Whole Lotta Stuff

Yesterday was a very full day for me. I managed to swim (pool was hot, I was slow; but back and glutes felt great) and run (glutes hurt like hell--back seemed to do OK; running on concrete didn't help!), cleaned up Bitchie, stretched a little bit, did some lawyer-y stuff, chatted with the guys building the new bathroom, accepted 3 separate deliveries (!), and worked (work work) my ass off. See how much one can accomplish with very little sleep?

I didn't sleep much again last night--partly because I'm sleeping on the sofa bed downstairs with strange blankets, partly because my back is pretty gnarly (but that hard sofa bed actually seems to be good for it), partly because I'm still so jazzed about the remodeling, partly because there's a whole lot of estate activity, partly because I'm paranoid about Thanksgiving coming and do not want to get sick or more injured, and partly because there's other shit I'm dealing with personally right now.

But I am letting the sleep thing be, because I know that if I stress out about not sleeping it will get worse. So instead, I've been using the "extra" time to my advantage, knocking out all sorts of things, so that once the remodeling is done next week (although big surprise--I may have some flooring work done!), I will only need to rake up leaves over the Thanksgiving weekend!

I really enjoyed cleaning up Bitchie--I always do! There is something about cleaning up a beautiful bike that just puts a smile on my face. I especially enjoyed getting into her crotchal areas and lubing her up. I ended up putting new rubber on her, too, as the old stuff was pretty worn. Below are shots of her from various angles, ending with the finished product in front of one of the new doors in my family/rec room. Sadly, I have no plans to ride her until almost June, since I leave LGL on the trainer for the winter. But who knows? There might be a surprise winter trip to someplace warm, and I just might decide to take her along!

Front fork, stem and bars. I love her front crotchal area!

Bottom bracket and crank, baby!

More bottom bracket and chainrings

Here she is flipped over prior to the final lubrication

Here she is with her new rubber!

One of the items that was delivered to my house yesterday is this chinup bar. One of the benefits of remodeling where one of the guys is really into fitness is that we talk about this and that, and one day I was talking about the prison workouts (which sadly I've needed to abandon until maybe December), and how I'd been doing chins at the Y, and Jared mentioned they now make bars that mount over the door frame. So I found this online and got it and it's DA BOMB! It's not attached to the frame at all--it has a piece over the backside of the top of the door frame and then the large bar that holds it in place. So now everytime I go by or into the laundry room, I'm going to see what I can do. I can also do hanging leg raises on it. This will be a great addition to my fitness routine to strengthen my upper body, eh?



Here's my little area on the sofa bed downstairs where I've been sleeping and also working. This morning, I moved the computers back into my office, since the dust level is way down in the upstairs bathroom.

Here is the bathroom at the end of the day yesterday. Electrical and plumbing were completed, and walls, floor and ceiling put in. I now will have tons of light in there, and the entire ceiling is high up since the stupid lowered ceiling over the tub was knocked down. Today's work will include taping and possibly some tiling. The guys say it will be finished tomorrow, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed! That will mean vanity, cabinets, faucets and toilet installation and painting. I'm so excited!


Another item that arrived yesterday is the towel sets I ordered online. They are not what I expected--I thought they were mostly zebra with red or black accents, but when I opened the box, I really liked that it's exactly the opposite, and these are going to look so nice in the new bathroom:



The custom shades for the office and spare bedroom also arrived, but they are just in a really long box right now and so there's no need for a picture of that! In other remodeling news, I received a call that my new garage door has arrive, and we set an installation date for Tuesday, 12/2.

In addition to remodeling and working, today's activities for me include biking on LGL, putting custom stickers on LGL (I've had them for months now--she's now ready to be christened with her given name, La Gazza Ladra!), fantasizing how the new bathroom is going to look and how the living room will look once the zebra carpet is unfurled, miscellaneous chinups, a core workout, a massage, some legal paper signing and a trip to the post office.

Something that was funny yesterday was that the guys left around 6:30PM, and I actually had the TV on! Ken remarked that he wasn't sure the TV actually worked! I told him that I'm only watching it because I've been relegated to downstairs for working, sleeping and bathroom usage (plus trainer riding now, too), and since I'm getting so much done in the early hours of the day when I could be sleeping, I now have a little time to actually watch the fucking TV. But what's funny is that Monday evening, when I normally get a massage, I didn't go (they were doing something funky in the school that Mike said I wouldn't benefit from), so I was home and free to watch my very favorite TV program, Chuck (what can I say I identify with nerds). So I actually watched that, and whatever was on afterwards, I just fell asleep watching, which was around 7:30, but I woke up around 9, putzed around a bit, fell back asleep and was back up around 2:30AM. I'm glad to have developed a habit of doing without TV, because I just ordered a bunch of vampire fiction to read over the winter, and I like reading in bed, and I'll like it even more now because I just decided this morning that the former bathroom mirror is going to go on the wall in front of my bed instead of behind the headboard vertically. I don't know why that makes me smile or has anything to do with reading, I guess I was just talking about my bedroom!

Time to get to work. Hope everyone has a great day!

Weekly Workout Totals 10/06/2008-10/12/2008 and House in Order

I can't believe that I got as much "training" done as I did. Every day was like this:

• wake up really early because I know I have so much to do
• move stuff around, cleaning as I go, before contractors arrive
• work
• try and get in a workout or two
• move stuff around, cleaning as I go after contractors are gone
• eat something while standing up and looking around for more stuff to do
• keep moving stuff around until I pass out

But today, the last 2 rooms are being painted, and I had time this weekend to put my living room and dining room back together. In the process, I touched every surface, taking time to oil all the wood, clean all the glass, and take apart the 2 chandeliers (which will be reassembled today after the brass chains are replaced). As stressful as all of this has been (I have 5 more weeks before the 2 bathrooms are remodeled), I'm glad I'm getting this all done. My house has not been cleaner!

I'm really happy with the new pink color of the living and dining rooms. It's a bit brighter than what I had before:























isn't that walnut wood beautiful?

Yesterday, after I had all the wood polished and table top glass cleaned, I figured I had better hold a brief cleansing ceremony before I began putting things on the shelves. It made me feel like I'd come full circle, being in a point in my life where my parents are gone, my house is almost brand new, I've tossed out all sorts of things, and my life is absolutely great! I found it funny that as I put things back onto the shelves and noticed how much space there was that I couldn't even remember what I had thrown out! I do notice the walls that are now bare where I decided the art work was no longer to my taste, and besides the room looks much cleaner. Below are the cleansing ceremony pics:




























































I found zebra carpeting (click on the link to see it installed--I am so excited!) that I am going to attempt to order today. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that they can make the area rug that I want, and that is really going to make the living room look great. Of course, once it's in, I will probably decide other things need to go, but I'm OK with that. When you bring new things into your life, you need to let go of some others--that's just the way it is--you can't have everything!

Interesting that twice this week while running I heard this:


Anyway, here's what I got done last week. Not much sleep, but that is correcting itself already as of today, and I should be able to find time to stretch daily. Also, my prison workouts begin today! This is going to be an awesome week!

Weekly Workout Totals	10/06/2008-10/12/2008 This week's totals are sponsored by home improvement
Swim:	6800 yards (3.86 miles) in 2.4 hours; 19% of weekly workout time; approx. 841 calories burned Canadian: 6217.92 meters
Bike:	Approx. 100.34 miles in 5.73 hours; 45% of weekly workout time; approx. 2581 calories burned; Total TSS=369 Canadian: 161.48 kilometers
Run:	Approx. 24.5 miles in 3.67 hours; 29% of weekly workout time; approx. 1661 calories burned Canadian: 39.43 kilometers
Strength:	0.83 hours; 7% of weekly workout time; approx. 208 calories burned
All Sports:	Approx. 128.7 miles in 12.63 hours; approx. 5291 calories burned Canadian: 207.12 kilometers
Sleep:	6.71 hours avg./night
Stretching:	0.47 hours. Massage: 1.25 hours

Three Weeks

FYI, I'm getting back to training. Pretty much one day at a time, but at least I've sketched out how much running I should try and do between now and 11/1, if I'm to do that 50K.

But I really just need to get through the next 3 weeks. After that, I'll have a freshly painted, inside and out, house, complete with new windows and doors. And my street should be finished! New house, new street, new training season.

If you read up on dreams or just even psychology, you'd know that "house" is often a metaphor for one's inner self. Dreams about houses or rooms signify that you are doing "work" on yourself. What the fuck, I am all about working on myself. So much so that it does, at times, feel like actual work. How can I do work when I also have to WORK? How is it that it this first stage of working on my physical house has come down to 3 weeks to go? Then I will need to decide what's next. I suppose subconsciously I decided to begin working on my physical house knowing that I'd be working on my inner house at the same time.

The only problem with finishing one thing is that it means it's time to begin something else. Just like when you find the answer to one question in your life you are presented with the next question. And you know what? From my past experiences, it usually takes about 3 weeks for something to gel in my head and answer the first question and then I'm usually ready for the next one. Maybe that's why coaches recommend a 3-week step up and then 1 week down.

I received a bonus question yesterday--an invitation to the 30 Days of Prison Workouts, care of Louis. He's a guy I met at the outdoor pool this summer who is into CrossFit. Well, I guess I just signed up for it. Starts in 3 weeks. I know I can do the 50 air squats, planks, Superman, anything abs I can do. I can do a few burpees. I'm excited about this because, well, it will be a replacement for my current strength training for a month. I am sure once the month is up that Louis will be pointing me to something else.

There are just too many coincidences here. This is why I write this shit down.

3 weeks. I can't wait! I get to be a prisoner in my own house!