Revisiting Writing for 2017

Over the past several months I have been doing much self reflection and taking time and efforts to work on bettering myself so that I might be better able to help others.   

In years past I have written about goals for the year. Most often those focused on cycling and triathlon related goals or school completion items. This year is a little different as focus has gradually shifted away from racing (as the blog used to be built around). 

Action items for 2017:

1) I want to read 10 books (one a month is ideal but I’m factoring in some travel and crazy times around the holidays)

2) I would like to write and post something at least once a month. Posting it means that I am writing for a potential audience and will be held accountable. Regardless if 0 people read it or 100.

3) Complete a daily journal for the entire year to focus on gratitude and appreciating the things I have. (The Five Minute Journal -- Recommendation from Tim Ferriss)

4) Find a way to give back to the community I live in. (I have two irons in the fire on this one currently)

5) This will remain as an asterisk as I know what it is but not ready for everyone else

These are also a focus on SMART Goals: specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and time based.

So...An Update

So, I haven't posted in a while and I didn't come out with my January goals/resolutions for the year like I did the past two years. But, this year has been different. I'm closing in on the last few days of my final internship for physical therapy school. After my last day, I will have a week and a half before I sit for my boards exam, a 5.25 hour test that decides whether I can practice or not. Three days later I will be graduating with my Doctorate of Physical Therapy. I've also been interviewing for jobs, contemplating my offers and where I will begin my career, planning trips, and oh yeah, rehabbing another surgery!

I had hand surgery the day after Christmas in 2013. The procedure that was done in the operating room was the last resort that was discussed in the clinic and the recovery process had not been fully discussed. So, I was a little surprised when I was finally able to talk to the doctor and found out I would be in a brace for 8 weeks and not able to ride my bike for a full 10 weeks. This set me back a bit with all things cycling. However, this wasn't the first setback. The first was the burn-out and trudge through the burn-out at the end of the year in the 2013 season. I no longer had the drive and passion to get in the saddle like I did in the beginning of 2013. When you combine that with hand surgery limitations, working 45-50 hours a week (paying to work I should say), studying for boards exam, job hunting, and a few trips out of town, it's hard to get motivated to put in the required time on the bike to be at the level I would be satisfied with. I'm not going to half-ass it. I'm not going to ride just enough to show up to races and hang on. If I do it, I'm going to do it right and really commit to it.

So, that's what I've been doing recently and where my decisions have come from and the stance on racing my bike this year. I'm not giving it up completely, but I am definitely limited in what I will be able to do: because of the start to the year and some stuff going on in the summer, that's another post though.

I do still have some goals/expectations for the year, some I've even already accomplished.

1) Travel more, similar to last year, but I got to keep it going. Places I've never been. Things I've never seen. (Checking places off: Vegas, Grand Canyon, Antelope Canyon, Hoover Dam, Bristol, Asheville)
2) Complete the 'Chattanooga Things To Do' list before I move away (I've been working on it).
3) Graduate PT school and pass my boards exam.
4) Get my first 'real job' with a salary and benefits and all.
5) Watch 'Uncle Sam' take most of my money and understand the plight of the working man.
6) Obtain my Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist certification. (Done)
7) Move into an apartment by myself; oh the sweet serenity that awaits.
8) Be conversational in Spanish
9) Be a better Man


More to come.

Driving past the Ocoee on the way to Asheville, NC

Basilica of St. Lawrence in Asheville

Another Asheville church and my beautiful travel companion

Eatin' Man Food

Since I couldn't ride on the weekends, a few friends and I decided to go camping a couple weeks back. It was a true man's weekend. We cut down trees, made fire, ate dove, cooked over an open fire, killed and ate a frog and a snake, shot slingshots, slept under the stars, and never washed our hands.

Killing the snake on the edge of the pond with a kukri knife at midnight was a pretty awesome experience. It was followed with skinning and cleaning the snake only to watch it continue to writhe in our hands. No head, no skin, no guts and the snake was still swirling around against gravity. I was excited to eat it as I watched it cook over the fire. I had never eaten snake and always wanted to. It ended up tasting a lot better than the frog legs we ate earlier in the day too, not nearly as chewy.

Watch the video of the snake still moving: click here

Cleaned and ready for the fire.

The skin turned inside out. Of course we kept it.

Target practice with the slingshot was for fun, but also in preparation for hunting. Even though we didn't find any mammals to shoot, we still had fun with it. We were pretty good once we got the hang of it.

A few good shots left the balls stuck in the clay

We also found some really cool funnel web spiders. Pretty neat to see them sitting, waiting at the edge of their deep tunnel for some unfortunate insect to land in their web.

I told him we should stick our finger in there. 

 Relaxing in the hammock was nice too. Never knew exactly how my feet got so black in the night. I decided  to sleep here the second night which got a lot colder than the first. The first time I woke up shivering, I went back to the tent and got my sleeping bag. The next time I woke up in the night shivering, I went to my bag, dug out these corduroy pants and my fleece pullover. It was pretty nice for the rest of the night.

After packing up the site on Sunday, we spotted what we initially thought was a squirrel about 14 feet up a tree. Turned out to by a flying squirrel. After we scared it further up the tree, it jumped and glided 35 feet to another tree before latching onto the trunk. One of the coolest things I've ever seen. 

But, my friends, I have all the parts for my new bike now and it is coming along quickly. There will  be no more time for leisure camping. Time to get back on the road and back in shape. March will be here before we know it. Pictures of the new girl and report from the ride to come after the weekend. 

Going Under

Well I thought I had it bad at ITU Worlds when I flatted twice and lost my first place standing. It was the worst experience I've had in the sport so far. That is until June 9th. I've waited for a while to write about this for many reasons: it was hard for me to face it for one, I didn't want to write details on the internet before the driver's insurance company accepted responsibility, and I was just feeling down and out about the whole situation without much motivation to do anything.

Most people probably already know about what happened to me, but for those that do not, or don't really know the details, here it is.

I was coming off a terrible race at Roan Groan and knew that I needed more practice at climbing, especially at the end of a race. I wanted to do well at River Gorge later in August, so I set out on Saturday June 9th, from my apartment in East Brainerd. I had mapped out a course that would take me over Missionary Ridge and the toe of Lookout before jumping into the River Gorge RR course. Things were going well and I was having fun playing out in my mind how the race would turn out this year and how things happened last year. I climbed Raccoon, stopping at the overlook to refill my bottles, eat some snacks, and take in the scenery. I started my descent from the mountain to head back home to get ready to head out to River Bend that night. Once I got off the steep slopes of Raccoon and made the hard 90 degree left hand turn, I saw a truck stopped at a stop sign on a side street to my right. He began to pull out to make a left hand turn and come up the mountain towards me. I was getting nervous and applying the brakes. As the truck got further out into the intersection, I was horrified to realize he was carrying a boat. His truck and boat were covering the entire intersection leaving me no place to go. I am grabbing as much brake as I can by this point. My wheels begin to lock up and my rear wheel starts fishtailing out from under me to the left. I was in shock and utter disbelief as I covered those last 3 meters before contact. I couldn't believe this was really about to happen. Skidding out placed me in a more parallel position to the boat so that my left shoulder and knee hit the boat first. I bounced off and swung around the back of the boat as the driver continued to pull away. I hit the ground and my bike went bouncing. I rolled around on the ground in intense pain in my left knee. It wouldn't straighten out and I knew I was injured pretty badly.

The driver and passenger got out of the truck after they pulled over to the shoulder. I laid in the middle of the intersection as they called 911 and asked if I was okay. I think the screaming and writhing in pain should have indicated I was not. Thankfully, I had just seen fellow teammate Jim Farmer at the top of Raccoon. He was packing his bike up and was about to come down. He drove up on the scene shortly after the accident happened. Another woman who had been running on Raccoon also stopped on her way down. These folks helped out a ton (Chattanooga obviously has an amazing outdoor community that cares for each other). My teammate was able to collect my bike and belongings and the other lady was able to call my parents back to let them know what was going on. The paramedics and fire truck arrived a little while later. They put me on the board and we were headed off for Erlanger ER.

Several radiographs and a CT scan later, they determined I had no broken bones and would have to follow up with an orthopedic surgeon the following week. The first visit with the surgeon was terrifying. The laxity in knee from the clinical examination pointed to several tears and disruptions in the tissue. The MRI ruled some of them out, but I was still going to need surgery. Thankfully, I didn't need immediate surgery which would have caused me to miss my first clinical rotation and be forced to sit out of the PT program for one year. Glad I avoided that disaster.

After much hassle with the police report, the driver, and the driver's insurance company, his insurance company finally accepted fault. They are collecting my medical bills and already reimbursed me for my bike minus depreciation.

I've had ups and downs over this time period. Times I would feel super energized about training for next season and all I will be able to do. Other times I was depressed and could only think about all the stuff I was missing out on and how hard it would be to come back after surgery. I missed several races including the Crit State Championship, which I was favored to win, the rest of the TBRA races, which now means I lost my Best Area Rider qualification, two Xterra races, which means I will probably lose my regional champion status and bid to nationals, as well as the Georgia Gran Prix stage race, the Huntsville race weekend, and two more crits in Atlanta. No defending my crit title at River Gorge this year. I also feel bad about letting my team down. This is the first time I've ever raced for a team and it ended with a terrible showing for myself. I wanted to do well to validate my spot on the team. I will have to settle for next year.

I got robbed, and I hate it. I've been so angry. But this is just the year I've been having with several broken pieces of equipment that required replacing and the bad finish at ITU. I have great plans for coming back next year with a more focused training plan, better knowledge of how to train, better equipment to train with, and a burning desire to come back strong and dominate the Cat 4 field. I'm trying to construct a detailed training plan without the help from a coach since I can't afford one. That being said, I would gladly take advice or suggestions from people out there that have had coaches or might be coaches just to make sure I am going in the right direction and I am interpreting my data correctly.

Surgery was yesterday (I meant to write this earlier in the week), so I have started the path to recovery and my journey back to sport. However, I guess I underestimated this surgery because of how easy my last surgery was on my right knee in 2007. I had my ACL reconstructed with a cadaver graft that time and I was able to get a full quad contraction the morning following surgery and was up ambulating without much pain at all the next day. That is not how this surgery has gone so far. I am in a lot more pain than I remembered or expected. I hope that it subsides before classes begin on the 20th. The first day of physical therapy as a patient on Monday the 13th. Should be a good experience. Just have to organize a way to get all my stuff moved to my new apartment while on crutches.

My bike got a little jacked, technically speaking

The culprits 

No big deal

No clue what this leg hit to get bruised 

ITU Cross Tri World Championship

I did not DNF. That's the first thing that I was able to say to people. It still bothers and upsets to write this because it means I have to go back and relive the race; walk through it step by step which brings on so many emotions and frustrations. So far I've just been trying to not think about it, because if I do, then I get too distraught and emotional with what could have been, what should have been. That being said, here's what I recall from race day.

The days leading up to the race were good. I had a good "taper" with some short efforts, my legs were feeling good, and my nutrition and sleep were great. Friday I skipped school and drove down to Pelham for packet pick-up, pre-race briefing, one last look at the course (which got changed the day before), and the opening ceremonies. The course change shortened the bike course by a few miles which was to my disadvantage because I knew if I was going to beat these guys, I was going to do it on the bike. More distance on the bike gave me more time to make up time. Anyway, I scouted it out and heading back to the hotel to relax and take an ice bath.

I fell asleep relatively easily and was set to get almost 8 hours of sleep. Everything went accordingly race morning: breakfast, coffee, transition setup, body marked, timing chip in place, and swim warm-up. I was ready to rock. I couldn't wait to get the swim over so I could rocket the amazing trails of Oak Mountain. Not only was it going to be a blast, but it should feel emotional to pick people off one by one on the trail.

It was one of my better swims coming into T1 in under 25 minutes. It was the most congested swim I've ever done: getting hit in the head, ankles grabbed, pushed aside, and at one point I kissed someone's big toe. I guess that's what you get when you swim faster and stay with a bigger pack. Running into T1, my mom informed me I was in 4th position. Not what I was looking for, but hey, my part of the race was just starting. I spent the short time on the road tightening my shoes and putting my gloves on so I'd be ready to hit the trail as soon as I got there. Fifteen feet after diving into the trail, my chain dropped and got wrapped around the crank and jammed up against the frame. I stood on the side of the trail pulling and yanking on it trying to free the chain so I could continue. After about 2 minutes, it came free and I could start riding again. My time on the side of the trail put me further down in the race which means I have to pass more riders on the bike. Not an issue for a road tri, but here in the single track, it was going to take time and slow me down even more trying to finagle pass people. I took some dangerous and really aggressive lines to pass people, but methodically I was making my way up the field. I passed one guy in my age group who I'm pretty sure must have passed me when I was on the side of the trail, so back to fourth position. A little bit later I passed Ian King who was repairing a flat on the side of the trail he sustained from crashing into some briers. 3rd position. As I exited the single track to start the climb to the top of the mountain, I passed the Mexican, Bobadillo. 2nd position. I hammered on the climb. The riders behind me disappeared. I kept pushing and didn't realize when I had made it to the top; I was still looking for one more steep incline. I had completely zoned out and destroyed it. I knew I had been climbing better on the road which I accredited to my new supplements from Biomedical Research Laboratories (http://www.brlscience.com/SERVICES.html) and was thrilled to see it carry over for this race. I rolled along the top of the mountain for a bit before I saw him. I was catching Seavey. My heart jumped, increased its rate, my body released a massive amount of adrenaline and my emotions soared. I almost teared up. Passing him this early on meant I was killing it on the bike and no one was going to be able to touch me, let alone catch me. I still had several miles to build up a substantial time gap. The rest of the trail was more technical which favored me immensely. I was on my way to a World Championship victory. I passed him with force to discourage him from jumping on my wheel. I continued to hammer and dropped back into the trail towards Blood Rock blazing. I rolled through Blood Rock like a champ taking the perfect line. Now it was time for fun on the wicked descent. I had just caught another rider and told him he better be ready to rocket it if I was going to be behind him, to which he responded with a go ahead as he pulled to the side. I let it loose. Launched over the first set of rocks and continued on. I think it was the third set that I didn't come down on too well at which all my fears became reality. I heard the hissing of my rear wheel pouring air. I tried to deny it and say it was just the freehub clicking and spinning. Bump, bump. I was flat. Dead flat. It was the feeling you get when you just finished a 12 pack and the blue lights start flashing behind you, when you're 6 weeks in and she's 3 weeks late, when the phone rings in the middle of the night and your child still hasn't made it home, when the doctor himself calls to give you the bad news. I wanted to cry, I wanted to throw my bike down the side of the mountain, I wanted to bang the wheel on a rock until it was properly broken, but most of all, I wanted another chance. I pulled the valve stem and put in my spare tube. I could see the rim was bent in a few places which made me question how long I would make it on this tube. I didn't even look for the hole in the tire. For all I know it could have been a big gash in a sidewall which the tube would poke out waiting to get punctured. I fiddled with my canister of CO2 and finally got it to work. Enough air in the tube and I packed everything up to get back in the saddle. While I was on the side of the trail, Seavey and Bobadillo passed me. I started back down the mountain and made it probably 3 miles passing Bobadillo again and moving back into 2nd position. Then my fears became reality again: another flat. I was SOL for this one and just started walking and running it out, having to stop and move off the trail every time a rider still on his bike came pass me. I was devastated. I never imagined this race would go like this. I was not going to DNF though. I'm not sure how many miles I had to walk and run in my carbon mtb shoes pushing my bike, but I'm guessing it was around 4 costing me close to 25 minutes on the bike leg. Another guy in my age group passed me about a half a mile before T2, 5th position. I continued running my bike in and the officials at the dismount line jokingly said there was no need for me to dismount. I'm glad they found some humor in my misfortune. As I changed shoes, my Dad told me I was over 18 minutes behind Seavey and almost 3 behind 4th place. I was running mostly to finish at this point and just wanted to complete my two laps and be done. My legs didn't feel great, but not bad either. Coming around for my first lap my Dad told me 4th place was only a 1:30 ahead now. I wanted to catch him, but I wasn't going to kill myself to do it. It was only racing for 4th place after all. I kept progressing and was actually passing people, something I rarely do late in the run portion of a race. With about a 1.25 miles left, I spotted the 4th place guy. I was feeling good and running pretty well actually so I knew I was going to take it from him. At first I couldn't decide if I wanted to sit on his heels and wait til the end to jump or just storm on past him. He wasn't looking so hot and I sure wasn't going to slow down, so I flew on past him and some other racers. I took a glance back to see if he tried to pick it up to stay in contention with me, but he was gone. I came around the lake and finished strong for a sub 46 minute 10K. Not great, but given the circumstances I'll take it. So, probably my best chance at a world championship ended like that. This race is in the Netherlands next year and Xterra Worlds is always in Maui; terrains that aren't my backyard and suited for my strengths. There will probably never be a world championship in the Southeast again in my lifetime. A chance well wasted.

I can't forget about this race because there is plenty to learn from it and take with me, but there is a lot I'm trying to put behind me. I have to let it go and focus on what's next. This Saturday is the TN state time trial championships and then Sunday is the first crit of the year. Really would like to bring home a win, especially after the disaster of last weekend.

Coming out of the swim strong

Beaten and broken, doing all I can to not give up

Found something in the legs to pull back 4th

The future of Xterra elite men

With my biggest supporters 

Ambitious 2012

Just like everybody else, the new year brings new goals and ambitions for me. Unlike everybody else, I will actually follow through with them. Heck, I've already made progress on three of them.

So here are a few of them:

#1 Win Xterra Southeastern Championships, this is largely dependent on a good run which is where goal 2 comes in
#2 Put up a sub 45 min run split at Southeasterns

Now goal three is a little tricky. Yes, I want to just go ahead and commit to it, but I don't want to show up and be embarrassed and waste the money and time and time away from school. So goal three is dependent upon completion of goal 1 and 2

#3 Race (WIN) Xterra USA National Championship
#4 Claim the Xterra Regional Championship Jersey
#5 Race at least 3 crits
#6 Win the TN crit state championship
#7 Take a girl out on a real date, not just hang out at some party
#8 Eliminate irresponsible nights of mayhem
#9 Under social obligations I guess I must include do well in school and my first rotation coming up this summer

I found this article/list of pretty good resolutions too. Not saying I'm shooting for all of them, but I think numbers 4, 9, 11, and 15 are pretty good ones that I have incorporated into my life. (Supposedly there has been some confusion. I do know my math and that I haven't listed 15 goals here. The numbers are a reference to another article that you can find by clicking the hyperlink at the beginning of the paragraph, "article/list".)


There. So now that they are down on paper and displayed to the public, they are real goals. I can be held accountable and will hold myself accountable.


Forgot to put the goal of riding 5,000 miles. I did a rough collection of my actual miles from 2011 and came up with 3,125 miles ridden. I didn't set up my training log to tally this so this is what I could come up with retrospectively. It had to be at least this much. Should make for some fun time in the saddle.

A Typical Ride

A caravan of five Porsches pass by and interrupt my few of hogs grazing on the hilly countryside. I also saw a dead deer, multiple opossums, and a raccoon. I saw Shetland ponies and donkeys. I'm not positive, but I think I saw a baby buffalo too. He was wrenching and squeezing his neck between two strands of barbed wire fencing to reach the grass on the other side. Of course, I saw the usual horses and cows, hawks and crows, goats and sheep, streams and ponds.

I saw the land still devastated by the tornadoes that swept through in April. I saw the work that had been done, the work being done, and the work that needs to be done. The countryside is still a mess even though many homes have been rebuilt already.

I explored new roads and revisited old ones. I climbed mountains and got to overlook valleys for miles and miles. I got chased by three dogs and avoided attacks on all three accounts. The sun warmed by back and the wind chilled my face as it swept through the sparsely placed hairs of my beard. I shot snot rockets and ran stop signs. The wind slowed me down to single digit speeds at times and I cruised down descents at 48 mph.

It was a pretty typical ride. It was an amazing ride. It was why I ride.
The saddle, it is probably my favorite place in the world and where I am most at peace.

Grad School Update

Wow, it's been quite some time. I have neglected my posting for "higher education" and "more important" endeavors. Not sure I agree with all those terms. I really miss racing right now and writing about the great times I had. Since I originally said this blog would be about my racing and my schooling, I guess I need to include some posts about graduate school.

Far too many things have occurred since my last post and the beginning of semester to attempt to summarize the trip it has been, but I can say it has been busy and very informative. Just this afternoon I had my hands in a man's chest and cut out both of his lungs. Yes, we are doing cadaver dissections in my gross anatomy class. That class is where 78% of my attention and studying has been going over the semester. I have done exceptionally well so far. Well, except for the most recent test. Not a great showing for me, but it will do. My dissection group is great. Thankfully, it consists of three amiable girls that let me do all of the fun, nasty parts of dissection. It also means that we have great gossip around the tank and get to discuss who looked super cute that day in class. We started on Bobley and then moved to Betty Sue. Betty Sue is textbook perfect and was a great time. Tina was not as easy to handle, but we ended up with a very easy dissection for her. Now wrapping the semester up I got to use the bone saw last Friday to cut through ribs, sternum, and the clavicle to reflect the thoracic cage. Lab has been an amazing tool to help me understand the body and get a very firm grasp on muscles, nerves, vessels, fiber orientation, fascia, and of course subcutaneous fat. My mental visualization of muscles in people and the workings of their skeletal system is at such a higher level now.

Occasionally, we have to leave lab and learn other subjects. We've learned how to walk with crutches, do wheelies in wheelchairs, and how to do posture assessments. I learned how to do a back tuck for professional communication and I mastered how to make a powerpoint for evidence based practice. In kinesiology, I've learned that TR (a.k.a. Trent Richardson) can squat 600 and bench 450. My teacher still wants to be him when he grows up.

I've taken the things I've learned in the classroom to my everyday life too. Trying to be more like TR to ensure an A in Kinese, I started uping my weights when I do squats. I've been trying to hit the gym every Tuesday and Thursday morning. I've been making some progress now that I'm really trying. Last week I did 20 reps of 315, 15 reps of 405, 14 reps of 455, 20 reps of 315, and then 25 reps of 315. Then I went upstairs and busted out 100 lunges with 25 pound dumbbells. Watch out TR; I'm coming.

I applied the anatomy of the hand in my most recent set of injuries. I've come up with the diagnosis of a torn posterior joint capsule of the first MCP. I finally got into the doctor so I can get a referral to the hand surgeon and see what he says. Radiographs from this visit pretty much confirmed my suspicion and also showed a subluxation of the first CMC joint and a possible dislocation of the capitate bone. Should be a really fun office visit next week.

I did manage to have a little fun the past two weekends. I went fly fishing with the school (we saw a whooping 0 fish the entire trip) and went camping with some classmates. This has been the extent of my outdoor excursions since I have not been biking in such a long time. It's hard to go when I'm so tired once I finally get home from school everyday and the weekends have just been occupied with other things. It's an insult to my bikes to be neglecting them like this. I must do better.

Quite a few of us have also picked up rock climbing. We've spent several afternoons taking study breaks at the bouldering wall in the student rec center. It's a fun sport that is pretty challenging. It's always good to be humbled by a 110 lb girl that scales the wall you've been working on for 20 minutes.

All in all life is passing. The sun rises and the sun sets. I'm trying to make the most of it and include as much as I can in every day. I don't always succeed, but that's what tomorrow is for. Like I said, too much has happened to include it all, but that's what I got so far.

This is my digital footprint. This is me

So the races this past weekend got cancelled. I emailed the race director Tuesday after we were starting to get hit with all the storms and asked about the condition they were in there. I didn't hear back from him until Wednesday right before my karate final. The Xterra race was cancelled, but at the time he told me the road tri was still on. That gave me some solace. However, later that day when I got home and checked my email everything was cancelled. Me not having a race to do is small and petty to get worked up about when so many people lost there lives and homes both there in Arkadelphia and all around the South. Still, it sucks to work for many months training for the race and to get it taken away from me two days beforehand. It won't all go to waste. I have another race in two weeks and then Southeastern Championships the week after that. I wanted to get an idea of how my training had been going and see what other things I should practice and focus on before Southeastern's. That is judgement day. The day I am determined to bring home the jersey.

However, the rains haven't stopped. We are still getting hit with storms and the river is continuing to rise. The Mississippi is set to crest in the next few days within a foot of its record high and maybe even more with the continual rains. The Memphis in May BBQ festival has been moved. Something that has never happened before. I have never seen the Wolf River flood like it did. The trail system that I ride most often was under multiple feet of water and one section of it is bound to be washed away for good. These trails will probably not be rideable until June; that's if the storms stop any time soon...and the Wolf River doesn't start flowing backwards as the Mississippi crests. Last week, the United States (the South) saw more tornadoes in a single day than it has ever seen, 312 in a 24 hour period. That beats the old record by over 160 tornadoes! It also killed over 340 people, another record. The tornadoes devastated 6 Southern states, hitting Alabama the hardest.

The world is getting scary. All these terrible things happening and finishing school has made me think more deeply about my life and what purpose I am living for, who I am sharing my life with that makes it worthwhile. The world definitely could come to an end in my life and it makes me think about what I am really focusing on. If that is the case, then my bikes worth several, several thousands of dollars won't matter at all. (I just got a $5,800 bike and I don't know when I will ever be able to ride it. The rains have destroyed the trails.) Neither will any race victories, the car I just bought myself, graduation diplomas, or future careers. What am I working towards; what goals; what is motivating me? The only thing that will matter is right now. Will I have any regrets? Will I look back and wish I had done it differently. I have regrets in my life right now. Several. The only way not to, is to not ever look back. I don't think I could ever fully commit to doing that. I just have to take it one day at a time I guess and keep pushing on. Hopefully the rain will stop soon and things will begin to dry out. Hopefully the overseas situation will improve now that Osama is dead. Hopefully my Dad will stay safe and finish his contracts in Kuwait, Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Iraq and get to return to a Memphis that he still recognizes.

Anyway, congrats to the Grizzlies for not only winning their first playoff game in franchise history, but winning the whole series! And winning game one of the second series. Another hats off to the Predators who are still playing for the Stanley Cup. I'll be watching both of those games tomorrow night. The greatest congrats and thanks goes out to the CIA operatives and Navy SEALS that have done years of work that ended with Osama Bin Laden being killed last night (may you be tormented in Hell). It's been a long 9 years, 7 months, but Justice has finally been served. The world is now a better place without him. Thanks to all those people that will never make the news and will never get any recognition for what they did in this special ops mission. Damn good speech by Obama too. Nicely done.