8r4d A spring delay left Milton out in the snow. #buggyland

8r4d We’ve got some challenging pieces this year, including a couple where only half the #orchestra plays, so rehearsal has been a bit weird. Sometimes the brass plays by themselves while the #violin and string contingent waits, and sometimes it’s vice versa.

8r4d Just a #spring day at the dog park.

8r4d I set out this morning to see just how long it would take to walk from my front door to #westedmontonmall on foot. That’s one heck of a long #walk. Nearly 12k and two and a half hours later, crossing the river, finding bridges across a couple major roads, climbing the Wolf Willow stairs, finding the school where I did my student teaching two decades ago and generally walking a lot, I stepped thru the doors of the mall. I think I earned a lunch out.

8r4d For all of last year I didn’t even take my #bike out once. I tell you why that is other than we spent a lot of time on vacation and busy with marathon training so in the end, I barely took the bike off the rack let alone actually getting it out into the trails. Literally I did not take it out even once. So in order to remedy that in 2024 I made sure to do a nice long trail ride even before April ended and got my bike tuned up and out and about in the neighbourhood for a 17 km ride this afternoon.

8r4d Our morning #walk was full of interesting shadows.

8r4d Mission Fail: My trip to the mall for #art supplies for my class which starts tomorrow hit a snag. I walked in to my trusty locale for inexpensive paints and behold the doors were shuttered and the bay dark. The cultural wasteland that is this city got another degree barren. Of course I spent an hour wandering in #westedmontonmall because y’know gas prices and why not. Tho for a Monday morning I don’t know what i was expecting. It’s dead as anything here.

8r4d It’s one of those things that often escapes or attention in a busy busy world, and tho you might feel that my life of quasi-middling retirement cannot possibly be busy busy, I do find myself needing to pause every once in a while and reflect on the good moments and #smallthings that warm up my still chilly days. Like when I walked over to starbucks for my two hours of morning writing today and was thankful that I wasn’t in this portapotty when the wind caught it, but also when I ordered a grande #coffee but they gave me a venti by accident so that my daily chapter was fuelled by discounted (but still overpriced) caffeine. Like I said, it’s the small things…

8r4d Around the park for some windy running play.

8r4d We did a trip to Canmore in March for spring break, tho the weather was decidedly still winterish. One of our hikes took us on a meandering stroll up and around the mountain trail past the golf course. #backposting

8r4d Spring-ish weather has arrived so the trails beckoned us on our morning #running adventure. It’s nice to be off the snow and asphalt again.

8r4d I was excited that the weather has finally improved enough for some long spring walks, but it seems like the second that happened they resumed road construction near our house again so our peaceful path is going to run adjacent to an active paving site for the foreseeable future.