The weekend did improve after Saturday morning. The board of the rowing's national governing body, US Rowing, was in town for their annual meeting, so rowers from all of the local groups were invited to have dinner with them. I enjoyed the dinner, taliking mostly to several board members and members of the referee committee, but probably not quite as much as Rudder did. He somehow ended up sitting with most of the athlete reps - these were all recent Olympian types, so I think he got to hear some interesting stories.
Where I was sitting, we talked more about work than rowing, but it was interesting - four relatively senior women, in four different fields, talking about dealing with bosses and such. I think I need to do that sort of networking more often.
On Sunday, Rudder went out for a row with She-Hulk and the two others who will be racing a mixed quad together next weekend, and I rowed with the Old Salt, because we'll be taking a double out in that race. It was a bit of a rocky row, but improved a lot once he got warmed up - well, the man turns 64 tomorrow, so it's not unreasonable that it takes him a few thousand meters. At least now we know, so he'll warm up a bit on the erg before our race. Only thing that worries me is that we were down to port the whole time; I'm afraid that racing that way might tweak my back a little and I've got another doubles race (with one of the junior girls) shortly after that, as well as a race in my single late in the day. I think it will be all right, though. The one thing that bugs me is that the race isn't handicapped, even though all the people in it are masters rowers. We'll be going against some fast crews (Rudder and She-Hulk, for one) and it's not like we're going to win anyway, but that handicap would have been nice. Any of this may change, though - they expect to post the final schedule today sometime.
After rowing, we all went to breakfast. Later on, I got to check out a new local yarn store - it's closer to my house than any of the existing ones and it's open on Sundays! The store was a little sparse on yarn, understandably as it was only their second day open, but did have a nice stock of various Cascade and Southwest Trading Company yarns (SWTC is a local company). I was also glad to be able to buy a little Denise add-on kit - extras of all the cables, and a few spare connectors and end-stops. They also had quite a variety of spinning wheels. (They looked intriguing, but I refuse to take up spinning, since I barely have time to knit. Also, I don't think I could read while spinning.) It was nice to hang out with the proprietors and some other local knitters including Brooke, too.
Then last night we went out to a fancy steak place for an early birthday dinner for me - it's not until Friday, but by then we'll be getting ready for the marathon and I won't be wanting steak that night (though Rudder will) much less wine. Good wine, by the way - it was a Spanish red, Bodegas Tarsus. (Rudder wanted me to write the name down, to remember it - I pointed out that that was unnecessary, since it shares a name with Dr. Who's spacecraft.)
Posted by dichroic at March 6, 2006 03:27 PM