OCT-A-6
A LONG-RUNNING WEEKEND,
WITH A PAIR OF DERWOOD TORTOISES
AND
A WALK-THROUGH AT AURORA DRIVE,
SOON TO BE ON THE MARKET AFTER RENOVATION
October 4—6, 2002
It is an almost painfully beautiful Indian summer day in Derwood, with the short and poignant summery day beaming down on layers of acorns with the first of the brown oak leaves and even a few crimson sassafras leaves falling down into the Rock Creek. The acorns are so thick, that besides the drumming on the roof, there are roller-bearing layers of them on the walk way, along which I just came upon a pair of box tortoises, terrapins, almost ideally camouflaged for this time of year in the leave litter and acorn mast—the first I have seen of a pair of the box turtles here. I took their photo which they did not appreciate. I have just come in all salt-encrusted from my only long-run of the pre-marathon month of much longer runs in only three weeks.
I was out before dawn, and parked in Bethesda where there is no charge for Sat/Sun parking, as the police were putting up barricades and a number of the streets were blocked off for a big event called “A Taste of Bethesda” following an AIDS walk. That would all be starting up after I returned from the “Experienced Marathoners Last long Training Run” before the fall marathons. I had emailed my friend Mike Broderick on the MCRRC Board, and asked him to pick up my running packet and shirt from the Marine Corps Marathon Expo, since I will be coming in late on the night of the Saturday 10/26 from Denver after the hunt in Capital Peak. If the packet is not picked up, there is no way I can run on 10/27 AM, especially since we are all registered for the MCRRC Hospitality Suite where I will meet Mike at 5:00 AM on Marathon morning, and he will transfer my packet to me. I had made up all the official transfer protocol, since the hotly contested race is closed with at least twice more the number of successful applicants, and my guaranteed entry comes only from my having run 17 of these MCM’s since my first one ever, exactly that number of years ago.
You can follow my progress in this race and each of the subsequent ones by logging on to the web www.championchip.com and plugging in either my name or my chip number CG64678 and they will post the time and pace at each mat crossed by my Champion Chip. This is true for each race I run, such as the four marathons for which I am booked now, and a number of races down to 10K distance, or 10M like the Annapolis or the Cherry Blossom in April:
RACES TO WATCH ON LINE
FOR CHAMPION CHIP # cg64678
BY LOGGING ON WWW.CHAMPIONCHIP.COM
Oct. 27, 2002 The 27th Running of the Marine Corps Marathon, My Bib #16608
Nov. 17, 2002 The 3rd Running of the Marathon in the Parks, Derwood, MD
Mar.23, 2003 The 2nd Running of the DC Marathon, in DC
Apr. 21, 2003 The 107th Running of the Boston Marathon, Boston, MA
It is a good thing the marathon was not run today. I left with the group from downtown Bethesda, and ran the Capital Crescent Trail down past Fletcher’s Boathouse and the crossing of the C & O Towpath down to Thompson’s Boathouse. I was feeling good, and passed all of my running mates to be doing eight minute miles. When I left with them from Thompson’s Boathouse to go north on the Rock Creek Running Trail at about the ten mile point, it got hot and I got hotter. I slowed down and was passed by a number of my running mates, and I even had to walk a couple of hills upward along Rock Creek. But I finally completed the proposed long run of 20.5 miles, knowing that my next long runs will each be another 10K further than that.
I got back across town into Bethesda under the Air Rights Building in the tunnel from which Joe and I emerged at 3 hours and 50 minutes last fall—a time that qualified me for Boston. Joe is up in Boston today running a 5 K race for visually impaired athletes in the group that assigns him a guide, so that he would not have the advantage of a familiar guide in that competition. He is coming back now and we will probably both settle for a short run before church tomorrow. I had been running eight to ten miles each day from GW where I have started using the Health and Wellness Center, but mainly for just a locker room and shower and not using the facilities they have for indoor running or pumping iron on all the state-of-the-art machines. I may need to know that is there for the winter ahead.
MY LONG-TERM TENANTS ON AURORA DRIVE
HAVE SUBMITTED THEIR THIRTY DAY NOTICE,
AND HAVE BOUGHT A DUPLEX IN THE SUPER-HEATED
MONTGOMERY COUNTY REAL ESTATE MARKET
The timing is just right. I will do the Walk-Through of my Aurora Drive hose tomorrow, and had already met with the realtor, who has shown the comparables, and the prices for even un-renovated ramblers in this area is absurdly high, thanks to low interest mortgages and a seller’s market for pent up demand.
I will need the funds for the remodeling and “blood money” to resolve the usurpers’ claims on Derwood—and the proceeds of the Aurora house will only be able to do one and not both of these satisfactorily. Meanwhile, I will now have to renovate that house before I can get to the postponed project of remodeling my own house, sop there will be further investments in the high priced real estate market exactly at the time that the capital saved in stock accounts for retirement have fallen to their lowest level in decades. C’est la Vie!
LONG RANGE PLANS FOR THE END OF THE YEAR
AND MUCH OF THE NEXT ONE
But I have been busily planning to be gone a great deal of those winter days for weeks on end: pre-Christmas from Dec. 10—17 I will be making some complex connections for Chicago, Detroit and Grand Rapids (see Oct-A-2); January, I will be visiting the Poehlmans in NC, Gibbses in Atlanta, Donald in Gainesville, and then on to Cumberland, where we will have a rendezvous with families and friends on the long weekend, before the rescued hog hunt Jan. 6-8, 2003. (See Sep-A-2) Then almost immediately I go to the Philippines, to Edward in Tboli-land for a week, then to Malaybalay in Mindanao for a week, and then to Leyte Gulf for several days. (See Oct-A-2)
I will be back in February for two cruises in Central America 2/21—28 through the Yucatan and Cozumel and Cancun, and the following week in Belize, Guatemala, and Honduras.
In the Boston Marathon weekend April 18—21, ’03, I will be attending the AMAA and running the 107yh Boston, and then come back to Derwood to pack up all the supplies and other items I have been assembling for the last week of April and the first two weeks of May in Malawi, with a chaser in Zambia (see Oc-A-5)
Then in May 29---June 15, ’03 I am the leader of the first-ever group of medical students for the National Youth Leadership Forum to the Peoples’ Republic of China.
After that begins the string of the Himalayan Health Exchange for the trips that will culminate in Lingshed-’03, with a probability that I will be leading this trek into the Zanskar Range of the remote Himalayas with a hand-picked team and a TV documentary crew.
So, this may be all the news that fits to be printed, on a long-running weekend in the beauties of Derwood.