Love this time of year!

This is my favorite time of year. The leaves are either completely yellow or fallen off the trees, the mountains have snow but the sky is blue. I love Canmore!

Almost there....

I'm getting closer and closer to feeling comfortable calling myself an ER nurse. I'm LOVING it. I passed the ACLS (Advanced Cardiac Life Support) course this weekend. That was a HUGE stress and weight off my shoulders. It was a hard course and even at the end I wasn't all that confident that I'd pass but I did! I scored 88% and 85% on the written tests and a 'pass' on the 'mega code' That's all I needed. Now I'm certified to care for all cardiac patients and run a code (cardiac arrest) when a doctor isn't there, I'm in charge...ordering drugs, defibrillating...just like on ER. The only thing that I'm not certified to do is intubate adults which is silly cause I'm certified to intubate babies which is WAY harder than adults but that's ok cause I'm not all that eager to do it anyways. I worked the last 2 days in emerg, still orientating but pretty much doing everything on my own and just having someone else there to ask questions when I need to. I have two more evening shifts orientating and then I'm on my own in the ER next Tuesday night!
So far our condo hasn't sold yet. They've showed it to a few people but in my opinion it's overpriced. We talked to our landlord about it though and he assured us that if and when it does sell they'll do their best to find us a new place and likely even in the same building so we're ok with that.
I have the next two days off and I'm so excited. I have no idea what I'm going to do but hopefully I'm going to sleep in tomorrow!

Much improved

After a rocky start to my week, I'm happy to say that it has only improved. I'm heading into my last weekend of night shifts at the Foothills and I couldn't be more excited. Any shifts I book there now will be on my own accord. Even though I absolutely love, love, love my job at the Foothills I'm really looking forward to the new learning opportunities that the Canmore hospital is offering. I'm currently preparing for the ACLS (Advanced Cardiac Life Support) course at the end of the month. It's proving to be more challenging than I had expected. I don't know if it's the course material that's so challenging or the fact that my study skills aren't what they used to be. I still have 2 more weeks to prepare so that's what I'm going to be doing in most of my spare time. It's a $450 course, that the hospital will reimburse me but only if I pass so I can't afford to fail this one! I start my orientation in the ER on Tuesday. I'm so excited about it. I've always wanted to give the ER a try and no better place than a rural hospital where you're resources are limited so you have to be that much more on the ball with your assessments. It's going to be great, I can't wait!

What a day.....

What a day I'm having...and it's only 9am. I'm starting to think that I should have stayed in bed this morning. I got up at 7am prepared to go to the classroom orientation session at the Canmore hospital. The educator, that I've been trying to reach for a week, finally calls me at 7:50am, as I'm on my way out the door to tell me that I don't need to attend today. That's when I should have gone back to bed but since I was up I figured I should get some studying done for the ACLS course I'm taking in a few weeks. So I head off to Starbucks to get in some quality study time. When I was in university the only place I could actually study without being distracted was Starbucks. So I get there and I order my usual triple shot vanilla latte and settle into a table in the corner. Oh I forgot, before I went to Starbucks I went to the bank and decided to actually go into the bank rather than go through the drive-thru. I go to all the work of parking and walking into the bank only to find that that one machine they have is out of order. I walk all the way back to my car, get in and go through the drive thru where someone has ripped all the envelopes out of the envelope thingy so I have to actually get out of the car and find a suitable envelope off the ground to be able to deposit my cheque. Then I find out that the bank took out my car payment for my Civic by mistake so now I still have to deal with that today. Ok, now back to Starbucks. Since I was staying I asked for my latte in a mug, well what did I get, a to-go cup. Not a big deal but one more thing to add to my list of "things gone wrong" today. Then my latte tasted funny. Not sure what was wrong with it, either too much vanilla or they had previously used the milk container for soy or whole milk and then added skim, it tasted weird, and trust me, I've had enough of them to know what they should taste like, I can tell when there's something off about it! Don't mess with me and my latte!! So I've been in Starbucks for an hour tediously going over the ACLS textbook trying to stay awake and interested when I'm accosted by a group of about 10 mothers celebrating their kids return to school. The all piled into the table next to mine, even though there were other available tables and not only did they pile around the table, they completely blocked me into mine. There was no escape! I can usually concentrate really well at Starbucks but when you're surrounded by 10 mothers shouting at eachother about which class little Johnny was in and which teacher little Jane got stuck with this year and who was with their friends and who wasn't and who got stuck in a split class and who had male teachers who never take the effort to plan social activities so now the mothers would have to volunteer and if they want their children to have social activities then they'll just have to plan everything themselves....it went on and on and on.....and I'm blocked into my table with a little boy on the other side of me swinging his feet off his chair and inevitably kicking mine....I had to leave....but I was stuck! I packed up my stuff and no one even noticed that I was trying to get out until I loudly pushed my chair back, stood up and excused myself from their group. How rude! They were probably thinking the same thing of me but whatever. I was there first and they totally took over my space, not to mention that they blocked me into my space, when I was obvioulsy trying to study. I understand that Starbucks is a public place but come on people, have some respect for other people's space. I didn't want to go home because the house is a mess and that would only aggravate me further so here I am at the internet cafe which is blissfully quiet except for the girl across from me who keeps staring at me, what's that all about, is my hair sticking up? i don't think so...what's her problem? ARAGH. So even though I have internet at home now, here I am spending money on internet and getting stared at by a creepy girl just to stay away from my messy house, where's the logic in that? I think I'll go to Beamers, my other favorite coffee spot, get a matcha latte, some breakfast and try to do some more studying. I can't believe it's only 9am. What will the rest of the day have in store for me if this is the way it's started? I shudder at the thought. Wish me luck I think I'll need it.

Still Offline

I took the HP into Future Shop yesterday to see what they could do to fix it and it's going to take at least 2-3 weeks! The good news is that it is still covered under warranty if there's anyting wrong with the hardware. I think it's just a virus but who knows how much damage it's done. I feel so disconnected without my computer at home!

Nothing new happening lately....I bought 500 thread count bed sheets and it's like sleeping in a cloud of softness. When you have the bed of champions you have to have the sheets to match. It's tough getting out of bed now. God, that can't be the most exciting thing happening in my life lately! That's pretty pathetic. Ummm...there's gotta be something else...I worked overtime yesterday and we had 18 empty beds. I don't think I've ever seen that happen. It was the easiest overtime shift I've ever had. I hope it's like that next week cause I've got 3 shifts scheduled. Sue and I watched Texas Chainsaw Massacre tonight. It was gross, disturbing and too graphic and the fact that it's based on true events just creeps me out. I'm supposed to be studying for my ACLS (Advanced Cardiac Life Support) class that I'm taking in Sept but I'm procrastinating. It's just like I'm back at school. I used to be the master procrastinator and it's all coming back to me full force. It's going to be a tough course I should really be studying. Instead today I went to Banff, have been here twice today to check my email, went grocery shopping, cooked a casserole for my lunches next week which I havn't done in months and months, watched a movie, went out for a candy run, did laundry, had a bath and I think I might have read 5 pages of my textbook. Aragh....I guess I better go home.

Computer problems

The seemingly neverending computer battle rages on.... The PC now has a virus, for sure, and isn't working and the Mac is still being fixed in Toronto. I have two computers and neither one is working...what are the odds? It would only happen to me. So I'm going to be offline for a bit. I'm at an internet cafe right now and will try to get here as much as I can to keep you all posted on my life but no guarantees how often that will be. I can still check my email at work but likely won't have time to write too many so keep em coming but don't hold your breath for a quick response ;)

Let's see...what's new lately...

My friend Liz and her family were here for a short visit last week. It was great to see Liz, Justin and Hunter again. They introduced me to Bohnanza (I think that's what it's called??) It's a great game! I really enjoyed it, not to mention that I won! Yep, that's right Jen! I won! I think they took it easy on me though. It's too bad we couldn't spend more time together but unfortunately I had to work the next day. Work always gets in the way of having a real life! Gotta do something about that. Better start buying lottery tickets I guess.

Work is great though. I'm really lucky to be one of those few people who can genuinely say that they love their job. I hate having to get up at 4:30am when I work days and I hate having to stay awake all night when I work nights but when I'm there I really love what I do. It helps that I've had some really cool patients lately too, they make the days fun. I'm finishing out my last few weeks in Calgary and then I start my job in Canmore on Sept 19 (Sue's birthday!). I've completed my orientation to the Acute Care ward at the Canmore hospital and so far it's really great. They have a very knowledgeable staff and a lot of them are around my age so it's fun. They've been really good about offering education opportunities and I'm already registered for the Advanced Cardiac Life Support course and there's a few more coming up this fall/winter that I'll be able to take. There's lots of courses for pediatric emerg and trauma nursing so I'm excited about that.

My new car is still AWESOME! I'm really, really enjoying it. I think I made the right choice between the Vibe and the Matrix cause now I see the Matrix's on the street and I really like the look of the Vibe a lot better. It's an awesome car. I'm so happy with it. I'll post a pic somtime. Just gotta take on first!

Sue and I spent the day in Calgary today trying to get some stuff done but nothing seemed to work out the way it should have. Although, Sue was successful in getting new tires for her car and we got a water cooler that we've been needing for a really long time so I guess it wasn't all a loss. We were going to go to Ikea to get some shelves to hold our DVD collection but were too tired to drive to the other end of the city and decided to just come home and deal with that another day. Our DVD collection is way over 100 now and we desperately need better storage for them. Or stop buying DVD's, one or the other. There's a movie store in town that sells previously viewed DVD's for super cheap, 5 for $25. Not to mention that we're still addicted to eBay and buy movies there too. I recently bought Hotel Rwanda, my favorite movie of all time, on eBay for $1.99!

That's all for now....

Major Update!

Alright, back by popular demand.....my old blog! People didn't like that you couldn't comment on the other one so I'm back to posting here. I'll try to keep this short but there have been some major developments in my life the last month or so since I've posted here.

First of all, my new computer, the Mac, crashed not even a month after I bought it. Unbelievable eh? Actually it didn't crash the backlight died on the screen so it would turn on but I couldn't see anything. Luckily it's under warranty so it's off being fixed as we speak. What's even more unbelievable is that my old PC laptop that I thought had crashed, hence the reason why I bought the Mac, is now working again as though nothing was wrong with it! So now I have two laptops! I must say though that I do prefer the Mac to the PC so I'm eager to get it back up and running.

I got a job at the Canmore hospital! My temporary position at the Foothills in Calgary is ending in a few weeks so the timing couldn't be better. I started orientation last Thursday and so far I'm really enjoying it. It's a small hospital so I'll be working in all areas, acute care, emergency and labor and delivery. I'm feeling much more confident in my skills and knowledge than I had expected to feel. I was nervous because I've become so specialized in postpartum and now I'm back to medical, surgical, cardiac, psychiatric, palliative, everything patients. I havn't started my ER orientation yet and that's the area where I'll need the most orientation since I've never done it before. I'm really excited about being in the delivery room again. It's been a long time since I've been in a delivery but I seem to know more about it than some of the people orientating me! I guess my postpartum/antepartum knowledge does transfer over somewhat. So I know own a permanent 0.70 part time position. I've never, in my almost 4 years of nursing, had a permanent job in the hospital. Just another reason why I should stay in Canmore forever! I love it here and now that I have this job, I have no reason to leave.

I bought a new car! I traded in my 2002 Honda Civic for a brand new 2006 Pontiac Vibe. I pick it up tomorrow. There were a lot of factors contributing to the decision to trade in and it was a tough one but I'm happy now that it's all over. I tried to sell it privately but didn't get any interest so I relented and traded it at the dealership. I know I didn't get what it was worth but I didn't do too bad either considering all the km's I put on it commuting all these years. So now in 5 years, if I'm unable to work at least I'll have a 4 door, practical vehicle paid off so it will be one less payment that I have to work for.

I've started physiotherapy for my neck. It's going to be a very, very, very long process and after a few weeks I havn't felt much improvement but I'm still optimistic. I had an x-ray done and it was "normal" well except for the metal plate and screws in there but at least there's no degeneration of my vertabrae below the fusion. That's the risk in the future, having the rest of my neck degenerate because it's compensating for the loss of motion in the upper half of my neck. So we're working on loosening my mid/upper back so that it's compensating for the fusion rather than my neck. It's tough and I have a lot of stretching exercises to do. I've lost pretty much all deep muscle function in my neck so my jaw, traps, shoulders and accessory muscles are all compensating for that loss which is why I'm so sore all the time. I need to build up as much of that deep muscle as I can as well as learn how to fit my limitations into my natural environment. Right now we're still in the very basic stages of loosening my muscles that seem to be tense from my head to my butt and getting more range of motion out of my lower vertabrae. So I'm doing physio 3 days a week and massage therapy once a week. For $800/month in rehab expenses it had better work but really, at this point, I'd pay anything to get my active lifestyle back.

Let's see what else is new with me....that's pretty much the highlights, life is good.

New computer!

My computer crashed on Tuesday :( So I bought a new one! I was thinking of getting a new one anyways and I ended up getting the Mac that I had been looking at. You can check it out at futureshop.ca or on a post I made a few weeks ago. So far I'm really liking it. It is a lot different than operating Windows so I went to the library and got Mac for Dummies. The guy at Future Shop says that it takes a few months to really get used to operating a Mac. The multimedia options are awesome! I even have a built in WebCam. I bought Microsoft Office for Mac so it's compatible with microsoft documents. Pretty cool eh? The only downside is that I had to buy the display model because it was the only one left in the entire province. The techs were supposed to reprogram it for me but something went wrong and now everything I try to do asks for a password that I don't have. They don't know what happened and can't fix it with me over the phone so I have to take it back in tomorrow to have it fixed properly. As long as they can slove the problem, I'm happy.

Happy Canada Day!

Happy Canada Day! Ok, I realize that I'm a day late but I've been working nights and when I work nights everything in my life other than work seems to happen a day later than it should. It's the "Night Shift Syndrome" Other symptoms include extreme mood swings, nausea, feeling as though you're on another planet, a level of fatigue that is unexplainable, complete loss of the english language and vocabulary, low self esteem (why the hell do I do this to myself, I'm a complete idiot), hate your job, hate yourself, hate everyone you work with (part of the extreme mood swings), complete loss of social/home/family life, extreme cravings for anything deep fried and unhealthy and when those symptoms become too much to handle there's always....career change. Fortunately I'm not there yet. I'd like to pay off the student loans for this career before starting another which means more student loans and more night shifts to pay them off. It's a never ending cycle, black hole, abyss of night shifts.
Anyways, back to Canada Day! I hope you all had fun celebrating the birth of our country. I was at work, of course, but we all gathered in the kitchen to watch the fireworks which were actually pretty good this year. It's a good thing the people I work with are like family to me otherwise I'd be a lot more upset having to be at work on a holiday. Actually, it's not a good thing that they feel like family because that means I'm spending too much time at work! Speaking of which, I have to get ready to go!

Everybody wants me....

I think I made the right choice when I decided to be a nurse. I'll never be short of work, ever. I worked 12hr nights all weekend and got home this morning feeling like a zombie, barely took my shoes off before falling into bed and when I woke up 6hrs later I had three messages from the staffing office asking me to come in for overtime. Days, nights, evenings, 8hrs, 12hrs, whatever I wanted for the rest of today and tomorrow. My 0.5 position is perfect cause extra shifts are double time so I'm making full time wages but not working full time. Why didn't I figure this out sooner? I've been busting my butt for the last 3 1/2 years working full time when I could have been less than full time but still getting paid as though I were. There's a few of us 'young ones' at work who have dropped to part time over the last few months and we're all kicking ourselves for not doing it sooner. It makes much more sense So I'm working 3pm-7pm on overtime tomorrow and told them that if they needed me to extend to 11pm I could do that too. A four hour shift really counts as 8hrs but it's only 4! This is so exciting and I got a raise too, well sort of $0.68 a hour or something like that for my third year of service! Yippee. Only 6 more years and I'm at the top of the payscale, halfway there! It's been a good day for me It's a good thing I can get so much overtime to combat my eBay addiction. I need to go to work so I'm not on eBay bidding on things that I'd never normally buy Stupid eBay!

Thinking of buying an Apple

I'm thinking of buying an Apple laptop. Anyone know anything about them? I like the features it offers for photos and such. This is the one I'm thinking of:

http://www.futureshop.ca/prodlink.asp?P=0665000FS10075463&L=EN

Check it out. Feedback would be greatly appreciated as I know next to nothing about computers.

Quick trip home

I finally got to go home this weekend! I havn't been to Kamloops since last October and even though this was a really quick trip I'm so glad that I went. I left Canmore on Thursday morning at 7am, drove to Sicamous and met my mom and Sue at mom's house, changed cars and drove to Kamloops just in time to see Steffie and Maureen graduate from university. I was so neat to be able to be there. Steffie and Maureen have been close family friends for the last 17 years. Steffie is like another little sister to me and Maureen is the strongest, most inspirational woman I know. It was so great to see them walk across that stage and accept their degrees that they have worked so hard for and how cool is it that mother and daughter are in the same university graduating class! After the ceremony we met up with Niki who I don't get to see nearly enough of so it was great that she was able to come see us. Then we headed back to the Rothman's house for a celebratory BBQ and then back to Sicamous that night. It was an exhausting day having spent 8hrs in the car but well worth it. It's always a blast from the past going back to Kamloops. It feels like a lifetime ago since I actually lived there even though technically it's my 'hometown' So much has changed and yet so much has stayed the same. We drove by the house I grew up in and they painted the garage doors that used to be dark red, white. It looks terrible! It doesn't even look like my house anymore. The front door is still dark red though and Sue and I realized that we used to be the girls who lived behind the red door! (All you One Tree Hill fans know what I mean). Yesterday mom and I spent the day cleaning out my car. Holy crap! I filled her entire garbage can with stuff that I didn't even know I had in there. It was gross. It looks so good now all washed and waxed and clean. Let's see how long that lasts! Today mom made me go to garage sales with her and I managed to buy the ugliest coffee table ever to be made but it was only $10 and we needed a coffee table. Sue's pretty creative maybe she can fix it up. I better go deal with laundry since I have to be up for work at 5am tomorrow. Can't complain too much though, it's 12hrs of overtime tomorrow!

I quit my job today

I quit my job at the clinic today. I'd hit a brick wall and I just couldn't cope with the verbal and emotional abuse anymore. I am feeling so relieved right now. On Thursday I was dreading having to go to work on Monday. That's not right. I have been so stressed and worn out the last month or so because of this job, it was time for me to quit. I left letters of resignation for all the docs explaining why I just couldn't take it anymore and apologizing for leaving everyone in the lurch. I spoke with occupational health and wellness at the hospital yesterday and realized that the clinic is within the health region so their "zero tolerance" policy with regards to abuse does apply to me. They were appalled and told me that I have every right to up and quit to get out of the situation and if they give me hassle about not giving notice OH&S will back me up. Good to know because I had to get out of there, I don't think I could have handled another day. I didn't realize just how down I was feeling until today when I decided to quit and felt a million times better. Now the plan is to pick up more shifts at the hospital which won't be a problem since they've called me for overtime 3 times just this week! I might apply at the hospital and public health here as well. I'm just going to play it by ear for the next few weeks and see how it goes.

Lazy Monday Morning

I don't remember the last time I had a monday off work. This is great! I'm so much happier with my new and much improved work schedule. This week I work Tues and Wed at the clinic, Fri in Calgary and Saturday at the clinic. Only 4 days of work and still full time hours! Fantastic. Much better than trying to fit in shifts at the hospital and working 6 days a week or 10 days straight like I did earlier this month. I think I mentioned that I picked up a 0.5 part time position on my unit at the Foothills?? Anyways, I did, and I start on Friday! It's a temporary position until September, 12 hr shifts, day and nights so it works out to anywhere between 1-3 shifts a week. Then I'll fill in the rest at the clinic to make up full time hours. It's perfect for me cause I qualify for full benefits for my much needed massages and it's only until September so I can do it over the summer, see how it goes and then decide what I want to do over the winter. I'm filling in for someone who's been off with a back injury for the last year so the position could likely be extended beyond September if I want. I think she'll retire before ever coming back to her job. The commute is going to be easy this summer. It's only 50 mins, less than some people have in the city, no snow and the sun will be up when I go to work and when I come home. In the winter it sucks because it's snowy and dark both ways. I'm really excited. I miss being at the hospital with my friends, the babies, the patients.....everything. I think I'll be much happier now.

Sesame Street Presonality Quiz

You Are Cookie Monster

Misunderstood as a primal monster, you're a true hedonist with a huge sweet tooth. You are usually feeling: Hungry. Cookies are preferred, but you'll eat anything if cookies aren't around. You are famous for: Your slightly crazy eyes and usual way of speaking How you life your life: In the moment. "Me want COOKIE!"

The Sesame Street Personality Quiz

No kidding eh? I could have figured that out myself. I love cookies! I'm a natural Cookie Monster.

Trip to the Cape

I had a great 6 days visiting my Dad in Cape Cod. It was long overdue and I'm really glad I was able to get out there one last time before Dad and Candace relocate to California next week. We had a great day in Boston at the New England Aquarium and the IMAX. The aquarium was amazing. They have a huge tank in the middle, 26ft deep and 40 some odd ft across with 600 types of sea creatures. My favorite was Myrtle the 600lb sea turtle. They had 2 sharks in the tank too! Scuba divers go in 5 times a day and feed the fish. The penguins were pretty cool too. I love aquariums!


We went on a 3D African Safari at the IMAX. There were elephants, lions, rinos and leopards and it looked like they were coming right out of the screen at you. The little kids in the row ahead of us kept reaching out trying to touch them. On Sunday we went to Provincetown and had lunch and then to see the Da Vinci Code. I saw the strangest think in Provincetown. A 70 some odd year old man? woman? not sure,sitting on a chair, wearing nothing but a leopard print bikini, singing. It was quite a sight. I was disappointed with the movie. I think it was because I had just finished reading the book and of course, it was way better. They took out a lot of the history in the book and made it more for Hollywood entertainment. On Monday and Tuesday Dad had to work during the day so I spent the days at the mall and the beach. On Tuesday night Dad's co-workers at the college had a really nice going away party for him. Wednesday was a llllooooonnnnnggg day! Long flights and long hours spent in airports, it was good to be home at the end of the day. Overall, it was a great trip! Thanks Dad!

eBay Addiction

I never really understood what all the hype was about with eBay. I have friends who have bought and sold items on eBay and listened to them rave about how much money they made and how easy it was but I was never tempted to try it. Then Laura told me that she cleaned out her closet and sold all her old clothes on eBay and made $250. Well, if you've ever seen my closet you know that it's jam packed full of clothes and I only wear about half of them. It's pretty bad although I know some people, not mentioning any names Fiona, who have way more clothes than me! So I figured that I'd clean out my closet and see what I could get. Well I found 14 pairs of jeans that I no longer wear so I thought I'd start with them. So far I've only sold 6 pairs and ended up breaking even at the end of it all but it's all about creating more room in my closet so I can go out and buy more! All the jeans looked like they were brand new so I couldn't justify giving them away. Some of them I'd only worn a few times and decided I didn't like them anymore. So now I'm constantly looking around the house for more things that I can sell! Hmmm...how much do you think I'd get for Susan?! just kidding

So now that I've figured out selling I thought I'd see what I could buy. Well, never take me to a real auction cause it totally sucks me in and I can't stop. It's not even about if I want the item anymore it's about beating the other person betting against me! I do have my limits though. I'll never bid higher than what I could buy it for in the store. That would just be stupid. Currently I'm bidding on 3 really cute summer dresses and a hoodie. They're all brand new, tags still on, and super cheap! This eBay thing is great. Two of the auctions are ending tonight and I'm going to be at work so I'm a little concerned about people out bidding me in the last few minutes when there's nothing I can do about it! I have to win them! Since when did I get to be so competitive? it's so not like me! eBay is bringing out a whole other side of my personality

Wish me luck!

Bittersweet news....

It's been a bittersweet day for me. I spoke with my lawyer this morning and he's decided that it's finally time to file a claim against Melissa's restaurant for my accident. He had been waiting to hear from my docs that my neck isn't going to improve from what it is now and we have a pretty good idea what my future will look like. On the up side the ball is finally rolling on getting some compensation for my injuries, on the down side I'm not going to improve and need to get compensation because in the not to distant future I'm not going to be able to work full time anymore. I think I probably have about a year of full time work left in me. I'm working more than full time right now and I'm in pain everyday. I'm cutting back to 3 shifts a week at the clinic and I've applied for 6 part-time jobs in the Calgary Health Region (4 in Calgary and 2 in Canmore). So when it's time for me to go part-time at least I have a job within the health region with full benefit coverage. It is a little upsetting for me but I feel better knowing that something is being done about it.

It's been a month since I've had coffee! Actually, that's a lie, I had a coffee last weekend but poured half of it down the drain cause I couldn't finish it. I LOVE my matcha lattes now. I even bought some matcha so I can make them at home now! And they're healthy too! Yea me, no more coffee

I ran 5km yesterday and today. It's getting easier and easier every time I go. I think I need new shoes though cause my ankles get really sore, not to mention my knees. I love it though. Canmore has tons of trials all over town. I can go somewhere new each day. Gotta watch out for bears though. There's been warnings all over town. Cougars are what really scare me though cause you don't know they're there until they're on top of you. I havn't seen any wildlife yet. I'm taking my bike in tomorrow to get fixed up and my friend Laura and I are going to start biking home from work (Banff to Canmore) a few times a week.

Gotta go to bed. I'm addicted to the Da Vinci Code, again! I've read it once before and wanted to read it again before seeing the movie and once again, I can't put it down!

Running update...

I finally hit my stride today! It felt so good, I could have kept running forever but my calves started to cramp so I had to stop. I started at the top of the Three Sisters (the housing area, not the mountains) and followed the trails back down to the river, around the houses down there and then back UP the mountain. It was a brutal climb back up, my legs were BURNING! It was great. Hopefully I'll be able to walk tomorrow. I think I definately went over 5km but maybe not quite 10km. Ok, so I'm watching the news right now and they just did a story on how they're warning Canmore hikers about the increasing number of grizzly bears on the trails right now! YIKES! Apparently there's more grizzlys this year than last! Maybe I shouldn't have been out on the trials by myself today expecially with my IPod blaring. Hmmm. At least it was a fairly well populated area.

It's official...

I've decided to become a runner again. I used to be pretty good, back in the day, when I was 12, but my glorious running career was cut short by bad knees and too many other things to do. So I decided to give it another try. When I was a kid my Dad and I used to do 5km "fun runs" all the time and my mom would give me a dollar for every minute that I beat him. Well now my Dad is a marathon runner and oh how the tables have turned! So I went running twice last week and could barely walk after each time but getting started is the hardest part and the first 5 runs are bound to be brutal. I had good intentions to go more than twice last week but ended up going on a hike last Friday and then with my ear infection this week...I kind of fell off the running wagon. It was a gorgeous day today, not a single cloud in the sky, warm and sunny and it inspired me to go running. My knees were screaming at me for the first 5 mins but once they warmed up it was all good. I was only out for about 30 mins today but that was enough. I'm hoping that after the first 5 runs I won't feel like puking and having a heart attack after 30 mins. Haha. I can already feel my calves tightening up and my knees aching and I probably won't be able to walk tomorrow but I'm determined to keep at it until it stops hurting...here's hoping that one day it will!