Coastwalk cross trains by beating his head against the wall with a utility provider.

Holly shows us a little R&R in the household. she has a sunrise 8.4.

RunnerKSA makes the treadmill work before and after work. 2.5 and 1.5.

Buehrle checks in. You better get that crud out of your lungs.

Stumpy shows Maggie who the boss is and she sets the pace. Tag was 10 weeks old when he and I were going to walk a 5K. The starting pistol went off and all I saw was ear and elbows. We were in the lead for about 1/10th of a mile. Another dog passed us and my mutt grabbed the leash and took Guinness down. He went 3/4 mile before I carried him the rest of the way. He's been a runner ever since.

Henrun logs another mile and a half.

Tramps has a 4 miler with TriBee.

Joe618 checks in.

Fatozzig puts in some serious steps.

Tetsujin209 discovers his equipment has been robbing him of record-able mileage. He still makes the best of it.

Rochrunner has a brief post about his ten miles on the trainer.

Jlynne had a good time at the Packer party. She punishes the treadmill and challenges us to name a favorite Christmas movie. I'm torn between: Christmas With the Joker, A Very Godzilla Christmas, Santa Claus Conquers the Martians or It's a Wonderful Life.

Surly Bill is Die hard over his 6.5 miles.

Runr_Nut breaks all the rules. He's got a cold and wet 3.8.

Falconfixer has his 6.4. DW and I occasionally get her Dear Old Dad a gift.

TammyinGP gets a cold 3.1 in prior go abandoning us for warmer climates.

Friday was a planned rest day. Good. I was in a mental fog all day. Just before work I found out a friend for 30+ years passed away. He quit responding to messages early last summer. I finally tracked his sister down and she said he passed just after Thanksgiving. I don't live that far away and would have went to see him in a heart beat. Only a few close family members knew of his health problems.

...mornin' guys......

woke up to

the Ever Popular Wintry Mix

funny

how I have to relearn to drive in this EVERY year

===========

Final

Christmas Choir Practice

this morning

with orchestra

(hey,

we also have Midnight Mass at 6-PM Christmas Eve)

so

gonna Bag It til after Festival of Carols tomorrow

................Good Running to Ya............Watch Yer Footing....

Good morning runners!

For some reason I got it in my head that today was a good time trial day.  Mostly, I guess, because Saturday is a good "race day" mentality day, but the reality was that I woke up way too late (after 6:00) to do a 7:00 time trial workout.  So I did anyway.

I wanted to get 2 cracks at a 100 yard IM (Butterfly-Backstroke-Breaststroke-Crawl) in 1:26, which would have been 4 seconds faster than when I tried doing an IM for the first time in 42 years back in mid-October.  I swam 1:24 on the first one, rested for about 3-1/2 minutes, then was only able to do a 1:29 on the second one.  That's enough of that.  I took a long rest (note - one of the great things about swimming is that there are bathrooms adjacent to the Natatorium so I don't have to run for miles looking for a public restroom ).  I swam 3 100 yard breast stroke intervals after that, then a 100 yard crawl and a 100 yard back stroke, in 1:57, 1:53, 1:53, 1:24 and 1:36, respectively.   These weren't time trial effort, just interval effort.

After hitting the gym on every weekday morning this week, swimming a hard 200 IM workout Monday and a 2.5 miler on Wednesday, it's time to take a break.  I probably won't hit the water again until Wednesday due to work travel in the Rochester NY area.

My wife is doing some yard work for an older friend this morning - a customer from the days when my wife did landscape work on the side to get out of the house regularly and add some supplemental grocery income; today she is like a daughter to this wonderful older lady and is out in the early AM raking her leaves that finally fell after the late November snowstorm - it was 11 degrees F when she left the house this morning.  I don't think I've ever raked in 11 degree weather.  It will be interesting what she reports back after 2 hours of raking.  It's up to 17 degrees now, but the real feel is probably at least 20.   

Have greta runs, all you runers!!

...

 

===========

 

Final

Christmas Choir Practice

this morning

with orchestra

 

(hey,

we also have Midnight Mass at 6-PM Christmas Eve)

 

so

gonna Bag It til after Festival of Carols tomorrow

 

 

................

Last night we went to a concert by the Soweto Gospel Choir of South Africa. They were magnificent singing African songs and Christmas carols. Their CD is nominated fora Grammy.

I joined a choir this fall . Today is my final rehearsal for this year. The choir is heading to NYC for a concert in a couple of weeks. I’m not that familiar with the repertoire to join them. Instead we’re heading for someplace warm for 5 days.

i’m also Joining a small chorus at our temple. Love to 🎵.

 

Wait...you get out of the pool to pee?  That was the only way I could stay warm.

I make fun of TriBee's swimming by referring to the Y as the "Petri Pool."  One giant petri dish.

Henry--I bet that was a good concert. Enjoy the singing. One of my goals for retirement is to pick up the guitar again and learn piano; I'll leave the singing to others, though.

Beautiful 30F sunny morning. 3 mile run.

BTY - Your DW sounds like good peeps.  Hopefully, she stayed warm.  (11 degrees???  

SteveP - Sorry about losing your friend.   I loved the description of Taggie's first race. 

I'm at work all day.  I don't expect anyone else to show - maybe - so I'll be cranking my music to help get me through.  When I told The Hub this, he said, "You don't listen to the kind of music that gets crank." . . . meaning I don't listen to AC/DC, Ozzy Osborn . . . he doesn't give Eric Church enough credit. 

The dept secretary who got moved into the the secretary position with the "Weed Dept" a few months ago - and who knew absolutely nothing about it or corporation work, which is what the dept does - well, things have been a real struggle for her and between her and the attorney.  Let me say first that she's a great lady and will work herself to death to do her job.

A problem, though, is she has the type of personality where you'd swear she drank 50 cups of espresso before she came to work and she doesn't drink coffee.  With the added stress of trying to figure out her new position on the fly while we're all dealing with the high level of crap with the Dept, well, she's always UP HERE now.  And then the attorney, although a nice guy, is like working with a whirling dervish.  The combination has been very stressful, to say the least, and Linda has been in my office a number of times crying and threatening to quit (she can retire).

Last evening when only a couple of us were still in the office, it came to a head in the attorney's office.  My boss was still here and I went down and told him that if either of them came out of Jeff's office alive, it was going to be a win/win.  By the time I left, I could hear a little bit of laughing, but I'm not sure if it was the maniacal "You're about to die" laughing.  However, when I came in this a.m., there didn't appear to be any blood on the floor, so maybe it all worked out . . . .

Okay - Off to the trenches ~~

Something to share -

If an employee meets his/her medical deductible in a calendar year, my employer will reimburse you for half the deductible so long as you provide proof.  I've more than met my deductible which is $1,750, which means I will get reimbursed $875.  Plus I have an inherited IRA from my dad from which I have to take a minimum distribution each year and I found out this past week what the distribution amount will be.  The two together will be coming at a fairly big time of need.  I thank God we are so blessed!!

Good morning dear friends. I just realized that it has been almost a week since I have been here or posted anything. I was sick with the cold for 6 says, yes six days of coughing, slight fever and being miserable. Because of the cough I have not been able to run. I will attempt a short run today.

Wishing a great weekend to sll.