Currently, sort of

I've been desperate for some colour in my photography lately. Some white on white is nice, and frost on stuff can be a good look, and icicles can dress up all sorts of stuff, and there is all sorts of things that can be done with reflections from melting snow, and evergreen trees are a classy and dignified green, and some people like action shots in snow, but (say it with me, with feeling) I'M READY FOR SPRING! I'm ready to see the green of growing things, and whatever blooms come up first.

In the meantime, there's still a ton of snow here. More landed last night. More is forecast. Sigh. Enough of that.

The Amaryllis is blooming, so I've been accumulating photos of that. One day soon you'll get the life cycle of bud to decaying, for the 5 blossom explosion underway here. Stay tuned. Curtis is often supervising while I do this, but his attention was caught by a bird or something in the back yard. He likes snoozing on this cushion and blanket. His fur has picked up a touch of green from the plants.

My inner shark has showed up with me rocking the swim mojo lately. I've been having fun in the water, and getting some nice times again after struggling for much of the last year. I'm still working up to my former times and distances, but I'm trying to be cautious. One of my buddies recently completed the Nevis to St Kitts swim. It's about a 4 K open water swim, and that might be fun to do next year, if the training continues. The inner shark highly approves of this.

Don't ask about the run or the bike.

I've sold another photo! It's fun to go to Resolve and pick out paper. I just saw the print today, and it's better than the version I see on screen. Wow! The print has a real sense of depth for the central part of the flower, and the colours are rich and creamy. It's been signed and I saw a photo of it framed and on the wall. Which photo, you ask? This one, which you've seen before several times.

One of my photos has been published in Impact Magazine! It's an autumn scene in Fish Creek and westward. You can find it on page 55 in the print version. You can see the digital version of the magazine here.

I've been trying to get out for a combination photo ramble and wine kit run, but the driving weather has sucked lately. My thinking is to leave early to find a sunrise mountain shot (pink is the money shot but I'm not going to complain about red or orange), get into Red Deer for breakfast, pick up the kits, and head home. There are 3 kits doing their thing in the basement, with one of them ready for bottling soon.

There's been some interesting bits of writing happening, once I had the wit to start plugging things into an actual timeline. I fixed a few minor timing whoopsies and had a nice idea about a scene. It's still just an idea though. I rewrote one scene to make a whole lot more sense. There's a lovely scene that was so much fun to write (Ronnie beating up Charlie) but I'm not sure where it fits into the rest of the work. This is part of writing some of the behind the scenes stuff that happened, but from the point of view of the antagonist and his world, where they see themselves as the good guys. There's maybe too much going on, but it's a complicated world with lots of players.

Some reading has been on the agenda lately. The latest is Tom Holt, The Management Style of the Supreme Beings is the latest. (God sells earth to some uber-capitalist twins, and decides to retire.) If you like his style of humour, you'll love this. I happily giggled to myself during the entire read. There's another photo book that has an interesting diagram relating ISO, shutter speed, and f stop in a different way than I've seen  before. It took me a while to understand how a lens could be fast or slow, and this explains it differently. I hope the rest is as interesting.

Yes, there's been some slackerpants attitude. I admit it. What do you expect? I have buddies sending me photos of beaches, and blooming flowers, and talking of gardening while wearing a tank top. I assume pants too, but that was left unclear.

There might even be news on the work contract front soon, but I can't talk about that yet.

Another of Curtis, just because.

Curtis silhouette experiment with inner shark visit

There was a peculiar set of circumstances yesterday morning, leading to a pair of photos that you might think odd. That's ok, you can comment and tell me if you like them or not.

I was sitting facing our front window. I'd been doing something with the camera so it was to hand, but   while doing something else I looked up to see Curtis watching me. This can be quite disconcerting because he has a very direct look, and it's almost like he's on the verge of figuring out some human secret that cats have been working for generations. The light was hazy but quite strong, so he was almost completely silhouetted, but I could see a gleam in his eye, and a hint of colour in his fur.

Of course, by playing with the camera exposure settings I could have got a 'normal' photo of him, but that isn't the point. I wanted to capture what I had seen. Technically it's under exposed. The window framing isn't square, but I didn't want to crop it out. I tried dropping it into B&W just to see what that would do and I like it, but in a different way. There is a faint aura around him is a digital artifact that I'd normally reject, but it looks sort of neat here.

My swim mojo has been coming back gradually. The other day I was working on my old CSS pace workouts. I went 9 x 100 m in 1:45 or less, starting every 2 minutes. The first few were faster, then the rest were right on 1:44 or 1:45. The deal with myself is I have to stop if I see 1:46 or slower on the clock, unless I know I blew a flip turn, then I'll do one more but it has to be faster than the 1:45 by as much as that one was slower. My last of the nine was 1:47, and I could feel it a little in my arms and in my lungs. So that's about the right pace for now and I called it done. I'll do that pace till I can do 15 or 18 or so of those, without struggling to meet 1:45. Then it gets tougher. I'll tell you when I get there.

Today we shared a lane with a guy that swims a bit slower than Michelle. I gave her some advice about drafting up to his toes, hanging out for a bit and figure out where I (or any other swimmers that might have joined us) are, see if he pauses at the turn, then burst past him in a sprint and recover at regular pace. That's a new thing for her, to be consistently swimming faster than someone.

And why is that? Because she's swimming FASTER than she used to! Yay her!

Today my inner shark showed up for the first time in a while. I think the combination of swimming back at nearly my old pace again, and passing a slower swimmer had him checking in. Even though the guy tried to speed up (I could see more thrash and splash) when I passed, it didn't work. I hope he wasn't demoralized when Michelle passed him on the turn, then I passed him and Michelle in one go. My inner shark was muttering about prey, but I was busy.

I'm not sure how far or fast I swam in the shared lane. Maybe 1000 m or so, relaxed and thinking about stroke and roll, head down, trying to feel my butt powering my kick. Still working on that last. I've been doing some research on cranky low back and hamstrings, and one of the causes is a weak butt and sitting too much. Hole in one there. Trying to get more consistent about water running and doing some kick drill during the pool time, and some core work on the mat at home.

Then after the pools cleared out a bit, and some hot tub time, I was back in the pool for a timed 500 m in a short course pool, meaning 25 m long. 9 minutes even, feeling relaxed and strong. Yay me! I could have gone on, but the secret to going further and faster and avoiding injuries is to stop before you have to stop.

The inner shark returns!

Here's another fun shot after waiting for the moon earlier this week.

This morning's swim was a complete surprise to me. Maybe the swim kids got the water all sped up for me, since I got in as they were getting out. The first few laps were pretty good, then I clicked into the groove when my inner shark showed up. Haven't seen my buddy for a while. (If you want a refresher, or you hadn't known about the inner shark, follow the link, and it will lead to an intro post with several links to other ones, including a revelation about shark expense accounts.)

There was no prey in my lane, and for the timed portion of the swim there wasn't anyone else around, and certainly nobody to chase. Still, he was feeling placid and was helping keep my stroke strong and steady and smooth. It stayed that way even in the dreaded 500 to 700 m doldrums.

He's been busy off celebrating my impending return to a relaxed life. Inner sharks don't like what we do for a living. I think they're allergic to offices. In any case it's good to see him again, and I hope he shows up more often now.

I finished the 1000 m in 18 minutes flat. That is 108 seconds per 100. I haven't swum that fast since I don't know when, and I wasn't particularly out of breath. I could have gone on, but I was beginning to feel things starting to fall apart. I took a break and did about 100 m easy and relaxed, the water still flowing fast. Then a strong 100 in 87 seconds! Wow! I've been struggling to break 90 seconds lately, and usually finish sounding like a steam engine about to explode. This time I was breathing fairly hard, but could have gone on, although a bit slower. Swim life is good!

Part of it is the stronger, better kick. It's coordinated better with the roll now, which helps. Something has changed with my catch as well. It's going better, and I can feel my momentum is carrying forward between strokes. Funny how some tiny little changes can make such a huge difference in speed.

Fitness catchup amazeballs!

After a couple of big essays, here (50 years of progress), and here  (something only slightly less important than your own breathing), I need to get you caught up on the ongoing fitness stuff. Because it IS ongoing. The rest of my life, I hope. This isn't a "get fit" once and done thing.

Last Wed was a run that felt horrible. I thought the phone was lying to me, and told me 5 K when it felt like much less. The run was 5K 35 min.  I had tried turning on the app internal pedometer.

Tonight I did the same route with the pedometer off. The map looked the same, within a few meters. Well, other than the colours being different. Why? Because I ran a whole lot faster! I ran 6K in 37:14 and that's my fastest 6 K, even though the last K was recovering from A BLISTERING 5K 30:14 time! Thats 6:03 per K which for me is an amazing pace.  The left is the fast one.

This consistency shit is paying off!

Friday, 1:10 water running with Katie then swim 1K 19 minutes feeling tired.

Sat run 13K run 1:37 at 7:22 pace along the north rim of Fish Creek over in the SE. I hadn't seen much of it before since the path I usually take is way off to the south side of the park. We were both struggling a little, and we had a couple monster hills up out of Fish Creek, but it was all good. Afterward I dropped in a Strides and got another pair of shoes identical to the ones I have now.  Along the way there was this. It looks threatening but we didn't get rained on.

Sunday swim 1K 18:30 feeling in the groove. 50 m in 40 seconds, 100 m in 92 seconds.

Holiday Monday was a gong show in the pool. A pregnant lady barged into the lane I was sharing with a fast girl, and tried to run me over. I hadn't known she was there, and talking to the fast girl after, she hadn't known either. The pregnant lady just plopped down the ladder in front of her. Even with that, and 5 other people joining us, I pounded out 1 K 18:30. I hadn't intended to try to be fast, but with someone swimming just a bit faster in the other half of the lane, my inner shark came out. She was swimming 400's with a pull buoy and I couldn't quite keep up in the middle of my one K.

Afterward we went up to the track. iSmoothrun says I ran 4.95 K in 30:09 and I don't believe it. Sure there were some fast laps as I pushed hard, but there were lots of slow laps, dodging the tourists. That was brutal.  I suppose I should be counting laps, then I'd know how far for sure. Take this one with a grain of salt.

Then today. Swam 1.5 K, 27:40 nice and relaxed, evenly splitting the 500's, 9:10, 9:15, 9:15. Then an 88 second 100 m. All of it felt really good. My inner shark was feeling mellow since I had a lane to myself and I was comfortably faster than all the other swimmers in a nearly empty pool. It was nice cruising back and forth, trying to maintain form. I was imagining a secret watcher (there's a joke there) with a clipboard, counting strokes per 50 and writing down intervals, and I didn't want to disappoint her. I mean the watcher. The secret one.

Then the fast run tonight I talked about earlier. This has been good. Looking forward to the 10 K race this weekend, but I'm looking forward even more to seeing my buddy Janice from the east coast.

I've got a bunch of other blog stuff to catch up on. The great mapping project. The novel. Garden news. Did I tell you we bought a new car? So much stuff to talk about, but there's a cat demanding my attention. He's been giving me such sad looks.

swish, swash, crickle, CRACK! A naked patio.

Last you heard, my swim sucked, but but I didn't despair. I know these things come and go. Within a couple strokes of my Saturday swim, my inner shark rejoined me and I knew I was going to have a good swim. We had the choice of joining a sloppy breast stroker taking up a whole lane, or a slow crawl who was at least circle swimming. Within a lap of joining him, he went off to swim with the breast stroker and Michelle and I had a lane to ourselves.

I settled into the 18:30/k groove and actually finished the 1000 m a bit faster than that. Then 5x100 on 2, all 1:45 or faster. A bit of easy swim playing with my stroke a bit, then a blistering fast (for me) 88 second 100 m. Yay me. Another 200 m cool down, then HOT TUB!

My inner shark comes and goes, in the way of inner sharks. He was all about trying to keep up with the swim kids in the next lane. As if. But what it did do is help me keep my stroke clean, and that leads to a faster swim. I certainly wasn't putting any more effort into the swim, and if anything I wasn't breathing as hard. But that subtle difference in water feel made for a swim that was a minute faster per k.

I tried finding out what my inner shark has been up to, but he was a bit evasive. Secret shark stuff, no doubt. Maybe he's part of a team working on laser technology. He was more talking about the sloppy prey in the other next lane.

Michelle wasn't feeling the swim love so we worked on flip turns a bit. I'm puzzled by how she be simultaneously so buoyant, and so heavy in the water. She comes from a running background so it's no surprise her legs are heavy in the water as she swims. I have the same problem, (she has run muscles, I have a lead butt) and it's a subtle balance thing to fix, along with finding the right kick, and engaging the core, body balance, and a side of Jedi mind trick. I'm still working on it. But then when she wants to sink, as in an initial push off the wall, or to pick something off the bottom of the pool for good luck, there is no sink. I'm a bit puzzled by that.

Team aquatic had a swim sale, and I know you all will be devastated to learn that I did not find a skimpy little speedo I could model for you. Try to restrain your grief. All I got was some body wash. (Of which there is less to wash, I found out after a brief visit to the scale.)  Michelle was in there trampling and elbowing looking for the deals, and scored!

Later, the CRACK happened. We went to a bike swap/sale, but it was pretty picked over when Linda and I got in. I was a little intrigued by a recumbent, and thought I would give it a try.

That photo catches the exact moment I tried to relax on the bike only to find the back of the seat and headrest was too low. I think if the room had been quieter, people would have heard the echo, the crack was that loud. It didn't hurt at the time, and nobody has mentioned me screaming. You could be forgiven for thinking so. I pedaled around the parkade, amusing people by going under the mostly empty bike racks. Getting up was a bit of a trial. They wanted $1700 for that bike. It was interesting to ride, but not that interesting.

Later during ice cream, (chili chocolate and guide mint) I tried to sneeze and thought someone was stabbing me in the right shoulder. Holy doodle! That was very painful, and essentially ended that day's activities. Some careful rubbing against a door frame, some gentle stretches on the yoga mats, a pain pill, and a good night's sleep and I'm feeling much better.

Friday was a 5K, 34:22 run in the warmth. This is only slightly faster than my last run, but it felt way better!

Lots of puttering around the house over the weekend working on a ginormous to do list. Which leads me to these before, during, and after photos. We put up this flimsy diagonal lattice because we had no other choices at the time. The old one was falling apart. Last fall we found a source for some good quality lattice, and decided to replace before the flowers got too big. I was thinking June...

The climatis on the right is already intertwined, and we had to cut the lattice apart a bit to keep it. This one used to live on the back fence. When we did the backyard renos a couple years ago we cut it off that lattice, back to the roots basically, and gave it another chance here. It seems to be doing really well. The other one, on the left side of the same box isn't doing so well. I think it's a grump old climatis that doesn't believe it's spring, and wants to snooze a little longer, and take it's time getting going. Lots of days I feel the same way.

The naked patio.

Now the new lattice. I think it looks much better!

The rescued climatis is gently hooked on with little clamps till it regrows it's own. If the light was better you could see the purple blossoms.

And just because, some of the flowers in the side garden.

After that was a lovely 11 K 1:21 (7:20/K pace) run along the WID canal, starting at 50th Ave, down to Glenmore and back. My heart rate was nice and steady about 130, which is a little bit higher than I'd like. We found a little picnic spot along the bike path, several tables and a little fire pit, trees to shelter from the wind. The only problem is access. This is pretty much a ride access only. No place nearby to park and carry in picnic stuff. We didn't get rained on though the wind was picking up and the clouds getting darker. It started raining about an hour after getting home and a good thing too. It's dry here.

All in all a very busy weekend. For things crossed off on my to do list, I'm batting about 74%, that is 17 of 23 things listed.  One of those things is a big huge complicated thing, and I was pretty sure it wasn't going to all get done. I should break it up into sub-tasks. One of the tasks (tidy desk and put away tax paperwork) is pretty much the fifth labour of Hercules, and I'm well started. Nowhere near done. I might yet get one more done, and one task is dependent on another, in that if I do the other within the month, I don't need to do the first.

And your weekend?

Forward at inner shark speed

Today was a good swim day. At first I wasn't sure I'd go. We finished season 2 of House of Cards last night, not late, but late enough and me tired enough from the spin yesterday that if I was asleep I was going to stay asleep. It's quite different than the BBC version, but equally good. I liked Ian Richardson (playing Francis Urquhart) and the way he broke the fourth wall. Kevin Spacey doesn't do it so well, but you see more the scheming and counter-scheming.

But no, habits die hard sometimes. I was up and ready. Talisman had only 4 lanes for us public, but Deb, Michelle and me got lucky and scored a lane to ourselves. Well, it started out that way, then another woman joined us. At first I was a bit worried, I was coming in for a turn, and she was floundering around at the end, right in the middle of the lane. Someone else was there too, so the turn was careful. Then we sorted ourselves out and it was all good with the 4 of us.

Then my inner shark came out! I was having a fairly strong swim, 500 m warmup in 9:05 or so, even with some waits to pass. It was the surges to pass that brought out the shark within. I could feel the water on my hands and forearm. Swimmers know what I mean. I'd slow down slightly, waiting for oncoming traffic to clear, then accelerate hard to pass, then relax again. Some of my 50 m times were amazing for an ongoing pace! One was around 45 seconds, then back to my normal pace. I don't know if fartlek applies to swims, but that's what it felt like.

What was interesting was that I didn't really have to look to know where people were. A part of me was keeping track of where the prey , I mean, where the other swimmers were. It seemed to be easy to time the passes. For a while a guy in the next lane was trying to race me, flailing down the lane, splashing water everywhere. Then he'd stop to rest, and I'd keep going, periodically passing my lane buddies. It made for an interesting swim, and a really good workout. They seemed to be having a good time as well. Hot tub, but no sublime moment like the other day.

I'm not sure of the exact numbers. 500 m in 9:05 or so. 500 m pull about the same time. 500 m mostly kick, lots slower. 500 m nice and easy, working on stroke mechanics, thinking really hard about the water feel on both the front and back of my hands, what my shoulders were doing, and body position in the water. Played some drafting games with Michelle. A bit of this and that, with a bit of chat, in the water a little under 90 minutes or so.

On the way home I got to thinking about the state of the world, and my place in it. Part of it was fueled by watching Frank scheming his way up the ladder in House of Cards. I have known people like that in real life, and will go to significant effort to avoid them. Part of it is getting used to having more time for me, and what I want to do with that time.

There are things to accomplish, but I need to be careful I don't bite off more than I can chew. I'd like to say there is a step by step plan, with goals, and milestones, and targets, but that's corporate bullshit. I'm trying to do this day by day. Get up, do stuff, go to bed. Eat good food. Hang out with interesting people. Go places I haven't been.

Some of that happened Friday. The sunrise was beautiful, and one of our plants is looking out at the winter landscape in a blossomy sort of way.

We did a bit of a date day, starting with breakfast at Blue Star Diner. Awesome food. Bridgeland has become quite a hotbed of good restaurants. Then out doing some shopping for the house, with a side trip out to the deep SE to pick up the stuff. I'm very please I didn't walk off the truck dock. Then some errands along the way home, buying a The Nightingale, by Kristin Hannah for the book club. Into the Italian Centre to check it out.

Along the way in the SE I was looking over all the various buildings. Manufacturing plants, warehouses, offices, whatever, connected by road and rail, as well as an invisible network of electric and data cables. Wireless antennas. Water and sewer lines. Gas and oil pipelines. It's an amazingly complicated network, and it mostly works very well. At least until some idiot demonstrates that they are not up to the cognitive demands of driving, and screws it up for everybody in the area.

The point of it all is to connect the people who want to buy or rent various products with the people producing them. In the middle is that intricate network. So many different things, all with their product codes, specifications, assembly instructions, manufacturing requirements, and so many people keeping track of where the stuff is, how many of them are there, who has bought them, or sold them, and the associated flow of dollars.

Perceived as a whole it's baffling complex, with inter-relationships out the ying-yang. Even with computer help, nobody can track everything about even one thing, let alone everything. That's why us data geeks take slices, or views of things. My boss sometimes rolls his eyes as I get pedantic about what exactly is making up the number I'm quoting, because it matters. You can't do set arithmetic if you don't know that your sets are congruent, or rather, you can provided you know exactly how the are incongruent and take that into account.

While we were picking up our new faucets, the warehouse clerk came back with one instead of two. One of them had been accidentally put on a pallet that was spoken for another job. She couldn't take it, even though it was mine, till they sorted it out. Somebody hadn't consulted the system when assembling the order. This seems to happen to me a lot lately. The computer system says they have x in the bin, but the clerk only finds y, and has no idea where the other is. Even with all the bar codes, and scanning, and tracking, and inventory counts, and point of sale systems, stuff still ends up where it doesn't belong.

Until very recently we used to throw many things into the landfill. For several reasons now, we are starting to track what used to be waste. We want to recycle products and materials. This means knowing what's in them, and developing a process to stream like with like, to go to the appropriate places. More tracking. More complexity.

If you have a kid contemplating what they want to do for a living, they could do much worse than go into data analytics or business analysis. These systems are only going to get more complicated, and they need people to build nice process diagrams to explain to software engineers how to modify existing software to cope. It's straightforward to track new things with bar codes. Old things with obsolete bar codes, or waste products with no bar codes are a different thing.

Then a hard bike spin in the afternoon, 1.5 hrs all up, with lots of short bursts at high effort. I like getting a good sweat on, but last time I was putting out that much effort I was snorfling sweat in as I breathed. Plus it dribbles/ pours down my glasses.

That isn't so much fun. I got a variable speed fan set up now,  with a remote even, and that makes the ride much nicer. I had to tie down the little piece of plastic over the trainer computer. Stupid Blogspot for unroatating it.

Thursday was a rest day. I was feeling knackered from the week, and glad it was only 4 days. Word is the lay-offs aren't done yet. Several of my IT buddies have been told they won't have jobs soon, May or June, or so. That reminds me of a New Yorker cartoon, a boss standing in front of the clerks desk, as he says, "I'm afraid we're going to have to let you go as of 4pm today, in the mean time keep up the good work."

That gives them several months to find a new project to work on, which is good because it might take that long. Looking for work now is tough sledding. There are companies hiring, but it's typically contract work, not employee, and they are asking for very specific skills. One good thing about times like these is they put some work into defining exactly what they want, which is good for everyone. If you don't have the skills, you don't waste your time applying. In busier times they might put out a job requirement that is so vague, it might as well be "can spell business analysis, and has used Visio."

The current read is still "Older, Faster, Stronger" I'm liking it, but it's a bit disconnected in some ways. She does a lot of name dropping about all these older athletes and times, but it's mixed in with her races, and I'm losing track of which one is which.

My inner shark came out to play

Back into the salty murky water of Glenmore again today for a lap swim. I had been thinking that a swim there would be good, since I'd be less likely to overdo my shoulders. Then my inner shark showed up. He loved it! He and I cruised past the other swimmers in the next lane. I passed some of the swimmers in my lane, and sometimes they stopped to let me pass. My inner shark was all about chasing them down, in a relaxed sedate sort of way. It sounds strange, but it made sense at the time. Not that he wanted to actually catch and eat any of them; most did not look like a healthy food choice, and my inner shark is a very picky eater. I cruised along, not working too hard, concentrating on a nice stroke.

There was a first along the way. The water is really choppy because they have lane ropes with small buoys on them, not the wave breaking plastic discs. I caught a mouthful of water just before going into a flip turn, and was coughing through the whole thing. Salty water.

Since the pace clock is really hard to see I didn't keep track of laps, but it was about 1.5 K, with some short breaks in there to fit in with my lane buddies. I even managed to fit in some short intervals, 3 x 50 in 45, on 1 minute, and I could have kept going, but there were people in the way. I started with some slower people, then all but one went away, and I drafted a guy for a while, then he went away, and I split the lane with a woman for a while, both of us doing our thing and not getting in each other's way. Then a few more people showed up, slow people, who seemed a bit uncertain about the circle swimming thing. Slow, as in, swimming very easy I could keep up with them as they churned away with swim fins. Perhaps the slow, medium, and fast lanes are more a mind set thing than a clock thing. I cooled down a little and bailed out of that lane. Hot tub at Glenmore is awesome!

On the way out I was chatting with one of the staff I used to know at Canyon Meadows. Nice to get caught up. I'm pleased how it worked out. My shoulders know I've had a swim, but they aren't complaining, and I'm not getting the chest muscle spasms I was getting for a while.

Saturday was good. Planked in the morning as part of the limbering up for a run. It was beautiful out and I nailed the clothes for sunny 0 C. One layer tights, long sleeved top, gloves, cap. 5 K, 35 minutes, nice and easy, though working a bit for the last K. Stretched after, then in the evening did another core session with a 90 second plank. So, on average, I'm still with the plank a day thing.

Traffic is still crazy. On the way out this morning I'm doing 65 to 70 K in a 60 zone on the way out of the 'hood. I got passed by a guy weaving in and out of traffic, doing maybe 90 k. He ran a red light (hey, it's only been red a minute) and and it's good that the guy turning left was paying attention. The stores weren't even open yet! Where could he be going?

The garden is still there in winter, just not as colourful. It's easy to see the colour is beautiful, of course, but I also like the stark winter beauty as well.

Why is the BBQ uncovered, you ask? BBQ rack of lamb.

Linda is working on some greenery displays. Photos when she's done. Stay tuned.

Did you maybe miss the recent blog posts? Pre-Christmas Crankies, or The Unmentioned Tusk?

The inner shark does CSS

Considering this is one of the pools at Talisman for the next month, the other pool wasn't all that busy. Maintenance. It has to happen. I didn't mind so much, but the good hot tub was closed. Sigh.

I've been sleeping really hard lately, but not enough. It was a bit of an effort to drag myself into the pool. Normally I don't do warmup. I just get in and swim. Today I put in about 250 m warmup, slowly getting it together while I tried to decide what to do.

Then I realized I hadn't done the CSS thing for a while, and started that. Normally my first one is fast,  and by the third I'm in the groove. This first 100m was slow, about 1:44, which isn't a good sign. The second was a bit faster, and the third 1:38.

Then my inner shark buddy visited, and I got in the groove, then next 10 or so were 1:41 or 42, cruising along nice and relaxed. The shark was not impressed with the prey at all. We chatted about stuff as I zoomed along. My catch was working really well and it seemed effortless. My reach and roll was spot on, though I noticed a slight hitch as I breathed to my right. Then there were a couple where I was working a bit to maintain pace, and for the last one I busted out a 1:37, just because. I was beginning to feel my arms and shoulders a bit. New goggles made me realize how gunked up the old ones were.

15x100 was enough, and a totally lovely swim with a whole short course lane to myself. Pretty pleased at that, though I can't expect that to happen much in September. Cool down, stretch. I think next time I need to start shortening the rest interval, even though that makes watching the clock and figuring sent off times more complicated. Such is life.

On the way out the sun was just barely visible through the murk.

Still murky this evening. The iPhone camera doesn't do the colour any justice at all. It was a beautiful orange.

We went out for dinner to Patisserie du Soleil. I've been there many times for coffee or lunch, but this was the first time for dinner. I'm really pleased with it. Nice to have a good restaurant within walking distance.

Right behind it is something I'm less pleased about. Do I have to worry about being tainted with it so close? Still building a head of steam, never fear!

You look like a maniac ax murderer, she said

At least it wasn't someone I was trying to get into bed.

But the day started really well.

The pre-stampede parade traffic downtown was still light when we got into Talisman. I could see one person cheating on the parking; they were clearly going to the parade, and not coming in for a workout. Both of them, and the kids should have picked the workout.

As almost always, it was a lovely swim. We had a lane to ourselves, and we churned back and forth. The improvements Michelle has made! Her right leg still gets off the reservation, but she is swimming quite well. Soon she will be able to cope with a triathlon wave start.

I played with fish stroke a bit more, and at one point actually ended up in the next lane, to the startlement of me and the girl swimming in it. At least I didn't run into her, though I totally surfaced into the lane ropes once. Good thing nobody had a video camera running. My inner shark showed up briefly to laugh at me. Thanks buddy.

Part of the technique was to work on reach and catch. It messed up my kick, such as it is, because the timing is subtly different. I was really working on keeping my elbows high, and I could feel my shoulders hard at it. It's funny, I was pushing hard, and felt fast, but the clock said 93 seconds (100 m long course). A bit later I tried again, felt slower and more thrashy, even though I was working HARD on form, and the clock said 91 seconds. Some days I don't know. The rest was regular drills and stuff, with lots of kick drills.

Did you know you can't currently buy crushed brick except at Burnco? The problem is the delivery methods discussed on their website involve a dump truck or a big cubic yard bag. I need about 2/27th of that amount. Maybe tomorrow or Sunday I'll show up with a couple pails in my car trunk and see if they take pity on me.

Then it was off to renew my business corporation thingie with the Alberta government. It used to be $20, and that bastard Prentice raised it to $55. Good thing I didn't vote for him. Oh well, it's a deductible expense.

I also had to renew my drivers license. What SHOULD be happening here is that I make an appointment to sit in a car simulator, and they run me through a standardized test to see if I still have the reflexes and skills needed to be on the roads. This should happen to everybody, every 5 years. None of this age-ism shit. More often when you turn into a geezer, but I admit the geezer-o-meter is not yet perfected.

If they can train airplane pilots well enough in a simulator that the first time they actually fly the airplane it has passengers in it, then they can make car simulators for testing drivers. I have this vision of the simulator starting at the bottom of the City Hall parkade. The simulator has a camera looking at your eyes so it knows where you are looking. If you don't look the right way, a pedestrian appears, and gets splattered all over your windshield, and you fail. Maybe they scream a lot. Come back in a month sir or ma'am, and by the way, your license is revoked. You are too dangerous to be allowed on the road, and can buy a bus pass at the kiosk in the lobby.

For training male teenaged drivers I'd be merciless. They make a mistake, and they crawl out of the simulator with bruises from the seatbelt and airbag, their ears ringing, and with wet pants. Again and again, as often as necessary, and in the meantime they are not on the road. There would be one section of the regular test where people try to text on a cell phone while driving. Remember what I said about wet pants?

It sounds harsh, but thousands of people are maimed or die on Canadian roads every year. You, yes you, are almost certainly a worse driver than you think. How can 80% of us think we are above average drivers? Listening to the traffic report any weekday ought to disabuse you of that notion.

I digress. What actually happens is some paperwork gets signed, and they take a photo. This has not been my strong suit in life. The camera loves some people, and I am not one of them. There are fewer than a dozen photos of me that I like. It's not as bad in recent years; I'm not sure why.

But when the first picture came up, she exclaimed, "Geez, you look like a maniac ax-murderer! Let's do that again." I have to admit, those eyes were pretty scary. I dialed it back a bit, and it was ok. So why can't I turn that on in work meetings, and quell people that are disagreeing with me because they don't realize I am right and they are wrong?

Which leads to another topic, those disagreements. It's actually a sign of respect. I'm helping them because I like them, or respect them, and am helping them to realize the error of their ways. I can see the pit ahead of them, and I'm trying to stop them from ending up in the pit. Or more to the point, to stop them from dragging me into the pit. Often they don't know there are hungry predators in the pit.

Some people I've worked with (I'm looking at YOU, Lucy, and 3 of 9) I could see the path lying open and clear to the pit. For them I slipped ahead and woke up the predators. You don't need to think very hard to understand what I thought of them.

And then there was the branch of the Stampede Parade through Coop, the toddle of the geezers. Holy cow. They were everywhere. I was in because I'd finished off the sunscreen and will need more soon. Really soon. I was disappointed they didn't seem to have the 100 SPF, and had to make do with 50 SPF. I'll just put on two layers and look elsewhere for the good stuff. I need it.

I need to get a good night's sleep, and be ready for my photo shoot tomorrow.

 The blog sound track.

Trooper (Three dressed up as a nine)
Trooper (The boys in the bright white sports car)
The Knack (Good Girls Don't)
Cheap Trick (Dream Police)
Cheap Trick (Ain't that a Shame, Live at Budokan, video!)
Cheap Trick (Surrender, Midnight Special)
Golden Earing (Radar Love)
Blonde (Heart of Glass) [How on earth can Debbie Harry be 70??!!]]
Sparks (This town ain't big enough for both of us)
The Sweet (Ballroom Blitz) [Do any of you remember the album cover that slid up and down to produce a wink?]
Deep Purple (Smoke on the Water)

Road to Nepal, you flirt you

I am playing hooky from work right this minute. Yay me! Though since I'm the one that sets my hours, I suppose that's not as cheaty as it sounds.

It started with a swim this morning. The training pool was closed, and only four lanes were open in the other pool. We watched my buddy Katie navigating the complete GONG SHOW going on in the four open lanes. I couldn't believe it. Two guys standing there, watching the chaos, decided to add to it. One fell off the ladder going in, and nearly landed on someone. The other jumped in and headed up the middle where the lane rope would be, dodging people left and right. What an idiot. I was wishing for a long shepherd's crook to haul them out by the neck.

We slipped off to the dive tank and practiced technique till the swim club cleared out of the other lane. I love swimming in the dive tank. It's so big, and well lit, and is such a fun place to play. No wonder the snychro swim girls always have a big smile.

Then we were into the other pool. Michelle is really looking like a swimmer now! I churned along, mostly doing technique work, but busted out some good stuff. First was 2 hard 100's, 87 seconds and 91 seconds with a 30 second recovery. Then a bit later after some drill, 5x100m on 2 minutes, at 99, 100, 100, 99, 100. I'm really pleased with that, though I was getting close to the retaste zone on that last one. By my normal interval rules I should have tried for number 6, but I knew better.

I was having fun focussing on my technique while chatting with my inner shark. He showed up in the dive tank, and followed us to the other pool, though he wasn't so thrilled with the cloudiness of it. My swim was feeling quite strong, and he was encouraging various elements of my stroke. Today was mainly recovery and catch, working on my roll and breathing out the whole stroke. I'm still not sure why that's supposed to be faster, or if it's making a difference for me. It turns out my inner shark has been off hob-nobbing with my book characters. Who knows what they are getting up to? When I asked, all he gave me were hints that could be called lurid and cryptic.

The novel has been on a bit of a pause lately, as other workout stuff has picked up. And taxes. It took a bit of doing to get it all together, and I missed the one slip that details how much I paid last year as installments. Oops! This weekend I must, I simply must get my desk tidied up and get started on organizing business taxes. What fun.

It's such a beautiful summer day out there, mid to high teens, sunny and lovely. I haven't taken Estela down Road to Nepal in several years now, and I could hear the road calling to us in four part harmony. For those who haven't done it, it's a fabulous training ride. All hills, all the time, nice pavement, not too much traffic, and a parking lot at the top. Once down and back (37 tough K) is a good workout, especially if you push on the hills. Two is a super workout. I've never done it twice in a row.

I listened, and bailed out of work at lunchtime, using up some extra hours from last month, so I'm not behind on billable hours. It didn't take long to get ready. Wow. Even more wind once I got out of the neighbourhood. It was straight from the south and strong. It normally takes me about 20 minutes to do the 7.5 K down to 22X. Today was 30 minutes even. That is the slowest time ever, I think.

Then down the first hill, slowly. Up the other side was brutal. I was going less than 7 kph for much of it. That hill is normally 10 kph or so. Remember what I was saying last week about being a week and feeble reed? On the way back there were several times I was going 50 kph, in a dead calm. Let's not talk much about the little gusts from side to side.

After taking stock at the top of the hill, and watching my bike computer tick over 40 minutes, I decided it would be smart to head back. I think if it hadn't been windy I'd have gone further. Maybe. 40 minutes out, 20 minutes back. Yes, twice as fast. That's what a bit of wind will do. After all the slow bits, I prefer to remember the max speed, 75 Kph, per the bike computer. 1 hour, 20 Km total.

Here's the graph of the ride.

And garden things are blooming! I don't know what these two little blue things are, but they're growing already. We're going to try to get out into the lawn and garden to start cleaning up after winter, even though we've got another month where it could quite possibly snow.

Amused by spam and inner shark thoughts

I don't get a lot of spam comments. Maybe that's tempting fate, but since they are all moderated out I don't mind. Blogger hasn't made a mistake in a long time, and dealing with spam hasn't been a chore at all. I hope you don't mind it might take a few hours to have your brilliant comment displayed to the world. Have I ever said how much I like to get comments?

Most of the spam is pretty inane, but this one amused me. I tried to copy paste it, but that didn't work, and I wasn't so amused I wanted to retype it. I can't tell if this is someone running another language through a machine translator, or if it's a computer set to work to composing the spam from scratch. There's a certain artfulness about the use of the language.

This might actually become the slogan of my blog, "You managed to hit the nail upon the head and defined out the whole thing with no need side effect."

In Acadia pool this morning. Still murky. I don't know if this done special for the morning swimmers, or in preparation for all the kids coming in after we leave. I am suspicious of small kids in the pool. There was one time swimming in Weyburn that comes to mind. I'm sure that you'll know exactly where that is if I say about half way between Moose Jaw and Estevan. Yeah. The water there was not just murky, but murky green. A huge number of kids got out just before I got in. It was much too warm. I showered very, very thoroughly afterward, both at the pool and my motel room.

But today was good. Very good. I had received some tips from a swim buddy and worked really hard in trying them out. My arms behave now, almost all the time. I think that right arm getting off the reservation was just laziness. Today I was thinking of scratching my ears with my thumb as I was recovering. It also seems to lead to a cleaner entry and a better catch. Much better rhythm and better roll.

The other thing was kicking a bit better. My kick sucks. More laziness. There were several times when I was swimming faster than expected, with less effort from my arms, and the water feeling a bit different on catch. So far so good. I was a bit shorter of breath, but that shouldn't be a surprise.

The breathing out throughout the strokes is a bit harder for me. I'm not sure how much of a difference it made. Normally problem solving theory is that you change only one thing at a time. That way when it works, you know what fixed it. Mostly.

But today I was changing several things at once as I merrily passed everyone swimming in the two center lanes. The one woman was there again, polite as ever about letting me by. A couple other people were less than polite and had to be passed. We were doing up the rope and down the middle, and some people seemed to lose track of which lane they were swimming in. One guy was doing a sort of figure 8 pattern near as I could tell.

None the less, my inner shark was totally enjoying it. One girl in the next lane pushed off as I did, and headed up the pool flat out. I passed her, nice and relaxed. One guy (I think he's the usual big dog of the pool at that time of the day) was going all out trying to keep ahead. My inner shark basked in the draft, then we got tired of it and blew past him. He didn't get the message though, and the next time I caught him I had to do the same thing all over.

So much fun doing some sighting and defending my space from people that don't swim a straight line, even when looking at the lines on the pool bottom. The water wasn't THAT murky. The downside of changing a bunch of things at once is that I don't know which thing has the biggest impact, or none at all. Oh well. I'm swimming faster and you've gotta love that.

Coffee after was one of the best conversations I've had in a long time.

After all that activity, what do I see when I get home? They didn't even notice. Such is the life of being cat staff.

The inner shark emerged

Then he was a bit cranky at me. Not because I was swimming slowly. No, he was pretty pleased at the speed today. He was cranky because I wasn't using it to hunt prey.

The problem was that I was the only person in the pool for much of the swim. I don't know what it was calm today, but I'm happy. My only assumption is the swim clubs figured everybody would be hung over and skipped a day. Some football game or other. If I was in charge of scheduling, I'd have put the biggest, toughest workout on Sunday afternoon, with a followup on Monday morning. Both as required attendance.

I think giving advice to the two bad-ass buddies was really good for me, making me think about my stroke. The water felt good right from the start, then I settled in a groove. When I hit 500 m in just over 9 minutes, cruising along, I was pretty pleased. At 750 m I was still going pretty strong, but was thinking trying to go much beyond a K and things would fall apart. I had a slow lap around 800 m then picked it up again.

18:20 for the 1000 m. I was rolling that around in my brain for a bit. That's almost 30 seconds faster for the same distance than a couple weeks ago, where I was really feeling it at the end. This time I could have kept going for a little bit longer, but I'm not sure how much. Rather than find out and remember a swim that went crappy, I'll take an unadulterated win.

I haven't swim that fast since before the 2013 flood. I'd have to go back and see what I was doing then. What's funny is that I wasn't trying to swim fast at all. The first bunch of it I was relaxing and not really thinking of anything, then was surprised by the clock. Then I was thinking about trying to swim clean. By the end I was beginning to run a bit short of air, but my arms still felt strong. It's been the other way around for some time now.

Then 4 x 50 m less than 50 seconds on 60 seconds.
My learning from all this is that I need to concentrate on my form a bit more. There was a bit of clandestine video shot, and I've got a bit of crossover happening again. Thought I'd fixed that, but I guess it has crept back in again.

Now I know I can actually swim at my desired pace for a little while anyway, I need to develop the endurance to keep doing it. I used to be able to do this.

In other news I'm still taking a break from running, and it feels really good. I am beginning to rethink my goal of doing a marathon next summer. Maybe I should try the bike without running.

Day one December streak done! Plank. Squats. Stuff.

Shark. Bike. BBQ. Warmth!

What a nice day!

Up and off to the pool in good time, though it was very busy. I jumped into a lane with a three other people. One swam quicker, and the other two about the same speed as me. The way it worked out I didn't want to push off in front of them at the top of the clock. Maybe I should have. I drafted for 50 m getting into the groove. Then caught up to the guy and mostly passed him on the turn. My inner shark came out big time as I was trying to pass the other girl, before the faster one came back. Was just pulling back in as we all came together.

I haven't swum with my inner shark for a while now, and it was good to meet up again. We swam together lots when I was at Renfrew, maybe because I was chasing other swimmers lots, and there were a couple people I could just keep up with if I worked at it. Talisman is a nicer facility, but there aren't many people who swim about my speed. There's the swim club kids that could probably swim faster than me using only one arm, and my buddy Katie who can cruise along at about the fastest speed I can swim at all. Then there are people that swim much slower, and good for them for getting out and trying.

If you want to check out more about my inner shark, check out:
 how sharks claim trips on their expense accounts,
or my thoughts vs shark thoughts,
or some shark jokes,
or a shark ditty with apologies to Christine Lavin,
or what the shark thinks of synchro swim girls,
or I'll bet you didn't know sharks are the strong silent type.

After the pass I cruised along trying to stay in between the faster swimmer and the other two. Then the faster one went away, then the other two. I don't think I was swimming really any quicker than recently, but the flip turns were much better, so I think that accounted for the faster 19:25 for the 1000m swim.

Then 4 intervals on 60 seconds, with my shark buddy cheering me on. Those were all between 45 and 50 seconds. Cool down. I was really pleased with the swim. Afterwards I picked up some La Boulangerie treats for Saturday morning. They do the very best cinnamon buns. No wait, they're terrible. Awful. Worst in the city. Don't buy them there, at least not before me.

Coming home after work I was struck anew by what a beautiful day it was. Autumn really is Calgary's best season. The temperature was up around 20 C! I was so impressed I decided to try to get out on my bike, since I don't want to run 2 days in a row. Poor Estela has been languishing in the basement. I was a bit nervous about it since my last ride was much earlier this year, and didn't go well. The plan was to zoom around the neighborhood and keep it light and easy.

It was lovely! Not quite 14 K, just over 30 minutes. My legs felt pretty good about it, with my right quad and left calve feeling a bit weak. RunKeeper weenied out and didn't give me any data after, though it was talking to me. RunMeter was very pissy about getting the data out after. No, I did not get a selfie of me on the bike.

After a recovery cookie and a shower I got the BBQ started. Even though the sun was beginning to go down, it was still really warm out. I sipped some wine and did the Bison tenderloin just right. It all went down really well with some spuds and corn.

Later I'm trying to compare the costs of buying an unlocked iPhone and getting a month to month contract, with getting it through Telus. It's pretty confusing. My buddy Leana had some good suggestions for using the old phone. The apps will still work perfectly well.

In the end I shook my head about the whole darned thing. It looks like I can buy the whole thing through the Telus store, and start paying more monthly for a bigger data package. I left it there and worked on my blog, and other writing. That feels much more productive.

Tomorrow I'll be watching at least part of IM Kona. Hope my buddy Sara Gross has a great day!

Something went thunk

The half full pool of water was there, taunting us. They said a pipe burst while filling it, so it will be delayed a bit longer. Meanwhile, the training pool was a zoo. I haven't swum with this many people in a lane for a while. Mostly it was good, the lane buddies.

Maybe it was the one slow (but well behaved) lane buddy that brought out my inner shark for the first time in a while. Maybe now that I'm swimming faster again. 500 m in 9:20, though I have to admit a bit of that was drafting. One of the lane buddies was pretty fast. That was 30 minutes of good swim overall. It's coming back.

My shark buddy cruised along, looking at the swim club kids in the next lane and the thrasher in the other lane. He's missed me a bit, wondering if I was ever going to be swimming again. I explained to him about floods, and he didn't get it. Lots of water is a good thing, for him. Equipment that doesn't run submerged is poorly designed. He thought Sharknado was pure exploitation, in case you were wondering.

Once again my super yoga teacher came through with something that was really good for me. I thought it was my left knee that was feeling tired and sore, until my right hip started complaining. During one of the twists there was a soft and meaty thunk deep in my back. It didn't hurt at all, and I think it was a good thing. Later rolling my butt on top of the little ball, I found one spot that had me seeing stars for a few seconds. It was very tight. Oh, and I was threatened with a terrible fate if I videoed her demoing Lion pose. We all had fun with it.

Tonight ought to have been a run but I decided not. Instead I did some core and some stretching. Yes with plank. 120 seconds! And other stuff too.

I've been awarded!

Such a nice way to end the year. In no particular order.

I won a "coveted" coffee mug from the CBC afternoon show I like to listen to. Every now and then they ask listeners to respond to a question through phone, email, or twitter. Here's the exchange:

I won't include a photo of the mug, especially not full of coffee because it would drive you all mad with envy. I'm sure of that. You'll just have to imagine how awesome it is. For non Albertans, the Legislature is where the Provincial Legislature sits and spends our money. The building has a nice dome, and a great view of the Edmonton River Valley. I hadn't known there was a nice reflecting pool there.

What was really awesome was the traffic to get there after work. There'd been an accident on Memorial westbound, near CBC. The back up was along Memorial way east, south on 14th St, and eastward along 11th Ave, which is the route I needed to take. It was pretty slow going. The host, Doug Dirks was in the lobby doing the show from there. Somehow I had thought it would be higher tech, reading the script from a laptop or a teleprompter. Maybe they really do make it up minute by minute. It's funny how you get an impression of people just from their voice. I had no idea that Jenny was so tall. Like my height or nearly so.

Another thing was a Sportchek $100 gift certificate. Another one. The first one was from work for doing at least 600,000 steps over 2 months. In fact I did about 1.3 million, but they wouldn't give a second card. I tried a couple times to spend it, but it didn't work out. Then one of my blog buddies, Ali Mc over at Running with Spatulas, had a contest for, you guessed it, a $100 gift cert from Sportchek. And I won! So I've either doubled the size of my problem (such a problem to have, I know!) or got myself to where I can get something really nice. What was their URL again?

Over the last little while I've been trying to branch out my blog reading. It started as just triathlon, and then expanded to fitness in general, and then expanded to, well, in general is about the best way I can put it. Blogs go on my blogroll for one reason, I like to read them. Maybe they amuse me, or educate me, or share my pains and triumphs. You all know who you are, even if you don't comment much lately.

One that I discovered recently is Janice at Figuring it out. I'm no longer certain how I found her, but I think it was a contest like this one, the Liebster Blog award. She won, and then passed it along to me, in the company of the Blonde Runs and SUAR. I'm flattered, and will be checking out the other people mentioned.

I think I've done this one before, but that's ok. I don't mind. Always nice to have your blog noticed. What keeps me going back to Janice's is in one of the first times I opened it, there was a beach photo. Some of you will know I'm a sucker for beach photos, with cuties nice but optional. Think of all the blogs, and all the photos of beaches on blogs, and I recognized it. I'd been on it. How cool is that? She lives in a beautiful but under rated part of the world.

So. Five Random Facts hereto though unmentioned on my blog:

1. I completely believe there is an alien conspiracy. Some of them walk among us as TV and movie producers. Their evil plot is to turn human brains into tapioca pudding via insidious broadcasts and commercials. They happen to like human brain tapioca pudding, and are patient. The harvesting will happen any time now. Even human brain tapioca can go rancid, and there are lots of signs of it happening. Which is why I don't watch much network TV or see many movies anymore.
2. I am a curious contradiction. I've only been blogging since late 2007, though I had a website and another blog on another platform back in the mid 90's. It took me a while to get onto Facebook, and much longer to get the point of Twitter, and I've come to love them both. There's lots of people I've never met that I've enjoyed chatting with, and exchanging (semi-)witty banter. I've even met a number of people through blogging and that's been really good. I can keep track of people who have moved to the other side of the world (hi Kelsey!) and family I had lost touch with. And yet, in a group of people I don't know well, I don't have much to say. I'm rubbish at small talk, but I've learned that many people are horrified at my not-small talk. When I tell you the very, very first thing I heard coming into my very first spin class was a woman saying "what's a little vomit between friends?" and it felt like I was coming home, that will tell you much about my small talk. (She knows who she is.)
3. The person I would most like to have dinner with is Leonardo da Vinci. There is little doubt he would make the top 10 list for most remarkable human beings ever to live, and has a strong case for being first on the list. I would ask him how he learned to see what no other person had ever seen before.
4. Dogs often bark at me, (though Austin doesn't). I'm not sure why. One of my dog buddies speculates there's something predatory about how I look at dogs, and it makes them uncomfortable. Maybe they sense my inner shark. I worry about dogs running loose on the bike path.
5. One of my father's brothers had intensely piercing blue or grey eyes. It was like he could see through to your soul, yet he was a kind and gentle man who walked the talk of his religion. My mom's dad had intense dark eyes that scared the crap out of me as a child. My cousin's (mom's brother's daughter) young daughter has inherited his intense look. It's unsettling in a very little girl. I'm told I have intent blue eyes as well. The blue part is easy to see, but I've never felt like I have the intent quality. 

Questions.

1. What is your mantra or motivational quote?  "Despair is a sin" or "I get to run when so many others don't."

I don't really have one. Sure, there are things I mutter under my breath at times as an alternative to a homicidal response to human stupidity. None of them are particularly fit for public consumption.

2. What is the next big goal on your list?  My next big  non-running goal is to finish my novel. My running goal is to finish the Bluenose International Marathon in a personal best time.

It just so happens I've been musing about this. Just very recently I've dug out the bits of a novel, and am thinking seriously about taking another run at it. Lots of good bits, I just have trouble figuring out what kind of story it is. There's a love story (sort of) in it. There are at least two murders, but I'm pretty sure the book is not about solving those murders, though one character could. There's a dream sequence I see in my head, because I dreamed it, that I have no idea how to write down, or how it could fit into the novel, because it does. The plant where the characters work is almost a character itself, and a significant part of the atmosphere. It's a little bit of a period piece. 

3. What is your favourite place in the world and why?  Risser's Beach because I feel more myself there than any other place on the planet.

Ah, Risser's Beach. I'm a big fan of Hirtle's myself. Venice was amazing. I want to go back. And yet I never, ever tire of looking at the mountains and foothills, and the cloudscapes from the strange winds we get. I'd never understood what painters meant when the talked about the quality of light in Italy, and now that I've been there I understand. I also now see the peculiar qualities of light here. In some ways Calgary is a frustrating place to live, but I've been here since 1980, and can't really see myself living anywhere else now. At least until someone carts me off to the old age home because of advanced geezerdom. With any luck by the time I need one, they will have figured out how to make them a civilized place to live.

4. What's the best way to spend a recovery day?  Good question that I find hard to answer because I nearly always spend recovery days working. If I didn't have to work, I like to think I'd spend them reading, writing and cooking.

Usually recovery days are spent catching up on laundry. Nobody ever told me about the laundry issues facing triathletes. Every now and then I like to spend part of the day in silence, doing nothing but meditating. No, not the formal incense sniffing, mantra chanting, cross-legged meditation of popular image. For one thing, I can't sit upright cross-legged. My hip flexors start killing me really fast, and then I have to hunch over to keep my balance, or I'll fall over backwards. I mean just seated comfortably, preferably with a cat purring nearby. But it has to be quiet. I like to let my mind wander, but I don't try to think about any particular thing, and I don't try not to. It's sort of like lucid dreaming. It's hard to describe.

5. If you could travel and run a race anywhere, where would it be?  Another tough question. There are lots of places I'd like to visit but, to run a marathon, I'd have to say New York. Or Dublin. Or maybe Edinburgh. Or Athens. sigh. Nope, I can't decide.

Hmmm. I don't know. I'm not a big fan of traveling to a race. So far I've driven to all my races. There is something within me that doesn't like the thought of disassembling Estela and putting her in a bike boxes. Maybe if I took a bike mechanic course I'd be happier about it. I used to like traveling a lot. My dad was an airline pilot, and some of my earliest memories are of airports and airplanes. But that was when flying had class. Men wore suits, and women wore dresses on a trip. Real food was served. Now, an airplane is a flying bus. I have seen people getting on a mid day flight wearing pajamas and slippers. Airports no longer feel safe to me, mainly because of the security theatre. 

I just finished reading The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. Even reading it I knew I was going to be sad at the end because I'd never ever be reading it for the first time again. Many people read because they like to immerse themselves in the world. That doesn't happen to me that often, but it happened here, big time. The whole book works on so many levels for me that I was just delighted the entire time reading it. Next time I read it I'll have to pay a bit more attention to the dates. I think they matter more than I thought.

Using a trackpad is a bit of a change from a mouse, but I'm liking it so far. The main issue is when I intend to do a two finger gesture, and do a 3 because my ring finger droops, and then something unexpected happens. I'll get used to it pretty quick.

The novel fragments are all rescued, and I need to do some serious work on story timeline. That will tell me what bits of what I've done so far I can keep, and what I need to write.

I sometimes do a year end blog, and some thoughts are beginning to surface about that. You have been warned.

The care and feeding of a Mo

Let me put up my hand and confess. I have a Mo. Perhaps some of you have noticed. I've had it for such a long time that I do not know what my face looks like without it. There are maybe a few dozen photos of me without it.

The reason is remarkable pragmatic. I nearly cut off my upper lip while figuring out how this shaving thing worked. My father deeply disapproved, and made his opinion known, but he could never say the words "porn star." Mind you, back then I'd have probably thought it was a compliment. Perhaps he knew.

A Mo takes a long time to come into it's own. A month is hardly enough to be considered fairly started. At that point you barely know what it will look like, and what the possibilities are. It needs to be gently shaped to suit your face, the rest of the hair on your head, and your personal style. There are a million subtle Mo styles out there, and all that I'll say about them is that most wouldn't work for me.

First thing is that you have to take care of it yourself, gently trimming it to shape. Just as a vineyard knows the footsteps of the owner, a Mo knows that it is loved when the owner pays attention to it. At least once a week I trim mine, and whenever necessary deal with any stray hair that got missed. It is much better to make frequent small trims, rather than a drastic periodic one.

I learned that lesson during lunch one day. I had been trying to grow it longer, thinking about doing the handlebar style. Then I took a big bite of a kaiser bun sandwich, not noticing that much of it was in my mouth. That was not fun. I trimmed it back right away.

There are certain rules to facial hair. One can grow a Mo by itself. One can grow a full beard, lightly shaped for neat edges depending on just how your face and neck produce hair. If you're married or in a relationship, or have a job you'd like to keep, you'd best keep it neatly trimmed. There are many variations on less than full beards, and they are all wretched, or worse. The fat guy trimming a thin beard line to make people think he as a jawline? Beyond wretched. The soul patch, the goatee, the mutton chops, and many others, all wretched. Long and wild is fine if you're a biker, or a survivor of a long lost Arctic expedition. You may think it makes you look like a rebel, but it really says you're too lazy for even minimal personal grooming. I am sure not to stand downwind of such people. I am undecided about long, full beards that are fully or partially braided and meticulously kept. In theory I think it could be a very, very manly look, but I think you'd have to be starting with a very, very manly look before the beard.

There are some ethnic groups that don't grow facial hair very well. No value judgement, it's completely a genetic thing. Men are allowed a period in their youth to find this out about themselves.  They might be the one guy in their gene pool that actually can grow facial hair and have it look reasonable. (Expecting to have sex during this period is unreasonable.) Once you have completed this experiment you have a choice. If it grows in and looks at least almost reasonable, just like the rest of us you can grow it or shave. If it doesn't look good, please just resign yourself to a lifetime of shaving.

Many women have an aversion to facial hair. On their men too. My hairstylist at the time was really down on my beard, and encouraged me to cut it off. She did the snoopy dance of joy when it went away, and encouraged the Mo to go too. Not gonna happen. I think the opinion is formed during the rough patch that follows missing a day shaving, and having the beard fill in and the ends soften up. Women, let your guy express himself with the Mo. And a beard too. Most men after a while will realize that in fact it is not a time saving, as trimming a beard can take a long time to come out nice.

During my last month long vacation in Nova Scotia I decided to grow a beard again, mainly because I was feeling lazy. I was pretty sure it would fill in ok. What I wasn't prepared for was the gray strip from my lower lip down towards my throat. The edges under my ears are still mostly red. It looked dreadful, and at the 3 week mark I shaved it off.

I am looking forward to seeing the different Mo styles over the next month. Please post photos!

Swimming with the bulkhead centered in the training pool at Talisman is weird. I'm used to having it set up as a 50 m pool, and I swam that way many times over the summer. Today I'd be getting into the groove, and the wall would be right there again. It seemed like I was doing a turn every few strokes, and it always came sooner than expected. They weren't smooth turns and it took a bit longer than usual to settle in, so the K was a bit slow, 18:45. Lots of dolphin kick and pull, 45 minutes.

My inner shark showed up for part of the swim. He was trying to help, pointing out my head was moving back and forth, and my arms were crossing over centre a bit, and my elbows were dropping, and my flip turn sucked, and I was being very slow. He also can't understand why I wasn't swimming under the bulkhead each time and going for the full 50 m. He was a little bored that there wasn't any other prey to chase in the pool. Still it was nice of him to drop in. Haven't heard from him in a little while. I should have asked if he was at the shark resort again.

Home and on the bike 90 minutes. Warmup long and gradual, hams and calves a bit cranky. Then 20 minutes at 225 watts with a very reasonable heart beat, under 130. Legs felt pretty good. Easy. Then 10 minutes at 250 watts, with my heart rate between 135 and 140. I think if I'd started at 250 I could have done that for the 20 minutes, but it would have been a bit of a stretch. Cool down with some easy fast spin. Progress is being made. Stretched a bit after.

Female readers, what are your thoughts on Movember?