Dear Santa,

I don't know if you're in the habit of reading blogs, but if so, I'd sure like to have this for Christmas!

Love, C

PS- I promise to leave you carrot sticks & non-fat ranch dip instead of cookies & milk :)

Thanksgiving Plans

For the past few years, we've gone hunting on Thanksgiving Day, and then done a big potluck Thanksgiving dinner with friends in Seeley Lake. This year, however, most of our friends have other plans, so there's no potlucking to do. It seems that everyone either has family coming in or is going elsewhere-- there aren't any young family-less folks floating around looking for a good meal.

So, I figured we had two options: either stay home and make a turkey dinner for ourselves, or say screw it and forego the pig-out tradition. We opted for the latter.

So tomorrow morning we'll get up and feed the cows, then head for the mountains, rifles in tow. (I shot a young deer the other day, but other than that, we still have several tags-- for bull elk or for either sex whitetail deer or buck mule deer. It's the last weekend of hunting season, and so it's time for us to stop being so picky. Instead of only going after elk, at this point in the season anything legal will most likely come home with us.)

Anyhow, rather than sitting around all day and pigging out, I figured it'd be much more fun and healthy to spend the day hiking around in the woods. I mean, Thanksgiving is really all about giving thanks for the blessings that you have, right? I count among my best blessings:

• the opportunity to live in a land where I'm free to choose how to spend my holidays,
• to ability wander through vast amounts of publicly-owned forested mountains
• to provide food for myself because wildlife are abundant and we still have the right to hunt and fish, like our ancestors did to provide their food for the first Thanksgiving (I mean, if they'd had an elk, I'm sure they would've chosen to eat that over a stingly ol' wild turkey!!!)

So for me, a burger and a beer when we get done for the day will be all the feast that I need to help me have a great day of giving thanks.

Why My Legs Were Sore Earlier This Week

Not all hunters sit in the back of their pickups drinking beer, listening to Nascar, and waiting for the deer to walk by...

Jim and I spent the weekend hunting with his dad out on the MT/ID border. We put on some good hikes, traveling at least 6 miles each day over steep, rough country... mostly off-road/off-trail. We didn't fire our rifles at all, but still got some good shooting done (pictures, that is):

Me hiking the last little stretch up to the top of Taft Mountain. Jim and I started hiking at 6:30am-- about an hour before sunrise-- and bush-whacked our way up, up, up the ridge so that we were on top of the country early in the morning (trying to catch some elk crossing over the ridge).

I don't take this hunting thing TOO seriously!

Jim smiling because we're almost to the top!!! (early morning hikes make for good lighting!)

Back down into the woods for a while... "Heeeere, elky elky elky... come out from behind the tree-eee...."

Ahh, soaking in sun after our post-lunch nap :)


We saw lots of sign, including elk tracks, scat, and rubs... but no elk. (Here I'm demonstrating how a bull in the rut scraped his antlers against this small tree to mark his territory).


At the top of the ridge I laid my tracks on top of wolf tracks on top coyote tracks on top of elk tracks... I see where I stack up on the predator ranks-- need to get up earlier, I suppose!


All in all a great weekend. Saw lots of cool places, got good and tired so that I slept great and woke up slightly sore. And came home to a nice warm house on a ranch full of cows that we can eat if we don't end up shooting an elk next weekend :)

Last Race of the Year

On December 6, I'll be running the Freezer Burn 5k in Frenchtown.

I haven't been doing much speed work lately, so I definitely don't have my sights on a fast time. But, since I'm revving back up the running in preparation for the Snow Joke, I'll use this as a fun "long run" for the week:
I can jog the mile-and-a-half to the start line, run the race, then jog home, for a total of 6 miles.

It'll be a good way to get in a long run with a harder-than-usual push in the middle, and to support a race in my "backyard."

Anyone want to join me? (There's also a 1/2 marathon if you're really motivated).

New Shoes

Did you know that shoes wear out on the inside much faster than on the outside? I never knew this until I really started running some longer miles. The interior cushioning takes a big hit every time my foot hits the ground, and can only handle ~250-300 miles worth of supporting my ~140 lbs before it starts to wear out.

Last fall (while training for my first 1/2 marathon) was the first time I'd put enough mileage into a pair of shoes to wear them out. They still looked fine on the outside. But I was starting to feel the difference-- my shins would burn a bit, my hips felt weird, my toes would ache after a run. Who'da thunk that running shoes could make such a difference?

Well, I went to my local running store, and the folks there helped me out. They looked at the wear patterns on my old shoes, watched me walk, analyzed how my feet were shaped and how they moved while I ran, and suggested several shoes for me. The pair I really liked was the Asics GT-2130. I bought a pair and loved them... so much that when it was time to buy a new pair of shoes this past spring, I went in and bought the exact same pair.

For the last month or so now, I've been starting to feel things again-- shins hurting, hips feeling stressed... signs that my shoes were on their way out. Again. (I try to only use my running shoes for running, and wear older pairs for doing other activities like walking or biking.) As I always seem to do, I first thought that it was me. Maybe I just haven't been running enough. Maybe I'm not stretching enough. I must be out of shape... But then it dawned on me-- it'd been about 6 months since I'd gotten new shoes. (Dang, could it have been that long?!)

Since we're headed into the winter months when conditions can be kind iffy-- slushy or slick roads and trails-- and because I've been enjoying trail running a bit more, I thought that maybe I'd branch out and try a trail shoe. I was a little nervous, though, about giving up on my 2130's, though, because they're such a great fit.

So imagine my delight when I went to the running store this weekend and told the guy what I've been wearing and that I'd like to try a trail shoe, and he said, great, Asics just came out with a trail version of the 2130! It's built to the same dimensions and everything as the shoe I've been wearing, but has a more aggressive sole (good for gripping) that's a little stiffer (good for running over rocks and branches), and has a water-resistant material on the upper (good for slush and mud).

I tried them on, and they felt perfect. "Do you want to try a few other kinds of trail shoes?" the salesguy asked? "Nope," I said, "these will work."

I tried them out on the treadmill yesterday, just to make sure they fit well (they do, and nothing hurt in my legs for the first time in several weeks!). And now this afternoon I have plans to take my new shoes for a spin on a 5-mile loop on trails in the Rattlesnake. Whooppee!