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Post by Merk on Jul 13, 2020 15:06:18 GMT
Sorry for the lengthy time away, life has happened in a big way...Maya and I lost out greyhound suddenly over the weekend, she passed away in her sleep. There was no warning, no signs, nothing...she simply slipped away.
Not that we have made this public but Maya and I cannot have children so our greyhounds (Pearl being out 4th) have been our children. In the 13 years Maya and I have been together (we celebrated our 13th anniversary this past Thursday) we have always had the wonderful pitter-patter of greyhound feet running through the house, at no time have we not had a grey-baby. The silence in our home is deafening, we are beyond crushed. Pearl was very special, she meant to world to us. Our lives revolved around Pearl.
Fuck.
In other news,
I managed to find a bike! It's brand new (guy bought it a couple of months back, never used it, and it now moving and cannot take it with him) and retails for $600 and I got it for $375! I took it for a quick cruise. It's going to take some getting used to. I haven't been on a bike in close to 20 years and I've never ridden a road bike previously. But it was fun none the less. So now I'm on the hunt for bike trainer for the house, I believe I might be able to get one from one of my buddies. Hopefully, that works out.
Now to my running.
June 8th 3.14 km walk 2.18 km Hill repeats 5.53 km walk
June 11th 3.00 km walk 11.50 km run
June 13th 18.52 km run (attempted to keep myself in zone 2, easier said than done.)
Both June 11th and June 13th were a little off-script. I was to train those days but I modified the training. I just needed to run, I wasn't interested in structured training...just run. I needed to try and clear my mind, distract myself from my current reality.
In any case, much to do.
I hope everything in your world is going well, Happy Monday!
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Post by seltzer on Jul 13, 2020 17:47:54 GMT
Sorry for your loss. My condolences to you and Maya.
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Post by macdiver on Jul 13, 2020 22:57:40 GMT
Loosing a pet kid is never easy and is even harder when sudden. My condolences to you and your wife.
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Post by shamie on Jul 14, 2020 16:35:00 GMT
So sad to read about the loss of your dog. My condolences.
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Post by Merk on Jul 14, 2020 19:47:23 GMT
So I just talked to my vet and based on Pearls medical history and how she passed away he says there is a high probability it was cardiac hemangiosarcoma or splenic hemangiosarcoma.
Hemangiosarcoma is a very aggressive cancer in dogs with a high mortality rate and median survival of 3–6 months with a ten percent one-year survival rate. The majority of primary tumours are found in the spleen and many dogs will succumb to organ rupture and hemoabdomen. The disease is indolent; in other words, it does not cause pain and the rate of growth in the early stages is relatively slow. Dogs harbouring even large hemangiosarcomas may show no clinical signs or evidence that they have a life-threatening disease. This to me makes the most amount of sense all things considered. Although there is no actual way of knowing 100% at this point, I can tell you that having some sort of idea on why she passed gives us some peace. It doesn’t take the pain away but it helps.
The short takeaway,
She passed away painlessly, there was no way to really know, and there was nothing we could have done about it.
I thought you guys might want to know.
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Post by seltzer on Jul 14, 2020 20:27:24 GMT
She passed away painlessly, there was no way to really know, and there was nothing we could have done about it. I thought you guys might want to know. I hope you and Maya can take a small amount of solace with the news. Thanks for letting us know,
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Post by Merk on Jul 20, 2020 13:41:10 GMT
She passed away painlessly, there was no way to really know, and there was nothing we could have done about it. I thought you guys might want to know. I hope you and Maya can take a small amount of solace with the news. Thanks for letting us know, Honestly, the news from our vet gave us both a sense of comfort and closure.
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Post by phillydude on Jul 22, 2020 0:37:18 GMT
Wow. Sorry to hear about your grey. I'm assuming that's her in your avatar. Fuck.
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Post by Merk on Jul 27, 2020 12:02:16 GMT
Wow. Sorry to hear about your grey. I'm assuming that's her in your avatar. Fuck. Thanks. The Jedi looking greyhound you see in my avatar is our first Greyhound Phoebe, she was a very special girl. We managed to get Pearl back from the vets on Friday, bit of a tough evening. However, it's nice to finally have her home. She now resides with all our other grey-babies on the rainbow bridge shelf.
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Post by Merk on Jul 27, 2020 15:16:47 GMT
Ok, I'm a little behind with my fitness related posts.
I'm still running and everything is going well in that area. I did a 5k speed test last week and I'm very happy to report I managed 5k in 28 min (5:30 min/km), this shaves 1:45 min of my previous 5k speed test. Reflecting, I know I can do better and I'm confident I can get myself down to 25 min with some tweaks to my technique and time under the bar so to speak...not anytime soon, but I'll get there.
10k now feels the way 5k's used to which is exciting! 15 k's aren't too-too bad, and I'm hoping to get a 21.1k in at some point throughout August/September. I learned a lot from my 18.5 km fiasco/rage run from a couple of weeks ago. Proper hydration/sodium, nutrition, sleep, and pacing. I'm learning that my 5k pace isn't the same as my 10k pace, nor is my 10k pace going to be the same as my 21.1k pace. Nipple tape is a thing and wearing tights under my shorts is just as equal of a thing that needs to happen. Oh! Let's not forget to not run in 100% cotton shirts, same with shorts! wearing cut off joggers, big effing no-no! With all these things in mind I know I can do that 21.1k without too much of an issue.
Also I have my "torture chamber" ready to go (by torture chamber I mean my indoor cycling set up). I'm on week 2 and it's been awesome! I bike 15-20 min in the morning and then take 15-20 min in the evening. The rides aren't crazy (4-6 km each ride). I've been using Zwift and a Garmin speed sensor on the rear hub for data and to keep things interesting. I'm getting a cadence sensor for the left crank arm for additional data, and some bike shorts for some comfort (my poor butt).
Everything is shaping up nicely if I do say so myself. Although I do need to take the time to start doing resistance training again. I've fallen off that bandwagon and need to get back into the swing of things, even if it's just to work alongside my running and biking.
Weight ranges from 187-197 depending on my food, water, runs, poops, sweat, etc. The average is 193-195. I'm ok with that.
Anywhoodles, I'm rambling.
Have a great day!
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Post by macdiver on Jul 27, 2020 23:20:22 GMT
Nice 5k time.
I find petroleum jelly works great to prevent chaffing. I wear runng shorts with the built in liner. when it is hot and humid i have to put the petroleum jelly on my inner thighs where the liner is. I will also use it for anything over 10 miles regardless of the temp. i had one shirt that chaffed my nipples so i threw it away. if it was more frequent i would use the petroleum jelly there too. The thing with petroleum jelly is it is cheap and readily available. I can easily find travel sizes that are not priced as travel sizes. Also a little goes a long way so it lasts for a long time.
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Post by Merk on Jul 30, 2020 12:25:11 GMT
Nice 5k time. I find petroleum jelly works great to prevent chaffing. I wear runng shorts with the built in liner. when it is hot and humid i have to put the petroleum jelly on my inner thighs where the liner is. I will also use it for anything over 10 miles regardless of the temp. i had one shirt that chaffed my nipples so i threw it away. if it was more frequent i would use the petroleum jelly there too. The thing with petroleum jelly is it is cheap and readily available. I can easily find travel sizes that are not priced as travel sizes. Also a little goes a long way so it lasts for a long time. Thanks for the info, I've heard of using stuff like Vaseline for chaffing but never really took the time to pick some up. However, with my runs getting longer it looks to be a good investment. I wonder if there is any in the house? I'll have to check.
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Post by Merk on Jul 30, 2020 12:38:06 GMT
I've expanded on the torture chamber a bit. So here is the set up so far. I have a decent elite Chrono hydro mag "classic" bike trainer, Garmin speed and cadence sensors for the rear hub and crank arm of the bike, ANT+ adapter for my laptop, HDMI'd to a 50-inch tv, rubber flooring, fans, CCM Endurance road bike (uber cheapy road bike), and of course a very tolerant wife for letting me convert part of the living room into this. There will additional tweaks to everything but the meat and potatoes are all in place. I'm using the bike twice a day at this point to get my body (mainly my ass) adapted to biking as quickly as possible. The idea is to start bike commuting for the next few months, just to try something new. I'm looking at 26 km round trip, currently, I'm biking 10 km in the morning and most recently 13 km in the evening. So hopefully by next week, I'll be doing 13 k in the morning and 13 k in the evening. With the long weekend coming up it seems like a good opportunity to do a test bike to work and back just to see how it feels. With these new lifestyle changes, I may have to make some adjustments to my running schedule. Resistance training still isn't a thing. With gyms now being open in my area, I may reactivate my gym pass. Oddly enough I really haven't had much of a desire to go lift weights which makes it easy to not work out. We'll see what the future holds.... Gotta run, have a great day.
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Post by Merk on Aug 1, 2020 13:34:42 GMT
Good Morning,
How are you today?
Things here are the usual for the most part, nothing to really write home about. It's nice to have a long weekend this weekend, yay!. On the agenda will be some youtube filming, home depot window shopping for desk building supplies, a 15 km run, and some cycling. I'm not too sure what Maya may have cooked up for us beyond this shortlist but I'm sure there will be more things to come.
Now I have no idea how I did this but I managed to get a flat tire on my bike....while it's on the bike trainer. The inner tube just randomly let go. I checked the tire over and didn't see any debris or anything that could have popped it. Just one of those things I guess. I went to Canadian tire and grabbed a couple of tubes (and other cycling items). Once I was home I had the tire fixed and back on the bike in no time flat. I did a 13 km test run with the bike trainer and all is well, so it seems.
Anyways I have to get moving, I hope you have a great day!
Chat soon!
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Post by phillydude on Aug 2, 2020 1:09:03 GMT
Good Morning, How are you today?
Fine, thanks for asking.
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