Back in March 2012, I started taking a walk at 10 am every morning. It was right about the time I got my first FitBit device and the walk served several purposes. It allowed me to get in some exercise. It broke up my morning so that I wasn’t stuck in my office writing code or sitting in meetings all day long. It allowed me to clear my head. I was very diligent about this walk, going regardless of the weather conditions. In the winter, this was a little more difficult especially when it was cold, windy, and rainy, but I still would get out when I could.

Then, in February of this year, I became an Audible subscriber and started listening to books while I walked. My walk is not long, just a mile. It goes around the block on which my office building sits and generally takes me 15-20 minutes. But I loved the fact that I could spend that time walking and listening to a book.

My walk has evolved since then. In late February or early March, I started repeating the walk at 2 pm, getting it in twice a day. Then, as the weather warmed up and improved, I added lunchtime as well. For the last couple of weeks I’ve been walking three times each day, at 10am, noon and 2pm. Sometimes, at lunch, I’ll walk around the block twice. These three walks pretty much ensure that I’ll hit my 10,000 step goal each day. Usually, my FitBit Flex buzzes (letting me know I’ve reached my goal) just before the end of my 2 pm walk. They’ve also had the side effect of breaking up my day into more manageable chunks: 7:30 – 10 am; 10 am – noon; noon – 2pm; and 2pm – the end of my workday.

I’ve grown fond of these walks that on days where I work from home, I miss them. Indeed, I’ve been feeling slightly under the weather the last couple of days. When I woke up this morning, I felt downright rotten, and ordinarily would have considered staying home. But I didn’t want to miss my walks, so I came into the office. (I also have a bunch of meetings this morning that I would have had to reschedule.)

At this point, the walks are the only real regular exercise that I get, and I think it is good that I’ve managed to make them serve so many useful purposes at once. I really look forward to them each day I come in. And sometimes, when the sun is particularly warm on that first walk of the morning, I take it a little bit slower than usual, just so I have a little more time to soak up that sunshine.

Some other things of note from the weekend because I feel bad for not posting at all on Saturday or Sunday. Here are some of the things that kept me from posting this weekend.

Installed a new cable modem

On Friday, I realized that I’d never heard back from Cox Communications when I accepted their offer of a free cable modem upgrade. I’d accepted that offer on April 2 and received an order confirmation that same day. And then nothing. Now, I’ve dealt with cable companies that had deplorable customer service, most notably, Comcast. But I’ve always had excellent, even outstanding service from Cox. So I was surprised when I called to get a status update that I got a bit of a runaround. I called the number in the email I was sent and was told that I’d gotten the wrong department. I was connected to the “right” department, which still turned out to be the wrong department. I got someone who said their manager was out but they’d call me back.

At that point, I decided to start from scratch. On that second try, I got someone who could handle my request. They not only apologized but said they were Fed Ex’ing a new cable modem and that if it went out that day (Friday) I might have it by Monday. After that call, I had a message from the person I’d spoken to previously, given me the number I was supposed to call. So props for following up.

I didn’t have to wait until Monday. The modem arrived Saturday. I got it installed, called Cox to activate it, and it is working beautifully.

It goes to show that not only does Cox really have good customer service, but when they slip, they make up for it quickly.

Still listening to Craig Wasson read 11/22/63 by Stephen King

I re-read 11/22/63 back in February but since then, someone mentioned that Craig Wasson did a phenomenal reading and so I’ve been reading the book again, this time via Audible and Wasson’s reading. And it is a phenomenal reading. I listen to this reading, and the performance that William Dufris gave for John Scalzi’s The Human Division and I wonder at how wrong I was when I scoffed at audio books as something less than actual reading. The performance dimension, especially when those performances are subtle, add a dimension to the book that simply doesn’t exist when I read the book on the page.

I’ve got several more books lined up after I finish this one, including:

• The Shining by Stephen King¹
• Danse Macabre by Stephen King
• The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett
• Double Feature by Owen King
• Joyland by Stephen King
• NOS4A2 by Joe Hill

There’s more, of course, but these, in some order, although possibly not as listed above are among those books coming up.

Writing and slogging

Yesterday marked 75 consecutive days of fiction-writing for me, although the last week or so has been difficult. Not finding the time, but finding the will. The story–the longest one I’ve ever written–is slogging a bit and I feel a bit like a man stuck in quicksand. My initial reaction was similar, too, which was a writer’s version of panic. I tried rewriting some scenes that I didn’t think worked. I tried considering a view point. I tried several things, but what occurred to me was that I think I was trying to tell this part of the story from the wrong character’s point of view. I am going back to the original character’s point of view and moving forward from there and we’ll see what happens.

Yesterday was Mother’s Day, and the kids got into it this year a little more than in past years. Kelly went out for a girls night Saturday and when she got home, both kids were asleep in their respective beds, a feat that I’ve now pulled off twice, on each of Kelly’s last two girls nights. I think this was a pretty good pre-Mother’s Day present and it also shows that I am improving¹.

One thing the kids did before I got them to bed was to make a Mother’s Day card for Kelly. In the past, I’ve bought a card for them to “sign.” But this time, they made their own card, each of them decorating it in their unique fashions and the cooperated quite nicely while doing this. In the morning, when we were all awake, we gave Kelly her Mother’s Day cards and her Mother’s Day present. This year, I thought I’d come up with a rather clever present. A while back, Kelly directed me² to a hilarious parenting blog she’d been reading, Crappy Pictures. Some time back, I noted that Amber Dusick, creator and proprietor of said blog came out with a book called Parenting: Illustrated with Crappy Pictures. This is what we got for Kelly.

In the morning, the Little Man played in his first t-ball scrimmage game. It was held indoors, in the gymnasium, because the rains had made the ballfields muddy. He played one inning at first base, and another inning at shortstop and third base. He came to bat twice and I think on the whole, he had fun. It was the most engaged I’d seen him in t-ball so far.

Kelly picked where she wanted to go for brunch and we made advanced reservations, knowing how places book up on Mother’s Day. The place she selected: Bilbo Baggins, a small pub/restaurant in Old Town Alexandria. This was great! They had an amazing beer selection. They even had Old Speckled Hen on draft, so of course I had one of those. I also had their Wooky Jack Black IPA. And to eat, I had their Monte Cristo sandwich, which was very good, and came with an equally good salad.

Afterward, we walked around Old Town for a little while. The Potomac was a rich, muddy brown from all of the recent rains. I think that is my favorite look for that river. There is something about that muddy cast that makes me think of Mark Twain.

In the evening, after we’d all napped, we wrapped up our day with a walk around the park.

I think it turned out to be a nice Mother’s Day.