Around and around and around we go

We had super weather here from Sunday through Friday morning. I skied! I ran outside! I enjoyed my bike commutes! Unsurprisingly, things took a turn for the worse for the weekend. -40 wind chills type turn for the worse. Since that is just too flaking cold to be outside for any period of time, I had to go to the gym today for my run.

I hate the gym. Especially running at the gym. Let me break this down. I can't run more than about 30 minutes on the treadmill without getting vertigo. Thus, I mostly avoid using the treadmill for safety reasons. The only other option for actual running at my gym is the indoor track. The 200m indoor track. Running on the track is better than freezing to death, but that's just about the only positive thing I can say about it.

So, I went to the gym today. I ran around in 200m circles for an hour. I sort of wanted to shoot myself. But I did it.

I'm hoping the weather forecast holds, because I should be able to run outside again later this week.

Winter Wonderland

I did lots of x-country skiing this weekend!

Saturday, E and I went to Little Red River Park in Prince Albert. It was so stinking cold that we didn't take any pictures, but I included a couple below that were taken on previous trips to Little Red. It's an absolutely gorgeous park with something like 50km of groomed x-country trails. We ended up staying there most of the day and skiing a total of 10.8 miles. We had fun even though the temperatures barely topped 0F!



Sunday, I stuck around town and skied at one of the city's golf courses with my friend S for her birthday. We did 4.9 miles before the previous day's ski caught up with me. It didn't help that the weather made a spectacular turn-around overnight Saturday so that it was 37F by 11AM Sunday. The temperature was warm enough to make the snow sticky. And me really sweaty. Sweaty enough that I got blisters on the tops of my toes from my socks rubbing!

All in all, it was a great weekend of skiing. I'm looking forward to getting some more time in on my skis before the season ends, especially since the weather seems like it might be decent in the near future.

I also decided to add an 'event' to my schedule. I'm doing a for fun winter triathlon at Little Red on February 6. The 'triathlon' consists of 4K of trail running, 8K of mountain biking, and 7K of x-country skiing. I think the short distances really fit well with where I'm at in my training right now, and it should be a fun way to spend a day!

You can never have too many bikes, right?

I put a deposit down on a new touring bike this week. After lots of research, I decided to go with a Rocky Mountain Sherpa. As far as complete touring bikes go, there isn't really a whole lot of choice, but I made sure I looked at each and every one that I could feasibly buy in Saskatoon. I went with the Sherpa for a variety of reasons. When I first started looking, I had already decided that the tourer was going to be steel-framed since my aluminum road bike buzzes and drives me batty after about 3 hours. Not only is the Sherpa steel, it's also a better quality and lighter steel than that used for some of the other popular touring models (i.e. Surly LHT, Jamis Aurora, Trek 520). The Sherpa also has slightly better components and wheels than the other tourers. As such, the Sherpa is quite a bit more expensive than a LHT or an Aurora or a Trek 520.

I think all the touring bikes (with the exception of the aluminum ones, not a fan) I looked at were good bikes that I would have been happy with. So, the actual deciding factor in my decision was the bike shop where I would be buying said bike. IMO, the hands-down best shop in Saskatoon is Bruce's Cycle Works, and they just happen to be a Rocky Mountain dealer. Decision made.

I love BCW. Everyone that works there knows who I am, what kinds of bikes I ride, and that I'm a crazy, dedicated winter bike commuter. The guys there have fixed a bike that a different shop broke, helped me through a frame warranty, converted my hardtail to a winter bike (Frankendale!), and helped me deal with some nasty saddle issues. They also offer free lifetime adjustments of brakes and derailleurs on any bike purchased there, so my bike always shifts well. The shop just happens to be located about 4 blocks from my house, so it's also super-convenient and walk or ride-able.

BCW is definitely one of the things I will miss the most when I move away from Saskatoon!

We have to stop meeting like this

Maybe I should have made a New Year's resolution to blog more. Sigh.

I am sitting here trying to recover from yet another dental procedure. The last 2 wisdom teeth came out today. I would like to say that it was no problem, easy-peasy, but it was not. For some reason, the teeth on the right side of my mouth are super embedded or something. It took a lot of drilling and pulling to get those suckers out. Much worse than last time. The local anesthetic has yet to wear off, so I have no idea if this time is going to be more painful than the last. At least I have my Percocet. Plus, I have no more wisdom teeth, so I won't have to do this again.

Christmas was good. I have been planning to write a post on 'My Favorite Things' (a la Oprah), and that list will actually include a couple of my Christmas presents. So, I won't go into much detail about my gifts other than to say Santa was good to me this year. Outside of some minor family drama (with both my family and E's family, but different dramas altogether), it was a pretty typical visit back to the mitten for me. The last day I was home it was in the 40s and raining! I probably won't see those temperatures again for a few months.

I returned to SK just before the New Year and promptly got sick. I did not go out for New Year's Eve. In fact, E had to wake me up at midnight to tell me it was 2011. Lame, I know.

I didn't make any resolutions this year since I don't ever. I find that January is a great time to evaluate what's going on in your life and make necessary changes, though. Since I already signed up for the Calgary Marathon (May 29, 2011), it was pretty clear to me that I need to start increasing my running mileage steadily. Since I gained 5 pounds between American Thanksgiving and New Year's, I also decided that I need to start tracking calories a little closer. In reality, this shouldn't be too hard since I know that most of the weight I gained came from all the JUNK I ate over Christmas, and there is no candy, cookies or cake in my house ever. I just don't buy the stuff. Because I will eat it. Strange how that works, right?

Happy New Year everyone! May it be peaceful and prosperous.

Tis the Season

I can't believe that Christmas is this Saturday! What happened to 2010? I feel very underprepared for the holidays this year. Typically, I don't do much shopping until I make it back to Michigan to visit my family. This year is no different, but I would normally already be back in the states at this time, and I don't actually fly out until the 21st this year. I guess I'll be part of the mad dash to buy presents at the last minute. Really, though, I can't get terribly worked up about the commercial aspects of Christmas, because that's not really what it's supposed to be about.

Last year was not a good Christmas for me. E and I were going through a really rough period relationship-wise. We chose to drive to MI, which is a pretty stressful 2 day trip no matter what the circumstances are. The trip was ok, mostly because E and I never really stopped being best friends regardless of what was going on with our romantic relationship. The family part of Christmas, however, was TERRIBLE. How do you answer questions about your life when you are unhappy and unsure about the future?

Without spilling a bunch of relationship details that aren't completely mine to divulge, E and I obviously worked things out. Frankly, E has always known what he doesn't want in life. I spent the first 7 years of our relationship hoping that he would change his mind and want the things that I want. It took me about 6 months of turmoil before I realized that I couldn't be happy without E, regardless of the finer distinctions of our relationship. And now, I am happy not because I've gotten what I want, but because I want what I have. Not to mention that I am also thankful for all the good things in my life other than E.

This Christmas promises to be much better than the last.

How it feels to be a PhD candidate

In a word: FANTASTIC!

Although everyone tried to assure me otherwise, I was really convinced up until my oral comprehensive examination started that it was still possible for me to fail. After the third of my six committee members told me that I did a great job answering his question, I think I realized that it was really going to happen. In the end, every single one of my committee members let me know that I had done a good job answering their questions. None of them really asked me any questions that I didn't know the answers to or tried to trip me up. The whole process was actually quite painless.

Now that the business of comprehensive exams is behind me, I feel like I may actually finish this degree. Granted I have A LOT to do before I can defend my dissertation, but the only thing standing between me and being a Doctor of Philosophy is lab work and writing.

A Story About My Comprehensives...and some other stuff

Well, I handed in my written comps almost two weeks ago. Don't ask me what I've been doing since then that kept me from blogging, because I have basically been wasting time in a rather unfortunate way. Aside from having 2 wisdom teeth extracted and spending one day cross-country skiing, I have accomplished absolutely nothing lately. Not even work. Not even a little.

The whole wisdom teeth deal really wasn't as terrible as I thought it was going to be. I didn't want to go the whole go to sleep and have all 4 removed route, so I just had the two on the left side of my mouth extracted. While I was awake. With only local anesthesia. It sounds terrible, but it was actually not bad at all. The worst part of the whole thing was when the dentist walked into the room, and I saw that he was about 24 years old. But he was really good. And also cute.

I do have to go back to have the other 2 wisdom teeth pulled at some point. I am definitely going to have it done since my bottom wisdom teeth are/were both partially covered by my gums at the back of my mouth. This led to a GIANT cavity in the bottom wisdom tooth that was already removed, and will probably do the same in the remaining one. Since I actually have great dental coverage right now as E's common-law spouse, it's the time to do it.

By the way, I have had $1700 worth of dental work done in the last couple of months. The last 2 wisdom teeth will be another $600. Dentistry isn't actually covered by Canada's universal health care system, so I'm very lucky that E works for an employer that carries a generous supplemental package. (Plus, we can get free massage therapy!!!)

Last Sunday, E and I took the two German students that are currently visiting our lab to Prince Albert to go cross-country skiing for the day at Little Red River Park. I am going to try to download our pictures and write a little essay about that to post here this weekend.

Currently, I'm not actually sure how I did on my comps. My committee did agree to schedule my oral exams (this is a good sign), but they don't actually have to return my scores until Monday of next week. Since the exam is pass/fail, it's unlikely that I'll ever know exactly how I did, but I do have to score at least a 70% on every question to even qualify for the orals. I guess the committee members were pretty sure I would pass the writtens (hence, orals were scheduled), but it's not a done deal yet!

I did get a little comprehensive-related surprise today though.

One of my committee members was assigned a question with the (fairly broad) topic of mechanism of action. He asked me a question about metals and how they interact with the aquatic environment and with fish. This is NOT my area of study at all, but I figured that it was a fair enough question. Comps are supposed to evaluate your general knowledge of toxicology after all.

So, this prof stopped me in the hallway today and asked whether I thought his question was a little strange. I told him that it wasn't really in my area of expertise, but that it was definitely a mechanistic question so I just went with it. Well, it turns out that he had written that question for a different student that does work with metals, and the administrative assistant that compiled my questions accidentally used that one instead of the one written for me. So, I answered a question from someone else's comprehensive exam!!!

The good news is that I apparently did a good job answering said question. Comparable to the answer of the student that actually studies that stuff. (I'm not sure whether this means I'm smart or he's in trouble.) The even better news is that the prof told me the question he was going to ask me so that I can study up on it and talk about it for my orals. And we're just going to forget about talking about metals.

So, I'll be studying up on sex determination in amphibians for my oral comprehensive exams. By the way, my orals are scheduled for next Thursday. Wish me luck!