8/11 - Just another weekend

I'm not certain I have the stomach for introspection either, lately...

The stress is back again. I discovered Friday there's an extra 12 hours or so of lecture I need to watch in the MIT course. I didn't think the recitations were important, because at first glance they appeared to be video-taped study group sessions. Turns out they cover whatever the professor didn't get to in class, and oh by the way they reiterate what he did cover, too. Since it's a teacher's assistant the material is presented in a different way, and the more times I hear it explained the better off I'm going to understand. Looks like once or twice a week I have to double up on the video watching, to make sure I get all the info.

I also discovered the training coordinator wasn't planning to schedule me for anything until I get through this course, which of course makes me feel like I'm falling behind again. I looked at the schedule for one of the other people I've been in training with, and informed the coordinator he can put me in most of the same classes. They are all Plural Site, which means death by PowerPoint and not instructor led. This means I'm not wasting anyone's time if I have to visit Google U to understand a concept. However, I have been exposed to XML, HTML, and I've seen a few CSS too. I think I can handle these. I'm a little annoyed with the idea that, since I don't know coding, I apparently don't know ANYTHING.

When I talked with the coordinator about it, he told me he'd send me the list of classes I need to take, from which I can cherry pick those I think I can handle. This is probably the best approach, though I get the feeling he's getting tired of me. He was visibly exasperated, at any rate. That's another stressor. I don't like being a special case.

I know my manager said he expected it would take longer for me to get up to speed, but I was kind of counting on not being the only one on the short bus. Turns out the person I thought was in the same boat is apparently not, so much. He was able to figure out and hand in the java homework, which is awesome for him. The training coordinator basically told me as long as this guy can hang, he's going to continue scheduling him in the classes. Implying again that I can't hang.

I'm not particularly fond of the training coordinator right now.

I planned to do homework all weekend. I had the problem set from the MIT course, plus 4 hours of death by PowerPoint on Agile Team Practices with Scrum. I was supposed to watch that earlier in the week, but it got pushed off to figure out what my training schedule should look like. I also had the hour of MIT Recitation lecture I didn't think I would need. I still have a paper to write on two different ways to scale a web application, too.

Somehow, all of that did not get done. I pushed the 4 hour death by PowerPoint class off until Monday, before I even left work Friday. I did watch the recitation, and finished one of the MIT problems. I didn't realize there were a total of 3 problems from this assignment. I did some research on the paper, but it was little more than article gathering. I haven't actually read any of the articles yet, to get the info in my head well enough to write about anything.

I can't even tell you what I did yesterday. Errands. Grocery shopping. Dishes and laundry. Very little in the way of homework. I can tell you what I'll be doing most nights from now on. You guessed it. Homework.

This morning I had the Perfect 10-Miler race. Blah Blah Blah didn't sleep well. Blah Blah Blah upset stomach. Blah Blah Blah can't run the first 2 miles of any run lately, because my ankles and shins HURT. I'm fine once they loosen up, but I have no idea how to loosen them up any faster. It's very frustrating. I tried walking and stretching before the race today. That didn't work. I've tried walking a full mile, which helped some. Even slow running does not work. I ultimately have to walk until they loosen up.

So I did a lot of walking the first 2 miles. You can see by the graph below though, once I found my pace I pretty much kept it regardless of hills. Also, upset stomach. The dip in the middle at the top of the hill was a porta potty stop - the first I've ever taken in a race.

Not my best race, but I wasn't in it to win it. However, it was the motivation I needed to get running regularly again, and I'm still focused on my marathon next year. I plan to sign up for it right after this year's marathon in October, so I have that same deadline motivation I had for this race. I have a training plan worked out, though it will of course change over time. I'm incapable of sticking to a plan long term, and Superman asked today if I wanted to go back to yoga come September. The answer to that is a resounding YES, but it will mean shifting my long runs to Sundays, which means I might not be able to run on Mondays like I am now. I might switch to Tuesday Thursday runs, with the workout classes at work on Monday Wednesday and Yoga on Saturdays. Maybe. We'll see how it all plays out.