Warehouse Beach - Taking a break on the drive to Portland

Once I got older, which corresponded nicely with the kids growing up and moving out, road trips became much more relaxed. Without the need to get from Point A to Point B at warp speed before one of the kids - or all three, in series or parallel - had a meltdown, I schedule with a little more driving time. I also schedule a run.

On the way to Portland, I diverted through Walla Walla and dropped down into the Columbia River Valley. Sadly, the temps dipped down with me. It was partly sunny with the mercury sitting in the 60's. Short sleeve weather in late November. Yay!

Instead, a cloying fog attached itself to the river and the thermometer showed about 42 degrees. Fortunately, by the time I got to Warehouse Beach, the sun had melted some of the fog and got it back to short-sleeve weather, in just barely.

I did end up with an audience watching as a ran up one of the sharp short bluffs. The deer posed for a picture, then dropped over the edge far more gracefully than I will ever manage.

Once you leave the old rail bed, single track extends in a dozen different directions. Some are well developed, some are not much more than deer trails, and all of them are sandy. If you're thinking of turning a fast five miles out here, forget it. Plan on a slow but pleasant five. 

Ducking down towards the river puts you on a narrow trail surrounded by scrub. 

If you head to the river, vistas up- and down-stream greet you. I ran out here the last time under brilliant blue skies. The view, sharp-edged with the basalt cliffs across the Columbia, combined with the sky and clouds, is worth the price of admission. Which, by the way, is free to the park. 

Warehouse Beach is about 12-15 miles east of Umatilla along Highway 730 at Landing Road. Next door is Hat Rock State Park. That's my stop on the return trip.

Running vs. the Holidays

I don’t know about the rest of you, but the month coming up – from Thanksgiving through Christmas – traditionally stresses me out, especially with my running.

For most people, the holiday season is one long party, starting with the traditional stuffing of turkeys on Thanksgiving to the final gluttony of New Year’s Eve. In between, parties at work, or at church, family get-togethers before everyone scatters for the actual holiday, the needs to go shopping . . .

For runners, every bit of that cuts into time for running. If you are anything like me, your inner Grinch stomps out if you don’t get your run in (for me, a double-whammy if I don’t also write.) On top of the “did-I-get-the-right-sweater?” stress, you have the internal stress.

The body only does so much with stress before starting to go into failure mode. Let's avoid that, shall we?

I have two pieces of complementary advice:

First, de-prioritize your running. Unless you have a major race very early in the year, going into maintenance running for a month isn’t going to wipe you out and, if you’ve been training at a very high level for a while, might even help. If you do have a major race, you’ll have to hit your key workouts, but some of the easy runs can be truncated or even eliminated without too much damage to your race performance.

The latter approach worked well for me when I ran a January marathon in San Diego. Probably my best effort at the distance, though not my fastest, I came through the holidays without the five pound penalty, put in another pair of high quality weeks after Christmas and hit the taper. The result was a PR with a one minute negative split and a totally fried pair of legs at the end. Success, in other words.

The second piece of advice? De-prioritize the holidays. I know, it sounds like sacrilege. The fundamentals of the holidays do not require us to race from mall to specialty shop in search of the next big thing in gifts. Nothing says that you have to attend every single party. As a matter of fact, you don’t have to go to more than a couple – one for work if they have one, one for your kids if you have any.

I am not saying you can’t go to more, just be consciously selective of the activities that you choose. You’ll lose runs to the holiday activities, but the reverse is acceptable. It’s okay to say no to an activity with the reason of, “I’d rather go for a run.”

If they accuse you of not being in the Christmas mode, you have my permission to offer this additional explanation:

“I’m going to run this evening in a neighborhood with terrific Christmas displays. I would rather celebrate the season that way than in a stuffy room where I will over-indulge in food and drink. I will be happier, healthier, and more appreciative at the end of that run.”

Or you could tell them to go pound sand. I prefer the tactful approach, at least at first.

People that know and like you will accept the first answer. The trick is finding the balance that works for you. Running vs. holidays? How about both, in moderation?

How far are you really racing?

Treadmill running? Thank goodness for basketball!

Some people can hop on a treadmill and, an hour later, feel that warm glow of a great workout.

I hop on a treadmill and whine, which is why I do it as little as possible. It can be twelve degrees from zero (on the positive side, mind you) and, if the sun is shining, I'll opt to go out the door rather than mount the treadmill in my office.

Still, there are occasions when I'll put the belt in motion and try to get some running in. Tonight will be one of them. I'm babysitting a dog and the weather outside damp, so I'm going to run indoors. For a little bit.

I seem to have a built-on regulator that recognizes the fact that I haven't gone anywhere in fifteen minutes and hits the boredom switch in my brain. I'll spend two happy hours on trails, constantly moving but blow up in minutes indoors.

So, I've learned to trick my brain. Unlike a friend who re-watches the original Star Wars trilogy to death on the treadmill, I use college basketball. I put a monitor on the wall and have it set to stream games from the computer. (Yes, cable might be less complicated - I don't have cable or satellite.)

I've tried movies. Nope, doesn't work. Neither does standard TV fare.

But basketball games do. The action flows continuously except for commercial breaks, so I use the breaks to do fartleks, the game time as recovery. Doing it this way, I get some running in, even a bit of intensity if I want it. I still wouldn't call it pleasurable, but it can be survivable,  except in loose ball situations. I have been known to get so involved in the game that I try to go after loose balls. The family knows the sound, me crashing into the side rails, then muttering about my own foolishness.

They think it's funny. Mostly so do I.

Because I get involved in the game, time passes much more quickly and I get a much better run than if I tried to grunt it out on the treadmill.

 Still doesn't beat outside but it's much better than nothing.  Sometimes running, like politics, is the art of the possible, not the ideal.

It's a good day for the dog

Our old guy of a dog looks his age. He's a Chesapeake Bay Retriever who the vets predicted would be dead by age eight. As a pup, he got badly mauled by a neighbor dog/wolf cross. Thousands of dollars later, Stitch looked like Frankendog and developed a severe paranoia of both vets and the car that took him to the vet.

Then he went in for x-rays and exited with more sutures, this time to remove tubes that got missed on the first round of surgeries. That's when the vets told us that he had bad elbows, messed up hips, and a life expectancy of seven, maybe eight years.

Stitch was still in puppy phase and didn't care. He was my middle daughter's dog, though he adopted me as well. He retrieved tennis balls since he couldn't go into the field, and smiled, happy to be 'productive'.

He still retrieves the same paper every day. We don't have it delivered, so my wife tosses it out when she gets up. Stitch waits until I get up to get the paper so he can bring it back to me. For a fee, of course. A cookie for good work, a smile from the dog. Happy to please, he is.

Same with retrieving tennis balls. He wants to, but yesterday, after fetching a couple, did the doggy version of "Hey, boss? I'ma hurtin' and could use a break." Inside we went and he got his treats.

The treats are important - he's hungry all the time. At seven, he developed Cushing's disease and the options are to poison him until he's cured or has Addison's, or to let the Cushing's follow the normal course.

Cushing's makes him hungry all the time, and thirsty. His weight ballooned so we put him on a diet. Clearly a first-world type of problem, but we cook his meals now. It's nearly as cheap as the dog food was and he lost most of the excess weight. Ten minutes of prep twice a week to make the food and Stitch supervises, hoping for something to fall from the cutting board.

Someday the Cushing's will kill him, or a heart attack, but today he fetched the paper. He moved with a gimp but it was better than yesterday. Yesterday we gave him an extra pill, an aspirin, which seems to help sometimes more than the more powerful medications he gets daily. For the first half of the day after trying to retrieve and asking to be relieved, he laid on his bed and watched us instead of following us around.

The aspirin helped.

Today was a good day for the dog. He didn't seem to hurt as much, and ran for the paper instead of walking. At one point or another, he brought all his toys for approval - and a treat, always a treat. He's a working dog, and expects his pay.

Stitch is closing in on twelve years old now. Some days are hard on him, but he's proved the vets wrong and keeps proving it every day, not that he cares. He's simply living, completely in this moment and appreciating it.

But we know it won't be too much longer. The signs are there, and the balance of good days and hard days is beginning to tip away. Still, he meets the day with a smile, and an eagerness to try to please. So until the inevitable, he gets an extra treat, a few more minutes of belly rubs, and slow walks that don't tax him too much.

As long as it's a good day for the dog, it awfully hard for us to have too bad a day.

Hells Gate State Park

I keep intending to get pictures of Hells Gate State Park since I run there at least once a week. Finally, some follow-through. For those visiting the Lewis-Clark Valley, Hell's Gate State Park is up the Snake River about two miles from town.

Depending on your mood, you choices include single track trail, jeep trails, and even a bit of pavement.

You also get a variety of routes. I typically start at the trailhead by the archery range where the horse trailers normally park in the busy seasons. In the picture, that would be off to the right side.  If you blow up the picture, you can see my blue FJ down in the parking area. From there, I follow the single track up to the jeep trail you see.

Once you reach this little plateau, you can head up towards the power lines  or running more of a rolling hills route to the back edge of the park. For those that want all flat, all the time, stay down by the river.

The single track to the left runs at about a 30 degree slope.

I used to go up a bomber climb on the face of the hill but the Park Service decided to close the trail for restoration. Instead, you switchback up. Not nearly as challenging.  

There is also a trail that branches off the edge of the switchback to the right. Definitely a treat to run as it bops up and down on short rollers. None of the ups on that side-trail will leave you winded while the downhills encourage some fast playful footwork.

Today, I looped out to the back on the jeep trail, switching out to single track to head deeper into the park. The total distance on this run is about 4.4 miles and none of it qualifies as challenging, though a few stretches have a little bit of technical running involved. Most of the time, a second fork gets created by the horseback riders who don't want to risk their steeds. When I night run out here, I usually slide down to the easier path.

If you follow the switchback up to the top and head out on the ridge, you have a couple of choices coming back down. One is Devil's Slide which is pretty runnable if you are careful and the footing isn't wet. When the dirt turns to mud, traction drops to zero. You may find your velocity increasing rapidly though. Running up it is an adventure in a "three-steps-forward, two-steps-(sliding)-back kind of way. Fun.

Devils Slide to the middle, the technical trail tracing through the ravine just to the left, and another side trail that loops back to the jeep trail.

The second choice is a technical trails that winds down through the ravine. In the winter, it gets icy. In the summer, it gets overgrown and rattlesnakes like to hide and shock the unwary.

All these trail come together at the bottom, so if you're in the midst of a group run, you can set out in different directions depending on how sprightly everyone is feeling and still meet up later for some of the other stretches.

Some day, in the not too-distant future, I want to GPS the hill version of the run and get a semi-accurate distance on it.

The views from the top of the ridge extend to Oregon. When thunderstorms roll in, you can watch the sky light up with the flashes as you trace the progress of the storm on the horizon. Of course, sitting totally exposed to weather on a regional high point is going to earn you questionable looks from loved ones.

The footing is pretty good except when it's wet. Most of the trails have a sandy feel to them though you need to keep your eyes on the lookout for the stray toe-catching rock. Some of the trails have deep sand. Not my favorite running surface but easy on impact force. The main trails stay pretty clear of vegetation, so you can see your footing. After a major windstorm, the trails tend to collect tumbleweeds, and the ravines capture a lot of them, too.

If you really need to have pavement, there's a paved trail in the camping area of the park that will lead you to the greenbelt levee trails of Lewiston and Clarkston. You can, if you want, get in a marathon length long run without ever having to go up a hill steeper that a bridge over the river. All sorts of variations exist.

For those interested in visiting, cabins and camp spaces are available year round. The cabins line the river. The camping spaces (shown in the picture) include wonderful open spaces. The park does allow dogs but would not qualify, in my opinion, as being very dog friendly.

First they came for basketball . . . Mizuno and Atlanta Track Club Combine Forces

Years ago, Nike made a value decision that sponsoring youth teams would pay off big when the kids got bigger and bought their own shoes. That decision included a second component - when a LeBron James turned pro, they'd already be in the Nike stable. 

It's Nike versus adidas versus Under Armour, not to mention the legions of others that want a fat slice of the lucrative basketball pie. The youth teams at all levels get sponsored by somebody, and the teams at the elite level get enormous benefits in travel expenses and entry fees. The coaches often earn very good livings shepherding their charges through the tangled system. Some reportedly double their money, acting as runners for agents for the most heavily recruited ballers.  

The money comes with strings, though. Ask Mike Flynn, who tried to set up a team for women, the Blue Star Select National Team in 2009. Two of the players that he invited to the squad were Nike athletes. The heirs of Bowerman were not amused. 

"I am going to suggest to the other Nike teams not to play in any events that this team plays in," said Roland McAbee, coach for the Nike-sponsored Georgia Elite . . .If we stick together on this, Mike [Flynn] will have to play under-talented teams and it will be very hard for him to find competition. Also, if teams do not attend the Blue Star events, it will have the same effect along with not providing him the income to support this team. Nike should drop all of its sponsorship and support for anything Mike has."

The official Nike response was more restrained.

Nike spokesman Knox said "In regard to the opportunity for players being involved in representing a national team, those players are expected to return to their original Nike team for all July competitions."

Feel free to color me as a nut job, but in neither of those statements do I see a concern with what is best for the athlete or the sport. Indeed, the Nike statement makes it clear that the athletes act as a property of the sponsored teams. The players lack the control to decide where they will play - and as made clear in McAbee's statement, any individuals that try to leave the existing system must be punished. 

The influence of the shoe companies actually dictates in many people's minds where a high school athlete attends college. If you follow the recruiting wars, which I don't in an intensive way, you hear rumblings that so-and-so won't be going to Illinois because it kid is an adidas product and the Illini play in Nikes. (Folks, I don't know the affiliations, I don't care about them, and I'm making it up on what they wear in Champaign.)

The Atlanta Track Club signed with Mizuno yesterday, a deal that moves us closer to the basketball model. At the plodder level where I run, it makes next to no difference at all. The races have had sponsors for years, from shoe companies to the local physical therapist. 

The space I expect to see the most change occurs at the elite level. We've already seen a bit of that competition building as first Mary Cain, then Alexa Ephrainson, joined the Nike stable of athletes, both before they left high school. The Atlanta deal proposes to develop two Olympic athletes in time for the Tokyo Olympics. I understand the intent, but the means escape me. To become an Olympian requires almost one of a kind genetics, a willingness to work at a brutal level for years, and a good measure of luck to avoid injuries.

The number of people that meet those qualifications consists of a handful of runners - perhaps 500 in the entire country that have a realistic shot in the running events, fewer if we count only distance events like the 5K and marathon - the ones most likely to draw attention. The pressure to identify these athletes early in their careers will be paramount - five years to get athletes ready is not long unless they're already in the pipeline. 

I expect that we'll see some of the strong high school runners get pulled into world of professionalism before they've had a chance to grow into fully formed people. Basketball went through a similar process when the first high school players started jumping right to the NBA. The league, after multiple expensive mishaps, instituted a program to assist the youngsters with the adjustment. 

I hope that the Nike Project and the new Atlanta consortium does the same but I don't expect it. We're in the early phases of the monetization of running athletes by the companies eager to sow their brand in the field of 40 million runners. The sponsorships will drift down the line. Universities already have shoe contracts. Soon (if it hasn't happened), the best high school teams will have them. A system of haves and have-nots.

I welcome the support of the athletes. The strings that come with that support worries me, though. I want to know that the best interests of the athlete get served, first and foremost, and that the sport is honored.  

I have my doubts, cynical old man that I'm turning into.

Run gently, friends - the payday is the run itself, at least for us. 

Highlights from a WIAA Cross Country Weekend

Started with a high five from Rick Riley as he ran by with his St. George women's team on warm-ups. Watched as they threw a major scare into NW Christian Lacey, coming with in a few points of taking down the eight time champs.

A pleasant chat with Craig Herlihy of Liberty Bell. His men's team qualified for the meet and took fourth, a couple of points behind Asotin. I like the kids on that Liberty Bell team. Next year, hopefully, they'll have some ladies running, too.

They do have an 8th-grader who's a heck of a runner. Unfortunately for Coach Herlihy, she's also a great Nordic skier. Hint: running is good cross-training for Nordic skiing.

Had an assistant who used to be an Asotin runner, and now, the first year away from the team, looked out of sorts. So she took most of the great pictures that I posted from the women's race, then went and joined her sisters and sister-in-racing. My thanks to Madeline for the help and the wonderful eye.

Seeing all the extended family and former runners swinging by the Asotin camp. It really is a community-supported program.

Finding out that little Lucy Eggleston refused to take the podium without her coach. In addition to goofing the published race times, the WIAA didn't stick to the schedule for awards and tried to do 2A/2B while the men's race was on-going. Lucy balked; Gundy has been her coach and mentor since she was a wee tiny thing. She didn't want him to miss it and didn't want to her final accolades without him present. Kudos for sticking to her guns.

Watching Chandler break the course record - and getting a picture of it, complete with clock. Right place, right time, fair degree of luck. The course record couldn't go to a nicer young man. A couple of coaches have asked me where he's headed after he graduates. I'm not sure he knows yet. He has the ability if he chooses to run at the next level.

Now, for a little down-time before I get back after it. First, before the weather gets to crappy, some runs. Then, according to Gerry Lindgren, get in more runs while everyone else parks on the couch. We'll see.

Here's how to get more media coverage for running - if you dare.

Something Larry Eder wrote over at RunBlogRun struck a nerve yesterday, the same one that Heather Romano struck that got me to write why Runners Will Never Have Parades a couple of weeks ago.

The piece that Larry wrote started with a discussion of Rita Jeptoo’s positive 'A' sample test when he was asked what his agenda was. He started by saying, quite appropriately, “In my mind, the agenda of the people who confirmed my story on Rita Jeptoo was a shared, sincere interest in cleaning up the sport. “

The article went on to discuss how to improve the sport by aggressively pursuing dopers and cleaning up suspicion that every major successful runner must be like Lance Armstrong, doping. It is grossly unfair to the majority of athletes out there who run clean and step with integrity to the line with to race.

It’s a very real problem, and Larry Eder is spot on that this is the top priority of the sport. He interjects a second agenda item that he ties back to the need to eliminate doping, that of the need to improve media coverage of the sport. His reason is that spectators need to  cheer for athletes they know are clean.

This segue to television made me wince.  Not because I disagree with him, not completely, but because there is a way to get what he wants – and none of us will like the answer.

Quoting Larry:

A reappraisal of the mediocre way in which many of our events are presented in the media is probably next on the list. We destroy any interest in young fans with our inability to provide them key events that are responsive on all media platforms. . . . Non-paid cable TV is key to providing Europe, Asia, Africa and especially the US with major athletic events. Streaming video is important, but terrestrial TV would gain a larger and wider audience and should be a beginning point for media coverage of our sport, not some add-on in 2014. 

Let’s start with the part that I don’t disagree with – I would love for more media coverage for the athletes. Hell, I write a blog that does nothing but write about local cross country and track. The traffic is minimal. A few of the kids that run get a kick out of the reports, parents that can’t get to the race send thank you’s, and everyone else couldn’t care less.  It would be great if the youngsters in my area got the same attention that sports with balls – football, basketball, baseball – get. It doesn’t happen because not enough people care. I keep writing it for those few who do - the same way I did with the books. 

Now for the parts that will rankle a few people. Television is an expensive medium to work with and non-paid television is an oxymoron. Somebody is paying for it, somehow. By asking for non-paid terrestrial coverage, we essentially are asking for a subsidy to the sport. I have a hard time believing that we’re the most special snowflakes that should get coverage, ahead of the other special snowflakes.

Football, to pick on the biggest of the elephants hogging the bandwidth, trades coverage for fans. Lots and lots of fans with lots of income they can be separated from.

Professional running athletes don’t have fans, because the average runner will opt a good run rather than  spend time watching someone else compete as a runner. People who run have heroes they look up to but that is a fundamentally different relationship than the average Seahawk fan has to Richard Sherman. The average Seahawk fan lives vicariously through the team because they don’t play the sport themselves. Runners don’t put themselves in the shoes of Ryan or Sarah Hall; they put on their own shoes and hit the trails.

So, the next question would be how to get the spectators, versus the doers, to watch?

The answer is you can’t, not the way the sport is configured now, mostly because the average running event is boring as hell to a non-runner. Everyone can see a touchdown. Very few can see a tactical change in pace of a few seconds along with a cover by the other runners in the lead pack. So marathon coverage breaks down to a hour and forty-five minutes of tedium, a timeout for a commercial in a sport that does not take time outs, and the inevitable missed break that happened while the network carrying the race tried to make some money. That’s about a scintillating as an chess match. Golf has more drama than the average marathon.

So, without a compelling drama, viewers won’t watch and television is a bust. The stories of the athletes are not enough. Every sport has compelling stories. We, as a sport, need the fans to care about what happens on the track or road or trail; and, pretty universally, they don’t.

They used to, though, a hundred and fifty years ago. Just as football and basketball started, pedestrianism began as a working class sport, along with foot racing. Athletes attracted a wide following, newspapers provided coverage, and fans showed up. Most of those events would be considered in the ultramarathon range of distances, but shorter foot races existed.

The spectators cheered for their champions, and jeered the challengers. Fist-fights would break out. The fans cared, mostly about their money, not the athlete, because they gambled on the outcomes. For them, the walkers were the equivalent of race horses, mounts to wager on, and cheer to the pole. Losers suffered vitriol from their backers.

With the gambling and the money came the corruption. This led to formation of the various amateur associations in the early part of the 20th century, both here and in England, and the eventual vilification of the professional over the pure in spirit amateur. As with everything, the major change was who got to make the money, shifting from the punters and walkers to the associations.

Gambling provides a driving force for the popularity of football, baseball, and basketball. It’s so entrenched that talking heads on ESPN talk about point spreads without considering the moral hazard of gambling.

(A quick aside – I have no problem with gambling. You want to gamble, nobody’s going to be able to stop you. For me, I figure there are two types of people that go to Vegas, losers and gamblers, and the only difference is their attitude when they walk in through the doors to the glitz and smoke. When they walk out, they’re all the same.)

Money acts as a very corrosive lubricant. Even as it smooths the path to popularity, it sets the seeds of the downfall. Look at USC and Reggie Bush, or, more recently, North Carolina and the paper classes that jeopardize their accreditation as a university. Gambling and scandals have been a part of the big three sports almost since their inception.

The sport of running already suffers from credibility problems. An athlete has a breakout performance and the first post up on Letsrun.com will question what PED they used. Not IF the used, what. Rumors abound.

So I applaud the effort to clean up the sport. We need it and I’d like to see the effort extend past the professional level and to the collegiate and high school levels, too. Given the influence of steroids at those levels in other sports, we should act proactively to protect our young athletes at least as diligently as the top guns on the track and road.

If you want to become a popular spectator sport, though, weigh very carefully the cost. There is no way to build it as a spectator sport that does not include giving the viewer a cheering interest and the race simply isn’t enough to the casual observer. They need something else to connect to, something that holds them personally. With football, the fan bonds to the players on the field who blast the running back and knock the ball loose in a huge adrenaline rush. Basketball has the monster dunk and the dagger three. Baseball has individual duels on every pitch and homer waiting on a swing of the bat.

Perhaps someone smarter than me has an answer - there are plenty of you - on how to make people care enough to watch running. Our best fans go out for runs instead of watching someone else run. The answer needs to be something more than the “beauty of the sport” and drama at the break. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and drama is life with the boring parts left out; running, when you’re not doing it, has a lot of boring bits. Substituting something else – gambling – to generate the emotion strikes me as a poor remedy. 

Not that I’m much of a gambler, but I’m betting you won’t recognize the sport when shady money finishes with it.

BPA 5K & 10K Fun Run

Hey runners! Lewiston High School is having a 5K & 10K fun run on 11/15 for support BPA. For those that don't recognize the acronym, it stands for Business Professionals of America and the kids are looking to compete against other high schools in Boise, then (hopefully) at Nationals in Anaheim.

First 150 runners that donate $10 (two lattes, plus tip) get t-shirts. They are perfectly willing to accept other donations, too, so don't feel you have to limit yourself.

Registration is onsite at Kiwanis Park starting at 800 AM.

Race starts at 9AM. I'm planning on being there to walk/run with one of my daughters and maybe help push a stroller.

I Hab a Code

The end of the month awaits, with the turkey at Thanksgiving and shopping for the loons on Black Friday. Right now, I get one last weekend of covering cross country races. The State Championships play out in Pasco next weekend at Sun Willow Golf Club. Asotin and Pullman qualified as teams. Clarkston had two young ladies, Lindsey Heflin and Olivia Lane, qualify.  Interestingly, by WIAA standards, I don't meet the standard for media. I'm betting no one else has written as much on cross country this year.

That will occupy all day on Saturday. I'll have a post up Sunday about the experience there - not the race, that'll be over at InlandXC - watching men and women that I watched grow from waifs to the top runners, or nearly so, in the state.

November business normally stays slow but this year is off to a roaring start. Hard to complain about except I didn't expect it. We can expect decent running weather for at least a few more weeks though I'm taking a few days off. As you might have gathered from the title, I'm feeling a little punk. That's what happens when you babysit little plague carriers. Very cute plague carriers, but  . . . my sinuses are filled with ick.  Not running today.

I'm trying something new with Trail of Second Chances - it's on a countdown special in the Kindle store at Amazon. Deal ends on the 8th, so click the link and grab a copy. Since I donate 10 percent of the profits, and those have been cut with the special, for this sale I decided to up the percentage to 20 percent. I would take it as an honor if you (collectively) would cost me a lot of donations. Tell your friends, too. A great book, a great price, double the giving. And yes, Amazon lets you gift Kindle books!

My Sellers Guide to Home Inspections book is nearly done. I start a cover design course Tuesday. I'm hoping to do the cover for that all by my little lonesome. Worry about that later.

Next post will be Thursday. Rita Jeptoo testing positive for doping bothers me and I think I want to do some thinking out loud on the subject.