I need time. I'm so busy I have only read 150 pages of the last Harry Potter book in the past 3 weeks. I haven't been reading any blogs.

So what have I been doing... last Monday I attended the first of four seminars on self-employment. It was interesting enough, but I'm really eager for tomorrow's session when we look into more detail at consulting, the different types of business ownership and the legal aspects of it all. From here I went to my sister's to help set up her office network.

I spent a lot of time this week making cold calls to various agencies a former colleague recommended. There were two interesting opportunities, the first I was selected for submission (gov't contract 3.5 months with possible extension), but found out two days later the RFP was pulled and the job cancelled. The other opportunity I was selected for submission for I did get an interview - though I got the call on Wednesday night (8PM!) for an interview at 2:30PM the next day. A little short notice to say the least. I crammed a little on the gov't agency's information, went out first thing to buy an interview suit, shoes, and a few other items. Raced home, hemmed my pants and raced over to another interview for 1PM - meet the recruiter at a different agency. From here I met up with the account manager for the agency that set up the 2:30 interview and walked over. I had asked the acct. mgr. to send me the statement of work for the position, which he didn't, and I was not at all impressed when I discovered the job was not the one I thought it was. I had to scramble to get my bearings as we were just about to head into the interview. I think it went very well, the contract is through December, with possible extention to end of Q109. I should find out by the end of next week. Fingers crossed!

Bluesfest ended today, I decided not to go because I needed to do some prep for tomorrow's seminar. On Tuesday KT and I stage hopped, catching a little of Fergie, Boz Scaggs, Jason Collett, Most Serene Republic, Stars, Born Ruffians, Tokyo Police Club, Jason Ricci and the New Blood and Michael Franti. Wednesday we saw some of Kathleen Edwards and all of Brian Wilson. Poor fellow is still a mess. Thursday I was so worn out after the stress of the shopping/interviews/racing around that we didn't go. Friday we saw Balken Beat Box, Great Big Sea, and the Budos Band. We didn't go yesterday as we wanted to rest up, and get out of the second hand smoke for a while. We had a great time dancing at all the shows, KT and I gigled ourselves silly at Fergie when we sang along to all the classic rock songs from her medley, and no one around us did, and actually stared. It got even better when the band played a few bars of 'Apache' by Sugarhill Gang. Naturally we went straight into the Will Smith dance (see below) and again, people stared. Granted, these people were 14 year old girls :)



Now for today! We raced the Graham Beasley Sprint Duathlon - 2k run - 20k bike - 5k run. We had a little humidity and a whole lot of rain when we woke up at 5:30. The Weather Network was showing thunder storms through 9AM, and rain until about 3PM. Sigh. As a rule I shy away from riding in the rain. Anyway, we left for Carleton Place, about a 35 min drive. We were shocked by the number of bikes already in transition, it was 6:45 AM! We got everything organized in transition, got ourselves marked, got our timing chip anklets, and then found my friend Karen. It was overcast but not raining. We had loads of time to kill so we watched the start of the Half Iron Tri and Du races, the Olympic distance Tri and the Tri-a-Tri races. Finally it was our turn and the wind was picking up. We lined up at the start and the horn sounded and we took off. As you can see from my week, I did no activity at all other than dance, so I figured this was going to be really ugly, or really great. Looks like ugly was going to be the word of the day. I ran the first 500 m in 5:15/km. Way way too fast for me. I slowed as much as I could, was sweating bullets, and cursed myself for not wearing my fuel belt. I HURT. Made it to transition, took a long swig of my bike swill, got my bike shoes, gloves and helmet on, and raced out. When I crossed the transition line I hopped on and went. My intent was to try to get my breath back and go slow. Slow was an immediate 30km/hr, which is blistering for me LOL. I seemed to be able to keep between 28km/hr and 34km/hr. I was thrilled! The first time I raced this course I averaged 23.7km/hr. I saw Steve and Karen just before the turnaround (they were on their way back), and when my turn at the turnaround came I stopped for a minute for another drink (memories of the last time I did this race and was very dizzy from not being hydrated properly). I took off again, faced a head wind for a little while but continued with a great speed. And then 5km from the finish the rain started. And it was pelting. I had to slow down because I was having a hard time seeing, and there are potholes in many places on this country road. Then I felt hail. Hail!! Argh. I leapfrogged with Richard (so his bib read) doing the sprint tri (age 50 his calf read) and we chatted each time we passed each other. Since it's a not a draft legal event, we had to pass without meandering. For some bizarre reason with 1km to the transition at the street lights a police officer told me to go ahead, and I decided it was time to turn left. The officer yelled - no, no! go straight!! I was sure I was supposed to turn but quickly got back on track. Phew, crisis averted and I didn't wipe out even though the roads were slick. I dismounted fine but heard 'oooooooooh' from behind me. Sounds like someone didn't have my luck. I was so annoyed when I got back to where my stuff was so neatly arranged - someone had put their bike on my stuff and dumped all their crap on it. There was no place to move the bike so I had to put my bike in someone else's spot. NOT HAPPY. Got my shoes, baseball cap and fuel belt on and ran out. The rain was really coming down now, but that was fine, I was on foot. But I walked alot over the 5k. With Richard... we leap frogged for a bit, then ran together the last half. Finally we finished! I was really happy with my time considering I'm undertrained. I'm not able to compare to the first time I completed the race because it looks like transition times weren't included for some reason. Or I was really really fast on foot back then, which is also a possibility since it was 2003! The first run was also 2km longer then. I guess I'll have to do it next year to compare then ;)

Steve placed 3rd in his age group, Karen placed 2nd. I came in 8/8. Considering the next woman was 15 minutes faster than I, it's unlikely I'm going to place any time soon ;) Here we are after the medal ceremony - Steve, Karen, and I.

As is tradition after this race we went to Dairy Queen :D And it was wonderful!

We've registered for another Du in two weeks, 3km-20km-5km. It will be interesting to see if I can improve at all!

So that's my week! Please keep your fingers crossed that I'm offered the contract :)

I'm tired, and it's not from exercise! The last bit done was Friday - a really hot and windy brick. I had to walk 4 times on my 5k, but happily my time was 33 mins and change. How the heck did that happen? Oh yeah, it was that first km where my legs were flying at 5:45/km. Yay me!

So not exercising because (as anyone following me on Twitter knows) I've been grooving the nights (and weekend days) away at the Ottawa Bluesfest. Since Thursday I've attended:

• The Blind Boys of Alabama (always gets you moving)
• The Tragically Hip
  
• Trevor Findlay Band
• Royal Wood
• Corb Lund
• Sonny Landreth
• Wintersleep
• Sean Kingston
  
• Orchestra Babobab
• The Frequency
• Steely Dan
• Amanda Rheaume
• Lucinda Williams
• Luke Doucet
• Zappa Plays Zappa
  
• Snoop Dogg
• Bryan Lee and the Blues Power Band
• Johnny Winter
• The Wailers
• James Taylor

Granted, I didn't stay for the full length of all shows as I wandered from stage to stage (there are 6 this year). James Taylor was last night - KT and I danced and swayed. It was nice to have a mellow show!

Tonight we're planning to see Michael Franti and Spearhead, since we so loved the show last year. There are a whack of other acts throughout the evening who we'll also see, and probably a bit of Fergie on the way out. The festival continues through Sunday. We're taking Saturday off since we have a duathlon Sunday morning! And it's going to be a scorcher!

That's it for now, the job search is done for the day!

Well I never expected to have such a great race!

We were up at 5:45 and out the door at 6:15 as planned. I was not in the least bit hungry, so we took one slice of multigrain bread with a thin layer of peanut butter with us. At 6:45 I had a couple of bites but that was it. We were on time to pick up my sister in law, zoomed downtown and found a primo parking spot.

The walk across the bridge to Gatineau where the race started took us about 10 mins. Since we were fairly early we had time to find an empty porta potty before lining up.

And we're off! We all ran our own races, so needless to say I didn't see them after a couple of minutes. The course is really stunning, (click the links for pictures) over the Alexandra Bridge to Ottawa (you can see the Chateau Laurier in the distance through the link), beside and in front of the Chateau Laurier, in front of the Unknown Soldier at the War Memorial, behind the National Arts Centre (the only shot I could find behind it was a winter one), along the Rideau Canal and by the Rideau Locks, and beneath Parliament Hill, along the path by the Ottawa River (see previous link). All that before 3k! At 3k or so we joined up with the Ottawa River Parkway, past the War Museum, the turnaround was at 6k approx., then back across the Portage Bridge to Gatineau, by the Museum of Civilization to the finish at Jacques Cartier Park. Did I mention the entire race was uphill? Ok, it really wasn't, but sure felt it. It's a tough course for Ottawa!

I finished in 1:04:53. My best time this year (and in several years to tell the truth) and a course PR for me. Last year was 1:11:01! Happy :)

Great shirts, will post pictures when my brother sends them (he came to cheer us on). But gorgeous medals - minted at the Royal Canadian Mint no less! They model the Olympic medals. Nice!



Feeling great tonight, had the family over for a Canada Day BBQ. The Snowbirds did I flyby just for us. Nice of them huh?