LAAATE.

Punctuality is a very important thing in my life. Tardiness represents disrespect in my opinion. If I am late to my commitment, it means I don't respect that commitment enough to get my act together to arrive on time. If you are late to meeting me, I feel disrespected. Call me. crazy, but that's my mindset.

I was super tired and fairly cranky when I got home from work last night (shocking, I know). I was trying to decompress from a long day and to mentally organize my plans for the next day (today). My team had a game and I knew it was going to be on the far south side of the city. I was going back and forth between biking there and taking a public transportation. Both would take ages. I looked up the routes for both and decided to sleep on it. The game was to be at 1:00 so I needed to be there at 11:45-12:00 for warm up. I set my alarm for 7am-- plenty of time to wake up figure out which mode of transportation to embrace, and get there stress free. ...HA.

So I finally rolled out of bed at 7:30 this morning. As I poured a bowl of Fiber One (which by the way isn't all the commercial makes it out to be...), I thought to myself wouldn't it be awful if the game was at 10:00am? I'm so glad it's not....... It's not, right? .....RIGHT?! I ran to my computer to check the weekly schedule email from the varsity coach. Lo and behold, my game was to start at 10:00. I may have used a choice word or two. PANIC PANIC PANIC. I am going to be LATE! I don't disrespect them! I have lectured them SO MANY TIMES about being on time! AAAAAHHHHHHHH.

Let the scramble begin: I threw clothes on and waved the magic mascara wand over my eyelashes WHILST brushing my teeth. I was out the door by 8:15--- a mere 45 minutes before warm up. Somewhere in the whirlwind of getting ready to go I decided to bike-- it was a fairly direct route, and this way I'd be in control. Sure a bus can travel faster than a bike, BUT, a bike was available to me RIGHT THEN, I didn't have to wait for it. I didn't have to switch bikes when I was halfway there. I didn't have to worry that my bike wouldn't come. And most of all, I wouldn't be sitting on a bus watching time go by, but I could use my adrenaline producing panic at being late to my advantage to go faster on my bike.

What bike did she use? You may ask. I recently got a cheap junker from Craig's List. It's not awesome, but it's (slightly) more reliable than IH. So I rode it.

I pedaled. Each pedal stroke I recited the address of my destination so I wouldn't forget. For the first mile or so of the 11 mile journey, I kept hitting stop lights and was getting irritated. HELLOOO DIDN'T THEY KNOW I WAS IN A HURRY?! Then I kept hitting green lights which at first I was very pleased with. After a while I was ready for a rest! Haha. I pedaled like there was no tomorrow. Mentally I drifted back to the triathlon. I felt both excitement and dread for it. Excited because it is ultimately fun, dread because my quads were burning already. After about 45 minutes of crazy biking, I saw a huge bridge. Even the slightest rise in altitude is potentiated by the fact that there are essentially no legit inclines around here. I gulped as I stared up at the Everest of the Midwest and started pedaling. I down-shifted, I got out of the saddle I huffed and puffed. I heard a siren nearby and was embarrassed that someone thought I looked so distraught they'd called me an ambulance! Luckily I was wrong and no one cared quite that much. At the top I gasped and wheezed and vowed to get a new inhaler STAT.

Down the bridge and a couple more miles, and I was finally there! I made it, thirteen minutes LAAATE to the warm up. I apologized profusely to my team who graciously forgave me and ended up winning their game. And then I made the trek back in a much less panicked fashion. Phew.