Training Log Archive: bl

Topflite fall morning, short DP spin in Nottingcook before leaving for Rockland. 2 mice to the outpost.

Downeaster from Exeter to Portland, bus to Rockland. Nice vantage from the tracks. Lots of colorful woods between Exeter & Durham.

Dog jog in Holbrook, expecting more but limited time as well as arrival of midget footballers at 8a along with parents made it impractical. Dogs also get to be a bit maurauder-like when acting as a pair. Home via Pt. Jeff, 91, 84 etc. (200mi). Really, just a jog in the park where dogs not welcome.... The inevitable weekend I'd rather not. Return to road & water tomorrow.

One for the road...

Thought there was going to be a run but not so. Drive to LI/Stoneybrook 220 mi plus 80' on ferry. Sad visit. Kept thinking a run somehwere green would be good compensation but Sat just disappeared into the dark. Insect sounds are a return to summer. Have dogs along.

Event: UNO Boulder Dash
 

Slogo SPS wander by stream, thru field, on paths. No A meet as Bobby had stroke & need to visit. Right about now, I just want a nap in tgif mode.

Ran home w/ a FF map from '84* yesterday (1/15). Reminded me of all the tricky spots in that forest. Have not been there for maybe 5 yrs, '00 BG, some NODs I put on, TT in some long ago May as well. Like it, neat niche in rural NH.

Beth came home fm work & took the next mouse off to the outpost, forgot it this am. I was reading about Ardipithecus on the DP, 4.4X10 to the sixth is reasonably long ago & fun to contemplate.

* 7/12/84 notes (map from spring meet, has some old names written on it, eg, Ron Pontius/USMAOC) say "trng: came here with Beth, arrived about 1700, 7/11 & went out as did Beth in fairly heavy downpour. Spent night at Oxbow campground. Fell asleep after dinner, around 2100! Woke to a nice day. Now noon & completely fair weather. Woods thick with bugs & poison ivy. Demanding orienteering, needed to concentrate!".

"Nice summer day after pm and last night's rain. Very tired...most of the legs were pretty hard - had trouble seeing with very wet eyeglasses. Got a branch in my left eye & thought I lost my contact - came back blurry eyed - sure I'd lost the lens but much to my surprise it was there!!" One or two familiar themes a quarter century later. 7.855k, 83:43.

Maybe return to FF in November. Recall missing a Peekskill A meet Nov '80 when I bought Rhodora & returned in December in the snow. Slept in Gypsy (in the ungated park), the van I sold to the Sankus sisters in '84. Rode out the early dark at the Peekskill public library.

Run home fm work, chilly but for exercise. Ran by countless pumpkins for fall showing. Slept poorly evidenced by sending Jeff S/Coach a "car talk" type email around 0345 & more. But energy anyway which is always nice. This was the Saturday night of the BD/Nottingcook meet 2 yrs ago, 9/30-10/01. Don't need any of that kind of timesink for the foreseeable future. My cold blossoms.

Am DP, slow lap in forest.

SPS track at noon, no expectations, nursing a cold as well. 4 young ladies, around 30, running seriously, guessed they hit one 800 in 3:10. Surprised to see anyone there, not to mention 4 track fans running.

The dragonfly and the mouse




This critter was flying about the kitchen last night. This morning it was fluttering low by a window in the sunroom. Zoe seemingly chomped on it but, somehow, it survived intact. I put it on a table on the terrace outside. It was cold. I was curious to see how it would pass the day. I recall a bee from years ago that revived with the first warm rays. At 5 pm, it appeared dead. I blew on it. There was motion so I brought it inside to see what warmth might accomplish. It moved more but finally curled up in permanent sleep. There is a collection of dragonflies etc. in the downstairs bathroom, spawned from, shall I say, common origin....

The mouse was one of numerous. August was a busy month after the cats died. Beth said, on the phone, "don't forget the mouse". It was in one of two have-a-heart traps in the basement, this one on top of the frig. I did the usual...bring it upstairs with the dogs' breakfast where I would not forget to take it along. At DP time, the usual mouse comes for the ride to the outpost. Some, maybe numerous, of our mice have never even seen the out-of-doors. This one was small and afraid. I opened the trap in the usual place but it refused to join the strange world. So I left the trap on the usual beam, returning after DP. The poor thing was still there, fearful:-). I shook the trap, it landed paralyzed on the beam. I jump started it with a touch to the back. Off it went, I presume, in search of its family that had disappeared over the past 5-7 weeks, some 30 plus of them.

For the most part, all critters great & small, are worth a second thought, at least here. Homo sapiens is certainly a stupid fellow (war, greed, population explosion/env't destruction etc), nary worth the time of day. I have a book by the bed, a bible of sorts. It was written in the 50s: "Immense Journey" by the naturalist Loren Eiseley. After reading the first few pages, I seized upon it immediately. I have a link to Darwin's "Origin of Species" on my office web site. I've read much of it. Such perspective leads to behavior that many might consider silly. So be it. Much of what's news of us is, at the very least, absurd.

9/30/09...

I was in my office this pm with a Bear Brook map in hand. UNO has a Russian mapper coming 10/13 to begin a mapping project there. I was perusing new basemap jpg's with the old BB in hand. I've seen alot of this particular map in the past year but paused to read some comments about "pretty autumn leaves" as well as handwritten race analysis & noted the date, Sept 30, 1979, 30 years ago today! Winner was PG in 95+, Steve Tarry 125', Lux 132', Sharon Crawford 213', Jim Arsenault dnf. Also an immense journey measured by a much different clock.

Track workout w/ GSR group - 2x400, 2x800, 2x400, 4x200 w/ varying degrees of rest - always moving.

Warmup 3.1k w/ 8;05 metric plus 200s, 400s 50"-1:45" pace: too much work for warmup.

Then workout: 99, 104, 3:34, 3:36, 102, 103, 47, 48, 41, 39 - only last 2 200s made me feel good about myself. Used to run most of the 400 & 800s faster on way to longer dist. Cool eve, nice group - start in between, can't catch some in front, fall back to group of 4 guys behind - jumped out on the last 2 200s & kept ahead but but. Hard to find a format to enter these type workouts - not really interested in keeping track of it all, just what counts. Have to pay my dues, join the group. Have not been a member of a running club since CSU in the late '70s.

Had an EKG today - better than 12/07 but still showing LVH consistent w/ HTN - some unquantifiable degree of cardiac inefficiency by this method - the pump isn't happy with the pressure head it works against, eg, total peripheral resistance. I ought to loosen up, learn to like Republicans etc:-). Or take a BP med more regularly or do a few other things I'm not inclined to do.

C • I try to write down what I ... 2