My Week Off

Hey Everyone, I know I said I wasn't going to post an update until after the Triathelon, but I'm finding that I have some free time on my hands this evening and decided to post a quick update.

How to waste time....
As you may know after the FairLakes 8K I decided to take a break from running. By doing so I figured I let me knee heel and use the time to do other stuff like organize/clean my closet, read some of the running books and magazines that I've been neglecting, finally watch a DVD from NetFlix that has been sitting around here collecting dust since July, take down the Christmas decorations and fill out my Publisher's Clearing House entry form. I may already be a winner! It says so right on the envelope. But alas I did nothing. I'm great at wasting time. I did everything but what I said I would do. My moto is... whenever I have a bad week for exercising I have a great week for socializing. Which is what I ended up doing.

Monday - Shopping, visit Roxane
Tuesday - Appt @ Hair Salon, Book Club
Wednesday - Make dinner for Al (P.S. He kept it down.)
Thursday - Shopping, spend night at mom's
Friday - Meet Al for Contradancing (See Below)
Saturday - Renaissance Festival (See Below)

Update on My Knee...
By Friday I was suffering from runner's withdrawl. So, I decided to go running around my neighborhood early Saturday morning. I ran for 1.0 hour covering approx. 4.5 miles, a pretty slow 13 minute mile pace. But my knee started acting up again after about 40 minutes. The pain was very on and off. And it was never so bad that I couldn't run, but I wish it would go away. Tomorrow I'm calling around to some doctors in the area of sports medicine to see if they can tell me what's wrong with my knee. I've been icing and resting it all week. Things have gotten better, but I really want the pain to be gone.

My Journey Into the Subculture
Webster defines a subculture as an ethnic, regional, economic, or social group exhibiting characteristic patterns of behavior sufficient to distinguish it from others within an embracing culture or society. This weekend I embraced 2 subcultures; the first I never knew about and the second I secretly wanted to be part of.

Contradancing?
What is Contra Dancing? Well, the only way to really know is to try it, but the following link does a realy good job of describing it "What is Contradancing?". Al is a regular contradancer and when he described it to me, I had this horrible flashback of the night Vijay and I went polka dancing. I imagined this as one of those things that nerds, social outcasts and overweight virgins do on Friday nights. Considering I fell into all 3 of those categories, why is this the first time I'm hearing about it? Despite my hesitation of being around "those people" for an entire evening, I decided to go anyway and I had the bestest time! I wore a button that told eveyone I was a first time contradancer. Everyone there was so friendly. And I danced with a ton of cool guys including Al. My "Balance and Swing" needs work, but it's not as bad as my "Hey for Four". If I keep going I may learn how to "Box the Gnat" and "Swat the Flea". Oh, and there was a live band playing. All night long I kept calling them the "contraband". Ha Ha Ha. Get it?! Contra Band?!!! I crack me up!

Rennasaince Festival
Ok, if you grew up in Maryland, there are 2 things that people look forward to in the Fall. 1. The beginning or end of Lacrosse season. (Seriously, it's like the state sport.) and 2. The Maryland Rennaisance Festival (aka Ren Fest). When I was growing up I use to see it advertised on TV all the time. It looked like one big circus set in medieval times. But apparently there were no black people back then, so my parents never took us. When I got to college, I knew plenty of kids (also not black) who use to work at the festival. They'd show up every Friday dressed in their costumes handing out filers for the Festival. I always wanted to go, but none of my friends were interested. I bet if there was a Ren Fest After Dark that featured strobe lighting, pulse-pounding music and an overcrowded dance floor they would be there in a heart beat. But alas, as the years went on my dreams of going to Ren Fest faded until this year. I finally found someone who was willing to not only go to Ren Fest with me, but also dress up and tolerate me trying to talk in a British accent all day. I had the bestest time!! The acts were pretty cool and the costumes were great. I got to see a bunch of stuff lit on fire and either juggled, thrown or swallowed. I learned to juggle (sort of) and wittnessed a real live Caber toss (this is something Scottish folks use to do for sport). I also had a turkey drumstick which was really good. All the food was good and cheap. But other souveniers were really expensive. So I came back empty handed. Anyway, a good time was had by all. Here's a picture of me and Al at RenFest.

He's such a great guy. And a lot of fun too. He's also a pretty good Jouster or is that Jester.

That's it for this week, kids. Wish me luck next Saturday. If my knee doesn't get any better I'm really going to need it.

- Gotta Run