This week has been a weather rollercoaster of light snow, rain, and sun with freezing temps one day, spring-like temps the next, and snow amounts varying between our home near town and the trails out in the country before finally melting.
Tag Archives | feeling mental
Numbers, Miles, & Pipes
Sometimes, the numbers don’t add up.
The Bounce Back
After my First World mental meltdown concerning aging, being stupid, mobile phones, frozen Apple I.D. accounts, and realizing that I’m 52 years old, offer nothing to society and get the same in return, I said that I would bounce back like a fat kid through a trampoline. Well, I am happy to report that I bounced back and then some by lumbering over 30 miles in 5 days; to hell with the trampoline-breaking fat kid; this week, I was bouncing back like the glutes of Big Sean’s lady friend!
The Best of The Worst
I got out on Monday for a 6.75+ lumber, half of which was done in a thunderstorm, and I have to say it was pretty magnificent. Plodding along through the dark woods with rumbling thunder and lightning overhead and rain pissing down shouldn’t be as fun as it is, but it is. And I only almost pissed myself once with fear.
The First Year
I still don’t know how or why it happened; perhaps it was the medicine, continued therapy with the O.G. Mindbender, or the unwavering support of B and Wifey. Or maybe the universe just randomly flipped a switch in my mind that made me get brutally honest about the person I was becoming and helped me realize that I am not the sort of person who walks a mile and calls it a hike, eats whole deli hoagies for dinner, washes it down with four double IPAs1, and then spends the next morning staring at the ceiling, regretting every life decision I’ve ever made and one major decision my future parents made in the late fall of 1970.
A 5-Step Program for Winter
This week, due to some home improvement duties, I was thrown multiple C-blocks in my bid to get in a 25-mile hiking week, but I somehow managed to get it done again in just four days, even with a couple days being 90˚ and humid before things cooled off. Hazah!
And with Labor Day and Fat Guy Summer now behind me and the days (actually 7 months) of darkness, cold temps, winter slop, and snow, if we’re lucky, around the corner, I have set my eyes on mental survival. Yes, I know that sounds hyperbolic, but that’s how my mind rolls: in extreme waves of perceived and actual misery, 24 hours a day.
A Tale of Two Augusts
In August of 2022, I was just starting to feel more like my old self (the one who enjoys pushing himself physically outside, preferably in the mountains woods, and doing so without wanting to take a dirt nap), but still not there yet.
The Hateful Eights
At the risk of violating my 2023 resolution, I have been deep into a late summer funk brought forth by my ongoing battle with heel pain, B heading back to MSU tomorrow, a burning hatred for half the country (and 95% of mid-Michigan’s population), and my long-perfected loathing for myself and my extensive list of shortcoming and failures as a man.
Additionally, I have also been made aware by persons close to me that my lack of desire to “go out” for social interactions has become unacceptable.
26 Years & 1,000 Miles
The first steps of the Comeback Special, September 2022.
Wednesday Morning:
I have been in a creative funk over the past week or so, and I can’t seem to find my groove for writing or picture-taking. So, bear with me.
I’m Just Saying Hi
NOTE: There are no photos in this post. ‘Cause I ain’t got none. Also, this post is written with a tinge of dickishness and a pinch of sarcasm. Don’t take any of it too seriously because I don’t.
Hikes are very much like rides, “a bad ride, er, hike, is still better than a good day at the office” or some such bullshit we tell ourselves. And that is mostly right, but when it’s not, it goes sort of like this;