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| Angus turd, if he were a Rottweiler |
As I have mentioned in previous posts, Kristie and I have taken to frequent walks up Mount Kaukau, a large foothill near our house. There are several routes that you can take up the hill, but our most recent favorite is a route that takes us up a very steep path and leads up into the foothills that join up with Kaukau.
On virtually all of our walks, we try to take the dogs with us, and I've got to say that for a dog with legs that are about four inches long, Angus can really motor up that hill! Angus is pure energy, wrapped up in black and white fur, so I guess it shouldn't surprise me that he can basically run the entire hill at full tilt. But as the title of this blog post indicates, this isn't about Angus' energy level, this blog post is about crap.
For a very small dog, in addition to his vast energy levels, Angus has the uncanny ability to crap out a brick! He can pretty much crap out half his body weight in one sitting. If Angus were a large dog, like a Mastiff or a Rottweiler, the only way to remove his crap would be with a bulldozer and those giant dump trucks you see in the Ft. McMurray oil sands. Let's face it, Angus is pretty much 3/4 crap and 1/4 dog. Actually it explains a lot about his personality.
So on this walk, up this very steep hill, Angus decided to dump a load, as he does. And I am the type of dog owner that refuses to leave his crap on the trail. I'm also very vigilant about the dog poop too. Anyway, Angus does his stop, squat and bowel, and because we were on the steep incline, his crap starts rolling down the hill. But it doesn't stay in one solid mass that I can catch; no what this crap decides to do (because crap obviously has free will), is break apart into smaller pieces and roll off into various directions similar to billiard balls after the break! So I'm trying to stop these little turdlets from making it to the Mexican boarder using only one hand, covered in the insulating layer of a plastic poop bag. Needless to say, some of the newly sentient pooplets didn't survive too long as I had to squish them in order to prevent them from rolling all the way down the hill.
So basically, this whole blog post was simply a lead up for me being able to say Roly Crap Batman!
This is actually going to be a fairly short post.
Today, at work, was one of those days! You know the kind. Nothing is working right, you try to get things done in a hurry, but you end up having to wait for issues you can't control. And everything comes to a head at 3 minutes before you have to leave.
Sigh!
As I've mentioned earlier, now that it is summer, Kristie and I are starting to walk into work together. On Monday's, my day off, we will walk to Kristie's office together and then I will walk home on my own. This Monday we decided to change it up a bit and try to run the 4.5 KM distance.
The run in wasn't bad at all and only took us about 30 minutes at a fairly relaxed pace. The first part of the run is actually not too bad. You start off with an 800 m incline that gets the blood pumping, and then it is down hill for 2 KM, then on the flat for about 1.5 KM and then another incline. We didn't feel too bad after the run, so I decided to run home too.
The first part of the run home, as you are now on a decline, wasn't too hard at all. But then, after gaining some confidence you begin your ascent of the 2 KM hill. The hill is interesting as it is almost like an exponential curve. It starts off at quite a gradual incline, so you start thinking to yourself:
"Hey, this isn't so bad."
So you continue running, and slowly start to feel the effects of a hill climb, but it isn't so bad. About three quarters of the way up the hill however, I started feeling the effects of the exponential curve and I started noticing my breath becoming more and more laboured, and I could feel my heart beating heavier and heavier. I finally had to stop about four-fifths of the way up as my heart was pretty much trying to punch its way out of my chest.
I walked for about 5 or 6 pole lengths panting and sweating like Homer Simpson at a barbecue, was able to bring my heart back under control and then continued for the rest of the run.
Below is a graphical representation of how I felt on the run.
Kristie and I ditched Wellington today to spend some time on the Kapiti Coast. Wellington was going to be miserable all day, but Waikanae was gorgeous today with lots of sun, very little wind, and a giant beach to let the dogs run free!
The day started with a nice long walk on the beach, where Angus and Walnut met up with some very friendly dogs. Angus got to chase sand pipers and sea gulls to his hearts content. After the walk, we drove into Otaki for some shopping. I've been looking for some new socks, but as I am quite particular, I didn't get any. I did find some that I liked, but they were Icebreaker and I didn't want to spend $20.00 for a single pair of socks. I did pick up a tiny micro fibre towel that attaches to a pouch on a carabiner. We have been doing some very strenuous hill walks lately, and it would be nice to have something I can wipe the sweat off with, and not have to carry around a huge towel.
After shopping in Otaki, we went back into Waikanae for some lunch. We went to our favorite beach restaurant and had fi & chi. We really like this place because the fish is nice and lightly battered, they make their own tar-tar sauce, and they always make fresh, thick cut chips. As an added bonus, they have a large courtyard with picnic tables, where they allow patrons to bring their dogs. So the pups got to partake in the fi & chi too.
Finally, on the way home, we stopped off in Lindale for some Kapati Ice Cream. The line up was huge, and an old guy butt in front of us to be served, but it was such a nice day, I didn't kill him by stuffing ice cream cones in his nostrils.
All in all, a great day!
