50 blogs

I thought this past weekend I'd change up my triathlon training a little bit.  Instead of combining two of the events together into a "brick", I decided I'd go for a regular longer ride Saturday, and a longer swim on Sunday.

So Saturday morning, I'm awakened by my darling, starving cat.  She starts her job "as the speaking clock" at about 4:15am.  This means, "Meow!" (It's 4:15). "Meow!" (Now it's 4:30).  And so on.  She also knocks my phone off my nightstand.  And walks on my head.  And licks my nose.  It's actually quite adorable.  And nips on my fingers.  Until I can't stand it anymore and at 5:05am I get up, feed her some kibble, put my sleep mask on, drink a glass of water (I may or may not have had a little too much to drink the night before), and go back to bed til about 7:45.

I then get all my bike gear out, padded shorts and all, and head out on my 30.5 mile ride.  It's a lovely day.  Warm, not too crowded, and I only have some slightly gross heartburn and don't feel too hungover.  And I'm only about 6 minutes slower than usual, which isn't too bad considering it'd been 6 weeks since I'd gone that far.  But, to my displeasure, this is the first time I've noticed my saddle, er, rubbing me the wrong way. 

I will admit to these things: 1) I rolled my bike shorts up to both get that nasty sticky silicone gripping stuff off my bare skin (I can't freaking stand it) and to allow the best possible tan line one could get in bike shorts, and 2) my seat post may have started to slide down because my left knee started to hurt for the first time in many many months on this ride.  And because Badger has brought this notion to mind.  So it could have been either or neither of these reasons that caused these really uncomfortable welts I ended up with in my personal space.

So, swallowing most of my pride and determined to maintain at least some dignity, I headed to Bicycle Village to get some chamois cream.  I can't find it, and I'm way too embarrassed to ask, so I wandered forever til I found one tube, and another little doo-dad of something else.  Then I kind of hovered, waiting until I could find a girl there to ask about it, and she doesn't know, so she's like, "You can ask any of those guys", gesturing to like, six of them standing together in a group by the front counter.  My shoulders slump.  Oh sure, like I'm gonna waltz over with this tube of Chamois Butt'r and a stick of Body Glide and ask, "Hey boys, which chamois cream do you think will best protect my princess pea from my saddle?" So I told her that I was hoping for a girls perspective. She takes me over to the only other girl working there, who is surrounded by other customers. She literally asked me, "What are you going to use it for?" I'm thinking, there's more than one use for ass ointment? I just want to know if it's got menthol and is going to burn...sigh.  So my response of raising one eyebrow then opening my mouth, but remaining speechless, prompted her to just say "Chamois Butt'r".  Thanks.

And my triathlon bikinis arrived in the mail last week.  I tried on the small and the medium each about a million times, and couldn't decide which one to pick.  I finally got on the phone with "team estrogen", talked with a girl there who had just finished a triathlon in one, and she helped me pick the small.  And it doesn't even say "S" on the inside. 

I headed to the pool on Sunday (after sleeping in and magically healing from Tylenol PM), again getting there early, and have a chance to ask that woman if she was able to pill her cat.  She wasn't, but she thanked me for asking, and said she was glad to be at the pool to get some of her nervous energy out.  I was also glad to be at the pool, because I had set a goal of swimming non-stop for 1600 meters, or one mile.

Me and my snazzy new red suit, stopping to soak my hair in the shower, plunked into a lane, strapped on my new shaded goggles, and set off.  I swam breaststroke the entire way, and didn't ever have to stop to catch my breath.  I made it 1000m in about 26 minutes, which was 6 minutes faster than my previous 1000m swim.  And just kept going, back and forth, 32 times. 

I had enough time each lap to tell myself.  "That was 50 meters.  When I finish this distance, it will be 100 meters."  And so on.  Until I said, "That was 1550 meters.  When I finish this distance, I will have swam 1600 meters.  I will have swam a mile without stopping.  I am a total bad ass.  Look at me rock this pool."  And so on.