beeker121

The weather here has been gorgeous, which means everyone is spending more time outside, and we're leaving our windows open.  This means we're having more contact with our neighbors, like it or not.

There are the folks downstairs who like to smoke, um "sandwiches" (thanks, HIMYM!).  Occasionally the wind blows the right way when they're outside and we end up closing up for a bit to avoid the contact high.  This week though, I think he's been lighting up sandwiches around 8a, daily.  It's possible that's always been true and I just didn't have my window open, or he has a room in the apartment for such things in bad weather but jeesh, it seems excessive to me.

In another direction are the neighbors who've been working on some kind of construction project that involves what sounds like a table saw at odd times.  They're out there currently listening to a Peter Cetera CD.  On repeat.  The same CD they listened to last weekend.  Also on repeat.  Would buying them a new CD be rude?  Wait, they may have just moved on.  That sounds new.  It's "25 or 6 to 4" by Chicago.  So, baby steps I guess.

-The car is back and fine.  The new clutch is especially springy, I mostly have it worked out now but for the first several days I kept having the urge to yell at cars around me "I know how to drive a stick, I swear, this is a new clutch!"  I didn't realize how automatic that motion had become until I had to change it.

-Bringing the car in means they did a mini inspection and I should also be getting new brakes and tires.  Luckily neither one is a dire, immediate need, because I need to pay off the clutch first.

-My class for this semester is winding to a close.  Of course the teacher dumped a lot on us in the last two weeks, which is exactly when I'd like to not be worrying about class.  Also, stupid group project.

-I'm back at work as of tomorrow.  This next show should be a lot of fun.  It's written by a three-person band, who are also the performers.  That means the company can occasionally do a little slight of hand like this weekend, when they'll be here writing, but not officially rehearsing as performers.  (Even if they're doing a read/sing through of the current version.)  Which mostly means they can get away without having stage management and don't have to pay me.  Blech.

-I've been feeling overwhelmed and unmotivated lately, which is a bad combination.  Speaking of, I should now go and get something done.

I made it out to my trail to run this morning which was nice, it had been a few weeks since I had last run far enough to be worth the drive.  It was a pretty morning, clear and breezy if just a little warm.  Around a half mile in a gentleman moving at an incredible pace with a bicyclist riding alongside him whizzed past me going back to the trailhead.  At about two miles out the same guy passed me by, running at a slower, conversational pace (he was chatting to the guy on the bike) that I don't think I could have matched at a dead sprint. 

I'm 99% certain that I recognized him, and that Ryan Hall was running on my trail this morning.  I'm still kind of giddy, not that I even got to say hello or anything.  But still, an Olympian passed me this morning.  He might have been going much, much faster, but we were on the same path.

So my car is in the shop getting a new clutch (clutch plate, bearings, slave cylinder) which isn't cheap. 

I could tell something was wrong sometime after the first of the year, by March I knew it was getting worse, and in the last couple weeks it was scary once or twice.  I described it to my boyfriend as not having enough power; I'd step on the gas and the RPMs would go way up (and the engine sounded fine) but I didn't go any faster.  This was especially bad on uphills and trying to merge on the highway.  He drove it briefly on Sunday and was all - it's the clutch plate, and you really shouldn't be driving this car anywhere at this point.  Whee.  This brought up two (okay, and a half) thoughts.

1) J did come to the garage with me to explain the problem.  I'm not thrilled with the idea that a guy talking to the mechanic will get more respect than a girl (I understood the issue after J explained it so I could have done it alone), but it just feels true.  This makes me wonder if bringing J along was simply smart, or somehow pandering to the status quo.  In either case, I'm grateful to J for the help.

1.5) I wish I knew more about cars.  Lumped in with this is that I wish there were more female mechanics, somehow cars have become such a boy thing.

2) My poor car.  It was in an accident before I bought it and there are lingering issues from that - like the back end isn't square - that I have not ever fixed due to cost.  This makes every repair a bigger question of whether or not it's worth putting the money into this car or not.  Then again I realized today that I've owned this car for 8.5 years which is the longest I've ever had a vehicle and it still runs well.  I suppose it's the same cost/benefit analysis everyone needs to do for car repairs, but I've been slowly inching towards 'not worth it' for a few years, and wonder when I'm going to reach that point.

While my car is in the shop J is letting me use his.  So I've switched from a standard Civic compact, to an automatic Frontier pick-up.  I like driving it so far, but really hate parking lots in a vehicle that big.

I'm back on my thyroid meds, after 18 days off and sliding to a TSH of 48.  The ultrasound looked clear and all the blood work came back negative, so I have my "still in remission" pass for another year.  My doctor kindly prescribed both T3 and re-upped my long term T4 so I'm feeling much better already.

I won the fantasy hockey league I was playing in.  Me, who when faced with two players of similar ability picked the one who was cuter.  The serious hockey fans involved have all been gracious about it, honestly I think I won mostly because I paid attention for the entire season.  Well and I drafted Mike Smith as my third goalie.

I've been watching a lot of movies during this span of time off.  I haven't been following any particular theme, other than stuff already on my netflix list.  The issue is I'll see something with an actor I really liked or had never seen (I watched my first Jimmy Cagney picture this week) and then want to add other films with them in it, and thus my queue will never get any shorter.  Ah well.

It is gorgeous here today, sunny and warm and very un-April-like.  I have to figure out some way of celebrating it.

I'm reading along with my flist, I'm just being really bad at posting lately.  Weird.  In any case....

I ran a half-marathon on March 25.  It didn't rain on us, but instead was just overcast and cool all morning which was awesome.  I finished in 2:16:06 which was much better than I thought I'd do, and within a minute of my PR time.  I guess my training was better than I thought.  My pacing was weird ( I ran alternating 10s and 10:30s for seven miles), and I still ran a mile way off pace at #10 so I need to figure out how to get through the late stages without tanking for a mile.  I still love the course and the crowd energy at Oakland and plan to do this one again.  I even made it to the theater with enough time to both shower and eat before the show, though it was close.

[The show closed this past Sunday.  It was a really good group of people, and a mostly problem-free run.]

I signed up for an introductory 30-day offer at a local yoga studio last week.  I'm starting off with a class called Yin yoga, it's all about holding poses for a really long time and really loosening up tendons and things.  It's fascinating to me how the same pose done on each side of my body can feel really different, or that the tightness shows up in different places on each side.  I would like to take another, more energetic class too, but I think I'm in exactly the right place to start.

I've been off my thyroid meds for a week.  Naps aren't mandatory yet, but I certainly get sleepy/draggy after being awake for around 4 hours (taking a short nap resets the clock, but then I get draggy again).  I'm trying to be careful about how hard I push this week, but having just finished the show there are a lot of things I want to do; for example, I have a list of people I should meet for lunch/coffee to hang out with, and spring cleaning the apartment would be smart.  Hopefully I will get through this quickly, and be back to normal soon.

Thanks to the folks who took time to fill out the survey for my class.  We've gotten enough response now to close the survey, and I got at least 15 of the 25 responses we had registered as of this morning (so I win!).

The show is rolling along and won't be extending so I have two more weeks and out.  This show is nice enough, and easy to run.  What will be interesting is over the next week we're transitioning out two crew folks for replacements, and have another fill-in person.  It shouldn't be too bad, but it's more turnover than I'm used to on a show (we overlap with the next one and so the longtime crew are abandoning our last week for another five weeks of work on that one).

My race is this Sunday.  I feel as prepared as I'm going to get, but still a little pokier than I'd like.  I'm aiming to run 10:45 miles which comes out to just under 2:21.  It's not a PR but it's faster than I ran the half last fall.  According to weather reports it is likely to rain on us which makes me slightly grumpy.  Actually running in the rain is kind of fun, planning to run in the rain is icky.  This does keep me on track for my master plan, which is to set a new half PR this summer.  The idea is to keep running and add more sprints and hills, instead of always having to start from nearly scratch building up mileage for every race.

Of course, the day after the race I need to stop taking my levothyroxine for hopefully only two-three weeks, so that I can do the annual testing to prove that I'm still in remission.  I'm going to need to figure out ways to keep moving, gently, throughout my time out of balance.  And take lots of naps.  I should be smart enough to read my body and not push it too hard, but I'm really excited about this plan which makes it a little tougher.

Alright, I should finish unlocking the theater now so that the crew can get in and actually do their jobs.  Happy spring everyone!

I know I've been horrible about posting lately and I'm coming back to ask a favor.  Sorry.  In any case it's super easy, won't take more than 15 minutes of your time, you don't even have to leave the computer, and if you let me know that you did it I'll write you a personal haiku based on the topic of your choice. 
( What is she talking about? Details about filling out a quick online survey below the cut... )

In other news, the show is open and going well, my running is still not as awesome as I wish it were for a race that is ten days away, and it's very wet here.  I promise to update more soon, if only so I don't have to feel so crushingly guilty if I ever need to ask for a favor again. 

This week, I'm a morning person.  My class this semester is at 9a so it's been pushing me in that direction for a while, and mostly I have to be to rehearsal at 11a and I run in the mornings.  This week the latest I've set my alarm is 7a and by 11:30p I'm wiped out.  I realize this is normal for most people, but typically I am on a second shift schedule.  Getting up at 6a to run before rehearsal feels weird, but accomplished.  I'm enjoying this morning-person life, and need to stay in it for at least another week and a half.  It might get harder when J comes home Monday night, and when I get to tech rehearsals I'm going to need to shift back to second really quickly.  But I have been enjoying my time in morning land - today I did my laundry before I got to rehearsal at 10:45a.  I'm amused that I'm excited by something that is daily grind for most people. 

Another exciting thing - 2/3 of the way through the season I'm currently winning the fantasy hockey league I'm playing in.  Maybe everyone is going to adopt my theory of picking the cute players from now on - heh.  The people with actual hockey knowledge are creeping up on me, but I should definitely make the play offs this year.

What's exciting in your world today?

I'm grateful our group project for class got done for today.  I'm that person who hates group projects and would always rather just do it myself.  But for this class our group project is going to go for the rest of the semester.  Currently our group of four has two very active folks, one who seems like she'll do the things she's specifically given to do, and one who is just checked out.  Whee!

Rehearsals a few days in are still going well.  All of the people in the room get along fabulously.  The weird tension is when we need to communicate to the folks not in the room - the shops and designers.  There are still things out there that just haven't been decided or are misunderstood.  I'm asking all of the questions I can but our first night on stage will be interesting. 

A friend borrowed a DVD copy of "The Help" for me so I can complete my mission to see all of the best picture oscar nominees this year.  I'm picking it up tonight and probably won't have time to watch it for a few days.  I don't know if it can knock "the Artist" out of my personal top spot this year.