holiday update

We had a nice weekend here in NC consisting of multiple holiday parties, cold sleeting rain, and capped it off with a great long run on the American Tobacco Trail today. A recap:

Tequila shots bestowed upon me at the FS Series Holiday party on Thursday night
Fun Secret Santa gifting at Nas' party
12.5 mile run Sunday morning while Bri covered 14.1 (I am slower than her if you haven't figured that out)

This week brings Christmas and some quality time with our family in Virginia. They have an Xbox, which I plan to comandeer in order to wipe out entire militias on one of them shoot-em-up games. We might also open presents.

I have posted all the 2009 OSB Newsletters on the newsletter page if you want to kill some time reading short training articles and athlete updates.

There is not a whole lot else going on. We're going to go see the Kill The Smurfs movie sometime soon, and I am going to buy some Edward the Vampire stuff for Bri, who is a driving force behind the Team Edward movement.

Bank stress tests delayed while government makes up results

Bah.

I am feeling decidedly fluish and less and less inclined to race in a half ironman tomorrow morning. I'm torn between doing the swim only, the swim-bike only, or if feeling OK then giving the whole thing a shot and seeing what happens. My issue is that if I start I almost always finish the race, sick or not. We are going out there to set up a table as part of our sponsorship so will be on site either way. Bummer.

Economizing 101

Bri and I have been waffling back and forth on looking for some new digs, since there are a lot of houses for sale, the prices are good, and rates are low. But yesterday on our 10 mile run we decided that neither of us wants the stress of upping our mortgage amount when we're still paying off some revolving cc debt that I can't seem to shake. I will hope that mortgage rates don't skyrocket between now and Spring 2010, but if they do, so be it. There will still be houses for sale.



To combat this feeling of helplessness, we're going to pay $125 more per month towards mortgage principal reduction. The argument that you can make more in the stock market is not holding much water these days and this will lock up some extra cash when the time comes.

We're off to St Pete for the 5th annual OSB winter training camp next week. The turnout is smaller than in years past but we plan to have a jammin' good time regardless.

I am still trying to talk Bri into figuring out how to get to the beach for a few weeks in the summer, she is all worried about "job" and "money" and "what will they think of me at work," but I counter with things like "fun" and "don't worry, be happy," and "you don't wake up next to them in the morning so don't sweat it."

This week I will wind up running 33 miles which is a yearly best. Going to run the Coach Bubba 4 miler on Saturday and then follow it up with a 3 hour bike ride. Good times.

what's new, random thoughts, random pics

Here are a couple nice pics from our short trip to the OBX (Outer Banks of NC for you non NC folks) summer last year, I just found them on our camera:





Here is one of Tassie and I about to share a beer at Shana/Scott's engagement party. Notice that I can actually get dressed up when the occasion calls for it.



Here is another one of poop.



Just kidding, that is me falling off the top of Grandfather Mountain in western NC.

Random thoughts:
Bri and I put away 16% of our pre-tax income last year. Our return on that was about -30%. If we save -12% this year will our return be +20%?

I am sending in an application for Wake County substitute teaching. OSB Coaching will survive the economic apocalypse, but Team Gaal needs to supplement our income and I have no fear of random jobs to make due. Poker night doesn't pay that well on a per-hour basis.

Inside Out Sports is fixing up the Endless Pool, which is going to be a huge boost to the swim DVD. A stationary underwater camera right next to swimmers in a flume is going to be killer for technique analysis. Our other option was to attempt carting along next to the swimmer in a 25 yard pool but the flooring would create a lot of vibration.