#33 Boston - Subzero - January 19, 2006
Well, well, well - where is the darn winter we were promised here?? New England certainly has lived up to its reputation as the Baskin Robbins of weather flavors and the darn Farmers Almanac who had forecast lots of snow for us - wrong, wrong, and wrong!! Case in point: Saturday evening - temperature at 57 degrees F (13.8 degr Celsius), rainy; Sunday morning: 11 degrees F (Minus 11 degr Celsius); Tuesday AM: back to 52 degrees F (11 degr Celsius). Snow anywhere? Nooooo. At least not anywhere near my house, I would have to drive up to New Hampshire or Vermont or other distant places!
Which is exactly what we did this weekend - Amanda, Chris, Rick, Phoebe the dog and myself braved wind and serious weather to explore Bear Brook State Park in New Hampshire. Temperatures ranged from -3 F(-19 C) to -10 F (-23 C) making the experience a chilly one to say the least. The drive up there was taxing, and we had to zip into the first gas station off the freeway to load up on windshield wiper fluid - at this point I was pretty much unable to see anything or not much out of the front window - snow, slush, ice, whoknowswhatelse was thrown at my poor Ella, who started more and more looking like a frosted but very dirty Christmas tree. Bear Brook (http://www.nhstateparks.org/ParksPages/BearBrook/BearBrk.html) is apparently the largest developed state park in New Hampshire - a lovely place and due to the arctic temperatures there were not too many people out there hiking (I wonder why). Snow was abundant, good views as well and we kept ourselves afloat with German gummibears, frozen Snickers bars and semi-frozen sandwiches. The water pipe on my Camelback froze as well, and my additional water supply had serious ice cubes floating in it. Chris, our new German friend, was passionately hallucinating about barbeques, and all the talk about ribs made us so hungry that we could not wait to get back to Boston, and we just had to pull into a very "classy" outfit called "Chantilly's". Guess what we ate?? Meat, heaps of it - burgers, ribs (very tasty), spaghetti with meat sauce - there was no holding back!
Monday (Martin Luther King Jr Holiday) it was time for another hike - this time back to the Blue Hills. Linda, Roger and I decided on a nice brisk walk around my old favorite, Ponkapoag Pond. (http://www.kellscraft.com/photos/2005photos/20050321_11.JPG) It had warmed up to a considerable 23 degrees Fahrenheit, still a bit nippy, but much better than the day before. Again, the hiking achievement was celebrated with a meaty meal, this time at the Piccadilly Pub in Randolph, MA ("The place to meet, the place to eat" - http://www.picpub.com/index2.htm) - another one of the great American food chains. Our original goal was actually to go visit O'Donnell's Irish Pub on Rt 28, recommended by a fellow hiker as a nice local yokel kinda place - but they wanted real money, not plastic (which they announce with a major sign at the door), so we hightailed it over to the Piccadilly, where they were quite happy to charge it up.
Aside from out hiking expeditions, the rest of this nice, long weekend was spent relaxing, watching movies, some running (in the pouring, freakin' rain - why oh why did I go out there?) and some very successful retail therapy. Beer needed to be consumed as well, which made me grab my friends Ellen and Patrick and head for Boston's beer heaven ,the Parish Cafe. I finally have started my "card" there, which requires me to consume every single one of their beers within a year, and if I succeed, I get my own mug with an inscription of my choice. Feel free to send suggestions for the wording on the mug. I will consider them, promise!
As to this week, boy did I have fun - ever had a colonoscopy? Yep, how good can life be, you ask? In addition to that I had an endoscopy at the same time, or as my friend Linda described it - "So, you got jabbed at both ends, eh?" The actual procedure is not that bad, considering that you are out like a light, and they could do God knows what to you, but the preparation for it.... that's a whole different story. It starts with a liquid diet, then some god-awful tasting (but effective) laxatives, and finally a half-day with neither food nor drink. At that point, everything you see starts resembling food, and you start experiencing a light-headedness that may or may not be enjoyable at times. And nothing, my friends, nothing, tastes as good as that first meal once you come home. It could be a three-day old muffin, who cares?? Everything turned out well though, and now I am only left to deal with the remainder of my laryngitis/sore throat, which on account of the procedure has flared up again.
On the athletic front, along with some of my Running Partners friends, I started participating in a study at MGH, which is conducted by the Institute of Health Professions. We are learning all about endurance, interval training, and prevention of running injuries. Next week we are starting with a program on stretching (something I never do, but should) and then we will take it from there. I have a Half Marathon coming up in March, so let's get to it!!
Alrighty, time to go home and blow this pop stand! My friends - enjoy the weekend, there is more hiking on my schedule and as usual, you will hear about it.
Cheers,
pet:)
Which is exactly what we did this weekend - Amanda, Chris, Rick, Phoebe the dog and myself braved wind and serious weather to explore Bear Brook State Park in New Hampshire. Temperatures ranged from -3 F(-19 C) to -10 F (-23 C) making the experience a chilly one to say the least. The drive up there was taxing, and we had to zip into the first gas station off the freeway to load up on windshield wiper fluid - at this point I was pretty much unable to see anything or not much out of the front window - snow, slush, ice, whoknowswhatelse was thrown at my poor Ella, who started more and more looking like a frosted but very dirty Christmas tree. Bear Brook (http://www.nhstateparks.org/ParksPages/BearBrook/BearBrk.html) is apparently the largest developed state park in New Hampshire - a lovely place and due to the arctic temperatures there were not too many people out there hiking (I wonder why). Snow was abundant, good views as well and we kept ourselves afloat with German gummibears, frozen Snickers bars and semi-frozen sandwiches. The water pipe on my Camelback froze as well, and my additional water supply had serious ice cubes floating in it. Chris, our new German friend, was passionately hallucinating about barbeques, and all the talk about ribs made us so hungry that we could not wait to get back to Boston, and we just had to pull into a very "classy" outfit called "Chantilly's". Guess what we ate?? Meat, heaps of it - burgers, ribs (very tasty), spaghetti with meat sauce - there was no holding back!
Monday (Martin Luther King Jr Holiday) it was time for another hike - this time back to the Blue Hills. Linda, Roger and I decided on a nice brisk walk around my old favorite, Ponkapoag Pond. (http://www.kellscraft.com/photos/2005photos/20050321_11.JPG) It had warmed up to a considerable 23 degrees Fahrenheit, still a bit nippy, but much better than the day before. Again, the hiking achievement was celebrated with a meaty meal, this time at the Piccadilly Pub in Randolph, MA ("The place to meet, the place to eat" - http://www.picpub.com/index2.htm) - another one of the great American food chains. Our original goal was actually to go visit O'Donnell's Irish Pub on Rt 28, recommended by a fellow hiker as a nice local yokel kinda place - but they wanted real money, not plastic (which they announce with a major sign at the door), so we hightailed it over to the Piccadilly, where they were quite happy to charge it up.
Aside from out hiking expeditions, the rest of this nice, long weekend was spent relaxing, watching movies, some running (in the pouring, freakin' rain - why oh why did I go out there?) and some very successful retail therapy. Beer needed to be consumed as well, which made me grab my friends Ellen and Patrick and head for Boston's beer heaven ,the Parish Cafe. I finally have started my "card" there, which requires me to consume every single one of their beers within a year, and if I succeed, I get my own mug with an inscription of my choice. Feel free to send suggestions for the wording on the mug. I will consider them, promise!
As to this week, boy did I have fun - ever had a colonoscopy? Yep, how good can life be, you ask? In addition to that I had an endoscopy at the same time, or as my friend Linda described it - "So, you got jabbed at both ends, eh?" The actual procedure is not that bad, considering that you are out like a light, and they could do God knows what to you, but the preparation for it.... that's a whole different story. It starts with a liquid diet, then some god-awful tasting (but effective) laxatives, and finally a half-day with neither food nor drink. At that point, everything you see starts resembling food, and you start experiencing a light-headedness that may or may not be enjoyable at times. And nothing, my friends, nothing, tastes as good as that first meal once you come home. It could be a three-day old muffin, who cares?? Everything turned out well though, and now I am only left to deal with the remainder of my laryngitis/sore throat, which on account of the procedure has flared up again.
On the athletic front, along with some of my Running Partners friends, I started participating in a study at MGH, which is conducted by the Institute of Health Professions. We are learning all about endurance, interval training, and prevention of running injuries. Next week we are starting with a program on stretching (something I never do, but should) and then we will take it from there. I have a Half Marathon coming up in March, so let's get to it!!
Alrighty, time to go home and blow this pop stand! My friends - enjoy the weekend, there is more hiking on my schedule and as usual, you will hear about it.
Cheers,
pet:)
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12:08 PM
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