Brrrr! It is in the low 40s here this morning & supposed to hit the 30s tonight. I don't ever remember it being this cold for a Memorial Day weekend. We're not supposed to get out of the 50s today and I don't think it is even going to hit the 70s until next week. If it isn't too windy, I'm going to burn this weekend. I haven't been out in the woods all week and it will be nice to get some work done on that front. Fred is looking to rent a lift for the weekend to get some of his projects done. Hopefully we can get it for the long holiday weekend and just pay for one day's rental. I think most of those projects won't involve me though.

My new goal is to do one thing a day that is strictly related to my fitness. Working around the yard and farm is good on many fronts, but it doesn't give me the feeling that I'm doing something just for me. I'm seriously considering starting a duathlon plan to give me some structured training. I did more reading last night on coronary artery disease and as tempting as it might be to try and go harder, the risk is far greater than any rewards I could get, so definitely not worth it. I'm going to play around with pushing to the point of pain, but I won't cross the line. I really think that just having some structure will do good things for me mentally.

All is well with the world. I can go where I want on BT again. :)

Shutters are finished and hung!  Fred needs to put some facia or sofit (or whatever that stuff is called on the underside of the roof)  around the back porch and the house will be done! :)  I bought a few more flowers yesterday, but didn't get them all in. It's probably too wet to do it today.

I have let my new cats out a couple of times since they've been here and Harvey likes to take off running in the direction of the busy road that we live on.  He also won't listen and runs from me when I go near him.  Not good.  Yesterday I bought a harness for him because I love to have him out with me when I'm hanging around the house and he's always in the house wanting to come out.  I expected a really ugly situation, but it actually went very well.  Harvey very patiently tolerated me trying to figure out how the harness went on his body.  When I let him out, he immediately took off running and was quite startled when he reached the end of the leash.  He did this 3 times, then laid down in the grass and looked at me.  We did this a few times and he is finally getting the hang of limits.  We were able to do a little walking in the yard, but it's not like walking a dog, you have to be very patient and go where he wants to go or he just lies down and won't move.  Niblet wasn't a problem.  He is happy anywhere.  I put the harness on him and he was happily sitting on the porch chasing bugs. :)

Think I"ll pretty much stay inside today.  I really need to find something to spark a bit of motivation on the eating front.  I have finally backed off the sweets, but my eating is on the verge of "out of control"  It seems like I'm hungry all of the time and I know it's in my head.  I think organized workouts will help the situation.  I always feel better mentally after a workout.  So I guess that's where I'll start.  I'll do some sort of basement workout this morning and see if I can't get a new streak going.

Feeling awesome after the bike ride.  New streak has begun!

Last day on the shutters!  Painter is finished and I will finish up the shutters this morning, then go get some flowers to finish the front flower bed.  I'll try to get mowing done this afternoon before the storms head in. Then I'm going to sit my butt down and relax. ;) 

Clearly, I'm the only one who hasn't figured out how to inspire.  Will take some time tonight to sit down and figure it out.  I really liked it better when I could push a button and it took me where I wanted to go. Sigh.

Painter has finished everything except my porch railings.  I spent yesterday painting furniture and shutters.  Scraping and painting louvered shutters are a pain in my butt!  I have two completely finished, two that need one more coat of paint, and four that still need to be scraped and painted.  Hopefully, I can get them finished today and get the furniture back on the porch.  I have an little cafe table and two chairs that were really sad looking, but I gave the legs a fresh coat of black paint and sprayed the tabletop with this textured paint that turned out really nice.  I considered painting the seats of the chairs, which are a plastic wicker-looking weave, but I was afraid it would look tacky, so I left them alone and bought some cushions to cover them up.  Bought a new rocker at Walmart and painted it red, so now we have a pair for the porch.  Can't wait to get them all in place and actually find time to sit in them! :)

Ended up feeling pretty decent yesterday afternoon.  We had lunch with my mom, s-dad and brother, then went to the cemetery to put flags on veterans graves.  Had to believe that Memorial Day weekend is coming up already.  Registered this morning to volunteer for Peletonia and Tour de Cure weekends.  Haven't selected a slot yet, but decided since I can't ride, I may as well get my butt out there and support the causes.

I'm in a real mental funk right now and I'm not sure how to pull myself out of it.  I'm hoping if I just keep doing something, I'll figure out a way to get my head in a better place.  I feel like there is so little I can do anymore and its frustrating to want to get out and do things but not having my body cooperate.  I also wonder if my limitations are real or if I've created more in my head than is really there.  It's a tough situation and I'm not sure how to handle it.

Still having trouble making any comments on other's blogs.  I can hit the reply button, but can't actually post anywhere. I did finally find friends under the community tab, so I guess that's progress, huh?

Need to snap out of this self pity thing I've got going, but I'm really frustrated this morning.  It just amazes me how little my body can tolerate these days.  I was up several times during the night because my legs and back hurt so much.   My massage lady thinks that something going on with my right foot is causing some sort of imbalance and making my entire left side hurt.  Guess I'll go talk to the doctor.  Seems like I have to bring out the serious drugs more and more and I don't like going in the direction of doing less and medicating more.  I want to be an active, older adult.  Not someone who sits around the house all day watching tv and thinking about what's wrong - which will only make the bad stuff more intense.

I haven't quite figured out how to reply to inspires or how to find friends on the new BT.  Yes, as Laura predicted, I'm less than thrilled with the new look.  Don't know that I'm willing to put in the effort to figure it all out since I'm not here so much anymore.

Had a really fabulous day with our Licking Couty group at the Susan Komen race for a cure.  Really fun walking down the streets of downtown Columbus.  Out of our group of around 20, only 3 of us did the 5k.  The rest either did the 1 mile walk or just hung around the celebration area.  It was a really cool course snaking through downtown with entertainment on almost every corner.  One musician had a sign that said he lost his wife to breast cancer 6 months ago.  There were so many touching and inspirational people.  Doing this event reminded me why I love racing so much.  You just can't get that kind of energy out on the bike path on a daily basis. 

We had a tailgate before and after the walk.  There was an absolute ton of delicious food.  Someone make cinnamon sugar coated tortilla chips with a fruit salsa. It was yummy! I discovered that the new Blue Moon seasonal beer goes very well with frosted sugar cookies.  Really.must.stop.eating.cookies.  :)