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.