Crunch time

Woke up this morning to a lovely email from my buddy Kristi. Actually it was an email from her husband Lee, forwarded to me. Apparently the next two weeks are quite crucial in our training. Lee wrote:

By the way, you are now in CRUNCH Time on training. This week and next week should be hard and you should be tired. You can gain fitness for the next two weeks. The last week will be a time to cut it back a little and to absorb the training. So in other words: train your butt off!

Well Lee is right. Today was hard. And I was tired. I swam a total of 400m in the pool. That's 8 laps. And that's how far our swim will be on race day. I can't do it without stopping yet. And that isn't with pairing a run AND a bike with it. Today's swim was supposed to be in the form of 2 x 50, 1 x 250, and 1 x 50. However, I am really not strong enough swimming to swim five straight laps so a slight break when I touched the wall each time was in order.

Each email I receive from Kristi makes me appear quite the slouch. I am doing what is on our training guide. Kristi is doing that and then some. She has always been this way. Once she gets her mind set on something, there is no deviation allowed from the Kristi! In my case, I am stubborn too ... but not as stubborn as Kristi.

I am so looking forward to spending a few days with Kristi and the race. What I am not looking forward to are the days leading up to Friday of this week. There is sooooo much to do to get ready for three weeks away from Base. We'll be in Orlando for nearly a week, we'll be in South Florida for two weeks, and I'll be in New Mexico for part of that.

I also have to get Scrubs to dog camp on Friday. I called Pat, the woman who runs the camp he attends. I told her that I was worried about his feet, but she told me that she'd take care of him even if he had the injuries still. Poor Scrubs! He hasn't really gotten up at all since this happened yesterday. He has only gone to the bathroom one time (this morning.) However, he did get up onto his bed today which meant he could put a tad bit of pressure on the feet. A good sign. I still feel lousy, but I know I didn't do it on purpose.

There is also soooo much to do before we move to Turkey in just over three months. That coupled with this "vacation" has left me just a wee bit stressed out. I am trying to remember the words I am learning in our current Bible Study. We have been reminded to ask ourselves "What IS" and not "What IF" in an attempt to stop the worry that can plague our hearts.

What IS right now is that there is a lot to do. But much of what I feel stressed about are things I can't do anything about at this moment. So I need to live in the IS and not the IF.

The IS right now is a screaming Elijah. Gotta run!