running

It has been several months since the last time I "Blogged". I have no real excuse other than that I have been busy with work, crazy women, crazy friends and just an all around?hectic lifestyle. I have recently taken two steps back and reevaluated a lot of the things in my life and changed several things. I think that every once in a while this is an exercise that we all do, sometimes we do it internally and the changes are not so apparent other times we make drastic changes that are very apparent. I would classify this right in the middle. For many of my friends nothing will change for others they'll see a big change.

sssooooo.... What have I been up to?

(deep breath).... 8k run, 10k run and another 5k run this weekend. I went to Boston to meet Diana and then we went to NYC (both of which were awesome), wine tasting, my cousin's birthday up in Seattle, Salsa dancing every now and again, started a Becker Conviser course for the CPA exam, developed and framed about 20 new pictures including a 4 1/2 foot long panoramic (it is sweet). I haven't been to the mountain for sometime now, nor have I been surfing.

I have two new additions to my "Family"

• A sweet Panasonic 3CCD Mini-DV camera.. wait I mean Scchwweett.
• An AWESOME 10 yr old Classical Guitar in perfect condition! ; Takamine CP132SC

Other news..

My student loans are due this month and my Masters degree still hasn't made me any more money.

I have tons more to write about but that should give all two of you an idea of what has been going on with me.

Until next time.

Well I went back to see the doctor again today. I still have not gotten rid of this horrible cough that I have. After running some checks, looking in my ears, nose and down my throat, and listening to my breathing he concluded that I have a sinus infection. Apparently a sinus infection can irritate your throat, especially during the evening, and causes one to have dry coughes. Oh and do dry cough hurt ever so bad. He prescribed some antibiotics and said that I should start feeling better within a matter of days.

The good news is that during my checkup he asked if I ran often. I, of course, responded "Heck Ya, boy!" (alright, I?only said?"yes"). I apparently have a very low rate heart which is common for?runners.

My run yesterday was great! I ran past the city limits of Salamanca and then ran along the border of the town. I can now honestly say that I have ran throughout the entire town of Salamanca out to each of the borders, it took me 4 weeks and I had to run about 3 to 4 times each week but I did it!!! The storm rolled in yesterday right when I began my run but I still ran in it anyways. It was quite fun, the wind provided enough resistance to make my legs ache this morning. The rain came down pretty hard at times and I was drenched within a matter of minutes but like I said it was about 30 when I went running so who cares.

Towards the end of my run I discovered a new park. It is similiar to the park that I have been going to but the grass is greener and all of the equipment is newer in the park (sit up benches, monkey bars, swings, etc. etc.). I went back to the park today to do a workout on the equipment. It is a perfect place to workout because it has a track that leads you to each of the different workout places so you can run, do some exercises, run some more, do more exercises, etc. etc.

In other news. Tonight we are heading out to another concert at Domus Atrium 2002, the same place where we saw The Ladybug Transistor. I think this concert brings my concert count in Spain to 12 or so. There were a few other concerts that I wanted to go to but I missed them for various reasons. Tomorrow night I am heading to a Flamenco concert with a few classmates that should be pretty interesting. Everyone has been telling me that Flamenco concerts are boring but they also said that bullfights were boring and to be honest I kinda liked the bullfight.

I have decided to leave town a day early and head to Madrid for two days. Upon the recommendation of a particular person I have to go to the Prado and a few other museums. Sander, Daniel, Jenson and I are going to head to Madrid on Friday morning and spend the night. Daniel, Jenson and I are all leaving from Madrid bound for different destinations. Daniel is heading back to Holland, Jenson to London and myself to Paris. Sander is staying in Salamanca for another week or two so he?ll be heading back to Salamanca. I may update my blog tomorrow but if not I will update it when I am back in the US, trying to find an internet cafe in Paris is freakin? difficult.

Until next time....?

I went for an awesome run yesterday. I ran about 6K or so, i?m not exactly sure but it seemed to be about 6k on the map. The temperature was probably in the high 20s or low 30s (28-32) and clear and sunny. The people in Spain are much more friendly than in France, every runner I passed said hola or another greeting and none of them looked at me funny or made me feel uncomfortable. When I ran in France I would get yelled at if I crossed the road at the wrong time or if I waited for cars to pass I could never win.

In Spain, however, I was waiting at a cross walk for the cars to pass and this old man was giving me advice on how to properly cross the road. At first I did not understand what he was saying to me so I walked a bit closer to him and kindly asked to repeat himself because I was not good at Spanish. He was kind enough to slow his speech and he even physically showed me how to cross the street. So as a complete opposite instead of me helping an old man cross the street and old man was helping me cross the street. It was pretty cool, he was awesome.

Just to let you know. The street was a round-about with two lanes in the road about but three lanes out of the round for each outlet (4 outlets total). There were no signals and although there is a walk signal it apparently never turn from red to green (or so the man said). So in short, my run was quite fun. Now I?m off to finish up my homework and to go swimming.

I woke up today at 9am so that I could take pictures of Jennifer and Kylie and they finished running the Portland Shamrock run (crazy freaks). Their pictures are posted here. Since I had the camera on me for the rest of the day I decided to take other pictures too, they are also posted in the same place.