchase and opportunity, 2007 saw squatters reclaim some un tilled land. By September, the whole homestead was up on the block. In my effort to fight back, I crashed a bike, wrecked my knee and have spent 2 months pushing the pain envelope to bring healing, with at least 2 months to go to recovery. Darker still, the searing pain that accompanies a torn ACL and uber sprain of a knee has decided to take up residence with old childhood memories and have rendered me terrified to get on a bike again. I wish I was being overly dramatic. I wish I could reroute my brain, but that is going to take some work.

There is a story in hebrew tradition of Moses bringing the Israelites to the edge of the Jordan River and dispatching 12 spys to recon the "Promise Land". Ten of the spys returned telling horror stories of giants and military machines of war. But two returned, looking beyond the giants to see a land of milk and honey. In their minds, their deliverer had not freed them from 440 years of cruel bondage to slavery, only to leave them short on the banks of the Jordan. 40 years later, one of those spys lead the Israelites across the Jordan, through the giants and the machines of war and into a new land, where they've remained, essentially to this day.

Every one of us has giants in their lives, obstacles that threaten our hopes and aspirations. I aspire to bring the hope that the past does not have to dictate the future, the giants do not have to win. Whether the giant be abuse, cancer, loss, broken dreams, whatever.

The overtly sexual nature of the song not withstanding, Bono is making a declaration of intent; Charles Manson stole a lot more then a song during his reign of terror with Helter Skelter, U2 is taking it back. Not lost on me is that this is one of the greatest hill climbing songs of all time. I despise hills. They scare me. I'm taking them back.

This message is generated as confirmation of your recent registration on Active.com. You have been successfully registered for the following:

Registration:	2008 Ford Ironman Arizona (November)
Purchase Date:	12/02/07
Category:	Entry Fee
Event Date:	11/23/08
Name:	Kari Holmes

It's going to be long road, the pain envelope is vast, but we've pushed it before, because there is milk and honey waiting on the other side.

Oh, btw, I don't want to do this alone, who's with me?

I am a friggin IT genius

2007-11-27T07:44:00.000-06:00

Ok, don't ruin my moment- but I, yes me, the incompetent one, actually fixed my own computer program! I don't suppose wars will end, or that world peace is imminent, but isn't it really about the little miracles. Speaking of miracles, (or not) the wise man was grazing in Baby Jesus' manger this morning, apparently in addition to a census, there was quite a famine in the town of Bethlehem, that or Balthasar had nipped a few too many times at the camel's milk, only to fall asleep while falling prostrate. If you grew up catholic, you've witnessed all too many accounts of uncle Balthasar during mass, so it's all the same to you. It's not all the same to me, and I will be picking up the CSI toy crime detection lab to dust for fingerprints and determine which of the Tribe has been violating the "Don't touch my nativity scene" edict. One of many presents Tac and I will test drive before wrapping. Two Christmases ago, Tac had racked up 1.2 million SSX Tricky points before Christmas Eve. I have three seasonal statue panorama things. You have no idea how difficult it is to depict the somber joy of the holiday when you regularly find the snow man wrapped in swaddling clothes and Baby Jesus making snow angels with the reindeer. I still have the original Nativity scene Tac and I bought for our first Christmas. Ours was a simple household, which might explain the discount bargain bin nativity that consisted of one blonde haired/blue eyed Mary, one 80 year old Joseph and one white as the driven snow baby Jesus. The only thing that keeps me from ditching the aryan nation nativity is that it's our first one, this just might be the year we break out the air brush set from Aunt Edna and set things right or suffer the seasonal enigma of displaying a "major award"

One of my favorite all time iconic christmas memories, (if you don't count Blue Blocker Santa who wears his polyester, white beard like an ascot and generally has the flask at his side as he drives the sleigh at our current Christmas tree cutting venue, and for whom I credit with the very early demise in the Tribe's santa mythology), was the year my Aunt played santa at the annual, family Christmas gathering. Once a year we bundled our way into the KC Hall to eat jello salad and krumkake with the once-a-year aunts and uncles, awaiting anxiously the appearance of Santa Clause and his bag of gifts. Santa reached an entirely new level of mythology with her four inch long acrylic nails and false eyeslashes, cig dangling from her robustly painted, pink lips. The wife of my father's brother, I lived in mortal fear of being an in law from that day forward. In laws routinely drew the short stick in that family.

Christmas officially begins at 12:01 am the Friday after Thanksgiving. Prior to that time, all holiday music is forbidden, but trust me The Tribe has some very creative versions of "Deck the Turkey with lot's of stuffing" just to tweak mom a little. We avoid the holiday displays in Target as if the plaque were stored along those aisles. I'm adamant. I'm a holiday separatist. There, I said it. But who wants to celebrate IndepentHallowGiving. Target does I tell you. It's not unusual for The Tribe to wake me up at 12:01 singing carols with Tac. They love the season, and you know what, so do I.

The tree is up, the fire is warm, the carols are playing 24/7, and the snow is in a constant state of tease. It's the little miracles that really are important, and I have a lot of them in my life.

Happy Holidays!

My Turkeys

2007-07-12T18:31:00.000-05:00

I'm posting on an old post because Blogger won't let me add new posts right now- so this is a test- which didn't really work. So, I'll have to get Tac to work on this for me. Ug.

On the way to the Summit of Boreas
What a view!
Playing in the creek

Cross training
King of the Mountain!

Playing at altitude-the kids don't seem effected as much as the adults

We are having a great time in Breckenridge. Spent Weds in Copper Mtn and the Kahuna estate, with Stronger and kids and the Grayhounds-swimming, tanning, snacks, cold beer, watching the lifts run up the mountain-that works. Adult night out at the local brew pub for dinner. Words aren't enough to describe the richness of fellowship with this group of fine people. I'm starting my own personal mission to get Mrs. Grayhound posting- you all or y'all would love getting to know her as much as I have.

The Dummies come in tonight, the 3X assault is Saturday so a romping good pasta feed is in the works Friday night. I have to weight Bolder down somehow so we can keep up with him during the day.

Happy trails!

Welcome to South Dakota

2007-02-12T19:13:00.000-06:00

Where the interstate stretches out before you in undulating miles and a beacon of Americana awaits off every exit ramp. We saw our first Wall Drug sign at mile 75 and lost track at number 110. We blew by Wall Drug, but how can you pass up buying gas in Mitchell, home of the Largest Corn Palace in the world. Now, I only need to see the "Smallest Corn Palace" in the world and my life will be complete.
We hit the road at 4:10 am and about 9 hours later we pulled into Rapid City. A quick swim in the pool for the kids, a much needed nap for me and then the short drive up to Mount Rushmore.
It's hotter then an oven here, 107 yesterday- 105 today. but a cold front is coming through, so it ought to be in the miod 80's tomorrow. Perfect driving weather to make the trek to Colorado- a seven hour drive. Contrary to HG opinion, Chopper is doing just fine on the drive.
I'm off for a quick run before it gets to 95- I sympathize with you southern folk now.

I've moved!

2006-12-28T09:25:00.000-06:00

Please change your link bars to, Trimama.com

I'm adding new links daily, please be patient if you don't see your name in lights yet. Please be even more patient if you see your name in lights with no link, or if the link is wrong...

Thank you.

Ta Da! round 2.5

2006-12-26T14:45:00.000-06:00

Ok, that's it for now. The new site is launched-yea. You know the brilliant thing about mac is that they make it so easy you feel stupid. Is that a good thing?

The comment bar is enabled now, so let me know what you think.

I think I need to change some of the fonts, they aren't as clear as I would like them to be-and I realize there are many links I need to add, as well as songs I like and I"m working up a race schedule.

But at some point today I need to actually do the breakfast dishes.

TTFN

Ta Da! round 2

2006-12-26T10:32:00.000-06:00

For those of you who stopped by Sunday, this site had my big

"I'm a Dot com now!" announcement. Then Dot Mac ate my entire blog. So, I'm back under construction
Here-

patience please- go return some gifts or something. Then stop on by later this afternoon. We should be right as rain by then- oh and hopefully posted :-)

Oh, please, oh please, oh please,

2006-12-20T13:37:00.000-06:00

Let it snow!

You can certainly have Christmas without the white stuff, but oh how awesome it is when it flies!

Brief update:

HG b-ball team 3-0. Yes, point guard, "you really are a good team this year" emphasis on "this" . They went 1-12 last year.

Senses of Christmas with Buck Naked this afternoon. It's a kindergarten classroom. You routinely taper all of your senses when you walk into it on the day to day, so they've thrown in the holiday challenge to defy nature and go in for the experience. I guess it could be worse, it could be the "senses of 5th grade right after recess" experience. From which there is no recovery.

Caroling at the Mall of Mass Hedonism and Greed tomorrow with HG. It's the most non school week of school second only to the last one in June.

Christmas chapel and Christmas parties on Friday. I'm one of Buck Naked's room moms, so that will be a fun afternoon. Although, I do have visions of arriving home plastered in frosting. I haven't wraped a single present, but I spent a few mindless hours winding up the last of the shopping. Yea me. I really dislike shopping. But I love giving presents, so, what are you going to do?

Have a wonderful, safe holiday weekend!

Tri Naked Blogger

2006-12-16T09:16:00.000-06:00

Iron Nick, who earned his props in Brazil this past May, could easily be named as one of the greatest tri brothers around. He's at most of the local races, taking pics and cheering when he's not competing, always a willing coach (sub 60 min IM swim time), and all around nice guy. In his spare time he has worked up two web sites. One, Trimapper.com does exactly what the name implies; it maps out the triathlons in the world, giving race info and other relevant information. Now just in time for Christmas, he's launched Trijuice.com a blog devoted to informing the tri community of all the latest in gadgets, apparel and gear- all things tri. Check these out, and add them to your link bar if you like what you see.

But Trimama, what about the naked part?

No, this isn't the naked part. Well, Robo is half naked, but that doesn't really count. (Ok, Robo looks fantastic, so the half naked part counts a little for him, because you have to give credit where credit is due-which is why I'm not half naked in this picture because I look a little like a pot bellied pig-the wonders of neoprene)

Half naked doesn't count this year. This year it's about full on, stripped down, just the essentials, naked.

I've come to the conclusion that it's a little insane to vigorously pursue something that holds no true value for me. I had this epiphany when I registered for the GYGO New Year's Day virtual triathlon. Follow the links and register. If you live in the midwest and want to join my local tri club at our freakin freezin' polar bear plunge reverse tri, we'll be meeting at the bar by the large, gaping black hole in the ice around 8:30 in the morning. The bar is open and serving, (it's also indoors and warm) if you need a little shot of confidence before you make the plunge. It's open when you exit the water if you need a little help un freezing your blood. You'll notice when you register that there is a question regarding your New Year tri resolution. Prior to Ironman Florida, my plan for this next season was to focus on speed and power and become a force to reckon with on the tri series circuit. Then I realized, with all due respect to the incredible athletes who earn the podium, I just don't care about the schwag. Go, ahead and exhale- I love the booty that comes in the race bags, and I'll always love the free stuff. I'm talking about the little beer mugs and ash trays that say you stood on the podium. Last year that seemed important to me. As I sit here today though, contemplating what it takes to make it to the ash tray, I realize that in the economy of time and energy, both physical and mental, I don't want to spend myself there. I realized what I liked about being a newbie last year was the ability to not care so much, to focus on the things that mattered to me, like friends and The Tribe, and meeting new people. I cared about training hard, and seeing how far and how fast I could push myself, and it was fun. The idea of being a player isn't fun. The idea of tweaking equipment and monitoring data, and living under a blogoscope, and being all about me and results leaves an unsavory taste in my brain. It's a strange dichotomy. I love to compete, I always will. I think I've realized that I can't justify the means or the end in setting a goal of winning races for next year.

It's my year to Tri Naked.

To train and race by means of the essence of the sport.

To this end, I'm going to drag my sorry butt over the Wildflower course, taking great delight if I pass Kahuna on the run again. I'm going to help Hyphen Girl train and run her first half marathon. My proposal to start a Y Tri, tri club at work was met with great enthusiasm, so I'm anticipating bringing 10 new athletes into the sport. I'm going to be the ass of our group rides again this year, not because I can't keep up, but because there are a lot of people who would come out and ride if they knew there was a buddy to go along with. I'm going to try a few new races, including (I hope) the 24 hour-cross over the mountain pass-Colorado relays. I'm going to enjoy more trail running. I'm going to recruit and help train a small army of kids to participate in theMiracles of Mitch triathlon. I'm going to cheer on my fellow athletes. Of course I'm going to cheer on and support Taconite Boy and his posses of IMmoo competitors.

This past year of iron I focused a lot on what was in my hand. Ironman was an oddessy that I held for 16 months, and it was very good to me. I held on to it through fire and storm and it changed me. The feeling of letting go at the finish line, and hugging The Tribe was indescribable. I almost made the mistake of confusing what was in my hand then, for what I am as a whole. The mistake of thinking it was all about grabbing something else up for me. I'd be a lousy triathlete, let alone person if all I am is a hand. This year it's about the whole body in action using all of the gifts and talents I've been given, for the benefit of others and myself.

It's all about getting Naked.

I have a feeling it's going to be a lot more fun to tri naked.

Are you aware that Ford sponsors Ironman?

2006-12-13T10:21:00.000-06:00

Really? That fact escaped my notice, hmmmmmmmm.

I roped myself into a Florida Ironman survey this morning (the first survey they sent out included one question, so I thought what the heck, I can answer another question- 45 questions later....)

A grouping of questions inquired about my knowledge of Ford's involvement in sponsorship of the events.

Ummmmm. You mean like the logo being plastered on the swim buoys, the misting shower, the turnaround markers, every piece of schwag. Yea, I kind of picked up on that.

Taconite Boy was ready to buy me a truck after the event though. In all fairness, he already drives an F150 and loves it, and for my part, I want a truck.

Actually I want a 40 year old beater that I can drive around when I'm working in the yard or around the house, on the days when I wear my goofy work hat and gloves and listen to old country music. I really need to move to a farm.

To give you an idea of how much work is going on in the Trimama household, when we brought home the Christmas tree and Buck Naked Boy sized up the situation and determined that there was not enough room for his train to run underneath it, he nochalantly suggested to Tac Boy that he needed to move out the front wall to make room.

Ok, I'll get out the sledge hammer and go to work on that.

In the mean time, here is a pictorial of our latest project.

Take one closet to no where. A byproduct of when our current living room was a bedroom. Which made absolutely no sense, in that the largest room in our home was the so called master bedroom. Much to Tac Boy's surprise, I registered my complaint by knocking a window size hole in the wall to demonstrate that wall could certainly be removed and most likely was not a load bearing wall. To his credit, Tac Boy saw my point of view and now we have a genuine living room. That project was completed 5 years ago, but we didn't know what to do with the closet until now.....

Plant the seed of an idea that it would be doable to open that closet from the other side so that we can access it via our current bedroom,

Then water that seed with the idea of how nice it would be to watch Sunday night football in our own bed

One barter of painting for cabinet making, one all nighter at the tv store and voila. Brings a whole different meaning to touchdowns and field goals.

When Tac Boy and I met he wasn't very handy in household projects, and we'll both admit I've kept him on his toes, so he can do just about anything now. Frame, wire, plumb, sheetrock, flooring, the works.

Except demolition. I handle that. I make the holes and he fills them.

Basketball is going well. The girls won again last night, so there team at 2-0 has surpassed their win record of last season. Hyphen Girl is a defensive terror, with a little work of her shooting confidence, teams beware.

Buck Naked Boy is the "Very Special Person" of the week which included a little presentation of himself to his class. Poor guy, trembled through the whole practice go at home, and was extremely relieved to be done with it on Monday. I'm hopeful that practice will help ease his nerves in public speaking.

My swimming has been benched until January to allow my shoulder time to heal- uggg. Not being able to swim causes me to see how much I love doing it. Who would have thought?

But, we are having a strangely warm December, so running is good and spinning on the bike is new, and of course there is always basketball.

Enjoy the week

The Great Underwear Mystery

2006-12-06T11:45:00.000-06:00

It was a blustery day, the sort which compells every part of a man's body to yearn south, quite in contrast to the normal flow of nature under such conditions. No one knew this fact more than Taconite Boy, whose manly parts were in grave danger of permanant recess had it not been for warm thoughts of a new Kelly Clarkson Christmas album being released.

(open confessional: I'm currently diverting my blogging mental resources toward penning a Triathlon Mystery Novel. I assure you, it will be the trashy type of novel that is perfect to read on the bus to the transiton area, or perhaps the ideal antidote to sleeplessness the night prior to an "A" race- so indulge me here as I further hone my writing skills while updating you with the current happenings of the Trimama household.)

"Damn this cold! mumbled Tac Boy, adjusting the red silk, happy heart, boxers he'd been forced to wear under his painter's whites. While any gift from his lovely, gracious wife warmed his heart, these silkies just weren't up to the task of warmth or support. Not to mention what the guys at the work site would think if they found out. Of course this latest rendition of hell freezing over was certainly due in part to USC's stumble off the championship horizon, that or the mid term elections.

(That part about the mid term elections is for the benefit of my liberal friends who should enjoy the angst of their conservative counterparts, as the neo cons have been allowed for the previous decade. Enjoy the bone. I'm not particularly impressed with politics as a solution to the dire situations of mankind as a whole, but it does make for interesting holiday conversation)

Either way, the frost was here to stay and he needed to find his stash of briefs, now.

But therein lay one of the greatest vexations known to man, second only to an admonition from his mother that she didn't want him joining the likes of Brittney Spears in public humiliation.

(ok, that was a somewhat appalling visual from the mom in law on the phone this morning-but I digress)

For eight days Tac Boy had been forced into the morning ritual of scouring the house for a set of briefs, only to be frustrated in his search. Trimama assured him that she had maintained her relentless assault on the mountains of laundry, but to no avail. For a man whose underwear collection could rival Imelda's shoes, it was indeed an enigma left to be unraveled. It is one thing to lose a wayward sock, but an entire assembly of undergarmets? It would take a mastodonic like black hole to completely erase the existence of his wardrobe.

A black hole the size of a young boys room. A black hole the size of say, a BNB/Urp room.

Mystery solved. In the farthest regions of under the bed, along with several piles of, recently washed/dried/folded and stacked for being placed into drawers so that you have something to put on when mom insists that you can't wear the same pair of pants six days in a row you actually have something to put on, piles, were Tac Boy's underwear.

Go figure.

Now, you might be tempted to ask Tac Boy exactly what he has been wearing for the prior 8 days, as I was this morning while he ranted while turning the house over, but I don't know if we want the answer to that question. You might be temped to ask if Trimama actually allows Urp to wear the same pair of pants six days in a row before erupting in frustration and insisting that he change. In a word, No. At most he gets two days out of one pair, but Urp always manages to come down the stairs in the same pair of pants. He insists that he has two pair that are identical, but I am the goddess of the laundry, however impotent in getting them to put the clothes away correctly, I do have a pretty accurate inventory of what they have.

You might be tempted to ask how Hyphen Girls basketball team is doing and did they indeed win their game last night.

Yes!!!!

You might be tempted to ask if Trimama and Tac boy are signed up for Wildflower and whether the idea of training for all of those biking hills has Trimama in a state almost equal to the state she is in because her shoulder won't heal from the beating it took in the waves of the gulf over a month ago, and the answer would be yes. Trimama is in a state of intimidation and uncertainty that is beguiling and only remedied by the thought that Kahuna is bringing his guitar and John Denver songs for the camp fire and that Fe Lady signed up!!! Not to take anything away from any of the other great people in the blogosphere who I can't wait to see again or meet for the first time, but this is John Denver. Of course, Fe Lady (pronounced iron lady for all of you non chemistry types) is one of the people I really want to meet in person.

You might be tempted to ask if this post is ever going to end.

Indeed it is.

Have a good one

Question of the Week

2006-11-30T06:55:00.000-06:00

Registration opens tomorrow Dec 1st.

Who's in?

Tattoo my butt and call me a triathlete!

2006-11-28T07:31:00.000-06:00

My original post title was going to be "Taconite Boy wants a tattoo". But by the wonders of modern auto think, a former title popped up when I began to type. This was the title of my race report from the Liberty Half Iron. At that time I had no intention of inking my backside after Florida, I was going to do the ankle thing-damn auto think.

At any rate, Taconite Boy is enamoured with my tattoo. So much so that he showcased his tattoo video as post turkey dinner entertainment, FOR MY IN LAWS!!!!!! I love his mom and dad, and they love me, I'm just not so sure they needed to "know" me that well. For the record, I'm not so sure anyone needs to know me that well, but alas, we didn't get 'too'd in Vegas so the world gets an all access pass. Of course the video is a gift that keeps on giving, thanks to the almighty Iron Kahuna, I'm just glad we didn't video any of our kid's deliveries.

So, Taconite Boy wants a tattoo. I suggested perhaps he ought to wait until he actually had something to say. Which explains why he showed up in my dream last night, butt freshly shaved and inked with

"Minnesota Proud and I LOVE TO EAT!"

How nice.

T-boy begins his journey to Iron January 2, I'll be alongside every step of the way, and I can't wait.

For those of you interested, we are going to Wildflower in May and will follow the same training program that got us through a rockin T-Boy olympic, two halves and Florida in fine style.

We'd welcome more virtual training partners, with many of our training endevours being podcast worthy, no doubt.

Details to follow- You might even get a tattoo out of the deal

Yes, Taconite Boy got his t.v.

2006-11-26T18:53:00.000-06:00

and it's entirely possible it's been on too much this weekend. The doctors tell me they ought to go back to normal with a few hours of sunshine and a good book. As for me, I did the ultra early morning run on stores, but was slightly less amused, I think I went to the store visited by the most hung over, onry types. How can you start the most magnificent season of all in poor spirits? I generally do all of my Tribe shopping on Friday am, but this year only walked away with a new quilt for our bedroom. We have a few ideas for the Tribe, and are still waiting to see how they pan out. We cooked for 21 people on Thanksgiving day, Soapinator, who is "Sweet as sugar, like apple pie" made her annual classic. Uh, yea, it's good. Especially with vanilla ice cream.
We never actually made it to the Turkey Day 5k. I can't explain it exactly, it just seems like the more whole I become, the less I need to have all of those diversions away from reality past, it's quite refreshing actually. And it felt really good to just sleep in after a hectic start to the week. Holidays don't hurt nearly as much any more. How could they with a crew like this? Pretty tough to express in words how thankful I am for The Tribe and Taconite Boy. We had his family over for Turkey, in addition to a few friends, and much to my amazement,

WE HAD NO LEFTOVERS!!!!!!!!!!!!

17 pounds of turkey, 10 pounds of potatos, 3 pounds of oh-my-gosh-gingerbread-is-the-new-secret-ingredient-stuffing, rolls, broccoli casserole, apple and pumpkin pie etc...

GONE!!!!!!!!!

I ended up cooking cornish game hens and a new dinner, mixing in the meager scraps from Thursday, for Saturday evening.

We did the annual run to the Christmas tree farm Friday afternoon.
You drive for an hour to the middle of mid america, and are met by a guy, heater in mouth, who shoves a map through your window, and directs you forward to his son who tosses a saw in your lap and advises you to watch the "one way" signs. Always polite and always slightly suspicious of anyone not adorned in camo or Polaris wear. We leave our spandex at home.
The fields are beautiful, and you wander along taking in the scent of fall and pine, looking for the perfect tree. Almost invariably we walk around for an hour only to return to the tree we parked the car by when we first pulled to the side of the lane. This year, however, the perfect tree was a quarter mile walk into the field, and the "old growth" forest. The Tribe always has to help cut the tree, and it's one of those annual pictures that really deserve a framed montage. Alongside the ones of dragging the tree through the door. The day we go artificial is the day Christmas ceases to exist.

This farm also has a petting zoo, and hay rides with Blu Blocker, gin soaked Santa. Fantastic. He's a riot. Of course, it was Taconite's year to bump along in the wagon with The Tribe, and imagine his dismay when there were no seats left and Hyphen Girl had to ride the round with Buck Naked. A 13 year olds dream date. :-) She weathers these things well, I think she gave in to our lunacy long ago. We capped off the night with Fuddruckers and the weekend with decorating the tree.

The latest Get Your Geek On broadcast is up, reminding me of one more thing for which I am thankful, the blog and tri family.

Have a good one!

I am not 18 anymore

2006-11-22T07:14:00.000-06:00

Or for that matter, 28. Two days of basketball practice have confirmed this. Ironmen get no sympathy, but, dang I'm sore. Tommorow is Thanksgiving and the annual Turkey Day 5K. This makes year 12 for me.

and while I love to show off my new 'too, I don't think I'll go this extreme. Last year it was 9 degrees race morning, these guys were a little cold. This year, we seem to be having our October in November. I think the high is going to be 102 or so. Maybe I will show off that tattoo. Our normal running contingent is out of town helping to rebuild Mississippi, so it will be a year to make new friends. I'm running with Iron Jenny and her busom (ahem) friend Iron Laura, so making new friends probably won't be an issue, although their tattoos are on their ankles (that's hardly fair). Taconite Boy isn't even running this year, he's saving his energy for Black Friday. Last I saw, he was rummaging in the shed for a tent mumbling something about "just freeze dry his turkey dinner" How big is the needle in Hyphen Girls hand? We pass TB's store everyday on the way home from school.

"Dad? What's the name of that store by the coat place?"

"TV land"

"Yea, I saw a guy putting up his tent there...."

TB was grabbing his keys and heading out the door to do surveillance. Until he saw HG rolling on the floor laughing.

TB is convinced that every saavy consumer in Minnesota is going to be waiting at TV land's door Thursday night waiting for his great TV deal, because of course we don't live in the land of Best Buy, Target, Walmart etc....

Confession. My alarm is set for 4 am. But that's because I'm a sadistic people watcher. It's better than Fight Club.

I have a list of 100 things I'm thankful for, but most likely won't get it posted until Friday, so in the meantime,

Have a very Safe and blessed Thanksgiving

Question of the Week

2006-11-17T07:11:00.000-06:00

While my buddy Chris can gain weight with impunity in the off season, we all know that trimama's have to be more careful in their consumption, something about all that fun loving estrogen wanting to hold on to fat. Case in point, I dropped 25 pounds in my first 3 months of training, but lost a measly 10 over the next 12. My weight loss program is simple, watch what you eat, watch even closer what you drink, and train regularly.

However, someone has clicked on the hibernation button. Couple that with how recovering from Ironman makes you hungry and eating diligence becomes an endurance sport all it's own. My hats off to those of you who regard every bite you take, but here is a list of things I HAVEN"T consummed, in spite of myself.

One whole blueberry pie
A pitcher of margaritas
3 people tenting in line at the local target for a PS3 (although that might be helpful as there are 9 people in line and only 6 tickets available)
An entire Green Mill deep dish pizza
A fully loaded Chipotle Burrito with chips and salsa
A complete Thanksgiving dinner with 7 pounds of potatos (this is killing me, T-day could have been yesterday for my liking)
A dozen doughnuts
Hyphen Girls science fair project (ok, that's not so tough, it's about how quickly meat rots at room temperature-lovely)

This weeks question is short answer essay, tell me, what am I missing?

OHIO V MICHIGAN?

This is a tough one, I typically like the underdog, but this time it has to be

Go Buckeyes!

We have our year end tri banquet tonight, Iron Jenny is the MC, hopefully I'll have pics to post Monday
First Swim Meet for The Tribe on Saturday, Basketball starts for HG on Monday (yea I got the assistant coach position-can't wait!) and training has resummed

Have a great weekend

Trimama out!

Mom, I love her

2006-11-14T07:55:00.000-06:00

And thus, Buck Naked Boy succumbs to the world of Le Femme Fatale. Poor guy. He met her during the first week of school, SHE was his seat mate, now SHE owns his heart. BNB was in a surly mood a few weeks back when he came home to report that SHE didn't want to be his friend any longer. The currency of friendship in primary school holds the value of a North Korean Won. Thankfully, moms are wiser, and regard friendships as dear, we'll be meeting at McDonalds playland soon. I didn't lose a son, I gained a soul mate.

SHE is the oldest of four kids, so her mom has her hands full, literally, at drop off time. I remember those days fondly, one in hand, three in tow, wouldn't want to go back there. A little secret, we're presently in the honeymoon years. There is nothing like the tweener stage of no diapers, and no hormones. Well, there are a few hormones, but life is fairly straightforward. I've been blessed with four kids who love life, and more importantly, love each other, so it makes for a generally sweet reunion at the end of a day. So, all of you moms with young kids, hang in there, as I was told numerous times, the busy time goes by fast, savor it while you can.

As I mentioned before, Standing Long Jump needs a new name. My kids named themselves over a year ago, when this whole blog thing began, and his was an impulsive response to the question. Actually, he named himself after the event that I manned at his track and field day. Following much deliberation, he will henceforth be named Urp, which rhymes with burp (an equally impulsive action) but that more aptly captures an eight year old boys persona. He's named after a famous cowboy of the old west, so it fits beautifully.

Hyphen Girl has busied herself lately with creating power point displays of her Thanksgiving and Christmas ensembles. Since Iron Bolder ran trembling and hid at the prospect of HG coming for a visit at High Altitude Shopping Camp, I've arranged for her to travel north and do things as only a hearty Canadian can, at some point in the future she will be meeting up with Wendy for Fashion Camp extrodianaire. Rumor has it that Wendy's Bro is taking on the amazing feat of two ironman races in the same year. He will be seeing all of you in Arizona and then again in Wisconsin. Details of IMmoo Fashion Camp '07 to follow soon. True to her multifaceted personality, I will be arranging "Surfing Camp" (Thanks Iron Kahuna, astonaut camp, tattoo camp, beer drinking camp (oh right, those are college), pottery camp, sewing camp........

"You know you can eat camel poop? It tastes like bubble gum."

I'm not so sure we'll find a volunteer for Soapinator's theory on animal dung, and perhaps we'll need to work on reading comprehension skills a little, even if the literature is "All About Poop". Nothing like weighting the Scholastic Book Fair with those age old classics. What did Shakespeare know anyhow.

I'm gradually easing back into work and working out. Wow, how quickly fatique sets in during that initial week or so following ironman. I'm completely psyched to have Wildflower to look forward to, it easily answers the question of "what are you going to do now". I need to work on strength and power this off season. Wildflower is a tough, hilly course and the rest of my season will be about speed. I'm surprisingly ready for the challenge, which is a stark contrast to how fried I was feeling about training just prior to Florida. It's either success breeding success, or that I'm eagerly anticpating a Trigeekdreams reunion tour. Probably both.

Being thankful in this time of Thanksgiving

Trimama out

Sometimes the best way to see where you are going...

2006-11-11T13:54:00.000-06:00

...is to see how far you've come. When I switched into running shoes and made my way out of T2 I had travelled 114.4 miles along my ironman route, and yet was back at the beginning. That's the irony of transition. You labor and strive and progress and then you return to where you began. However, the beauty of it all is that each return to the start brings a marked change in your perception of where you began. Wetsuits in heaps, bikes askew with dramatically less shine, aero bottles empty, some hearts charging forward, some relenting to call it a day, all 2/3rds iron.

114.4 miles of iron, hundreds of miles of training and millions of miles away from the days of having my five year old virtue sold for Monopoly money. That's a lot of miles. Tiring at times, crushing at others, refreshing yes, and at times downright ecstasy producing. When someone sets your value at play money, it takes a fairly long journey to prove them wrong, and to find what is right. I spent a lot of years trying to persuade those people, and thereby hopefully myself, that I was worth more then what their currency allowed, but in an economy of hate, it is very difficult to find purchase to move forward.

Training for ironman resets the table. If you allow it to, ironman is a forge that will burn away even the most encrusted dross, it is fire and pressure that can crack the most stubborn chains, and for me it was a tool used by a masterful God to set me free.

I love C+

Hyphen Girl came home with her report card yesterday. A brilliant montage of A and A+, "she's wonderful" "an asset to our 7th grade class", "a pleasure to teach". all hidden between the back seats of the minivan. I found the report card this morning and brought it inside beaming with pride at my 13 year old daughter.

"Holy buckets of ice, HG, you smoked your report card!"

"But I got a C+ in math".

Here by a peculiar twist of fate my daughter was missing the awe of the forest due to the prescence of one struggling tree.

In my old economy of hate there was only my shortcoming of B+ in a montage of A's. That economy was miles ago, and that is why I could grab HG up in a bear hug and express to her how very proud I am of how hard she works, what a beautiful, kind young woman she has become and how much I love her.

I am not them. I spent years playing by their game, struggling against their poverty of value, and yet, thank god, never entirely selling out.

Perhaps this is why I could swim amongst the waves smiling and tossing with the seas. I had nothing to prove. Perhaps this is why I could cycle along, largely unimpacted by my diminished average speed. I had no contraints on time. Perhaps this is why I arrived at transition with a smile on my face and a little laughter with the volunteers. Life was beautiful and I felt at peace. Perhaps this is why, following that first peg leg mile of running I began to fly. Mile after mile clicked by with the gracious help of volunteers and spectators. I only allowed myself to contemplate the next mile, resisting the urge to look at the big picture until it had shrunk to one mile remaining. I ran each mile, pausing to power walk the aid stations.

Cola, chicken broth and sugar cookies are my new best friends.

Ok, that would be lame, but oh how those three things carried me along. In spite of Gatorade being a primary sponsor on the course, the aid stations served C-O-L-A, but a tired brain doesn't really care where the caffeine is coming from, only that the stimulant is there. At mile 4 I picked up with Collette, a massage therapist from Carolina. She asked me if this was my first Ironman and what I would do with a nauseous stomach. I told her that it was my first attempt, and I had no idea, but that cola was handy at helping you burp and as far as I know, there is nothing so satisfying as a nice burp when your stomach is queasy. (learned that with 160 weeks of morning sickness). She and I ran along together, up to the park and back toward the 13 mile turn around. At about mile 10 she expressed concern that the turn around was enough to make her want to quit, or at least that's what she feared. No chance, just get back to mile 14, then there is no turning back. Besides, we were dressed like twins with black shorts, blue singlets and pink running hats, my twin and new found friend couldn't quit. We lost each other at the turn when I stopped to chat with The Tribe, but she finished in 14:04. Yea!!

Understandably impossible, I felt as though I was running slightly down hill with the wind at my back through the entire marathon. Everytime I thought about stopping to walk, it just seemed easier to run. I planned to run until I couldn't run any longer, but that time never came. There was no wall, no fatigue, I ran as if the weight of the world had been pulled off my shoulders.

It had.

I ran across Iron Jenny and Robo Stu, then Kahuna and Tridaddy, how fun is that?! On the second lap I ran along with Triboomer, and Tridaddy, and Kahuna and I just kept running mile by mile. At mile 20 I called Taconitehubby to let him know I was at the turnaround and that I was feeling great. At mile 22 I ran across an oppossum, glad they were friendly. At mile 23 I watched a fellow athlete veer off into the road and oncoming traffic.

"Dude!" "Dude!" It was as if he had fallen asleep and was sleep running. My shouting jarred him and he jumped back onto the running route.

I called TH at 23 to let him know I was 3 miles out so he could deliver the kids to the Gatorade finish line.

At mile 24 I resisted the urge to reflect on the long journey to this place, knowing that I might break down crying hysterically and not be able to finish the course. Just one more mile. Just one more mile. I could now see the bright lights of the amusement park half a mile from the finish line.

Then, at mile 25 I could hear it. "Jane Doe, you are an Ironman"

I kept moving forward, but the emotion was starting to get to me. How is the world did I get here? The final mile closed quickly and I passed the turnaround point and headed up the finish chute. High fives and arms extended.

Go Trimama, Go! You made it! Go!

Then it hit me. Where are my kids? I have to find my kids. I was asking spectators, anyone, as I made my way up the finish helix. I didn't want to miss my kids. Then, at the top of the helix the finish line was finally visible. There was the huge inflated Gatorade. I glanced over my shoulder, no one was coming. I had the chute all to myself. Then I saw The Tribe! They came springing out to meet me and we grabbed hands and made for the tape. And all of that emotion hit at once. Every doubt, every don't quit, everything flooded like a Tsunami. I reached over to hug Hyphen Girl and SLJ, and I collapsed. Totally. The catchers ran to help. And I cried. The poor Tribe looked on dumbfounded, and Trihubby (who had volunteer access to the finish chute) ushered them aside, allowing the volunteers to take me through the finish area. With medal, and finisher bag collected, The Tribe rejoined me and Trihubby's hug allowed me to collapse and cry for a few moments more. I had done it! We had done it! I was an ironman!

I wish I could personally thank every one of you in the blogosphere for all of your help and encouragement. You made the training a wonderful experience and the finish line sweet.

To the Florida Tri Geek Alliance, you guys are just plain awesome. This week will go down as one of the sweetest ever! The only fault is that it was not nearly long enough. I love you guys! Wildflower makes parting do able, and may there be many reunions in the future.

To Kahuna, my music loving, tattoo buddy, life triumphing brother, thanks for bringing it all together and seeing us to the finish line. We got here on our own training, but how sweet it was to finish as a team. It's better than Everest, it's like the State High School championship.

To Trihubby, Taconite Boy. What can I say? None of this is possible without your love and support. Thanks for all the meals you cooked, the dishes you washed and the nights you gave up when I crashed way to early in the evening. Thanks for investing in all of my equipment, but far more for investing in me. You believed in me from that first "little" ten miler, and you believed in me in my first sprint last year. You encouraged me to sign up for Florida, never doubting I could make it. I couldn't ask for a better training partner, lover or friend. You are a great father and an incredible man. My life is richly blessed by you. And finally, thanks to my creator and God who allowed me these moments in time, who loved me enough to not leave me in an abyss but who graciously brings me daily through transition and into new life.

Random pics to share with the Geek family

2006-11-10T17:36:00.000-06:00

Bolder, Iron Jenny, Taconite Hubby and I race morning

Triboomer, Iron Jenny and I ready to "Get our Geek On!"

Running to the turn around (full story to follow soon)

Savor!

Soapinator and her new best friend

Walking our gear to transition

Iron Jenny and Soapinator surveying the ocean

The Cheering of The Tribe

Standing Long Jump (who really needs a new name) playing in the ocean

Now, where was I?

2006-11-09T10:41:00.000-06:00

Oh, that’s right, exiting the swim. One of the good things that comes of believing that there is a God and that He is more than just a fantasy in the sky is that you get an inside track on some good information. I’m just a scarred; partly broken down, stay at home mom with a great family. Because of the abuse of my past my brain doesn’t always work so well, and there are times when pain or other triggers just shut me down. Who am I to think I could take on one of the world’s toughest endurance events and succeed. I knew to train well and to cross that finish line I would need a lot of wisdom, and a lot of help.

“If you lack wisdom, ask God and he will give it to you generously, without finding fault.” It’s a good thing for me that being a total screw up, a lot of the time, doesn’t get in the way of being gifted wisdom.
“but when you ask, do not doubt that you will receive or you will be like a wave of the ocean blown and tossed by the wind”
This then is why I do what is right oftentimes in spite of myself. Reading some other blogs I’ve learned that I should have been concerned about getting sick on the swim, and that in fact many felt queasy and some no doubt got sick. I knew the ocean made people sick, so my chief concern was to not swim through vomit. Unbeknownst to me, earplugs are a great antidote to motion sickness. I just so happen to bring my plugs along; I wear them because I really hate the feeling of water in my ears. I didn’t wear them the day of our practice swim because I wanted to make certain I could hear my swimming partners, and I presumed I wouldn’t wear them race day for the same reason. The morning of the race, as I double -checked my gear I noticed the plugs and threw them in my pocket, a little voice in my head told me I might want them. I was glad for them when I saw the size of the surf, and stuck them in my ears because I didn’t want to be distracted by the discomfort of water flowing in and out of my ears. I had a few moments of queasy, but nothing overwhelming. Widsom.

I’m certain it was a cold run from the shore to the changing tent, but I think my delight at finishing the swim warmed me to the core. The volunteers in transition were awesome! I deliberately took my time in changing, making certain that I made the right choices in what to wear and what to leave behind. These choices began when I packed my gear at home and added my long sleeve biking jersey to my bag. I assumed it would be warm during the race, but that long sleeves would be nice to throw on post race. Was I glad for that wise impulse. I wore my jersey, a pair of grey leggings, my bike shorts, fingered gloves and a UA skullcap. I was toasty and didn’t have to think at all about staying warm, but was also aerodynamic, unlike some of the poor folks I saw on the bike course wearing windbreakers and garbage bags.

It didn’t take long on the flat course to be grateful for all the hours on the trainer and the circles on the flat bike path, my legs were used to spinning for hours at a time, and I had trained in a lot of wind so I knew what gearing I wanted in those circumstances to keep a steady pace without undue exertion.

Stick with your plan.

My plan involved a steady stream of nutrition, replenished at every aid station. Again, the volunteers were awesome. I did add bananas last minute to my intake, mostly because it was a riot trying to shove a banana in you mouth while pedaling, and I gave myself 2 points for each time I hit the trash can with the peel. Trimama 8, Cans 12. I don’t doubt that there is still banana residue in my nose.

I mentaled through the first tedious 28 miles, stopping for a break to eat, stretch and find a bush. I knew that this was a no complaint day. In ironman there is no room for whining, it takes too much energy and it’s a negative drain. The terrain was unique and beautiful and I spent that first couple hours just taking it all in. The wind was frustrating, but what are you going to do, quit? For every head wind, there is a tail wind when you ride a circuitous route, so I just reminded myself the ride home would be easier. I would chat briefly with each athlete I passed, trying like a dog to be mindful of the drafting and blocking rules.

This mindfulness was not universal. I’m not particularly bothered by people who cheat in the sense that they have to sleep in their own skin, and if they find cheating to be essential to success, well they get an asterisk by their success. It’s more important to me to just race with integrity. That was tough at times when the bikers stretched in a line as far as the eye could see, but I did my best to keep my draft zone clear. What makes me mad is when the cheaters jeopardize the safety of other athletes. On that note, chick with the ipod blasting, if your going to choose deaf, at least choose a straight line, you almost took us both down when you couldn’t hear my passing call. And to the chick with the disc wheel and tear drop helmet, you know better than to ride 3 and 4 abreast chatting leisurely, thereby forcing all the athletes passing to go far out into the line of traffic.

The best part of the bike, hands down, was that The Tribe would be waiting at mile 58. A hundred mile per hour wind couldn’t wipe the smile from my face knowing they were out there with me. I rolled into a stop and we had a little picnic together. Hyphen Girl wanted me to eat something other than the hot squashed sandwich from my special needs bag, so I explained the outside assistance rules to her. Soapinator wanted to give me her ipod, bless her heart-again, rules.

Trihubby had been keeping track of Paula Newby Frasier’s live race report and let me know that the first 70 miles were tough, and then things settled down.

He was wrong. This was the only tough part of the bike course. At mile 70 we turned not out of the wind, but straight back into it. It was only about 4 miles of the course, but I disgraced myself with a little tirade on the bike. It didn’t help that this was the bumpiest patch of road I have ever ridden. The good news, if you were going to flat it was going to happen here, I didn’t and on we rolled.

“You’d be real cute if you didn’t piss yourself.” came the southern drawl from behind me.

Well thank you for your insight Gizzy. But here’s the deal. I’m fueling with liquid, lots of liquid. At one point my rate of "dropping fuel" was about every 10 minutes. If I stopped and dismounted every time I would never finish this bike course, particularly because there was always a wait at the port a lets.

Stand and deliver became my motto. Remember those grey leggings? Yea. Oops.

I rolled through the century mark and into unknown territory. I’ve never ridden more than 100 miles at a time on my bike. That last 12 miles flew by, I had ridden an Ironman bike ride and no one could ever take that away from me. The ride took 7 hours with a 16 mph average. Obviously, everyone would have been faster on the bike sans the wind, but this day wasn't about time splits, it was finishing and when I left the bike I felt fresh and ready to run.

The Tribe was waiting and yelling at the bike transition, and I kissed them all- they are just plain awesome.

And dirty, so now it’s off to laundry.

Sweeettt!

2006-11-08T11:51:00.000-06:00

Well, I guess you'd like a race report....

2006-11-07T19:40:00.000-06:00

The Soapinator and I are home from the airport now, waiting to return to the airport to pick up the rest of The Tribe. Trihubby, who is just plain awesome, has all the AV equipment, so this post will be a little shy on pictures, yes that includes the oh-so-sweet-I-can't -believe- I- actually- did- that- tattoo, picture from my lower back.

Did you know your booty clevage and your spine don't line up?

You do now. No, really go check the mirror. I had to decide which landmark I wanted to accentuate. I went with spine. I'm not a plumber so it was a no brainer.

Robostu, Kahuna, Trihubby and I had a riot of a night last night, a fitting farewell to the whole Panama gig. Allow me to just say, I'm glad my wild friend Iron Jenny had gone home earlier in the day or there was a fighting chance we would have left Coyote Ugly having danced on the bar while leaving our bolder holders in the rafters. Ironman will do that to you. As it was, the savor merely continued and I left Panama feeling as though I'd gained two brothers. Although this was evident from night one, when Robo Stu, not even remembering my first name, (sigh), gazed longingly at my unfinished chicken burritos.

"Are you just going to take those home to your hotel refridgerator?"

How could Trimama deny a starving triathlete?

And so this man, a relative stranger, consummed the remainder of my meal. I'm not even certain he switched over to his own fork. But Ironman will do that to you.

To think, a year minus one week ago I'd never ridden a road bike in my life and had only accumulated 42 miles during 3 separate rides, on my brand new tri bike before winter shut down out door riding. I signed up to do a freakin ironman terrified of biking. I didn't know why I signed up for that race. I just knew had to take the plunge. The only way that works is if you don't tell your soul what your body can't do when you feel an irresistable tug on your heart.

That's why I didn't let my soul know, (or any of you for that matter), that my right arm was so screwed up from swimming that I couldn't raise it above my head right up until last Friday. Somehow my little header off of my bike, where I landed full force on my chin and left shoulder helped. Both arms were totally messed up. But I couldn't tell my soul that, because my heart had to carry me through a 2.4 mile ocean swim. Ironman will do that for you. I went to bed the night before ironman with two painful shoulders, but I hadn't travelled this far to quit, and frankly, I didn't care if I couldn't lift my arms for a week I was going to do that swim.

You know by now that we awoke to wind, waves and Minnesota morning. It was just cold. Everyone did what they could to keep warm, but there was a lot of shivering going on out there. Didn't lessen the intensity of anticipation a bit though, where nervous smiles and clusters of friends praying together and encouraging each other dotted the beach.

There are no atheist on Ironman beaches. Especially when 1100 iron newbies are staring at 3 to 6 foot seas, bombed the previous day to keep sharks away, (ok, it's good I didn't find that out until the day after the race) and we were about to lose one of our own in the water.

Jenny and I caught up with Trihubby in the lobby of the host hotel, surprisingly not so crowded, to warm up and do the final carbo unload. (my consistently good omen that it will be a great race day) There was no line for the nice indoor bathroom, and I warmed up to a place of no more chattering. Yea, I guess it takes a Minnesotan to figure out you come inside when windchill is a factor :-) We made our way to the beach a few minutes before the pro canon, warm and ready to race. One quick prayer with Triboomer, and it was time.

Other ironmen will get this. The time leading up the start of the race seems to just freeze. It's a moment when a room opens in your soul, and the persona that you have built with hours of physical and especially mental training walks out, ready to take on the day. All of the doubts, all of the the "I can't do this" are absent. It's just you and the task at hand. Any other day and I would have been freaked out by those waves. I would have been overwhelmed with doubt in swimming one, much less two laps out there. But on this day, no fear. Ironman will do that for you.

Jenny and I loosened up by dancing on the beach. What are you going to do? It was great music, and yes there is video.

Then it was time, and the canon fired. I took the inside line, behind the first wave of Kona heads, and set out to take down every guacamole dorito buoy in my line of sight. My only concern on the swim was the first turn buouy and what was going to happen when the pros caught us.

By now you know my mantra, just keep swimming, just keep swimming.

About 500 yards out is when I first noticed the sparkly lights. Initially I thought it was the sun glinting off of the divers face masks, but they didn't go away even as the yards moved passed. Thousands of sparkly lights.

"Dory, no!!!"

I'll be damned, those were jelly fish. Lots of jellyfish. In my mind the waves kept the jelly fish away. I'll take waves and frightened jelly fish anyday. They just hovered well below the surface. Thank god! (Although I did get stung 3 times on the second lap. It hurts like a bee sting but goes away much faster.)

The buoy was tight and chaotic, and ultimately I had to pass it on the left (hitting it as I went) because an older man was hanging on to it and everytime I tried to move around it I was hitting into a wave of people and the buoy was getting blown around by the waves. This is about the time the pros passed, and I got konked on the head hard.

More sparkly lights, but this time not from jelly fish. Just keep swimming. We had about a 200 yard swim across the waves to the next turn buoy, and damn that was fun. It was like body surfing fun. Wouldn't want to do the whole 4000 yards that way, but it was ok while it lasted.

Then, into shore, down the beach and back into the surf. I just kept tellling myself every dorito I pass was one less dorito, and I needed to savor the moments. Who knows when I'll ever get a chance to do this again. This is the ocean for goodness sakes. I was swimming in the ocean, on my ironman.

The second lap was easier in the sense that there were fewer bodies in the water, but more difficult because there were fewer fellow swimmers to site off of, and there was little to no sighting in the surf. You had to make an effort to sight on the strokes you happened to be at the top of a swell, otherwise it was just a wall of water in your face. The final run to shore was weird in that the current was going right to left and the waves were going left to right. I just kept rotating my arms and working my breathing and before I knew it I was seeing the bottom again, and then hitting the sandbar, and it was up and out of the water. I had just swam an ironman swim and no one could ever take that away from me.

I cheered and high fived up through the shoot, even pausing to five Mike Reilly, that swim was just fantastic. It took a few moments to find Trihubby in the stripping area, but then he caugt me up in a huge bearhug and we laughed and whooped a little. In no time his team had me out of my wet suit and on my way.

Trihubby later told me that he was really worried for me out on the swim. I guess from the shore it looked nasty out there, bodies and waves thrashing and trashing.

I finished the swim in 1:26:XX Four minutes faster than my outside goal time of 1:30 that I was hoping for, which was very cool for an old Trimama broad with bad shoulders. According to my watch, my swim splits were 36 minutes from the point of stroking to feet on sand for lap 1 and 45 minutes for lap 2. So, it took me about 4 minutes to putz on the beach and get back into the surf.

More on the shoulders, the bike and the holy cow I ran the entire marathon and of course the finish,

but for now I need to go get my Tribe at the airport.

Trimama, you are an Ironman

2006-11-06T05:38:00.000-06:00

The only thing sweeter than hearing Mike Reilly say that at 8:42 pm was the sight of The Tribe waiting at the kids chute to run me through the tape. We had the chute to ourselves, we got to break the tape, and we had done it!

I am an Ironman. I couldn't have done it without their love, Trihubby's unfaltering support, the love of my friends and family and of course the overwhelming encouragement of all you in the blogosphere.

We had a awesome day at the pool yesterday, drinking tequila and beers, savoring...

So, more to report of course, but later.

Thanks for all of your cheering and encouragement

Ironmania

2006-11-03T19:16:00.000-06:00

Bags are checked in, bikes are racked, prayers are said, now it's just a good night's sleep then

2.4, 112, and 26.2.

But what would an Ironman be without drama?

I exhausted my drama today.

I almost never flat-bike arrived with the stem poking through the tube. Change the tire. I stopped timing myself when the clock passed 20 minutes. I always forget how to do it until I've done it. No matter, tire changed and practice ride complete. I expect a full tube when I arrive in the morning.

Practice ride. Ugg. I have only crashed my bike once, and that was on my trainer in the basement. I always wondered what it would feel like. Be careful what you ask for.

Allow for a little IM narration:

I met up with Robostu, Bolder, and Iron Jenny to take a ride and drop our gear transition bags. As we rode down the busy little tourist road I balanced my bags slung on my shoulder,rolling rolling...

"hmm, I think I forgot to reclamp my rear brake when I changed the tire" check brake, yep, not tight.

"I'll have to fix that when we stop. We are rolling slow, so the front brake should suffice."

"I really shouldn't sling my bag on my shoulder like that. It might roll down my arm and bump my tire, I need to adjust that..."

No sooner had the thought left my little brain, than my bag slid down my shoulder, caught in my wheel and

see Trimama.

Seee Trimama fly.

See Trimama really happy that the car following her was paying attention and pulled the side to keep Trimama from being hit by the cars behind him.

See Trimama sit dazed for a minute, wondering what in the heck just happened.

See Trimama see stars.

By the time I stood back up, Iron Jenny and Stu had circled back.

Robo Stu, (one of the nicest guys I've ever met) offered to take my bags the remainder of the ride. We rode down to the Transition area with me checking my parts, rolling my neck and opening my jaw.

Everything is working. I have a nice round bruise on my chin when I hit the aero bar, my shoulder is stiff and my knee has a welt, but like they say, what doesn't kill you makes you an ironman.

Funnyy thing, no more nerves.

It took a jolt to the head, but now we're right as rain.

So much to say, but it's bed time. Ideal weather tomorrow, especially for us Minnesotoans for whom 45 in the am is cause for shorts.

The Tribe is here, t-shirted and ready to cheer.

Thanks to all for the well wishes, it's time to become an Ironman.

Taconite Boy will be updating for all throughout the day- hopefully might even post a few pics.

Trimama out!

Question of the Week

2006-10-29T09:25:00.000-06:00

But first, congrats to Hyphen Girl and her soccer team for capturing the league championship yesterday. The girls won 2-1 and 4-2 in games yesterday, taking the championship from the highly favored team that beat them a few weeks back. Yea, that was fun. This was Hyphen Girl's first season and it was exciting to watch her grow as a player over the course of the season. The team graduates their goalie this year, so I'm already working on her to take up her mom's old position :-)

Now on the the question of the week. As the readers of my blog will know, I've called into question the "man card" status of a certain Boulderite for whining like a school girl because his diswasher broke down. I know it's tough washing your Vera Wang "Love Knots" by hand, but for goodness sake, nuts up and at least try to find the handle end of the screwdriver.

And thus I descend deeper into my karmic appliance sink hole. Since impugning the Bolderette, my appliances have universally rebelled and gone on the blink. And I mean appliances plural. Sink is dripping, dishwasher leaving crust, fridge/freezer warm, oven cold, disposal backing up. In infinte Trimama wisdom, I fixed the freezer/fridge, but everything else is just plain tempermental. With the pending chore of packing the Tribe off to Florida, I can't afford this quirk to float down toward my laundry room, so I wrote to The Bold and begged him for absolution. I imagined he would respond with his typical booty call, which I feel fairly confident to pull off in my Iron shapened body,

BUT NOooooooooo!

He went for the heart.

He demands the ancient oblation of the gods of old.

Just as Jepthah long ago, in the jubilation of defeating the Ammonites offers to sacrifice to the Lord the first thing that comes from his house, only to be met by his beloved daughter, who he must now sacrifice to keep his word,

I too am being asked to sacrifice my first born to the magnificent, all caring, biker god, Bolder.

To assuage his wounded pride I must change the name of the one and only Hyphen Girl to "Bold"

What would you do?

A) Send HG to Boulder for a week, let him deal with the disorder that is 13, in hopes that by day 2 he'd send her packing name and all.

B) Change the name, for what's in a name? A rose by any other would smell as sweet.

C) Entreat the blogosphere to so press the Bold with indignation and bribes that he might renounce his claim on HG?

D) Please feel free to add

Taper: what doesn't kill you makes you ready to roll. 6 days baby!

#2297

2006-10-26T12:03:00.000-05:00

Finished in fine form the past three years the number was assigned-meaning to carry on the tradition.

IMFL Schedule

2006-10-26T11:21:00.000-05:00

I could have been Julie McCoy on The Love Boat-you're friendly cruise director. I'm sure at one point in life I had hair like that. I'm getting antsy to know my plans for Florida, so here is what I have come up with, trying to implement a simple way for my fellow gator bait IM er's to catch up with each other.

Weds: I arrive with the Soapinator about noon. Tan and Taper by the pool at The Inn at St. Thomas Square. Sorry, no tequila, see Sunday.

Thurs: Swim with the Soapinator. 8:15 in front of the Boardwalk Hotel (host site). My training buddy Iron Jenny will be there as well so that makes for a safe swim. I know they have sponsored swim times, but they weren't listed in the athlete guide, and I want to get a feel for the water in the morning. Hot beverages and bagels to follow the swim.

10:00 Ironman village, REGISTRATION!!!!!!!!!
11:15 Drop swag at hotel
11:30 regroup in The Inn parking lot to drive the bike course- lunch somewhere along the way.
3:00 (at the latest) return to hotel
3:45 Pick up the rest of The Tribe at the airport
Evening carb load dinner, (Iron Shelly is bringing signs for blog fest), Kahuna's multimedia production and athlete meeting.
8:00 or so, nice evening stroll along the ocean

Friday
8:00 or so, another ocean swim and run (maybe 15 minutes each)
12:00 picnic with all of the kiddos
2:00 bike drop, tour Iron Village, etc
4:00 final calorie load meal

8:30 or so bed

Saturday Whoooo Hoooo Hoooo!!!!!!!

Sunday: Tequila, tanning and tattoos by the pool!!

I'll bring my laptop along to update as changes occur and I have several cell numbers. If I don't have yours and you want to join in on the festivites, email me your number and when you arrive in town.

Can't wait to meet all of you and your families

I dropped my gear bag off this am and I was shaking as I packed it, I think that qualifies as excited.

I the immortal words of Marvin Gaye

Let's Get It On!!!!!!

Final 2 hour spin

2006-10-24T09:14:00.000-05:00

The final 2 hour spin is in the bag. Now it's all training indoors all the time. I'm trying to find the hottest/steamiest enviroments to train in now, to keep some semblance of warm weather training. I dropped Bubble Bike off at my local bike shop, where it all began 20 months ago, for a final tune up and shipment to Florida. It was snowing when I pulled into the parking lot. There are palm trees in the transition area in Florida. That is a Trimama transition area. I can't wait to put my feet in the ocean again, Florida, here we come!

Question of the week

2006-10-21T08:57:00.001-05:00

You are at the YMCA, happily contemplating your final two mile swim while showering, when your boss comes through the locker room leading a tour of prospective Y members, the tour pauses in the shower room to have a view of the sauna, you:

A) Hug your naked body against the shower wall, praying that no one will notice you behind the skimpy six inch shower curtain.

B) Fling the curtain aside, strike your favorite "muscle" pose and exclaim, you want a bod like this, then join the YMCA!

C) Hopeful of a diversion, you fling your shampoo bottle across the room, then while everyone is distracted by the sound, whisk over to the locker room and hide yourself in a locker.

D) Feel free to add your own

Did you notice I said final two mile swim! Yea baby!

I can't drink her pop, we don't share the same soul

2006-10-18T19:08:00.000-05:00

Only a 10 year old girl could apply metaphysics to gatorade, and unfortunately I didn't have time to discuss the concept of "soul mates" with Soapinator and her friend at yesterday's soccer game. So, I'm down two gatorades. No matter, it's taper time. I feel at a loss for what to do, being fully convinced now that all of my conditioning is diminishing exponetially and that I will arrive in Florida barely able to run down the sand into the surf. The logic of taper is so irrational. Hyphen Girl is playing soccer this fall and we froze as spectators at last nights game, but it was worth the effort-the girls won 2-1.

It's Soapinator's birthday today, yea for ten years of blessing with this kid. She's just one of those kids who are easy to have around, and her birthday reminds us how fortunate we are.

Buck Naked Boy is a whole other story, unless of course, you want a detailed description of chest proportions. He is at that stage where a keen awareness of body parts dominates his thoughts, and tonight he filled me in on the size and shape of each family members breasts, boys included, while we peeled potatos. Fascinating, I assure you.

We had recess duty yesterday. Mostly same old, same old. With the exception of Queen Gertrude. One of the first grade girls had convinced a large contingent of the kindergarten class that she was "Queen of Everything" She had many loyal subjects, some of whom even paid her money to curry favor and remain as subjects in her kingdom. The kingdom came to an end yesterday when the first grade teachers resolved the drama, and Gertrude isn't allowed to play with kindergarteners for two days. Who says the devil wears Prada?

Then there was "Hammy"

Hammy was heaved over the chain link fence that marks the border of the playground. It took 20 questions to finally understand what Hammy was and why it was so important to retrieve. Turns out the fifth grade class had discovered a dead squirrel, adopted it as their own, buried it and Hammy was the memorial stone.

Yea, gross. In particular, because as I understand it, Hammy was "sacred" because parts of the squirrel were petrified to it.

Ironman North America sent me an email today. The last "out"

"We will be assigning race numbers for IMFL on Friday, October 20th. If you do not intend to race and do not want to be assigned a number please contact us."

No chance.

Of course it would be great to get #1406. Time to start packing the warm weather clothes up for The Tribe, we leave 2 weeks from today.

Zoinks!

Question of the week

2006-10-14T07:26:00.000-05:00

Whew, got this in under the wire. If you are going to add a weekly feature, it's probably best not to take it on during the apex of Ironman training, tax deadlines and the tornado that is The Tribe's weekly output. That being said, here is this weeks question(s)- yes, two for the price of one, they are related.

If the means by which we measure a man's fortitude is by his (insert favorite_______ eg balls, kahones, etc) what is the true measure of a woman?

a) It's woman's lib, she can have balls if she wants to (which I don't because apparently it brings up a whole other level of underwear concern Kahuna I'll send you a nice, supple, man purse to hold your SERIOUSLY IN JEAPORDY man card.

b) Utilize an allegorical standard of measure where the gender distinction is fuzzy at best- say WNBA, as in that chick is WNBA X's 5. (what???? Oh, I suppose you think WNBA is sersely rockin hoops.)

c) Format your own scale based on other female anatomical parts. But see, this really doesn't work, as we have already established that falsies sink.

d) Please feel free to add your own (but keep it tasteful, Hyphen Girl and my father in law frequent this site- sorry dad)

NEXT QUESTION

If the measure of a man is validated by his "man" card, which is certainly revoked by the following:

1) Undue adulation of Kelly Clarkson music (music, not the hawt chick herself)

2) Prattling on about dishwashers and coordinated wash utensils

3) Reveling publicly (note public-ly) about the glory of supple underwear

4) Again, feel free to add on..

Then,

How is the measure of a woman validated? In other words, what are the credentials of a chick card?

No multiple choice on this one class, it's blue book time. (For those of you not old enough to recall the era of blue book exams-that means essay)

Text Message, IM and otherwise incomplete prose will be returned without a grade. And yes, spelling counts.

Snow??? Now that could be a problem

2006-10-10T07:51:00.000-05:00

My final century ride was scheduled for Friday of this week. However, we have out of town guests for the weekend, so I moved the ride to Wednesday. That was until I saw snow in the forecast.

SNOW!!!!!

Excuse me, I'm training for an Ironman here.

So, I moved my final "long" ride to yesterday. It was 42 degrees when I set out. But, there was no rain, and variable winds, so all in all, the ride went well. I took my "flat" loop that winds around the city, which takes me on a bike lane through the downtown area. You exit downtown and head back out into the first tier burbs. I was still within smelling distance of the city sewer gas when I almost ran smack into three deer.

Yes, deer. White tail, four legged, 250 pound, rats.

In downtown!

I saw them on the path from about 50 yards out, and they had no intention of moving. So I yelled. And they looked at me as if I had a 1000 watt halogen strapped to my head. Well, they were encamped near downtown. Between the cabbies, the homeless people and the stressed out, they are probably used to crazy people yelling at them.

They didn't move. I don't think they even blinked.

I considered a run at deer bowling.

But it was 3-1 and I was on bubble bike.

So, I crossed to the other side of the path and rode on by, close enough to hear their breath.

I hear venison is a nice lean alternative to beef.

Trihubby needs your help, please, a little intervention would be nice.

Swim/run today- oh I'm glad to be seeing the starting line that marks the end of training.

Happy and safe trails

Answers and more questions

2006-10-06T07:06:00.000-05:00

"B" and "C"

My first reaction to Marathon singer was to turn and ask him to sing louder, with an "I love that song" and just as I was about to do so, I remembered this was probably an "A" race for him and he was in his own space, enjoying the day. There is nothing like a little course humiliation to ruin the experience, so I thought it kindest to leave him to his Billy Joel, thankful for the laugh. "For the longest time" lingered in my brain until we hit the Lake of the Isles bridge with The Hallelujah Chorus blasting from a bose system that wouldn't fit in my living room. Perfect.

Now, onward to more pressing matters.

With all of this training Taconite Boy and I feel like Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head with our parts falling off. So, if anyone has a spare right arm, email me and I'll give you my address. While we are at it, I might try a new nose...

At any rate, I'm lying a little low this week, sort of a recovery week, sort of I stacked all of my "key" workouts in the front of the week, which leaves extra time for life's little observations.

Speaking of Potato Heads, many of you know we bought this little girl this past springNot bad for a little drop kick, and her name is "Re" yes, as in "I need to consult with you re: the Jones account" Don't ask. Re is a mix breed comprised of Shiatzu (sp?) and toy poodle, thus a shi poo. This is the back end of Re, which I've had extra time to observe this week. Stay with me here. Yesterday, BNB and I caught up with Trihubby for some lunch and Re came along for the ride. This is where I observed that Re, being the potatohead that she is, has a poodle back and a shiatzu front. Kid you not, the dog is in permanant aero
position. This tilt is not a simple case of her nose being on the ground, no, when she is level, she is not level, she is aero.

Can I get a refund?

Who do I consult re: Re?

It's a perfect biking day, so I'm breaking protocol and heading out for a 25 miler than a swim tonight.

Have a great weekend and Wish Swinging Girl a super sweet 16 birthday!

Question of the week

2006-10-04T07:10:00.000-05:00

Perhaps a new weekly feature at Trimama.com?

If you are running in a race, say, a marathon, and the athlete two steps behind you starts to sing out loud the song on his ipod you:

A) Shrug and go into passing gear to run on the other side of the road

B) Exclaim, "I love that Billy Joel song" and sing along out loud with him, knowing that since you sing slightly off tune anyhow, between the two of you there is wonderful harmony.

C) Remain indifferent, run another mile, then bang your head against a tree because you can't shake the Billy Joel song from your head

D) Other (feel free to add on)

Running the monkey off my back

2006-10-02T16:18:00.000-05:00

Last year I ran the Twin Cities Marathon, my first marathon, and frankly, had a terrible race. It wasn't supposed to be a terrible race. It was supposed to be the lynch pin on which I rested my decision to sign up for Ironman Florida. I thank God for perspective, because if I had allowed that race to be the lynch pin, I wouldn't be sitting here less than a month from tracing my name in the sand with my toes. (Yea, I'm making a starting line for myself) I ran that day with the weight of the world on my shoulders. At mile 5, I ran by the road that marked me four miles from home. It took every ounce of will to move on to mile 6. I ran to mile 6 because I wanted to keep a legitimate claim on pushing The Tribe to finish what they start and to start aiming big. By mile 12 I was a crying mess, blubbering to Trihubby that I just can't do this, not on this day. I had accumulated hundreds of training miles for this race, but I just didn't have it on this day. I tuned in my mp3 and just tried to let the road absorb me, pushing back the demons that were having a field day in my mind. I hyperventilated from miles 17-19 and merely accepted my fate at The Wall. And I ran on. I sort of knew that if I had quit, I couldn't sign up for Florida, and for god only knows why, I really, really wanted Florida. I ran along Summit, and up and over the hill, and down the hill, thankful to just see the finish line. When I crossed that line, I cried. And I cried for over an hour. Every thing just came out at that moment.

Fast forward one year.

Yesterday I ran 18 miles of the Twin Cities Marathon. My training plan called for a 2:40 run, so why not in race conditions, along a beautiful course, fully supported? When my running buddy, Henry, and I made our way to the starting corral we saw a middle age couple with stuffed animal monkeys pinned to their backs. I laughed at that metaphor, as I'm sure they pulled them off at the finish line. It was a glorious day to run. Cool morning, with the sun gradually heating up the day. Half a million spectators lining the course, bluebird sky, slight breezes, just fabulous. And I ran the race I was looking for last year. No ear phones, just me, the sounds of fall, 10,000 other runners and the fans. I floated past mile 5, and laughed at the thought of turning, I can't believe I'd thougth that way last year. Mile after mile, I chatted with my neighbors, breathed in fall and just ran. I barely noticed passing mile 13, until it hit me, wow I just ran a half marathon. Only 5 miles to go. Then, as I passed mile 16, where I saw a man stop running, go to the side and smoke a cigarette, that it hit me; it is so much easier to run with the monkey off your back.

I hit mile 18 feeling great, knowing I could certainly run another 8 miles to the finish line. But this race wasn't a lynch pin, it was a training run, so I left the course with all that good vibration bottled up.

Last week I biked 120 or so miles, swam 4 or so miles, and ran the monkey off my back.

I call that a good week. Now it's off to the pool

Trimama tres sheik

2006-09-29T17:01:00.000-05:00

Ok Paris, New York, I'm waiting! Apparently everyone wants in onTrimama fashion.

Hat tip to Wendy who has no link because she has no blog, but really should because she is insightful and funny and a dynamic swimmer chick who's brother is doing IMmoo '07.

My training week is going well, which brings me to another point. Ahem, "who knows what's next"
Lana, IMFL is 36 days away. Which means registration for IMFL '07 is in 37 days.

The monumental question is, who is going to step up and fill Trimama's shoes for '07. Someone's gotta represent the cool chicks next year in Florida.

Will it be you?

When I signed up for this journey last year I had never raced farther than a long sprint, in a rookie season, had only recently ran my first marathon, was training on a mountain bike, was still pretty self congratulatory when I swam a whole mile and really didn't have much of a clue about anything.

So, who is next?

The ride to no where

2006-09-28T09:36:00.001-05:00

Yea, this could be trouble.

In my defense, when he came home last night, dinner was hot, his beer was cold and I rolled out his back with the massage stick.

Riding yesterday was fabulous, until the two "county" roads I planned to take turned out to be more freeway, with no shoulder, than "county". I have one last 100 or so miler to tackle, I think I'll do a little more re con this time. As it is, when I called Trihubby for some map help, he happened to mention the downpour that was flogging the streets where he was at. I don't mind drizzle, sprinkle, rain shower, but downpour meant getting soaked, and I still had 2.5 hours to ride. That's just misery in the making. So, my ride had a slight diversion. After the drop off, I rode for another 22 miles outside, than brought it home and finished on the trainer. So, that gives me 5.5 hours of actual time moving, which took 6 hours, over the course of 7.5 hours. I guess that's one way to learn patience.

3300 yd swim with 40 min run today

Happy trails

The ride to no where

2006-09-28T09:36:00.000-05:00

Some brief notes

2006-09-26T19:40:00.000-05:00

Yesterday The Plan called for an 1:20 bike ride "just for fun" Mountain bike, catch ups whatever you want to do. How could you not, on a bluebird day, with crimson dappling the sunshine, strike out on your mountain bike? We have a park close by with numerous double and single track trails. Man, is it good to be alive! So, that was training yesterday.

Tomorrow is a 5.5 hour bike ride, rolling hills, heart rate 1 or 2. Tomorrow calls for a high of 55 with lows (meaning when I head out the door) of 42. and rain. The plan actually calls for the long ride on Friday, but I am running the Twin Cities Marathon, or at least 18 miles of it on Sunday. Trihubby registered and had to drop, so I'm taking his place to run part of the race as a race day simulation. So, it's biking tomorrow. Time to break out the tights, hoodies and toe warmers.

Kahuna if you ask what toe warmers are, I swear I'm catching a red eye and I will personally introduce them to you.

Today was swimming day. Originally I was going to the Y to crank out the yardage, but I haven't been in a wet suit for a month. So, after work, I headed over to the beach with Trihubby, who graciously sat on the beach smoking a Romeo and Julietta while I thrashed out my yardage.

I should have known it was going to be tough when I saw the local PADI class in dry suits. And there I stood in my sleeveless. Can anyone say silicon ear plugs? Obviously, I can't, because I never thought to ask for them at the sporting goods store. They've pulled the swim beach buoys, the birds have headed south (thankfully) so it was just me and the shoreline. A guy sat on shore playing a guitar and singing. If it was an improv concert there might have been a song about the triathlete who turned into an ice cube.

"Oh, it might be 60" responded the very warm, dry suited diver I asked for the lake temp. Uggghhh. But that shouldn't bother you, you're an Ironman.

Whaaa? Oh, he means my Ironman wetsuit. Can't say I didn't like the sound of that though, and we are getting so close, it seemed silly to belabour him with the details of branding, my training etc.

On the bright side, chiggars can't live in that cold of water. At least I hope.

Commodore probably thinks I'm a wimp because he was saying something about Tempe Town Lake being a bit frosty, but I didn't wimp out. I just noted that my arms were burning and red when I finally emerged and my eardrums were frozen. Other than that, no problem.

And now, drumroll !.!.!.!.!

Trihubby is officially in the off season, so he didn't take the plunge in the lake with me. However, he did the IMmoo '07 belly flop this morning and validated his yellow registration slip with a credit card number.

He's in!

I'm so proud!

To commemorate the day he is launching his own blog. Yea! No more looking over my shoulder and saying, you should write this, or write that etc. He's a smart guy, so go check him out and leave him some bloggie love. By day he might be Trihubby, but by evening (and a few early mornings) he will be

Taconite Boy!!!!

How Trihubby got his Man Card back

2006-09-23T09:52:00.000-05:00

1) He went and bought something shiny which seems to be the thing that gives cred in the animal kingdom. Sorry, no bike porn, but he's working on that.

2) He knew that Trimama was tired of feeling like a mom/housekeeper/triathlete so he suggested we go out on a date. He open her doors, held her hand and, well you know, Trihubby is the only one who can make Trimama feel like a natural woman. (sing it with me)

3) He took Trimama shopping for clothes.

Now, some of Trimama's clothes have the dubious distinction of being "mom sheik". Ladies you know what I'm talking about. It's the "fat jeans" and baggy sweatshirt. The clothes that do absolutely nothing to flatter Trimama's new, sexy, hot, iron body. (I can't belive I just said that, I think Kahuna is getting to me.

Earlier in the day I had dropped by REI to pick up a swim suit. This is my second swim suit in as many months. The last one I bought has the unseemly characteristic of sliding down my hips every time I turned at the wall. 3600 yards equalled a lot of slipping. It was a little embare-assing if you know what I mean. I also grabbed a pair of awesome black yoga pants to replace the pair that Trihubby had heretofore banned to the waste land of "below mom sheik", meaning, why do you wear those they do absolutely nothing for your hot little booty.

"Oh you got some new work pants."

Aye Carumba! My great new yoga pants never left the mom sheik ballpark. Work clothes being only slightly more flattering than mom sheik. I'm a trainer at the YMCA, what do you expect?

Off to the store we go. Shop, shop, shop.

"Here, try these on." handing me a pair of black pants that look startlingly like the yoga pants I had just bought, only slightly fuzzy.

I emerged from the dressing room to a Trihubby's "Whoa" and nodding approval.

Exactly how are these different than mom sheik?

"Because they are tight on your hot little booty" (fill in hand gesture here.)

Trihubby loves Trimama. Trihubby loves Trimama's body.

And that's man enough for me. Welcome back to the club.

The adventures of Trimama and Taconite Boy

2006-09-20T13:45:00.000-05:00

Frankly folks, I'm a little worried. Not so much about Florida any longer, thank you so much for your comments and support, and I had a good chat with my head doc, she's easily one of the best ever, so I think I'm pretty good to go.

No, it's Taconite Boy that has me concerned. You know, when he came home singing along to Kelly Clarkson I thought perhaps his man card had just dropped out of his wallet. But then, after many years of cajoling, Trihubby finally heeded my advice and took his muscle cramped body to a massage therapist. An hour later he called, extolling the virtues of massage therapy, with three more appointments booked.

"I smell good" and by good, he didn't mean Old Spice body spray. He meant lemon lilac, aroma therapy, good.

That's nice honey.

The man card is in serious jeapordy.

The smell of burning masculinity fully erupted last night when Taconite Boy directed me to iTunes to hear some samples of Clay Aiken's new album, which happens to be a cover of some the sappiest love songs ever.

Frankly the whole male wing of the tri alliance has me a little unnerved. What with reports of skinny jeans, plundering a wife's personal products for ice packs and of course, fretting over, company coming we seem to be experiencing a serious drop in testosterone in the blogosphere.

Gentlemen, there was a time when we ladies could expect this
from the male tri community.

For the love of all things good, can someone please go sit in the garage and smoke a big ole stogie, listening to Motley Crew?

I mean if you want to harden that taconite body into a Wisconsin Iron Beast, we'll need a little something to work with.

PSA over

Trimama out!

Training is going fine, Trihubby is pregnant and Fall is defintely here

2006-09-18T07:16:00.000-05:00

All, right, I'll start with the obvious concern; Trihubby is pregnant. Not in the Buck Naked Boy sense of pregnant, he hasn't been to the dentist in a while. But more in the, one of my eggs meandered across goodness knows how many cellular membranes and implanted in a pre-evolutionary pouch in TriH's abdomen, where one of his sperm, being surgically impeded from following nature's path, also landed. At least that is the explanation Trihubby gave in my dream. Exactly why a pregnant TH was invading my dreams, I have no idea. It might have something to do with his new found obsession with Kelly Clarkson. Yes, I know outing a Clarkson fan is sinister, but we might as well be done with it. Yesterday Hyphen Girl talked him into buying her new "Walk Away" video, and before I knew it, the whole album was down loaded.

"You really ought to learn to dance like that."

As if becoming an Ironwoman wasn't enough, he wants me to dance like a rock star too?

It was supposed to be cold and rainy yesterday, so I planned to throw the bike on the trainer and spin out 40 miles while watching the 2-0!!! Vikings. It was a picture perfect day, as I discovered on my 30 minute run off.

So, of course today is 44, spitting rain and breezy. Just for fun I checked the PCB weather forecast, figuring I'd stay warm on today's 40 miler with thoughts of Florida. It's 50, stormy and rainy there as well. So, more training fun.

This week my plan calls for 4 days of 40 miles, each day followed by a swim or run. 160 miles biking. Bring it on. I'm also being dilligent in stealing a nap for 30 or 40 minutes everyday to let my brain recover. A tired Trimama brain is nightmare's waiting to pop up brain, and nightmares during the day aren't so fun. I had someone ask me once if I ever have good days or if everyday is shakled by memories (my paraphrase). I responded with this analogy. When I lived in Colorado it stormed every afternoon. Some days it's just a quick rain shower that passes, and some days it was a snowstorm that dumped 2 feet of the white stuff. I suppose it's a little like having lost a love one. Some days you pass with just a dull ache, you walk in the house vaguely aware that they aren't there, you look for a phantom hug, etc and some days, like anniversary's or special moments you ache with your loss. I carry a lot scars and cuts from years and years of violence and mental bludgeoning and pass most days merely aware of that fact. But then there are days when the storm clouds break and an old wound opens and the nightmares and day terrors flare up and that takes a little extra care to navigate. I'm frankly a little concerned that Florida will throw my brain off a mental ledge, and you'll just find me in a fetal position under a palm tree somewhere, but that is where The Tribe and Trihubby (if he can get his pregnant belly on the plane) are god's grace towards me. In triathlon we have this saying regarding racing and training whereby every endevour is another deposit in your race account. I sort of chuckled about this analogy on my last swim. You see, I have two bank accounts. One is my own "fun money" account. This is where my YMCA check is deposited and that money buys fun; race entries, Christmas presents, weekend get aways, etc. I definitely plan to have fun racing Florida, because I can. Because neither my deranged parents nor my "bad" days killed me. Because life is good, and living is sweet. My other bank account is our household acccout. This one pays the essentials. It's the one that keeps the roof over our heads, food on the table and clothes on our back. And this account has overdraft insurance tied to it. Nine thousand dollars worth of protection. It would take a lot of screwed up things to overdraw this account. I've tried. In many races and on multiple training days I've tried. But it's solid. It's solid because it's not just built on my deposits, but it's backed by a good God, a faithful and loving husband and a bundle of affection known as The Tribe. They all conspire to keep me looking foward, forgetting what lay behind, and living this day and everyday better than the last.

There is a guy who rides a scooter around town and his bike cracks me up. He has adorned his bike with 50 or 60 chrome rear view mirrors. So essentially, while he is always moving forward, his view is always back. I can never remember the correct blurb on my car mirrors, it's either "things in mirror are closer than they appear" or "things in mirror appear closer than they are". Either way, the analogy to life is perfect. Some of my experiences appear closer, and more threatening then they are, and I've learned to "talk these down" while on the other hand, some things I thought were farther away, really sit quite comfortably between my ears, waiting to throw a wrench in my spokes. I'm learning to identify these and talk them down as well. It's all about perspective, and this is where it is certainly good luck to break a mirror. Not in the sense of distorting reality with denial, but rather in the sense of accepting where I've come from, assessing the damage done, owning the hurt, and then putting it in perspective relative to today, tomorrow and eternity. I guess it's like being on that bike and moving forward, seeing the road ahead or fixating on an image in the mirror. The reality is, if I keep moving forward, if I let those past things go, if I forgive (which is hard), if I just keep putting one foot in front of the other, eventually the images will fade into a distant speck.

And if I fixate, I crash. Hard.

I'm not a big fan of road rash, so I think you know my choice.

Whoa look at the time. Did I just write all of that? I swear if you pop up in my dreams pregnant, I'm leaving the blogosphere.

Just keepin' it real here

Trimama out!

Buck Naked Boy has a girlfriend

2006-09-15T09:25:00.000-05:00

Which explains why, at 6 am, I am cutting a PB & J into four equal squares for his lunch. His girlfriend eats her sandwhich that way. And who says the way to a man's heart isn't through his stomach. Of course, Hyphen Girl is all over that.

"BNB has a grrrrrllll friend"

"I do not!" "FYI (yes, he said "F" "Y" "I") she's my "friend" girl, not my "girl friend" heavy emphasis on the hanging quotes.

And so the morning went.

There is a definitive chill in the morning air, so we took the scenic route to school. Lovely fall color and shimmering dew.

Note to self, bring the chamois butter in from the car overnight. Face it girls, there is nothing so disquieting as frozen butt butter in the nether regions.

I have a 1:40 ride today with a 55 minute run afterward. Couldn't pick a better day, it's bluebird fresh and sunny. Poor me, having to go out and train in it. Gosh I love being a "stay at home" mom. Heavy emphasis on the hanging quotes

Trimama out!

The end of all things, oh I seriously doubt it

2006-09-13T16:43:00.000-05:00

There is a trustworthy saying that at the end of all times daughters will rise up against mothers (and there's something in there about nation against nation etc). What this prophetic insight failed to mention is that the source of this apocryphal rebellion will be Fashion T.V.

"Mom, I need to borrow a shirt." quipped Hyphen Girl as she sauntered into my room and began going through my dresser.

Now, the fact that she who owns more clothes then Imelda Marcos piqued my curiosity as to why she was looking for a shirt in my room. Oh, that's right, I need to do laundry.

"Race shirt, race shirt, race shirt" she intoned as she pulled article after article from my drawers (dumping them on the floor of course) There's nothing here but race shirts. Mom, all you have is race shirts.

That's not true, you can wear... oh wait I'm wearing that one.

Ok, it's true. Sad. But true. I have no clothes. Well, almost no clothes. Essentially I can put my entire non training, non work wardrobe into a paper grocery bag. That of course, is if you exclude my new line of Hefty fashion.

And here is why.

1) There are four members of the Tribe. That means 4 tuitions to private school, 4 winter, spring, summer and fall wardrobes, 4 piles of medical bills, 4 mouths to feed etc. you get the picture.

2) Trimama is an incompetent shopper. The closest thing I get to "couture" is when the Macy's ramp is full and I have to park at Nordstrom's en route to Lego Land. I like shopping in the sense of looking around and window shopping, but I am easily overwhelmed when it comes to selection. I gravitate to comfort, Trihubby gravitates to Victoria's Secret. Well, that's not entirely true. Everything I own of class or style Trihubby selected. The man knows how to shop.

3) In December of 2004 Trimama was a well rounded, "baby fat" laden, holy cow I can't believe I got that big, Trimama. That was 10 sizes ago. Now at a rapidly shrinking 6 going on 4, nothing I owned last year fits. My form fitting yoga pants are baggy, my "skinny" jeans drop to my knees sans belt and I have to roll the waist band over on pretty much every pair of pants I own.

"Mom, you are a disgrace. We need to write to Clinton and Stacy".

That would be Clinton and Stacy of "What Not to Wear" fame.

Clinton and Stacy would say I have no sense of style. And they would be right. I think years of parenting toddlers, fluctuating weight and voluminous psychotherapy sessions that tend to leave you feeling spent and vulnerable combined to make me indifferent to externals like clothing and style. Oh, I feel a massive journal entry formulating, I won't bludgeon you with those details, that's what a therapist is for, but suffice to say, when the game is about survival, what you wear is secondary.

Allow me to just say this, yesterday I swam 2.5 miles and today I biked 84 miles. Ironman training is tiring and at times painful. Mental fatigue and pain tend to focus my mind on my healing process, which is good. By God's grace, this endurance training is a powerful forge, with a fire intent on purging dross, and sifting out the dross just makes for stronger more beautifully refined metal.

But I digress. I need to find a sense of style. One that is not founded on spandex and lycra. Trihubby texted me this afternoon when I was biking to say that "skinny, black, pants" are back in at The Gap. I hear shopping!

I need help though. Anyone want to be a personal shopper? Or at least lend a bit of advice. Trimama is ready for some style.

And who knows, we may stave off the end of the world for a few years yet.

So yea, stripping is fun

2006-09-11T15:07:00.000-05:00

So is cheering!

and the most fun is catching, especially when it's a Trisaratops!

What a fantastic race!

Trihubby and I had an incredible day that began at 5 AM heading down to Monona Terrace by six to watch the athletes assemble. We scanned the crowd for familiar faces and were warmly rewarded with a huge hug from Trisaratops and Iron Wil. The athletes will tell their own stories, this was their race and we were thrilled to be along for the ride. Stripping duty began at 7 am, shortly after the canon sounded the start. 2400 or so athletes churning the water for 2.4 miles. Two women, including Andrea Fischer bested the men by several minutes and were first out of the water. Contrast that with the sorry people hyperventilating in the ambulance only minutes into the race. A rep from Ironman North America told us some people just freak out and quit, that would be so tough.

We met up with Greyhound, who was just a great guy to hang around with- (what else can you say about a man who goes hunting for hot coffee and food for you in a sea of people-heart as big as his homestate) and headed out to Verona to watch the bikers come through on their first loop. By this time it was raining off and on, everything from sprinkles to full on rain. The wind was gusty, but not as bad as it could be, on the whole, everyone looked cold and cautious.

We reported to our run aid station, where I invented a full line of clothing made entirely of green Hefty bags. Watch for the debut on the runway next spring. Trihubby was not so enthused by my sense of style, but that didn't stop him from huddling with me and Hefty trying to get warm.

"You left The Tribe at home?" a voice soaked with indignation. (well that could have been the onset of hypothermia talking)

And it was The Silent Fury himself, Walcka.

It is so great to meet our fellow bloggers, even if you think the most handsome "Fury" can't possibly be the guy from the blog because blog guy has blonde hair.

Mike's a nice guy who took it all in stride, mostly because I reminded him that I am the one who glued their helmet to their hand.

For the record, we left The Tribe at home because we knew it would be a long day, and face it, sometimes you just need a little mommy/daddy time.

Around 3:30 we headed back down the run path cheering for friends, watching for Iron Wil and Sara. Chris came through the aid station looking strong with a classic Chris smile, he is so fun to see on the course, because on the way to a stellar finish, he has you convinced that he's merely crawling along. The guy is an animal! A courageous, friendly animal.

A brief stop at Starbucks, trading places at the finish line, and posting, throwing every prayer I know behind Sara and Wil who were still out on the bike course. IM live is slow updating, so for a brief moment we thought they hadn't made the cutoff, but then the site caught up with reality, and they were off and running. Trihubby met up with Wil and ran her to the first water stop, what a smile!

Greyhound used his influence and got us into the finish shoot, so we spent the next several hours "catching" and escorting finishers through the medals/pictures/timing chip process. The first time I met RunbubbaRun was as he came through the finish with his wife and adorable daughter. That one made me cry. Not that you would notice, because by now the rain was unrelenting.

We broke for dinner, toasting our friends courage and strength with tequila and scotch (ok, we had to warm up somehow) and returned to the finish line, waiting for Sara and Wil.

Then out of the drizzle and fog came

"Sara Z, you are an Ironman!" and there was Trisaratops, glowing with excitement.

A little after 11, we got the sad news that there was a half marathon cut off time and that Wil hadn't made it, so sad.

We said good night to Fury and Greyhound, each leaving exhausted but thrilled with the activity of the day.

But then morning came and it was time to reload the ironman canon: Meeting up with Bubba, Simply Stu, Iron Wil, Greyhound, we processed through for Ironman Wisconsin '07.

As of now, the burden of Ironman will be on Trihubby's shoulders, as it just doesn't seem wise to have two parents training for a super difficult race at the same time. But Simply Stu assured me, there is always room for a Trimama on the IMmoo '07 team,

even if it is just stripping you all!

Trimama signing off.

They made it!!!! With mins to spare

2006-09-10T17:57:00.000-05:00

They Made It!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This bike course was nasty but Sara and Iron Wil made it with minutes to spare--I mean it, 2 mins to spare!!! But they are running now!!!!!!

Chris should be an ironman within a hour or so!

It's Cold, it's rainy and it's awesome!!!!!!!!

2006-09-10T17:09:00.000-05:00

Greyhound, Trihubby, Walchka and Trimama reporting live from Ironman Madison!

Iron Wil and Trisaratops were in fine form on the swim, but wish them well-the bike course is rainy and slow and with 22 minutes to bike time out they haven't crossed out to the run- They'll make it though!

Greyhound is catching at the finish line, and we stripped our hearts out this morning- Iron Wil had one word of the swim,

Fabulous!

Chivarly Chris passed the dreaded finish line/turn around point about 10 mins ago-looking strong!

We are stationed at mile 13/finish line to keep you posted

Cheering on at IMmoo

2006-09-08T17:08:00.000-05:00

Trihubby and I are just packing up a few final things, then we leave for Mad City in the morning. We plan to live blog with pictures throughout the day Sat night and Sunday. So, if the blogspot stars align, we should have live pics of Iron Wil, Trisaratops, Chivalry Chris and the rest of blogland-can't promise pulizter quality pics, but you'll get the picture (I think :-@)

Happy weekend all, and total thanks to Iron Shelley for the great info on Iron Training.

Swimming/Training question?

2006-09-07T12:28:00.000-05:00

I was glancing at my training plan for the remaining weeks leading to IMFL and I'm seeing a lot of swim yards. A lot being 3-4 swims per week at 3000-4500 a crack. That seems like a lot of swim yardage to me, especially since the biking distance is a sparse 5-9 hours per week. There are 2 five hour rides and 1 six hour ride, with no run off, and then a smattering of 1 to 2 hour bikes. There are 4 long runs, and 2 or 3 hour runs per week. My inclination is that I need more bike rides, and bike/run workouts in the 2-3 hour bike, hour run range. The swim is no problem-I'm ready with the yardage, and it's the smallest part of the day. The bike course, advertised as "flat" still has a couple climbs and rolls, and obviously that constitutes the bulk of the day.

What do you Ironman veterans think?

Last year at this time,

2006-09-05T19:33:00.000-05:00

The Tribe started school today, sigh. It's funny how you can get so busy counting down days you hardly notice they are passing by. In a sense we were all ready to get back to structure, but like all things, you really tend to miss them most when they are gone. I love summer. I always think I'll like a clean house with The Tribe around less, but a clean house is just that. It's not giggles and hugs and bugs and bruises, fights and experiments, dirt and playing soccer with a water melon on the living room floor. (they almost broke me on that one-especially since the watermelon splitting didn't stop the game-it just made it even)

Hyphen Girl wanted her hair curled for the first day of class, so I sat this morning with the curling iron, forming ringlets in my teenagers hair, wistfully thinking how I hadn't done this since she was a five year old cutie with natural curls and a penchant for twisting them into knots that could only be removed with scissors, and therefore needed the help of a curling iron to get each of the "strands" to curl with it's neighbors. Now instead of, "are we done yet" and "sit still I don't want to burn you", it's a cyclone of converstion that whirls around boys and friends, classes and "Lost" (our recent media addiciton) and clothes and soccer.

"Aaahh, does it get any better than having your hair done?"

Not for me, not on this day.

And I realized that no matter how I get myself ready emotionally for this day, it just tugs at your heart to watch you kids grow older. So, they all posed on the front porch for the annual first day pic, and then piled into the car, two forgetting their lunches on the dining room floor, and we carpooled off to school.

HG is dropped first, I walked her upstairs and it was all I could do to keep from admonishing her teacher to take good care of her this year. She will, and I know this, but that's my baby there.

Then it's over to the elementary campus to drop the reluctant Soapinator and the "Oh Yea!" "School's here" SLJ.
Buck Naked Boy starts class tomorrow, and he.....can't......wait......!!!!! SLJ and I organized his desk, which of course made me feel better (he still needs his mom's help a little) and we were off. I encountered a cluster of teary eyed moms on the way out, so we went to breakfast and commiserated over latte's. I chatted with a running friend I hadn't seen over the summer and we made plans to run Friday.

Last year at this time I was thinking that, next year at this time I might be staring down the short end of a training schedule enroute to an Ironman race. Next year at this time when we go to IMmoo, it will be to watch some amazing blog friends compete, and it will be different. Next year at this time leaving the kids at school won't be so strange because I will have a larger goal to focus on. Last year I was only partly right. I do have a lot of training to tackle. I do have 18 hours a week with no little Tribettes around in which to accomplish that training.

It was still strange. Always will be I suspect.

Because while being an Ironman is a goal for this year, being a mom is forever.