InnerTeub

Wow, a month between posts. Whoops.

So, I’m getting married next weekend. Score! In the grand tradition of couples everywhere, The Boss and I had the pre-wedding heated conversation, which went a little like this:

The Boss: “Umm, honey? Can you stop spending money on clothes for the wedding weekend?”
Me: “Hey man, you only get married once”

[AWKWARD SILENCE ]

Me: “…Well, I mean, in THEORY”

Whoops. Oh well – no sense in getting caught up in the details, right? Right.

Maybe it’s the Minnesota girl in me, but this picture from my friend’s lake house just feels like home to me. A big lake covered in rain – man, I wish I was there right now, curled up inside, watching the water.

I love rainy weather. I love running/biking in the rain, getting muddy and dirty in a way that adults don’t generally deem acceptable, and knowing that only people who truly love to run and bike are out there with you; our own little fraternity of crazies, getting to experience the city in a way most people miss. I love coming home after said muddying and taking a long hot shower, warm and secure inside while the rain swirls around outside. Rainy days give you a great excuse to hibernate and cuddle up with a good book, a good person, or a good group of friends.

A good friend once told me that Seattle was full of people who used to like rain. I’m sure he’s right, and I’m sure I’d miss spring if I didn’t have the promise that it would most definitely be coming, but honestly, this rainy spring in DC has been one of my favorites.

Great post today at Bodies in Motivation:

“No one likes running. This I believe firmly: this is why I kind of
silently roll my eyes when I hear my friends say, ‘I can’t run. I hate
running.’

Well- yes, you can. And everyone hates running.”

Go read the whole thing. And then go for a run.

When partaking in “Operation: Smokin’ Hot Bod“*, the correct response to the “I’ll just have a snack now because dinner is in 3 hours” thought is NOT the leftover calzone waiting for you in the fridge.

Protein shake, cliff bar, cottage cheese, chocolate milk: Yes.
Cheesy carbtastic calzone (but it had SPINACH. Which is HEALTHY): No

*Also known as: 2 months before wedding

Bringing Moose with me on errands is great; see below him carrying a pound of coffee beans back to the house.

(trust me on this: that is what he’s doing. If he’s carrying something, then he is going to beeline for home, no matter how much I’d like to get a picture taken)

Obviously, the next step is to teach him to make the coffee, but I’m concerned he won’t get the milk:sugar ratio correct. It just so hard, sometimes, training a puppy.

Ugh, this annoys me.

This article discussing the “Gay Problem” at American Idol; specifically saying:

“… it’s complicated. On the one hand, the show is supposed to be a family-friendly event”

Now, I know I trend to the left of um… most people… when dealing with things like this, but help me out: being gay isn’t family friendly? C’mon! Call me crazy, but if we keep treating “gay” as “wrong”, won’t kids grow up thinking it is? Isn’t this kind of a self fulfilling prophesy?

Wouldn’t it be amazing to have a whole generation of kids grow up to think there is nothing abnormal or wrong about being gay? That it’s just one of the many differences that exist between one person to the next?

I’m about to become a stepmom, so these kinds of things swirl around my mind a lot. When my step daughter was in DC last, we had dinner with a good friend of mine. Throughout the course of the dinner, my friend was telling me about the date he went on and how he was excited about this new guy he was seeing. Normal chatty friend conversation. It didn’t occur to me until later that the idea of two men dating might seem weird to my stepdaughter, and maybe I overstepped a boundary or two by not censoring the conversation. But in my next breath, I thought “Eh, whatever. I don’t want to give the impression that there’s something wrong about my friend’s dating life, because I don’t think there is, and I don’t want [stepdaughter] to think there is, either.”

Granted, she’s not my child and it’s not for me to make these decisions, so in a sense I did overstep a boundary line if her parents feel differently. But I really do believe that kids learn by watching, and the reactions we have to the world around us will influence what they think is normal. What a shame American Idol sees fit to prepetuate a culture of homophobia to the next generation.

A few years ago, a good friend of mine was running along the National Mall, listening to music, completely oblivious to the fact that there were two police cars directly behind her, sirens blaring, speeding down the sidewalk of the Mall, trying to get her out of the way. (There had been a stabbing up ahead and they were en route to the scene).

Now, some might see this as a good parable explaining why we shouldn’t listen to music when we run in the city near cars; I, however, see this is a good parable explain why you think through the intended point of any given story – in this case, upon hearing the tale, the question that was immediately asked was: “Yeah, but what song were you listening too?”

The answer, she finally admitted, was Hanson’s “MMM Bop”, to which we all made fun of her, because… Hanson. And then of course we went home and downloaded the song immediately, because say what you will, that is a damn good running song.

I was thinking about this story the other day as I was running along jamming to the ultra-cool title track from “Flashdance,” and I realized that, really, even the biggest music snob gives a pass when the playlist being considered is for running. In that spirit, I give you the last few tracks played on my run from earlier this week, assuming, of course, the “No Judgment on Music Taste” principle extends to the Internets:

– Paper Planes
– Let’s Hear It For The Boy (WHAT?)
– My Life Would Suck Without You (oh man, I love you too, K.Clar.)
– The trailer music to “Kill Bill”
– Summer Love (Timberlake, not Travolta)
– Regulators
– Just a Friend
– Sweet Child o Mine
– Encore (JayZ/Linkin Park)
– Cold Hearted Snake (WHAT?!)
– Before He Cheats
– Cherry, Cherry. (Yeah, I said it. WHAT)

I have found myself in this very strange position of very much liking my job, yet I have just quit.

I’ve experienced, in the past few years, the perfect storm of executive sponsorship, fully funded budgets, and enthusiastic mentoring, and am extremely interested in my field, and love the work that I do.

And so I quit.

It totally sucks. I cannot believe I am leaving a job that I built up and that I love. But I really believe that you need to change jobs, or at least roles, at least every two years. After three years in my current role, I can feel myself starting to coast, a bit. That’s not a good thing for me. In college, the best grades I got were for the hardest professors; I need to feel the pressure of being slightly out of my league in order to perform at the top of my game. And I feel like it’s time to switch things up a bit. Do something different, again.

Now, the good thing about working in a consulting firm is that you can quit your job but not leave the company; while I’ve accepted a role with a different team, I don’t need to go through an interview process, change my W-2 information, or even say good bye to the people I work with. Hell, my commute won’t even change(…sigh) I’m spending the next few months transferring my program over to someone new, and that in itself is exciting; my successor has strengths that I don’t and I can already see the next phase of the program and how he is going to improve upon the foundation. It’s all going to work out.

But I’m still having a minor breakdown about it, though I am assured that this angsty feeling will subside as soon as I get immersed in my new position. Here’s to building character, right? Right. Wish me luck.

So, I’m in the process of booking a last minute flight home to Minnesota for the weekend — quick trip, 36 hours at best — and was looking for cheap flights. Ever since Sun Country stopped flying direct from Dulles to MSP, it’s been hard to find a good low cost air carrier to hook a girl up, but I still swing by the Southwest Airline site every time to see if, by any chance, they’ve decided to add MN to thier list. I know this task is fruitless, as they DON’T FLY THERE, but that doesn’t stop me from trying.

But WAIT! As I went to the Southwest site today, I was momentarily elated to see “MSP” as a “Going TO” location. Wha? Do miracles really happen? Can I for real get a non stop low cost flight to Minnesota again? It’s like Christmas!!!

And then…

DOH! So close, yet… hope. There is hope. It doesn’t help me now, but I see good things in my future. I love Southwest. I really do.

So, I mentioned in my previous post that “I miss training”. Allow me to elaborate: my post IM “Hey man I’ll get up and work out when I feel like it” is shockingly failing on me. I mean, really, let’s all take a collective gasp of surprise that, after 9 months of two hour workouts every morning *before work*, I no longer “feel like” jumping out of bed at 5am, especially when you factor in the 20 degrees weather.

The first week post IM this “sleeping in” felt decadent and deserved. And it was. I worked hard, got rewarded (Ironman! WOO!) and now got to rest. It was fabulous. But now, two months later, well, it feels… off.

I am struggling mightily with the time justification. Training for an Ironman is completely and utterly selfish thing to do, a goal you pursue for your own vanity and/or to sooth whatever mental defect you have that thinks it’s a good idea. Training for an Ironman demands a YOOOOOGE amount of time away from family, work, friends, and there’s no real way to fairly balance it all; the best you can do is strike deals with the affected parties and promise you’ll be back eventually. (For example, see the post regarding the day Boss and I went to settlement on our house. I woke up, ran 9 miles, went to settlement, rushed to work, worked frantically, went to the pool, swam, rushed to the grocery store, and finally made it home with dinner around 9pm, where the boss had been unpacking ALL DAY and hadn’t eaten a thing. At the time, I felt unfairly pulled in about twenty directions, letting down work, the Boss and others, and ended the day in my new house crabby, tired and overwhelmed; looking back, I can’t believe I bypassed the occasion of buying our first family home and neglected to, you know, HELP UNPACK. Yeah, I totally win the “good partner” award for the year.)

So now, when I have the choice to cram in a run or a trip the gym OR walk the dog so the Boss can sleep a little longer, or make coffee while HE walks the dog, or make dinner while he’s working late, or work late because my coworker needs a favor (or, even more on point, because my job just needs to get done), I feel like that’s where I need to be right now. I need to be present, in my life, doing any of the millions of things that we do for each other to make life a little better.

But here’s the thing: This method isn’t working either. I feel less productive at work, I’m crabbier at home, and I feel infinitely less satisfied. So last Friday, in between work and dinner with friends, I snuck over the gym and pounded out a hard, sweaty, breathtaking 30 minute run. Now, three months ago I don’t know that I would have even bothered suiting up for “just” 30 minutes of exercise, but now, ten minutes in to my treadmill induced zone, I thought “Oh right. THIS is who I am.” That 30 minute run hit a reset button somewhere inside me, and I felt more like myself than I had in days. Exercise isn’t a vanity-motivated luxury that I selfishly do in my precious “me” time; it’s something I need to do so that I can be the best version of myself for the people around me.

So, yeah, maybe partly I do this because I like wearing my skinny jeans and I don’t want to give that up, and I’m sure that in the ever evolving quest for balance I’ll screw it up again and skew too hard in one direction or another, but I hope that I can remember this lesson: that taking care of myself enables me to take care of the other important things in my life, and there’s nothing selfish about that at all.