ABD

Yesterday, I was asked if Eric and I went out to celebrate since I passed my prelim exam. And of course we didn't, maybe because I feel like I really am nowhere near being done. Then she said, but you are ABD (all but dissertation or all but defense). And I guess that is pretty big. I didn't realize I technically could now apply for jobs and be ABD. That is kind of cool. I was telling Eric and last night with dinner he opened up some wine-very sweet of him.

I guess my weekend trip can be my celebration-as I have been looking forward to this for quite some time. I will get to see all of my friends I haven't seen in a while over the long weekend. I know this will be a great weekend!

1 Down and 1 to Go

I gave my prelim (oral exam) today. Actually, about an hour ago. Things went well and I passed. I didn't get asked nearly as many questions as I thought I would, so that is good. I managed to stay relatively calm. I was pretty nervous all morning and stressed out but after I got started it wasn't too bad. I think I talked to fast-typical of me-but Stitz said it was fine, and as long as no one had questions then I wasn't going that fast.

Now all I have left is my other talk at Arkansas on Friday. I keep thinking that that one won't make me as nervous, but then I will be talking in front of all my previous faculty. And this is kind of like a pitch for a possible job in a year so it does matter quite a bit. Hopefully, I can pull myself together for that one and give a great talk there.

Isn't it supposed to be warm here

I am so ready for warmer weather. We had great weather a couple weeks ago (thank god for the race day weather), but since then it has just been back to cold weather. Maybe it is cold since we had a mild Januardy and Feb, really not any snow or ice which is pretty rare. But Eric and I are both warm weather people and we can't wait for it to get nice a toasty. Yesterday we went up to the pool to swim and it turned out to be closed...oh well. Instead we went to the park and ran-5 miles for me. But it was probably the most miserable run I have had. I tend to run on the treadmill if it is raining. But yesterday in the middle of my run it started to rain-a cold rain-like a sleet, and it was windy so it was just blowing into my face. Argg...it sucked. As so as my run was over, low and behold the sun is out and shining brightly. Could we have not chosen a better time.

We were going to ride today-but it just isn't warm enough for me any more-50 and windy (so really like 45) just is not fun. I will have to suck it up and get on the trainer again for the third time this week. Tomorrow it is finally supposed to start warming up again so hopefully I will get a ride outside in before I go on vacation Thursday. And hopefully the weather will not turn back to the chilly side again and we will finally have our constant 60's/70's and soon 80's! Yeah! Eric and I decided we are moving to San Diego (even though the traffic will most likely kill me, since it definitely is not the country)-then we can never complain about the weather. :)

Can we live in the Country...I mean way out in the Country

While Eric and I already live in the semi-country out in Apex, it is starting to become more and more like urban city all the time. This morning I left extra early (6:40am) to go to school as I wanted to go to the gym and workout a bit. Typically when I leave this early traffic is heavy but not stopped. However, the days that I leave at 7, traffic has started to become stopped a bit, but still managable. Leaving anywhere between 7:30 and 8:30 just makes me mad and frustrated.

This morning however was a different story. On my way, somehow just past where the exit I can get off to take the long round about way to get to school, traffice is stopped. And not stop and crawl but stopped. What in the world is going on...the news had said everything was fine. 10 minutes later while still stopped and not moving, I hear a 3 car crash has happened up ahead (a couple miles) and is blocking the lanes. Seriously, worse timing, had I left 5 min earlier, I would have missed it, had I left 5 min later I would have been able to exit and cut through town. It would be ok if there was room to get around, however since they are doing construction, there are no shoulder areas. Oh lovely.

Overall it takes me an hour to get to school, which normally takes maybe 25 minutes tops. Sucks. I get so mad because people here can't drive. How come in big cities people pull off the road so they don't block traffic, but here, we don't do that. The other week I drove home and there were 3 accidents within a quarter mile span, but since again there are no shoulders, the rest of traffic converges into one lane and passes one accident then everyone gets in the other lane to pass the next accident.

I can't stand traffic. There is no way I will survive in a city bigger than this. I want to live in the country. I don't need any of this.

Dig Deep

So this past weekend, Eric and I went to VB to watch the sis complete her first (and only ever) marathon. She has been training all winter up in Michigan which is crazy to begin with. She did most of her long runs-17 and 18 miles on a treadmill. Just the fact that she can run for 3 hours on a treadmill says something about her mental strength. We spent Saturday with her and her hubby just hanging out and went to dinner and watching a little bball. Sunday morning E took her down and watched the start and then came back and the three of us went down for our trek of seeing how many times we could see her go by.

We drove down to where we thought was mile 6 and mile 8 so we could see her go by twice. However, we were not where we thought we were and were actually at mile 2 or 3. So we had missed everyone go by. But we did not realize it...we walked around aimlessly wondering where we were and what we were suppose to do. We ended up walking up to the finish (of the half marathon) and realized we were not at all close to her. Then we see the lead men run by a street over. So we head that way and start walking in the direction they are all coming from so eventually we will see my sister.

Meanwhile, as we are watching the fastest people, female #2 runs by and Eric and I look at eachother and say she looks familiar, like one of our friends from AR. Very strange, as I had a dream about them the night before. We keep walking another mile or so and decide to stop and wait. Sooner or later here she comes right with her 4 hour pacegroup looking good. She hands off her long sleeve shirt to us and keeps running. So we walk back to the car and start drving to go see her again.

We are following this road north and we come to a place where we can hop out and watch the race again, so we stop and watch the runners pass by. Not a minute after we arrived my sister runs by again...wooo hooo, wow we just barely made it!! So we get back inthe car and keep driving but find out we can't seem to get north. We spend a while trying to figure out how to get around this lake/bay, and finally make it around to the northern most part of the race-about mile 17/18. We get out and wait about 10 minutes and she runs by and says she is starting to get tired and breakdown and is ready for me to run with her.

We drive a little further down and walk up the road about 1 mile-and I keep going until I catch up with her, around mile 21 1/2 and start running with her. She is in some serious pain, her foot hurts real bad and she has kind of fallen off the 4:00 pace people. We talk a little bit and I try to encourage her, that she is doing awesome, and she is passing all these people that had been in front of her at other stops. She tells me we aren't stopping at any more aid stations as she is in a lot of pain and doesn't think she can get going again. The wind is at our back here which is nice so we don't get that added frustration of feeling like it is harder. I time our mile 22 to 23 and see 9:40, she is over 4 hour pace but she had a little cushion so we are ok. Our next mile is 10 minutes and she is starting to slow pretty bad. We pass a clock and see that we have to run a little faster than 10 minute pace to break 4 hours. I tell her that she didn't come all this way to just miss it and we start playing little games. Like lets just catch that guy in front of us, or lets just go 10 blocks, that is not that far. She starts to pick up the pace as she realized how close she is going to be.

We start haulin-and I can't believe she has got that energy in her. We keep passing people left and right and she just digs deep and puts it all on the line and runs as fast as she can the last mile to mile and a half. We cross the finish line and she shows me her watch- 3:59.31!!! Way to go! I am so proud of you! You are absolutely amazing. From the training on the treadmill to the deadication those last miles, you are my hero. She vows she will never do a marathon again and can't hardly walk. We all help her and she goes and drinks a beer. We take some pictures and then head back to the hotel.

We went to a nice rest on the beach for some good seafood and then say our goodbyes and head home. I felt like I had run a marathon on the way home-even though it had only been like 4 1/2 miles and a few miles of walking, so it was nice to get home. Great to see you guys and great job!! You are one tough cookie!!!

Oh-and that was our friend we saw running. She finished 3rd female overall!

It's Madness up in here!

I am so excited and so sad at the same time. It is finally march madness and all the fun college bball, but in just a couple weeks more there will be no more college sports (on tv) anymore until fall football season starts up. So the weeks will no longer be filled with exciting yet lazy sport watching. Then again, I have taken up watching Nascar...and that is even more lazy tv watching on the weekends.

I decided today to do a longer brick. Mainly just because I need to ride and run more so why not just put them together and do it all at the same time. My "long" ride wasn't all that long, just 25 miles, but it was windy (again) today and so it felt longer and harder than it should have. My run wasn't all that long either-just 3.5 miles and it was super slow, just glad that it was over. I have a nice easy day tomorrow of just swimming before head up to VB to watch big sis run her marathon Sunday morning.

No green beer today for me, but Happy St. Pattys anyway!

I miss my friends :(

Do you ever have a friend that you desperately feel is trying to avoid you??? Maybe she just doesn't want to be my friend anymore. But I do miss her and I wonder if I will ever hear her laugh (OVER THE PHONE) again. I mean I am going to see her in a couple weeks when I go to Arkansas-and I am even staying with her. But I feel that after you make an effort of calling someone oh about 10 times and bugging them and getting perhaps one return call-which I missed-then it makes you start to wonder...Does Corey still love me? :(

Do you want to look like Cindy Crawford??

I got a funny email from one of my friends that lives out in San Fran. Below is the email to give all of you some much needed insight on how you too can look like Cindy!


"so, this morning i woke up really early, earlier than i wanted to.considering it has been freezing up here, i was warm in bed and (for once)had 5 minutes to spare. i turned on the television because i was in thatweak state of not-quite-awake. this is where everything went wrong...somehow the channel was on an infomercial for some skin care line by cindycrawford. and in that brief 5 minutes, cindy and her french doctor managedto convince me that they were the key to preventing signs of aging. that inot only could but WOULD look like cindy crawford at 40 if i started usingthis stuff now. and then... they took off another 10 dollars off if icalled in the next 5 minutes!you guys, it was awful. i couldn't change the channel - i was spellbound.what has happened to me? lesson learned -- just say no to infomercials,they are evil.but, just in case i do start to look like cindy crawford, i will be sure tolet you all know...."

Trish-you crack me up!

Is Lost trying to tortue the world??

Why does Lost always seem to be repeats and then like once a month they show a new episode, it just doesn't make any sense. The more they do this the more I just don't even want to watch it any more. And I really wish they would just stop hitting the stupid button. :) I really have no desire to follow american idol anymore so that leaves me with sitting at home and doing nothing...or sitting at home and doing work...but that never happens when I get home if Eric is there. We just get too lazy and end up watching pointless crap (or Eric likes all the Discovery Channel stuff) or we play mario kart for a could couple hours. How intellectual right!

My back is getting better but I chose not to swim yesterday and today, but hopefully will be ok by tomorrow when I swim with Kate. It feels a little worse that it did yesterday...could it be that I decided instead to run almost 4 miles-since of course that would be better right?? :) I am determined to get my stuff together on this run thing so I can at least not embarrass myself at the next race-since I did choose to race elite this year...what in the world was I thinking! On my schedual was to ride today but it is a crazy windy today and not the warmest of days (especially with the wind) so i will probably end up on the trainer again-hopefully I can make it through an hour but we'll see.

My Back! My Back!

Yesterday Eric and I went for an easy 25 mile (really 23 mile) ride. About two thirds of the way through we were coming to a stop sign so I slowed down then to pick up some speed across the road I stood up on my bike to create some power and felt this horrible pain go down my back. Don't know what I did but I couldn't bend over for the rest of the day. I was walking around like I was pregnant! Eric was quite amused. I don't know if I have ever hurt so bad just lying on the couch. I took 3 advil and went to sleep and this morning it feels a bit better. Not agonizing anymore, just painful. It rules out my wanting to swim today, but I made Eric put my bike on the trainer so I can ride for like an hour this evening. I know, I know, I probably shouldn't ride at all, but if I just sit and spin for a little bit and not bend over I will be ok. :)

Superwoman

They finally posted the race results from yesterday and I notice the girl who won (who passed me-and she started a good 6-7 minutes behind me) is from Colorado. Who comes all the way to Charlotte to do a race from CO?? So naturally I google her...and she is superwoman. No kidding. Not only is this woman a professional triathlete (why the hell did she not race elite, or for that matter race in a small NC race), but she is a mother of two and an ER doctor. Holy cow. When does she sleep? Other than her, I was only 3 minutes back from second, which isn't terrible. Not one of my finest, but I am happy with my swim and bike. Just need to get that run back together and I should be good. If only I could be superwoman...according to Eric I just need 10 more years and a couple kids!

Hello Newman

Friday night Eric and I went to see Jerry Seinfeld. The tickets were quite expensive, but I can honestly say it was well worth it. I have never laughed so hard for so long for an extended period of time. At one point I was laughing so hard I was crying. He has got to be one of the best comedians there are. He had an opening act that was also really good, who talked for about 15 minutes and then Jerry was on stage for about an hour. Definitely well worth it.

After the show we head to Charlotte for our race Saturday morning. Of course they had almost all of 40 shut down that evening so the drive took maybe 20 minutes more than it was supposed to which was not great but what can you do. I didn't sleep well that night, maybe got 3 hours of sleep. I just couldn't get comfortable and our air conditioner in the hotel every 30 minutes would make this horrible noise. We got up Saturday morning and head to the race. The weather turned out to be great as it was warm enough to not have to wear more than my suit. My race went well for the first 2/3 and then I just lost it on the run. You can read my race report at http://www.elitetriangletriteam.org/scgi-bin/forum/Blah.pl?m-1142112602/

I am pretty sore today, as I usually am the day after a race. The weather is suppose to be beautiful today so Eric and I are going to go on an easy 25 mile ride and maybe do something later outside like go to the driving range. Then back to school tomorrow.

These Pretzels are making me Thirsty!

So for Christmas I gave my husband tickets (for us) to go see Jerry Seinfeld perform. Then I didn't realize that this show is the night before our first triathlon. No worries...maybe it will relaxs us enough! Or maybe it will make the drive to Charlotte after the show go quicker since we will probably be talking about it. I am sure it will be fun and I am sure Eric will enjoy it...since Seinfeld is his favorite show ever.

It is pretty windy today and I went and road this morning-nice a short-only 8 miles. But the wind was crazy going out, I wanted to turn around so bad. I was in my easiest gear and having to push hard going down hill...that is never good. But once I turned around the ride back was so nice, just great spinning since the wind was at my back. It is supposed to be calm tomorrow morning but possible storms. I think I would rather ride through rain than wind, but that is just me.

Legs

I am getting ready for my race this weekend and I was going to go for a ride today but my legs are pretty tired. I took some time off not too long ago because I was unmotivated and now that I am back in the swing of things I have tired out my legs pretty good. I am hoping that by not riding/running today and going very very easy tomorrow-I will be in good shape for Saturday morning. I just swam today-most of my workout went well, I felt good and everything. Then I go to do a simple main set that isn't too long or hard and I feel like crap. Don't know what it is, but I am hoping that by Saturday I will be feeling great. I think I might go home and take a nice bath to loosen up my legs and back...I really think that might help.

Hotel??

So as my husband and I were sitting here, I thought about where we had a hotel reservation for this Friday night and I had no clue, neither did he. Wow aren't we a smart bunch to make some reservations and not write anything down! So began the search on the internet maybe to find the hotel...and my husband suggests looking up our credit card statement and we finally find it-or at least the name of the hotel so we can at least look it up and then call them to make sure we have a room. Guess we'll remember from now to write it down. :)

Spring Break

So I am on spring break this week and figured I would get a lot of work done. But really I just don't feel like doing anything at all. I guess it is ok-everyone can use a break every now and then. I don't want to overstress myself this week anyway because my first race of the year is this Saturday too. I am a bit nervous about it-I am not as prepared as I wanted to be but we'll see. I had ordered a bike back in late December and was hoping it would come in before this race, and I was told it it might be here this Thursday or Friday. I am hoping it comes in Thursday and I have a chance to ride it a couple times and see if I feel good on it. I know this bike is faster than my bike and it would definitely help me out. Well, well see.

Suprisingly, I have a busy day today without actually doing anything. I have physical therapy this morning and then am meeting my friend to swim. I have to run some errands and then I have to clean a little since my dad is coming in today around 5. So once again, won't get any work actually done, but I still have the rest of the week to work!

Long Day

So for those of you who don't know, I am trying to become a somewhat decent triathlete. I am part of a new local team that just formed last year and this will be our first year as a "team." The link is on my links. Yesterday, we threw our only fundraising event-we brought in a couple professional triathletes and did an all day thing... Ride/run in the morning, lunch at Stonewood, then clinics all afternoon. I was so tired by the end of the day-but I think it turned out very well. I was stuck for most of the afternoon in the endless pool analyzing swim strokes, so I didn't get to see what really went on. All I know is that I was happy to be done-I got home and just wanted to go to bed. Instead-we were going to hang out with some friends to watch the crazy Duke/UNC game. And what a great game...JCongrats to UNC...but what is with the UNC folks...is breaking windows on Franklin street and vandilizing downtown celebrating?? And the whole building the bonfire and seeing if you can make it across without burning yourself...just doesn't make sense...maybe I am just to old to understand.

Here we go

So I decided that maybe it would be nice to start a blog...why not, everyone else has one! :) But I really just thought it would be a cool way for my friends and family to see what was going on...and for me as a journal that will be here on the web. I have a feeling that if I write all the stuff down that I tell my husband every day-then maybe he won't get sick of me telling all my random stories!