In Which I Set Another Crazy-Assed Goal.

I haven't written in a few days mostly because I've been really bummed out and depressed. It feels like forever since I've run, and I realized that now it's been about 4 months. Nothing is getting better, so f##k it. I'm going to go run. If nothing is getting better by not running, then I might as well run, right?

And then last Thursday, I was stretching - that's it, just sitting in a chair observing a neuropsych evaluation, and I did a standard old "Ooo, I'm sleepy" kind of stretch, and I heard a noise that was kind of between a crunch and a squish. And then I couldn't turn my head. WTF?

It started feeling better, this very serious crick in my neck, by the weekend and then Monday morning I opened my eyes, yawned, stretched, and I did it again. OW. No lifting. Can't run. Ice made it feel far, far worse. The only thing that made me feel good was valerian and Advil and a nice dose of leaving it the hell alone.

Of course, bad IT band+bad neck=depressed. Hey, does anyone make a sports drink with Prozac in it?

More importantly, is this what getting old is? Because getting old. Sucks.

So, the neck thing, though, it's slowly going away. What happened was, my traps get really super tight when I'm stressed, and I've been a bit so lately, and I stretched my traps too hard by raising my arms and stretching hard. But it's better, a bit. Tomorrow, I go back to power walking and maybe some light lifting.

Sunday morning, I'm going to run. Don't care how much Advil it takes.

Meanwhile, I was thinking I need something to keep me going. So, now I've got this crazy-assed goal,

I was going to make it my secret goal, but now I'll say it out loud because that helps me be accountable:

I want to do the quad next year.

"The Quad" is the Mt. Taylor Quadrathlon: a crazy-assed race in Grants, New Mexico. It's a 13 mile bike, 5 mile run, 2 miles cross-country ski, and then 1 mile snow shoe out, and then the whole thing back, in reverse.

Hmm. that doesn't sound bad, for an IronChick, you might say. So, you're covering 44 miles Why, that's not even a half iron. There's not even any swimming. What's the big deal?

Um, did I mention that it's up to the top of Mt. Taylor and back down? See, the bike climbs 1800 feet, the run climbs 1200 feet, the ski climbs 1200 feet, and the snowshoe climbs 600 feet.

I climbed Mt. Taylor with Sweet Baboo once. It took me hours and hours and hours. And hours. No--hours. Most of the day, on foot, carrying very little, in the summer. He followed patiently and tolerating my sweating, swearing, crying and whining - this was in 2003, I think, before I became a multisport idiot fiend.

Um, Okay. Now this is just sounding nuts. I'm starting to scare myself. Wait. How do you climb up 1200 feet over 2 miles on skiis?

I had this insane notion that maybe I'm more focused when I have some sort of crazy goal like this. Crazy-assed goals motivate me. I'm too stubborn to back down from one, even when it's painfully, woefully clear that there are many reasons why I should fail. Like the laws of physics.

So, goals. This is mine. One year from now.

February 2010.

Me.

Mt. Taylor.

The Quad.

Bike, Run, Ski, Snowshoe up...then snowshoe, ski, run, bike back down

OOOOrah.

Now, I guess I need to learn how to ski.

...