HUGE Work Party at the Memorial Park Trails this Weekend

There will be a GHORBA sponsored work party this weekend to keep the Callout Section of the Ho Chi Minh trail from washing into Buffalo Bayou.

Both days the work will be done in shifts from 8-12 and 1-5. Please RSVP to Russell Adams as lunch will be provided. I hear that most of the Saturday shifts are filled.

Where to Meet:

29.764731,-95.441438 (paste into Google maps),

East side of softball fields near dog wash, Memorial Park, Picnic Lane, Houston, TX 77266

Grumpus amongus

Do you ever have days when everyone just seems to be jacking with you?


First, my intent was to join Nboaka and Helen for a run, but I woke up exhausted. Maybe tired from too much hashing, maybe dehydrated, whatever. A small pickup had obviously hit me at some point last night and I did not notice.


I get up, dink around , read a novel, and Jessica calls me to meet she and Dolly for lunch.


At a diner.


I walk in and find them at a corner booth. Watching my expression, they start to giggle as I ask, "Okay, who's hung over?"Dolly insists that she just wanted a sandwich and named a spot close to her. I fired her from being the lunch-spot-picker for the rest of the summer.



I grouse over the bleak menu and settle on the grilled cheese, same as Jessica, who recently decided to become a vegetarian. It was fine; it's hard to screw up grilled cheese on wheat.



We go to pay and I tell the lady what I had. She replies, "With fries?" Well, yeah, but when the waitress says, "Would you like fries or onion rings?" it sounds to me like it's a combo deal. And you know what I should have said? NO THANK YOU. Because they increased the price my $3.55 crappy sandwich (which I could live with) by another $1.50. I am NOT cheap, people. Not when it comes to food. But I could have had real food for 6 bucks, come on!



Next I travel to Lowe's to purchase more stainless steel cabling for the trellis project. It's going to be way cool. No huge issues, but geez, have you ever tried measuring 100 feet of wire coiled on a spool ALONE? It was a freaking bugger, man. Wow! It twists o-so-may-ways!



Next spot: the newly revamped downtown Houston Public Library. So pretty!! Found a couple of DVDs, and a couple of novels to amuse myself in the coming days. Actually one of is a novel- the latest Marian Keyes. Somewhat shallow British single-girl humor- sorta Bridget Jonesish. The other was a collection of Annie Proust short stories. Everything I've read by her is grand-I'll let you know. Anyway, no troubles at HPL, right? Wrong! Nothing earth shattering, but when I tried to use the new fancy-schmancy self checkout, I got an error message of INVALID CARD!

Again, no biggie, just an inconvenience. I probably owed a .20 fine from an overdue book last summer or something, so I go get into a line with a real checker.

Did you know that library cards EXPIRE? There's no date. No warning. Not even a new card is issued- they just mess with you every three years. You fill out a new card- even if ALL your information is the same, and she hits "renew". No ID, no real "proof"- just fill out the damn card.

I tried to get to the bottom of why I needed to fill in my address and all if it was exactly the same as on the screen in front of her (that I could see), but her continual reply was, "That's just what we do it." I had already done it; I just wanted her to agree that it was silly and wasteful. Bless her heart- she just wouldn't do it. Sigh.

Then I went home and read. And it was good.

I did return to the Rice track once again for a fun filled evening of 200s. Highlight of my day, I tell ya.

Hashit, meet the hashit...

Ah, the hash. This Sunday was Beaver in the Burbs III, with the fabulous Menage Myself as the solo-steppin'up to the plate Joint Master Hare that he is. Spring Texas, 98 degrees, hard-core shiggy. The first photo wasn't on trail, but in the circle.

Malibu Strap-on Ken from Guantanamo bay, Cuba - a transfer who we chose to waterboard for his transfer down-down.

What you see above is a smiling Grind, holding the "new and improved" hashit-lovingly redesigned by The Pitts after the plunger was lost by an unnamed Harriette. What a beauty- can you imagine running with that thing? Well Grind did, three weeks ago, after presenting and accidentally destroying the My Hooter award. (below left)



Fast forward 2 weeks. Cummi Bear now has the hashit. Grind managed to pass it off to him for some crime against humanity, so he has to wear it to the next hash, run in it, and perhaps successfully give it away. Here's the part where I come in....






I'm running the Slightly Sticky, Somewhat Slummy hash last Sunday, and "Aha- there's bear near!" Bleeder was standing on the banks of the creek I was wading through and asks, "Is it deep?" I'm standing in the water, right? The Bear near is between Bleeder and me, so I'm wondering why he hasn't crossed the creek and scaled the bank across from us to run on in.
I don't want to wash my shoes, he says.

Cummi Bear approaches me pre-circle and says, "Grind said you have an accusation for Bleeder..."

Um yeah, I say. He continues, asking me what happened, so that HE can use it to give away the hashit.


"Get your own damn accusation~!" I say, knowing that there would likely be severe ramifications.. and so there were. To the left, you see little Gaslight carrying the backpack that she wore on trail yesterday.

Through the shiggy.

That looks like this:

I think that's some toilet paper on the right bank marking trail. Through the nose-high poison ivy. Sheesh.


Obviously, I survived. I even ran my ass off, skirting by other hashers to the tune of clangida-clangida- clang as the hashit bounced everywhere. That said, it was r-e-a-l painful, especially in the deep shiggy. Like a pointy Dowager's hump, the frame of that thing got caught on vines a jillionty times.

For what it's worth, Heartache bitched like a grumpy old woman throughout the entire trail.

Are you ON? (after they called on on) Is that a CHECK? After I called check. Apparently he wanted a chorus.

Yeah, good luck with that. This photo to the right is me grinning sheepishly after using my "teacher voice" in the circle.

It worked, didn't it??

So for better or for worse, Mr. Heartache now has the hashit. Seeing as how he gave me duct tape before the run to help with "adjustments", I felt a teensy bit guilty. But at least he knows how to adjust it, right?

Watch your back!

This is a shot of Lorna Dunes looking crazy. She just did, so I thought I should include her.

Go Lorna!

Yeah, I party hearty

Someone asked me this morning at the loooong run how I celebrated the solstice. Sort of an odd question, and the real answer is certainly not the way I intended to (see last post).

Last weekend my friend and yoga teacher, Rie, invited me out for Saturday night. She teaches at The Houstonian, my dream club, where they were hosting a yoga retreat. The event Saturday evening was an instructors' class taught by Johnny Kest, and they could invite some non-Houstonian guests. 'Cause if they could invite members, it would be a total catfight! Meow!

Afterward, dinner would be served (something quite healthy, I felt sure), and then she and I would go drink some BEERS!

Johnny's photo doesn't do him justice. He's attractive and all, in a yogi-sort-of way, but one look at the guy and he seems, so...nice. Warm eyes, non-judgy (good for a teacher, yes), with a calm yet cheerful, yoga-teacher kind of voice. Very cool.

I was feeling quite remedial in the company of 30 mostly yoga instructors from around town, I must say. We started by pulling the short end of our mats to the wall and backin' it up- supine on the mat with legs in the air, against the wall. Way more relaxing than you might think.

Apparently I was exuding my stress-ball tendencies during this period, and Johnny came over and gave me and adjustment by rubbing my head. I wondered if he was going to do it to everyone, which would have taken f-o-r-e-v-e-r, but he went on. I told Rie at dinner and she was envious. Yay, I got my money's worth!

The vinyasa flow was challenging, but doable. I did laugh out loud once-we were in down-dog and he instructed us to lower onto our forearms. Okay, I can do that. "Now lift your thighs into a forearm balance.." HAH! I just giggled. Sure, I'll lift my legs. No, wait, I'll just crack up and stay in bent-arm down dog, thank you.

My balance and hand strength seemed to improve during the class, which pleased me to no end, because the alternative was very painful.

The last segment was a prolonged prone frog pose, which totally sucked. Maybe it doesn't look like much, but I nearly cried. So I adjusted, several times. The main idea is a groin stretch, but the pressure on your knees and hip tissues is seriously insane. I was really ready to drink after this.

The class ended a very touchy-feely yoga-teacher type dialogue, which I could have done without, but eh, he's it's his gig, right? When people pay $80 apiece for my classes, I can compare philosophies and teaching styles.

Dinner was, very, very, healthy. Veggie sticks, veggie wraps, fresh fruit, and FINALLY some sushi. They did serve wine and desserts. Interesting crowd.

Couldn't get to Onion Creek fast enough.

Summertime Blues

During my first 10 days of summer break, I chose to spend about 5 days in continuing education. Taking some classes every year is required in the land of teaching, and others I just wanted to attend.

I told the instructors that it keeps me out of the bars. They were impressed that I knew of any open at 8 am on a Tuesday, but I assured them I did.

In reality, spending my days in a school room does keep me away from my worst vice:

EBAY

I have real issues with internet shopping. I am, however, quite good at it.

Thus:

My New Boots! Coming soon to a honky-tonk near you.

This Day seems so long...

...okay. I will cease the bad jokes for now. Maybe.

Our original solstice plans were to gp to Norway and run the Tromso Midnight Sun Half Marathon in the Arctic Circle. Brrrggh!

Unfortunately, Tromso is nearly impossble to reach, even coming from freakin' Oslo. Oh well.

World's Greatest Athletes

Know anyone that you think can compete? This WSJ article tells of their ranking system.
Don't get too excited - they was they have it set up, a pro baseball player ranks above a winner of the Tour or a marathon! Too one-dimensional, they say. Hmph!



I can live with all of them except number 10. I think they felt pressured to include a baseball player.

So here's the the criteria:
Vision and reflex
Stamina and recovery
Power, strength and size
Speed
Coordination and flexibility
Success and competitiveness of sport (a pretty lame category if you ask me-plenty of sub-3 hr marathoners don't win a thing).

Hashers that could probably compete:
PP
Johnboy
Rollerballs (he's got that Akido thing going for him)
Grind ('cause I think they left out bullheadedness as a category)
Brrrgh

I don't know- are any of the rest of us coordinated? Before I even lift my right foot for a long run, that completely knocks me out of the running!