Ready for the Weekend

The weekend is upon us and I live for the weekends. No football games to actually attend as Maryland is down in Winston-Salem to play Wake Forest, but plenty to watch. Auburn-Arkansas is on tap for noon tomorrow on ESPN. War Eagle! Also on tap this weekend, on Sunday, is the George Mason Men's Crew sponsored Head Race - the Occoquan Chase. Along with the Head of the Occoquan, it's one of my favorite races. Its on our home water, but more then that, I love the twists and turns of the race. Makes for some exciting racing When I first joined my rowing club, the Occoquan Chase was just starting up and we would win the Masters 8+ every year - by default as we were the only boat entered in our category. Still we wore our "Champion of the Chase" t-shirts with pride. I might add that I love that they have special t-shirts made for the winners. Medals are nice, but you can't really wear medals anywhere. They just sit in your bedroom. T-shirts you can wear out. Anyway, the race has grown over the years and its not uncommon to have 4 or 5 boats in our category now. Its been a while since I've won one the t-shirts and I'd love to get another. As far as I know, I'm just in a Men's 50 4+, which, frankly is one of our weakest boats so winning a t-shirt might have to wait another year.

Speaking of Head Races, I officially signed up to race a single in the Head of the Occoquan. This will be my first time trying that. I've raced in 8s, 4s and Quads, but never in a single. I decided to do it just to see how I will do. A test of sorts. It's made possible as singles race on a Saturday and the rest of my races (a 4+ and an 8+) are scheduled for Sunday. Therefore, I won't be totally wiped. Hopefully we'll have good weather (Ha!) on Saturday, but if not I'll scratch. I'm not looking to go in the water during a windy Halloween day. Yes the race is on Halloween. I do need to step up my training though. 3 weeks to go.

On a health note, I picked up a skin infection just below my eyebrow. My left eye is almost swollen shut, which looks as lovely as it sounds. I'm on antibiotics for it and if past history holds, it should start draining over the weekend. I hope you weren't eating while reading this. I did go to the Doctor's today on a another matter, my blood pressure. It hasn't been too bad lately, but the Doctor has been tweaking my meds for a while now trying to get it down where he wants it. Based on today's visit, he's happy. Now I just need to do my part by taking the medications and keeping up with my exercising.

Have a good weekend everyone.