Best Laid Plans

Business is summer slow, so for my first hour of Bear Freedom this morning I was going to treat myself to either a bike ride, an open water swim or some Evil Cross Training (garden wall building - I'm halfway to my goal of getting it half done this summer). Or maybe 2 out of 3, if I was feelin' sassy.

It literally started raining just as I buckled Bear into the car seat for his ride to school. Bleh.

It's 7:58 am. I can't believe I'm fully dressed, ready to do ANY of those things, and am being thwarted by the weather.

***later this morning***

I went with Evil Cross Training because it was closer to home in case of lightning. I got 7 more feet of retaining wall installed. Go me!

Money Well Spent

After Bear hated the rough ride in the cheap bike trailer we got last summer, we got rid of it and started looking for a used high end model.

There were plenty on Craigslist, but we never managed to be first in line. Then we got lucky and stumbled across this Burley DeLite in darn good shape at a neighbor's garage sale. At $150 it was less than any of the Craigslist offerings for the same model, and well worth it.

Bear absolutely loves it and Wonderful Husband has already taken him for several rides. We're really happy that we can go biking as a family now.

Shuffling Priorities

Had to drop my September sprint in favor of a friend's baby shower. I'm cool with that - your friends only have their first baby once.

After consulting with my friend who was to race it with me, we're fairly certain we're going to drop the August 9 sprint in favor of reality and common sense.

There's that I haven't had a chance to work out - unless you count Evil Garden Wall Building Cross Training - even once since my sprint in June. But the bigger issues are that money is tight and the foot is still a real problem.

It makes more sense to put the money I'd have spent on the race entry on - as my doctor, my PT and many of you have recommended - into another pair of high quality arch supporting shoes. Aside from the logical medical reasons, the leather Burks need a chance to, um, breathe a little, if you know what I mean.

I've been doing some reading (thanks for everyone's tips, btw, these are shoes I've known existed but could never find). Based on reviews containing phrases like "wide feet," "great arch support" and "helped my plantar fasciitis," here's my wish list ...

Keen Venice Sandals

Chaco Unaweep Sandals

Teva Open Toachi Sandals

Chaco Flip Flops

*** Update***
Tried on a pair of the Keens today. They seriously felt like walking on air and I almost got them, but held off because they're $100. Now I'm glad I waited; I did some more searching and found a blog post from a woman with "insanely high arches" who wrote about her comparison test of Keen vs. Chacos. She bought the Keens and had to return them because the arch support wasn't robust enough.

I also tried on some Tevas. Definitely wide enough and the arch support would probably be great for a normal person, but it didn't feel robust enough for me.

Born to be Wild

Life with Bear, in a nutshell.

So, it is a bad thing...

... if I don't get in a single workout between my last tri and the one I'm supposed to do on August 9th?

At this rate I'm going to have to count bouncing around with Bear in toddler swim class as training sessions!