It could be a result of my creeping old age, which some days is less of a creeping like an afternoon shadow across a patio and more like a wild galloping horse from which I have fallen, attached only by a single foot stuck in a stirrup as I get dragged along to an inevitable conclusion.
But my question is this: is it just me, or is it cold?
This spring seems to be slower in arriving than a tax refund. Slower than just about any spring I can recall in the last few years.
It is absolutely true our winter was relatively simply – maybe two or three mornings when shovelling was required and perhaps two or three weeks of true, raw chilling cold. So are we paying the price for that now?
Where are the scientists and their data on global warming, alarming us about the coming tropical reckoning? Even on Saturday and Sunday, days filled with glorious sun and blue skies, it was too cold for my old bones to cycle. The windchill created on a bike moving 25 or 30 km per hour is outside of my comfort zone.
So no biking for me yet – and no, I have not yet replaced the Bianchi. These things take time.
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Chris and I went to the Glen Abbey Rec Centre on Saturday and signed him up for a summer student membership. The facility is remarkably clean and far better equipped than when I used it more than a century ago. It’s not ATC, but it’s fine for what he wants.
Mostly it’s well equipped and close to home. Score on both those points, plus $85 for four months, including use of the pool and racquet courts is amazing value.
Chris will bike over and back, which involved a little tune up of the off-road bike as well as a new bike lock and a new helmet.
He got his first workout under his belt and now me and the boys can stand around the kitchen and trade stories of rippin’ curls and ab-busting barbell rollouts.
Curls for the girls. Sun’s out, guns out.
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Because I go to ATC I can sometimes speak the language of “training” with Patrick. I do not pretend to do what he does, but I can relate. So when he talks about what he is lifting in a front squat or deadlift and whether he’s using a hex bar or a straight bar, I know what he’s talking about.
I do the same things. Only, lighter. And slower.
Pad is a BTNL guy and I’m an ATC guy and as much as I’d enjoy him coming to ATC some Saturday morning and working out with me and the regulars, I don’t see that happening. If you’ve seen West Side Story, it’s a kind of a Sharks and Jets thing, to him anyway.
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I am going to embark on a home painting project. Front foyer. Staircase walls. Kitchen. Baseboards. Ceiling.
My hope is to be completed to a level of domestic partner approval in time for the Leafs next Stanley Cup parade.
Updates will follow as hilarity ensues. Probably this is a bigger project than I think. Good news is I’m not really smart enough to know the difference.
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Engaging Laura in a conversation about painting triggered a small avalanche of spring cleaning on Sunday. I had already done a passable-for-a-guy cleaning of the house on Saturday before she returned from a trip.
Discussing painting led to discussing all the things that need to be done before painting, and some of that started yesterday. Stuff like taking ceramic bowls and bric brac off the tops of the kitchen cupboards and cleaning them and washing the tops of the cupboards.
Which then led to window cleaning, baseboard cleaning, washing the car, and a bunch of other stuff that, yes, needed to be done and no, had nothing to do with painting.
Laura will pick the colour(s) and I will provide the labour. She’s away for work for chunks of the next week or two so, I have a deadline of sorts.
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Prince died last week. He was slightly older than me but basically the same age. I really liked his music and his ability to move effortlessly (well it seemed effortless; I’m sure there was lots of effort) between genres.
The guy was a genius and he stood up to the record companies to fight for control of his music and, it seems now, his legacy.
Accomplished as a writer, he was also one of the top guitarists in the world, respected by virtually everyone whom the media would consider to be elite.
When I was cleaning the house on Saturday afternoon, I played a lot of Prince and really loud, too.
I have no idea why he died but I could guess. A vegan with a reputation for clean living, Prince was not of the reputation of, say, Keith Richards (who is alive and well and turns 126 later this year.)
But a clean living rock star is not the same as a clean living couple in Oakville. Even on good days, these folks lead busy, hard lives. Clean living for show biz folk is relative, I think, to what we consider cleaning living.
I think the respect and tributes paid to Prince is quite telling about where Prince stood in the music pecking. Springsteen opened a weekend concert in Brooklyn, NY, with Purple Rain. Clapton. Elton John. James Taylor. Usher. So many stars from so many genres of music and they all considered him ground breaking.
teamoakville 