Bridge Closed & Road Impassable

June 17, 2019 - June 23, 2019  

Monday (5) - Walked with Ro at lunch at a very casual pace, it felt good after 2 miles so we added on to make it 5.

June 17, 2000

Dinner out for our 19th anniversary, we went for pizza at our favorite place, the pizza wasn't as good as it usually is and the beer menu was sad.   I said, "I hope this isn't a harbinger of the year to come."  Dave said, "I don't think that I'm worried its a harbinger the only place in a 45-minute drive that has good pizza is going downhill."  Dave is very practical.

Tuesday (0) - Lots of busy stuff at work and a downpour at night and I really had no interest in working out so I didn't.  I did have the best cannoli I have ever had, beats Mike's Pastry in Boston hands down. Merianos's Cannoli.  I could go for a few more of those!

Wednesday (3 + 2) - Lunch run resumed!  A bit of walking and more running and no coughing fit.  I was a little nervous, I still feel slight pressure when I take a deep breath, I focused on breathing through my belly although I don't think I was very successful.  I ran, that made me happy.  Although I'm still thinking about that cannoli...

OK, where are the cameras?

Dave and I took Jax out to Burlingame, to check on whatever is going on down there.  He didn't moon the trail camera but he did flip it off.  Where ever it is... 

Thursday (1 + 2) - Mile on the treadmill at 4% to get my heart rate up a bit.  Weird my heart rate isn't going up as fast as it used to.  Hmmmmm.....  that is a good thing, makes me wonder what is going on inside me with the inflammation.  Rheumatologist appointment next week and blood work.  I'm super curious what is going to happen now that I'm off the Doxy, was this really undiagnosed Lyme?  I'm never giving up hope I'm fixable. 

He is so funny.
He dropped the stick before I got the picture.

Took Jax to Grills, we were going to Burlingame but krikies I wasn't in the mood for that, and the kids were at Bradford Preserve.  I made the bad call to go to Grills, it is very swampy there, and there were at least 100 Thousand Gajillion mosquitos.  I was 1/10th of a mile in and knew that this was a bad idea yet, I kept going.  I swatted mosquitos Jax swished his face through the tall grass to get them off of him when I was to busy swatting them off me.  It was a dumb idea that kept getting dumber.  We did manage to make it out not looking too worse for wear and by the end of the night, only a few mosquito bite bumps on both of us.  That was very surprising, I figured we'd be having Benadryl with our evening snicky snacks!

Friday (0.5) - Camping at Coolidge State Park in VT.  After a rainy morning, we were off to nice dry cool VT.  A quick loop around the loop with Jax was it for recorded activity.

The view from our campsite
Killington Mountain

Saturday (1 + 21) - My first road ride in weeks.  I woke up with tightness in the left lower lobe, seemed to have moved from the right middle lobe?  Probably it was just nerves knowing I wasn't sure how my body was going to react to two hours of activity. The recent past would tell me not well.  BUT I've been feeling like I used to feel years ago, unfortunately, I lost all that fitness.  

Such a nice scene to walk in on.

The ride was good, the last 9/10 of a mile is straight uphill.  I walked my bike, taking breaks.  Still not sure how my body was going to take all of this exertion, between the two weeks of pneumonia and the beast.  

It may be a US Route, but it was surrounded by beautiful scenery.

I was just fine.  It was really odd.  Dave went for a ride and Jax and I hung out at the campsite, me in the hammock and him in his bed.  The boyz hiked Shrewsbury Peak in the a.m. and Jax was clearly tired and clearly not relaxing. Jax misses Dave when he's not around.  He'd prefer we all three were together or he was with Dave.  While I'm so jealous, I did have Gizzy, Gus, and Sage who were all super attached to me over Dave.  I went in the camper and Jax followed leaped up on the bed spun around 10 times and was out, snoring.  He needed to sleep, he sleeps 20 hours a day and that was a pretty physical hike, 1,500 feet of gain.  I was happy to play games on my Kindle, and if the mood struck, take a nap. 

See the ski runs?

Sunday (4 + 32) - I went out for a ride first thing, the tightness from Saturday went away.  I wasn't sure about where I'd go and decided just to ride flat along US 4.  On the way back there was a sign to "Bike Route"  I knew there was a road paralleling US4 (on the other side of a river) for a while and there was a covered bridge, and I thought another bridge.   I went over the river and along a nice gravel road and then came upon the "Bridge Out" sign.  Oh, shit, there wasn't another bridge, so back I went.  It was a nice adventure and a really poor call in my critical thinking capabilities!!

So peaceful.

Dave was going to go to Green Woodlands in Dorchester NH, he figured it was about an hours drive.  Which, had he looked at the map and decided on directions rather than having me use "Jeeves" (Waze) as we were driving there it would not have been a three hours drive!  I plugged in the address we used the last time we went there and "Jeeves" came up with a route, different than the one we used before.  He does that, he has a sense of adventure or this time he was pissed at us complaining about the stupid routes he comes up with?

I"m not choking him really.  He so hates selfies.

After a few miles on dirt, it became, closed in the winter dirt, and then "Road Impassable".  Totally not the part of Green Woodlands Dave wanted to be in, we took an hour to go around and get to the right spot on North Dorchester Road.  Jax and I had a nice hike that I estimated to be 3 miles, it was 4.4, whoops.  Dave's ride went very well, which was nice after a crappy drive out there.  I put a GPS pin in my mapping app (not "Jeeves") for the next time.

The folks at Green Woodlands have done such a great job with the trails, the design, the upkeep, and the 'decorations'.

So that was kind of the theme for the day, You can't get there from here!  Whoops!!

It was 8 before we got back to camp, it was a 75-minute drive back to camp. Surprisingly I was not tired or worn out.  Pleasantly sore and still a bit energized.  Perhaps the prednisone?  

So quaint.

Reading:

Old Lady on the Trail: Triple Crown at 76
by:  Mary Davidson

Status:  In Progress

Still proving to be an interesting, and as much as Mary would hate this an inspiring read.  Inspiring in the if you take care of yourself it will pay dividends and holy shit a 72-year-old woman did that!! She had one tidbit I found interesting, while she says "I'm an old lady." she isn't exactly complaining she is first surprised she can hike 500+ miles in a year and second she is bragging that she can.  Puts some things Ro (only 8 years my senior) says in perspective.  Perspective is always a good thing. 

Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less
by: Greg McKeown

Status:  In Progress

Plugging away.  I read the book, and am getting through the audio.  Maybe I'll be done this week.  

Knitting:

Finished the pair of purple/pink socks and started on a new pattern with the same yarn.  This pattern has a slipped stitch, it is interesting to work, I'll see if I like it after a few more hours of working on it.   

I did buy some Lorna's Laces sock yarn, the colorway was cool (and on sale) and I bought a sock measurer, paid way to much for it, but it was kind of interesting and gimmicky so what the hell, maybe it will work.  Knitting one sock at a time is proving to be difficult to get them to exactly match.  

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This was a weird week.  Feeling like death two weeks ago to feeling like I haven't in years.  I'm scared it is all a dream and will go away.  I'll manage to piss off the beast and he will come back with a vengeance.

It is weird and scary.  I'm going to have some interesting conversations with my doctors this week, these were already scheduled appointments. Why wouldn't my primary care just give me the doxy two years ago when I went in with the lyme/tick borne illness symptoms?  Then requested a second test and to have the medicine, just to rule it out.  Don't give me the "It's the practice of medicine." Bullshit...  I'm not a hysterical woman, I'm a pissed off woman.

Sincerely,
Beth, quite pleased with a great week physically and a little ticked off if she's been robbed of two years.