UUUUUUUUUUUUUUGH
My speed has freaking tanked due to whatever I did to my knee.
It’s really, really frustrating.
Sorry, too frustrated to blog.
UGUGUHGGHFHFDKHGDFKLGJFDGJDFKL
I could only do 14 miles today. I might have been able to do 15, but I didn’t want to push things too much.
It all still hurts, but if I walk really slowly and kinda wonky, I can start collecting miles.
I’m so slow, though. 3.86 MPH versus 4.90 MPH at the beginning of last week.
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.
I used to walk 30 miles a day…but then I took an arrow to the knee
Or rather, I took an “I don’t know what the hell I did, it just started randomly hurting” to the knee and now I can’t walk for shit.
Seriously. I was out walking this morning, planning just to do 20 miles because we were going to drive up to Coeur d’Alene this afternoon, and around mile 10 my right knee kind of started to twinge. Every muscle/joint/tendon/ligament/fiber in my lower body has hurt at some point on these long walks, so I kept going. By mile 12, it hurt so badly I was actually crying. Managed to hobble 4 more miles back into town and called my mom to pick me up at Winco.
I have no idea what I did, but it hurts to walk and everything is terrible. And I can’t go to a doctor or Quick Care or anything ‘cause I don’t have insurance in the States anymore.
Edit 1: alright, so it doesn’t actually seem like I hurt my knee. It’s seeming more like it’s a quad muscle thing or a connective tissue thing, though the symptoms I have aren’t really a great match to anything I can find on the internet. Maybe a quad strain or sprain? Maybe a tear? Maybe I screwed up the connective tissue?
I’ll take a day or so off. Maybe two. Then I’ll try a walk again.
UGH.
Edit 2: man, this turned into a thing.
Record Mileage!
So July is over.
Time to talk about miles.
This year has had some record months in terms of walking distance. I think I’ve walked more than 400 every month of the year this year, actually.
But July? A completely different story.
- Total July mileage: 670.48
- Total July steps: 1,472,068
- Average July speed: 4.6 mph
- Total time spent walking in July: 8,687.4 minutes
8,687.4 minutes is nearly 145 hours. That’s a bit more than 6 days.
I spent 6 whole days walking in July.
I walked on 23 of the 31 days in the month, which means my average walk was 29.15 miles long.
I also had that 50-mile walk, which I’m pretty damn proud of.
Here’s a graph of all my walks.
Here’s a graph of miles by day of the week.
WOO RECORD WALKING MONTH
3,000 Miles
Yo dawgz, I just hit 3,000 miles for the year. To put that in perspective, it took me until November 1st last year to get to that distance.
So that’s cool.
What’s cooler is this badass little hideaway I found while out walking the other day. This is about as far west as you can go on my current walking route. How cool is it that Calgary is a city of 1.2+ million and you can still get views like this from within the city?
What Happens at Mile 30 Stays at Mile 30 (warning: gross feet pics)
Walking 30 miles takes quite a bit of time.
It also beats the hell out of my feet. Ready to see?
Gross callouses!
My feet have the consistency of a pumice stone.
I might lose my toenail.
This is the bottom of my foot after walking in the rain for a few hours.
Fun!
Sorry. I know it’s gross, but it’s what’s up with my life right now.
H I L A R I T Y
So walking 30 miles takes me about 6.5 hours, right? During these 6.5 hours, I like to think.
Just think.
I think best while I’m out walking.
However, every once and a while, I’ll randomly think of some hilarious thing and just start laughing like an idiot while I’m walking.
Which I’m sure doesn’t make me look crazy at all.
Examples of such hilarious things?
- “It’s time for a new sheriff”
- “Stop bidding against me or I will invade you!”
- This freaking Vine
- That time Sean was running around the house wearing socks and just ate it on the hardwood floor. Aaron bought him some of those grippy socks from the dollar store to prevent future accidents.
- “I walk onto a terrace where I think I’m alone / But Arthur Fonzarelli’s got an army of clones!”
- That time Aaron, Lanky, and I put like 30 of those magic grow capsules in the toilet and Sean came home to a bunch of sponge animals clogging up the toilet bowl.
- That time I put like 30 of those magic grow capsules in a blender with some water and Sean came home to a bunch of shredded sponge animals and a blender clogged with partially dissolved capsule gunk.
- Brendan’s Dune “bloopers” script.
- That slowed down line in The Beetis song.
There’s more, but these are the recent ones.
I am Walking Georg
Canadians, y’all need to get up off your butts.
I’m actually surprised the average daily step total was as high as 5,000 across the different countries, but that surprise might just be a product of the fact that I’ve just lived in the US and Canada, two of the “lower than average” step total countries.
There are flaws with the study, of course, in that it was a voluntary survey and relied on smartphone tracking rather than anything more controlled (and omitting any walking done when people weren’t carrying their smartphones), but still.
But I should shut up anyway; I’m an outlier.
YAY I DID IT
Did what? My 50-mile walk, that’s what! It took me 10:16 straight hours of walking, but it’s done.
Oh, and I totally didn’t go this route that I’d planned a while back. I just walked up and down the river path, up and down 17th, and then back home along 16th. Lots of back and forth. But it was better that way.
This was a pretty big deal for me. I wanted to prove to myself that I could walk 50 miles in a day, and I can.
Coolio.
STUPID FREAKING SUMMER RAIN, MAN
I grew up in Moscow, where summers are dry. I don’t like this wet summer nonsense.
Like…it’s not as if I haven’t walked in the rain before. It sucks but it’s manageable. But it was seriously raining this morning, so I took the day off.
Which I shouldn’t have, because the rain cleared up around 1 PM.
But leaving for a 30-mile walk at 1 PM means that I wouldn’t be home until like 7 PM at the earliest.
Which I didn’t want to do.
So BLAH.
Sorry, I’m in a bad mood.
This is my life now
My existence right now:
- 5:00 AM: get up, get dressed, and head out for a 30-mile walk
- 9:00 AM: stop in the bathroom by the walking path to put on sunscreen, since the sun is finally high enough in the sky to burn me
- 11:30 AM: walk done! Arrive at Westbrook Mall. Shop if necessary
- 12:00 PM: Catch the bus back home
- 12:30 PM: Crash on the bed with Jazzy for a few hours
- 3:00 PM – 12:00 AM: Do non-walking stuff
- 12:30 AM: Make dinner (sometimes)
- 3:00 AM: Crash on the couch for a few hours before getting up to walk
Rinse, repeat.
It’s actually kind of fun. I’m pretty proud of the fact that I can walk 30 miles a day.
Sinister 7
WOAH WHAT IS THIS
For anyone who doesn’t want to click on the link (for whatever the hell reason?), the Sinister 7 is a 100-mile race through the Rocky Mountains in Alberta. There are seven sections/stages and you get 30 hours to complete it.
I wonder if I could walk that far in 30 hours. Or more specifically, I wonder if I could walk that far on uneven, rough terrain in 30 hours.
It’s an interesting idea. MAYBE I’LL TRY IT NEXT YEAR WHY NOT
Dear Knee:
I have given you time—multiple months, in fact—to let you calm down and heal from whatever damage I did to you when I did those two half-marathons back to back.
If you do, in fact, have runner’s knee, then the rest from running should have helped.
So tell me, knee o’ mine, why you decided not to get any better and instead start causing pain about 5 km into a very nice, relaxing run this afternoon?
Why you gotta be like that, knee? Why you gotta be a pain when all I want is to give you fun exercise?
I.
JUST.
WANT.
TO .
RUN.
WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT?????
At least walking doesn’t hurt. I’d be screwed if walking hurt.
LEIBNIZ DAY 2017
IT’S LEIBNIZ DAY!!
YAY!!
It’s also Canada’s 150th birthday, but Leibniz day takes precedence for me. The guy invented calculus, yo. Would Canada even exist without calculus?
I GUESS WE’LL NEVER KNOW, WILL WE
(Sorry, I’m hyper.)
I also did a 30-mile walk this afternoon/evening. It took me 6 hours and 18 minutes, but I kept a pace of 4.77 MPH despite it being obscenely hot and then obscenely thunderstormy. My feet/legs didn’t feel any worse than they do after a typical 15-mile walk, so hey, that’s cool. I’mma try it again on Monday.
(I spent most of my walk thinking about Leibniz, not gonna lie.)
Mileage Update: Halfway Point
If I had walked 15 miles a day six days a week (as was my goal at the beginning of the year), my current mileage should be: 2,340
What my current mileage actually is: 2,433.19
Nice? But 90 miles a week won’t get me to 5,000 miles for the year!
To be on pace for the 5,000 miles, my current mileage should be: 2,500 (duh)
So I’m a little behind.
TO BE FAIR, I’ve had to take quite a few days off from walking entirely in order to get all my work done for teaching this semester. And since I don’t have anything else to do in July*, I’m going to try to not only make up the difference in miles but try to get ahead of pace.
So yeah. Hopefully I’ll be able to make it!
*“Get a job, you lazy bum,” you say? Well, I technically got paid for a whole summer’s worth of work teaching during spring. Plus, I’m still holding out and hoping that I’ll get another class to teach in the fall (pleasepleasepleaseplease). PLUS, I’m going to Moscow in August and then on a week-long cruise with Nate, and I don’t know if any job would be willing to give me that much time off right off the bat. So for now, I’m going to take advantage of the awesome opportunity I have to spend a whole month walking to my heart’s content. How many people get to do that?
Zeet Zeet I’m a Beet
HOKAY, so I’ve walked a total of 2,199.32 miles this year so far. I want to get to 2,500 by July 1st.
So can I walk 300.68 miles in June?
I should be able to. Heck, given what I’ve walked so far this year, I’m actually averaging 439.864 miles per month, which is way more than I’ve ever done per month in the past.
SNAZZY!
Also, have some Braves playing terribly.
I’m completely under Saucony’s thumb and I don’t even care
Ayyyyyyy, so today I broke in my third pair of shoes this year. As far as my previous pair goes, here are some stats, all cumulative since March 20th:
Distance: 839.96 miles
Steps: 1,815,832
Average speed: 4.54 mph
Total time spent walking: 189 hours and 20 minutes (that’s like 7.8 days of walking, haha)
Hooray for a new pair of shoes!
Edit: blister party 2k17!
Edit 2: blister party 2k17, it is now 4:00 in the morning and I’m calling the cops. Please stop.
Edit 3: the blisters have bought the downstairs condo and are partying 24/7. Send help.
Well now I HAVE to do it
So as you probably all know, I’ve been doing my “walk 15 miles six days a week” thing this year. I’ve been half joking that I’m going to try to get to 5,000 miles by the end of the year.
Then I found this out:
That distance? 4,989 miles.
And now I practically have to make it to 5,000 miles. Walking across the Pacific Ocean? Awesome. Especially since I walked across the Atlantic Ocean last year.
Counting today’s walk, I’m at 1,776.3 miles. That puts me about here:
Long way to go!
The Inaugural “It’s Too Damn Hot to Walk” Walk
I don’t think I’ve walked in temperatures this high since…two summers ago? I don’t think it got this hot in Calgary last summer, and if so, maybe once. Maybe.
ALSO: what the hell is up with the dust in Moscow? I can walk 18 miles in Calgary without my feet turning black from dust (at least, not yet). But 18 miles in Moscow? My freaking shins are dusty. What.
In other news: I’ve walked over 1,700 miles this year so far! I’m going to have to push it a bit to get to 2,500 miles by July 1st (which would mean I’m half way to my 5,000 mile goal at the halfway point of the year), but it’s totally possible.
WEE!
The Fade: Part II
So it’s FINALLY getting warmer up here (sort of), which means it’s time to start transitioning into “summer walking pants” as opposed to my thicker “winter walking pants.”
I put on the summer ones for the first time a few days ago, and wow…I forgot how faded they’d gotten last summer.
Yes, that’s fade. The top part of the pants are their original color–that portion is always covered by my shirt. The rest? Faded as hell.
Serious fashion.
It is April 9th
In 2013, my total walking distance was 1,361.2 miles.
Counting today’s walk, I have already surpassed that distance, with a total 2017 mileage of 1,373.48. It’s taken me a total of about 305 hours of walking to do that, which roughly rounds to 12.7 days of walking.
That’s pretty snazzy, if you ask me.
I want to try for 5,000 miles this year, but who knows what the fall will bring in terms of a job (HOPEFULLY MORE TEACHING PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE), so we’ll see.
The Consequences of Walking 15 Miles per Day
So yesterday I surpassed 1,000 miles walked for the year. I’m too lazy to check, but I’m pretty sure it took me until sometime in May to reach that same distance last year.
So in celebration (?), here are all the things I’ve noticed that are consequences of walking 15 miles per day*.
- It’s only March whatever and I already have to get a new pair of shoes.
- My cardiovascular fitness is better than it ever has been. My resting heart rate is in the high 40 BPMs. It used to be as high as the 70s.
- I CAN RUN LIKE THE WIND!
- I can’t actually run like the wind. But a 10k is like no problem at all anymore.
- INGROWN TOENAILS, ANYONE??? At least none of them have fallen off. TMI, I know.
- It doesn’t show up well in a picture, but I can assure you that my heels have the texture of pumice stone.
- Walking 15 miles takes me anywhere from 3.5 to 4 hours. That’s a decent chunk of time, but I try to justify it by telling myself that if I wasn’t out walking, I’d probably spend that time sitting around and being useless. At least this way I get exercise/miles.
- My speed has also gotten a lot faster. Last year it was a lot of work to break 4 mph. Now I’m pretty consistently at a speed of 4.5 mph or faster.
- Here’s a non-consequence (a nonsequence?): I still am crap at telling distances. The only way I can even remotely guess how far I’ve walked (if I’m not constantly looking at my pedometer) is by keeping track of how long I’ve been walking, as my speeds are usually pretty consistent. But if I stop to get groceries and/or charge my iPod, all hope is lost for mileage monitoring.
- There’s probably more to this list, but I can’t think of anything else right now.
So yeah. Party time.
*Okay, so I don’t walk this distance every day. From Saturday to Thursday, I walk at least 15 miles per day. On Fridays I barely get off my lazy butt. So I guess it averages to a little under 13 miles per day technically, but it really is 15 per day on the 6 out of 7 days per week that I actually walk. So there.
1,000 Miles!
Woot, I hit 1,000 miles during my walk this afternoon. I actually walked up to Westbrook Mall in order to buy a new pair of walking shoes (1,000 miles is “replace the shoes” time whether I want to or not), but of course they had zero Kinvaras.
Oh well. Guess I’ll get them tomorrow.
STATS!
Mileage: 1,006.09
Time spent walking: 222 hours, 36 minutes, 9 seconds (that’s like 9.25 days, haha)
Average speed: 4.61 MPH
Graph!
ONWARDS!
“Gluten for Punishment” would be a great name for a bread store
It’s the end of February and I’ve walked a total of 825 miles this year.
Last year, it took me until April 11th to walk 825 miles.
So that’s pretty cool.
My toes are in shambles, though, and I could probably sand a deck with my rough heels, but THE PRICES WE PAY, RIGHT?
(If I could get to 5,000 miles this year, that would be awesome.)
OH MY GOD I DID IT
I broke the 5 MPH barrier during a walk this afternoon.
I didn’t maintain it for long (I did a marathon walk today, so I slowed down quite a bit during the last several miles), but this is the first time that I’ve ever had my walking speed average over 5 MPH for any amount of time.
So that’s pretty cool.
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