ice, ice baby…

I feel like I have an excuse for everything violin related at the moment. Oh I was sick for three days. My fingers got smashed. And now I think I’ve bruised one of my fingers. It sounds small, but I can tell you from experience it’s not a lot of fun. I got halfway through one of my pieces Saturday and started noticing my second finger was not happy when it touched the violin. Currently I’m typing this with one hand while icing the offending finger. I thought it was getting better yesterday and re-scheduled my lesson from today to Tuesday morning. Now, well the stupid finger hurts more now than it did all day yesterday. It’s super sensitive every time I touch something or even brush it against anything. I’m tired of making excuses for myself. It has overshadowed my awesome 20 mile bike ride from Sunday, and my first attempt at mile repeats this morning (and you will think I’m crazy for saying I enjoyed them despite how hard they are!). It stinks that this just keeps happening right when things are going really well with my lessons. Yet again I have had to stop playing. Frankly it’s just as bad if not worse than not being able to run. I swear I’m not accident prone (although my teacher my argue with that one). So, it looks like I might be canceling my lesson, which stinks! I’ll just need to work on getting everything else on the to do list done…

Catching up

Um, so it’s been a while since I’ve written. Yeah, sorry about that. Things have been a little crazy…

• The front window in my bedroom is being replaced. I’m currently sleeping in one room, and getting everything I need out of my room. Tuesday I moved furniture since they ordered the wrong type of window, which can’t be returned so that I would have access to a window that does open & close in case of an emergency. Then they decided to trim out the other window the same as the new and I had to move things all over again…
• The room I’m sleep in doesn’t have a 3 prong grounded outlet for my computer. I do have internet, which is more than I can say for my bedroom when I climb over everything to plug it in (I have a powerbook G4 laptop) and actually try to get to what I need to get to done. So, I either have internet, or a plug…
• I was helping my mom trim our neighbors tree on Thursday. It’s growing into the roof of our house and has a vine growing up that’s trying to take over. I pulled the tree over to the window so she could trim it, and she proceed to smash 3 of my left fingers while trying to get to a branch. She ran off to get ice leaving me stuck (my shirt had gotten caught in the window, and I could get the grabber I was using out of the tree) with ants climbing all over my right arm. So now I have three smashed fingers and some ant bites…
• I still have about 20 pages of music to memorize. My teacher thinks it’s great that I have more time to practice except that I had to move furniture all day on Tuesday, and now have 3 smashed fingers that still bother me when I play. I think out of the 20 pages I have 4 memorized. This is going to take a while…

The good news is that I can run again!! And I’m pretty excited to go biking with some friends Sunday morning. I got my bike checked out, fixed, and adjusted (the seat was about an inch too high) during the week. Plus I went and played with shoes at the Big Peach Running Co Thursday morning, and have some awesome new bath salts for post long run soaks! Lots to share once I get everything working. Now I just need the painters to come do their job so my room can have blinds and curtains again… Fingers crossed for Tuesday!

germs, germs, and more germs

 I feel like I am always saying I’m sick. It all started a week before the 2009 Nike Women’s Marathon. Enter cold number one. 8 months later I am still battling germs. I feel like I’ve had at least one cold a month. It just never stops. Part of the problem is probably the fact that my students walk in for their violin lesson and then cough all over me. Despite the large can of Lysol that sits in my studio the germs just keep winning. Maybe it’s my body’s way of telling me it’s time to slow down.

When I walked out of the house yesterday I had every intention of doing my 10 mile long run. After 2 1/2 miles I knew that was never going to happen. I felt like I couldn’t breathe, so I turned right and headed home. While there were lots of good things about the 5 mile run, but I was worried I was getting sick again. I wish I had realized before I left the house. I spent the rest of the morning coughing, which my stomach wasn’t able to handle, and then a possible fever settled in. Not what I wanted. It meant taking time off from both running and my violin. My arms felt like they were made out of lead.

The good news is that after napping all morning I’m finally starting to feel better. No more fever, and no more coughing. I’m hoping that I can join the group for our 3 mile run Saturday. I’m ready to run again! Now I just need to get through 3 violin lessons this afternoon…