Of Moose And Men
The Best Laid Plans Of Both Often Go Astray

PT again today, am doing much better, foot-wise. One thing I did was ask for new orthoses to better balance my odd little feet. He’d put a couple cushions in strategic places on my current orthoses the last time and those did seem to help (until the tape fell off). Keeping my fingers crossed.

More importantly, it was an hour in which I was able to turn off all my little electric devices and be “off-line” for a while. Felt like heaven.

Tonight I’m headed out, because I need to get the hell out of the apartment and see people other than my co-workers in a social setting. So, off to a haircut and JRs for moi now.

Thank you, DC Ofc. of Tax & Revenue, for timely processing my tax return. Thanks to that, one more student loan bit the dust tonight. Zing. Just two more to go with that company and all the private loans will be history.

Had dinner with a friend this evening whom I hadn’t seen in a while. He got all boyfriended last year, and between that and my own craziness we hadn’t seen each other in ages. It was nice to catch up, and learn some of his new haunts these days.

I think I’ve figured out a pattern for a scarf for myself. Given that I’ve knit maybe one thing for myself (the brown fingerless gloves, which I’ve not used because they need some repair), I think that’s pretty noteworthy. Well, that and the fact that I really dislike wearing scarves. They’re a necessary evil, and they always seem to be too bulky, which is why I’ve been trying to wrap my head around what I want in a scarf (thin, short, non-bulky – a bit of insulation for the neck, but not something that’ll puff out the jacket). Have to do a test swatch soon in the yarn I think I want to use (yay stash!), and then I’ll get to working it up. In the meantime I’ve made a bunch of progress on a traditional sock, and started a new hat for a friend (to match the one I already gave his boyfriend – same pattern & yarn brand, different yarn colors). Yes, I’ve had knitting on the brain.

Been doing my stability exercises as prescribed. I suspect these, like the IT band stretches before them, will become part of the overall maintenance repertoire. Not a bad thing, certainly something I’ve needed to do, so it’s good to get some direction there.

Which brings me to this race season. I’m signed up for two races at the moment, and I might do them, but I’m not going to focus a lot on racing this year. My focus needs to be more on weight loss and overall stability (i.e., injury proofing). I’ll still be training, but those two things need to be priority over actual racing, so that I can come back with a much better 2010 race season (and a healthier body overall).

Now comes the difficult part – trying to get things fixed in the conference on the stimulus bill. Ugh.

Seem to have irritated my foot, not in the plantar fasciitis sense, but a sprain on the top of it. Yay for overdoing it. Guess the swim last night was a tad too much.

Because it was so irritated, tonight was a night off from things, watching a couple of bad movies (“The Seeker,” and “The Apple”), with some more progress made on my co-worker K’s hat:

It’s about halfway done now, with most of the repetitive cabling done – 1.25 repeats left of the main repeat, then I start the decreases to the top. Might get it done this weekend so I can get it off to her.

Because it’s positively gorgeous outside here in DC (officially it’s 67 – my balcony temp gauge says 72), I went for a run. Outside. Figured if I ended up having to walk, at least I wouldn’t freeze out there.

It went okay. Heart rate was okay until about 1/2 way in, then it was up and wanted to stay there. Ran the entire thing, slowly, save for a period right at the end when I had to walk to bring my heart rate down to a reasonable level. I’m sure I’ll be sore tomorrow (yay delayed onset soreness), but at the moment the light muscular soreness feels like heaven. Foot’s doing okay, and I made sure to take the yoga strap and stretch it thoroughly at the end of my stretching routine (which, courtesy the pilates/core class I took last week, now includes a lovely deep stretch for the IT band as well). So far so good. Again, will sleep in the brace as a just in case, but this is definitely heartening.

It was so nice to be able to run outside, too. I really do dislike treadmills. Did do one thing which was not normal for me – I took the new shuffle out for a spin and ran with music on (though turned down fairly low). It wasn’t bad, but I did find that my brain tended to disengage more than I’m used to doing on a run. Running was active meditation time for me, letting my mind wander as it would. Mainly I got the shuffle for use in the gym, and when I have to run on a treadmill, and I think perhaps that’s where it needs to stay. I’ll need to create a more customized playlist, too – while I had it load the thing with 4 & 5 star rated songs, I need to be pickier about putting on more up-tempo stuff if it’s going to be on while exercising.

Still busy with the stimulus bill here. I’m “on call” this weekend, meaning I actually have to carry the work blackberry around if/when I go out. Sort of annoying, but not overly burdensome, as long as I’m carrying other things. And as long as they’re not sending me .pdf attachments and actually expecting me to read them.

I made a PT appointment for my foot for Thursday. It should be an assessment of where it is, what other factors might be contributing, and what else I can be doing to help it. It still twinges on occasion, and I’d really like to be done with that. Hopefully with a PT assessment I’ll get better advice than just my (non-running) podiatrist and his ‘well, you just have to rest it’ attitude. Love the doc to death, but he doesn’t get it sometimes. And I’m tired of not feeling like I’m in control of the foot and its recovery; I want more options for what I can be doing with it.

I can tell I’m fighting off a cold, and not just sniffling from allergies, because I’m in full “OMG, must eat and eat and eat some more” mode. Stoopid body. Probably caught my friend’s cold from Monday night. No good deed going unpunished and all that.

I finally started knitting on the hat I was requested to make by my friend K for her chemo treatments. Of course last night as I got past the initial ribbing and into the cabling I managed to goof two rows, one of which I couldn’t tell was goofed until I got up a few rows. So, I ripped out four rows at the end and called it a night. Redid them this evening, and they’re correctly done now. Have to say, for a non-wool yarn, Calmer is pretty darned nifty to knit with. Definitely a different (and better) experience than with other non-wools I’ve knitted with.

Work continues to be insane this week, and the early morning insanity continues into next week as well – I’m scheduled for 9 am meetings again all next week. I know most folks don’t think anything of that, but I don’t normally report until 9:30, and adjusting my sleep and waking schedule hasn’t been easy.

Almost forgot to mention the foot’s progress. Had a wee bit of soreness this morning when I took the first few steps, but I had slept in the brace, and made sure to stretch it before I got up. By mid-day I remembered to focus in on it and realized that I hadn’t felt any pain since I’d walked in to work. There was a very mild twinge or two if I paid attention to it, but otherwise didn’t notice it at all. Score one for rehab. I’ll likely try another short run on Wednesday, provided I get enough sleep tomorrow to make the attempt in the morning.

This afternoon I ran for the first time since last August 5th. Almost six months.

Headed over to the gym with my running gear, got changed, and headed upstairs to the treadmills. The area was empty, but for two other men, one of whom spent more time talking on his cell phone than actually walking on the treadmill (with a body to match the lack of actual exercise). Warmed up for five minutes, then did three minutes on (running), three off (walking), for half an hour (2.56 miles). During the exercise the foot did fine. My legs protested a bit, which was expected, but the foot itself did fine.

It’s a trifle sore here this evening, but I’ll be sleeping with the brace on, so I’m hopeful that it’ll heal/recover well in the stretched out position. Won’t be rushing back to the treadmill immediately, but will attempt to ease back into it as the foot permits. A good first step, though, and hopefully just the first of many runs this year.

While I am glad we have now inaugurated a new President, the last week at work was somewhat bittersweet. In doing the type of law I do, I come into contact with a lot of the top political office holders at my Big Government Agency, and over the last five years there I’ve worked closely with several of them and gotten to know them well. As with the last change in parties, there were some I was happy to see go, but some whom I will truly miss. I will especially miss the leadership in our General Counsel’s office, they were fantastic to work with and for, and were consummate professionals.

My BGA will have a lot to do, and as will be the case with many other BGAs, there will be changes in direction to absorb and run with, and new faces to have to learn and get used to. I only hope that the political appointees chosen to lead us are personable, fair, and competent, and that they do a good job to support and promote the common welfare of us all.

Despite my best efforts to be a complete and utter slug today, I did actually manage to get something done today, namely laundry. Otherwise I called in to work because I hadn’t really slept, and then crashed until noonish to catch up on sleep. Then there was Dead Space. Lots and lots of Dead Space. I actually beat the game once through just now (started it Saturday; easy mode), and I’m trying to decide how much more I’ll play in the near future to max out achievements. Sounds like a good inauguration day activity (when not watching the events, that is).

Called the SIL this evening, no word back tonight, so I’ll pester again tomorrow. I can tell I’m still on edge because my poor fingers have been gnawed down to nubs (I bite my nails/cuticles when I’m upset). Perhaps throwing myself back into work tomorrow will help assuage some of this, and I’m hoping my SIL will have better news about my brother (and their efforts to clean the apartment). Who knows?

Still need to organize some shelving I picked up on my way home (yay Ikea!) which looks pretty good, but needs to have some sense of what-goes-where on it. It’s given me an idea for the entertainment stuff as well, which might not need to be as large as I’d assumed before. We shall see. But first tomorrow evening is prep work for the new triathlete program for this year. We’re getting off to a slightly later start, and I’m hopeful this will help cut out some of our volunteer burnout from previous years.