The new year begins here... from Saskatchewan to British Columbia

August 25th, 2006 –
Today's trip started off a little rocky. After very little sleep and a whole car to pack, not to mention bikes to put on the rack, I tried to get everything together and out of the house by 6am. One hour behind already. Crap. I had to stop by work to grab my day planner, which I had forgotten the night before. Then I was off to pick up Kathryn. I can find solace in the fact that I am sure that I didn’t forget anything. There will be no repeat wet suit-forgetting incidents. All sports accounted for... and that’s the really important stuff. Plus, I have enough food to feed a small army of vegans!

I picked Kathryn up and as we were loading the bikes onto the rack, Zoe (the stray dog I rescued off the street) decided that she wanted to explore Kathryn's neighbourhood. However, she was not on a leash and my bad-mother-syndrome came out. We spent almost an hour searching for her, calling her name, and biking around trying to find her. I was almost starting to cry when I saw Kathryn in the car waving at me and pointing. She had found Zoe. Thank goodness. I’m not THAT bad of a mother! We were off at 7:30… 2.5 hours behind schedule. Damn.

The drive went fairly well. No real problems or incidences. Zoe sat quietly in the back, Kathryn and I chatted about our lives, I drank pop and ate junk food, and we listened to music. It was good.

So now I’m here in Vernon at my cousin’s house and I’m starting to get super scared about this whole Ironman thing. I mean, holy shit!!! What am I thinking?!? I’ve never done anything like this before. I’ve come all this way in order to sign up for the hardest day of my life thus far. Is this masochistic? Or am I just a little crazy? I am more and more seeing that most triathletes are a little crazy. Not necessarily in a bad way, it’s just so frigging hardcore. No matter what, though, I’m signing up. It is going to be one year of grueling training and careful nutrition analysis and I’m going to learn so much about myself. It’s going to be one hell of a year. New Year’s will no longer be the day to celebrate the first day of the year. My New Year is coming up in 2 short days. Let the countdown begin.