Leggs.

June hasn’t been off to a good start. Last week at work, while I got on my tiptoes trying to rehang the air blow gun on its hook and missed, the hose recoiled, pistol-whipping me in the forehead, leaving me with a zit-like welt. Worse yet, the joints in my right wrist and left index finger had randomly become inflamed, causing me to wince every time I used the spray bottle, like this:

Only 42 years old, and this is already my reality?

Outside of work, my fitness age, as determined by Garmin, continues to decrease. The expectations put forth by Garmin, however, remain lofty. After three months, my estimated VO2 Max has stabilized. Theoretically, at this point, the prescribed workouts should be hard as fuck, yet doable. This VO2 Max workout seemed to be pushing it, though:

Continue reading “Leggs.”

Rewind.

Behold, my beautiful, lush garden.

The green sugar snap peas, purple moon cauliflowers, and bush green beans are well underway. The green lettuce, kale and butter lettuce are ready to be harvested. The Hungarian peppers are struggling, and the cherry tomatoes are taking their sweet time. The arugula has already bolted and were ripped out this morning, as were the radishes. In the previous two years, we grew the Cherriette variety of radishes, but this year we planted the Easter Egg II blend, named for its range of colours from white to burgundy. They went from seed to R.O.U.S. (radishes of unusual size) in just six weeks:

This is the largest intact radish from this morning’s harvest. There were larger ones, but they’d cracked, and bugs had worked their way into the crannies, so I discarded them in the compost bin. Even after getting rid of all those fissured radishes, the bounty is too large to be divided among two people, especially when just one radish is the size of an apple.

I’ve tried my hand at pickling:

Shredded on the left and thin slices on the right. Supermarket-purchased dill in both jars.

With new seeds in the soil, I’ll have three weeks to discover new ways to prepare radishes. Candied radishes? Caramel radish? Radish ice cream?*

Continue reading “Rewind.”

A bit more about Gabriola.

I succeed in getting Yann to read the last post: I find that people are more motivated to read my posts when they know they’ve been mentioned. I don’t think I’ll get the friendly e-biker who said, “Have a good ride!” as he zipped past us. Yann and I had stopped after the climb out of Mill Bay Terminal to remove our jackets.

I turned to Yann and repeated what I thought the guy had said.

Yann looked surprised. “That’s exactly what he said. Word for word.”

My lipreading ability is heavily dependent on context, which brings me to the freshest experience to be filed under, “Just fucking write, please.”

Continue reading “A bit more about Gabriola.”

Return to Gabriola.

Welcome to Greg Minnaar’s Tour of Terror. First stop: my shower.

Technically, he’s been making people shit themselves a little since he arrived at the bike shop two years ago. He didn’t have to try very hard either: he’d just stand there motionless, and people would jump. What talent. Apparently, he can also do backflips on a bike.

Last week, a colleague was about to eliminate him for once and all. As I was about to enter the break room, Greg took a nosedive in front of me from behind the doorway, jolting my heart.

“Wait. You’re getting rid of him? May I have him?” I asked as soon as I realized it was just Greg, and he was on his way into the dumpster.

Continue reading “Return to Gabriola.”

Destination: Donut.

Rachel Entrekin.

Wow.

I did not know this person existed until Google’s algorithms decided she was a person I’d be interested in. She’d completed an ultramarathon in under 3 days: the Cocodona 250. Holy wow, I thought, “250km in under three days?!”

But I was wrong. The distance was in miles. 407km across deserts and through mountains, accumulating more than 11,800m of elevation gain. You don’t need to be a runner to know that’s a mind-blowing achievement.

Ed, who is no stranger to ultra-endurance activities, was gobsmacked by the thought of one’s fuelling needs for such a race. “Jeeeeeez, her fuelling must’ve been insane,” were his words. I was more focused on her luck in footwear selection, for I have a few spots around my feet from blisters that have come and gone over the span of two pairs of running shoes, both of which I actually consider comfortable.

Of course, she won. Also, 268 people finished this race.

Meanwhile, Lola had flagged my Training Status as “strained” after I’d done a 12km run on Thursday. I ignored Lola and rode up Mount Doug with Matt three times on Friday. That night, I was supposed to go bouldering, but as much as I like Nic and Jamie, I was relieved when Jamie said she needed to postpone it.

Continue reading “Destination: Donut.”