I'm off to see the wizards

I've been hoping they'd kick it up a notch in physical therapy, and they sure did.  They brought their A game today.  I was burning and sweating.  If nothing else, I at least had the sensation of working hard.  :)

Not much blog tonight.  I have to go get ready for the ruck.  I already made brownies.  I can smell them in the kitchen.  They're taunting me.

Y'all have a great weekend.  See you when I get back.

I spent the weekend in a castle

I spent this weekend with fellow hikers at the PA Ruck, which was held in VA.  It's kind of a long story.  the important thing is it was very nice, and also fun.  We stayed at Bear's Den Hostel instead of Iron Master's Mansion Hostel this time.  The place was MUCH nicer.  Not as much history, but the plumbing and electric all worked.  I'll take a functional toilet over an underground railroad story most days.

As is traditional for Rucks, we had several delicious communal meals.

With a foot of snow outside, we set up some tents indoors.  I bought a new Lightheart tent - very light, and the huge amounts of mesh may solve condensation issues for me.

I took a walk out to Bear's Den Overlook. Those hummocks in the front are the snow covered rocks at the edge of the cliff.

The hostel is sometimes called The Castle.  It has 2-3 foot thick stone walls and a slate roof.  It's lovely.

The ruck was much smaller than usual at this new location.  That made it much nicer for me.  I find the 80-120 people attending most rucks to be overwhelming.  I didn't count but I'd guess we had 40 at the most.  I was able to talk to nearly everybody, and even have reasonably long conversations with Skeeter, Heartfire, Vera, Lisa, Mark, and Merry Mary.  It was a good time.

Despite that I had my typical desire to escape to somewhere quieter.  I went in to the women's bunkroom and got under my covers with my ipod at one point.  I listened to Garrison Keillor and was blissful.  But then I got up and went back out.  It was time for cooking and doing dishes.  (I am not sure how I got into that racket.  I gotta stop being OCD about dirty dishes at hostels.) 

While eating dinner I found myself gazing out the window at the beautiful winter scene.  And then I remembered just how much I would have given to have dinner partners on very many solo occasions during my hike last year, and I forced my attention back to the table.  I love people, I guess.. but in small quantities.

After a pleasantly short drive home, I celebrated the last of my weekend with a few hershey's kisses and a trip to the local Mongolian grill.  And now I'm ready to be good again next week.  Tomorrow also starts a 10k challenge for me - trying to walk 10,000 steps per day, by pedometer count.  It will be a  good reminder and incentive for me to get out and walk even when the weather isn't nice.  Which seems to be a lot of the time, recently. 

Sooner or later I need to run, also.  Or that 5 kilometer race in April is going to be pretty rough.

This week: cold, with farty fronts expected

JD modeling his winter getup - his hiking boots, my gaiters

Blogspot was being wonky yesterday so no bloggage.  Today I tried a different browser and voila!  Aggravating that it works only sometimes.  But it's a free service so I can't complain too much.  Although I just did.

Beauty is on day three of Flagyl, which is an antibiotic.  She's also getting anti-nausea medication, which seems to be helping as she is mostly holding down food.  She is, however, afflicted with the most horrendous farts.  Ever.  I keep checking to see if somebody has taken a massive dump, but no.  It's all gaseous.  Even she doesn't want to be around those farts.  Today she came into the dining room, farted, and left.

And she's a silent farter so I don't even have any advance warning.  I'm just sitting here, in my own little world, and then OH MY GOD I start to suffocate in a putrid, invisible cloud of nastiness.  I love that dog but if it were a little warmer out she'd be spending a *lot* more time outside.

Anyway.

It snowed last night, and it rained, and it sleeted, and it thundered and flashed blue light and generally was a comprehensive display of winter weather possibilities.  This morning I checked my email (from bed, as I finally remembered to bring my phone upstairs with me) and saw that work had a delayed opening.  11 am.  That's the latest I've seen it, in the last seventeen or so years.  Not counting days where they shut work down entirely.

JD and I shoveled this morning, and that snow was super heavy.  It's about as soaked as snow can get and not be actual liquid.  It felt fine while I was shoveling but now my neck is tweaked because hello I'm forty.  At least it's not my lower back tweaked.  Necks are involved in fewer movements than lower backs.

Afte the shoveling I decided that telecommuting the rest of the day was a good option, so that's what I did.  And so I was at home when I got the news that pipes were leaking into various offices.   My poor boss was there on his own and he got to deal with it.  There's an incipient leak in my own personal office, directly over an electrical outlet.  I hope some plumber fixes it before the bulging ceiling tile gives up the fight.

At lunchtime, even though I was telecommuting, I went out.  Because it's lunch date day, that's why.  JD and I went to Five Guys, which is within spitting distance of work.  Kind of an odd feeling.  And there I got a "little hamburger" and split an order of fries with JD.  Oh goodness.  That hit the spot.  Also I determined that I am off my diet until Monday because tomorrow is the start of the Mother Ruck, and that is an eating occasion.

Throwing all caution to the winds I ate several Hershey's kisses, and then I made brownies for the Ruck and ate some of the ones that didn't come out nicely.

I made a crustless quiche for the Ruck, which I hope is good.  It looks good:

With us home all day I got to see the various kittens rampaging around.

That's Olli and Dory.

Here's Olli and Nazca not rampaging.

I'll be busy rucking all weekend so no bloggage for me on Friday or Saturday.  Probably.