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Entry the Six Hundred and Thirtieth05 June 2004 All Quiet Busy time of late. I'm on another grand jury, local court this time. Three days a week for the next two months. Whee. Work has been very accommodating about it all. Managed to knock out a pretty big project on Friday, now just one more big ugly sitting on my desk at the moment. Fun stuff. Head cold this past week. Not too bad of one, and better since I got the clarinex. Strangely, clarinex seems to do better for my nasal symptoms than did claritin. I guess that little molecular flip helped my system. *shrug* In any case, the stuff works for me, and that's all I'm counting at the moment. Exercise has continued apace, with the exception of swimming this week (stuffy nose + pool = bad idea). I'm happy with my progress on getting back up into decent cardio shape. I need to do more drills in the pool - that's my one really weak area in the triumvirate at the moment, but it's getting there, slowly. Got highlights again. Bought more rings (five silver ones for the left hand now; one for each finger). Went dancing last weekend at Cobalt and enjoyed it. Took some new pics this morning for the LiveJournal account's user icons. Lighting wasn't the best, but it works. Posted the larger versions here for posterity. It's not been terribly anything of late, though; no extremes to any side, bad or good. Which is why I've been unmotivated to write. I've posted in LJ, but just not taken the time to sit down and write here. Started some things on the Palm occasionally, but nothing serious, and no long times sitting alone on the bus to help with that in the mornings. Oh, one change of note. Ever since I went on the retreat, I haven't had NPR's Morning Edition help wake me up in the morning. And you know, I've enjoyed the silence when I'm getting up and getting going. Mornings seem more... peaceful that way. I've used the excuse of them dumping Bob Edwards, but it's really that I got tired of the information overload every morning. I already read the paper before work, and check the web periodically during the day. I don't need the noise going all the time, too. Archives |
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Entry the Six Hundred and Thirty First13 June 2004 Pride Today was the Pride festival for DC, and I wandered the length and breadth of booths twice, once on my own and once with Richard. Was fun, I saw many people I knew and got oodles of hugs - always a plus in my book, attention whore that I am. Signed up with email with several of the athletic groups in town (swimming, running, adventure, etc.). Am hoping I can do at least some activities with others - I need to get out more and get more practice with other people. We'll see how this pans out. It's summer so I happen to have a tad more time available, especially with Richard out of town for the next week or so and I'll likely temper my membership and activities, but even a few more runs and swims with others would be a good thing. I need the help! Can't do this triathlon stuff totally on my own, and frankly I don't want to. It's too bad there's not a gay triathlon group in town. Grand jury goes well. Five more weeks! As nice as it's been, I want it over now. Work needs me, and keeps reminding me of this. With Reagan's funeral this week I was only in for one day last week, so got next to nothing done. Ugh. It'll end, soon enough. I've pretty much decided I'm going to run again for my commission seat, and again for the chairmanship of the commission. If I do so, though, I'm not going to take on a committee chairmanship. I want the freedom to dump committee work in favor of running the commission when the need arises. So, signature and money gathering beginning on August. Fun. I've not seen a lot of Christopher of late. He's been busy with his job stuff, and we've just not connected well. That needs to be remedied if anything's to continue there. Hopefully as his job stuff evens out to a normal schedule we'll both be able to work something out. The swim this morning, pre-festival, went really well. I'm pleased with the progress, slow as it is, and I know I'll get there. Archives |
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Entry the Six Hundred and Thirty Second14 June 2004 Desires 04/6/14 6:32 p.m. Got some bus time while heading out to dinner in the 'burbs with RNJTM, his man and Richard, so taking it to write. Been a while since I've been able to take advantage of a nice, long bus ride to write. It seems these days that it's directly to Metrorail to gym to work or the courthouse. Busy, busy, busy, at least until early evening, then I seem to falter, not really focusing on anything of use past vegging out at the computer or chatting with folks online. I rearranged my room on Saturday to make room for an eventual reading nook, a place where I can sit alone, away from noise, and read or relax without having to be on the bed or at my desk. Found the perfect chair to fit the design aesthetic I want, too - only three thousand dollars, give or take a few. Eeck! There are others that'll work for less, but the chair is really pretty. ;-) Ah well, I'll keep hunting. At least now I have a space in which to put the chair I get. The grand jury is almost at the half-way mark, only a month to go now. It's been fascinating, but I'm ready for it to end already. I want and need the time at work to do what they're paying me to do. Plus I feel like I'm missing too many discussions about the various goings on, with the result that I'm brought in with incomplete or dated information that's not useful to the ongoing discussion. It's very frustrating, moreso because I happen to like me office and co-workers. I didn't think I'd say this, but I want to do my job! Exercise is going well, onward and upward. It's too early to have hit any plateaus yet, so I get the psychological bonus of the early exercise gains without the smackdown that is the first plateau. Am happy to accept the bonus with open arms, trust me. ... Dinner with RNJTM was lovely. Thai food (which I asked to be made extra spicy - was passable, but not truly, truly spicy), and two rusty nails (Yay for 2 for 1 cocktails!). Plus lots and lots of water (behaving, and dealing with the spice, donchaknow?). Was fun, then rode the Metrorail and Metrobuses home. Am going to go pack the gym bag, then hit the sack. Hopefully I'll sleep a bit better tonight than I did yesterday. Archives |
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Entry the Six Hundred and Thirty Third16 June 2004 Tired The spicy food ended up not agreeing with my system the next morning. I've actually neglected exercise all week because it's been hot, humid and nasty here in the apartment and not exactly conducive to good, deep sleep. Will get the to gym Friday morning, the work gym, for an orientation, so I might run then. We'll see how that goes. I'm at the point where the grand jury has lost its sense of newness and interest. I am so ready for it to be over so I can get back to work. Richard leaves in two days, to be gone for almost two weeks. Eeck! I'm sure I'll get myself in trouble during this time, but hopefully not too much. The big news of the day, though, was that I had to shave my chin. I have a spot where I got an ingrown hair and it was being all icky and not wanting to heal up under the other fuzz, so I took it all off so I can take care of it. And I have to say, I hate how I look. My face is showing a lot of fat. The weight I gained with the ankle woes has not gone down, I've not been paying enough attention to my diet, and I've gotten way too big in the face. Without the chin fuzz the double chin is so much more obvious. It's very disheartening. I'm torn between growing the chin back ASAP and leaving it bare for a bit to remind myself to be more moderate in my eating. I just can't stand how it looks, though. I want my body back, damn it. Am working on it, but it's so much easier to gain than to lose for me, it seems. Ugh. Archives |
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Entry the Six Hundred and Thirty Fourth17 June 2004 Heat Spoke with one of my constituents this evening and she confirmed that there is indeed something wrong with the AC system in the building. Apparently something's wrong down in the boiler room. So it's not just my imagination that it's miserably warm in here. Joy. Yeah, it's the end of spring here in DC, which means we have 90+ degree temps and 90+ percent humidity to match. Whee! Most days I'm okay with it, it just means it's a little sticky between buildings, but when your own abode is miserably humid and warm, it's just not fun. And to think I lived through this without AC in Taiwan. One adapts, but not if AC is readily available. ... Oops, ran into the manager of the restaurant here in the building and he said they're trying to arrange for a helicopter (!) to get a new compressor up on the roof, or maybe to repair the one that's up there. Regardless, there's some delay involving the lack of a helicopter and a compressor on the roof that needs fixin' or replacin'. So, it might be a bit. I'm going to call the building manager and check up on it so I can answer questions about it later. So responsible. :-p Anyway, it's late, laundry's done, and I'm going to go hit the sack with Richard for the last time before he takes off for his two weeks in Turkey. Archives |
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Entry the Six Hundred and Thirty Fifth21 June 2004 AC/Fantasies No, not fantasies about the AC, though that'd be understandable! Got out of the grand jury an hour or so early because 3/4 of my jurors are hacking up their lungs. The air circulation in that room is terrible, and one person came in sick, who then spread it to others... As it was we barely made quorum this morning, so was a relief when they let us out. It was also fortuitous because I ran into the building manager when I got home; he was out on a smoke break. Chatted him up on the AC situation (the radiator/cooler for one of the big AC units on the roof was out, was set to arrive and be fixed a month ago, but didn't get here until this week - should be fully operational by next Thursday, the 1st; in the meantime the other unit is going full-blast), the window replacement (will start in October), and the HVAC unit replacement in the apartments (to start next year). This is not, unfortunately, part of a sale, or so he claimed, but part of a planned refinancing of the building. The windows and AC units are original to when the building was built about 50 years ago, so this will be a much needed change. After that I napped for a bit, had a light dinner, then hopped online after resetting the cable box and TiVo (I swear, those things hate me and only goes on the fritz when Richard's out of town!). Was chatting with a couple guys (since I have a few nights free, and Christopher and I keep missing each other's communications *frown*). One of them wants to be humiliated, have a whole dominance scene going on. Never really done one, but I have to admit the idea did turn me on. I've been slow to explore the whole BDSM scene, only doing a few small forays into bondage, but not really any of the "D" part, past simply having the guy tied up. So having a whole scene going (he even asked about what kind of boots I have... I knew I bought those for a reason... *grin*) would be a new thing, and one that seems pretty interesting. Hopefully it'll happen - scheduling is ever a difficult thing with some folks, especially ones who live further out in the 'burbs. Until then, it's time for more sleep and most likely the gym in the morning. Archives |
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Entry the Six Hundred and Thirty Sixth22 June 2004 Education I suppose the bar is onto something by requiring continuing education classes for all lawyers. Those should be required for gay men in regards to sex. Tonight I earned several credits myself. Not to go into great detail, but the quote of the evening was, "your left hand is bigger than your right hand." 'Nuff said. The grand jury was easier today - the hacking and coughing had died down somewhat. They're supposed to come in and clean out the vents tomorrow morning, hopefully clearing out whatever it is that's making us all sick. Let's hope it works. Speaking of education, I need to go in and set up another workout schedule. Ran this morning, will bike tomorrow, swim the next day. But knowing my externally focused nature, I need more structure than the day-to-day "what do I want to do now" thing I'm on now that the 2 month schedule I'd put in is done. A bit more reading, a bit more planning, and I'll go from there. Archives |
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Entry the Six Hundred and Thirty Seventh26 June 2004 Swim/Alone Went to bed early last night, got up at the usual time this morning and biked down to go swimming with the DC Aquatics Club at Hains Point, one of their open houses for new members. Enjoyed the workout with them; the pool is longer than I'm used to (50 meters versus 25 meters at the YWCA), so that was challenging ("where's the end?!?!"). Pushed a bit, though not too much more - was more there to see how the workouts were, not to kill myself. I think I'll join, which will be a good thing. I could use a regularly scheduled, outside enforced, swim workout. The bike did okay getting down, though I lost all air in the back tire. Didn't discover this until late, so had to walk/Metro to City Bikes and get it fixed (forgot the kit with the tubes this morning). Lunched with Claddah76 at Meskerem, after getting the bike fixed and getting some coffee at Tryst (and enjoying their wireless networking. Finally headed home mid-afternoon. ... Thought about going out, decided against it. Napped for a couple of hours this afternoon, post shower (the third of the day - one getting up, one after swimming, and one after biking around). Made a simple pasta dinner, watched the rest of the 2nd Matrix movie from the other night, putzed. Read some earlier (pre-nap), chatted online some (post-nap), generally just not motivated to do much of anything. Going out would be a waste of time at this point; my heart just isn't in it. I reiterate once again: I. Should. Not. Be. Left. Alone. It's a dangerous thing. Thankfully, tonight, I'm not acting on it (i.e., not hooking up online or heading out to look off-line), and will get some sleep and go running in the morning instead with the DC Front Runners, but the impulse was there earlier. Boredom (mixed with a bit of depression?) is a bad, bad thing for me. But tonight, I'm headed to sleep; I'd rather run in the morning, anyway. Your entire lifestyle is relevant to your progress as a triathlete. Archives |
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Entry the Six Hundred and Thirty Eighth27 June 2004 Lazy Sunday 04/6/27 9:35 p.m. Missing a train when you're at the end of the line stinks; the wait for the next train is anther 15 minutes yet, but at least she's letting us sit onboard in the AC. Lovely day today. I got up to run this morning, and did go running down in the park for the first time since October and the broken ankle. Took it slow, as I knew I'd have to (and as the heart rate monitor admonished me to do), and watched where I was running pretty carefully. I even tossed a few small pieces of wood off the trail on the way out, just in case. The run went okay, though was not one of my stellar runs. The important part was that I ran outside, in the park, at all. I also paid attention to my heart rate monitor, using it to do what it's designed to do: keep me in the right "zone" for the workout planned. I went out too quickly, which was expected, and finally got a good pace toward the end of the first half of the run. The average rate and max rate were higher than I'd have liked to have, but I did okay, and I didn't overdo it. I've been wearing the monitor for a week or two since I got it back, mainly to get used to wearing it again, and have only in the past few days started using it to stay down where I should be training. The tool doesn't do much good when you don't pay attention to it, but once you do it'll definitely help. After that I washed up, chilled out some, and made lunch plans with a friend. We went down to Raku for lunch, which was good, then off to Target and Best Buy for some shopping. Finally got a much-needed power strip for my bedroom so I can plug my alarm clock back in next to the bed (getting up and walking to hit the snooze is sooooo annoying). Back to his place to watch a few movies, and now am headed home. A nice, relaxing, productive day, and a lovely way to spend a Sunday. Archives |
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Entry the Six Hundred and Thirty Ninth28 June 2004 Not Exactly Exciting Tired, tired, tired this evening. As usual, I slept not enough on Sunday night (don't quite understand that pattern, but it happens). I've packed my stuff for tomorrow morning's planned swim at the YWCA. Looking forward to the 25 meter distance instead of the 50, though I'll practice swimming 2 lengths to push myself in prep for the next Saturday workout with DCAC. Not much to my day today. Got up on time, did the grand jury, came home, dinner, watched a movie I'd rented over the weekend, some reading, shaved my legs, and now packing for the gym. Not exactly exciting, but this is where I am now. And it's where I want to be (well, save the "tired from no sleep yesterday" part). Contentment comes in odd packages. Archives |
