Speaking of Reality Getting in the Way of Training

Despite the travel, I started last week quite well, cooking vegetarian meals at home before our departure, and getting in just under 5 easy miles over the first 3 days.

Brown rice mushroom risotto, Turkish salad, broiled broccoli rabe.

Thursday, I headed out for hill repeats, as we were staying with friends who live on a serious hill.

I was quite proud of this workout.

Friday, I took the day off, as I was speaking in two sessions at the conference.  But Saturday AM, I headed out for what I'd hoped would be a nice solid 6 miles.  Instead, around 1.5 miles, I tripped on a curb cut and flew forward.  When I tried to catch myself with my right hand, I felt and heard the terrible noise of my shoulder dislocating.

Unfortunately, I couldn't put it back in and I couldn't get ahold of E to come help me because he was in the shower.  So, a kind passerby stopped to call 911 and I begged with the fire and paramedics to relocate my shoulder... nope.  I rode to the hospital with it out, and then spent time being checked in, evaluated, x-rayed to confirm that yes, it actually was out (and nothing was broken).  After over an hour and a half, the doctor finally helped me to relocate the shoulder.

Santa Monica Sunsets never get old.

Folks, even if you have a loose shoulder with some of the supporting structures damaged, it REALLY hurts to have your shoulder dislocated.  Every extra minute that it is out is quite painful.  Thankfully, once it was back in, I could manage the pain with ibuprofen.  E and I got out of the hospital in time for him to give his talk at the conference and then we spent a nice day in Santa Monica before flying to the annual E family ski trip.

Telluride is beautiful, even if you can't ski.

Needless to say, I'm not skiing this ski trip.  I'm bruised and a little sore, but the real danger is just that I don't want it to dislocate again.  Today, I'm going to head out and try some easy miles on a very flat path that I saw on the drive in -- I'm hopeful I can still complete the 12K I'd been training for, but only time will tell if that's a good plan or not.  Long term, I likely have some shoulder surgery in my future, which is not going to be fun, as it'll likely include 8 weeks of aggressive recovery, with much of it in a sling (no real running).