Taken by Surprise

I am definitely not a morning person. Today I went for a bike ride and forgot my helmet, my watch, and my gloves. But check it out....I brought the camera for a change so I could take some pictures.

My roomie here in Florida has an extra bike, so until my ankle is feeling up to running again I'll be biking instead. It's much easier on the joints but yet still yields a good workout. I pretty much keep it in the lowest gear and ride at max speed unless I'm going over a bridge. Definitely not the same as mountain biking but still fun.


Biking here in Florida is lovely. Especially today. It was the perfect weather. Temps were probably in the high 70s, it was sunny and just a little bit breezy. I had only planned on going out for about an hour, but it was so nice I kept going and going and going and going......


.....all the way to the Hillsboro inlet. There were so many people out today taking advantage of the perfect weather: walkers, runners, cyclists, boaters, beach-goers, etc. You can explore so much more on a bike. I've been going different places everytime I go out and am amazed at all the places I've never seen......even though I grew up here in Florida!



Once I realized how far I had gone, I had to race back to where I was staying because I had a lunch date with my dad. I knew he would understand, but I didn't want him to go hungry!

As soon as I met up with him I noticed this hospital sticker he had. Within five minutes of seeing my dad I was in tears. His friend just died and he was with him the last few hours in the hospital. Liver failure. What a way to go. I try so hard to keep everything in my life positive and upbeat, but boy you never see these things coming.

To top it off we went to go see a funny movie at the theater but it was sold out. Next option was Marley and Me. I don't want to tell the story if you haven't seen it, but DAMN. It is not what you think. I thought it was just going to be a cute movie about a dog. WRONG. It is so sad. Sniffles could be heard all around the movie theater. Twice in one day I'm crying. That's NOT my kind of day.

Dating Adventures and Advice for Men

We are going to take a little detour today on the blog. Yeah, I went running yesterday, bike riding today and my tail bone still hurts from last week's snowboarding, but that stuff is boring. Today it's all about dating and men.

Friday night I went out with my friends and saw this poster in the girl's bathroom. I thought it was hilarious. It pretty much describes our basic needs. Well, maybe everything except the cooking, because we are usually on a diet anyway.

But in reading this I realized I have been missing the mark on almost every point. And I never even got to experience point number six. Bummer.

Well that's all about to change. My standards are getting higher. So for practice, I am doing a lot of "turning down." I try not be mean, because I realize it takes some guts for a guy to ask a girl out in the first place, but I'm finding it easier to be upfront from the beginning rather than go through the slow painful process of trying to make someone go away.

My roommate turned me on to this great blog called ManSlations. Not only is it quite humorous, it's really giving me the insight into how men think....or should I say.....don't think. They seem to have similar patterns when it comes to women and having a clue about their reactions is quite enlightening. Because of this I'm toughening up. And to help guys out, I've set down some guidelines to follow when pursuing women in general. Hopefully this will help save some future embarrassment. So here they are....

1. Don't tell her she looks like X, Y or Z movie star. It doesn't matter how beautiful the actress is, we women want to think we are unique and we ARE unique. Besides we may not even know who you are talking about and then have our attention stuck on who this mystery person is that we apparently look like. This happened to me Friday and I really didn't like it. I was related to Tracy Pollan and Stephanie Graf. When I finally looked at their pics on the web, I was like, "NO WAY." So just don't do it. It is NOT FLATTERING even though you might think so. Do yourself a favor, and just ZIP IT.

2. Don't play the "shy" card. This guy Friday night told my friend that he liked me but was too shy to tell me so she told me. Huh? What does that tell me? L...O...S...E....R! We want a guy who is assertive and confident, not a wiener. We'd rather you make a fool out of yourself and be brave than be afraid. I lost all respect for the guy before I even knew who he was. Don't let that happen to you.

3. Alright, so maybe it is a bit scary for a guy to go over and talk to a girl in a bar. But if you made the effort, stick with it. Friday night, this really nice guy from Jamaica came over to tell me how beautiful I was (we love that by the way) and invited me to go on a date with him in Jamaica. I wasn't super interested, but I think I would have at least chatted for him a bit to get to know him better. However, he said, "OK I'll leave you alone now" and left. ???? What was that all about? He didn't even give it a chance. It was probably nerves because I don't really think I had bad breath. I don't know. Translation to me: Q...U...I...T...T...E...R. Not good. So if you start something, finish it.

4. This one may not happen much but it happened to me so I thought I'd mention it. After I had turned a guy down, he started doing this thing where he said, "I saw you checking out X. You want me to go get him for you?" First of all he was wrong. He didn't know where I was looking and secondly, it was kind of creepy that this guy was observing me THAT MUCH. P...S...Y...C...H...O is what that one spells. Stay far far away. If she turns you down, just move on. Don't make a big deal out of it. We'll only think you are crazy.

5. If she tells you she is not interested or not attracted to you, leave it alone. There is no reason to elaborate our reasons. It's like saying, "Why don't you like mushrooms?" Or, "Why don't you like spinach?" Through our own individual experience we've learned what we like and what we don't like and telling you any of this is only going to invalidate you. I mean if you like to be abused, then go for it. But realize we don't want to go there, just as you probably wouldn't want to do that to a woman. Besides it's a sure sign of I...N...S...E...C...U...R...I...T...Y.

6. This should be a no-brainer but I'm going to mention it because it happened. No matter how charming you are, never ask about having a threesome.

7. Probably the most important of all....If you say you are going to do something, do it. Manslations educated women are going to be watching this one very closely. We will judge you not by what you say, but by what you do. So if you say you are going to call her, you damn well better call her.

A Pain in the Ass

Snowboarding is not friendly to one's behind. You usually fall forward on your knees and/or wrists or backwards onto you behind. Occasionally you will do a helicopter flip where you and the snowboard spin until you land on your side and one or both ankles gets twisted in the process.

Well, yesterday I managed to do all of the above multiple times.

It turned out that Mt. Baldy isn't really a place for beginners to go. It's got some pretty advanced runs and some serious slopes. We should have got a clue when we were driving in. The road up to the resort is super steep. The one good thing we did have going for us was the weather. It was a beautiful sunny day. Cold at the beginning of the day and freezing at the end of the day, but perfect weather while we were snowboarding.


However, the conditions were not perfect. The snow was not nice and powdery, but hard and somewhat icy. There hadn't been new snowfall since Christmas and they had only just turned on their snow machine the day before. How does that translate? Bad for beginners. After our very first run, we were all ready to exchange our snowboards for skis. It was pretty defeating. But we ended up sticking with it. I guess we all like to abuse ourselves!

Falling was the worse thing, especially in our case when you do a lot of it. It was like falling on concrete. So yes, I have sore wrists, sore ankles, bruised knees, and a very tender tail bone.

But that's not all...Apparently the full development of soreness from my previous crossfit workout hadn't come into play until then too. It appears I tweaked my neck and shoulder area somehow from those wall climbs and I was still feeling quite a bit of the stomach muscle soreness as well from the L pull-ups. So every time I fell backwards my neck whipped back irritating the already irritated area. And then when I got up I had to use the already sore stomach muscles. Ouch.

Needless to say I am in quite a bit of pain today. Driving was almost impossible. I couldn't even turn my head and walking up and down stairs was torture because of the burning calf muscles.

I started to wonder how nuts I am for putting myself through all this. The pain was so bad today that I wanted to cry. So I did nothing today...drank some wine, ate some chocolate, watched a movie and went back to sleep. Hopefully this won't last long because it really sucks.


The crazy part is that my friends and I still can't wait to go snowboarding again. At least I'm not the only one who is nuts. However, next time I'll be wearing knee pads, a tail bone pad, wrist guards and possibly a helmet. Football gear has been recommended.

That's at least 2 months away. Tomorrow I fly to Boca Raton where the closest I'll get to snowboarding is virtually. My tail bone should be healed by then!

Snowboarding in Florida? You've Got to be Kidding!

Shannon, Dan and I went for our first virtual snowboarding lesson today. OH MY GOD! This is the coolest thing. We were able to refine our edging technique without falling! It is so realistic it's crazy! And we only did the intro lesson.

Since we are hitting the slopes tomorrow we wanted to be a little bit more prepared and this was perfect. Who would have guessed that such a thing even existed. But even experts use virtual training to hone their skills. So imagine how it helps beginners or anyone just needing to get the basics down pat. My hat's off to Dan for finding this.

The founder of virtual lessons is two-time world champion and legend in freestyle skiing Bob Salerno. The whole idea is that by training in a controlled environment, you learn the skills and muscle memory without all the time, trouble, travel and costs associated with a trip to the mountain. After the training you understand the commands and are in shape to ski or snowboard. Below is a video about who Bob is.



What's got me really excited is that there is a virtual training place in Florida--a mere 1/2 hour drive from where I'll be hanging out the next couple of months. Is that bad-ass or what? Ten lessons or so should do some major damage in improving my technique. Perhaps I'll even learn a few tricks.

Tomorrow I'll get to test how this virtual experience translates to the real deal. I'm just hoping my muscles will hold up because the last couple days of crossfit were brutal. They are so sore from the combination of crossfit, my 10-mile trail run yesterday and today's virtual lesson. Walking up and down stairs is quite painful. And to top it off I've got major skin burns from trying--unsuccessfully-- to scale a cement wall. (No, I wasn't running from the police!)

Boy, is my body a wreck.