What a Drag

This week has really been sucky! The bitch of it is, that nothing really happened that I can definitely blame it on. No one definitive shining moment that reared it's ugly head and said "This week I will make you feel like crap and throw your new lifestyle into a tail spin!" My work is uninspiring, my house is a disaster, my sex life is pretty much a bust and I just feel blah. Blah, blah, blah, blah. It could be a case of the Mondays, but it's Thursday, so I doubt that's it.
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I am two months into my new life as a healthy person and it seems like the honeymoon is over. I have stuck with things and kept moving forward, but I feel like things are just dragging. Wait a sec! Now that I think about it, I do know why things have been dragging.

I have been riding my bike to work for the last month or so and really logging some serious fitness minutes. I would even ride the bike on my lunch just to get the blood going from sitting on my ass creating truck loads of ad drivel for people to ignore. It really clears the cobwebs and wakes me up for the rest of the day.

About a week ago the wind started kicking up and really creating some resistance for me. I pushed through it though and got a good workout in the process, but it seemed like my legs were getting more and more sore. It also seemed like I was peddling harder and harder but not going any faster. Wind or no wind the bike rides all of the sudden started kicking my ass. This went on for several days and I just kept getting beat down and tired.

Last Thursday, I packed up what little brain cells I had left by the end of the day started to head for home. When the whistle blows I am seriously like Fred Flintstone trying to get home to his smokin' hot wife. I must LOOK like a cartoon character for sure. Feet spinning in place until they finally catch and I leave hairpins flying through the air as I bolt down the street for home.

So as I started to get on my bike for the trip home, I noticed there was something kind different about how the bike was rolling. I stopped and got off, lifted up the frame and gave the rear wheel a Price Is Right style spin. Sure enough my worst fears had been confirmed. It didn't land on the $1 mark. As a matter of fact it didn't land anywhere. My rear wheel had been dragging on the brakes this entire time! It wasn't the wind it was the fact that my fat ass warped the rim so badly that it no longer moved freely. I was basically dragging my self down the road everyday! The tire rolled but I had to force it. No freakin' wonder I felt as beaten as cake batter. No showcase showdown for me! How in the hell did I miss this?

So now I was faced with the decision of "Do I puss out and call my wife to come get me," or "Do I go on knowing that this will be a drag (literally)." I choose the latter. Now, you thought I had a hard time when I didn't know there was something wrong, let me tell you knowing is worse. At least when I didn't know, my mind wasn't constantly focused on it. It was blaming the wind for Pete's sake.

Every crank of that gear was torture for nearly 5 miles. I felt like a tugboat dragging the Titanic (before the ice burg) with it's anchor down. I must have been quite a site to the Roadies, Joggers and Dog Walkers. The up side was the work out, the downside was that my bike was officially busted and so was my spirit. I swear I have a hernia now.

Red faced and dripping sweat, I got home and parked the bike with the notion that I would take it in and have it overhauled. That was a week ago and I am no closer to having it fixed. The crappy part is that It has created this ripple effect in my routine and killed my buzz! I had a great buzz going too. Like happy-drunken-woo-girl buzz.

My time management skills have not been the best and I have this problem with over committing my self to all kinds of stuff I don't need to do ( I will save that analysis for another blog). I have not made the time to take the bike in or find an alternate form of exercise. Notice I said I didn't MAKE the time. I didn't say I don't HAVE the time.

Finding an alternative is gonna be the key to getting my buzz back though. The truth of the matter is that the weather is changing and the days are getting shorter. Soon I won't be able to ride my bike at all.

I guess the thing that I learned most from this whole ordeal is to take the time to figure it out when you feel like something is wrong. Weather it's your bike dragging or your ass. Ignoring the problem and continuing to drag it around with you only makes you tired, frustrated and ready to give up.

Isn't that how I got here in the first place.