And keep it mooooooving! That’s the thing about injuries, they don’t seem to subside, they just stack and stack and stack, and before you know it, you’re at the ripe age of 40 and can’t do anything but pedal and swim. That’s the trajectory I find myself on these days, anyway.
Life Stuff
Crystal got a ring! For her middle finger. It’s cute, though. It has my birthstone in it. #imalibra (I think?). She spent the weekend in SLC at her best friends (short notice) wedding. Adorable.
I did a running race. It hurt but my body is well on the path of (very slow) recovery. The race was supposed to be 8.5 miles which turned into 10 due to some poor course marking, and it was supposed to be 1.25 hours which turned into 2 due to poor injury management and equipment malfunctions. I’m still dealing with some of the after-effects of an ankle that I broke back in June, mainly weaker tendons and scar tissue surrounding it. Though I enjoy trail running and racing, the extremely sloppy and muddy course did nothing to help ankles or traction. I twisted my bad ankle at mile 5.5 and held pity party in the woods, needing to sit down and hyperventilate until the pain subsided. After “walking it out” for a few minutes, I felt good enough to run and settled into a rhythm that was about a mile a minute under what I can normally manage. Climbing on the bad ankle felt relatively good with the slower speeds and lower impact forces, but as soon as I started downhill again, I almost immediately twisted it on some innocuous roots. Rinse and repeat two more times, and I was relegated to walking the last 2.5 miles of the course in pouring and cold 40-degree rain.
There were some positives and I’m happy with the first 5-miles of the race, averaging split times around 7:30-8min/mile on tight and twisty singletrack despite not running more than a few miles since March of this year. I’m hoping to recover enough to do the December running race, with some important lessons learned in my back pocket (read: ankle brace, shoelace covers, and better shorts). Part of me wishes I picked up cross-country running in high school since it would have been a lot cheaper than cycling (and almost as rewarding).
DND SZN
It’s here, it’s here! DND season is upon and for the first time since 2021, I get to play as a character instead of herd cats! We had our first session of the year recently, the character-building one, and it went relatively smoothly. I made some of my locally famous and endlessly delicious Spicy Cabbage Soup, and we all created our characters. Now in year 3, many of the DND intricacies are finally starting to ‘click’, but I find myself Googling and referencing the player's handbook just as often as ever. Our DM this year is ambitious and funny, and I’m sure he’ll run a great campaign. He’s got some homebrew cooking up in his head, so we’ll see how that goes. Either way, it’s nice to play with a motivated group of individuals who want to be at the table.
The Future
I’ve been complaining to anyone who will listen about how tired I am lately, and that hasn’t changed too much. I spent some $$ on new multi-vitamins, seeing as the only difference between now and last Spring is that I ran out of my $.02/pill multi-vitamins. I’m now spending $.10/pill on some Haggens (high-end grocery store) branded multi’s, but I doubt they’ll do 5x as much good. Either way, I’m ready to break out of this slump.
Regardless of how my body feels, I’ll be doing a big ‘ol cyclocross weekend. With the ankle feeling as weak and tender as it is, I’m a bit tepid about the events. The first is the infamously muddy Hannigan Speedway Cyclocross race here in Bellingham, and the second is the “Nations Largest CX Event” in Woodland Park. Both events look to feature extensive running.
Finally, Crystal & I are still on a big ‘ol music kick so we’ll be doing a fun ‘dinner and a show’ double-date on Thursday with some close friends. John Craigie is coming to town with Bella White opening, and I’m very excited to catch them both. We saw Bella White at the Fairwell Festival, and we’re making quite the habit of catching artists on tour that we originally discovered there.
Hot Take of The Week
I’m stealing this from Amigo the Devil, aka Danny.
When Crystal and I went to his show last Monday in Seattle, towards the end of his set, he told us he would not do an encore because he thought they were stupid. The crowd gave him a little bit of grief, and I did too at first, but he still delighted and put on an amazing performance. At the end of his last song, instead of us all standing and applauding for 5 minutes, everyone cheered and then left in an orderly fashion. It was actually really nice.
On Saturday night, I saw Watchhouse (fka Mandalin Orange) locally. They put on a good show, nothing too exciting (it was like listening to vinyl in your living room, but live), and after the “last song,” they simply waved to the crowd and walked off the stage, leaving their instruments. No talk, no “goodnight” message, nothing. The crowd cheered and hung around, doing the “encore, encore, encore!” until Watchhouse not-so-nonchalantly walked back onto the stage, said thanks, and played their actual last song.
It was lame as hell. Cringey, even.
So, thanks Danny. I appreciate you opening my eyes to how lame these pre-planned encores are.
Until next time, friends.
Books worth reading
As You Wish – Cary ElwesAs You Wish (A fun, well-written story about the lead-up, behind-the-scenes, and aftermath of The Princess Bride movie)
Shows worth watching
[Intentionally Blank] – I haven’t watched anything of note since the last blog post.
Cry for help of the week
Work is a drag, and I am not a random content machine. New career suggestions need apply.
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