Though summer won’t officially start for another few weeks, like many others I declare the Tuesday after Memorial Day to be my start of summer. And even though I have already suffered one major setback, and am hoping not to encounter another (mentioned below), I am hoping to make this an enormously fun summer and am asking you to orchestrate/join with me.
Consider The Source
Because of the unfortunate event with a hasher taking her own life a few weeks back Sunday’s Black Sheep had a late start time and was advertised as being “short” so that people could go home and clean up for the karaoke that was to begin at 9pm. As I do, I had talked myself out of going to the hash, but then I was semi-guilted into going by ITP-Reader Barb given that the start was no more than three miles from the ITP Estate.
In the past ten years I have lost most of my running ability, especially the ability to through the woods. It was clear to me that after only a few hundred yards of “running” through a parking lot that I was completely out of shape and that my left hip/knee were not going to be happy to be hashing after being injured eight weeks earlier. Fortunately, this occurred at the start and I was able to walk with Barb, Sanitary, and House of Boobs.
At one time I knew the area behind Value Village and around the landfills well, but I had forgotten how strenuous climbing around, into and out of the Entrenchment Creek, and through swaths of poison-ivy infested woods could be. It didn’t help that I was in tights and a long-sleeved technical shirt, my armor against poison ivy, on a high-eighty-degree and humid day. I was swearing profusely, had brought no water because I heard trail was going to be short, and unfortunately all attempts to cool dow with water crossings failed. It would have been much worse had my hashmates had not been so generous in sharing their water with me. I make no lie when I say that at points on the journey I was hallucinating. Hell, had I seen the snake in the tunnel through which we walked I may have assumed that I was hallucinating then; I walked by it unknowingly and it wasn’t until HoB screamed that I saw what I had missed.
I’d suspect that we, the walkers, were on trail for at least two-and-a-half hours.
By the time I got home, hung the hashing clothes outside to dry, showered vigorously, and sat down to eat dinner in what I was assuming was a low-blood-sugar state, it was past 8:30pm.
The waiting to see if I get attacked by poison ivy has begun. Sadly it feels as if I have the makings of body itching. It’s hard to explain, but I have been here before. I hope that I am wrong. Today I will be investigating to see if my primary care physician takes my new health insurance…
ITP Flickr Pics
“Eating A Bahn Mi With My New Friend ‘Laura'” (Chamblee, Georgia, United States)
You know that I have a preference for women whose names begin with the letter ‘J’ but as the saying goes, Beggars can’t be choosers. I had a plan to head to Marietta for dinner and a desire to rid my hashing clothes of any poison ivy so I stopped into the lavanderia next to Lee’s Bakery to do a small load of laundry and then treated myself to this for lunch.
“Hello My Old Friend” (Sandy Springs, Georgia, United States)
The next stop on my “Oh, The Places I Used To Go” tour was the Perimeter Mall area. No, I didn’t go to the Apple Store, I purchased that iPad Mini 4 from Best Buy on Saturday… No, my target was Target, and then Taco Mac to pick up what I will show in tomorrow’s blog. Of course when you are in Taco Mac you have to have a beer, right?
Nothing Life A Death-Defying Drive
My dinner destination was the Garage Mahal. Seeing the heavy rains slowing traffic on I-285 I thought I could beat the worst of it and cleverly take Old Paper Mill Road from Sandy Springs to Marietta. This was almost as bad of a decision as deciding to hash on Sunday.
Torrential rains.
Very low visibility.
The beginnings of flash flooding (I drove through some spots that concerned me).
And finally a downed tree branch that blocked my lane, forcing me to drive in the other lane around a blind curve! Of course a SUV came from the other direction while I was in their lane.
By the time that I got to Terrell Mill I was never so happy to be in Marietta.
Dinner was a lot less dangerous as we sat on the Deck Mahal eating deliciously-cooked ribs and swapped stories like old sailors. My drive home was far less harrowing.
Hope yours is a happy Tuesday. Think about what we all can do this summer. Let’s do this!
Cheers,
Paulie [eatl/ga]
Well, the answer to my insurance question is “No”. That’s no fun!
Seeking a doctor that takes Kaiser now…
Wow. Sounds like you dodged multiple bullets. I’m not sure how a 2.5 hour hash is short, but you were walking and it was Blacksheep.
My exercise was limited to Saturday, when I rode 18 miles. For some unknown reason, my neck was killing me and I even stopped about halfway through to stretch. That isn’t a normally complaining part of my anatomy, so I really don’t know why it was hurting. I may ride the trainer tonight and see how it performs.
Last night we took Doug and Nicole out for a pre-wedding dinner. They have a civil ceremony here Wednesday then fly to Scotland to do the big “we rented a castle for all our friends” wedding. Sadly we could not get it together to go, but we will celebrate with them in spirit(s). Some not too shabby Italian at a local place in Newnan.
Today is my only full day in the office. Tomorrow, a half day, then pick some folk flying in and head to Augusta for Masters Nats. Hopefully, the weather gods will look kindly upon the officials and not rain too much.
-FP
I am not sure I have ever fully walked a Black Sheep so I don’t know how the time compares to others. I do know that I never had the bodily reactions I suffered on Sunday however. It was strange and a bit frightening. Must remember never to go out without my Camelback again.
Long weekend…
Daughter Elizabeth was in town from Dallas for a whirlwind visit. We hit all her favorite haunts, Taqueria del Sol, OK Cafe, etc.
And even included an impromptu visit to Oakland Cemetery to test out her new “birthday present” lens (Canon EOS 60mm macro).
https://www.flickr.com/photos/hamwithcam/34147857974/in/dateposted-public/
This morning Elizabeth did a practice run of the Peachtree course in around 60 minutes, not too bad for the humidity and a light rain.
After a quick lunch at Taqueria, it’s off to ZATL and a return to Dallas. She’ll be back July 4th.
BTW, not sure if posted, but here’s a link to her “Tom Tom GPS off the beaten path” story:
http://www.active.com/outdoors/articles/why-you-should-ditch-popular-hiking-trails
And the related “Instagram Roundup:
http://www.active.com/outdoors/articles/Acadia-National-Park-Instagram-Roundup
Lastly, the (big, big) Atlanta Blade Show (world’s largest knife show) is this weekend (early start Friday) at the Galleria. I’ve been looking forward to this since last year.
http://www.bladeshow.com/
Oh, and the 88th annual Atlanta Hamfest is this Saturday (Jim Miller Park in Marietta, GA.):
https://www.atlantahamfest.org/
73 de JG/HamWithCam
Gun show, and now a knife show? Yikes! 😉
Forgot to mention I ran into Jim Duckworth at Target on Sunday. We chatted for a few minutes and caught up on things.
Knife Show and Hamfest….
😉
JG/HamWithCam
That hash was about 4 miles, and we were moving slow, but we were moving, so it really felt like more miles. I was beat at the end. We got home about 8:30, immediately hit the showers, there was NO WAY we’d be heading back to the Southern Comfort Lounge in Conley for karaoke. We ate some left over spaghetti & went to bed.
We slept in & decided we needed to get some yard work done, so no bike riding at all this weekend. Cutting the grass actually helped my sore legs, but the massage in the afternoon really helped more.
Now that I think about it, we did stop quite a few times. The terrain slowed us down considerably as well. I’ll never understand how people can run through all of that stuff.
So far so good on the PI. The spot on my arm has seemed to go away, so maybe it was just an irritation from all the blackberries.
Hoping I have the same good fortune. I’m attacking this as early as possible to minimize any affects.
Feeling itching on my legs, I think the assault is starting.
MFer!
Just discovered that I took the wrong leftovers with me this morning. Poop.
Ate the “wrong” leftovers, guess I will eat the “rift” one tomorrow.
What was so wrong about them?
I should have gone home for leftovers for lunch, but no time, so a Hardee’s hot ham & cheese it was!
I brought three Tupperware tubs with me, one of which was not the chicken breasts I cooked last night. Therefore the cornbread stuffing and vegetables had no protein. The “wrong” one contained weekend breakfast leftovers.