I never thought this day would come… but it has. I have found myself counting down the days until summer is over. Not in a painstaking, dreadful way though, in a wishful, anticipating way. I am more than a little bit excited to see the tail end of August just ahead on the calendar. Summer is really wearing me down.
After my whirlwind trip up to Thunder Bay to kick start my summer I’ve fallen into a gridlock routine. From Monday to Friday, 9-4, I am a mountain bike camp counsellor. Now 9-4 is a full day, but what makes it even fuller is the fact that my commute is not a driving one. My commute is a 55minute bike ride in to work and usually a little less on the way home. So if camp starts at 9, I need to be setting up by 8:30, which means I need to leave home at 7:30. Camp ends at 4, so by 4:15 I’ve usually got things cleaned up and I can get home sometime shortly after 5.
The best part is that I fit all my training in there as well. Oftentimes I’ll strap my roller ski poles onto my bike (along the frame with the extra length out over the rear wheel), fasten the roller skis onto the sides of my backpack and the boots and water belt either in or on the bag as well. I don’t have a picture of it yet (if someone is up when I leave in the morning I’ll have them take one) though. I have gotten quite a number of strange looks from passing vehicles as they slow down to get a look and make sure I’m not an escapee from the penitentiary.
So with my life pretty much full of work/camp, early morning training, sleeping and eating (oh and I stretch sometimes too) I haven’t really had much time to foster a social life. I did actually get out to see the remade SpiderMan movie – it was pretty sweet. Before hitting up the theatre Laura, Jenn and I decided to hit up the dollar store for some gag gifts for our friend Jenna’s birthday the next day (yes, there are two Jenns and a Jenna in our group). We found some cool stuff.
Appreciating some of the Harry Potter score
At the actual birthday celebration part of the event was to make the Hawaiian themed dinner ourselves. Needless to say the two toughest people, Jenn and myself, were commissioned to pulverising the meat, seasoning and making the burger patties. We were so well suited for the job it was a no brainer to have the Jenn^2 team put into action.
Pretty pumped about the quality of the ground beef
Since those two outings I have only garbed myself in civilian clothing once (civilian clothing, for those of you wondering, is something you would wear in public – no training clothes, not usually sweatpants, hoodies are borderline and unwashed socks are out of the question… kind of.) That would be today, and this was only because my parents were so kind to inform me that they would be entertaining a dozen guests for the evening. … whut? These people are going to come over to my house on the evening before my one (kind of) sleep in day of the week and disturb my 8:30 bedtime routine. How dare they. And so I rest here, on my computer, studio head phones on, trying to write something bearable…
Here’s a picture of the omelette I made the other day and dropped my iPod on. Why? Because I can.
There isn’t even a good story about how this happened… It just happened.
Anyways, looking forward to this weekend, and even more to the end of summer so I can relax (haha, doesn’t really make sense does it?). The plan this weekend is team training tomorrow and probably a nice long roller ski with Kieran on Sunday. We were thinking 5 or 6 hours maybe. Anyone want to join us? It’s a blast. I actually got Ryan out with us last week for a 4 hour ski. He held up pretty well. We think that in the one workout he roller skied for longer than he did all last season. Attaboy Ryan!
Oh and I am so envious of all the skiers over in Germany and Canmore/Haig. I mean roller skiing around here is some of the best in the country, but it doesn’t quite have the same prestige as being out west or overseas. I did exchange a number of humorous emails with Pav and her crew in Germany, by the sounds of it they’re doing pretty well. Even if they do miss me more than what would be considered healthy. I mean it happens right? Withdrawal from any kind of even moderately tight knit team is quite an unpleasant experience. But fear not! The end of summer draws near, and with it comes the SOD camp. The beacon that keeps me crawling through camp, week by week, struggling to keep up with these 7 year olds and their boundless energy. When they say being a camp counsellor is good birth control, I kid you not, they’re so right. If camp has taught me anything, it’s that even the good kids aren’t that great and that the bad kids are worse than you can possibly imagine.
Such optimism! Here’s something to cheer you (or maybe just me) up… ONLY 143 MORE DAYS UNTIL CHRISTMAS! And that means even fewer until it snows (hopefully).
Jackson Out.
Jenn Jackson 