dara marks marino

Last weekend Troy and I had a great time exploring the trails near Greer, AZ. I hadn’t been in the area since I was a kid skiing at Sunrise, and had been wanting to go for years. It definitely did not disappoint. They get a lot more moisture over in the White Mountains, so conditions were perfecto. We had 2-a-day monsoons: one around noonish, then another in the middle of the night. We would wake up to baby-blue skies and tacky trails. Troy has some pics up of the Third Trimester Trifecta. Each day of riding was +/- 3 hrs. The first day was mostly on picture perfect double track, followed by one of the sweetest single track descents ever. The second day was an out and back, all uphill one way and all downhill the other. There was one section that turned out to literally be the steepest trail I have ever pushed my bike up (or down!). We also did a hike into the wilderness area that eventually leads to Mt. Baldy. I think I may have seen a mountain lion out there, but it was really hard to tell what it was. It was bigger than Sazi, too small to be a deer, too big to be a fox, colored kind of reddish, and running in to the woods. Hmmmm….

We are really close to moving all the furniture back in to the baby’s room. Troy finished the main painting and I am working on stenciling in some leaves. It is looking really good!

Pregnancy hormones sure can be a bitch though. Some days I feel downright pregerrific (cheesy new word for my vocab!) and other days I am grumpy, dark, frustrated, tired, and, as always, hungry. Today has been a great day though, so I just have to appreciate it for what it is! I’ve officially had my first pregnancy “complication”. My blood test showed a low platelet count. Platelets being the part of your blood responsible for clotting, a low platelet count is not a good thing when you know you will be losing a fair amount of blood during childbirth. The midwives want me to take a 3-prong approach: 1-increase protein, 2-supplement with alfalfa tablets, and 3-increase my green-leafies. Numbers 2 and 3, no problemo. But the protein thing, geeesh! Somedays I think I am killing myself with protein. But, alas, I’ll try.

Had to take my car in this morning because the ignition has been doing this thing where the key just won’t turn until I jiggle it for like 10 minutes. It has been happening since the winter, but sporadically so I kept forgetting to get it looked at. Miraculously, when the mechanics went to turn the car on, it got totally stuck! Evidently to the point where they truly couldn’t get it to go, and had to take it apart where it was parked instead of moving it in to their shop. That never happens…cars always work perfectly when you take them to the shop, don’t they? They say the tumbler is worn out, which is what someone else had guessed was the problem too. Good thing it is getting fixed before I broke the key off in the ignition trying to get it started!

Just for Lisa, here are the latest belly pics. The first one is the progression from the beginning to week 24, the second one was on my birthday at week 27. For some reason I’m having trouble getting that last one to attach to the series photo, no idea why, since I’m doing it the same way I did all the others!

She’s been doing some mad kicking lately, and remains a hungry little thing, or at least makes me a hungry little thing. If I don’t wake up around 2 or so to eat, I’m for sure up by the crack of dawn ready to eat and start the day. I think I’ve gained somewhere around 19ish lbs at this point, which seems right on track to me. Our next appointment is next week, then after that we move to the every-two-week appointment schedule, which will be an exciting milestone.

I’m a morning person. Always have been. This morning, since I was up at 5:30 (hungry) anyway, I got myself out the door for a mountain bike ride before it got hot. That middle of the day heat has been one of my main obstacles for not riding more lately. I’m like a giant inferno of body heat with my extra 19ish lbs around the middle. The early start really paid off, and I had total redemption for my last skill-less ride. Sazi and I were out the door by 6:30, and were riding in the shade from home all the way up to top of Red Onion. We both really appreciate that! It was still mild and pretty shady across Brookbank to the Dry Lake Hills where Sazi got to swim in his favorite swimming hole. Then we just cruised it back down Brookbank and straight on home, for a super satisfying 2.5 or 3 hr loop. 28 weeks pregnant and still having awesome days on the bike…can’t ask for a whole lot more than that!

Saw this pretty flower while I was out there, growing straight out of a rock: Like a microcosm of Flagstaff.

I got to thinking while I was out there, about how much I love riding and how many years/miles/hours I’ve spent on the bike. I realized that although it is true that I absolutely have bad days where it really seems like I have never ridden before, and right now there isn’t a person around who would call me speedy, it is because of all those years/miles/hours that I can still have such wonderful days too. I guess you spend enough time and passion on something and you have to know deep down that it will always be in you, even if it doesn’t always seem that way, even if you are not always fast or strong, even if you are not always smooth.

And it looks like we’ve got some monsoon storms rolling in! That will make for some really sweet riding.

Yesterday, Melissa Buhl became a World Champion! She won the women’s 4x and it sounds like she did it with true style points too. And on Friday, Tim Allen finished as the US’s best placed U23 racer. No slight to Sam Jurekovic however, who looks to have been having a great day until a race-ending crash took him out.

Troy and I spent the weekend in Lockett Meadow, where we did a little hiking and a little riding. I evidently couldn’t ride for sh*t though, and walked down most all of Pick Up Sticks. Oh well, now I have lots to look forward to next year when I’m not pregnant, since I do hope to get my confidence and handling skills back! Troy was riding great, and looked super smooth hopping over logs left and right. Sazi was smooth as ever too.

Speaking of Sazi, he is now officially the Small Woodland Creature Terrorist. He spent every spare minute digging in logs for the little squeaky mice and other critters that make their homes in there. He was in dog heaven, digging away, chewing on logs, sticking his tongue in to the hollows just trying to get at the poor critters. I don’t think he actually got any for all his efforts, but I’m sure there are more than a few chipmunks in Lockett Meadow that are seeking counseling for post-traumatic stress syndrome.

Auspicious things:
-yesterday I turned 33 (excellent double number)
-the full moon rose bright orange while we were bbq’ing in the back yard for my birthday party
-2 days in to my 33rd year and I have gotten in 2 fun (albeit short!) mountain bike rides

A great start to what I hope will be a really great year.

Because I work such early morning hours, on my ride home I am going against the bike commuting traffic along the bike path on Rt. 66. For most of the year, I can count on one hand how many commuters I see, and I have little nicknames for most of them (Helmetless Recumbent Guy, Ultimate Commuter Guy, etc.). But yesterday morning was remarkable. I saw 10 commuters just along the one 2-mile stretch of the bike path that I use. Awesome job, Flagstaff! Keep on being One-Less-Car and pretty soon, we’ll have a revolution on our hands.

On my way in to work though, I did have a small incident. I had to throw down into pregnant lady race mode. I was coming up behind a guy who was riding the path in the same direction as I was. I politely rang my bell to let him know to move to one side or the other. He didn’t move for several rings, but eventually moved to the left. (Left? Doesn’t the natural flow of traffic here in the US of A just kind of move to the right, regardless of if you are on foot, on bike, or in a car?) Anyway, I pulled up on his right and he immediately started pedaling hard. Great, now we were traveling the same speed. For quite a while. It was getting awkward, you know, uncomfortable. I got curious. I looked over at him to see if he was smiling or anything. No, he was staring dead ahead, pedaling for all he was worth. It kind of made me giggle. I had two choices: 1- I could slow down and let him go, but then I would be stuck behind him because I could tell he wasn’t going to keep up this pace, or 2- I could throw down. So I did it, I threw down on the bike path. Dropped him. Didn’t look back, didn’t see him again. I’m such a jerk.