I can't believe we're practically in May already. Finally I am digging myself out of a hole of anxiety and busy-ness. One of my colleagues was fired a couple of weeks ago, and I have been picking up shifts to cover in addition to having taken a week off for a "staycation." I'll not bore you with the details of the work situation, but I will bore you with staycation pics.
The DH and I were determined to get some serious diving done while I was off, and not only did we get that done, we also did some scouting for future dives. Here are some pics of said missions. The hiking was at Camp Kalaqua near High Springs. We were trying to see what things looked like at Hornsby Springs, the spring they use for swimming on their property. It's supposed to be a fantastic cave, but access is uber-limited. We were also looking for the access to Treehouse Spring on the Santa Fe River. We think it might be in the body of water you see behind me in the picture taken in the woods. Not sure, though. The cave pics were taken at Ginnie Springs by Hollywood stills photographer Gene Page, who happens to be a friend of ours AND one cool dude.
One of my other projects for my time off was to do some climbing at Gainesville Rock Gym. I couldn't find anyone who wanted to go with me, so I went by myself and, therefore, didn't have a belay. So I had to spend my time there doing only bouldering (climbing without belay). I was initially very disappointed, but it turned out to be a good thing. The whole point behind doing some climbing was to get me out of my comfort zone a bit. Climbing without belay simply took things up a notch. I ended up climbing a nice, easy wall as far as about 10 feet high. Problem? Getting back down.
I ended up climbing back down a foot or so then dropping the rest of the way. The other thing it pressed me to do was play on some walls that didn't go up very far but encouraged lateral movement. This took me out of a previously set thought process and led me to stretch my idea of my assignment some. All-in-all, it was a great experience, and I'll be going back...Oh yeah, and it smoked my forearms!The workouts otherwise have been going well. My handstands are coming along, getting stronger and longer, and I am still enjoying that process as well. I continue to find new ways to challenge my concept of my being a "jump retard," and that is fun too. Nutrition is advancing, honing. I'm not dropping weight, but my measurements are starting to budge, and I'm definitely seeing more and more definition.
Needless to say, I won't be posting here much over that time, so I wanted to post these pics from my dinner last night. My college roomie and I ate at Bistro Aix in Jacksonville...Tres chic! We had a great time, and our meal was wonderful. Needless to say I had a splurge meal.
In the one picture of the two of us where you can see our arms, mine look HUGE, but that is ok. In real life, I am beginning to see a lot of muscle there, especially when I move around, so I know that as I drop fat, those big arms will be ok.
Abbie, however, is now convinced we're both nuts.
