14 Hours

That's how much sleep I got last night. I didn't mean to sleep more than an hour or two when I lay down after work at 5:30pm. My alarm even woke me up so that I could eat supper, go train, work on the Operation Triumph website ... but I suppose I needed the rest. I'm at the end of a 3-week cold and it's been a pretty exhausting month.

So no training last night, nor this morning (I could have slept more!) but I did manage to get in a half hour run Tuesday evening. The cold and slippery surface outside wasn't that bad ...

Have a great day all! I'm finally starting to feel revitalised!

Slow creeping start, but hey!

I've been trying to work training back into my life, now that I've gotten through two weeks of working at a totally insane frenetic pace. Took two nights to recuperate and started with a reacquaintance with Mr. SB. For those who don't know who he is (i.e. those who haven't been following the blog since the beginning), here he is ... Mr. Stationary Bike.

He's really hard to ride, not the most comfortable position, and I'm sure the adjustment mechanism is entirely off ... Even at it's lowest setting, this magnetic resistance bike is HARD to pedal. I figure it's a good introduction to cycling again. Big padded seat and I figure the resistance would be good to build some strength. I've done a bunch of 25 min. sets in the past week. Woohoo! Will have to get onto my road bike and trainer soon so I can do some spinning ... but that's still daunting to me since it's closer to the real thing and the skinny seat will take some ... um, adjustment ...

I've also fit in two 1000m swims before work, including this morning, so that's a good kick start to the day ... I don't think my shoulders could handle more distance at this point, but I'll be able to work up to more soon when I start to swim at least 4x/week. Right now, I'm just happy that I'm not drowning. I'm super proud of myself this morning ... got up only a few minutes after my two alarms sounded, didn't take advantage of the snooze function and then said, "I think I'll go for a swim" and was out the door 15 min. later.

Last sport to restart, after early January's training hiatus, is running. But it's so cold and dark outside still ... brrrr ... I know though that once I get out there, I'll be fine. I can't believe I've run so marathons when I can't even motivate myself to get out there and run for half an hour. I used to love winter running. But then, I probably wasn't as distracted by cycling and swimming and ...

... dancing. Yes, instead of running tonight, I went dancing ... Jive, Lindy Hop, West Coast Swing, and Blues ... What a great evening! And I met a cyclist who will hopefully help to motivate me when it'll be time to take to the road again once this snow clears up ... Yay!

Inspiration is exhilarating!

Tonight, I went to see the film "The Bucket List" with an actor friend of mine. It's the story of two cancer patients that meet in a hospital room, become best friends, and then decide to go on a road trip around the world to do all the things they've always wanted to do before kicking the bucket.

Fantastic acting, interesting story line, surprise ending. Made my friend and I think.

So ... what was supposed to be a late training evening turned into an exhilarating inspiring one as MR and I talked about life, death, love and spirituality. The subject got onto Operation Triumph and what it meant to my friends and I, and how I'd like to get the acting community to participate in this positive project. Well, interesting how inspiration leads to creativity leads to exhilaration leads to being in awe with all the possibilities!

Life is what you make it. You can choose to go wallow in a hole or float in a protective bubble or ... decide that life is beautiful and wonderful and choose to be positive.

Just another dull boring week

Last week was more than a little *C*R*A*Z*Y*. I suppose my friends who know me would say it's "just a normal week" for me. And the thing is, I think they're right. I might just have to resign myself to the fact that my life always moves at a million miles per hour ... sigh ...

This is my past week:

- 4-day migraine
- caught my youngest son's cold with appropriately annoying cough, much to my chagrin
- snowboarding with the kids
- I am presently in workshop with a new play Import/Export as we were offered a residency at Usine C, a cool performing arts complex in Montreal (I'm a lead!)
- I also have a day job that I barely squeezed in ... argh

- getting ready for my big blast of a b-day party this weekend

- and oh yes, most importantly, getting ready for the launch of the website of "Operation Triumph", a new charity my friends and I created to help fight against cancer. Check out the preview at www.operationtriumph.com ... official launch is coming up soon!

Needless to say, yet once again, um ... no official Ironman training.

I did get in a short albeit almost usless swim on Saturday. Between playing with the kids and trying to swim around the woman who insisted on using the only free lane to do some pool walking, all I can really say is that I still have a good sense of water and am still feeling confident that I won't drown.

Today it snowed, so obviously, it took me an hour and a half to travel the 15km back home. Yup, that's Montreal snow removal services.

So when I got home tonight, I made sure to laze around in front of the television for an hour tonight and do nothing, absolutely nothing ...

And it felt goooood.

Wow, I can't believe I'm already back to work ...

I hope you all had a fabulous time bringing in the New Year. I surely did ... bubbly, great company, games, a fun flick, great food and lots of hugs. Here's our supper, one of mine and my children's favourites: braised beef with potatoes and carrots, caesar salad. Dessert was CHOCOLATE. Yes, more festively plump fixings.

Then a short visit to my mother who is regaining her strength and looking much better than the last time I saw her before Christmas. It was so nice to see her laughing again. We played Jenga, a hilarious game suited for all ages. We got as high as 32 levels before my son knocked it down accidentally with a bad move. Pretty cool ... it was a new record!

Spent time snowboarding this week too ... it wise fun to enjoy the powder that fell the other day, not so fun to drive in it ... now we're headed into a warm spell ... goodbye snow. It'll make running a little easier though!