A Day in the Crackheaded Life

Every so often when I'm feeling like I'm running at full throttle, I feel like writing down all the things that go on in my day. And then I can go back and read it at a point in time when I might need motivation or be wondering how the hell I do this. Not like my life is any busier than anyone else's, but I do feel like I've been cramming in a lot lately. Thank God I type fast! So here it is, and it starts at 5:00AM and goes through 4:15PM.

Day in the Life

Wake up. Beat the coffee pot, although 5AM is late for me…had to get up at 1:30AM for a feeding because my metabolism is racing. Run downstairs and turn on the coffee. Take hard-boiled egg out of fridge and English muffin for breakfast. Peel the egg and put the muffin in the toaster. Not starving since had the meatloaf and jelly beans in middle of the night, so don’t fire up breakfast yet.

Run upstairs and open both laptops. Put clothes on. Go back downstairs and pour a cup of coffee. Back upstairs and hook up Ergomo to download yesterday’s trainer ride, which was awesome despite how wiped out I felt. Smile to myself. Look at the Internets and clean out my email.

Go back downstairs and fire up the toaster, go downstairs to laundry room and get swim bag ready to go and throw in jump rope and gloves (for chinups). Back up one floor and get a pair of running shorts and socks to wear.

Take swim bag into upstairs bathroom. Go back to kitchen to get another cup of coffee and breakfast. Go upstairs and have just a few minutes of quality time in the bathroom, and apply defogger to goggles and shoot up nose with Nasonex at the same time (I am the queen of multitasking). Put goggles and cap into swim bag which is now ready to go except for putting on a swimsuit.

Back to computer to chill and eat breakfast. Gotta get it down well before doing jump rope lest I puke like last week. Think about what I have to do today. First meeting at 9AM, but want to start work by 8:30 so I can be done by 5:30, and need time in there to go for a run. Supposed to be good weather today, hope the winds change directions finally!

Decide which swimsuit to wear. Going with the cheetah print bikini. Throw bottom into swim bag, put top on, shorts, socks and my Pink Floyd running shoes. Going to test out the flats for a 1-hour run today, what the hell. Take swim bag down by front door after stopping off at fridge to get a bottle of Gatorade. Open front door and go outside to take recycleables out to curb (it’s garbage/recycleables day). Notice the warmth in the air—it’s going to be a great day to run later! But I digress—I need to go swim first. Pick up the newspaper and go back into house.

Think whether there’s anything I’m forgetting to do this morning. Nope. I can finish my second cup of coffee, brush my teeth, put in my contact lenses, throw on a jacket and head to the Y to do some core stuff, jump rope, and then swim. Oops—look at today’s swim workout. Nice! It’s only 2900 yards. Last minute decision to change into cross trainer shoes. I shouldn’t jump rope in the racing flats.

Drive to the Y. Towel Nazi is at the front desk, and I see a sign that there are NO TOWELS AVAILABLE TODAY. OK, fine, when I’m done swimming, I will just drip all over the locker room and then stand under the dryers until I’m dry enough to put clothes back on. But wait—there’s another sign that says we can only use the shallow end of the pool because of some construction snafu??? What the fuck???

I never know with the Y, so I head into the locker room, put my bags down and walk onto the pool deck. Useless Rasta Guard is on duty. I ask him what’s the deal, and he says we can’t use the deep end. So I’m like basically can’t use the pool. He says, “if you do what that guy is doing.” And he’s referring to this huge fat guy walking around in circles in the shallow end. URG knows me, knows I swim 3-4 times a week, and I am incredulous that he tells me this. I just roll my eyes and walk out.

Now I’m thinking do I skip my swim workout altogether or go with Plan B? I decide that I have enough time to drive to Good Samaritan Hospital Wellness Center to do my swim, but will I have time to jump rope and do some other stuff first? Let’s just get on the road and see. Luckily, there is minimal traffic, and when I get to the front desk, the girl working there is understanding when I flash my Y card and she asks about its pool. I tell her I don’t know what’s going on, but I want to pay a daily rate. She only charges me $7.50, which is nice, since I think the regular charge is $10 or $12.

I’m on a roll, so I put my stuff in a locker and decide I’ll jump rope first. I do it on the basketball court, since another class is just ending on it (it’s almost 7AM now). I’m happily jumping, skipping, running, etc. and I see a small fan club watching me from behind the metal curtain. One of them starts yelling to me (with a smile on his face), but I can’t hear him because I’m listening to music. I take an earbud out to see what’s up and he says I am putting everyone to shame. I tell him that’s my job! I go back on full music, and like 4 guys are watching me do my thing—fast jumping, single foot fast jumping. I do 10 minutes worth, and then I chat with them and one guy asks me how long I’ve been doing this, and I explain I just started back in on the jump rope after about a 10-year hiatus, but that I used to do an hour at a time. This is the second time in a week that someone has been impressed with me jumping rope. I don’t know why—one person was impressed I was doing it one-footed, but hey, it’s just jumping rope.

Anyway, that felt so good that I hunted down the assisted pullup machine and knocked out 15 with yet another strange grip, then went and did 60 pushups and 90 crunches. All good!

I started my swim workout at 7:20AM. The pool was a decent temperature, but this pool is one depth the entire 25 yards, and I always feel like my hands are going to hit bottom, but they don’t. The last time I was here was to race on January 25. I started out sharing a lane for my 800-yard warmup (after politely telling the woman to narrow down her backstroke because she would end up hitting me and I would not like it), but then had the lane to myself. I remembered that there is a huge hot tub, and I wanted to make time to spend in there after my swim. I also thought about how it’s supposed to be nice weather tomorrow, but because of meetings and such, I can’t get in a 2 hour run in the middle of the day (need a tan, you know) and would then need to do it on the treadmill at O-dark-thirty, but then I’m thinking creatively and figure I have time for a 1:30 run tomorrow in the middle of the day and I’ll do another 1:30 run on Friday, when it is supposed to be even nicer! That would make some good run preparation for Triple T, since basically we run 13 miles on Saturday and another 13 on Sunday. What the hell, I’m strong, I can do this!

The swim workout feels great, just great! Also nice that my bikini tops are a bit tighter and the bottoms a bit looser. 2900 yards completed, and I figured I had time for 5 minutes in the hot tub. I wasn’t going to make it to the work start line by 8:30 like I had planned, but that’s OK, it was worth it to get in some hot tub time. I stretched my arms and chest out in there, and believe me, I wanted to stay in for another 15 minutes! But work called, so I got out, showered and shaved, and made it back home and started work at 8:45.

I immediately had a debrief call before my 9:00AM call to summarize the mayhem that had occurred yesterday with a customer, but explained that I had everything under control and things should go well this morning. They basically did, and so now I will just work until about 11:30-12:00 when I can get in an hour run. It’s warming up nicely, but the wind direction is still winter-ish, NNE. What the hell? Oh well, no worries.

10:34AM and I decide I’m going to take a little break and sneak in some weights. Knocked out bis, tris, delts, some chest, and a few abs. 25 minutes. I hope to do another 15-20 minutes after my work day is complete.

11:00AM and another conference call and all I can think about is going for a run. Although it’s not as warm as I’d hoped it would be today, so I check my calendar and I can wait to go until maybe 12:15. It’s cloudy, so no tanning today, and I may need to wear a shirt. Damn! Drinking the last cup of coffee during the call.

Hit the road to run at 12:20, and wearing shorts and a short-sleeved technical top, I’m a little chilled at first, but should be fine. There isn’t too much wind, but I’m going to run directly into it because I dislike having a headwind on my way back in. I fired up a new pair of running shoes—New Balance 903—because I noticed the soles on one of my last pairs of 902’s were wearing pretty thin. I decided against the flat--I'm going to stick with them only for runs under an hour.

Considering what I’d already done today and that I biked really hard yesterday (best wattage for that workout so far!) and felt pretty shelled (which I think was from doing what, 3 workouts on Monday then getting deep tissue massage and having trouble sleeping), my legs felt awesome! I really believe that the jump rope is making me stronger at running. Plus, my back feels better than I can ever remember. I just feel really solid. I’m not running incredibly fast, but I am running strong into the headwind and uphill basically, so I’m good with that.

I ended up running 7 miles at a solid pace (1/2 mary pace basically--I should get faster at that hill route as time marches on), got back inside and stripped down immediately so I could shower since I knew I’d get chilled, put something for lunch into the microwave, showered quickly and got back at work.

2 more conference calls, 4 status reports to produce and I am done working for the day. I’ve decided that I will hold off on any additional strength training. Body is saying enough for today. I will, however, crack open a beer and then stretch for ½ hour, eat some dinner (more tonight so I can avoid the 1AM wakeup call), read for at least an hour, and try and get a good night’s sleep, so I can be ready to go in the morning to knock out at least another 30 min. of strength, maybe some jump rope, and then be ready to enjoy the warm weather with a 1:30 run around noon!

I found out today that I won’t be able to close my Dad’s estate until June because of some Colorado laws about how long things need to be open in that state (the Illinois stuff is pretty much finished). Fuck. But I also found out that a friend in a far away place found something with my name on it, it's available in my size, and it is being purchased and sent to me! I'm not saying what it is, but it's very unique and will bring a huge smile to my face and perhaps someone else's. So to summarize today, there were a couple of setbacks, but 4 good workouts, good productivity at work, a cool thing on its way to me and I can’t complain! The next 2 days will be key to see if I can get through the week continuing to feel strong.

Saturday looks like I might be able to get in some outdoor riding, and Sunday calls for shitty and rainy again. Oh well...this will just make the next 2 days of running in the sun feel glorious!

Life is good!