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| Typical low temp this week |
If I hadn't run a race, the title of this post would be something about it being cold, and not just kind of cold, but ridiculously cold. Frigid. I only ran outside 2 days because I saw no reason to run in that shit. I don't need to prove how hardcore I am by running in negative tips on slippery roads only for a shitty performance. I remember smashing my face on the ice in 2015, and I don't really want to do that again. Due to the cold, the roads continued to be a slippery mess so I'm perfectly happy getting a better workout in on the treadmill. I did run outside twice, three times on the treadmill and two zeros, although one zero was a spin class. With the two zeros it ended up being a low mileage week, but I was fine with that. The race on Tuesday kind of wore me out, and then working a 34 Wed-Thurs cut back on my Thursday mileage a bit. Doesn't matter. I knew I was about to get the hell out of dodge to some place warm, and I was just so done with this cold weather. Fuck it. So 37.9 miles for the week. Since it was the last week of the year, this week meant the FINAL total for 2017. I ended both mileage and elevation gain just shy of the next big number. Haha. 2494.2 miles and 249,295ft of elevation gain. I could have easily done the extra 6 miles to hit 2500 and another 705ft of gain to hit 250,000, but I just didn't care enough since it really doesn't matter. Haha. I'll do a 2017 year in review post next so I won't go into more 2017 details here. This post would be WAY too long if I did that. Haha.
Monday, December 25, 2017- I worked my usual shift on Christmas. Like I said in the last post, I wasn't going to be doing anything anyway so I might as well work it. It was a weird day since I had two partners with whom I don't usually work since my regular partner took the holiday off. It ended up being a busy day for us and our North Conway based crew. And even though it dropped about 6 inches of snow that day, none of the calls had anything to do with the snow. I was surprised we didn't have something early on since my drive into work was on completely unplowed roads. I guess the plow guys take Christmas off? I was kind of mad to wake up and find the neighborhood completely unplowed since I was probably the only one working and I live at the very bottom of the neighborhood. I got out ok only to find Rt 16 also completely uplowed. I guess they assumed no one works on Christmas? Fortunately, it was still the sticky snow and I got into work ok.
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| My drive into work |
Tuesday, December 26, 2017- Nooseneck 18K-
Woke up to the freezing cold and what looked like completely frozen land. With no heat in my car, the first part of my drive was pretty uncomfortable, but I was treated to a beautiful sunrise.
When I hit the faster speed limit, the car was able to warm up with the forced air from the outside pushing the heat into the car. I didn't need the blower at all since I ended up getting too hot! I got down to RI pretty early so I made a stop before continuing on to the Tavern on the Hill. This would be my first time running Nooseneck, and I had heard the hills were brutal. A look at the course elevation profile made this claim appear to be correct so I knew I had a tough race in store for me. I walked in to register and put a donation in the box and leave my raffle exchange gift on the table. As usual, there were a lot of familiar faces there. People are still shocked to learn I drive down there for races when they should be used to it by now. I think Steve Brightman was the only who was expecting me to show up. Haha.
Once I was ready for the warm up, I walked down to join the group of Turtles and Kaela O'Neil with whom I would try to keep up with. We did a mile out and back and then picked up Karolyn Bowley for the second mile. I did not feel great on the warm up. Even though I was attempting to talk with Kaela and Karolyn, I felt very winded and just not quite right. I knew this race wasn't going to be good. I shouldn't have been struggling on a warm up at that pace, so it was a good indicator that I was about to be in a place of terrible hurt for 11 miles.
I opted for a warm shirt with one last hoorah for Level Renner by wearing my LVL singlet over it and my 3/4 length tights/skirt combo. I would end up being comfortable with that for the race, but my face and hands froze during the last half.
I walked down to the start and lined up with Karolyn with whom I share a somewhat similar pace...even though that would not be the case today. Haha. The race started on a long downhill for almost the first mile and I actually didn't go out like a crazy person! 6:22 for the first mile was pretty reasonable. As soon as it leveled out and then started the first climb, I felt super sluggish and my legs very heavy. This was going to be a long 10 miles, and I knew it was going to be bad. I'm not sure why I felt so bad. The drive maybe? Too many treadmill runs over the weekend? No beer the night before? Haha. My glutes and hamstrings were sore, so I had absolutely no power on the hills, and just before mile 3, Karolyn and I got passed by a young girl and then I dropped back. I had to slow the pace down. Karolyn would move on just ahead where she would stay for the next 2 miles. Maybe only 10 seconds ahead of me. With the hills, my pace was all over the place, as expected. The icy dirt road didn't slow me down at all, but when we finally got to the start of the steep climb of Pardon Joslin, I cut my speed way back. Probably TOO much. I was barely out of breath I was going so slowly. It's only .4 miles but about 209ft of climbing, and the footing was a bit rough. The young girl that had passed earlier and Karolyn would end up gapping me by so much that I was never able to catch back up. There a few points where I wasn't too far back from Karolyn, but as soon as we hit a hill, she would gap me again. I just couldn't do the hills today. I had nothing. Mile 6 would end up being 8:10. Major ouch!
Miles 7 and 8 were nice with their flat and downhill so I did my best to make up time on these, but by the time we hit a climb again just before mile 9, I had no energy left whatsoever and the rest of my race majorly sucked from there on out. Mile 11 was basically a slow shuffle up the hill to the finish. I finished 4th female in 1:18:14, 16th overall. That was 3 minutes slower than I expected to run it. It wasn't my day. Haha. I would normally be upset to run that horribly, but I knew it wasn't going to go well from the start so I guess I accepted it from the beginning. So, yeah, I had a terrible race, but whatever; I wasn't going to dwell on this one. As soon as I finished, I put on some clothes and ran a mile cool down with Bob Jackman and Steve Brightman. My legs were so done that I could barely even run at all. I was ready for dry clothes and then beer in the warm bar. I was frozen and tired.
The bar was fun. I had $2 tacos and 2.5 Guinness's and hung out with friends. When it was time to pick my re-gift raffle, I felt the bags before I chose. The second one I picked up felt like a bottle of wine so I grabbed that one, and sure enough, it was a bottle of wine but also some slippers and cool hat. I picked the right one. Mike Daniels snagged a photo of a few of us at the table. I realized after that 4 out of the 6 of us are CMS teammates. Funny. Full Results
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| Steve Brightman and Jen Graves kind of got cut out of the photo a bit. Haha. |
I think I was there about 2 hours post race, but then I had to hit the road to head back north...then south... then back north again. I had to pick up John at his grandparents in Marshfield, MA. It added on an extra hour to the drive, but it wasn't bad.
I was up late washing my work stuff and packing up again for two days since I was working a 34 hour shift. I basically wasn't home for 4 days this week. Haha.
Wednesday, December 27, 2017-
Even though I was up late and pretty sore from Nooseneck, I still managed to get up for a measly 3 miles before work. Super easy pace. 22:31. Just needed some exercise before my 34 hour shift. And I'm glad I did because it was a long 2 days.
My regular partner was on vacation so I had a brand new person on her first shift as a real crew member. She's cool and actually did ok, but nothing went well this shift. We had two transports and neither went right. Just fucked from the beginning. I was not happy with either. And I fucked up the first one by forgetting something I shouldn't have. Something that I know and was so obvious, but amidst the chaos of North Conway Rescue controlling the scene, I got totally fucked and missed it. I was called out on it at the hospital and was so fucking pissed at myself. Just something I shouldn't have missed, but I swear anytime this certain person shows up on scene before us and takes control, nothing goes right. He's not to blame for my fuck up because it was all mine in the end, but truth be told, HE missed it initially and the patient never should have ended up in my care without this one thing being done considering he was also a higher level of care. But still, like I said, when comes down to it, it was my patient when she was delivered to the hospital, and I DID totally miss it. It happens to us all, but it still eats away at you because you know you're better than that. The one thing with this type of mistake is that you never do it again. So you live and learn. And that's how you learn everything in this field. You learn by doing. Training doesn't get you far.
The second call also ended up in the control of a different North Conway Rescue provider, and while nothing was really missed, I still didn't like the way the patient care was handed over to me. I felt bad that this new person was seeing the way these two calls were going so I made sure we talked about both. I had no problem telling her what I missed and then discussing how neither call was run well by these other people. Had I been in control from the beginning, neither call would have gone the way they did. It was good for her to see that, though. I'm not cocky. I'm not going to pretend I know everything. She needs to see that we all fuck up no matter how long we've been at this job. I'm hoping that she learned from our fucked up day, just like I did.
Nothing else to write about today really except that I was so ready to go on vacation. I needed a break from this job, even if it's only 2 weeks. I really hope I'm not still working here a year from now, but as I said before, I don't know if I can leave it either. It's addicting. I tried to leave once already and came crawling back 7 months later. Such a dilemma in my head. Maybe all I need is a new EMS job, but where? I don't know. Not going to blah, blah, blah about it this time.
Thursday, December 28, 2017- I made a quick stop at Starbucks for a coffee and some food in between leaving the North Conway base and going south to the Tamworth base for the next 10 hours of my shift. I love the Thursday crew so I always enjoy that part of these overtime shifts. The days was pretty quiet, but my partner and I took the first call where we stood out in the fucking frigid temps while the fire crew worked on breaking open the dead bolt on the door of our patient's home. Oh my god, was it cold. The patient ended up being fine and only needed minimal assistance and care. No transport to the hospital. That was it for our calls for the day which made it really drag out. By the time 5pm rolled around, the temps were below zero. There was no way I was running outside in this in the dark, so I put my running bag back in my car and drove home. It actually felt good to be home early for the night since I felt like I'd hardly been home.
I opted for a treadmill run. Not as long as I had originally planned, but I made it a quality 5 miles. 1.5 mile warm up with a half mile at 3% grade, followed by 10x 1 min on/1 min off. Half mile cool down. 35:05. 7:01/mi avg pace. Good workout. I actually felt really good.
When I was done, I realized Amazon had delivered my shoes so I went to the garage to get them and found another package with them. This other package was addressed to Leslie Beckwith. Inside was a necklace and no note as to whom it was from. This freaked me out for days!! I contacted the company who must have contacted the buyer since I got a message from my sister on Sunday saying it was from her! Phew! I was totally freaked out. It's a beautiful necklace, so I'm glad I can wear it now. Haha.
I spent the rest of the night wrapped up in a blanket on the couch with Phoenix.
Friday, December 29, 2017-
I was up early to -19 degrees. UGH. Fortunately, I was headed up to Bartlett where the weather was actually "warmer". I had my car appointment for a new blower for my heat/AC. Timing couldn't have been better with this cold snap. The blower would come on intermittently, but had only come on once in the last 2 weeks. Wouldn't you know it would decide to come on this morning?! And thank goodness! I was dreading driving up to Bartlett in that cold of a temp. Haha. I had decided to brave the cold this morning and run up Bear Notch Rd., even though it would turn out that temps were warmer at higher elevations. Couldn't have worked out better. After I dropped my car with the mechanic that Jen had picked, I donned every layer I could put on, including hand warmers and toe warmers, and microspikes and started my run up Bear Notch. I was happy the first half of the run was all uphill because I was warm instantly. It was -10 at the start so I needed to get warm fast.
The run was slow, but the conditions were perfect on the snowmobile trail for microspikes. Snowshoes would have worked, too, but I was happy not to be wearing them. The climb is basically 5 miles to the top of the road, and as I climbed, so did the temps. I even heard birds chirping at one point. I wouldn't say it was warm, but maybe around 10 degrees. It ended up being a very pleasant run. Once I hit the 5 mile mark, I turned around and ran the 5 miles back down. 10 miles total for the run in 1:32:40. 1,125ft of elevation gain.
I made a stop at the grocery store and Paris Farmers Union for wood pellets, then it was home for the rest of the day with John. I wasn't going back outside again except to take the dogs out. It was below zero and just brutal. Got the Sandy Morris Ab workout in despite Phoenix assuming I was on the floor as a dog bed.
I ended up building a fire in the woodstove every day of the weekend because that side of the house was SO cold. Had the pellet stove going for the other side. Really saves me on my oil use with this kind of weather.
Saturday, December 30, 2017-
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| Reluctantly crawling out of her sleeping bag for my morning greeting. She does actually sleep in a 0 degree sleeping bag. Haha. |
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| Thank you for the shoes, YOU! :) |
Since I wasn't freezing from running outside, I was able to get my abs in right after the run with a plan to do a 15-minute fit slide later in the evening.
Plans to xc ski were thwarted when John told me he had blisters on his heels from skiing with his dad all week. I had no idea what to do at this point but remembered the bowling alley in Fryeburg! It's a bit pricey, but it's literally the ONLY thing to do to indoors here. It'd had been years since we'd been there mainly due to the price, but also because it's candlepin. We used to come all the time after I won 10 free games at a race in 2011, and John had his 6th birthday party there as well. But once I had to pay full price, it lost its appeal. Today even killed me to spend the money since it would be $18 total for two games and shoe rental. Ouch. That's more than going to the movies!
The place was packed, as expected, but we lucked out by getting a lane right away. Candlepin is really hard, but we both ended up having a really good time. Now, I wish we could actually afford to go more often. Our scores were terrible, but I got a few spares and one strike! Haha. John had a good first game, but kept hitting only 1 pin in the second game. He still had fun, so it's a bummer we can't go back except every now and then.
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| Still loves his Christmas presents |
I got in the 15 minute Fit Slide workout I had planned because I was just too restless. Haha. I made another fire in the woodstove and then spent the rest of the night on the couch until I had to reluctantly go out for more wood or to take the dogs out. It was just brutal outside. Tuesday's flights to Hawaii couldn't come fast enough!
Sunday, December 31, 2017-
New Year's Eve, but just another day for us. I don't typically do anything for NYE even though I did go out to Hobb's 2 years ago and then maybe an occasional night out in the past. But generally, I've never been into the New Year's Eve party. Plus, I had to work the next morning, and my plan was to be in bed before midnight.
Since I was going to be gone for a few weeks, I signed up for Sunday morning's spin class so that I would get at least one class in. I planned a zero running day, but as hard as spinning is, it doesn't feel like a zero day at all. I got to the gym only a few minutes before the class start and walked into every bike occupied. Oh hell no. I had signed up. In fact, I was 3rd on the list. It sucked, though, because I looked like a bitch because someone had to step out, but, hello! That's why you sign up ahead of time. I wasn't risking driving 45 minutes not to have a bike. The class was great. Totally pushed me to my limits so that I was feeling the fatigue the last two songs. The class ran over an hour, too, so I was pretty much destroyed...in a good way. I'm SO happy to be back spinning even if it's intermittent right now.
Once I was home, I showered and then John and I headed up to Believe in Books to xc ski, with dogs in tow. The website had been wrong about what was groomed so we weren't able to make the long loop, but our faces were frozen anyway, so we were fine with 2 miles. John has been skiing with his classic xc skis on the Nanamocomuck Ski Trail with his dad during the week so he was super excited to be on groomed trails for a change. As he got out there, he was so happy, "This is so fast!" He's a great xc skier with all of his backcountry xc experience so he was schooling me. It was nice to see him having fun since he said he's starting to hate the backcountry stuff. I like going on the ungroomed trails at times since I have backcountry xc skis, but I prefer groomed. It's so much more fun.
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| Out cold by the wood stove |
Love this song, but the dust won't ever settle...
I so love these updates. I live in NYC, but come from the Berkshire Hills. You give me a glimpse of what I'm missing. Thanks! Hope you have/are having/had a great vacay.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Mike.
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