out at prospect heights...
the daily task of wearing blossom out. she did bring me the tennis ball 3 times tonight so i could have done more on these trails. we were out there for 2 hours and i tosssed her tennis ball the whole time. hmmm...rio is tired. lots of snoring tonight.
just thought this came out okay of sleeping lady and anchorage.
i'm tired so this is bound to be short....well, i am chatty...always have been. yesterdays dog walk was great, as usual...it was just andrea and i and the three dogs. everyone else opted out i guess. tanya was sick and it was a holiday. it's continued warm here. andrea and i were steaming out there in the near 40 degree weather. i went a bit higher up today and did a big loop in prospect heights. it was cloudy, but the blue skies made a minor appearance. in between walks i've put the olympics on. no swim yesterday but today felt great. a nice clean, poop free pool! i got 32 laps...so if 35 laps is really the mile mark, well i did pretty good. when i told my friend sandra she seemed quite shocked and said initially i was no where near a mile. i must be doing better than she expected though. i have backed off considerably on the number of laps i do with the kickboard. i have also added the number of laps i do without the kickboard and today was starting to change up my breathing. previously, i would rise up for a breathe each time my left arm came out, today i was practicing holding my breath longer under water and only taking a breath every other time the left arm came out. hip feeling better overall, still some twangs, but i have 4 nights coming up and 3 of those in the generally busier adult unit. i hope i can squeeze in some stretches and see if that will help. i'm hoping that whatever is ticked in the hip will relax with the stretches and disappear forever. not sure anything dissappears forever once you hit a certain age though.
our cross country ski team are finishing, but pretty far back. today's paper was pretty soft on them. sadly, cross country skiing in the united states is far behind the europeans at this point. i think it could improve some in the years at least up here in this area, but it just doesn't have the global appeal that some of the other venues have in the states and thus people tend to fall into it rather than live for it. also the ones that are competitive no doubt have less around them who are anywhere near thier competitive level in the sport to drive them forward. kikkan was smart to spend some time in europe training. she is also one of the few americans who had cross country ski's on before she was 3 years old. i'd like to see the sport grow, certainly we have the talent in america to post more competitive times than 42 or 48th place. often it seems we hear now...it's just thier first olympics. it seems in the past that was the only chance you got at the olympics...just that one. now, it's like, it's cool if you totally screw up, there is always next time. seems odd to me. that is the america we are becoming though. soft in so many ways. coddling. there is some good in that, but if you accept 48th place as being spectacular how do you learn to win...it's okay to win sometimes, it's okay to want the gold to reach for it. and at the end of the day....it is okay to not get it...as long as you put your best out there. you are up against alot of other people who want the same thing and obvioulsy all can't have it. in the end the most important thing is getting in there and doing your best. even your best isn't good enough sometimes, but you still must put your best out there. for pride...yours and your country. the one cross country team member was coaching up until a month ago. she wasn't training for the olympics. i mean you watch the ice skaters and how much time/effort they put in. she ran some big races and worked as a coach and then she's in the olympics....not to say anything against her, it's just that i think that shows how limited the pool is to select from. i wish them all well and am proud that there are so many alaskans in the winter games. i hope this number grows and that anchorage fosters it's athletes...the potential of the future games. done rambling...night
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