and in other news...

I tried to do this as a "real" bulleted list, but it totally hosed my template. Weird. I think it might have had something to do with putting part of it in the body and part in the extended entry, but I'm not so good with HTML. So, we go with low-tech bullets here.

**I had a personal training session today, and I hated every minute of it. These last couple sessions, she's been starting with my most hated type of movements--coordination exercises. Like, "hold yourself up and extend your right arm and left leg", or front lunge followed by side lunge, or squats with alternating torso twists. HATE. I am the least coordinated person on the planet, and these stupid things exercise my brain more than my muscles. I'm also getting frustrated that she hasn't taken any measurements since the end of my last set of sessions, even though she said she was going to on that Tuesday she canceled because she was sick. So I've been wearing my lightest clothes every freakin' session, and she doesn't mention it. She'll probably decide to do it on the day I come sporting sweatpants. I know I could just ask about the measurements, but dammit! I'm also irritated that I went through all the trouble of filling out those stupid food preference forms and she has done exactly nothing with them. AND her objective for the last few sessions seems to have been to irritate the crap out of me and then get the session over with as quickly as possible so she can go hang out with the other trainers.

Of course, it's also possible that I'm a little on edge today, and this may be affecting my interpretation of her motives. Mostly I'm just pissed because I weighed light this morning and skimped on breakfast in anticipation of the weights and measures, and now that effort's completely wasted.

**I've gone back to the Core plan for my weight-watching needs. Flex is obviously not doing the job for me--I'm going into my 10th week of meetings, and my cumulative loss during that time is 0.4 lbs. Not to mention, recording every blessed thing is a pain in the ass. So, we'll see if this is better. Oh, and I might start staying for meetings again. Even though I can barely stand them, I always seem to do better on weeks when I've stayed for the meeting.

**I desperately want to do this tour...badly enough that I'm half-tempted to put down my deposit now. The only thing stopping me is that I also really want to be pregnant by then. If I commit to the tour, then I have to avoid conceiving between now and, say, April, otherwise I'll be too pregnant to ride. Of course, it's not like we've had enormous luck with that endeavor, but it would be just my luck that I book the trip and then have to cancel due to baby belly. Though now that I think of it, maybe that's a good way to ensure that I'm pregnant by July--just rely on Murphy's Law as a conception strategy. Though we've already made several major purchases and still no baby, so maybe that strategy doesn't work all that well.

About the tour, though--that April timeframe coincides almost exactly with when I could afford to pay the balance of the tour cost anyway, so the sensible thing to do is just wait to book anything until then. Sigh. I hate waiting.

**Speaking of people who hate waiting...I had a guy on my club ride this weekend who absolutely would not stop at stop signs. I've never seen anything like it. I mean, I've seen cyclists run stop signs before, but usually they slow down and yield right-of-way to anyone who was there first. This guy--let's call him Flagrant Disregard Man (FDM)--it was like he thought stop signs were merely suggestions. Dude didn't even slow down at most of them.

I start out every ride with a brief safety speech--obey all traffic laws, signal turns, point/call out debris, etc. I do make a special comment about stop signs, because we roll through them if it's not a high traffic area and there are no cars. There are some places on the route where we'd be losing momentum every 100 yards if we didn't. The line I always use (borrowed from another ride leader, I think) is, "treat them like you would in your car." For me, this means that a rolling stop is permissible if you have the right-of-way. The sheriff's department disagrees with me, I'm sure, but I haven't hit anyone or gotten pulled over yet.

Anyway, I knew there was going to be trouble with FDM almost immediately. For one thing, he was faster than me. He was good at hanging back enough to ride with us, but keeping up was starting to be a challenge. I didn't realize his utter disdain for the big red octagon until after the first regroup stop. That's the place on our route after which the 4-way stops begin in earnest. He ran the first one without even slowing down. I was a little surprised, but I didn't press the issue because there was no one there. Then we got to the first high-traffic 4-way stop, and he barely slowed down at that one, too. Again, we had the right of way, so I wasn't too concerned.

When he cut off a left-turning minivan at the next one, I knew I had a problem on my hands. I stopped everyone else and waved the van through, mouthing "Sorry, sorry" as clearly as I could. Then we caught up with FDM, and this shit continued for the next several stop signs. Thankfully, most of them were car-free, so I decided to save my tactful correction for the next major intersection. I did have to pick up my pace to make sure I could keep an eye on him, though...I felt like I was chasing a hyperactive 2-year-old. At the next high-traffic 4-way, I broke out the stern Mom-voice. "We need to STOP!!! at this intersection, even if there's nothing coming. It's too busy."

To his credit, he called back, "You're the boss," and did make a complete stop. Unfortunately, that was the last one. I didn't know what to do. Dude was a menace, and he was just enough faster than me that I couldn't catch up enough to stop him before it was too late. Then by the time we got to the next rest stop, I didn't want to seem like a jerk by calling him out in front of everyone else.

The weirdest thing about it? I think he actually believed that he had the right of way, as long as the cars saw him. He made a comment later in the ride (as he was violating the right-of-way of a Lexus driver, who responded with an unpleasant hand gesture as I waved him through), to the effect that "see, if you wave at them to get their attention, they'll let you go through". Well, YEAH, but that doesn't mean they LIKE it, or that you're RIGHT. It's like "borrowing" your neighbor's lawnmower by walking over and stealing it out of his garage while he's sitting on the porch. The first couple times, he might nod and let it slide. After a while, though, he'll probably start locking his garage. And I wouldn't count on being invited to his next BBQ.

I mean, the guy was nice enough aside from that, but by the end of the ride I was beyond irritated. I doubt that he'll come back to this ride--he's too fast for it, really. If he does, though, I'm gonna have to have a come-to-Jesus with him beforehand if he's going to ride with us again. Drivers around here are pretty tolerant of bicycles when we ride courteously, but all it takes are a few cyclists like FDM to ruin it. There are already enough jerks who think we should get off the road...no need to reinforce that perception.