Centaurian Time; A Standard Thirty-Seven Hour Day.

By its nature, my job can be overly demanding.  That is one reason I bought my E-Go.  On a good day there are no surprises.  On an average day, there are very few unexpected issues, and just a drive to keep up with the documentation.  A bad day can go on for as long as 72 hours.

Any day I have to do a removal of a child from a family is a bad day.  It never feels “good” emotionally, psychologically you have to suck it up and be strong.  Physically is exhausting, and intellectually it is a process that has a series of multi-tasking steps, ending in court.  Bad days start late and keeps you out late.  It makes you come in early the next day, stay late again, then early again as you get things ready for court.  You do not eat well, just what is “There” because you have no time to plan anything.  Sleep is fleeting. 

The only thing that makes it worse is when there is more than one going on at one time.

That being said, my job got in the way of my training.

•  I was not able to cross-train on Wednesday. 
• I was not able to do my Tempo Ride on Thursday.
• There was no time to do even the short ride on Friday.
• I was not even doing my PT exercises.

I was so glad when the day ended on Friday, and for the first time in 3 nights I slept. 

Saturday was the first day I could think about me during daylight hours.  It was more humid than hot, but that was not my concern.  I needed to do a 25 mile ride.  Having missed my rides on Thursday and Friday, I had not conditioned, and was ill prepared.  I decided that I am not doing the same course as last week as the hills were so intense, and I was not able to condition for it.  I left in the late afternoon.  I would have liked to go out later but BAD weather was coming, and I needed to be done before it arrived.  Otherwise, I doubt I would have done the ride at all.

I did my ride, and it was a killer. The hills were not as intense, but there were longer grades.  Humidity, wind, and my lack of condition worked against me. It actually made me ache as I rode (ache, not hurt) and at the end I was completely spent. My stomach was cramping, along with my legs.

Today I did my regular ride.  It was good, not painful.  However I now see the importance of every training session, and the PT exercises I am supposed to be doing.