i'm a finalist!

Fun and exciting news for the day...I'm a finalist for the wesay.com amatuer photo contest, sports devision. How cool is that?

http://www.wesay.com/Contest/2110200817638254/3/

I doubt I'll win, but one can hope, right?

happy surprises in my inbox...

i got this from the parent of a kid that i coached on saturday. he's not in my group, but one day will be. it made me love coaching even more:

Hi Andi,

I wanted to send you a quick note about this past week with Johnny*. I have to tell you, he REALLY liked working with you. Both after the Foxhole for the butterfly and on Saturday after the meet, he was able to tell me things that “Coach Andi” told him, and he usually does not do that! He was really disappointed when Coach Joe* wasn’t at the meet, so I’m actually very glad that he had that time with you on Wednesday as you were a familiar face for him. So, Thank You for working with him!

We are going to try to get him back over to the DLCC for Foxholes at some point here – I’m going to give him a bit of a break this week and only swim twice, so I don’t know when I’ll get over there to see the availability. If you are aware of when there are openings for starts and turns, I’d really like to get him in one of those, especially after the 2 really big belly flops on Sunday!

Thanks!

It was a good first season meet for me. Even with a crying 6, 9 and 10 year old girl, we all made it home with smiles on our faces. I'm just hoping I didn't traumatize the 9 year old as I literally had my hand on her back as I -gentally- pushed her into the water for the start of the race as she kept crying "Idonwanto I donwanto!"

As I said...it was a good meet....

completely bored at work, i've found my new favorite blog to cruise, curtosy of squeakers:

http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/

It's quiet hilarious how horribly people can mess up a cake and it's also pretty akward how many times people can actually fit a penis on a cake. we're assuming it's accidentally.



however, this cookie monster cupcake cake is pretty cool...



can i get this one with van gogh's sunflowers on it? might be the wedding cake of my dreams....

speaking of weddings...it's incredibly hard to not try and plan a wedding right now, even though you do not have a groom (or are even close to having one). with everyone getting married, all you can do is take notes. i've already got flowers, colors, dresses, location and photographer picked out. so yeah...just waitin' on that groom...

they're giving away handbags!

so for the next...um...19 hours, this site is giving away a free handbag on the the hour till they launch their new site. i think it's kind of cool. to get in on the fun, go here.

back to the gym!

after the major crisis of the chiropractor last week, i'm ready to get back into the gym. i had done really well last week, and after last week drama and pain that was not needed, i'm ready to start working out again. i'm just hoping my running will still be up to par...i had made good progress so far, so hopefully i don't fall behind! also...i think i need to find a good spinning workout to do on my own. also to buy...i need a little fm radio, nothing fancy, hopefully cheap, so i can listen to my fav. primetime shows while i work out...

oooooprah

I knew that the olympic swimmers were going to be on the oprah show on monday for the season premier. the timing unfortunatly did not work with my scheduling, but i did know that they rerun that days episode at 12:30 at night. checking the tv listings, i did not see the olympic show on at 12:30 at night, so i figured, they must run it the next.

so last night i waited up to see the show...and the olympians weren't on. apparently you only had one shot to watch that show. and i don't think it's online anywhere. not cool at all.

however, the girl that was on oprah last night? charice? A.M.A.Z.I.N.G. voice.

the Michael Phelps effect

we knew it would be large numbers...but how large, we wouldn't know until our first day back at the pool.

saturday was our open house for the swim team. as minnesota's largest and most accomplished swim team, we were expecting large numbers. from 1-2:45 i took kid after kid, some scared, some overly excited, as they showed me their skills in the pool. do you know freestyle? backstroke? breaststroke? butterfly? some nod their heads, some gave me blank stares. then into the pool as they swam and i evaluated, kids running everywhere as us 9 coaches tried to find enough room for our new swimmer to swim. then i would place them in a group and send them back to mom and dad for registration.

there were a lot of kids, and we were done before 3 pm, which was our cut off time.

yesterday, my group had 42 of the 48 kids registered show up. our roster is 2 pages, compared to the 1 page and 20 names it usually is. good thing i had a co-coach.

now, i'm not too worried. the way i coach this season will have to change a little bit and with all the kids and the wider range of abilities, i unfortunatly won't be able to cater to the individuality of the kids as much as i used to. heck, i'm worried about learning all of their names! co-coach was freaking out a little more than i think she needed to, but i guess that's expected. she's also worried about getting time away from the pool, which i just committed myself to 5 days a week plus weekend meets. it'll keep me busy and hopefully in shape, too.

but i guess this is what happens after you have someone go and win 8 golds in your sport. i love that just by him doing that, our numbers pretty much more than doubled for the season. i'm really curious, however, to see how many actually stick around. i'll give you an update in 2 weeks when the free trial period is over for these swimmers :)

every 4 years

i wait for this every 4 years. growing up a swimmer you learn one thing: the olympics is where you gain your glory. this is the big show, and the only show, that matters to a swimmer. you make it here, you make history. so every 4 years i wait for my favorite swimmers to take on the world to prove who gets the glory. expect a few posts of excitement as world records are broken and amazing feats happen at the bubble in china. ((which reminds me...did i even post about trials? that goes on my list of most amazing things i've experienced. i should post a list of those sometime...hmmm))

but as tradition in my house goes, we always sit down and cook up an amazing meal while we watch the opening ceremony. i remember bits and pieces of the last 4, but what i really remember is making homemade pizza with my mom and sister and watching the atlanta games opening. so, for this year, i'm having friends over and we're going to enjoy some chinese and watch the beijing games. word has it that it's an amazing opening ceremony...so i'm getting kind of antzy to get out of here, hit up the liquor store and then lee ann chins...

go world!

--andi

buca heaven

last night, we had the state swim team pasta feeds. the 12 and unders were at a home 2 miles from where i live. nice gorgeous gigantic home. we sat out on the deck, the adults drinking wine, kids playing sardines, and eating plate-fuls of pasta from buca de bepo. and when all was set and done, what do the parents offer me? that's right, about 2 pounds of buca pasta. they suggested that with all the pasta i invite friends over for my own pasta party. all i could think about was how fast i would have that gone without friends (and it is well on its way to being gone!). it's pure buca heaven.

then as i was leaving...the host couple asked if i would be interested in house sitting. sounds like i may be doing that for a month! in a big gorgeous gigantic home (deck, yard, marble counter kitchen, fire place, big screen tvs)...spider free!

it's war

I've always had a fear of spiders. never thought that in my newest residence that i would be in full out war with them, facing my fear. so far i've bombed, sprayed and bombed again in order to build myself a barrier. so far, it's worked...except one place.

when i first told my roommate that i would live with her, i was ecstatic...a whole basement to myself with a beautiful bathroom with walk in, tiled shower and seat. beautiful. i even purchased a big ass shower head for it and transformed it into my own little spa.

all was well, until i started seeing these huge spider creatures on the shower curtain...only 1 at a time. i killed them all, one smushed into the shower liner and forced me to buy a new one. i bought a drain plug, and after last nights viewing of big ugly spider 5 crawling up the wall, AFTER my latest bug attack, i've had enough. i now have a bowl over the shower drain.

i'm at a loss. i'm wet and naked in the shower, my most vulernable, and i'm asked to kill spiders at the same time? i now wear shower sandels, so that i can stomp if needed. please, if anyone has any miracles to guard against these uglies, please share!

1 John 4:18

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

Olympic Trials Video

Some video of Friday, July 4th, at Swimming Olympic Trials. It was finals and they decked us out for a great American night! This is the crowd doing the wave and really getting into it...

friday 5

1. What was the last thing you purchased from a vending machine?
i got some sun chips or something a couple of weeks ago...i get hungry at work.

2. What was the last thing you made copies of on a photocopier?
um....i think it was at my last job, just used the photocopier on the print. unimportant stuff.

3. When did you last use a pay telephone?
a long, long time ago! i remember using it when i was in elementary school to call home from skating practice. i don't even carry around enough change to make a phone call today. and i love my cell phone. but they say when you are in london, there's a red phone booth by big ben...and you should call someone right before it goes off so that they can hear big ben.

4. How often do you visit an automatic teller machine?
somewhat often...i've been depositing a lot since i'm never available during their business hours. occassionally i'll take out cash too...

5. Which of your daily tasks would you most like to see automated?
uploading web page content! then i wouldn't have to worry whether i'm doing it right or wrong!

swim meet weekend

this weekend should have been a fun, big meet, weekend. but with my co-coach and i only having 2 kids signed up for one day of swimming, out of the 15 or so we have on our roster, it was actually more of a boring meet. although it was fun to watch all of the other kids swim, including our kids that we just moved up to the next group as they got too fast for ours, it was also just a lot of sitting around on a hard metal bench. good thing there is free food for the coaches.

coaches pic
waiting for the meet to start...

tara and i pointing out U of M swimmers on the record boards that we will see swim at trials in 2 weeks!
2 of my favorite swimmers that use to be in my group

Twins Territory

my lovely friend ann has been so generous to share her free twins tickets from work with me. when we went last week to the game, i gave her an extra twins shirt that i had laying around, as she was without. we also enjoyed the company of some much beloved bsu design tech alums...it was great to see my boys and lisa!

bomono

for work, we just updated our firefox browsers to 3.0 and i happened to also download some fun plug-ins for mine...one that was called snag it, which basically pulls up websites that might be of interest to you. so for all of you that like to color...head on over here: bomomo.com

something to look forward to

i found this site a while back, when i was in college. it's a competition put on bombay saphire to design a new martini glass. how more perfect can that be? however, in order to win it, you must be 25 and working in the design industry for 3 years. which puts me at 2.5 years out. i guess...it's just something to look forward to. i can start generating ideas anyways...

Designer Glass Competition

perfect sundays

my sunburn from a few years back. won't do that again...

i could have finished cleaning my basement yesterday. or worked on web pages. or a million other things. but with a nice day when every other day has been rainy and cold, i was outside right after church. after lathering up in sun lotion which i later found out didn't do much for the upper body, i headed out to the town home community pool. there i was greeted by the obnoxious boys whose parents are making the pool the babysitter for the summer, which i really have no tolerance for parents who can't see the dangers of not watching their kids at the pool. the way they were horse playing, i'm just waiting for one of them to get hurt and i hope i'm not there when it happens. while laying out in the sun, half napping, i also called my dad and grandpa to wish them happy fathers day. squeakers also called and we chatted as she walked to the mall. i was outside for 2 hours.

making me way back to the house, i changed and decided to go for a run. or run/walk. i'm not quite at running the whole way. i then came back and did some ab work before taking a shower and making super. then i watched the tonys and went to bed.

this morning, not only am i a little sore from the slightly burnt skin, but i am also sore from my athletic adventures. and i have a form of eczema on my fingers which makes it hard to hold writing utensils...so that's fun. but really, it was a perfect lazy sunday in my opinion and all the pain today was worth it.

friday 5

Who gave you your last balloon, and what was the occasion?
Balloon? The last balloon I probably got was when I went to state for high school swimming.

Who gave you your last scolding, and what was it for?
my horrible boss from my last job. thanks for understanding jerk...

Who gave you your last attaboy, and why?
yeah...my last boss. after i redid his website. he's still a jerk.

Who gave you your last haircut?
one of the ladies at avant in gf!

Who gave you your last massage?
i'm always rubbing my neck...other than that, it was probably my boy.

the expense of travel

After a short lunch outting today to turn in all of my comcast equipment, my jaw hit the floor when i noticed the price of gas hit $4.10 a gallon. since this has happened, i have now cancelled my trip home for father's day as i cannot afford it and i also looked into trying to find an alternative way to work for a couple of days a week. if i took the bus, which is $2 a ride, i'm sure i could buy a monthly pass, i would have to be on the bus at 6:51 and switch buses 4 times to go 3 miles, according to the metro transit web page...and it would get me to work at 8:30. it doesn't make sense to me. then i looked into bike paths...there is no path from my house to work that doesn't involve me getting run over by a car as i pass under I494. so...all my money saving dreams have been crushed. and i will inevitably have to pay $4.10 and rising in gas. when will this madness end??? i'm fearing the end of the week when i have to pay...the last time i filled up it was at $3.82.