Somewhere between half empty and half full.

Last week, on Monday night, I came home after being gone from my house for 14 hours (which were my Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays all semester long) the first thing I did walking into the house was to glower at Jake, aka a$$hole dog, because of the constant phone calls and emails that he'd gotten back out again.  He had been running back and forth for a while between our house and then neighbor's house, being spoiled rotten because they had just had to put their dog down and really love Jake.

He quickly tired of that because it neither aggravated me nor cost me money and headed back into the neighborhood again.  All my neighbors love Jake.  Of course they do  They don't  spend as much money and time on him as we have, trying to contain him and his destruction.

So I glowered at Jake.  I just didn't have it in me to be happy to be home, or to respond to his happy wagging tail.

I looked at my watch as I set down my briefcase: 9:15 PM.    I looked around.  There was nothing to eat.  "I'm going to bed," I said, and I know I said it flatly because I felt flat.

Sweet Baboo followed after he put the dogs to bed.
"I miss the way you used to be," he sighed, "optimistic and happy."

"Yeah, well, I miss me too," I muttered.  Then I went to sleep, until 3:30 am, when my largest cat woke me, as she does every morning.

It doesn't seem like things used to affect me this strongly.  My outlook this semester became completely skewed.  Everything was a reflection of how crappy the world is.  What was once minor setbacks or glitches now seem like proof that everything sucks.  Flat tire?  Suck.  Cable company runaround?  Suck.  Naughty dog?  Suck.
I never thought a single semester would take so much out of me, but I never took on so much before.  And, my best means of coping was thwarted by a bitter, wet winter.


And as the semester dragged on and I exhausted my coping skills, my optimism and happiness accounts were drained. My normal self sees everything as a sign that things will always work out, and that people are generally decent.  I felt a constant sense of dread and anger that I couldn't shake

I knew things were bad when I found myself wanting to slap the crap out of every cheerful person I saw.

Now the semester is over I've had some free time.  I'm coming back,  slowly.  The world looks a little prettier today.  The apple tree, wisteria, and lilacs are blooming.  Just yesterday, I told Baboo in the car excitedly, I love running down our street in the dark because of all the motion detector lights that go off as I go by.  It's like they'll all doing the 'wave', just for me.

That's the old me talking.  The old me is what gets me through another Ironman or ultra-marathon when I've run the numbers and the numbers say that I won't make it.  It's an important part of who I am, this unrealistic belief that things will always work out, people are not intrinsically bad, and for every start line, there is a finish line and I will cross it.

I have to be careful, though.  It doesn't take much to make me feel tired and discouraged, all over again.  It's like I've had an ultra marathon of stress, and I need time to recover.  I need some serious down time for that to happen.

I need some good long, runs, too.  Then I'll feel better.

..

Boring, boring, boring. A boring Thursday 13 on vacashun.

13.  Yesterday morning I got up and did a quick trail run over a couple miles of trail next to the house.  I always hate the last run of the week, when I haven't run a few days.  My legs are tired and heavy.  Tomorrow will be better.

12.  Yesterday we also started installing the "invisible fence'.  I guess I'd have to say that the system works.  Jake is a little freaked out right now.  We'll do some more training tomorrow, but today he went trotting up into the barrier zone, and then when he tried to leave Chloe, who wasn't wearing a trainer collar, was cornering.  So he's yelping, and she's barking, and it's an ugly, ugly scene.  I brought him in, but he's a little freaked out right now.

11.  I'm using this time off to change out some of the hardware around the house.  The former owner, as I've mentioned before, desperately wished she lived in 19th century England.  So I'm busying myself this week changing out a couple of light fixtures and door hardware.

10.  I ordered a Pizza online from Dominos.  It was so cool!  I'm just saying.  Cool.

9.  Today a guy started fixing the door from the break-in in February.  After this, it will be like it never happened.  Almost.

8.  Jake was a little more cheerful today.  Cheerful enough to exploit the one corner where there is no electric fence coverage.  Fucker.  Yes, I know that's a swear.

7.  Baboo, too, has been working hard on creating our garden sanctuary.  I'll post pictures of our work for the week soon.  Here's one, of the new and old light fixtures in our hallway.  The sconce on the right is what I can only say looked to be inspired by a bordello.

6.  Tomorrow, my exciting day includes working on 2 different essays, putting new house numbers on my house, and changing out the "I wish I lived in New England"-inspired front lights for something a little more modern that is actually a security light.

5.  I also ate popcorn today.

4.  I'm also going to make a couple of simple little window hangings tomorrow.  Just so you know.

3.  I'm watching Futurama, and I'm wondering how a robot gets a pot belly.

2.  Got a FaceButt post from SW Tri Gal today, who is herself at St. George, Utah.  She said that she drove the bike course and "it's not worse than Silverman".  Yeah.  Looks like I dodged a bullet on that one.

1.  Good thing I had Hank the Handiman come over and shut down our furnace for the season.  Especially, since, you know, it's going to be windy and cold for the next three days!

...

4 days to, well, Albuquerque.

I won't be in St. George this weekend.  Sorry.  I really hope I haven't let anyone down.

On top of everything else that's been going on, (me being untrained, the daily new expenses of things falling apart, Dogs tearing things up and escaping, my sky-high stress level), now we find that Sweet Baboo is pretty badly injured (knee).  That was pretty much the last straw.

So, vacation is here, in the Dream House, making it more of a Dream House.  We're going to have the door replaced that was kicked in this winter.  We're going to install the invisible fence for a$$hole dog.  We're going to get the sprinkler valve box that won't shut off fixed or replaced.  I'm going to install a couple of light fixtures, and some new house numbers.  Plant some peonies.
And maybe I'll even have a clean house at the end of all of this.

I will swim with Baboo.  We'll hang out at a coffee shop in the mornings.  And do rides together.

I went to my last class for the semester tonight.  I still have 3 large papers to write, but it will all be over by the weekend.  I will run at dawn.  And do Yoga. And see my house in the evening before it gets dark.

It's gonna be grrrrreat!

...

6 days, and counting.

On Sunday Baboo and I rose at 3:45, got ready, and drove up to White Rock, New Mexico.  It's northwest of Santa Fe, south of Los Alamos.  Up there, at 6300 feet above sea level, I completed the Atomic Man Duathlon.    I've done this one 3 times before.  What was different about this time was that I PRd, beating my 2009 time by 13 minutes.

I like this little race.  I've only missed it once, and I forget why that was. What always suprises me, as Karen and Sara and I were talking about in low, hushed voices this morning...is how many people complain about how hard it is.

SRSLY.  Who comes to a race in the Santa Fe national forest in northern New Mexico and complains about terrain?  So, it's challenging.  You climb.  Your lungs hurt after.

But not my legs.  I'm not sore.  It was a nice little sprint.

Just a little sprint.  But right now I feel the closest to normal that I've felt in a long time. 

Now, I would never, ever compare a little duathlon to an Ironman.  I certainly know better.  But, I was surprised by my time, and how I felt afterward.  I took a 15 minute nap.  I don't know what my endurance is like, but maybe, just maybe, I can struggle to the end, to the finish line of another Ironman.  As Cody said, maybe I can "gut check" this.  We'll see.  I'm prepared for either success or failure.  It doesn't define me.  It's just a day in the country.

Baboo and I went to the store and bought foodstuffs for the trip.  First off, I'm not sure whether I can get good espresso drinks in this part of Utah, so I bought some Hills Brothers sugar-free instant Double Mocha mix.  It kicks ass.  Also got some low-fat poptarts.  I'm sticking to stuff we can microwave in our room.

494.  1645.  Those will be the numbers we wear on race day.

Reallllly hoping this isn't as painful as I'm thinking it's going to be.

...

More things to bitch about, and reasons to be hopeful. A Thursday 13.

13.  There is a bird sitting outside my window at work.  He's been there for about three weeks now and he's desperate for a mate.  At first, the continuous chirping was charming.  Now I'm turning up the music to block it out.  How much of a bitch am I do complain about chirping birds?  Am I a horrible person?

12.  Oh, and there's this: Current water temps at the reservoire at St. George are a brisk 55 degrees. 

11. The little college where I'm going is really big on end-of-semester potlucks for the last class of the semester before finals.  All three of them.  Do I have time to make a dish?  I do not.  I have volunteered to bring a cheese and fruit plate for each of them.

One of the professors insists that we make whatever we bring "with our own hands".  I work full time and go to school full time and don't have a wife at home to make some of this crap, as this professor does.
 he said, "I'm going to have my wife make rice."
Well, he can suck it.  I'm not even going to cut up the fruit and the cheese.  I will, with my "own two hands" wash the fruit and take the cheese slices out of the package from Costco.

10.  Sunday, I did hill repeats on the boulevard near my house, which involves traveling about 8 miles out north, and then decending into the valley over 5 miles, dropping 1000 feet in elevation. Then I climbed back out, descended, climbed again, and the went home.  As I was coming back up, I felt a little sick, which tells me that I'm not trained enough yet.  My stomach isn't ready for the intensity.

9. Wednesday as I lay in bed talking with Baboo I have come to a decision: St. George.  is likely to be a - excuse my language - a cluster fuck.  My longest ride since 2009 is about 52 miles.  My longest run since March is about 12 miles.  My longest swim since September 2009 is 1800 meters, with paddles.  I am not willing to risk kidney failure to try to drag my untrained body around a challenging course just to be a symbol of something.

8.  But, I do need a vacation. And I miss my friends, who I haven't seen much since the semester from hell began. So I'm going to St. George.  I've decided to take all my stuff: bike, running shoes, wet-suit. I will decide after we drive the course if I'm doing it or not. I am giving myself permission to not do this.  And trust me when I tell you, it's taken weeks of agonizing and discussions in therapy to work this out.

7.  Just by having decided this, I feel a sense of relief.  I feel happier and more relaxed.

6.  In just 2 weeks, I'll have my life back again.  I'll be able to come home in the evenings.  I'll be able to garden after work.  I won't spend my weekends perseverance on papers to write.  For 3 full months it will be thus.

5.  Every week at work seems to have a theme.  Not too long ago, I had kids, one after another, with psychotic disorders.  Then another week was "sexually maladaptive week".  this week is angry pissy teenager week.  There they sit, glaring at me, answering me with clipped, paranoid, hostile ideation.  It's a scene.

4.  I received a letter at work letting me know that I was now cleared to work with substance abusers and sex offenders.
uh, thanks for clearing that for me.  I don't think so.

3.  In therapy i've been working on why i became so overwhelmed. here's part of what's come out: Crisis is defined as what happens when your ability to cope is exhausted by too many stressors.  In the past 6 months, I was laid off, then I couldn't get an interview for months. Then I rolled my ankle, and for 4 weeks, I couldn't run.  For weeks after that, I couldn't run on trails.  In December, the long crappy winter began.  I started a new job, and only had time to work out on weekends; every weekend sleet and snow would pelt the area.  In January, my car was broken into.  In January, I also started full time graduate school.  I was afraid of rolling my ankle.  I was afraid to run downhill.
In early February, I had the first panic attack.  Then our house was broken into.  The panic attacks continued.  In March, I did a second run I wasn't properly trained for, and suffered mightily.  Also in march, it finally started warming up enough for cycling, but again, many weekends had very crappy weather.

2.  So it turns out, according to my therapist, that they've seen a lot of people who are endurance runners who are injured, and about a month after the injury, when they're returning to training, the panic attacks begin.  They think it might have something to do with the body not being used to the feeling of increased heart rate, respiration, et cetera.

1.  But today, just today, i'm feeling good.  even if that fu**ing bird won't shut up.

...

Question of the Day.

Yesterday I got a call from Sweet Baboo at about 4:15 in the afternoon.

"Do you know where Jake is?"

Jake?  You mean a$$hole dog?  Because if he's calling me in the middle of the afternoon, from home, asking where he is, then today he's a$$hole dog and the dollar signs, folks, are there for a reason, not just to clean up my language.

No.  I don't know where Jake is.
But I do no one thing: There was a reason I didn't want any more kids.  And it had a lot to do with phone calls in the middle of the day.

As Sweet Baboo was standing there talking to me, he saw Jake come back over the wall, from the open space, where he'd escaped to.  Mind you, when I say open space, we're talking about the boundary between Cibola Wilderness and the city of Albuquerque.  At this point, I don't think Asshole dog will be around much longer, because there are hungry spring bears waking up, hungry enough to probably catch even a fast Blue-heeler, shepherd mix.

But, so.  I take my status as a parent very seriously.  And, we're out of money until the next pay day, I guess...so I had to tie him up.  I hate that.  My neighbors hate it, too, because he's barking continuously.  He has a long tie, access to water and shelter and shade, but of course he's Jake the A$$hole dog, so he wants to be able to roam, even though he has 1/3 of an acre with cool shade, warm dry sunny spots, and a large running water source.

It also occurs to me, right now, that there was another reason I didn't want kids.  It had something do with the sucking sound I heard every payday.  Kids, though, grow up and become people you like to talk to.  What does a dog become?  A larger, noisier expensive child who never grows up?

Chloe, for the record, is relatively well-behaved, stays in the yard, entertains herself, and doesn't cause trouble.  She will run with me.  Jake will not run without Chloe, and I can't run them both at the same time.   She does not tear up drip lines just because she can.  So.  Do I untie Jake so my neighbors can get some peace and the bears can have breakfast, or do I leave him tied up so that he's safe and my neighbors hate me?

That is the Q.O.D.

We're going to have to put an underground, electric fence on our credit card.  If this doesn't work, Jake is either Smokey's breakfast or he goes back to the pound, for a third time (He'd been surrendered twice when we got him.)

...

Future thought.

I've lost an inch off my thighs, and about 12 pounds.  I think last week I was stressed and dehydrated, because I gained a couple pounds this week but didn't change sizes.

This year as I turned 45 I had the time pause and think and I came to a couple of realizations:

1) Forty-freaking-five.  Holy crap.  That's older than, well, than I imagine many of my high school teachers would have been when I was in high school, and I thought they were old.

In other words, I'm older than what I used to think was old. 

2) I have been in college almost continuously for 20 years.  I started working on my Bachelor's degree in 1991, and then wondered from one graduate school degree to the next, including a couple of PhDs I never finished.  Don't get me started on why.  I rarely take a straight path to any destination, either literally or figuratively.  I meander. 

Meandering to my eventual destination is my third special gift.*  It makes a nice counter-part to Baboo's way of doing things, which is very tight, organized, and efficient.  He got his Bachelor's degree in 3 years, taking exactly the amount of credits he needed to get it. For my bachelor's degree I accrued 183 credits.  He's made me think more about efficiency.  I've made him learn to relax, because if you're all about efficiency and deadlines, but have to live with me, you'd go mad, otherwise.

All of this, of course, ending up where I am now.  Could I have done this with far less schooling? maybe.  But it's unhelpful for me to dwell on that.  One thing that is certain is that it's not like the journey is more enjoyable, I wind up overloaded and stressed because I've taken so long to get things done that they are piled up on top of other things I'm trying to get done, like this spring, when I've been trying to get ready for an Ironman, work full time, go to school full time, and deal with two new dogs.

Meanwhile, pretty soon, I will get to see my house in daylight.  My dogs will know who I am.

This third master's degree is kind of an analogy to Ironman.  After I've done my third, or fourth, one--I've made my point.  I'm ready to move on.  Or not.  I don't think it could ever be argued that I've gotten some shit done in my life. 

After May of this year, I want to take a step backwards, at least for a few months, and enjoy working out for a change, instead of feeling locked into a training schedule.  I'll do my last Iron distance this fall and then be done. 

I want to focus on what I like, running and swimming.  The swimming I'll do for fun, and the cycling will be cross training, but after this year, the most triathlon I'll consider doing is a half iron.  Maybe I'll train for a 100K.  Or not.  I'm stil thinking about these things right now.  I have one last iron distance race I signed up for over a year ago, and I'm committed to it, in OKC, in September.

There's nothing terribly entertaining in all this.  It's just me thinking out loud today. 

I guess I should get up off this couch and go ride my bike.


*the other two having already been mentioned yesterday.