I meant to mention that when we were in Tahoe, I had all the language tapes with me. At one point, H walked in when I was puttering around (I thought he was still in the shower) and I was counting in Portuguese. As I have not shared this TAR thing with him, he was very confused.

I haven’t shared TAR with him because who knows if we will get on. I PLAN that we will get on, but one never knows. So telling him now would be ridiculous. Instead, I figure I’ll tell him after we’ve been chosen. Since you do the whole thing in 2 weeks (even if you’re eliminated right away, you have to stay “sequestered” so that no one can figure out who won by who “goes home”), I figure that about 2 weeks out I’ll tell him “oh by the way…”

Today’s Crossfit workout:
CONDITIONING
8 RFT
200M Run
10 Back Squat 70/45KG
15 Push Up
20 Sit up

That’s not so bad. I am fairly sure I can’t do it with 45 KG (that’s about what I do a deadlift at – you know, those things that everyone else does with like 200 lbs? LOL) but hopefully I can do it with the bar itself (like the photo). The key is to try to get your thighs as close to 90 degrees as possible, with keeping your shins fairly straight up and down. (The gal in this photo seems to have her knees over her toes instead of more over her ankles – but who am I to judge?? 🙂 )

H just said he’s “not sure” that he will go to Crossfit tonight. I’m not sure what’s up with him. Luckily, he is just leaving for an appointment with my acupuncturist – he’s felt unwell for SO long, I think he will at least START to get some relief by seeing her. In reality, I’m fairly sure what he needs to do is to get on my nutritionist’s “eating system,” but I can’t force that.

I do pretty well, but I’m back being “bad” because now I feel like TAR is farther off. As in, I had some pie at Tom and Jan’s going away party (though it was gluten-free) and let’s not talk about how much cheese and ice cream I ate!

The biggest habit I got out of was making the green shakes which I really do feel were a boon to me. You have to make them with NOT so much “green” stuff (it makes it just disgusting), and not too “taste-heavy” like for example kale. Best nutrition profile, believe it or not, winds up being romaine lettuce, which I can just eat a whole headful of while sitting on the computer. I had been very good with this until H and I went away in September, then got out of the habit. However, today at the Farmer’s Market I “bulked up” again on the stuff to make it – I need to go to Trader Joe’s to get some frozen wild organic blueberries and such,, but time to get that going again.

I’m reading Thinner Next Year again, which really is such a great book. It cracks me up. It’s like Younger Next Year but really talks about the nutrition aspect. I also have finally downloaded the Nutrition Certification info to my computer, and so I need to start working my way through that. I love this stuff, so I think once I get started it will be just interesting to really learn.

Went to BNI again this week – last week I was Dr. Cinda’s guest, because she has my testimonial on her website and this week I was the substitute for Willie, my nutritionist. You only get to “visit or sub” 2x every 6 months, so I “shot my wad” as it were. Everyone and I mean EVERYONE keeps coming up to me and saying I’m the life of the chapter, etc. and would I PLEASE come back? I’m not sugar-coating it any more – they didn’t ever give me any actual referrals, so it didn’t even pay the monthly dues to be a member. And I was a member for YEARS! So I’m glad that folks liked me being there – but they didn’t do anything to KEEP me there. It’s a bummer because I put a LOT of $$$ into that chapter in referrals. Ah well!

So that’s my check-in for now. I’m feeling sleepy and a bit under the weather, which I’m quite sure is mainly due to not really exercising in a week, and last week (except for the marathon) only really working out a few times. Time to get back on track. The bad part is that I wind up being able to do one (say exercise) and then I want to “treat myself” on the other (food) – or vice versa. Tough to get them both aligned!

OH – and I cut about 4-5″ off my hair so now it’s at my shoulders. It’s VERY cute. It makes the waves really “work” (because they’re not as heavy) and I think I look a lot younger. Of course, my face is super puffy because I’m retaining water/weigh too much – but my hair is very cute! Donna also “reversed” it back towards my natural color versus bleaching it – she said it was time. I was looking through a lot of old photos this past week (cleaned out boxes in the office closet) and realized that for my hair to look more full and healthy, I really can’t let it get much longer than shoulder-length. And at that length, I can still pull it back, but it’s not so long as to be “unruly.” Funny when I think I had my hair at “sit-on” length when I was in 8th grade – and how proud I was of that – but I think that sort of length hair really ages you. You look like an old hippie 😉 This way it’s still “long” (especially as my neck is so long!), but it’s more fun and looks “perkier.”

That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it 😉

Yeah, okay, fine.

I didn’t go to Crossfit AGAIN today. This is really stupid.

It’s the “I’m curled up in bed, H is curled up in bed, I don’t wanna get up” thing. Also likely one should sprinkle in a healthy dose of “I just want to be fit again and do whatever I want like I could when I was 20, maybe if I go back to sleep this will all be a bad dream…” (laugh – kinda!)

SO, I said a while back what I would “do with the money” should R and I wind up winning The Amazing Race, against all odds. I said that it would come out to like $250k each – and that I would take H to a great trip to Greece/Turkey (which we’ve both always wanted to do) on that money. It could also put us far closer to H being able to retire.

But let’s just pretend (hey, this is my Daydream, right?) that a Travelocity “benefit” of having won was – ta da! – a first class trip anywhere that you want to go, for each participant, for 2. (That’s always been one of my questions – as in, if it’s two friends doing TAR and they win a travel trip, do they only get to go together? Or do they get a “trip for 2” each? Inquiring minds…)

Anyway –

So my grandboy Caleb has had some terrible TERRIBLE luck recently. For at least ten weeks now (maybe more), he’s been subject to something going VERY wrong with him. We’re talking incredible, awful pain that the doctors can’t get to the bottom of. It could be (as his grandmother had a gall bladder issue that didn’t present with any specific body chemicals showing that it was going in) a gall bladder thing. But whatever it is, he hasn’t been able to go to school, and has basically been eating nothing for 10 weeks – and hasn’t lost any weight, and is still screaming with pain for hours and hours. This is NOT a guy who would have this “all in his head” – he’s your usual “nearly 13 year old” boy, who could talk your ears off, and who is sensitive, but who wouldn’t just “make up” this sort of pain. He’s pretty Stoic, as evidenced by when he had a thing stuck in his foot that we were trying to get out back before he went to Boy Scouts Jamboree. He’s helpful, kind, a great all-around guy.

He’s also in a new school – which REALLY sucks – he leaves to go to this new school, is there for like maybe a day or two, and then this set in. So he’s getting more and more behind – and the “home school” stuff is IDIOTIC and I’m afraid he’s going to get held back once we get to the bottom of all this.

How do I have a grandson? It’s sort of a convoluted story, but the crux of it is that a friend’s Mom passed away and she was afraid that her kids would never really “have a grandma” – just as I found out that I couldn’t have kids. I hadn’t planned to be “that woman that never had kids” – but so it goes. That’s the short version, but I’m basically the only grandma these boys “know” – and it’s been this way for…wow, about 5 years? From about when Caleb was somewhere around….8? And when Cody was somewhere around…5?

They live in Utah which SUCKS because not only I, but my Mom, would be there constantly to try to soothe all this and give the parents a break. The other thing that worries me is something I’ve seen time and again when a sibling has a disease of some kind – the “other” child winds up acting out, because they’re not getting the “attention” that they were used to. Something has to give when time is being spent on one child – and try as you might, it usually comes from the time otherwise spent with the “well” child.

ANYWAY – so I realized today in the car when hearing that yet another test came up negative, that H and I have been talking for forever that “when we’re not here any more,” that we want to have a Trust with the bulk of our assets going into it. We’ve written up our wills and trusts this way. The Sandy and Herbert Trust 😉

We’ve talked about various things that  the trust could benefit – but I know now. I want it to benefit kids with pain. And their siblings. And their parents. I was talking once with a couple of gals in Denver – one had had a daughter with cancer. She said that if someone had just shown up during those long, long hours she was in the hospital with a glass of wine and some chocolate, she would have probably paid $100 for it. Imagine a website where you can do that for a Mom or Dad with a sick kid? Where you could get a meditation or hypnosis CD made specifically for the child who is sick, to help them in a “biofeedback” sort of way? Or a space where siblings could go to discuss their feelings, or even just receive one-on-one attention – whether being taken to the zoo, given some credits to an online game, etc.? There might be something like this already – I do know that the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society does things for families (and that is why I support them through marathons, triathlons, etc.) – not just “finding the cure.” The non-profit would pay to have the website designed, and for beta tests with families going through things like Caleb is. There was a New York Times article on a young girl in a similar situation who was ultimately treated at the Mayo Clinic – I’d fly out and take that doctor out for a weekend “brain retreat” and find out what he thinks would be the first order of business in this area. Then I’d get to it. In fact, Caleb’s Mom could run the whole thing. Hey, I can dream, right?

Today at our local corner market, I saw a little boy that was like a Sherman tank, fearless, happy, giggling, and SO CUTE! How old is a kid right when they are learning to walk? 9 months? He came up to me as I was getting a cup of coffee. His Mom actually works at the store (so she knows me) – though I’d never met her son before. He walked right up to me brazenly with a huge smile, and pointed “up” (that’s the benefit of being over 6′ tall – I get that pretty often from little kids!) So I scooped him up, laughing, and held him up over my head, then sucked on his fingers (they tasted like apples), buzzy-kissed his stomach, and then held him upside down as he squealed in glee. It was like a little fizzy ball of happiness incarnate. That’s what made me think of Caleb – how he’s just in pain ALL the TIME. How awful this is – how he feels like “people don’t believe him,” and how this is changing who HE is. The pain is changing “Him.

So that’s what I want the Trust to do. I want it to benefit children who are in pain – particularly, if no one can figure out what that pain “is.” I’m not sure how one would describe the “mission” of that Trust, but that’s what I want it to be. The “difference” between this little boy in the market and my sweet grandboy and what he’s going through made me realize that This Was It.

So – that’s what my $ will go to – it will go towards some fun stuff for H and me, sure, but it’s going to go towards starting this Trust. I feel REALLY strongly about that – and I think that the memory of this super duper happy little ball of boy juxtaposed against my poor sweet grandboy will keep me going, and that’s a fact.

 

 

Oy.

Last week was long on running around and short on running (or Crossfit, for that matter). Although the “plan” was to hit Crossfit on Wednesday, it didn’t happen – then Thursday was Book Club so I knew that I couldn’t go, but the “plan” was to do something – hike, run? – that afternoon. Unfortunately I went to visit a friend who was home from the hospital from having a heart attack, and what should have been an hour visit turned into an all-day visit. What are you going to do when someone wants you to stay, and you CAN stay?

We left for Tahoe on Friday, and on Saturday we did another “Gilligan’s Island” hike, this time in Olympic and Squaw Valley. The funniest thing is that I had to explain to what the whole ‘Gilligan’s Island’ reference was – because he’d never seen the TV show. I had of course used the “three hour tour” reference to him when we did the “hour long hike that turned into four hours” up Mt. Tam in September, but really hadn’t realized he didn’t have ANY idea what I was talking about.

It was a TOUGH hike. Up and over boulders most of the way from the bottom of Olympic Village to Shirley Lake – then instead of going back DOWN, we traversed, went up the Shirley Lake “run” (if the lift had been running, that would have been faboo, but, alas, no), all the way up to the “top” of the mountain (which was also closed), then we walked back down from there.

I was great in my hiking shoes until we started the long trek down – then my big toes were slamming against the front. H finally re-laced them to try to get my feet to stop sliding forward – but unfortunately I think that they may not be TAR-worthy. I really have to figure something out. I have my ENORMOUSLY heavy boots from when we hiked the Alps – they were fantastic, above the ankle, waterproof, etc. – but man, each boot is like 5 lbs! The lacing seemed to help, and I need to “hike them” around here to see if this will make them “work” for me.

Our hike was so exhausting, the next day (Sunday) we just went to Tahoe City, and then walked around a bit on the bike path. We drove down to the South to look at the scenery, and then went to a wonderful restaurant (a real “foodie” restaurant in Tahoe City? No! Yes!) and actually walked some again, there.

The snow reports were getting ominous, and so we ditched the room at 11 p.m. (wasting $200 – the room was 1/2 price because it was shoulder season, but that still hurts) and “bolted” for home. We only hit one small flurry, but we were back by 2:00 a.m. and I’m glad we did it. H was ambivalent, but I realized that if it was snowing from about midnight Sunday night all the way through Monday, all we’d be doing is sitting inside anyway. (We looked at the Weather Camera Monday morning and it looked completely passable – but it’s not like we would have gone out hiking – it was about 3″ on the ground up to about 8″ on Donner Summit.)

So Monday H said to “do things that I wanted to do, and pretend like it was still a vacation.” That meant (for him) pulling out and sorting the stones where he’s re-laying the slabs on our “martini porch” – for me, it meant going through 4 storage boxes that were in the closet in my office. I sorted them out into old pictures (some of which I need to scan for our TAR submission), and then another box for “miscellaneous” – leaving me with 2 free boxes. OMG the DUST! The real reason for doing this was that H wanted to get up into the attic to turn off the whole house fan – and the only way is in that closet, which is perpetually full of boxes, etc. I also sorted out everything IN the closet on the shelves, which felt good.

Next I “attacked” the fridge, freezer, and the lower pantry. H said that I spend too much time cooking and thought that I should try to do a “prep day” for food. So I did just that – chopped up veggies I had and putting them into ziplocks, re-organizing the freezer, etc. That was pretty satisfying.

I did the bulk of this while watching the new episode of TAR. So I wasn’t paying complete attention . . . and though the Baseball Bunnies went from being last to 4th (yay!) the Chico Boys were eliminated (boo!) I really liked them. They had such a great attitude – and they really only got eliminated because the Afghanimals U-Turned them (though they were themselves U-Turned by the E.R. Doctors – who did get the Express Pass for telling Pinkie and her ex how to get to the next clue when they were stuck).

They wound up in Poland, and 3 of the teams REALLY got messed up because the taxi drivers had NO IDEA where they were going. One funny thing, however, was that one of the “lost” teams’ drivers called up one of the other drivers – who knew where he was going – and the driver did NOT tell, because his “fares” (the affianced team) asked him not to. That was VERY funny.

I was interested that they are very much downplaying the Afghanimals/Ice Princesses this time around. I wonder if they got “flak” of some kind because of it, and if they’re trying to make it so that the Afghanimals aren’t so hated? I don’t know, just found that interesting.

Today I’ve been cleaning out email ALL DAY yes ALL DAY. Holy cow. And no, no paying work, either.

Tonight would be Crossfit, but Tom and Jan are leaving (sob!) and so there is a going away party for them at 6:30 – right when we would be going. This is bad. We signed up for the Membership and suddenly aren’t going!

I had to write my RVMC Magazine article which I just turned in – the subject was “Traditions.” It was pretty fun to write.

H is still feeling very unwell. He wonders if his ulcers are back. I want him to see my acupuncturist – she’s a genius at this stuff. I hope that he does it. And speaking of eating – since I (and one of the other gals) are gluten-free and I have to bring dessert, I guess I’d better jet to Flour Chylde to get something before they close! I REALLY hope that he’s willing to go to Crossfit tomorrow morning because we have to get back in the swing.

POSSIBLE LEARNING: I wonder if, the SECOND you jumped the cab and he seemed to be taking you to the wrong place, you could get him to take you to a hotel to get help? I’m trying to figure out a way to get help FAST. These cab drivers didn’t have SmartPhones (it was Poland), so there wasn’t a way go “Google” where they wanted to go. My supposition would be that going to a “big name” hotel would be your best bet, rather than just driving around. That, or a Tourist Agency…not sure about Poland, but in many countries there are “Tourist-related” businesses with “tours” etc. on just about every corner, especially in busy towns.

THIRTY-EIGHT DAYS TO DAY 100: I’d like to have something to celebrate on that day! It’s a month. Not sure what it would be – but it should be something! 1/3 of the way there!

 

So today, since I MUST listen to the doggone book club book (Book Club is tomorrow), I’m going to “Hike” to the store as I think I mentioned I would do yesterday. I didn’t make it to Crossfit today – I had somewhat of a “plan” to do it, but I didn’t set an alarm, and woke up at 9:00 a.m. The “warm sick Panda curled up in bed” thing . . . (H has gone from calling himself the Panther – which has always been his self-moniker – to the Panda . . . unfortunately I am not the only one who has “succumbed” to my gourmet dinners and wine LOL!)

When I mentioned to him that I hadn’t made it to Crossfit, his reaction was: “Why don’t they call it CruciFit or GrumpyFit? I think that fits it better.” Said with Viennese accent of course. Made me laugh out loud.

I plan to do some Crossfit-esque things today though. I want to see if there is ANY way I can figure out how to do a Burpee without engaging my right shoulder in a painful way. I certainly can’t do pushups, but Bo showed us “the flop” of a Burpee that is “perfectly allowable” yesterday – and I want to see if there is some way to do that. He said that the deal with a Burpee (wonder how that silly thing got that name…) is that you need to have the following components:
1. Start standing.
2. Squat down, putting your hands on the ground.
3. Get the front of your hips onto the ground, “however you can.”
4. Get back up to standing.
5. Put hands up, jump up.
6. Repeat.

Now, how “everyone” does Burpees is to start standing, put their hands down on the ground near their feet, “jump” their legs out (a la a Plank), go down to the ground (sorta a “belly flop” though if you’re really good, more controlled LOL), push up, jump feet back up to hands, stand up/jump/hands up together. HOWEVER, Bo was showing the one gal that’s heavy in our 6:30 WOD that it’s “perfectly acceptable” to do “what it takes” to get the hips down and then back up – e.g., crawl down on knees, step back up forward, whatever. The “parts” of the Burpee are as above – as in, if you do all those things, “however you do them,” you’ve done one. (Similar to “toes to bar” – you’re “supposed” to raise your toes up and touch the bar where your hands are hanging in an impressive move of ab strength, but if instead you bring your knees up, wiggle, turn sideways, grunt, stretch, and kick out and manage to get some part of both feet to the bar, that counts.)

We’ll see what I can do.

I did manage to get 13 minutes’ worth of billable time today (rah-bloody-rah) – though that’s $65.00. And it will also lead to about the same amount of work tomorrow (this was an intake call, tomorrow will be an email I have to write, but the client is going to draft it to “save himself money” – then I will tweak and send to the other side). I said something in the call that had us both in a fit of giggles (and this guy is an uber-serious head of a company so not a big giggler) – once I figured out what he wanted, and we’d talked out the strategy of how to do it, I meant to say “Okay, I think that’s set, I agree with you on our strategy.” Instead, I said “Okay, I think that’s set, I agree with me on our strategy.” He was silent for a second, as we both processed what I’d said, then to break the silence I said “Obviously I’m schizophrenic – and so am I.” And he started to giggle. Lord almighty, what a boob I am sometimes LOL!

Last night, R put the brakes on the video for November. She had gone through and scanned in old photos, etc. – and said that “I just don’t realize” how far off the rails she’s gone since I last saw her (which has to be a couple years) – so N-O to the video being done by November 7th intake. That’s fine – it seemed a little soon to me as well (considering I still am a big whimp doing anything close to Strength-related, and I think that’s going to have to be my forte in our pairing), and I THINK that in fact TAR has 2 “intakes” because it seems to ME that the “last” Episode (the one where the father broke his ankle) was less than a year ago…this would mean (a la So You Think You Can Dance) that they actually have a “semi-annual” intake. Fine by me – I called this 365 days to TAR for a reason LOL.

I did find some old photos to put into Dropbox, which Prashant saw and said he loved. I don’t have any “in between” photos – I know that I actually DO have some from when R and I first met, I just don’t know exactly where they are. That gives me a little more time for “filler” photos (though I put like 30 into Dropbox)! I made Mom scan some from when I was a little kid – always with book in hand – I told her that it was for a speaking engagement coming up, because the LAST thing I need to do is to tell her I’m thinking of applying to TAR. In fact – SOMEWHERE (okay I gotta find that…) I have a photo of me hang gliding – it’s not a great photo, and we were just running down sand dunes in Mexico – but the important part of it was that AFTER I did it, I let my Mom know and she had a fit (this was freshman year in college LOL). She told people for the next ten years that I “never ask for permission, I ask for forgiveness.” (Which, come to think of it, is not a bad thing to put into the video)

COMMERCIAL BREAK…

Well, just got off a 45 minute “potential new client” call, answering questions. I feel fairly certain that this will NOT turn into paying work – the gal is just starting out, and is in the unenviable situation where she’s “moved forward” with 3 other people but they didn’t have anything in writing – and she’s feeling uneasy about how things are developing. She’s been a serial entrepreneur, and she has the “knowledge” in the area of this business . . . 2 of the folks “don’t really think they need a contract” (ACK) and the other one – who doesn’t actually have ANY knowledge in the area of business, etc. – is the one who suggested that she call me. I think that she’s going to have to figure out a graceful way to pull out – which is ALWAYS an ENORMOUS pain when there isn’t any “paper” from the outset. Yes, that’s my lawyer hat you see firmly on my head – DO NOT MOVE FORWARD WITH SOMEONE UNLESS YOU HAVE YOUR AGREEMENT ON PAPER – BECAUSE YOU WILL GET STUCK WITH A GENERAL PARTNERSHIP UNDER THE LAW AND BELIEVE ME I KNOW YOU DON’T WANT ONE.

Two Google Calendar reminders have gone off as I’ve been writing this – one to make something for a business associate who had a heart attack a week ago “out of the blue” (though she smokes, drinks, etc.) – and another to do some letters of reference. I really gotta do that, then I’ll get going. Some day, I will do something that pays LOL.

Did I say I will hike to the grocery store today? I will.

I forgot to mention – at the Nike, a guy cut in front of me, and I went down HARD – though I did roll. So I have two beee-you-tee-ful bruises, one of my left hip (accentuates the cellulite thank you very much) and one spanning my left elbow. I didn’t actually go “down” on the elbow – more on the outside of my upper arm – but the bruise travels down below the elbow.

Today (this evening) is crossfit – I’ll go. H is leaving for a couple days’ worth of director training in San Jose, then we are to Tahoe for some R&R. Whenever he wants to travel, I agree – he likes to “get away” especially when work is a pressure-cooker. The problem is that as it comes closer, he never wants to go! It’s funny. He also has had a brutal cold for a week or so, plus a hip muscle issue. Yes, we are falling apart!

Today, as I said, massage. Back in my “wealthier days” I bought a 10 massage card, and it’s time to use it! I’m not as sore as I was yesterday, thankfully.

I need to catch up on a lot of email (none of it business email – I’d be starving and homeless if I wasn’t married), and I’d like to start the “Hike” thing today if possible. We’ll see. There are a few things I actually need at the store which is up and over quite an impressive hill – that’s another thought is just to strap on the hiking shoes and hike there and hike back. Not quite as nice as the “hills” but it will do the same for my bod.

I have some more photos I need to find to put in the Dropbox for our video. Mom sent some of me as a kid reading books – which goes with my 30 second “story” – and I have in the back of my mind I actually have a photo from Surrey at my wedding of R behind the big camera, which would be a good one to include.

That’s my check-in for today! Oh – have to get “listening to” The Paris Wife (our book club book) so no more random language lessons. It was interesting listening to the Japanese one – there were some things that I did recognize, but sadly considering I passed a fluency in 1983, not THAT much. And I recognized more of the Spanish than I thought I would. I also listened to the Portuguese one – the only thing I retained was that they say “Ciao” to say “Good bye” a la Italian.

Ciao!

POSTSCRIPT: Have NOT started listening to the book yet (bad bad me), catching up on cleaning out my email, and uploading photos, etc. to Dropbox. Also “snuck in” a watch of the TAR Episode – learnings:

1. CHECK YOUR EQUIPMENT – the Afghanimals wound up with a wheelbarrow with a flat wheel. O-M-G…that is literally HELL. I do wonder if they had found it out in the BEGINNING (versus 1/2 way up the hill) if they could have gotten it mended. That’s an interesting question. I IMAGINE that either (a) there were more than enough wheelbarrows, and one had a flat tire to see if someone would pick it (nefarious!) or (b) there were just enough wheelbarrows, but IF it had been noticed at the beginning that the tire was low on air, it could have been fixed. It would have been supremely unfair if (let’s say) the LAST group to hit the Road Block got that wheelbarrow, just because it was “the one that was left” – and it had a flat tire. So I imagine that either it was there “to see if one team would be stupid enough to take it” (and there was another perfectly fine one next to it) or that they would have been able to get it fixed. I might actually go put that as a question on the TAR site – not that I think they will answer, but I’m dead curious.

2. KNOW HOW TO DO THINGS – the Ice Princesses didn’t know how to drive a stick. I think that’s sort of a “given” that you just HAVE to know how to do. I would add to that to go to a Ford dealership before the race, and try out EVERY vehicle, know how to like plug in an electric vehicle, get walked through EVERY permutation of the on-board computer, etc. As Ford is the sponsor, that’s gotta be IMPORTANT!

3. BE READY TO RUN AT LEAST A MILE WITH A BACKPACK – I know that this is not R’s “sweet spot” but when the teams were looking for taxis in a tiny Norwegian town at 3 a.m. (there was ONE), it was only 2 km to the destination. That’s about a mile. It turned out that most of the teams HAD to jog that mile – but two of the teams just got to it, one being the Chico Boys who wound up coming in first in the end. I think that’s immensely important – if you do NOT have to depend upon transportation for a short distance, not to “have” to. Huge huge huge. Also important to be able to carry BOTH backpacks for some distance – in each “track” of the event choices, one team mate had to carry both backpacks where the other teammate had to do the “task” (whether it was pushing a wheelbarrow uphill or carrying 15 pair of sun-dried codfish). And at that, time to talk about…..CROSSFIT! 🙂

4. LOOK FOR THE TAR COLORS ON THE “THING” – In this episode, Pinkie and the Ex were far, far ahead but had hung their fish onto a pole without TAR colors on it – and then 3 couples passed them by before they figured out what they’d done wrong. Interestingly, no one helped them – they weren’t particularly “nasty” about it, but I think that Pinkie holding the “Express Pass” over everyone’s head has really engendered some bad blood. (The first folks who finished – and turned her down – were the Chico Boys, who were all “We don’t need your stinkin’ Express Pass” – which was funny.) But beside the BE NICE learning (laugh), this is the SECOND time that a team has gotten screwed by missing the TAR colors on something. Our favs the Bingo Boys wound up commandeering a “random shoe shine guy” (STILL laughing at that one – that poor guy!) because they didn’t see that some of the shoe shine stations had TAR-colored “ribbons” on them – similarly, Pinkie and the Ex just slung the fish up onto the first pole, not looking at the end to see that some had TAR-colored tags, some did not.

(I’m sure there were other learnings, but those were the big two!)

Here’s the WOD for today at Crossfit:
For Time
Run 1 mile
Then 4 Rounds of:
10 Dumbbell Push Press each arm 45/30lb
10 Burpee
Then 1 mile run

Oh for goodness’ sake, I think Bo just put in a couple miles of running because I didn’t show up yesterday! And yes, it’s ALL about me LOL. Not sure what a dumbbell push press is – I think that it’s when you start at your shoulder and push it up straight and back down – I know I can’t do 30 but I’ll scale. Burpees we know what they are. My shoulder still “disallows” that. When I was getting my massage, she said my shoulder was “mad messed up.” She spent 1-1/2 hours on me (like I said, I have 10 hours in “backlog”). When she was working on my legs it hurt like a S-O-B, but I feel 200% – maybe 400% – better now. Wonder if they have masseuses when you’re waiting on the next leg in TAR? (Yeah I WISH)

Yup – got behind.

Somewhere in here – and I think it might have been Day 49 – had to go to Kaiser to pick up “new and improved” thyroid meds. I didn’t go to the Wednesday Crossfit (though looking back at the post, the WOD actually looked kinda fun…) – then Thursday the idea was to go to the WOD, but I went in with Kat and Trish to pick up my Nike race bib. We found our names on the Nike wall, and then turned out that Kat hadn’t run more than just shy of 7-1/2 miles, and wasn’t really “prepared” with nutrition, race pack, etc. – so we did the whole Sports Basement “trip  to Mecca” (laugh). There was a BRUTAL car accident then as we were coming home – so no chance of making the 6:30 p.m. WOD. (In retrospect, maybe it was a GOOD thing that we wound up at Sports Basement, since it’s possible we could have been IN that accident – there was glass literally ALL over Highway 101, and from where the flares were, it looks like they had closed down all but ONE lane – there were a ton of police cars plus mashed-up cars on the side of the road too).

Friday I did go to Crossfit –

CONDITIONING WOD:
50-40-30-20-10
KBS 1.5/1P
Push Up
6 x 50M Shuttle Run Sprint at end of each round

I wasn’t going to do the run – since it was (duh) 2 days to the Nike – but I did and I came in FIRST out of the whole box (by one second – Jimmy literally chased me down). Exhilarating! Of course, I’m scaling – but I’m going as hard as I can. Discovered that you can make the kettlebell swings go faster if you (again – duh) pull the kettlebell DOWN (instead of just letting gravity take it down) on the downward part of the swing. Bo was leading the WOD and said that I am going to have to use a heavier kettlebell now. 😉 (I have to ask what the “1.5/1P” part means above – I’m not sure).

Did more running around Friday – had one business call that I can’t bill for (sigh) – and then Tom and Jan had us over to “St. Patrick’s Day Dinner” – because she of course broke her leg (tripping on our stairs!) the day BEFORE they were going to have it this year. She’d put the corned beef in her freezer – and now that they are moving (SIGH!) they wanted to do it. It was a lot of fun – my doctor told me I MUST stop eating gluten because it is SO BAD for the thyroid (body sees the thyroid cells/gluten in the same “way” so when you eat gluten the body attacks the thyroid) – so no Irish soda bread for me – I had 2 glasses of champagne but no wine at dinner. Yes I know, “bad” re the champagne but so it goes. I did leave at 8:30 (right before she brought out the Irish Coffee!) to get to bed, since Thursday and Friday are really the MOST important sleep days before a race. Slept SUPER late on Saturday – again, with the theory that the more you can do, the better.

Saturday mainly laid out my “race woman” (as you can see at Left) then I had to get all dolled up, as I was the auctioneer for a charity auction benefiting the House of Steel. They were kind enough not only to have “flipped” the usual event program (putting the auction before the dinner, not after), but they boxed up a yummy take-away dinner for me from The Pleasure Is Mine catering. I got home at about 8:00-ish, ate my yummy dinner while watching a little bit of a movie with H, then was off to bed with my OuchWraps puppy 😉 (That’s what I’m calling my big wrap.)

Got up at 3:00 a.m. (yaaaaaaawn!!!!) and ate my “ritual” Vega Pre-Workout Energizer and oatmeal (no gluten – H made me check!) then posted my ritual “Ave Imperator, morituri te salutant…” on Facebook, then off to be Vanpool Mama. I brought my friend Kat and 6 other TNT/LLS Run Team folks (yes, that adds up to 7…V.A. and Sherri sat in each other’s la) to S.F. The day before I’d gotten the van carpets steam-cleaned, just in case someone had to sit on the floor! The best thing I did that morning was to I.M. with Sherri – she actually wrote to tell me she had a cold and wasn’t going to do the race – I kept writing and writing until she got out of bed and decided to brave it. I am SO GLAD that she did! We had one “tense moment” when my mentee Sandy Z. somehow lost her corral wristband in the car (I was really worried she had dropped it in the parking lot while getting INTO the car), but all worked out fine.

Kat and I took a photo of ourselves in our “crazy cat ladies getting ready to take their cats out on their leashes” outfits (courtesy of Marin Goodwill – hey, you can’t beat $10 for sweat pants and jackets!) and then went and met Trish, Anne, Lois, Michelle, and April at Maiden Lane for some send-off photos “as usual” for Nike.

I wound up trading my earlier corral slot to V.A., because she was afraid she couldn’t make it if she started back in 11+ where she was slotted. The amazing part is that I haven’t ever actually been in the “back” corral – WOW it’s far back! The good part was that was where Kat’s wristband started her, so we were able to start together. I have run with other people, but never when not starting in the same corral. I had come up with a “scheme” for how we would link up – but I always forget what it’s like to run with 29,999 of my BFFs. So I was really glad to have the same wristband.

We practiced our squats in the Port-A-Potties, and then ultimately the gun went off for the first racers. And then we waited . . . and waited . . . and waited. WOW, it takes a long time to get to the last corral! I want to say it was close to 40-45 minutes. I could really see why V.A. wanted my slot in the next corral after the Professionals/fasties!

I’d decided we’d do a 7/2 Galloway. I kept our pace pretty well – in that in the results (they time you at every 5k) I only had 2 minutes “creep up” over the whole race. Not bad. We were slow though, because instead of “fast walking” during the 2 minute walk periods, was just walk-walked. That was fine though – once we got to Mile 12, Kat said “I’m done” – and I said “Um, no you’re not” – so I’m glad that we had taken a bit longer in the “walk breaks” than usual. When we got in sight of the Finish line though, Kat SPRINTED to the finish – and I mean a full-on sprint! I couldn’t have caught her. It cracked me up! I thought “If you had that in you, woman, we could have spread that out over the whole course…” 🙂 She came in at 2:49:49 – I’d hoped to get us in at 2:30, but that was about what I figured we’d come in at since we “walk-walked” the walk breaks.

Ran into my sister in the shirt line, who talked my ear off until I got to the TNT tent, about her races, her classes, her experiences, her “I have done so many races I just give my shirts to all my family members,” her thoughts on chocolate milk (“ridiculous, in ‘all my research’ it is useless”), her (name that tune). Unfortunately as Kat needed a Medium and I was in the Large line, lost track of

her. I did catch up to Anne, Lois & Trish in the TNT Tent (and saw Brian, Patty, HB – had seen Elise, Al, and Jen Jay on the course) which was great. It had really gotten cold and foggy, so was glad for the “astronaut” blanket. I did take one of the turkey sandwiches – unfortunately only the peanut butter ones were on gluten-free bread. Then back out to find Kat.

Cell reception was sketchy, but I did send her a text and left her a voicemail, and just headed to the After-bag shuttle. I figured we had dropped our bags off at the same bus, so she’d have to head that way at some point. Caught up to my sister again there with my Dad. Dad was trying to get a hold of Mom (who had been tasked with parking the car).

Liz was shouting at all the walkers who were passing the bus in an “Atta Girl” fashion on and on and on. Found my After bag and was able to get into some warmer clothes and start nursing my recovery drink when Kat showed up (YAY!)

I was super duper glad I’d been able to get Kat a TNT shuttle bus wristband, as we sashayed past the IMMENSE line for the Nike bus and got into ours bound for Union Square. We got into the car, and then headed to Whole Foods where Kat bought me a whole tub of the Vega Energizer as a thank you (no, thank YOU!)

Got home and kibitzed a bit with H, then headed up to the requisite ice bath 😉 I actually wasn’t all that sore or stiff, so I hadn’t picked up a 50 pound sack at Andy’s. I just used the ice we had in the machine. I did add a new “wrinkle” to the experience though – generally I have a cup of miso soup (and a full-sugar Coke, if the run has been over 17 or so miles) – this time I made a cup of Bulletproof Coffee (Brain Octane Oil – which is basically a supercharged version of coconut oil plus butter plus egg yolks) and then added a shot of whisky. (H teased as I was making the coffee that I should “add a shot” to it – at which point I realized – Oh HECK yeah, that sounds like a GRAND idea!)

Caught up on Facebook while lying in bed afterwards, making sure that all my peeps, V.A., etc. had made it in – and then just went to bed. H and I were supposed to go out to an early showing of

“Gravity” after I got my ice bath/nap out of the way, but I was just too sapped by all the talking on the run, being talked “at” by my sister, etc. that I’d had too much “input” for the day! I was sorry because I know H really wants to go, and I hope that we can do it later this week. (I had thought Wednesday, but I just found out he has to go director training in San Jose Wednesday and Thursday – then we’re off to Tahoe for 4 days. Maybe we’ll see it up there!)

I did come down around 8:00 p.m. and got some dinner, then H and I watched some “low taxing” TV and I went back up to bed. That’s a lot of resting! Felt good though.

I really had planned to get up and out to Crossfit this morning, but H still feels bad (he has a nasty sore throat and cold – has had it for a week), and so since I plan to go to Bikram at 1:30 p.m. (it’s already noon – how’d THAT happen?), I bailed. I think H will go with me tomorrow night before he heads out to San Jose.

So now it’s October 21st – time to really get going on our TAR video. I have emailed my Mom to find out if she has any “bookworm-esque” shots of me when I was a kid. I have some other shots and video (especially of the skydiving), but per the timing that I laid out, it only needs to be 30 seconds. Unfortunately – unless Robbie has one – I don’t have any photos from when we were at Lucas together – even then, the funniest part is that we were mainly in contact on email!

I figure I’ll just start a Dropbox folder, like Prashant and I have done before. That will make me feel like this is “going somewhere.”

Unfortunately no more language tapes for a while, as I have our book club book on tape and need to listen to that before Thursday night!

 

 

 

 

 

Okie dokie. I posted some thoughts on Day 4/September 1st (entitled ‘The Video” – something like that). It had my thoughts as to how the beginning could “look.” We get THREE MINUTES. I personally know – from doing video podcasting, speaking, etc. – that 3 minutes is just about time to breathe in and out, and say one sentence. Unless you want to talk like Alvin the Chipmunk.

Here are TAR’s pointers on the video:

Be yourself!  We want to get to know who you are as a person, and who you are as a team. Tell us about yourself and your teammate. How will your personalities affect your experience on the show?  How will you interact with the other teams? How will you interact with each other? When describing yourself, remember to cite real life examples. We love a good story!

This is a show about relationships, so let us know how your relationship with your teammate will help you win this Race. It’s not about putting together the best skit or wearing the wackiest costumes. We’re looking for real people and we want to see the real you.  Tell us what skills and life experiences you and your teammate bring that will help you do well as participants on the show. Both teammates need to be on one video. We especially are looking for how the two of you interact. If you can not get together to make a video, you’ll have to figure out a way to edit both of you on the same video. We do not accept single submissions for this show.

This all has to be shown in 3 minutes, mind you.

So this is a mock up that I think will GET THEIR ATTENTION, and will
SHOW WHAT COULD BE INTERESTING FOR THEIR SHOW:

First 30 seconds: Star Wars “crawl” intro:

Star Wars “crawl” in beginning (SEE Day 4 idea on this) – ending as noted in that post. Using the John Williams score that’s actually linked to that post, the music begins at 0:03. I believe that a short crawl (a la the one I mentioned in the Day 4 post) would get us to about 0:23, where the “scratch” sound would happen, then my voiceoverand R’s voiceover (as per Day 4).

That will take us to about 0:30.

Second 30 seconds: Robbie’s photos/introduction by me:

Next comes R’s photos, I overdub her story, as we then seem more “together”/as if we “know one another’s story” because we’re telling each other’s story.

So this would be something like:

(photos of R as a kid hunting/fishing/canoeing – in between whatever story is told – now/L.A. entertainment stuff/more desk-related)

I overdub: “Robbie started out as a tomboy kid in Michigan. She learned not only how to swim, climb, and jump, but also paddle a canoe backwards. Now, she’s a city girl, in the Entertainment Industry in Los Angeles.” (That exact phrase, said at the right speed, would be 10 seconds. So it would need 20 seconds more, for the full 1/2 minute, and would need photos to go under the voiceover.)

Third 30 seconds: Sandy’s photos/introduction by R:

(photos of S as a kid – bookworm – in between whatever story I tell – now/more active, lawyer)

R overdubs: “[Photos of me as a kid – the names of the photos could be the “subtitles” of these photos, perhaps shot as if they are in an old scrapbook, with the title underneath?] From her earliest memory, Sandy lived out her life between the pages, imagining what it would be like to climb, jump, and canoe without actually getting dirty. She is happily married [photo of H and me at wedding with Robbie in background, perhaps with an “arrow” pointing to Robbie that says ‘Robbie’ on it] and has traveled with her husband [travel photos go by here], but he is responsible for the planning – she takes care of keeping things light [photo of “making a face like the statue” in Cambodia goes here]. As she approached 50 [photo in orange leather dress at 50th bday celebration], she came to realize that life was more fun in 3D, got up off the couch, and in the past couple years has completed an Ironman triathlon [Ironman finish photo], marathons, triathons, all while raising over $25,000 to fight blood cancer. She’s a lawyer in Northern California, and wants to do the Amazing Race to prove that she can both keep things light and plan.”

This, said at the correct speed, is 30 seconds long. I have Dropboxed photos of me as a kid with books, photos with Herbert, one photo of Robbie from my wedding (standing next to my friend Seb, who could be cut out – this could be used by Robbie or not used); one photo from our wedding where Robbie is doing the video to the side, various race photos.

Fourth 30 seconds: scroll intro of our background “together”:

The screen goes black, Williams score fades back in (at about 3:45 mins, per the John Williams score linked on Day 4), “scroll” starts with:

Robbie and Sandy met over 20 years ago
while interns at Lucasfilm. They were older than the other interns,
but played well with others. They stayed in touch through first email,
then Instant Messaging, then Facebook and Facebook Messenger.
Though 20-year friends, they have seen each other less than 10 times in person.
Their relationship is that of…

(in Starvader script): CYBER PALS

NOTE: To do this right will take looking at the initial Star Wars “scroll” HERE to see the font/scroll (just like the first “scroll” mentioned above) – but in ours, the “CYBER PALS” (which should look like “STAR WARS”) will come after, not before, the crawl.

You hear me in the background shouting “Robbie!  HEY!  STOP THAT!” and the “needle scratching off a record sound” again…it could even cut to “Darth Vader’s theme” for a few seconds if we have time, in a black screen (as if to indicate me, the big bad lawyer/Darth Vader…).

Fifth 30 seconds – our “video” together:

Cut to us on Skype. Video should “fades in” as if the video is “cutting into” a conversation that is already going:

R: It’s all about the visuals. We have to use the Star Wars theme ‘cos that’s where we met – and I think that we should like do a cut of us running across the Golden Gate, now 20-odd years later. It’s beautiful. I can drive up. We could shoot it on a weekend.

S: But that’s not our “relationship story.” The deal is – how will we work together, when we’ve been friends for 20 years but nearly never in the same place? That’s never been done on the show! That’s the story! [me flailing my arms around]

R: [arms crossed, sort of pouting] But it’s not very pretty. We need good visuals.

S: [eyebrow raised] Well . . . I’m taping this. That’s a visual.

R: [Horrified look] Oh, you’re not. [Peers into Skype box] Geez look at my hair….[hand in hair]

Video fades out to black.

<That dialog, as written, is 30 seconds>

Sixth 30 seconds: Finale:

Black with stars (see Star Wars video for what I’m talking about) – you hear R in background saying “you’re not recording this, right? Really?” and then S saying something like “You’re going to learn I snore like a Mack truck on steroids” and R saying “Look, we’ve gotta have better visuals…” ending with R capitulating – “okay, let’s try it” and S then saying “I dunno, maybe you’re right…”

Slowly fade in to the following, in this order: (1) our names and info, then (2) “CYBER-PALS’ fades in (in the Star Wars font)…then (3) the Pick us line fades in, then (4) the last line fades in:

ROBERTA KENNEY, 59 (rlk@rkenney.com)
SANDY SHEPARD, 51 (goodsolutions1@yahoo.com)
CYBER PALS
Pick Us: We don’t even know what we’ll really be like!
Let’s all find out together, on camera!

Ending with the “end” of the John Williams score (in THIS version – it’s from 2:00 to 2:07 – the other score that’s linked above doesn’t end the same).

Finis.

The only thing that we do NOT have is a “photo of the team together” (per the application) – we have everything else once we get this video done. So that’s the one thing that we have to figure out how to have. Could be a photo of the Skype screen….I put a number of potential “single photos” into the Dropbox, for me.

POSTSCRIPT: Just heard a great tag-phrase on an ad: Would love to co-opt it, something like “We want to travel the long distance together, to shorten the distance between us.”

Crossfit workout:

CONDITIONING
6 RFT
200M Run
25 Box Jump
15 Pull Up
5 Deadlift 100/70KG

I am typing this in the night before – I might actually do this one – I like all those things. Of course, the pullups would kill me LOL! I did what – 4 x 10 on Monday? And this is 6 x 15…? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. I can’t do 70 KG deadlift – but I can do 40 (orange bar is I think 10 kg, and then the 30 kg plates) – I think I could do 6 x 5 of that.

Box jumps – Bo said to put a 5 kg plate in between the 25s the next time. So that’d be what I’d do.

Wondering about them pullups…..

UPDATE: Yeah, not going. I’m SO SORE from yesterday’s WOD that I’m going to try to get a massage today. I have a masseuse that in “$-ier times” I purchased like a 10-pack from and still have massages left on – I’ve already emailed her! Have a ton of chores to do today (running around-type chores – going to post office, helping Mom pick out a rug color, etc.) but I can smoosh them around my calendar and get that massage in. Oooooouch, sore!

My Day 49-TAR thing will be listening to language tapes while chore-ing.

UPDATE: No massage – SIGH! – masseuse booked. I did get a Groupon spray-tan though and it looks glorious 😉

So, yesterday at work study, I did my usual (steam clean the yoga floor, do laundry, clean up after the piggies oh I mean yogis in the bathrooms, etc.) and then I had one BIG chore to do.

Gail had gotten what is likely a semi-annual delivery of “soap and stuff” from Seventh Generation – and my job was to put it away. Now, she said that I didn’t have to do all of it – but I made it a “TAR event” (yeah, I’m pathetic, I know) and also knew that she’d just be so glad it was done that if I could, I should.

There were 40+ boxes of product – from boxes of a dozen squirt-bottles, to boxes with two huge jugs of “wholesale” soap (as in, the stuff you would put “into” a bottle you already have). The boxes were of a size that (weights being manageable) I could stack two on top of one another, and they would fit just under my chin, with my arms fully extended. Since I’m over 6′ tall, those are fairly large boxes.

Now, granted, I couldn’t stack 2 on top of one another, for two reasons. One, some were too heavy for me to carry two at a time. Two – I had to carry them from a breezeway down a steep flight of stairs, duck under a support beam, into the cellar, then under a rat’s maze of pipes to the very back of the cellar, where the cleaning products go. (Things that are used up more quickly, like coconut water, Hint water and such, are stacked against a pillar by the door just inside the cellar, but the rest is way in the back.)

Both R and I were pretty impressed the pink-haired girl in TAR this season (the mean one) in that during the event where the teams had to carry 60 pound sacks of salt to a tub and pour them in, she was able to carry two at a time, versus all the other women who could just barely lift one. I admit I was thinking about this as I was lugging those boxes around!

I realized that bringing the boxes from the breezeway down the stairs one at a time, ducking under the beam, through the door, under the rat’s maze of pipes, then piling them up nicely where they belonged obviously would take way too much time. I personally couldn’t pile up 2 boxes (even of the lighter ones) and go down the stairs, because I couldn’t see the stairs if I did that. So what I did was to bring all the boxes to the top of the stairs, and then lift them down the stairs, going down 3-4 stairs at a time. So basically, making a little “wall” of boxes at the top of the stairs until they were all that bit closer, with me pulling them down from 3-4 stairs below. I could get 3 boxes across, 3 high – but any higher I wouldn’t be able to “lift over” the wall to get the next set – this being where R building from behind would have been a boon!

It was interesting doing it – also interesting figuring out the “Tetris puzzle” of how to get as many boxes as I could onto a stair (they were not exactly the same size, did I say that?). They all said “do not shake/this side up,” so by and large (meaning – “when I didn’t lose my grip on one and it tumbled sideways down a stair”), I paid attention to that.

I also was very VERY conscious of how I was moving my body. This weekend when we were moving those damned quartzite slabs around, H was constantly harping on me to watch my back. The good part of Crossfit is that it makes such a big deal of that, too.

Once I got the boxes all down to a couple stairs from the cellar door, I started transferring them into the cellar itself. I stacked them up on the coconut water boxes, etc. that were inside the door, so that I wouldn’t have to lift them off the ground. (Thank goodness the door didn’t have a spring! That would’ve been an extra level of madness…) After I got as many boxes as I could in, I carried those boxes back (under the pipes and ducts) and stacked them up. Then I would go back out to the stairs, transfer those boxes to on top of the coconut water boxes, then carry THEM back.

At one point, I wasn’t watching what I was doing (since most of the “dance” I was doing necessitated me to be moving backwards down the stairs), and I picked up a box and turned to take it into the cellar – then SMACKED into the support beam right in front of the cellar door. O-M-G. I actually saw stars – I thought that was just a joke from old Bugs Bunny cartoons!

Today I have Crossfit at 6:30pm with H – he can finally get off work to go. I just heard he will be down in San Jose for 2 days next week on work – they’re working him HARD. He wanted to get away for Thanksgiving, but I don’t think we can swing it. So he actually just told me he has booked us 3 days up at Squaw Creek in Tahoe – he found a Groupon, and so he did it. (Now, mind you, he doesn’t like that I do work/study on Mondays, and this will be a Friday-Monday thing. So I’m going to have to find someone to take my time without making a big deal of it.)

Ah, money. We did our taxes, and my income was pathetic last year and I mean pa-the-tic. I didn’t realize it was SO bad until I saw it in black and white. I’ve tried to do my best to do things (like work/study) so that stuff I want to do doesn’t come out of our budget. Since we were members at the JCC mainly because they had a wonderful pool for me to use, by getting H involved in Crossfit, I can transfer the JCC “budgeted amount” to Crossfit. (Not that we actually HAVE a budget mind you – H takes care of paying all the bills that aren’t directly “my bills.”) That means that we’ll have to suspend our membership to the JCC and its lovely salt-filtered-no-chlorine-pool, but I’m okay with that – if I want to swim, I can just bite the bullet and go swim in the Bay, or from the dock in Tiburon. Two people at Crossfit costs a bit more than the JCC did, but I know H really likes it more, and I also know he’s getting a much much better workout than he was getting just going to their fitness center and going through his “routine” two days a week while watching TV on the wall.

So how pathetic is my income? As in, I made a gross of around $20,000 last year.

Back when I was general counsel and my company was on rocky grounds – I actually wound up getting downsized – I had an interview at a company I really wanted to work for. I remember this very clearly. At the time, I “couldn’t figure out how I could possibly” drop my salary down to $110,000 from the $200,000 or so I made.

Pfffffft.

H doesn’t really complain that I don’t make that much, probably because he mainly pays all the bills, and they are the same bills that he had (by and large) when he was single. I still have my house, but I rent it out, and now (FINALLY) after re-financing, it’s cashflow neutral. (I was actually a little negative every month until earlier this year – but we also have a big line of credit on it that we’ve used to purchase more rental properties.) I do all the laundry, breakfasts, dinners, lunch when he goes in to the city, and such like that – but my gross of about $2,000 a month obviously shows why I do things like stage “clothing swaps” at my house instead of heading to Nordstrom’s. Not like I was ever a big shopper, mind you – but a lot of things that we used to do – go out to dinner, movies, etc. – have definitely fallen to the wayside.

More pathetic is the fact that a huge chunk of that pathetic income goes to malpractice insurance. I really should get my act back together and market for more work – but H hasn’t sat me down and said “you gotta bring in more” – and so, I don’t. Bad me. A few times I’ve floated my resume out for in-house jobs – since if I did get a job that made more, H could retire sooner – but I’ve managed to make it into that lovely age group where folks don’t want to hire you because you’re really “way older” than your boss would be. And H actually likes me to be at home. Ha! I guess that makes me a trophy wife! LOL!

I think the $ thing was front of mind because we just did our taxes, but also because R’s always “trying to figure out” when I work. I work when work comes in. The thing is, work hasn’t come in all that often recently. My biggest client got purchased – so that work went away. Even my 2nd and 3rd largest clients have “tightened their belts” in this economy, so I can go for a month without getting much work at all – a little here, a little there. So that’s my story – and how my life works. 😉

POSTSCRIPT:

Workout at Crossfit was: CONDITIONING
5 RFT
400M Run
20 Wall Ball
10 Dip
50 Double Under/100 Single Unders

I did it all – coming in after the “regular guys” but before Jay, his wife, and H. Wondering what R is going to say about the application….