I know you missed me

Well, I'm back. I know that I've been such a strong presence on the board, and you're all relieved that I'm resuming my extensive posting. South Africa was incredible. What a country! It's beautiful. We saw lots of animals (lions, cheetahs, giraffe, zebras, all kinds of antelope varieties, wildebeest, tons of birds and 1 very poisonous adder that I almost leaned right over b/c I thought it was just an interesting looking rock of some kind. oops!). We ate lots of great food. Meat in the desert; seafood at the ocean. The Garden Route along the coast is just stunning. I highly recommend. Once I get my pics online, I'll send them. For some reason, my computer at home (that houses all my pics) won't sign me on to post, so I can't put any pics on the blog. BTW, if you're not really into manatees (if they just don't have the speed you're looking for in an adoptee, for example), you could adopt a cheetah. We went to the DeWildt Cheetah Ctr. outside Johannesburg. They do good work as far as cheetah conservation and educating the public about cheetahs. You can adopt a cheetah for as little as 250 Rand (approx $35). http://www.dewildt.org.za/adoptacheetah.htm We got to pet a cheetah (he purred really really loud - how cute), and we got super close to cheetahs running at full speed during the 'cheetah run' they do. So, Tasha, I don't think I'm going to use your manatee imagery. I'm going to visualize myself as a cheetah during my training. how cliche, I know.
Now, on to the real topic at hand. I don't know if you all know, but I'm signed up to do the Grand Columbian ironman (in WA) on Sept 15. Yesterday marked the official kick-off of my training! Yay! I went swimming! Yay! It felt good! Yay! Right now, I'm feeling optimistic about this whole adventure/insanity, however I'm also using good portions of denial, i.e. not looking at the future workouts on my plan. Just pretending they're not there. Kind of like how I completely ignore the counter on this blog. Until someone so ungraciously pointed out that it was down to 100 days, I had no idea. To me, that section is just a blank part of the screen. Anyway, b/c I know you'll all be waiting on the edges of your seats, I'll keep you posted on the progression of things.