adventures

adventures / history / I do not know what is happening. / photo / running / weekend — Comments Off on A Christmas Eve jog
24
Dec 16

A Christmas Eve jog

We ran 12.64 miles today. We did that on Christmas Eve, and I do not know what is happening. But it was in the low 60s, because we’re back in Alabama for a few days. We ran to the dam, and then we ran over it. I remember being nervous about riding over it as a kid, and then driving over it when I was young, so narrow is the road. But there’s now a nearby bridge that took much of the traffic off the dam and so it seems like no big deal to jog along on the sidewalk, which is about as wide one of the two very narrow lanes.

I ran over that. I do not know what is happening.

There are five turbines inside the dam, taking the flood waters upstream and generating hydroelectric power, 663 megawatts a day. Those turbines can produce what is equivalent to 35,000 horsepower. That’s the most powerful set of turbines in the TVA system, and an impressive degree of efficiency for something developed in 1848.

There are 49 spillways in the dam, and the signs say that if you collected the water from just one gate for an hour you could fill the Astrodome. The lock on the side is the highest one in the country to the east of the Rockies. More than 3,000 commercial and private boats go through each year.

adventures / I do not know what is happening. / Monday / music / running / Twitter / video — Comments Off on It still counts
19
Dec 16

It still counts

It doesn’t matter if it was a training run, or criminally slow. It does, somehow, count, that it was quite chilly and very foggy.

What’s important here is that another half-marathon was put into the books. A half-marathon was completed at an arbitrarily important birthday. (I do not know what is happening.)

(Today, meanwhile, it is 2 degrees. Two. Dos. Zwei. Deux.)

No individual mile splits were good, but that’s not important right now.

adventures / Monday / photo / running — Comments Off on Weekend color
7
Nov 16

Weekend color

Autumn is here. Too soon for me, but too late for others. I hear about it, believe me. It makes for good elevator fodder and faux-angst. It is all the Southerner’s fault, and so on.

But the roses are still blooming at the house:

So there’s that.

I struggled my way through a 10K on Saturday. Here was our path:

That was at the beginning, in about the last moment this particular run felt good. About two-thirds of the way through, though, my feet numbed up and I was able to run a slight bit better. And this was my view at that moment:

And right about here was when I realized I needed to get new shoes … to replace the brand new sneakers I’m running in right now. I suppose not every pair of even the same model of Saucony is the same. Let’s just blame the fallen leaves:

There’s that moment in a fair amount of my runs where I’d like to be done, but I have to get back to the house or the car. This was that moment. When you go for a low-angle shot on your run, your run is pretty much over:

It is a lovely little leaf turn, though:

adventures / cycling / Monday / photo — Comments Off on I can’t reference the same song in text and title
10
Oct 16

I can’t reference the same song in text and title

This weekend we visited with my folks down the road aways. The four of us went out one night for a lovely steak dinner and we all felt like celebrating:

Because if you get a steak that good — oh, so, so good — you should celebrate it.

Rode my bike to the office this morning. On my thus far preferred route I actually go through the woods and over the river creek.

And then I have a half mile of a walking path, with a picturesque barn set off to the side:

After that there’s a roundabout, and one long residential uphill to campus. It is about 4.5 miles. Takes about 15 minutes. Twenty if I’m carrying my bag and am trying not to sweat.

It isn’t a long enough trip, by any means, to make me think of steak again. But I’m thinking of steak again.

adventures / football / photo / video / weekend — Comments Off on He watched football … in church (there was praying)
1
Oct 16

He watched football … in church (there was praying)

We are here:

It is a chapel on a small college campus in north Georgia. Also, a football game was celebrated on the front lawn, just after the bride and groom drove away. Before that, however:

Some 10,000 people have seen that on Twitter and it got picked up by a couple of those re-write sites. Every once in a while you get one that really takes off …

Anyway, he was watching the Georgia – Tennessee game. The hail mary one way, hail mary the other way game. He was quite pleased with the outcome.

(Edit: The guy in the picture saw it. Hah! Thankfully he has a good sense of humor about it.)

After that, the reception was lovely:

The groom was one of The Yankee’s former students, and we saw some other former students and friends there as well. A fine time, as they say, was had by all.

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