Me last Saturday, towards the turning point of our walk.  Photo by M.

After mom left Monday afternoon, this week has been a rather forgettable one.  Sometime last week, between an immune system weakened from the race, overexcitement/stress about the impending visit, and the normal petri dish of germs I’m exposed to at work (visiting elementary schools, picking kids up from daycare, etc), I caught a head cold.  What was a fairly ignorable hacking cough over the weekend progressed, by Sunday night migrated into my sinuses and by Tuesday migrated to the top of my head.  Purposefully ignoring it over the weekend (there was no other options, of course) didnt help, nor has working all week.  (Sick days are for trips, of course.)  So I’ve done little besides work and sleep, on two occasions since Sunday I’ve taken after work naps, which I hardly ever do.

But it’s almost entirely gone, enough to enjoy some moderate adventuring and training this weekend, I think.  I’m at the start of the main training phase for the summer, which means that hiking power and toughening up the feet and legs share space as first priorities.  Fortunately we’ve got some dry dirt to play with, and the rivers are coming up for boating, and it’s light until almost nine at night.  High adventure season is upon us.

M at Craters.

In more interesting news, M found us a nice push lawnmower, for free, yesterday evening (by push I mean non-motorized).  Good as our current place didn’t come with one.  The novelty was such that for only the second time since moving to Montana I didn’t have to mow the yard!

Ryan Jordan wrote a very illustrative post about fishing Tenkara on larger rivers, giving me food for thought and reminding me of how much I have to learn about fishing.

I got some new shoes that are just awesome.  (M thinks they’re ugly as hell.)  Especially time as, my flat foam insole mod notwithstanding, my old day shoes still had enough arch support to be really uncomfortable after too much walking.  My transition away from structured shoes continues.  I’ve got some new trail shoes en route that will continue the trend.  I’m very excited about their arrival, and hope they fit right.

Have a good weekend.