being back is hard

All of 2 hours after getting home, things are sort of hard to pin down and handle. 2 weeks till Ben's season starts and we're still lacking some vital components; racing this Sunday and I'm probably 10 lb heavier than I was a week ago, no thanks all-inclusive; piles of wedding things left to do still staring us down; and the daunting name-change task outstanding. I can't thank enough anyone who crossed the cheddar curtain for our big day- we had so much fun and hope you did too! I've only seen two photos from our wedding (thanks Naz n' Amy), anyone else got some for us? The pros are slow. Things are still processing but the highlights...
- Our room was the jam. The jimmy jam. We had a hot tub on our balcony that overlooked the resort and the ocean and offered great privacy. Nice.
- Always the cultural tourists, we went to Chichen Itza. What can I say, it was HOT HOT HOT. The highlight was swimming in a cool shady sinkhole. Ben has awesome photos of it.
- The joke of the week was bad tattoo white speedo guy, who would lay on the pool bar ledge tanning with a piece of paper in his lips. I think he was French.
- The hurricane completely missed us but the surging surf off Cuba shut down the beach for a day and a half. Resort security guards kept turning on flashlights watching the surf. I asked and they said they were "looking for little corpses. Cats, dogs, sometimes Cuban people wash up after hurricanes." Now there's a vacation thought for you.
- Those same guards, though, took a special liking to sea turtles, and would help protect sea turtle eggs by burying and labeling them in a fenced off area on the beach, then holding hatchlings till it was safe for them to go to sea under cover of darkness. We got to meet some of the babies. So flippery, so cute.
- Swim up bars are dangerous. Especially when drinks available include candy colors and names like "miami vice" and "dirty monkey." Even more dangerous are the 20 oz 'ers at Margaritaville.
- I drunkenly promised Ben that if I'm working the pit for him at a cross race warmer than 75 degrees I'll wear a bikini. Let's hope for a cold fall.

and one more thing I haven't yet mentioned: Did Amy tell you she caught my bouquet? That's right, folks, she's not only the nicest person on the Chicago cycling scene, she's single....for now. :)

9+5=steroids?

yeah. so. ran yesterday's 9 after work. it was rough since I don't like running after work- I was hungry and Molly was insane because of all the activity on the streets. It didn't feel great but it did feel strong, and I finished in 1:39. According to McMillan, that means I'm in the neighborhood of a 5:15 marathon. which is way faster than I thought. Huh. Not that I'm going to care on race day- I'll just run.

I was thus tired during this morning's 5, but cranked it out, no problems. 5 is the new 1. 5 is easy. 5 is a sleeper, literally- i'm not usually awake till mile 4 anyway.

I was also back at the orthopaedist this morning, who seemed to think that a week off of running and PT should have taken care of the foot problem. He suggested steroid injections at the site, but I'm a wimp and think that's a bit extreme. So, I have a short course of cortico-steroid pills instead. Yummy, yummy. In his words, this should "knock out that problem" in time for next Saturday's 20. If I could do it over again, though, this is what I would do:

• Lose more weight in fall- focus on it, really- so that I'm not stressing my body so much still carrying extra.
• Do more weight-training as part of cross-training day before and during the 18-week plan.
• Do stabilizing exercises- like balances and such- to strengthen those muscles.
  

Live and learn.

And we booked our honeymoon today. It was tough finding 2 available FF award tix for labor day, and almost the entire Caribbean was booked, but we got ourselves to Cancun. We're staying at an adults only, pool bar, all-inclusive, all-you-can-drink... I have a feeling Ben might have a slow start to his season. Sorry about that.