biking

Three (3!) Things Thursday

1. I am having a great week. I feel good. I’ve been sleeping well. I’ve been eating well. I wonder what the difference is? OH, yeah – maybe it’s the whole “going to bed by 10″ and “getting up early” and “exercising every day.” Despite my good exercise record, I have a small problem. I rode my bike to work yesterday; the first time in AGES. Seriously. I don’t even remember the last time I did that. It’s not too bad of a ride, really. Just over 9 miles one way. And I got passed a lot. By young people and old people and a woman in skinny jeans riding a beach cruiser. On the way home, riding up the only significant hill of my round-trip commute, I had to shift into the lowest gear in order to keep peddling. I felt like my legs were made of lead. I am slow and it makes me sad. (Also making me sad: the way my sitting area starting hurting about 3 miles from home.) I need to be better/faster/stronger! I know that part of that is actually maybe biking more than every 3 weeks, but will that actually help with the faster, or am I doomed to average 13 mph on my commutes forever?

nothing ever blurs when I'm biking

2. I’m starting to feel that maybe, just possible, I am getting a handle on what I’m doing at work. I’m hampered by the lack of people to delegate to, and am anxiously awaiting the return of my office mate (she’s on maternity leave and apparently isn’t tired of her new baby yet), because dear gods, I need help. BUT, things are starting to fall into place. There are still things that give me a bit of anxiety – like the need to have an uncomfortable conversation with one of my delegees . Overall, however, I think I can do this.

So glad that I never need to have the confidence to do THIS job

3. My garden is growing like crazy! I just haven’t had the time to spend with it. Last night, I made a Tuna Niçoise-like salad. The spinach and arugula came from our garden, as did the potatoes. The green beans and tomatoes came from the CSA. The Parmesan cheese was homemade. The eggs were a gift (in trade) from Eric, a cohort in my grad program. The olive oil (lime flavored) and balsamic vinegar (fig!) used in the vinaigrette were local purchases. The tuna (in a can, not all fancy and seared, like the best Niçoise salads) is the only item in the salad of possibly questionable origin (although it was purchased at New Seasons, and I’m sure the tuna had a happy and complete life before being put in a can). I am hoping for some quality garden time this weekend. So many exciting things are happening!

* all photos were found by searching my 3 things key words for Creative Commons licensed photos at Flickr.

Shoesday – Kind of

Jun 21st, 2011

by gazelle.

5 comments

I have a confession to make, but before we get into the revealing tell-all portion of this post, I want to show you a picture. Of shoes, of course.

Those are my sweet, kick-ass bike shoes. I love them. First of all, they are pretty cute for bike shoes. Second of all, I got them on super-duper-wicked clearance for $20 at REI. Go ahead & look at how much bike shoes cost at regular price. I’ll wait.

Expensive, right? And although I don’t mind dropping $100 for a pair of running shoes, $100+ for bike shoes seems steep (I don’t know why, but it does). So $20 bike shoes = win, right?

A few weeks ago, I had a pain in my left big toe joint region. I got X-Rays, thinking stress fracture. I blogged about it. I got referred to physical therapy. The pain went away almost immediately.

During the triathlon, it came back. During the bike portion. Which seemed weird.

I talked to my PT about it last week, and she has a theory. My toes are not flat. If I am standing, there is an arch in my toes so that the balls of my feet & tips of my toes touch the ground. This puts (apparently) a lot of pressure on the heads of my metatarsals (I am totally picturing foot bones with faces now, are you?).

So, if for instance, one had worn high heels, or pointy toed shoes, or done a lot of down-hill running, or, I don’t know, squeezed their feet into a pair of bike shoes that were approximately at least an entire size too small for them, that could exacerbate the problem.

My bike shoes are a size 5. My feet go in them. They are tight, but whatevs, I’m not running, right?

Apparently, I can squeeze my feet into too small shoes because my toes just curl up even more, causing more pressure.

The first time the badness happened, I had done a track workout 2 days before, and had gardened & biked the day before. A lot of foot time in too small shoes. During my 10 miler, there was a little pain in both feet, in that exact spot. During the triathlon – it happened during 12 miles in too-small shoes.

I may have to go buy new shoes, because apparently spending a little extra for shoes that fit is worth it. And I’ll need those shoes! I have another triathlon the end of July AND, the architect has challenged me! If I ride 1000 miles in 2011, I get a new road bike! One that might not vibrate violently at moderate speeds! (Only 866.7 miles to go! In 6.5 months. That’s 133 miles/month average. Dammit. I CAN DO IT, right?)

Monday, already?

Jun 6th, 2011

by gazelle.

1 comment

When I have a 2-day weekend, Monday totally takes me by surprise! I did fit a lot of stuff into my two day – although not as much as I’d hoped.

Friday morning started out with an exciting event! The architect was in the shower, and I walked downstairs to make coffee. And there it was: A giant puddle of water with a solid drip stream coming through the ceiling.

I ran upstairs yelling “get out of the shower! shut it off!” which made him think that maybe the house was on fire & we were all going to die. I was having flashbacks to streams of water pouring through light fixtures, followed by months of moldy walls (thank you, wonderful Venice, CA landlords!).

Once the shower was off, the water stopped coming through the ceiling. The next day, the architect cut a hole in our ceiling, re-caulked around the tub upstairs, and ran the water. And no water came through the ceiling! I asked if I was cleared to shower upstairs, and he said yes. And then added, “but put a bowl down underneath, just in case.” So yesterday, I showered, and when I went downstairs, there was water in the bowl, and all around. Guess the caulking didn’t work. (Hee.) We are now pretty sure we need to replace the sheetrock behind the tub (it looks like regular sheetrock & not bathroom sheetrock was used), replace the stuff that is supposed to keep the walls dry (the ugly bathtub wall thingie), and obviously fix the ceiling….or maybe not…

Per the architect: this installation emphasizes the emptiness of modern life.

Ceiling/bathroom issues aside, the rest of the weekend was great.

The architect & I went to Migration for dinner/drinks after work on Friday – it was such a gorgeous day! Then Saturday, after changing the tube in my front tire (for the third time in 3 weeks) we headed out for a long-ish bike ride (longish for me = 20 or so miles). One of my summer goals is to learn to really enjoy/appreciate biking. (Also, I have a triathlon on Saturday.) I was having a great time. There was a long downhill and we went so fast! I love going fast. After the down-hill there is a slight uphill that I seldom even notice. For some reason it was wicked hard on this ride. I was struggling. And then, I looked down. The front tire was completely flat. Again.

I flagged down the architect. He had two extra tubes in his pack. We took out the flat tube & put in the new one. We pumped it up, but before we even got everything back together again, that tube was flat. We then got out tube #3, but it was too big. We pumped up tube #1 again, and couldn’t find an obvious leak, nor could we find anything on the tire or rim that would be causing all of my tubes to flatten. We had to abort the bike ride. We put the first flat tube in as that one seemed to hold air the best, and turned around (and immediately had to ride back up the long, long hill). We had to stop one more time on the way home to pump up the tire. My overall average ended up being only 13.2 mph, which is not nearly fast enough, although on the miles where my tire wasn’t flat, I was hitting 15 mph+ consistently and the long downhill was closer to 19 (of course the long uphill was more like 8, but whatevs!).

After returning home & cursing at the bike a LOT, I changed into my 2nd set of workout clothes for the day. Sarah met me at my place & we headed to Rushing Water Yoga in Camas for a free Living Yoga yogathon class with Emily. It was two hours & really challenging. Really challenging. But good! I just wish Camas wasn’t so far away; I’d go waaaay more often. Like more than the once/year I’m averaging now!

After yoga, I made Sarah go to Gartner’s with me. My sausage stuffer (finally) arrived, and I needed ingredients! I picked up some beef shortribs for my all-beef hotdogs I’m going to make, and more pork belly for some bacon.

Then, it was time to buckle down. I spent the rest of the most gorgeous day of the year (so far!) holed up in my office doing homework. I finally finished at about 7, and made the architect go sip gin with me on our patio before we headed out to Leisure for dinner.

Sunday morning, I got up ~~bright & early~~ at about 9, and headed out to the trails for a nice, long run. I did a gorgeous Forest Park loop (Saltzman -> Wildwood -> Maple -> Leif -> Saltzman) that ended up being about 8.75 miles + 790 total feet in elevation gain. I felt great for most of the run, although there were a few sections on Wildwood (miles 13.5-15 or so) that were so overgrown and/or muddy that I had to go pretty slow so as to not slip or trip or die.

After my run (and stretching like the good girl that I am), I rushed home to shower & head over to pick up Alisa for our afternoon of shopping fun. We headed to Woodburn for some outlet action. It was my first outlet shopping experience, and I came away poorer and with a lot of great summer clothes. I need to head over to the tailor this weekend to get my pants hemmed, but am pretty pleased with my purchases and am super glad that I had someone who knew what they were doing & had an action plan (and a good eye for clothes).

I was so exhausted last night after my weekend of activity. The architect & I made a little picnic meal (the last of my homemade chicken/tomato/basil sausage, some cheese, some homemade bread, homemade mustard, and homemade beer…we are so homemade!) and watched “The King’s Speech” before I hit the hay.

This is my last week of my current class, and my last week of pre-triathlon training, so I expect it’ll be a wee bit busy. BUT THEN, I have a 5-day weekend this weekend…I don’t work Friday, and I took Monday/Tuesday off (no work! no school! What on earth will I do!).

Happy week, everyone!

Shoesday!

May 17th, 2011

by gazelle.

2 comments

Today, as there were no real requests, I am going to show you a picture of a pair of shoes I personally own.

Those are bike shoes. On my own personal feet. It was the first time since before I hurt my foot last spring that I’ve been able to put these on comfortably.

I rode 10 miles last night, in my fancy bike shoes, and if it wasn’t for my broken valve stem on my front tire which made re-inflating the tire impossible (and the very slow but steady airleak from said tire), I could’ve ridden more. Perhaps I should stop and get some tubes on my way home so that Jorge (my bike) and I can spend a little more time together.