On Tuesday morning I did a gym session and then headed down to the river. I paddled in the harbor for 60 minutes, and during the 40-minute period from 0:10 to 0:50 I did a little workout of (1 minute on, 2 minutes off). For each "on" period I kept the stroke rate in the 70s; I didn't have my cadence sensor with me, but when you're doing one-minute pieces it's easy enough to count your strokes. The workout felt good and it was nice to have something besides the hip rotation to occupy my attention. I came away feeling good about what I'd done, and it's seemed like that hasn't often been the case lately.
The Mississippi River had crested over the weekend around 22 feet on the Memphis gauge. Over the 30 years or so that I've been paddling regularly on the Memphis riverfront, that's not a remarkable level, but it sure feels high compared to the levels we'd been having since last summer. It's dropping now and the current forecast says the level will be back in the single digits in a few days. Hopefully some more rain will fall in the Midwest soon and keep the river up. There's something satisfying about paddling atop a mass of freshly-fallen rain.
It's been a while since I've provided an update on the aches-and-pains front, and I guess that's because I haven't been feeling too bad lately. But there are definitely little things I'm dealing with. That pain in my right clavicle that was so bad a couple of months ago isn't gone, but it's not as bad as it was. Meanwhile I'm having soreness in my wrists and forearms, and I suspect that's being caused more by chores in the woodworking shop than by paddling my boat. Some days I have some stiffness in my lower and upper back, and some days I don't. Maybe the best news is that the pain I was having in my hip flexor in December seems to have run its course. That means I've got the option of incorporating some running into the routine again, though I'll probably wait until the weather is consistently warmer.
I've also had a few days this week where my digestion felt out of whack-- sort of a low-grade unsettled feeling in the pit of my stomach. As of this writing I think it's doing better, but it's lasted long enough to make me start thinking of morbid scenarios like some terrible cancer of the stomach or colon or intestines. I sure hope that's nothing more than my silly imagination.
I was back in the boat Thursday doing another 60 minutes in the harbor. It was mostly a steady paddle this time in which I focused, as usual, on hip rotation. On Friday I stayed in and did a gym session.
The weather was cool but sunny when I paddled on Tuesday and Thursday. By Saturday it was just the opposite: a bunch of rain had moved into the Mid South, while the temperature was up in the 60s on the Fahrenheit thermometer. I went down to the river Saturday morning and found it shrouded in fog, and the fog seemed to thicken as I paddled out of the harbor, up the Mississippi to the mouth of the Wolf River, and back down. Coming downriver I stayed within sight of the left bank just so I would know where I was, and so I wouldn't be surprised by any silent barge rigs. It wasn't until I was maybe 400 meters from the Hernando DeSoto Bridge that I was able to see the bridge's steel trusses. Once I was back in the harbor the fog was thick for several hundred meters, and then, suddenly, I came out of it. By the time I was back in my car, maybe a half-hour later, departing the riverfront, the fog was all gone from the river.
As for how I felt in the boat Saturday, well... I felt lousy. I was sluggish and slow, and the low visibility out on the river had almost a vertigo effect. I guess I've always struggled to have some giddy-up during the gloom of January and February, but I think it might be worse than ever this year.
I was out of the boat yesterday because the handbell group I play with had a gig. I'm also busy with a fairly complicated project in my woodworking shop. I'm hoping that spending some time with those things for a bit will be a good way for me to hit the reset button.
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