On Monday I get in a good bicycle commute to work and back home. During the workday on Monday one of my secretarys comes into my office and congratulates me for the recent President's Award for Innovation from Northrop Grumman. And she says, "But I don't see your picture here."
When I respond with, "Oh I didn't go to the awards dinner", she gives me a puzzled look. So I have to continue as I hang my head in my hands, "It was on a Saturday night". But this doesn't clear it up, so, "I have better things to do on my Saturday nights then to hang out with the people that I work with." And this doesn't quite sound right, so, "That sounds mean, doesn't it?" And my secretary sees that I keep digging myself in deeper and deeper so she finally leaves.
So Monday and Wednesday are good bicycle commute days as I ride for an hour to get to work in the morning (and thankfully for my coworkers take a shower at a Northrop Grumman facility) and ride for an hour to get home each afternoon. Tuesday and Thursday are two-a-day sessions with the weights. I workout both mornings before work and then again when I get home from work. I'm still on the high repetition workouts to maximize the muscle loading and minimize the joint loading.
During the workweek at Northrop Grumman I have a number of people tell me that I should apply to be "The Boss". (The boss of our department has just announced that he is taking another position within Northrop Grumman and now we need to find a new boss.) One of the people is actually the temporary boss and tells me that I would be a great candidate. And I reply with, "But I have no security clearances and probably have no hope of ever getting one". But she still encourages me to apply. Later in the day, when I relay this conversation to my project boss, he discourages me from applying because he says that I would hate the job. And I say, "Well, I can't even run my own life. How can I run 60 other people's lives?"
I wake up twice on Thursday night or Friday morning with nightmares. The first has the police accusing me of hit-and-run. The second...um...I forget. But in the first case I woke up with no air in my lungs and feeling that I couldn't get any air in them.
On Friday I get up a bit late and get out for a good (almost) 30 mile bicycle ride. This is followed up with mowing, edging, and trimming the lawn. The tree trimmer comes by and gives me an estimate and he'll start in on Saturday.
In rapid succession I visit the ATM, order a window for the garage, visit Home Depot to buy some items, visit the bicycle store to buy more (necessary) items, visit a bathroom contractor at her showroom, and stop in at the grocery store for additional supplies. The entire set of errands takes about two hours. This is the approximate time that it would normally take me and Person C_T just to get through Home Depot. Hmmm.
After relaxing on Friday afternoon for about an hour I do the laundry and lay down some (newly purchased) fertilizer (to let the rain expected this Sunday green-up the lawn). And then, as the sprinklers are running, I grab a chair, the most recent issue of Scientific American, and sit out on the front porch. As I'm sitting there the neighbor lady comes by and tells me how long she has been on hold with the IRS (as she tries to resolve a little dispute). As we're talking a policecar approaches my house and my neighbor says, "Hide me Ray - they're already coming after me for not paying my taxes". But the policecar rolls by and I wave to the officer in the car. As we're talking, Person A_M drives by and waves (and probably cannot stop since he has yoga on Friday evening). And the neighbor kid cyclist drives by and waves. Finally as the light is fading I go inside. I need to get out on the porch more to "involve" myself with the neighbors more.
On Saturday morning I'm up at a reasonable hour to get in a high repatition with the weights, watch qualifying on tape for the San Marino Grand Prix, and get out for the aquarium bicycle ride. By the time that I have returned from the bicycle ride the tree trimmers have started in on the giant tree in the backyard. I continue with a shower, some web surfing to see reports about the qualifying, and then do some errands. I stop in at a bookstore and browse for a while before I get bored and go back home.
When the tree trimmers finish I am happy with the results. The giant tree is scaled way back and well away from the wires. After paying the tree trimmers I lay down for a nap. And sleep away about 75 minutes. Later I get in the second of the "two-a-day" workouts with the weights and I am certainly glad that the week is ending. The "two-a-day" workouts, though effective, are very difficult and tiresome.
Before I can pick up Person J_VKPI to go clubbing, he calls and says that his grandmother is very sick and that the entire family is headed for the hospital. I think about whether to stay home tonight or go out anyway. And I decide to go. Person T_U calls and says that he will meet me at the club and keep me company. (I think Person T_U wants to find the guy that he was eyeing last week also.)
The crowd builds to a huge crowd tonight. The music is absolutely fantastic - only two songs that I don't like being played for the entire night. (One that I don't like because it uses "the f word" and another because it reminds me of bad behavior from Person N_V.) There are a number of people who give me great smiles and second looks and a few come and talk with me. We only make idle chit chat and it goes no further than that. Person T_U shows up and we hang out until the guy that he was eyeing last week shows up. Person T_U and I wander around and eventually notice "the eyeee" smiling at us. Person T_U asks, "Was that for you, Ray?" I think it was for me, but I tell Person T_U that it was for him in order to keep his confidence high. Later I run into a former ice hockey teammate and he says, "I need to go find my boyfriend. He's around here somewhere." And I see my former teammate go up to the eyeee and start dancing. It turns out the eyeee has been the boyfriend of my former ice hockey teammate for 18 months. It is a small world. I relay the information to Person T_U and now he has to search out someone else. I call it an evening at 2:10 am and head for home.
On the way home the streets are wet and very slippery. As I'm getting on the freeway a car two ahead of me spins 150 degrees around. The car ahead of me gets stopped in time and I manage to take evasive action and get stopped also. We wait for the spun car to right itself - it didn't hit anything - and continue on its way slowly. A few miles down the road there is another car that is sitting 90 degrees from the road on an entrance ramp. Another case of somebody trying to go too fast on the wet curves of the entrance ramp. Having said that, I make sure to approximately double the "advisory" speed around each entrance ramp. The one suggests a maximum speed of 25 mph (in the dry) and I go around it just short of 50 mph (in the wet slippery conditions). And I manage to "skate" on home faster than everybody else.
Sunday is a blah day. I walk over to the grocery store to buy the newspaper and other supplies for the week. I read the newspaper, watch the San Marino Grand Prix, change a bicycle tire to a new tire, sand a doorway, and try to make the best of a mentally dreary day. Every 3 hours starting at 9 am I do some abdominal and lower back strengthening and stretching exercises. I do this just to shock the body into stayng in alignment and within a neutral muscle balance in the lower torso region. And a mid-day walk almost brings me out of a "weird day".