Success
Friday was kind of a bad day. I was trying to think of a succinct way to summarize the argument I got in with my co-worker. It was about this program in California called ‘districts-of-choice’, where kids can transfer to another district if their school sucks.
A brief part of it went like this:
Him: Charter schools are a better alternative.
Me: In California, the two programs work essentially the same way.
Him: No, they don’t
Me: Yes, they do.
Him: No, they don’t.
Me: Yes, they do. Both programs give the kids a choice other than their school and the money connected to the kid is transferred to the new school.
Him: But at least in charter school, the money stays in the district.
Me: No, it doesn’t.
Him: Charter schools are local.
Me: Not necessarily.
Him: At least with charter schools the money stays in public schools.
Me: Uh, all the schools we’re talking about are public schools.
It went on like this for a while, except times 100, with some other stupid shit.
It’s not a topic I have huge opinions about and I know everyone has an opinion about how to fix the education system, but the conversation just kept going on and on and on. And then at the end, he was like ‘well, what’s your argument for all the money leaving the original school? what’s your solution to that? what’s your argument for that? what do you have to say about that?’
I was like ‘whoa, let me finish a motherfucking sentence.’
And, wow, he like flipped out. “I’ll let you finish a motherfucking sentence if you can finish it without motherfucking swearing.” Uh, hey, I haven’t sworn this whole time. “You always fucking swear every fucking sentence, you can’t fucking talk without fucking swearing, it’s such a pathetic fucking way to fucking talk.”
Um. Whoa.
So, we’re officially on a need to talk basis. I figure I can just go home and be snide and pretentious to myself and save us all the time.
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This weekend, I got in more training in 2 days than I have in any full week in nearly a month. I rode and ran yesterday, did not sleep enough, and woke up still sore and achy. I thought about not going to Masters swim practice and staying in bed, because not sleeping enough is counter-productive to getting faster, but since I was awake anyway...
The swim was rough, but basically just softened me up and spit me back out in preparation for my run.
I had plotted a new (to me) 10 mile lollipop loop, up to the lake, around the lake and back. However, I vastly underestimated 1. the fact that running UP to the lake means running UP, 2. that we are in the middle of a heat wave and 3. that if I felt like shit at 7:45, I was probably going to still feel like shit at 10:45 after swimming 3850y.
I was dripping sweat from my scalp and my eyelids and the trail just kept going up and up and up. I kept trudging along, shuffling, barely walking up, spraying sweat everywhere. People were staring: ‘why is that girl so red? and wet?’ Flies circled me like vultures. Which is really what kept me moving, whenever I stopped they would land, wondering if I was dead yet.
By the time I got to the lake, going around it seemed like a really bad idea. So, I only did the stem of the lollipop. Definitely the right choice.
By the time I got back to the car, I was weaving across the road. Walking the 50m to the car, I couldn’t keep a straight line. I ate all the gel and water I had in the car, but couldn’t keep down a powerbar because I was too messed up. So I drove the 1/2 mile to the liquor store (after sitting in the road for a little while) and drank 24 oz of Gatorade in 5 minutes and then waited until my vision pulled itself together to drive home.
Obviously, we are considering the weekend a success.
Sunday, June 28, 2009