Goodbye May '13!

All right. Gonna try something different here for the next couple of months. Bear with me on the learning curve.

I think on the final day of any given month, I’m going to list my accomplishments.

On the first day of the following month, I’m going to list my goals.

Hopefully, after a month or two, I’ll see the two lists converge.

Or maybe not.

It’ll be an experiment.

A work in progress.

So … here goes.


In May 2013, I …


* Lifted weights 11 times

* Rode my exercise bike 14 times

* Jogged twice (really, walk/ran a half-mile each time)

* Read the final two books of my PJF project

* Finished the mammoth Making of the Atomic Bomb

* Went to my semi-annual Confession

* Served as an EMHC twice

* Saw Little One bridge up to Junior Girl Scouts


There. That’s all I can recall off the top of my head. Not a bad list of month accomplishments, to be sure, but it’s all the same, if you know what I mean. Maybe in June I need to mix it up a bit.

We’ll see.

Beyond the Tempoflux ...

SF author Jack Vance died a few days ago at an almost relativistic age of 96.


Didn’t read much of his stuff … maybe I should have. What I did read I more or less liked, though he was hit and miss, at least in my unacceptably narrow sample size.


Trullion: Alastor 2262 – solid A (read sometime in the mid-90s)

The Languages of Pao – solid A (read a few months before I started this blog)

The Brave Free Men – a surprisingly disappointing D (read a few weeks after Pao)

and

Big Planet – reviewed here.


An “alien” idea in Big Planet – the “Tempofluxion Dogma” – inspired me to write a four-part posting contrasting said idea with my rough, child-like understanding of Kant’s philosophy, here, here, here, and here.


Rest in peace, big man.

Shin Splints

So I’ve been working out in my garage for half a month now (since May 12 to be exact). My exercise bike is out there. My bench is out there. My dumbbells and bars, straight and curled, are there. I have a clock but no radio yet. I usually workout out at 6 a.m. and am done a half-hour later, so I won’t be blasting any metal yet. Yet.

I’ve got it in my head to run a 5K. My town sponsors one every April. That’s about eleven months away. Should be enough time to train. The last 5K I ran was in 2003. The last time I ran anything longer than ten yards was around the same time. The decade that has flown by has seen me battle atrial fibrillation, pulmonary vein stenosis, and a steadily enlarging waistline. Running not only winds me, it scares me.

This morning I did my first “run” in ten years. I got up and got dressed and got out the door by 6:30 am. Ten minutes later I was done. Outside was a weird mixture of cool and humid, banks of fog giving only one-block visibility. I did a variation of 100 paces walking, 100 paces jogging. Did this about a dozen times over half-a-mile. Got back, slightly winded but otherwise okay (read: alive).

Thought I’d have a euphoric high to carry over into my early morning at work, but, no. Just a somewhat non-centered fatigue, probably due to my body still rebelling against 6 am wakeup workouts. Then, around noon, I noticed my shins really started to ache. Shin splints. Hadn’t felt what they felt like in years.

Tonight I’m gonna soak in the tub – I know, I know, what else is new – but pay special attention to my calves. Not sure what I’m going do. Maybe an Epsom salt soak. Maybe some baking powder (hey, it works!). Definitely some stretching tonight, Rodney Yee yoga stretches, so they’re loosened up for the six or seven hours of sleep I’ll get.

Tomorrow morning – back with the weights.

Friday morning – going for a 200 pace walk/jog mixture.

Pray for me.