The B.F.H.

(Big Freakin' Hammer)  It's what I've contemplated taking to my scale.  "Hi.  I'm The Mother Freakin' Princess and I am addicted to my scale."  It's true.  I weigh myself *at least* six times a day:

In the morning, right after I wake up and go potty.  Again after my morning workout...and after breakfast.  Usually after lunch or at least by mid-afternoon (some times twice in the afternoon).  Always after dinner and before I go to bed...and if I wake up in the middle of the night - of course I hop on that bastard!

I know it's not right and logically the scale is only *one* tool out of many to measure my health and goals.  But the scale is the easiest and most immediate way to get feedback.  For a gal who lacks patience, and lives in a society that thrives on immediate gratification, the scale is the utmost wonderful tool.

Over the last couple weeks - well since I've been at my Crossroads - I've envisioned taking the scale 'out back' and letting myself go wild on it with the B.F.H.  Maybe I would have Nathan video tape me and post it to Youtube.  It would definitely make great pictures to use on my blog!  It would be so liberating!  It would be letting go of this huge attachment in my life.  I would free myself of this burden and judgment.

But I can't do it.  Mostly because there's a part of myself I know very well.  It's the part that will just buy a new scale in a month or so.  It's the part of me that is obsessive compulsive.  It's the part of me that needs the security of an unbiased opinion of something...the part that knows I have a lot of work to do to reach my goals and if left to myself, I'll start slacking...thinking I'm hot shit, settling for mediocrity.  No.  I don't want to settle.  I wanna be a rock star.  And if using my scale is something that will get me there, then that's what I'm going to do.  And I'm going to be okay with it.

But I am going to take a small vacation from it and let Nathan hide it from me as soon as I lose 2 more pounds.  Just for a little bit :)

East Coast Rocks

On a recent camping trip, the kids and I stopped at my sister's house to 'steal' some of her firewood.  We all got out of the truck and I asked the kids to start loading up the wood.  The kids had been mostly unhelpful in getting all our gear ready that morning, so I probably didn't really ask them to load the wood...it was more of an order.

My barefoot kids headed back toward the wood pile, slowly and uninspired.  The Brainiac, youngest of the three, started pouting first and The Artist was not too far behind.

Brainiac: "I don't want to get the wood."

Me: "Get the wood."

Brainiac (whining): "The rocks..."

Me (raising my voice): "I don't care about the rocks.  You should have put on your shoes and socks.  It's your own fault.  Now load up that wood!"

At this time The Social Guy started to throw wood out towards the other kids.  I stomped off back by the wood pile.  I grabbed a piece of wood and then I felt this searing prick on my ring finger.  I looked down and there was a wasp, stinging me:

 

I flicked the wasp off my finger and yelled at the kids, "GET OUT OF HERE! THERE ARE WASPS!  STAY AWAY FROM THE BACK YARD!"

We waited a few moments and I crept back to the wood.  I covered the pile and locked the gate.  My finger was swollen for the evening and we had a mostly uneventful camping trip.

A few days later I was re-telling my wasp story to a friend and Social Guy says, "We told you there were wasps."

Me: "No you didn't."

Social Guy: "Yes we did.  You told us to haul the wood anyways."

Me (flabbergasted): "No I didn't!  I wouldn't tell you to haul wood with wasps!"

Social Guy: "Yeah, Brainiac told you.  He said he didn't want to haul the wood because of the wasps."

Me (finally putting it all together): "Oh...I thought he said 'rocks'.  Wow, what kind of mom do you think I am to have you haul wood by wasps?"

Social Guy: "Well, we were kinda naughty that day."

(To my defense the youngest has a speech impediment that sounds very East Coast...wasps sounded a lot like rocks...very East Coast.)














 

Awesomeness

A couple weeks ago I had the pleasure of mountain bike training with two of my friends.  Both are new to the sport.  One of them had been mountain biking once before and the other one, well it was her first time.  I warned them the week prior to the bike ride that if they saw anything they didn't want to go over they could just hop off their bikes and walk.  This was to be a no pressure ride...let's just have a good time.

Well, these girls got on the course and went completely mad!  They ripped up the hills and jumped over rocks and logs.  They even took this drop/berm here:

 (Do you see how steep that drop is?  It's about a five foot, mostly vertical drop!)

They didn't think anything of it.  They didn't know they were *supposed* to walk down that hill and over that berm.

It's all good though.  I was riding behind them and when I caught up to them, I made sure to show them how to get off their bikes and walk.  Do you know what these girls did?  They encouraged me to take the drop on the next lap.

Again we went around and I panicked.  "I'm supposed to walk down all the scary parts."  These women didn't let up.  They told me to back my bike up and try again.  They said I could do this.  I took another false start.  I pointed out the fallen tree that my head might hit when I took the berm (look again at the photo).  They assured me I would not hit the tree and mentioned how they had both already done it and neither of them had hit the tree.  These ladies were just not buying any of my reasoning and common sense.  I took a deep breath and backed my bike up again.  I pedaled up to the drop and...

I DID IT!  Full of adrenaline and excitement I screamed at my friends, "YOU'RE SO AWESOME!"  They screamed back, "YOU ARE AWESOME!"  Then I screamed, "YOU ARE AWESOME!"  This round of awesomeness went on for awhile and then we collapsed in a fit of giggles because we are all just so awesome.

My vision that day was stretched beyond what I ever thought possible.  I did things that day that made my heart soar and I finally felt like a 'real' mountain biker.

Crossroads

Yesterday while training for my Sunday mountain bike race, things became really hard.  I was face to face with the fact that mountain biking (and racing) is hard...like really fucking hard.  And it gets a bit discouraging to think that I am working so hard to get 'not last place'.  It's a lot easier to do something when you know you're going to win, be close to winning, or be in the middle of the pack (so no one knows how bad you are).

When I first decided to mountain bike race it was March/April and I weighed 220+ pounds.  I wanted to lose weight and I thought racing would be a great motivator to get me out there exercising.  I definitely have that little (some times big) part inside of me that likes to compete, so it should have been a great match.  But...

I haven't really been in competition and I am just under 200 pounds.  It's not exactly what I expected.  In fact, my expectations were more like vying for second/third in my age group and by this time weighing close to 170 pounds.

I don't feel like I can continue where I'm at, which is exercising like an athlete, but eating and drinking like a rock star.  I don't want to quit exercising and racing (or my goal of weight loss - which would make competing easier).  But the call of glasses upon glasses of wine and rich food is sometimes just too good to resist...