May Day Ride

These are posted a bit late as I had some issues with downloading the pictures from my phone (I hate the phone with a passion, but that's a post for a different day).

I rode with the club on May 1st out to Deep Cove but left them at the Second Narrows and came home on my own. As it was a lovely day and I was on my own, I stopped along the way to take some pictures.

The view from the top of the bridge. To me the picture captures the "big sky" feel the day had. I also love the roiling water. I probably should have cropped out either the sky or the water to make this more balanced, but I like them both too much to remove - artistry be damned!

One of the grain elevators,looking freshly painted.

I'm not sure if this is a grain elevator but it's picturesque. The section of Wall St. along the bike path is one of my favorite parts of the city.

Finally, a view back towards the bridge from Wall St.

Uncle!

I'm taking a break from the photo challenge. It became work and stress and something I couldn't deal with so I'm on hiatus for March.

Spring pretty much always brings me down. I can't remember a year when I approached my birthday (April 1 - please mark your calendars) in a good mood. It's not that I mind birthdays or getting older, half the time I can't remember my age anyway, it's just the time of year. Maybe allergies are to blame - lack of sleep and oxygen can definitely get in the way of joie de vivre. Perhaps my version of Spring renewal is more like a really painful case of pins and needles in your arm as sensation returns after you fall asleep on the couch in an odd position. Or maybe I just don't like March? It certainly doesn't seem to like me.

Regardless of the cause, the effect is that I'm easily overwhelmed and pretty low in terms of energy and attitude. In order to keep both my sanity and my friends (been a wee bit cranky lately) I'm simplifying - no photo challenge, doing workouts at home when I can rather than trecking out to join the group or skipping workouts entirely in order to cook a decent dinner.

We hope to return to regular programming in April.

The week in review

"Week in review" sounds much better than "I'm totally behind on posting."

I blame drugs and alcohol!

Robaxicet on Wednesday, and no photo that day. I put my back out changing my bike brakes the previous Sunday and that threw me off from workouts and life in general for the week. The back is mostly better but I'm still babying it a bit.

I did get in a good ride out to Iona with the crew on Saturday and the back didn't protest until right near the end. I did my first post-bike run of the year regardless of the back.

Vast amounts of Malbec on Saturday night made for a fun evening but I forgot about getting in even a last minute shot. The Malbec also made for a painful start to my Sunday a.m. swim. The upside was that the workout would have been hell regardless (all out sprints interspersed with core work) so I got all the pain out of the way at the same time. By the time we ran I was feeling vaguely human and knocked out 1:20 reasonably easily.

And then the allergies kicked in Sunday afternoon:

Defunct playground equipment by Lord Byng Pool. sort of how I felt during the swim!
Sakura!
Rainbow seen in the a.m.
Cherry trees on the banks of the Fraser. I forgot my camera but the light was so fabulous I took the shot with my phone. It didn't turn out half bad.

Over

O Canada

Final day of the games. And what a finish! 68 incredibly stressful minutes of hockey, I don't think I've ever been that tense watching sports before.

A whole lot of flag waving this afternoon. It was an incredibly fun ride home from Joanne and Torbins' - I was high-fived, honked at, yelled at, cheered at. All in good spirits and good fun as the city, or rather cities (I road through Richmond & Vancouver), were ecstatic over the win.

Now we have to adjust to going back to normality, say goodbye to all the visitors, and get used to the mundane.

This is going to be a rough week!

Dim Sum

Hiroki at Dim Sum. He was amazingly skilled with the chop sticks, he hit someone square on every time he threw one.

Cat's Meow

My neighbourhood is overrun by birds, mostly starlings ripping up everyone's lawns, but also a good dozen robins, lots of itty-bitty songbirds and, of course, the inevitable crows.

I assume that's why my neighbour's cat is 1) licking his lips and 2) so fat.

Monday's Photo

And after all the Olympic picture taking, this is my favourite shot:

I laughed when I saw Amy's picture for the 19th as the building reflected here is the one doing the reflection in her shot. Great minds think (almost) alike.

Day at the Olympics - Highlight Real

Executive summary of my day with Mum:

• Early start at the cauldron (lots of pics from the fence)
• Checked out lots of long lines (Cdn Mint, zip line) for things we opted to miss
• Checked out Robson Square sans crowds
• Picked up curling tix
• Lined up to view the cauldron from the viewing area. Took about 20 pics, none as good as the ones I took from the fence!
• Found more long lines (200 ppl at Russia House two hours before it opened, no thanks) and discovered, at 10am, that most of the houses open at noon.
• Right to Play House was open and full of kids - fun.
• Introduced Mum to babka buns at Solleys. I couldn't get her to commit to whether she liked them more than their cinnamon buns.
• Went to curling and watched the Canada women beat Sweden 6-2.
• Checked out Robson Square with crowds.
• Watched "Mascots on Ice" solely to get a picture of Sumi for Oscar. One-year old crying for Miga, sort of cute but mostly creepy ("Meeeeeeeega")
• Saw the line for Irish House. Didn't go in.
• Visited Live City, saw more lines for houses we didn't go into. Watched a bit of Canada vs. Finland womens' hockey on the big screen.
• Took the ferry to Granville Island - saw the ridiculously long line for Atlantic House. Got lots of second hand smoke in the process, good thing we don't have to go through doping control!
• Dinner at Noodle Box

Photos (more to come when Mum sends me hers):

My best cauldron shot. Not taken from the viewing platform!

Apocalypse Now moment (very happy not to hear Ride of the Valkeries).

Maison du Quebec - didn't open for another two hours.

The Sochi Teletubbie.

Curling.

Sumi & Fans

Langley Half Marathon

It was a stunningly beautiful morning on Sunday. It was also very cold - Shannon thought I was nuts because I wanted to take pictures when clearly the intelligent thing to do was to go inside the visitor centre and stay warm. I think the pictures below were worth a little bit of chill.

The run wasn't my best half marathon, but I knew going in that I wasn't in peak shape. The course is also the hardest half marathon course I've ever done, one very steep hill and one that was less steep but kept going up without let up for three km.

I was confident I could break two hours and hoped I could get close to 1:50 (my PR).

I felt comfortable in the first 10km, enough so that I had visions of a PR dancing in my head. Some logical part of my brain realized that this meant I was actually going out too fast, but of course I didn't slow down. About halfway the two hour pace bunny passed me. I knew I was on pace to break two hours with time to spare but it bugged me to be behind the bunny! Especially as I was slogging up the long hill and not feeling overly spectacular.

After about 11km I started to tire and at 13km, the start of the long hill, my legs felt like they were made of cement. I got a bit upset and my breathing was slightly out of whack but I talked myself out of a bad head space and just kept going.

I desperately wanted to beat the race bunny (not sure which definition of "beat" applied at this point) but sadly I wasn't even close. I did, however, finish in 1:55:12. Not bad.

Unfortunately the course was one of those hard ones, like the Peach (where I still feel I have something to prove), that's probably going to draw me back next year.

My pre-race shots:

Golden Ears out of the mist. My picture of the day.


Yes, I'm an arboriphile.

I totally copied a shot my Dad took earlier this month. Not on purpose though, it just looked pretty!

The Fraser with Golden Ears lost in the mist.

Magnolia

The weather is annoyingly nice right now - there's no good excuse to stay inside and watch TV all when it's spectacularly warm and sunny. I want to watch the Olympics darn it!

Today's workout was a short ride. As Louis is in need of new brakes, rather than do bike repair I rode Ruby and did errands. I may have ridden for more than an hour but it was nice to be outside.

The short ride is because of tomorrow's endeavour - the Langley Historic Half Marathon. I'm not feeling overly prepared, I haven't put in the distance in my long runs and running has felt difficult in the past few weeks, but this isn't supposed to be a world record pace for me. I'm hoping for 1:50, less would be nice but unrealistic, especially as the course is quite hilly. 5min/km pace is the goal.

I just figured out this evening that one of the race charities is Mountain View Farms, run by my employer from my last job. Hopefully I'll get a chance to say hi to Gordon.

I now have to try to get myself away from the TV so I can get to bed!

Good Day (just not where training is concerned)

Yesterday I woke up tired and cranky so skipped my swim. I'm never sure if I'm being smart by listening to my body or wimping out by not doing the workout in these situations!

The evening was great. Met up with friends at Granville Island to eat at Swiss House. I had perfect timing and arrived just before the crew that had been waiting two hours got in to be seated. The cheese fondu "for two" was more than the five of us could eat but very good. The strudel, which people were waxing poetic about, was nice but didn't hold a candle to the strudel I had when travelling through Texas with Helen and Jane (and the name of the town was ...?).

We went downtown after, into the total craziness that is Granville Street on a Friday during the Olympics immediately after Canada had won a gold medal. We'd missed seeing the medal and had to rely on ebulient, hive-fiving drunks for details. According to them the medal was for "doubles" skeleton. I think this is how new sports are born - alcohol and misunderstandings. After watching all the macho guys being so excited about the skeleton gold I now really want Virtue & Moir to win, love to see them hi-fiving each other and singing O Canada because we won a gold in ice dance!

We got half a block away from Robson Square before the crush of people made it impossible to move. Again my timing was perfect as the fire and light show started just as we got there.

When it ended we tried to head West on Robson but it was impossible to get through the crowd so we head down to see the flame. Tons of people and lots of couples - apparent it is the official "canoodling couples" area for the Olympics.

I wimped out and headed home after that while the rest of crew headed back to Robson.

Track Workout

Thursday's run was at the track at UBC. I arrived on campus as the very happy US womens' hockey fans, and subdued Finish ones, were making their way home. I didn't need to ask the result!

I also didn't have to who was playing the next game - the flags (Canadian & Chinese) told the story. In front of the arena, many excited Chinese fans were taking their pictures holding their flags up high. I was neat to see, especially as China and hockey isn't exactly a combination most of us are used to thinking about.

The workout was a tough one for me. I was still tired from Tuesday, my brain wasn't functioning and my body wasn't doing too well either. The workout was 5 x 200m at slightly faster than 1/2 marathon pace (for those of us doing Langley), 5 x 1km at marathon pace and 5 x 200m at slightly faster. Through the warm up and up until the 3rd 1km piece I was dying and miserable. Somehow everything clicked and I got into form and had a good finish to the practice. No idea if it was mental or if I just need 30 minutes longer than everyone else to warm up.

A good day

Short of time/ideas today so this is it. I like how the hologram on the ticket turned out.

New Friends

Through work (and an invitation from a very generous supplier) I got to join the "A List" and take the Alberta Train to Whistler yesterday. It's a leisurely way to get there at three hours one way but very pretty at least it is once the sun actually rises and you can see the view. The rest of my photos are here.

Whistler was crazy busy but with a very different energy to Vancouver. Getting to Whistler is so restricted and so difficult that almost the only people there are involved with the games: watching, competing, volunteering, media. And the cranked up prices for everything felt par for the course for the village.

Trip highlights:
- Train to Whistler.
- Breakfast with pro bull rider and pro chuck wagon driver (promoting the Stampede). The bull rider lives in Turner Valley so I'm sure my Aunt knows who he is. I'm used to being able to impress people by talking about my hobby. Not so much yesterday.
- Free tickets to biathlon ($25.00 standing area tickets so not quite A list anymore, but more fun!)
- Watching biathlon with all the crazy Europeans. I need a significantly weirder hat to be a true fan.
- Cheering for the Canadian in the mens' 12.5km pursuit.
- Hanging out with Clayton, who is up there volunteering but had the day off .
- Being in the village when Canada scored its second gold (of course we were watching a different sport at the time, but we were there!).
- Getting interviewed. Amazing how I normally just blather on about nothing in particular but put a camera in my face and Voila! I blather on about nothing in particular. I haven't checked yahoo sports to see if they actually used the clip.
- Trainride back (would have been awkward if this didn't happen)

It was a long day, up at 4am and back home at 10:30pm, and I was pretty wrecked at work today as I'm a totally wimp when I don't have enough sleep but it was an amazing day.

Crepuscular (thanks Amy)

I live under one of the great crow commuting paths in the Lower Mainland. This is my best attempt so far at catching the crepuscual rush hour, sadly it's not that great.

My fallback shot is my new mittens. My mother very kindly picked up a pair for me and shipped them out (seems almost coals to Newcastle, but I won't criticize as I like them very much). I will proudly, and warmly, wear them for the rest of the games.

On the topic of evenings, they're getting lighter later, enough so that I could fit in a ride outside after work today.

Multitasking

On Sunday afternoon I set up my perfect Olympics viewing environment. Then promtply fell asleep.

In my defence, that morning I'd had a solid swim workout immediately followed by a thoroughly evil hill running session. Furthermore, naps are written into my schedule by my coach. ("Nap" and "eat" are two instructions I have no problems following.)

Craziness in a pan

On Saturday I took a second crack at cinnamon bun french toast. Cook at a low temperature to avoid burning , and be tortured by the scent of slowly carmelizing cinnamon bun.

Catching Up

A note from the coach this week:

"The final days of hard week should be mentally tough and have you spending some time thinking about throwing in the towel after the last few workouts. If you breezed through it with a smile, fully stocked fridge and neatly folded clean laundry you may need to work harder (or write a book about your secret!)."

My fridge is bare, the laundry pile is demanding the right to vote (if it allies with the dirty dishes I'm doomed) and my backlog of pictures to post is huge. Nice to know I'm doing things right!

I've been doing all sorts of Olympic things but I haven't mastered art of the quick shot, or even the non-shakey shot, so sadly no good Oly photos.

My fridge may be empty but that doesn't stop me from thinking about food:

On Tuesday I went to a event at Canada's Northern House put on by the Northwest Territories. The food was lovely, even when mispronounced (Arctic Char was offered to us as something sounding very close to "artichoke"). Above is a platter of house smoked muscovy duck breast, bison bresaola, muskoven mipkuzola, and venison salami. Apparently the North is not a good place for vegetarians.

Just before going to bed on Wednesday I realized I hadn't taken a picture so snapped a shot of the first colourful thing I could find.

When I said I had no good Olympic shots I lied, I have one good shot. But I didn't take it:

Helen caught the torch in motion out at UBC last night. She used my camera - does that count for anything??

I'm anticipating the answer is no so here is a list of all the things that can kill you in Helen's lab:


That brings us to today. I could see the torch procession from my office but couldn't get any decent shots through the glass. A stunning number of people were downtown. I was expecting the crowds but it was exceptionally strange to be on the skytrain first thing in the morning (6am, I swam before work) with people who were happy and excited to be heading downtown. Madness!

So instead of a torch relay photo I'm posting a picture of the second most amazing thing I saw today.

Leek

I was extremely tired and extremely cranky today, a result of my blow up on the run yesterday, so I'm treating myself with roast leek.

It's pretty and tasty but you have to rinse it very well as there tends to be lots of dirt in the crevices.

Despite being cranky I managed to have a decent swim this morning. I wasn't sure if swimming four days in a row would kill me but I seemed to have a good workout. We worked on pull, with lots of fist swimming. The last piece was supposed to be 400m with a 25m sprint every 4th length. I decided, however, it was going to be a time trial. I did the 25m sprints every 4th length except that when I hit 300m I went all out for the last 100. I didn't tell Mauro, who is usually the same speed as or faster than me, as I knew he'd stick to my feet regardless of what pace I held. I was trying to make him blow up (and to get a good 400m time), which is mean but I know he'd do the same for me.

Oh yeah, my 400m time was 7:10. I'm somewhat impressed with myself!