Thursday Sep 28 |
 | Yoga 1:00:00 [1] | |
| weight:132.5lbs |
| Namaste |
| Bicycling 30:00 [1] | |
| |
| Work commute, plus to school and back.
aur
I biked back to work past Dunkin Donuts and felt the pull*. I've decided my next DD purchase will be on the drives this weekend to and from HVO jr training weekend. I think knowing that I'm going to get my fix, and exactly when, helps.
*Like that of Schiehallion?:
|
| |
| C • Schiehallion 2 |
Wednesday Sep 27 |
| Bicycling 1:00:00 [2] | |
| |
| Biked to Tufts and gave a *terrible* talk, which just convinced me further that I would like to be laid off, get severence, and try to find a living that I'm good at, enjoy, and wake up in the morning eager to get to. (I think my current job satisfies the first two criteria, but there is something wrong when I postpone and procrastinate and just don't *do* the work.) The problem at the Tufts talk was that my failing mind is incapable of generating vocabulary on the fly. And I didn't practice my speech ahead of time, just pulled together the slides - because I didn't want to take too much time away from work to prepare. I think I used the word "interesting" about 200 times, and I should have used it not at all.
Afterward, biked to the Sheraton Commander, did a little this and that in the lounge (where I ingested neither alcohol nor wheat), and then listened to a lecture on the earth as a living thing. My friend wanted me to go to it, and I wanted to please my friend. It will give us more food for thought at our occasional lunches. It was a good talk in that it left me feeling more aware of wanting to make the best of the short time I have to participate in this universe. Also, the guy had written his speech ahead of time and used an enjoyable breadth of vocabulary. |
Tuesday Sep 26 |
| Note | |
| |
| OK, now that I have shown that I have enough willpower to mostly stick to a restricted diet for a few days, I'm going to tackle another issue: addiction to AP, DailyKos and websudoku. |
| |
| C • I share 2/3 of your addiction 2 |
| Bicycling 38:00 [2] | |
| |
| Work commute & parent night at school |
Monday Sep 25 |
| Note | |
| weight:128lbs |
| Same scale that said 135 last week said 128 this morning. I must be dehydrated. By 10:30 this morning I'd had two cups of herbal tea, four fruits and half a pack of rice cakes. I think I might be a bit of a binger. Especially while sitting in front of the computer.
I did have some dairy, caffeine and wheat this weekend: decaf ice coffee with cream for the long drive each way, and a corn muffin to go with the coffee on the return trip. Having gone without caffeine for a few days previously, the residual caffeine in decaf was apparently enough to wake me up at 3:30 am Saturday. Maybe decaf Dunkin Donuts coffee has more than the supposed 3-4 mg of caffeine per cup.
Anyway, while this all was off my exploratory diet, I did avoid regular coffee, an enticing glass of wine offered at the Moosewood restaurant Saturday evening, several attractive opportunities to ingest wheat and/or sugar and/or dairy, and other miscellaneous evil temptations. And I feel good about that. |
| |
| C • How was Moosewoods? We were in... 2 |
Sunday Sep 24 |
| Orienteering race 2:35:11 [3]10 km (15:31 / km) +230m 13:55 / km | |
| |
| Blue Classic at CNYO A meet.
Worst error was where you flip the map over at 13; it was raining and I didn't expect that so didn't have a hat with bill and my glasses were a Big Problem, and I pulled a 180. |
| Orienteering race 1:23:30 [3]5.13 km (16:17 / km) +100m 14:50 / km | |
| |
| F40 Green Classic at CNYO A meet. |
| |
|
Classic - Blue - Splits |
| |
|
Classic - Green - Splits |
Saturday Sep 23 |
| |
| Event: CNYO A meet
|
| Orienteering 1:46:04 [3]6.3 km (16:50 / km) +215m 14:23 / km | |
| |
| Blue Middle at CNYO A Meet |
| Orienteering 28:50 [3]2.48 km (11:38 / km) +78m 10:03 / km | |
| |
| Sprint at CNYO A meet. Got stupidly stuck in green early on, took a while to get out. My thighs are covered with angry red poke marks from the thorns.
|
| Orienteering race 55:08 [3]3.52 km (15:40 / km) +115m 13:28 / km | |
| |
| F40 green middle at CNYO A meet. Prerunner; felt slightly useful as I could report that the GO control wasn't out yet. Otherwise, despite my efforts to make running twice easy on the organizers, I felt I caused way too many small problems. The shortened start window and on-the-fly start times made this endeavor particularly challenging, I think. |
| Note | |
| |
| We were fortunate to be able to stay at Theron's uncle's pond-side property, with his grandparents Jean (science teacher) and Mike (radio astronomer), who tried orienteering for the first time. The boys and I were treated to accommodations in the "Spartan Mansion":
|
| |
|
Sprint - Strong Lungs - Splits |
| |
|
Middle - Blue - Splits |
| |
|
Middle - Green - Splits |
Friday Sep 22 |
| Running 16:00 [2] | |
| |
| To work and back |
Thursday Sep 21 |
| Note | |
| |
| I have been thinking lately, from time to time, about getting older and beyond the having-babies-and-small-children phase.
I was awoken by my alarm this morning, from this dream: I have a baby, a third child. It is a wunderbaby: in a matter of days, it can walk. I show Dave; I'm pretty psyched. We are at some crowded function with other families. I show another mother. My baby has one weird leg, kind of flattened, but no matter - she can walk fine on it. Then I have a realization: that my baby may be different in another way. I ask the other mother if she can see the baby, and she says, no she can't. She's been humoring me. I realize that the baby is an elaborate hallucination. I sit there, holding this very real baby, reddish hair, wide open eyes, sweet little baby body tucked in my arms, knowing that she is a hallucination but experiencing her just the same. I ask Dave if he sees her, but I don't remember what he said.
Yesterday at Tufts I listened to a lecture that touched on the effects of sleep deprivation, including how the hypothalamus might send signals that put the brain into a mode having some of the characteristics of sleep while still awake. That must be where the hallucination element came from. |
| Yoga 55:00 [1] | |
| weight:135lbs |
| |
| Running 8:00 [1] | |
| |
| work-home |
| Note | |
| |
| Clarity of thinking was a side effect cited to me by my friend who tried this elimination diet thing, at least for the first couple of weeks where you are eliminating things from your diet. I guess people fasting claim the same thing, but I'm unlikely to ever find that out. Well, I don't feel particularly clearer, but I did have what might have been an unusually cogent conversation with a coworker this morning. I even remembered some of the science presented in two of the talks I attended yesterday, including actual gene names. That might be unusual. Forgetting has been my strong suit lately. |
| Running 30:00 [2] | |
| |
| |
| Bicycling 10:00 [1] | |
| |
| Day two. Ate quite a lot actually, just no caffeine, wheat products, etc. Rice cakes, that green juice, herbal tea, sushi, rice/chicken/broccoli dinner. Feeling kind of hefty. |
Wednesday Sep 20 |
| Note | |
| |
| OK, so today so far I've had no caffeine, no alcohol, no chocolate, no wheat or dairy products. I'm really hungry. I have a slight headache. I've ingested an orange, orange juice, oatmeal, salad, and lots of herbal tea. Too early to see the positive effects, I guess. Goal is to do this for 2 weeks and if by then I don't experience clarity of thinking and/or lack of the symptoms I'm trying to address, then I am barking up the wrong tree, because I'll have no baseline onto which to add possibly problematic foods. Woof! |
| Bicycling 1:00:00 [2] | |
| |
| To work. Out to Tufts. Back home. |
Tuesday Sep 19 |
| Running 20:00 [1] | |
| |
| Uncomfortable.
Getting closer to the threshold for going on an "elimination diet" to figure out what is causing the discomfort. I am supposedly going to go two weeks without caffeine, alcohol, most sugar, wheat, nuts, chocolate, dairy - and then try adding one thing at a time to see what it does. |
Monday Sep 18 |
| Bicycling 8:00 [1] | |
| (injured) |
| Work commute.
Yesterday, and today to a lesser extent, I had a lot of shoulder/back pain. I attribute it to Friday's yoga, Saturday's 5 hours of exams, Sunday's orienteering and random biking, all exacerbating the same problem. |
| Note | |
| |
| 
Boys with bugs.
Bugs with arms.
|
Sunday Sep 17 |
| Orienteering 1:00:00 [3] | |
| |
| Slow green course. Green; ran into Dave several times. |
Saturday Sep 16 |
| |
| Event: 2006 Sprint Series Finals Festival
|
| Running 15:00 [2] | |
| |
| Along Fresh Pond during the exam break. I then read the Globe outside of the nearby Dunkin Donuts while treating myself to an ice coffee and corn muffin. Then I visited Danehy Field and socialized with other soccer parents for half an hour before heading back to Cambridge Rindge & Latin for the science exam. The exam was a blast. I enjoyed the essay question about semiannual inversions in temperate lakes. For example. Next I want to take French & Math. |
| Bicycling 20:00 [1] | |
| |
| Biked to the test, then to Fresh Pond at lunch, then back to the test and home.
Recently I read (heard? saw?) the story of a famous scientist (mathematician?) who earned his keep teaching fairly uninterested schoolboys. Who was that?
I guess if I *did* teach in K-12, I'd like to retain a foot in the heady and rarified scientific world. Like that guy. |
Friday Sep 15 |
| Yoga 55:00 [1] | |
| |
| It's amazing how much strength training you can do just by moving your body into different positions. |
| Running 16:00 [2] | |
| |
| Work commute |
| Note | |
| |
| Tomorrow I will spend all day taking the Massachusetts Tests for Educator Licensure. Not sure exactly WHY, mind you, other than that I enjoy tests. In the morning I plough through the required reading and writing exam. In the afternoon I chose to tackle general science. |
Thursday Sep 14 |
| Running 50:00 [2] | |
| |
| Around the soccer field while R&E practiced. |
| Running 10:00 [4] | |
| |
| Tried to go fast. |
Wednesday Sep 13 |
| Bicycling 1:00:00 [2] | |
| |
| To work.
To Tufts.
To Graham and Parks.
And home.
Today's "dessert":
 |
Tuesday Sep 12 |
| Running 20:00 [1] | |
| (sick) |
| To work & back. Coming down w/cold. |
| Bicycling 8:00 [1] | |
| |
| Work commute.
Random photo of the day: moms at the bus stop, first day of school.
 |
| Running 40:00 [2] | |
| |
| From soccer practice to the mall to buy soccer equipment, and back. |
| Bicycling 10:00 [1] | |
| |
| Home to Sennott Field, and back, with Isabel and Rachael. |
Monday Sep 11 |
| Running 25:00 [1] | |
| |
| Ran to Star Market to pick up some echinacea tea for David, who is coming down with a cold. I think I have some symptoms as well, so I'm going to go heavy on the echinacea too. I'm a believer. |
Sunday Sep 10 |
| Canoeing race 1:14:00 [1] | |
| |
| Canoe-O with the girls. We were over time due to some navigational difficulty on Horse Island. It was fun, and a nice time of day to be on the water. I am hoping I did not exacerbate my right elbow/wrist/forearm injury that has been worsening over the past two months. But paddling was probably a bad idea. |
| Orienteering 21:00 [2] | |
| |
| Shadowed Isabel on white. Fartlekky. When she sprints I can not keep up.
There is a lot of talent developing on white and yellow. Rachael, Theron and David all completed a yellow course; Rachael was fast enough to secure 3rd place, though I think 3 kids were within a minute of her time - hotly contested. Isabel shadowed Elizabeth on white. It is nice to see the kids developing. I'm hoping that Isabel, Rachael, David and Ceire will all make it to the HVO training. It would be nice to see Theron there too, but he may stay in town to go to his 3 hour advanced math class taught by Russians on Saturdays. I was psyched to find a nerd kid willing to orienteer because (a) orienteering is totally fun for nerds, and (b) Theron doesn't play soccer or baseball (which inevitably conflict with orienteering) - I never realized that weekend *math* classes might be an issue. |
| Orienteering race 1:14:00 [4] | |
| |
| 5k green course. Tried to move quickly, but only managed sub-15 min/km.
I love Pawtuckaway. Lots of nice running areas and map simplfication challenges. |
| Note | |
| |
| I am grateful to UNO and all the folks who set up the Pawtuckaway Experience. It is such a beautiful place, and always a fun weekend. Thanks to J-J, Nancy, Goulds, Bundschuhs, Ernst, etc etc etc for some really great orienteering! |
Saturday Sep 9 |
| |
| Event: UNO Camping Weekend
|
| Orienteering race 2:41:00 [2] | |
| |
| Blue course, though I think I copied one control wrong. Started early, 6:15 am, so that I could drive the girls from Pawtuckaway back down to Lexington for an away game, first of the season.
It was hot.
 |
| Orienteering race 2:23:00 [3] | |
| |
| Night-O. Not sure of exact time. I'm still a scaredy cat in the woods at night on my own. And I was on my own a lot, particularly after control 9. At first Dean and a couple others were around, and I saw a few others near other controls, but then I was solo for the deepest belly of Pawtuckaway. Took the trails around from 11 to 12 because I'd had some trouble threading between marshes on the way to 11, and thought I'd play it safe. It was a blast to run at night on the trails, except I wiped out pretty good on one. Scraped up my knee and shoulder. I picked my feet up extra high after that. The new mountain bike trail is particularly fun to run on at night.
For the most part I was in touch with the map: I took accurate bearings, walked, and checked off features. I lost contact between 11 and 12, which is how I ended up struggling a bit. |
Friday Sep 8 |
| Bicycling 10:00 [1] | |
| |
| Did some errands on the way to work including stopping by the Bermans' for some compasses. Maybe if I have a brand new Moscow compass this weekend it will make up for my total lack of training, and I'll be able to run 3 blue courses, including one at night in a thunderstorm, in record time. Got 4 compasses for the 5 kids I'm bringing. |
Thursday Sep 7 |
| Bicycling 8:00 [1] | |
| |
| Commute |
| Running 20:00 [2] | |
| |
| |
| Note | |
| |
| With all this inactivity, running several long courses this weekend should be... interesting. |
Wednesday Sep 6 |
| Bicycling 16:00 [1] | |
| |
| Pretty bad... Trying to finally do some things I've been putting off, which means I sit around pretending to work instead of going running and the like. Anyway, today I picked Isabel up at the bus stop and she rode the rack on the back of my bike back to my work, where she checked email and then attended a meeting with me. |
Tuesday Sep 5 |
| Running 32:00 [1] | |
| |
| |
| Note | |
| |
| First day of school.
 |
Monday Sep 4 |
| Running 30:00 [2] | |
| |
| To the point. |
Sunday Sep 3 |
| Walking in the woods 30:00 [1] | |
| |
| Took 5 kids ages 8-11 to Breakheart. It was raining. They split into two groups and set courses for each other. Turns out the area around the southern access point is in need of updating on the map: new buildings, new trails, disappeared trails. They were in the woods for a total of about an hour and a half. |
Saturday Sep 2 |
| Running 22:00 [2] | |
| weight:136lbs |
| Ran on the kids' Erie street. David did the first half mile with me. We were there to pick them up and bring them home for the summer. Running felt like a small forward step in what is otherwise physical fitness backsliding. |
