daily slice-of-life photo blog of a Gen-X dad
Today I went for a quick ride around the neighborhood with Sophie, my 1972 Peugeot UJ-10 bicycle. I happened to be wearing my newly-acquired Tomie joggers that I found at TJ Maxx over the holidays. It was such a random find that I had to buy it (only $12). It really scares Mariko.😆
Give the video a watch if you have a few minutes!
I took a snapshot this afternoon and when I put it into Adobe Lightroom, I hovered the mouse cursor over a preset by mistake and the sky turned a pale blue. It reminded me of a summer evening so I decided to keep it. I miss summer!
Yesterday I completed one of my bucket list items, which was to run a marathon.
I am actually registered for the Austin Marathon that is happening in February, but with the Omicron variant going crazy right now, I’m not sure that I want to join the masses and run in it. That has been on my mind lately.
I realized that it’s convenient and easy to say that the virus is the reason I don’t want to run in the Austin Marathon, while the real reason might be that I am just not confident that I can run that distance. So to eliminate that possible reason, I decided to just run my marathon early and prove I can do it. Now I can have a clear conscience if I decide to not run in the big race.
Another thing I was thinking about (and I should admit to myself) is that I’m not really into running in organized races or events. I’ve run in several 10K and 5K races, and they aren’t that fun to me. People have said that running the marathon is fun because people are cheering you on. That actually doesn’t sound fun to me. It makes me feel uncomfortable. I prefer to run in my own little world. I guess that’s just the way I am.
Well, I have over a month to decide if I want to race in it or not, but right now I’d give it a 20% chance of it happening.
One of the bonuses of New Year’s osechi is that eventually you can put most of the dishes into a pot and make a nice curry. The lotus, carrots, chicken, and mushrooms makes for a delicious Japanese curry. It’s awesome!
I hope you had a nice day. またね〜
In 2021 I started a couple of new habits which I am somewhat proud of.
One of these is studying Japanese with Duolingo. It’s a lot of fun, and I can definitely see progress. In 2022 I will continue with Duolingo, but also make an effort to use my Genki book, Anki flashcards, and WaniKani in order diversify my studying a bit.
A cool thing is that when I go running and am listening to Japanese songs that I’ve had on my playlist for years, I can understand more and more words. And my listening skills have gotten better too in that I am able to isolate words and phrases that I do not know. However, I wish there was a way to make a quick note when I am running with the unknown word or phrase so I can look it up later. I don’t think Siri can do that while my phone is in my running belt. So I try to repeat the word so I can remember to look it up later. Or maybe I should just remember what song it was from? That may be easier… We’ll see! At any rate, it’s a fun and satisfying learning journey.
