Fact of the Day from scotsman.com
In 1544 the Earl of Hertford invaded Scotland in an attempt to force the Scottish estates to agree to the marriage of Edward, son of Henry VIII, and Mary Queen of Scots. Known as "The Rough Wooing", it resulted in the burning and destruction of Border towns and abbeys and of Edinburgh.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
a very nice and sunny start of the day as i went out and went as slowly as i could around the usual 4 mile loop; short enough to get some recovery in and enough to keep the head at bay. pretty along the river, though the water was quite a greenish brown color. warm also as the temps would head up towards 70 and each day this week is predicted to be warmer than the day before. UV a 5 and i will have to keep an eye on that, but being out early enough should help.
afterwards gail and i headed up to the wed. morning market for the usual stuff one might buy at a safeway back home. then we went spent a little time at the coffee shop reading newspapers and gail having coffee. and then walked home. the day of recovery now had 7 miles in it.
later i went up to the range. yesterday had gone so badly that i was truly discouraged. after several good days where i thought i had been making progress, yesterday had seemed like a giant step backwards. weak, thin and right- mostly heel hitting and i could not figure it out at the time. then last night i spent some time in front of a mirror and thought i found the problem. so today i was off to try the fix.
and it went pretty well though i kept to irons only and nothing longer than the 6. wasn't all great, but mostly pretty good and i can now add one more thing to check when things go south. i suppose it helps to know your tendencies and this one had been pointed out by kathleen sometime back. spent about 30 minutes chipping as the grassy area was being used most of the time i was there, but i hung around to get some in. then hit a few edges and 9irons and went home.
did some more online banking and listened to a one hour documentary on roger bannister's 3:59.4 minute mile record. tried to call back to the states but the network has been busy.
and another day about over. hillary seems about done also. time for obama to start attacking mc cain now and getting on with winning the white house back for sanity. also a good chance to find out just how far the country has come in many ways. are we ready for the future or are we stuck in the past? listening to some of the interviews given after voting i am not sure. but we will see.
Wednesday, May 07, 2008
Tuesday, May 06, 2008
a sunny tuesday may 6th
oxford mail newspaper says that on this day in 1954 roger bannister ran the first sub-4 minute mile on the iffley road track in oxford, in 3:59.4 --- i believe it was a cinder track then and is now the high tech track we see everywhere today. i mentioned that i have joined that track and run there when i can and there are many little plaque like things on the inside of the track signifying people who have run great races. it is a really nice facility and as the only public track around that i know of, gets plenty of use.
will blog more about the book i am reading now-"the perfect mile" which i am really enjoying and find so motivating. only about 120 pages into it but will wrap it up this week. i even used the training stuff in the book about john landy to get myself out the door this morning despite knowing i could use the day off. landy ran up to 12 x 600 yard intervals at 4:20 mile pace five times a week while the other two days he ran 7 miles at 5:20 -6:00 pace; every week not missing. this while going full time to school and having to sneak out to do these workouts at about midnight.
so this morning with john landy as inspiration and a morning heart rate of 47 (was up to 54 when i went to sleep last night)and despite gail saying "weren't you going to take today off?" out the door i went about 7:15am. and i ran down binsy lane and across bottley road and down oatlands road and did the long loop around the park and bike path there and though i was moving none too fast, i was moving ok and eventually i ram myself back over to the made up stretch of track. and there i proceeded to run 32 x 100 yard intervals. on very wet grass, but on a very nice morning with the temperature just over 50 and warming up as the morning went on.
gail had come out and was running her loops around the park while i did the 100's. i had a good workout and ran more consistently than i had the other day, though i was never quite able to get down to that day's fastest times. had the usual right leg problems, but ran through that. will be good to get back and have that worked on again. even used the right leg to run some of the last set. afterwards i stretched and then ran the loop around the park and headed home. the longer warm-up had helped some and will try to keep that in mind. should be easier to that again now that the winter weather and rain may be behind us at last. time will tell.
after usual morning stuff i headed up to the city center and did some bank and post office stuff. lines were unusually long as they were both closed yesterday. then did just a bit of shopping and headed home. and eventually headed up to the range to try and build on the last few days of somewhat decent hitting and chipping. but it was not to be and to use the british phrase, i was total rubbish. 150 balls of mostly hitting off of the heel part of the club and though they still were mostly straight, they weren't hit clean or high or long for the most part as they have been more and more lately. chipping went ok despite being frustrated. i tried all the usual stuff, but nothing worked today. my friend dave was having the same sort of problem and eventually we just both end ed up hitting 40 yard pitch shots and playing closest to the pin. we couldn't decide whether if you are hitting "rubbish" and you keep at it trying to work through it, are you ingraining all of the bad stuff and does it cause long term hurt. or should you just quit and come back another day? and of course on the last ball i hit, i hit a beautiful high gap wedge to the green 107 away and next to the flag. i hate this game sometimes. don't tease me, sometimes just let me keep sucking.
and home to listen to last night's usa news and have dinner. tired enough now and tomorrow is a needed market day. legs had been ok after the run, but the driving range had taken its toll. will punish myself some more tomorrow.
before i stop wanted to say congrats to Salane Flanagan, who broke the usa women's record for 10k this past weekend, running it in 30:34.49. she crushed the old mark by 17 seconds, kicking by kim smith of new zealand with 200 meters to go. this took lace at the payton jordan cardinal invitational in palo alto, calif.
and of course a big fist pump congrats to paula creamer for winning again this past weekend in a playoff. the lady in pink has become a real star.
until later.... 84 and a wake-up to go.
will blog more about the book i am reading now-"the perfect mile" which i am really enjoying and find so motivating. only about 120 pages into it but will wrap it up this week. i even used the training stuff in the book about john landy to get myself out the door this morning despite knowing i could use the day off. landy ran up to 12 x 600 yard intervals at 4:20 mile pace five times a week while the other two days he ran 7 miles at 5:20 -6:00 pace; every week not missing. this while going full time to school and having to sneak out to do these workouts at about midnight.
so this morning with john landy as inspiration and a morning heart rate of 47 (was up to 54 when i went to sleep last night)and despite gail saying "weren't you going to take today off?" out the door i went about 7:15am. and i ran down binsy lane and across bottley road and down oatlands road and did the long loop around the park and bike path there and though i was moving none too fast, i was moving ok and eventually i ram myself back over to the made up stretch of track. and there i proceeded to run 32 x 100 yard intervals. on very wet grass, but on a very nice morning with the temperature just over 50 and warming up as the morning went on.
gail had come out and was running her loops around the park while i did the 100's. i had a good workout and ran more consistently than i had the other day, though i was never quite able to get down to that day's fastest times. had the usual right leg problems, but ran through that. will be good to get back and have that worked on again. even used the right leg to run some of the last set. afterwards i stretched and then ran the loop around the park and headed home. the longer warm-up had helped some and will try to keep that in mind. should be easier to that again now that the winter weather and rain may be behind us at last. time will tell.
after usual morning stuff i headed up to the city center and did some bank and post office stuff. lines were unusually long as they were both closed yesterday. then did just a bit of shopping and headed home. and eventually headed up to the range to try and build on the last few days of somewhat decent hitting and chipping. but it was not to be and to use the british phrase, i was total rubbish. 150 balls of mostly hitting off of the heel part of the club and though they still were mostly straight, they weren't hit clean or high or long for the most part as they have been more and more lately. chipping went ok despite being frustrated. i tried all the usual stuff, but nothing worked today. my friend dave was having the same sort of problem and eventually we just both end ed up hitting 40 yard pitch shots and playing closest to the pin. we couldn't decide whether if you are hitting "rubbish" and you keep at it trying to work through it, are you ingraining all of the bad stuff and does it cause long term hurt. or should you just quit and come back another day? and of course on the last ball i hit, i hit a beautiful high gap wedge to the green 107 away and next to the flag. i hate this game sometimes. don't tease me, sometimes just let me keep sucking.
and home to listen to last night's usa news and have dinner. tired enough now and tomorrow is a needed market day. legs had been ok after the run, but the driving range had taken its toll. will punish myself some more tomorrow.
before i stop wanted to say congrats to Salane Flanagan, who broke the usa women's record for 10k this past weekend, running it in 30:34.49. she crushed the old mark by 17 seconds, kicking by kim smith of new zealand with 200 meters to go. this took lace at the payton jordan cardinal invitational in palo alto, calif.
and of course a big fist pump congrats to paula creamer for winning again this past weekend in a playoff. the lady in pink has become a real star.
until later.... 84 and a wake-up to go.
Monday, May 05, 2008
and onto monday, a rainy start...
so the rain that was due at 4pm came in early. having run two days in a row gail rested her plantar/heel and i went out in a reasonably cold rain and dark skies. knowing i was tired decided to go as easy as possible and stay out for awhile and then decide about taking tomorrow off later. even a bad plan is a plan, and this is not one i would force on my runners, but i figured i had enough experience to adjust on the fly and newbies like to do exactly what you tell them despite how they feel and what they didn't tell you about that.
this turned out to be quite the convoluted route and i will try and simplify it or those reading- like anyone but me cares. up binsey lane and over to the rainbow bridge and through port meadow was the start. the usual cows and horses were out in the rain and the trail was pretty muddy, some puddles not easily avoided, especially around the gates where puddles like to form. being a bank holiday today there were more people out than usual at this early hour.
i ran out the port meadow gate and turned left so i could take the long route to university parks and also to see if i could find the little art gallery i had seen last week. did run past the gallery again further away than i remembered and will come back to it later in the week. ran all the way past st margaret's hall and down the road to the back gate for a change. gail and i had used this gate two years ago when we were staying in summertown. summertown is a smaller version of old town back home.
into the park and i did the long loop around the outside taking me past the pond and then cut back and ran the inside trails to add some distance. the flowers were more in bloom than when beth and i had come through here several weeks back now. seems like yesterday. met a few nice people here and stopped for a second at a memorial bench to say hi to marcus sutton. his bench is really recent and the plaque is nice and simple and just says-"he ran here". i tried to google him but came up empty. anyway, i like to think that when i run here i run for him and use his strength on the days like today when i am tired. cannot explain that in a way that makes sense probably.
back in the days when i lived at oakwood in falls church i would run in the cemetery right there at the corner which had 2 good hills and one 1/4 mile circle at the top. and i would always pick out a name on a stone and dedicate that day's run to them. always felt inspirational. only one friend of mine would there with me and that was steve thompson. it wasn't his favorite place to run, but we would turn it into a fartlek workout and that appeased him. should find a place to put a bench in steve's name when i get home. funny how you miss people...
at any rate, as my old billy budd friend used to say, i ran on through university park and eventually out the back gate and down st cross road. plan was to look for gail on her way to the bodleian thinking she would wait for the rain to die down a bit before she walked the two+ miles there.
st. cross road is a neat old road which runs past many colleges, including good old bill clinton's himself. went past "linacre" college where they were building new dorms and then "new" and "balliol" college and of course, "st. cross" college and cut back over to the hollywell st. quad. then past the library and no gail yet. ran down the road and stopped briefly at her favorite coffee shop, but still no gail, so turned and went back to the bank's "hole in the wall" machine, an ATM to we americans.
and then just ran back on the road i knew gail would take and eventually made it all the way home where she still was. and the rain was about stopped now. 8 miles of rain and one of drizzle. an ok outing despite tired legs and quads. what gets one through days like these is the miles already run for strength. hope to build on that, but either way it is nice knowing i can still enjoy being out. need to carry that attitude over to the go course more often, though i think it is easier on the course itself than the driving range. in perspective it should be easy on the range also as you work on stuff there and can expect it to not always go well. Ha ha on me.
some more laundry done and breakfast finished and the sun is sort of out behind the clouds and maybe i will go hit some balls. maybe- but more later on i hope...........
this turned out to be quite the convoluted route and i will try and simplify it or those reading- like anyone but me cares. up binsey lane and over to the rainbow bridge and through port meadow was the start. the usual cows and horses were out in the rain and the trail was pretty muddy, some puddles not easily avoided, especially around the gates where puddles like to form. being a bank holiday today there were more people out than usual at this early hour.
i ran out the port meadow gate and turned left so i could take the long route to university parks and also to see if i could find the little art gallery i had seen last week. did run past the gallery again further away than i remembered and will come back to it later in the week. ran all the way past st margaret's hall and down the road to the back gate for a change. gail and i had used this gate two years ago when we were staying in summertown. summertown is a smaller version of old town back home.
into the park and i did the long loop around the outside taking me past the pond and then cut back and ran the inside trails to add some distance. the flowers were more in bloom than when beth and i had come through here several weeks back now. seems like yesterday. met a few nice people here and stopped for a second at a memorial bench to say hi to marcus sutton. his bench is really recent and the plaque is nice and simple and just says-"he ran here". i tried to google him but came up empty. anyway, i like to think that when i run here i run for him and use his strength on the days like today when i am tired. cannot explain that in a way that makes sense probably.
back in the days when i lived at oakwood in falls church i would run in the cemetery right there at the corner which had 2 good hills and one 1/4 mile circle at the top. and i would always pick out a name on a stone and dedicate that day's run to them. always felt inspirational. only one friend of mine would there with me and that was steve thompson. it wasn't his favorite place to run, but we would turn it into a fartlek workout and that appeased him. should find a place to put a bench in steve's name when i get home. funny how you miss people...
at any rate, as my old billy budd friend used to say, i ran on through university park and eventually out the back gate and down st cross road. plan was to look for gail on her way to the bodleian thinking she would wait for the rain to die down a bit before she walked the two+ miles there.
st. cross road is a neat old road which runs past many colleges, including good old bill clinton's himself. went past "linacre" college where they were building new dorms and then "new" and "balliol" college and of course, "st. cross" college and cut back over to the hollywell st. quad. then past the library and no gail yet. ran down the road and stopped briefly at her favorite coffee shop, but still no gail, so turned and went back to the bank's "hole in the wall" machine, an ATM to we americans.
and then just ran back on the road i knew gail would take and eventually made it all the way home where she still was. and the rain was about stopped now. 8 miles of rain and one of drizzle. an ok outing despite tired legs and quads. what gets one through days like these is the miles already run for strength. hope to build on that, but either way it is nice knowing i can still enjoy being out. need to carry that attitude over to the go course more often, though i think it is easier on the course itself than the driving range. in perspective it should be easy on the range also as you work on stuff there and can expect it to not always go well. Ha ha on me.
some more laundry done and breakfast finished and the sun is sort of out behind the clouds and maybe i will go hit some balls. maybe- but more later on i hope...........
Sunday, May 04, 2008
Despite Alert, Flawed Wiring Still Kills G.I.’s - New York Times
as if fighting in a war isn't bad enough... maybe i was lucky to spend most of my viet nam time living in a tent. -lt
Despite Alert, Flawed Wiring Still Kills G.I.’s - New York Times
Despite Alert, Flawed Wiring Still Kills G.I.’s - New York Times
sunday - a day late
funny how i must have just done this day's blog in my head, but it is monday now; yesterday i went out early to run and gail was going to come out later and meet me which she did. i ran the loop around king edward park over to the made up track and ran 32 x 100's. was a good workout and i was surprised to see that my legs were almost ok, though i knew i would pay for it soon. had debated taking the day off, but decided to keep going until i really needed it off. ran 5 sets of 6 and then two relaxed. each set was two working on breathing, two using the right leg and two with the second 50 yards faster. a made up workout for sure, but a good way to get some faster stuff in and made it easy on the head this way. the last two were just relaxed to see what pace i could do those in without really trying. for those reading this who have not done any form of speedwork, you would find that once you start a workout your legs sort of get locked into a pace. the last two were incredibly easy just over 7 minute pace. to be sure these were just 100's, but i use my own plan for training which has served me well over the last thirty years and simply adjust for age and circumstances. always liked individualizing plans for runners rather than stock workouts for everyone.
gail had come out and done some of her own workout and then headed home. i stayed out long enough to run the trail down to north hinksey and then back again so i could get 10 miles in. another 60+ week. all good, and have about 3-4 weeks to go to really get going with the longer track stuff. will do a time trial soon.
the rest of the day was pretty normal. we had breakfast and took a quick read of the sunday paper. reading about the election here was interesting and it seems like gordon brown and his party are in big trouble. about time to start thinking of what the people want i should think. the newly elected mayor in london really showed how weak brown's party is. hope it goes that way at home. the press here seems to attack everyone and they have a mu more aggressive style of interviewing than in the usa. there we only attack democrats.
gail went off to watch show jumping and then to write some more of her book and i went up to hit some balls. so-so day doing that, but got some good chipping in. someday will be nice to get back on a golf course. i have learned some new short shots and will eventually get the speed and distance down. for now i chip towards the river and then away from the river.
after dinner we took a long walk up around the neighborhood and the thames. all in all another ok day. and one less to go.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fact of the Day - from scotsman.com
Margaret Thatcher became the first woman Prime Minister of the United Kingdom on this day in 1979. She was the longest serving Prime Minister in the 20th century, and remained until she resigned and was replaced by John Major in 1990.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
from crooks and liars-
i keep looking for passion and even anger in the dems, but they show so little-lt
Glenn Greenwald will be hosting the Book Salon over at FireDogLake to discuss Arianna Huffington’s latest, Right is Wrong: How the Lunatic Fringe Hijacked America, Shredded the Constitution, and Made Us All Less Safe right now at 2:00 pm Pacific/ 5:00 pm Eastern. From the Amazon Editorial Review:
Huffington makes the case that America has been hijacked from within by a radical element—the “lunatic fringe” of the Right that has taken over the Republican Party. Despite holding views at odds with the majority of Americans, these zealots have given us an endless war in Iraq, a sputtering economy, a health care system on life support, a war on science and reason, and an immoral embrace of torture.
But they haven’t done it on their own: they have been enabled by a compliant media that act as if there is no such thing as truth and are more interested in cozying up to those in power than in holding them accountable, and by feckless Democrats who have allowed themselves to be intimidated into backing down again and again.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Did You Know? - forgot where i saw this-lt
Scottish stonemasons were hired to build and carve the sandstone walls of the White House. Painters then covered the walls in 1798 with a whitewash to keep water and ice from seeping inside the walls and breaking them apart. So it was white from the beginning
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
from crooks and liars blog
For the last 2 weeks the Republican Party and a GOP front group, Freedom’s Watch, has been pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into deceptive TV smears linking conservative Democrat Don Cazayoux to Rev. Wright via Obama. But last night Louisiana voters just scratched their heads and voted against the Bush Regime/McCain agenda. This is a district (LA-06)– centered on Baton Rouge– that has a PVI of R +10 and gave Bush 59% of the vote in 2006. Cazayoux took 49,702 votes (49.20%) to extreme right-wing Republican Woody Jenkins’ 46,741 votes (46.27%). This ups the Democratic margin in the House 235-198. You think the congressional Republicans are nervous? Keep this in mind– when Alf Landon only got 36.6% of the vote in 1936 so many Republican members of Congress were defeated that only 17 senators were left standing!
UPDATE: DCCC Chair Chris Van Hollen and Speaker Pelosi congratulate Don.
Van Hollen: For the second time this cycle, Republicans were reminded that ‘all politics is local.’ House Republicans tried to nationalize this election, illegally coordinated with Freedom’s Watch, used false and deceptive special interest smears, and funneled nearly a million dollars into a district that Republicans held for more than three decades. Don won by focusing on the concerns of LA-06 voters – good paying jobs, affordable health care, and better education.
gail had come out and done some of her own workout and then headed home. i stayed out long enough to run the trail down to north hinksey and then back again so i could get 10 miles in. another 60+ week. all good, and have about 3-4 weeks to go to really get going with the longer track stuff. will do a time trial soon.
the rest of the day was pretty normal. we had breakfast and took a quick read of the sunday paper. reading about the election here was interesting and it seems like gordon brown and his party are in big trouble. about time to start thinking of what the people want i should think. the newly elected mayor in london really showed how weak brown's party is. hope it goes that way at home. the press here seems to attack everyone and they have a mu more aggressive style of interviewing than in the usa. there we only attack democrats.
gail went off to watch show jumping and then to write some more of her book and i went up to hit some balls. so-so day doing that, but got some good chipping in. someday will be nice to get back on a golf course. i have learned some new short shots and will eventually get the speed and distance down. for now i chip towards the river and then away from the river.
after dinner we took a long walk up around the neighborhood and the thames. all in all another ok day. and one less to go.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fact of the Day - from scotsman.com
Margaret Thatcher became the first woman Prime Minister of the United Kingdom on this day in 1979. She was the longest serving Prime Minister in the 20th century, and remained until she resigned and was replaced by John Major in 1990.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
from crooks and liars-
i keep looking for passion and even anger in the dems, but they show so little-lt
Glenn Greenwald will be hosting the Book Salon over at FireDogLake to discuss Arianna Huffington’s latest, Right is Wrong: How the Lunatic Fringe Hijacked America, Shredded the Constitution, and Made Us All Less Safe right now at 2:00 pm Pacific/ 5:00 pm Eastern. From the Amazon Editorial Review:
Huffington makes the case that America has been hijacked from within by a radical element—the “lunatic fringe” of the Right that has taken over the Republican Party. Despite holding views at odds with the majority of Americans, these zealots have given us an endless war in Iraq, a sputtering economy, a health care system on life support, a war on science and reason, and an immoral embrace of torture.
But they haven’t done it on their own: they have been enabled by a compliant media that act as if there is no such thing as truth and are more interested in cozying up to those in power than in holding them accountable, and by feckless Democrats who have allowed themselves to be intimidated into backing down again and again.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Did You Know? - forgot where i saw this-lt
Scottish stonemasons were hired to build and carve the sandstone walls of the White House. Painters then covered the walls in 1798 with a whitewash to keep water and ice from seeping inside the walls and breaking them apart. So it was white from the beginning
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
from crooks and liars blog
For the last 2 weeks the Republican Party and a GOP front group, Freedom’s Watch, has been pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into deceptive TV smears linking conservative Democrat Don Cazayoux to Rev. Wright via Obama. But last night Louisiana voters just scratched their heads and voted against the Bush Regime/McCain agenda. This is a district (LA-06)– centered on Baton Rouge– that has a PVI of R +10 and gave Bush 59% of the vote in 2006. Cazayoux took 49,702 votes (49.20%) to extreme right-wing Republican Woody Jenkins’ 46,741 votes (46.27%). This ups the Democratic margin in the House 235-198. You think the congressional Republicans are nervous? Keep this in mind– when Alf Landon only got 36.6% of the vote in 1936 so many Republican members of Congress were defeated that only 17 senators were left standing!
UPDATE: DCCC Chair Chris Van Hollen and Speaker Pelosi congratulate Don.
Van Hollen: For the second time this cycle, Republicans were reminded that ‘all politics is local.’ House Republicans tried to nationalize this election, illegally coordinated with Freedom’s Watch, used false and deceptive special interest smears, and funneled nearly a million dollars into a district that Republicans held for more than three decades. Don won by focusing on the concerns of LA-06 voters – good paying jobs, affordable health care, and better education.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
.jpg)
