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Showing posts from February, 2012

Someone Nudged

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Biking the Us for Mom I don't know who, but someone nudged the total donations to BTUSFMS past the $5000 mark. Officially, as of around 10:00 this morning, the total donations made now stands at $5001 . I truly wish I knew who the donor was, as well as all the other anonymous donors, so I could thank him/her properly. Not being able to offer a more personal thank you just doesn't seem right. But I understand the desire to remain unknown. To all of you who have donated, anonymous as well as known, your thoughtfulness and generosity have touched not only my life but all those living with MS. I'll never be able to describe the feeling that fills me when I see the total continue to go up, or the feeling I get when a person suffering from MS shakes my hand and says, "Thank you for what you're doing." I can't take all the credit, though. None of this would be happening without all of you. I just wish I'd made the decision to do the ride, to encourage

A Lovely Note From My Friend

When I was in the last few months of being a  fourth grader, my family moved from the place we had called home since I was five years old. This meant having to go into a new school at the end of the school year. This meant all the other fourth graders had their friends and weren't too interested in the new kid. My first day I found myself in what everyone referred to as a "portable." It was actually a trailer that had been set up outside the school building because there were more kids than space, and to accommodate all the students, portable classrooms had been pulled onto the grounds and set up. I remember thinking it was kind of cool to have a classroom in a trailer, but when I sat down at the desk the teacher pointed out to me the first day, the coolness factor evaporated and was replaced by feeling completely self-conscious. My knees wouldn't fit under the desk when I scooted my chair forward; they were actually higher than the desk top itself. And there was no

A Long Week

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Whew! I can't remember a time when I was so happy to have a week end. Nothing horrible happened. I was just so busy mentally each day that by Friday afternoon, my brain was mush. This resulted from canceling classes and doing individual student conferences. Take 85 students who come in for a twenty minute conference and you get a full day of interacting that begins at 8 am and ends at 5 pm. By the time I got home in the evenings, all I wanted to do was sit on the couch and not think. Training didn't happen either. I thought about getting on the bike each evening, but I just couldn't find the energy to do it. So a week went by with no training hours or mileage. And that's why this morning I only lasted 30 minutes doing the AMGEN DVD. My heart was pounding after the second interval, and the tell-tale signs of heading towards dizziness was setting in. After last Sunday's awesome training ride at the high school, with no problems keeping my heart rate up or keeping my

Leaving My Sweat on the Gym Floor

Today I participated in my first organized indoor training ride. The group sponsoring it was raising money for a high school trip to DC, so I thought good cause as well as good way to get a solid workout in. I wasn't disappointed. When I'm training in the living room at home, I tend to keep the same pace for the entire hour. This isn't necessarily bad, but never changing pace or gear to increase effort will eventually cause problems for me when I am able to get back outside. I could be walking the first hill I come to if I don't push myself a little more on the trainer. I know this, yet I'm loathe to change things up. Today, I was forced to change things up. The leader of the ride called out when we needed to change gears, when we needed to get out of the saddle, and when we needed to increase cadence. The last 90 seconds of the ride, I was in the most difficult gear, trying to keep my cadence up as fast as I could. When she called out 40 seconds remaining, my leg

What's Up With the Pink Skunk?

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Lately I've been having really vivid dreams, the kind that are so crystal clear when they're playing out that I remember them for days afterward. Last night, I had one such dream. When I woke up from it I was very tempted to get up to research the possible meaning behind it. One look at the clock kept me in bed; it was only 1:46 am. I still had several hours of sleep to enjoy if I pulled the covers up to snuggle under, so I did just that. No way was I going to forget the dream even if I did go back to sleep. In the dream, I was walking Neurotic, Silly Dog along a rural road. I could see up ahead of us a trio of kids in the road, walking away from us. I was faced with having to decide to continue walking straight or turn left onto another road. Right when I had decided to continue straight, a rather large, very bright pink with white stripe skunk came out of the ditch just in front of us and began to cross the road. While I marveled over its color--bright pink?--at the same ti

Lessons Learned From Mom

Because of the upcoming cross-country trek I'll be taking part in, I've been working on my nutrition. This has included eating lots of fresh fruits and veggies, some carbs, some protein, and gallons of water. Occasionally, an urge for sugar fills me, like last evening after dinner, and I'll soothe the urge by baking cupcakes or cookies. Once I eat a cupcake or a couple of cookies, I'm satisfied and don't feel the need for anymore sweets. Last evening, the desire for oatmeal raisin cookies kept nudging at me, so I pulled out the ingredients and baked up a couple dozen. As I was measuring out the brown sugar, the baking soda, and the flour, I thought about the many times Mom had made cookies for us: oatmeal-molasses that she swore would come out wonderfully chewy if you used your hands instead of a spoon to mix all the ingredients together, chocolate chip without the chips because Dad didn't like the chips, and chilling the butter cookie dough for an hour to ensur

Spending Minutes Wisely

The current argument around the house these days stemmed from Angel Baby bemoaning something that had happened at school, wondering how he could get his friend to change. My response was that the only behavior he could change is his own. If he doesn't like something his friend is doing, he can tell his friend this, but he can't expect his friend to change. Upon hearing our discussion, Hubby jumped in, basically saying I was wrong and that I changed people's behavior all the time due to my position as teacher. For quite some time, we went back and forth, with me, Beautiful Lovely Daughter, Funny Delightful Son, and Angel Baby all saying I wasn't changing anyone's behavior, and Hubby adamant that I was. While I understand what Hubby was saying, I truly don't believe I have changed anyone's behavior. I don't have that kind of influence. I offer the tools with which to work to become more proficient writers, but what the students do with those tools is tot

Touchdown!!!

$3786 raised for BTUSFMS!

My Mind in Fantasy Land

I keep telling the family that once I reach San Fran on August 1st I'm going to turn north and head up the pacific coast, into Canada, up to Alaska, catch a ferry to Russia, and keep on going. They think I'm kidding. Though I know in real life I can't, in fantasy land the notion to leave it all behind to explore the world from a bike makes perfect sense. The desire to make the fantasy reality just keeps getting stronger every day, most likely because all of my free time is spent reading about people who have traveled the world via bicycle or who are currently doing so, like Erin who writes ErinsWorldBike . She started out when she was 18 and is still going. My increasing desire could also be a result of checking out one-man tents, air pads, sleeping bags, and other camping equipment, all of which I need for my summer adventure. I'm enjoying comparing brands and talking to people who know the differences between the choices, like the awesome guys at WildCountry . They

Fabulous Friday

Friday, if there are no meetings scheduled, is my day to go to the office and get things caught up, such as grading and prepping for the next week. After doing a class worth of responding to journal entries, I take a breather and play around online. You know, checking Facebook, checking in at BTUSFMS, checking out the blogs I follow, checking hotmail, reading the news. Yeah, basically just wasting time. So today, I go to Facebook and see that my big sis shared my status about getting close to goal and asked her FB friends to consider donating. While I was responding to her, a message came in from a friend of my big bro, asking where she could send a donation. After responding to her, I see a post from Incredibly Funny Sis-in-Law, sharing my status about getting close to goal and encouraging  her friends to donate to the cause. All of the support, all of the encouragement, all of the getting the word out has been absolutely heartwarming. I just can't thank everyone enough. Now, ba

About a Rose

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Yikes! I am totally distracted by BTUSFMS and the fact that my fundraising goal is so close I can almost reach out and touch it. But really, my distraction today isn't so much about the excitement of reaching goal. No. Rather, it's about the envelope that was handed to me this morning at work and what was tucked inside, clipped to the donation, that is creating a whirlwind of thoughts. Yorktown Tattoo My mom loved temporary tattoos. She often talked about putting a rose on her ankle, but due to the compression socks she had to wear to keep the swelling down, she wasn't able to ever don the rose she so wanted. Today, paper clipped to the donation offered to me was a temporary tattoo. It's not a rose, but it is whimsical and one I know Mom would have liked. I'm going to apply it to my ankle the morning I start out from Yorktown, leaving it on as long as the dirt and grime from the road allow. And since I've been talking about getting a real tattoo for the