the Way of the Turtle

Ending the Week on a Positive Note
Friday, February 2, 2018

I spent most of last night on the road, driving to Syracuse for visiting hours at a funeral home and then a bite to eat before driving back to Albany. Right after I left the restaurant my car's computer decided that it was time to switch from "oil change needed soon" to "oil change needed right now", at which point it starts recording how many miles I've driven since it told me that. So after driving back through rain and sleet (fortunately, the temperature never really dropped below freezing until I got home) I had to schedule an appointment at Saratoga Honda, and managed to get one for 4 PM tonight.

So right after work I drove up to Saratoga and dropped off the car, figuring at that time of day I'd have about a two hour wait. No big deal, I had plenty to do while I was waiting. But I got a really nice surprise - they took the car in immediately and 45 minutes later I was driving out of the lot.

I would have liked to go walk around Saratoga Spa State Park a bit and check out conditions for Sunday (currently, a trail race with spikes because of the ice) but the temperatures were in the low teens with a strong wind (so probably around zero after the windchill.) So I settled for driving home instead.

I was pretty sure I would freeze during my short walk later in the evening but that was the 2nd pleasant surprise, while it was cold the wind had died down and it was a fairly nice night, with an almost full moon in the sky. It's too bad I wasn't so tired, it would have been a nice night for a run.

I'm definitely not going out to Hammond Hill State Forest for the Loomis snowshoe race - really don't feel like driving 6+ hours, especially for a race that the RD has said has barely enough snow. I had considered going to the Beer & Chili 10k in Newport, NY (put on by the Kuyahora Kickers, the same group that did the Towpath Trail Run I enjoyed running last May) but that's a 3 hour round trip and I don't even feel much like that, especially since it would mean leaving at 7:30 AM. So it looks like I'll just go out for a run somewhere around here tomorrow - probably for the best, given how little I've run recently.

JMH