First day of school & other madness

The past couple of weeks have been insane. Christopher didn't have summer camp or pre-school for two weeks and started pre-school again on Tuesday. That would have been crazy enough but I decided to really try at the potty training. He was ready but didn't usually feel like going through the effort of stopping what he was doing and using the potty. My car died -- the alternator and starter have been replaced and now there appears to be a short somewhere. The car is a 1996 but we just really can't afford another car payment right now. And, now, my desktop computer is pretty much dead. It's been dying but, after yesterday late afternoon, it's pretty much dead. I was able to get it back up to get some files off it. I had last backed it up late August and wanted to make sure all the photos, etc. were on the external hard drive we have. At least new desktops are a lot cheaper than new cars.

The Meltdown could have gone a little better for me but it was still an awesome time. Cook County cut out a lot of logs the week before the race. Considering it is the technical stuff I'm good at and am not a speed demon, that made my race a lot harder. I was duking it out with Ronit, from Half Acre. I was faster in the single-track and maybe a little on the hills but she was faster on the flat power sections. She'd be right on my butt and then I'd get a little gap to see her back on my butt again. I was ahead until almost half-way through the race but couldn't stay with her when she passed. Almost every race this year, I get nauseous when I eat during a race(I had eaten a Gu a little before she got by me) . It's annoying. I stopped feeling like I was going to puke but she was gone and beat me by a few minutes. My legs started cramping going up gravity cavity for the last time but I am proud to say I didn't go in my small ring in the front and stood to climb most of the last time up the grassy hill -- mainly because Julie and Erica were screaming at me and were almost as fast running as I was trying to make my way up the hill for the last time. I did beat about five guys and passed several of them during my last lap. All in all, awesome race put on by an awesome group. I can't wait for next year.

Tom and I will likely do Lake Geneva and then switch gears to cross. Yea, cross! Tom put in to upgrade so we're still working out how we'll both do this. We'll likely focus more on the Wisconsin races with me doing Women's 3 and him doing the 30 plus or 35 plus (I can't remember which) for 1,2,3. With the Chicago series, he'd have to do the men's 1,2,3. We'll definitely be at Jackson Park though. And, I'm already registered for the Jonthan Page cross races in Sun Prairie and just registered for Jingle Cross. = )