Here’s a short update on my running training. I have not completed a run for two weeks now on the Watch to 5K program that I have been following. Initially, as I said in this post, the experience of exhaustion from my last run took the wind out of my sails. Next I found myself getting ready for a trip that I am making back to the England to celebrate my mother’s 90th birthday. Maybe I could have found time within the busyness of getting ready…but the short of it is that I didn’t.
But I have been missing running, and so today at the airport hotel that I have been staying at I got on the treadmill for 15 minutes. I didn’t race. I set myself a good consistent pace, and came away from the run feeling as though I had exercised, kept the pace up and felt better for it. I hope that I keep up with the running in some shape or form while I am away.
April Photoblogging Challenge, Day 2: Flowers suggested by @davegullet
The first Agapanthus of the year flowering in the front garden.
Reading this news of the World Central Kitchen staff who were killed by Israeli air strikes in Gaza hit me in a way that surprised me.
Before the Maui wild fires last summer I had not heard of World Central Kitchen. While volunteering in Lahaina following the fires I discovered this charity organization. They were on the ground in Lahaina serving up meals not only to those who had lost their homes in the fires, but also to the volunteers. And they weren’t just serving up any food, but had taken the time and care to discover what was eaten locally and that’s what was on the menu. I hear that that is how World Central Kitchen operates.
During the days in Lahaina trucks were going back and forth bringing supplies to the staff managing the tented kitchens and serving areas. I can picture them now.
I cannot imagine the bravery required to go into Gaza to help bring a meal to those in need. They were doing their piece to help relieve suffering, through serving up that which nourishes us in body and spirit. And now seven of those brave volunteers are dead. I find it all so sad.
✈️ In the air. Traveling solo to England for my mother’s 90th Birthday celebrations.
This morning’s rainbow 🌈
Monday April 1, 2024 Newsletter letter
Monday April 1st, 2024
Dear Readers,
I had to laugh this morning. It’s related to the post that I put out yesterday around busyness (see it below). I had been trying to slow myself down, to be focused and get done what needed to be done, but obviously it was not working. I forgot that this newsletter was going out today.
That’s humbling and at the same time an opportunity to try that little bit harder and see where I can improve.
I think back to a story that an old Buddhist friend told me. He was talking to our teacher, a Tibetan monk who had grown up and been trained in a time and place that no longer exists - old Tibet. The Tibetans have done a great job of preserving their culture in exile since the Chinese invasion, especially in India, but the conditions will never be quite the same as the Tibet of old.
Anyway, back to the story. My friend was talking to our teacher (Geshe Damcho Yonten - Geshe-la for short) about a project that he was involved with. My friend said something which I guess we have all said at sometime in our lives, “I’m doing my best," to which Geshe-la replied, “No your not."
It was typical Tibetan humour to make a point. Geshe-la never disrespected the efforts of others. However, if he sensed that someone could hear what he had to offer, he would share some words for them to reflect on. In this case, yes you are doing well, but you have the potential to do better….and better again. Don’t forget that.
So as we enter the fourth month of the year, I sit and remind myself - I am doing well, and I can do better.
Thank you, as always, for reading.
David.
🧘 I have, am having a busy few days. When that happens my mind starts to pull me onto the next task before the current one is finished. From that anxiety builds and patience can diminish. I must remember to stop, to breathe and be aware of others around me. Rest…my body will appreciate it and the jobs will still get done.
☕ My coffee in take had been going down. One or two cups in the morning. However, in the last couple of days I have going back to another cup mid-morning. I'm not sure what is up?!
🏞️ Digitizing slides. Reliving memories.
I have been silent on my running posts for six days now. I haven’t run in that time, though that is not the sole reason for not posting. The last run took the wind out of my sails. More so than I initially thought. I was tired by the time that I finished my last run because of the increased run times that the Watch To 5K had me doing at the Week 4 stage - at least I assumed that that was the reason. However, though those run times played a part I now don’t see them as the sole reason.
My mind was in comparison mode, comparing my current run’s distance and time with how well I had done on the previous run. In essence I had been competing with myself and telling myself that if I ran further and/or faster, both was a real bonus, I was doing better.
I was essentially in race mode. Racing with myself, though I did not see this. I need someone else to point out to me that this way of running was simply not sustainable. Rex Barrett kindly reached out to me on Mastodon giving me some perspective. He pointed out that the pace that I was running for my training runs, was a race pace. I needed to slow down and set myself more realistic paces for the training runs, along with the time that I spend running.
Something else that I am forgetting is my age. I turned sixty last September. I’m in pretty good shape, but whether I like it or not, I’m not where I was forty years ago. I am older, the body is slower, it needs more time to recover. I need to recognize this and proceed with my training accordingly.
I hope to get back to running today or tomorrow, before I loose the momentum. I don’t think that I will, I want to see myself running a 5K whatever the speed, but the mind can be tricky and as I said at the start of this post, that last run took the wind out of my sails.
We watched Mrs. Doubtfire last night. I had never seen it. I miss Robin Williams.
Experimenting with a Different Way to Capture the Travel Slides
Benaulim Beach, Goa, India.
A month ago I explained how I was capturing the slides that I am using in the “Story behind the Photograph” series (all of which can be found here (RSS), or under the map emoji 🗺️ in the menu bar above). Well I have now found a gadget that I was given a number of years ago. Its purpose is to digitize slides and negatives. Due to the device’s age, the scans are probably not the best. With the slides also being about thirty years old, the resultant images have a vintage look to them. Possibly the original method, which includes the use of a modern day iPhone camera, is producing better images? Either way, I am going to continue experimenting with this little gadget and see if I can do any fiddling with the images to improve them, without at the same time loosing the authenticity of the original.
My reason for doing so is because this method allows me to digitize the slides so much quicker, and I do not have to wait until nightfall for it to be dark enough to use a projector to view the slides. The slides themselves are still in a complete jumble, and so finding groups of photos centered around one part of the trip, one story, is not always easy whichever method I use.
The Story Behind This Photograph
The photograph above is of Benaulim Beach in Goa, India. I have not altered this image from the scan that I made with the little device. The photo was taken about two weeks into the new year of 1990.This image pretty much summed up how busy the beach was, and it was a very long stretch of beach. Once I got past the village of Benaulim and the fishing boats, there was no one there. My memory is that the beach went on and on until it came to the mouth of a river right at the end. Apple Maps confirms this, though it does not give the river a name.
As I walked the length of the beach I saw the beginnings of construction of what looked like resorts and hotels. Goa now has an international airport, and so I do not know what this beach looks like today? My hope that its shear size swallows up any development.
A village hidden beneath palm trees.
On arrival had no plans for how long I would stay there. I had a room in a house that I shared with another traveler; what might be called at 1990s AirBnB. The house was in a small village and only fifteen minutes walk from the beach.
At that stage I had been on the road for seven months. The relaxing atmosphere of this part of Goa ate into my bones and I ended up staying there for a week. I walked, read, met people (both local and travelers) to sit and talk to. It was just what I needed at that time.
Sunset over the Arabian Sea.
👓 The new glasses arrived today with progressive lenses in them. My first pair of progressives and they feel a little disorientating at the moment. I sense that I'll get use to them, but for now I think that I'll be switching back and forth between the new glasses and the old.
I remember being in college when Space Invaders first came out. Then there was Asteroids, Pac Man, and a few other Space Invaders variants. Pinball machines were still available in UK pubs, and then as Space Invaders started their, um, invasion, evenings moved from trying to keep a metal ball on the playing field to huddling around the boxes that housed Invaders and the like, trying to better your score.
I was never that good at these games. Maybe they just weren’t my thing or I did not have the aptitude necessary to improve my game.
Recently I think that nostalgia got the better of me. I purchased The Iconfactory’s iOS app, Ollie’s Arcade. Recreating the video games of yesteryear, three of them and done very well as The Iconfactory do, they are a fun to play. However, I am still not very good at them. My scores remain low, but I keep on coming back for more.
Monday March 25, 2024 Newsletter letter
Monday March 25, 2024
Hello and welcome to another weekly roundup of posts to my blog.
This has been a wet winter and as such some outside jobs that needed to be done in the garden have been sitting, waiting for the weather to clear up. Seasons here in Hawaii don’t have as clear a delineation as more northerly latitudes, but there is a definite change in weather patterns. In the part of Maui where I live the weather becomes wetter, and although the day time temperatures can reach the high 70F(21C), mornings and evenings are cold and the trade winds that blow through the islands can be chilly.
This last week, the weather has started to clear…at least there have been windows, and I used it as an opportunity to get outside and tackle invasive plants taking over, power washing concrete on which mold can grow in our hot and humid climate. The upshot of this has seen me posting less this week, especially as the week progressed.
Another victim on the outdoor work has been my runs on the Watch To 5K program that I’ve been following. I’ve worked as much as the day has allowed and exhausted myself in the process…so no running. The exhaustion piece has also been a lesson to me in my running. Each week the program has me running more and walking less. On top of that the running intervals are longer. By the end of the last run I was truly wondering how I was going to keep this up and just took an extra day off both through tiredness and feeling a bit dispirited. However, a chance conversation on Mastodon with a coach has given me some perspective, reminded me that I am not to expect the same results as forty years ago (now there’s a surprise!), and suggested some helpful pacing and running schedules for me going forward. I hope to get back into it this week.
Until next week…
Thank you for reading.
David.
🗣️ I’m trying out various translation apps to decide which best suits my needs. I find apps that offer a slower play back of the foreign language helpful. Though finding an app that has everything I want neatly packaged, is not easy.
♻️ I wouldn't mind restarting today afresh. I've got things done, things that needed to be done, but I'm sitting here now at the far end of the day feeling a little dissatisfied, maybe frustrated as well? Such is life....up one day, down the next.
🍃 I’m waking up to wind and rain, hard showers followed by a wait for the next one, this morning. Yesterday’s sun appears to be an anomaly at the moment. It appears that we have a little longer before the winter rains recede.
🌱 Clearing in the garden today. Pulling out an invasive plant. There is still some to move, but it just got too hot….so I started work on a new blog post.