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Another Fun Run
Last One Before the Big Weekend… Every week Kris and I have been going out and doing these early-morning fun-runs for different causes. This morning was something to do with the Marines. A platoon of clearly recruits (very young, meaning college age) or something were running at cadence and I fell in behind them and stayed with them for over a mile. Not bad for an 67-year-old guy. I ran the last part with a 71-year-old Navy guy who served on submarines during the Vietnam War. That was interesting and he left me in the dust near the finish. I have dropped about 22 pounds since the first one of…
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Running Fun?
Still Totally Exhausted… But Kris and I were signed up for this Halloween 5k run this morning, so even though I had no energy at all, I managed to crawl out of bed at 6 a.m. and be going through a starting gate at 8 a.m. On the other side of the valley. Great costumes. I was so slow, at one point I was passed by a very overweight man wearing an alligator suit with a long tail. He said in a very friendly manner as he went past, “Let’s go!” I would have kicked him in the tail, but I was too tired and he was too fast. But…
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Exercise Continuing
Down 20 Pounds in Ten Weeks… Exactly as planned, which almost never happens with weight loss of any kind. Ran/walked another 5k this morning in another fun-run event, this time for a Children’s Hospital. Started at 8 am on the other side of the valley from here. (Meant getting up about the time I used to go to bed when living on the coast. Course was hilly, so my time ended up about the same as the last two. I need to drop more weight before the time will really improve. But I did walk 43 miles in steps last week. Average about 12,300 steps a day. Best week so…
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Off and Running
Also Getting Back Into Shape… The goal is 13 weeks from this weekend to run/walk in the Las Vegas Marathon and complete it around four hours. So not only with the writing goals, I have an exercise and health goal. I considered today Day One, and got off to a good start. Did well over 10,000 steps (5 miles plus) of which a half mile of that was running. I want to do about 40 miles per week of walking. Then over the next 13 weeks really ramp up the totals on the running. Can you tell I am getting settled in here in Vegas? (grin) Reminder!!! August Regular Workshops…
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Started Running Finally
Not Much in Distance, But a Start… Like every book or story, you have to start with a first line, a first word. Today, finally, I figured out how to motivate myself enough on the running to get the goals I want done. And interestingly enough, it is a twisted gambling structure that helped me get started. Now, for the folks who love to toss money away in casinos, yet feel they are winning, there are gambling systems. A Martingale is one. (Really silly.) Another is a simple Positive Progressive Betting System. All that one does is give some structure to betting and make a gambler feel lucky at times…
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Too Much Other Stuff
Yup, We All Have Them… Meetings and then I spent a couple of hours up at WMG working on collectable stuff. We (meaning me and Josh, the North store manager among other jobs) are madly working to dig out a massive collection I bought about four years ago and haven’t done anything with. But at the WMG stores and offices and warehouses, to dig out one thing, it takes moving around a ton of other stuff. But almost there. The collection? Well, for libraries, they used to bind newspapers to make them easier to store and handle. The Oregonian, the main Portland paper, was bound in large black books, each paper…
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Some New Goals
New Goals… I am back at writing and exercise with new goals on both. Writing Goal My big goal is to get back up to pulp speed (million words a year fiction) and hold it for all of 2017, which would include staying on time until issue #50 of Smith’s Monthly. Now that’s an impossible goal to wrap my head around, so I am going to break it down into a shorter time frame to start with. Between now and the end of the year I want to write a number of novels, with luck at least three or four done between now and the end of the year. And at least eight short stories. That…
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Adjust A Goal
Adjust a Goal On July 1st, without saying much to anyone but Kris, I started a push to run a marathon in November. But as I detailed out the first of September, I had to hit one major benchmark before I would even start that marathon. Some background: I will be 66 before the race starts. I have bad knees from my years in sports. And I was far overweight on July 1st. Benchmark: To protect my knees, I needed to be under 180 pounds to start the race. I would be better served to be around 170, but I was willing to go at 180. On July 1st I weighed…
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Refocus on Running Day 4
Refocus on Running Day 4 Hit the five miles for a fourth day. I have spent the last three days down in the Salt Lake area with the state chapter of the Romance Writers of America. A fantastic group, a great conference, and I was honored to be part of it, teach a couple of classes, and give a very short speech. Mostly I got to learn from all the wonderful and dedicated and driven writers there. Great time. I really love to hang around with writers who want to learn. So tomorrow I’ll go back to a more normal blog here about writing and other things since I will be home.…
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Refocus on Running Day 3
Refocus on Running Day 3 Hit five miles for a third day. And I got to learn a bunch of fun stuff from some fantastic professional writers. I’ll explain more next week. And I ate far too much. (grin) As I said before, for a few days here I will focus on on this gaining distance until Sunday and then will expand this blog back out more. But right now I need to be focused on the running. This is a very short-term focus. Also I want to illustrate to those of you having some focus issues how you bore down to one thing for a short time to bring that thing…