Or maybe it was a forethought.
Woke up. Flipped out of bed. Ran a mile in the rain.
Call it a Rest Day.
My legs did feel heavy.
I left the afternoon free of training. Almost.
The kids and I did put in 45 minutes of training wheel-less biking.
Pushed them down the hill about 30 times each.
It is amazing:
- How much progress they have made in just 2 days
- How much fun they are having
Last summer, I tried several times to get them biking without training wheels.
They hated it. Screamed it away.
And now I realize that learning to ride a bike is a lot like trying baby food.
They say, if your baby doesn't like a particular type of baby food like carrots, you need to feed it to him something like 17 times.
Don't give up. Eventually he will eat it.
That's what we've learned with the bike.
You're gonna fall off, you're gonna crash, it's not gonna be fun, but keep at it.
I would love to apply this strategy at work.
But, the target of this training method would probably stab me with a pair of scissors.
Speaking of keeping at it, I have finally done it.
I have identified and completed the logistical requirements for the Liberty Island Swim on Friday.
Here's a sample of the path to the swim:
- Register for swim back on Christmas Day. $95
- Hang out
- Complete qualifying pool swim a few weeks ago
- Scan pool swim certification and upload to NYC Swim website
- Receive acceptance notification
- Purchase 8AM ferry tickets for myself, my brother and the kids to get to Liberty Island
- Realize that 8AM on the ferry means like 4:30AM departure from home. No good. Need to leave later
- Chat with online ferry representative who tells me to go to Hell. In so many words.
- Call ferry representative who gladly lets me bump departure time to Noon. But we have to give up the actual tickets for Inside the Statue of Liberty. Fine.
- Confirm with my little brother that he is indeed going
- Find out that he isn't
- Figure out who can go with me on a few days notice on a Friday and can capably watch the kids during the 20 minute race. Aka nobody.
- Ask my brother one final time and he decides he will go
- Calculate that I will need 3 Guest passes for my brother and the kids to take a specially chartered ferry off of the island after the race
- You only get 2 Guest passes
- Post a sob story to the NYC Swim Facebook page
- Have a girl offer me one of her guest passes
- She registers my brother as her guest. Perfect
- As instructed, send an email to NYC Swim requesting the "special" instructions for registering my kids for guest passes, as they are "minors"
- Get the instructions which involves requiring unique email addresses for the kids
- Set up email addresses for the kids
- Send a test email back-and-forth with my kids' email addresses
- Why does that bring a tear to my eye?
- Successfully register the kids as guests
- Breathe
It is VERY hard for me to do that kind of stuff. Very hard for me to follow through with all of those little details.
Fortunately, most of the people I have dealt with throughout the process have been nice and helpful.
If I do this race again in the future, I will be much better prepared.
Now just a few little things remain.
Do I buy new goggles before the race? My goggles usually spontaneously explode this time of year, costing me $20.
I need to make a checklist both of supplies like food, drink and sunblock to get us through the day as well as racing gear. I need to figure out how to carry a camera during the swim.
As for the actually swimming, it will be short but tough.
It is only .7 miles.
The current and tide will probably knock me around.
It's also my first open water swim of the year. With water temperature in the 70's it will be very inviting.
One final practice swim tomorrow in preparation.
Did I mention this is my favorite day of the year?
Longest day of the year.
Which also makes it kinda sad.
Every subsequent day for 6 months will be shorter. Damn.
We've made the most of each day so far.
And maybe I've celebrated by staying up way too late.
Or maybe that's because some stuff at work exploded tossing a 2-hour interlude into my night.
Still got to put the kids to bed.
Let's wrap this up with the lullabies.
This one was pretty random.
And I heard this song on the radio today. Takes me back.
I hope you enjoyed the first day of summer, too.
3 comments:
the other night sunset was at 8:54, I was all excited, but then like you said, I remembered it's all down hill from there!
i'm not good at following through on little annoying details like that either... but it feels good to fully cross something off the list.
i was kind of depressed last night/today thinking about how the days get shorter now. ha. "seasonal affect depression" (or whatever it's called) in summer. i consoled myself with the fact that it will be daylight in the am/pm for quite some time, thankfully.
Obviously I am staying up too late at night as well. Get some sleep before those races. After the work it took to get you all there tomorrow, it sounds like you need it! In fact, you better be asleep now.
And does that 17 times thing apply to potty training accidents? Please tell me it does.
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