Nice you had a great run, D2!

Good luck with Red Cord Day, LRB.

Good luck with the official prepping start for your marathon, Phil.  Congrats on your awesome race day!

((((Damaris))).   Hope you feel better.

I'm thinking duck, or lobster..   Or both, Lily!  You'll earn it with your 10-miler, so enjoy the night with friends and the food.

Congrats on the 6M easy, DaveP.  I sure miss the days when I could say 6 miles was easy......ok, enough of that self-pity-party stuff..

Good luck with your strides, hill sprints, etc, Step! Hope your son's body-clock gets back on track.

Hope you have a great post-work 10 miles, B-Plus.

For your the sake of yours and your wife's sanity, Andrew, I hope a happy result solution occurs for you two soon!  Nice track workout...wow, 6 miles in 51 minutes...that's about my 4-mile time, lol.

Yard work is x-training, Marjorie, log it!  Tough workout too, all that bending up and down, etc...enjoy your deserved rest day today!

Now you have to rest up from your resting fun weekend, OOTB.  Good luck with SF this upcoming weekend!  To you and Damaris...isn't she doing it too?

My DW is about to go engage in hand to hand combat to get my 12 year old daughter out of bed....Lurch, if you built a mud-ring and sold tickets to your neighbors, that would probably pay for the computer class right there...     Hope your interview went well!  It's nearly noon here in Texas so I assume your interview is already done.

Nice of your son, Step!  I gotta make my own breakfast since I don't have kids.  I got cats...but you can't get them to do anything in the kitchen except eat...

Your son is the sweetest little boy I've ever seen, Shari.  What a good heart he has! I think I'd cry if my son did this for me. James isn't big on niceties and kind gestures. And as you know, he's been diagnosed with Aspergers, but it is showing less and less as the years go by. Anyway, about 6 months ago, he is sitting on the back seat of our car, squeezed between our two elderly neighbors, as we are all driving to a restaurant. Knowing that the proper thing to do is to make small talk with them, he first asks them if they are still happy with their car. Then he tells them that it has been a long time since he last saw them, and adds: "I love you".   hahaha... You don't hear 16 year old teenage boys say that too often. He's still a little bit off in his small talk skills.  But it made Mrs N sooo happy! It was cute to see. :-)

It was very sweet to see this morning, because we've had some problems the last week or two with attitude at other times (not listening, yelling at me for "making him upset" by telling to do/not do something, and even telling me to "SHUT UP!"). That last one has earned trips to his bedroom and cost him treats and fun outings. Hopefully it is just the mid-summer psychosis.

It is great that James is trying. Does the school have a group that can help him out? Or someone through a counseling/speech therapy/etc? We have a fantastic speech therapist in our area who brings together small groups of boys with Aspergers to work on social and communication skills, based on their age and needs. Kevin has a group now with his age group, but I know she has/had teenagers also. If he is willing to work on it, it could make a big difference as he transitions to college or the workplace.

 

It was very sweet to see this morning, because we've had some problems the last week or two with attitude at other times (not listening, yelling at me for "making him upset" by telling to do/not do something, and even telling me to "SHUT UP!"). That last one has earned trips to his bedroom and cost him treats and fun outings. Hopefully it is just the mid-summer psychosis.

It is great that James is trying. Does the school have a group that can help him out? Or someone through a counseling/speech therapy/etc? We have a fantastic speech therapist in our area who brings together small groups of boys with Aspergers to work on social and communication skills, based on their age and needs. Kevin has a group now with his age group, but I know she has/had teenagers also. If he is willing to work on it, it could make a big difference as he transitions to college or the workplace.

Each age brings different challenges. James is not one to reply, but he will ignore us completely, which is just as frustrating. It leads us to yell at him at times (because after asking 5 times for something, we feel the need to make more of an impact by screaming at him). To which he will calmly respond with: "Nice. Is that the extent of your parental skills?" GRRR!!!!!

We have asked about groups that could help him. The problem is that our area is almost 100% French. James would not do well in French, it really is a second language for him and he dislikes it (to my big chagrin). He could get services on the island of Montreal, but it would be a long drive for us. Plus, he is not big on the idea of sharing with other kids. Fortunately, he loves his big sister and she has been an incredible help to him, explaining things about life in a way that is much better than what SO and I could have done. There is 12 years difference between the two of them, but they have always been the best of friends. Without her, we would have definitely needed counseling services to help with a few things.

 

Each age brings different challenges. James is not one to reply, but he will ignore us completely, which is just as frustrating. It leads us to yell at him at times (because after asking 5 times for something, we feel the need to make more of an impact by screaming at him). To which he will calmly respond with: "Nice. Is that the extent of your parental skills?" GRRR!!!!!

 

We have asked about groups that could help him. The problem is that our area is almost 100% French. James would not do well in French, it really is a second language for him and he dislikes it (to my big chagrin). He could get services on the island of Montreal, but it would be a long drive for us. Plus, he is not big on the idea of sharing with other kids. Fortunately, he loves his big sister and she has been an incredible help to him, explaining things about life in a way that is much better than what SO and I could have done. There is 12 years difference between the two of them, but they have always been the best of friends. Without her, we would have definitely needed counseling services to help with a few things.

That's great that she is able to help him. We have been very lucky in our school, too, that the special ed teacher has Kevin choose a couple of friends to join him for lunch each day and they all work on things. As I result, I've heard his peers remind him about getting too silly or forgetting to let other people have a turn to talk. I hope it will continue and that he will continue to have friends who accept his eccentricities, but also try to kindly guide him toward more socially-aware behavior.

Hi all,

I have found two great parks to run in Madrid. I managed 6 runs in Barcelona, did not run on the day we drove to Madrid, and will most likely run 6 days in Madrid also. Probably all easy running as we walk so much(5-7 hours per day), my legs are completely dead at night.

Awesome!  How is the food?

I did some really strange moves at red cord today.  It's never-ending with the maneuvers they come up with for that thing.

Some of them are so detailed and tedious that I would never do them on my own, which explains why my hips are were as weak as a house of cards in the first place.

I am now ejoying some strawberry cheesecake ice cream from Baskin Robbins as a treat.  

Step, it's great that Kevin's friends are helping him like this. He's at the right age for it. James was older when he was diagnosed and he's very self-conscious. Anything that makes him feel like he is standing out, or different from others, he hates. He likes to blend in and not be noticed.

Eric, sounds like you're all having a great time! I want a travel report when you get back!

LRB, you deserve the ice cream after the torture session you had. I just finished two bowls of chocolate mint ice cream and I didn't do anything to deserve it. The first bowl tasted awesome, the second bowl tasted like guilt. lol

I want to talk more about the long run, but work is keeping me busy. grrr...