More fun with charts

This was the first year I tracked my running mileage. My intent was to keep myself on track while training for the Mickelson Trail Marathon in June. By the time the race passed, I was in the habit of noting my mileage on my dachshund puppy calendar upon returning home. So, I kept up with it.

Tallying my monthly distance produced the following chart:

August turned out to be my big month. (Ah, summer. It seems so long ago now.) Cross country began mid-month. And I put in several long runs in preparation for the Sioux Falls Half Marathon.

March would have been my most productive month if not for the two blizzards that hit at the end of the month. (A third blizzard hit during the first weekend in April.) I only put in 18 miles in the last nine days of March. My marathon training boosted my mileage before then though.

I was surprised when I saw June was the month with the lowest mileage. I only ran 75.9 miles, and 26.2 of those were during the marathon. In fact, the marathon was the only time I ran through the 12th. My number one excuse for not regularly running marathons is the amount of time necessary for training. But it looks like my overall mileage drops both before and after race day as well. Half marathons good, marathons bad.

My seven-mile run this evening under a blue moon brought me to a grand total of 1,108.65 miles of running during 2009. That's roughly the distance between Boston and Atlanta.

I'll probably note my mileage during 2010 as well. I know I looked at the calendar a number of times this past year to find stretches of two, three, or four days where I hadn't run. It was easy to lose track because the year was so hectic, especially the summer. So, this exercise definitely kept me on my toes.

I don't think I have a target mileage figure for the coming year. My lone goal is to run 13.1 miles in an hour and a half.

Free at last

Today was my breaking point. Spending the better part of three days indoors is my limit, evidently. I'd been cooped up since Christmas Eve, which was, not coincidentally, also the last time I'd showered. You know things are bad when you smell yourself approaching from a mile away. But I'd been keeping up with my teeth-brushing. Ten years spanning the broad spectrum of orthodontia prevents one from becoming lax with oral hygiene.

But I digress. My point is, I needed to get out.

Freshly bathed (with clean clothes on too, no less), I squeezed myself past a drift and out the door. The hard part was still to come, as I had to circumnavigate several drifts in the road:

None were as large as the one in the yard. In the above photo, note the behemoth looming in the background. Also, the roof of my car is just barely visible above the smaller, middle drift.

Farther down the road, there was no getting around the smaller, yet still knee-dip, drifts. But, as Meriwether Lewis was apt to say, we proceeded on.

Since the roads in town had been plowed to allow at least one car to pass, the hard part was behind me. Of course, I still had to trudge through the snow again to get back; however, that was in the far, far future. I had made contact with the outside world, which was worth the frozen, stiff pant legs upon my return home.

And the best news of all is a front-end loader rolled through around 6:00 p.m., the skies have cleared, and the wind has died down. Guess who's going running in the morning.

***

The Mission Post Office:

Looking north up Mission's Main Street:

Christmas blizzard

We knew it was coming. Meteorologists in Sioux Falls said this could be the worst blizzard to hit South Dakota in 40 years, which is saying something. Local churches canceled holiday services. The folks at KINI told listeners Christmas Eve to make one last trip to the grocery store and stockpile wood to prepare for the approaching storm.

My main concern was losing power. We had freezing fog for three days earlier in the week. The heavy frost was beautiful, but it caused outages Tuesday and Wednesday evenings. In fact, some of the outlying communities were still without electricity and water on Thursday.

When the power goes out, so does my heat. Most of the winter storms are accompanied by northwest winds. Well, guess whose bedroom is in the northwest corner of the building. And it's not like this old place is well-insulated either.

My other concern was the pipes. We had frozen pipes a number of times last winter. Some even ruptured last December when the wind chill dipped to 45 below. Not fun.

The storm must have rolled in fast. When I went to bed Christmas Eve, the skies were clear and the moon was visible outside my west-facing window. Christmas morning, the wind was howling and the snow was blowing horizontally. And it didn't let up all day.

It's hard to say how much snow we received because of the wind. My front door is in the lee of the building. Portions of the sidewalk and my car are clear of snow. But the snow had an unobstructed path between the building and the church. A gigantic drift has formed in a northwest/southeast line:

A tree and a picnic table caused a slight saddle in the drift. The hump to the left is about eight feet tall; the one to the right is slightly smaller.

The road to town looks passable, but my car is surrounded by drifts. Good thing I don't have anywhere urgent to go. As I write this, watch my appendix burst or some other emergency befall. In fact, I feel some pain in the lower-right portion of my abdomen...

I think the snow has stopped falling, but the wind makes it hard to tell. It's still gusting to 40 miles per hour out there, blowing the snow all around. It should calm down by Monday, which is also when the sun is supposed to reappear. I'm anxious to see what the rest of town looks like.

Until then, the building is holding up well; I haven't lost power or water. And I have enough food to last me until early next week. I do get a bit stir crazy, though, if I'm cooped up indoors for long. So, I may chance a run once the wind dies down.

Winter in South Dakota!

The bird's nest

No, not the one in Beijing, but this one:

The curlicues aren't visible from this angle. Actually, my hair is behaving today. It's still early though...

Where's my curling iron?

When I was living in Delaware, Denise cut my hair. I'm not sure when my parents started taking me to her, but it couldn't have been long after we moved from below the Canal to Hockessin when I was five and a half. The place where she worked was literally just a few steps across the state line in Pennsylvania. When she left there to work at a salon in Trolley Square, we (the males in the family) followed her. When I go for visits back east, I always make a stop to see Denise. She's still one of my all-time favorite people.

When I left Delaware for Texas, I became more faithful to the clippers than to a specific hairdresser. I did later find Rhonda in Juneau, however. Like Denise, I followed Rhonda to her new shop. My "3 and 2" haircut isn't difficult. But Rhonda managed to clip my hair without leaving strays. One would think it wouldn't be so hard to spot those missed hairs considering how short I usually keep my hair. But when Rhonda wasn't available, I often found myself pulling the scissors out upon returning home. That's only worsened here in South Dakota, and I've tried hairdressers from Rapid to Sioux Falls.

But I kept my hair longer in my youth. I even had a part. When I was a kid, I would be ready for a haircut before Mom was willing to schedule the appointment with Denise. And since I obviously couldn't drive myself and she controlled the purse strings, I was stuck. My hair is wavy when it grows out. And it flares out in the back à la Carol Brady, just not as severe.

So, to buy a couple more weeks between visits to Denise, Mom would pull out her curling iron and curl the ends under. I'm not sure how this started, whether it was due to my bitching or my parents wanting to save the expense of a haircut for a few more weeks. (Or maybe it was Mom who didn't want me out in public looking like that. Hmmm...) But before school, she'd come down to the basement (where my bedroom was located) armed with the curling iron.

I share this memory because it's now been 15 weeks since my last haircut. Yes, I'm counting, and it's three times longer than my haircut frequency in Juneau. I think it looks... okay. But that depends on how it lays after coming out of the shower, whether I've worn a hat, and my mood. Sometimes, I look in the mirror and think, "Hey, not bad, Bri!" And other times I just look and shake my head at the bird's nest on top of my head, which is an appropriate description considering how dry my hair is, short or long.

There are no hairdressers in Mission, so that's one reason why my hair hasn't been cut lately. But I have to admit my hair's entertainment value has increased exponentially as the weeks have passed. I often find myself running my fingers through it pulling out the knots, just like when I was a kid. And before bed some nights, I head to the bathroom mirror to shape and contort my hair into designs once left only to my imagination. A few more weeks and I'll be ready to join A Flock of Seagulls.

After a cold run

The sun was down, pitch black except out to the far western horizon. It was cold (2 below), but the wind had died down (wind chill of 17 below). I needed to get out for a run.

The roads, both in town and to the north, were snow-packed, perfect conditions for YakTrax use. Because of the recent snow, passing vehicles didn't kick-up dust as the drove by. Not that there was much traffic out anyway.

Most of the dogs were evidently trying to keep warm somewhere instead of "greeting" me as I ran past the usual trouble spots. With just the light breeze and my headlamp visible from some distance, they would have heard or seen me coming. But, no. Just me running up the dark Dump Road and the crunch, crunch, crunch of my YakTrax on the snow.

The best part of my night runs is when I turn around at the top of the ridge to head for home, the lights of Mission and the Antelope Community down below. Prior to heading back, I can definitely see White River in the distance. I'm still trying to figure out if that's Murdo even further to the north. That's quite a ways.

It has been a frustrating couple of weeks. Nothing too bad, but there's plenty going on here. I'm still amazed, however, how quickly it all disappears when I'm at the top of that ridge in the dark. Yeah, my face and the Gatorade in my water bottle were half-frozen, but there was nowhere in the world I'd rather have been. And it's a moment that served more as a reinforcement than a reminder of the great life I have here.

It's now 8:00 p.m. The temperature is down to 10 below, 25 below with the slight breeze. I'm stuffed to the gills with spaghetti after a hot shower. I'm thawed, and I'd like the pipes to remain that way. Here's hoping for a night of functioning heat.

Guess who's coming to dinner?

I went to City Council tonight. For this faithful attendee, it had been a little while since my last meeting. The first November meeting was canceled, while I had to work during the second one.

I always learn something new at these meetings. Tonight, it was the complicated topic of governmental jurisdiction, notably state versus tribal. I came home with a worksheet which clears up some of my confusion. And electric rates are going up - again.

After the Council discussed holiday bonuses for City employees ($300, unanimously approved), the City's holiday party was next on the agenda. After setting the date and time, one of the Council members said, "I don't know if this needs a motion, but I think our concerned citizen should be invited." (He's always referred to me as "the concerned citizen." In a good way, of course.) That sentiment was quickly echoed by another member, which surprised me only because of his cool demeanor around me, both during Council meetings and in other settings.

So, I'm going to the City of Mission's holiday dinner at the end of the month. Obviously, it's not that big of a deal; however, I'm thankful for the offer, even if it's just recognition of my biweekly presence. "Thanks for attending our meetings. Here's your pork chop."

And they take note when I'm not present. Tonight, I was asked why I wasn't there two weeks ago. My long hair was also commented upon.

It's this small stuff that makes looking ahead to my departure from Mission very sad. And it doesn't help when I walk into the bank, as I did this afternoon, and all of the tellers greet me. Life on the rez is going to continue without me, for sure. But this is home and, unlike toward the end of my time in Juneau, I'm not in the mindset just yet of looking forward to the next adventure. It'll come, I think, when my grad school plans solidify.

But now? Well, I had better make the next six months as memorable as the last 12.