Of Moose And Men
The Best Laid Plans Of Both Often Go Astray

Okay, got laundry done, went grocery shopping, assembling the race gear now, as well as cleaning the house now (and by “cleaning the house” I mean that I set the Roomba loose in the bedroom while I was out shopping and it’s now getting the kitchen and front hall done). Car reservation made. Hotel reservation confirmed.

Once assembly’s done, there’s not a lot more to do except try to relax. Which will likely drive me crazy. Thankfully I have Sacred to keep me somewhat distracted.

Tomorrow’s plan is to pick up the car, get BC, then off to Bear, Delaware, for packet pick up the race on Sunday. It doesn’t appear they’ll be doing live updates, but I’ll try to get something up on LJ after I’m done.

Let’s see. Today. Bullets:

• Left work “late” (aka on time) because I got caught up in fixing something. Not a bad thing, it gives me something to write tomorrow. (I say “late” because it’s summer and I typically am the last one in the office, with an official quit time of 6pm, and it’s been dead after 5pm)
• Got home to a new obsession in the mail. It’s all BC’s fault for mentioning it. And Amazon’s for offering the full set for less than $10.
• Played said obsession until just now. Hadn’t evven checked email this evening, that’s how bad it was.
• Despite that, managed to get laundry done for this weekend’s trip and race.
• Ran briefly this morning (as in, less than 2 miles). Went okay.
• Discovered while doing laundry that my favorite big running shorts have a hole in the crotch. Thank heavens I have multiple pairs to choose from.
• Still recovering from the head cold, but getting better.

And that’s about it today.

Was up until 4am. Sleep was not to be found. Then, I was rudely awakened at 8am by the sound of a chipper/shredder taking out the limb that came down Saturday night outside my window. Called work, went back to bed. Just getting up now, and only up because I got hungry. Well, that and the half-awake dreams got really, really fucked up and I couldn’t take them any more.

I even hauled out my neti pot to help clear out my nose. I haven’t used that thing in years. It did do a good job of clearing some stuff out, so I’ll probably see about doing it as a regular practice. I think I got the head position better last night than I have (chin and forehead level – previously I’d had the chin too far down I think) after a lot of insominac reading last night. And hey, if it helps, water and salt are cheap, certainly cheaper than sudafed.

I sense much monster killing today, around napping. And a little bit of work, since I have a meeting with a political appointee tomorrow about his project and how to fund it in a way that doesn’t kill the thing.

So, I’m texting back and forth with BC the other day and he casually drops in a text that he’s “Chilling out, playing some diablo.”

*cue screeching halt noise*

Quick phone call to BC gets made. “Wait, did you just say that you play Diablo (II)?” Yup, he does, LOD expansion pack even. And loves it. One of my favorite games of all time, and he loves it.

*cue geek squeal*

Yup, definitely infatuated here. More and more each day.

Without a means to play games (without having to connect to the net or wifi, that is) the phone is encouraging more writing than the previous one. I’ve done more email checking and writing than I used to do on the Treo. The larger screen is a definite plus for that, even when it gets sucked up by the keyboard. Scrolling is easier, with a flick of the finger, though I still have trouble with zooming in and out.

Most definitely not bored today at work. Taught an hour-long seminar, been catching up on and responding to a ton of emails, and getting handed more reading for meetings later this week. Busy is good, don’t get me wrong, I far prefer it to the alternative.

SNAFU between work and the new carrier – we qualify for a discount on service, but they have to confirm where you work by sending your work email address a link to access their discount page. Fair enough. But each time it tried, the email comes through with no link. And of course it’s nigh impossible to figure out who to contact about the issue. I wouldn’t bother but money off is money off, and I’d prefer a cheaper bill if at all possible.

Busy week for BC this week, so it’s unlikely we’ll see each other until Saturday. Not a huge deal, but I do find myself missing his presence. Phone calls, texts & emails are okay, but no substitute for a good hug.

I don’t think it’s a portent for the day, but when I got into my office this morning and went to change out of bicycling clothes and into work drag, I managed to step right on top of a purple jelly bean. Good thing I keep extra napkins in the office.

Got in a long ride this weekend, but no long run, so went out and did 7ish miles this morning before work. Was well behaved and kept my heart rate down in a semi-decent zone, rather than my usual overdoing it. I suspect I’m going to have a couple things I want to focus on after mid-september’s races, including some fat loss, weight work, and practice staying down in heart rate zones one and two. Might go for broke and get myself one of the new garmin heart rate monitor/gps units, too. BC just got one, and I was pleasantly surprised at how multi-sport friendly it was, unlike my nice, but kludgey, polar unit – it’s good for single sport training, and will give you great info for each sport, but you can’t do multi-sport workouts or races and keep the data in one file, which is a major weakness in my opinion. Perhaps a birthday present for myself this year. Probably better for me in the long run than, say, a Wii, too.

Not that a Wii wouldn’t be fun, as seen Saturday night when we were out at a friend’s house and played Wii bowling. Good job, Nintendo, even if it is still easier to get crack in DC than it is to find a Wii on the shelves in the area. Cheaper, too.

The natives are restless tonight. It’s the usual pre-July 4th firecracker week here in DC and they’ve been going off sporadically all night. My favorite was just a few minutes ago, an explosion so loud that I lost hearing for a couple of seconds, even here inside my apartment (with the windows open). I can only imagine what it did to the kids who set it off.

BC’s birthday was Friday, and some space he had tried to get for a blackjack night to celebrate on Saturday fell through so I hosted it here. I’m happy to report that the table easily seats eight. ‘Twas a fun time, and a good way to celebrate the birthday in a nice, low-key manner.

Needless to say, though, we didn’t get up until sometime around noon today.

Once we finally got going it was time for some shopping at the Macy’s sale downtown. ‘Twas fun to shop with him, he’s got good taste. Unfortunately I wasn’t looking for much in the way of fun stuff, more like socks and dress pants and the like. Regardless, the target items were found, and we wandered around a bit more downtown before heading back here for a bad movie and some cuddle time.

Should be an interesting week ahead. I’m acting team leader for my team this week, which seems (from the report from this past week’s acting team leader) to be a lot of getting tons of emails from our boss and forwarding them on for assignment. I know there are other things, but that seemed to be the most onerous part. Thankfully one of our main ethics attorneys will be there to consult (my team leader’s main experience is in ethics work), since I know little to nothing about advising folks on the federal ethics statutes and regs.

Evidently I needed extra sleep. I didn’t set an alarm for this morning, figuring I’d get up somewhere near my normal time. I think I did, but went right back to bed until around 8:30. Sinful. But it felt good. As a result I didn’t get out on the bike until around 10, so finished up the planned ride around 12:40ish, not quite 40 miles. The ride itself went well. No close calls with small children this time (went out about a month ago with a friend who ended up running over a small child who turned suddenly into his path with no space to dodge her; thankfully aside from a little cut on him, neither were seriously hurt). Only had to yell at one person (“Watch out!”) on the zoo property as he came at me head on while looking at birds off the trail rather than where he was going, and otherwise folks were behaving as I expected them to.

I find that I dislike riding the capitol crescent trail once you cross into Maryland. I’m sure the DC side would be just as bad were it as densely populated, but there’s a definite uptick in strollers, idiots wearing head phones and other obstacles. Heart rate goes up in such situations (stress much?), but so be it.

Debating a planned swim, I think I might be better off doing that tomorrow evening. The rest of the evening is set aside for le crush and a cheesy movie & dinner. Until then, it’s time to make coffee. And gather fruit.

I suppose this is one of the drawbacks of training as I do, what with swimming and what not. it seems I have a nascent case of swimmer’s ear. At least, I think that’s what it is now. Previously (because I’ve had lighter versions of these symptoms before in the winter) I’d just assumed it was a bit of excess snot built up in my sinuses, as the symptoms weren’t that far apart (slight pressure on the eardrum, which is really irritating when you’re running and your eardrum is beating in time with your steps). Now, I’m pretty much convinced it’s swimmer’s ear, so i’m backing off swimming this week, seeing my physician’s assistant on Wednesday, and in the meantime I’m just about steadily saying: OUCH!

This. Fracking. Hurts.

I’ll be getting some earplugs next week, too. Ouch.

In other news™, I keep thinking I want to get a Wii, but then I remember that I barely have time for my DS these days, which means I’m really not playing games at all, which means a Wii would pretty much be a waste of money. Which is annoying, because it looks fun, but I’d rather save my $$ and pay off a student loan this year. Irritating to be so ‘adult’ at times. I’d also rather spend my time, at least until July 22, on training our newbies for their first triathlon. After the ear’s better, of course.

Ouch.

To say I was busy at work yesterday would be an understatement. Best way to explain how the day went: When I got to the end of the day, I picked up my thermos (the one I pack my good coffee in from home) to put it in my bag. It was still full. I’d never even had my coffee. And if you know me, you know that doesn’t happen; I always have my coffee. I’m sure I’ll make up for the caffeine consumption today, but, yeah, busy.

Am hopeful this upcoming holiday week will be a tad easier, and let me concentrate on two semi-big projects and get them out the door. That and time to do some research on the new vision and dental plans that the Feds are offering as a choice this year.

Today is about catching up on my games (there were weeds all over my town of Crobuzon in Animal Crossing:Wild World) and cleaning. The off-season is so thrilling. I did swim last night, so I’m not totally slacking, but it’s nice to lay off the exercise for a little bit.