Time to give credit where credit is due

Wow, what a busy week and a half I've had. I'm usually busy by normal peoples terminology. I work 6 12hr shifts a week. As soon as I get home I sleep, train for triathlon as soon as I awake, then spend a couple of hours with my wife & kids before I go back to work & do it all over again. So like I said, I'm usually busy, but this week was unusually busy. Last week the transmission went out in my van so my wife I are were trying to use one vehicle between the both of us. Since time is such a rare commodity with me, juggling who can use our only remaining vehicle, & when, made things pretty rough. But we made it through that just fine. My wife a I have always had the ability to make the best & see our way through anything as long as we have each other. Our mini-van has a 100,000 mile warranty & we had 90,000 miles on our van.



I called the dealership about our transmission & told them our extended warranty should cover it. They said "bring it in & we'll see if it is covered. The new tranny will cost 2,400 dollars. We'll put the new tranny in & in the mean time we'll see if its covered." A red flag went up in my mind. I'll spare you all the gruesome details, but long story short after what felt like a hundred hours on the phone with the dealership they decided to cover the cost of replacement & labor. We only had to pay 100 dollars for the deductible. We also had the battery & oil changed. Total damage was 350 dollars Much better than over 2600!



Tonight an immediate family member & I worked out some problems that we should of worked out over a decade ago. It wasn't easy, and there were some hurt feelings on both sides that we were able to talk out. But we worked it out. First time since 1993 I felt like all was well in that relationship. I've missed her so badly even though she was right here the whole time. We made up allot of ground tonight.



I weighed in yesterday st 193 lbs! I've met my WW goal so now I'm going to spend a couple weeks in the maintenance phase of the diet. In the maintenance phase I'll be getting allot more calories a day to eat. 6 more food points to be exact. For someone like me who has a love-hate-love-love relationship with food like me that is great news!!!!



In Nov 2006 I did the Clearwater 70.3. When I had my bike shipped from Fla. back here to NM, UPS damaged my bike during shipping. It just so happened that this week they finally decided to work out all the kinks to try & send me a check to fix or replace my bike. 17 months fighting with them & they just now decided to get off their butts. So there is another large block of time spent on the phone, sending out email & faxes. It looks entirely possible that UPS will be sending me a 2000 dollar check in the next 14 working days. The new Cannondale Ironman carbon frame came out recently. Cannondale has a frame trade in policy so that I can get the new frame for 2250 dollars (usually 3800) by trading in my old frame. I don't think it was a coincidence that it took 17 months to get this UPS claim resolved & Cannondale just now came out with their first carbon frame. No coincidence at all.



My son is normally a perfectly behaved 8 month old. He's teething this week so all hopes of sleep & peace have been out. Poor guy. But today he got his first good nap all week. There is light at the end of this tunnel.@The gate on our fence broke. Normally I can't fix anything mechanical or home project to save my life. The gate only took about 45 minutes to replace. Usually fixing broken things are one of my 3 triggers to send me into emotional eating. I didn't turn to food this time!



I thought I had broken the pinkie toe of my right foot. The Dr said I stubbed the heck out of it, but its not broke & I could continue to train as long as I didn't feel like it was at anytime becoming more badly damaged.



My wife and I put a bike for her on lay away 3 months ago. This was the last week we had to pay on it. By Saturday we had to either pay it off or lose the money we had put down on it. We got our tax refund about 10 days ago. So my wife & I not only was able to pay the last 400 dollars owed on the bike, but we also got her a helmet, cycling shorts, a jersey, & cycling shoes. Before I went to work my mother in law watched our children while Cindy & I went on our first bike ride together. It was amazing. We had more fun than I could ever have dreamed. We rode through a neighborhood in the NE heights of Albuquerque looking at houses & talking of when I retire from the Penitentiary & we can move our family to a real home in Albuquerque away from the prison. We talked about our children. We discussed each others dreams & inspirations. I have over 10,000 miles on my Cannondale Ironman bike. That's only 1 of the 4 bikes I own & ride. I've ridden allot of rides that I've felt were special, but today was by far the most magical ride I've ever had. We enjoyed it so much we decided we're going to do the Albuquerque quarter century together May 7th.



Friday night my wife & I went out with friends to the Horse & Angel bar & grill. It was the first time in 2 years I'd gone out on the town. I had my wife by my side so I was bound to have a great time. But last night ended up being one of the best times I've had in years. Friends, my wife, laughter, & love. Truly, I had so much fun last night out on the town with my amazing wife. Add today's bike ride, I can truly say I fell in love with her all over again. Today, before work I didn't want to leave. I felt like it was when Cindy & I had just started dating again. All I wanted was for me stay with her & in each others arms.



God is good to me. I don't deserve even a small tidbit of what he has blessed me with in my life, but he goes & blesses me anyway. God deserves some much deserved and over due credit. Thank you my Lord. You are so big, & sometimes I don't recognize all the blessings you give me in my life. This week you threw so many blessings into my life not even someone as blind as me could have missed it all. Thank you my God.