eclaire (what’s in a) name?

i just read a very interesting article in the new york times (thanks, dad!) about female swim coaches – somewhat surprisingly there are very few of them in the competitive swimming world – and only three who coach 2008 olympians, all of whom reside in california.

i just don’t get the preconceptions that female coaches will be “easy” or “less competitive” than male coaches, but that’s probably because when i was in high school we had an awesome, laid back male coach who created loooong, grueling workouts for our afternoon practices. but in the morning (we’re talking 6am monday-friday, people), we had this gnarly female coach who made us focus on stroke refinement instead of yardage. i believe it’s due to her that i dropped so much time in my events my senior year – as well as the reason why i was able to in turn teach swim lessons for almost a decade. i ran into her a couple of weeks ago when i went swimming with my mom at ucsc, and she’s still going strong with the coaching, setting up the next generation of swimmers for success.

ok, enough from me, check out this article:

Women Jumping in as Elite Swim Coaches

ps- is anybody else excited about the summer olympics? i don’t know bout all of you, but i plan on spending all of my free time in front of the tv, watching my favorite summer sports!

this could potentially be quite exciting for all of you out there who don’t own an ipod nano, but are interested in utilizing the nike+….there’s no cost listed yet, but it’s expected to be available on april 10:

http://www.uncrate.com/men/gear/sports/nike-sportband/

a very honest and very dear to my heart person asked me frankly yesterday: “is is even worth my time to read your blog?  i mean, you never post, soooo…..”

i have been quite a slacker this month, and i completely apologize, dear readers.  i have a post almost complete with all the fun stuff i did this month that kept me from posting.  but until then, just know that eclaire is back on the scene.

mike and i are sitting outside at the bagelry right now, consuming delicious bagels and iced tea while taking advantage of their free wireless internet (thanks, cruzio). inside my honest iced tea, the quote says: “guilt is the gift that keeps on giving.” touche, iced tea, now i see why they call you honest.

jessi highlighted the website stuff white people like in a recent blog post, and while i’ve been *meaning* to read it, i haven’t spent much time on the site. luckily, mike sent me the link to the website’s post about bottled water this morning.

when i clicked on the link, i had one hand on the mouse and the other wrapped around my metal sigg water bottle, full of filtered water that our office provides. i was about to take a large swig, but ended up uncontrollably laughing out loud at my desk. i immediately tried to muffle the laughter with a pretend cough so people in the surrounding cubes wouldn’t get suspicious that i was reading a funny blog, but it didn’t really work, and kind of sounded like a sneeze. (i only read blogs on my breaks, i swear!)

so anyways, if you need a good laugh you should check the blog out yourself – just make sure you do so before taking a swig of that filtered and/or bottled water, lest you end up spitting it all out of your mouth and nose as the unavoidable laughter ensues.