Jingle Bell Run

It was a good weekend.  Saturday I had a lesson with Courtney, then hacked General on the trails near Farrell McWhirter.  It was really cold, and General's arthritis was acting up a bit, but it was so quiet and peaceful outside.  I took a wrong turn, and ended up on a longer ride than I had planned, but we made it back to the barn before the snow started.  We ended up with maybe an inch overnight, but lots of ice.  I almost decided to sleep in, but crawled out of bed to meet Jennifer and Victor for the 5k Jingle Bell Run in downtown Seattle at 9am.  About 10,000 people participated I think.  It was a slow start, and the race had a number of icy patches, but it was a lot of fun -- everyone was festively dressed.  Victor and I hit a coffee shop afterwards, then I went home and took Ms. Cli for a walk in downtown Kirkland.  It was cold, but sunny and crisp.  Cli tried on some winter coats at Barkz, but I couldn't make up my mind as to what looked best between the Ivy-League Baker wool look, or the L.A. sheepskin shawl.  She looked really cute in both.  I then drove back to Capitol Hill to meet Victor for a movie at the Harvard Exit.  We saw Slumdog Millionaire -- it was great.  Afterwards we had a great dinner at Poppy, which included a number of creative vegetarian options.  It will be hard to go to work tomorrow. 

End of the Season(?)

Today was my last cross race of the season (I think).  It was up at Monroe; pretty cold, and damp start, lots and lots of mud, and my feet were numb after the first lap.  The course was pretty drab; not too difficult; only two run-ups, no barriers, although the mud fields were quite the slog.  I think I ended up 11 of about 26 or so.  Not near as good as the last race, but I think it hurt to have last weekend off, coupled with a very lax training week, due to a business trip.  It seems like you can't really let up on the intensity training for these races.  On the plus side, the bike handling was good, no mistakes, and I was comfortable (but still in pain of course) going through the mud.  Not a bad end to the season; I think I'm currently ranked 8th for the series, but that will change after next weekend, since I won't be able to race due to going home for Thanksgiving.  It was a good couple of days, coming off of a crappy work week, with the trip to central Washington.  Friday I turned 38 -- Brad and I went to see the so-so Quantum of Solace, followed by dinner at matts in the market.  Ran into Jen and Mark there.  Brad's birthday present to me was a customized Gunnar Roadie -- white frame, black and silver decals, with red accents (wheels, wire tips, headset, etc.).  The bike looks great, and I was touched by all the attention and time he put into it.  I took it for a spin on Saturday, although I was loathe to get it dirty.  Then I trailered General to Tall Firs for a lesson with Courtney, Sally Sue, and Durrel.  It was a beautiful day;  Brad and I then just relaxed at home, watching the amusing Iron Man before bed.  Back to work tomorrow, but at least it will be a short week.  I had contemplated taking my cross bike home to do a race in Murrysville this Sunday, but it is so expensive to take the bike on the plane.  I got an email from the sponsor I had emailed about the race, trying to get me to come, but perhaps it will be to crazy with everything going on at home.  Might be a good time to put the cross bike away, especially since it's finally clean.

Elusive Blue, Elusive Podium

It was a great weekend.  Brad went home to Rhode Island, so I decided to catch up with some friends and get outside.  Friday, Andrea, Kore and I went to Sitka & Spruce.  They hoped to get us seated by 8:30, but it was more like 9:45 when we sat down.  We passed the time by ordering a bottle of wine at the bar, and had laughs all night.  We didn't get home til about 1-ish.  Kore had suggested that we see some live music, but I was psyched to just be up past my bed time of 11:30, and to have made it downtown for dinner.  The restaurant's food was good, but atmosphere was a little tight, service a bit too casual.  Saturday morning, I took General to another dressage show at Gold Creek.  We rode Training 2 again.  He placed 2nd (again) out of about 7 horses, but he was so lazy, which warranted the "needs more energy" comments the judge gave us.  He just seemed tired.  Perhaps he sensed I too was tired from too much wine the night before.  Still, it was a nice sunny afternoon, and a couple of guys came from the barn for moral support.  Saturday nite Jen and John were kind enough to make a drive up from Tacoma to meet me for dinner at Steelhead Diner.  We had a bizarre combination of food, from french fries with cheese and gravy, to potato latkes, but everything was good.  This morning I woke up at 6:30 for a cyclocross race in Bremerton.  I was late getting out of the house with getting the dog and all my gear ready, and thought seriously about staying home and reading the paper.  I'm glad I didn't, because it turned out to be my best race.  The course was so fun, taking you through mud fields, single track, and even through the concrete aisleways of the fairground exhibition barns.  I finally got the hang of keeping up my momentum when mounting and dismounting, and running harder and faster up the hills and over the barriers.  I avoided making any big mistakes, and ended up 4th overall.  I think the big jump in placing was due to the high intensity training I've been doing the last week and a half.  I stopped commuting after I crunched my road bike into a concrete pillar in a parking garage while it was on the roof rack.  I wasn't too disappointed, as I looked at it as a forced rest from commuting to and from work.  In any event, I've been spending more time on the trainer, getting comfortable with the pain of threshold intervals.  I think it really helped today.  So, not bad - a red ribbon, and a 4th place bike finish -- I think I'll go to Nordstrom tonight to celebrate by buying some shoes.  

We've Gone Country

Having now thoroughly integrated into western ranch life, Brad and I are likely unrecognizable to the normal Seattle eye.  Let's see, we've been clearing brush George Bush-style, we made (and stocked) a compost bin, tore out old fence posts, moved rocks, created burn  piles, scooped up manure, and split wood.  I've been busy cooking for Brad each night, although with mixed success.  The pie was great, as was the nut-stuffed squash.  The butternut squash gnocchi was pretty tasteless (I swear I followed the recipe to a t), but last night's mushroom/spinach fettucine was really good.  We are currently in the midst of a very intense scrabble championship - Brad is winning though 4 games to 2 (I really think he's been cheating).  We went to Sun Mountain Lodge on Wednesday for a mountain bike ride (using the Indie series course map), and then yesterday I took General out to our real estate agent's 150 acre ranch for a trail ride.  She borders state land, so we just rode and rode and didn't see anyone for miles and miles.  We did see three young horses who looked like a mini wild herd, and a few deer, but nothing else.  Just sage, pine, old homesteads from the 1800's, and views to die for.  When we returned to the ranch, some of their cows had gotten into the wrong pasture, so General had to try to use his previously-deficient cow herding skills to get them back together.  One cow freaked him out, but then he was pretty good getting a baby cow into the right pasture (whatever it takes to get up his confidence!).  He seemed pretty proud of himself.  For our last day here, we might go for a hike since the weather looks like it's going to be clear and dry again.  First though I think I'll make some omelettes for breakfast.  This would be an easy life to get used to.  Now I just need to convince Brad that we need a second horse.  

Monday in Mazama

Brad and I started our fall vacation this past Saturday, and drove out to the cabin for a week.  It will be the longest we've stayed here since we closed Labor Day weekend.  It's been absolutely amazing.  The fall colors are brilliant -- the whites of the alder trees, with bright yellow leaves, contrasted against gray river rocks and green pines.  Already there's some snow at the top of the mountains.  We arrived late Saturday afternoon with our three furry friends - Indy, Clio and General.  Tom, the guy who was working on a corral for General, finished it before we arrived.  It looks fantastic (definitely something we could not have done on our own).  Saturday evening we spent time unpacking and arranging all of our gear, and putting together a coffee table and side chair that we bought at World Plus Market.  Sunday morning I got up at 8 am and starting moving the old stone path that was to the garden (which we partially tore down during fence construction), to the entrance to the corral.  Then I started taking out the remains of the garden from the inside of the corral.  I'm glad I did -- it was full of blackberry bushes (that I had to dig out), but the bushes were held together by twine and wire, not to mention some rails and nails.  Horse nightmares.  Brad pitched in after buying a wheelbarrow, rakes, and other misc. tools from the local hardware store, and we created a number of "burn" piles -- kind of the thing to do out here.  Needless to say after all of this, we were so sore.  I took General on an hour trail ride though through the Freestone Inn and back.  We had comfort food -- pizza, veggie burger and fries at Jack's Saloon in Winthrop and went to bed early.  This morning we got up, I threw a bareback pad on General, and Brad, Clio and I headed to the Mazama store for the paper and scones.  It was so cool to be using my horse for transportation on quiet country roads with no traffic in sight.  We later headed into town (not on horseback) to pick up groceries and run some errands, then came back to learn that the reason our land line has been dead, was that the fence installers had cut through the line.  We'll need to have that fixed later this week.  This afternoon, while Brad was tearing down the tree house that was in the back of the property, I started to cook believe it or not.  I love to make stuff, it's just that I never have the time.  So, for this trip, I planned to make a number of recipes, and also went to the bead store so I could work on some necklaces.  I put some bread in the breadmaker (can't take credit for the bread), but then launched an ambitious effort to make an apple/pecan pie and stuffed delicata squash.  The squash was good (or so Brad says).  The pie is still baking, but looks and smells awesome.  Brad was so amazed that I made this from scratch, including the crust, that he took a picture.  I'll supplement this later when I find out how it tastes.  What a great day though.  I took General for an 8 mile loop from our place on the well maintained community trail.  I couldn't believe how nice this trail system is.  It goes across rivers, bridges, through pine forests and alder groves, and has signs marking your way.  I came across a family of deer on our way back.  General was too focused on getting home to pay them much attention.  They were so cute though -- they hop in stead of run by jumping off all four legs at once, just like the skunk "pepe le pew."  This evening, while I was cooking dinner, Brad burned our first "burn pile" -- we were a little nervous that we would burn down Mazama, but it turned out okay -- it was really nice and warm.  Tomorrow night we'll have smores while we do the next one.

Sea-Tac Cyclocross -- A very painful 30 minutes

Yesterday was my fourth cyclocross race.  Hmmmm, I "guess" it was fun.  It felt good afterwards (maybe 20 minutes afterwards; immediately after my finish I had to lay down on the ground to catch my breath; haven't felt that way since I ran the 400m sprint in high school), but the first lap was extremely difficult.  So bad, that I started telling myself, "hey, no one will see if you just duck under that yellow line there and act like a spectator."  I didn't warm up as much as I should have - I spent probably about 30 minutes riding around the course, and my mounts were so completely terrible -- I really need remedial mounting training.  It just freaks me out having to jump on my bike during the race.  I literally am stopping, tilting the bike over, and swinging my leg over.  Really awful form.  After the first lap, I started to think that I could salvage the crappy start.  I kept trying to remind myself that in mountain biking it always felt like I was doing worse than I actually was, and how I actually ended up.  So, I didn't duck under a yellow line, and tried to keep at it.  By the end of the second lap, I felt warmed up, and then it was horse to the barn -- the thinking was, 'the faster I go, the faster the pain will be over.'  When it was all said in done, I ended up 17 out of 38.  Not quite as good as the last two races, but I don't think I could have done much better than say, 15th, if my mounts were good, and if I was able to ride through the damned sand.  The next race is this coming up weekend, but we're planning to go to Mazama for a long-awaited week off.  It's tempting to stay for the race, but a week of doing nothing at the cabin sounds like so much more fun . . . .

Enter working trot, halt, and salute the healthy horse!

Well, I got sick of writing a blog pretty fast, but I realized that I type a lot faster than I can write in my diary, so I figured that I'd just use this as a way to keep track of what I do day to day.  When someone I haven't seen in awhile asks what I've been up to, it pretty much just boils down to a blur of work, horses, biking, running, hanging out with Brad, the cat and dog.  The details just get lost in the blur of routine.  There's so much good stuff in the details, though, so I feel like I should commit them in writing so that I can look back and smile at what really goes on in our lives.  Anyway.... today was a great day.  I signed up for the Gold Creek dressage show about 3 weeks ago.  I was so looking forward to this.  Ever since we attended the Buck Brannaman clinic this summer, General (and I) have improved so much.  I finally understand the concept of contact and release, which has completely eluded me over the years.  General has just been so much softer and so much more willing.  We've been practicing all the things we learned at the clinic on a narrow, but long strip of grass in front of the soccer fields on the Sammamish River Trail.  He's been so good, that he's actually been recently doing a good half-pass at the walk, which is something we really never did before.  So, I concluded that he was ready to go back in an arena -- but nothing too hard -- just fun.   I entered him in just one class -- Training 2.  The Gold Creek schooling show was today, and the timing was perfect -- just this week, October 7, I celebrated a year since General was found down in his pasture and rushed into colic surgery to remove a terribly tight lipoma that had wrapped around his small colon.  The folks at Pilchuck, specifically Dr. Bryant, performed nothing short of a miracle to save my pony.  I will never forget that day.  Dr. Bryant told me to be prepared to put him down during the surgery.  Miraculously though, once they got in, they found that the colon was not yet quite dead, and that they could sew him up to see how he would do.  It was a week of complete uncertainty, as General stayed in their "ICU."  I kept waiting for the call with the bad news.  The call never came, but it was so weird waiting around for something that you did not want to happen.  After a week, he was considered to be out of the worst, but it was 30 days of pretty intensive care, followed by another 3 months of slow rehab, and putting back the 100 pounds that he had lost.  So, to see my horse today, after all of that, was truly a blessing.  He was so full of himself from the moment he got off the trailer -- just would not stay still moving around constantly, like a 3 yo TB waiting for a race.  Hard to believe that he's 19.  I planned to do a nice slow warm-up, using a lot of the things we worked on in clinic.  We warmed up for an hour then went in for our test.  It was great to ride on such good footing.  Shannon showed up for moral support, and did awesome reading her first test - the was a total pro at it.  General was surprisingly energetic still, even after the long warm-up, and really moved around the arena.  With Shannon reading, I finally succeeded in not forgetting where I was supposed to go, and let him do his thing.  Everything was great, except for not moving out completely at the free walk, and some lack of balance at the right canter -- we ended up with a 68%, and a red ribbon.  Next time, we gotta go for the blue.