Gladiator Rock n Run 2017

This last weekend was the Gladiator Rock n Run at the Rose Bowl.  It was the same weekend it was last year, but unlike last year, which was cold and cloudy all morning, this one was warm going toward hot.  I did the 7:30 wave again so I could do the 10K, and I was sweating almost the entire way.  Still, it wasn’t as hot as it would get even yesterday, when it hit 110 here in town.  Over there, I think it was a little cooler, but still, that’s hot!

The bad part about doing the 7:30 wave is having to get up and be there in time.  I am so not a morning person.

The good part about doing the 7:30 wave is that I was home by 11 AM.  Not that I did much with the rest of my day but veg.  I did get my clothes from the mud run washed, but that was about the only productive thing I did.

The run itself?  I thought I was doing well by training for some stairs.  I didn’t train nearly enough.  And running into the Rose Bowl and going up and down the stairs 3 times is one of the first things we do.  I was so sore for the rest of the run that I had to walk parts.  My legs just couldn’t run.  And I skipped the cargo climb again.  I probably would have gone for it if they only had one cargo climb, but my legs were shaking pretty badly and they had two back to back.  I knew I wouldn’t be able to do both of them safely.

I also really need to work on my upper body.  It is embarrassingly how little upper body strength I have these days.  I can run the distance, but I can’t do anything else.

All this aside, yes I had fun.  The 10K part of the course is really cool, and I enjoyed that.  It’s a fun challenge.  I just need to prepare more for it.

And that includes stairs.  Between the mud run Saturday and then playing ultimate yesterday, I am so sore!  I’m getting better as the day goes along, but it might make bowling very interesting tomorrow night.

Back to Bowling

When the spring bowling league came around, it didn’t work with my work schedule and I didn’t want to commit with ultimate Frisbee being on an unpredictable night of the week.  Then, as it turned out, I got sick and wasn’t even able to sub most weeks.

When sign ups happened for the fall league, I once again thought I was going to miss out thanks to work schedule.  But when one team needed an extra person, I took a closer look at the schedule and realized I could do it, so I signed up.

We are playing on Tuesdays this time, instead of Thursday.  And we are back to teams of four, but we have six teams of four.  It’s pretty much the usual gang out there bowling and having fun, but we are loving it.

Every time, they’ve offered a very good deal on a bowling ball, a bag, and bowling shoes.  I decided to get that this time around, so I am using my own ball and shoes.  I love it!  I should have done this back in the fall when they first offered it.

Of course, the first week with my new ball was the lowest I’ve bowled.  But my entire team was off that night, and I’m not sure why.  I really don’t think it was my ball, I think it was me.

My best so far this season was a 161 in the second week.  That second week was pretty funny.  The first game, I started out with a turkey (three strikes in a row).  I followed that up by bowling a gutter ball with my first ball in the fourth frame.  I did pick up the spare.  Then I started the second game of the night with a turkey.  No, the fourth frame wasn’t a gutter ball again.

My low was a 107 last week.  That was my first night with my new ball, and it was the middle game of the night.

Last night’s scores were much closer to my average, 135, 132, and 147.  I’m quite happy with them.  I had a really hard time bowling strikes, but I did pick up a nice number of spares.

I was so worried about the holes on my ball being big enough for my thumb, but so far, it’s worked out well for me.  I’ve always had a hard time with house balls.  In fact, there is one ball in particular I made sure I used every single week.  Obviously, the guy in the pro shop knows what he’s doing because I haven’t had any trouble in the two weeks I’ve used it.  And it’s just so fun to walk in and go straight to the lane to bowl.  Sometimes, it really is the little things that are just so much fun.

End of Summer League

Unfortunately, my summer league season ended worse than it began.  We lost our last couple of games, putting us just below the 50% mark.  It didn’t help that we were down players those last couple of games.  I got a lot more playing time than normal, or than I really wanted.

After all the driving I did for games, I was pleased that the tournament was once again here in town.  I was especially glad when I saw that we were in the first game, which started at 7:30.  Yikes, that’s early.

We had numbers again for the tournament, including three subs.  Unfortunately, that didn’t help our performance.  We lost the first game, and it wasn’t especially close.  We did win the next game, and quite handily.  But we lost the final game of the day.

I could easily see some personalities come out as we lost that I didn’t enjoy being around.  Many of my teammates were great, but the few were definitely annoying.

Because the tournament was in town, I saw quite a few of my friends from pick up here in town who were around to watch at various points during the day.  Some even subbed on various teams, which was a lot of fun.  And one friend came with three of his kids to watch the finals.  We wound up sitting together and talking, which I really enjoyed.  Unfortunately, the wind came up for finals, so it wasn’t nearly as interesting a game as normal.

I put in my appearance at the party as well.  It was at a different bar here in town, but it was a bar I wasn’t familiar with.  Obviously, I just don’t go to bars here in town.  Seriously, the only time I go is with ultimate teams/tournaments, and since this is only the second tournament here in town, it’s introduced me to two bars now.  Not that I plan to be going back since I don’t drink.

Trixie Camp 2017

I finally made it back to Trixie Camp!  I actually had a hard time believing it had been so long, but the last time I made it to one was 2010.  That’s a long time.

For those who may not know, this is what we’ve started to call the annual Trixie Belden Convention.  Basically, it’s an excuse for those of us who have met on the message boards for this old kid’s mystery series over the years to get together and have fun hanging out in person.

This year, the convention was in New Orleans, a place I’ve always wanted to go.  Yes, it was in July, which is definitely not the best time weather wise.  I truly appreciated our dry heat when I got home.

But we had a lot of fun.  It was so great to see people I haven’t seen in person for years and just hang out.  There was just about enough time to catch up with everyone.  Another day or two would have been perfect.

We didn’t leave the French Quarter the entire time we were there.  We had a walking tour, including one of the cemeteries.  We went down to the old mint and got a jazz concert out of the deal.  There was time for shopping and just hanging out.  We took a steamboat up the river to the site of the Battle of New Orleans.  And we did lots and lots of walking.

Did I mention it was hot and humid?  It was.  It even poured one afternoon when we were at a museum a little ways from our hotel.  But after wrapping my phone in a plastic bag, I headed back.  Honestly, it felt pretty good.

I would have loved to get to the Garden District, something there just wasn’t time to do.  I guess that will be the next trip, right?

End of an Era

I have more things to blog about, but I want to mark this one closer to the actual event.  You see, last Saturday, my roommate moved out – my final roommate.

Yes, after all those years of panicking when I didn’t have a roommate or one was moving out, I am actually living on my own.  It’s a weird feeling, and I don’t think it has really sunk in yet.  How can it when I’ve been so busy that I haven’t had time to do much at home.  The bunk beds are still up in both bedrooms, for example.  And I don’t know what to do with a pantry all to myself, especially considering how little food I really buy.  The entire place needs a good cleaning, but that sounds way too much like work.

But it is still a wonderful feeling.  I can do all of those things, and I will then be the only person to mess up the place again.  And if I don’t know where something came from, I can throw it away.  It seems I’ve inherited stuff from multiple roommates over the years.

But I look back at how God provided all those roommates over the years, and I marvel at how good He’s been to me.  I never went without roommates.  And, while I had some interesting roommates over the years, the vast majority are people I count as friends.  In fact, they are some of my best friends.  The thought of not making new friends this way makes me a little sad.  Not enough to actually get another roommate, of course.

And I’m not opposed to having a roommate in the future.  I’m planning to keep a bed in the spare bedroom, just not bunk beds.  But I can be very selective about who becomes my roommate.  I don’t have to jump at the first guy who walks through the door.

I’m excited to see what happens in this next chapter of my life while still being thankful for what God did for me in the last one.