Surrounded by Retirees!

Is it possible to have both a relaxing and a full weekend? I think I just did.

We got together with Karen Thursday afternoon to do some needed legwork toward our sunporch/deck project. More about that here.

I've resumed the walking that I unexpectedly fell in love with last year. I need to ease back into these seemingly easy workouts though because they're leaving their mark on me with tender shins and some sore spots on the bottoms of my feet. 10.5 miles a couple times a week is a little much until I'm conditioned. I'll get there.

I made it out Friday afternoon for the Hampton loop. Yes, those were flakes of snow toward the end of the video (for those who watched) as the spring that just can't seem to get going continues to spin its wheels! It had been close to 18 months since I've last done this ride. It's really nice to be back on the road again. There are so many rides ahead of me that I look forward to, places I haven't been since late fall of 2011 because I was forced to sit out all of last year. It's sort of like visiting with old friends again when I'm out there.

In addition to Garmin and TrainingPeaks, I've begun uploading my ride data from my Garmin to Strava. I still use Garmin because that's what I've used for the last 7 years. As I mentioned in my last post, I'm using TrainingPeaks because it does a nice job of breaking down my power meter data. I'm playing around with Strava now because it's got a fun feature where it compares segments of my ride with identical segments of others who have ridden the same section. It then gives me my ranking against the others so I can try and improve on it next time I'm riding that segment.

Between the motivation that my power meter is providing me and these timed sections out on the road, I can see riding myself into a form I haven't seen in several years. I'm looking forward to it. The key now will be in learning where these timed sections are located so I'll know when to go hard and put in my best effort. Fun stuff!

I stopped in at Greg Haupt's retirement party on Friday night at Carbone's in Lakeville. Greg retired with more than 27 years of government service. It was a nice turnout of people with quite a few retired controllers in the mix. I can't be sure but I think the retired controllers may well have outnumbered the active ones.

We've had 5 controllers retire in the last 10 days. I'll list them for those interested who aren't on Facebook and plugged in with the announcements there. In addition to Greg, we also saw Julie Damico, Jeff Daly, Jeff Eggers, and Ralph Fee retire. We'll see so many of us leave in the next couple of years.

Jeff Eggers came to the area I work in to say goodbye to everyone on Wednesday morning. I was in the sector and he tapped me on the shoulder and said: "don't stay too long". He's right. I was speaking with another controller at Greg's party about this. Randy retired 10 months ago and he said that I'll know when the time is right. I'd like to think so.

I was finally able to take down most of our outdoor Christmas lights yesterday. There wasn't much I could do until the snow melted off the roof. This may be the latest in the year that they've been up. I got to wondering while taking them down if this may be the last time I do this? Tammy would rather not see me up on the roof any more than is necessary. Christmas lights aren't necessary.

We watched an excellent documentary last night called Searching for Sugar Man. It's about a guy who makes a couple of albums in the late '60s and early '70s but they never garner any notice here in the US. The artist trades making records for a life of manual labor rehabbing old buildings, all the while he's unaware that his music has found an enthusiastic and loyal following in South Africa.

Check it out, it's quite a story.


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