tannery

I hate it when people ask me whether I prefer hot or cold weather. If I had to absolutely choose one over the other, which one would I pick? Like if all year long, it was either really hot or extremely cold, and you couldn't ever move again. It's kind of asking someone, if forced into this unrealistic hypothetical situation, whether they would rather choke themselves with a spoon or a fork. Both options have their pros and cons; but is this really going to happen?
Wait, I take that back. It actually might [the choking part]. Mostly because this heat is making me do some ridiculous things.
Like how I thought that time on the rollers would be a good idea at 8am, then decided after a pathetic 20 minutes that it wasn't a great idea and that I should really just lie down. And then falling out of my bed when I attempted to actually get up. And then heading to school on underinflated tires, thighs still twitching in protest, to stare at a few books without so much as a sip of coffee to power me through.

All of which resulted in me coming back to my apartment in the scorching afternoon heat, drenched in my own salt water [you might not be able to see it, but that is sweat from my face on my hand]. And to top it all off, I even got to experience exactly what sunblock, sweat, and eyeliner feels like when it drips directly into your eye.
Yeah, yesterday was fucking awesome.
Don't get me wrong, I love the summer. And with temperatures peaking at around 30C [or 90F], and having lived in Tokyo, I really shouldn't be complaining. It's just that I'm starting to look downright ridiculous.
The tan lines, I mean. I'm considering slathering on the fake tanning lotion. Because it's spreading.

Mid-checking-out-my-own-ass-and-weighing-exactly-how-unhappy-I-am-with-its-massive-proportions, I caught a glimpse of the back of my shoulder. Ah, the bane of sleeveless jerseys. Keep in mind that only the back of my shoulder is that tan. The front has some t-shirt tan going on that's a noticeably lighter shade. All exacerbated by the fact that I don't wear tank tops enough because the whole mess is so embarrassing.
Which makes me wonder why I'm actually smiling in that picture. The only plausible explanation is that the heat was going to my brain, again. Because after that picture was taken, I actually considered getting back on the rollers. Without coffee. Again.

The sheer amount of sweat in my hair made me think twice, and after scheduling a haircut, I ended up doing lots and lots of stretching instead [for once]. Weak, I know. But today, I'm out to a ride that might end at the gym, before I attempt to resist the temptation to cut all my hair off. Then, of course, time on the rollers.
Crazy, right?

taking a breath

Law school exams are sort of like that space between comfortably drunk and black out drunk. Okay, that's kind of a big range, but you know that phase that starts when everything goes numb and the room spins a little. That phase when that booze-fueled fog that's making bad decisions for you clears for a moment and you realize that that shot waiting for you at the bar is totally unnecessary, but you take it anyway.
The last time I did that, I went home in a cab around 7pm [yeah, we started early] and I was puking my guts out until 3am.
I thought I was going to die.
The next morning, I patched together pieces of the previous evening, only remembering hours later that I had literally crawled from the elevator to my sister's apartment that night. All those embarrassing moments, slowly filtering in, like your memory won't let your ego die of shame by bringing it back all at once.

That's kind of what exams are like. Really. It's a numbing three hours where at the end, you're not even sure what happened. And in a lot of ways, I don't even want to know what happened. I have three more exams coming up; how well I did [or not] is a question gladly deferred until my ego can handle it.
So when I walked out of my tax exam around 1pm today into a warm, sunny afternoon, I couldn't resist the longer ride home. A day this beautiful can't go to waste, especially when I have the handy excuse of "well, I need to clear my head after that exam totally effed me in the a." And so, I mercilessly exploited that excuse, riding through Watertown then heading through Cambridge, stopping to see flowers and trees with [green!] leaves on them and groups of friends or happy couples strolling lazily with coffee cups in their hands. And cruising past it all, I gulped in the fresh, spring air, trying to clear my lungs of the cobwebs and dust that's forming in them.

I sucked in more air when I stopped by Cambridge, and stomped around in my Sidis, running inside and out. But that's for tomorrow; for now, coffee [and maybe a little more law] calls.

trying to chew

I hit the snooze button this morning. Almost twice.
That's a pretty big deal for someone who can't manage to sleep past 8am, even if I end up going to sleep at 3am. To sweeten the whole deal, I've even managed to sleep like the dead these past couple of days, not getting up restlessly in the middle of the night/early morning. This morning, I woke up and was positively giddy...and I had no idea why.
But as I hopped out of bed and inspected my gigantor thighs [and coming to the conclusion that they can use much more definition], I remembered exactly why. I passed out last night thinking of 100-milers, kits, and training sessions with friends...all on a fixed gear. And I was close to convincing myself that it could actually happen.

Blame Facebook on this one. When I put up "100 miles + fixed gear. Discuss" as a status message, I expected people to discourage me from even attempting it. Too bad friends were all too willing to help me meet this goal. And because I hate to disappoint, well...looks like I'm training for a century.
Assuming my knees don't completely crap out, this means a lot of serious riding and probably a good measure of cross-training, too. This idea scares me; I'd actually consider facing the embarrassment of falling on my face in front of [insert name of hot messenger/cyclist/biker boy] as I try to clip out over the blood, sweat, and tears that's going to be involved in this endeavor.

Yeah, I totally bit off more than I can chew on this one. I did consider backpedaling my way out of it, but couldn't justify it without trying. And as I started contemplating how exactly to start chewing, I remembered an incident last year involving an insensitively inappropriate joke and my best friend. It had us both in fits of laughter in front of our respective computers [as always, it was over gchat]:
Me: I almost snorted out coffee all over my screen!
Lauren: I'm eating a cookie, and I'm laughing so hard I can't taste it.
As embarrassing and terribly painful as this training thing might turn out to be, here's hoping that even if I did manage to bite off more than I can chew, maybe I'll be laughing so hard that it won't even matter.