The Olivia Farm

Well it is hunting season here in Texas, and you know that means; the dove are flying. This weekend I was invited to a friend's, Todd and Jill Griffith, family farm house down near Port Lavaca, Texas. It was about 2.5 hours drive from our house and well worth it. Their land consisted of about 400 acres on the main farm and about another 400 acres at a separate field that had about a mile of shoreline that bordered a protected bay. How awesome it that?

The weekend began with us driving to the farm on Friday night. Then Todd and I woke up at about 7:15 or so; well it was more like Todd woke up and I kinda rolled out of bed too. I am not a morning person. We grabbed the shotguns, some shells, put on the camo and headed out the side door for a day of hunting. It wasn't 5 minutes before we saw the first flock of dove scatter when we approached them. They scattered quickly and we did our best to bring bring home dinner. Since I had not fired a shotgun in about 2 years I was a bit rusty when it came to leading the dove, and it really showed through the remainder of the day, but the important thing was that I was outdoors and enjoying some great weather. All in all we ended up bringing home 4 birds between the two of us, 2 dove, 2 quail. Not a feast, but the thrill is not necessarily in the meal, rather in the harvest.

We went fishing that night as well. The tide report said low tide would be at 2 am and high tide at 7am, meaning the best times to fish were between those hours. All four of us: Daicia, Jill, Todd and I grabbed some quick sleep from about 10 pm to 1:15am and awoke to head to the beach to try our hand at fishing. Again, not a feast of fish, but we caught a few, I probably caught my largest fish ever, an 18'' redfish! Daicia caught a similar sized one and Todd caught a nice gaftop catfish.

All in all the weekend was great. I enjoyed hanging out with a new set of friends, and getting to just be outdoors and hunt and fish. It can't get any better than that.

Half Marathon

It has been a while since my last post and I was wanting to get caught up.

Last weekend I ran my first long distance with one of my long-time friends, Leo. Leo is such a powerhouse. Not only is the guy a monster in the weightroom, he can still hold his own in the aerobic rhelm as well. I finished a couple of minutes before him, but Leo also has about 40-50lbs more muscle on his frame ro run with.

The worst part of this race for me was around mile 10. I was not used to running on concrete and my legs were taking a beating from the impact dispite the new shoes.

My goal before the race was to finish under 2 hours and I did accomplish the goal, 1:51 was my final time.

We will have to see about a full marathon, doing two halfs would sure be difficult and really puts a marathon in perspective after running this event. My hat is off to all the guys that have run marathons in their life, great accomplishments.

My Triathlon

Finally, I have completed my first triathlon and think that I did pretty descently for a first timer. I had a final time of 1:21:58 with an average on the bike of 22.5 miles/hour and 6:43 min/mile; I won't mention the swimming time since I am not too proud of it, but was happy with my overall performance. I got 7th in my age group.

What I loved most about the event was all the preperation that converged to one day of performance. I had been running all summer and up to the race, then began riding my bike and swimming more and more to really hone the necessary skills.

While the race was ony a "sprint triathlon," meaning probably some of the shortest distances available in the triathlon race, it was a lot of fun and lots of hard work.

The guy that is guilty of getting me involved in doing the triathlon is the guy here in the photo with me before the race, Joe. A great guy from my church and small church group that meets on Sunday nights. He was training for a tri and I was getting a little jealous of all the fun he was having, so I finally got signed up.

Fisheye Lens

Well the lens is finally here after much shopping and patient wating for the lens to finally arrive. For some reason when you "Track" a package that is being shipped to your home it almost make the journey seem as if it is taking longer. This lens came from NY and went through KY and finally Dallas and then Houston, TX today.

Anyway a fisheye lens is a specialized camera lens that allows you to capture 180 degrees of field with one exposure. Something that is not easily done and something that is done with a little bit of distortion as well. You can recognize fisheye pics by the curvy lines they produce when in reality the object if straight. Also by the fact that the subject can be very close to the camera and seems much larger than the background of the picture.

Here are a couple of my favorite shots that I took today with the new lens.

I will Tri

Well I am going to do the Triathlon after a little thinking. I just need to really start training more. I think the swimming at this point will be the most difficult, but I can do it.

I have been sick the past couple of days, Labor Day weekend, and am a little bummed about it. I didn't get to do all that I wanted this weekend and hoping this next week will go quickly. Also my Dad is getting married this Friday again, so that should be exciting.

Despite getting sick I did get to go to two concerts. I got to go to the Goo Goo Dolls/ Lifehouse concert which was pretty great, except for the muddy hill where our seats were, we did get free lawn chairs to sit in though which was nice. I also got to see Acappella tonight at our church, that was pretty great too.

To Tri or not to Tri

Well I have always wanted to do a Triathlon at some point in my life and have recently made a good fried at the church that Daicia and I are going to, Bammel Road Church of Christ, that has seemingly motivated me to actual do one; he has been training to do is first for a few months now. It is a beginner's triathlon, 400m swim 19 mile bike and 3 mile run. I probably would have had some reservations about doing this sort of event, but I think that I am up for the task, maybe not tomorrow, but by the 30th of September. This summer I began running a lot, since there was little else to do in Tahlequah, OK when clinic time was over. So I began running, running more than I have ever run in my entire life. I also got faster. I can pretty confidently run 8 min/mile pace for 10 or so miles. I think that I can also build the other areas of the triathlon by race day. Cycling has never been much of a problem, but swimming is another problem. I could swim well when I was in elemetary school and middle school, but now I am 26 and began swimming the first time since gradeschool last night. WHEW. it is a workout let me tell you what. A good majority of swimming is in the breathing and paceing one's self. It will take some serious training, but challenging one's self is what build self confidence. Plus loosing some weight and getting more fit has never hurt anyone.

Well we went to the zoo the other day with my in-laws. The zoo is kinda funny in that it seems like something you do when you are a kid and then is gradually becomes something you don't even think about doing. Well I will have to say that it sure was fun. Despite the 100+ degree weather our vusut was a lot of fun. I even took my camera (huge shock) to capture a lot of the animals. Here is one animal, a meerkat, that I thought would be nice to have a pic of.

Next time you don't have anthing to do don't immediatly discount the zoo. It can be a lot of fun.

Driving Home

Well when I was on the drive from Tahlequah, OK to Houston, TX I had several hours in which I thought to myself. I kept thininking that people should really get out of my way when I am driving. Not because I am dangerous, but because I am just a little more important than them and really wish I didn't have to slow down when they are in front of me. I should just be able to set my cruise on whatever speed I want and go non-stop from Point A to Point B without interruption.

Ok well you hopefully have read my sarcasm, but everyone has been in that spot before. I guess I was just really excited to finally be home and to see Daicia.

My bumpersticker for the occasion should be "I'm kind of important and if you could get out of my way that would be great."

Later,
ML

Two posts in one day

I am posting again just because I have time today.

I have been in Tahlequah this whole summer in UH's Optometry Porogram Externship here with the NSU college of Optometry and I will finally be going home tomorrow night, late. I am really looking forward to finally being home again being with my wonderful wife. I can't wait.

Here is a pic that I took last Fri, near the town of Vian, OK, a rurual drive to one of the clinics that I worked at here in OK for the summer.

Welcome to my blog spot. I am new to all of this so, don't be too critical of my postings. I am mostly going to just post when I have time, which might not be too often, but will also post some pictures that I have taken just to share some of my free lance art. Hope that you enjoy.

To the right is a picture of my wife and I backpacking in the Arkansas wilderness near Hot Springs, AR. All in all we hiked about 25 miles in probably 4 days. This was a great Spring Break trip and we really loved being in the woods for a few days.