Living an EXTRAordinary Life

For the last month or so, at the house we currently live in, I’ve been complaining to Matt that the water is “not right”.  I hadn’t taken a very good shower in a long time, because I kept being unable to moderate the water temperature.  I was either freezing or scalding myself.  Matt claimed that it was just me, that nothing was wrong. I threatened to turn the hot water tank temperature down.

One day, Matt says to me “I used practically all hot water and the shower still wasn’t hot”.  We both took a few showers like that, until last weekend, Matt went to check the hot water heater.  He came up from checking on it and he says to me “Hey, you turned that down way too much, it was on warm.  I changed it to medium” or whatever.

Um, I never actually did that.  Really.  I know sometimes my memory isn’t as sharp as it used to be, but I can definitely assure you all that I never got around to checking the temperature of the tank.  So tell me … if it wasn’t me, and it wasn’t Matt and cats don’t have opposable thumbs and therefore cannot do it … who did?

Last Friday, we closed on our new house.   During the inspection, we were told that a GFI switch doesn’t work and we couldn’t figure out the basements heater, but we tried out the doorbell.  And the ring is quite unique … and very long.  So on Friday, my in-laws came with their truck and took us to IKEA for the furniture we wanted.

We were there putting stuff together, when my brother and sister-in-law show up with our nephews (and baby niece).  During the evening, we discovered that the GFI DOES work and Matt figured out how to work the heater.  However, Matt was entertaining our older nephew and told him to check out the doorbell.  Guess what?  The doorbell didn’t work.  And no-one knows why.  We tried turning on all the light switches (there are at least a million in the house) to see if that mattered and it didn’t seem to.

I know its coincidence, but I am blaming the same entity for both pranks.  He or she can stop now.  Thank you.

Although I am not running at this time, running is never far from me. My husband is a runner, and I have many friends who run as well. I also meet people frequently who are runners. And there are some themes to the thoughts that I notice that these runners have. I wanted to discuss that ….

The first is the whole notion of not being a real runner? What makes a person a real runner? A real runner runs. They run a few days a week or more. It’s important to them. They miss it when they don’t. They run even if the weather is not perfect (sometimes). They buy running shoes and technical fabrics. They are out there … running. Doesn’t have to be fast. Doesn’t have to be steady … you can still be a runner and take walk breaks. You are also a real runner even if you don’t participate in races. REAL RUNNERS RUN. That is it. Simple and truthful. Don’t confuse yourself with an elite.  An elite runner is a professional, and most people cannot attain the crazy level of training (and low body fat) that they have.

Another refrain us runners say a lot is “I’m just doing the half”.  WTF?  What do you mean JUST??? That is 13.1 freaking miles my friend!  That is NOT a small accomplishment.  How many people can do that?  How many people even try?

Sure, I understand how it feels.  You have a few half-marathons under your belt and you think you can do more.  So you train hard and complete a 30K or a marathon (42K).    And it was awesome, it was fun and it was also torture.  You get addicted and want to do more.

But then you don’t feel up to the full distance and so you decide to run halfs for a while.  So you feel like a failure.  Trust me, I know.  But I can also tell you that the many times I have finished a half marathon, while my husband finishes his full, that I am so happy that I “just did the half”.  I have my medal, my water, my post run fuel, my flip-flops and I am done running. I am always so happy that I don’t have double the distance to do.

Half-marathon distance is a perfect distance in my opinion.  But I think the word “half” is what is tripping us up and making us all not feel good enough when we complete one.  Making us explain that we “can” do a full.  So I propose changing the name.  And mini-marathon is even worse, more “degrading” that half.  I propose we call them 21Ks.  Now doesn’t that sound nice.

As humans, and especially as runners, we all tend to be hard on ourselves.  There is no need for such foolishness.  I would even bet that the majority of runners are driven in their personal lives as well.  No need.  There is more to life than being our own harsh critic.

So just go out there and run your 1 mile or your 20 miles.  Run it fast or slow.  Include walking intervals or not.  You ARE a runner, and you are damn good at it and should be PROUD.

Chaos. That is my life lately. Maybe nobody else thinks it is, maybe its just me, but I have just been running around, making phone calls, doing stuff. And since nobody offered to be my personal secretary, well, then I had to deal with all of this myself.

As far as the move goes, Matt & I are rolling along on the long to-do list. We have selected a painter, bought living room furniture to be delivered the day before move-in day, put a pool table on layaway and picked out the rest of the furniture that we will buy as soon as we close. We did end up picking stuff at IKEA, but our cars won’t hold a lot and there was no sense in having it delivered HERE and then moved again, so we’ll go out at a later time. We also just accepted the fact the we have to build bookcases. I was also quite surprised to see how expensive dining room sets are. I knew they weren’t cheap, but what we saw, besides IKEA was quite heart attack inducing.

There is still a lot to do around here. Still some projects at the house we need to find someone to do. I haven’t made any phone calls this week, except for “one” which turned out to me many to the same place. Yesterday, I spent my whole afternoon with one company. See, there was incorrect information on two of my credit reports. The address I never lived at didn’t bother me much, but the collection charge did. My mistake was trying to have the collection agency take care of it for me. After three, no four, days of talking to different people and talking to about 10 different people and hearing “You know this isn’t your charge, right?” I was ready to explode. YES! I KNOW it’s not mine, but its on my credit report people and holding up my mortgage, grrr. After talking to the very last person yesterday, I was told to call the credit bureau (Experian). Now, this sounds pretty logical right? Well, except that they won’t talk to you unless you have a “report number” and I didn’t have one because I ordered mine online. Finally someone yesterday shows me where to find it. It is deeply buried in the interface. Tell me what sense does that make, considering you need that number just for a general inquiry?

Anyway, after I had that number, Experian was most helpful. The person I talked to there asked if she minded if she put me on hold. That was how I spent my entire afternoon. I didn’t care again. She called the collection agency herself and got confirmation that it wasn’t mine and promised it would be removed in 48-72 hours. This morning, I received the e-mail that said the information was deleted! That was even faster than Equifax, who, when I called for the collection account number I needed, asked what was up and filed the dispute and took care of it for me. I received that confirmation on Thursday.

So while I will say that collection agencies are not necessarily evil, and the people working for them are not evil, they are just doing their job, I will say that they just don’t do it very well. If you are ever in this situation, go straight to the credit bureaus. Learn from my mistake.

So this week was crazy. Monday was the first contact with the collection agency and that took the morning and then we went furniture shopping. Tuesday, I had a vet appointment. Wednesday, an appointment with my neurologist/headache specialist and yesterday, the deal above. Running, running, running. I thought I quit running.

The neurologist told me that I have migraines due to chemical imbalances in the brain. Oh lovely. Sometimes they are helped with anti-depressants, but not the one I’m on. But he didn’t change that.

I’m on a new “retrain my brain” to work regimen. I need to take my medicine right away, not wait to see if it goes away. I need to tweak my supplements and exercise (even walking, it doesn’t have to be intense, high impact every day) even on migraine days. On migraine days, keep it to 30 minutes and take it down a notch. So instead of high-speed walking of 1 mile in 15 minutes, I say, do 20 minutes or more per mile. I am to be on a regular sleep schedule … nice one, doc, I’ve been trying to do that for YEARS ha ha … and eating schedule. That I can handle.

This weekend should be nice. I won’t have the collection thing hanging over me anymore. We are going to be home on Saturday, doing things, although Matt will go running. And on Sunday, we are going to see our girl Kayla at college and take her to dinner and a movie. It’s always nice hanging out with Kayla.

I have more to say, but I’ll save that for another post. Thanks for reading!