Just Three Days...

... until the big Cotton Row race.

So far, 1,766 people have signed up to run the race.
It will be big.

And then....
... the day after the race I drive to Oklahoma to visit my long friends Doug and Laura Bayless.
I will be with them for about a week.

During my visit, this blog will be asleep.
Enjoy the silence.
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There Was A Crowd...

... this morning for the Saturday morning jog.
I managed to arrive right at 6:00AM and there was a gaggle of about 25 or 30 runners staged to start as I walked to the starting line.
The group started before I got to them.
I let them go on ahead because I did not want to run with a group.

The weather was about 70 degrees and very humid, typical for this place and season.
It was cloudy but did not look like it would rain on the parade.

The journey went well, for the most part.
Right ankle/foot was acting touchy for about half the party, but not so painful as to warrant any attention from Running Central, Coach.
Runner noted the issue and worked to adjust his stride so that the landing of that foot each time included a little extra rotation from back to front.
That seemed to ease the squeaking from the affected area.

My biggest problem this morning was breathing.
Even though I did not feel tired, I ran out of breathing capacity at the end of mile two.
I did my best not to try to catch the group running about a quarter-mile in front of me.
They made that pretty easy as they set a pretty stout pace.
I did manage to pass a couple of laggers during the course.

But my breathing rate moved from level two through level three on the hill at mile two and stayed there the rest of the run.
I had to work to keep it from going the level four, which I save for the end of the run.
I do not like this.
It means that I am not as strong (for running) as I need to be for the Big Race in eight days.
This may be caused by me re-arranging my weight workouts and adding some leg exercises back into the mix.

The weight work will make me stronger in an absolute sense, but will require extra recovery time.
Apparently I did not get enough recovery time this week.
But this does not explain my breathing difficulty last week.
Hmmmm.

Anyway, I will lay off the leg work this week in preparation for the big race.
I need all my Wheaties for the big event.

As I approached the start/finish area on Clinton Avenue, there was a huge crowd of runners standing around.
Apparently, there was another practice group staged to run the course.
I was breathing hard and could see the group as I covered the last half mile.
The closer I got the bigger the group looked.
I was in the street as usual and they were spread along the sidewalk and two lanes of the eastbound side of the street.
When I got within shouting distance I recognized several of the guys from past races.
There were actually two groups gathered there, one mostly men, and one behind of all women.
I estimated at least 150 or more.

And as "out of breath" as I felt, I managed to turn on a sprint to the finish line.
Some of the ladies called encouragement to me as I trotted past.
Somehow there is still enough teenager left in me to show off for a bunch of girls and I ran even faster.

The time across the finish line was 59:05.
Not bad for an old guy.
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Wow

There was quite a crowd on the Cotton Row course yesterday morning.
(contrariwise, it was just me and the two paper guys out in the neighborhood for the morning walk this morning.)
I managed to wake up about ten minutes early Saturday morning and that gave me the extra time I needed to beat the rush on the race course.
I started out at 5:56:45 and there were about ten people migrating/gathering on the corner of Clinton and Monroe streets for the "official" practice run.

The weather was a nice, humid 68 or so with a layer of gray clouds that looked like they wanted to pee on us.
A peek at the radar before leaving the house told me that the actual rain was coming in from the west and would not be in the area for a couple more hours (it actually arrived about 9:30 while I was shopping at Walmart.)
The warm weather allowed me to dress for the run as I prefer - just shorts and a sleeveless top (I also had on socks, shoes and a headband, but I assumed you knew that).
This was the second trip around this course in my NEW NB running shoes.

BTW - after looking at how my previous running shoes fit, I decided to get regular D width shoes this time, rather than the EE I had been buying since 1999.
The new shoes feel more snug than the others (duh) but not uncomfortably so.
And they seem to support my feet better.
Wee shall see.

Being the antisocial person that I am, I choose to go it alone, as usual (actually, I am just shy).
I expected to be overtaken by most of the crowd anyway.
The first person to pass me was Marty Clark.
I was about halfway through mile two and he came zipping past me (as usual).
A minute or so later another guy came by me.
Early into mile four, a lady and a guy passed me.
That was it.

Am I really that fast?
No.
It is just that everyone else just dawdles along on these practice sessions.
Most of them are younger, stronger and faster than I, but they do not push themselves as I tend to do.

I had no physical problems during the party.
My left knee started to make quiet little complaints near the end of mile one, but as soon as it got my attention, it went away for the duration.
Also, my right ankle tried to whine about the difficulties of life midway into mile three, but, again, the complaint was so quiet and went away after a few seconds.
I seemed to be a bit fatigued, however.
Near the end of mile two my breathing kicked into level three, and try as I would, I could not get it back down to my usual, more comfortable, level two cadence.
A couple of times I even went into level four, which is reserved for end of race/emergency situations.
I fought this the whole rest of the course.

I passed a couple of guys coming up Bankhead Parkway as I was going down.
The real surprise came near the finish line.

As I turned onto Clinton for the last half-mile, I saw a gathering crowd at the corner of Clinton and Monroe.
The closer I got, the bigger the crowd looked.
I estimated the group to be about 50, with lots of women.
My breathing by this time was rapid level four and I wondered if I had any more to give to the cause for a strong finish.
And I was intimidated by the crowd.
But to my amazement, as I passed Monroe and the gaggle of ladies, I launched into a full sprint for a big finish.
And maybe I was showing off a bit for the girls.
For all the noise and fuss, my time was 59:30 or so.
Not so fast.
But I felt good.
And tired.
Prolly from the heat.
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A Fun Time Was Had...

... by most.
I guess.

I was invited to attend the birthday party of Sam Nordstrom yesterday.
He has now completed eight years breathing on his own. (He's EIGHT already???)

Sam is very intelligent, funny, handsome, and occasionally, carnal (by the Biblical definition).
This last attribute certainly does not make him any worse than many children his age and he is, no doubt, better behaved than most.
I enjoy his amazing verbal articulation.
He has a very good (as in, large) vocabulary (no doubt from his home schooling and general home environment).

We were joined by my former spouse, David and Faith Persel, and Lori McClesky, along with Zack, Rachael, Autumn, and Bradly Nordstrom. (of course, mom n dad were there, too)
We all had some cake and ice cream, did the candle-lighting-and-blowing-out thing and sang the happy birthday song.

IN OTHER NEWS

A few weeks ago during a weight workout I happened to slide my hand along one of my safety support boards in my home gym and accidentally inserted a wood sliver into the third finger of my right hand.
It hurt a bit and I wasted no time trying to get it out of me.
I pulled it out after some minor digging and went on with my workout.

I thought I got all of it.
The next day my finger was still sore.
A week later my finger was healed over but still sore.
Two weeks later my finger was still sore.
So, I was pretty certain that I had not extracted all of the offending material.

Today I became sufficiently tired of the nagging discomfort, concerned that the affected area was not going to heal in a satisfactory manner, and inspired to try to do some left-handed surgery.
So, armed with a new razor blade and a push-pin I opened up my finger, Rambo-style.
The trick was to get the cut from the razor to go deep enough (about 1/8th of an inch) to reach the root of the sliver and to get the incision right next to it.

My left hand is not my most coordinated member.
Nor is it the most trustworthy with a razor blade.
But I managed to get the cut deep enough and close enough that after some poking and scraping with the point of the pin, I was able to locate the rest of the sliver among all the blood and cellular mush, and pick it out.
I was surprised how big it was - about 3/16ths of an inch long.
No wonder my finger was sore.

To document my first surgery of the year, the following picture is presented (also taken left-handed).
The offending intruder (the darker brown wedge) can be seen lying to the right of the still-bloody incision.

Three Weeks To Go...

With the big Cotton Row 10k race looming, activity on the course took a jump this past Saturday.

There were guys all over the course as I ran.
I did not count but there were at least ten people on the course.
A local running supply store had a water station set up early into mile four (at the top of The Hill) and is sponsoring the practice runs.
Coincidentally, they start their practice run at 6 AM - the time I TRY to start my jaunt.
I was late again and did not get out the chute until 6:06 or so.

The weather was marginally warm but threatened more (!) rain, so I started out with my rain hat on my head.
But it is waterproof (duh - RAIN hat) and gets a bit steamy underneath.
So in mid-mile three, I took it off and carried it the rest of the ride.
No rain came down while I was on the course.

Interestingly, I passed everyone on the course except two older guys who passed me in mile six.

Now that I have caught race fever again, I am thinking seriously of running the Jesse Owens Memorial race in Moulton, Alabama on Saturday May 16.
It is a nice generally flat course that ends in the high school stadium track.
Sort of like the Olympic marathon.

IN OTHER NEWS

Have you ever heard of a world-wide epidemic where only five people have died and a few hundred have gotten sick?
I thought not.
You are in one.

The Swine-flu "epidemic" is an Obama-U.N.-manufactured "crisis" to gen up interest in his socialist health tax plan.
Trust me, when he gets his program going, health care will be rationed to the old and the young will receive treatment first.
The wording is already IN the "stimulus" tax legislation passed by the United States Congress.
If this were a REAL epidemic and thousands of people were sick and Obama-care was in place, there would be long lines of people waiting to get in the guvment healcare clinics for treatment.
It would take weeks for many to get in.
Many would die in the process.


IN OTHER NEWS

I cannot wait for the first Chrysler-Fiats to roll off the assembly lines in this country.
I predict they will be a colossal failure.
I predict the new Chrysler-Fiat company will fail in two or three years.

What Did I Tell Yoo?

Ezaklee one month to the day, from my March 30 post, Messiah/President/CEO Barack Husein Obama Chavez Stalin announces that Chrysler Corporation is...
1) officially bankrupt,
2) merged with Italian junk-car maker Fiat in a joint venture,
3) 30 percent owned by the US federal government,
4) 40 percent owned by the United Autoworkers Union,
5) 30 percent owned by the former investors (who used to own most of the stock),
6) certain to need more guvment money to "survive" because the union will continue to bleed the company for benefits until they bleed it to death.

Fiat used to sell cars in the US but failed to hold their customers here because their cars were junk.
They still are.
(Remember the Yugo in the 90's? It was a Fiat built in Yugoslavia [how's THAT for a losing combination?]. It failed for the same reason all Fiats fail to sell in this country - they are junk.)
They could not produce cars with quality equal to the American cars at the time (imagine that!), and nowhere near the quality of the Asian imports at the time.
Chrysler is not known for high quality cars now (pre-bankruptcy), joining with Fiat is like the two last-place teams in the league (pick a league, any league) and creating an "all-star" team.
Instead a regular losers, they are special losers.

General Motors is next.
Care to guess how much of that company the UAW will be given by the Obama-Stalin administration?
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Ah, Spring!

Saturday morning was close to perfect for my six-miler.
It was about 52 or so, warm enough to shed the long britches and commune with nature a bit more.
I kept a light long-sleeved top on, which proved to be about right.
Other than seeing a solitary lady runner at the end mile five for a couple of minutes (she was going my direction but before I could catch her she stopped and disappeared) I had the course to myself - again.

BTW - seeing a lady running by herself indicates a serious runner.
Most ladies like to run with one or two friends so they can talk while they run.
Its that bonding thing they do.
I have never liked to talk while I run because the running takes too much of my lung capacity.
(that either shows how strong the girls are or how hard I run or how weak I am.)

Anyway, the trot was a good experience, no achy breaky ankles, knees, hips, etc, no almost left leg collapse stuff, no biological emergencies.
Just a nice run in the morning cool.
And another 600 calories gone.
My time was just under an hour so I was happee.
Four more weeks until the big race.....
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The Magic Lawnmower

Well, the saga continues.
Last week, I mowed the yard again.
I used ALL of the remaining gas in my plastic can.
That amounted to about a third of a cup or less.
It was so little gas that it did not even cover the lattice pattern in the bottom of the gas tank in my lawn mower (I don't know why the bottom of my tank has a lattice pattern. Maybe they are there for strength. But the whole bottom of my mower tank has little half-inch square depressions about an eighth of an inch deep in it.)

I thought sure I would not make it through cutting both my front and back yards this time - small as they are.
But guess what - I did.
On a fourth of a cup of gas.

IN OTHER NEWS...
I had another successful traverse of the Cotton Row course Saturday morning.
It was cooler than I would have liked (I LIKE 65-75 degrees) but I did the drill anyway.
There were two other ladies going my way and I caught them at the top of The Hill.
They expressed that they were impressed that I ran up the hill.
I confessed that the top half of the hill is not as steep as the bottom half.
I did not have time to tell them that I only ran the top half.

The jaunt took me just five seconds longer than 59 minutes.
Not bad for a 64 year-old (now) geezer.
The Cotton Row race is in five weeks.
I need to buy some new shoes for the event.
They are on my To Do list.
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No - I'm Not Dead

Well.
Tax season is officially and finally over.
Working in the tax preparation office was an educational experience.
Generally, I enjoyed the time.
The work hours were mostly good (I still do not like working on Saturdays).
The working conditions were mostly good (the HR Block office in the Sears store is unheated, so it was COLD in there some days).
The people in my office were easy to work with.

I was able to run and walk and work out every day that I planned to, with no intrusions from my work schedule.
That was good.

I have been running the Cotton Row course each Saturday morning since I last posted (two whole weeks ago - mercy!)

My dogwood tree is still blooming.
Some years it seems the dogwood trees bloom for a week or so then they are gone.
This year, the DWs have been blooming for about three or four weeks.

My back yard, which has been mowed once already this year, is due for another haircut.
It looks like a meadow in Yellowstone park.
I am still using the gas I bought in 2007 in my lawn mower.
I am trying to see how little I can put in it and still cut both my front and back yards.
I used to use a full tank (quantity unknown [a quart?)] to do the job.
Last time I mowed, I used about half a cup, and STILL cut the whole yards.
Even though the tank looked empty when I checked it when I finished, the mower showed no signs of wanting to stop.
Interesting....
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Obamamobile?

We are witnessing the piecemeal dismantling of our society as we know it, just as I predicted.
Since when does the President of the United States have any say in who is the Chief Executive Officer of General Motors?
As of today, the Messiah-President Barack Husein Obama does.

In addition to saying who can run a company, he also has a say in HOW the company should be run.
Thus, the Messiah-President feels that General Motors and Chrysler have not made enough concessions to the United Autoworkers Union to satisfy his preferences.
So he has given them sixty more days to make more concessions.

I see a subtle trend here.
Here is how is goes...
1 the "card check" method of union intimidation is passed by Congress and implemented in all levels of business.
2 those businesses that manage to stay solvent will have two options -
1 do what the union says or
2 allow the federal government will step in and take the business away from the owner.

If a company tries to reduce the excessive cost of healthcare benefits, the federal government will step in and force the company to maintain the level of coverage/costs that the union wants.
How?
By forcing it to raise its prices to cover the increased costs.
Or remove the owner/President/CEO and install a new person who will do what the union wants.

Who will pay for the increased costs of union benefits?
The customers of that business.
Multiply this pattern thousands of times and you will see the new Obamacare healthcare system.
We are about to see price inflation on a level not seen in our lifetimes.

In California, the we-know-what's-good-for-you-better-than-you-do legislature is proposing to ban black cars because their air conditioners must work harder to keep them cool in the sunlight.
All of this to SAVE THE PLANET from evil humans.
So your Obamamobile will not be black, I guess.

In other news....

THE PLOT FAILED - I RAN

The plot to kill me with lightening failed.
In spite of dire warnings from various weather persons, the evil weather did not materialize with the intensity predicted.
So as I stepped out of my car at the VBC Saturday morning for the weekly six-mile trek, I was greeted by only a light rain and a breeze.
I was dressed for the rain and wind and my considered choices of garment weight, fabric and coverage proved to be spot-on.

I started out at 6:09:12 (why/how I remember this is a mystery to me...).
Although I rested well the night before, I had helped Jef and family move on Friday and while not actually sore, I was still a bit fatigued.
In the runners parlance, my well was not as deep as I would have liked.
I felt good, but not as strong as I would have liked.
But I putted along by myself with no physical points of distress (after several complaints from right foot, left ankle, knee, hip and lower back for the first quarter mile or so - but this is more or less normal).
The weather did its off and on misty rainy thing for most of the party until deep into mile six.

As I approached downtown Huntsville, the rain stopped and the wind picked up.
With a vengeance.
Channeled by the tall buildings around me, a cold, gusty north-west wind alternately tried to stop me, blow me over, or push me faster.
At one point along Clinton Avenue, the wind was so strong that it was pushing my feet off course when I lifted them off the ground.
I managed to stay upright for the whole journey and finished at 7:09:12.
EXACTLY sixty minutes.
Amazing.

Again, I was the only person on the streets.
All the pretty/handsome, young exercisers slept in again, listening to the quiet dribblings of the gray dawn.
Me?
I was ready for a shower and to get on with the day.

Enjoy what freedoms and prosperity you have now.
You will not have them much longer.

In God we trust....
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A Plot?

It seems that there is a celestial (or at least, a meteorological) plot to thwart my exercise plans this weekend.
There was supposed to be thunderstorms this morning just in time for my 5:20 AM walk around the neighborhood.
But I was determined to resist the temptation to stay indoors, if at all possible.

It turned out that the thunder was too sleepy to get up, so I was left to stroll (briskly!) in a light drizzly rain with a bit of wind to make things more interesting.
The birdies seemed to mind the blowing wet not a bit.
They were all busy singing their pre-dawn cantatas as I walked.
As usual, they were all on pitch but out of sync with each other.

Tomorrow morning is also supposed to be thundery and rainy at my scheduled running time.
I will attempt to traverse the course if at all possible.
I do not like the thought of getting struck by lightening.
The good news is that the Cotton Row course is mostly surrounded by tall buildings and/or trees, so the likelihood of me getting zapped is lessened.

But I recall two occasions, a few years ago when I was running the course in the afternoon after work, when a nice, juicy thunderstorm came up and gave me a good, Methodist baptism, and scared the brave out of me with some nearby hits of pent-up mega-ampere static discharges.
On both occasions, the rain and thunder had stopped/passed by the time I got to my car. (how handy...)
But it was summer and the storms cooled things off from about 90 degrees to about 75.
I did not mind getting a free cool shower in that environment.
But you could have bought a bottle of my extra adrenaline cheap on those two days.

On one of those occasions, a nice lady offered me a ride in her truck.
I declined the offer but mused that I prolly looked like a drowned rat as I squished along the street.

BTW, the Saturday morning run last week was nice, if cool, with no physical or intestinal problems.
Starting out was a bit rough, with feet, ankles, left knee and lower back, all whining about the degree of stress and the hour of the day.
Yak, yak, yak.
They had all been stretched and warmed during my usual Saturday morning ablutions prior to driving to the course.
It took a full quarter of a mile to get everybody comfortable and quiet and warmed up.
But after that, we were good to go.

In God we trust...