a randomly written two day effort at a blog

no time to blog yesterday. got up at 6am and was out the door for a short 4 mile run in very cold temps and saw nobody while i was out. on 4 hours sleep i was surprised how awake i felt and how i had remembered to turn the
clocks ahead, but never thought about how dark it would now be early in the morning. always pretty to watch the sun rise over the potomac, but today the run would start and end in the dark.

quickie bowl of cereal and yogurt and off to philly. the cars tires were still a tad warped from sitting still, but they would iron themselves out over the miles. some light traffic, but not bad for a sunday. saturday's trip to philly had fallen ill to bad weather. up 95 i went and was too early for either the nike outlet store or golf galaxy- two of my favorite quick hits on the way up.

i had bruce, kate wolf, leonard cohen, gordon lightfoot and big and rich for company on the way and must confess that at one point i listen to "the river" 4 times in a row. if you haven't heard the song "the 8th of november" do yourself a favor and listen to it on you tube. all good stuff and i sailed up stopping once to top off the gas tank with liquid gold and buy a washington post. was a treat to be able to not read it on-line.

nice day at my mom's, whose life is even more on repeat than my own, but just barely. ate too much as usual after doing the list of things that waited for me to come back from the UK. then headed back down the road to home.

dark ride back but all went well despite some tie-ups in delaware until just before the wilson bridge, where there was a huge accident on the right side of the road and as i inched past it 25 minutes later i could still hear people screaming. didn't look good at all and even the tractor trailer had parts hanging down from the chassis. not a good sign that someone hit it that hard.

to home and threw in some laundry and climbed up on the bike. i can never sleep after driving back no matter that i must have had 20 hours of sleep in the last 5 days. did 28 miles on the lifecycle and just stayed steady at 95 rpm's and 24 mph. not true to outside riding, but a decent workout to go with the early morning 4 miles.

done at 1:30 am and grabbed almost 5 hours of sleep and woke up just before the phone rang from england. talked a bit as i stretched and dressed and then out the door again and up to the track.

morning track has always been one of my favorite runs. who knows why? the track is quiet except for the birds chirping and it is usually too early for other people.
and having not been on the track for awhile i was curious to see how much the right leg training i have been doing has mattered.

ran 18 x 200 and then 2 x 400. did 3 sets of 6 with each one faster than the one before. did the 5th and 6th mindfully using my right leg in a real stride and that went ok for the most part. i can see the progress. around # 15 i could feel some tightening and did the last 3 as relaxed as i could. then i ran the 400's trying to run the first 3 x 100 at the same pace and kicked it in a bit on the 4th 100. that went well. ran enough cool down to actually recover and also to get 7 miles total done. just as i was leaving some walkers came onto the track. good timing for all of us.

almost hard to believe that there are people who don't like running. cheap and easy exercise. yesterday in usa weekend there was an article about pam anderson, the cute cooksmart columnist, not the enhanced actress person. this pam was a runner and is so much better looking than the other pam, but in the article she says something i just love about running- some paraphrasing follows-
this is not torture; this is not work. this is loving myself in a healthy
way....

and my favorite--
the great thing about running is, you don't have to be athletic. you just
have to endure.

she has a good book out on the perfect recipes for losing weight.

anyway- the day went on after the run and several appts to have various things checked out and done or bought. all good for now. then to the range to try and find a piece of a golf swing and a little bit of rhythm. but nobody was on the first tee, so i thought i would jump out and see if i could still hit off of grass.

not used to being nervous on a golf course and playing by myself was surprised i felt that way. managed to get around and survive the few really bad shots and some decent ones. had a 37 on the par 31- not pretty and very few well struck balls that went straight as the solid hits seemed determined to hook their way around, but two good chips and one great putt and that was ok. then went back and played 5 more holes and even birdied the 4th hole with about an 18 foot putt. all in all an ok start and now to lose the hook and get some tempo and confidence back. hit 150 balls after i played and putted and chipped some.

i would fly dr bob rotella in to talk to me, but the plane needs some work so i will drive to baltimore instead and talk to someone i trust.

home in time to do some yard work and more laundry and write out some bills. a big bowl of raisin bran with a dying banana and the day is completed. not much of a blog today, but that is the way the day went. i had a better day than the governor of new york i can tell you. poor guy. another guy with two brains and the one on his neck not fully functioning.

a little luck and a decent attitude and life can be pretty interesting even in its most mundane moments. on the other hand, everything you say or write can be argued against. isn't the bell curve a great thing?