Day 69

I finished my big brief today at 5:30, my impeccable sense of procrastination bringing in the project exactly one day early. It was very satisfying, although I wonder what my client will say when he sees my bill.

Once it was done, I started thinking about my poker game tonight at Billy’s at 7:00. And then I remembered my pledge to walk every day this week and audibly sighed. (My dogs Penny and Sam looked at me with canine concern, probably wondering if they were going to the vet.)

Could I get a walk in? I wasn’t feeling great; in fact, I’d cut today’s workout with Art short today after feeling like I had no energy. (Having to pull 350 pounds on a sled may have also had something to do with it.)

But I’d made a promise to myself and felt like I had to hit the road, so I did.

And it turned out to be a good walk, mostly because I decided to listen to music instead of a book on tape. Clear and cool, a light breeze in the air, I felt new energy that was enhanced by my music choices.

A short digression about music. I have a setlist from my marathoning days on Apple iTunes that is basically comprised of fast, propulsive songs. Some other day I’ll memorialize that list here, but I wasn’t listening to it today.

Instead, I started with a song I’m trying to learn for my blues band: “Many the Miles” by Sara Bareilles. Here’s a version of the song live on a houseboat:

What a cheerful song! The chord progression moves in a nice, shifty way and the lyric is actually kind of relatable for a retired guy who wants to see the world:

There's too many things that I haven't done yet
There's too many sunsets I haven't seen

Wanting more of that sound, I went to a 2002 album from a singer named Sarah Shannon for a song called “I’ll Run Away” (apparently not available on You Tube).

I have fond memories of that indie record, which I heard playing at Cactus Music and bought on a whim. Sarah never made it - but she has had a nice career singing to kids, and her record never gets old.

Still in an indie mood, I then pulled up Jon Brion, the musical savant from LA who has a residency at the supercool club Largo.  He has some quirky cool songs that I used to have on heavy rotation in my office:

If you want to understand me, you have to know that I truly believe that he and I would have been close friends and collaborators had I gone to California to write comedy instead of going to law school. But I didn’t, so we aren’t. I still love his music.

Then I pulled up the video of Jon’s legendary television show pilot featuring Elliott Smith, which was shot by genius director Paul Thomas Anderson in 2000. The banter between Brion and Smith is a little twee, but the music! Every song is great and the shambling informality of the show is charming:

That was my soundtrack the rest of the way in. Lisa worries about me when I listen to Elliott Smith because his songs can be a little…grim, but I love his melodicism and commitment. Please listen to this video.

The funny thing is that none of these songs were true running songs - they were introspective and sweet and meaningful to me, and took the edge off the long walk. Today felt like the equivalent of a stroll in the park holding hands with your girl and feeling like everything in the world is okay. I might be being a little twee myself, but so be it. Life is too short to miss out on any opportunities to feel a sense of contentment.

See you tomorrow!

Day 68

When I was a kid, I was an avid reader. My 84-year-old mother will tell you, whether you ask or not, that I was reading at 3, and that I had read (and comprehended) a chapter book at 5.  (The book was called Richthofen and it was about the legendary World War I ace known as the Red Baron. What this particular book was doing in an elementary school library, given that it was about a guy whose claim to fame was shooting down English and American pilots, I have no idea.)

But I was one of those kids who had a book in his hands all the time, including when I was walking to and from school. (Consider that for a moment as well: a kid who read and walked to school - no wonder I was skinny and smart!) People driving by would see me, head down, absorbed in the book I was reading, and wait for me to walk into traffic or walk into a light pole or tree. (I knew this because these drivers would then see my dad at the hardware store and say, “Durf, your idiot son almost got run over by a panel van on Valley Parkway.”)

But I never ran into the pole, tree, or traffic. I had some kind of weird radar that alerted me when I was approaching one of those hazards and I would unconsciously move aside to miss it. 

In short, I was a distracted walker, an early precursor of the current generation of phone heads who walk (and drive) obliviously while surfing social media.

Why tell you this? Tonight, I dusted off the old skills and updated the distraction: I played online poker while walking.

There were upsides to this: the walk felt like it went by much faster and it turns out I won the tournament!

The downsides: I gave up situational awareness, which you kind of want when walking in the dark after 9:00. Also, although I felt like I was going as fast as I usually do, I actually wasn’t. It was weird - I’d look down at the Apple Watch, breathing hard, and expect a sub-16 minute pace, but find out instead that my pace was over 17 minutes.  I’d noticed this phenomenon about a month ago when I was talking on the phone while walking - something slows me down when the phone is out and in use. Go figure.

Anyway, a nice nearly five miler today. No ailments, except for sore pinky toes. See you tomorrow!

Day 67

Once again, time passes without a training walk. Here are my current excuses/explanations:

• Illness - I had a pretty gnarly flu over the holidays and was stillcoughing until about Sunday. Respiratory stuff really takes it out of you, especially when you feel like your lungs aren’t filling up to capacity.

• Other Exercise - Despite the illness, I have been going pretty faithfully to my workouts with Art. When you get a full hour of intense strength training, it’s easy to justify not doing more exercise. And when you’re already not feeling well, the justification threshold is low, almost nonexistent.  Plus I feel sore all the time, which Art tells me is normal, but man, it is still annoying.

• Work - Despite my happy retirement, I am still doing some law work here and there. One of those projects is a murder case in which I am responding to a 105 page, ten issue brief on behalf of a DA’s office in a nearby county. It’s been a while since I’ve had a project that big, and its weighing heavily on me. Plus I have another big project in the on-deck circle, so when I’ve finished working on it for the day, I’m not inclined to do much other than decompress.

So there you go. I was ready to sit out another day on Sunday when Josh asked me if I was up for a walk. How could I say no?

We walked the golf course I live on and talked about life. It was a good walk for both of us.

Now that the big murder brief is pretty much done, I’m going to pledge to walk every day for the foreseeable future. 

Tonight, I walk with Lisa - she’s been wanting to exercise with me for a while. We’ll see how she does!

Day 61

Yes, there has been a little gap between entries, which means that, yes, there has been a little gap between long walks.

To explain: this weekend, I went to Oklahoma to play in a World Series of Poker tournament. Poker is definitionally the exact opposite of any kind of exercise activity - you sit and sit and sit some more, waiting for a pair of decent cards to play with. And when you play those cards, you are actively suppressing any elevated heart rate or other physical tells that would give away your hand. You kind of look like this:

So, yeah, I have not exactly been elevating my heart rate over the past few days.

But when I got home yesterday, I eased back into normal life with a table tennis match with Josh, and then later, we took a nice five-mile walk and talk. He’s been keeping me from being a total couch potato.

Anyway, more to come this week, even though I have a brief due next week and two poker tournaments here this week. (When I told Lisa that, she understatedly said, “That’s a lot of poker.”)

Yes, yes it is.

Day 55

Happy New Year!

After a nice family weekend with a visit from my nephew and his son, I had a noon workout with Art and Sam (Avina was off for one more day). The new regimen is quick transitions with 8-12 reps. We did dips and pull-ups and flies and shrugs and presses, oh my!

Art said he had been reading my blog.

“You’ve been writing a lot about me,” he said. “It’s like I’m one of the main characters. I mean, Sam and Avina are in the blog, but they’re supporting cast.”

“That’s true,” I said.  “You’re a big part of the story.”

He smiled.  “If this was a show, who would I be?”

I thought about it and said, “If I was Thomas Magnum, you’d be TC, his helicopter pilot buddy. You know, the sensible sidekick.”

“I don’t think I’ve seen that show,” he said, to my shock.

I keep forgetting that, due to our age difference, Art didn’t grow up watching the shows I watched. Would he get it if I compared him to Mr. Spock? (That would, of course, make me Captain Kirk in my life story, which I am totally in favor of.) Maybe Picard and Data would be a more apt comparison for him as a member of the Next Generation.

I got today’s walk in later in the day when Josh and I walked our home golf course in drizzly weather. I always have good conversations with him. He has hidden depths. The pace was good too, although walking the unlit golf course can be tricky in wet weather.

My favorite moment: Josh found a golf ball near the path and instead of taking it home, he ran onto the green of a nearby par 3 and deposited into the hole. Someone will have a nice surprise tomorrow.