Rest, Thoughts, and Swimsuit Contortions....

It's raining and my bike is in the shop so I feel justified in taking a night off from my Tri training. I'm enjoying a day of rest; a whole day off. Not that partial day that Diane is always teasing me about where I still get in a 11 mile bike ride in the early mornings. She refers to them as "Jeanne Day's Off" versus everyone else's day off. I will admit that I push myself a little too hard sometimes. I'm convinced that it is genetic. This last summer my mom was supposed to be recovering from foot surgery. She painted the entire outside of her house, and planted a new tree in the backyard. What can I say---"It's in the genes!"

But I am learning. (Or at least trying to...) One thing I am learning through all of this training is that you need to listen to your body. Respect it and it'll work well with you. Don't respect it--- and you can be in a world of hurt. Though, I know that there's some hurt that naturally comes with this type of training. I can't help but feel (or imagine) that after the SLOW SALTY DOG Tri that I'll be in a whole world of hurt. I'm going to feel like dog meat that's been put through the grinder. The amazing thing is that this is a "grinder" of my own making. I'm purposely doing this to myself. I REALLY must have one twisted mind!

As I'm thinking these twisted thoughts last night, I remember that I got my new swimsuit in the mail yesterday. I need to try it on. I had a plastic hook that broke on the old one. It was almost 8 years old. It was time for a new swimsuit; anyway that's my excuse. It's not as though I don't have a couple of other swimsuits. It's just that I don't feel that a tropical print bikini, or a black monokini are appropriate for lap swimming. ( Some more twisted thinking?)

So out comes the new swimsuit. It's a ClubSwim Lycra one piece (pictured above). Right away I notice that it doesn't have the plastic hook. A good thing, I think. But it is then that I 'm standing with suit in hand trying to figure out how to get this small Lycra one piece on me. At least with the plastic hook I could figure out how to get the suit on. Now in the back there are solid straps that don't move. I look at the tags attached to the suit in hopes of some kind of hint or at least a suggestion? Nothing on how to put the suit on but plenty of directions on the care of the article. My mind is boggled! We live in a culture where there are directions on how to open cereal boxes but not even a hint on how to put on a one piece swim suit.

Well, I guess it's trial and error time. First, I put my feet through the lower back and pull up the suit. Okay... I've got the bottom part on. Now to figure out the top.....hmmm. So I decide to bend over as much as possible and put my head as close to my waist as I can in hopes of fitting my head through the same hole as I just put the rest of my body. Nope! NO CAN DO!

Okay, I think to myself. There's more than one way to skin a cat. I take the suit off and decide to put the top part on first through the same hole in the back. Okay, the top part is on.... now the bottom half, hmmm? I lean against the wall and raise one leg to put it through one of the leg holes. I'm sure this is some kind of yoga position where your foot is close to your waist and your holding your ankle there to hold it. Meanwhile, my knee which unfortunately is not double jointed is as far from my body as possible and at almost a 90 degree from my waist. My balance is terrible and I'm leaning more and more on the wall. I catch myself before I almost fall. This is not working! I take off the suit and look at it.

And then the light bulb goes on! I, of course, am calling myself an idiot by now. Gee, what about the top hole you dummy! Amazing! I pull the straps off to the side and slide my feet through the holes at the bottom. The swimsuit pulls right up. Then I loop my arms through the under the straps, and tad ah! The swimsuit is on! WOW! It looks good!

Not one of my brighter moments... and maybe I shouldn't be sharing this with you and the whole wide web world. But you know we all have are moments where we are just plain IDIOTS! And well, that was mine. Hopefully, they are few and far between.