the Way of the Turtle

Downs and Ups and Downs...
Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Today I received two collections of Frazz comic strips, Live from Bryson Elementary and 99% Perspiration . For those who don't know, Frazz is (in my opinion) a brilliantly funny comic strip about a songwriting triathlete janitor at an elementary school, written by triathlete Jef Mallett. I rank it up there with Calvin & Hobbes and Get Fuzzy. (For more info, check out the Frazz Wikipedia entry...) Reading the first book tonight made me smile and laugh.

Today I received my confirmation letter for the Adirondack Marathon. I'm not cancelling my hotel room until the week before the race, and I'm holding out slim hope that I will be healthy enough to do it at a slower pace than I'd planned (and maybe even use it as a training run for the Mount Desert Island Marathon...) but it's a pretty slim hope. Downright anorexic, even. Reading the confirmation letter made me sad.

Today I scanned in photos from rides and hikes earlier this summer (it's hard to believe the summer break is almost over!) and worked on updating and streamlining some older sections of this blog. Happy and sad bounced back and forth on that one...

So where are things at physically? Last night went for a 2 mile walk in the Pine Bush and then helped with karate classes. My legs were pretty tired after all that, and my strained groin muscles were grumbling. Spent a few hours last night sleeping on my stomach, in hopes that might allow me to bypass the spikes of pain in my back that come from either lying on my back or even sleeping propped up on the couch. That may have worked - tonight will be day two of that experiment. Scrapes are mostly gone, hip and butt having a nice colorful bruise, and the ribs hurt like heck. And I suspect that's going to be the case for a while to come...

JMH