ATB 2011 - check

Okay, I ran/completed the 30km Around The Bay Roadrace in Hamilton this past weekend.  I am nowhere near trained & was not race-ready at all.  It hurt, and then it hurt some more...  Just sayin'

I ran the first 10 km with my girlfriend.  She rocked her way through the first third of the 3x10k relay.  I was impressed.   I never actually caught up to Beverly (the girl on the second leg of her relay team)   but I did keep her in sight from KM 18 to 20 where she gave the chip to Jean who booked it to the finish.  I never actually saw Jean again after she took off..  

I did see some other people who were struggling & we all encouraged each other ...  The dwarf was there and the Reaper was posing for a photo when I passed him ...    I had a had go of it but it only took half an hour longer than last year.  

I'm thinking I need to consider a rest period ....  But there is a marathon in May so that isn't going to happen yet ...

For the record ...

I will hold the three political party leaders responsible for having another unwanted election when they make it happen later today.       I will NOT vote for a Liberal, nor an NDP  ... and it is a given that I would perform self-mutilation of my own genitals before I would ever vote for the BQ - even if I ever had that option.

Which leaves me the option of voting for a weaselly little dweeb for whom I have no respect  ... just to spite  politicians who believe that 300 to 400 million can not be better put to use than to have an election that changes nothing.   If they lose again can we urinate on them  .... can we, can we huh?

could use a change in the weather ... warmer would be nice

I'm heading to Hamilton to run on Sunday and I would really like it to be a little warmer.   The wind is always a factor in the Around The Bay Roadrace and I'd rather a nice warm breeze off the lake  ...  Just Sayin'

water, water everywhere ...

and still the enviro-propagandists would have me not flush my toilet.   They obviously have no wolf-blood coursing through their veins.   There is a group of people who think that not flusing the toilet when you urinate is cool.  Those people never drank at the dive-bars and probably never cleaned the bathrooms in a restaurant where drunks played.   Urine stinks ....  if you don't believe me try an experiment piss in a jar and leave it sit in a safe place in your bedroom where it won't spill.      I would bet that it would only  take a day for your nose to start working again....  Now, try to imagine how someone who does still smell those things feels walking into a restroom after you didn't flush.   It is as disgusting as if I were to leave the bowl full of feces.  It stinks; the fist & last thing I do in that case is flush the toilet ... yes I flush it for you, and then I use it and flush it for me too.

It is basically a problem of not having enough sewage treatment facilities and yet we have not made nay changes or improvements to sewage treatment methods in decades.  Not glorious enough for any level of government to be bothered.  In all honesty, it wouldn't buy any votes from the kind of people who buy the "green propaganda" about global warming, composting and water-use reduction.   So many environmentally conscious people mindlessly driving their cars while talking on their hand-held devices & texting.... and gunning through the yellow light.     Not that any of you would do that ....

First full day of spring ...

Looks a lot like winter.   Feeling under the weather ...  and I'm going to go to bed.   Have I ever told you how amazing this city I live in is?   There are beautiful women, great tourist attractions ... Lots of fine dining establishments ... and the cougars!    Ah yes I love this town.

Nostalgia .... (C'est toujours à recommencer)

So someone posted a link to an old Chiliwack tune on FB today .... and I played the song then a couple of others ...  Then I got to thinking about a song that I liked many many years ago.   I have not been able to find a copy to purchase legally and so I don't own it.  But years ago my sister did.  She got it around the time she visited Chicoutimi, QC  on a high-school exchange.  I was much more tolerant of the francos when I was younger ...  They were less arrogant back then too.   The song can be found at this link... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O87O_zrrFdA

The lyrics are below ...                      

Comme un été, comme une image Je sens que tout va recommencerHier, hier je me suis enivréJe ne savais vraiment plus quoi faireBaby, oh my baby; Je crois que j'ai trouvé l'amourBaby, oh my baby...I think I'm falling in loveBaby .....
Comme un vautour qui tourne au tourTu t'envole avec mon amourTu m'as laissé, tu m'as oubliéC'est toujours à recommencer
Oh Baby, oh my baby. Je crois que je t'aimerai toujoursOh-oh-oh Baby, Oh my baby; You know it always happens this way

Oh, oh, oh, oh Baby, oh my baby. Je crois que je t'aimerai toujoursBaby, oh my baby. Je crois que j'ai perdu l'amourBaby, Oh my baby; I think I'm falling in loveOh, Oh Baby, Oh my baby. You know it always happens this way

Oh, oh, oh, oh Baby, oh my baby. Je crois que je t'aimerai toujoursBaby, oh my baby. Je crois que j'ai perdu l'amour

Now, as I said I had more tolerance back then  ...  and I admit that I proposed to someone every time I visited Montreal before I sobered up ... so things were very different.   The music is still good ...  The women in MTL are still prone to be yummy & I still have a soft spot in my heart for the folks in Chicoutimi, and some folks from the Gaspe. But, I am tired of the quebec parasite that drains this country of so much of its economic potential by insisting that we provide services in languages that could be facilitated technologically by video-conferencing & skype ....  from a central Department of the lang-francais which could provide call-center type jobs to people who actually were bilingual (not just the crap that passes for bilinge in the federal PS).   But I am old and jaded and tired of watching successive gov't piss valuable tax-dollars into the black-hole that is Quebec.  Don't get me wrong ... I still find the people &  the culture & the places have value ... & I always will love those aspects that the franco-culture bring to the table.   I'm just tired of the extortion and the bullying from the franco-national-socialists.  And I'm tired of having to pay the tab for Trudeau's "pipe-dream"

Wow did I over-sleep

But I need to make note of this or I'll forget.   Last night I dreamt about Sandra!   She was in the middle of her addiction and it wasn't pretty ....  But I still loved her.   the dream was full of what it is to be an addict ...  all of the scary self-degrading things we do to get & use without any regard for all the collateral damage that is involved in that.  The last thing I remember is her in a church & you're hoping that she is doing ok then she grabbed 3 purses from these ladies who are praying and she books out the door.

When I woke up  I said a prayer for her  ...  I really hope that she is okay.  Strange dream ...  No idea what made it happen  ....  But I was inside the police station talking to a group of ladies about running  last evening.

A long time ago ...

I removed a number of posts from this very blog to appease a girl that I had at that time recently ended a relationship with.   I  don't  like to say that I regret things in my life but, in hindsight,  I do regret the loss of those entries.  They were emotionally charged and well thought out.  They were raw and angry, some expressed the hurt and disillusionment I felt at the time. but they are gone  ...  binary ashes on the charged winds of cyber-space.    If I am not mistaken, today would be her birthday .... Only a few months prior to that incident the beginning of another incident also took place that  coincidentally also  has a notable occurrence today.    The Messenger probe, launched on August 3, 2004,  will be maneuvered into a polar orbit of the planet Mercury (if there are no hitches)  which is intended it will try to maintain for about a year.    There are many many ways that this could go awry ... and even if they succeed in braking and positioning the craft in orbit ... they need to keep it in the right place and protect it from the intense heat .... and keep the transmitting antennae pointed back at earth ....   All that just to find out about a planet that we would never want to live on ....  hmmm,  And in other news, a Montreal mother want the laws changed so that trains do not run with their headlights dimmed .... to prevent the kind of accidents that happen when people trespass on the railway properties & haven't got enough of a survival instinct to stay out of the way of a moving train.    Now if you ask me this seems like a no-brainer.  Yes I am saying that if you are stupid enough to mess with a train you deserve to be a mess on & under & behind a train.  Period - no exceptions.    Maybe the mother should focus on teaching her offspring to take responsibility for their own actions and continued survival.  Maybe these mothers need to remember that darwinian adaptation has only the fittest surviving to procreate ...  

Stop expecting the state to make it all safe for you ffs!   The world is a dangerous place  ... filled with wondrous things but remember  ....  there are also "lions, & tigers & bears, oh my"  ... and trains, and cars, & busses and a myriad of other things that can be hazardous to your health.   Keep Calm & Carry On  ...  but proceed with caution.

Beware The Ides Of March ...

I remember those words as clear as a bell.   The crone's  face  is fading with time .. but the shrill admonition of her words still echoes across time & space.    Of course, the proud and the vain seldom heed portents & omens.  That just makes it easier for the sands of time to shift and sift and flow.  

Any way, today is a good day and life is looking up.  I am fighting off the tail end of a cold & I am feeling remarkably good for having run 20km on the weekend.  

20km .... Outside on relatively clear roads!

Thank you thank you thank you!    I am so glad that the spring is coming.   The people that I would have to try to train with were running 23km yesterday (Sunday morning) & I haven't run 10 k in a few months!    I was not certain & I gave my self permission to cut short if I needed to.  As it turned out, if I had not slipped on some ice at 15kms I could have done the 23k.   I felt a little pull & knew that I was 5k from the barn so I told them I would see them back at the store & let them go.  

I struggled a bit for a few minutes here and there but overall I ran 20km and I kept pretty close to the pace  ... I expected.    The 30km run at the end of March is not unrealistic.  I almost don't feel it at all this morning.

What brings a tear to my eye this morning ...

 ...  I don't mind it when I wake up and I feel like crying any more.  I used to think that I needed to fix it and stop the tears but now I take a moment to embrace them.  Indeed, I sometimes take a moment to extend them ....  Like I did today.    

For the longest time, I guess I thought he didn't give a damn.  He was hard to read, hard to please; Yeah, that was my old man.  On the day I left for college it was nothing new,  we never had that heart-to-heart. He had too much to do 

I started thinking about all of the things a father should share with his son, and how Dick was lacking in those things.   I also thought about how I spotted a reflection of myself in the glass of the microwave oven yesterday.   I thought how much my reflection looked like my uncle Jim's face.   I always had a good rapport with my uncle; I almost felt closer to him than I was to Dick.  But I feel that way about uncle Mike too.   Those relationships were never complicated by the entire father-son dynamic.  So it would be unfair to judge them based on the same criteria but all the same  I noted it.

He checked the air in my tires, the belts and all the spark plug wires. He said "When the hell's the last time that you had this oil changed?"  And as I pulled out the drive, he said "Be sure and call your mom sometime." ...

Now and then, I find myself crying ... grieving the father I never had,  but also for the father I lost - Yes I Miss Dick.  You may not understand just how much that means, but that is okay because I do.    I miss many people who have come and gone.  I even miss some of the people who are still here ...  but deep down inside a little boy misses the dad who never actually did take him fishing.   Yes, even if that is the same dad who threw a beer bottle towards him and cursed because the little boy had not learned to catch a baseball.

... and I didn't hear it then but I hear it now ... he was saying "I love you" the only way he knew how ...

Having said that  ... and having had a good cry, I can get on with my day ...  and with apologies to Mr George Strait let me just say  "...  little boys dont just ove their parents  every now and then. Its a love without end, AMEN. ..."

     

March 20th ! Mark your calendars

Yes I said the 20th; that will be the first day of spring this year!    I hope you appreciate all that was involved in our being able to bring you an early spring.     I could go into details but that might hurt by brain & I'm saving it in case I need to think about something important - like girls.

The Magician's Birthday is past & tomorrow is Tear Drop's  birthday ... after that we await the Ides Of March (Beware Caesar)   ... once we safely survive the ides, we watch as the sun crosses the line ...  The passing of the dead-season & Coming Back To Life   (someone ought to write a song about that).  

Currently life is good,  I am happy and with the exception that my training is not on schedule I am doing fine.   I trust that you are well & that life is treating you at least half as good as I believe that you deserve.