Posts

December

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December started with a pretty big bang this past weekend! First, there was the Santa Pur-suit- a 5k race that’s done all in Santa suits. I signed up for it a while ago and it was a total blast. The weather was cooooold, but there was a little bit of snow, all stuck to the trees which made everything beautiful. The motorists who were waiting for the horde of Santas to pass didn’t even seem put out- they were just bemused at what was probably one of the more surreal events of their day. Everyone was a bit disheveled by the end but it was so much fun.

Later in the evening, Trevor took me to see The Nutcracker in Mississauga! It was a touring company that was performing it, and it was fun. The Living Arts Centre is a really nice venue, convenient to lots of restaurants and shopping, so we were able to wander around and amuse ourselves pretty easily waiting for the house to open.

Then, on Sunday, the Advent Carol service at church, which was really nice. It was super warm though, I was sweating buckets, but I really liked the music we did this year. Super pretty stuff.

Despite all the Christmas season kick-off stuff over the weekend, I haven’t gotten any decorations up yet. Hopefully I’ll get to that soon. 🙂

April 26, 2011 Updates

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Running

Over the weekend, I managed to run a whopping 13.3 miles (that’s a tiny bit longer than a half-marathon, or Pikermi, as some call it). It was definitely hard, but I did it! I ran a route that took me through town, so I was dealing with traffic, and a number of different surfaces- trails, asphalt, concrete.

Now that I know I can do it though, I’m going to think about when I’d like to do the half-marathon as a race. There’s a marathon and half-marathon in town coming up May 1, but The Odd Couple is closing the night before that, so the likelihood of me being properly rested for it is pretty well nil.

There’s several others coming up though that I can consider, and lots of shorter races- I’m already committed to doing a 5k Fun Run on May 29, and another 5k in July, and I can always do some 10k races here and there.

Speaking of The Odd Couple…

Theatre

I’ve been doing a little bit of running crew work for The Odd Couple, which is going into its final week of the run this week.

It’s a good show! I wish I could watch it properly, but I’ve been pleased to get to work on it in a backstage capacity. I’ve gotten to meet some great new people, and hang out with others I had already met but didn’t really know. Good stuff!

Choir

This past weekend, we sang Bach’s St. John Passion. The concert went really well. I don’t find myself enjoying St. John as much as I did St. Matthew, music or text-wise, but it was still quite good. Rufus Müller was fabulous as the Evangelist, as expected, and the turnout was pretty good.

Next up will be the Chamber cabaret concert on May 7, and then singing for Holst’s The Planets with the KW Symphony. Should be good.

Voting

I voted at my advance poll last Friday, because May 2 will be a little too busy for me to drive across town 2 extra times in order to get to my polling place. It is my first federal election as a Canadian! I was excited to finally get to vote in the country where I’ve lived for the past 6 years. We’ll see how the election turns out- the reports thusfar are quite varied.

Movies, weather, music, and running

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I finally saw The King’s Speech this past week, and it was awesome! And not just because of Colin Firth. 🙂 The costumes were really quite splendid as well, the screenplay was good, the acting was superb. I really enjoyed it.

This week also brought some very welcome above-freezing weather. Up to 7 or 8 degrees a couple days in a row! A lot of the snow melted, and everyone got a taste of that mental and physical perking-up that spring brings. It was awesome. I went out without my snow boots on! There’s something really awesome about the first day you can go without snow boots or a coat. Even if it is in February and the winter weather is still going to come back again before spring arrives properly.

Was back at the gym this week after a few weeks of not going, as well. I did lose a bit of speed in those couple of weeks, but I managed to get through one long-ish run last night (just over 6 miles) so that was good. I needed it.

Starting to work on the St. John Passion in choir. I never thought I’d say this (being a long-time anti-Bach type) but it’s nice to come back to Bach. I think I’m just now starting to realize why the big Bach fans feel the way they do. It’s a different challenge from the 20th century stuff we’ve just finished, and there’s something very comfortable about baroque tonality, even if the actual singing can be quite difficult sometimes.

Running

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I started running early this year, as I had signed up for a 5k race in April in a fit of  joiner-ism and wanted to finish it without completely embarrassing myself.  After the race itself, in April, I thought I would stop running- it’s fairly high impact exercise, and I could burn calories other ways, so why keep on with something like that when I could bike or walk or do the elliptical or the arc trainer!

So I didn’t run for a while.  I did a lot of walking and so on through the late spring and summer.  But late in the summer, on a hot and humid day, I decided to go for a run.

And you know what?  I love running.

It’s hard, and it can hurt and I’m not good at it.  I get horribly sweaty and I jiggle.  But I love it.  No other exercise seems to give me quite the same satisfaction as a good hard long run.   I feel exhilarated afterward.  I feel like I’ve accomplished something.  It seems to chill me out.

I signed up for another 5k race in October, and was 4 minutes faster than my April time.  I’m a lot faster already than I was when I started- I’ve gone from a 13 minute mile to a 9:30 mile.  Not superhero- or athlete- fast, but pretty fast for me!  I’ve been running 8k regularly at the gym (on the days I do weights, with cross-training and yoga on other days).  I’m thinking about building up to a 10k race at some point next year.

So I guess I’m a runner, then.  Weird.