Author: admin

Risky business…

Your head will collapse but there’s nothing in it and you’ll ask yourself, “Where is my mind?” ~ The Pixies

Yesterday: Hike – Coyote Trail, 1 hour
Today: Run – Neighborhood, 1 hour
Tomorrow: ???

At what point does sitting in front of a computer for days on end become riskier than some of the crap I do outdoors on any given weekend? When every day is Sunday, are weekends even relevant anymore? Probably not when you work through them. Oh well. Make hay while the sun’s out.

Busy busy busy. We are in serious crunch mode right now with three (Three? Maybe four, I’ve lost track.) deadlines looming at the end of the month. October is lining up to be more of the same and that is good for sure. I would rather be way too busy than sitting around staring at the cats. All in all, things are good. Hectic, but good. I am managing to pry myself away from the computer from time to time and so I really can’t complain.

Movie stuff: I actually took a couple hours off last night because my brain was leaking out of my ears and watched Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. It seems that they are starting to figure these out as this was significantly less painful than the first two. I think the kids are actually figuring out how to act. Which is nice. I might actually recommend this one to you. A little slap-sticky at times but otherwise not too bad.

Speaking of prying myself away, I am going to go run.

All work and no play…

The trick to juggling is determining which balls are made of rubber and which ones are made of glass. ~ Anonymous

Yesterday: Worked
Today: Hike/Cut down trees
Tomorrow: Hike/Cut down trees

I wish I had more to report but I have been way too busy working. Frankly, it is making me a bit grumpy so I need to figure out how to make more time for other stuff in each and every day. I haven’t figured that out yet but will get back with you on that one.

Today, I am going to start thinning our property. In case you hadn’t heard (or somehow never leave the front range), we have a bit of a pine beetle problem in the high country that is killing vast amounts of forest. This is much more evident in Grand and Summit counties but is making its way eastward. One way you can help strengthen your trees (and hopefully stave off the worst of the damage) is to thin your trees to help those that remain to grow more resistant to the attack. Essentially maximizing the nutrients, water and sunlight available to each individual tree by minimizing the competition. So that’s what we’re going to do. Plus, we have some trees that have what is called Gall Rust which makes them more susceptible to wind damage so we’ll drop those as well. Pete and Luke are coming up tomorrow to lend a hand which will be awesome.

The only other news is that I am a month out from Leadville and am feeling fine. One interesting phenomenon that occurred this week was that about 3 and a half weeks out, the skin on my feet started to shed. Mostly this was that which was affected by blisters but some between my toes decided to head for the proverbial hills as well. Not really a problem, just an interesting side effect of the craziness that is running 70+ miles. My toenails are still attached, which is nice. (I think that all sounded much more gross than it really is.)

Ok kiddies. That’s all for today. Hope to have something more interesting for you tomorrow and in the days to come.

~stubert.

First frost…

Death lies on her like an untimely frost. Upon the sweetest flower of all the field. ~ Lord Capulet

Yesterday: Rest
Today: Hike
Tomorrow: Ride

Several quick announcements:

  1. Per the title, today can be marked down as the first frost of the season. For those of you who are not fond of Winter – bummer for you. Everyone else, start doing the snow dance.
  2. I am a bit stressed out right now but will keep thinking about #1 to try to deal with it.
  3. In an effort to help out #2, I went to see The Bourne Ultimatum yesterday. Not really a recommended movie if you are trying to chill out. Just sayin’.

Movie time: As stated above, I went to see The Bourne Ultimatum yesterday. I felt this was a big-screener and was not disappointed. Pretty much non-stop action. Good times. I am not sure you should go see it if you tend to have seizures when confronted by flashing lights as I think the longest single camera shot in the whole film was about 1.5 seconds but from my perspective, the Bourne series is decent action filmery.

It has been awhile since I have watched the other two installments but I recall being pleasantly surprised by the first and more than satisfied with the second. The third built on both of these but didn’t muck it up with the standard action-hero BS lines, some sort of cheesy love story or trying to make Bourne anything much more than the machine into which the government turned him. Sure, there is some social/political commentary tossed into the mix and a large amount of silly action stuff (Every action hero is an expert at everything, which always cracks me up. They can jump on a motorcycle and pull off stunts that would take years of dedicated practice to master, for example, and can sustain obscene amounts of abuse and keep on rolling but hey, it’s an action movie, not Merchant Ivory.) but overall, this is a pretty good series if you are interested in just shutting off your brain for a bit.

On the other hand, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets continued the tradition of great book, mediocre movie started in the first installment of that series. I know it is for kids but there have been plenty of kids movies made that aren’t borderline excruciating. I will probably continue watching this series as well but am not entirely sure why. I guess you get what you deserve when casting for looks instead of talent. And whoever wrote the score (John Williams) should be beaten to death with his own heavy-handed music. That would show him. And I seem to remember the book actually ending, not just trailing away into nothingness. Anyway… just my take on it.

Ok. Time to get some work done before I have to get more work done.

~stubert.

Gettin’ my run on…

Three tomatoes are walking down the street — a poppa tomato, a momma tomato, and a little baby tomato. Baby tomato starts lagging behind. Poppa tomato gets angry, goes over to the baby tomato, and squishes him… and says, ‘Ketchup.’ ~ Mrs. Mia Wallace

Yesterday: Hike – Raccoon Trail, 1 hour
Today: Run – Switzerland Trail, 2 hours
Tomorrow: Hike

Ok. I have to catch you up on recent events.

I jammed over to Gunnison on Friday to hang with the ‘rents. Played 9 holes of golf with my pops, did some stuff around the humble abode, ate some good Mexican food, hung out with my mom. That kind of stuff. It was a nice weekend for sure.

Gunnison is an interesting town. Crested Butte is nearby so there is a definite hippie/liberal element (plus, there is a college there which adds to this vibe) but the rest of the area features a lot of farmer/rancher types which makes for an interesting mix. It is always good to get back over there for sure as the area is beautiful and filled with Stu-style goings on. Lots of mountain biking/trail running/skiing/outdoorsy goodness. I am psyched we moved there and that my parents have stayed. The X-Card went on sale again. Just put that on the list of things to get. Which reminds me. I need to get my Eldora pass as well.

The aspens are threatening to turn throughout the high country. I think two-three weeks will be the peak. I am hoping to get the Crüe together for a Leadville run from Half Moon to Twin Lakes and back. This section of the course is aspen-central and would be gorgeous if timed right. We’ll see who is interested in an adventure of that sort.

Today’s run was a real surprise. I actually felt pretty well throughout and ran a steady pace for a full 2 hours. Luke wasn’t feeling so hot towards the end. I think he is coming down with something. I, on the other hand, had enough in me to turn some serious times in the last 2 miles or so and finished up strong. I definitely couldn’t have sustained that pace for long but it was nice to get the legs turning over.

Luke and I talked about Leadville and whether or not I am going to give it another shot next year. The jury is still out on that one and I think I will try to hold off on any decisions until after February. In the meantime, I’ll keep training to stay in shape for ski season and the Enduro and see how I feel about things later in the year. If I could figure out a way to do it without having to invest so much time training, I think I would give it another whirl. I just don’t know if I can spend that much time away from my sweetie again this year. We’ll see. In any event, it is really great to be able to run again. Today was just awesome along the Peak to Peak.

What else? Just procrastinating horribly. I have meetings all day tomorrow so need to get some work done tonight in preparation. We have been watching Season 3 of The Office which I highly recommend. Funny stuff. It’s not Arrested Development but it is actually decent TV for a change.

l8s

~stubert.