I took the plunge the other day and signed up for a marathon at the beginning of May. The idea had been rattling around in the back of my head for at few months and I didn’t feel like I was
Another marathon?
I’m vaguely thinking about running a marathon again this year. Maybe the one I ran five years ago in Vancouver. It was a nice route, and by running the same event I’ll be able to see how my fitness is holding
Running on
My six-year runniversary, celebrating the start of my informal middle-aged commitment to running, slipped by without me noticing. When I began running at age 46, I was really excited by the whole endeavour. I enjoyed the milestones, I liked noticing
The data-driven runner
Look, data! Running data! I admit I readily get too obsessed over this stuff, to the point where I forget why I run. (Note to self: I run for the happiness it brings, to clear my head, to learn
Xeroshoes
Another review in the gear-and-gadgets vein. First I made my own huaraches. That was really fun, and they worked well enough, but I didn’t have quite the right sole material. The soles were thick enough but not rigid enough. They
My Fitbit
It’s an activity tracker, a value-added pedometer. I bought it about 15 months ago. I got it as a way to be less obsessed with tracking the minutiae of my exercise. With my old Garmin (has it really been five years?!), which is
Almost a circle
So here’s how I felt on the third morning: revolting. Jittery, feverish and nauseated. The first day was amazing. I had rented a kayak from Smiling Otter in Slocan (my paddling destination) and brought it home the night before, depositing
Circle Route
This circle route is one of those off-the-beaten-path gems. We live at the northwest corner of it. Once they widened the road at Cape Horn (at km 25 on the map) in the early 1990s, the motor homes began trundling
Five years of running
I run. Come rain or snow or slush or all three, I run. I have no particular goals. I have no races planned, I don’t track my mileage any more, nor do I measure my pace or keep track of
Trail-building

Armed with three hand-tools — a mattock, a rake and a saw — I have been gradually building a trail from our yard to the Galena Trail. For years I’ve been frustrated by the can’t-get-there-from-here dilemma that separates me from
Sufferfest Weekend
It’s Kootenay Sufferfest weekend. Chuck is away but the girls and I got involved in volunteering the first day. Fiona and Sophie volunteered as marshalling assistants. Fiona was marshalling up-mountain at the halfway First Aid and Marshalling station. She and
Treadmill!
Look what lives in our basement now. I’ve been wanting one for ages, seriously doing price comparisons and reading reviews for the past 4 years. For whatever reason, we reached the tipping point. Maybe it was my need to revert
Running on
Telegraph Trail I haven’t written about running in almost a year. I made running a part of my life beginning in March 2009. More than four years. I’m still at it, but am currently plagued by an ankle bursitis (the
Fall bits
Where has October gone? Where has my blogging mojo gone? My additional teaching load, and all the juggling of travel and activities by Noah and Sophie, is taking a toll. Fall was amazing until the rain finally caught up with
Suffer-bike-run
Sufferfest went almost exactly as I expected, except that it was harder, and more fun, and the weather was exceptionally fine. So, not exactly as I expected. But close. The bike ride was long and hard. The 45k included about