Tucson- Day 5 quick version

I'm tired, so this is gonna be short. Swam. Did another injury lane workout, solid 2000 yards. Took pictures as the others did a relay. Played some sharks and minnows. Quite the competitive group. Went home for some quick down time and food. Drove to the base of Lemmon. Did a bike warm up on the course. We always use the same loop, its about 4km with a false flat. First brick was draft legal. Three laps followed by a 1200m run. Girls started together, went pretty easy and stayed together for a lap and a half. Adeline took a long pull at the front on the steepest part and I stayed on her wheel. Turned around at the corner at the top, realized we dropped the rest. Continued for another lap. Let her go and finished half a lap alone. Had a decent run. Got passed by Laurin, she's a fast runner. Held off the other girls. Bit of a break and an easy spin. Grabbed some water cause it was crazy hot. Convinced the coaches to make the next one two bike laps. Started in reverse finish order from the first one. One minute apart each, time trial style. Died a bit in the second lap. Decent run again. Got caught by Adeline and Laurin again, not sure how I compared to everyone else. Cool down. Actually we were still dying of heat. Drove off to Tri Sports. Bought a tri suit for training. Pretty sweet. Grabbed giant slurpees from circle K again. 79 cents for every size. Made pizzas for dinner. Sat around, and now I'm wondering why I didn't go to bed sooner. Sorry my writing is crap tonight.

Tucson- Day 4 (Kitts Peak)

This morning we started the day with a swim again. For me, my shoulders were quite sore so I knew it would be just a short warm-up swim to try to loosen up a bit without aggravating them any worse. I swam for about 10 minutes, which was 700m total. Actually yards I guess. The bike today was Kitt’s Peak. I didn’t have the best mentality going into today’s ride because I’ve never had a good experience with this one. It seems to always be crappy weather while we do this climb. The first year us girls ended up walking up half the mountain because the wind was so strong we literally could not stay upright on our bikes. It was really scary and we thought we would be blown right off the side of the mountain. Then last year Darian and I only got blown over once where we have to unclip rather than fall over. And leading up to the mountain we battled such a headwind while still on the flats that I’m pretty sure we were holding about 8km/h. Also the sandstorm out there last year was what caused the split in my toenail that I still kind of have. Weird story I guess.

So as we pulled into the super sketchy gas station we always start from I wasn’t too excited. It was a large group of us riding to the mountain and it was quite frustrating. Not everyone was on the same page when it came to communication for pointing things out and keeping a consistent pace. It turned out to be over an hour of this crazy warm up by the time we got to the base of the mountain. We regrouped and started. The incline is mostly the same for the whole 12 mile climb. I did the whole thing with Ashlyn, Laurin, and my dad. We stopped twice quickly for water and stretching but other than that it took an hour and forty five minutes to reach the observatory at the top where the rest were waiting. As per tradition, Gary had cold cans of coke for everyone. The descent wasn’t quite as fun as Lemmon. I found the turns were tighter and the road more gravelly, making it not quite as safe to sail down at high speeds. The way back to the gas station was better than the way there, because it’s a slight downhill and with a tailwind. The group riding skills still hadn’t improved much, but we survived. Total for the day was about 95km. The voice of reason aka Angie convinced Gary to not make us do a run after.

We got back to the house and had a hard time unlocking the door because there had been a repair guy during the day. It’s a bit scary when your keys don’t work. At least the guys now have a door for their bathroom, not that the rest of us ever see their hidden-away room. Once inside it felt really good to clean off the sunscreen and grime in our “vintage” shower. Dinner was ready really fast today; a relief for the chaperones was who had prepared it the day before. We have our challenges in this house in the “ghetto”, but everybody seems to be making it work. We had planned to meet Alberta at the Blue Banana for our favourite frozen yogurt. It was supposed to be a 24 minute drive according to Google and our GPS. We showed up pretty late because we got lost when the GPS didn’t know some roads existed. Thanks to the friendly gas station lady. We finally arrived and joined them for some delicious frozen yogurt. It is a self serve place where you can mix flavours and toppings and then are charged by weight. Now we’re home, it’s been another long day. Tomorrow will be some bricks at the base of Lemmon. Always a favourite of mine so looking forward to it.

Tucson- Day 3 (Saguaro Park)

I promise this one will be shorter. I’m tired. This morning we got up to head to the pool again. It felt early but it was the most sleep we’ve gotten so far. Angie made a great workout for me and Joel in the injury lane again. It included lots of drill, as well as various speeds. Lots of rotating 25, 50, 75, and 100m. The main set was 1000m and Angie was hoping we could do it twice but I only got through it the first time. I was still happy with that though, because the 2000m total I did was a new recovery record for me!

After a quick turnaround at the house and an early lunch, we packed up the bikes and drove off to Saguaro Park. We started out with an hour run for most of us. It was hilly and hot. Good thing I like both of those things, cause it was a hard run and I could tell not everyone was having fun. I actually felt alright and kept a steady pace. We went out and back a few times so that we could get water during the run. I think last year we did it all at once and since I was the only girl and couldn’t keep up with the guys I had been by myself in the desert during the long run. I realize today’s run was a better plan. After grabbing some more water us girls regrouped and started the bike ride. Originally Gary told us we’d be biking 6 laps of the park. It’s a 7 mile loop and for part of it it’s a lot of ups and downs, which are pretty fun.  For the first steep downhill there is a very sharp right turn at the bottom. We had to really warn Alberta about this, because it can be pretty dangerous. People have definitely crashed on that corner before. We all survived that piece so we split up to keep cycling. There is also one brutal hill in the ride. It is long and slow, and not very fun for the most part. 6 laps turned into 4-6, which turned into 3-4, which turned into 3 for the girls. After fading a bit on the second lap I came back strong on the third, but was glad to be finished. We waited for everyone else to finish their laps then drove off.

 Some ice cream on the way home was a relief for all of us tired athletes in the van. Once back at the house there were complications with dinner. As in the BBQ didn’t work. We’ll add that to the list of problems with this place. With some switch-ups that the chaperones quickly came up with we were all fed and happy. And tired. Just relaxing right now. It feels like we really haven’t had much downtime on this trip so far. Tomorrow will be Kitt’s Peak.

Tucson- Day 1 Cont'd and Day 2 (Mount Lemmon)

To pick up where I left off, we finally went for our ride on Old Spanish Trail. We’ve biked in this area before, but this time we kept going and did a loop instead. It was nice to have some change in scenery for the second half. There were some massive high schools out there that we passed. We also had to keep pulling out the map to navigate our way back to the city. I found for the first half the pace was kind of inconsistent, making it seem a bit hard to hold on. About halfway it felt like we settled in and with a few people taking some longer pulls it was much more comfortable to stay together as a group. Once we got home we went for a short run. By now it was almost dark. When the sun sets here, it goes down pretty fast. Our area seems a bit sketchy, so it was interesting for the three of us girls to be running in “the ghetto” as we affectionately call it. Wearing all black, listening to loud music in our ears... hmm good thing we do most of our runs in daylight. We were quite exhausted at the end of this day. Even before we started our first ride we were all tired. I think we all came into this training camp fatigued. Probably a combination of adding long rides the week before in Winnipeg, not really tapering, such a long travel day, and then not much sleep.  We had a nice dinner, although the oven takes crazy amounts of time to cook anything. Then it was off to bed as soon as possible to try to rest up before Mount Lemmon.

Wednesday was Lemmon, as planned. We drove to Gary’s hotel then rode a short way to the base of the mountain to meet Alberta. I was going into this ride feeling pretty confident and I was looking forward to helping some of the girls that had never done this before. In fact, out of the six girls that rode today I was the only one that had made it to the top in previous years. We started out all together for the first couple miles before the guys finally took off on us. One of the other girls joined some of them. I stuck with three of the other girls and my dad. One was behind. Angie joined us at some point and we mostly stayed together until the halfway point. We stopped to grab some food and water at the lookout there, at mile 14. The mountain is a total of 26 miles, and some sections are harder than others. For example, the first 5 are probably some of the worst. Then it gets better for a while, mile 8 I think is also pretty hard. For a while it all blends together in my head, during the transition from cactuses to forest. From 21 to 25 there are some downhills, and then the last mile is a brutal climb. A little while after stopping I was having a hard time hanging on. I asked several times for the group to slow down a bit. They were fine with that but it wasn’t enough. I was struggling a lot and it was kind of embarrassing to make them wait for me. I told them to leave me behind but then Gary pulled up in the van and said no; he told me to get in the van and take a rest. I think maybe those one and half to two miles I sat in the van were the hardest of all. I was so frustrated and upset. I wanted to get back on my bike as soon as possible. The worst part was that this was the first time I hadn’t done the entire mountain and I knew even at the top it would feel like a fail. I had accomplished getting to the top of this mountain three times in the past two years. Once I hoped out and got back on my bike I took it easy to calm down and catch my breath, and keep a steady pace I could hold. My dad and an Alberta athlete, Claire, got out with me. We stayed together to the top. Once we got to the top everyone was waiting for us and once again I felt really disappointed. I know sometimes I am too hard on myself. We hung out at the top for a while and snacked on those giant cookies again. They are as big as the plate and very yummy.

Ashlyn and I got into the van for a few miles of the descent then got out with just over 21 miles to go. I think a few days ago I said something about hating that part. I realized that was such a lie. What was I thinking, I love descending. The adrenaline is awesome and once you get used to it it’s so much fun. My first year I made the mistake of using my brakes too much, and trying to stick to the bike lane. The better strategy is to be not afraid to use the whole road and take the tight curves wide.  At the bottom we went for a 20 minute run, which was brutal. Once again I felt like crap and struggled through it near the back of the group. It was a long day and I was kind of disappointed in myself.  But everyone was encouraging and Angie told me she had a feeling the next time we do Lemmon on the weekend I will have an amazing ride. I sure hope so. If nothing else, my dad has a new appreciation for the work I put in, he struggled up that mountain as well. We were very happy to see that the van was loaded up after the run and we didn’t have to bike back.

At home we changed into swimsuits and headed to Alberta’s house, as they had invited us to hang out. We knew they had a nice house and pool, but as soon as we pulled into their massive driveway we took back any invitation we’d extended for them to come visit our place. We’re all quite jealous. I’m pretty sure our entire little house could fit into the main kitchen and living room area of theirs. They had rooms they didn’t even use and I wasn’t even kidding when I asked if we could stay and sleep in their freaking huge closet. After a tour of their house they blasted some music from their sounds system and the guys were hard at work preparing dinner. That’s right, their coach wasn’t even there and they make all their meals by themselves. And it’s mostly the guys in the kitchen which is impressive.  All of us girls hovered around trying to be helpful, but the guys had it all under control. We put some stuff out on the table to get ready for dinner, but that’s about it. By now we had been invited to stay for the meal, and they prepared tons of food. It was great. After sitting around outside having dinner together we hopped into the pool and had an awesome time just hanging out. Then we headed back to the ghetto for some sleep. Long day. You had to read it, but we had to get through it.

Tucson- Travel Day and Day 1

It seemed like one of the longest travel days ever, but now we are in Tucson, Arizona. We were supposed to leave Winnipeg around 3pm Monday. Up until then everything had gone smoothly. We arrived early enough at the new airport to have a nice lunch and get checked in. The Westjet people were super friendly and we got away with really minimal bike box charges. Then the flight was delayed and we barely had enough time to get through security and board the plane. Well, most of us anyways. The plane almost left without a couple of people from our group, and for a little while we were quite stressed. We were standing at the gate being told we had to get on the flight immediately if we wanted to make it and that the gate would be closing, leaving Darian and Eleanor behind. Once on board we argued with the flight attendants but since it was security being stupid, not Westjet, there was nothing they could do. It was a relief to see the two of them finally board the plane at the last minute, because it would have been quite inconvenient for everyone if they were left behind. That would have been a great way to start our training camp. But all our people, luggage, and bikes managed to get to Phoenix.

Then while the chaperones went to get the rental vehicles the rest of us waited around at the airport. It seemed to take a long time and we managed to grab some food from the limited selection before most things closed for the night. It was a little tough to fit all the bike boxes and everything into the vehicles as well as people, but we got cozy and tried to settle in for the 2 hour drive to Tucson. For the millionth time I really wished I was able to sleep in vehicles or planes, but no luck. We managed to find our house in the dark and get inside. We didn’t know there would be an alarm though, and we stumbled around in the dark trying to find the code to shut it off. Apparently this house doesn’t have light switches in convenient places either.

We are still trying to figure out this odd little place. It’s quite small, with no hallways, places to store bikes and bike boxes, or space to sit down and eat. The bathroom is also quite sketchy. We decided to call it “vintage,” especially the shower. We were also confused where the last bedroom and bathroom were. It turns out you have to walk behind the house to get to it, and that is now where we hide the three guys from the team. My dad sleeps in the porch. Ashlyn and I are sharing a room, and it is actually decent, we are getting used to it already. The bed felt comfortable and it was a relief to finally get some sleep. By now it felt like 3am to us, which meant it was 1am local time. Awesome, set the alarm for 7am to go swimming. We were exhausted and shut off the lights. Then we noticed how noisy it is. Our house is a few steps away from a highway and the whole place shook all night with the sounds of cars, trucks, and trains. I’m hoping later into the training camp we won’t even notice anymore if we bike hard enough every day.

One other problem we ran into was that the wifi in the house wasn’t working. This was a priority for all of us technology dependant teenagers and we are happy that by the next morning the chaperones dealt with that. After breakfast and getting sun-screened up we were off to the pool. It is a different one than prior years, but still on U of A campus, and still nice. Next few little issues... Gary wasn’t ready to get us in the morning so the chaperones drove us there. I was a bit worried about being late but this wasn’t an issue, since we waited for a long time in the lobby of the pool with the Alberta team. They wouldn’t let us in because we are all minors, and apparently are never allowed into this pool. Also, the Alberta coach Angie had gone to get her coffee and it took both coaches quite a while to join us, to argue with the pool staff to let us in. Once in we had tons of space, two to a lane. I was very happy my swim practice for the first time in a long time. I joined an Alberta athlete with similar shoulder injuries and Angie gave us a personalized shoulder-friendly workout. We did a warm up of 7 x 100m from swim to kick (if you don’t know what that means don’t worry) and 20 x 50m on a minute with various drills and swimming. There were some 200’s on the workout sheet after that but I was done. It was already more swimming than I’ve done and I was happy with it. It was also good to have a training partner at the same speed for those things. The injury club will continue for our next practices and I’m hoping to get some decent swimming in.

Once back at the house we grabbed some snacks and got to work building the bikes out in the sun. It will be good to have lunch, and then get out there again. Today we will be doing a ride on Old Spanish Trail, a road we’ve biked in previous years. Not sure anymore how many kilometers we will be putting in today; we are likely condensing the workout a bit as well as starting later in the day. The day after will be a big one, Mount Lemmon with Alberta. For now I have to remember to keep hydrated and sunscreened.  That’s all for now, just chilling for a bit. I’m just happy to finally be here.

Finally... swim time trial

So today was the day that I finally got to do that much-awaited 400m swim time trial. I hate to set the bar low, but seriously... I took about 7 months off from swimming, I still haven't swam more that 15 minutes easy at a time,  and I've done zero speed or intensity in the pool. Well ok, instead of the usual race prep of doing 4 x 100m goal race pace both the day before and the day of I modified it. As in I did 1 x 100m the day before, and then 2 x 50m as part of my 10ish minute warm up. Not your typical race prep, but that would have totally fried my shoulders. I started to get worried though, doing that 100m yesterday, because I did it in 1:28. That's slow. I had mentioned I had a secret goal? Well I guess now I can say it; 6 minutes. With the way I was feeling I was really starting to worry I would be over 6 minutes. To give some context here, when I started the program two years ago I swam about 6 and a half. Between being injured I think I got my 400m PB down to 5:24, within an 800m time trial. That's still not super fast, but at least I was doing alright while at that speed in my injured state. My usual training partner Ashlyn has now gotten under 5 minutes, which shows how much catching up I am going to have to do!

Anyways, with my pathetic warm up completed, I was as ready as I could be I guess. My shoulders hurt before getting into the pool, probably from the swim the day before, the bike ride also the day before (outdoors, shoulders get really tight after a long ride), as well as the usual injury pain I guess. But I felt alright otherwise. I didn't feel too much pressure, which was nice. I still felt kind of nervous though. I told myself to enjoy that nervous feeling that comes before a race or time trial, because it has been way too long since I've had that from swimming. I dove into the water and it felt great. The feeling of swimming hard came back right away. My internal saying during this time trial was "enjoy the speed." I repeated this to myself whenever I felt myself starting to fade or when my shoulders began to hurt near the end. I used this to keep pushing myself; to remind myself how much it had taken to get to this point and to give it everything I had. Enjoy the speed. I was really dead by the time I touched the wall and right away starting thinking about what time Gary would say I went. I was still worried about the 6 minute thing, but I felt like I had done well and it was probably just under. Yeah, by that point I expected to hear 5 50-something. Nope... 5:45. That was pretty exciting. Better than I had hoped for (I found out later my splits were 1:18, 1:27, 1:30, 1:30). This has given me some new hope towards getting back to where I was before. Considering the amount I've swam that's decently close to my PB. I can't wait to fully get back to swimming and chasing some new times.

Rabbit Reconstructors... and a bit of training

I would like to say that I will avoid posting anything further about the skeleton reconstruction project I am doing for school on this blog. Allison and I have started a new blog dedicated to the project and if you would like to follow our progress, it will be on there. Warning: the day 1 pictures may be disturbing. I will just say something on this blog every time I update the other one, so that you know when to check it if you are interested and don't have to try to follow two blogs. Here is the link:

http://rabbit-reconstructors.blogspot.com/

Anyways, after a week of still recovering from being sick I didn't get in as much training as I would have liked. However, this may not be a bad thing, my focus is being fully healthy and ready to go for training camp next week! The swim time trial plan from last week has been carried over, which means Tuesday I will do my first 400m in a really long time! Of course I have a goal time in mind, but I won't be sharing that at the moment. Normally I believe in putting goals out there to hold myself accountable and not wimp away from an ambitious goal. But under these circumstances I don't want to say anything unreasonable and I think it's fair to keep that to myself for now. I'll let you know how the time trial goes though, good or bad.

Also, for the first time we will be able to do some riding outdoors prior to training camp! I can not believe how amazing this weather is! Looking forward to probably getting outside for a ride tomorrow, it's going to be good.

Back at it, almost

Finally starting to get over that bug, whatever it was. It turns out lots of people are sick lately. I made it back to school today, which was good because it's really not a good time to get too behind. I'm aiming to be back for practice tomorrow. Probably not anything too long yet, because I know I will be told to make sure I am fully recovered. Don't worry, I will for sure be smart about it this time. I have to, with training camp coming up. It's setting in how soon that is, but I don't have time to be excited at the moment. There's so much going on in the last few days before I leave, including several big projects. And by big projects I mean making blood glow with forensic luminal, throwing eggs off the roof without it breaking, and getting to work on Edgar-Marie. Let me introduce you to Ed-Marie, he/she (not sure yet) is the rabbit whose skeleton Allison and I will be reconstructing. As in a dead bunny, that will be skinned, gutted, boiled, and glued back together (the bones, that is). Yummy. Just kidding, I think it sounds awful but I'm pretending to be excited about it so that maybe it won't be so bad. No other high schools or universities I've known so far seem to do this project and people always think we are kidding. But this is legit, so wish me luck. Anyways, we aquired this dead body today just by chance; someone overheard us asking another person with a farm if they had any chickens we could use, and said they actually happened to have a dead rabbit. Not the most ideal, but better than the back-up plan of asking the Humane Society. Mmm, skinning and boiling puppies and kittens. I stopped at the thrift store and picked up a nice big pot and some knives that we will not mind throwing away once this project is done. Wow, I actually had no intention of writing about all this today... anyways school is as crazy as ever and I can't wait to escape to the heat in Tucson, where all I have to worry about is working my butt off by biking up mountains every day! I heard before my very first training camp that it is so hard that you think you're going to die, but as soon as it's over, you can't wait to do it all again. So true. 12 days until the fun begins... (my definition of fun, remember) but back to getting some work done so I can go to bed early and get fully recovered!

*edit: here's a nice little video clip, enjoy

Sick

So for the past few days I've been sick. It sucks. I guess the last week of craziness finally caught up to me and left me susceptible to catching something. I started out just feeling really tired Saturday with a bit of a cough. I went to work and realized it was getting worse and began trying to get someone to take my shift the next day. I was supposed to work till 11 on Sunday and knew if I was actually could get through it I would only get worse and that could really mess up my week. But after trying everyone available I was still stuck with my shift. So my supervisor sent me home an hour early with some chamomile, in hopes that some extra sleep would help. Oh yeah, I was also losing an hour of sleep becaues of the time change. Great timing. Woke up the next morning way worse. Barely able to get out of bed, I finally realized I had to call in sick to work. I hate doing that. I've only done it once before. So I've also missed out on church, my long run, and family lunch, work, practice, and now school on Monday. Two long nights each of 12 hours of "sleep" later I still feel like crap.  I spent all day killing some brain cells by watching some really dumb movies. I'm really hoping to be back at school tomorrow. Also, this unfortunately means no time trial yet. Hopefully next week. I'm also hoping to get better quickly, because training camp is now sneaking up really quickly. Two weeks! Anyways, after a really unproductive day I'm getting around to writing this after finally taking a nice long shower and eating almost normally for the first time. The only good side to getting sick like this now is that it's not during race season. Because most cold medications are banned within competition. Alright, I guess this was kind of pointless, I could have just said I was sick. But I felt like writing. I had also felt like writing about my angry run after a frustrating doctor's appointment where I ended up watching a deer and a drug deal, or about the Jets game I watched on tv with some friends on Friday. But maybe another time.

Catch Up: Boeing 3000m. It tastes green. Don't read a 600 pg book in 2 days. Swim TT. I fell.

Last week I ran a 3000m. Yeah, it's actually been that long since I got around to writing about it. This week has been crazy, more about that later. But race report: overall it didn't go as well as I had hoped. I felt I was ready to pull off a good one, and wanted a new PB. The goal pace was 45 second laps, which would be 11:15. I felt good going into it, and there was no reason I couldn't do it. However, I guess I started out too fast. I went out in a 40s, followed by a 41s before settling into a better pace. My first kilometer was still on pace, 3:43 (goal: 3:45). Half way through I was also still on pace. Someone passed me and I got right on her and tried my best to stick to the pace. Began to fade.... second kilometer time was 7:37 (goal: 7:30), darn it. The last kilometer was the worst, I fell off the other girl and finished in 11:40. Her speed was closer to what I wanted and had I started out at a more reasonable pace, maybe I would have been able to stay on at a consistant speed the whole time. Oh well. It wasn't a really bad race. Just not, you know, good. So yeah, it was disappointing. I stuck around to watch a few more races after that. Boeing is a pretty big meet and quite a few friends were there, it was good to catch up with some. Then some of us went out for shamrock shakes, yum. I still don't really know how to describe what that is for the (surprisingly large amount of) people that don't know. It tastes green. Not exactly mint, but kind of. Someone said like the green ice cream in the middle of rainbow ice cream. Whatever, I had my shake for the year, I'm happy. Then I went to hang out with some other friends, because I could. It was a good time, but the start of many late nights unfortunately. Sunday I worked untill 11, I hate doing that because it makes me start off my whole week tired. Monday night I talked late to a friend. Tuesday and Wednesday were my nights of intense reading. This was the main cause of my craziness this week. I will try to never put off reading a 600 page book until the last few days again. And if you were thinking about trying it, don't. Someone gave me an audio book, but again, only in the last 2 days. It would have been about 45 hours of listening. At least I can read faster than that. But I found the audio book to be quite useful during the times I couldn't physically be reading. While I was biking, making my lunch for the next day, brushing my teeth, cleaning/packing my various clothing, and while studying for that chem test I also decided to ignore until 2 days before. Multitasking to the max! Yes, I actually thought it was a good idea to studying and "read" at the same time. I wasn't too bad at it actually, although I think the test went badly and I barely finished the book in time to write a quiz on it. Once both those were done I felt like I could stop and breath for the first time in about 3 days. I also enjoyed my first meal tonight without either of those things. Yes, I actually read and studied through breakfast, lunch, and dinner those days, it was quite depressing. Anyways, at least the book was actually quite good. I would consider re-reading it, when I actually have time. Hmm what else. Oh, I plan on doing a swim time trial next week! Byron did not even laugh at me when I asked him during last week's massage, like most people thought he would. Since I had been doing well with my swimming and had done two weeks of 2 times 15 minutes of constant freestyle swim without my shoulders screaing at me, why not? So we made a plan. This week I wanted to swim 4 times. Big steps, I know. I'm going to have to cut down to 3 though, because my shoulder did start hurting pretty bad again so I skipped this morning. Then next week I will swim 15 minutes again on Monday, and do my 400m on Tuesday! Also, unrelated: this week I biked on rollers. I fell. Someone said I should blog about it. There, I blogged about it. (Don't worry it wasn't serious at all, I laughed and got right back on. I think the problem was I am getting a bit too comfortable with it and taking a bit more risk when getting on, which caused me to fall). So yeah, until someone tells me to blog about something else random, I think I'm done for now. Hope the title gave a decent summary of what you would be in for. I actually made it up afterwards, and I know later it's going to bother me that it's so long and doesn't look neat like the others. But thanks for reading, if you actually got to the end of my ramblings. And as promised last time, keep reading, cause I'll keep postin'.