Hard. Core.

I know longer fear the pain of natural childbirth. Why? I've shampooed my hair with 14 open blisters on my left hand.

The schedule:
7 am: wake up
7:45-9:45: power strokes
10 am: breakfast
11 - noon: technical work
1 pm: lunch
1:30-2:30: nap
3 - 5pm: rate pieces
shower, chill, hang out, do academic work if you can hold your eyelids up
8:30: dinner
9pm: debriefing from head coach
10 pm: lights out
11 pm: listen to screams/giggles of team mates falling victim to practical jokes. pray german national tean on floor below doesn't have energy to start a war.

training camp was awesome. there's just way too much to tell. take me out and buy me a drink and i'll talk about it all night, but here are the highlights:

• I love quads. best boat ever. everything i love about an 8 plus everything i love about a single scull in one craft. genius. best of both worlds. exhileration times 50.
• i love alpine likes. we were on the olympic course used in the barcelona games. it's situated in the foothills of the pyranees, surrounded by green hills and snow-capped mountains. still, beautiful, secluded, misty, frosty, flat, freezing cold and full of bird shit.
• i love men. i love living with 20 perpetually half-naked men, blossoming into their manhood with petals of broad shoulders, long backs, and rippling thighs. there was so much eye candy i damn near got cavities in my corneas. and of course...
• i love rowing. even on the sloggy freezing wet dribbly sleeting outings, i love the power, the synchronization, ambition, desire, the clunk (you know what i mean), whe water rushing past under the shell, the sweat, the heaving, the burn, the blisters, the calluses, the desire. i love it all. i never want to stop. i'm perfectly happy doing nothing all day but eating (not as much as i want, but as much as i possibly can), sleeping (given 20 minutes and a flat surface), and rowing (or sculling). it's utopia, paradise. the outside world ceases to exist, the only terrorists are the doubt-demons in my head 7K into 10K ergo, and if you pass out and collapse there are 20 pairs of hands attached to strong, caring team mates to carry you back to your bunk. it's the perfect womb for infantile athletes who fear and loathe the real world. like me.