Summer is looming large. It seems like five years since 2020’s Summer of Lockdown, which saw our big trip to Philmont postponed and most normal summer activities (going to the beach, going to an IronPigs baseball game) were canceled. Heck, I haven’t slung dice in the real world in 15 months. If last year was … Read more
After six months on the trail to Philmont … we finally got on the trail. In August, we went hiking twice: first a 5-mile day hike on the Monocacy Creek Trail in Bethlehem, Pa., then a more rigorous 5-mile day hike on the Rattlesnake Swamp Trail and Appalachian Trail (AT) in Delaware Water Gap National … Read more
‘Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’ Returning To Planet-Of-The-Week Stories & TOS Optimism, Says Alex Kurtzman – Yes, please! Invisible rogue planets without stars? NASA’s new space telescope could find hundreds of them – Speaking of strange new worlds, NASA is looking for some. Racing to Stay Alive – When I run, I just run. I don’t give a … Read more
The long, winding trail to Philmont continued in June as I launched into training for a 10K race. I don’t have a particular race in mind, and given the state of the COVID-19 world, it’s likely any race I do will be virtual. That said, this is very much a journey-before-destination sort of thing, so … Read more
May started with our trip to Philmont being canceled. We moved our reservation to 2021 in the hopes that we’ll be able to travel (and hike) by then. The challenge used to be getting ready for a 60-mile backpacking trip by June; it became staying motivated when that trip is now more than a year … Read more
Like an astronaut hurled far into deep space, Nuketown Radio Active returns to Earth a year after it left to find the planet utterly transformed. Fortunately, there are no super-intelligent apes. At least, not yet. On this episode of Nuketown Radio Active, I reintroduce folks to the podcast, catch up on the state of Nuketown, … Read more
April was the countdown to the inevitable. We knew mid-month that Philmont Scout Ranch would update their COVID-19 strategy on May 1 and that announcement could mean the end to our 2020 backpacking trek. Throughout April, NeutronLad and I maintained our Philmont routines and started thinking about how we could kick them into higher gear … Read more
I expect to learn a lot on the Trail to Philmont. In February, I learned that if you run a lot … you need to periodically buy new running shoes. I bought my Hokas when I started running again after breaking my ankle. With thick soles and excellent support, they were like running on pillows … Read more
The summer did not go as I imagined. Back in the spring, when I was coaching baseball, I had these visions of three mile walks every morning, running every other day, and starting to add on to my fitness regime. It didn’t work out that way. Oh, I exercised and I’ve been pretty active, but … Read more
I’ve started running. Not well. Not quickly. Not for long. But I am running … and slowly making progress (where “progress” is defined as no longer feeling like I’m going to collapse after running for three blocks).
Running was never my thing. My sister’s thing, yes, but never mine. I was more about cycling — I was happy to go on on a meandering 20-mile ride and have fun trying to find my way back home.