Patience; the new endurance sport.

I love running on Sundays.  It is so serene and quiet out there.  I"m not running as hard or fast, or trying very much--so it feels declicious.  That, plus, I want to see that kid on his unicycle again.  What was that kid doing, riding that unicycle down the trail, on a Sunday afternoon, in the snow.  Makes me wonder what else I've been missing on the trail on Sundays.

In the fall I took about 200 picutures of the trail where I run.  I took the camera with me today in the morning, just around 9:30 a.m.  The moisture on the branches had again formed crystals.  It was a winter wonderland.  Blue sky, white glittering tree branches, fields of soft snow. There must have been 10 other people out there with cameras.  The scenery along the river was breathtaking.  I wish I could post the pictures here.  I took about 266 more of the trail in winter, all covered with snowy crystals.  But man it was cold to stop and shoot pictures every few meters.  My fingers froze.  But what a gorgeous morning.  I've never seen anything like how every branch of every tree grew snow.  My pictures have given me quite a bit of pleasure since yesterday.  I'm so glad I have them.  Just 2 more seasons to go.  I plan on taking the same pictures from the same spots in every season.  I have one like that, that I've taken of Mt. Timanogos.  But this will be like taking a walk on the trail in every season of the year....like a slideshow.  They can bring it to me when I'm in the hospital having hip replacement surgery in 10 years.

I ran on the treadmill and watched the inauguration before I had to go to work.  My mother's family was from the South and in my opinion the most terribly racist people I know.  My mother grew up with sharecropper families skirting her father's property in S.C. She wrote a story once about how her little neighbor friend stopped going to school in the 3rd grade because her family needed her home to work the farm. My mother was told by her father that she could no longer be friends with that girl, and when my mother asked why, she told she was too old to have a 'nigger' for a playmate.  Her father told me when I was 19 that if I got married he'd give me a $100 bill, but that if I married a black man I could expect to never see the family again.  I have no idea how people get to be so mean and closed off to other humans.  I know, had my mother been alive today, regardless of political affiliation, she would have been happy to see the civil rights movement she was a part of in the 60's come full circle.  I was moved by President Obama's speech, his gratitude of those who have fought for and died for this country, made sacrifices, worked hard to make this country great.  Time will be the judge of whether or not his deeds are bigger than his words.  But it was something I'll never forget to have witnessed a moment significant in history for myself.

Treadmill, stretching, core, push ups. Yawn.

Inside, on the treadmill. The air quality is so bad; my lungs feel scratchy and tight like I have a cold.  I've avoided running outside now the air is this mucky.  It reminds me of how bad the air was in Riverside CA in the 1970's before CA implemented emissions standards (although it's still pretty bad). I used to spend summers with my grandma there, and my eyes would itch and my lungs would be so tight after swimming or playing outside.  When my Dad was a kid growing up in Riverside, in the winter they would drive up to Big Bear Lake in the mountains on the weekends just to let the kids breath clean air.  In those days people burned wood to stay warm and the smoke and muck would sit in the valley locked in by the San Bernardino Mountains.....what's our excuse now? I can not believe that in every single city in America, the air quality is BETTER than it was 20 years ago---in every city EXCEPT Salt Lake.  This is the worst air I've ever seen since 1979 in Riverside. Maybe I should just move back there.  Utah is getting just as crowded, and polluted, that plus kids are carrying guns and shooting each other here too - so much for all my 'clean living' arguments for staying here Utah.

It was totally foggy and rainy outside.  Felt just like San Diego in the winter.  All the rain has washed away the snow.  But at least it cleared the air?  Right? I had a weird run-in with a guy 'walking' his rotwiler/husky mix and golden retreiver.  He was riding in his truck with his elbow out of his window while he 'ran' his two dogs down Center Street and then around Boat Harbor Drive. On Boat Harbor Drive the rotwiler came running toward me growling, so I stuck out my foot like I was going to kick the dog in the head, and I yelled at the guy in the truck to call his dog away--to which he replied "Oh, she's ok, she's no problem."  Then when my dog came up from behind me, that rotweiler went after her, pinned her down to the ground and was ripping at her neck, so I kicked his rotweiler in the head and sprayed her face with mace.  I yelled again to the guy to call off his dog.  He then got out of his truck and started walking toward me, and it occurred to me breifely that he wasn't headed toward the dogs.  So I ran right past him, leaving my dog to be attacked by his dog until she finally got away and came after me.  I turned around and saw him grabbing his dog by the fur and tossing it into the back of his truck before he drove away.  I had a dream once a dog attacked my dog.  But it was years ago when I actually had a different dog.  It was a bizzare incident.  So if you see an early 1990's model teal green/brown stripped short bed ford pick up (rusty) out on the trail. Watch it. His dogs are mean.