leah oppenheimer

An open letter to UConn students

2012-01-31T23:37:00.000-05:00

This probably applies to people outside of UConn.

Actually, it definitely does. But because I'm at UConn and I'm witnessing this on a daily basis, I'll address it here. Because you have to deal with problems at home before you can deal with them abroad, right?

Tell that to our government.

Anyways, my message to UConn: there is a SERIOUS problem with laziness. There are other problems as well, such as improper use of grammar, a lack of knowledge about anywhere outside of the U.S., and a strong belief that the food at the Union is culinary mastery. But I digress. Let's start with this: first of all, I realize that the doors to the library were likely built by engineers wearing beer goggles (and likely drinking a martini at the same time). That, however, is NOT an excuse to use the handicap button to open the doors automatically.

Obviously, this is addressed to people with two working arms and legs. People who actually ARE handicapped have my blessings.

My point is, despite how awkwardly built the doors at the library are, it is simply ridiculous for people to being using the handicap button to open them. Whatever epic study session you are about it tackle, it doesn't matter. I, and many other people wondering who could possibly be so lazy, have full faith in the ability to open a door. Frankly, otherwise perfectly fine people who use those buttons just look stupid. It's such an obvious waste of energy on such a mundane, simple task. But it can't just be the unfortunate design of those particular doors. You can bet that any handicap button on campus connected to any doors is getting way more action than is any frat boy on a Saturday night.

Other examples of pure laziness at UConn:

The roommate of a friend of mine offhandedly mentioned a few evenings ago that her future roommates would be driving to campus next semester from their new apartment, which is technically off-campus housing but is actually right next to Buckley and the Arts complex. Basically, this means driving about a quarter of a mile to the parking lot, driving double that amount while looking for a parking space, and then walking 10 minutes from the parking lot to an academic building. In the direction of their apartment.
A few days ago, I watched two girls in the Co-op take the elevator from the second floor to the first. Yes, going down, not up, one flight. No crutches, wheelchairs, or otherwise acceptable excuses.
I didn't actually see this one, but a friend told me about it. Two girls, who lived on the north side of campus, in either North or Northwest, decided that the walk to the gym was just too much for them, so they drove there. On a sunny, 60 degree spring day. This might be where I'm too much of a hippie to be commentating on this, because the idea of running inside when it's beautiful out seems absurd to me. But even worse, to drive all of a quarter of a mile to the gym on a lovely day and then go running inside for a half hour? It's like people actually want S.A.D., global warming, and a waste of gas money. Go figure.

I realize that most of this plea for reformation is going to reach dead ears, if even read at all. So, I'm going to appeal to one of the former top party schools in the nation this way: if you don't climb the tree, you will never have your piña colada.

A fair warning ...

2012-01-07T14:53:00.001-05:00

… to all those who get motion sickness, migraine, or otherwise don’t do well with emotions. Stop reading.

For everyone else, a lesson learned: Let moments happen. I’ve just spent the past five months, with little exception (except for maybe the time I ate fritjes met mayo at 4:30 AM), trying to keep this moment from happening: going home. I just had the time of my life in a country full of dairy-guzzling tall people. I’ve made some close friends, I’ve fallen off my bike (only once), I’ve cooked, I’ve studied (maybe not enough), I’ve … acquired some interesting souvenirs. I’ve done quite a bit in five months, and each moment was special. I knew I would have to go home eventually, but it seemed so far in the distance, like I didn’t have to worry about it. So I didn’t. And now I’m sitting on the plane, headed home, and it’s weird. My life for the past five months became so natural. My number one rule in traveling is not to get attached, and I did the exact opposite this time. I got attached. Attached enough to feel deeply shaken knowing that next semester, I’ll be in Storrs, not Maastricht. I’ll live down the hall from my new roommate, not across the street from T, L, and Mathieu Hermans. I’ll understand all surrounding conversations (except for the engineering ones), and I won’t struggle to order a coffee while masking my accent. Each moment was amazing, and I spent the past week trying to avoid the reality that I would be climbing into an airplane to head home.

So, after spending five months trying to hang on to moments and not to let this one arrive, I’ve been sitting on the plane for about four hours already, chasing the sun. And not just the sun - I’ve had a four hour (or maybe two and a half, I may have watched “Ice Age 3” as soon as we took off) sunset so far, and it’s only getting deeper. I spent five months trying to avoid an incredibly hard moment. But guess what? This moment has turned out to be a really beautiful, rich combination of deep red, yellow, and navy blue. Maybe this isn’t so terrible.

Let the moments happen. The unwanted ones can actually be quite nice.

Or they might not be. But at least give it a shot. For all of you who didn’t heed my warning, go have a shot of something.

Sólin skín á Íslandi

2012-01-05T07:59:00.000-05:00

This might be the first time in the history of my young, amateur blogging career that I've actually written about a place that I haven't yet left. I'm sitting in a little no-name cafe that was recommended to me last night, and drinking the only good espresso I've ever had outside of the Vahle household. As far as Reykjavik goes? This is a cute city. Like REALLY cute. Not "nice" with some "drawbacks" like London or Brussels. This place is just super cute. The city is tiny, full of brightly colored houses, little cafes, and boutique-y stores, and is surrounded by water and beautiful glaciers.

Some things about Iceland:

11:15 AM sunrises
Dried fish snacks
Yummy bread
Ice (yes, seriously)
Girls walking in heels on said ice
Me wearing boots and falling on said ice
Glacial landscapes
Blond hair
Mind-blowing language

On Icelandic

At the risk of sounding a bit show-offy, no language has ever baffled my mind like the one I've been listening to for the past 48 hours. It's a lot of "rrrrr" and "th", much like the way the Spanish speak. Actually, from a distance, it doesn't sound that different from the Spanish spoken in Andalucía. Regardless, for a Germanic language, it is completely incomprehensible to me. The good news is, it's a happy sounding language, so it at least makes good background noise. In other news, despite what I've said about the Dutch and their talents in English, I have to concede that the Icelandic have them beat. The level of English spoken here, including accent, was incredibly impressive. Even the grandfather who was trying to help me find the perfect watch at a store spoke perfect English. Go Iceland.

"Remember that time I slipped on the ice and we landed in a gay bar?"
During my little journey around the city yesterday, I got a bit disoriented and had my map laid out on top of a trashcan when two girls, one American and one Icelandic, offered to tow me back to the hostel, where I told them I was headed to. It turns out that the American girl was staying there as well, so they invited me to get drinks and dinner with them. We ended up having some excellent organic beer at the hostel bar, followed by burgers and not-so-excellent white wine at a cafe-bar-type place. On our way back, after Asta (Icelandic) left us to go home, Lydia (American) and I were walking, and she promptly fell. Not because of the ice, but because her shoe laces got caught. After laughing it off and re-tying shoes, we kept walking ... and landed in a gay bar, which we only discovered after seeing "Homo Sweet Homo" on the wall and the rainbow-colored American dollar bills hanging above the bar. The one comment I have to make is that Icelandic style does not change much from inside of the gay bar to outside of the gay bar, as it tends to in the U.S. Everyone just dresses well all the time. And very funky, in a sort of Brooklyn-San Fran-Siberia way. Another city where I look like a total dork. Yiha.

Other things about Reykjavik:

Despite what common sense tells you, the snow control isn't great and the streets are still pretty icy in the winter.
Don't wear a snowsuit and hiking boots. That will scream tourist even louder than your attempt to pronounce the cute sounds that are found in the Icelandic language.
Wool stuff. Wear it.
According to Asta, "you can never find good food and good coffee in the same place."
Despite what any locals will tell you, you can easily walk most of the city. For some reason, the Icelandic don't like to walk.

Aaaaand posted! From Keflavik Airport. I've just made personal history on my blog. Now homeward bound!

Feiertage in Deutschland

2012-01-03T16:53:00.002-05:00

I’m officially off of the European mainland, headed for Reykjavik (fact: I still have to look up that word every time I write it, I have no idea how to spell it). In 48 hours, I’ll be on an airplane headed back to the USA for the first time since the middle of August. I’ve been lucky enough to spend the past twelve days with T’s family in Kassel for Christmas and New Years. Being my first Christmas, and my first extended time in Germany, it was full of experiences and lessons. Mostly good ones.

1. Don’t ask a German how to pronounce an “R.” Not only can they not explain it, but each neighborhood has a different answer.

2. Sausage. Sausagesausagesausagsausage. Sausage.

3. Repeat no. 2 with whole grain bread, beer, and glüwein.

4. Despite what my dad said in during our road trip in Germany, the “cowboy driving a rocket ship” method is actually moderately effective in arriving on time.

5. Boars are really really really ugly pigs.

6. Moms know best. About everything. Except for hunting, then dad usually knows best.

7. There will always be the girl wearing bright red stilettos, even when hiking up a mountain to watch NYE fireworks.

8. If the instructions are 7 pages for a game that is supposed to take 30 minutes, don’t bother.

9. An egg that was supposed to be sunny side up but got completely cooked through can be called “egg sunny side upside-down.”

10. Life is really good. Particularly if the person sharing the bed with you can’t inadvertently steal the blankets.

In all seriousness, Kassel was really nice. I had my first Christmas, which amounted to a Christmas Market, a church service, a large dinner, cookiescookiescookies, small and often odd presents, and several days of sleeping until 11 AM. This pattern continued through New Years Eve, interrupted by a 6:30 AM wakeup for an introduction to German hunting, a few runs, several trips to the amazing saunas in Kassel, and several rounds of movies and How I Met Your Mother. New Years Eve included a raclette, Feuerzangenbowle, lots of fire crackers and roman candles, and of course, pajamas and board games until 3 PM the next day.

We also spent a day exploring my dad's family history in Grebenau, a little village to the south of Kassel. And when I say little, I really mean a main street and a secondary street. And then coooooows! Moo. Anyways, it was really interesting, especially since T got a cute old lady to help us figure things out a bit.

Anyways, I left Germany this morning and am now in a hostel in Iceland. I arrived too late to see anything cool, but so far it seems icy (please laugh) and small. Sunrise tomorrow is at 11:15 AM, sunset at 3:43 PM. Awesooooome.

London bridge is falling down, falling down ...

2011-12-31T10:25:00.001-05:00

Newsflash: not only is the London bridge quite sturdy and most definitely not falling, but the UK might be the only country with a culinary culture WORSE than that of the Netherlands.

Maybe that's not a fair statement. The "typical" breakfast - toast, egg, beans, sausage, and various juices and teas and coffees is a fantastic hangover cure. The fish and chips is pretty good, though my stomach does not always like when I eat fried food. However, beyond that, I can’t say that anything was particularly spectacular. After living in Spain for a semester and traveling in France, Portugal, Italy, and Morocco, and particularly after being a human vacuum cleaner for my mom’s cooking for the past 21 years, I can say that I have been culinarily spoiled. Horrifically so. And England did not meet my standards at all. Admittedly, the fish and chips were good. But the beers that accompanied were horrible. Really, really awful. Additionally, not a single bartender in all three evenings in London knew how to make a whiskey sour. Slightly shameful. However, this was made up for by the pear cider which I immensely enjoyed, hailing from … Sweden! Next vacation spot, a socialist paradise.

Before heading to London, we spent a night with Michael in Colchester, which is a “very British” town, in T’s words. All we really saw was a castle, which was pretty cool, but I have to admit that SOME of the girls definitely lived up to their stereotype of maaaaybe not wearing enough clothing. We also missed our train. Aside from that, Colchester was pretty nice.

Onto London: the city is a mix of beautiful old buildings, newer buildings, and huge buses. Emphasis on the buses. There are too many of them. We tried renting bikes from Barclay à la Parisian Vélib, but there were simply too many of those huge red buses to comfortably navigate the city. Because London is, without a doubt, the most expensive city I have ever set foot in, we limited our “touristy” activities to a free guided tour, lunch in a pub, walking up and down the Thames, and both London and Tower bridge. My honest opinion? Similar to Brussels, it’s a nice city. Nothing spectacular. In complete honestly, I find the combination of harshly old and new buildings to be particularly ugly. Alone, they are nice. Together, however? It looks weird. Especially with the power plant-y looking area on the southeast bank of the Thames. We also went to a Changing of the Guards ceremony at Buckingham Palace, which, in the words of the five year old standing in front of us, should be called “The SLOW Changing of the Guards” ceremony. He plans to write a letter to the Queen to suggest that. Again, not the most spectacular thing I’ve ever seen.

In conclusion: London is an interesting place with its own issues. A little story about the Stansted airport. After taking a 2.5 hour bus ride from London that should have taken less than 1 hour and 45 minutes, there were three attendants to validate and check bags for something like six Ryan Air flights. And because I am ‘murrcan, I needed to get my visa validated. As if I would pretend to be Canadian or something? Anyways, that took forever. Onto the free whiskey samples in the terminal. That was awesome. I digress. We lined up at our first gate, almost went to Berlin, and then discovered (before the announcement) that our gate had changed to the other end of the terminal. So we booked it. And promptly arrived at our new gate FIRST IN LINE. Byah. As the line grew behind us, it turned more into a mob between the flights to Eindhoven, Poznan, Krakow, and Katowice. The bad news is that no one knew where the lines for anything were. The good news is that three-quarters of the people in the terminal ended up in the right country, if not the right city.

In conclusion-conclusion: London bartenders and brewers need a lot of work. Buildings are gorgeous, ceremonies are a bit boring, there are a lot of frying vats, and I almost got killed crossing the street many times. I think I’ll be back.

Tot ziens, Maastricht

2011-12-25T10:41:00.000-05:00

So, I am done with Maastricht. After an 18 hour cookie-baking and packing frenzy after returning from a trip with T to London (more on that in the next post), I am now in Kassel with T’s family for Christmas and New Years (also to come in a future post).

Onto Maastricht. I guess I’ve spent the past four months blogging about this place (sort of), so I decided my final post should be about my favoritest places in Maastricht, starting with home. Home to some strangely dressed people, some really tall people, a lot of shiny jackets, a really weird dialect, and virtually no culinary culture aside from frying everything (the Netherlands as a whole, not just Maastricht), there were some places that I grew to love and appreciate during my time living there.

Herbenusstraat 182A

My first experience with a lofted bed and living across from a bakery. My lovely, fairly large, really really cold, and pretty old white room became my home for the semester, although I didn’t spend too too much time there until I was well into the depths of hell (aka finals week). My room did, however, see a lovely Thanksgiving dinner, several Bones episodes, many ice cream and dinner dates, a cookie-baking marathon, and the best Saturday and Sunday brunches in Maastricht, courtesy of the amazing Bekkerij Mathieu Hermans. It also saw a small number of panic attacks resulting from too many papers written for Roberta Haar. Also, a nice little shout out to the coolest housemate on earth, and my gluewein-drinking buddy, Kathrin.

Let’s move across the street.

Bekkerij Mathieu Hermans

To anyone who has ever considered living across the street from a bakery, I highly suggest you reconsider unless you have very strong willpower. That smelllllllll ….. oh my. Anyways, apparently Mathieu Hermans is the best bakery in Maastricht - I was told that the Queen has places orders several times. I never quite got the chance to sample everything, but I can say that the vollkorn and 6 grain breads are incredible, as are the vlaii, appelbollen, suikerbollen, and the raisin rolls. I’ve already asked T to bring me as much bread as possible when he comes for a visit in February, and hopefully the texture will still be the same - crusty on the outside, and soft and chewy on the inside. Omnomnomnomnom.

Also, I would like to thank Mathieu Hermans for NOT being open overnight. My drunken self was tempted many times to break in and have a little midnight snack. Additionally, coming home from a party when the bakers had already started working for the next day was the sign that it was really time for bed.

Take Five

My favorite cocktail in the world (and one of the only ones I’ll drink) is a whiskey sour. There is no better way for a bartender to win my heart than to make a really really good one. And I can officially say that I have fallen in love with the bartenders at Take Five (in addition to the baker at Bekkerij Mathieu Hermans and one more below). Ignoring the music that was always a bit too loud, this place was one of the best bars in Maastricht by far. No other words necessary.

Preuverij

The final place on my culinary tour of the best of Maastricht, the Preuverij is an eetcafe around the corner from the Maastricht University Student Services Center. It looks like a pub inside, a bit dark and very cozy, and has some of the best food I had during the entire semester. And CHEAP. Lasagna or chili with bread is no more than 6 euro, and T got a full rack of ribs and fries for 11 euro. Rumors I’ve heard say that the chef is trained as a 5 star chef, but decided that he preferred the atmosphere of a small pub cafe, rather than a fancy restaurant (and it probably goes without saying that he is the third man in Maastricht that I plan on marrying).

UCM

So, despite being on a semester abroad, I actually had to study once in awhile. Weird, right? UCM, academic home of some of the nerdiest hippies I have ever seen, provided me with plenty of opportunities to curl up with some tea and a textbook and read my life away about the horrific methods of American Foreign Policy (for example). In all seriousness, despite not agreeing with some of the teaching methods and set up in the school, I had an amazing time at UCM. The people were all incredibly welcoming, kind and amazing, the professors unyieldingly tough (no names mentioned … ahem … R.H.), and the coffee machine questionable (but caffeine is caffeine). UCM, you will be missed … for the most part.

The little river next to where I went running

I have no idea what this place is called (obviously). It’s just a cute little river than runs alongside a few houses on the road from Maastricht to Kanne. I went running there at least once or twice a week throughout most of the semester, and it’s the nicest place. I don’t have much more to say about it. There was also a really cute house at the bottom of the hill up to the winery that I plan to move into someday. Someday.

The cute old streets where I always got lost

Are we seeing a pattern here? I don’t remember the names of anything. Maastricht is a pretty old city, and having survived the war, much of the old stuff is still intact. The city is full of cute old cobblestone streets filled with little pubs, cafes, and boutiques. They’re all just cute cute cute. And those heavy bikes are really good for surviving a trip over the cobbles.

The Villa

I have to give the Villa a small shout out. One of the coziest apartments I set foot in since August, we had many dinners and Gossip Girl nights rolled up in blankets in the living room. Much love to everyone there and elsewhere who made the past four months so nice.

Anyways, I suppose that defines my past four months in Maastricht. They have been amazing, occasionally frustrating, enlightening, a bit cold, chocolately, and every other adjective. Maastricht, ik hou van jou.

A Very Dutch Thanksgiving

2011-11-25T05:41:00.001-05:00

For anyone who is interested in how to do a Thanksgiving dinner in the lowlands.

One week before: Run around the entire city trying to find somewhere to buy a turkey (preferably dead first). Get crazy looks from the high schoolers at Albert Heijn who are wondering what the hell one does with an entire bird. Finally go to the high-scale butcher and timidly ask “Do you sell turkeys?” while trying not to sound like too much of an American idiot. Balk at the response: “Of course we do!” Just like nothing.

Try to figure out where to find sweet potatoes and butternut squash. Spend twenty minutes with German friends trying to describe what sweet potato and butternut squash is. Settle on “an orange potato” and “a squash with ladylike curves.” Explain that a squash is not just an eggplant and a zucchini. And yes, a pumpkin is a type of squash. Go to high-scale fruit and vegetable store on the other side of the Maas and again, get the “Well, of course we sell those!” response. Sigh and roll eyes simultaneously. Look at the price tags and roll eyes again.

Send out an email recruiting all ladies to come drink wine and help me cook before our set dinner time next week. Boys get dish duty.

Three days before: Have a small panic attack about roasting a 12 lb., I mean ... 5 kilo bird. Skype mom, learn about the 45 Minute Roasting Method. Sing a song of praise. Realize that I will need to do some crazy surgery on this bird to get it to roast in 45 minutes. Try to remember Ms. Sonet’s biology lessons from the 9th grade.

Two days before: Small panic attack round two. No roasting pan. How to roast a turkey sans roasting pan? Hmmm ..

Start buying other ingredients for a Very Merry Thanksgiving. Unreasonably large carrots, raisins, pine nuts, butter and the self-assurance of knowing that no one will know if I screw up dinner before no one else has had Thanksgiving before.

One day before: Screw this. Wine and NCIS with T.

Thanksgiving:

Morning: Write War in World Politics paper all morning in an attempt to actually have a nice weekend.

2 PM: Finally suck it up, get dressed, go out, and buy bread, cranberries and spinach. Balk at price of cranberries. Oh wait, they’re Ocean Spray. Imported from New Jersey. How exotic.

2:45 PM: WHY DOESN’T ANY STORE SELL A NORMAL SIZED ROASTING PAN???

3:15 PM: Found an expanding roasting pan. Life is good. This may be the first time my mom gets a hand-me-down from me.

3:30 PM: Cycle back home with a tote bag full of groceries, a roasting pan, and a 12 lb. bird. Try telling me I’m not talented.

4:30 PM: Coffee with T. Take the back bone out of the turkey. Simultaneously.

5:45 PM: Girls show up. Turkey gets named Herbie. Herbie gets dressed.

5:50 PM: Herbie goes into the oven. So long, Herbie.

6:00 - 8:00 PM: Roasted vegetables, spinach with pine nuts and raisins, garlic bread, cranberry sauce. Lots of wine. My room magically rearranges itself. More wine. Need more oven racks. Take Herbie out and poke him several times. He still isn’t done. What happened to 45 minute roasting?

8:05 PM: Bring food out to table. Delivery woman shows up with package from mom. Skype mom, she is ready to kill someone.

8:10 PM: Herbie comes out. T carves Herbie, discovers that deep inside is still raw. WTF 45 minutes? Herbie goes back into the oven.

8:30 PM: Herbie makes his second appearance. Feasting commence.

10:00 PM: Food coma

10:30 PM: Franzi brings out dessert. What a devil.

10:31 PM: Who am I kidding, I can’t turn down cinnamon oranges and vanilla ice cream.

11:00 PM: Holy leftovers.

11:30 PM: Send everyone home. I’m glad I don’t have to go outside.

Midnight: Collapse. Epic food coma.

In other news ...

I realized that being the horrible blogger I am, I never wrote about my time with my parents in Maastricht/Germany/Amsterdam.

Maastricht: Cookies were brought, mommy cooked. Life is so good. Mom and Dad learn to ride bikes, Dutch style.

Germany: The historical tour of Germany. Food included. And beer. Did I mention the food?

Also: Dad goes on a hunt for streuselkuchen. Moderate success.

Amsterdam: 24 hours in the city of debauchery. Life is so good. Dad's birthday is celebrated with beer and apple pie.

España

2011-11-12T08:41:00.001-05:00

My parents just left the Netherlands a few days ago, which means that I am officially two weeks late on updating about Spain. Surprise? Not really. I wish I could say it has to do with the large dent I've been making in my schoolwork, but somehow my body is still in tune with a 14 week semester, so I haven't gotten that sense of ohmygodIneedtogetthisshitdone urgency yet. It'll come. Until then, stories about the trip to Spain that almost didn't happen:

Learning to love Belgian drivers

So the night before we left, Christina and I decided that an 11 AM train to Charleroi would be sufficient to get a 4 PM flight. Which it absolutely should have been. We, however, accidentally watched that train pull away from the platform while chatting about which magazine to buy for the journey. After freaking out for several minutes and then learning that a taxi to Liege would cost 70 euro, we decided that a large latte, some praying, and the 12:00 PM train would have to do the trick. We got onto that train, however, our train got stuck for about 25 minutes at some point (of course it did), thus making our prayers ever more fervent. Anyways, we decided to take a taxi from the Charleroi station to the airport instead of the normal shuttle in order to ensure that we would make the flight. And so began my little spurt of faith in Belgian drivers. Not only did I survive the drive, but we made it to the airport with plenty of time to spare thanks to our driver's promise to "gas it." Needless to say, we arrived in Sevilla with most of our wallets still intact and at this point, we put Christina's scuba-diving lessons to use:

Sevilla

Upon arrival, Christina was immediately introduced to the very anti-German lifestyle of the Spanish in the form of a 15-minute late bus. We did eventually make our way to our lovely host, Melissa's apartment. After dinner and the obligatory playing with the resident puppy (they are ALWAYS puppies, even at 15 years old), we went out, where I heard Spanish spoken with more accents than I have ever imagined: German (surprise), British, Italian, Greek and Finnish. Oddly enough, foreign accents sound sexy even in a foreign language. The two days after, we toured Sevilla, ate a lot, bought chocolate and coats, ate some more, got rained on, dried off, took cold showers (only me, thanks Christina), dried off, had drinks, ate tapas, watched a free flamenco show, spoke in German (surprise), and didn't get tan, unfortunately.

Who on earth buys a winter coat in Sevilla?

Tapatizing

Granada

After several days of 80 degree (25 or so for all of my Euro friends) weather and happiness in Sevilla, we left for more happiness in Granada. After hunting for the (very nice) hostel for awhile, we dropped our stuff off and took a hike up to the most gorgeous and hippie-laden spot on earth: Mirador San Nicolas

We hit up all of my favorite spots, including RECA (home of the infamous octopus incident - of course, this time I got shrimp instead, heads included), "the" Moroccan place, Central (no comments from the peanut gallery, please - we got cheap drinks, almost free), the Moroccan street, the circle bar, and Carmen's house!

We also hit up the Centro de Lenguas Modernas, only to discover that the coffee corner has been replaced by a classroom, and in its place is a coffee machine a la UCM. Shame, CLM, shame.

Madrid

I don't feel much of a need to discuss Madrid since we only spent about 12 hours there, and they really were not that pleasant. However, two things are worth mentioning:

1. Hot showers can solve anything. Really, a hot shower will bring world peace.

2. Ross speaks Dutch:

Vier landen, een week

2011-10-27T13:21:00.000-04:00

For all anglophones, I got four countries under the belt in one week. That includes Holland, but who's counting? And let me be frank and say that I have never been so happy to hear Dutch as I was when I returned from all of those places.

Belgrade, Serbia
Belgrade is an interesting place. Half of it is pretty cute, relatively nice for Eastern Europe, and the other half looks like it's been through hell. Which, in all fairness, it has. For those who were too young at the time to remember (myself included), Belgrade and NATO got into a fight in the 90s. NATO won. This is the result:

Anyways, Belgrade is a cool place. My original plan was to go try to get some thesis research done there. When that didn't work out, we decided to capitalize on the notoriously low prices of Eastern Europe (and I guess boost the economy a bit) with some good old fooding and boozing (note: Rakija is, in fact, very strong. Reminiscent of Dubra, but betterish) and souvenir shopping. Lots and lots of food, not so much money. Life is good. Also, currency conversion in Serbia is a royal pain in the ***. Picture a euro. Got it? Cool, now add two zeros. So every payment was a division sequence. We were, however, not far off from being millionaires. Life is cool.

Brussels, Belgium
So after returning from Serbia on Tuesday night, I decided to give myself a day to recover from the burdens of traveling (the horror!). On Thursday, for whatever reason, I decided that a day trip to Brussels would be nice, also because I would get to see Lukas for lunch, not to mention buying some chocolate and getting harassed by guys trying to get me to come to their restaurants. For the record, Brussels is nice, but it's just a big city. Some nice buildings and areas, but really just a big city. Of course, given my past experiences in Belgium, it would be impossible for me to get through the day without a problem. So, on the way home, my train decided to get stuck for 2.5 hours ... between stations. Belgium, je t'aime. I befriended the guy sitting next to me, mostly because he could translate the various announcements ("Something is wrong with the machine" ... "Twenty minute delay" ... "Does anyone know how trains work?") from French to English for me, and provided some entertainment in between announcements ("Can you give me your name and number? Next time you come to Belgium I will avoid all public transport"). Anyways, said friendship came in handy when his housemate came to pick him up from the station and volunteered to drive me to the Liege station. Belgian drivers ... no comment. Long story short, I made it back to Maas 4 hours later than planned and had a nice evening infusing myself with caffeine and cookies in an attempt to finish my Roberat Haar paper on time. Life.

Aachen, Germany
Two days post-Belgian experience, Tilmann was kind enough to have some level of faith in my track record on Dutch and German public transport and took me on a day trip to Aachen, the German border town close to Maas. None of my pictures from that day are very good, so suffice it to say that Aachen is cute. And it was sunny. We slept in the grass a bit, had good food, walked around, went to see the Dom, ate a lot, and learned to ask for directions in German (only me).

Side note
Because I am really horrible at uploading posts in a relatively normal amount of time, it is now close to two weeks since said trip to Aachen. As I am uploading this, I am also about to start writing about the trip to Spain I just took. Someday I will learn to discipline myself.

España vs. Nederland

2011-10-04T06:39:00.002-04:00

No, this is not about the World Cup match of 2010 (my condolences to Holland, though). I just booked my flights last night with Christina to Spain for the reflection week. Yes, that does mean that I will be staring at my reflection in a nice glass of Spanish wine all week while extending my summer by about two months. I might stare at the reflection of the sun as it sets over the Mediterranean. I also might do some reflecting about how jealous you all are, but that's unlikely.

Anyways, in a form of celebration, I've decided to do a little Spain vs. Holland study in four important categories: daily life, landscape, language, and the ever important culinary culture.

Daily life
So this is a tough one because it's very all-encompassing. But I think I can generalize it into one word: laziness. In that respect, the Dutch are the antithesis of the Spanish. Let's be honest here, the Spanish are lazy. At least the ones in the south are, I know the north is different. But they are really, really lazy. Like Bruno Mars lazy. Which is understandable. If the sun didn't rise until 9 AM in the States, I wouldn't wake up until 10 either. Or have dinner until 10 PM. But the truth is, the sun in Holland rises at around 8 and sets also at around 8 (at least for now). And, particularly when compared to the Spanish, the Dutch are some of the most efficient people I've ever seen. They have a task, they get it done, and they get it done quickly and well. When I went to the post office to send stroopwafels to Ben and Mira in Atlanta, it took 15 minutes, not an hour. The bakery across the street from me has a number ticker on weekends when the line gets too long, rather than relying on the public's decency to hold a place in line. Things just happen quicker in this country. Also, from what I've heard, lunch breaks at office jobs here are confined to 30 minutes, not the three hour siesta in Spain. This also, however, means that the shopping day ends at 6 PM, an unpleasant surprise to those who enjoy some retail therapy after a grueling day of PBL sessions.

Landscape
I think I can sum this one up in one sentence. Yesterday, I ran up to the highest elevation in all of the Netherlands. A grand 100 meters. That's right folks, these Paises Bajos reach a all-time high point of slightly over 300 feet. Picture a football field (the real kind), and then include the sidelines behind the goal posts. Welcome to the Netherlands. Spain, on the other hand, has mountains that still have snow on the top even when it's sweltering at sea level. And gypsy caves. Can't forget those.

Language
Okay, so I'm a bit biased here. I speak Spanish, I don't speak Dutch. That said, I'm going to do this relatively so that I can give Holland some points. First off, I learned to speak Latin American Spanish, not Spain Spanish, and particularly not Andalucian Spanish. In Andalucia, letters are dropped all over the place, so it turns out I spent four months living not in Granada, but in Granaa, a similar place in which the letter "d" on the keyboard never works. The Spanish in Andalucia drove me a little crazy. On the other hand, here in Holland, everything I hear is split between three languages: Dutch, Limburgish, and German. Let's go from bottom to top here. Limburgish, the local dialect in this region, has to be one of the weirdest sounding languages I've ever heard. Not really in a good way. Onward. Between German and Dutch, I hate to do this, but Dutch is the winner. UCM students, please don't immediately write my name on a hit list. Dutch just sounds so cute, while German is very staccato, not smooth sounding at all. That doesn't mean that I don't like it ... it just means that Dutch is more romantic (did I just say that?)

Food and booze
This is why everyone goes on study abroad, right? Food and drinks. And good looking guys, but considering the typical hairstyles on Dutch guys here, it's been a tough hunt. I digress. Again, both countries have their ups and downs. I'm going to start with the actual food. I'll be honest, the Dutch lack much of a culinary culture. It's really a lot of fried food, bread, meat, fried meat, Dutch beer, french fries and cheese. Oddly enough, when I mention frying bread to make eggs in a basket for breakfast, they look at me oddly. Anyways, the Spanish have it a little better: also a lot of fried food, but a ton of seafood, good wine, tapas, meats, cheese, and lots of pastries. They also have paella and tortilla española which is an automatic 20 points. Now here's the problem I have with the Spanish: with their eating timetables, it's as if they want you to starve before you get to the table. Breakfast barely exists, lunch is at 3 PM, dinner at 10 PM. It was 4 months of teaching my stomach to deal with being hungry for awhile. The Dutch, once again, are the exact opposite: from what I understand, Dutch families typically have dinner at 6 or so. Verrrrry early, the sun is still high in the sky! For once, I think I have to credit the Germans with getting it right. They seem to eat in the 8 PM neighborhood, the happy medium. Well done Germans, well done.

Now .... all of that said, I think we know who the better soccer players are.
Sorry Dutchies!

Frietjes met mayo

2011-09-23T08:20:00.001-04:00

Things I've learned in Maastricht:
1. Mayo does not belong on fries. Sorry everyone, it's just not good. (Thanks though, Michael, for making sure EVERY fry on that plate was covered)
2. Mayo on fries is acceptable at about 4:30 AM when everyone is determined to stay at the party until 5 and my body has given out. (Thanks Fritz)
3. Breakfast for dinner is an unknown concept here. But don't worry, I'm spreading the crusade

4. German bread could kill someone. Really. Buy a loaf, keep it by the door, throw it when an intruder intrudes. How's that for a gun control policy?
5. The good smell in my room is actually the scents of the bakery across the street wafting in. And I thought it was just me.
6. The Dutch culinary culture is very limited. Meat, cheese, squishy bread, herring, deep fryers. Beer.
7. Which is funny because apparently everything I've learned is related to food.

Pants shopping for the vertically challenged
The Dutch are tall. Really. Very tall. The average height for men is 6'1" and for women it's about 5'7". As someone who is on the small side even in the States, I can confidently say that I fall in the bottom 2% or so here. That makes jeans shopping quite difficult, especially since the smallest size I've seen here is a 26 32 - which is far too long on me (surprise!). After realizing that nothing in Zara or H&M fits and that all of the boutiques here are too expensive, I took a little trip to ESPRIT, where they kindly offered to tailor their jeans to fit my abnormal body. They had to take 6.5 centimeters off! For all 'murrcans, that's TWO AND A HALF inches. Off the smallest size. Time to start growing.

I just ran over the border into Belgium
I'm not saying, I'm just saying ...

World, meet Jan
He got a bit of a makeover

Day 5 in Maastricht: I can order a beer

2011-08-28T11:40:00.000-04:00

Mag ik een biertje?

Good. I'm all set.

Anyways, I've been bouncing around Europe for almost two weeks, and I figure it's about time that I show people that I have actually survived so far.

Frankfurt

I have an American passport. Born and raised in Amurrca, y'all. But, as I'm sure many of you have noticed, I have a ridiculously German last name. (Fun little side note about that: whenever Americans see my last name, they immediately ask if I am Jewish. Europeans, however, immediately ask if I am German.) Anyways, upon arrival to Germany, I had to show my passport for something. The person I showed it to immediately switched back to German ... even after I said that I don't speak German. Really. Sorry dude, just listen to me next time. I promise I'm not lying.

In all seriousness, Frankfurt is a cool place. Dominik's roommate took me to a fake beach along the Main and the city has too many skyscrapers. It was fun.

Paris

That Saturday, I hopped on a train to Paris. America, take note: train stations IN EVERY CITY. Just saying. So Marjo and I stayed at Claire's friend Marcia's place, which was super cool since it was close to everything. That didn't stop me from getting a bit lost, but it was good to know that I had a short trip back home. So basically, we rented bikes from Velib (again, America, take note), rode around Paris, napped by the Louvre, rode the ferris wheel, napped, ate, rode bikes, went inside the Louvre, napped, went to Corcoran's and Cafe Oz (and got happy hour priced drinks by way of a fake Australian accent), napped, rode bikes, and picnicked by the Seine. All in all, successful weekend. I can now order a sandwich in French (sort of) and can navigate the metro system better than last time. Well done, me. Oh, and a gorgeous thunderstorm that barely missed us during our dinner at the Seine.

(Photo credit: Michael Straub)

The devil of Belgium: Brussels
Remember when I was in Spain last year? We took a trip to Amsterdam for a weekend and the trip home was something out of hell. Basically, aside from waking up at 3 AM and all of that, our plane got stuck in Brussels for 4 hours. It's a better story than that, but suffice it to say it was awful. Anyways, when I left Paris on Tuesday, I took the train first to Liege and then with a connection to Paris. But of course, I couldn't get through the entire trip without some problems (aside from the enormous suitcase I was dragging around). Our train got stuck for over two hours in Brussels. I swear, someday I'll see that city intentionally, but until then I have no desire to be back.

The cutest room on earth

My room in Maastricht is awesome. It's so close to the center of the city, about 5 minutes by bike, is on a fairly quiet residential street, and it's so cute! My bed is lofted, which didn't bode well on the night I drank too much red wine, but it's awesome. Like a little fort. With stairs going up to it. I love it. I haven't actually taken any pictures yet, but here are some from the girl I'm renting from:

The first picture is taken from the bed and the big white structure in the second picture is the bed. It's a pretty awesome setup. Also, I have lots of floor space, so if anyone wants to have a dance party, come on over. I'm game.

Bicycles!
A friend was just over here a little while ago and I was joking around with him how the things that junior racers learn in training camps and drills at home are things that kids know here instinctively. Like how to lean on each other in corners. When we were riding home from an event on Friday afternoon, we were going through a roundabout, and a few riders in front of me were leaning on each other as they went through it. Instinctive to most, but it's funny how we have to specifically teach things at home that occur so naturally when they are part of everyday life. I do love how people bike EVERYWHERE, distances are given in cycling time, and tickets are given to cars parked in bike lanes, not bikers riding in the middle of the street. Bikes have the right of way, they are all those awesome old steel cruisers, friends can hop on the little rack on the back for a ride. It's amazing. Like heaven on earth in the wrong language. We went to a party on friday night at a convention center, and there were just hundreds of college students pouring into the parking lot on bikes. So great.

Food
So ... the Dutch are not exactly known for their culinary skills. And let's be honest here, it makes sense. Mayo was simply not made to top french fries. There is, however, an excellent bakery right across the street from my house. That, my friends, is dangerous. So far I've been pretty good about it, but who knows how long that will last? I've properly stocked my room with peanut butter, fruit, cheese, meat, bread and cereal. I still need Nutella and a large chocolate collection, but I will work on that. And Keith is sending me a box of proper black tea, so I am almost all set.

Mag ik een biertje?
As mentioned before, it's Dutch for "Can I have a beer?" an important sentence to know. Friday afternoon, last day of INKOM 2011, we went to something called a Beer Cantus. Basically, gather in a convention center, bring copious amounts of beer, sing in Dutch, pour beer all over everyone, get soaked, sing "Angel" by Robbie Williams (I know, not really fitting for the situation, but ...), drink a little bit of beer, throw beer. It was fun. I got soaked. Really soaked. Like I could squeeze half of a cup of beer out of my hair. It was somewhere between gross (afterwards, when it dried) and awesome. Closer to the awesome side, edging on epic.

Natural disasters
So while everyone back home has been experiencing the apocalypse in the form of an earthquake and Hurricane Irene, I've been experiencing the dutch equivalent:

Sheep stampedes.

The end of the world and the end of the season

2011-08-19T17:07:00.000-04:00

Carol wasn’t kidding when she said that landing in Iceland is the closest I’ll ever get to landing on the moon. I’ve never seen such a beautiful, barren backdrop for an airport in my life. The airport is also not huge (read: it’s about as big as I am tall) which is good for my super long 45 minute layover. It’s quite modern and cool looking, with glass ceilings and very clean architecture, and we got to fly in watching the sunrise. I swear, Iceland is the end of the world. All you can see is the ocean, it’s incredible. However, this dream world that I have started creating about Iceland was just busted about five minutes ago when I paid $17 USD for breakfast. I guess when you are this far into the North Atlantic, you have to stimulate the economy somehow - picking on hungry and sleepy tourists seems like fair game.

My flight to Frankfurt starts boarding in about 20 minutes, so I figured I’d give a quick update on the end of the season before all of the Europe-oriented posts start coming.

Also, guys, my body says it’s 2:30 AM, Iceland says it’s 6:30 AM, and I’ve slept for all of 45 minutes. Bear with me.

If I’m not mistaken, last time I wrote was a long rant about how freakin’ hot it was at Grandview GP (I’m currently working offline, since the other economy stimulus is expensive airport internet, so I can’t actually check). I’m trying to remember what I’ve done since then, and I’m drawing a blank aside from my birthday weekend and Tour de Millersburg. And Robeson, but that was a bust and there’s no need to talk about it.

Birthday weekend

First thing, I survived. This is the featherweight, who got tipsy from one glass of wine in the airport last night in an attempt to pass out immediately on the plane (it didn’t work). I actually had a spectacular time, at least until around 10:30 on Sunday morning when my head promptly flipped me the finger. On Saturday night, I hit the streets of the concrete jungle with Chris M., Lindsey, Tom, Julia, and Julia’s friend Kristy. First stop was my neighbor’s bar, which, while awesome, is also a bit pricey for our college-constrained budgets. Onward to the College of the Streets and The Gay Ice Cream Shop, both of which were closed but made our nights simply by existing. We eventually wandered over towards the NYU area and found a place that was fun, only a little creepy, and not too too overpriced. And then the fun began. And then it ended when I woke up the following morning. End of story. Simply put, it was a good time. We spent Sunday morning (early afternoon) eating breakfast at the “Green Diner,” where all of my previous memories are as a little girl eating grilled cheese and french fries with my dad every Thursday afternoon. We then decided to find somewhere cool and dark to sit. Solution? The movies. Logical? Maybe not, but I got to see Ryan Reynolds shirtless.

The parents made it in later in the day, as did Kate and Lindsay, and drinks and cake were had, bars were hit, and we found ... Wait for it ... INSOMNIA COOKIES. Brilliant.

See? I remember all of my birthday weekend.

Tour de Millersburg

Alright, so TdM has definitely been my favorite stage race for the past three years. It’s fun, it usually marks the end of the season for me, and it’s good and challenging. This year was no different, except I’d been pretty mentally burned out leading into it. The racing itself was okay - I took a minute off my TT time and didn’t get last despite being one of the only people on a road bike, but the crit wasn’t great and the RR wasn’t much better. I’ll owe that to being mentally burned out. The host housing, however ... Last year, Chris, Ricky and I stayed with an Amish family that lived right on the course of the road race. This year, with a larger group of people, we were placed in a church right near the center of town - the ultimate location. Our slumber party roster ended up being myself, Sarah, Ky, Michelle Bishop, Gursk, Jon D’Alba, Nick Iacovelli and Josh from Colavita U23. And it was oh so much fun. Jesus loved us, the church was AMAZING (thank you so much for your hospitality!!), and we ate ice cream. A lot of ice cream. And air mattresses. We didn’t eat those, we just cuddled on them.

I’m just going to stop, this whole no-sleep thing is going well. Also, my singular fond memory of Robeson was “I’m beached az, bro!” Much thanks to Tom^2, Noons, and Wes for endless entertainment.

Cornering practice

2011-07-25T14:13:00.000-04:00

Grandview Grand Prix
7 corners x 25 laps = 175 cornering drills (I'm embarrassed to admit how long it took me to do that math)
+ 105 degrees + enough humidity to make even my hair frizz = delirium
Delirium + 175 corners + approximately 2 potholes/sewer grates/manhole covers per turn = some very questionable cornering skills (no names mentioned)
50% = approximately how much of the field finished

Needless to say, it was a suffer fest for everyone. I was unbelievably disoriented during the entire race and was literally just hanging onto the wheel in front of me, and I'm pretty sure the lap cards got messed up once or twice, maybe bringing aforementioned corner count up to 182? Truth be told, the lap count was probably fine, but I turned religious a few times during that race praying for it to just be over. Also, a huge thank you to the family on the false flat with the sprinkler set up over the course. That saved my day in so many ways. Though the potentially bike-eating pothole right in front of the sprinkler could have made for some interesting stories, thankfully it didn't. Kacey got the W with Dana Walton coming in 2nd, and Julia and I were the only two cat 3 finishers. A big props to BChan for not taking either of us out when she flatted in the most treacherous corner with 4 laps to go.

NJ State Road Race
Quite the opposite of Grandview, this race had under 10 corners per 20 mile lap, and only 150 ft of climbing per lap. We did two laps, potentially making it not only the shortest, but also the flattest race (road race or criterium) I've done all year. The ladies of CAWES pretty much went into the race with a single plan: ATTACKATTACKATTACK. So attack we did. All of us (Me, Sarah, Gursk, Bchan, and Ky) spent some time off the front. At one point, I had been off the front for a bit, and Sarah tried to bridge up to me, but the field closed the gap. Right after that, she and BChan escaped while we slowed things down back in the field. Sarah and BChan came through with a big fat W with 1:30 on the field! Success.

And then we ate lots of Mexican food.

Tour de France
I'm actually going to keep most of my comments to myself, save three:
1. This years TdF was definitely the best I've ever seen. Hands down. The fact that I actually turned on the TV everyday to watch it speaks volumes.
2. Next time the Schleck brothers get 2nd and 3rd GC, someone get Cadel a milk crate. That final podium was demoralizing.
3. Garmin-Cervelo, please please PLEASE auction off that cardboard DZ from the podium in Paris. I don't even have words to describe how awesome that was.

(For the record, we'll take the rest of the boys, too)

Zoo trip
So as anyone who saw my Facebook during finals week knows, I am incapable of drawing a pig. Or an elephant. I am, however, quite good at drawing some horrible combination of the two:

Upon seeing this, my dad decided that he had "failed as a father" by not taking me to the zoo when I was younger. So sometime this week, either Tuesday or Wednesday, we'll be taking a trip to the Bronx Zoo, complete with peanuts and ice cream, where I will spend time learning what what both elephant and pig noses look like. I will update my drawing skills upon returning.

On a final note, what am I supposed to do now between 8-11:30 AM everyday? Does this mean I'll actually be leaving for training before noon?

Hills of iron and balls of steel

2011-07-14T18:08:00.001-04:00

I've got a few things to say here, so let's do this in sections.

Iron Hill Twilight Crit, West Chester, PA
So for anyone who has never raced a miss-and-out on the track, this is probably the next best thing. If you were at the back of the field in this race, game over. I'm pretty sure that less than half of the field, which started at around 30-35 girls, finished. The nice thing was that payout was 30 deep, so as long as you actually got pulled (instead of dropping out), you got money. I went into the race never having seen the course before (by the time we arrived, I couldn't pre-ride it), so I stuck to the back of the field for the first two laps so that I could learn the course. I learned two things: there are some REALLY deep potholes and there are some people who can't corner very well. Obviously, I learned both of those the hard way, and I ended up off the back with a few other girls after about 7 or 8 laps.

I'll be back, Iron Hill, and I'll be 21. Watch out.

Hoogerland
Oh man, this guy got me so excited to study abroad in Holland. Not the part where he went flying into a barbed wire fence because, just to confirm what we already knew, the French are terrible drivers. Rather, the part where he got back up and rode into the polka dot jersey. Maybe there's something in the Dutch water or maybe it's the Stroopwafels or something, but I want to come back to the U.S. with the balls of steel that this guy has.

Did anyone else want to give him a hug when he was on the podium?

I've finally caved ...
... and the other badass on my bikedar has agreed to help me. I'm mountain bike hunting! After spending the entire 2010 collegiate season promising everyone that I would never mountain bike, two things finally occurred to me:
1. New England roads are a MESS in the winter. CT in particular. Maybe it's because the state is the southernmost in New England or maybe it's that rich-poor disparity (heh), but Conn roads are a chronic disaster between the months of December and March. And this girl cannot handle four months of trainer rides.
2. I love being dirty. Enough said.

Augusta Training Series 2011
The training crit that I've been doing since I first hopped on a road bike at age 16(ish) has finally come to a close for the season, towing some bad news with it: Blake Hargrave will not be returning next year. And you know what that means? NO MORE TRIPLE CHOCOLATE COOKIES (or whatever she called them). In all seriousness, Blake has run an awesome series these past few years and will be missed sorely. Unfortunately, I only made it to two of the races this summer due to a combination of being a dirty trackie and learning to express myself in a combination of squiggles and dots. When I first started racing Augusta as a scared 16 year old, I couldn't even hang on in the B race. This season, I've been doing both the Master's race and the A race with moderate success. It's nice to have a series to mark progress. I also had the honor of racing with Joe Saling twice last night, who is the granddaddy of NJ cycling. Coolest man alive, just take my word for it.

On tap:
1. My first keiren in two years. If you are looking for entertainment, come out to The Track tomorrow night to watch me ride behind a motorcycle, spin really fast, and hopefully not make too much of a fool out of myself.

That's actually how they make scrambled eggs in Japan.

2. The NJ State RR on Sunday. Ironically enough, the NJ state crit has more climbing than the NJ state RR, so it will hopefully be a fast day with lots of Wasabi and Orchid on the podium.

The nicest part of living in the middle of nowhere?

2011-07-05T18:00:00.000-04:00

Even doing research about a topic like genocide isn't that bad.

Life is pretty awesome.

After a weekend of racing (Friday and Saturday at the track and a Sunday crit at Greentree with BChan and Sarah), Dad and I rode into Manhattan yesterday. Possibly the only ride I've ever done that ended at negative elevation. As in, I didn't have to climb over 4,000 feet to get 60 miles done!! Incredible. I could get used to that.

OH WAIT ... I will. In Holland. Flattest country on earth. Too bad I won't have my bike with me.

In other news, I officially have an apartment in Maastricht, so I won't be sleeping on the streets. Which is good, because while I'm sure the streets of The Netherlands are much nicer than the streets of The Concrete Jungle, that's not really how I had planned on making friends. So this will work out well.

I just tried chasing down a little bear to take a picture. Barefoot, in a dress (me, not the bear) through the woods. Hippy life, high balling.

I'm home right now (obviously), and will be through Friday afternoon, which is a new thing for me. Since I've been home from CT, I don't think I've been able to spend an entire week at home without traveling for racing in the middle of the week. Yesterday we rode into the city and spent the evening drinking too much wine and watching fireworks, but I still slept in my own bed. This has been incredibly relaxing.

On a final note, I own a GRE book (unfortunately). The original plan was to take the GREs in Belgium (with the added excuse to then check out Brussels with Marjolein for the rest of the weekend) so that I could apply to graduate schools upon returning home. My top choices, at this point, are Georgetown, American, or Columbia (the idea of living in Manhattan full-time for 2 years is what put Columbia at the bottom of that list). However, upon rethinking the past 18 or so years in school, I've started to consider taking a gap year to intern or teach English in South America or something along those lines (I don't think that I could really validate a year to backpack in Europe, since that is pretty much what my college career has been). Suggestions, anyone?

And on a final final note, one of my favorite songs:

Yes, I can procrastinate in the summer

2011-06-30T14:20:00.000-04:00

That's what I get for eagerly deciding to do three credits worth of research about genocide this summer: new and awesome ways to procrastinate doing my work, including riding my bike, making Nutella cookies for bartering sleeping places, cleaning my room (that's a new one), and pillaging villages with the BChan.

That's what the menu looked like at the cafe we went to post-Giro del Cielo ...
... the owners just don't know it yet.

The Giro was somewhat successful, at least in my mind. I didn't get last in the time trial (of all of my skills on the bike, I can neither climb nor TT particularly well, so being more than 5 spots from the bottom was good) and the crit was pretty solid. The road race was another story, but no need to talk about that. Let's talk about the crit. Typical cat 3 women's race, we averaged maaaaybeeee 20 mph. Maybe. As in, it was a 15 mile, 25 person match sprint. The good news is, BChan and I can sprint. Or she can sprint, and I can set up for it. We got our shit together and she pulled off 2nd place against a super strong girl from NYC (who didn't ride the TT that morning and had much fresher legs).

So my art skills aren't great, but I tried. Another attempt at procrastination.

The good news is, now that I have so much work that I don't want to do, I'm actually updating my blog. The glass is half-full?

In other news, Toona has not been cancelled yet, and we're a week out. That's better than anyone's done in the past ... a long time. However, it has been cut to 4 stages for the pro race and 2 stages for the omnium, so I will not be making that 5 hour drive. What I will be doing is going to West Chester, PA for the Iron Hill Twilight Crit that Saturday evening for some bike racing and yummy food. I will, of course, not be drinking any beers, because that's completely illegal. I would never do something illegal.

Of course not.

Harlem SKYscraper Classic and the rest of my life for the past 4 months

2011-06-21T00:11:00.000-04:00

Why SKYscraper? Emphasis on the fact that it wasn't the SKINscraper Classic this year. All of the races had about a 98% survival rate, approximately 48% higher than it's been in the past few years. As some guy said to me as I was about to ride home, this was my first time doing the race in 2 years without crashing (to which I pointed out that I'm up to 3 years if we count 2009 when I didn't do the race). I'm not sure who this guy was.

Anyways, Harlem was awesome as always. I am a bit upset that I "forgot" to get a waffle from the Wafels and Dinges truck, but I did get some awesome mango piragua. When in Harlem ...

Also, on a serious note, yesterday was awesome for another reason: I got to race, for the first time since I can remember, with both Lenore Imhof and Nanci Modica at the same time. Nanci and Lenore were the first "real" female cyclists that I met when I first came into the sport at the ripe old age of fifteen. I was awkward and shy and not capable of going very fast, and in the past five years they have both taught me so much of what I know about racing and how to pay everything forward. So being able to race with them both at the same time (plus playing with Nanci's adorable, hyperactive son Frankie) was definitely the highlight of my day.

Because I am incapable of being serious for more than a paragraph at a time, I'll go on now to mention how we celebrated father's day (I definitely have the coolest dad alive) with a dead fish and a watermelon martini. I highly recommend that approach to anyone who had a lackluster day yesterday.

Also, I've spent a considerable amount of time compiling a list of excuses about why I haven't updated my blog in so long:
1. I took 19 credits this past semester (legitimate)
2. Training, thesis research, and studying for the GRE have taken over my life (legitimate)
3. I've started a Nutella cookie factory out of my mom's kitchen and my fingers are constantly sticky (semi-legitimate)
4. My birthday came 6 months early this year and I've been enjoying life as a pseudo-21 year old (semi-legitimate, but unfortunately not true)
5. My dad's chickens have given me non-stop migraines with their sensory overload combination of smell, sound, and craziness (just weird)
6. I've been too busy kicking ass and taking names with my Wasabi Warriors (super legitimate)

So, with a hard morning session and an afternoon race on tap tomorrow, I am off to sleep. Cheerz

Trailer Park Training/Studying Bootcamp, Part I

2011-03-08T22:56:00.000-05:00

As my loving father was so kind to point out to me yesterday, my blog has been "sitting in a cloud collecting dust" since the last time I updated it in ... a long time ago. Officially, I'm on spring break, but really, I'm up in Storrs until Friday putting myself through a bootcamp of studying and training. The campus is literally empty, the snow is almost melted, and I have a stack of books and papers waiting to be read. So I figured that it's about time that I give this thing some TLC, particularly since racing season has begun.

Rutgers hosted the ECCC season-opening Scarlet Scurry this past weekend, and not that I'm hating on it or anything, but it was pretty much a track omnium. Saturday morning started off with a 2.2 mile TT (pursuit) and then followed with a crit on some of the roughest pavement I've ever seen (scratch race at Kissena). Sunday was what was loosely defined as a points race, but the course was under a mile and had 120ft of climbing per lap. 15 times up the hill, which hit 12% grade at its steepest, split up the field a ton and left very few people sprinting for points and the vast majority of us simply sprinting to get up the hill. In any case, it was a good weekend of racing, and despite sucking, it was good to get some speed back into my legs. I'll be spending the next few weekends racing my ass back into shape.

In other news, I have a thesis advisor! And a thesis topic. And, hopefully, another study abroad in the fall. I'm going to be doing my thesis on primary and secondary education in post-genocidal societies, focusing on Turkey, Germany, Bosnia and Herzegovina/Serbia, and maybe others that I haven't considered yet. As for study abroad, I still haven't decided between Maastricht and Utrecht, but I applied to both, so this should buy me a little more time before I am forced to make a decision.

Also, before I go to bed, I should mention that I have discovered heaven in the form of Nutella cookies. I made them for Lindsey's Superbowl party awhile ago, and they were fan-fucking-tastic. Also, I need a reason to quickly go through my American-style oversized jar of Nutella before I attack it with a spoon, and cookies seem like a good way to pass those calories onto people I love rather than my own pre-Battenkill body. After Battenkill is another story though, then it's fair game.

And finally, it's every bike racer's favorite month:

I love doing bumpy races in the cold in the middle of nowhere …

2010-12-22T01:05:00.001-05:00

… Which is precisely why I’ve officially registered for the Tour of the Battenkill on April 10th (watch, winter is going to be super long just to spite me) in Cambridge, NY (yes, there is more to New York than NYC). Anyways, I will be racing in support of two of my lovely (and wildly tough) teammates, so hopefully it will go well!

It’s been over a month since the last time I posted on here (of course), which means that I haven’t shared my new discovery yet: Penn Masala. I swear, I am going to marry one of these guys. Particularly the guy who does the Hindi solo in this song:

Really. He’s gorgeous, right? And because I spent all of finals week studying with a bunch of engineers (there’s nothing like numbers and Greek letters as background music while studying similarities in American wars of the past century), and half of them were Indian, they shared my appreciation and I got to blast the music (blasting music in the library, HA) and they even translated some of it for me.

Speaking of finals week, I survived! (Obviously.) It really wasn’t that bad – by some miracle, my exams got grouped by language, so I had Arabic first, then History, then all 3 Spanish exams in a row. Five exams, four days total. Not awful, but I was so done with it by Thursday afternoon that I didn’t even proofread my exam. Oh well.

The good news is that May Britt, in her usual fashion, has reassured me that now that I am done with exams, she plans to take full advantage of my free time for “three weeks of hard training” (her words). YAY. The good news is I made the discovery at the gym tonight that the guys here are much nicer than they are at school – two of them offered to unrack the entire leg press for me! Manners in New Jersey, who knew that existed.

In another topic, which obviously belongs right below the paragraph about training, I’ve discovered two deadly recipes: Oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and Oatmeal almond white chocolate chip cookies, which I made last week and then brought over to an apartment full of boys and beer. They were gone in about 30 seconds. No more for me. Boo.

On the note of both cookies and training (improvement!), I had a lovely mini-training camp with some of the CAWES ladies the weekend before Thanksgiving. After a (horrendously) long drive down to Philly, Sarah and I drove to Maryland (I think!), and stay at Robin’s house. We rode on Saturday with Ky and Nikki, along with Jay (Robin’s husband) and Michelle (the owner of one of our sponsors, Teaism). Where do cookies come in? Right, so after putting away around 4 hours on Saturday morning, the general consensus was that the only proper way to recover would be to eat sushi, drink beer, and make multiple batches of cookies. Which is exactly what we did. One batch of gingersnaps, and another of dark chocolate-cherry-walnut cookies. Recovery of champions. And definitely solid fuel for the hour and a half of recovery that Sarah, Robin and I did the following morning, and the VO2/LT testing (blah) that I did with Father Burns at DeSales University that Monday morning. Along with the pre-race breakfast that Gabe was nice enough to cook me at the Stone House when I stopped by for a visit.

Anyways, now that I’m done with classes (4 A’s and 1 A-, SCORE), I am going to go do what winter break was made for: reading a bit and then sleeping for about 12 hours.

Oh, summer?

2010-11-13T17:21:00.003-05:00

So after the slushie machine that was Storrs, CT this past Monday, Mother Nature decided to fcuk with all of us again and shoot some 60 degree temperatures and lots of sun our way today. Not that I'm complaining, I had 3 hours in the saddle on tap and dare I say my horrendous tan lines may have made another appearance.

Kidding. I rode in kneewarmers. But it was tempting.

I did, however, make some friends, during my ride. The only good thing about CT riding (because, let's be honest, CT fails at keeping roads properly paved) is that I get to see cute little guys.

The other fun thing I've discovered (in my junior year - I've been living in Storrs for 2ish years, and it took me this long, sad) is that there are a ton of dirt roads in a 25 mile radius from here. Usually, though, I discover this when I had already made that road a part of my route - from a map. So by the time I get there, I don't have much of a choice. Cool, Battenkill training. I can handle that.

Too bad I haven't cleaned my bike in forever.

In other news, Thanksgiving is less than 2 weeks away! Which means:

1. It's the mooooost wonderful time of the year (that was for you, Lindsay)

2. No shave November. Bring it on, boys.

3. Black Friday. USA, can we break the previous record of how many people will get trampled?

4. TOURISTS. Gah.

5. I'm trying to be creative here, but all I have is Turkeys and pumpkin pies. From my mom's kitchen, which means they are automatically 10x better.

Speaking of kitchens, I finally figured out how to turn on the over (kidding, Mom) and made some cookies. Oatmeal-chocolate chip cookies. Specifically these cookies. And they are wonderful. Wonderful enough that I won over ALL of the boys on the cycling team with those cookies.

Kidding, I won them over with my charm, looks, and secret wrenching skills. See Dad, I can be modest too.

But in all seriousness, those cookies are good. Really good. Especially with peanut butter, as Kerry and I discovered last week at the Karpuska Klassic (beer + bikes + a "downhill" course = funny for anyone not actually racing).

Essentially, just make the cookies. It's worth it. And for your sake, don't buy the chocolate chips at the UConn convenience stores, where they cost a whopping $4 per bag. Normal chocolate, not Swiss or laced with gold or anything. Capitalism at its finest. Also, ignore the authors comment about taking the cookies out underdone. Leave them in there for 10-11 minutes, not 9, or they will come out underdone and they will stay underdone. As much as I love cookie dough, it's not very transport friendly.

Also, I am officially a member of CAWES! Scroll down, my name starts with an O, remember? Yeah, cool. And yeah, that jersey is huge on me. If all goes well, I'll be headed down to Philly on Friday to meet with Sarah, and from there we'll be heading ... south of there. Not 100% of where, but we will be staying with some of the ladies for a weekend of training and meeting sponsors. Should be nice, cumulated by VO2/lactate threshold testing on Monday afternoon. Followed, presumably, by a full week of training. If anyone has any leftovers after Thursday night, I'm sure I'll be happy to eat them.

We're gonna party like it's 2012

2010-11-01T17:18:00.002-04:00

So I'm sitting here with Lindsay watching some story about the Maya 2012 theory on the History Channel, and I did a little Google search. And I found this. Whoever wrote that, if you see this, give me a call. You're awesome.

And, as always, it is tomorrow. As in, the above was written on Monday, and it is now Tuesday. Story of my life, I am incapable of getting anything done in one sitting.

In any case, I figured I'd bring about some life updates:

1. CAWES: cows or cause, it depends on who you ask. Capitol Area Women's Elite Squad, aka my team for next year! I'm so excited to be riding with these girls, and I definitely think it's safe to say that a season in green and black will be my best season yet. That, and I'm the baby of the team. What else is new.

2. I'm an Individualized Major. Finally, after a year of saying I would do it and a month of more writing, revising, meetings, and form filling than I ever care to do again, I just got the email saying that it has been accepted, titled International Relations (focused in Human Rights). I'm extremely excited to be studying something that is so interesting to me. Oh, and UConn bureaucracy at its finest: There's a joint class between the Poli Sci department and the Human Rights Institute called "Contemporary Human Rights" (or something along those lines). I, however, can't take it because I am not a major in Political Science or a minor in Human Rights (the school doesn't offer a major in Human Rights. Or International Relations for that matter.) Effed.

3. (Surprise, it's Wednesday. Told you I'm not good at this.) I got a job! Score. And, as usual, I'm being paid to play with bikes. Tough life I have. A new bike shop just opened, literally crawling distance from the trailer, called Storrs Center Cycle. It's a pretty sweet place, owned by a guy named Aaron, and I'm working there with Dave and Joe Davis.

It's Thursday night. I really wasn't kidding about this, I'm atrocious at doing anything at once. That said, Thursday night is my time, so I am going to go back to being curled up with Bones and figuring out what kind of cookies to make for the Karpuska Classic this weekend.

I will do another update soon, hopefully a real one. And before Thanksgiving break.

I hope.

Since I haven't gotten any work done today ...

2010-09-18T20:19:00.002-04:00

... I figured I may as well be productive in some form. Blogging counts as productivity, especially since I have managed to set a new record in going around four weeks since my last update.

Anyways, since my last post, I have ...

... moved back up to UConn.

... successfully put together (and customized a bit) multiple pieces of IKEA furniture.

... started learning Arabic.

... discovered that the entire German nation decided to study abroad at UConn this semester.

... sprained my foot (that was today).

... decided to study abroad (again!) in Holland (I think) next fall.

There's been more than that (learning how to cook, learning the truth of calories not existing after midnight), but four weeks has been a long time, and while I haven't had any of "those nights" yet, one glass of wine on an empty stomach at Seth and Aviva's wedding did something to my relatively short-term memory capabilities.

By the way, to any UConn freshmen who have the misfortune of stumbling upon my blog (or anyone else), the lights in Homer Babbidge start flickering at approximately 1:47 AM. Just in case you were planning on sleeping there.

Anyways, I think I can officially say that my season is over, mostly because of my aforementioned sprained foot (who even does that? what a fail), but partially because I realized that I have absolutely zero desire to sit in a car for anywhere between 1.5 and 3 hours (the time required to get to the races I was planning on doing). The Mayor's Cup crit in Boston seriously sounded like fun at the time, and still does, but the $50 entry/several pro teams making a showing/motivation that would be required (that I do not have at the moment) to do that race successfully deterred me a bit. For the better, since apparently my left foot doesn't handle seven mile runs on pavement very well.

Weak.

In all seriousness, I sort of forgot about the joint-pounding feeling that those first few runs after a long hiatus create, so I decided to to a seven mile run with intervals (bad plan) with the thought that I'd be fine, since I ran through the entire spring.

Incorrect.

That said, I am a college student, and should the pain become too difficult to bear, I will most likely take care of it in a collegiate fashion. You can all guess what that means. I'd like to think, however, that these little guys (except in more colors, brought back from Morocco) will automatically make any liquid that is poured into them just a touch classier.

A note on the rest of the world:

1. As mentioned above, about one-fifth of the German population is here at UConn. The good news about that is, unlike the French, they really want to learn English, and therefore have created a German box. What this means is that every time one of them speaks in German, that person has to put a dollar into the box. A fabulous idea, and I really do wish the French would do something similar, because I'm pretty sure the rest of us would be drinking for free for the rest of the year.

2. Also as mentioned above, I am seriously considering doing another semester abroad, this time in a slightly tamer country: Holland. UConn has two Honors programs there, one in Utrecht and one in Maastricht, and while I don't love UConn exchanges because they tend to be so isolated, studying in Holland sounds like an amazing experience, and as a little bonus, they speak English. Because, if you'll remember, I am still of the opinion that Alphabet Soup should be eaten, not spoken. As far as choosing between the programs, I am currently basing my decision on a. whether or not I can pronounce the name of the town, and b. how many people I know who go there. So far, Maastricht is winning 2-0. More on that in the future.

Sunrise in Central Park

2010-08-22T16:30:00.002-04:00

I wish that were as romantic as it sounds. Unfortunately, there isn't really anything romantic about doing a bike race in Central Park at 6 AM, no matter how well organized it is (and yes, CRCA, I will give credit for getting a tree completely out of the road in record time, even though I almost wasn't allowed to race). Anyways, yesterday went fairly smoothly. 4 AM wakeup, made my way over to the park, blah blah blah. The difference between early morning races in June or July and August is that in August, it's still pitch black out at 5 AM. And the streetlights were doing this funky little thing where they kept going out right as I rode under them. So I took the 72nd street entrance to the park, and in case anyone was curious, there is a hole in the right-hand lane at around 70th street. I discovered that one with my front wheel. Yep, awesome.

Anyways, so as mentioned, there were rumors floating around of a tree that had taken over the park at around west 90th street. Stacey and I went out for a little spin and discovered that part of the road was, in fact, well-fitted for a cyclocross race. Anyways, so by some miracle (we all remember how long it took when the obstacle was a person, imagine how bad it could have been that this time it was an inanimate object) , the tree was gone, and we actually started that on time. The race was pretty good, a bunch of strong girls showed up, and all (er, most) of the team that were well represented launched some good attacks. Everyone kept chasing everything, though, instead of letting people tire out, so the end came down to a bunch sprint. Unfortunately, I sort of botched that sprint, so I ended up having to sit up and just roll in - that finish is far too sketchy to actually try anything from the middle of the pack. Great race overall though, with Stacey winning it and Lisa Jellett coming in second.

Today, on the other hand ... I woke up and could hear the rain coming down. The honest truth is that I don't mind racing in the rain. Really. Aside from the cleanup afterwards, which does qualify under the "epic pain in the ass" category, racing in the rain can be really fun and refreshing. All of that said, there are some conditions to that statement: one, that there not be paint all over the road, and two, that the people in the field know how to race in the rain. That's the thing. Racing in the rain really only takes a bit of logic and a lot of confidence. Enough confidence to not hit the brakes in the middle of a curve on a descent. And yes, that is exactly what the girl in front of me did. Where's a girl to go when the person in front of her slides out on a wet descent? Yeah, pavement. It happens, it's bike racing, it's just annoying. As the first crash of the season and with minimal injuries (a bruise and a scrape on my elbow), I shouldn't be complaining. I just wish people would learn to ride in the rain, that's all.

Annemarie also went down, so she and I hobbled our ways back over to the start line, where Jorge proved his arm strength and straightened out my shifters - sans allen key. Nice.

Anyways, I'm done racing for the next two weeks. I'll be heading into T-town on Tuesday for some last-minute field testing with May Britt, and then Thursday will be the big move-in marathon up to UConn. Until then I'll be nursing my hip with an icepack and enjoying a Harry Potter marathon on ABC Family with some dark chocolate.

Amishville, USA

2010-08-17T19:17:00.004-04:00

So, as was previously mentioned, Chris, Ricky and I hit the road this weekend to go race at the Tour de Millersburg, inconveniently located in Millersburg, PA. Another one of those places located around 45 minutes off the highway. The weekend started with a little game of car tetris, and because I just happen to be the one who rides the bike that is most commonly mistaken for a BMX bike, my little guy got squeezed into the trunk of Chris' car, along with a set of rollers, approximately five sets of wheels, and multiple bags, while the other bikes got to ride in the fresh air on the trunk rack. Three racers, four bikes, too much stuff. Bike racers are a special species.

Anyways, Chris drove all the way out, and once Ricky was done DJing a playlist copied straight off of Z100's website and repeating how the only things in life that make him nervous are Pennsylvania and the Amish, he fell asleep in a manner that I can only imagine created the world's worst neck crick. Typical of PA, this drive involved roads through places that made Fitchburg look like a thriving metropolis. You all understand what I mean.

So by some miracle (not really, we had a GPS), we made it out to the home of our host family, Dan and Ada King. Here's the deal: as mentioned above, Ricky had some sort of unexplained fear of the Amish. I, obviously, don't understand it, because I love the Amish if not just for the horses and the rocking food. In either case, this family was so awesome that even Ricky admitted it. No small feat. The King family, comprised of Dan and Ada, 8 kids (ranging from 2 to 21 in age and including a 6 year old girl with Down's Syndrome), 39 cows (they run a dairy farm), and 40-something cousins, is absolutely awesome. I have never met such kind people. They welcomed us into their home, relocated some sleeping locations for the weekend so that we could have bedrooms, and fed us some absolutely incredible food (fresh chocolate milk, apple pie baked oatmeal, sticky buns, and taco salad were the most popular of the weekend). Overall, the stay with the family was a great experience, and I'll definitely be requesting them again next year should I find myself back in the lovely little town of Millersburg.

So after we got to the King house and got settled it, we went out for a little spin on the 18 mile road course. Light ride, and it took an hour, that's how fast that course is. And the roads are perfect, there's about one hole in the entire lap, and even the road that had been chipped and tarred a week before was doing fine. I guess a constant barrage of horse and buggy traffic doesn't lead to too many road problems. We got back from our spin, had dinner, and soon discovered two things:

1. The joys of living without proper lighting (I'm officially skilled at taking out my contact lenses by the lighting on my phone).

2. $70 cheesecakes. I'm not kidding. Another racer, who will remain unnamed, mostly because I don't actually remember his name, showed up at around 10 PM (very, very late in Amishville), and then proceeded to basically state that he wasn't married by mentioning his job as a computer programmer and how it takes him 4 hours to make a cheesecake that he then sells for $70. Pretty sure the Amish are known for their modesty ... no comment.

Saturday morning we woke up to the best oatmeal I have ever had. I'm not really sure what Mrs. King did to it, but it was like apple pie baked into an oatmeal. Absolutely fabulous for early, cold race mornings. We made it down into town, where I proceeded to ride one of the worst TTs of my life (I'd like to think it had something to do with me borrowing Ricky's disc and not being used to the extra weight). The crit wasn't a lot better, to be honest. The course is very difficult, with a long hill and the world IP champion in the field. That got shattered quickly, and multiple people were lapped multiple times by the top seven people. Dinner that night was taco salad, chicken, potatoes, sticky buns, fruit, and the reason that I am truly in love with the King family:

S'mores.

There's no way to end a race day like around a fire pit with chocolate, graham crackers, and marshmallows. Oh, and a political debate that made me want to curl up into a ball and go deaf. I have to give Chris credit, I've known him for long enough to know when he's getting annoyed, but he definitely doesn't show it. I, on the other hand, kept my mouth shut (no comments from the peanut gallery about my diplomatic skills, ahem, DAD). Mr. King also put all of us to shame with his surprisingly vast knowledge of electricity. Ironic, we know.

Sunday was a very early morning, since both Ricky and Chris went off at 8. I was left in the feed zone for the two of them, bundled up in tights, yoga pants, a base layer, a t-shirt, a sweater, and Chris' fall training jacket. It was cold. And raining. Thankfully, I made friends with the guy who owned the cafe down the block, and he let me take one of his chairs to where I had stationed myself, so I stayed dry under the overhang of the house I was under.

Little side note about feed zones: they can make or break the race. The racers rely on the feed zones, especially for longer races like Ricky's, to stay fueled and hydrated and to not have to carry two extra pocket bottles during the race. This becomes a bit of an issue when it's located in such a manner as it was on Sunday - right before the finish line, after a fast right-hand turn, on the right side of the road ... and with paint. Thankfully, I think all crashes (at least in that section) were avoided, but it definitely wasn't set up ideally.

Anyways, my race started at 12:30 and was going very smoothly ... until the second lap an attack went that I couldn't stay with - but I definitely should have been able to. I rode back to the start with Julia, and upon later inspection, Ricky discovered that my rear wheel was out of true and was hitting the brakes.

Oh.

So that was game over for me. Part of racing, things happen, but I'm glad to know that my legs are feeling stronger than ever and that all of my work with May Britt in the past year and some has paid off very nicely.

Overall, it was a fun weekend, but the boys were a little more than antsy to finally just get out of Millersburg. So after a quick stop back at the King house to shower and say goodbye (sadly, the 11 year old who fell in love with Ricky was MIA and was probably a bit heartbroken to discover that he had left), we made our way out of there with a quick stop at Applebee's in Trexlertown for dinner.

Safe to say I will be back there next year, and hopefully staying with the King family again as that was absolutely awesome. For now, I'll be finishing up the season with two road races this weekend in NYC (they both start at 6 AM, get ready for a river of sarcasm in my race reports) and then two crits up in New England in September (Mayor's Cup and Portsmouth's Crit).

Red velvet cake, beer, and cobbles

2010-08-09T22:22:00.003-04:00

No, I did not do a race in Belgium, though the above items would fit that setting perfectly. Rather, I finally turned 20 (took long enough!), my incredible mother (seriously, not sucking up) made a slightly lopsided but amazing tasting red velvet cake, and Lindsay Pryor and I attacked it last night along with a little bit of beer and watching a little bit of this and this. Including the 3.5 hour ride I did yesterday and walking all the way from Grand Central back to the Upper West Side, one beer did the trick quite nicely.

Oh, right, and the cobbles. I managed to have my first crash of the season on the crowded bike path in Manhattan ... on a recovery ride. Really, a win no matter how you look at it. I'll just say that the cobbles were laid in the wrong direction (you cyclists should know what I'm talking about) and aren't filled properly, and once my wheel went in there ... well, you know what happens. So I'm sitting here with a bit of ice on my hip, and thankful for the very kind lady who loaned me her multi-tool to straighten out my shifters.

All in all, the weekend was great. I raced on Friday night at the Valley Preferred Cycling Center (still the Lehigh Valley Velodrome in my heart). The Dutch and Canadian ladies went home this past week and quite a few people were down in North Carolina racing at the Presbyterian Invitational, so the field was a bit smaller, but the speed was definitely still there. I raced a slightly lighter gear than usual in anticipation of the following 15 or so hours that would lead into my birthday. May Britt and I had agreed that this would be a good weekend to test my legs out and see how I am feeling, so we arranged for track on Friday and then the Kirkwood Road Race bright and early on Saturday morning. Thankfully, Lauren Tracy also was doing that combination, so with a bit of coordination, she and I prepared ourselves for getting five hours of sleep and a long morning drive out to Amish country. It definitely wasn't that terrible, I got some much needed caffeine in my system and I was good to go. My legs didn't feel that bad since I had ridden a smaller gear the night before, but they obviously didn't feel great - who does a road race 12 hours after a track race? We pre-rode the course, which was surprisingly difficult - a little over 7 miles per lap, with lots of "rollers" and a tricky section involving a fast downhill, a left-hand turn, gravel, and a short, steep hill. Quick thing about course descriptions: usually, they'll say that the course is "rolling." Here's the deal, as far as I am concerned, rollers can be done in the big ring. I realize that the men's 2/3 field was probably doing about 95% of this course in the big ring ... but the rest of us weren't. Those hills definitely caught me off-guard when we were pre-riding.

By the way, I have to mention that while driving to road races in PA tends to be a major pain in the ass (they average around 45 minutes to an hour off the highway), they are actually completely worth it. Not only is the scenery great, but the Amish and Mennonite people who live in the area are so friendly and love watching our races. They also run some awesome farm stands, where Lauren and I picked up a bucket of gorgeous, juicy peaches after we finished racing.

Anyways, the race wasn't too terrible. We had 3 laps, around 22 or so miles total, with a 9:30 AM start time so the weather was still perfect. I wasn't feeling as terrible as I should have, considering I'd been off the bike for around 11.5 hours at that point, but I wasn't feeling great so I got dropped at the end of lap two on the uphill leading into the finish and just rode the last lap with another woman from Rockstar Racing. Definitely a good, fun, well-run race that I will be back for (and hopefully with a bit more sleep in my system!).

After racing, Lauren and I made the drive back into T-town, commenting along the way everytime we saw the word Amish, since I am officially obsessed with their food. I made it back into the city at around 4, and we met Harold (my dad's cousin), Lori (his wife), Ben and Mira (their adorable 9 and 6 year old kids) and got dinner at a great Italian family-style restaurant on 91st and Broadway. Saturday night ended with red velvet cake and white wine on the end of the dock with Ed and Reggie. Definitely a good, relaxing birthday - no complaints from me.

As a quick finishing note, on Friday night a couple who I had never seen before stopped me as I was walking out of the track to tell me how much they enjoyed watching the racing and thanking us for making it so exciting. It was so great to see that these people really do enjoy watching us (apparently enough to pay $7 to do so, but a bit of beer never hurt!), and that hopefully they are being inspired to come try the sport!

Airplane thoughts

2010-07-28T00:16:00.002-04:00

Four days off for Daniella and Joe’s wedding out in Spokane, WA. I guess I can call that my mid-season break, considering my season has only been around two months long at this point. Whether or not I even needed it is up for debate, but my legs are feeling refreshed and antsy, which is always a good feeling.

The gorgeous bride!

By the way, I’m currently on the plane from Denver (hello, random layover, but I did manage to meet a redhead on leave from the Air Force with freckles and blue eyes, something which would have driven me crazy a few years back) on the way to JFK, and I’m listening to the Zune Most Requested station. And I’ve got to be honest, I’ve spent a lot of Sundays in the car listening to Ryan Seacrest doing American Top 40 on Z100 (my guilty pleasure, stop judging me), and I’ve never heard about 80% of these songs. Which demographic is using Zune? Clearly they are a bit out of touch with, uh, pop culture.

Right, I should talk. Four months in Spain and I can’t name any of the Jonas Brothers or figure out Snooki’s sex appeal. Not that I could do any of that before either. I can, however, say that the Spanish futbol team rocks! I forgot to mention that last time I wrote. The country I lived in beat the country that stole several years of my life in the World Cup finals. A solid reason for celebration. None of that has stopped the two lovely Dutch ladies at the track from routinely kicking my ass, something I’ve accepted since one of them kicked the entire world’s ass a year back. Yep, former World Omnium Champion. She’s fast.

I honestly don’t have any bitter or witty remarks to make about any races this weekend since I was across the country and sans bike. I can, however, say that I made friends on Wednesday with a valuable person – the piragua guy just a little bit north of Riverbank Park on Riverside Dr., something which amuses Amaury to no end. But that’s fine with me, I did about three hours with hill repeats, and it was around 95 degrees when I got back. Chipped ice covered in sugared-up lemon juice was so necessary.

Something that has amused me to no end was this past Thursday during motor pacing. I warmed up with the ENTIRE Canadian National Team. You know, the sprinters from the country that we live to make fun of? (Just kidding, we actually love you guys a lot.) I think Kati flatted her rear wheel as we were starting, so she had to sit out the first warm up (more on that in a minute), so it was just me and about 12 huge Canadians (no, being Canadian does not make the sprinters any smaller – just a lot paler). There were also about 30 people and four motors on the track, just a tiny bit chaotic. And might I add that one of those motors was louder than Jack’s motor (yep, it’s possible) and the driver found some cheap thrill in roaring around the track at around 80k/h. Yes, it was a little terrifying, thanks for asking. Anyways, somehow everyone survived training, at least as far as I know. Corrections are welcome if I am mistaken. Anyways, after motor pacing, I headed into the bustling metropolis of Kutztown to get lunch (read: I ate while he watched) with a certain Kiwi who is convinced that the reason for my shaking hands and racing metabolism had something to do with “too much milk and biscuit [chocolate chip cookie]” in my coffee.

While I’m on the topic of making fun of countries (while secretly being jealous of how gorgeous they are and how kind the people are), does anyone have any good Kiwi jokes? I’ve been cracking the same ones for about two weeks now, and I need some new material. Or I need to verbally admit that New Zealand is actually a rocking place, but I’d rather leave that to a last resort.

By the way, in case anyone was curious (I know you all were), the wedding was wonderful. Marti and Dennis hosted it in their backyard, which is the perfect location for a garden party, and the food was excellent. And I didn’t have to wear heels, which was essential to my happiness. The food was awesome (fish and chicken tacos with salad) and the cakes (one was chocolate, the other carrot) were incredible. Lauren and I may or may not have had a “you eat the cake, I’ll eat the frosting” system going for quite some time. And the bartender was kind enough to not card me. Plus, a typical Jewish brunch the morning after. I’ve been a happy girl this weekend.

On a final note, I have a new song obsession that EVERYONE needs to listen to. The truth is, about a quarter of you will understand it, but the song is great and definitely worth listening to.

A Floyd Bennett wine race?

2010-07-20T12:39:00.005-04:00

The logistics of that race just don't play out - I'd say about 80% of the people who race at Floyd Bennett ride out there. And with good reason. It takes probably twice as long to drive there as it does to ride.

So let's think of this one - those poor winners who had to ride from the outermost edge of Brooklyn (aka "the end of the world," as they would say in Hebrew) to other various parts of New York City. With a box of wine. Right, I forgot that part. First place wasn't just a bottle of wine. It was a full box.

Good thing I didn't win, not only could they not have legally let me take my prize home, but explaining the purple stains (I would have chosen dry red, thank you very much) on my way-too-white kit (thanks Dano) to my mom would have gone over, well, swimmingly. She loves when I bring home surprises like that.

Not.

Another one of those places that hasn't changed since I've gotten home is FBF. And when I say that, I mean it's as bumpy as ever. One of those courses where your hands literally hurt if you don't wear gloves. Obviously, since I know that, I wasn't wearing gloves on Sunday. My hands just stopped throbbing last night.

Anyways, I'm done with my shpeil about FBF. Just another day dodging cars on Flatbush Avenue and racing in a wind tunnel. The rest of the weekend was great. The Golden Wheel Race was on Friday at the track, and the women's field had ...

... get ready for this ...

... TWENTY-SEVEN girls. Yes, that's worthy of both bolding and caps. We actually had to do heats for the final (no comment on those), it was awesome. The miss-and-out took longer than our feature race. Fun moment of the evening: we're on the rail, waiting for the Pee-Wee Pedalers to clear the track so that we can race, and I'm sandwiched between the two Dutch girls, who start speaking in Dutch (obviously) over my head. My mind was blown. I don't care how good I am at picking up languages, alphabet soup was made for eating (or slurping), not speaking. Dutch bewilders me in unimaginable ways.

Post-racing, Andy and the rest of the Stonehouse crew hosted a nice little party for everyone, and timed rather wisely since we all know what happens to tolerance levels after a hard race. That's what we call being frugal. That said, there were some Kiwis and a Pole (and a few stupid Americans) who decided that Southern Comfort and vodka (hey Kamil!) were the way to take things. That might explain Sam's entry in Kacey's guest book.

Nice. That party may have ended with Kate and I taking a little trip into a Nutella jar ...

... with a spoon. It had to be done.

Oh, and I have to give a quick shout-out to the creative Polish guy with a bit too much time on his hands. And some nationalism. Nothing like an artistic man.

And finally, I got to spend some time with my 92-year-old Bubby yesterday, whose sarcasm and charm I can only try to rival.

Yep, I just admitted that someone out there is worse than I am. My mother included.

Summer break, for real this time.

2010-07-09T19:39:00.005-04:00

Ok, so I know I've been on summer break, officially, for around a month and a half (it would be closer to two months had I not studied abroad, but honestly, that was like a 4 month vacation). But here's the deal: I've been taking an online class since the beginning of June, and I just finished it today.

My soul has been aching.

It's not that it wasn't interesting; it really was. It was essentially a comparative study of western nations, what defines a democracy, and then case studies of India, Brazil, and Japan. It was good to be able to write in forums what I wanted to say instead of saying it out loud because it meant that there was no time limit on my thoughts. And the course was taught really well.

All of that said, summer simply isn't made for learning. Which is why I'm rewarding myself for surviving six weeks of that with a nice, cold beer and a lovely view.

Remember the ways to my heart? Yeah, well I'm definitely putting that into action right now. There may or may not be some dark chocolate sitting in the kitchen as well. I'm taking everything step by step.

Anyways, now that the worst (relatively) of my summer is over, I have all of the good stuff to look forward to: Daniella's wedding, my birthday, and the Tour de Millersburg.

Yeah, about that last one. I love that race. It's a good time, it's run really well, and it brings some level of publicity to a town that couldn't possibly have a higher population than 1,000. Oh, and the ice cream place.

55 flavors of soft serve? I don't think you can beat that. And even if I did get food poisoning last year from an unnamed restaurant in that town (I think there are only two of them to begin with), Tour deMillersburg still rocks. Especially this year, since I'll be heading out there with some of my boys (Ricky, Nick, and Chris) who better learn some manners before we go and spend the weekend with an Amish family.

True story.

The Tour de Millersburg has this fantastic program where they will hook you up with a host family for the weekend. And what seals the deal, for me, at least, is that a good portion of these families are Amish. So the boys and I will be living with an Amish family for two nights. Sarah and some of her teammates did this last year, and they said that the family was great and that the food was incredible. I'm convinced. The woman running the program, Julie Hoffman, was also kind enough to convince me that the stereotype of electricity-free Amish homes has a limit - apparently, some of them have cellphones, so charging my phone may or may not be an issue. We'll have to see. But it's going to be awesome either way.

Speaking of cellphones, I have vivid memories of being amazed that I had full service out in Millersburg. Good job, Verizon.

On a final note, it recently occurred to me that I've been writing a ton about racing this summer (of course), but I haven't written about the other way I've been occupying myself. Long story short, I made a bit of a fool of myself, met one of Gabe's teammates, Alex, went to coffee with him, and he got me hooked up with an internship at Amnesty International, working in the marketing department. Pretty sweet, no? I guess I should make a fool out of myself more often. Anyways, working there has been pretty awesome. My boss, Helen, is a bit all over the place, but she's the nicest person and she's really fun to work with. I just finished archiving fifty years worth of AI campaign posters to be shipped off to London for the 50th anniversary, and it was so interesting to learn about all of the missions through the years. It's an unpaid internship, but it'll be excellent for the future, and I scored a ticket to the world premiere of Nicholas Cage's new movie, The Sorcerer's Apprentice (Helen's boss is friends with Nicholas Cage). So no complaints here!

Fitchburg Longsjo Classic 2010

2010-07-07T12:32:00.003-04:00

First things first, I've discovered a little secret to summer happiness. It involves a cold, Belgian beer, 72% dark chocolate, and some quality time on my favorite sailboat.

Anyways, now that that's out of the way, I'm going to jump into this post headfirst (that's a dive, not a jump, whatever) with a little story from the stage two road race up at Fitchburg this past Friday:
Carrie, Melissa and I are in the feedzone for the boys on Metlife (and Bobbly Lea and his teammate on Bahati), probably around the fourth or fifth lap. (This is after we carried four coolers and a tent up a STEEP hill, thanks guys.) So the women's field goes by, and right after they pass us, we hear them being neutralized so that the men's pro/1 field can go by. Fast forward five minutes and two firetrucks go screaming by. Now, anyone who knows the Fitchburg road course knows that it takes probably about 5-8 minutes of climbing (I'm slow, ok?) to hit the fastest part of the descent after the feedzone. So I hear firetrucks, and my first thought is that the fields mixed, someone touched wheels, and there were about 500 people laying on the ground in the descent (you can hit 60-70 mph on that thing). Small panic. Firetrucks don't belong at bike races, and whenever I see them there, I get nervous. Anyways ... the fields come back around, everyone (take that with a grain of salt) is still alive, relatively. Then the men's caravan comes by ... and Jamis-Sutter Home's car is not in there. I took a little walk up the feedzone to Steph, who mentioned that Seba's car maaaay have caught on fire.
Excellent, a pyro show at a bike race.
Seba and Hugo showed up at the feedzone on the spare bikes about a half hour later and confirmed that the car did, in fact, catch on fire. Between that, the team losing the jersey, and Argentina losing the World Cup (that was the next day, but regardless), Seba was not a happy man. Very enojado, as Steph put it.

So that's that story, just another fun day in the feedzone. Overall, Fitchburg was fun. I'm a little bitter about the situation, but hopefully the race will bounce back next year (I think I'm being a little too optimistic here). For those who don't know, The Situation did not join us for Fitchburg, sadly. What I'm referring to is that for reasons that remain not understood, the womens 3/4 field only got to race two stages this year: the crit and the TT. And this is the flat TT, not that hillclimb(ish) TT that they used to do. So essentially, we raced a flat, 24 mile Fitchburg. Kind of takes away from the Fitchburg-i-ness of it, right? And I would complain about our 8:45 AM crit start on Monday, but let's be honest here - the juniors raced even earlier, and I'd much rather get up early that race in the heat (101 degrees at around 4 PM) that the pro men's and women's fields had to do with.

Overall, I'd say it was a successful weekend. I was lucky enough to have Carrie in the car with me going up there, so 4 hours of driving through CT and MA (a little too close to Boston for my taste) were less painful than they would have been alone. Also, my new teammate (outside of UConn), Jena, won the women's TT and the overall! So that was wonderful. I managed to slide into a not-as-terrible-as-I-though 16th place in the TT, and unfortunately got pro-rated in the crit because of a little incident involving my imagination and a flat tire. Bad story, not worth repeating on here.

Oh, and as of yesterday at 2:20 PM (according to my phone's call log), I am committed to racing GMSR. Not sure what I was thinking.

Harlem Skinscraper Classic and the first day of summer

2010-06-21T16:10:00.002-04:00

So, Harlem. Lots of this going on. Thankfully, I managed to be dropped and out of contention (sad, I know) before that happened. At least if I have to suck, I timed it well. Anyways, the men's 3 field had a big pile up in the sprint. Big surprise, I know. The real problem was that no one ever taught the cat 3 field that when there's a crash, well, you're going to go down also unless you slow down. Or stop. Really, either way. You'll get stopped eventually. So these riders just keep piling up, and I mean a full twenty or thirty seconds after the first guys went down, the last guys were just crashing. So that was great. They had to hold our race up for about twenty minutes to get the ambulence (and firetruck and roadkill) off the course. But, let's be honest here, the men's pro/1/2 race was set to go off right after ours, and we all know how much more important they are (plus, it was going to be televised). So our race got cut from 45 minutes to about 25 minutes - meaning we paid more than a dollar and a half per minute raced. Not that I'm bitter or anything.

I'll be honest, I really do like Harlem a lot. Maybe it's because I can wake up at 12, leave my house at 1:45, and be at the start line with plenty of time to spare, but it's just a fun race. The course is awesome (without rain - then it morphs into an ice-skating rink), the corners are about four times as wide as the straights, the entire thing is a block party, and the waffle truck. It's a great time. That, and Lewis' friend (sorry, I don't know your name) who bought me a coconut-flavored piragua yesterday. You rock, I totally needed that. But anyways, it's just been irritating how much people say that they support women's racing, they want to see more of us out there, and then this stuff happens. We had 45 women pre-registered! That's huge. And this stuff still happens. Even at the track on Friday, our 5-mile final was cut down to a 15 lap points race. I know the intentions are there ... but it's just irritating, that's all.

So, onto nicer news: Summer is here!! It's June 21st, meaning that the sun will never set. That would actually suck, since it's in the mid-80s here right now and a touch too warm. But it does mean that strawberries will finally cost less than my bike, and that I can survive off of frozen yogurt and the Whole Food's salad bar! Win.

To end this up, three good stories:
1. Guido got fourth yesterday and Demis got sixth. Excellent, but the payout for fourth was over $600, which means that he had to pay taxes on it. Sad life of a pro bike racer. Anyways, he had to fill out a form. Which means I got to help. Story of my life. So one of the questions was something about "has this person been in the country for more than a third of the days plus 183 [WTF??] of the last two years combined?" Something along those lines. Needless to say, even in English, I didn't understand it at all. Neither did the woman who was helping us. But the boys got their checks (and I got dinner, yay!), and all was well.
2. Right after this, we had to drive back down to my house on the west side. Funny story about Manhattan in East Harlem: The streets aren't quite as clear as they are on the upper west side. Meaning they start curving a bit and there are parks everywhere. Demis, for whatever reason, decided to drive. Bad plan. This involved turning onto a one way street, running two red lights, and him constantly telling me to stop boludeando. All between 120th and 79th streets. Yeah buddy. Intense props to Myron the Kiwi for surviving the journey home with Demis and Antonio and not hating all of us.
3. After above story (I know, these are all sort of continuous, but seperate events, I promise), Guido and I headed up to Popover's for dinner. On the way there, he chose to mention that he may have left his passport in the race car. Problem. The reason he stayed over is so that I could get him to JFK this morning so that he could fly home to Argentina for two weeks. Anyways, that was great. Because guess who the only two guys without cellphones living in the Jamis-Sutter Home house are? Yep - Demis and Antonio. After a mess of communication between Demis (e-mail) and Sarah, we got Demis to agree to drive out to Newark in the morning to bring the passport out. Really, Demis did more driving this weekend than probably in the past year. And everyone is still alive, it's a miracle. Anyways, so long story short: Guido and I took a little road trip today: from 79th out to Newark, then out to Queens, and then I came back home - and he goes to Miami to hang out with the Cubans for an hour or so before waaaaay down to Buenos Aires. It's been a long day.

[Side note: as I'm writing this, there's a news report on CBS about the protesting going on in Bay Side (I think?) about the protesters of a mosque planning to be built where there was a church. One woman just said, and I quote, "We have enough terrorism here." Wow.]

So I'm going to end this on a better note and say that it's recovery ride time, and then dinner at Mama Mexico. Sadly, I'll be paying, because I owe Lewis after the mechanic at SBR fixed my noisy rear wheel for free, but still ... good food. I'll take it.

Watermelon margarita

2010-06-19T23:23:00.005-04:00

Yep, that kind of night. But this thing was absolutely delicious.
Not that I ordered it or anything, come on now, I always abide by the law. My dad ordered it. And I had a sip. Or two. Don't worry about it. This brilliant creation came from Josie's, the delicious all-natural-and-mostly-organic restaurant on 74th and Amsterdam.

Anyways, Harlem is tomorrow. Definitely my favorite race of the season. I didn't get to race it last year because the last stage of the now-defunct Giro di Jersey (something about a loss of sponsorship) ended too late, and there was traffic, and blah blah blah. I arrived in time to watch most of the womens race and all of the mens race, so it was still worth it. Hopefully none of this will be happening tomorrow like it did in 2008. But to be honest, even if it does, it'll be ok, I've already been promised a waffle with Nutella at the finish line. Just got to get there quicker! Motivation.

So last night marked the start of Friday Nights at the track out in T-town. Fun? Of course. But here's the thing. Nature Valley and Tour of the Dairylands are both this week. That means that the women's field had a whopping grand total of ten riders. Which meant that our miss-and-out ... well, usually you race those down to ten riders. So I'll leave it at that.

Anyways, it's midnight, and I need to be up in time to beat the locals over to Central Park so that I don't kill anyone while I'm doing my prep jumps in the morning. Goodnight, and hopefully next time I post I'll still have all of my skin on my body!

Oh, PS - happy father's day Daddy!! I love you!!

Philly one-liners

2010-06-07T11:25:00.003-04:00

So, what do you get when you mix a 156 mile race, Demis' 23rd birthday, and, uh, the girls next door (no comment)?

Fiesta. Yep. Yesterday was the Philadelphia International Championships (or something along those lines), so I went out there with the intentions of seeing Steve and Sherry after the race. Which I did, but shortly. Anyways, suffice it to say that chilling in the feed zone for six hours gave me a new appreciation for the soigneurs, namely Stephanie, who is officially my hero. After the race, I headed back to Kutztown (not originally part of the plan) and we went over to the boys' house to celebrate Demis' birthday. Um, way too much cake, but I got the end slice COVERED in frosting and had people vying for a bite left and right, so I guess no complaints here.

Anyways, one liners? We had a Cuban machine full of those:
"My legs are okay, my soul is dead" - Ivan Dominguez, after dropping out of the race at around 200 km.
"I won't tell you what my soul needs" - see above.
"What? Come on. I used all of my arrows up, that last one was supposed to be for me, but it's your birthday." - Ivan to Demis on his matchmaking skills.
"Feed zones are the only time in life when you will purposefully walk towards something speeding at you at 35 mph." - Stephanie
"Delicious coffee, thanks Princess." - Stephanie, while drinking red wine out of a Starbucks coffee mug at the party last night.

Fun people, right? Off to the track to pretend that I still have track legs, and I guess we'll test that out tomorrow night!

Zabar's Vienna roast, brewed strong, with 2% milk.

2010-06-02T00:21:00.003-04:00

Ok, yes, I have a bad obsession with coffee. But you know what? None of you would like me very much (at least until 2 PM) if I didn't have it. And believe me, there is nothing more welcomed in my life than real coffee after four months of espresso shots with too much foam on top.

Suffice it to say that I'm adjusting well. Or rather, already adjusted. To be honest, Spain seems like it was a lifetime ago. That's not to say that I'm being quick to forget it; on the contrary. But it just feels so distant, not like something that happened only a week ago. It's a weird feeling. But after speaking to a few other people as well, it turns out that I am not the only one who feels like this. Again, it’s weird, and I’ll write about it another time because quite frankly, that aforementioned coffee hasn’t started doing its job yet and I’m lacking the motivation at the moment. But soon, I promise.

Anyways, life stateside has been, well, normal. I restarted training the Friday I got home (the day after we got in), after accidentally “meeting” one of Gabe’s teammates. Good story for another time. I’m midway through my second week of training, and so far I think it’s been an average of about 15 hour weeks, so nothing too heavy. Just slowly getting back into it. This weekend I did two 3(ish) hour rides. On Saturday, I went down to the edge of Ringwood and then made my way over to 17A, which, by the way, did not get any flatter while I was gone. Too bad. Sunday I took some of the girls from the junior team out, and we did an hour and a half (the normal winter team ride loop), found Steph along the way, dropped the girls off, and then continued for another hour and a half, meandering through Far Hills. Since then, I rode easy yesterday, did hill repeats this morning, and then had my favorite of all agility tests at the training crit up at Augusta. Seriously, I think handling skills just disappear with age, those guys are incredible in how sketchy they can be.

As far as racing goes … I’ve been limited to Augusta for now. I was going to race at the track this past Saturday, but after going to bed at 9:30 on Friday and setting my alarm for 7 AM, I slept until … 9:30 AM. On Saturday. Magic. That’s where that ride on 17A came in, I guess we can call that punishment. I went to check out Ricola (apparently now called Basecamp International or something like that. Ricola sounds better), which Lisban won. I also got to see my boys, which was great – I haven’t seen any of them (most of them) since last August, and I definitely missed everyone. And it was nice hearing Spanish with a normal accent (read: not Andalucian) accent again. Yesterday was Somerville, more commonly known as piragua-and-a-sunburn day. That’s how it’s been defined for me for the past three years, at least. The Colavita ladies took home the win with Teresa Cliff-Ryan (not Tina, for once, but she’s the director now. So I guess it was her victory also), and the men didn’t win, unfortunately, due to a crash about 200 meters from the finish in which bikes “grew wings” (not my words, but it’s true, there was definitely a set of wheels flying through the air). There were a few crashes throughout the day (I mean, Somerville, let’s be serious here), but I think the worst two were in the pro race and in the men’s cat three race. But everyone came out alive, no (really) serious damage was done. Just some bruised egos and a pretty angry directeur sportif (no names mentioned).

So anyways, I managed to take all day to write this, and it is currently 12:21 AM, way past my bedtime (depending on who you ask). Just quickly before I go, I have to express my disappointment that the huge jar of Nutella I picked up this weekend doesn't taste the same as it did in Europe. Nothing a few strawberries can't solve, but still. But let's be honest here, it's not like that is going to stop me from eating it.

Goodnight!

On the plane

2010-05-20T22:10:00.002-04:00

It really hasn’t hit me yet that we left Spain. I keep on joking that it won’t hit me until I go to a restaurant or a café or something, order something in Spanish, and no one understands me. It’s sort of true though. In my mind, I’m still going to wake up tomorrow, go get a café con leche from Café Futbol, where they put speed in the coffee (sad to say that I discovered this on the second to last day), and spend the day enjoying the sun and getting annoyed at people who walk far too slowly on streets that are far too narrow. And while I am excited to say that I will instead be waking up tomorrow to a Zabar’s bagel with cream cheese and lox and a cup of my dad’s very strong Viennese roast coffee that will actually keep me awake for more than two hours without the jitters, it’ll still be sad. And maybe that’s when it will hit me. Or maybe when I realize that Annie is actually about an hour away by car instead of down the hall, or maybe when I actually have to make my own lunch (and maybe without soup or bread, god forbid), or, as I said, when I order something in English. I have, of course, been speaking English to everyone in our group for four months. There are thirty-six of us. I spoke a lot of English. But the truth is, with the exception of Paris and Amsterdam, I have not ordered a single thing from a restaurant or a café or asked for help in a store in English. In 120 days. It’s been awhile. Who knows, I might bust out with a “me pongas una capiriña por favor?” (a capiriña being the only drink that I really wanted that I totally forgot to order while I was in Spain). Of course, being back in the states means that I have a year and 79 days until I can drink. Legally. Again. Not that I’m counting or anything.

Granada had a magic to it. I’m the kind of person who is happy no matter where I am, as long as I’m with people I like. But this time was different. It’s not that I didn’t like the people in our group; I loved them a lot. But walking through Granada during my last few days there made me realize that this time, it was the place also. Granada captured me in a way that no other city has before. And yes, in the words of Danielle M., I “shat on it” quite a bit. But as most people know, the more I make fun of something, typically, the more I love it. And this was no exception. I have never seen a place like that before, and the sad thing is, pictures can’t even begin to capture it. The view over the city and the Alhambra from the Mirador San Nicolas, the Sierra Nevada, and the Cathedral all blew my mind. That’s the only way I can put it. The tiny streets that people shouldn’t be driving on but they do anyways, the alleys that are literally impossible to drive though, the seemingly endless number of bright, sunny, fountained plazas through the city, the lack of any buildings over ten stories (I’m not kidding), and the overgrown-but-still-manageable greenery all around the city. The all-white Albaycín, the Paseo de los tristes that, if you walked far enough along, went straight into the green and endless valley between the mountains, the gypsy caves, the bright, beautiful colors of the Arab markets (affectionately known as the hippie street), and those orange trees that smelled like a little bit of heaven. The cobbled streets, the (literally) endless number of pastelerias, heladerias, bars, and schwarma places, the people who took too long with anything that they were doing, but once they finally got around to it, they did it perfectly. That city radiates something, and I’m not sure what it is, but I loved it. It’s a city, no doubt, but it’s small and manageable. But it’s an old city, and the Moorish influence is everywhere. There are hundreds and hundreds of tiny streets, and until the last day, I was still going down new ones whenever I could find them. The small apartment buildings are beautiful colors, and the oldest neighborhood in the city is all white, like a picturesque Mediterranean village. It’s hard to piece together with words, and I’m sure this description sounds a little bit out of order and incomplete, but everything together makes that place magical.

This past Saturday, I was supposed to go for a run, but it had been raining all day. So I decided to wait until the evening to go. I left at around 7:45, heading up the river as I almost always did. The rain had just stopped, and once I hit the dirt road that goes up to the waterfall after crossing the river, I had to stop. Really, it had nothing to do with the particularly steep part that leads up to the dirt road. That part of the road is where the valley starts, leading into the pueblos that are on the outskirts of town. That’s also the direction that the sun shines in the afternoon, the sunset being downriver. So while I was stopped, not catching my breath or anything, I took a look around. The road was almost deserted, probably due to the huge puddles from the rain earlier, and the sky was clearing a little. The sky was still cloudy and wet, but the sun was coming through completely from the late afternoon angle, casting the most incredible glow on the trees and houses in the hills. It was as if the entire city had a halo on it. I would do anything, including keeping running as part of my regular training, in order to keep that view within reach, whenever I wanted to see it.

But sadly, I can’t. In the words of Robert Frost, nothing gold can stay. I’m sitting here on the plane from Madrid to JFK, at hour 3.5 of a seven and a half hour flight. I’m tired. We went out last night (I use that term loosely, I made it until about 2 AM before I called it quits and walked home) and I’m running off of a little more than five hours of sleep, the only thing in my life which has been a constant for the past week or so. The coffee that Carmen made me this morning only lasted until a little past lunchtime, and the coffee that Iberia served with “linner” (lunch/dinner, depending on what time zone your body is in) was weaker than my flying 200 time at the Kissena velodrome last year. It still hasn’t hit me that I won’t be speaking Spanish tomorrow, and to be honest, it might not hit me until September because last time I checked, the Argentinean National Team (aka Jamis-Sutter Home Pro Cycling) still doesn’t speak too much English. I’m still not used to the idea that I’m actually going to have to drive to get to places now, and that stores will be open between the hours of 14.00 and 17.30 (more commonly known as 2:00 PM and 5:30 PM). I’m not loving the idea of having to walk further than around the corner to get a good gelato, and it’s going to take some getting used to having to make evening plans more than an hour in advance. I won’t miss the party only getting started at 2 AM, but I will miss wandering around the city in the early hours of the morning and dancing with a perfect view of the Alhambra. There’s so much that I know I’m going to miss once it hits me, like the spectacular view from the mirador right below the cell tower that I only went to for the first time last week, but I guess that’s how I know I’ll definitely be back there. It typically pains me to use clichés, and even more so when it’s been translated, very awkwardly, into Spanish from a movie that I really love, but one of the beer billboards on a bus station really got it right:

Siempre nos quedará Granada.

Gelato for lunch ...

2010-05-01T16:40:00.003-04:00

... is 100% acceptable. I'm not sure that the Italians agree with me, but after it hit around 80° in Rome last sunday, gelato for lunch happened. A mix of raspberry and yogurt flavored gelatos in a cone, to be exact. And it was delicious.

Anyways, food aside (not really), Rome was incredible. We made it there on Thusday night at around midnight, after our flight was delayed by about two hours (and disappeared from the departure board for about 20 minutes? Terrifying). We made it to the hostel, thanks to the wonderful (seriously, I'm not being sarcastic this time) shuttle service, but that's when our troubles started. Let me just say that our hostel, The Alice in Wonderland Hostel, is great. The location rocks, it's small, cozy, and they have strong coffee. That being said, the management does leave something to be desired. The hostel is not well marked at all (you wouldn't know it was there unless you were looking for it, and even then ... ), and when we arrived (almost an hour later than we had told them, but we had called), we had to call about ten times to be let in. We had booked a three person room, but the room we got only had a queen sized bed and we had to wait for a cot to be rolled in and set up. The second day, when we got back from sightseeing, we found that our stuff had been moved to another room (already set up, thank god). So the hostel itself is great, but you need to have a good level of patience to deal with it at times.

Anyways, it turns out that we just so happened to be in Rome during the Italian Culture Week, meaning that we didn't have to pay to get into anything except for the Vatican (I guess it's technically not Italy, right?). Friday morning, after a breakfast that was superior to those of any other hostel (as in the normal stuff plus pastries, good coffee, and fruit), we headed over to the Colosseum. I'll just put this out there, that thing puts most plazas de toros in Spain to shame. It's enormous and absolutely incredible (I'll be using those words a lot, talking about Rome). A lot of it is still intact, minus the stunning decorations that our guide said covered it in its better days. Annie, of course, directed our photoshoots, and upon leaving, I got a מה נשמע? from some random vendor who saw my necklace. We ended up buying three leather bracelets from a different vendor who really didn't appreciate our attempt at bargaining with him. After, we went and wandered around the area behind the Colosseum, which I believe was mostly the city centers. After that, we met up with one of Jamie's friends, John, and his friend, Nathan, and walked around with them for awhile. We got lunch after awhile, I had eggplant parm and fettucine with mushrooms. SO GOOD. Nothing like Italian food in Italy, right? Then we headed over to the Fontana di Trevi, and then spent some time walking down the side streets, where I found a leather store. Italian leather. And let me just make something clear, I do not own a single pair of pants that stay up on their own, the ones I was wearing that day included. So I headed in there,and after lots of charades (a guy in a purple polo shirt was really entertained), I got a belt, Italian leather, cut to my size (for both waist and hips), for 30 euros. A little pricy? Maybe. Worth it? 100%. I got something else there as well, unmentionable here until May 21st. Don't worry about it. we went to the Pantheon, also lovely. And free. Made it that much more gorgeous. After, we kept walking. Eventually, we headed over to a restaurant to get dinner, where we got shafted to the back room. Yep, American college students. Whatever. I had vegetable soup, which really hit the spot after wandering around in the rain all day (yep, the rain followed us to Rome. Asshole). We headed back to the hostel and promptly passed out.

Next day, next country. Legit. By the way, the Vatican, while recognized internationally as an independent country, is one of the few that is not a member of the United Nations. Just in case you were curious. Anyways, the museum is enormous, seriously. We spent about four hours in there, just going from exhibit to exhibit. Oh, and it's such a tease - EVERY room has a sign saying "Sistine Chapel - through here." What they don't tell you is that you have to go through about three hours worth of rooms to get "through here." Rediculous. Anyways, it was stunning. And I ran into two Israelis by accident. Whoops. We had lunch, and then continued onto St. Peter's Basilica, where I went to ... drumroll, please ... my third mass in three weeks. In Italian. And I understand about 70% of it, more than I can say about the one in Spain. Oh, and it was not led by the Pope, that would have been awesome though. But it was really interesting to listen to the sermon, from what I could understand of it. Religiousness aside, of course, the priest said a lot of things that I found to be very true. After we left St. Peter's, we walked down the river towards a neighborhood that I think is called Trastevere, but don't take my word for it, we all know how good my directional/name memory skills are. Anyways, it was a cute little place, we got pizza and paninis for dinner and enjoy the lack of rain (finally). After that, we walked back towards the Fontana di Trevi, where we did a rainless photo shoot. After that, we went up towards the train station to catch our metro back to the hostel and send John on the train back out of the city. It was during this walk that I made an important discovery: cannoli are Sicilian, not Italian. And yes, there is a difference. In any case, I had been craving a cannolo (singular - I learned some Italian grammar) all weekend, and had been so confused as to why I couldn't find it anywhere. But I found one, so problem solved.

Day three: we slept in a little. Exciting. It turned out to be gorgeous on Sunday, hence the gelato for lunch thing, so we decided to just walk around with the boys and take in everything that we hadn't been able to see in the previous days. As in, gelato. And the Fontana di Trevi (yes, we went three times) in the sun. And the Piaza Navona, the plaza that was full of painters and street performers. Oh, and we found Kyra. And we ate lunch outdoors at a cute little restaurant (homemade pasta with clams, I think, and artichoke. Delcious). In the late afternoon, we (the girls) headed out for the airport for our 10PM (ish) flight back to Málaga.

And that is when the shitshow began.

And I'm using the term "shitshow" rather lightly here, because the truth is, Sunday night was nothing compared to the flight back from Amsterdam. But it still sucked. We got in at around 12:30, which meant that the train running to the city center was closed for the night. We had planned for that. So where did we sleep? The benches in Burger King. For around four hours. Don't judge us, they looked comfortable. And we slept surprisingly well. At around 5:30, we started walking towards the metro (it's a bit of a hike from T3), only to find out that the first train left at 6:30, meaning that Kyra would miss her 7 AM bus. So we took a cab, hopped on the 7 AM bus ... and went straight to class.

True story, I kept my eyes open through my 1.5 hour 9 AM history class. Do I remember what he said at all? No way. Does attendence count in that class? It's about 70% of our grade.

Anyways, loved Rome, will be back.

Ciao!

God bless the French.

2010-04-13T09:01:00.004-04:00

Seriously, I mean fries, toast, braids. What else? Oh yeah. Rediculously high standards. Case in point: we (me, Leila, Michael, Avner, and Mehdi) go to a bar on Saturday night, and in my usual fashion, my first stop is finding the bathroom. In case you were curious, it's behind the bar and to the left. In any case, we get in there, there are around three stalls, there is toilet paper, and there are seatcovers. Had I been in Spain, I would have considered that high quality, especially in a bar. But according to Leila, the bathroom was disgusting. Again, the French are awesome.

Anyways, so I miraculously made it to Leila's house after traveling overnight (= 5 non-consecutive hours of sleep) and navigating the Parisian subway system (not as bad as I thought it would be) on Friday at around one in the afternoon. She lives in Saint-Mande, which in her words, is the best of both worlds being so close to Paris yet much, much quieter. Her apartment is ADORABLE (hopefully she knows I am moving in, after I learn French of course), and her mom, Therese, is possibly the nicest person I have ever met. Oh, and Luna, the half-husky, half-something two year old dog? Cutest thing on earth. Even thought she left enough fur on my jeans to build another dog with. So after I made it to her place and took a shower, we left to go walk around on the typical "tourist walk" of Paris. As in, the Arc de Triomphe, the Lourve (we didn't go inside, just sat outside), Notre Dame, and of course a walk down the Champs-Elysées. Sort of in that order. In any case, it was really fun. We ended up being at Notre Dame during a mass, meaning that I have been to mass twice this week, officially making me a better Catholic than a Jew. Sorry mom! Apparently Paris heard that I was coming for the weekend and decided to bring out the sun after quite some time of chillier weather (according to Leila), so we got to walk around and bask in the sun for a few hours. Quick word to the wise (and by wise, I mean Americans): first off, don't wear super-mini dresses without tights, especially when it isn't summer yet. But if you really really must, please do not bend over and show the world (AKA the digusting man standing behind where we were sitting) what you are wearing (or lack thereof) underneath.

Anyways, when we got back that night, Leila and her mom made salad and crepes with eggs and cheese for dinner, so good! And then, of course, a Nutella crepe for dessert. Never have I seen such a large population of amants of Nutella, and I love them for it. Another reason that I am pretty sure I will be back in Paris within the next few years. After that, Leila and I had talked about either roller-skating (every Friday night, they close certain streets in Paris for a few hours so that people can roller-skate, AWESOME) or going to a small soirée that her friends were having. We decided on the party, but also decided on a nap first. We fell asleep at 8:30, and when Leila woke me up at 10, there was absolutely no way I was going to be able to survive even the smallest of parties. So she left me sleeping, went out for a little bit (she wanted to stay in also, but could not), and apparently got back in at around 1:30 AM. I was out cold.

The next day, we got up at around 9:30 (13 hours of sleep, hell yes) had some lovely croissants and pain aux chocolat for breakfast. Someone remind me why the French aren't all obese? After breakfast, we left to go walk around with Marylise, one of Leila's friends who had stayed over after the party (the subway that runs to her neighborhood stops at like midnight or something and she missed the last one). We went to the infamous Moulin Rouge (take a walk down that street and tell me what street it reminds you of in the U.S. Need a hint? Think liquor + Southeast U.S. Answer at the end of this post.), got some lunch and pastries (I'm not really sure what they were called, aside from the baklava, but they were delicious), and walked around some more. I'm getting pretty good at that. Anyways, after that, we went up (literally, steepest hill I've ever seen) to the monestary, where we had a stunning (if not a bit smoggy) view of the city. The monestary was gorgeous, and refreshingly small compared to the mammoth-sized cathedrals and monestaries in Spain (seriously, what on earth could they possibly need all of that room for?). After that, we headed back home and took a nap, and had a delicious pesto pasta with some sort of meat-and-cheese thing. Later on, we headed off to some bar in Paris with Michael (Leila's brother), Mehdi (a friend of theirs), and Avner. The place we went to ended up being full, and no amount of Avner's sweet-talking was going to get the bouncers to soften up, so we decided to head off. Michael let me and Leila take the scooter, so Leila and I went for a romantic nighttime tour of Paris through some of the streets, on the river, down the Champs-Elysée, and right by the the Eiffel Tower (definitely on the list of UConn's "pleasedon'tdothisourinsurancedoesn'tcoverit" activities). We ended up at Cafe Oz, an Australian cafe/bar/discotheque. There are four of them, and to be honest, I'm not sure which one we were at, but I highly reccomend it. The cover is pretty low (relatively - it's 10 euros), and we had an incredible time. We ended up meeting two of Avner's cousins there (do I remember the names? What a funny question. No.) who were Israeli, so we broke that language barrier for awhile, that was nice. All in all, it was me, Leila, and five guys (plus a few others that the boys knew? I have no idea who they were). Long story short, the guys at the bar left me and Leila alone. It was glorious. We left at around 3:30, and were forced to take a cab home since the subways had long stopped running. Leila, Mehdi, and I split a cab, which Mehdi generously paid for (seriously, nicest guy on earth. Forget the intense language barrier.), headed back, hung out for a little bit, and fell asleep a little bit before 5. Definitely a successful night.

Side note: Another reason that the French are incredible? They banned smoking in bars and restaurants. Minor setback? Now, instead of everything smelling like smoke, everything smells like B.O. But I mean, France is known for its, um, odors (cheeses? come on!), so I guess it works well.

Right, so remember that whole falling asleep at 5 thing? Well guess when I woke up? Yeah. 9:30. Not fair, not fair at all. Anyways, because I had the body odors of about 300 people on me, I decided that 9:30 AM was as good a time as any for a nice, de-stinking shower. Did that, and promptly fell back asleep for about an hour and a half, by which point Leila's mom was back from mass and made me breakfast. And coffee. Did I mention that one of the reasons that I love her so much is that she makes wonderful coffee. Not that cafe con leche that I've been drinking in Spain and much of Europe, but a nice, strong coffee in an adorable, old-fashioned French press. Oh, and she and I were the only ones who like coffee, so I got to have as much as I wanted. Anyways, I had breakfast, relaxed for awhile, and Leila finally woke up at around 1:30. We lounged around the house for awhile with Mehdi (he was still there after staying over, Michael had left already), and then headed out to go meet with Julian for crepes. And I had (drumroll, please) my first ever Nutella-and-banana crepe! And yes, I know, it's absurd that I have been in Europe for three months without having one yet. But I've been trying to eat really well here since I'm not training as much as I do at home. Anyways, the crepe was delicious, and I wish it were easier to bring them to races - perfect recovery food! This is probably why Europeans race so well - they know how to fuel! Sadly, Victor couldn't come to meet us - he has some crazy exam coming up this week and has pretty much dedicated his current life to studying for it. Again, another reason I need to go back to Paris sometime soon. So after we left Julian, we headed back to Saint-Mande to get ready for a little get-together that evening. Leila's mom made this great dish of pastry bread baked with "strong French cheese" (her words, not mine) on top. Being someone who doesn't even like the taste of Gorgonzola, I thought I was going to be that American. The good news is, baking cheese is something like cooking with wine, where the "stink" kind of evaporates into the oven, so it was absolutely delicious. Laura (Leila's cousin), Michael, Mehdi, Ben (Leila's jewish boyfriend), and Laurent (a friend) came over, and it was definitely interesting playing with the language barrier. I'll figure it out soon enough. Anyways, Leila and I went to bed at around 12ish, since I had to wake up at 6:15 to catch my flight. My lovely father, however, decided that calling at 4:15 AM (10:15 PM his time) to tell me about the minor earthquake in Spain sounded like a great idea. Thanks daddy. Anyways, I woke up, Therese made me coffee, and I headed back to Spain (almost without incident, but not worth discussing here).

So all in all, Paris was wonderful and I will definitely be back there sometime soon (and hopefully speaking a little French). Next up: Roma with Jamie and Annie (April 22-24).

By the way, the name of the street I was talking about before? Bourbon Street in New Orleans, LA.

Granada, Ronda, Marbella, Fez, and Málaga

2010-03-30T11:20:00.002-04:00

So normally, there would be something witty in the title about how I, once again, failed at updating in a normal time interval. But I figure that everyone is already used to (or bored of) that, so I figure that I will get right into it.

Oh, I am also skipping Madrid and Toledo. Suffice it to say that Toledo is stunning and that Madrid looks like Manhattan, at least the part that we stayed in. And running in Madrid two hours before a soccer game is the Greatest Agility Test Ever. Give it a shot sometime.

Anyways, my parents got here on Friday, and we spent the next two nights in Granada. Quick thing about southern Spain during Semana Santa. IT IS A MESS. Sort of like New Years Eve in NYC, but think European city. Small streets. Lots of plazas with outdoor restaurants. I went through the Second Greatest Agility Test Ever (see above) trying to run on the river on Sunday afternoon. It was Palm Sunday. Not to be ignorant, but I am not even sure what Palm Sunday is. I need a tutorial in everything Catholic.

You will notice I have been avoiding using contractions at any cost. The reason for this? My computer is dead (we think), so I am using the hotel computer, and I still do not understand European keyboards.

Anyways, so our time in Granada was nice. We got to go to the restaurants that I have never been to on a student budget (love having parents around), hit up Cafè Central (of course. And they gave me and my parents free drinks. Love those boys.), went to La Alhambra, and found a procesión. By accident. It was rediculous. Think lots of people, red and white KKK hoods (I know how not-PC that is, but seriously, how else am I going to describe those things?), women in black dresses with veils, and an ENORMOUS Virgin Mary float at the end of it, along with a band playing a funeral march. And when I say lots of people, I am talking Thanksgiving Day Parade-sized crowds. Sunday evening was a test of how well I know Granada´s (first fail) small, little alleyways, because there was no other way to get back home. For the record, it seems as though I have finally mastered the city, because we managed to not get lost with me leading the way. Check that off of the bucket list.

Yesterday we headed up to Ronda to explore the city (we found it when we were in Spain three years ago, but did not have time to explore it much). It was cute, fun, has gorgeous views, and the hotel and restaurant were incredible, but there is not much than a day or two worth of activities there. One of those activities, however, included killing our car battery and making friends with two guys there who were gracious enough to jump start (and then kick start) our car. Fun experience. I guess I should re-learn to drive stick if I want to live in Spain. We managed the drive back down the mountain without much incident (except for being the closest I have ever been to getting carsick), and made it to Marbella without getting lost (um, that is a lie) and landed in the most gorgeous hotel ever! The owner, who is from Brazil and worked for Club Med, basically bought out a block of whitewash apartments in the old city in Marbella and turned them into hotel apartments and rooms. It is incredible.

Anyways, we are heading to Morocco tomorrow, and hopefully we will make it back to Spain alive! We will be in Fez until Friday.

p.s. - pictures will come soon. As soon as I have a working computer again. Sad face.

My future job

2010-03-12T18:32:00.002-05:00

Right? It's always a possibility in case the economy goes south of the Bible Belt.

Let's all pray that doesn't happen, shall we?

In case you can't tell, it's a mini-carousel powered by a bike. Little kids and bikes. Disasterous or fun, depending on so many things.

I've come to learn here (and during the other year and a half that I've spent in college) that if you can take everything that comes at you with a good sense of humor, nothing is that bad. Or at least it doesn't seem like it is. Not that I made any friends on that flight from Eindoven (remember, that "pit stop for chocolate" in Brussels?), but for me, the only way to not lose my mind in that situation was just to make as many jokes of it as possible. Because the truth is, you're stuck there anyways, right? May as well enjoy it ... somehow. Maybe enjoy is the wrong word. But just make the best of it. We found this bar/cafe near Plaza Nueva called El Central. It's a fun place, and we made friends with the waiter and the cook after we had Annie's party there last week. I ended up heading over there again last night after drinks and tapas with Annie, Anna, Danielle, Sean, and Jamie. Isabel, Sarah, and Liz were at El Central already, so I went there to meet with them for a little bit. The waiter there, Maxy (I think) is very, very friendly. He and the cook, Javier, are the guys who followed us to El Camborio last week. In any case, I said hi to them, and Maxy offered me several drinks, all of which I turned down. I just wasn't in the mood, I wanted tea and then I wanted to go to bed (which is exactly what I did). In any case, I kept telling him that I didn't want to drink, and left the honey-rum shot that he brought over on the table. Anyways, I went back there today because I had some time to kill before an appointment and again, I really wanted tea (and I needed a bathroom, don't judge me). So I went there, and the other waiter, Diego, was there, but not Maxy. I guess Diego had overheard the various conversations last night, because he kindly offered to spike my tea with tequila. Sense of humor? New best friends.

Speaking of a sense of humor (and of the food I've been promising to write about), I tried something new last night. Slimy, small, eight tentacles ...
BABY OCTOPUS.
It was the tapa that came with our drinks last night at Reca (that bar we've been wanting to go to for a long time). I wasn't sure what it was at first, partially because it was sort of dark (we were outdoors) and partially because it was seafood stew so I think there were shrimp and crab in there as well. There was also, however, without a doubt, baby octopus in there. Anna convinced me to eat one, and I can say with confidence that I will NEVER eat that again. But at least I can say that I did it ... right?

I went to a place called Yogurtlandia today with Kyra, Kaitlyn, and Kyra's friend. The only way I can think of to describe that place is incredible. It's like pinkberry with probably double the options. I ended up getting yogurt with nutella and crumbled corn flakes. SO GOOD. There may have been a few gummy candies and a few tea biscuits involved after the yogurt. Good thing I have a seven mile fartlek run tomorrow to, um, take care of all of that.

I can see clearly now, the rain has gone ...

2010-03-11T14:34:00.002-05:00

Yep, I just titled a blog entry with song lyrics. I'm that asshole. But that's fine with me, because for three days straight, it hasn't rained in Granada.

Watch, I just jinxed it.

Seriously though. From about a week after we got to Spain until just a few days ago, it rained almost every single day. It was insane. I still carry my umbrella in my bag because I just don't trust the weather here anymore. But I'm beyond happy the the weatherman (yep, I still blame all meteorologist happenings on the weatherman) has decided that we deserve some sun after the near flooding (I'm not being sarcastic, for once) that has been happening in ALL of the southern Iberian Peninsula.

Anyways, I've discovered that I am an amante of two foods: dark chocolate covered raisins, of course, but also dark chocolate covered pinenuts. Crazy, right? I wouldn't have thought to dunk them in chocolate either. But here's the deal: pinenuts, somehow, have a very similar consistency to chocolate. So when you eat one of the little guys, it seems (at least to me) like solid chocolate. But there's a healthy little thing in the middle! It's perfect. Dark chocolate is good for you anyways. At least that's what I keep telling myself. Better than the churros con chocolate, at least.

Carmen made tortilla with spinach tonight, one of my favorites. It's a perfect light, yummy dinner, especially with the cold cuts she gives us. Typically, a tortilla española is eggs, potatoes, and sometimes onions cooked in a pan, until the eggs are roughly like a solid pan of scrambled eggs. Great description, I know. In any case, with the spinach one, it's about 90% spinach, with just enough eggs to hold it together. Yummy!

I went for a run today, around 5 miles, up the river to the overpass. My calves were hurting a bit, so I decided not to make it any longer than that. Around once a week, I've been running by a group of soccer players (unintentionally, obviously. Not that they're rediculously good looking or anything.), and apparently, they now recognize me also, because I got a wave from them today. That, or they could have been mocking "the stupid American running in shorts when it is still winter." Whatever. I finally made it to the track yesterday, which is about 2 miles from Carmen's apartment. I ran there, and after, yet again, appearing to the man at the front desk as a stupid American (I didn't understand why the bank could possibly be involved with me getting a 10-entry pass to the track), he let me in for free. What a guy. I was supposed to do 4x4 lap (1 mile) efforts at 5k pace, with about 2 minutes between each one (this is the difference between cyclists and runners. We measure rest intervals in time. You guys do it in distance.), but my legs felt like absolute crap, and I wasn't keeping pace, so I only did three. Oh well. 10 mile endurance run coming up this Sunday, can't wait to eat like a teenage boy for a day or two.

Catch up!

2010-03-09T14:08:00.002-05:00

So the way I figure, because I skipped almost three weeks of posting, I should probably overdo it this week a little, no? Right? Balance is everything in life. There we go.

So I got this idea from another blog I StumbleUpon-ed (if you don't have that toolbar, you need it. Now. Especially if you have exams coming up soon.). This blog, called Runner's Kitchen, is done by a woman in the Manhattan area who basically writes about her running and her appetite, both of which are impressive. I realized, after reading her blog for a few days, that one of the things that I haven't written too much about in Spain has been food. Now, as we all know, I have proven myself incapable of writing for more than a day or two consecutively before I "forget" or "don't have time," or any of the excuses I am so good at coming up with. However, I've decided that if it so happens that Carmen makes something extraordinary and I decide to write that day, it shall be mentioned. That wasn't the case today (lunch was just fries and grilled pork), but I do want to mention a few of my favorite meals. And some running I've been doing.

Disclaimer: Yep, I ate pork. I've also had shellfish here, all for the first time (sorry Mom). As most people know, my "thing" back home was that I never had shellfish or any meat that couldn't be kosher, didn't eat red meat just by habit, and did eat poulty/fish. I decided, when I got here, that because Spanish culture is so much based on food, I would eat the typical Spanish foods while I am here. I doubt it'll continue once I get back stateside, but for now, I am enjoying it.

That being said, one of my all-time favorite meals here is paella. It's delicious, filling, and somehow I think it's healthy as well. Such a winner. The way Carmen makes it, it's rice with peppers and tomatoes, plus shrimp, cubes of meat, and lots of mini-clams (I think that's what they are. Keep in mind, I'm new at this.). It's SO good. Another winner of hers is this thick tomato soup that has rice and mini-clams it in. Also wonderful. I'm going to try to keep adding new foods to the "winner" list, but Carmen has a (usually) relatively predictable cooking schedule. So we'll see. Carmen did let me cook last week, and I got to make my favorite dish from home - spinach sauteed with pine nuts, raisins, and garlic. Yum! I can say that our dinner this past weekend at the hostel in Málaga was pretty yummy. We got a bunch of vegetables and I sauteed spinach, mushrooms, and broccoli together with garlic and olive oil and dumped all of it into a bathtub-sized pot of pasta. Imagine that, eating healthy on a college student's budget. Success!

By the way, this is standing proof for my mom that I can, in fact, cook. Or at least, I try really hard. So far everything has been edible.

Dessert has also been a big thing here. Or rather, we've all made it into a big thing. You try walking by multiple gelatto shops, pastelerias, and candy stores during the day and you see how long you can last. My particular favorite is dark chocolate covered raisins (really original, I know), and it has gotten to the point that the woman at the candy store near the schools knows me by face (right, I mean, I guess I don't blend in too well here). The rest of the study abroad group seems to have fallen prisoner to the napolitanas, which are essentially crossaint-dough baked with chocolate inside. Amazing, but I am trying to resist them for as long as possible. Carmen, of course, has been kindly helping the situation by making flan (custard) every once in awhile, complete with strawberries and whipped cream.

As far as running goes, I can guarantee that I will not be continuing this habit once I get home. At least not until October - maybe I'll do it again a little bit for cross training. It has been nice, and it's a really fun way to explore different cities (I did a nine mile run in Lisbon, Portugal on the river at sunset that was incredible), but it is just awful on my knees and shins. I've gotten to the point where I don't have to tape my shins anymore (nothing like running with electric blue tape on your legs), but the very idea of the potential injury from running is just awful. Bikes are so much nicer to the body (most of the time). That being said, I'm enjoying it for now (while I have to, I guess) and have been getting some solid workouts in. It's nice to be able to get done in under an hour what would usually take me two hours on the bike, such as the LT/VO2 intervals I've been doing a lot of lately. Right now, my week consists of 2 days of recovery, 2-3 days of hard intervals, and 2-3 days of endurance (6-10 mile runs). So it's pretty similar to being on the bike, but each workout is more intense so there are fewer hours involved. Which means that I actually have a social life ... Another new experience.

Sidenote - my camera is "malfunctioning" at the moment, so until a little miracle happens, there won't be too many new pictures on here - sorry! :-(

Three weeks of recap

2010-03-07T15:44:00.004-05:00

So I keep on meaning to update, but between homework (yes, I do get homework in Spain, it's a shame) and multiple trips in a row, I haven't had the chance to. So I'm just going to do a huge update now, in reverse chronological order because too much has happened in the last three weeks to let it slide.

So yesterday, at about 3:00 PM, we (Me, Annie, Anna, Eileen, Jamie, Tina, Kayla, Isabel, and Kaitlyn) got back from Málaga. I had been looking online awhile back, and I found this 5k road race (running, not cycling) that cost 3 euros. Half of the proceeds went to Haiti, and the other half to breast cancer. Málaga is under 2 hours away by bus, so I figured it would be fun to get a couple of people to do it. So we headed out there yesterday afternoon, managed to find the hostel (the information desk at the train station gave us the "old" address. Awesome), settled in, and waited for Tina and Jamie (they took a later bus). Kayla really wanted to go to the Picasso museum, which was awesome, and then we did the inevitable: THE GROCERY STORE. Seriously, so many possibilites, so cheap, and you make friends in the kitchens at hostels. I'm not kidding. CFG (from Portugal, remember him?) loved hanging out with us in the kitchen, I guess it worked for him. Anyways, we went to the supermarket, loaded up on some vegetables (spinach, tomatoes, broccoli, and mushrooms), bread, cheese, and of course, pasta. Now here's the thing with pasta: it's sold in metrics (obviously, we're in Europe). The problem with that is we usually (always) end up with more than we need (we had the same problem in Portugal - we could have had dinner twice with the pasta we made). It's also very cheap in Europe, a one kilo bag is under a euro. So, no names mentioned, but someone bought two one-kilo bags of pasta. When cooked, that's approximately four lbs. of pasta. Include the sauteed vegetables in there, and we had enough food for a small army. And there were only seven of us eating. I may or may not have finished that meal with a bit of a stomachache. Anyways, we all went to sleep (sort of. A cold hostel and lots of rowdy, drunk Brits/Irish guys doesn't allow for much sleep) soon after, and woke up at 7:30. Voluntarily. To go running. Incredible, right? So of course, it was raining, so we all put on tights or whatever and headed out to walk towards the start of the race, which was about two miles from the hostel. Once we got there, we got free t-shirts and hats, and let's talk about something quickly: the shirts that they gave us were 3XLs. Now, they by no means fit well, and definitely need a shrinking in the wash, but they were TINY compared to a 3XL that one would see in the states. They were what we would probably call a large. Europeans are so damn skinny. Anyways, the race was good. I didn't really get the time I would have liked, but considering that I haven't competitively run in over two years, it wasn't too terrible. I'm going to try to find another 5k (or something) to do before I leave Spain just to see how I am coming along. Anyways, we made it back to the hostel, changed, and made it back home before 3 PM. Overall success, and definitely the least stressful travel situation so far.

Which leads me to our weekend in Amsterdam, which won the opposite suprelative: SO stressful. The traveling part, at least. And only the way back. The way there and the city were relatively calm. We left Thursday afternoon at around 6 for Madrid, got there at 11, and may or may not have spent about 5 hours in shantytown (read: we slept in the airport. On marble floors). It wasn't that bad, suprisingly. The worst of it was the drunk people (Americans, obviously) next to us who just didn't stop talking the entire time. But whatever, we chose not to stay in a hostel. Anyways, we got on the plane, made it to Eindoven, and took the train to Amsterdam. We didn't exactly make any friends on that train, but it went without incident. The same cannot be said, however, for actually getting to the hostel in Amsterdam. Amsterdam has this bizzare (and fairly wonderful) transportation system that is probably about 50% bikes (yay!), 30% public transportation (tram cars that run through the city), and 20% otherwise. It's a very efficient, environmentally friendly system, but it's a little confusing. Anyways, we get off the train at the station and we are trying to find the right tram to get to our hostel, which would be numbers 1-5 (hint: you can sneak on number 5 for free). We find a number 2, but we didn't really get there in time. What I mean by that is Eileen managed to get on before the doors closed, but the rest of us didn't. So Eileen is off in a tram traveling through Amsterdam, and what doesn't she have? Oh yeah. A working cellphone. She forgot the pin number. AWESOME. So we just decided to head to the hostel with hopes that she would manage to get there on her own. We walk in, and who is sitting there, very calmly, waiting for all of us? Eileen. Of course. So typical. Anyways, the rest of the weekend was great, if uneventful (yeah right. We just made a pact to not publicize anything that happened in Amsterdam). We actually did have a really good time, there was a lot of chocolate spread involved, and we did this wonderful "free" walking tour on Sunday with the best tourguide ever. And the houses in Amsterdam are adorable. And apparently they are slowly falling, sideways and forward at the same time. Such talented houses. Anyways, now for the trip back, AKA the longest day of my life to date. It started off at 2:45 AM (Monday), when my alarm went off. Now keep in mind, those of us in the best shape had only gotten 2.5 hours of sleep, there were three of us who got anywhere between 0-35 minutes of sleep. It just wasn't a good way to start the "day." So we dragged everyone out of bed, quickly gave up on the idea of actually walking to the train station, and called two taxis. We took three connecting trains to Eindoven and then a bus to the airport. All was going fairly smoothly until this point. We got on the plane in Eindoven at around 11 AM, with an ETA of 1 PM in Madrid. So thirty minutes into the flight, what happens? The plane starts vibrating violently, midair. Terrifying. I definitely didn't make any friends during that flight, since I was doing anything in my power to make the situation humorous (I guess no one else thought it was funny that our plane was falling apart midair). We made it back to the ground alive, the plane in one piece, but in the wrong city ... and the wrong country. Any guess? Brussels, Belgium. I like to call it a pitstop for chocolate (the duty-free was about 75% chocolate. My kind of place). We were flying Ryanair, by the way, and I am going to highly recommend that you stick to Easyjet or something slightly more reliable if you ever want to arrive alive or on time. Anyways, Ryanair got us another jet, and we were back on our way to Madrid by 2:30. We made it to Madrid at 4:30, got on the two metros to get to the bus station, and made the 7 PM bus back to Granada. That went smoothly, aside from a little bit of traffic, and we got back to the apartment by around 1:30 AM. Needless to say, I didn't go to classes on Tuesday.
So, for the grand totals:
Modes of transportation: 11 (2 taxis, 3 trains, 2 planes, 2 buses, and 2 metros)
Time: About 22 hours
Oh yeah, and it was Annie's birthday. What a way to spend number 20.

Anyways, so that was definitely a long weekend. The weekend before, we learned where UConn's money goes (since it definitely doesn't go towards snow removal or, ahem, the basketball team). UConn paid for a full weekend (Thursday-Sunday) in Seville, Córdoba, and Cádiz for all 36 of us. In a four-star hotel. Yep, that's where that money goes. It was a great weekend, and unfortunately, since it was over two weeks ago, it's a little fuzzy in my mind. But Seville is a gorgeous city, and Córdoba and Cádiz have some of the most gorgeous cathedrals I have ever seen. Oh, and we did a winery tour. It was wonderful.

So this coming weekend, I will be in Granada the entire time (thank god), so I will try to put some pictures up then from Amsterdam and Seville!

Obligada!: Lisbon, Portugal

2010-02-16T08:42:00.006-05:00

So Danielle M. made me promise not to "shit" on Portugal when I write about. The problem is, I don't really know how to write without using copious amounts of sarcasm. That might explain my bad grades on papers until college when I got professors who actually appreciated my somewhat cynical writing style.

Seriously though, not too much shitting in this post. Most of it will relate to someone we called "Creepy French Guy," or CFG. Other than that, Portugal was incredible.

After a minor collective panic attack on Thursday afternoon, the nine of us took buses to Madrid in two shifts: Eileen, Danielle M., Jamie, and Danielle C. on the 7:00 PM bus (arriving at midnight), and Me, Annie, Anna, Tina, and Kayla took the 12:30 AM bus (arriving at 5:30 AM). So basically, the result of that was the first group sleeping in the airport (Shantytown) for five hours, while the rest of us slept on the bus and then hightailed it from the bus station in Madrid to the airport (about 20 minutes by taxi). We made it to Lisbon at around 7:30 AM, enjoyed some much needed coffee, and then got a card called a LisboaCard (I believe) which basically gave us free public transportation and free/steeply discounted entry into a lot of the tourist sites around the city for 24 hours (15 euros). Needless to say, it was definitely worth it. It was raining the day we got there, so we used the public transportation a lot and we went to the Castelo de Sao Jorge, the Museo de Arte Antiguo, the Mosteiro dos Jerónimos, and the Torre de Belem. All four places were absolutely stunning, my favorite being the monestary (possibly because it was actually sunny by the time we got there). The thing about Lisbon is that it is a bit like San Francisco (including the gay population): It's unbelievably hilly, with a "Golden Gate Bridge" and some spectacular views. So every time we huffed and puffed our way up to the top of these sites, we could see a large part of the city and the water. It was gorgeous.

We went back to the hostel after all of the sightseeing (Yes! Hostel in Lisbon, by the way - stay there. It's absolutely amazing.), rested for awhile, and then got ready to enjoy the night. The hostel had a 3 beers/2 euros happy hour (told you it was a great hostel), plus a super cool lounge area, so we hung out there for awhile until Tina, Danielle C., Danielle M., Jamie, and I decided to try to find something to eat. We went to an area called Bairro Alto (or "high neighborhood"), appropriately named so. As I mentioned, Lisbon is very similar to San Francisco in terms of topography. Those streets were probably as steep as the ascent of Sacromonte (read: very steep. And cobbled. Difficult.). We made our way around the neighborhood a bit until we found a little restaurant that we decided looked cute/cheap enough to go into. The food there was actually amazing, dessert included (more on that later). We ended up being next to two Italian men who were there for work until the following Monday. Somehow we started talking to them about traveling in Europe, they drew a map of Italy (and then Spain) on the table, and they shared a bottle of red wine with us. Win? I think so. And dessert. It was amazing. I got a piece of cake called Toucihno do Ceu, which literally means "bacon from heaven." It wasn't bacon, but it was definitely from heaven. It had the texture of coconut, with flavors of pumpkin, almonds, and spices. AMAZING. I will be experimenting in the kitchen when I get home until I figure it out.

The next day, we went to a flea market near the cathedral in the city. It was huge, ranging from people selling random things in their houses to the typical merchants with a variety of clothing, jewelry, souveneirs, etc. I ended up getting two scarves (I really need to stop buying those), a cartiledge earring, and two presents - one for my mom and one for my señora. After that, we headed down to the water and sat there for about two hours. It was a gorgeous day, probably about 60 degrees in the sun, the nicest weather I've seen in awhile (it rains too much in Spain). When we got back to the hostel, the girls decided to relax for awhile, and I decided to go for a run. I ended up running about 4-4.5 miles on the river (in each direction), for a little under an hour and a half. The view was stunning, I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt, the people were good looking, and I got to watch the sunset on the way back. Win? Again, yes. That city is so full of wins. When I got back to the hostel, the girls were gone buying food for dinner (we decided to cook that night), so I took a book down to the lobby of the hostel to wait for them. And who did I meet? An Argentinean, named Guido, from Buenos Aires, who has a Jewish heritage. And who said that was impossible? Another win, unofficial this time though. Anyways, so after that we cooked a dinner of pasta, steamed brocolli, salad, bread, and red wine. I did the brocolli and the salad, and some of the pasta, and apparently I can "make brocolli taste good." I've always liked brocolli, but I guess some people consider this to be an accomplishment. So that's pretty sweet. Dessert was, once again, incredible. We had Salami de Chocolate (dense, amazing chocolate cake in a roll with almonds baked into it) and strawberries with whipped cream. The Portuguese really know how to do desserts properly.

After dinner, we headed out to Bairro Alto again to hit up a bar or a club or whatever. We ended up at a bar with a dance floor and a Spanish DJ. Who played the Macarena. AMAZING. That can't be beat. So we had a really good time there, met some people, and then we left at around 3 or 3:30 when they turned the lights on (partying in Portugal isn't as big as it is in Spain). We all made it back to the hostel alive (something of a miracle), and I was out cold by around 4 or 4:30. The problem there was that we had to be out the door of the hostel at 6:20 the next morning (technically that same morning) to catch the bus to the airport. So that morning (and the entire day) sucked something AWFUL, and was even worse for someone (no names mentioned) who had a nasty little tequila hangover. Lessons learned about playing "Never Have I Ever." But we made it back to Spain alive, with everything we started with, and nothing broken (as far as I know). So the trip was a definite success.

And I just realized that I never actually mentioned CFG. He was this older (too old) guy staying in our hostel from France who had this little habit of just popping in on our (and everyone's) conversations. He'd just show up. And then just hang around silently, staring at everyone. When we were cooking dinner on Saturday night, he was just chilling in the kitchen (which was not big enough to have anyone chilling in, by the way). Just an overall weird guy. So that was the worst of Lisbon, I guess.

So no shitting on Portugal, Danielle. Happy? :-)

Since we got back, I've just been doing my best to catch up on sleep. We went out last night to Chupiteria (remember that place?) for Eileen's birthday, and had an awesome time. Somehow, the entire population of France seemed to be in the bar as well. EVERYONE was French. Even the guys who looked Spanish were French. It was incredible. So we hung out with some of them for awhile, I had a good time talking to one guy who spoke no Spanish and not a lot of English (I'm really good at charades? just kidding), and then Annie and I headed back to our apartment (after she got a schwarma) at around 1:30. Love living right around the corner from that place.

Tomorrow morning we are leaving for Seville on a group trip until Sunday evening. Hopefully the weather will get a little better!

El idioma, La Alhambra, y la Americana

2010-02-10T12:44:00.002-05:00

So before coming to Spain, I was warned by multiple people that the accent would be different. I'm used to some weird combination of Argentinean, Chilean, and Colombian accents. They're all relatively easy to understand (at least I think so), with the Argentinean one sounding a lot like an Italian accent, the Colombian one being very neutral, and the Chilean one being just Chilean. All in all, they just sound very normal to me.

I can't really say the same thing about Puerto Rican accents, to be honest. I still have no clue what they are saying.

Anyways, so upon arriving, my Spanish was in the garbage for a day or so. Nine hours of night flying plus a six hour time change does that to you, I guess. Within a day or two, though, I got my verbal skills back, good news. And I started to notice that the Spanish really is a lot different here. The accent is very distinctive, I get weird looks if I say vos, sos, or dale (I'm training myself to say tu, eres and venga instead), and of course, the infamous lisp. Before I came to Spain, everyone who I talked to joked about the way in which Spaniards pronounce the soft C - with a very distinctive lisp. They pronounce Z in the same way (like ciudad or azul). One of the girls in our group very accurately pointed out that the same accent that Spain is so famous for is exactly what makes guys sound gay (stereotypically, at least) in the US. It was an interesting perspective. I guess Jack from "Will & Grace" would do quite nicely here. In any case, the lisp is alive and well, and I'm made it pretty obvious that I am not from around here (not like I needed any help - blue eyes and freckles?) by pronouncing my C's in the South American way, how most students learning Spanish in the US are taught.

Random trivia: If I'm not mistaken/if I remember correctly from 2007, Barcelona is the only city (aside from the Basque region, of course) that actually does not lisp the C. What's funny about that is I've found that 99% of the time, if you tell someone you are going to Spain, the first thing they say is "Oh! You're going to BarTHelona?!" Not quite. My guess is that it has something to do with Catalán being so prominent there.

So the whole language thing has been fun. Arabic is also pretty prominent, by the way, since Granada was one of the region ruled by the Moorish awhile back. We went up to La Alhambra, the huge, castle-y looking thing that sits on the hills of the city. We did a 3.5 hour walking tour of the castle, the courtyards, and the summer house of the royal family. It's absolutely gorgeous, with the walls covered in tiny, intricate carvings and the ceilings high and domed. Apparently there is a rule at the Alhambra that backpacks have to be worn backwards so that they don't hit the walls and break the delicate plaster. So what did that mean? Fifteen college students (two guys included) walking around looking pregnant. SWEET. I think it's pretty safe to say that we were all wiped by the end of the tour, but it was definitely worth it. Pictures are in my album on Facebook, but if you want a picture of what it looks like from the outside, just Google it. It's hard to get a good picture because it is so much higher than the rest of the city.

I was supposed to do a LT test last night because it turns out that my zones for running are a lot higher than my zones for cycling. Maybe it was because I didn't get to start until 6:30 or because I was just so tired from walking around all day, but that was definitely a failed test if I've ever had one. It was supposed to be 15 minutes, but I only made it to 10 before I felt like dying. I was supposed to start at 8 km/h, and the increase by .5 km/h every 200 meters. Hard to measure? You bet. I did my best, but it was mostly guesstimating, and I think I went too fast from the start. I'm doing a lot of my running by RPE though, which I've found works pretty well. I have to do an hour of endurance today, so we'll see what my heart rate does then, especially considering the coffee I had this morning.

One of the only things that really got to me about Spain is the coffee. THERE IS NONE. They have café con leche, which is basically an espresso with hot milk. It's good, but I like my large cup of coffee in the morning, not something that comes in a double shot glass. I like enjoying my huge, steaming mug of coffee. Anyways, so until today, I had been either getting enough sleep or getting a café con leche every morning (I learned the hard way that café cortado is just black coffee. That put some hair on my chest.). But we recently discovered a little cafe right near the school that sells very American-y items, such as bagels and muffins and coffee! Appropriately enough, the full-sized drip coffee is called an Americana, since we are probably one of the few nations that drinks it that way. In any case, it was an amazing discovery. So today, for the first time, I got a normal coffee with milk, raw sugar, and cinnamon. And I was wired, from about 10:30 AM until just a little while ago (it's 4:15 now). That's a pretty solid dose of caffeine. A bunch of the girls got coffee also, and do you know what happens when you get a group of girls drinking coffee and then sitting through a 1.5 hour class? A long line at the bathroom also (for those of us who could wait, at least). But it was oh so worth it.

Casablanca

2010-02-07T15:29:00.004-05:00

As much as I would like to say that the reason for this post is that I actually got to visit Casablanca, that is not even remotely the case, though I do (at the moment) live 335 miles from there (in a straight line, it's a lot of swimming).

"Casablanca" is one of my favorite movies. I had to do a project about it during my sophomore year of high school, and from the day I watched it, I was hooked. I haven't seen it in awhile, but it's a wonderful movie. Now it seems as though one of the local beer companies has a similar love for the movie. Their billboards all over the city (in bus terminals, whatever) have a picture of a man (not Sam) sitting at a piano with famous quotes from the movie printed over:

There's another one floating around that says "Siempre nos quedara Granada." To be frank, I'm not a movie person. But this whole translate-and-apply approach that is being used in the cases of these two phrases is a little sad. "Play it again, Sam" just doesn't translate well into Spanish, at least not in the way that these guys attempted it. And, ahem, Sam wasn't white in the movie. Minor detail.

In general, though, we've noticed quite a bit of American culture here, as much as any good Spaniard will deny it.

Random trivia, by the way: According to Europeans, there are only five continents: America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Oceania. So according to Europeans, not only do we, North Americans, live in the same continent as our buddies all the way south in Argentina and Chile, but those two huge ice cubes at each pole are not continents. What a concept.

Anyways, as I was saying, American culture is rather prominent here. At least, moreso that I expected, and mainly in the music industry. I can't tell you how many times we've been in clubs and heard Rihanna, Lady GaGa, Beyonce, and so many other American artists playing. People here seem to love the music (certainly more than I do), and what's funny is watching them sing it. You know how when you were little and you could never tell what words were being sung, so you just kind of glossed over them and hummed it? That's exactly what they do here. And there is nothing better than a bunch of tipsy (I'm being generous) Spaniards trying to rap to "Baby Got Back." I can't even sing that song in its entirety. Other than music, though, Europeans tend to have a "what, Americans?" perspective. The fashion is very, very different (hence the term "Eurotrash" - guess what I am doing for Halloween next year!), and random things in everyday life are different as well. In pharmacies, everything is behind the counter and you have to ask for what you want, and in restaurants and cafes, you just sit down and a waiter will come by. We have yet to go to a restaurant where there is a hostess or any sort of, ahem, order. But it's nice compared to waiting for twenty minutes for a table at the places back home. It seems as though there are so many places to eat here that backup isn't much of an issue, and when it is, such as at the tapas bars, people don't mind eating and drinking while standing.

One thing Spaniards haven't really picked up on is football (ours, not their futbol), probably for the better. The Superbowl is tonight, and the only place in town to watch it (as far as I know) is an Irish pub called Hannigan's that is across the street from the Cathedral in the middle of the city. One thing is for sure, that place will definitely be packed with American students tonight.

Lily and I went running today along the river, as usual, but we went in the opposite direction. It ended up being very nice and much quieter, with the only downfall being the lack of pavement in certain areas. On the way back up the river, though, we ended up running into a guy who was herding his sheep, so we got to run next to a bunch of sheep for a minute. That's one thing crossed off the bucket list. I think it was a seven mile run, but I am not sure because I couldn't find the bridge that we ran to on GoogleMaps.

On a sadder and final note - Franco Ballerini, an Italian cycling legend died today in a rally accident, leaving behind his wife and two children. Condolences to all of his family and friends.

Friday Night and Sacromonte

2010-02-06T16:44:00.003-05:00

Ok, so I realized that I put up pictures without actually talking about the hike, so I'll take care of that now.

I'm just going to start by saying that I was hiking in a t-shirt. And sweating. I heard that the East Coast just got eight inches of snow? Just saying.

Anyways, so we had planned this hike out earlier in the week, but we decided to go out last night anyways. Annie, Anna and I started off at an Argentinean bar (don't remember the name) that had excellent red wine and tapas, and then headed over to Chupiteria with Eileen and Christina. Now, for those of you not familiar with Granada (or Spanish), a chupito is a shot. So what's the Chupiteria? It's a bar dedicated entirely to shots. There are over one hundred different kinds of shots on the menu, divided into categories: suaves (soft), medios (medium), and fuertes (strong).

Let's just put this in perspective, shall we? Number 30 on the menu (in the fuerte category), Fuego, is whisky-vodka-tequila. Now I know many people with some pretty strong systems, but I think that I can safely say that it wouldn't take many of those to knock anyone out.

Anyways, I wasn't feeling too adventurous last night, so I stuck with a vodka caramelo shot. It's pretty much liquid alcoholic candy. It almost made me like vodka (just kidding). So we stayed there for a little bit, and then Tina, Kayla, and Danielle showed up, along with a few other girls. We stayed there for a little longer and Annie and Anna headed back and Eileen, Christina, Tina, Kayla, Danielle, and I headed over to D'Cuadros (I finally figured out the name!), the lounge that I really liked at Plaza de Toros last week. We ended up not having as much fun as last time, but Kayla had a blast partyboying everyone in sight and we met a guy having his bachelor party, wearing a skirt and a Miley Cyrus wig. Brave guy. We left the lounge at around 3:15, and I was asleep a little after 4. So guess what time I woke up this morning?

10:00. Not too bad, right? Six hours of sleep really isn't that bad, and it only took me a few minutes to drag myself out of bed. We met up at 11, and started our hike up towards Sacromonte. It started out walking under the Alhambra, along the cobbled street (which is not wide enough for both a car and a person, by the way. So fun), and then we headed up one of the roads into the hill. Last time we walked up that road it was raining. And it's steep. And cobbled. Thank god it wasn't raining this time, or else we would have probably had multiple casualties. Anyways, we walked by the more tourist-oriented gypsy caves with cafes and flamenco performers, and then continued up the hill onto a dirt path that goes past the legit caves - the area where you shouldn't be speaking English (or any language at all). Aside from getting pricked by an Aloe plant on steroids, it was a gorgeous path. It was fascinating to see how people still live in such rudimentary homes, and yet are thriving. It was also a little unnerving, as we were literally five feet from their front doors, with the path being all of eight inches wide. We got past the homes, and continued on the path up the "hill" (moutain) to the top where there is something of a cell tower/military base. We weren't really sure. Tyler, Hannah, and Jim wandered off, and when we were trying to find them, I whistled. Did I catch their attention? No. But the dogs were howling. So comforting. We stayed up there for about an hour, admiring the view and enjoying the warmth, and then started our trek back down the mountain - almost harder than going up. The dirt was really loose and a lot of us were slipping all over the place. In any case, we made it back down in one piece and I walked back home in a t-shirt while the locals scratched their heads wondering why a crazy American was walking about in so little clothing while it was only about 60 degrees.

Right, super cold. Again, East Coast, enjoy the snow. See you when it's melted in May!

Pictures from the hike up Sacromonte

2010-02-06T10:05:00.005-05:00

We made it up the mountain!

Yoga at the top of the mountain.

Everyone falling on the way back down the really steep, loose-dirt hill.

The view of the city from the top (it was really hazy).

The Alhambra from partway up the mountain.

Spanish Drivers, Flamenco, and Running

2010-02-03T14:01:00.002-05:00

Almost four years ago, I spend a month in Santiago, Chile. It's an absolutely gorgeous place - a city surrounded by the Andes Mountains, and an approximately two hour drive from the coast. So much fun. I will, however, say that Santiago (and South America in general) has some of the worst drivers I have ever seen in my life - and this is after going to Israel twice and driving into Manhattan and PA weekly. It's absolutely terrifying to be in the backseat (or front seat) of a car down there. Thankfully, driving skills are apparently not something that was carried down when Spain colonized (most of) South America.
(By the way, since I mentioned most of, can we all just take a moment to appreciate the irony of Portugal, a country the size of New Jersey, colonizing a country like Brazil, a country the size of Russia? Spain, the bigger of the two, got left with a puzzle of Spanish-and-other-language speaking countries).
The driving here is a lot different than it is in the U.S. Traffic lines and painted lines are more like suggestions than rules, and because all of the streets are really old, there are no sidewalks on a lot of the smaller streets that run between buildings. That being said, the driving chaos is a much more organized chaos than anything I've ever seen. Probably a result of standard cars being driven on small streets, no one drives quickly and the jaywalking is just as prominent as it is in Manhattan, minus the vicious cab drivers.

Now all of that is in the (relatively) flat part of the city. Once you get into the hills, the roads are cobbled, steep, one lane, and sidewalk-less. It's a little bit terrifying. We went to a Flamenco show last night (it was fantastic, by the way), and the busride down the hill from the dance hall (it was in a cave) was something of a rollercoaster ride. These roads were definitely not created with the intention of getting a six foot bus through them, and the driver had to pull the sideviews in at one point. We also got a gorgeous, yet terrifying view of the Alhambra at night, all lit up. This is also when we were at the edge of a cliff. Small price to pay.

The flamenco show, as I said, was gorgeous. The theatre was a small hall in one of the caves up in Albaycin, which was pretty incredible. Small room + tile floor + flamenco dancers = lots of loud percussion, which kept poor Amelia (Ana Maria's daughter) awake way past her bedtime. But the dancers were wonderful, the vino dulce was way too sweet, and the trip back down the hill (see above) made the entire night a bit of an aventura.

So, lots of hills. As I said, sketchy at best. Cobblestone, steep, where the gypsies live, narrow, you get the picture. So when I got an email from May Britt today saying that I had VO2 hill intervals, I said no thank you. I did them along the river instead, where I usually run. It's getting a little old running there, especially since the trail only stretches a little over two miles in the direction we usually go in (we're going to try the other direction on Sunday for a one and a half hour run). Otherwise, running has been going well. I'm slowly coming to terms with the fact that I can't eat as much as I used to be able to, but I'm getting past the two week "ohmygodI'minanewcountrythefoodissogood" period, so that shouldn't be an issue. Now just hopefully my legs will do some talking for me once the season starts, but as I've said, it's going to be an experimental season. So we'll see.

Spanish Scents

2010-01-30T07:43:00.002-05:00

I'm personally a big fan of scents. Preferably good ones, of course, but even with bad ones, I have found that I often remember a person's scent better than their name. Being in a different country, everything smells new and exciting. Most of the smells are good, like the churros con chocolate that we had last night, the smell of lunch cooking out of all of the apartments at two in the afternoon, and the scent of the orange trees and spice stands that are all over the city. Some smells, on the other hand, just suck.

Everyone talks about how Europe is doing so much better than the U.S. on so many levels, and I usually agree with this. That being said, the U.S. does have a hand over Europe in one area: it is illegal to smoke in bars and restaurants in the U.S. Absolutely brilliant idea. Here, it is up to the discretion of the owner of the place to decide to allow or ban smoking. Problematic, at least from my point of view, because most owners don't want to lose their valuable smoking customers (there are a lot of them), so probably about 95% of bars and restaurants here do allow smoking. Now here's the thing: I've lived in Manhattan for most of my life. I'm used to people smoking everywhere, and especially since a lot of places here leave the door open, the smoke isn't too much of an issue for me. What gets with me is how nasty my hair and my clothing smell after I leave. We did a little bit of barhopping last night, starting at a little place with some good tapas and a glass of red wine (for me), and then moved on to this really chill, awesome lounge that is in the bullring in Plaza de los Toros (somehow, even after going to this place twice, I still don't know the name of it). It was a really awesome place. When we got there, it was pretty empty, we got a table and all just chilled together, and then as more people started coming in, they cleared away the tables and benches and it became a really chill, non-Americanized club. We were pretty convinced that most of the guys in there were gay, but they were adorable. We made friends. In any case, we got back to the apartment at around 2:45, and I REEKED. My jeans, tank top, sweater (wool - big mistake), scarf, and my coat all smelled awful. My coat I just hung up in my room, and it was fine this morning. My jeans and my scarf I hung out of the window overnight. My scarf, this morning, was fine. My jeans, on the other hand, still smell awful! Who knew that denim was so capable of hanging onto stink? My hair was pretty bad also, and I thankfully got that smell out this morning with two strong doses of shampoo. The only good news, I guess, is that since the entire club smells like smoke, it's not just that one guy next to you who you are forced to smell. It's not even noticeable until you get to a place that has clean air.

So, I guess there is one area where the we in the U.S. have managed to one-up our greatest rivals. Take note, Europe.

La Siesta

2010-01-28T12:50:00.002-05:00

Everyone knows what the siesta is. It's an approximately 2-3 hour period during the afternoon in Spain, usually from about 2-4:30, where everything shuts down. Schools get out, stores close, everyone goes home for a huge lunch and a nap. It's brilliant, and I'm not sure why the U.S. hasn't picked up on it yet. The entire city is about as quiet as it will ever be (it definitely isn't too quiet at night), and if you need to buy something, you are pretty much SOL until mid-afternoon. But it's definitely a great concept. It definitely helps the day go by to know that there is a two hour period when you can do nothing - just sleep and eat. Everyone's dream, right? And it doesn't hurt that the sun sets at around 6:30 during the winter here, so there is still some daylight left over after everyone goes back out to resume the day.

I have discovered, however, that there is an art to the siesta. Part of it is being able to fall asleep in the typical Spanish apartment, which has tissue paper walls, a loud TV, and people speaking incredibly loudly. The other, bigger part, however, is being able to wake up. I am the kind of person who can go down for a nap and just keep sleeping until the next morning. The fact that our apartment is a pretty constant 52 degrees (approximately) and that there is virtually no daylight in the apartment (it constantly looks like nighttime) definitely doesn't help. Today, I got back from classes a little before 1:30, had lunch at about 2, and was pretty close to asleep by 3. Now, I know that most doctors will say it isn't healthy to sleep right after eating, but I have to say that, at least mentally, it is probably the healthiest thing I have ever done. In any case, Eileen, Jamie, Danielle and I had planned to go running at 5. I set my alarm for 4:30, because the park is all of a three minute walk away from the apartment. So my alarm goes off, and it must have taken me at least five minutes to drag myself out from under my huge layer of blankets and sweatshirts (did I mention how cold it is in the apartment?). It's rough. But I'm definitely learning how to make the days here manageable, given the odd eating and sleeping schedules that everyone (toddlers included) in this country follows.

On another note, Eileen and I stopped on a small concrete platform along the river today to stretch, and two guys on bikes go by. One just keeps riding along, and the other locked up his brakes harder than I have ever seen before, stops, stares at us, and starts trying to talk to us. When I say trying, I mean he was mumbling in a way I wouldn't have understood even if it was English. So Eileen and I gave up on stretching and peaced the eff out of there.

Tapas tonight! Maybe some clubbing? We'll see ;-)

En Granada

2010-01-27T17:40:00.002-05:00

Alright, so I figure I should probably get back to writing in here. It has been well over my estimate since my last post, around two weeks ago. We've been in Granada for exactly a week today, and it seems like it flew by! But it also seems like years ago when I was saying goodbye to my parents in the airport. Clearly Spain is enjoying the time difference and playing games with my mind.

The first day we got here, Annie and I dragged our bags (read: died on the way) to the apartment, where I managed to unpack in about an hour and passed out. Annie, on the other hand, took approximately three hours to unpack. Impressive. We woke up for dinner, which was at about 10 (or 22:00, as they would say here), and then went back to sleep until 4, when I woke up and couldn't fall back asleep. Annie, it turns out, was awake as well, so we passed the hour playing Mahjong and Solitaire and listening to music. Then we both fell back asleep until 12:15. The fun things that time zones do.

(Speaking of timezones, has anyone ever noticed how screwed up they are in Europe? We are going to Portugal in two weeks, which I assumed was in the same time zone as Spain, since you can't look at one without looking at the other on a map. Is it? Nope. It's an hour back. Guess what country is in the same time zone as Spain, though? Greece. WHAT?!?!)

In any case, I finally managed to get my right ear to pop the next day and Annie, Anna and I spend the day exploring (read: getting lost) in the city. Let me just mention quickly that I am from Manhattan. Manhattan streets run in very, very straight lines, similar to those of graph paper (the exception being Broadway and the streets in the East Village). Streets in Granada, however, twist and turn as they please. Needless to say, I am not the one leading the group. Aside from the "directional complications," the city is absolutely stunning, and very manageable size-wise (I like to call it a baby city).

Friday the whole group met up to get lunch at this cute place along the river that runs through Granada. And it was sunny, that was nice. I missed the sun. That night we did a little bit of barhopping, where I noticed that not only is the hard cider delicious, but the cheap beer here is Amstell. Awesome, because that's my favorite beer. Granada and I are getting along so far. After barhopping, we went to a hookah bar so that some of the people could get crepes. Interesting little exchange there: one of the crepes on the menu was "con chocolate y nata." What's nata? We didn't know either. According to the guy who worked there, it's "una crema blanca." It went from there:
Me: "Vale, es de chocolate blanco?"
Him: "No, es una crema blanca."
Me: "Entonces que es??"
Him: "Ven, te la muestro."
Ok ...
It was whipped cream. Really, is there no other way to describe whipped cream other than being a white cream? What a winner. In any case, the crepes were great at 2 AM, but not so great the next morning for Annie, who got a little bit of food poisoning from it.

On Saturday, we did this gorgeous walking tour of the hills facing the Alhambra. The houses up there are stunning, the roads are frightening slippery and steep (picture San Francisco, covered in cobbles and in the rain), and the view at the very top was absolutely gorgeous. Unfortunately, it was cloudy on Saturday, so we didn't get to see the sunset that we had hoped for. But I will definitely be heading back up there soon, so hopefully I'll get to see it. That night I went to this pretty awesome bar along the bullring with Grace, Isabel, Sarah, and Chrissy. It starts off as just a really hip looking, three-level bar, and then (I believe) turns into a club as the night goes on. I'll definitely be heading back there sometime.

By the way, blogspot is a pain in the ass about posting pictures, so I am just going to post the link to my Facebook album.

Sunday was just more exploring in the city. I don't remember exactly what we did, to be honest. No hangover, I just really don't remember it. Monday was orientation at the school, which was as boring and dry as I had expected. Some stories were told (to scare us), the most interesting of which started with a guy on a horse riding up to an American student in Granada, but none of them end well, so I won't go down that road. Monday afternoon I went on a nice 8k (yep, I'm using metrics now. Uh oh.) jog with Danielle M., Jamie, and Eileen along the river, which was lovely. And then we got caught in the rain. And Eileen and I found a little cafe that had the best sandwiches ever.

Tuesday I did a little bit of shopping in the morning with Eileen and Melody (mostly at Zara) and came out of it with a cute red (yes Mom, RED) jacket and supersupersuper soft grey long-sleeve shirt (I went back today with Anna and got two more, in green and pink). After that, I got back to the apartment and pretty much crashed. I've been getting over a cold all week, and it made another lovely appearance that afternoon. So I spent the rest of the day relaxing.

Today, we started classes. Not too bad, but the truth is, history is boring even in Spanish. That being said, I really do have to pay attention this semester. Taking classes in English (especially liberal arts classes), you can kind of BS your way through something if you dozed off for a minute or two. Doesn't quite work like that in Spanish. I'm working on it though. The second class seemed like it will be more interesting - Social-Politics in Spain.

By the way, did anyone else know that people here don't use lined paper? All of the notebooks are graph paper. Tiny graph paper at that. So now I can practice my cursive! Awesome.

Also, the put their babies in the strollers upside-down. I'll get a picture soon.

And finally, my señora is the coolest woman ever. She's like a kind of wacked-out grandma, and is under the impression that I don't eat enough. Riiiight. In any case, she came into my room a few nights ago wearing a white-blond wig and a traditional Spanish flat-top hat. I almost died.

Last Few Days of Winter!

2010-01-13T10:31:00.002-05:00

Sort of. From what I've heard, it's in the mid-40s during the day in Granada right now, and it can only go up from there, right? So it's still winter, but 40s sounds tropical to me right now considering how bitter it's been in the Northeast for the past few weeks.

You'd think that since I've been on winter break for the past four weeks I'd have updated more than, what, twice? I don't know what it is, I think I just keep on forgetting. Training has been taking a lot out of me. I've been doing two or three interval sessions per week, along with three endurance days and two to three days at the gym per week. The plan is that since I might not have a bike in Spain, we're going to build up almost completely now before I leave and just try to maintain it (and maybe build a little more) through Spain by running. I'm a little nervous about going into the season after four months off the bike, but the truth is that not having the bike in Spain will save me a lot of headache, and since running takes so much less time I'll be able to do more while I am there. It's going to be an experimental season, and I'm not expecting any big results, but I'm feeling strong so far, and hopefully a few motorpacing session when I get back will get some spin back into my legs.

By the way, thanks so much to May Britt Hartwell, my coach (coach/director of Young Medalists), who has been absolutely incredible in working around my academic goals in helping me become as strong as I can and calming me down when I have mini-breakdowns about my situation for the upcoming season.

I originally started this blog with the intentions of writing about races, complaining about those people who can't ride their bikes in a straight line (you know who you are), and complaining about waking up before the sun to get to a race in Brooklyn (still a little bitter about that). But then September came, and it occured to me that the season only goes for so long (for those of us who don't race CX - I actually LIKE being able to feel my extremities when I race). So then it became a place for talking about training and school and a crazy roommate and pretty much anything else. So I guess it's pretty safe to say that this is going to become a "My Adventures in Spain" sort of thing. Maybe I'll even post up the time and distance of my runs so that I can prove that I DID in fact get "Rookie of the Year" in cross country in high school.

We leave in six days, and I'm excited in unimagineable ways. But I'm a little nervous also. I've never been out of the U.S. for four months straight before, I've neven been away from home for that long, and even though my parents will be coming to visit for a week, I've never been in a situation where I can't necesarily call my mom on a whim. It'll be interesting, to say the least.

As I said, training has been rough. I had six persuit-like efforts yesterday, in zone 4 with around 110 RPM. I did those on the rollers, and props to me, I only popped my front wheel off once during spin-ups before my efforts started. I've also made my way through half of a season of Bones so far. Really good show.

I went into the city on Monday to go to a shop in Brooklyn (might work there this summer). I got lunch with Lewis before that up on 157th street. Taking the subway up there was all sorts of fun - once the subway surfaced at 125th, I realized that I was no longer on the UWS. And some terrifying guy tried to pick me up when I was waiting for Lewis on the corner. I'm wearing sunglasses next time. I went back in last night to get dinner with Gabe, which was great as always. We hit up a place on 77th and Broadway called Vai, which we almost didn't go to because the website design drove me absolutely insane. But we did go, and the food was AMAZING.

My schedule for today says 1.5 hours of running. I think not. Dad and I are going to head up to High Point soon for some XC skiing, probably for the last time until next winter. I wish it was a little sunnier out though.

If I continue posting at the intervals I have been, my next post will be from Granada, Spain! So I'll say goodbye on here for now, enjoy the novel-length post I just wrote, and I'll be back stateside on May 20th!!

Happy New Year!

2010-01-07T09:03:00.008-05:00

We are officially in a new decade. A little frightening, but mostly surprising that my mother actually let me live this long. God only knows I've racked up quite a few threats to not make it to my 20th (or 19th, or 18th, etc.) birthday.

I've missed quite a few days of writing, mostly because of being busy. Weddings, training, New Years Eve, and ... haven't had much of an excuse since then. But May Britt will be happy to know that I've been training my butt off, instead of going online (90% of the time).

Before I talk about the wedding or anything, let me just start by saying that sleeping for 4 hours + flying for about 5 hours, not consecutively + jetlag = grumpy Leah. We figured that one out pretty quickly.

The wedding out west was fabulous (I'll say that at all risk of sounding like Jack from Will & Grace). We had a rehearsal "dinner" (read: cheese, crackers, fruit, and more dessert than you've ever seen) on Saturday night. The wedding was on Sunday, and it was AMAZING. Lolo looked like a princess, the food was amazing, the ceremony was great (props to Daniella for singing, crying while singing, and then just giving up and laughing), and the music was good. My dad was a little (more than a little) drunk, mostly because of the amazing martinis from cocktail hour that looked something like this:

Hypnotic with peach schnapps. WONDERFUL. And a bartender who carded. Nothing that a little flirting couldn't solve (I didn't bother with the female bartender). But seriously, who carries ID to a wedding? And even if people do, if they're driving or something, not only can they not drink, but who actually cards at a wedding? I'm still a little confused by all of this. But again, problem solved, so I'm not complaining. The wedding was on a Sunday night, so around two thirds of the people left by 9:30, presumably those who had to work the next day. The wait staff then decided to start dancing with those of us who were left, so I got to swing dance with a waiter who was, ahem, well over six feet tall. Not quite the highlight of my night, but pretty damn close. Lolo managed to get pretty good and tipsy (I'm being generous with "tipsy") thanks to Sherry, who kept bringing her glasses of red wine, which miraculously did not end up all over her dress. But she was all kinds of fun for the rest of the night.

Monday morning was brunch at Marti's house, attended by a solid mix of hungover and not-so-hungover people. Bagels are suprisingly decent on the west coast, who knew? After that Dad and I headed over to Mt. Spokane for some XC skiing. We only got an hour and a half in though, because apparently, even when on top of a mountain, the sun still sets at the same time! What a concept.

(For anyone not fluent in sarcasm, I'm not retarded. I was just annoyed by the two and a half hours of sunlight everyday that we get in the winter)

In any case, we did get to see sunset from the top of the mountain. Did I mention how high the mountain was? It's high.

That evening we went back to Marti and Dennis' house to hang out with everyone ... and I succeeded in proving how horrible I am at scrabble (sorry Max).

Tuesday we stopped by the house again to drop off Mom and our stuff (and to say goodbye to Lolo, Stefan, Max, and Allie - they were leaving for a skiing honeymoon in Utah). Dad and I headed waaaaay out of Spokane, to an area that I'm pretty sure they filmed those motel-horror movies in. We ended up at the base of a ski place called 49 North, strapped up, and went skiing. First trail we hit was supposedly intermediate, yet in it was a hill steep enough to rival the back side of Macopin road (anyone from North Jersey should know what I am talking about). So that was, um, rough on the less. Then we skied 6 km (out of 10) around/up the downhill ski mountain that is part of 49 North. So basically, we skied up steep hills with switchbacks and a legit ski mountain. So badass.

Aaaaaaand then we got Mexican food. That's obviously the only way to end 4 hours of XC skiing.

We headed home the next day, uneventful aside from the long day flying, landing at 11:30,

getting home at 1:30, and finally falling asleep at 2:30.

I tried waking up at 7:30 the next morning since I had an hour-long run on my program, but that was a joke. I fell back asleep until 10, then hurried up to get into the city to get everything ready. Bought six cupcakes for Lindsay's birthday cake (AMAZING), got food, etc. I went to meet everyone at the train station, got pizza, made it back to my place alive, chilled, had "cake," the girls pregamed a little, and we left.

Just a warning to anyone who has ever had any remote dream of going to Club Abyss: DON'T DO IT. It's terrifying, to put it nicely. I'll just leave it at that. But we did end the night with a pair of latinos, who (like all of them) didn't believe that a girl with blue eyes could ever speak Spanish. Love those guys.

Not too much has happened since then, just a ton of training (I even dragged my ass all the way to T-town on Saturday morning for a session - that sucked something epic), dinner with Gabe (entertaining as always) on Monday night, and that's it folks!

Spokane, WA!

2009-12-25T20:16:00.004-05:00

I kind of skipped two states. Last time I updated, I was still in CT, suffering through finals week. Now I am (almost) all the way west, in Spokane, for Lauren's wedding. I finished up exams last Thursday with Econ (not my best, by far) and we got our party on on Thursday night. Blueberry beer is suprisingly good, I'll leave it at that. And some furniture-tetris playing in Margaret's room.

Friday morning, I got breakfast with Aimee, Jose, and Meg. Then I got another breakfast with Lindsay, along with Becca and Kobe. Linds and I went to my room, where she hijacked my computer while I packed up my entire room. Second time in two weeks, this time took a lot longer ... mostly because it wasn't a rushed exodus. Dad showed up, we packed, Dad cut his finger open, created a biohazard in my room, and then drove the 3-turned-5-hour drive home. SO MUCH TRAFFIC.

Since then it has been mostly training and complaining about how much I miss everyone. Both of which I have become frighteningly good at. And Mother Nature was kind enough to dump a huge blanket of snow all over the east coast as soon as I got home, relegating me to several days of XC skiing and trainer riding. Now let me just say that the last time I went XC skiing I was probaby 11 or 12 years old. So this was the first time in approximately 7 or 8 years, and truthfully, I wasn't too terrible at it. That being said, about five minutes into the first ski expedition, I fell. And landed with my ass, hard, on the edge of the ski. THAT SHIT HURT. I am now sporting a gorgeous, and almost perfectly symmetrical.

And now we are in Spokane! I'm in the process of recovering from a frightening case of lack of sleep/jet lag, so I'm not really sure what time it is. Wedding is on Sunday night!

Oh, and Merry Christmas to everyone! And happy Chinese food/movie day to all of the Jews!

Finals Week!!

2009-12-15T12:02:00.003-05:00

I'm not sure why I used exclamation points there. I'm not excited about this. As of twenty minutes ago, I am done with three finals (read: I took one exam, handed in a take-home exam, and handed in a paper), and have two more to go - Anthro tomorrow and Econ on Thursday. Basically, they get worse as the week goes on. That paper that I handed in? Fifteen pages (plus two pages for worked cited and a page of endnotes) about war, feminism, and international relations. It was actually an interesting paper to write, moreso than the last time I had to write 15 pages (about agriculture for an English class? WTF?), but I do feel bad about the small forest I probably killed when I printed/edited/reprinted the paper.

I can't wait to get home! I'm happier here now since I moved down a floor (still in my dorm though), and my living situation is about 45783758934678346 times more pleasant, but I miss my bed, hot showers that don't scald, and my mom's cooking ... And proper snow removal. CT sucks at it.

I'm also trying my luck with an energy drink right now, for the first time. Normally I just have a cup or two (or three or four) of coffee in the morning, but today that's just not going to cut it. I have 2+ hours of sprint/interval training (starting soon), two exams to study for, and I didn't sleep so well last night due to my roommate's air raid-like alarm clock going off twice ... once at 5:45 and once at 7:30. So here I am, trying to force myself to drink a Monster. I'm not going to lie, it's gross. I don't know how people drink these things so often. Especially when I look and see (and taste) how much sugar there is in it. It's like a really bad, fruity cocktail. Hopefully it will work some magic though - getting through this training session is not going to be fun at all. I can't wait until I get home for some long outdoor rides.

Just a few comments before I get on my bike (and watch Ace of Cakes! Nothing like watching a show about yummy looking cakes while you are suffering on a bike):
1. Cheesy pick up lines can be cute. Just not through text message.
2. If you are going to get into a lousy situation, seriously, don't lie about it. No need to make it worse, right? And lying really never works.
3. Dream Street, Jump5, S Club 7, Dream, and The Spice Girls are all alive and well. Proved that last night. Go YouTube their videos sometime, it's good to see how America has (not) progressed.

Thanksgiving!

2009-11-26T21:50:00.002-05:00

Let me start by saying how thankful I am for many things (take this as you will, it is almost entirely serious):
1. My friends and family (serious). I love all of them, they are so incredibly supportive of everything I do, no matter how "crazy" (non-cycling friends) it is or much much I deserve a "tanderina" (Mom). You guys are the best. Plus, my mom's cooking is amazing. Come over sometime, try it out.
2. The south side of the GWB. This sounds random, but I was just reminded yesterday of how absolutely awful it is to cross the bridge on the north side. Both sides are like city-style cyclocross practice, but at least I don't have to get off of my bike on the south side.
3. Thanksgiving break. A full week!! Finally, UConn gets something right. Seriously, Thanksgiving is about that point during fall semester when you are ready to kill everyone you talk to. Maybe it's just me. I needed that break so badly. That being said, it's Thursday already, and I miss everyone. Time to go back!

By the way, that guy with the glasses from "Love Actually"? Anyone know what I'm talking about? If you know someone like him, please introduce me! I could deal with meeting someone like him =]

Also, phrase of the day: sos un mujeriego. If you know what it means, awesome, and you can probably relate. If not, don't worry about it.

I think this week has just been a ton of riding, spending some time with friends, pretty much exactly what I wanted it to be. I probably should have gotten some work done, but hey!, final cram sessions up at school, that's what I live for!

OH, right. I had time trial testing on Tuesday night. Forgot about that. It was miserable. There's something about those industrial fans, they're like men and ice cream: can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em. If the fan wasn't pointed at me during the test, I felt like I was drowning in my own sweat. If May pointed the fan at me, it felt like a desert. Really can't win that one. The four hour ride the next day wasn't especially welcomed, by the way. Just throwing that out there.

Less than two months until Spain!

Home for Thanksgiving!

2009-11-19T21:48:00.002-05:00

I'm back in my city, finally. Thank god. UConn is ... nice. Lots of cows are ... nice. Classes are ... not so nice. You get the picture. But I'm always homesick for the city when I am up at school. Leila D. came back with me. She'll be spending the week in a hostel in Manhattan, so she and I will get to have some quality bonding time. Love her!!

Plus, in the next week and a few days, I get to put in some nice, long hours. As in around 25 hours. Plus some field testing. AWESOME. Love you too, May Britt.

Speaking of bikes, for the first time in what seems like a million years, Colavita will not be the title sponsor of, well, Colavita Racing. For the 2010 season, at least for the men's team, Jamis is going to be one of the title sponsors, along with Sutter Home to create .... get ready for it ... Team Jamis Sutter Home!

Yeah, I bet you never saw that one coming. It's like their love child.

In any case, the roster looks super strong, as always. Seba Haedo, the (gorgeous) Argentinean sprinter who graced Colavita with his presence for several seasons, has moved along and will now be racing on a ProTour team! No word on which one yet, but congradulations to him, that's absolutely amazing.

A little bit off topic, two little bits of advice:
1. Halogen light + bed = trouble
2. A bad attitude never gets anyone anywhere.

Just throwing it out there. Keep it in mind next time you wind up in a situation with halogen lights, a bed, and a bad attitude. As in, hopefully never.

By the way, I'd like to recommend that everyone download/install the StumbleUpon toolbar. It's the ULTIMATE in procrastination tools.

Andddd on a final note, Rock Tape. Best stuff on EARTH. Not only does it get rid of my shinsplints 100%, but seriously, there's absolutely nothing better than bright pink tape and crazy tanlines on my legs!

Seriously though, buy it. It solves everything.

De-Swined!

2009-11-16T20:07:00.002-05:00

That's right, I was a lucky recipient of the made-of-eggs, not-as-painful-as-the-regular-flu-shot H1N1 vaccine. Now, being someone who is terrified of needles, I can say that this shot is worse in the hours after that during. I got the shot at about 3:30, it is now 8:00, and my shoulder is killing me. Which is why I am not doing my recovery swim tonight.

Just a quick side note - if you are allergic to eggs (I didn't even know that was possible), you probably shouldn't get a vaccine that is made from ... EGGS!

That was dedicated to the guy who asked the nurses if he was better off risking getting the flu or an allergic reaction. What a winner.

I have been fighting off a cold for the past few days, lovely, which means that I have missed about ... 3 full days of training and 3 half days of training (translation: I took 3 days off, and 3 days of reduced training). It's a sucky feeling, but I guess it's better than having to take a full week off because of full-blown sickness.

Also - for all of you fast-energy food people out there, a quick recommendation: my mom made these AMAZING cookies that absolutely do the trick: oatmeal-cranberry-white chocolate-orange. They are delicious. Go look for a recipe and make them.

Do it.

The semester is over in 3 weeks! Technically, it's about 5 weeks. This week of classes, Thanksgiving break, 2 more weeks of classes, and then a week of finals. So it's sort of only 3. Sort of. In any case, I'm extremely excited to be done and to be on winter break and so close to going to Spain! Plus I'll be able to ride EVERYDAY for about 5 weeks. Whoop!!

Oh, also, just to state the obvious, I haven't been doing cyclocross, hence the lack of race reports. I tried it for a few seasons, didn't love it, and put it aside. But I've noticed how big it's become, and I'm considering giving it a shot again next season ... especially because I'll have a car on campus. Makes life so much easier.

That being said, the only way I'll do 'cross is if I can race on this baby:

Seriously, how badass is that thing?

Three day weekend!!

2009-11-08T22:26:00.003-05:00

It's actually not supposed to be a three day weekend. But two of my classes for tomorrow got cancelled, and the only one left is a 10 AM English class, so I figured I may as well turn it into a three day weekend. Yay.

This weekend was fairly awesome. I headed home on Friday afternoon so that I could spend Saturday with my dad on his birthday. Friday night I went to services with my mom, then drove into the city for the night. I spent the night alone on the boat which was nice, but sucked at the same time since ... I couldn't figure out how to use the thermostat.

Cold night.

In any case, I got up on Saturday morning and headed out for a ride out to Nyack with Gabe, a ride that should have taken up to 3 hours, no more. It took 3.5 hours. Cramps and endurance rides (in the cold) do not mix well. But it's alright, I can handle all of the pride I lost during that ride.

That night, we headed out to Westchester (going through Yonkers in the process, AWESOME) for my dad's birthday dinner with my grandma, my aunt, my cousin, and his girlfriend. We went to a place called Legal Sea Foods which was really nice. And the entire evening was a pleasant reminder of how I can never escape the NorthFace-Ugg combination that plagues all of New England; the girls in Westchester rock the outfit as well.

(As a side note, I am guilty of wearing the two in combination at times ... In my defense, however, I own the slippers, not the boots, because they are comfortable, not because they look good. I still think they are hideous.)

I spent last night at ... someone's ... apartment. No names. Anyone is welcome to guess, but very few people actually know that there is anything between us. Whoop.

ANYWAYS ... I tried riding again this morning, only to be tortured again by my cramps. So this time, I gave up, about 45 minutes in. Pathetic, yes, but I was not willing to ride for 4 hours in that condition. Judge me as you will.

Wow.

2009-11-02T11:44:00.002-05:00

I'm officially the world's worst blogger. Almost four months without a post, that is pretty impressive if I do say so myself. Especially considering how much has gone on.

I was reading my "recent" posts this morning, and I realized I never finished updating about the races this summer. I don't remember most of them, but three weekends do stand out:

1. The last day of the Giro de Jersey/The Harlem Skyscraper ("Skinscraper") Classic: Whoever gave Harlem that nickname knew what they were talking about. Last year had some crashes, the most impressive of all being in the men's cat 3, but this year was the epitome of a crashfest. The thing about that course is that two of the corners have a TON of paint in them, and of course, without fail, the rain started about five minutes before the start of the men's pro/1/2 race. So not only did the poor guys have to deal with the paint, but the road was slick from oil from cars as well. The pictures on Facebook speak volumes, but I'll just leave it at this statistic: I'm pretty sure that less than half the field finished - not because of the speed, but because of the crashes.

2. Tour of Millersburg: Definitely a good, fun race. The promoters did a great job, everything ran smoothly, and with the exception of a frighteningly hard crit course, everything was great. Except ... There is a restaurant in Millersburg called "The Wooden Nickle."

DON'T EAT THERE.

I had chicken parm there the night before the road race, and, low and behold, I could barely get out of bed the next morning. I had no appetite, I couldn't keep my eyes open, and I was in the worst mood of my life. Keeping in mind that I haven't thrown up in around five years, I'm pretty sure this was my body's way of getting food poisoning. I dragged myself to the start line on a breakfast of a banana and a granola bar, got about 5 miles into the road race, and promptly turned around.

Other than that, it was a great weekend.

3. Mengoni Grand Prix/Lou Maltese Memorial: Overall not a great weekend for me. I had really bad knee issues, probably due to the rain/early morning temperature that we raced in. Other than that, though, it was definitely an exciting race, and it was my last road race weekend for the season. Again, not the results that I had been looking for, but it happens. I'm still getting used to having to wear knee warmers when the temperature drops even the slightest bit, and this time was the exact same case.

After my road season ended, I kept training through the end of September for Collegiate Track Nationals. Those didn't go so well. I had originally planned on doing the points race, the 500, and the pursuit. I ended up getting an infected tonsil about two weeks before racing, so my training got messed up, and we decided that I would just do the points race. That race didn't go so great, I didn't do as well as I had planned. But I was very relieved to be done with my season.

So since all of that, I've been up at school, studying my ass off and finding some time to train. It's been a blast. My social life is thriving (note the sarcasm), and the weather is lovely (it snowed twice in October).

Life is good.

This is getting long, so I'll write more at a later date (less than four months, I promise).

"Shitshow"

2009-06-18T07:35:00.002-04:00

Was what I thought was an appropriate title for last night's race, until Steph informed me that "shitshow" refers to someone who is trashed out of their mind.

I still think it is pretty appropriate.

The men's Pro/1/2 race for the Giro Di Jersey started last night, opening up with a crit. An interesting way to start a stage race, no doubt. (Just a side note: the race promoter made the pre-race speech about 20 minutes. Guido had this look on his face that clearly said "CAN WE START YET?") What was even more interesting was the race itself. When I looked at the race bible, it said "64 k race, 80 laps." I thought they had written it backwards.

Nope!

It was, in fact, an 80 lap race around a half-mile course. With approximately 100 guys starting. Recipe for an absolute mess. Pretty much the only blessing was that the rain managed to hold out, so that bit of danger was avoided. Every other danger imaginable, however, was present. The start/finish line was about 20 or 30 meters from the first corner, so a few guys were shelled before the first lap was even over. Normal criterium rules say that everyone is on the leader's lap, so guys can just get back in the field when they get lapped. The problem was, people were getting lapped all over the place, and it was getting dangerous. Jame Carney spent a bit of his voice yelling at the officials everytime around to start pulling people already. One guy, if I counted correctly, got lapped six times. Finally, at about 20 or so laps to go, the officials started pulling people who were not with the field. The problem they are going to have with that, though, is scoring. Had they pulled people when they were getting lapped the first time, as they should have, they could have used pro-rated timing, and the scoring would have been easy. But now, the officials are going to have a hell of a time trying to figure out who had been lapped three times versus four times.

But that's their fun.

Anyways, Colavita set up a fantastic train at around 7 to go, with Jame Carney having snuck into the middle of it. They came around the final corner, and Luca Damiani won the sprint, with Leandro Bottasso and his trackie-sprint coming into second. Jame Carney got third, Eric Schildge fourth, and Will Dugan fifth. And Ricky was the only junior to have finished on the same lap as the leaders.

I just tried putting pictures on here, but it didn't work, so if you want to see them, they are on my Facebook.

Last Sunday, I ended up racing out in Brooklyn again, this time at Floyd Bennett. There were only three girls, so we ended up racing with the 3/4 men. We all got dropped at about the same time, so it was really just a long persuit after that, with all of us trying to get back in the field and catch eachother. I ended up in second, if I had a few more laps I probably could have caught the girl ahead of me as well.

The ride back was fun though - I rode back with Lisban, Ale, and Josh on Flatbush Ave., and let's just leave it at ... CAR DODGEBALL! Thank god I was with them this time though - when I rode alone on Flatbush Ave. the day before I almost got killed.

The Pro/1/2 road race (stage two) should be starting just about now. Poor guys have a 130 k road race in the rain.

And I have two hours of race prep in the rain. Sounds awesome.

Brooklyn drivers...

2009-06-13T19:44:00.003-04:00

SUCK. That's all I have to say about that.

(Not my mom, though. Love you mom =])

I was planning on waiting until tomorrow night to do an entry so that I could recap my entire weekend, complain about how early I woke up both days, etc. Now I can only complain about how early I woke up this morning ...

4 AM. (Dedication. I wasn't kidding.)

Anyways, so approximately four hours after I posted on Tuesday, I was in the chicane at the Augusta training crit, and I heard a loud pop. As anyone who races (or rides) bikes knows, hearing a loud pop when going through a corner hard brings some terrifying thoughts to mind. The good news is I was either last or second to last in the field, so I didn't worry to much about slowing anyone down or crashing anyone. I took a look down, and what do I see flying across the road? My bottle. Still attached to my bottle cage. How that happened is absolutely beyond me, but I was just happy that it didn't take a chunk of my bike with it. So that was all nice and fun. After Augusta, Ricky and I hit up the diner nearby, where he somehow managed to get through a meal without hitting on the waitress. First time for everything, I guess.

On Wednesday, I came into the city and rode up to Lewis' house, met up with him, and rode down to Nyack. We made a stop on the way to get me some new bottlecages (that won't break mid-race, hopefully), and then of course stopped in the cafe in Nyack for some amazing breakfast sandwiches (apparently you have to request them hot? Who eats a cold breakfast sandwich?). After riding, Lewis came back to the boat for a little bit for some coffee ... and then suckered a free ride out of me back to his house. I'm so nice.

Not too much happened on Thursday ... We came into the city, I did a short recovery ride, that's about it.

Friday ... I got my ass out of bed at 7, was riding in the park by 7:45, and sometime between then and around 10, Lisban came up behind me and scared the crap out of me. So I rode with him for a little bit, then headed back home. I headed back up to SBR after, and Lisban, being the amazing guy he is, cleaning the sandman off of my bike and convinced me that the noise I was heading wasn't coming from my bottom bracket. I guess that's good news.

Today I woke up at 4, rode over to Prospect Park in Brooklyn, raced, hung out with the Garguilos and Zane for awhile, and then rode back home ... And now I could pass out. I think I'm going to go do that. Another early morning tomorrow. Yay ... ?

"She is so black!"

2009-06-09T14:23:00.002-04:00

I don't mean for that to sound racist - it's just that May Britt said that (totally offhandedly) yesterday at training, and got me, Els, and Nick Reinert laughing for about five minutes straight.

The season opener (The 10 Mile Championship) on Friday ended up being moved to Saturday night, due to "rain causing a mirror-like surface on the track." The problem with that was, the Philly International Championships were on Sunday, which meant that anyone with enough soul to go and brave the Manayunk Wall was not at the track on Saturday night. The men's field only had to do two heats for the 5 mile final, and the women's field was EIGHT people. Yes. Everyone was in the money. In any case, Lauren had a small panic attack before the races, and then ended up doing pretty well, and Elspeth ALMOST got $100 worth of primes before the girl from New Zealand with a beastly sprint grabbed both of them.

Sunday was Dan and Antonio's wedding, which was lovely. They were adorable, I got to spend some time with Amy, all was well. Oh, and the H&H downtown was seized. I guess that means there's only one place left in the world to buy a single bagel for over a dollar. Too bad.

Yesterday I headed down to the track in the morning for a session of overgeared starts and jumps. Apparently I looked like I was going in slow motion, says the coach. Oops. After that I rode back to Elspeth's house and then I FOUND MY WAY BACK TO THE TRACK. I'm a little excited about that, because after the two of us being friends for over two years, this is the first time I have found my way from her house to the track without her or a GPS. Mission accomplished.

This morning I had time trial intervals ... and I almost passed out on the climb back up to my house. Not sure what happened there. In any case, I had a Clif Bar, some Ovaltine, a turkey sandwich, and some cherries and will soon be on my way to Augusta for a training race ... Yay ...

And tomorrow will be a nice ride down to Nyack with Lewis! That should be fun.

The hardest part of being an athlete.

2009-06-05T21:32:00.002-04:00

I know that this is sort of a up-in-the-air question when it comes down to getting a straight answer. Being an athlete isn't easy at all, and there are a lot of components to that. A lot of athletes will say that it is the dedication, the number of hours, watching weight gain/loss, the slight loss of a social life, any number of things. In my mind, it is something so much simpler.

It's so hard for me to understand that rest is just as important, if not more so, than the actual training. When I get my schedule for the week and I only have 10-12 hours, my first thoughts are usually how nice it sounds. But by the time I get to Wednesday or Thursday, I'm thinking about why I'm not so sore, and how much free time I have. May Britt is a great coach, and I don't second guess her at all, but it is hard to keep on reminding myself that having a "rest" week is not, in fact, a waste of time the way it sometimes seems like it is. I have to keep reminding myself that I am getting stronger even though I am not putting in long, intense hours like I would on most other weeks.

I've also gotten to the point in the summer where I really wish I had rented an apartment in Kutztown. I got the outline of my schedule until the end of July, and let's just say that my car isn't going to be too happy. My goals for this season are really just based around getting my upgrades, so May has me coming out for group sessions and track practice 2-3 times a week, every week. Awesome.

The season opener at the track got postponed until tomorrow night for rain. Kind of sucks, but it should still be just as much fun. After that, I'll be headed into the city for Antonio's and Dan's wedding.

And then, as May put it last night "the hammer will go down."

Can't wait.

Brick legs and hydrodynamics

2009-05-31T21:18:00.002-04:00

That basically sums up my weekend. I had those time trial intervals on Thursday, and I thought I ate enough did my recovery well, but apparently not, as I couldn't move on Saturday at the track. During warmups, I was doing my jumps, they weren't very ... well, jumpy. They were pretty stale. The first race was a 9 lap points race, and I pretty much gave up after the 3rd lap. Someone attacked, and I just had NOTHING and figured that a points race wasn't going to get much better, so I just dropped off. The second race was also 9 laps, this time just a scratch. Katie and I were at the top of the wall when we rolled off, and even after the official shot the gun in turn 3, we did a typical Saturday afternoon race and just kinda ... rolled. One of the women suggested trading recipes. Not a bad idea. In any case, I was bored, and wasn't going to do well anyways, plus I was on the front and no one was letting me move back, so I jumped. Not much a jump, but it got the race moving. And then I was on the back, with my legs dying a bit, but that's what I was expecting anyways. The third race was an unknown tempo (I think it ended up being around 8 laps). It was fast. I was toasted after that. Just a rough day overall.

After that I met up with Lauren to ride around for awhile. We ended up doing a super easy hour and a half - around 20 miles. We had an intense gossip session, of course, and had an almost FML/awkward moment making the turn onto Weilers Rd. Good times.

Today was the State TT Championships out in Chatsworth, NJ (presented by MAMBO Kings). They did a great job, as usual. Definitely needed a ZOOT suit for the first half of it though - it was pouring (big thanks to Teresa for praying for rain ... ). It wasn't too terrible though. I decided to use my road bike, as I have been having some comfort issues with my TT bike and need to get it refit. I got a good start, and passed my 30 second woman in around ... 30 seconds. I'd love to say that I was killing it, but the unfortunate truth is that she was just going really slowly. After that I just kept moving along, I was feeling pretty strong, but I was being pretty reserved, as I have never done a 40k TT before and wasn't sure how my energy would go along. It got pretty rainy, and I ended up with a nice coating of sand on me afterwards. I managed to beat my goal, which I am not going to write here because it is slightly embarressing, haha. In any case, my legs felt like bricks after. I slept most of the way home (I forgot to mention that I woke up at 4:30 for this thing. Try telling me I'm not dedicated enough) and then went to the Roger's for a little for Janis' graduation party. I was supposed to a somewhat easy hour and a half after that, but I felt like I was going to pass out, so I came straight back here and took a long shower. Since then I have ...
1. Had a bowl of greek yogurt
2. Had a bowl of frozen yogurt
3. Spoke to Els for awhile
4. Spoke to Steph for awhile
5. Had TWO conversations in Spanish (aren't you proud, Prof. Guijarro.)
6. Watched the last stage of the Giro (Menchov ate it about 500 meters from the line, switched bikes, finished in style, and won the Giro. What a guy.)

So essentially, I haven't cleaned the sand off my bike. I haven't sent in my training log. I haven't cleaned the guest room, and I haven't found my camera.

P for Productive!

And tomorrow will be just as good! I've decided that my definition of active recovery involves sand and salty water, so I will be heading down to the shore for the day with Steph. So I really should be getting on finding that camera.

Oh well.

Ricola Twilight Grand Prix

2009-05-27T22:08:00.002-04:00

So, just got back from the Ricola Twilight Grand Prix, put on by Liberty Cycle. Great race (for watching, not for racing, as I was told last night) - 40 laps, 1.1 mile course, 6 turns, 1 chicane, an off-camber turn, and a steep climb to the finish definitely provide for some great entertainment. Got the chance to hang out with Lewis, Sean, Steph, and then Rodney and Gabe when they got popped off the back (sorry guys). By the end, I think the only two left in the race that I knew were Gavi (who finished pretty decently), and Guido (who I accidentally cut off in the parking lot when leaving - sorry about that!). Congrats to Aldo Ino Ilesic from Team Type 1 for winning! There was a guy from Mountain Khaki who was off the front for quite a bit, and almost had the win, but got swallowed up towards the end of the last lap, poor guy.

Had a coffee when I got there ... at 5:30 or so ... Caffeine is just starting to wear off now. Weak system. Had a slice as well, still hungry ... Oh well. Big breakfast tomorrow, my favorite. I got a "smoothie," pretty weak though - shaved ice with sugar water. Sort of like a Sno-Cone (anyone remember those??) in a cup.

Time trial intervals tomorrow morning, then dinner/movie (maybe?) with Dillon!

The good news is ...

2009-05-26T17:53:00.002-04:00

... That I found my computer on Tuesday night. It was chilling in a sweatshirt pocket that I had already folded and put away.

The bad news is, I lost it again. For good. I had an easy hour with jumps this morning, so I drove out to park at the church and ride on Clinton road. All went well, but when I got back to my car, I think I put the computer on top of the car ... and forgot to bring it back in when I started driving. So now my computer is laying on the road, somewhere between my house and the church on Larue Rd., possibly in one piece, possibly not. In either case, I took a trip to Mike this afternoon to get a new one (I figured that getting lost twice in two weeks was the computer's way of telling me that it was time to go).

We got back from Atlanta on Monday. Jordan's Bar Mitzvah was amazing, of course, and it was great to see everyone. And I got to go on my first motorcycle ride with Mark! Definitely fun.

Tuesday and Wednesday were just training. Tuesday night I headed to the Augusta training race, which did not go so well, since I was on the tail end of a headache that had been going strong for almost a full day. Wednesday I had endurance with hill repeats ... and for some reason I don't remember what I did that evening. Wierd. Thursday I had an easy morning session, about an hour and a half with jumps. I killed some time during the afternoon texting Nikita and Facebooking and Ebaying (notice - still not cleaning up. Whoops), and then headed out to Trexlertown for an evening track session. So nice to be back on the track! Friday I had an easy session, and then headed into Manhattan with my parents for Antonio's aufruf. Saturday I had track racing, which went alright, considering it was my second time back on the track since ... August? Hopefully it'll go better this coming weekend.

Sunday morning I drove out to Steph's house, and we did a 60ish mile ride (we forgot to bring a camera, unfortunately). I learned that I'm not so good at putting on sunscreen - I borrowed one of Steph's sleeveless jerseys with the intentions of covering up my tanlines, while instead I missed a spot on both shoulders and ended up with 2 splotch sunburns. Awesome. Anyways, after the ride, we went over to a barbeque that her parent's friends were hosting ... and we had an interesting texting experience that probably shouldn't go online because I'm really not sure who reads this thing. Monday morning we headed over to the Tour of Somerville, my favorite race of the year. I checked and double-checked my sunscreen this time (and it payed off - no new sunburn!). It was great to see everyone again. Big congrats to Tina Pic for winning the women's race for the 4th(?) time in a row, and to Seba Haedo for winning the men's race! Double win for Colavita! And some good views for me ;-).

I had a morning session today, just an hour with jumps. I was supposed to do the Augusta training race this afternoon, but it was raining while I was driving there and I was just about to fall asleep, so I called May Britt and asked her if I could skip the race today, and thankfully she said yes.

Ricola Twilight Grand Prix tomorrow! Supposed to be rainy - should definitely be an interesting race!

Unpacking leads to ...

2009-05-14T21:48:00.002-04:00

... chaos. Which is why I can't find my heart rate monitor.

I had it, I think I put it on my bed on Monday night ... and then I'm not really sure what happened. So I've been training based on RPE all week (good thing I haven't had any interval sessions!). It's kind of a pain though - I've been using my cellphone to time my rides, and I've gotten used to looking down to check how much longer I have - and there is nothing there! Anyways, hopefully it will turn up soon.

This past Saturday I did the Somerset TT ... The race itself wasn't too terrible, my legs felt ok-ish, considering that I rode a grand total of around 3 hours that week, and I was pretty motivated, but my time BLEW. So I guess I'll be working on that a bit.

I got an email today saying 6 weeks left til Fitchburg! Hill repeats ... 6 weeks ... Oh my god ...

We're heading down to Atlanta tomorrow morning! Which means I should be packing right now. Oh well. Second time in five months! Not that I'm complaining - I love seeing everyone down there. I can't wait to practice my slightly (more than slightly?) inebriated Spanish skills with Susan. Woo!

I saw Evan today - he's working at a sandwich shop downtown called Swich. I got a salad with goat cheese and portabello mushrooms and it was delicious. I also got an AMAZING dessert, which was basically three types of chocolate spreads in a sandwich, toasted. Perfection.

I'm getting myself mega-amped for next weekend, when I get to a. hit the track for the first time this season, b. go to Somerville, and c. chill with Steph! Ahh! Too much for me to handle.

By the way - the link is listed on the sidebar of my blog, but everyone should check out Ample Harvest, the website my dad just made. It made so that backyard gardeners who have the troublesome issue of growing too much food can connect with food pantries and homeless shelters that need that food. They can then arrange for a pickup, so that the shelter/pantry has the fresh produce (a rarity, we've learned) and the gardener does not have to feel guilty about throwing out crops after no one wants anymore.

And it is official! I am applying to study abroad in Granada, Spain spring of next year (2010). It's a tough decision, as I would like to be thinking about looking at Elite/U23 teams, but I can't do that if I won't be home until May. It will definitely be worth it though.

I really should get to packing ... Oh boy.

Pictures sometime next week!

I made it!

2009-05-07T20:21:00.002-04:00

I never thought it would be possible, but I actually did survive my hell days. I had my last exam this morning, Macro Econ. We'll see how that went, haha.

Now I am in the process of packing up and cleaning up my room, sadly. It's pretty upsetting - most of my clothing is sitting in an enormous garbage bag in the middle of the room. I've already sold back almost all of my textbooks (I got almost $200 - after spending almost $700 on books for the semester. Awesome?), and I am Ebaying all of the books that the Co-op won't take back.

Training this week has been ehhhh. I think May kind of expected that though. I had short intervals on Tuesday, went swimming with Erin yesterday, and was supposed to have short endurance today, but I had to skip it in order to have time to get everything done. I have race prep tomorrow and then the Somerset Time Trial on Saturday. My first time on a time trial bike since, oh, around nationals in August. Should be great.

And I will definitely be taking massage offers afterwards.

By the way - big thanks to Mike at Town Cycle for regluing (sort of - turns out they didn't need it) my race wheel, and to Tim at Montclair Bikery for getting me a lovely set of Cycleops rollers (and half of the other gear I use).

I'm currently getting myself amped for the summer, seeing everyone I haven't seen in forever, and doing some quality creeping with Dana at Friday night races on those lovely Argentineans. Nothing like some summer latin eye candy.

Hopefully, they won't see that. And if they do, hopefully English is still a weak point =]

I've been meaning to do this ...

2009-05-03T11:28:00.005-04:00

I've had pictures of both bikes - my Jamis (RIP) and my Van Dessel - for awhile, and I keep on forgetting to post them ...

RIP ... =[

My new baby =]

Acapella concerts at UConn are expensive ...

2009-05-02T22:09:00.000-04:00

... And what's funny about that is that they really aren't. The most we've ever paid to get in was probably around $2 (afterparties were another story, but that's alright - Mushroom is worth it).

The problem is AFTER the concert, when I get back to my room, and need to hear all of the songs again. So I download them from iTunes, which, up until now, has come to around ... $15?

So it's not mega-expensive. But I'm a college student. $15 is plenty.

Erin, Justin, and I just got back from the Extreme Measures Spring Concert. They were absolutely amazing, as always. Conn-Men opened for them, and while I'm a little sad that they didn't do "Hey Girl," I'm willing to let that go and give them their deserved credit. They were pretty awesome as well.

I also have to give Joey and Chris (among others) credit for some amazing dancing in the back of the room. Always keeping things entertaining.

CDN's spring concert was last night, and they, too, were fantastic. Joey's song (not sure what it's called, unfortunately) was AMAZING.

I guess you could say that UConn is good at basketball AND acapella.

The afterparty at Mushroom was great as well, love it there. Least sketchy house parties on campus. It's awesome.

And now, I guess I should get back to writing my 8-page-and-growing outline for my polisci final on Monday morning (8 AM! Woo!). Forty terms. Dates, definitions, relevance to IR, related term, and a related current event.

That's just mean.

Procrastination.

2009-04-27T21:39:00.000-04:00

I just found this on another blog, and I really need a distraction.
As if I don't have enough.

THREE NAMES I GO BY
1. Leah
2. Loppenheimer (only Shapi, kind of makes me miss high school)
3. Olive oil

THREE JOBS I HAVE HAD IN MY LIFE
1. Bike builder
2. Bike shop (two different things, I promise)
3. Student?

THREE PLACES I HAVE LIVED
1. Manhattan!
2. West Milford, NJ
3. Storrs, CT

THREE TV SHOWS THAT I WATCH
1. NCIS
2. House
3. Ace of Cakes

THREE PLACES I HAVE BEEN
1. Israel
2. Spain
3. Turkey

THREE PLACES I WANT TO GO
1. Greece
2. Italy
3. Argentina

THREE OF MY FAVORITE FOODS
1. Bagel with cream cheese and lox
2. Chocolate covered pretzels
3. Sushi

THINGS I AM LOOKING FORWARD TO
1. Thursday, May 7th, at 10:30 AM
2. Atlanta
3. Track racing!

THREE PETS THAT YOU HAVE OWNED
1. Mummenschanz, my cat until I was around 5 or 6
2. Multiple fish. I don't remember any names.
3. Lucky, my dog =]

THREE FRIENDS WHO WILL REPLY
1. how
2. about
3. none?

THREE FAVORITE BANDS/SINGERS
1. Elliott Yamin
2. Rascall Flats
3. UConn acapella groups

THREE FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH
1. Swimming
2. Cycling
3. As a UConn student, I feel required to say basketball

THREE FAVORITE DRINKS
1. Water
2. Chocolate milk
3. Iced tea

Spring has sprung...

2009-04-27T20:45:00.000-04:00

... And so has spring weekend. The vast majority of campus should be sober by now, as opposed to an average BAC over the weekend of probably, oh, around .3 or so.

And apparently UConn isn't even on Playboy's top 25 party school list anymore. Shame.

The temperature shot from around 60 to about 85 in two days. In those two days, I had 7 hours of training. Needless to say, my tanlines (sunburn lines at the moment) are back. Proof to May Brit that I really do my training.

I've been suffering through a sinus infection for the past week or two, and made an appointment at the infirmary for Wednesday ... which means that I only have to get through one more interval session and one more endurance session before I get some meds to clear myself up a bit.

AND we are on the last week of classes! All I have to do is survive this week, and a week of finals, and my freshman year will be over!

That being said, I have a mountain of homework and studying to last me until then ...

On a lighter note ...

2009-04-07T21:29:00.001-04:00

A presidential candidate in Iran is pro-(well, maybe not pro, but certainly not anti) Western, hasn't explicity denied (or admitted, but we'll give him the benefit of the doubt) the Holocaust, and believes that Ahmadinejad is an extremist?
Awesome. It's a work in progress.

UConn Women's basketball is playing tonight in (what I believe is) the NCAA championship game.
I'm pretty sure. Don't take my word for it, Jewish school did nothing for my sports-following skills.
ESPN says that at this moment, the score is 39-25 UConn. And the game is at halftime.

Wouldn't a husky eat a cardinal anyways? It's amazing the mascots that some schools come up with. I, being the great college sports fan I am, was convinced to make a bracket for the women's tournament on ESPN.com.

I did it based on team colors and mascots.

And let me just start by saying, I don't remember which school it was, but whoever came up with the Horned Frogs, wow. That pretty much tops it off. I don't really know that anyone could do much better than that.

I just checked ESPN, and it told me that this is, in fact, the championship game. YAY HUSKIES!

Training has been going alright. For the past week it's been more of "wakeupeatgotoclasstrain," rather than enjoying it as much as I should be. Blame it on the end of the semester.

And on that Econ exam that I have at 8 AM on Thursday.
Fantastic.