The Once and Future Year

The Crazy Support Team

2015 was interesting. Exhausting in many ways, but definitely interesting. I've been feeling a bit burnt out lately so it's been easy to focus on the exhaustion, the negatives, what I haven't done. So I'm taking time out to have a look at some of the fun that I had this past year. And maybe come up with some ideas for more fun and challenges in 2016!




Highlights of 2015

Best Pub of 2015!

The Highest Pub
I've written a number of posts about the Outback Odyssey and it was an awesome experience, but nothing beats actually making it to the end. And it's pretty cool being able to say you've had a well earned beer at the highest pub in South Australia!

Lark Ascending

My partner in Crazy!

This one is all Rob Cannon's fault. He talked me into participating in the Fox Creek Duathlon as part of a team. Due to my overuse injury from the Outback Odyssey, I got the run leg. So I thought some training was in order.

One thing many of you don't know about me is that I love classical music. When I commute by car, ABC classic FM is my station of choice. And I love their swoons! So when they had the classic 100 swoons last year I knew I had to have the music blaring all over the house. But I needed to go for a training run, so what could I do?

That's how I did it too!

Thankfully, technology made this easy and a set of headphones into my phone let me listen to the wonderful calming swoons as I wandered the trails at Cobblers (don't worry, the walking only ones, I'm not going to use headphones on trails with bikes!). Soon the number one swoon came on, the Lark Ascending by Vaughan Williams. It was absolute magic listening to that piece and feeling like I was flying along the trails. I was grinning like an idiot even as my camera and wallet flew out of my camelback that I hadn't zipped up properly!



Norton's Surprise

How I felt!

I'm not built like a climber, so climbs are always a challenge for me. More so since I realised that all those people telling you that you get heavier as you age weren't lying. I'd set my fastest time up Norton Summit about 5 kg ago, so I suspected that I'd have to do something about that before I'd beat that time. Simple physics really.

Norton Summit

Apparently other things change as you ride more that can offset this, stubbornness, skill, ability to suffer more. Which apparently means you can go up hills faster than the simple maths of the situations dictates. Which is my fancy way of saying I took 30 seconds off my PB when I believed I couldn't even get close to it! I rock!!!!!

"Beat my PB" Grin!

I love learning!

Friends who like learning too!

This one may suprise my workmates, as I may have been resistant to participate in some of the training this year (due to time constraints), but I have really enjoyed working in an environment where learning is important and valued. Being able to try things out, investigate how things work and having access to scientists from many disciplines has been amazing. Even when it got tough at work, I could always say that I work with amazing and talented people who made me and my brain feel valued. They also challenged me to learn more, which is awesome and something I aim to embrace more in 2016.

2016 - the future is here!
I want to touch briefly on the low light of my year in a roundabout fashion. Everywhere I've worked I've found that most people can work together really well. People are generally honest and don't try to cause each other undue pain. In my world, people are generally good. That doesn't mean that everybody gets along, everybody has different values and cultural references which do clash, but I have never met anyone who I thought was being deliberately painful. I suspect there may have been some, however I am mostly oblivious enough not to notice and I think in the work environment, I've been lucky enough to be protected from some of this by my work colleagues, for which I am very grateful. But this year brought to my door a situation where there seemed to be no path for working together and deliberate attempts to cause disharmony. I'm a problem solver by nature and I value working with a team so this was and still is a big stress to me. I don't know how to fix it, but I suspect the lesson for me here is not to fix it, but to learn to live with the stress that it causes and develop new skills for coping. So that is my biggest aim for 2016 - not to let this issue in an otherwise amazing workplace, overwhelm and drain me.

With that in mind here's my first big decision for 2016:

YOGA!!!!!

Serenity by bike

But here's the deal. I spend way more than 15 minutes on facebook and poking around the net on any given day, why can't I give myself 15 minutes doing something that I know makes me feel better? I am worth those 15 minutes, I should value myself enough to give myself 15 minutes of time to make myself better. You know, because I'm worth it! Obviously I'd like to do more than 15 minutes and I suspect that will come, but I'm starting simple.


The other idea I have to destress me is also simple - more music! Play it, listen to it, go see it. I'm going to get my tabla out and beat the stress out of me! And if that doesn't work, I'll put on the Lark Ascending and drift away to a happy place. Any suggestions of awesome music will be gratefully appreciated.

2016 - More Bike!

So what else does 2016 hold for me? Obviously there's the bike. My major goal this year is to participate in the dirty weekend. I've already lined up most of a team, though some of them may take a little more convincing. Now I just need to learn how to mountain bike. I had an unfortunate run in with the ground in a pigeon related incident last year and now all my confidence is shot. It was actually a goal for last year to ride switch backs at Cobblers and I didn't get to it. This time though I'm serious. I have my mountain bike teacher lined up (she's amazing), an event to train for where I'm going to need those skills and determination to get over this gut wrenching anxiety when the trails turn downhill. I am going to do this!

Running! Me?

Given how much I enjoyed the Fox Creek Duathlon, I want to give that another go in 2016. With my new found mountain biking skills I'm hoping to do it solo. But in case of bike related injury, I'm going to work on my running as well. Because, surprisingly, I enjoy it! So I'm going to see if I can run 100 km total for the year. Hopefully mostly on trails because running on pavement is yuck.

My food mojo didn't really come back in 2015, so I'm holding out hope for 2016. But I have secret weapons this time! Work colleagues who are passionate about food, in particular bread, are inspirational. And they might have pointed me in the direction of courses to further my skills! Here's hoping that they don't clash with other events!

I have a geek goal for this year as well. Every time I've done programming and playing with computers I've really enjoyed it so I'm getting myself a raspberry pi and am going to learn more about computers and programing. I've got no real idea what I'm going to do with it yet, though the notion of automated housebots appeals! I'll gladly accept any suggestions or challenges!

My motto for 2016 is going to be "breathe deep, fear less". Too much of 2015, particularly the later half was filled with anxiety, and that's no way to live. So I'm going to live, love and ride with everything of got and then some!

  

Live, Love and Ride!