Random Musings: Bike Bits, Swimmy Swimmy, Pain

The world is waiting, I know, for every shimmering pearl of wisdom that may form in the clamshell of my MacBook. Ooh, labored metaphor alert. Ouch. But hey, I'm out of practice. Been working a little bit on the fiction, but not too much. The old day job has reared its ugly head with a vengeance and is failing to allow me much free thinking and musing time. Even more annoyingly, my old nemesis, the extensor tendons of the right wrist, were flaring up big time, even before my workload got heavy. So in the interests of continuing to receive a regular paycheck, I cut back drastically on all non-work keyboarding. Facebook, blog, novel, Twitter, email, the lot.

Even now I feel the soreness coming on so I'm going to be succinct.

1. Bought some new aerobars for the LeMond, but installed them wrong, so I'll need to take the armrests off and put the spacers in and put 'em back on again.
2. Need to buy another little saddle bag, as I keep forgetting to switch my one bag with my tire levers and spare tubes between bikes. This bit me in the ass yesterday on the way to the train
3. Swimming is lovely. My 100s are getting a little faster, my 400s a little less labored. I even managed a full 25 yards of rather languid butterfly the other day. As the Sacramento summer really kicks in, though, I realize I need a non-black swim cap and some anti-glare goggles.
4. Running - eh. Not so much. Not feelin' the love right now. Gonna try a quick waddle tomorrow. Even the acquisition of a Garmin Forerunner 305, with all the lovely geeky data it provides, has not inspired me to get out on my two stumpy legs. Tomorrow it's supposed to be cooler, and I will get up early and trot about.
5. Played another two rounds of disc golf, getting kind of ok at it. If only I had space in the schedule for another time-intensive hobby!
   
6. Wrist pain curtails not only writing but also longer bike rides. This officially sucks.
7. Additional pain is found down in the area of the sacrum, which is sort of familiar, but it seems to be abating. I really need some body work though.
   
8. Better get on the stick - registered for the Luna Bar Women's Tri in August and the Golden State Tri in October.

More pearls before too long. We hope. Meanwhile, have fun out there. Go swim.

New Developments, Apologies for Sporadic Posting

Hey sports fans,

I know it's been almost 3 weeks since I had an update for you, and here's why. I'm writing another book. Whoa! Where did that come from? Well, where most of my ideas come from, out of a nether orifice. My great friend Anne, who is also a great writer, invited me and another of her friends on a "writing retreat" to celebrate the end of her semester. I was like, "Sure, I got nuthin' in my pocket as far as writing, but I'll come to Sea Ranch with you and see what happens." So we up and went to Sea Ranch for a few days, and next thing I know I've written three chapters of a novel. I've never written a novel, or even part of one, or even thought very seriously about writing one. The idea of going on a writer's retreat, though, made me think, "Hell, I'm a writer. Damn straight! Maybe I'll write a novel!"

Now, there's no way I get this thing going without Anne. She is an absolute fountain of plots and ideas and notions, and I've always felt, for some reason, that I can't figure out a plot. But we sat down and started throwing out crazy ideas, and words started to flow. It was fun. And writing for fun is one of the funnest things I know. The flow was flowing big time.

A cool place to write a few chapters.

I don't know if this story will ever be published, and I don't care. I mean, I do care, and I will work to get it to the largest possible audience, but right now I'm just squeezing in a hundred words here and a hundred words there. So when I have a few moments, I've been pulling up that "manuscript" and not the blogspot URL. The flow has slowed a bit since I no longer have the great luxury of writing for several hours a day just for fun, but it's still trickling along.

It was a great few days for BFFC reasons, too. We walked, we hiked, we swam. Linda gave me some pointers on the butterfly, which remains my Everest. Very hard, very enticing, potentially very beautiful. Someday I will reach it, but I may need supplemental oxygen or a Sherpa to help me.

We ate great food, we watched some cool movies, we all got along great. I saw a grey fox trot up almost to the window, pounce on something, miss it, yawn, look into the sun, and walk away.

Highly recommended: a few days with extremely congenial people in a beautiful, stress-free spot where you can reconnect with something you really love in a way that's not too structured. You never know what may flow.