Inspiration!

Thanks to Heather, here's some interesting and inspriational reading.

VFF completes its mission to raise awareness for rare diseases! Excellent account of their ride from Pittsburg to Washington DC. Fun narration and excellent pictures. Check it out. Well done Heather!

A 3,000-Mile Triumph, Spurred on by Diabetes: A team of eight people with Type I Diabetes won the Race Across America! “Despite mechanical problems, the team members, started in Oceanside, Calif., and rolled into Annapolis, Md., a distance of 3,021 miles, in five days, nine hours and five minutes. Their average speed was 23.41 miles per hour — 0.17 better than the winner last year, a Norwegian cycling team made up of professionals.”

Article from the NYT about the Big Horn 100.

Doctor rescued from Antarctica in 1999 dies at 57. "I believe you're always much better off knowing what the real truth is. I think it's only then that you can come to grips with your illness, or with any difficult situation. Some people call this process 'mourning.' I prefer to call it tiring of the fear and the depression and the denial, and the fake optimism and the irritation of it all -- and just saying, 'Hey, I'm tired of feeling bad about this. Now I go on.' "

You know you're chronically ill when you...

...have a pajama collection.

...call the pharmacist and she recognizes your voice before you tell her what it is.

...are excited that Zofran has gone generic.

...are psyched to get a computer table tray for sitting in bed as a gift.

...find out that you can order a three month supply of meds online and you think it's great.

...share and discuss journal articles with your doctor.

...have an inbox full of emails all from people with your disease or related to your disease.

...get updates from MedScape.

...set up your pills a month ahead of time in pill holders.

...have pill stashes in your car, purse, backpack, etc.

Feel free to add your own! :)

Big Hole Crest Trail: snow and mud!

The view for most of the "run"

Paul and I ran, scrambled, slipped and pondered the Big Hole Crest Trail on Sunday. It was warm, snowy and muddy. We started out in the South Fork of Horseshoe and came out at Corral Creek. Because of all of the snow and a missed turn, we had a detour down a really hot canyon (twice!). I took 5 mg of HC/hour and used salt pills. I skipped my 11 am and 2 pm HC doses opting for taking a little HC at a time.

Paul, pondering one of the many huge mud pits

Lots of blowdown at the Horseshoe end of the trail

More blowdown

It's summer and there's still LOTS of snow

Beautiful!

Part of the trail, it went up and over the highest point of that hill

One of many, many snow fields

Look in the middle of the picture and you can see a trail going STRAIGHT up the hill to the highest, farthest away point. We had to come down that to find the trail that we should have been on. When we reached this gate, all of the trail markers were laying on the ground, broken from a winter of deep snow

Indian Paintbrush