Salt Melts the Ice

So the good news is that I woke up this morning and my saltiness of the last few days seems to have dissipated. I am not so sure exactly what caused it, but it seems to be subsiding, so that's good. Salty Megan is not so nice. Or patient. Or understanding. Or easy to deal with.

The bad news (at least for me) was that I had a really bad swim. The reason this is significant is that I rarely have REALLY bad ones these days. Tough, but not bad. Today, however, it was bad from the get-go. First, the pool room was so cold due to the sub-zero temps again today (sixth day straight) and the water was like swimming in an ice bath. There were pockets of hottness as I swam down the lane, and at first I thought it might be someone peeing. But the only other person close to me was Larry, and I am pretty sure he stopped peeing in the pool months ago. Or so he says.

Anyway, every stroke felt like I was pulling myself through mud, and I never quite warmed up. I just finished the book, Swimming to Antarctica, by Lynne Cox, so I tried to channel her, thinking, "Just turn you arms over fast, fast, fast - stop being a wuss - she swam in water 40 degree colder than this.!" I was supposed to swim at 75% effort, but all my effort was spent trying not to drown. Every lap felt like ten (wishful thinking) so all my counts were off. It was just a really long morning in the pool. And that is all I will say about that.

Right now, my little fingers are numbing as I am trying to type, so I am going to try to ride my bike and spin myself into some heat. In an effort to evoke warmer feelings, I am posting some pictures from back in the days of warmer, sunnier times.

This is me in Hilton Head at my friend Suzanne's wedding. Ahhh. I can almost feel the sun on my face and the sand in my toes. I remember thinking, "Dang it's hot!" that day, because it was about 100 degrees with that much humidity, but, geesh, if I could only go back.

This one's a little different, taken at my very first triathlon, which I actually did the day before my 29th birthday as the swim-leg on a relay team with my sisters. It was a sprint tri, the middle of July, dead of summer, and hotter than a rat's ass in Texas. But we didn't care, we just loved the look of the numbers marked on our arms. That's me, Elbow and Dynamite D, rockin the team shirts and our medals. Okay, truthfully everyone got them, but we were just so happy to be there, you could have mistaken us for the winners of the darn thing. Oh summer, so close yet so very, very far away.

Sigh.

Off to ride my bike in the living room.