Some days you wake up and just know that things are going to be shit. And some days, you have that realization as you are in the act of doing so at 5:15 AM, and your cantankerous bulldog is snorting, whining, huffing, and puffing at the bathroom door for her morning gruel.

“GIRL, GIMME A SECOND, I’M IN THE MIDDLE OF SOMETHING!!”

The day’s vibe declines further when you proceed to put on your shorts inside out and don’t realize until you attempt to button them and have to repeat the process.

Fast forward an hour, and somehow in all that, you put a freshly charged battery in your camera, head out the door for your morning lumber, get to the parking lot, gather your gear by the light of your headlamp, and realize that, yes, there’s a fresh battery in your camera, but no SD card.

*SIGH*

But hey, that’s all goofy life bullshit. The day was too young to be shit. Plus, how shit could the day be if I’m starting it in the woods, banging out a 6-mile loop?

I might not have had my camera, but I did have my bottom-of-the-line Apple SE iPhone to capture the moments that no one asked for. No critter pics, of course, but in the fall woods, some days just pointing and shooting with a phone camera gets the job done.

It’s also rare that I ever shoot with such a wide-angle lens, so it was cool to see the extent of fall’s kaleidoscope of colors.

The day might have started shit, but the right frame of mind, and six miles of “blowing the stink off of me,” sure helped. Two lumbers and 12.21 miles down, 17+ to go for the week.

Later.