Crawling Back

9 days into this sickness and I am wondering what the heck good are antibiotics if they couldn't kill the plague residing in my throat? Perhaps they at least prevented a trip to the hospital to get my tonsils extracted. I've never had this much forced time off the bike before and it's funny to observe how emotions flow according to your health. For the first 5 days I was so ill and feverish I couldn't contemplate thinking about anything besides how awful I felt. All of my energy was focused on how I could swallow even small amounts of liquids without having them come out of my nose.

At the first sign I started feeling even a little bit better (Day 6), I tried a little spin on the trainer. Pushing barely 120 watts sent my heart rate up to almost Zone 3, causing me to sweat like I had set my bike directly on the equator, so my optimism (and my ride) didn't last long. I think today may be the day I try a ride again. I actually left the house for 20 min. yesterday to go to the post office. That was exciting. I had to follow a herd of deer up my drive way on the way home.

We got a lovely sunset last night, too. At this point, I'm trying to find joy in the simple pleasures!

Good Times to Bad

My departure from bloggy-land for another extended period was at first for a good reason...then for a very bad reason.

Last week, my sister, brother-in-law, 6-month old nephew and mom all came up for a visit. We had a great week of skiing powder, playing with the baby and just spending time together as a family. Mom babysat, allowing Alyson and Dave to ski together for the first time since forever. Luckily, it snowed a bunch for their visit, so Nate and I were able to show them some great skiing out the gates of Jackson Hole.

Unfortunately, booger-baby Asher had a cold all week and by Thursday morning, Alyson, my mom and I were all sick. However, the baby cold morphed in the adults into an particularly evil strand of strep throat. By the time we learned Alyson had strep and a raging fever (and that I probably did too) we had already packed up the car and were enroute to Green River, UT and then Moab to ride bikes. Yes, I had wanted to ride my bike SO BADLY outside that I guess I was in complete denial that I was ill with more than a cold. (In retrospect, not being able to swallow my own saliva was probably a good indicator that this wasn't just a cold.)

A peek with a flashlight into my throat revealed tonsils the size of golf balls, covered in white blotchy spots. Thankfully, a friendly PA called in a script for a Z-pack for me while we were on the road so we could pick it up in Idaho Falls. We ended up at a Super 8 in SLCity, where I spent the evening yelling at Nate to "turn down the heat, turn down the heat!" when it wasn't even on. Yikes. The 102 fever made me a little crazy.

I made the call the next day to keep going to Green River b/c my fever disappeared and I was feeling better. I knew I would be rather ticked off if I had started to feel even better and had called off the trip and ended up sitting on the trainer at home. So, I took the chance that I would continue to improve (I was on antibiotics after all!) and hoped for the best.

What ensued was the "less than ideal" situation. If I had continued to feel better, I would have had a great week of riding. Instead, I got worse and spent most of the time in a sleeping bag, choking down applesauce, chicken soup and a lot of theraflu. The boys, however, had a great time ripping around Chimney Rock on their motos for hours and hours. I haven't seen Nate that happy in a long time and I don't for a second regret going on the trip. If I can't be happy, he at least should be! I couldn't possibly count the number of times the poor guy has stood around and waited for me in lonely feedzones, withstood crappy hotels and sacrificed sleep and riding time to get me out on my bike. Taking this one for the team was something I was happy to do for him, especially because I don't get to return the favor all that often.

So, after 3 days of camping in motoland, we decided to go home and try for Moab another time. Unfortunately, I am on day 5 of a Z-Pack and am not getting any better. I have taken enough tylenol/advil/theraflu/nyquil for a small army and feel reeeeaaaaalllly bad for my liver. Poor thing is working overtime for sure.

Yipee

My apologies for the lack of posts lately. Not much at all has been going on here to speak of...until yesterday.

Look at what arrived on the same day:

and this:otherwise known as the yipee! card. I am now 2 for 2 in the Leadville 100 lottery. Some folks have tried for years to get into this race with no success. I've never dog-eared or weighted my entry form, paid any bribes or sacrificed anything to the Leadville lottery gods. I therefore cannot explain my good fortune :-)

I can only consider this postal coincidence as a major hint that the season is just around the corner.

Goodbye Robbie McEwan

No, not that Robbie. Our Robbie, the beta fish. He was quite the sprinter/swimmer in his youth, hence the name Robbie McEwan.

Robbie finally turned in his chips last week after a glorious 5 year run. Although the real-life Robbie is still winning races at the ripe old age of 37, our Robbie hadn't had a sprint in him for well over a year.

Robbie-the-fish was originally adopted by our good pal, Deb, who brought him home from a wedding. A wedding? Yup. It was a typical Jackson Hole destination wedding and for some reason, the bride thought it would be a brilliant idea to use live beta fish as centerpieces, orphaning many poor little fish when the festivities were over and the guests all flew home.

Deb handed Robbie down to Nate 4 years ago. I think she thought Nate needed some responsibility in his life and that a fish was a good place to start. 4 years later, the poor guy has an abundance of responsibility-a new house, a wife, a dog and a real estate license. To think, Robbie was there for it all.