Schwaggle Deal and Another PDR Weekend

First off, have you seen yesterday's Schwaggle deal yet? 50% off PRO Compression Socks plus free shipping ... which is a really great deal for great quality! I have a couple pairs of PRO Compression socks and I LOVE THEM! They are pretty much neck-and-neck with my Zensah socks/ sleeves and I actually DO prefer them in the warmer months (they're thinner). I may need to talk mom into buying me a late birthday present ... I see a couple colors I want and don't have yet. :)

It was an interesting weekend for me. Besides the Olympics (SO proud of our USA Rowers! Makes me miss that part of my life even more!), I pulled off another double PDR.

Running ...

I've been doing my long(er) runs on the towpath trail to take advantage of the shade and scenery, but there was ABSOLUTELY NO WAY I was going to purposely dirty my "pretties" (how long can you still call running shoes brand new? 20 miles? 50? 100? Until they finally get dirty?) in the dirt and stone. So, I got up early Saturday morning and plotted a BORING route that would keep me on roads and the paved W-C Trail AND within a couple miles of a restroom at all times (thank you, Metroparks). Even with hitting the "snooze" a couple times, it was still blessedly cloudy and in the 70s when I finally made my way outside (a first for this summer). The first 3 miles felt great as I just let my body cruise along and warm up a bit. I even got a catcall or 2 from guys sealing a driveway as I ran by [I sped up after I heard the first one - I HATE catcalls!]. Right around the end of mile 4, I could feel my GI starting to rebel and I remember grumbling under my breath more than once "THIS is why I can't run a more interesting route. #$!&^@ bathrooms!" To make a long story short(er) and less uncomfortable (for you readers), the nearest restroom was almost a half mile BEYOND my planned turn-around point. So, a planned 10.5 mile run became 11.26 miles. It really WAS a nice run, though. I didn't follow a regular hydration/ nutrition strategy, just took a drink when I felt like it and sucked down a Power Bar Gel around halfway. I don't know if it was the cooler temperatures or that I was on pavement instead of uneven trails, but I felt like I used less effort for these 11.2 miles than I used for my 10 miles last weekend. Probably a combination of both. I think I need to complete the rest of my long runs leading up to the half marathon on pavement to get myself ready.

And waiting for me at home, my favorite post-run meal ... 2-egg omelette with bacon and cheese, my beloved diet coke (Save me the lecture, I know it's bad for me. It's one of my 2 major vices [the other is my love of profanity], so sue me. I'm not giving it up any time soon.), and my recovery drink. One note about that omelette, the bacon has to be crumbled up and mixed into the eggs before they cook and it needs to be colby-jack shredded cheese in the fold. Also, that omelette took up 3/4 of that plate when it came off the stove, I swear. I just devoured that much of it before I thought to take a picture. Oops. Same deal with the recovery drink, that glass was full. lol. Seriously, this meal is what I CRAVE after a long run.

I also decided it might be a good idea to take an ice bath. I've read many reports and articles on these and they contradict each other so much it's ridiculous. Actually, the arguments kind of remind me of the climate change debate when the first couple data sets were released. Anyway, I've been experiencing some CRAZY soreness/ stiffness in my legs an hour or 2 after long runs, even with my compression socks and stretching and laying with my legs propped up (usually against a wall), so I figured it was worth a shot. Anything [and I mean ANYTHING] that ends up helping, right? My family, of course, thought this "ice bath idea" was hilarious and ridiculous. Though, I'm not really sure if they were laughing harder at the idea of it or at my reaction to the cold. Cursing is my other major vice and I "let it fly" when I eased myself down into the bathtub. Pretty sure the family was laughing as loudly as I was cursing. I amazed myself and was able to stay in the water until well after the ice had melted. And, just so it's out there - this picture was taken about 3 seconds before my gimp of a mother (she's walking better and better every day, stitches come out this week and the pins in another 2 weeks, hopefully) hobbled upstairs and dumped another cup of ice down my back when I was trying to focus on biting my tongue. So nice, isn't she?

Cycling ...
Saturday is my long run days and Sunday has become my long RIDE day, I guess. I rode all the way east on the W-C North Fork, across the highway overpass past the Fallen TImbers Monument, and down the (ridiculous) hill to SideCut Metropark and back. 18ish miles, another distance record for me. Had I known that hill was there between the monument and SideCut, I wouldn't have ridden it. I even forced myself to RIDE it all the way back up! "It's just another little challenge. Come on, you LOVE challenges." Holy Crap. On a good note, I now know of the perfect place to practice running hills. :)

That big dip there in the center? Yea, that's me going down the hill and coming back up.
The bit of a hill on either side is the overpass. Basically right at the top of the hill. Ugh.

Six for Saturday

I know, I've been falling behind on my blogging again. I REALLY need to update my side panel and pages too. *smacks hand* Bad blogger! Oh well ...

(1) One (1)

I SEVERELY procrastinated getting in my long run today. I just felt so sluggish (must have been all that hilarity from my cousin's wife's surprise birthday party last night) I didn't know if I could do it. Most of my aches and pains were probably mental too. I swear I told myself "I'll just get one more thing done and then I'll go run" half a dozen times. Finally, I decided I just had to go do it. By then, it was too warm and sunny to be running the roads around my house so I made the 10-minute drive over to the river and the old towpath trail.

I amazed myself. Once again. As soon as I started running and finding my rhythm, all the aches and pains disappeared, my lethargy melted away, and I realized I mentally needed this run just as much as physically. On long runs, I normally won't eat, drink, or take any walk breaks for the first 3 miles (sort of a mental training thing for 5ks). Today, I reached 4 miles before I even thought to take a sip of my Gatorade. By then, I was almost to my favorite halfway point ...

PS - I can't believe how low the river is right now! You can walk all the way across in a
couple places! Kind of hard to use the river as a post-run "cool down" when the water is super
shallow and almost 80*!

I finished off my Gatorade, ate a couple of my Power Bar Energy Blasts, and took off again. I slowed down twice on the way back, once to dump the water from my smaller bottle on my fuelbelt into my handheld bottle (I'm more likely to drink if it's in front of my face) and once because I somehow got a rock down in my shoe and I wanted it out before it snagged my sock or I stepped on it wrong and hurt myself. 9.58 miles (distance PR) in 1:50:58. That's an average pace of 11:34/mi.

(2) Two (2)

Is anyone else using Earndit? I've been using it for a couple weeks now and I'm loving it. From the website:

Sometimes we could all use a little extra motivation to exercise. While you’d think that the allures of better health and a leaner body would be enough to kick us into action, the reality of the matter is that they’re not. In fact, behavioral economists have a scientific explanation for this called "hyperbolic discounting".

In practice, hyperbolic discounting means that humans discount the value of a reward that occurs far into the future, preferring instead a more immediate reward even if its absolute value is less. For example, if I gave Harry the option to receive $10 today or $20 in a month, he’d probably choose $10 today even though it’s financially wiser for him to get $20 in a month. Hyperbolic discounting is the reason why better health and a leaner body down the road are not compelling enough to make us exercise today.

So we’ve created a system that gives you more immediate rewards for your exercise. Our hope is to foster a more active lifestyle in each of us, and in turn play a small role in improving the health of our users.

Go exercise. Get rewarded. You earnd it.

FAQ

It really is easy to use. Mine syncs with my Garmin Connect. When it comes to the "rewards", there's some awesome stuff. You can earn stuff for yourself or you can donate your points to a couple causes Earndit champions. I decided as soon as I started on the site that I would donate to every cause before I scored anything for myself. So far, I've donated to Heifer International, Shining Hope, and Christmas in July for US Troops (which is near and dear to my heart).

(3) Three (3)

I've been spending a LOT of time with Roadie lately ... and I love it. I'm slowly cleaning and fixing things as I find issues and riding further and further each time. My butt still hurts if I spend too much time in the saddle, but it's getting better. There's no ache right after a ride, but you can bet I'm feeling it the next time I sit in that saddle again. I think I'm developing a "groove" in my butt. lol.

(4) Four (4)

I've been noticing a bunch of these showing up around our yard lately ...

Yep, that's a hole. Big enough I could shove a garden hose down it. And yes, that really is our backyard right now. We live on the edge of the Oak Openings Ridge (basically, a giant ridge of old sand dunes) and we've NEVER [in the 21 years we've lived here] been able to grow a decent lawn. And this summer's extreme heat has burned the heck out of any grass we DID have out in the open areas. Up around the house, you can tell exactly how far the water spreads out after exiting our downspouts and where is shaded most of the day. Those areas are the ONLY green in the yard, expect for the trees.

But back to the holes ... I finally figured out what they were when I saw some movement around one of the holes yesterday ...

Cicada killer wasps. I guess they prefer really loose sandy areas for their burrows ... and they hit the jackpot with our yard. I actually took THIS picture today, but the one I saw yesterday was in the process of dragging a cicada down the hole. It was pretty cool to watch. I was a little nervous about having wasps this big in our yard, but then I did a little research. Apparently, they aren't aggressive. I accidently put that to the test his morning with this guy in the picture. I was sitting under our pool deck fixing something and this guy flew over and landed on me several times. I brushed him away every time and he never got aggressive.

So, I'm still not completely comfortable with them, but now I'm more interested than scared. We'll see what dad has to say about them when he gets home. I'm pretty sure his reaction is going to be drowning the holes in wasp killer spray and then flooding them with the garden hose, but we'll see.

I'd take these guys any day over the ant assault that's happening in our kitchen right now. The really nasty thing is that the ONLY place they show up in the kitchen IS ON THE COUNTER!!! No matter how clean we keep it, they seem to flock to the area around the sink. Mom put out "bait traps", but that would require the ants taking the material back to their colony. Dad, brother, and I have the philosophy that they shouldn't make it that far. We're having ant-smashing contests and spraying (probably way too much) chemicals. And it's lead to some pretty spectacular arguments over who left dirty dishes in the sink ...

(5) Five (5)

With the parents gone this week and my brother spending most of his time packing up his apartment (he's moving into a house with friends for the next school year), I've been trying to balance "cleaning out the leftovers" and eating healthy. I've ended up with some interesting creations too ...

Ramen noodles with soy sauce, tuna, celery and grape tomatoes. It was pretty good, actually.

(6) Six (6)

I've talked before about taking aluminum cans to the recycle center to pay for my race registration fees. I made my latest run this morning. 43lbs of metal brought me $17.52. The price of aluminum went down again. Drat. Oh well. It's better than nothing and I'm lucky my half marathon will be small and cheap. :)

If we're friends on DailyMile, you know how often the neighborhood munchkins have talked me into riding bikes with them up to Oak Openings (they aren't allowed to go that far alone) for the sole purpose of picking up cans for me. I love that they want to help me and the environment at the same time. I always hope I'm setting a good example for them and this is one of those times I know I am. It sickens me, though, that I can completely clean the 2-3 mile stretch and we can ride by less than a week later and still pick up SO many cans, almost exclusively beer.

I could have waited a bit longer to take the cans in, but dad went on one of his rampages before they left on vacation. With the bags out of the garage, it's one less thing he can blame the ants on. It'll take me a while to build up enough of a stash again to out-grow the old garbage can and worry about bags sitting around. Though, hopefully I can find a semi-steady job soon and I won't have to be so concerned with collecting them for money.


Oh well. The parents will be home sometime tomorrow so I'll be spending every waking moment until then scrubbing and cleaning and organizing. Mom is having surgery on both her feet this week so we want to have the whole house cleaned and stocked before then. I think the plan is to take a MASSIVE shopping trip and cooking marathon the day before. I can cook for myself, and dad can cook for himself and mom (usually), but we're all a bit particular about our food (different medical issues, I refuse to eat beef and starch every night, etc.) that it's just not a good idea to have dad in charge of food for everyone. Or me, for that matter. lol


PS - At what age is counting down to your birthday "immature"?

GDP 5k & Apparently I'm Crazy

Today was one of those days where you just wonder what you're doing next because YOU don't even know. And, fair warning, I had this post written out oh so eloquently in my head during my 2nd run, but you know how that goes ... Maybe I should start running with a digital recorder too? lol.

Let's start with Global Distance Project 5k, shall we? I was obnoxiously nervous for this. My cousin C and I have been talking trash all week over who was going to beat who. It was his first 5k race so I thought that gave me an advantage. It was raining when I woke up so I was hoping the clouds would either stick around for a little while or it would at least hold the temperature down until we could get through the race. Problem #1. A big fat NO on both counts. It was sunny and the temperature was already nearly 85* and climbing when I pulled into the church parking lot. I was dripping sweat within 5 minutes. I went to find C and his wife, L, right away. I was expecting all kinds of smack talk, but there wasn't any. We actually had a calm and interesting conversation about how things were going to work (since I was the only one who'd raced before) and what we personally wanted to get out of the race. I think L was surprised we were able to have that conversation without acting like a couple of kids. lol. C and I grew up pretty close (we even had most of the same classes when he transferred to AW for our Sr year of high school) and we tend to act more like bickering siblings than adult cousins. *innocent grin*

From our conversation, I knew C wanted to sub-30, which was fine with me since that was my basement goal as well. We kind of made an unspoken promise to run together, but about a half mile into it, I knew that wasn't going to happen. He took off ahead of me and never looked back. Problem #2. It was around the time that he pulled ahead that I finally looked down at my Garmin and realized something was wrong. It was bouncing back and forth between "searching for satellites" and working normally. When I crossed the 1 mile mark, it was only showing 0.47 miles. Crap. I THOUGHT I hit the "lap" button so I would at least be able to check my splits for the rest of the race. The race was an out-and-back [crossing over a highway overpass TWICE ... UGH] so they set up a water station on either side of the road between 1-1.25 mile mark, which was a much-appreciated idea. When I was making the decision if I should walk through the water station, I looked down at my Garmin again and realized I must have pushed "start/stop" instead of "lap" ... so it hadn't been recording anything! Double Crap! I just made a split-second decision and just shut it off. If I ran great, awesome. If not, it's a training run and a learning experience. To make that part of the race EVEN BETTER, Problem #3, there were only 2 women working the 2nd water station and they never got a rhythm down or pre-filled cups, so I GOT MISSED! I wasn't about to stop dead and wait for them to fill up another cup, so I just kept going. Thank goodness I train with the idea that I will only get 1 sip of water during a 5k and I was able to suck down the ENTIRE cup at the first station.

By the time I reached the overpass for the 2nd time, I was feeling the heat and my nervous-ness at being without my Garmin. I gave up a little since I didn't know my time and walked up the incline. Once I got going again, there was about three quarters of a mile left and I just pushed myself. Once I made the last turn into the driveway and saw the clock click over to 0:29:xx, I just started sprinting.

C says the clock was 0:28:xx when he crossed, but we'll wait and see. The major difference, as I see it, is that he pretty much vegged out after finishing where I got a quick drink and then went back out to the 0.5-miles to go (I think) and cheered for/ ran L in. Gotta work on that endurance, C. ;)

So ... I am currently at the mercy of the Toledo RoadRunners' webmaster to find out my official time. I may have PRed, maybe not. If I didn't, it was darn close ... and it was a gun start/ popsicle stick finish so I don't put as much stock in it as I do in chip-timed races. But, looking back, I'm a little disappointed in myself because I KNOW I would have had sub-29 if I hadn't walked up the overpass the 2nd time. *pouts*

All that being said, I'm still extremely happy. I got to spend quality time with one of my favorite cousins (and his awesome wife). Pace-wise, I know I pushed myself beyond my comfort zone without the help of my little electronic friend. I ran a smart race for all my "issues" and I learned from those things I didn't do right. Seriously, just think about what I could have done today if the weather had been cooler and I didn't have to struggle with the overpasses! An instant PR, I'm sure. And it was a GORGEOUS day, despite the oppressive heat and humidity. :D

Once I got home, I started thinking (dangerous, I know). I'm at the end of the 3rd week of my half marathon training and I've already bumped 2 long runs in favor of racing 5ks. I know it shouldn't make much of a difference this early in training, especially with upping my mileage during the week, but I still wonder about it.

Maybe I'm crazy, maybe I just went into it to see where it would take me, but I decided to get on "Roadie" and go for a ride. Once I got going, I started thinking about how GOOD it felt and I found myself going the LONG way to Oak Openings ...

6.5 miles

 Once at Oak Openings, I decided I wanted to get in a run. To make a dent in that whole racing-instead-of-doing-long-runs thing. I started off with a 2 min. run: 2 min. walk ratio since it was supposed to be a "recovery" run, but after 2 miles, I got tired of this and switched it to 2:1.

2.91 miles

... And then rode home again. The short way.

3.46 miles

And now?

I'm sitting here, smelling the steaks cooking on the grill, drying off after spending the rest of the afternoon relaxing in the pool ...

... and trying not to do anything else crazy today. Trying ;)


Keep cool everyone! June recap and what July has in store for me coming (probably) tomorrow ...

Happy First Day of Spring!

I'll be honest ... I totally forgot today was the first day of spring until I heard it on the news last night. Here in the Midwest, we had late winter/ early spring all winter and then just jumped straight to summer sometime last week. It's crazy. Saturday, I had to dig out the box with my (non-workout) shorts in it!

First off, someone asked how long my hair was BEFORE it got chopped ... since it's been in a perpetual bun or ponytail for the past 5ish months ... so here you go ...

Secondly, I found these lovelies over the weekend and decided I needs to make some cookies for St. Patrick's Day:

OF COURSE I'm not eating the cookie dough.
Who do you think I am, my grandmother's granddaughter? Haha

They spread out a little more than I would have liked (and were a little too soft), but they were pretty darn yummy. I bought some mint chocolate chip ice cream and Mint Bailey's at the same time I bought the m&ms. Talk about a mint overload! Between all the mint, the alcohol, and the emotional upheaval, Saturday night was interesting.

I DID get a run in yesterday, but it was a hot, short, miserable slog through the trails at Wildwood Metropark. The dune trail was great (despite the people traffic), but I decided to make a loop of the meadow and found the biggest mud ball in the park. Myself and another girl who was running the same route made use of the hose attached to the wall of the visitor's center to rinse ourselves off from the knees down before going anywhere NEAR our cars. Oh, and to the teenagers we interrupted: your "secret make out place" isn't so secret. You're right along the main trail for runners in the park. It's a gorgeous day, as people are getting off work. Don't be surprised when you get "caught". And don't be a couple pricks and start screaming and cursing at the runners going by who couldn't give 2 $#!@s about you hiding from your parents and making out. End rant. *rolls eyes*

A while back, one of the neighborhood kids I occasionally babysat when they were younger got a "real" mountain bike for her birthday ("It has shocks and everything, Jess!"). If you saw my post from last weekend with the picture of me laying on the deck after my race, same girl who took that picture. Anyway, I promised her back when she got the bike that I would take her over to Oak Openings and ride a trail with her this spring if she stayed up to date with her homework and she stayed out of trouble with her parents (she reminds me of myself at that age, defiant and moody). When she saw me come home from riding last week, she got really excited and reminded me of my promise. I remembered. And I reminded her of her part of the bargain. Today, she showed up with a note from her mom (no joke) and a copy of her weekly homework "report card". Since it was TECHNICALLY spring and she IS doing really well and it was a GORGEOUS day (it reached the low 80s!), I told her to go home and change into old clothes. She just screamed and ran home, excited. I was already changed and ready to go by the time she got back.

It's almost a 2-mile ride up to the park, so I had her ride in front of me and set the pace, mainly so I wouldn't be tempted to push the pace and tire her out too early. It gave me a good chance to watch her ride and get an idea of how her balance was and how well she shifted gears. I was impressed. She held the pace pretty steadily at around 10mph the whole time we were on the road. Once we got on the trail, she handled the mud and "hills" really well. I had to remind her to slow down a little bit through the standing water if she didn't want to end up COMPLETELY soaked, but I was really proud of her. She never complained and really seemed like she enjoyed it. She didn't even complain when I told her we needed to clean off the bikes before we put them away. According to my Garmin, we pulled out a little over 8.5 miles in 50 minutes. I consider that pretty darn amazing for a girl who has never ridden outside her own neighborhood (the girl, not me). I don't know if she'll want to go again or not, but I'm sure her parents didn't have any problems getting her to go to bed tonight :)

Oh yea, and we got a little muddy ...

I guess it MUST be spring ... mom's flowers are officially blooming. :)

Happy Spring! :)

PS- Happy Birthday to my big sister's (well, she might as well be) husband who turned 30! Luckily, he has coworkers and friends who have just as twisted a sense of humor as he does ...

My Butt Hurts.

I can't believe I just typed that in as the title of this post. Oh well, moving on ...

I took yesterday as a rest day since my normal rest day (Sunday) was spent racing, but when I woke up this morning, I was ITCHING to get out and do something physical (other than drain all the water off the pool cover from that crazy storm last night). My legs were still a little achey, so I turned to my family's collection of bikes.

My Banana Seat Beauty, a 4th birthday present.

First, a little background. Crap, this could get lengthy ... and I promise to attempt to make this sound as not-whiney as possible ... I have had 1 brand new bike in my entire life (not counting my rockin' red tricycle). Every other bike that I have owned has come out of someone's trash. Yep, you read that right. Granted, that's only 3 out of 4 bikes, but that's beside the point. My dad drove the delivery trucks before he moved up to semis and he'd always see bikes sitting out with the trash. Most were still in pretty good condition and just needed a little TLC and elbow grease to be awesome again. My first bike was this great (light) Barbie pink banana-seat stunner. I LOVED that thing. Oh, I could tell you so many stories about my adventures on that baby. When I outgrew that, I got my only brand spankin' new bike ... my gorgeous purple, sparkly "mountain bike". Around the time I outgrew that, dad found a nice road bike on the side of the road that really only needed a good cleaning and some new tires. I worked on that bike for a couple years, but it was just never a comfortable bike. And I felt like I could never get the rust under control no matter how much time I spent on it. So, when dad and I found another road bike in the garbage in excellent condition - and with BRAND NEW tires - I was estatic. We even went up and knocked on the door to make sure the guy was throwing it away since it was in such great shape. I never heard WHY he was getting rid of it, but he gave us his blessing to take it. I was SO excited. It still has it's issues (need to tape up the grips, needs a bottle holder, and some other small things), but I love it. The reason I don't ride it more often is that the tires always seem to go flat. We've put new tubes in multiple times, and it always happens within a couple weeks. I've tried checking the inside of the metal frame to see if it's cutting the tubes, but I've never found anything. My next step is to take it either to Cycle Werks (which is literally less than a mile from my house now that they've opened a shop in Whitehouse) or up to Wersell's in Toledo (literally less than a mile from the University campus). I also want to get some different pedals and quick-change wheels and seat stand (and a different seat, which I'll get to). So, I've been riding other bikes of ours until it's taken care of.

My road bike. I added the rack a couple years ago when I was carrying my backpack AND
laptop case back and forth to campus.

My brother, on the other hand, has always had brand new bikes. I never resented him this, I loved my bikes. He's even ridden my bikes (the ones I've fixed up) on occasion when his mountain bike would just be too clunky and heavy. Oh, and he has multiple bikes right now. So, when I decided to start trail riding again last summer, the only mountain bike we had at the house close to my size was his newer (and nicer) Huffy. He had no problem with me buying a little cyclocomputer and installing it on the bike and using it whenever I wanted to go out (he had his older bike at his apartment for getting around campus).

So, today when I decided to go out, bro's white Huffy was the choice. It was the first time off the ceiling hooks for this season, so I cleaned it good and checked the tire pressure and everything. Seriously, I take better care of bro's bikes than he does. Anyway, I wanted to get off the pavement. I knew Oak Opening's "multi-purpose" trail would be nice and wet and muddy after last night's storm, so I headed up that direction. Oh, MAN was it fun! I was probably grinning like a crazy person the entire time. The same parts of the trail that I shy away from as a runner (basically any place that floods ... the whole west and north sides of the loop), I blasted through on the bike and enjoyed every second of it. My poor shoes and socks were soaked from one particular area by the dunes where the water across the trail was deep enough to come up over the pedals and I had a lovely mud stripe going up my back. I kind of giggled every time I saw someone heading the other direction because I KNEW they'd turn around and come back the way they came once they saw how deep some of the water was. I was almost sad when the trail changed back to pavement and I got back on the road to head home.

My attempt at photographing my mud-speckle-stripe. Would have been better if I left my
muddy shirt on to ... and hadn't been such a weird angle. lol

After I got home, I texted my brother "Good news. Your bike loves mud and pedal-deep water. Haha." His reaction surprised the crap out of me. He basically spazzed that I had taken the "good" bike out when his older mountain bike (which has no shocks) was hanging from the ceiling of the back garage (more like a small barn). I fired back pretty quick, annoyed at his reaction. First of all, our back garage is somewhere around 2 stories tall and all the bikes we don't ride on a regular basis are hanging from hooks on the support beams. And it usually takes AT LEAST 2 of us and a basic winch system out of rope to move them. How was I, alone, supposed to get out one of dad's big ladders, position it right in the middle of a shelf unit currently storing motorcycle parts (which are actually for bro's harley. Dad is paying to rebuild the darn thing after bro crashed it last summer. And dad paid for it originally too.), set up the rope winch system, lift the bike OFF the hooks, and lower it down safely? Not possible. I sent him a text saying "#1, you know damn well I'd kill myself trying to get your old bike down alone. #2, the Huffy already had my cyclocomputer on it from last year. #3, It's a mountain bike. It's meant for that crap. #4, When was the last time YOU rode it anyway? #5, Kiss my backside. It's already cleaned and put back away, which is more than you ever do for ANY of your bikes." I think I got to him because about 10 minutes later, I got an "ok" text. *rolls eyes*

The Huffy in question ... BEFORE the mud bath.

I hate that my family (myself included) snap at each other so easily, but it's just how we communicate. I seem to be the only one who takes those interactions to heart and over-analyzes them. I can be a completely different person with the rest of the world, but I turn into "that person" when it comes to dealing with my family. We do love each other, we're just loud about it.

And I finally come to the title of this post. As much as I love riding, IT HURTS MY BUTT! I've been told my entire life that even though I have plenty of "padding" in my posterior, I have a seriously boney butt. On every bike I've ridden, I have 1 or 2 of those nice gel or foam cushions, and those help some, but it STILL kills! Dad jokes about buying one of those wide seats you see on the cruiser bikes, but I don't want to believe that is my only option. Can you imagine one of those things on a road or mountain bike?

So, someone help me out here .... any ideas? Seats or cushions you'd recommend? Anything?

- - -
Update: My butt may have been sore yesterday, but I swear it feels bruised today. I actually YELPED when I sat in the car this morning (first time I had sat down today). A cohort has already made a joke about buying a hemorrhoid pillow for my desk chair in the lab. NOT amused. >:-(