Great Health Report

It’s been three months since my surgery, and last week, I had an appointment with my oncologist.  Actually, I’d had another MRI scan the week before that, so we met to go over the results and talk about how I am doing.

And the great news was, I’m still doing well health wise.  The scans showed nothing new, and the spots that had concerned them before haven’t grown at all.  He agrees my symptoms seem to be gone, so all told.  He wants to see me again in 3 months, but after that we will probably space them out more.

Naturally, I couldn’t be happier about this news.  I’m praising God for such a great outcome.

And Two More Games in the Books

Saturday was week four of Beach League, and we kept our perfect record intact, losing both of our games.  Not too surprised looking at my teammates.  We are the slow team, so it stands to reason we can’t win games.

But the weather!  It was glorious out.  My phone only ever said upper 70’s, but it sure felt like lower 80’s.  The sun was shining and there was a small breeze.  You couldn’t have asked for nicer weather.  In fact, I stuck around after our second game and finished my book on the beach before heading home.

Might not have been the smartest move, however.  I got one of my famous unevenly applied sunscreen sunburns.  Still hurts.  I’ll definitely have to be more careful with the sun screen going forward.

Week 3 of Beach League

We’re almost ready for week 4 of beach league (tomorrow), but I haven’t talked about week 3 yet.

We were at a different location.  There was a beach tournament going on, so they moved our location to be next to it.  I’m not sure why exactly since it wasn’t like anyone stayed around when we were done.

It also meant I had to pay for parking.  Normally, I park several blocks away and walk down, but since I’m parking in a neighborhood, it is free.  In this case, I was running late, so I had to park somewhere I knew I could park.  It wasn’t as bad as the lot right next to the beach, at least.

I wasn’t in trouble for arriving late since I was our second sub.  Two teams still had decent sized teams, but our team was very small.  For our second game, we were down to one sub, and we played the other team that only had one sub.

And, we lost both of our games.  Again.  I know, I could have just led with that and been done with it, right?  But it was a warmer day on the beach, so I’m not complaining.  And, at this point, I’ve pretty much given up on us winning.

Since we had so few subs, I got lots of play time.  And my hamstrings were very sore when I got up the next morning, so I didn’t play pick up last Sunday.  Still went out and enjoyed the weather for a little while, however.

Hamstrings Getting Better

I mentioned my hamstrings being a problem when I was running.  Not that this has kept me from running.  I have the Camp Pendleton Mud Run coming in two months, after all.  However, what I’ve found has really helped is soaking them in the bathtub after I run.  Between that and stretching, they aren’t bugging me nearly as much between runs and when I am running.  I definitely have to keep this up.

And I have been running.  I jumped back up to my 3.3 mile run pretty quickly, and I’m wondering if it was too quickly.  I’m really struggling to get through it.  I am doing a slightly longer run as well, and it is a struggle, too.  But I’m holding my distance for at least another week and hoping that helps.  I will be adding distance after that, but slowly.  I have a feeling I won’t be setting any speed records in June, even for me, but I am confident that I will get through the mud run, and that’s what counts.

Beach League Week 2

We kept our streak alive and went a perfect 0-2 in our second week of beach league.

And, honestly, the games weren’t that close.  Oh, they started out close, but I think the most points we scored was 6 to the other team’s 13.  We were down a few players from last week, but a few who hadn’t been there the first week were there including my friend Russell.  We wind up on the same team quite a bit, and it never really goes well.  Not that we don’t get along, but our teams have better records when we are on different teams.

It was also cool.  We’d had warm weather here most of the week with temps hitting the mid to upper 80’s.  As a result, I didn’t even pay attention to weather predictions before heading out, and I showed up to foggy, mid-50’s weather with only shorts and a T-Shirt.  Definitely should have brought my running pants and a sweat shirt.  I was okay when I was running, but when I stopped I got cold quickly.

Because we were down in numbers, I did wind up playing more than I might have.  I did okay.  One drop due to miscommunication (I didn’t think the guy was going to throw it to me).  A couple of times they threw it over my head due to wind.  But I also caught a few, and every one I caught I successfully passed on.

Not the best day of beach league, but I was at the beach, which is always a plus.