I've been a bit quiet lately. Some of that's due to the annual feeling of ennui that envelopes me after the holidays have past but a good part of it has to due with an assignment I've been given by our local Audubon Chapter.
Terry and I have been tagged with making a presentation on our Alaskan trip. While many locals and members of our group have made trips to Alaska, most have done so either by flying to their appointed destination or by taking a cruise that has limited their access to the largest state in the union. Very few (and none of our acquaintance) have made the trip via the overland route. That makes us and our experience a little unique. (Gary, our webmaster, has called our presentation: "Mainesburg to the Arctic Circle or Bust!" I would have preferred, "There And Back Again!" but that's just me.)
In preparation for our big night, I've been going through all the blog posts and pictures from that 78 day Road Trip and it's been keeping me busy as I select and resize my photos. So far I've not even reached the half way point in our trek and I've already got more than enough material for a monumental travelogue let alone one that's to last a mere hour. We're going to have to do a good deal of pruning to fit our time slot but I just can't think of where that's going to happen!
On the plus side, this is the first time someone has actually asked to be bored to slumber by viewing my home slide shows.
On the negative (?) side, viewing all those pictures and thinking about the great time Terry and I had has me wanting to hit the road and do it all over again. We experienced and saw so much that we would want to do again...and there's so much we had to skip due to forest fires and road washouts, not too mention and so much we would want to explore in greater depth...that, given sufficient time and money, we could spend several summers (and maybe a winter or two) on the roads of British Columbia, the Yukon and Alaska.
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Watching the bowl games on TV I've come to dislike the Pacific Life commercials. You know the ones. They have great footage of breaching whales. Every time I see one of those ads, I'm reminded of the many short cruises we took in Alaskan waters and the excitement of viewing humpback whales rolling alongside the vessel. Or groups of sea otters, Stellar's sea lions, puffins, murrelets and more swimming in the water nearby. Like the photos I'm editing, those ads make me want to hit the road to the (far) northwest
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Winter has returned to the Aerie. After experiencing a couple of days of well above average warmth to ring out the old year and welcome the new, we're again in the deep freeze. This morning it dropped to just 10 degrees on the porch. It was a few degrees lower in the valley. The winds out of the west northwest have brought some lake effect snow as far south as our mountain home but that's only been an inch or two. Just enough to turn the ground white again without requiring any shovel work except on the deck. I can live with that. The snow that AccuHunch is forecasting for Friday and Saturday will--according to them--miss us as the heavy accumulations will be to our east and northeast.
The Bolt Hole hasn't been as lucky. The lake effect off of Lake Ontario has stretched as far east as that little section of the southwest Adirondack Park and this weekend's storm may bring several more inches to the area. Mark's not been around to give a first hand report, but I'm assuming there's a foot or more on the ground as I write and another six inches or so on the immediate horizon.
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Taking a clue from Wyatt at Support Your Local Gunfighter, I'm going to attempt to shed some of the weight I've been carrying around. While I was pretty good while we were on the road and gained only a pound or two, since the leaves fell my weight has gone up to 233 as of last Monday morning versus a pretrip total of around 215. Just too much inactivity and good holiday food. Now, 233 isn't a bad weight if you're a 6'2" middle linebacker ot a running back in the NFL, but for a 5'10" 61-year old retiree? Not so much. My goal is to at least return to the 215 pound level by April 1st. Then, as springtime arrives and outdoor activity can increase further, I'd like to get down to around 200 by my birthday in mid September.
I'll not be following any formal diet program but will instead just try to cut back on the snacks and portions and attempt to incorporate a bit more walking into my weekly schedule. If I was to follow a plan, it would be Weight Watchers as theirs makes the most sense.
As a start, I've eliminated ice cream from the freezer. (It never stayed there too long anyway as the 1.75 quart containers made just 3 or 4 servings.) Meal portions will be reduced. (Which makes Terry happy as the left overs will mean less cooking.) We will also move our "main meal" to the noon hour the better to not have it in our stomach as we sleep.
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Well, time to go back to the photos and get some more ready to use in our slide show.
Later.
4 comments:
You have quite a challenge in that hour-long presentation. We only spent 7 days on the road between St. Charles, MO and Anchorage - and I wouldn't want to try to fit all those pics into a short time. Good luck.
Good Luck with the weight loss. I am 6'2" and got down to 234.5 but gained a few pounds over the holidays. It is slow but smaller portions and less snacks is slowly taking the weight off. I am going to try to get down to around 200 if possible. I should be able to keep some measure of my mobility for a longer period of time. At least that is my hope.
JDP
Congrats on your losing your first pound! Keep up the good work.
Thanks, Mrs. Crankipants. I'll be posting my first weekly report on Tuesday. (That will give me an opportunity for one or two BMs and, perhaps, a better that one pound loss.)
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