Hi, all:

Glad to see that folks are passing unharmed through the snowstorm and that it's been more of an adventure than a problem.

I got up early this morning and had the "pleasure" of riding the latest stage of the Tour of Sufferlandria, described thus:

Stage 6: Thu, 29 Jan: Local Hero
Duration: 1hr 25mins
A mixed bag of a stage, riders will be faced with criterium racing, time trials, flats and short climbs. And a brief stay in a Thai prison. Heavy legs are no reason not to pursue as much GLORY as possible. You might not win the ToS today, but you could lose it if you’re not up for the terribly unnecessary sprints that finish today’s stage.

My legs are heavy, I can't spin up to cadence easily any more, and the HR just won't budge up into the kind of territory I need it to to push the wattage that isn't coming.  Seems about right for this point in the game.  I took myself to the pool at lunch today and when I saw that it was an absolute zoo, took myself over to the swirly therapy pool and stretched and rested.  Totally the right call.

Shovel on, frens.

reminded me of the old days when I skied on similar sunny winter days..

Me too Henry, especially as there weren't too many of us skiing in the city in those days and my tracks through the grasslands of the local parks would often still be there after work.

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In 2009, one of my summer trips to Japan coincided with some work MikeMP was doing in Japan too so he joined me in one of the then-weekly marathons sponsored by the All Japan 100-Marathon Joyful Running Club eight-plus times around the 5km perimeter of the Imperial Palace in Tokyo at the Takebashi Gate.
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Having sponsors who thought we liked to work on the weekend too caused us to miss a repeat performance earlier this month but we’ll meet up tomorrow (Saturday) for one of the Joyful’s weekenders around Hiratsuka Central Park a little south of Tokyo.  I hope he has better luck finding this one though.

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ETA (four hours later) - I went out to get some goodies or tomorrow’s bimonthly/semiweekly (or vice versa) Saturday Joyful Marathon at Hiratsuka Central Park as, or a 200 yen entry fee ($1.93) the 26-plus-a-little circuits around that 1.7km perimeter of the park (1.1 mi) is entirely self supported but, with such a short loop, . . to say nothing of seven facilities around the way in case you drink to much (and associated drinking fountains to make sure you do). 
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I wonder if MikeMP likes salty carmels, shrimp crackers, Japanese jerky, cod egg potato chips corn consume taste potato chips. I should have gotten the kimchi ones but they're too spicy for me.  At least he will like the jerky, . . . I think.

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I already tried the mikan ones but, somehow, the all that salt didn’t go to well with mikan taste. I’ll just tell Mike there’re BBQ or something.

Tet - do you ever lose count of the loops?

I know I sure would! Heck, I lost track of my warm-up laps on the track the other day. I was doing a 1/2 mile warm-up before intervals and when I was done with my w/u laps, I looked down at my garmin and I was at .75. sheesh, how do you lose track of TWO laps???