I like lists

Run 694: For the first time in two days, another 10K!

View from Cariboo Dam, just prior to starting the run.

It was forecast to get up to 28C today, so I opted for a mid-morning run to beat the heat. Here’s my run report in handy list form, because I like lists.

  • Good News: I ran another 10K. Yay! I can now say it’s been two days between 10K runs, instead of 988 days.
  • Less-Than-Good-News: Around the 5K mark, an upper left thigh muscle began to twinge a bit. It settled after a few km and is fine now. I blame my body for being weirdly asymmetrical. It may also not surprise you that I am also left-handed.
  • Bad News: None, really. This run felt a lot harder than Monday due to the warmer temperatures (though they were not bad), but mainly the still-high humidity. Humidity is like a superpower designed to drain all energy from your body. It works very well!
  • Fun Fact: For whatever reason, I mistype “humidity” almost every time. I didn’t this time because I was concentrating hard enough for Mavis Beacon to sit up and notice.
  • Trail update: They are putting the final touches on the trail resurfacing near the dam. Where will they resurface next? (Please please please be the trail along the athletic fields.)
  • Sensitive subject: A few years ago I had a weird issue when running if my chest got wet, whether through perspiration or precipitation–my nipples would become strangely sensitive. It almost feels like this might be making an unwelcome return. It’s both weird and annoying. So far it is only hinting. I will give it a hint to go away and see if that works.
  • Award time: I got an award in the Apple Watch Fitness app for most calories burned in a running workout, 723. I find this somewhat odd that it didn’t happen years ago. Maybe I have more calories to burn now.

Award:

Finarly I did it.

Stats:

Run 694
Average pace: 6:12/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CW)
Start: 10:00 a.m.
Distance: 10.02 km
Time: 62:08
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 22-25ºC
Humidity: 64%
Wind: light
BPM: 150
Weight: 165.6
Total distance to date: 5085 km
Devices: Apple Watch Series 5, iPhone 12, AirPods (3rd generation)
Shoes: Brooks Caldera 5 (198 km)

The incomplete list of things I could learn to do properly and the odds of it happening

I do some things quite well, like breathing and walking. Others I do moderately well, like avoiding donuts, and some I’ve resigned myself to never being that great at, like math. Math is hard.

But there is a group of miscellaneous things that I have attempted to become better at and, for various reasons, have failed to do so. Here’s a short list of some of these things, along with the odds that I might actually become better at them:

  • Ice skating. I am not terrible at ice skating, just a bit wobbly, especially when required to move in a not-straight line. I very rarely ice skate, though. Odds of improving: Close to zero.
  • Swimming. I have long described my swimming technique as “not drowning” and after taking aborted swimming lessons, discovered that part of the problem was having an actual fear of water, or at least water’s potential to snuff out my life in the right circumstances. I rarely go in water, though I am sometimes near it. I’d have to overcome the fear before trying lessons again. Odds of improving: Slight, but better than winning the lottery.
  • Typing. I never learned to touch type. How can someone who dreamed of becoming a writer never learn to touch type? I do not know. I even got my own typewriter as a kid. I’ve tried learning with Mavis Beacon and it did not go well. I’ve dabbled a few times since. This would clearly benefit me, yet I never seem to get enough momentum to keep pushing through. I need a magic typing pill. Or just start using dictation. In fact, I’m going to dictate the rest of this post! Odds of improving: Slim, but possible.
  • Losing weight. I am in the process of losing weight now and have actually seen some success, so I am somewhat positive that this will be a thing I can actually achieve. Odds of improving : Good.
  • Drawing. Over the last couple of years I have started to draw more, and I am seeing improvements by doing so. I have taken actual lessons on things like perspective, shading and so on, and some of those lessons have actually stuck! Odds of improving: It’s already happening, woo.

I’ve now turned auto punctuation on for the dictation, because it was doing weird things with the periods and commas. Let’s see if it works better now. So far it seems to be working better. Who knew? Computers are just so darn smart. Maybe I’ll let the computer write the next post.

It’s time for some lists

My List

  • Your kiss

Top 5 Theme Songs for May 2020, Metro Vancouver Edition

  • Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head
  • Here Comes the Rain Again
  • Singin’ in the Rain
  • November May Rain
  • Rain is Falling

Bonus (maybe, hopefully): Here Comes the Sun

The Best R.E.M. albums, ranked yet again by me

  1. Automatic for the People
  2. Lifes Rich Pageant
  3. Murmur
  4. Monster
  5. New Adventures in Hi-Fi

Previous list (which I did not check before writing the current one):

  1. Automatic for the People
  2. Lifes Rich Pageant
  3. Monster
  4. Collapse Into Now
  5. Murmur

I swapped out their final album Collapse Into Now for their 1996 release New Adventures in Hi-Fi. It’s really close, though. Collapse is actually a really good R.E.M. album, especially considering how bored the band had seemed by the earlier Around the Sun. I don’t listen to Murmur much these days (R.E.M. joke) but when I do, it still seems kind of magical. It’s an amazing debut album.

Random things I like

  • Sugar peas
  • Taking pictures of things
  • Getting lost in a drawing
  • Watching something that makes me laugh (that doesn’t involve someone taking a ball to the crotch)
  • Walks along trails (often done in conjunction with #2)

That word

HISTORICAL NOTE, April 8, 2022: This post was saved as a draft on August 18, 2015, but never published. I think I wanted the list to be longer. I no longer feel this need, so enjoy!

Words that don’t mean what some people may think they mean:

  • Bemused. It sounds like “amused” so maybe it’s a synonym. It means perplexed or bewildered.
  • Penultimate. Some may think this means “uber-ultimate”. It actually means next to last.
  • Arid. This one gets confused with arable (fit for cultivation) but means pretty much the opposite in that it refers to land that is very dry. Like a desert or all of California, for example.
  • Inflammable. This is perhaps the perfect example of crazy English. If you think it’s like invisible and thus means “not flammable” you’d be wrong because it actually means flammable. What does flammable mean, then? The same thing. Why? English! Actually, you can blame the Latin origins, which treat the words similarly.

Things I wish I had more of

These would be nice, but not essential.

  • Hair. In a way, having a shaved head is nice. It’s very low maintenance. I can’t have bad hair days. But a big, lush head of Robert Plant hair would be nice to tousle in slow motion. Until I had to wash it, and you know, actually take care of it.
  • Money. Would lots of money turn me into an evil, hedonistic monster? I’d be willing to find out.
  • Better taste in clothes. I’m not horrible, but I’m not great, either. I wear (nice) sweatpants with little shame. I can’t see where exactly this would help me, but it seems like something that would be nice to have.
  • Patience. Everyone can always use more of this, right? Not to be confused with the Guns ‘N Roses song, which is okay and does not try my patience.
  • Passion. Passionate people are weird and scare me, yet I long to join their wild-eyed club. My passion is more like a warm bowl of soup. It’s fine, but it doesn’t last and you can only re-heat it so many times before it gets kind of gross.
  • Muscles. Who doesn’t want to be big and brawny? Well, me, actually. But to have nicely-toned muscles, to have a body that makes people notice without immediately thinking, “Loser must live in a gym”? I could handle that. What I can’t handle is the exercise necessary for getting these muscles.
  • More as they cross my mind.

2021: Well, that was a year

photo of cats near a green dumpster
I was looking for “dumpster fire” but I think I like this image better. Photo by Betül Balc? on Pexels.com

As the final days of 2021 draw near, and we look forward (?!) to 2022, let’s reflect on the year that was. And it was a year.

Unlike previous posts, I’m mixing everything together–personal victories, political nonsense, the state of the world and so on. Let’s call it Earth Blend, available for $11.99 at your local Starbucks.

The Good

  • I left a job I had come to actively not enjoy (hate is too strong a word)
  • I did three and a half months of drawing prompts to start the year
  • I did an Inktober prompt. Yes, one. Hey, it’s better than nothing!
  • Summer forest fires, while bad in general, only led to a few smoky days in Metro Vancouver, down considerably from previous years
  • I ran a lot more than in 2020, even with a late start of August
  • I got a mirrorless camera (Canon EOS M50) and have had oodles of fun taking photos with the telephoto lens (nothing pervy, just naked birds)
  • Dodged getting sick for another year
  • I kept blogging. Funny cats, hooray!
  • Contributed art and a trailer to an actual video game that will be for sale on Steam soon™
  • Trump is no longer president
  • The world did not blow up

The Bad

  • Will no one rid me of this meddlesome pandemic?
  • The COVID twins of Delta (“more people will get infected”) and Omicron (“everyone you know will get infected”)
  • My weight is basically unchanged. It should be down. I blame myself and salty/sweet snacks.
  • The heat dome (seriously, I never expected it to be hotter locally than the times I travelled through the Mojave Desert in the summer). 42 °C is pretty warm.
  • The frozen dome. Yeah, that’s what I’m calling it. -14 °C is actually probably easier to manage than 42 °C, but it’s still, you know, rather chilly for these parts. We shattered temperature records at both ends of the thermometer in 2021. 2022 will reveal if this was a fluke or the start of a fun new climate trend.
  • My fiction writing was, uh, moribund-though I did one writing prompt, so that’s a start!
  • I didn’t read as much, since I no longer have a commute. This is both good and bad.
  • I got a DisplayLink adapter, so I could fudge using my MacBook Air with dual displays, and have yet to get it working. A minor thing but still technically bad.
  • I’m ending the year with sinus issues, possibly related to the cold weather, but likely not related to COVID-19
  • U.S. democracy is looking a little beat-up after four years of Trump, the January 6th riots, and 40+ years of Republicans pushing for one-party rule

The Rest

  • I still haven’t seen a movie in a theater since watching Onward in the first week of March 2020 and can’t say I miss the experience. I love being able to pause and go pee. It’s especially handy now that the average movie is ten hours long. To clarify, I go pee in the bathroom, as civilization expects.
  • Justin Trudeau smelled a majority government within reach and instantly doomed any chance of it by calling an unnecessary election. The result was a Parliament virtually unchanged from before the election, proving the whole thing a waste of time. You’d think Trudeau might learn a lesson from this, but…we’ll see.
  • Discovering a prominent anti-vaxxer was living in my building and later died of COVID-19 was a little weird
  • I still like lists

The Great No Soda Experiment

It’s actually more modest than great.

The plan is, starting tomorrow, to not drink any soda for the next week and see what happens. What will I drink instead? Here’s a list:

  • Goat blood
  • Motor oil
  • Liquid soap
  • Molten lava

No, wait, that’s the list of what I won’t be drinking. Here’s the actual list:

  • Water
  • Chocolate milk (after a run)
  • Tea

I am curious to see if anything at all noticeable happens. And if I can resist the siren song of that delicious1For relative values of “delicious” diet soda.

I will report back in one week with the results, possibly presented in chart form or as some kind of multimedia extravaganza.

More random questions and answers

Questions provided by that guy on the internet I know.

  • Q: Are street tacos really as good as people say?
  • A: I don’t know. I’ve only had indoor tacos.
  • Q: Why don’t dolphins build apartments if they’re so smart?
  • A: Probably due to the lack of opposable thumbs. But perhaps they build grand cathedrals in their minds, waiting to evolve flippers into thumbs. Then we’ll be sorry.
  • Q: Are the appropriate amount of my tax dollars being invested in public transit?
  • A: Probably pretty close, actually. People love to kvetch about transit and while no system is perfect, I feel transit in Metro Vancouver is pretty decent. Results may vary elsewhere.
  • Q: Is it really camping if you bring your own toilet?
  • A: Yes. While pooping in the woods is perhaps a more rustic experience, it is not a requirement of camping.

Five deadly things I thought were great as a kid

  • Volcanoes
  • Lawn darts
  • Dinosaurs
  • Second hand smoke (just kidding)
  • Sharks

I still think dinosaurs, sharks and volcanoes are cool (er, maybe hot in the latter case), but continue to boggle over lawn darts being an actual thing. You can get non-lethal versions now that are blunt, but seriously, who really thought that throwing what amounts to a deadly weapon back and forth on the front lawn was a good idea for kids? It’s no wonder kids loved them, they were like the forbidden toy that somehow slipped through.

A case of the blahs

Hard to explain. Could it be…

  • Uncertainty about the future
  • Global warming (sort of related to the above)
  • General sense of flabbiness
  • Something intangible and unknowable
  • The fact that the Styx album Kilroy Was Here really got made

I’m listening to “Mr. Roboto” right now, and I’m leaning toward the last one. I loved this album when it came out in 1983. I was 19 years old at the time. I present this as my only defense. Well, that and being a sucker for concept albums, apparently even bad ones.

My mind is blank

Yep, it is. I am in one of those weird phases where the more I try to think of something to write, the more the thoughts find ways to squirm out of my head and fly away, never to be seen again. Or maybe they just splat against the nearest window.

So when in doubt, let’s list1I like lists!

The Five Best Colors in the World According to Me

  • Dark pink
  • Red
  • Dark blue
  • Verdant green
  • Black. It’s not a color, but it’s so handy. And black.

Three articles of clothing I will likely never wear

  • A speedo
  • A kilt
  • A burlap sack

Perks of working in IT Support

  • lol
  • lol
  • Seriously, lol

Ways to Make the World a Better Place

  • Ride your bike
  • Grow some veggies
  • Be nice to others. Not super stupid nice, just reasonably nice and pleasant.
  • Eliminate all management
  • Probably need to do something about capitalism, too