My Smelly Skinsuit

I signed up for the Bob Beal stage race last night, right before the deadline. Sandy then extended registration until this morning. I knew I'd regret it if I missed the cutoff. Now we'll see if I regret signing up. Sometimes this race just gives me a headache, but in the end my thoughts were that this would help me preserve the fitness I've achieved this summer for a bit longer, thus giving me more time to ramp up my running program. Yesterday morning, with only a touch of soreness from Monday's inaugural jog, I headed out again, upping the duration to 18 minutes this time. There was some logging activity going on in the woods of the estate behind my house, and this kind of worries me, as I don't want to lose the resource. The owners are filthy rich, old money, so I am not sure what the deal is. I doubt they are selling to developers, as most of their land around town has already been put into a preservation trust. Possibly they are building a new house, as the nine bedroom mansion currently on the property is shown on zillow.com as only having one bathroom, which can't be much fun when you get as old as this guy is. My next-door neighbor is one of the caretakers for the property, so I'll have to ask him what's going on.

Today is Mom's birthday. I'd say Happy Birthday, but Mom lives over on the other side of the digital divide, so she'd never see it. Tonight I'll head over to the elderly housing project for a visit. Last night, in preparation, I trekked to the dreaded outlet mall to browse for a gift. As usual, I spent a lot more on myself. Still having not really updated my work wardrobe since reducing my girth, I sprung for three pair of Dockers. The 33 waist almost would have worked in the relaxed fit (killer thighs you know), but ultimately I settled on the safer 34's. Leg length is more of a problem. I don't know if I've shrunk or if pants have become longer, but I now step on a 34 inseam. Problem is, 32 can be just a bit short, and 33 is a very rare animal. So I went with the flood pants options. I really don't give a shit. After that, I checked the Saucony store, but they didn't have much. My Grid Hurricanes still have less then 50 miles on them anyway. I am not sure if I like them. I miss the cushy ride of the cheaper Grid Jazz that I used to run in, but they didn't have any of those. My running clothes inventory is non-existent, so I then went into the Adidas store and they had all kinds of cool stuff at reasonable prices, so I filled two bags with track pants, shorts, jerseys, and jackets. What a country.

This morning I'm searching high and low for my newest Polar HRM transmitter, which has gone missing since Haverhill. I think I found the strap, but I'm not sure if its the right one. My quest led me to my milk crate of dirty cycling clothes, which, since I've not been training this week, contained only my kit from Sunday at Haverhill. I'll be needing the skinsuit for Bob Beal, so while digging through to see if I'd inadvertently tossed the transmitter in there, I took the time to unpin the Haverhill number before washing it. For a 37 minute race, I managed to stink that thing up pretty good. Nothing like the science project that comes out of the dirty bag after a cross race (ever put your wet, muddy shitz into a grocery bag post-race, then lose it for a few days? Of course you have...), but a fucking nasty way to start my day nonetheless, and still no transmitter.

Hmmmm, I know there was something else, but we're up to 6 am now, and I've got the TT bike setup on the trainer for a little spin before work. My road bike fell over at Haverhill and it seems like the derailleur hanger got pushed in a bit, so I'll need to deal with that too. I forgot that Bob Beal rules make us race only in our own age group (no racing down), so Confocal Boy won't be giving a powerful leadout to his teammate Burke after all. And it's a damn shame that MoveitFred decided to sit this one out too. It could have been a blogspot jamboree on the Rhode Island coast. Oh yeah, now I remember, I was going to talk about psychopharmacologists. I saw this on Francine's blog, and I had to look it up. I thought that maybe I was one back in the "Save the Bales" days of my misspent youth, but I guess maybe that would have been psychopharmacist, although the psychoactiveness of chronic is still up for debate. I'm not really sure; I can't keep up with the kiddies these days. (BTW Francine, the crankset arrived yesterday safe and sound, thanks a lot!) And no, I don't take EPO, but thanks for asking, and thanks for reading.