Week Thirty-Four

(The Header picture is the Mt Whitney assault team of 2008)

 

Well, folks, it’s another late start on the blog.

It’s Saturday night and we just got home from five days in the City.  And since I was away from my home scale, I won’t have an official weight until tomorrow morning.  I will edit this posting in the morning with Sunday’s result.  I hope you can wait until then.

I saw my ‘personal trainer’ on Monday, and she gave me three exercises to start with, using the various machines they have at the Y.  Mostly upper body and core stuff, and I should continue with some of the exercises the physical therapist gave me until I’m fully integrated in the Y program.

The trainer said if I don’t start gaining weight, we will have to postpone the exercise routine.  She said I can’t do much about lost muscle mass if I don’t gain the weight.  And speaking of weight, I’m very curious to see what it did after 5 days in the City, eating out every day.

I did no exercises this past week after the Monday introduction.  I guess you could say I’ve been resting my muscles for the big muscle mass push starting next week.  And when I go to the Y next week, I hope I can remember the machines and exercises the trainer showed me!

Now I have tell you a little bit about our outing to SF.  The purpose of the trip was to go to the USF v. St Mary’s basketball game on Thursday night with an old (and I mean old) fraternity brother and his wife.  St Mary’s was ranked 15th in the nation for the game at the USF gym on Thursday, and they had beaten USF by 40 points just two weeks earlier.  But the Dons played them tough this time!  USF fell behind by 11 points early in the first half, but fought back, and managed to get a 6 point lead with just a couple minutes left…and held on to win!  Very exciting.

I should also take this opportunity to tell you about two outstanding dining experiences we had in the City, both of which were lunches.  First, we took a bus out to 595 Alabama, sort of between Potrero Hill and the Mission, to a place called Tartine Manufactory.  It’s primarily a bakery with really good breads.  I had a patty melt with kohlrabi kraut (!), melted fontina cheese, and a beef patty on incredibly delicious toasted and buttered bread.  May be the best burger I’ve ever had!

The next outstanding dining experience was at Brenda’s French Soul Food on Polk Street near Turk, just off the Civic Center plaza.  It’s a New Orleans style spot with a big menu.  I had a cup of gumbo (really good) and a piece of deep fried chicken, crispy skin and all.  Great flavor, great chicken.  I highly recommend the place.

So there you have it.  That’s about all the highlights of the week, except for the weights, which I’ll get tomorrow.

Time passes…………okay it’s Sunday morning now.  Here’s the weight story:  I was 124.1 lbs last Friday, and 124.1 lbs this morning.  So, not an eventful week, weight-wise.

That’s it for this week.  Today’s poem is the first one of this year’s Lenten season, and it talks about some changes (physical/mental?) I’ve experienced this year.

 

(Unnamed at present)

My night time–full of dreams

All forgotten when I awake

Sometimes I talk when I sleep

The quiet of the night I break.

 

Usually I talk because a question has been asked

Explanations are required for some convoluted task.

 

My talk is but some muttering

And I awaken to the sound

But the questioner has faded

And no longer is around.

 

I look out across the bed

At some amorphous thing close by

I reach out with grasping fingers

And try to clutch the thing I spy.

 

But it too has dissolved

Like the questioner who left

 

These new nocturnal mysteries

Leave me puzzled and bereft.