Sunday 20 January 2008

Squash and postponed triathlon

Last Thursday night I played squash with Murali. I was so organised. I had my racket out on the kitchen bench, ready to go. I got my gear together, packed my contact lenses, made sure I had my knee bandage and headed out the door - minus squash racket. When I got to the court I changed, hired a racket, and headed out to play - minus contacts and knee bandage. This week I'm just going to leave it all to chance and see what happens.

We had a much better game this week. The two of us managed to hit the ball more often. It was our typical epic contest, being decided in five. This time Murali won. He got quite excited early on as he won two games in a row. He claims it's the first time he's managed that. I'm taking his word for it as I haven't been paying that kind of attention to our results. I'm not looking forward to the day that he wipes me out in three. I'm going to have to hit my brother-in-law up for some coaching to make sure that I delay that day as long as possible.

On the triathlon front, I've decided to postpone my triathlon debut. I'm not going to enter the one I've been training for. I've managed to get myself into quite a state over riding my bicycle. I couldn't sleep on Thursday night because I was so worried about going to the cycling training on Friday morning. I was ok about the whole thing the day before, even after falling off, but then I had time to think about what happened. I fell off because I hadn't coped with the steep driveway. I realised that there were plenty of situations out there when I didn't cope very well (I'm a nervous bike rider) and so there were lots of times when I would be in danger of falling off. I figure I have to build up my general riding skills before I go riding in bunches on the road. At the moment I'm a danger to myself and to anyone unlucky enough to be riding anywhere near me.

It was really hard to tell people that I was going to pull the pin on this triathlon. I was grumpy as anything at work on Friday. Mind you, that might have been the broken night's sleep rather than the triathlon decision.

I ended up not exercising on Friday (I skipped cycling training) or Saturday (it rained). I went for a 4 km walk with Alex today and then to brunch with the running girls. I'll get back into it properly this week.

**Edit**

My mum's back in hospital. She's not been well. She kept saying she thought she'd be better than she was. We all reassured her by telling her that she was recovering from major surgery and that it would take time. Even her doctor, who is wonderful, told her that. Anyway, last week she saw her doctor again and was taken straight to hospital. She has fluid on her lungs. They are trying to determine the cause at the moment. She's in a queue for a test that will examine her new heart valve to see if it's leaking. Hopefully that will happen in the next couple of days. If her heart valve is the problem then she will have to have the operation all over again. That's the worst case scenario. Needless to say, we're all hoping that's not the case.

I'm a great believer in the power of positive thinking. If you have good thoughts you can send her way, then I'm sure they will help her recovery. Those of you who pray - we'd really appreciate your prayers at this time.

6 comments:

Kathryn said...

Hope your mum is fine and doesn't need the op.

I fully sympathise with being a nervous bike rider (since my bike is gathering dust in the hallway).

jojo said...

..im definitely sending good thoughts your way..
..as to squash...try to hog the 'T', and dont rush your shots..you usually have a lot more time to hit the ball than you realise... its all about length..either good deep shots..or little drop shots rather than the in between length.. oh and watch your opponent(the ball) as he hits it..next time your in melbs..let me know..and ill take you on the court and give you some tips

Anonymous said...

Plenty of good thoughts here, hope your Mum comes good soon.

Don't stress about postponing that Tri, better you gain some confidence on the bike rather than rushing in and having a bad experience that puts you off.

MorseyRuns said...

I am sending out some positive vibes to Mum- hope she gets better soon. And don't beat yourself up about the triathlon- there is no great rush and if you aren't ready then you will just hate it anyway.

Kathy said...

Just a quick note .. thanks for the positive thoughts for Mum. She's home from hospital! I don't have all the details yet as she was too busy phoning everyone to tell them she was home to fill me in.

I'm feeling better about my tri decision too. Not nearly as grumpy!

Andrew(ajh) said...

Kathy, hope your mum's diagnosis is positive, plenty of positive thoughts coming from this direction too!

Don't stress about the postponement of the tri. If you're not feeling ready it is the right thing to do. I hope it wasn't my story that put you off.