how's this go again?

I seem to have forgotten to post here lately. I'd make some lame blogger excuse, "I'm too busy," but that's a lie. Direct your attention more to the photographic outlet of my creativity. This writing thing just ain't doing it for me anymore.

I guess I'll still occasionally post here, but it won't be as timely, and it'll sure be less rant-like. To tide you over, check out some climbing action from last weekend. We had a good day, ate some Mexican food, and showed Bella how to be a crag dog.



When I got home, I went on a three mile run. She's been training hard, and I finally got the all clear to start running again. The Run for World Peace 5K is next weekend. I'll keep you posted.

a whirlwind tour of the district

yesterday, i partook in a scavenger hunt race under the guise of meeting some new people, doing something active, and seeing the city. the story line was that a spy was loose in the city; thankfully, the story line was limited to the task sheets we picked up at each checkpoint. it could've gotten quickly cheesy had we been chasing an actual spy. each checkpoint was a double dare kind of fun; there were mental challenges and physical challenges.

first, the team. just by careers, i think we had a broad cross section of d.c. let's see, we had the air force, army and marines represented. we had the defense and state departments represented. we had a government contracts employee for a big aerospace firm. we had three education representatives in varying degrees: summer camp counselor, teacher's assistant, and a teacher. hey, that's me! to add a bit of intrigue, one of our members was a tourist visiting her daughter from austria, who just happened to be one of the organizers. we ranged in age from 21 to 44, and were about evenly split by the sexes. so gung ho about the competition were we that we all ran up the down escalator at one metro station to beat another team to the street. what?! there were strollers and "escalumps" in the way on the right way!

second, the challenges. first hour consisted of mostly icebreaker activities. we had to talk to each other about our life stories, jobs and whatnot. we ran too far in one direction on the metro, only to show up late for checkpoint one at the supreme court. we did pretty well on the challenges there, easily remembering the specific facts about our teammates. we did a little better in the next hour, showing up on canadian soil third for some points with that. some trivia, sing the canadian national anthem, take a breather. this was clutch. we were all getting pretty tired at this point, especially the non-sneaker-wearing members. third hour, we took over. we completed almost all of the challenges and questions, beating the organizers to the next checkpoint at the white house. the final two hours were compressed into 90 minutes or so. that had us crisscrossing downtown and dashing up connecticut avenue, cutting hair and getting hassled by homeless people. we showed up at the endpoint well ahead of the other teams, completed nearly all of both lists, and were on our second round at the bar before they started trickling in.

at that point, we were likely in sixth place or so. our fearless leader for team boss was thrown into the irish jig competition...and summarily destroyed the competitors. who knew that ballet dancers could channel michael flatley and mary katherine gallagher at the same time? final tally had us in second place. six measly points out of winning. no matter, we still shared the same prizes that the winners got. too bad she and i can attend neither of them. i'm sure you'll hear about our consolation prize someday soon.

the past week

in a past life, i was an occasional scribbler on palmer and clowe's active guy blog. staying active is more fun that sitting on the couch and being lazy. problem is it makes me tired. i just have to face the facts.

i'm getting old.

there, i said it. damn all you friends that have been saying it for years! yes, i know i have little hair left and my joints pop and creak when i climb or run. the last seven days have proven to me that i can't be frenetically active day after day without crashing. burning my candle at both ends was much easier at the other end of my twenties.

it all started last tuesday. climbed at the gym. pretty good day. next day, hit the road in my worn out running shoes and ran about 3 miles. i think. i can't figure out distance around here, i'm guessing based on time. thursday, back at the gym. finally sent a V6 project. left feeling pretty good, but tired. friday, running again, less distance probably, but same amount of time. saturday morning, up with the rooster's crow to get some real stone beneath my fingers. tack on what amounted to a 6 mile round trip approach hike with crash pad, and i was pretty wiped out by saturday night. instead of taking off the sabbath, i decided to hike the same section of the billy goat trail with her. two hours later, smelling like roses, head home. monday night, back at the gym. projecting a V7 now. i pieced it.

last night, benadryl aside, i finally crashed. i should've gone running, but i didn't make it. tonight, the gym is calling and we'll see how the extra sleep last night and the day off helped me. listen close, you might hear my cheer or my fall from grace...