We are having a tough night here. I took the guys to the playground today and they decided to yell curse words up the tunnel slide so that they boomed across the playground. Thankfully, they did this before their Spanish teacher showed up with his daughter. Elias and Benjamin got in big trouble and I told them they they were staying home from the Boy Scout pack meeting tonight. Sure got their attention. So, we have had a solid 90 minutes of weeping and gnashing of teeth... It is getting old. Ron called me right after he left and said that if I were planning on giving in, since I had made my point he said, that I could drop them off. This is why Ron is a marshmallow and why the guys don't believe him when he threatens them with a consequence. Not on your life buddy -- Elias and Benjamin are staying home. They knew they shouldn't have been saying those words and they decided that it was more important to say them instead of doing the right thing. Oh well. Yup, I am a bitch.

I had a major victory on the bike this week! I have been working on standing up and pedaling for a long time, and this past Tuesday, it finally clicked!! It was so great! I decided to practice by going up Mt. Lemmon and I stood up and pedaled and it was bad -- not smooth at all. So after about a half mile, I stopped and talked to another woman who was doing hill repeats. She suggested moving my hips a little farther back. What did I have to lose? I did it and the difference was AMAZING! I did it -- and I managed to pedal smoothly and keep on going. It was very exciting. I went home after that because I was exhausted. I decided to do it again today since my coach said that the next thing to do was to ride standing up for one mile, then sit for one mile, then stand for another mile... then die. (His routine is to stand for two miles, sit for two miles, stand for two miles, home to the jacuzzi.) I made it through the standing for one mile, but it wasn't fun at all. And I did have to stop twice because I thought I was going to pass out from lack of oxygen. Once I could actually breathe, I kept on going until I hit the one mile marker -- standing standing, sit and pedal, standing standing, sit and pedal, and by the time I was almost there, I could only stand for about two revolutions at a time and then I had to sit again. I stopped at the marker to recover -- I think every cyclist on the mountain could hear my breathing at that point. I was going to do the one mile sitting, but I was fried. Stick a fork in me, I was DONE. My legs were hurting, my forearms were hurting, everything was complaining. HOWEVER, I still DID IT!! I am so thrilled about this.

My beach trip is now cemented into the summer schedule. I will be at the beach in Delaware from 5-12 July. I am already looking forward to it!!