Tuesday, October 30, 2012

All Alone In The Moonlight, I Remember.

Just recently I realized that certain songs remind me of certain events that happened in my life. It's the strangest thing, but I've talked to others about this and they said it occurs with them too. Either way, I created a small list of songs and the stories associated with them. I must say the list consists of some pretty good tunes ranging from boys bands to folk.

Where to start though is the question...

High School. Paradise by the Dashboard Light - Meatloaf. This one is a one liner, barely seventeen and barely dressed.

Wagon Wheel - Old Crow Medicine Show. Grade 12 winter, every time DC, SM, and I would drive down to O-town for some indoor meets we would blast this tune as we flew down the highway. One time we went down in a blizzard and we came home with 13 second pb's. Myself and DC ran 4:07 that day. Twas a blast minus the fact that we drove 60km/hour the whole way there and the race was 40min late. Oh, and we ran 400m too that day, ran a 59. Please don't laugh.

If Ya Gettin' Down - 5iveBenabus Jonses showed me this one, I think it was on much dance '95... Yeah he owned that album! Craziness. Either way the night he showed us this tune we were on our way to Pizza Hut with LS for the family fun feast for 6. This meal is huge too, it consists of one monster salad, one monster bowl of pasta, 4 garlic breads with cheese, and 2 large pizzas. We had one rule, no vomiting. We did it and were the first 3some to ever complete the task.

Who's That Chick - David Guetta ft Rihanna. OFSAA 2011. Its was DC and my's first track OFSAA, we just got to the track, and boom we hear it, we feel the beat, we start grooving and swaying. I'm telling you, it was the coolest entrance ever (next to maybe..... this one), got so jacked up!

Electrolove - Kuba Oms. Can sum it up with one name, Freddy. And one letter, X. And one word, Frosh. Basically every party at the slampiece (XC guys home) that song was played at least 6 times. Thanks Fred.

Finally the main event. Good Day - Nappy Roots. Over the weekend we were in Halifax for the AUS XC Championships, it was wild! Race went well. Did what I had to do. Now its time to gear up for the formal. Not the point though, The girls raced first, and was it ever a nail biter, I think X won by maybe 5 points. Then the guys were off (thats me) and we killed it as expected, but still. Now where the song comes into play, after the race before the cool down we were all just chilling and being happy and stuff and we start walking and then we start grooving, then we are having a dance party in the middle of the road. Wild! Side note, turned old last week, so once back at X we celebrated a tad, and danced the night away.

Two weeks till the formal.
see ya'll there
rj


Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Can You Smell That Smell?

Anybody that knows me personally know that I am not the biggest fan of soap and products that deal with keeping someone clean. I have my reasons, I'm not crazy or anything, I do not believe that the government puts cameras and microphones in shampoo bottles. And it's not as if I do not clean myself! I do. Alright, my reasons, shampoo makes my hair look weird, body wash just gets washed off. Being 100% honest there was a time where soap was just not part of my life, but now, now it is. It's on a pretty strict schedule and the soaps used are carefully picked out. Herbal Essence shampoo and goat milk soap.

Now to what I really wanna talk about is choosing your smell. It's a tough thing to do. I spent like 30 minutes today trying to pick a new deodorant, I've used the same kind for about 18 months so I figured it is time to switch it up. But when choosing a smell you always want the smell to encompass your lifestyle, personality, your youness. I wanted something a tad stronger than the last stuff, maybe meaning I got intense or something. Either way, I got a new scent.

I guess some running news would be nice, did a pretty fun workout on saturday. Might be the first time I have ever talked workouts on here, might be a workout wednesday kinda thing happening. Either way, 6x1mile-400m rest on the track. last 2 in spikes. They started at 5:00, probs the hardest one to be honest ran the first lap in 78, really had to work the last 800m. Then they went 4:52, 4:56, 4:52, 4:53. And as always the last one is balls out. Too bad it was windy, I think I could have broke my mile pb of 4:40 set last year in a 5x1mile repeats, ran 4:43. So it seems like I am kinda fit hopefully it all comes together this weekend. AUS on saturday.

X gunna give it to ya!

rj

Thursday, October 18, 2012

Volvo

Seems like as soon as boys, sorry men** hit puberty they make reasons to grow their facial hair. Some examples being Movember and Decembeard. Another good one is the evolution of the hockey playoff mullet or mohawk to the playoff beard. But as a fairly cleanly society for the most part, minus the homeless and the people who dont like soap society makes us create reasons for our facial hair, like how Movember is for testicle cancer, I'm not saying I have a problem with the events purpose, but why can't we just grow beards for the sake of growing beards. Brings me to my next point.

November is awful chilly when you are in nothing but shorts and a small shirt (pinny/jersey), and I don't think it's legal to race in a mask (balaclava). So what do we do? We stand up! We fight! WE GROW CROSS BEARDS! Sadly though this does fall under the category of society making us create a reason for our beards. None the less, mine is in full swing and nothing is stopping this one. Not even a lady!

So I thought I would create my general rules for a XC beard.

1. beard starts either the day oh the first race, or the 1st day of training camp.
2. no shaving it untill after CIS, NCAA,OFSAA, PEISSAA.
3. allowed to trim it into a stache for movember if you want.
4. its allowed to be nasty.

May the beard be with you.

rj

Thursday, October 11, 2012

For So Long It's Not True.


I'm going through some mad writers block right now, I can't type more than a couple sentences without having to start over. But now after about an hour of sitting here staring at this bright screen and not studying for my mid term tomorrow I realize what has my mind all up in tangles. This weekend we are headed to UNB for an annual (other than last year) race against all the Quebec schools. I don't know what scares me more the fact that they are french or that they are kinda fast.

that's all I got right now.

rj

Tuesday, October 09, 2012

My World It Smiles, We Run The Miles.

Thanksgiving was this past weekend, and I found myself far away from home, I was all the way down in Yarmouth Nova Scotia. The most southern point in the little province and was it ever the prettiest little town I have ever seen. Went down south with a couple buddies to one of their homes for some turkey and fun, and did we ever have a ton of fun! Missed the family a lot though, missed the Turkey Trot (5km race in my town), winner gets a turkey. I guess I'll cut right to the chase, things I am thankful for this year.

All the guys on the team, they are just the best of folks. We have such a strong sense of team pride due to the fact that we are one of the forgotten treasures of X athletics. Another great thing about our team is how close we all are, coaches are always saying that its all about good team dynamics. Our team has the weirdest team dynamics ever, all we do is chirp the s*** out of each other, no one is safe. The funniest part too is how against the girls team we are, it's actually sad how boring they are. But, I'm not going to complain, without the girls team it's just a bunch of guys running around naked.

That's a good into the next thing I'm thankful for, is the stories that occur on the run. Some that can be laughed about, cried over, and others never spoken of. One of the best ones this year must be chasing down Olympians, where I met Eric Gillis. Another that still haunts my dreams is a LSD on a sunday not to long ago where we were recovering from the race and beers from the day before when this guy comes running after us, at first we were happy to see runners out, but once the towel came off and his junk began to flop back and forth with every stride the team took off like rockets. About 4 minutes later he finally gave up either to exhaustion or because we were running up one of the busiest streets in the town and multiple cars would have seen his white a** chasing us.

Last but not least, my family, they are cool people! I miss them a ton.

rj