No Spring here but a new Jeep is!

Yesterday I got a little too much sun while I was out running and then raking the yard. First world problems.... Today it was cooler and when I walked outside to take Rock for a hike it was snowing. Those on the East coast are probably sick of the snow but we are enjoying our few days of sunshine and then a few days of snow. This coming weekend it's going to snow a lot, so we will head to the cabin and enjoy a little more winter.

We should be enjoying the drive in our new Jeep. We decided to sell our plow Jeep (since we have only used it one time) and our other Jeep (mother in laws). MIL's Jeep is staying in the family, just transferring ownership, so that's comforting to everyone. We doubled our money on the plow Jeep, and with our new purchase we finally have a reliable non company vehicle that we can drive around the country on trips (that's not a large diesel truck).

2015 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited Rubicon, automatic, 4.10 gear ratio, saddle leather, dual tops, upgraded sound/stereo. Ordered a pet barrier net to keep Rock in the back and some door protectors to keep his little claws from digging in.

Our last attempt to purchase something left me so frustrated I wanted to scream. This time I had to go back to the dealership and complain and push in order to actually get the correct help I wanted. We ended up getting one of the lowest prices possible (I had shopped dealerships across the country) and actually enjoyed the experience for the most part. No, we aren't crazy, our last new vehicle purchase was 1995 (well my purchase, it was right before we met).

Rock got new tennis balls!

We did an ammo inventory this morning, part of our weekend in the city house cleaning party. Ammo count is good and I'm glad. Ammogeddon started early yesterday, I don't think it's going to let up for a while. Like other bloggers I saw the available inventory plummet over a short time span. There is ammo out there, but I think it's going to be gone in the next day or less.

We shall keep on prepping, stocking up and working on skills. Still hitting the gym 3-4 days a week, running 1-2 and hiking a few times with Rock. Our hikes have a loaded backpack or even just a pack with 15 loaded p-mags. Every little thing helps. A few less carbs, a little more protein, a few more veggies, a couple more sets/reps, one more 1/4 mile, etc.

Everywhere I look I see people who don't even try. We have a country full of people with bodies that work great and yet they choose to destroy them. Father in-law stumbles around and his body doesn't work so well anymore... I can't imagine what it's going to be like for people my age who don't take care of themselves. A world full of scooters and wheelchairs smashing into each other on sidewalks and in the grocery stores.

Perhaps the future is already here....

Cabin fever?

It's not even dark yet and it feels like it was a week instead of a weekend. Father in law needed to get out of the house, the last 4 months have been rough, and the last 2 weeks hellacious. He hadn't slept alone in a few months shy of 60 years, and he had never been in their current house alone for more than a few hours.

Where does the cabin fever come in? It doesn't, I just heard someone in town talking and they said they had cabin fever.... WHAT?!?!?
We did happen to be at a little eatery full of couples our age, and while the food was good, hearing people say they are tired of being cooped up was annoying.

I know that I'm (and we are) untypical and the grain goes in all directions instead of how everyone thinks it should go. How can anyone have cabin fever around here?

Let's start with the first night and a little walk with Rock....

We broke the retractable leash, now we use a 30' lead.

That's right, can't see this if your head is buried in a TV

Seems like a great vaccination against cabin fever.

I don't understand how people, who are able, don't get out.

Father in law spent his first night out of his house, without his sweetie, and he was able to get some rest. He ventured to the end of the driveway and even made his way to the woodshed with me as I checked to make sure there wasn't any wind damage. It was windy in the tree's but on Saturday it settled down some.
Until I went running that is. 10 mph constant wind in the plains, if not 15-20, and big gusts. I'm obviously stubborn and kept going to the designated extraction point. I was completely drained from the sun and from the energy expelled to stay upright as the wind blew sideways the entire distance.

Doesn't look windy does it? It was my turn to extract someone.

Expelling energy means you have to fuel up!

It wasn't enough but I was full. Needed 10 more.

Mountain eating and a cabin tradition of blueberry pancakes!

Saturday night proved exciting in the skies as well.

That's looking back towards the city home and Pikes Peak.

The woods.

Looking South towards our usual hiking area.

Sunday was a nice sunny day and what better thing to do than punish myself with another run. Rock was already pretty tired, we totaled 8 miles on his paws in a little over 24 hours. This is from our early morning hike:

Pitbull on bull action!

Moon!

More moon.

Mollie, the in laws dog, can walk about 200 feet at a time, she needs to be conditioned. A lot. The dogs spent a lot of time together and get a long great. Rock is under socialized but there are only a few dogs he gets long with Mollie obviously, and Lorie (the Amish neighbors dog).

My Sunday run was pretty horrible. My legs were destroyed from the hiking and running I had already done, but I headed out at a faster pace than before. The wind was just a simple 10 mph headwind but no gusts. I was extracted and returned to a chore list, so we worked hard. Father in law commented that we sure don't let the grass grow under our feet. He also was impressed with our supplies and how we had just about anything he asked for. We need to work on medication for him, he needs a longer supply than 30 days especially if he is going to be down here a lot.

We finally got the outside holiday lights taken down, the comforter beaten and hung outside to air out in the sun (to the joy of the Amish that went by), the firewood rack was refilled on the porch, the fireplace ashes were cleaned up and tossed out, we filled the bird feeder and we checked the chimney for soot. It needs to be cleaned but it's not dire, we will try and get it done this coming weekend. The cabin is cleaned, laundry is done. Dinner consisting of elk meat, potatoes and onions has been eaten and now it's just me. Father in law ended up getting some good walks in, on his own, and felt a lot better than he did when he first showed up. I told him it's the thin air, but he actually has some goals and ideas for the future, so that's great news. It's a slow process but nothing we do is slow so he got swept up in it.

In total I put in over 17 miles of running and hiking since Friday afternoon. The weather here is in the mid 50's for the next week minus one day of possible snow. The water is starting to flow but I'm not fooled, it's only February.

Compared to the other photo's this one is dull.

I need to put some canned goods away and do the dishes before I settle down into a good book. It was a great weekend.

Thinking back.

I'm tired, we are both tired, Rock is tired. We are getting more sleep finally.

Closure. It happened finally and now we are moving forward and moving on. It's been hard on all of us but the friends, family and even the bloggers kind words and well wishes have certainly helped.

Now what...

Having been through this before, I know what comes next, the various stages, etc. We are taking Father in-law to the cabin this weekend for some get out of the house time. It's supposed to be 60 degrees so it's going to be a great weekend for running, sleeping in, eating pancakes and doggy hikes.

We did escape ourselves on Friday night, it was very relaxing and sad and we spent some good time thinking back. We talked about how the memories we make right now, today, are the good old days. If we don't make good memories, why even bother looking back.

I hope to be posting more often and getting back to reading all of my favorite sites.

Here are some photo's from our escape!

Can't get enough of Rock and our hikes together!

I ate the smallest one, Rock ate the next two!

Opposite direction hike... Rock wanted to play!

Sometimes you have to get out of bed early in order to see amazing things.

These, right here and now, ARE the good old days!

On loss

There is much to read, think and say on losing loved ones. Mentally I debate myself about losing someone fast vs. a longer drawn out process. There isn't a prize, people are simply gone. Is there relief if it's a long process, and if so is that suddenly second guessing when you feel relieved.

Are they in a better place? Is that even possible when your family is still alive? Do people decide it's time, are they waiting for something, etc.

When my Father passed away I cried for hours, days. I think I cried enough for a lifetime. The hear breaking agonizing grief, anger and frustration.

Mother in law had a great life, of that there isn't any doubt.  We are working through getting all of the service arraigned and notifications. I keep reminding everyone it's a celebration of her life, nothing else, so keep it that way. 59 years of marriage, 4 children, 3 grand children, world travel, family cruises, mountain getaways.
I even got her to swear once in a while, and that would always get her to say, "shit you did it again!".

For us, life will return to a normal state, with emphasis on involving father in law in activities. I have several business trips coming up that perhaps we can escape on to try and reflect together without others around.


In the meantime life is rolling on as it always does. When I get some time I'll put a post up about my excursion to San Francisco, and my increased loathing for cities. ick.

As the sun slowly fades

Rock and I are staring out of the window, we are exhausted. 7+  miles a day of Rock hikes, a few hundred pushups and a few 3 mile runs. I really want to go out and enjoy the sunset but it's going to be more of a star gazing kind of night, we hope. If you don't find your failure points you won't know what you can really do.

Normally I run uphill for the first half of my runs, sort of a no brainer to me, but I feel it's a little like cheating. I don't usually let up on the pace in either direction, but for a change I ran downhill to start. It was a nice change, but there were some conversations with myself on the long lonely road. When you are exhausted and want to give up, you keep thinking about things that provide motivation (hey, are those zombies horses?).

The Amish thought I was crazy yesterday when I ran by in my little running shorts and tank top. Today ALL the Amish thought I was crazy as I ran by the house they were having Sunday service at (not sure what they call it, but I doubt it's called church for some reason).

We had Sunday brunch with the neighbors... I'm not sure when they are moving, but I'll be out of town for a bit and might not see them again. Rock wasn't impressed but he only howled a little bit. Good neighbors often make good company. Lori the dog, Rabies the cat (we thought the named fit).

Here is a picture that could have been identical over the weekend, on several different occasions.

Rock did enjoy getting on the snow and sniffing out rodents and digging for them. The wind wasn't so bad today, but the last 2 nights it's been howling hard enough to make me concerned about a tree coming down. 45 yesterday, 50 today and of course the fire is just about ready to be lit as the sun has now been swallowed by the mountain demons.

I have so much going through my brain right now that I'm going to curl up in front of the fire with Rock and read another zombie book. It won't provide insight into anything, it won't make me understand stupid people, it wont help me decide if I should buy another AR. It will kill some time before we go check out the stars... if I can manage it, I'm super beat up.

Tomorrow is another day and we will head home in the afternoon. I need to get some clothes packed and some work done.

Shorts, skates and cycles of sun

I won't be the cause of jealousy and envy, so no picture of me in my running shorts.

As with the weather in most places, wait an hour or 12 and it will change. In Colorado the extremes are just.... extreme? Thursday I go for a run in 55 degree weather and sunshine, Friday I'm back in town and there is an inch or more of ice on everything. Saturday I'm at the cabin again and running in the sunshine. On and off sun and ice over a few days.

We've had cold weather and snow the last two days, today it's going to be in the 50's and continue on over the weekend.
I've always said that in Colorado you have all 4 seasons, you might just not enjoy whatever season decided to land on a particular day but overall it's very reasonable.

We were going to be in Cancun but at the last minute the travel agent was able to cancel the trip with a small penalty, to be rescheduled in a couple of months. Mother in Law probably will be departing in the next week, but as with all things, who really knows. I still took my vacation time, I have another 7 days to use in the next few weeks so I'm on  half days at work.

The table and bench we purchased for the cabin finally arrived. The order was placed in the middle of June.

We really like the look and weight, and think t hey fit in just fine. Once we get the front rooms tiled, it will be an even better match. The table itself weighs around 400 pounds if not more.

I managed to be in the gym for 4 days this week and am continuing to make progress on my strength and keeping my mouth closed. Last time I was really active in the gym I wasn't being careful about how much food I was eating and got burnt out on the lack of progress (in physique). Now I'm fairly careful about how much food I'm eating and what type of food it is. I'm still able to run well and lift well as I trim down so I think I've finally nailed it.

On Dec 26th I posted a picture of some 95 pound dumbbells. I prefer the dumbbell presses to the barbell, it keeps my shoulder from snapping angrily at feel better overall. The gym only has one dumbbell at 100 pounds so when the 95's got feeling easy I just stepped right up to the 105's

I think in another week or so I'll be using the 110's. Right now at the 105's I'm lifting over half my body weight in each hand.

Fun times in Colorado.

Every end has a new beginning

The end was cold.
Really cold. We jumped in the Jeep and headed to the cabin on Tuesday night, it was going to be the coldest night of the year and for some reason I was nervous about the heat settings at the cabin. The Jeep has a snow plow and the roads were snow pack and/or icy so it was a long, slow drive.

When it's -15 to -20 outside, and you are doing an average of 40 MPH. that's a negative 50 degrees on the vehicle. It wasn't a very warm drive, no matter the heat setting, but we had plenty of gear on and around to help. The cabin was fine, but I did turn up the heat a little and the driveway got plowed. It was a long cold drive back home.

New Years eve had me heading back to the cabin. I had a grand plan to hike about 15 miles on New Years day, but the 18 inches of fresh snow derailed those plans. I did get out and about several times, and spent some time reading and reflecting on the type of person I am, and where I/we are headed in 2015. New Years isn't about drinking, fireworks, balls dropping or other people. This is the day I lost my Father several years ago, this is a day for me to try and have some sort of epic adventure.

Alone.

Hello 2015! The temperature was -15 but I got out for a few miles of hiking, I'm determined.

The beginning was cold and wet.

The snow started falling early on New Years day and of course in the country the plows don't run on a holiday. This storm and the end of the previous days storm left a bit of snow on the roads and plenty in the hills. It was very tempting to head up into the tree's but I need to get snowshoes.

Fresh snow, it was really coming down so I waited it out inside. A few hours later the sun started to break through and I shoveled. Then it was hiking time! I got hot and regretted wearing thermals, I probably should have worn shorts. I'm always running on the melty side of hot.

Here, I'm smiling... honest. It was about 3 degrees but with the sun I didn't even get chilled.

I read a book, watched a movie, watched Oregon spank Florida, ate a big salad and did 400 pushups. I figured since I couldn't get out for much cardio I would still get some sort of workout in. All the usual chores were done and then I went to bed for a 4AM wakeup drive to work. The joys of commuting on roads that weren't plowed.