Basketball and Movies

Saturday was a day for watching basketball and Sunday a movie day. My usual Saturday routine, when it's not rowing season, is to get up around 7:30 or 8:00, grab a Coke and a breakfast bar and go read e-mail and what not until it's time for lunch. Sometimes I'll do some erging if I haven't done so the day before. This Saturday was such a day. I wasn't feeling all that up for it given that my 5,000 meter time the week before was depressingly slow. I was determined to do better and I did. I think a lot of my erging problems stem from erging alone and therefore not pushing myself as hard as if I was doing an erg test and surrounded by teammates. This Saturday I did much better. Not great but back in the normal range for me at this time of year. Now if I can just make myself erg during the week to keep aerobic capacity up that would be a plus. Saturday there was also a number of college basketball games Ann and I wanted to watch. George Mason, which is sort of right down the street from us, and Ohio, Ann's and Daughter#1's alma mater were playing in the Convo Center at Ohio. That game started at 1:00. Maryland was playing at 2:00 against Miami and finally, Radford, The Son's alma mater, was playing VMI at 4:00. Somewhere in there we also had to do our grocery shopping. After we finished lunch, we headed to the store and started taping the GMU - Ohio game. We finished at the store such that we only had to rewind the first ten minutes or so. We like both schools so it was hard to route for one over the other. It certainly was a game of two halves. Ohio couldn't score in the first half and Mason couldn't score in the second. Ohio did better in the second half then Mason did in the first and ended up winning the game. I fell asleep for much of the second half and missed most of Ohio's comeback. I then watched the first half of the Maryland vs Miami game and DVRed the second half. Maryland was behind by 9 at the half. I the switched over and watched the Radford vs VMI game. It was sort of like watching a high school game more than a college game. The difference in athleticism between say the ACC and the Big South is pretty dramatic. But I wanted to support Radford and watched to the end of regulation. Of course they played to a tie and went into OT and we had to head off to Mass. So I started recording that game as well hoping for the best. After Mass I put the game on and going into the last minute of OT, Radford had the lead and then the screen went blank. Crap. I had to look up the final score on line. Radford won, thank goodness. I didn't watch the second halve of the Maryland game after Ann informed me they ended up losing by 15. I didn't see the point. So a lot of basketball and I'd say my teams went 2-2. Radford won, Ohio won and Maryland and GMU lost. We were in bed asleep by 9:00. We are so old.

Sunday I got up the usual time and walked the dogs. They had been neglected what with all the basketball on Saturday. They are old dogs and seem to do much better during the day if they can start it off with a walk. After finishing our walk, Ann fed them breakfast, while I got the laundry started. Sunday is our laundry day. I hate doing it so I try to get it started and therefore over with as early as I can so it's not hanging over my head like some albatross all day. At eleven I went and erged at my class and managed 11,200 meters. It felt good and not as exhausting as it has felt recently. I already miss football and baseball hasn't started and there were no college basketball games I wanted to see, so we dove into our Netflick stash and pulled out National Treasure. It was was light enough and action packed enough to be entertaining. Just what the doctor ordered. We also have The Passion of the Christ at home. Ann has wanted to see it for a long time. I can't say that I have. It creeps me out. I'm just not sure I'm up to watching a realistic portrayal of the Crucifixion. Even if it was to save us all. Ann got about a third of the way through it before stopping it. We haven't sent it back yet, but I think it's only a matter of time.