Inconsequentials & Trivialities

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Tonight was my last meeting as Grand Knight. I’m relieved to be done, but I wish I could have accomplished more. Hopefully I accomplished SOMETHING! I am apprehensive about Bill taking over starting next month. His attendance sucks and I don’t expect that it will be improving much. 🙁

This was a short work week. Monday was a holiday and as is true all summer, I have Fridays off. I’m very glad to be off tomorrow. I plan to meet Mike at the church to go over the use of the sound system, head to a different Mike’s house to playtest a new game, and finally, do my 10K training tomorrow evening.

Plans for September seem to be coming together. Exciting! So far, Rizza is coming for Jeff’s wedding, Dave (and hopefully Rizza and Starbuck) is coming to hike up Half-Dome. The possible plan is to run the 10K on the 17th, do some wine tasting on the 17th/18th, spend a day on the lake on the 19th, and go to Yosemite from the 20th through the 22nd. Much of this may not come to pass, but it sure is fun to plan!

All good things…

(Not just a Star Trek episode.)

And so comes to an end a very laid back weekend. Didn’t do much, but that was just about right. Today I went to the church to assist with a Memorial Mass for a man who died last week. I enjoy assisting at Mass, but it would have been just fine if I hadn’t had to leave the house today. As it was, I also stopped at the ATM for some cash, got gas, and bought a few groceries. Efficiency!

Got Haelindir up to 41. Did it mostly by skirmishing with Colred. That went well. But I’m a bit bored with the hunter. There’s not enough going on to make it interesting. We shall see if I can stand to press on.

I’m really short of money this month. 🙁 So I’m abandoning my effort to see a movie every week of the year. I may try to make up the time in July, but I kinda doubt it. The Modesto AmBadAssAdors never really materialized. Tant pis.

Sunday is a normal training day but I took this one off after the race. I wanted to make it up today, but I never got around to it. So tomorrow it is. I will begin transitioning to 10K training. But rather than start on week 1, I’ll begin with week 8. I am of two minds with the running. I am thrilled that I am doing it, and I look forward to it between sessions. But when I’m actually running, I don’t much like it. I sure hope that changes!!

I think I’m going to be trying something different. I’m going to try to get up a little earlier in the morning. Instead of 7:15ish, I’m going to try for 6:30. I’m sure I will hate it. And that means I have to go to bed. Good night.

Friday is the old Friday

I frequently wonder how in the heck I get myself so busy. On the surface, I really dislike being overbooked. But I wonder if deep down I don’t really enjoy it. I mean, I get to that place all the time!

This morning I went down to the church to serve as a sacristan for a Memorial Mass. I don’t do this very often so when I do come up on the rotation, I’m usually unsure of what I’m supposed to be doing.

I had lunch at Papachinos downtown. I made a point of having some pasta with chicken, a highly recommended day-before-a-race meal. And it was really, really good too! I’m going to have to go there more often.

This afternoon, I had a meeting with other members of the Pastoral Council to continue working on the strategic plan. This was a three hour meeting. It feels like it’s going rather slowly to me, but I really think we’re making progress.

I went and picked up my race bag from Doctor’s Medical Center. They had the wrong shirt size for me so I hope I fit into the one I got.

After that, I went and hung out at Minnies for a couple hours before the hafla. Boring. I stuck around for about an hour once the dancing started and took some photos.

Now to settle in for a good night’s sleep.

Thursday is the new Friday

Today seemed very long. It wasn’t busy at work, but it wasn’t as slow as it’s been other days this week either.

I’m a little OCD I think. Here’s one manifestation: whenever I eat M&Ms, skittles, or any bite size snack food, I have to eat them in pairs, one for each side of my mouth. Well, I don’t HAVE to. But I definitely make every effort to satisfy that need.

I watched again the episode of the Office where Michael leaves. What a tear jerker. Very good acting/directing/writing to pull at my emotions the way it did.

Went for a run after work. I think I pushed myself too hard. I wasn’t able to go as long as yesterday and my ankle started hurting a bit. Tomorrow is a rest day so I hope that I’ll be good to go on Saturday.

I attended a dialogue session at the church tonight on the topic of immigration. It’s a complex issue that I struggle with sometimes. The video we were shown felt so heavy-handed. I wish people wouldn’t do that. It’s really unneccessary.

There ain’t no cure for the summertime blues.

Today was an incredibly boring and unproductive day at work. Summers are always slow, but this was ridiculous.

This evening, I played Aluatis for a while, but my Monday night group couldn’t really get things together so grouping didn’t actually happen. Alas. We intend to try again on Thursday.

I listed to and sang through several Mass settings that we will choose from for Advent and beyond. I liked the Mass of Renewal by Curtis Stephan the best. I think Jody is amenable to that setting.

I don’t think I’ve mentioned it before, but I am sort of learning Italian. I love languages and I miss studying them.

Sunday potpourri

I started the day by playing/singing for Mass. Despite my lacerated index finger, I think I did a tollerable job. But here’s the problem, in 3 weeks, the Mass schedule changes and the 10 AM Mass will be in the Maze church. We still don’t really have a plan for what will happen with music when the schedule changes. I suspect that Mike will not last long and if/when he goes, Chris will follow. Cynthia has turned out to be pretty much worthless, so maybe I’m all there is. *Sigh*

Played several more hours of LOTRO this afternoon. Haelindir again. I got him up to 38, so mission accomplished. Back to Aluatis tomorrow night. All of the enhanced xp is used up for Haelindir, so I probably won’t play him again until next weekend.

Our tri-tip fundraiser did turn a profit, but I’d guess that it will all turn out to not have been worth the effort.

Did week 7, day 3 of my 5K training this evening. I’m pretty sure I upped my speed. That’s great! I have two more training sessions before I actually run a 5K (next Saturday).

I’m very much not looking forward to going to work tomorrow. I’m rather discontent. I’d like so much for things to be different but I am ruled by inertia. I keep looking for that combination of things that will lead to change. The search continues.

Oh, and it seems I’m an inconsiderate jerk.

Fridays in the summer

At MJC, for the summer, we all switch to 4 10-hour workdays with Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays off.
I hate it. The days are so long; you have to spend Fridays recovering from the week, Sundays getting ready for the next week, and there’s no time to do stuff in the evenings after work. My solution is to use vacation time to shorten each of my work days.

Anyway, fans of this schedule will point to the extra day off. But as I mentioned, I spent most of today sleeping in, and doing nothing. I did get some time in on Haelindir, he gained almost 2 levels today. I’m hoping to have him at 38 by weekend’s end. I also went shopping with Jose for the tri-tip fundraiser this weekend. We spent just under $1000 at Cash & Carry. He still had more shopping to do at Costco too. I hope we make a decent profit.

I did my training tonight. I’m on week 7 (day 2) which has me jogging 25 minutes. But I made a mistake and did the training for week 8, day 2, which had me jogging for 28 minutes. I did it, and it wasn’t too bad. Now, do I go back and make up for what I missed or do I just go forward from where I am?

Oregon, Day 8

Did my 5K training this morning. Had a rough time of it. Had to stop twice to rest. 🙁 Hopefully Sunday will go better. I’ll be back in Modesto where I’ll be running over flat terrain.

After that, Dave and I went to Voodoo Too to get some doughnuts. I got a Bacon Maple Bar and a Memphis Mafia along with a milk. 

We then drove out to Forest Park and hiked around for about 3 hours. Good workout. Following that, we drove out to The Grotto. I took many photos; it was quite peaceful.

Lastly, we went to Bella Faccia Pizza. It was very good.

I’d really like to move here.


Tomorrow, we both return home.

Oregon, Day 3

Got up this morning and the first thing on the agenda was to do my 5K training. Today was 5 minutes of warm-up, 20 minutes of jogging, and 5 minutes of cool-down. I started off from my hotel and made my way to the Broadway Bridge. I managed to do the jog up the incline and coming down the other side was a breeze. I jogged past the train and bus stations and began my ascent of the Steel Bridge. By this point, I’d been jogging for 15 minutes, almost double my previous time, and I was feeling it. And I was jogging uphill. I though if I could make it to the top of the bridge, I could finish out my alloted time. Alas, it was not to be. I was out of gas. I forced myself to get to the 17 minute mark, then I hit pause and walked for a few minutes. I did resume jogging after a bit, and finished out the 20 minute total.

After a shower and breakfast, I went to Mass at St. Pius X. Overall I was pleased. If I had to make this my parish, I think I could tolerate it. I’ll keep looking but I sure could do worse. Here are some salient pros and cons:

Pros

• Layout of the church – Tabernacle was to the side, worship space was wider than long.
• People sang!
• The worship resources in the pews were acceptable
• There are a good variety of active ministries at the parish
• The parish is growing
• There were lots of families at Mass
• The Presider sang the Eucharistic Prayer (and did it well)
• Music group consisted of piano, organ, guitar, bass, and choir
• During the Prayers of the Faithful, we prayed that people find it within themselves to forgive Osama Bin Laden and others who would do us harm. – This was really moving to me. I think forgiving isn’t so much for the transgressor as for those who have been wronged. It’s hard to forgive but so good for us if we can.

Cons

• Marian songs were sung during Mass (twice!)
• Only 1 verse of the Preparation Song and Closing song were sung
• Some strange, unfamiliar Eucharistic Prayer was used
• Psalm was a paraphrased version
• The Fraction Rite was a little odd. – It looked like the Precious Blood was poured into cups held by each of the EMHC that were assisting.
• There was poor line of sight to from the back of the church to the sanctuary
• There was a long delay before singing started at Communion
• The Presider directed us to hold hands for the Our Father
• The Presider directed the assembly to stay seated for the Prayer After Communion

In the afternoon, David and I went to meet Suzanne and Mike at Powell’s Books. As advertised, the place is quite large. After this, we all went to see Thor. It was pretty good. Only a couple of story/continuity problems which I am willing to overlook.

Finally, we all went to the Brazil Grill where I, for one, had WAY too much meat to eat.

Pretty good day.

A whole lot of running around

Today was the first day of what will be a very busy weekend.
After I got off work at 2, I went by the church to pick up a key, stopped in at the Salvation Army store, and did my 5K training. The wind made it difficult but I got it done. Then, after a quick shower, I went down to open up the church for the Memorial Vigil for Jeff Broome. After the service, I went down to Minnie’s for the hafla. I took 500 photos! Quite ridiculous really. So you can expect to see some more belly dance photos soon.