I take things for granted all the time. Things always seems worse, or not as great when time to reflect is not taken. When I look back at the times I felt the most angry or down, their always not as bad as they actually seem. The heat of the moment amplifies feelings. With that said I am feeling good this morning. I have a long week of work ahead of me, hopefully one of my last truly out of control busy weeks. But not to worry, my training this week is going to be recovery based with some tests near the end. No not pen and paper tests, those darn CPA exams are over for good! These tests are ones that included how fast I can swim 400 yards and how fast I can pedal in 20 minutes....I like these tests!!!
On to a recap of my weekend, since I can only imagine you are all dying to hear it. All in all it was a pretty good weekend. Even though work consumed about 12 hours of my time I was still able to fit in a 5 hours of bike riding, and 2.5 hours of running. Saturday started off at 4am with a 3.5 hr bike ride which gave me the chance to finish watching Season 1 of the The Wire, a very good TV Show that was on HBO. Now I just have to find out how to get the rest of the seasons without having to buy all those DVD boxsets, there like 50 bucks each...maybe I can borrow them from somebody, that'd be cool! I also caught up on a couple episodes of Mad Men Season 3 sans iTunes. So that was that, I cranked out 3.5 hours on the bike and ate a ton of food to fuel the ride. This is something I am working pretty hard at. I never used to eat a lot of food during exercise because simply its not always the most fun thing on your stomach, and secondly I never really worked out at a level of exertion that caused for on-the-go fueling. But as they say "More during, less after" something that is very true, and something that I work at every day. Since a 3.5 hr bike ride takes well 3.5 hours my 4:30am start got me off the bike at 8am. I was "supposed" to be at work around 9ish. A strict time was not mandatory but its kind of implied. Well I missed the boat on that a bit, but I had let the people know in advance. They'll get over I think, I mean we did all end up staying until 6 at night on a Saturday, busy season or not, after a long week of late nights a saturday at 6pm at work is not where anyone really wants to be. Oh yeah, why was I a bit tardy? Because I had to squeeze a 30 min run off the bike in of course! When else can you simulate the way your legs might feel coming off the bike leg of a half ironman!! Ha.
So Saturday came and went, I was able to catch up with my dad and have some dinner with him at Wegmans which was greatly appreciated. He even brought me some presents like my taxes forms to sign so that I can receive my warmly welcomed Government refund check, YESYESYES. And even some new pants from my favorite pants place in the world...BONOBOS. Check them out, they are pretty sweet! And if you ever need a pair of these killer pants just use the partner code "Curbonobos" and enjoy a nice first time buyer discount on good ole Matt Curbeau. NEW PANTS
Sunday was an awesome day as well, really awesome actually. I had the pleasure of getting an early morning 2 hr run in with a new training partner. His name is Phil and he has beaten me in numerous races. I thought it would be a good time to start training with him and figuring out his winning recipe, or at least that his knee was bothering him so I now know his weak spot..haha, just kidding of course. In all seriousness it was really awesome to get out there and run with someone my age who is in to the same darn stuff that I am. We really have a lot in a common and even though we had really only chatted for a few minutes in total at various races, their wasn't a moment of silence to be had during our 2hrs of running. He ended up going for another half an hour since he is ramping up for the Boston Marathon, however I peeled off at 2 and called it a morning. After that I boogyed on over to work till 1. Work was well...work. The time passed quickly and it felt like nothing got done even though we were all busting our butts. Just the nature of the job i guess. It's going to be a rough week ahead but somehow it will all get done, hopefully. Then at least I can move on to the next job and be one step closer to the spring. And speaking of being a step closer to the spring. The best part about Sunday was that my good friend Josh called me up around 2 and told me he wanted to ride OUTSIDE! I was fully on board. I quickly took to assembling my bike, which is a bit of a chore for this guy. I am not the most proficient around my bike yet. I have a tremendous amount to learn. But I did my best getting the brake pads to fit right and all that stuff. The hard part was changing the whole tire and tube since the tire was a training one I had previously been using on the trainer and it was so run down that it probably would have tore open the second it touched the ground. Then when I took that off I realized that the actual tube was in rough shape. It was still holding air but who knows for how much longer. So I did my best to change the thing but needless to say Josh rode to my place and helped me finish the task...what a great guy. And off we were on a absolutely beautiful BONUS Day as middle school Football coach used to say...or "A beautiful day in the Finger Lakes as another one would yell loudly even when it was thunder and lightning with the threat of a hurricane approaching..still beautiful in that crazy man's mind! I mean outside on bikes in February, it doesn't get much better than that! We rode to Fairport and then back to Brighton and even had a nice detour on the canal path where we had to walk our bikes for like a half a mile because of the snow...ONLY IN UPSTATE NY! But it was all good, an absolutely awesome way to spend Sunday afternoon. A really good head clearer of all the stress that winter and work brings. Hopefully their will be more of these days to come. And btw Josh gets to spend more days on the bike OUTSIDE this week as he is heading south to spend a good few days riding his butt off! I am so jealous! And would definitely be going with him if it wasn't for the time of year it is with work. He's knows that to, but oh well there will be more times, definitely more times!!
And the best part of Sunday was that Josh had me over to his house. I was dropping his Mtn Bike he had let me use back in like October, haha it was residing in my apartment for a while. But anyway, when I was dropping it over he invited me in and we hung out and watched bike movies and everything. His awesome wife Satera even brought me home dinner from Wegmans! So cool. It was just so nice to be able to spend time with great people. Josh also gave me all his bike magazines that he had already read, which is way cool of him since these magazines are all like 40 bucks an issue, haha. Great night, so much better than being all cooped up in my apartment alone...
Well as I post this I am happy. I got a pool workout in this morning, Im dresssed, Im eating breakfast, and it looks like I will be into work early today. Hopefully things will get accomplished and life will be good. I am sure I will be utterly miserable over the next few days but I will not let it get to me. I am bound and determined to truck on. I have so many good people around me. Saturday and Sunday certainly showcased that with my dad coming to see me for dinner, bring me cool work pants my mom suprised me with, and then getting to go for a run with a new training partner who will hopefully let me keep tagging along with him, and then even going for a bike ride and hanging out for the evening with a great friend who I didn't even know last year. Things are good, things are always good. You sometimes just have to zoom out and take it all in via a new perspective. I think its very true that in all aspects of life if you analyze something to much, or look at something to closely you start to miss things. You miss out on whats really going on in the BIG PICTURE. Because ultimately our life is one big picture with many intricate little details making that up. If we can focus on the beauty of the whole instead of the flaws in the details we will be much better off...and you know those flaws, well when we are in a better mindset those flaws don't exist anymore, their just pieces of the puzzle. Pieces that are extremely important in making everything come together. So when life is tough and it doesn't seem like their is a light at the end of the tunnel, step back and put things into perspective. I know that makes me feel better and I am working on it everyday.
Big things, good things...they are all closer than you think!
Train Hard, Train Smart....TRAIN THIS!
Out,
-MjC
PS I think that my blog posting is a direct correlation to how I am feeling. The more I post with actual meaning, the better I am feeling and the more sleep I have had. This week is a rest week where I will hopefully use it to my advantage seeing how work is going to keep me late. I should still be able to get a lot of sleep in (well relatively, seeing how since Jan 5th, I've been living on about 5hrs of sleep a night. I've held up well and knock on wood (my desk is wood and I am knocking loudly) I will continue to do the same. And I hope all the rest of you stay healthy and injury free as well.
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