Closing Time

In about 2.5 hours we'll be closing the purchase of the house in Raleigh. Kelley and the kids have been staying with me at her dad's since last thursday, so my blog time has been limited. But it has been an exciting couple of weeks here in Flynnland, and today marks the end of a drawn out journey and the beginning of a new settlement for us.

In workouts this week, I've been really hitting the pool hard. Two 1-mile+ swims and 2 1000 yd swims each week. Total, I hit 7 workouts last week and 9 this week. Pretty good stuff too. Lots of speedwork, hill work, endurance swims. The Total Immersion swimming really makes the miles in the pool go down easy. It's incredibly cool.

I took today off from work for the closing, then it got delayed until 1pm. We've got all of the services lined up to start on time. Phone and internet aren't coming until wednesday because that's what I was in charge of lining up. The pods are getting delivered today, sometime late this afternoon. The sellers are still moving out today, but I can't imagine they will be very late getting out of there. Our plan is to paint a few rooms tonight, then tomorrow my parents and Morgan are coming up to help us unload the pods. Any local (Raleigh) peeps that want free beer come on by saturday and help out!

October 7th 2009 is when I started the new job up here. I have been living by myself with Kelley's dad since then, and just going to wherever Kelley and the kids were every weekend. There were some weekends they would come up here. Still, it's been close to 8 months since I've had a home and a family to come home to every night. That all changes in a couple of hours.

Step 1 was to get the job in Raleigh. Step 2 was to sell the house in Greenville, then step 3 was to buy a new house in Raleigh and get moved in. Everyone is glad to see the plan finally come to a conclusion (well, I guess not the people who wanted us to stay in Greenville). I did not expect it to take 8 months. But it did, and now it's done.

Have a great weekend! We're moving in!

All Clear

So the mole thing on Friday.... I get there to have this giant hole cut in my back. The dermatologist comes out and tells me now that she doesn't have to cut me! There were some non-problematic abnormal marginal cells in the biopsy so the conservative approach was to take out the rest of the mole. But when I told her my insurance from work didn't kick in until June 1st, she agreed that it was fine to put off cutting me for a while. When the nurse originally called to schedule the surgery there was no way to opt out of it. So this was quite a relief.

So I'm feeling good about that. Kelley will have to watch my back and if the mole starts to come back before the next annual check then it will have to be removed completely. Now I just had to muscle through a mother's day weekend in Greenville.

We had so much fun hanging with my family. The kids didn't want to leave. There were lots of pictures taken, but I don't have any of them yet. Saturday we got to hang out with Morgan some. He's handling his 30th birthday really well. Then that night we had dinner with my grandmothers. It was wonderful to see everyone. I know it's only been a couple of months since I have been to greenville, but it feels like a year. Getting to spend time with my whole family like that was wonderful.

Sunday I made it back to my father-in-laws house with a car full of moving stuff. Only two more weeks until we move into the new place! The smoking cravings really peaked on the drive. Charlotte will do that to you though. Side note: Did you know that the NASCAR hall of fame is opening tomorrow? It's in downtown Charlotte. I am decidedly not a nascar fan, so this is one more reason to avoid Charlotte.

So traffic got really bad in places, and I was almost resigned to just pick up a pack of Camels. I think I would have done it if you could buy just one. I stayed strong, which is tougher than you might think, and went back to my normal nicotine deferment methods today.

Today I hit the triple. Tri Power workout before work was tough, it's been a while since I've been through the circuit. My abs were feeling the effects throughout the day.

Over lunch I put a mile in the pool. I have recently been watching through the Outside The Box - total immersion swimming for open water dvd. Specifically I've been working on the slow skating stroke, making wide tracks, and using the mail slot entry method in the pool. It's made me swim faster for longer with less effort and today was the proof. I can only count to five. So normally every time I touch 'that other wall' five times I call it a set. 10 laps, 250 yds per set, and I'll do normally 4 or 5 sets on mondays. 76 laps is a mile. I always have to stop between sets. Today I just jumped in and knocked out 80 laps without stopping, slowing down, taking a rest break, anything. Just knocked down those laps. It was amazing.

Then after work I went back for a 5 mile tempo run. I was trying to hold steady around 9 minute miles. I finished the 5 in 45:03 and felt fantastic. So tonight, for the first time in 10 days, the nicotine cravings have gone away. I'm so glad I didn't stop yesterday. And I couldn't have made it two more weeks if that doc had cut me. Running always gets the job done. Always.

I am now registered for those two open water swims. Both in Jordan Lake, the one mile is June 13th and the Big Deuce two mile swim is 7/24. After nailing the swim today, I feel certain I can train up for the two miler. I'm actually getting really excited about it.

It's going to be a fun week!

A Bit Behind

This week has been kind of crazy at work. 16 hours monday, 14 hours tuesday, 11 hours wednesday and (thank God) only 8 hours today. So 49 hours in 4 days and half a day tomorrow is enough to put anyone behind. And I'm exhausted. And that left no time for exercise! This is less than ideal but it's only temporary. We were wrapping up a big project.

Last week I had one day to workout that didn't hurt after the century ride. Tomorrow I'm having a mole cut off of my back that means no exercise for 2 weeks! This is also less than ideal but temporary. I'm really not happy about it. This is the kind of chain of events that usually leads to me starting back smoking again. Even after 2+ years, the temptation is incredible! The lack of consistent exercise compounds the desire.

At least I got in some AM yoga and a great lunch swim (60 laps). Tomorrow after the surgery I'm heading back to Greenville to visit with my folks for the weekend, and I'm meeting Kelley and the kids there. It's the first time in a long time that I'm really looking forward to being in Greenville. I miss my parents and morgan terribly, and while it was a pain having to drive back there every freakin weekend until the house sold, at least I got to see everyone regularly.

Also this weekend is Mother's Day. Happy mother's day to all you moms! I can't wait to go see my mom tomorrow. Also yesterday was Morgan's 30th birthday. So we've got to celebrate a bit. Also next week is my dad's birthday and my brother Michael's wedding anniversary. May is a popular month!

So I can't workout for 2 weeks. Guess what happens exactly 2 weeks from tomorrow? We're closing on the new house and moving in. So my last two weeks of freedom still have to be restricted. gaaaa. Still it will be nice to get settled into the new place and act like a real family again. Actually living with the wife and kids seems like such a foreign concept now after almost 8 months apart. It's going to be nice.

April Totals:

Swim: 4 miles, 5 swims, 1 triathlon
Bike: 280 miles, 8 rides, 1 century, 1 triathlon
Run: 15.2 miles, 4 runs, 1 triathlon
Strength: 5 workouts
Yoga: 5 sessions

I put some serious distance on this month. 280 miles on the bike? I know some folks will do that in a week, but that's a ton of mileage for me. yes it includes the 102 mile Tarwheel Century ride. But even without that, 172 miles is still a huge month on the bike. Wow. What's surprising is the number of workouts. 5 swims? 8 rides? 4 runs? That's only 17 tri workouts, and I am supposed to hit 9 of those every week. It looks low because of the taper, race, recover cycle. I really do feel good about the month. I tapered a few days before the triathlon. The week between the tri and the century was spent with a cold, and the week after the century was certainly in recovery. So that's really 2 and a half weeks out of the month when I couldn't workout. And CJ plus stress minus workouts equals nicotine cravings and heavy ones. It's not a good time to take two weeks off.

There is one thing I'm going to have to do. That's get over the hatred of open water swimming. I'm going to add a few events to fill out the summer/fall race lineup. Remember this is Ironman prep year. I've already done a marathon and a century ride. The only distance left is the 2.4 mile open water swim.

Here comes the OWS. The Jordan Lake Open Water Challenge is a 1 mile open water swim locally here on June 13th. Supposedly I do a mile in the pool every wednesday, so I should be well prepared for this. Open water is a totally different feel than in the pool, so I'm curious what a timed swim-only event will feel like and how hard I can push myself. I'm only mildly concerned about the distance or conditions, as Jordan Lake is a fantastic place to swim.

Then comes the BIG DEUCE. It's a 2 mile open water swim also in Jordan Lake July 24th. This is the big dog. I've never come anywhere close to swimming 2 miles before. So if I can get trained up for this one (and yes there is plenty of time for that after we get moved into the new house) it will be the last step in Ironman prep. Yes I would love to do a fall marathon and century ride too, but that may not be in the cards. But if I can drop that deuce then Ironman is a sure go.

SetupEvents is running a triathlon at Jordan Lake on October 2nd. That may be too soon after the half ironman in september to do a sprint, but it could be a fun one if the half ironman doesn't happen. The race organizers are still getting the permits set for the half ironman.

I think I'm going to finish things off this year with an oly. I know I said I wasn't going to do an oly this year, but hey it looks appealing. Pinehurst (where they play the US Open golf championship sometimes) is only about an hour away from here, and SetupEvents is putting on the Pinehurst Triathlon again. The thought of 900 triathletes invading golf country is just too appealing. It's in October, and I love to race in October. Actually I love doing anything outside in october. So that will end up giving me four triathlons this year, which is the goal. 1 half ironman, 1 oly and 2 sprints. I'm getting really excited! Again not a good reason to take 2 weeks off.

IT'S TOO FREAKING HOT HERE!! I know we get a lot of summer here in the south. But come on, really? Already? It was 95 outside the whole time I was driving back to Raleigh last Sunday. Spring is gone. Summer is here. Summer will not go away here until November. I already miss the high's in the 60's and 70's. They weren't here for very long. The one bright side - this heat is conducive to open water swimming. There's a group that hits an OWS every wednesday night that I might start hitting. I did it once last year with Calyx and Donna. It would be nice to make it a regular thing. There's also a master's team that meets at an outdoor pool that I'm looking into. Long distance swims and conquering the open water are going to take more than the 25 yard pool at the gym can really provide.

Allright, that's enough verbal flatulence from me. I'll blog as soon as I have something decent to report. Have a great weekend! Big congrats to Ryan for making Kona again - can't believe he won his age group with a 10+ hour ironman. You know that was a tough course. And he even hit 58 mph on the bike! And big ups to Amanda who recently hit her weight watchers goal weight after losing 107 lbs! Now she's running half marathons.

New Digs

We're under contract! Found and qualified for a new house to buy here in Raleigh, and yesterday the sellers and us worked out a deal and signed all of the contracts. May 31st is the closing date. It's a beautiful house, and has everything that Kelley wanted. It's outside of the beltline (saved us about $100k) and not quite in Cary. Still close to the NC State Campus, about 3 miles from Kelley's dad's house, and less than a mile from the RBC center where the Carolina Hurricanes play and the NC State football stadium is. I'm pushing for some season tickets.

Here's some pics stolen from the listing's web site:

Front yard has great landscaping

Hardwood floors everywhere and plenty of open space

I love these built-ins in the dining room. The kitchen is really small, though.

This is a really cute house. It's got some positives and negatives. The positives are the sheer cuteness, it meets most of the size and room requirements, and is in a cool part of town. The negatives are there's no garage and it's on a busy 4 lane road. But there's kind of a wooded part between the road and the front yard, so I think that's enough separation really.

There is a small storage shed on one side, but I'm going to have to knock that down and build a bigger workshop. There's a few landscaping projects I've already got my eyes on too. But I don't really see a sunny place big enough for a decent garden. Still, that should be enough to keep me occupied for a while.

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In training, I hit 11 workouts last week. Tri Power twice (skipped friday, too tired) and 2 yoga's before work. I also got in 2 swims, 4 bike rides, and a nice run. Next Sunday is the TOA sprint triathlon, and I can't WAIT! We've been putting off so many races and race plans because we didn't know when we were going to find or buy a house, it's so nice to know everything is in place now.

Actually, I've got three races in the next three weekends. The TOA Sprint next sunday where I'm hoping to PR the course, and then the Tarwheel Century on the 24th out on the coast. Now that we're not closing until the 31st, Kelley feels good about doing the Mud Run again this year, and that's May 1st back in Greenville. I think the Warrior Challenge is still looking good too, but it may be a game time scratch. What's definitely gone is the Fletcher Flyer in Asheville June 5th, that's the weekend we'll be moving into the new place. That means I'm back to looking for a hilly century ride in the mountains, late june, july, august.

Everything is coming together here. Also this week, I finished the 6 month contract part of this job and became a full time employee! I'm very excited about that. So is the mortgage company.

Big congrats to you if you raced this weekend! I know Stacey did her first half marathon. Have a great week!

Eff Mondays

I'm not a huge fan of the time change. I'd rather just stay on daylight savings time, really. But today it really got to me.

The move went ok. Saturday we loaded up both pods, and got a few truckloads of stuff to the storage unit and both parent's garages. Sunday Kelley and Mom went back and cleaned everything good, and we are out of there. It was strange to leave, 5 years is the longest we've been at one house. And we still found boxes that were never unpacked since moving in!

So we spent saturday night with my folks, and sunday Kelley took the kids back to her mom's place and I went back to Raleigh. I did get to visit with my grandmother some first. That was a real treat. Turns out she had to do the same thing! They moved from Gaffney to Charlotte (about 2 hours apart) when she was 9 months pregnant with my oldest uncle (he's 65 now). Then my grandfather had to be back in Gaffney, SC for 3 months. Some things never change.

So today was horrible. Screw Monday's. Screw the time change. It wasn't a big deal yesterday. But today when I woke up at 4:30 AM with a migraine, the body thought it was still 3:30 am. So of course there was nausea and more pain..... ugh. I hate migraines. How did I ever live getting those stupid things 4-5 times a week! Thank God for chiropractic care so I don't have those too often anymore. This is only the 4th migraine in the last 3 years.

So by the time I needed to leave for work, the medication had kicked in enough to let me drive. I got there on time, and got instantly overwhelmed. I got dumped on and yelled at. And the body is still pretty sore from moving.

Over lunch I had to find a UPS store near the house. I wrote down the address, and walked outside to find my trunk had been popped. Turns out somebody broke into my car and stole my GPS!!! The bad thing is I needed that; I had no idea where the stupid UPS store was. We are moved out of our house and I can't even get a PO box to forward the mail to! I gave up looking for the store and went home for lunch.

I get back to work and nothing goes right. You ever have one of those days where everything breaks? I still had the tinge of a headache, was knuckle-dragging tired, and ready to leave by 3:30. I left at 6.

I got lost going home. Actually, I found the UPS store behind a grocery store I needed to hit anyway. Then I got lost going from the grocery store to Target. Eventually found Target, and by this point I was so mentally done for I bought a shit ton of chocolate and a gallon of milk. I knew how I was going to spend the evening. Then even after buying dinner at the grocery store, I stopped at Snoopy's (a local hot dog joint) for some dogs and fries.

So in the end I have a PO box to forward the mail to, a new pillow to sleep on to help with the migraine, and enough reece's eggs to fill an easter basket. But no GPS in a town I don't know my way around in very well yet sucks. And I still have to file a police report. I want to put an hour on the bike trainer tonight just to have something happen today that I can feel good about.

So I hope your monday was better than mine! Got the marathon this Sunday, taper madness is kicking in. Pics from the move to come whenever we can plug in the camera again.

Finally moving

If you guys don't have anything to do this weekend...... We're moving out of the house in Greenville all weekend long. Come on by! We'll put ya to work. The pods got delivered today. I'm headed back to Greenville tomorrow after work and we're going to load them up all day saturday and sunday. Oh the joys of moving.

I had to miss the 10k last weekend. Kelley was a bit overwhelmed with the packing, so I blew off the race and went back to SC to pack up all weekend. It was quite productive.

I finally did get my 10k on last night (wednesday). I walked for a few minutes to warm up, then set the treadmill at 6.7 speed and just left it there for 5.2 miles. Took the next .8 miles at 7.1 and the last .2 at 7.3 speeds for a total time of 56:02. Damnit Snail.... he's been goading me into a 55:xx 10k for weeks and now I miss it by only 2 seconds. Going to have to try again after the marathon.

Yes don't think I forgot. This weekend is moving, next weekend is the marathon. I don't have to go back to SC for the closing. So once we finish loading up the pods sunday it's go time. Last year I ran my first Oly Tri only 6 days before my first marathon. This year it's lifting heavy furniture and the emotional release of leaving our family home. Why can't I just have a calm the weekend before a marathon? Is lifting armoires really an appropriate taper activity?

We still have no place to go. Kelley and the kids will move around a bunch. I'll stay here with her dad in Raleigh. They'll be in raleigh next weekend for my marathon, and then taking off to the beach for 2 weeks. That's what the kids are focused on. Still we moved into that house with 2 pets and no kids, and we're moving out with 2 kids and no pets. Tough to see it go, it's going to be an emotional and scary weekend.

Have a great weekend! and if you don't come help me move out this weekend, at least try to get in a run will ya?

Iron UP

Everything is looking ok to get our house in greenville sold. Closing is still lined up on schedule. We are still fighting some mortgage stuff and still trying to find the right house to buy. And still haven't figured out how to not be homeless for a few months. Nothing like living in a van down by the river!

Training is going pretty well. I'm still on the fence about the march 21st marathon. Kelley wants me to do it, but I"m pretty sure she just doesn't want me to pester her about another marathon later in the year. I hit the triple today: yoga before work, a 10 mile hilly bike ride over lunch, and 4 miles of speedwork on the treadmill after work. It really felt good to get some treadmill intervals done today. Running hasn't been agreeing with me very well since the tybee race. But tonight I felt fast and fluid.

Yesterday had just one workout, a 1250 yd swim. Supposed to be a mile, but I had to get back to the office for a meeting so I cut it down to only 50 laps in the pool. Tuesday we had a company meeting, followed by a drunken company barhopping. So all I got done was some yoga before work and a 4 mile tempo run over lunch.

Fear not, I hit the trifecta again on monday though. Tripower before work, 1000 yd swim (fast 100 yd intervals) over lunch and a 21 mile bike ride after work that was tempo. very good day (for a monday). Tomorrow's lunch swim should finish off the week nicely.

So why am I finally posting an actual training log up here? What's missing in that messy log? Well for starters I'm missing a long run. I might try and run some while I'm in Greenville this weekend. But monday it begins.

Iron Week. My target is to complete the Ironman distances - 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike, 26.2 mile run - all in one week. Yes I know next year I'm going to do it all in one day. But I won't have to work that day either. This is going to be a fun challenge.

Why next week? It's the only time I have left in the schedule for a 20 mile long run. The marathon is almost here. So I can attack the run game with a 6.2 mile tempo run and a 20 mile long run. Actually, here's the plan:

Monday - 1250 yds (50 laps) swim, 45 mile bike
Tuesday - 15 mile bike, 6.2 mile run
Wednesday - 1 mile swim (76 laps 1760 yrds), 20 mile bike
Thursday - 15 mile bike, 17 mile bike
Friday - 1250 yds (50 laps) swim
Saturday - 20 mile run

The first workout is over lunch each day. Friday night one of my company's owners has invited us to his house for dinner (I hope there's carbs!) - and he did Ironman CdA a few years ago. So he knows. Since Kelley is coming to raleigh for the weekend I will be doing the long run here on saturday, not thursday night like I normally do.

So that gives me 4400 yards in the pool, and ironman distance is 4224 yards. covered. Normally I only do 1000 yards monday and friday, so what's an extra 10 laps right? 112 miles is exactly 112 freaking miles on the bike. I might extend the monday night and tues/thur lunch rides by a few miles each so I won't have to go back thursday night for the last 17 miles. And the 10k run on tuesday and 20 mile run on saturday will finish off the marathon distance. That's a full week people. A very full week. It's going to take a lot of good food and good fuel to get it all done. I bet there won't be much sleep trouble though.

So I'm going to take what I just called a full busy week's worth of workouts and try to do that all in one day next year??? I think taking 2010 as an Ironman Prep Year was the right call.


I'm not sure what's more surprising.... that someone actually listened to my drivel advice or that it actually worked. Tyly is actually blaming me for trying her first 5 mile run yesterday. She did it - setting a personal distance record and beat her time goal. She's also getting married in a month and building a house, and I'm enjoying stalking her (if you haven't seen her blog yet it's pretty neat). She deserves a thumbs up pic! I's proud of ya girl!

Now after Ironman week..... I'm going to try and post every day next week to track the progress. Anybody else feel like taking an Iron Week this year? I'm really getting excited about the concept. Have a great weekend!

G B O

I've seen so many good, bad, and ugly posts in the last week or so that I thought I would throw my hat into that ring as well.

The Good
Our house in Greenville is under contract! Took four months, and we're selling for $30k less than the original asking price but that sucker is done. We finally get to be a family again. This is certainly good. They want to close March 19th, which is only about 5 weeks away.

The Bad
Thanks to my current situation at work we can't close the purchase of another home until May 15 according to my lender. So we will, officially, be homeless for a couple of months. That means right now I have to figure out what to do with people and stuff. I am totally open to suggestions here homies. Got any ideas?

For the stuff, I'm leaning towards getting a large self-storage unit in Raleigh. We can't afford to hire the moving company now, so I think we will have to move ourselves (which I swore I would never do again) into the storage unit. I will let the movers come in and take the larger furniture pieces into their warehouse. I'm just not going to haul armoires around like I did when I was 25. no thanks.

For the people, we're going to have to crash with family for a week at a time. My folks said they would put us up, I know we'll be ok with kelley's dad for about a week, and kelley's mom has an apartment they aren't using right now. I know the kids are going to get all kinds of disoriented and homesick, and we won't have a home to take them back to. This is going to be the toughest part.

The closing is March 19th. They take possession at closing, so we have to be moved out March 18th at the latest. Guess what happens March 21st? The Tobacco Road marathon. So much for an easy, stress free week before the race. Moving is an appropriate taper activity, right?

I think this means my marathon chances this year are screwed. I might be able to find a summertime marathon, or something in april. But this one is in my hometown, flat, and fast. Hence, exactly what I'm looking for. This has thrown my training for a loop. I've lost the motivation for my early morning workouts (tri-power and yoga), and the evening workouts are getting harder mentally. Lunchtime swim/bike stuff is still awesome, I'm going to put a mile in the pool today. I know that the house is more important than the marathon. But when I settled in for an 18 mile run yesterday and only made it 3 miles, I know it's because I am worried about house stuff. Also Kelley came into town yesterday so I knew she was waiting for me.

Still, I'm just off my game mentally. My left foot, knee, and (to some degree) hip are getting new pains when I'm running. It just doesn't feel as fluid as it should (or did 2 weeks ago). This weekend I'm going to head out to Furman to run around the lake some, we'll see how far I feel like going. I'm not going to write off the marathon completely until the house plans are finalized. But you guys know what the last 5 weeks of marathon training are like. When those long runs start to get really long you don't feel like moving furniture afterwards. I've got to get my head on straight for everything to be more effective.

That looks like a lot of bad, and only a little bit of good, but I swear the good is really good and the bad I can handle.

2 pm update: I put 80 laps in the 25 yd pool over lunch, which is just over a mile. 76 laps is a mile, according to a piece of paper tacked up to the wall in there. Now I am really hungry.

The Ugly
I've notice a growing and disturbing trend in the men's locker room recently. Men who are seriously overweight have been walking around naked with impunity. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad these guys are in the gym working on their fitness. And if you've been reading this for a while you know I have no problem with naked men and the sanctity of the locker room.

Apparently Swollen Sack Syndrome is sweeping its way across North Carolina, maybe even the nation. This is a serious problem which must be addressed; I've never seen anything like it. These sacks are so engorged that there is only about half an inch of pecker sticking out the top. It looks like an apple with a really thick stem. Please, in the name of health, check your husbands, boyfriends, and male co-workers sacks out to be sure they are not inflicted. We must stop SSS before it becomes a national crisis. So be kind to your favorite sack, treat it right and it will be spared from this new epidemic. So your mission this weekend, if you choose to accept it, is to drain a sack by any means necessary. Enjoy.

Blown

Well turns out it was all a no-go. Raleigh got dumped on with snow and sleet, so I ended up staying here for the weekend. Missing my girls, but the snow is so much fun. and we rarely get any. So no trail race, no worrying or scary drive on sunday. Instead we got 8 inches of snow and these:



Self portrait in the snow

Our driveway and the neighbors backyard


I still wore my trail running shoes to play in the snow

Have a great weekend! Enjoy the snow in the southeast. I have my bike on the trainer and Eleanor is making cookies.

Run out the cold

So tuesday I was flat on the couch, and wednesday i felt better but still ended up working from home. Thursday I went back into the office but was still struggling with this stupid thing a bit. Then friday I went to the office, and it started snowing right after lunch.

Now when SC gets a little bit of snow the people there freak out pretty bad. I had no expectations of what Raleigh would do with some of the white stuff. We got flurries for about 30 minutes, then later on after dark there was some freezing rain. nothing actually stuck to the ground here. Farther west (greensboro, charlotte) they did get quite an accumulation. And in the mountains, Boone got 18", and Asheville got about a foot. but we got nothing, really.

Still, the schools closed down at 1pm, I left the office early just to avoid having the highway turn into a parking lot; I still worked from home the rest of the afternoon. Some businesses closed, the whole place just started shutting down. This was a problem, but not as much of a problem as I was expecting.

See, thursday night I went to charlotte and back to meet kelley. Concord Mills, actually. She came back to Raleigh with me because Saturday was her birthday and we had plans made for friday night. Those plans ended up being cancelled. But we still went out for a nice dinner and did some shopping, etc. Still, saturday we were supposed to do christmas with my mom's side of the family in Greenville. With our plans being cancelled we can go back to Greenville saturday night? well, not with the snow west of us. Greensboro was shut down.

So saturday morning we could make it back down, right? 143 wrecks reported on I-85 around greensboro. If we go south then west to avoid that crap, it turns the 4 hour drive into 6 hours. then we miss christmas anyway. waiting to get around those conditions was also going to add the time, so we were just screwed. Then kelley's mom said it was ok to keep the kids for another night, so I ended up getting my wife all to myself for her entire birthday weekend! We finished the christmas shopping and just got to spend a lot of quality time together. You just don't get to do that very much after you have kids. It was fantastic!

She made it back to Greenville today and the girls were pissed that I wasn't with her. The holidays are here people!! Wednesday I'm heading home for christmas. you can count on that.

I'm still fighting with the snots. moving quite a lot of mass through the sinusoidal cavities. I feel ok, but not as much energy as I had last weekend. I have been downing massive amounts of POM Wonderful, and it's working very well. Still, I needed to get a run in today just to see how it felt. I did 3.5 miles slow. i mean slow with walking. but it felt sooooooooo goooooooddddd just to be out there again. and I've been eating everything in sight since the cold started going away. What's that "feed a cold, starve a fever" thing all about? I keep stuffing my face I'm going to be too heavy for the first of the year.

December is gone people! Brace yourself for 2010. I hope to get to post again this week, but in case I don't I hope you all have a great Christmas! be well.

Getting Back

First, thank you all so much for the comments on my b2b race report. 40 comments? that's the most for any post so far. Fantastic. Your support and friendliness truly means a lot to me.

It's time to get back into the swing of things. Last week I allowed myself no restrictions, just do what I wanted to do. I only did one swim and one run. I ate anything that would fit in my mouth. I was recovering. By wednesday my legs felt like being shaken again. So I only ran 2 miles. It was good enough to work out some remaining soreness. No sweat there. The swim was pretty good too. I felt efficient and strong in the pool, and came out hungry. I'll take it.

Then this weekend, I had a batchelor party in Charlotte to go to. So many beers. Oh so many beers. I'm too old for that crap now. Still, I got to regale some of the guys with tales of ironman. We were able to properly send that one poor soul into the death of his batchelorhood by way of lap dances and pole work. It was mostly fraternity brothers, but the groom's uncle showed up at a bar for a while. It was fantastic to get to see my old college buddies again. We all get together a couple of times a year. But now we're all old and married, so it's just a matter of time before these weekend long parties turn into 3 beers over golf in the afternoon and a nap before dinner.

Which is really ok with me. I discovered this weekend how much bars hate me. They are so loud, and I don't hear well anymore. So I can smile, and clank my beer against yours, and that's supposed to be entertaining until 2 am? I'm too old and too married for that crap.

I stopped wearing a wedding band when I got fat a few years ago. Yes, it does fit again, but I'm not in the habit of wearing it so I never think to put it on. Since then, I've also stopped being a fan of things that go "around" me. I even quit wearing a watch, or ties, or any other jewelry. I know what you're thinking, and yes it was weird when I finally took off that ankle bracelet - no just kidding. But I did have to admit to the fraternity brothers that I shaved my legs. That's another story. Anyway.... we found a few batchelorette parties at the bar saturday night and I was 1 of only 3 of our group not wearing a wedding band. I did get some of the strangest looks when I admitted that I was married (and full disclosure: I ALWAYS admitted it, even when I was not asked - see the above note about not being able to hear or talk in bars).

Saturday was our 11th wedding anniversary! Yea I know, bad timing, I spent my wedding anniversary at a bar without my wife. Hey, I didn't pick the date for the party or our wedding. Total coincidence. Besides, you may remember last year when for our 10th anniversary, Kelley was shopping and barhopping with her college friends in Williamsburg, VA. So I had justification. We did the celebration thing Monday night after getting back from the race. Just going out for a nice dessert and coffee after putting the kids to bed. Still, 11 years? Happy anniversary honey! I did actually call her from the bar at 6:10, approximately when our ceremony ended 11 years earlier.

When I got back to Raleigh sunday afternoon all I wanted to do was eat vegetables and sleep. I did some yoga just for the cleansing effects mentally. I think my stomach is still off kilter a little bit.

Today I decided it's time to get back on track. I'm going to have to ramp back up to the 14 workouts a week I was doing before. But I started out with a 600 m swim over lunch. I was amazed how much my lungs were feeling the effects of those smoke filled bars. I could barely make it 6 laps without stopping to cough up a lung! wow, it was tough. I still feel dehydrated too. I'm doing my tri power workout tonight too, then going mountain biking with the office crew tomorrow over lunch.

I'm searching for races in 2010, and starting to lay out the calendar a bit. It's tough to go too far in advance without knowing when our houses in Greenville will sell, but I feel safe nailing down a few outlines. I'm leaning towards doing this century ride, it's very near some friends of ours that we want to visit soon. And it looks flat enough to qualify for an easy first century. I don't want to do the same thing I did with my first marathon, picking something incredibly challenging in the wrong time of year.

All I know is, I better be ready to stomp out the snail come February.

Halloween

My kids are insane. For halloween, Bigun insisted she dress up as Unc (my brother Morgan). I told her she couldn't carry the required quantity of illegal drugs in public; even at age 4 she could still be prosecuted. She didn't care.


The funniest part is actually what she wanted us to dress up as. She said Kelley should dress up as a door, and Evil Genius could go as a lamp. Only our eldest would want to dress up like a "normal" person - not that Morgan is usually considered normal - and still want everyone else to blend into the background. EG fell in love with an actual penguin costume, so that was incredibly adorable. She would practice her waddle even saying "waddle waddle waddle" while acting like a penguin. Adorable.


She also said that I could dress up as Natalie (Morgan's girlfriend - she is actually normal) because every Unc needs a Natalie. She likes Natalie, I get that. But really? Daddy in drag? You want daddy to dress up like a girl and be your girlfriend for the night? There's so much wrong with that, some therapist is going to love her in 30 years. We found some glasses and took the lenses out, and flip flops and pajamas for her costume. It is Morgan's typical dress code after all.


I ended up going out as a farmer; a pair of overalls was all the clean clothes I have in Greenville these days. The scary part is most cold spring weekend mornings you can find me in the backyard working the garden in the same overalls and straw John Deere hat that I used as my halloween costume. Kelley's always made fun of that hat, but I like it. Didn't think it would come in that handy though. She went as a (hot) witch.

Our neighborhood in Greenville sucks - it's such a red state on halloween. Over 200 houses in the hood and only 3 available for tricks or treats. Of course we told the kids that they got a great hall and went over to Morgan's to let them steal his candy. My parents were over there too so we all ended up having a great halloween.


Here's all the GU's I got with the rest of the gear. These are going to come in handy on saturday. Some of these flavors look great. Vanilla Gingerbread? bring it on.

October is done and November is here. Here's the totals from October:

Swim: 10050 meters (6.28 miles) over 9 swims. It's about time.
Bike: 100 miles over 6 rides
Run: 27 miles pathetic
Strength: 2:50 over 10 workouts. kind of pathetic but I'm ok with it
Yoga: 2 hours = 4 sessions pathetic

Now granted, in October I started a new job, joined a new gym, moved 4 hours away from my family, and had to completely re-orient my entire life. Including changing my training from a 7 day week to a 5 day week and adding multiple workouts per day. So this is more like 2 weeks of training rather than a whole month. I can live with those totals given how Life got in the way. But I adore the new training routine, and I wish I had longer to use it before tapering.

So this saturday, a scant 4 days 9 hours away, is the Beach 2 Battleship. I'll post race targets and more info later. But today I got in yoga before work, 800 m swim over lunch, and 20 miles on the bike after work. Tomorrow is just a short run after meeting my friend Mandy for dinner.

Mandy runs a non-profit www.pajamapals.org that is having a fundraiser at the Chic-Fil-A near the Crabtree Mall in Raleigh, NC if you are in the area. Come join us to support this charity! Mandy and I have been friends since college, her husband Chris was my little brother in our fraternity, and Chris is also running the b2b as his first half on Saturday too!

Taper, taper, taper. Run tomorrow night, then swim wednesday, then maybe a short bike on thursday? Wednesday's swim might just be the end of the training plan. I'll post race goals beforfe we head out of town. C ya! How do you make a door costume anyway? We couldn't figure it out.

15 days

First, wth? Nobody commented that the movie quote in the first paragraph of the last post was from High Fidelity? I guess that post was so long by the end you had forgotten about the question. Still, one of my favorite movies.

The dang Phillies won against the Dodgers last night, so they are going to the world series. again. Pffffftt!! Dodgers/Yankees would have been sentimental. Dodgers/Angels would have been an all-LA series. But the phillies? poo poo. no thanks. ding dang. Thanks for ruining the world series again.

I'm ready to taper. Beach2Battleship half iron is only 15 days away. Who else am I going to see down there? Just Missy, Ryan (dropped back to run the half iron after competing @kona - save me a beer at the finish line), Calyx, Donna, Carol, geez the list goes on. Be sure and say hi to me if you see me there. I can't believe how many people I know are running this race.

The 2 a day (or more) workouts are really letting me sleep well. typically it's yoga or my tri power workout in the morning, a swim over lunch, and run or bike after work. Today it was yoga, a hard 500 m swim over lunch, and 5 miles running after work. taper is going to be a welcome relief.

Tomorrow I (might) get to meet up with Calyx and Donna for an open water swim. It's at 7 am, and I still don't know if the wetsuit here will fit or if I can get the 1 mile swim done and still make it to work on time. It's a group swim, so they will be in good company if I don't make it out there. It's been getting hard to wake up in the mornings on time, so I don't know how much earlier I will have to get up to make it out there.

Then I'm headed back to Greenville tomorrow to see the wife and kids for the weekend. Man this is tough, I'm really ready for them all to be up here in our new house that we haven't found yet. We had a skype video call tonight, and Evil Genius actually got up on the desk and hugged the computer monitor at the house in Greenville. That's incredibly sweet, but I bet she broke something while she was up there. That's why she's the EG.

OK, catch you on the flip side. I'm thinking about going for a short trail run tomorrow lunch, and/or the OWS before work. Come on taper.

The Ache

Why does life have to be so awesome when I have no time to blog about it? Or is life so awesome because I take no time to blog? Do we listen to pop music because we are miserable or are we miserable because we listen to pop music? (name that movie) is it better to burn out or to fade away? (Jack Black - same movie)

That means I have a lot more to post about that I have time (or maybe you have interest) to be posted. So here goes nothing and everything at the same time.

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The Ache

Last saturday 10/10 was the 5 mile Ache Around the Lake race. This is still my favorite race of the year. And my favorite distance. 5 miles (8k) is long enough to keep out the people who are scared of a 5k, but not so long that you have to train specifically for it. Plus the location is one loop around Lake Lanier in Tryon NC, about 30 minutes north of Greenville. Local and beautiful, and slightly mountainous without being really killer hills.

I stunk it up this year, but Kelley did great. Last year she took 3rd place ag with a 57+ min time, and I took last place ag (of 6) with a 47 minute time. I thought this year I could pr the distance, but it was not to be. The hip slowed me down some, and I had a real bad stomach cramp from not having enough liquid. I did not run with the Camelbak, only took in the aide station water and could have used a lot more. I finished in 50:24, and Kelley finished right behind me in 51:48. So she beat last year's time by over 6 minutes, and I was 3 minutes slower. It was still a beautiful course, and the people there were so friendly. Coach Katie is the race director for this one along with my friend Scarlette, and I helped them out with the web site last year.
That's me in the middle, blue shorts gray shirt. Stole this pic from facebook, Scarlette posted it.

One of the coolest things about this years race was that they added the 2 mile Ouch run. The first place overall oucher was a 10 year old girl who ran the 2 miles in 15+ minutes barefoot. Holy cow, a 10 year old clocking 7 minute miles? barefoot? You've got to be kidding me. Her dad ran the 5 mile barefoot and finished near the top too.

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Back to Atlanta

Monday I had to make my last trip to atlanta for the old job. Woke up in Greenville, drove 2.5 hours to atlanta. Had the meeting (4 hours), hit the road before 1:30 to head all the way back to raleigh. 7 hours later (over 9 hours total) in the car I arrived at kelley's dad's house (now called home) one tired little coder. Nothing like having to drive 9 hours total for a 4 hour meeting. But it's done and i'm done there. So life is normal again. It rained all day, the whole time, quite heavy at times. So it wasn't exactly the best travelling conditions, but I'm glad it's done.

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POM Wonderful

POM sent me some bottles of their magic juice. I've long recommended pommegranate juice to remedy everything from the common cold to just having a case of the monday's. I swear by the stuff. POM in particular has the most agreeable flavor of any other brand I have tried, and holds up well if you want to dilute it some. With all of this swine flu going around, I'm on a steady stream of 8 oz a day hooked in through an IV if I could get it. Seriously, protect yourself from this H1N1 flu and all of the other common colds people are floating around these days. I'll take my POM wonderful over a flu shot every year. In fact, I have for the last several years. Every year if I get the flu shot, I get sick. If I skip the flu shot and hit the pommegranate juice instead I am fine.

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And back to Raleigh

Have I mentioned lately how much I love this new job? It totally kicks ass. I'm working with some really smart fantastic other coders. It's really nice being back in an office again and being able to make new friends and socialize with other people. I've been regularly getting to go swimming over lunch when something more awesome than swimming doesn't get in the way. I'm loving the new schedule and all the swimming and the new gym. Heading back to the gym for run/bike workouts after work is really working out well too. I'm getting in some serious miles and having some serious fun. Still, I'm living in the land of @Calyx and @Donna and @Carol now and haven't met up with any of those racing chica's yet. Soon enough though. Even @Ryan comes up to raleigh for his kids to race and only lives a couple of hours towards the coast from here. I'm going to setup some time to head out his way and ride some if he ever chooses to come back from Hawaii.

Soon enough? The Beach 2 Battleship half iron is only 19 days away!!!1! Talk about soon enough. I feel like my training is ready for the race, so I'm not really intimidated by the distance anymore. Still, endurance. You have to have a healthy respect for the endurance. No training runs have yet taken me 7 hours to complete, so you never really know what it's like to race for 7 hours until you do one. and I only have 19 days until I figure that out. So I'm nervous (and a little anxious at this point), but not intimidated.

I've been invited to join two open water swim groups, one at Lake Jordan with @carol and one at a different lake in North Raleigh with a guy from the office (who is a multiple ironman finisher). The people are so much nicer here than in SC! I mean it's really night and day. amazing!

What could be more awesome than swimming over lunch? One day the company bought lunch for everyone and we got in some team building. Free lunch? I'm there. Then the next day I took off with a new friend from the office, and there's a group that goes mountain biking every tuesday and thursday. So I strapped on the mountain bike and hit the trails. It was my first time mountain biking since college (wow almost 15 years ago) and Kyle and I took on about 13 miles at a reasonable speed. We hit Umstead State Park which is less than 2 miles from the office, and gave us a helluva good ride. We even hit something called "man up" hill, because you have to really nut up to make it to the top. It was around a 14% grade, and by far the steepest climb in the route. My comparrison was Paris Mountain in Greenville that has an 18% grade, and Man Up hill was not nearly as tough. Kyle, however, still made me look slow. But I'm OK with that. I'll get him on the road bike soon enough to see if he can keep up.

Mountain biking is a totally different ride from road biking, and I had forgotten just how different it was. Kyle is going to train for an XTerra triathlon in may of next year, and he's got me thinking about doing that one with him. But the big, fat, soft tires felt really loose compared to the road bike. It also puts you in a more upright position, and your weight/center of gravity shifts much more than on a road bike. I am going to take some time to get used to the feel before trying more technical single track or something besides these wide hard packed trails. There was a few times on man-up hill and some of the other climbs where my back tire would spin in the dirt, or my front tire came up in the air when my weight was shifted wrong. But overall, my 15 year old mountain bike held up great, the gearing was smooth, and the brakes worked (Thank God). I think I need to replace the front brake pads, they squealed some and kind of "felt" slick. Still, I'm going to really enjoy getting to ride out with Kyle and the other guys on mountain bikes. We did have to ride across a creek once, and around some smallish obstacles. It was a blast and I can't wait for more!

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Family

Tuesday Kelley and the girls came up here to Raleigh and stayed through the weekend. They are all heading back to Greenville tomorrow so Bigun can hit school on tuesday without missing a beat. It's been wonderful having everyone here.

We have the house listed for sale now! So if anyone wants an incredibly reasonable 4/3 2600 sq ft house in Greenville let me know. It takes a little time for the discovery sites to pick up the listing, but slowly it is starting to show up. Kelley chose to vacate the house for this week so that it would be clean and free for the showing, but the listing didn't come in until friday. So it's not going to show while she's out after all.

I hope it sells fast, because she's found tons of houses she wants to buy here in Raleigh. If you're not from the southeast, Raleigh, NC and Greenville, SC are about 4 hours away, 5 hours if you're driving with kids. So it's not a small move. Bigun is already homesick. She calls Greenville "Taco City", and I don't know why. But today all she's talked about is going back to Taco City to see our house and visit Grandma's house (my folks). I'm sure once we make the move and she gets to see her bed and all of her toys in her new house she will feel more at home here. Still, I know the move is going to be tough on them.

We're trying to show off the new city. So yesterday morning we took them to the same Umstead state park that I was biking at for a little hike. They loved it! They loved it so much they didn't want to turn around and hike back to the car. In fact they couldn't keep walking at all and had to be carried back in. I reckon we hiked a couple of miles out and back, and the kids got lunch and crashed like they hadn't napped in days. it was awesome. Kelley and I escaped for some house hunting and shopping.

I picked up a new pair of Mizzuno's finally. I've been alternating between 2 pairs that I got for Christmas last year. They each had less than 200 miles on them. But when you're running on as much weight as I am, I know I won't get 500 miles before a pair of running shoes just feels "flat" and I pick up a new pain. I'm surprised these made it this long. So the new mizzu's are great.

Kelley and I both were shocked at how many trail runners passed us and the kids on our hike. It was in the low 80's in Greenville when I packed up for this trip, so I didn't pack anything with long sleeves. Of course, it's only been hitting the mid 50's now all week long, so I was looking for a light jacket. Instead, we found these:


Trail running shoes!! I got the La Sportiva Crosslite, a Runner's World magazine best buy winner. It was a serious sale, we hadn't seen trail shoes for under about $130 anywhere we had looked, and these were only $60 each! So we jumped and each got a pair. Kelley's all kinds of excited about trail running anyway. These are cool shoes, with huge knobby cleats for gripping a trail. They look great, and have a shield over the laces to keep debris from rubbing inside the shoe. I haven't figured out what to do if I have to replace the laces, that could become tricky. And I felt like a good ol' girl going out shopping and coming home with 3 pairs of shoes and without the jacket that I was originally shopping for. But I am excited to hit the trails. XTerra next year anyone? Anyone? This could get fun.

The only unfortunate (but not really) thing about having Kelley and the girls up here is that I had to miss the Seizures Head Slog Fest again. I missed it once already this year for some other scheduling conflict, and they had it rescheduled for yesterday. 60 miles, including climbing Ceasar's Head, the tallest mountian in SC. 3300 feet of climbing. It was also in the high 30's and sometimes raining, so I might be better off staying here in Raleigh. I heard it was a great ride though. But with all of the flu, and the way I have to travel anyway, and the b2b in 19 days I don't need to risk riding in the rain.

Did I mention that I'm back in Greenville for the next 2 weekends, then it's off to Wilmington for the Beach2Battleship? Wilmington is only about 2 hours away now, and I've got a bunch of friends there. 3 saturday's from now I'm running a half ironman. Time is almost here.

Have a great week! I'm catching up on everyone else's progress, believe me. Between hitting the pool like a madman and settling into this new role or lifestyle, everything seems up in the air. Still, life is great here.

First Day

Wow, it's been almost a week since I've been able to post. HECTIC! I've been everywhere, all over the place. The weekend flew by. Friday I was supposed to finish the old job work projects and be done with it. That got hectic and I didn't finish. Saturday and Sunday we were slamming out home repairs. Kelley has been working her tail off (bless her heart) to get the house ready to list. Cleaning, decluttering, we got a storage unit and moved a bunch of crap into it. Then clean and declutter some more. Then clean some more. Then declutter some more. So now half of the house is clean and ready to go. I had to skip the saturday long run and sunday bike ride to work on the house. It was exhausting!!!

Monday I almost finished the old job stuff. I think I'm abandoning the rest of it, but I might try to finish something when I can. Still, I worked. and cleaned some. and decluttered. and had no training.

Tuesday I packed up for the week and drove to Raleigh. Got all the paperwork filled out so I was actually an employee again. Went and checked out a house that looks promising. Planned my commute from Mickey's house (kelley's dad - staying with him until the fam can move up), and rode around town some just to get myself oriented. I don't know all of the back roads yet, heck I don't even know where most things are. But I know where the major roads are now, and how to get back to Mickey's from there.

I also joined up with Gold's Gym here. They have 5 locations including one that's really close to the office. And that one has a pool! So the plan is to cut over there for lunch and swim (Thank God), then head back after work for the run/bike workouts as normal. And the membership is good with all 5 locations, so wherever we end up buying a house at there is one near there. Going to have to get all of the workouts in while I'm here; when I'm back in Greenville I want to spend that time with Kelley and the kids. It's only been one night and I already miss my girls something fierce!

I never really thought Greenville was lacking in anything. It's not really a small town, there's over 1 million people there. You can get anything you want, get anywhere you want to go. Raleigh has 1.1 million people. But there are 3 major universities here (NC State, Duke, UNC) within a 12 mile radius, and Raleigh is the state capital. The ultra-conservatives in SC - which is 90% of the genpop - hates paying taxes. Now I can see why. They don't see any real benefit. Greenville county has one public access indoor pool. It's open from 9 am to 11 am 5 days a week. I've been paying taxes to support a pool that's only open for 2 hours a day while I'm at work? Gimme a break. The city of Raleigh has four public access pools open from 5 am to 10 pm 7 days a week. Pools might be just one example, but the NC government actually does something! Something that people can see and use! It's amazing. It really is a night and day difference that I am quickly developing a real appreciation for.

So last night I got in my first workout at Gold's after checking out a house and getting some dinner. Did 3 miles on the treadmill at a decent pace. Hip is still kind of tight. This pain has been going on long enough to make me concerned. But whatever, I'll just deal with it.

Today was my first day on the new job, stiff hip and all. First, I sat in on a meeting which was a great introduction to the product I was going to be working on. Felt great about the environment and the people. Then I got to look at the code behind the project, and it looked like spaghetti. And it was primarily built on two pieces of technology that I have never used before. Immediately I felt overwhelmed with the learning curve I was currently at the bottom of. But I remembered that they hired me out of hundreds of other applicants because I am capable of learning this technique, not because I already knew it. This new stuff is only about 10% of the total job, so I have to keep that in perspective. They only hire the best, I only get to work with the best. As long as I can keep my confidence up the gaps will all be filled in soon enough. Still, today started out great and ended up giving me a bad stress headache. Hey if it was easy then anyone could do it. At least my co-workers are really fantastic people.

Then I went back to Gold's for another workout after work. Wanted to get some time on the bike, and I walked in right as a spin class was starting so I jumped in. Turned out to be a fun class. Maybe not as many miles as I would have clocked by myself, but it was at least more fun.

So tomorrow I'm going to try the lunchtime swim, followed by some elliptical time after work. Might have to skip the gym after work to pick up supplies for the new living/work situation. Need some web cams for the fam, a new pillow for the bed here, and to meet with a realtor about the house I drove past yesterday.

But to summarize, Raleigh is awesome, the new job is killer but really tough, and I'm loving the new gym. Y'all have a great day!

Brick!

With actual running! The hip has been feeling good lately. Thought I would give her a spin. I missed wednesday night's bike ride thanks to work so I bricked it last night. 10 miles on the bike in 29 minutes, then 3 miles on the treadmill in 29 minutes.

I started the run slow to really check my form, then added speed as it felt comfortable. It's been almost a month since I've felt ok running, so I was pretty cautious going in. Got the speed up to 6.2 and held it there. Now a month ago, I did 10 miles at 6.8 speed (1 min/mile faster), so this was pretty conservative. About 2.8 miles in I felt the hip starting to tighten up a bit, and I didn't want to push it. Today I can feel the inflamation in my hip flexor, but I iced it and it's fine. So I still have to do more PT movements, but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. It's good to get some confidence back in my running.

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Work

Today is my last day working full time at this old job. I'm going to stay on board for a while contracting at night going forward as needed. And I still have one trip left to Atlanta to hand over control of my projects to the boss. But overall I am not sad to leave this one behind.

Working from home has been great. You get to somewhat set your schedule, control your hours, and work at your own pace uninterrupted. I typically stay in pajamas until at least noon, then I do actually shower and get dressed every day. No office attire, no shoes needed, and other people can come by if they want to interrupt you. Kelley can leave the baby monitors with me while she does errands during naptime without having to haul the kids with her (that may be the biggest benefit of work-from-home - a happy wife). I get to see the kids whenever I can walk back upstairs. With no daily commute, I don't need a car or cell phone. I never have to go anywhere. Walk downstairs to work, walk upstairs for dinner at the end of the day. Blog and bill my hours back, everything gets tracked and paid up. I keep a tv in my office, and watch soaps and movies and talk shows and sports every day. It is background noise. In an office you hear the phone ring sometimes, and other people talking to each other. I have to reproduce that through tv.

Working from home can suck too. I only have one phone number here, so any client or office person can call me at any time day or night and I'm always here. One client called at 8 pm one saturday, when I had the girls in the bathtub. They were screaming loud and he was trying to talk about an access database project. I told him I was tied up with two naked wet chicks at the moment, and he kept talking. Sometimes work keeps you going well into the night. If I could have left the office and gone home at 5:30 on wednesday I would have, but this web site had to go live so I worked clear through until after 8 pm (started working at 6 that morning) and ate a cold dinner. So when you work from home and you never leave you are always at the office! Some weeks it gets really bad. I will literally go from sunday night until thursday night without stepping through the outside doors of the house. I work until kelley puts dinner on the table (God bless her), then it's time to get the kids in the bath and in bed for the night around 8:30 pm, then I can go to the gym. If I don't have to go back downstairs and finish something before xx comes back into the office the next morning. That's one reason I hit the stationary bike and treadmill/elliptical so often, I have to wait until late at night before I can leave the house. If I am able to get away then and feel up to a workout that late at night. There is no "swing by the gym after work" if there is no commute home from work.

So now I have to buy or borrow a car. I think I can borrow for at least the first few weeks. Monday at the latest I'm going to the verizon store to get a cell phone with a Raleigh (919) phone number. Yesterday I got estimates to replace the broken down furnace ($2500) and hire the movers ($4500) to get all of our stuff up to the new house in Raleigh. We haven't found the new house yet. This weekend will be final prep for listings like landscaping, interior paint touch ups, and start packing up boxes. Monday I might have to do some work for the old job still, but tuesday is travel & paperwork day, and wednesday I start the new job. This is incredibly exciting for me.

My current boss says that he wants to hire someone to replace me. I have my doubts if he actually will, he did my job himself. So if you want to work from home (or in atlanta) as a programmer and write vb.net, classic asp, transact-sql, css, html, javascript, and can work on access and sql server databases, call or email me and i'll put you in touch with the guy.

My new job is just building vb.net web sites over sql server databases in a closed envorinment. It's a software company, they build software and sell it to agriculture businesses like farmers and grocery stores. Management loved that I keep the organic garden every summer. About 2/3 of the employees are developers like me. They also need to hire one more developer just like me. They are only considering people who already have a place to live in Raleigh, and they only hire the best developers in the area. My job was open for over a month. There are so many people out of work in Raleigh that most jobs are filled within an hour and they don't have to hire people from out of state. I only got in the door by putting kelley's dad's address on my resume. But since I am going to live with her dad until we buy a house up there, it's a legal move. Still, they interviewed dozens of people, and only offered the job to me. Robert Half technology got me in there, so let me know if you're interested in that and I can put you in touch with my guy at RHI. This is an awesome gig, an incredibly desirable company to work for. They only hire the best, so I will only be working with the best.

Before I had this work from home job, I was self employed. All of my friends went away then, I only socialized with clients and employees, and I worked 14 hours a day, 6 days a week. AAI was a client then, they subcontracted their software development to me. Then 2 years ago I wanted to sell the busienss and become an employee again, and they had a standing offer on the table. We had to negotiate pay and that was it. This was just over 2 years ago. I took a 60% pay cut to work from home. It hasn't been easy only earning 40% of what I used to, but we still got by. And it was worth it. I was able to stop smoking, start running triathlons, and spend time with my kids. But the social depravation has taken its toll. I'm ready to make new friends, set regular hours, learn a new city, and reconnect with all of my old college friends that live there now. The new gig has a significant pay raise to about 75% of my self-employed pay. Leaving my own business went so badly that I have been paralyzed by the thought of change for the last few years. Now that the plan is being executed I am feeling confident that I am making the right change for my family. Of course, nobody else wants to admit that and they are still trying to talk me into staying in Greenville. I hate to upset the balance of my extended family, my mother says to ignore her if she starts crying. But I have to do what's best for my family and my kids.

OK, now this has become a long, honest, emotional post and I'm just rambling. But you probably didn't read this far down, did you Glaven? [he posted the same question earlier in the week] Good luck to Nic, he's trying to break 3 hours in the Twin Cities marathon after missing it by only 7 seconds a few weeks ago! Also sunday is the Milwaukee Marathon that Gazelle and Havs are both running. Good luck to you guys! The SC Half Ironman is also on sunday, but I'm not sure I know anyone running it this year. Coach Katie will be there with her athletes though. Have a great weekend!

Wowza

September

is over. It went out with a cannon blast. Actually, my furnace blew out like someone shot it with a cannon. The gas man said it is going to have to be replaced, so I called my HVAC guy for an estimate and he thinks he can repair it. Repair man is coming today, if he can't fix it we're in trouble. It finally got cold enough here yesterday for me to turn on the heat. Hopefully next week we will be listing this house for sale, so of course the furnace now needs to be replaced. At least we'll be able to advertise the house with a new roof, new paint job, and new furnace. This is the way it goes I guess.

The bike shop called too many times yesterday. Turns out the broken spoke from Saturday's tour ride meant I will have to replace the entire wheelset. It seems strange to me to put $250 wheels on a $500 bike, the frame is supposed to be the most expensive element. But that was the cheapest wheelset they had, a Mavic set sized for that bike. The plan is to sell that bike sometime in December/January and actually buy a nice bike. You see the pattern here? I want to sell something and it breaks.

This continued in everything yesterday. I had several big work things to knock out yesterday, including publishing a major software upgrade and new design for www.cookswarehouse.com. So I ended up working about 14 hours yesterday. But tomorrow (Friday) is my last day on this job, so it had to be done. So the end of September also brought several meat punches from the job.

In training, I hit the elliptical tuesday night (5 miles in 36 minutes - fast!), and missed last night's bike ride. Here's how the monthly totals ended up:

Swim: 0 crap
Bike: 273 miles (1 tour) sweet!
Run: 50.1 miles - not bad, most of those are elliptical miles
Strength: 7.6 hours right on target
Yoga: 4.5 hours right on target

So no swimming blows. And dealing with a hip injury sucks. But I'm loving 273 miles on the bike, that rocks!

October

is my favorite month of the year. This is documented from last year. NHL hockey starts today with regular season games. ROCK ON! Tomorrow is my last day at this old job. This weekend we're lining up some babysitting help to get the house ready to list for sale. Tuesday I head to Raleigh, and Wendesday I start the new job. With the move to Raleigh, there are more gym options, so I will actually be able to join a gym with a pool. I plan to find this gym before going up there. The search is on.

Baseball is in it's final week. Chances are good that I am going to win my fantasy league. My beloved Mets ended up with the second highest payroll and the seventh worst record in the league. But I love the baseball playoffs. I hope the Rockies and Twins can pull out playoff spots. And football is getting into full swing. Conference matchups and rivalries really heat up in October. For a sports fan like me, this is gold.

My hip is feeling ok just walking around. Still doing PT work and tons of biking, but October should bring a return to running. I'm going to spring for some new shoes, and meet up with Coach Katie over the weekend for some form help. I think that will put the final stamp on this stupid thing.

October also has two races for me, the Ache Around the Lake 8k running race a week from saturday. Kelley took 3rd place in her age group in this one last year. This is one of my favorite races, as Coach Katie is the race director. and it's a beautiful course around Lake Lanier. Then the following Saturday 10/17 is the 60 mile bike ride up Ceasar's Head. It will be my first time climbing that mountain, which some think is the toughest in SC. I also have one other 60 mile ride on the schedule before B2B which is only in 36 days!!

October rules!! Fall is here!! Consider yourself warned.

Le Tour

Thanks for all the well-wishes for the new job. I am really looking forward to getting back amongst the living. It's going to be a tough and strange transition. But we will take it one week at a time and do anything needed to make it all work out. It's tough to sell a house in the wintertime. I still need to get rid of the mountain house. We have another rental property here in Greenville that I'm on the fence about. It's had the same good tenants for the last 4 years, and there's no real reason to sell it. But we could roll that equity into the new house in Raleigh.

I'm going to have to get a car and a cell phone too. It's been fantastic (the last 18 months) not having to pay for insurance, extra gas, and having a second car in the garage. Or paying for the second cell phone line. But I guess it has to be done now.

I'm also so glad I didn't settle for less than the best opportunity. So many times if you are out of work you will take the first thing that comes along. This was the first time I had the luxury to hold out. I write vb.net, and C# is a competing language that I also write some. I turned down a fantastic salary several months ago because it was a C# job in the wrong city. I was very dissapointed last month when I didn't get a C# job that paid $15k less than this one does. But I know this is the right environment, the right languages, the right salaray, the right location. And I have to embrace that fact as I listen to my family try to bribe me to stay in Greenville. Or at least keep the kids here.

---------------------------------------------------
I tried running again last night without success. After 3 steps it was back to the limpy gimpy form with hip pain. So weird. So I hopped over to the elliptical and knocked out 6 miles, mostly during halftime of the USC/Ole Miss game. It felt good. I'm done complaining about the hip though.

Today it is supposed to be 85 and cloudy here in Greenville. Tomorrow it is supposed to be 70 and raining. Then Sunday it goes back to 82 with a chance of rain.

Good thing the Tour de Peach is tomorrow.

I'm looking forward to the ride, really. It will be my first time trying 60 miles, which I'm going to do a few more times before the B2B. The route starts at an office complex in Spartanburg and goes up to Gaffney (home of the Giant Peach water tower) and back in a big loop. There's no serious climbs, just a bunch of rollers. So IF the rain holds off until the afternoon it should be a great ride. I'm going to try and bring the small camera with me and take some pictures. It should be a good litmus test for the B2B bike leg. If I can cover 60 miles of rolling hills in a decent time/speed, then I will know how much I can push the flat course at the half ironman.

So I'm looking forward to a fun weekend, and I'm so glad it's friday. Good luck if you're running Ironman 70.3 Augusta this weekend! I'll be tracking.