running with sasquatch

Books Stuff Read:
Advanced Collective Bargaining
B.C. Labour Relations Code
B.C. Employment Standards Act
Yarrow Lodge Ltd. [1993] BCLRBD No. 463

Kilometres Ran:
week six — 84.1

To date: 312 km

There was never any risk of insomnia. I spent the week out at Harrison Hot Springs Resort for the fourth week of the annual Canadian Labour Congress’ Winter School in the Advanced Collective Bargaining class. So I completely missed the snowpocalypse in Vancouver. But Harrison had its own, so I didn’t miss it, per se, I just got a different version. Mine was colder, dryer, windier and snowier but the first two made the last one much more bearable. Or maybe Sasquatchable? If I ever knew (seems probable) about the Fraser Valley’s fascination with Bigfoot I’d forgotten. But I digress. I didn’t get a lot of reading done this week because I was busy reading other stuff and by the time I got back to my hotel room each evening I opted to go sit in the hot springs rather than stay in my room with a book. Small sacrifice. From time to time I almost very nearly impulse bought one of those glowing, waterproof Kobos. That would have been handy. Though by now one could hardly characterize it as impulsive.

I arrived in Harrison on Sunday in the midst of an ongoing blizzard and between the walk from the bus to the hotel cabin fever was already setting in. After checking in and getting settled I checked out the fitness room: two treadmills, one elliptical, and one stationary bike. The room opened at 6:30 a.m. Classes started at 9. I was confident, for reasons I should refrain from articulating. Suffice it to say, there was a “no scent policy”, so while deodorant was verboten, smelling of booze and/or cigarettes was a-okay. Hence, I wasn’t expecting a line up for the fitness centre at 6:30 in the morning. And I was wrong. I showed up Monday morning to find the machines spoken for and a line up. Frustrated, I went back to my room. And then my stubbornness set in. I changed from shorts to tights and grabbed my toque and went outside. My phone read minus 10 plus the wind. My Garmen couldn’t find a GPS signal (not confidence inspiring, Garmen, ahem…) so I just used Strava on my phone and set off. And I am so glad that I did. The wind was sporadic and while the snow drifts were sometimes over my knees the snow itself was dry and soft. No surprise ice patches and no slush. The mornings were beautiful, with barely even a car to contend with. I ran every day this week, and in spite of the worst weather since I started running this is the farthest I’ve ever run in one week. So after a rather frustrating week five, with week six I’m back on track for 2,600 km. I didn’t make it to Sasquatch Park though. Perhaps Harrison deserves a return visit.

snowed in in harrison

Books Read:
5. Inside of a Dog — Alexandra Horowitz
6. On Bullshit — Harry Frankfurt
7. The Last Gang in Town — Aaron Chapman
8. How Proust Can Change Your Life — Alain de Botton

Kilometres Ran:
week four — 40.9
week five — 12.1

To date: 228 km

It seems like I’ve been reading a lot when I put it here, but it doesn’t seem like a lot in real life (this isn’t real life this is the internet). Inside of a Dog was pretty good. It wasn’t really well written in that I think that it could have been maybe half its length, but it had a lot of information that I didn’t know, and I learned a few things that I thought I knew about dogs are, in fact, myth. I still don’t think I’ll get a mutt, but I’m closer to being talked into the idea. On Bullshit should be required reading for our time. Last Gang is about as much fun as nostalgia can be, I suppose. Proust didn’t change my life, but de Botton/Proust left me with some stuff to think about.

Running was pathetic, as you can see. I’m annoyed. I don’t know what I’m doing with this thing that I’m supposed to be doing called a “taper”. I’m probably doing it wrong. Week four was fine and then in week five I had planned to run Wednesday (and did) and then on Friday run over to Forerunners on West Fourth to pick up my race package for the Vancouver First Half, which I did not because it was a wet blizzard. Then I was going to do a short five-to-eight on Saturday but because I didn’t go to Forerunners on Friday I was going to do that on Saturday instead but the weather again was terrible and the weather doesn’t really bother me that much but the roads and sidewalks were predominately impassable. And then the news came that the Vancouver First Half was canceled. So I didn’t run this morning. I ran 12 kilometres this week and now I’m sitting in my hotel room that smells like vomit (not mine) at Harrison Hot Springs (that also has such terrible wifi that I’ve had to tether to my phone tor write this) for a week of CLC Winter School and it looks as though the only running I’m going to get to do this week is on a treadmill. I’ve never ever run on a treadmill, so that should be interesting. But I want to run to Sasquatch Park at least once. So we’ll see.

okay start good start bad start

Books Read:
2. The Princess Diarist — Carrie Fisher
3. The Long Tomorrow — Leigh Brackett
4. Nutshell — Ian McEwan

Kilometres Ran:
week two — 58.1
week three — 50.9

To date: 175 km

So 2017 so far: okay start on the reading, good start on the running, bad start on the writing. I think that of all the celebrities that died in 2016 Carrie Fisher is the one that probably had the most effect on me. Bowie was big. So too were Prince and George Michael, but there’s just something about Carrie. One of my earliest memories is going to see The Empire Strikes Back with my [late] father (I was barely five years old) and us showing up late and coming into the theatre at the moment Leia and Han are arguing the the ice tunnel on Hoth. In university I dated a woman that was a Fisher fan, though I wonder if her fandom was more due to an episode (I have no idea how many…) of Sex and the City that featured Carrie playing Carrie being Carrie. I managed to find first editions of all of Fisher’s books (at that time) and gave them to her one by one. Regret isn’t the correct word because I don’t regret, but maybe I should have doubled up and collected copies for me. Alas. It’s strange how death seems to force us to appreciate life in retrospect. I’d not read anything of Fisher’s, though I was very curious about this book given the salacious attention to the Harrison affair. It still amazes me that it was kept a secret for so long. I had no idea that Brackett also wrote The Empire Strikes Back. Her book was on a list of post-apocalyptia that I thought I would like to read. I liked Empire better. I feel like Nutshell is a book that crazy, right-wing, anti-abortionists might read and shout “SEE!!!” thereby completely missing both points, if there are points at all. I think you’ll have to have read it to understand that. And a part of me doubts that crazy, right-wing, anti-abortionists read much of anything except for a book that they claim is the basis for their crazy, right-wing, anti-abortionist stance in spite of the fact that said book, in all its eternal wisdom, actually says literally zero directly about abortion. Zilch. I remember pointing out this fact to a Rock for Life dude once (I had a past life). And he, in his white maleness (they’re almost always white males, aren’t they?) tried his best to co-opt some vague scripture but couldn’t quite answer the overt question that is if this is really as important as you want people to believe that it is don’t you think that your precious book would be a little more overt? I recall him being stumped, but memory is a strange thing. Anyway, it’s a pretty good book. You should read it. No, not that one. The McEwan one. Gawd.

I was getting nostalgic the other day looking at my accomplishments and realized that about a year ago I was pretty damn happy with running a sub-one-hour 10 kilometres and 12 or so months later I’m running a hair-thin sub-one-hour 13 kilometres and that is pretty effing humblebrag inducing. I was on the Seawall the other day and there were some tourists walking and chatting (like they do) and I’ve a pretty decent pace going and I’m just about to pass this pair and then this dude, let’s call him Kevin, blows by all three of us and one says to the other that’s not jogging that’s running. So I still have some more work to do.