Running, new neighbors and other stuff

Running notes

Today's goal was one-mile. My stretch goal was two-miles.

I hit the stretch goal of two miles with a pace of 12:44 per mile. That is significantly faster than the 13:52 I ran the mile two days ago.

My objective is to find "the wall" in terms of distance, to regain my running form, to get all of the stability muscles dialed in and then to work on speed. One of the first rules of increasing your fitness after age 50 is DON"T GET INJURED.

At this point, I will be very happy to find myself running three miles in 36 minutes by October 15.

One of the quirks of dead-lifting is that it doesn't exercise my lower legs all very much. I lift my toes up so I don't lift with my weight too far forward. That means that the weight is centered somewhere between the balls of my feet and my heel.

Running, even when done slowly, fully activates shins and calves, especially when running on uneven surfaces. There are also many more torsional, core muscle groups coming into play.

One downside of adding running to my routine is that I screwed up and did not let the ducks out this morning. Fortunately, today was not a hot, sunny day. I let them out when I would normally be penning them up for the night. They will get an hour to eat, play in the water and roam around. 

Life is a process. I made a mistake. I got lucky. My ducks may have been uncomfortable but they still look healthy.

Mowing

I mowed forty minutes today.

Between the lifting, the running and the mowing, I am feeling pretty beat up. 

Other

I installed a light in the basement. Mrs ERJ thinks I am a genius. I cannibalized a light from our seedling grow shelves and will replace it later. 

Thank-you for your tolerance regarding the political memes

I know that many of you visit this site to get away from that kind of thing.

Generating those memes is one of the ways I have for dealing with the uncertainty elections create. The production values of the memes aren't all that great but quantity has a quality of its own.

New neighbor

One of my neighbors sold off 3 acres. The buyer of the lot stopped and chatted with me while I was standing at the end of my driveway a few days ago.

I heard equipment running at the back of his lot as I was cooling down from my run (i.e. walking the rest of the way back home). I walked back there to say "Howdy!"

He remembered me. There are some advantages to having a hunched back, missing teeth, a lisp, rickets and a face that shows evidence of a childhood case of the yaws.

I think he is going to fit into the neighborhood just fine. He was running a backhoe and clearing the building site. He had already installed the first structure on the property: A swing-set. For his grandkids.

He also mentioned that his mother-in-law lives with him and his wife and she loves to look out the window and see wildlife.

Iodine testing for ripeness

A short video clip of a women testing Golden Russet apples for ripeness. She is going to make cider so she wants them riper than if she was storing them. I port you into the video just before she sprays the cut apple halves with diluted iodine solution and lets them "develop".