bethliebert

Jam session!

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Beth came over tonight for a jam session with Kris. It's pretty awesome to see him continuing with the guitar this long. I'm very happy for it.

Beth's dog's OD

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A Christmas note from Beth:

This is what happens when turkey-coma sets in. Even though spencer looks
like he's dead, I assure you he is as happy as high school wes with a bucket
of ice cream, thanks to many generous suckers with scraps at the table last
night. God bless.

Merry Christmas, and may you too have a triptophantastic holiday

Beth

What next?

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On the ride home from the airport tonight, Beth asked me, "What are you going to do in the off-season?"

Although my first thought was, "Sit around, eating bon-bons, gaining weight and just healing," I did pause long enough to think about her question and give her an honest, non-flippant answer.

I'm going to continue with my Monday-Wednesday-Friday morning fitness classes at Velocity Sports. Partly because I've already signed a contract with them for another six months, partly because I really like the instructor, and party because inertia keeps me going that way. Tuesday and Thursday mornings I'll stsart back up at the yoga/pilates fusion class I've been going to off and on. It's a good stretching program, if nothing else. I don't feel I get a good "workout" going, but I do use my abs for about 3 minutes. That part, the stretching part, and fact it gets me up in the morning so I can keep my regular sleep schedule means I'll keep going.

The part that I'm toying with, however, is the third idea I had for what to do over the winter. A few years ago, I asked Lisa what her fastest mile time was. My plan was to add a minute to her time and try to run that time.

I didn't realize when I asked that her personal best was a 5:30 mile.

Meaning I just set my goal at 6:30.

Gee, that's only 45 seconds faster than I've ever run a mile, and that success was on a treadmill with the machine helping me along. My fastest ground time was around 7:45.

I mentioned my goal to Kris, and, in his wonderful, adorable way, he immediately drew up a training schedule that would, in his words, have me running gazelle-like to a 6:30 mile.

I didn't make that mile time that year, but I'm seriously considering trying this winter. Until I commit to it fully, it's just a idea, but I'm thinking I'd like to try. I'll dig up the program Kris designed and add a tweak to it. Following the thought, "A person cranking out 7 minute miles never learns how to move his arms and legs fast enough to run a 6 minute mile.", I'd like to try Kris' workout with a twice-weekly or so workout where I run a 6 minute pace as long as I can around the track.

A 6 minute pace is a 90 second 400m. That's a completely doable pace for one lap. So, I start at one lap and run that pace for the lap, then continue for another 100 meters. If I can keep up the pace, then I'll keep going. I might try 50m increments instead of 100m increments, not sure. But, my watch has an interval timer on it, so I can use it to beep at me at 11 second intervals: I'll need to have run about 50m in each of those 11 seconds.

With this plan, I'll be learning how to move my arms fast enough to run a 6 minute mile.

Of course, the goal is a 6:30 mile.

I just need to decide if I want to commit to it. If I do, it'll be a lot of hard work, but oh so very worth it in terms of personal satisfaction in the end.

Why I'm always the girl

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Kris and I were talking about our evening dinner. He told me a story.

"So, you know how we were cheering tonight? Well, when I tipped my glass to you, I tipped the bottom of my glass. When you tipped your glass, you held your glass in the middle and tipped the top of the glass to me.

Well, after practice on Sunday, I cheered my glass with Beth, and I presented the top of my glass. Beth tipped the top of her glass to me. I told her, 'Beth, Beth, don't you know the man rules?'

'What?'

'The man rules. You need to clink glasses with the bottom of your glass. If you touch the tops, you spread the spit around.'

'Really?'

Tyler piped up, 'Here, like this,' and cheered with me, touching the bottom of the glasses.

Beth said, 'Thanks, Tyler, for teaching me how to be a man.'

Tonight, I was thinking, 'Huh. Kitt does this, too.'"

"Great. Does that mean you're going to teach me how to be a man, too?"

"Well, if you're going to be the boy in the next life, you need to know the rules. This is why you're always the girl."

Of course...

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Emails like this one from Beth are wonderful, too.

I heart kitt.

That is all

B