Well, I now know that the school year has finally begun. I received a call from Benjamin's teacher yesterday. Benjamin is not doing his seatwork. He is sitting there and playing around and looking off into space and that kind of thing. I told her that Benjamin would test her and test her not do what he was asked to do until he had certain evidence that she was in charge. I also suggested that she talk to Benjamin's kindergarten teacher and see what worked for her last year. I also found out that he had to stay in for recess yesterday to complete his work. Did Benjamin mention this to me? Not on your life. I found that out from his teacher too. I had Ron talk to Benjamin about this stuff, but if it continues, football might not be in his future.

I posted a message on the TriGirls website looking for weekday workout partners and I actually found someone to bike with! I met her yesterday and we headed out for a ride. I was pulling James in the trailer and she had her 16 month old son in a seat on the back of her bike. We rode about 2.5 hours -- it was horrendous. I just didn't think and I didn't bring food along and bonked big time. ("Bonking" is the biking term for when you totally run out of energy.) It was terrible -- I was sick to my stomach, shaky, just a mess. She wasn't feeling too great either, I don't think. We finally made it back to the parking lot and I wanted to kiss the ground, but I was so desperate for food I just shoved everything (including James) into the car and streaked off to McDonalds. She had been telling me on the ride that studies have shown that chocolate milk is the best muscle repair drink for after a workout. We got there and each of us downed a chocolate milk before we had even paid for our stuff -- I guess neither of us had enough fuel for the ride. We both felt much better after the chocolate milk. After we had calmed down a bit, the boys played in the play area and we ate our lunch (salad for me, double cheeseburger and fries for her). We are going for another ride on Thursday morning, but we have agreed that it will be mostly flat and that we are only going to do 90 minutes of riding.

Ron is doing great things at the gym these days. He has lost a little over 10 pounds and is looking good. I don't know if he is really enjoying his time at the gym, but I think he might look forward to it in a small way. He is thinking of riding his bike to work and is going to scout out routes this weekend. If he finds a good route -- meaning roads with not too much traffic and a good bike lane -- he will ride to work one or two days a week. This is in preparation for El Tour de Tucson in November.