My day went like this:

I had Environmental Policy class from 8 to 9:15 a.m. This is the class I T.A., I go to lectures on Tuesdays and Thursdays and hold office hours by appointment. Office hours start tomorrow, today was my first signup day, and four whole students made appointments to see me! I was pleasantly floored.

Then I went outside and hacked up two lungs, Boulder is burning, FYI. I called Felicia about the fires, she said to NOT TRAIN OUTSIDE, which made complete sense.

However… I am only on pedal power until my car gets fixed and somehow found myself at FAC, where we only do masters in the outdoor pool. I didn’t put on sunscreen because I fully planned on not swimming, I was just going to see what the workout was and “borrow” a towel from the gym and pedal over to an indoor pool at one of the city rec centers, but Dave Scott started out the workout by telling the whole pool a story about how last week he went for a ride up Lefthand Canyon and saw this woman up ahead and thought oh sure I’ll catch her, but it took him for forever, as he got closer he saw she even had on a backpack, finally he got in her draft, then came along side, and guess who it was? ME!!!!!!!! Yay. And he didn’t drop me either. Props from The Man himself!!!! And he didn’t even know it was my birthday today!!

So obviously after he told that story to Julie Dibens, Tyler Butterfield, Joe Gambles, etc., I had to do the workout . And hack up more lungs. Then after that I went outside and laid in the grass and made Dan come fetch me, no way was I riding all the way up a hill in the smoke with a backpack and flipflops and no snacks on my birthday.

Then I had a run on tap but swimming in that air was more than enough, even though the workout was amended due to conditions… so. No training due to smokey air, what to do? Shop!! (Yes, I know, danger all around). My birthday chauffeur (Dan) gave me a ride to AND from Anthropologie/MAC/Whole Foods/Aveda (where I met another woman whose birthday was today!). Oh and I had an MRT appointment with Josh the miracle worker, after which I found myself showing Craig Alexander’s daughter photos of Hercules (do recall, the world’s cutest pony) on my iPhone. Next up was fabulous “family dinner” at Aji. In between all this, many wonderful calls and messages – thank you!!

Coming up: photos of things, and stories from the weekend…

Hercules knows how to fuel properly

My nutrition has been on the not-good side recently. I think it’s due to stress, lack of sleep, and the weather, which I promise to stop mentioning every sentence soon. I feel hungry but nothing sounds good, and when it’s hot my mom is particularly vehement about the fridge not being open for longer than 0.0015 seconds, which is totally not enough time to hem and haw and make a decision. So it’s easier to just stay hungry. Yes mom, it’s all your fault . I need to start eating well soon, though, I have some races coming up!

The plan for June was to go to South Korea for an ITU Long Course race, but just before I came to Maryland, I was informed that the race was canceled. Boo, I was really looking forward to my first trip to Korea! But, on the plus side, the cancellation has given me the opportunity to return to a race I did in 2008 and loved – Pacific Crest on June 26. I’m super excited! I love Bend, I love this race, and I’ll get to see my cousin and his family, as well as Mackenzie Madison, I roomed with her at Wildflower and totally wanted to hate her (young, blond, fast, skinny, thus obviously hateable), but she is kind of too awesome to hate.

Before I leave Maryland, I’ll do one more race, the Tri-Forces Triathlon this coming Saturday. It’s in a town about 15 miles away that I ride through all the time!

So to recap… Tri Forces Triathlon on Saturday, fly to Oregon next Wednesday, Pac Crest next Saturday. Then I drive my rental car (oooo fancy, I haven’t rented a car since I had a real job!) up to Seattle, where I’m going to pack the stuff that didn’t fit in my car back in March and ship it all out to Colorado. Then on June 30 I fly to Colorado, where I will be for a while, probably about five years.

Yesterday, my uncle’s daughter Elizabeth stopped by my mom’s for a snack and a visit en route to Long Island with her Boyfriend.

She asked my mom which way to go, up 95 through Baltimore, or along the Eastern Shore. I had total deja vu.

“WELL. bla bla bla eastern shore is prettier bla bla traffic bla bla but it will be dark soon bla bla.”

It was awesome.

What was especially awesome was that Sal ended her opinion with the statement that if they left RIGHT NOW and took the eastern shore route, it would still be light when they passed Elizabeth’s alma mater, St. Andrew’s, which was the whole reason they were interested in going that way.

Then Sal told a story for 10 minutes .

My mom, his big sister, did indeed have an opinion. Tony and Betsy should fly into Philadelphia and then drive along the eastern shore instead of through Baltimore because even though Wilmington is a nightmare, overall that way is prettier, although every time she goes through Baltimore she notices that it’s way faster, but through Baltimore on that particular Friday afternoon they would likely hit a lot of beach traffic. Then she asked if I was behaving myself, and I yelled “hi sal!” across the breakfast table to the speaker phone.

In other news, I think I ate something. I don’t know. Today every single flip turn made me want to throw up, all 123 of them (I counted). So after all my training, I had frozen yogurt, supposedly it had active cultures in it, and here’s hoping that tomorrow goes a little better. I might call my mom and see what she thinks.

I think I’ve come to a decision on grad school, but I’m going to let it sit for another couple of days just to be sure. I have until April 15, that is tons of time. Today I talked to my mom about it, always a questionable idea when one of the two of us is tired (in today’s case, it was me). My mom is by nature verrrry interested in other people’s goings on, but in this case she is particularly interested because if I go to SAIS, I will live at home, so today she called to be helpful. Actually rather than tell you about that conversation (which involved both of us talking over each other until the interrupter (ahem, Sal) would stop talking and let the originally-talking person finish), I will tell you about my mom and her friend Flee last week.

“Oh Sally, he’s like the dog from that book you loaned me!” ”I loaned you a book?” ”Well I think it was you? I don’t remember!” ”Me neither. What was it called?” “I don’t know.”

Ugh obviously you guys are talking about “Marley and Me” and yes, ma, you loaned it to Flee.

Then later: “… and today my feed order was delivered.” “You got yours today? I thought we got it next week?” “Well I think it was today. Maybe it wasn’t?” “Was I supposed to order on Monday?” “I don’t know.” “I’m so confused!” “Me too!”

I don’t know how the two of them get anything done together! They’re like that Who’s On First routine, but the funny/scary part is they aren’t exactly joking. Ah, the things I have to look forward to later in life .

Finally, just because I was curious, I made a list of the cities I have set foot in over the past 5 weeks:

Honolulu, Los Angeles (2 times), Denver (3x), Boulder, San Francisco (2x), Dallas, St. Louis, Seattle, Ashland, Oakland, San Diego (3x), Salt Lake City, Baltimore, Washington D.C. (2x), Durham, Chicago, Colorado Springs, and Las Vegas. That’s 18. No wonder I have lost track of what time zone I’m in, and whether I really have recently been in the exact same airport bathroom stall.

Sal and her Tractor last summer

It seems that parental stress always goes up during the holiday season, regardless of whether your kids have flown the coop and/or have their own kids. At least, this is what my highly scientific experiment of “does my own personal mom always freakout at the holidays” has revealed to me…

Last week I called my mom the day after Thanksgiving, which was my own fault, because I already knew that she’d had 22 people over for turkey and food, so obviously calling during the aftermath was a big risk but I was having a bad day. “Hi Ma, sniffle sniff, I’m having a bad day because bla bla and other stuff too.”

“WELL,” she says, “OBVIOUSLY you are NOT HAPPY and we have KNOWN THIS…” (we have? i’m not?)(not sure what came next cause I put the phone down) “… and plus – are you still there or are you HANGING UP on me -” (ugh no but maybe I should be) “and you just need to SIT DOWN and MAKE a LIST about your PRIORITIES. Although, what do I know, it could be that you are just having a BAD DAY…”

I am indeed just having a bad day. That is how I prefaced this entire conversation that I should have known not to start/foist. At least now, a week later, I am laughing about it .

Then today we had some more gems courtesy of Sal! Our family is going to Hawaii for Christmas and we’ll be at Sunset Beach on the North Shore, which is going to be great, especially if we can get my mom to relax and enjoy herself.

“NOW, we need to talk about TRANSPORTATION. I am renting a car, and we have your brother’s car, but YOU and BEN need to be flexible with your WORKING OUT.” I know. We are going to ride our bikes up from Honolulu to Sunset so you guys don’t have to worry about driving us or our bikes up there and then we can ride to the pool. “Well. I don’t think you REALIZE that is a LONG and ARDOUS WAY and there are HILLS.” I do realize what the route is. It’s fine. It’s only like 50 miles or something. “Well, whatever. I don’t know why we are talking about this now.” You just said we needed to talk transportation…

Then she had to go. Like right now because she had to feed the horses and Polly was coming over to go for a walk and oh wait here she is driving up the driveway as we speak and whose dog is that running down the road?

But then I unleashed the magic words: wait Ma, don’t go, I have gossip! Do you have a second? “Ooo, yes, what is it? Of COURSE I have a second! Tell me!!”

I love my mom!

Yesterday I was feeling kind of not-awesome, but I was at work, and I don’t know, work doesn’t usually make me feel awesome, so I was ready to just chalk it up to “rainy Tuesday in Seattle in November” blues. Except by 4 p.m., all I’d had the appetite for was a grapefruit, a small coffee, and a bar – normally this would not get me past 9 a.m.! Perhaps my feelings of not-awesome were legit.

The evening went by fairly normally – I worked on stuff, Ben worked on stuff, we helped each other with stuff, I made him feel my forehead a billion times, we both decided that the only thing that was feverish was his hand. Then at 8 p.m. I finally found my mercury thermometer and stuck it in my mouth… 102.4 degrees! That is SICK! So I took some Robitussin (more like Rodisgusstin) for my awful cough, and went to bed.

Then my head was killing me. And I was roasting to death, and awake for hours. Then finally it was morning. I found the thermometer again, it said 99.4! I ran downstairs to show Ben that maybe I was better, then came back upstairs and called my mom to share the exciting news about my fever.

She said I should take Advil or Tylenol for my fever, because fever is bad for the brain. Oh. My brain did really hurt. Then I kind of suddenly couldn’t focus on anything. Then I was thinking “huh. Why am I on the bathroom floor with my arm in the trash can. I should go to the bed.” Then I think I got up. Then I screamed for Ben. Then Ben and his dad were standing over me. “What is going on? Where am I?” Halfway in the hall, halfway in the bedroom. Then they said I had blood on my face and asked if I could wiggle my hands and toes. I laid there for a while, it felt good to be still, then I started to cry and be worried. Ben scurried around, got me some electrolyte drink, made some phone calls, and decided he would take me to Harbor View Medical Center. I made him change my pants for me, I love my pink pony pajama pants but the E.R. has enough crazies as it is, I kind of wanted to be respectable. Regular sweatpants, please.

Slowly I sat up, then stood up, then walked down the stairs with Ben as his dad went to pull the car up to the door for us. We got downstairs and my eyes got all wide, “it’s happening again!” and then, like the other times, I found myself sprawled on the ground, disoriented. This time it happened gently thanks to Ben, but still it was no less confusing or scary. So, after that episode, Ben and his dad carried me out to the car, no more walking for me, and I laid the seat all the way back for the drive to the hospital.

We got there and the intake process seemed pretty quick. I passed out yet another time, but that time was in a chair, and it was with the financial lady so maybe fainting was a subconscious escape tactic!

Fun in the E.R.

Then we were there for forever. I got my blood pressure taken (113 over 54?!!?), gave a urine sample, got blood drawn, got an H1N1 test, got an EKG, got chest x-rays, and got 2 I.V. bags. Oh and I have a face mask now. There was a lot of sitting around. Thankfully, Ben brought his laptop and they had free wi-fi. Also I called my mom to make sure she didn’t think I was dead. As it turns out, she thought I had simply hung up on her because I didn’t want any more advice! I was filling her in on everything when suddenly she said “I can’t hear you at ALL! Why don’t you send me an email or a text, I CANNOT hear you!” Ok, I said. “Well, do you have any answers? Do you feel better? Did you faint again?” Whatever I said in reply was garbledygook on the other end, I guess she forgot she couldn’t hear me when she suddenly asked me more questions.

Gradually my blood pressure got up to 125 over 74 so that was exciting. Also exciting were the other characters in my ward. The lady on the other side of my curtain was probably in her 40’s but looked 60, a heroine addict, suffering from a bladder infection, and, it seemed, a prostitute. She complained vociferously. Eventually she had to be restrained. The guy across the hallway just got out of jail three weeks ago. Another guy further down had to have a police escort. Then two EMT students from North Seattle Community College (where I am taking Chemistry!) stopped by my bed to ask me some questions and do some learning. They listened to my lungs, and Ben said something funny so I laughed, which made me cough really badly. “WHOA. At school we listen to each others’ breathing but it’s always pretty normal. That is a real wheeze!” (I told you!) It was cute. I asked them why they weren’t next door checking out my neighbor with the bladder, etc. issues. They had been told to steer well clear of her. They must have heard that about several patients because they came back to see me again less than an hour later.

Masks are the new black

So, the verdict. There really isn’t one yet. The EKG ruled out arrhythmia in my heart, the chest x-rays ruled out pneumonia, and the blood test revealed a high white blood cell count, so I am definitely fighting an infection. The H1N1 test takes 24 hours, so I have to call back tomorrow for the result. Fainting isn’t exactly a symptom of swine flu, but considering that my fever was pretty high throughout the night, I’m pretty sure that I got very dehydrated. The fluid imbalance would have made it hard for blood to get to my brain, which would have caused me to faint. Anyway, we’ll see. The good news is, I feel better already, plus I have a really cool big cut/bruise on my nose that I didn’t even feel when it happened! So hard core. I don’t know what I would have done without Ben. He has been awesome – calm, capable, reassuring, and very caring. It could just be that he’s grateful I waited until after Huatulco before getting all scary and fainting and sick!

The band was Gossip, the venue was Showbox, the opener that we caught the end of and wish we’d caught more of was MEN, new project of JD Samson (from Le Tigre). And the night was awesome, if you ask me. Ben saw Gossip back in July and lamented that last night’s set list was nearly identical, which is a somewhat inexplicable shame considering that they have been together for 10 years and must have some sort of library to show for it, but perhaps they adopted an “if it ain’t broke…” philosophy. Either way, as a Gossip virgin, I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Yesterday afternoon I told my mom about our evening plans.

“Well. I am sure glad you can AFFORD things like that. When I first moved to San Francisco I had NO MONEY and when Neil Diamond came to town everyone went, but I stayed home and ate OATMEAL because I couldn’t afford anything else.”

Yes, well, I bought the tickets a while ago. And Ma, a few months later you went to Altamont, which I still think makes you almost the coolest thing ever, so if that meant you had to miss Neil Diamond and eat oatmeal I vote that it was worth it.

“Courtenay. Sijui is BANNED from her STALL.”

(Sijui is my horse, I got her in 8th grade and now she is retired at my mom’s house.) Why is she banned, I asked.

“As SOON as I let her in to eat, she always PEES. It drives me MAD. I JUST cleaned it! She is BANNED.”

See technically, Sal and Sij are friends

Then yesterday… deja vu. Sal marches up to make an announcement, hands on hips and feet splayed as usual…

“Courtenay. Sijui is BANNED from her stall. I let her in to eat and she started PEEING!”

This is like when we have dinner parties, and someone teases her, and she says “no dessert for you!”, and by the time dessert rolls around no one is technically allowed to have any, but we all get dessert.

Oh, and as if on cue after my post from yesterday (which she hasn’t read), today my mom looked out the window and lamented “the nice thing about Winter is you can see what’s driving down the road!” Summertime foliage really makes news-gathering harder. But actually I had seen the big news, Charles Tasker was helping Churchill haul this big wagon full of chopped-down trees with a really big tractor. Twenty minutes later, Charles came back the other way, with just the tractor. Hmmmmmmm. Tres interesante.

Charles Tasker rules. Here is more. (click on the post titles to read more, i can’t get “read more” links to work on my archives, sorry!)