I hope it's worth it

After suffering from knee pains after nearly every ride, I haven't ridden my bike since last friday and I haven't worked out at all (although moving out of charlottesville all weekend contributed to that as well). I'm going to shell out some money to get my bike fitted professionally at a local bike shop tomorrow and will probably join my mom on another bike ride. I'm hoping that the fitting and the knee brace I just bought will take care of my knee problems and let me focus on getting ready for the trip.

I am also trying to do research for my portion of the presentation I have to do about affordable housing on the trip. My topic is housing initiatives in the 1970s and 1980s. I'm having trouble with this because a) it's a broad topic, b) I haven't written a research paper since my second year and am at a loss with where to start, and c) I don't have access to all the databases I've been spoiled with over the last four years. I think tomorrow I'm going to hunker down in a local library to try to look up some information. I shouldn't have put it off so long seeing as how I have to have my information turned in tomorrow but to be honest I kind of forgot about it with all the craziness of the last month.

This weekend I won't be able to train because I'm going to visit my dad's family in Philadelphia. I haven't seen them since January and miss them a lot. My little cousin just turned one and I can't wait to see how much he's grown. My grandma is very worried about me and this trip. Every time I talk about the trip with her she tell me I shouldn't do it. I told her I'd just tell her I decided not to go and make up reasons why I can't visit her over the summer. I don't think she bought it. When my mom was expressing her concerns to my other grandma, that grandma told her "of course she can do it." Many of my friends have expressed a similar sentiment and it has really calmed my fears to know that I have so many people who believe in me.

What has also helped calm these fears is group e-mails. Someone started a thread about training and a couple of people were talking about their training rides. Then another person responded "training, what training?" and let me know that I'm not alone in feeling a little behind in that department. I'm glad to know I won't be alone in being relatively new to biking.

Finally, I'm still far short of my fundraising goal. If you would be willing to donate, please go to the bike and build website, click on donate, and select my name. I need online donations by June 2nd.