Chef Chase-R-Dee...

I'm not much of a chef.

Although I did hold down a job as a chef in a fine dining establishment (Dairy Queen) while I was in high school, historically I haven't ever cooked. Not really ever for myself, and only once or twice for my family in my 8 years of martial bliss.

But that has changed lately.

Since moving into our new house I have decided that I need to both learn how to cook, and cook.

So I've been working on it.

I've got a few meals down pretty good so far!

I make a kick ass Mexican Cornbread dish (it's got taco seasoning in it, so that means calling it Mexican Cornbread ISN'T racist) that I have made twice now. I've made spaghetti a few times, and the family's new favorite dinner, Corn Flake Chicken!!! It's been a HUGE hit with my son who is allergic to wheat and so therefore cannot have any normal fried chicken. He also likes my side of mashed cauliflower! It's like mashed potatoes, only better!!!

Now, although I feel like I've been doing sort of alright with this cooking stuff, I wouldn't say I'm a good cook. Not even close! My wife is a good cook! No. Scratch that. My wife is an amazing cook!
As proof of my low status as a cook, I'm offering up the following picture of yesterday's wheat free (aka; gluten free) garlic bread AFTER the flames died down...

Sore Muscles

I think the best thing about coming back into running after taking some time off is the soreness that develops in the muscles in the beginning.

I like the feeling of sore muscles. Especially the quadriceps! Those are my favorite!

When I've been training consistently for awhile it takes a lot for my muscles to get sore. This is due in part to the way I run (slow and steady), and to my muscles becoming stronger and better suited to what I want them to do.

When they are is shape I can feel them. I can feel the fibers firing almost individually as I'm running. I can feel the tightening and loosening of the muscles as I walk or climb stairs or even stretch out in a yawn.

I LOVE that feeling. When I'm out of shape and inactive I miss and crave that connectedness with my body that only months of training can bring around.

But the initial soreness of just starting out is a great reminder of things to come.

New running partner

I love animals.

I always have.

Where I grew up, people would dump their dogs by my house quite often. We had a lot of dogs growing up. A LOT...

My wife also loves dogs. (We're not really cat people)

My sister loves dogs as well.

My wife and I share a love for one breed in particular and have always wanted one, but their too damn expensive and not very common.

Well... I got a text from my sister last night with a picture of the dog I want saying that is a dumped dog and they can't find the owner. Then this morning she tells me that she can't take it (she has 5 dogs currently) and asks if I would be interested in taking it....

HELLS YES!!!!!!!

So, we are now the proud owners of a 3~4 month old, black, male Irish Wolfhound!!!!!!

His name is Sampson.

If your unfamiliar with the Irish Wolfhound, here's the gist of what you would be interested in knowing...

They are the world's tallest breed of dog

They were bred to hunt Wolfs... in Ireland...

They look like Werewolfs.

They're totally bad ass!!!

I've included a few pics below. He's the black puppy, the others are compliments of a quick Google search.

Monday and an injury review

I'm going to go for a run on Monday.

I don't know if it will be a morning or evening run, but I do know that it won't be very long. Maybe 1/4 mile at the most. Just testing the foot too see if it's ready.

I'm going to continue these small runs for awhile just to make sure I don't over do anything and get set back even further. And that's only providing my run tomorrow goes smoothly.

This injury has led me to think back on my other injuries that I've had since I started running barefoot.

My first injury was a dropped cuboid in my right foot, and the funny thing about it is that it was caused by me altering my gait while running in a pair of shoes (my homemade huaraches), so I can't blame that on running barefoot.

The second injury was an interesting one that took me out for nearly 3 weeks during my optimal training time frame for the Rocky Racoon 50 miler. I managed to damage my seismoid bones in my right foot. I think this can actually be blamed on being barefoot while doing bleachers. I would land with my seismoid bones right on the edge of the stair while coming back down. I think that knocked them a little out of whack. That coupled with running 50 mile weeks (that's high for me) and altering my gait to accommodate for the soreness on the inside of my right forefoot area inflamed a tendon on the lower outside section of my right foot. I actually had to call or quites 9 miles into a 20 mile out and back run and ended up getting picked up by a total stranger and given a ride back to my car. That sucked.

.....

Well, that's it! Other than my current injury (500 pound pipe crushing foot at work) I have only had 2 bad strings there. If I had stuck with barefoot running (no minimalist shoes or cross training on bleachers) then I don't think I would have suffered any injuries at all!

Still on the road to healing

My foot is still not at 100%, but it's getting better.

I'm not ready to start running just yet, but I might be ready to start off small next week.

We went back to our normal schedule at work (6:00am to 4:00pm) starting this week. So I will be able to catch up on some much needed sleep this week and hopefully get healed up a little better so that I'm good to go starting next Monday.

I'm really missing my running. Running helps me cope with a lot of inner turmoil that I struggle with. Running helps me balance out everything in my head and assists in keeping me sane. It always has.
In the mean time I have been working on building us a dining room table for our new house out of free materials (yes, I had to buy a few tools and such, but the lumber is all free) and once it is complete I will create a very large post for it. It's been very therapeutic working on it.

Damn foot.

It's not getting better.

I had my third follow up yesterday and after describing my symptoms to the Dr she had it re-x-rayed and they came up clean. No cracks, breaks or fractures. The bone placement looked fine to.

But if I apply pressure to the outside of my foot, like walking on the side of your foot, it hurts like a bitch! It doesn't feel like a muscle pain, it feels like a bone pain.

Maybe I just need to rest it longer though. It's not like I have a race looming in the near future (or even far future...), and I don't really have the time to do any serious training any ways.

On a positive note, today is my lovely wife's birthday! I dont know how she manages to become more and more beautiful every year, but she certainly does! So a happy birthday shout out to the love of my life! I love you baby!