Cav's Place

Since the half marathon was today, I’ll just mention that I completed it with an official time of 1:49:13 and a net time of 1:48:25, which is disappointing but actually a fair bit less bad than I feared after the recent runs, and in particular after the one that this post is about, and then move on to May 5, when it was almost 4:10 PM when I got up, and I just stayed on the computer until just before 5 PM, after which I pretty much stayed in the kitchen, deciding to make the pasta that day after all, though it was close to 8 PM when I actually started working on that and 11:50 PM when I started eating some of it as lunch while I spent a little more time on-line. And at 12:20 AM I went back to the kitchen, dealing with a few more things, including making the tea for the morning, while making dinner, which I ate between 2:50 AM and 3:20 AM. And then I put the cereals and the baked almonds with Himalayan salt in a bowl, which I placed in the fridge, just leaving the yogurt to add in the morning, brushed my teeth for the only time that day, which hadn’t happened in a very long time, and also shaved, even if my brush was still falling apart, since I couldn’t find where dad had thrown the glue after taking it from where I knew it was and out of its packaging, which was left there but empty. Either way, I ended up getting in bed at 4:20 AM… And a few minutes later I realized that the pasta was still on the balcony, so I got up to put the pot in the fridge.
It took me a little while to fall asleep, but not too long, and while I woke up to pee at one point, I got back to sleep right away after that, getting up when the alarm rang, at 8 AM. Then I had the usual stuff, with the sweet thing being an expired energy bar, with added bio (organic) honey, took most of the supplements, adding that additional one, though I don’t think that it makes a difference, but forgetting about the one with magnesium and potassium at that point, then actually left something in the toilet, and walked out at 9:45 AM, wearing the full running gear, with the slip of paper with the emergency information in the pocket of my tights. The temperature was about 15°C at 10 AM, holding steady at the other two stations, but increasing to 18°C at the one inside the city at 11 AM.
The time was 49:37.01, with sector times of 4:09.85, 5:20 (5:19.44), 6:13.41, 4:46 (4:45.37), 5:19.75, 6:07 (6:06.44), 4:33.44, 5:14 (5:13.90), 6:03.38 and 1:53 (1:52.03), making for lap times of 15:42.70, 16:12 (16:11.56) and 15:50.72. I pushed really hard on the first sector, but while I was pleased with that time in itself, I knew that I had pretty much exhausted myself and my chances of getting back under 48 minutes were pretty much gone because of it. Still, after trying to recover to some extent on the following sector, I hoped to cover sector three in less than six minutes, so when I saw that I even went well over 6:10 it was clear that even staying under 50 minutes was going to prove difficult, and sector one of lap two made it seem that my chances of doing so were likely to go away even by the end of that lap. So I tried to gradually put more effort into it once again, and after lap two I thought that I might just make it while also considering continuing to 16 km if I won’t be safe at the end of lap three. But that’d have just meant exhausting myself even more for no reason, since the time was obviously going to be just awful, so I pushed more from the start of lap three, which resulted in feeling pretty safe after two sectors, while at the end of the lap the target became to get under 49:40, so I gave everything I had left on the final sector and managed that… But that’s obviously an awful time, and if I’m to compare it to the other morning runs done on the week of a race, it marks one more time when I’m the slowest I’ve been since before the hospitalization, in 2021. And pushing on the first sector is far from enough of an excuse for that, as I proved as recently as on February 14.
On top of being so exhausted after that first sector, I felt that I really had to snap my back even before starting to run and couldn’t, which resulted in quite a lot of reflected pain, mainly in my chest and abdomen, that I had to just deal with. But at least that slow pace spared my legs to a fair extent, those warnings from my right knee only appearing on sector three of lap three. On the other hand, there were some gusts of wind that I had to fight against, most notably at the start of each sector three, but for the first half of the run, while it was cloudy, there were some other windy areas as well, the wind dying down when it got sunny, except in that area. But the only notable problem caused by people was on sector two of lap two, and even that just meant slowing a little in order to make my way through a group, while the fact that I stepped in a hole that was under the lane on the following sector was just jarring. So the real problem was that I just couldn’t go faster…

After jogging back, I decided to turn the old computer back on and install the updates for Windows 10 on it, to test them, doing the day’s squats at some point while I was waiting, and then I also tried to get Windows 7 to work properly again on it, but I couldn’t, even after uninstalling BOINC, which I thought might trigger that conflict with Emsisoft Anti-Malware that causes that error, and deleting dad’s user account, since that error had reappeared when I created his account, so I eventually gave up, switched back to this computer and installed the April updates on it as well while eating lunch, everything seeming fine at that point.
After changing, I left again when it was almost 4:50 PM, with the plastic and metal, which I dropped off in a recycling bin on the way, and the recyclables with the deposit symbol, which I took to the store that I had noticed two days earlier offered 20% more for them, just cashing in that voucher after all of them were accepted by the machine. And the offer will continue until the end of July, but while I asked for that to be confirmed even if it was written on the sign, I couldn’t get myself to ask whether it was just something that they were offering at that particular location or it was in all locations, since I had used a route that took me past another one before reaching that one and I hadn’t seen any such sign there. Either way, it’s frustrating that I only noticed this two days before, and even then forgot about it by the time I got back and ended up putting what I had gathered into the machine from this Mega Image, so I don’t know when they started doing this, but I could have gained quite a lot if I’d have known earlier.
Either way, since it was the last day when some cat food that my mother sometimes gives to her cats was supposed to be on sale at Supeco and I also had dad’s metro card and could then go anywhere else, I decided to walk there, picking up a few more recyclables on the way and putting them in a cabinet when I got there. However, there was no sign indicating the three for the price of two deal for that cat food, and it was an unhealthy kind anyway, and I found plenty of other cheap things to get, so I eventually gave up on that cat food and bought plenty of those other things, an expiring bread for dad, plus the last 200g bag of raw almonds for myself, which cost a fair bit but I thought that it was still a little cheaper than elsewhere, though I later found that they had the same price at Carrefour… Either way, I also stole another expiring bread for dad, the cheapest one left in the pile, unsliced and actually already expired the previous day, the price being just a little more than what I had to recover from them after a discount listed at the shelf didn’t apply just over a year ago. So, between carefully looking all over the store to spot those great prices, calculating just how much to get, and figuring out both how to carry everything and how to make it so that bread will be unlikely to be noticed, I spent quite a lot of time there, and then I needed some more to arrange the purchases before retrieving those recyclables from the cabinet and walking away, picking up some more as I made my way to the metro station, took the metro to Obor and went to that Carrefour.
Actually, after putting everything in a cabinet, I found two more recyclables on my way to the bathroom, picking them up before peeing and washing my hands and then rearranging everything I had in that cabinet in order to add them. Then I checked the expiring products, grabbing two. There was quite a pile of those fluffy flatbreads as well, but while they supposedly expired the next day, there were spots of mold on every single one already, so I didn’t take any, and while I also found one of those pumpkin pies in the cart with bakery products, it had no discount label… And most of the other discount labels were pretty much wiped because of the grease, which I pointed out to the employee who was wiping the refrigerated expired products, but nothing was done about it even by the time I got back there, after going to the bakery area, seeing that they were making the discounts there as well and grabbing the last of those apple pastries that was left and two breads that were also discounted that time around. But at least I sorted out the issue with that pumpkin pie, since the regular label that was on it was from May 5 and I still wanted it, so when I got back there I took it and then showed it to one of the bakery employees, who printed a new discount label for it and told me to wander around for a couple of minutes before checking out, so it’ll show up in the system. So I did that, and it worked.
After retrieving what I had in the cabinet and arranging everything, I put everything back in a cabinet when I got to Kaufland, entering the store at 9:25 PM and seeing that the evening discounts increased sharply a little later, so if I was initially wondering about taking one lettuce with root, I ended up taking two, plus a pack of four bio (organic) apples, even if those were imported. On the other hand, the fact that those were also imported made me not take any carrots, even if those also had a great discount and I’d have normally wanted some. Either way, I also grabbed a few slices of a meat product that I found among the expiring ones, plus two of those cheap yogurts and some olives that also had a discount, being charged for the box that they were placed in. And I was just about to start using the self-checkout when the closing announcement came, but after retrieving what I had in the cabinet I still took my time to arrange everything, walking out when it was almost 10:15 PM. And then I took the metro back, picking up some more recyclables on the way to and from the metro station.
It was almost 10:55 PM when I got back, with 17.5 kg. Then I put most of the purchases in their place, only then noticing that those few slices of that meat product which I had grabbed looked rather suspicious, ate one of the apples that I already had and some salty snacks, and it was past 12:45 AM when I went to wash and almost 1:25 AM when I was done, but then I spent a little time on the computer, so it was almost 15 more minutes before I got back to the kitchen. And then I washed what was there, ate that pumpkin pie, sliced dad’s unsliced bread and put both in the freezer, also dealt with one of mine, moved something into a jar, and used some of the lettuce for the salad, finally eating dinner between 4:30 AM and 5:10 AM and getting in bed at 6:35 AM, after noticing a .NET error stating that PowerChute was terminated because of an unhandled exception shortly after rebooting. And, on a different note, I found three warnings that my display driver had stopped responding and then recovered on the morning of May 4, which I hadn’t noticed until then, and I didn’t think that I was at the computer at that point… Though when I investigated further, after getting up, I saw that I opened Vivaldi a couple of minutes after the last such warning, so I wonder whether I had done something before as well and forgot or something else had happened. Either way, PowerChute seems to still work, and I didn’t see any of these events again since then. And I’ll also mention here that in the evening I made mamaliga, “cheating” in order to be able to say that I started eating in my room before 3 AM, but actually starting when it was past 3:15 AM. If I wouldn’t have looked something up on-line, I might have managed to finish at 3:40 AM even so, after really gulping it down as that hour approached, but as it was, I finished at 3:43 AM. And I got in bed at 5:25 AM.

It took me far too long to read this book, and while my eyes having a hard time with the font, even more so when large sections were mostly or even almost entirely in italics, had something to do with it, the main reason is the complexity coupled with the time that passed since I read the other two in the series. Then again, I doubt that this series can be properly understood without rereading, and possibly not even then, and I never do that, so I’ll just say that the improvements from one book to the next are huge and this last one keeps only the best elements and shows just how much thought and planning went into it all. Worldbuilding, character development, thrilling combat, emotion, it has it all and it’s excellently written. The Grey Places remain memorable, but so are so many other parts and events, identifying some that aren’t possibly being harder.
However, I still couldn’t quite follow what was going on, some things seemed to just come out of nowhere, and even some explanations left me with more questions than answers. Sure, part of that is my fault, considering how much I must have forgotten and the fact that I let myself be lulled into not paying enough attention even then, along with the difficulties I have in keeping track of those characters with complicated names and maybe even the fact that I’m not keen on many of the key explanations being more in the realm of science fiction rather than fantasy, but that can only account for a part of the problem, the rest clearly having to do with inadequate or even missing explanations. Some characters seem to understand more than I did, but it’s even explicitly stated that others gave up even trying. Plus that the way the different story arcs were concluded, quite suddenly, separately, and openly, hardly offered any closure. And the very end left me quite literally stunned… But, just like the book and the series as a whole, still somewhat in confusion rather than revelation.

Rating: 4/5

In the early hours of May 2, I went to the kitchen at 1:10 AM and then had the bottom part of the grill to deal with, since dad had used it and I had only washed the actual grill and the cover earlier, leaving that bottom part so the grease would harden to some extent and be easier to remove without just dumping it down the drain with the water. So I removed that grease and then washed that bottom part… And then I bumped my head quite hard against the bottom of the freezer door when I stood up after reaching to grab something from the fridge, so I cut a bit of ice from the freezer and held it in that spot, but only for a minute or so, and the lump was noticeable later. Either way, all of that led to eating dinner between 3:20 AM and 4 AM. And then I took it a little too slowly and ended up getting in bed at 5:20 AM.
The alarm was set to ring at 11 AM, but at 9:10 AM I was woken up by an SMS from my provider, announcing me that the active period was about to expire, and that was pretty much it with sleeping, since I had a hard time getting back to sleep after that, then Liza went to the litter box, then dad woke up, and the neighbors were also making various small noises, so I drifted off a few times but really doubt that I got more than a few minutes of sleep on each occasion, if even that. But the plan was to walk the route of the half marathon, so I got up after the alarm rang, ate a banana, an egg salad and a large doughnut, with added cocoa cream, spent some time on the computer, took one more supplement on top of those that I take these days, filled a reusable bottle with tea and took it with me, along with the bag with the few recyclables with the deposit symbol which I had brought back three days earlier, and left at 2:50 PM, in a real hurry, with the backpack and headphones in my hand… And after putting them on in front of the door and checking that I had everything else, when I wanted to plug the headphones into the phone I realized that I had forgotten it. At least I hadn’t actually walked away, so I just went back in and grabbed it, but that meant that it was 2:55 PM when I actually left.
After getting on the route from here, I made my way to Constitution Square, picking up some more recyclables on the way and making a detour to put them in the machine from Carrefour Unirii, after which I also checked the store and spotted a couple of interesting expired products, plus an employee who seemed to be picking more that were likely going to be added there, but I wasn’t going to wander around for several hours with products that were already expiring, so I just cashed in that voucher and then continued on my way while also continuing to pick up recyclables.
After reaching what would be the last turn of the race, I briefly stepped off the route again, to get to what would be the starting area and continue from there, one thing that surprised me being how easy that climb on Berzei felt. It definitely won’t be easy during the race, but I was used to really feel it even while walking and that wasn’t the case that day, which seemed odd. On the other hand, I noticed that there’s a little slope a little earlier as well, which I don’t think I really paid attention to before. Either way, after also going both ways on Kiseleff, which is usually the easy part, when I returned to Victory Square I entered that Carrefour Express to put the recyclables which I had gathered in the machine from there and cash in that voucher as well, after a brief look through the store. And then I picked up more as I continued on my way, the next relevant thing that I noticed, not counting that short but steep climb that felt as hard as it usually does, being when I got back to Constitution Square and actually passed by it, steam or smoke coming through a fenced off manhole cover that was partially off and seemed to be right on what would be the final straight, though it might be right next to that lane, so on the one used to go past that area the first time around, and I wonder if that’ll still be like that, or otherwise a potential hazard, at the time of the race.
Either way, after passing by Constitution Square I made the usual detour to the crossing and back, then once again continued along the route until I made that other, smaller, detour as I approached Unirii Square, to use that crossing. And then, after putting a bottle which I had picked up but which didn’t have the deposit symbol in a recycling bin, I stepped off the route to go to Carrefour Unirii one more time, once again putting the recyclables in the machine, which even accepted a can that was quite crushed and a bottle with part of the neck broken off, peeing and thoroughly washing my hands and face, and seeing that some bakery products already had the 50% discount, so I took one of those mini breads, plus the tea that I wanted, and then also cashed in the voucher, since the value was greater than the price of those purchases and all of those interesting expiring products which I had spotted the first time around were gone by then. And then, after putting the purchases in the backpack, I drank the tea before walking out and getting back on the route, continuing to pick up recyclables.
With nothing else worth mentioning about the route itself, I’ll just say that when I reached Decebal again I had a quick look in that Profi, entering with everything, and then also went to that Penny, being wary when I saw the same cashier who was there when I walked the route of the marathon, considering what happened then, but I wanted to at least get some mustard for dad, so I once again entered with everything, including the recyclables, since the machine wasn’t working at that point, and bought that mustard, not only remembering to hand over the store card but also telling the cashier that she could use it for the person who was ahead of me as well, who said that she didn’t have hers with her, and the cashier thanked me for that and then there were no problems. The recycling machine seemed to have been fixed by then, but I just walked out, added the mustard in the backpack, had a quick look in that Mega Image as well, once again entering with everything and not using the machine from there either when I didn’t find anything to get, and then continued all the way to the point where the route turns.
It was definitely late by that point, but I just barely had enough time to rush to Kaufland, so I did that, washing my hands when I got there, entering the store, once again with everything, when it was announced that the store was closing in five minutes, and just getting some wafers for dad and two cans of the cat food that was on sale, since they were also placed at the end of the shelf and I passed by them on the way to the self-checkouts, the fact that the store had closed having already been announced at that point. Then, after arranging my things, I continued to that Mega Image, putting the recyclables in a cabinet… And being surprised to see that the bakery products were also discounted by 90% that evening! So I eventually got quite a few, including a baguette with butter and garlic that I was thinking about giving away, plus some packaged bread for my parents that was also discounted by 90% and one of those imported high-protein puddings, which was the only remaining refrigerated expiring product that had that same 90% discount. And then, after retrieving the recyclables and walking out, only taking the time to arrange everything properly when I was outside, I finally put those recyclables in Kaufland’s machine, keeping the voucher for later… And I also ended up keeping that baguette that I was thinking to give away, since I didn’t see the homeless person that I expected to pass by after getting back on the route, covering this last portion of it on the way back, and while I considered giving it to another guy I saw, he was walking past me and holding a beer, so I decided against it. And I picked up one more recyclable by the time I got here.
I got back at 11:25 PM, then cleaned the litter box and went to drop a bag of trash down the chute, gave dad the wafers, ate an orange and that pudding, spread out the bread and bakery products and put the few other purchases in their place, washed what was in the kitchen, and went to the bathroom, to use the toilet and wash, at 1:05 AM, being done a little after 2 AM. Then I also put the bakery products in their place and started eating lunch at 3:20 AM, but dad wanted some things taken out of the freezer, so I then did that, which took quite a while, and when I was done I also put those breads in there, eventually finishing lunch at 4 AM, and then eating dinner between 4:40 AM and 5:40 AM. I got in bed at 6:45 AM.

I’ll also mention here that the initial form of this post only included the first two paragraphs, the one above this one and what follows, since the main part, about the actual walk, wasn’t already written and going out again today meant that I had no chance to write anything more before midnight, and I only added it on May 14, at which point I also realized that the post wasn’t filed in the correct category and fixed that as well. Either way, I’ll also just add that, after getting up on May 3, I started thinking about making mamaliga that evening, eventually deciding to do that… But finding, when I was about to start, that the water was brownish, and then the hot water was turned off completely, and when I later checked I saw that the site reported that there was no water at the heating station, so it’s a good thing that we still had cold water, at least for washing. But I wasn’t about to use it for cooking, so I ended up putting some cheese and the piece of very old salo which I had taken out of the freezer, meaning to put it in the mamaliga, into that baguette with butter and garlic and eating that as a late lunch… And for dinner I used one of the plain baguettes bought from Mega Image, finding what were quite obviously three deep finger marks when I took it out of the paper bag, so I cut out that part and ran the rest over the fire from the stove a little before slicing it. And I don’t know whether it had anything to do with what I ate or not, or perhaps just with being concerned about it, but after dinner my heart started beating irregularly again… And I got in bed at 5:20 AM.

In the early hours of April 25, after dealing with the two breads that I still had to deal with and moving the remaining peanut butter into another jar, I ended up eating dinner between 3:35 AM and 4:15 AM, with peanut butter on all of the bread. Then I set the alarm to ring at 2 PM, but when I woke up at one point and really had to pee, I decided that if it was past 1:30 PM, I was going to turn it off and get up… And it was 1:31 PM, so I did just that, which also meant that I had time to shave without problems, after having given up on the idea of doing so before going to bed. And then I had the usual stuff, though the yogurt was a “Greek” one which had just expired and wasn’t quite what you’d want before a run, having 10.1% fat, of which 6.9% saturated, and only 5% protein. But I also added raisins in dark chocolate in it, and another sweet thing consisted of some more of those wheat things, putting jam and bio (organic) honey between them. And I also took another of those somewhat better supplements for immunity, drank most of the tea, and then decided to wait to see the temperature at 5 PM, which was about 24°C at the station inside the city, and that held steady but, oddly, at the other two it was 26-27°C when I left and 25°C when I finished. Either way, I left at 5:05 PM, wearing the full running gear, including returning to the better shoes, and also taking one armband.
The time was 1:50:28, the sector times for the first four laps being 4:31, 5:15, 6:12, 4:40, 5:20, 6:16, 4:46, 5:26, 6:20, 4:55, 5:34 and 6:26, making for lap times of 15:58, 16:16, 16:32 and 16:55, while I covered lap six and the final portion in 17:16 and, respectively, 10:29, the sector times being 4:58, 5:40, 6:38, 2:01, 6:36 and 1:52. The problem is that, while I know that I covered lap five in 17:02, the sector times seem to have completely slipped my mind, so much so that I skipped over them without realizing it when I wrote down the times, and I did so in a hurry, without checking what I had written and only at night realizing that I couldn’t remember those times and noticing that they weren’t in the file either. I eventually worked out that the time for sector three of lap five was 6:30, since I did clearly remember 13 seconds at the end of a sector two after I had gone over one hour and the hundredths were no longer displayed, so it must have been on lap five, since after sector two of lap six the time was 1:33:21, and in fact there was no other point where I had 13 seconds anyway. That leaves the first two sectors, and I know that I checked and calculated the times, but when I try to remember them, I just can’t. A likely explanation is that my mind eliminated what seemed like duplicate entries because the times matched some of those from laps four or six, but while 4:58 and 5:34 would really fit that, and another, less likely, option would be 4:55 and 5:37, I’ll just go with 4:52 and 5:40. With big question marks, but I have the impression that sector one of lap five was less slow than that of lap four and actually keep finding myself thinking that I had a 4:52, while on sector two I lost some time, and then there’s something that my mind did on the following run. Not that it matters, this being the worst time since 2021, before the hospitalization…
And to think that I meant to start at an unsustainable pace and then see if I’ll have any chance to get under 1:45. Considering how I felt, managing that was pretty much out of the question, but I did initially hope for a time that was similar to that from a month and a half earlier, or at least under 1:48… But after the first sector it was already pretty clear that I had to aim to just stay under 1:50, and after just squeezing under 16 minutes on that first lap, with a sector three that was already bad, it was hard to see how I was going to even manage that… And when I calculated the target lap times, I once again made a mistake, so I was yet again off by one minute. So, after resigning myself to just stay under 1:50, it seemed that laps two and three were fine, and while lap four was a concern, at first it seemed that it shouldn’t be that much of a problem… But it was around that time when I realized that mistake and tried to correct it, yet I failed to actually do so, maybe also because there was no way to gain that minute before the end and I wanted to at least avoid embarrassing myself in such a manner badly enough to fool myself into thinking that the realistic target times were still enough. So, under those circumstances, I was actually rather content with lap five, and on lap six I tried to push in order to give myself a chance to squeeze under what I thought would be 1:49:30, thinking that I might just have a chance to do so after the end of the lap. But the first condition was to cover the first sector of the final portion in less than two minutes, failing to do so being a really bad sign even if I did lose a little time on it. Yet I just kept pushing after that, and really gave everything on the final sector, thinking that I had made it… But then I also looked at the minutes…
Sure, past the typical weaving and going the long way around, because of both people and the lane, the people did cause me to lose some time, starting with hesitating on sector two of lap one, then on sector three of lap two briefly stopping once, hesitating two more times, and then also needing to go on the grass for quite a few meters, then slowing or hesitating a little once or twice on pretty much every sector after that, more notable being sectors two and three of laps five and six, when I probably briefly stopped or otherwise clearly lost a bit of time. I’ll leave the details aside otherwise, especially since I couldn’t match the events to the sectors anymore, but the biggest loss of time in a single spot was when a kid on a wheeled vehicle cut in front of me just as I was about to use the one available bit of space to pass another runner in a spot that was otherwise blocked by other people, causing me to have to slow to a walk for quite a few seconds, and while I’m not entirely certain, I believe that this was on sector two of lap five. But, considering how short sector one of the final portion is, needing to go both long and wide, and around a small tree, instead of turning right away to go down the bridge also had a particularly notable impact on that sector’s time.
Otherwise, I was already sweating after two sectors, so it was a good thing that from lap two it got cloudy… But bad that it also got windy on sectors two and three, and in some places I felt that I was fighting against the wind. And the dark cloud that came right at the end, as I was on sector two of the final portion, brought some pretty bad gusts. But the worst problems were physical, starting from the fact that I wasn’t feeling well in general, and as I started running there was pain from my back, which was certainly also responsible for part, but probably not all, of the pain that I also felt in my diaphragm and abdomen, which obviously affected my breathing. And then there were my leg muscles, which felt rather stiff from the beginning and started to hurt if I tried to push through it. All of that did eventually lessen, maybe from lap three, but I was obviously not in a good shape for such a run and couldn’t go any faster. And I guess I should also mention the lesser issues, such as the pressing need that started to appear from sector two of lap two, but which came and went and wasn’t particularly notable until the start of lap six, when it actually seemed like it was going to become a problem for a while before lessening again. As for the usual warnings from the right knee, I think those appeared from sector two of lap three, and later on they did turn into somewhat more notable pain, though it didn’t actually reach a concerning level. And I also stepped in a hole that was under the lane at one point, on sector three of what I believe was lap three, though there is a chance that it was actually lap two or lap four, and either way it was just jarring.

From now on I won’t mention that the recyclables that I grab have the deposit symbol anymore, since it should go without saying, so I’ll just say that I grabbed two of them on the way back… And then, after taking off the t-shirt and tights and opening the door again to shake the remaining bugs off them outside of the apartment, since I had been just covered in those annoying little bugs after the run, I weighed myself and found that I only had 45 kg… So I changed, drank the remaining tea and made another, and ate what was still good of a spoiling banana and a bag of peanuts, getting 950 calories just from those peanuts, before leaving again, at 9 PM, with the recyclables with the deposit symbol.
I picked up two more of those small oddly-shaped bottles on the way to Kaufland… And once again had the machine from there just “eat” them, since after it happened with the first I decided to try the second as well, just to make sure that this is what happens. So I decided to recover that amount from Kaufland soon enough, but I didn’t do so that evening, using the room for disabled people to wash my hands, since a cleaner was in the men’s, entering the store at 9:30 PM, and getting two lettuces with a good evening discount, some onions, the price being significantly lower than the regular price had been in quite some time even though the label didn’t list it as being discounted, and one of those cheap yogurts, then rushing to the self-checkouts after the closing announcement and cashing in the voucher received for the recyclables after paying for the purchases. And then, since I had dad’s metro card, I took the metro to that non-stop Mega Image where expiring products discounted by 90% appear around 10:30 PM, but I got there some ten minutes too late, so I just put my things in a cabinet and then retrieved them, but at least I then looked more carefully and got back here with a bag that was almost full of recyclables.
I was back a couple of minutes before 11:30 PM, then put the yogurt and onions in their place, ate a small mini cake and lunch, did the day’s squats, and it was past 1:10 AM when I went to the bathroom, mostly wasting time on the toilet and then washing, and almost 2:10 AM when I finished. Then I washed what was in the kitchen, selected some of the worse lettuce leaves in order to also use them for the salad before putting the lettuces in the fridge, and ate dinner between 4:25 AM and 5 AM. I got in bed at 6:15 AM.

After getting up I finally washed that thing I had bought for my chair to some extent, by hand, while at night I ended up eating dinner between 3:15 AM and 4:05 AM, after washing what was in the kitchen, which included a large pot, also cleaning a little, and moving the remaining mamaliga into a smaller bowl. And I got in bed at 5:20 AM. Then, after getting up, I decided that I had time to go out before the handball match, so I rushed out a little after 3:05 PM, with the recyclables with the deposit symbol, picking up a few more on the way.
Despite going on the other side, I decided to go to Carrefour first, entering through that mall’s parking lot… And seeing that I should have at least kept going to Kaufland’s recycling machine, since the one from Carrefour wasn’t working, so I entered the store with the recyclables and just grabbed one of those mini breads from the discounted products, being surprised to see that they still had the regular discount as well. Then I continued to Kaufland, putting the recyclables in the machine and entering the store with that mini bread in the backpack. Since there was a 30% discount on all spices and sauces, I first looked for some black pepper of their store brand, finding three 100g ones left and taking all of them, and then also grabbing some discounted products, plus some mozzarella, which had a regular discount those days, and another one of those cheap yogurts. And then I also used the voucher received for the recyclables when I paid, took some time to arrange the purchases, and then jogged back.
I got back at 4:55 PM, getting annoyed that dad had again cleaned the litter box and took away a lot more of the “sand” than he should have… But then I just took that little bag of trash and dumped it down the chute, watched the handball match, ate a sweet thing and lunch, with a small bag of bagels instead of bread, did 200 squats, since I had forgotten to do them the previous day, started taking all of the supplements that I usually take before races, and then shaved my head… And the following morning I was woken up at 9:45 AM by the sound of mowing from behind the building, though when I looked outside I saw that they had almost finished clearing the plants from that fenced area, so I had slept through most of it, but I guess that at one point it was just too much. Either way, I did get back in bed some two hours later and slept some more.

Moving on to the early hours of April 29, I wasn’t feeling well. There had actually been some irregular heartbeats over the previous few days, and more notably that evening, when I curled up in bed to read some more, but when I went to the kitchen, after taking a late nap, my stomach, or digestive system in general, didn’t seem happy either, and while making the salad my heart seemed to be beating really erratically. But at least things seemed to more or less get back to normal after eating dinner, with peanut butter on all of the bread.
Then again, it definitely didn’t help that I then slept poorly again, waking up several minutes after 9 AM to pee and then being mostly awake until a little after 11 AM, initially having a hard time getting back to sleep and then sort of drifting in and out after dad got up, a little after 10 AM, got ready to leave and left. And after that point I kept switching between being asleep and awake every few minutes, and from the second time I woke up I was thinking that the alarm had to be about to ring, yet it was only a few more such brief naps later when I actually checked the time, finding that it was only 1:05 PM. Interestingly, it’s possible that I then slept for most of the remaining time until 2 PM, when the alarm rang and I got up. Then I had the usual stuff, but what I was noticing was that my vision kept sort of clouding over, or more exactly making it seem that I was looking through tears, but mainly while wearing my glasses, seeming better if I took them off. Either way, after basically wasting time on the toilet, which didn’t seem like much of a problem after having crapped before going to bed, taking the supplements, and eating the sweet thing, which consisted of a slice of cozonac, with added honey, I once again decided to wait to see the reported temperature at 5 PM, which was 19°C, holding steady or maybe dropping just marginally by the time I finished. And I left at 5:05 PM, wearing the full running gear and also putting the slip of paper with the emergency information in the pocket of my tights, just in case.
The time was 1:19:33, with sector times of 4:19, 5:14, 6:12, 4:38, 5:12, 6:01, I think 4:37, I think 5:22, 6:07, 4:44, 5:24, 6:06, 4:34, 5:11 and 5:52, making for lap times of 15:45, 15:51, 16:06, 16:14 and 15:37. After sector two of lap three, I realized that I remembered 13 seconds at the end of the previous sector but had calculated 4:40 as its time, which was obviously wrong, since I had 31:36 after two laps, and since I was pretty sure about the 13 seconds, I recalculated the time for sector one of lap three accordingly, though I will still leave question marks there. But this also made me decide to actually list some probable times for sectors one and two of lap five of the previous run, since I had been thinking about that and the fact that my mind came up with 40 seconds when seeing 13 made me decide that those times that I ended up listing there, and which already matched the other, less specific, impressions that I had, were actually the most probable ones.
Getting back to this run’s times, I pushed hard on the first sector, so that time was worse than I expected, and when sector three of lap one was already over the target for a 16-minute lap, and matched sector three of lap one from the previous run, I wondered whether I’ll even stay under 1:22, the first two sectors of lap two at least allowing me to hope to manage that. But when sector three of lap two was almost decent, just over six minutes, and the lap as a whole was well under 16 minutes, the thought of squeezing under 1:21 entered my mind, while over the course of lap four I started thinking of 1:20:30… But that was frustratingly close to 1:20, so on sector three of lap four I decided that I could try to squeeze under that time after all. That hadn’t seemed at all possible until then, but at that point I just went for it, and at the end of the lap I saw that I needed 16:03 on lap five in order to make it. So I kept pushing, and when, at the start of the last sector, it was quite certain that I’ll manage it, I was frustrated that I was actually going to end up closer to 1:19:30, but unable to squeeze under that time as well, so I thought that I was settling for just staying under 1:19:45 and, judging by the previous times, that I had to push hard to make sure of that… But giving everything on that last sector resulted in being even more frustratingly close to 1:19:30 than I thought.
It was rather windy during the first half of the run, and a couple of places remained gusty after that as well, but that was pretty much the only external problem, not counting a pretty normal amount of weaving and going the long way around. As for physical issues, the right knee started to give warnings from sector two of lap two, but much more concerning was the sharp jab that I felt at the back of my left thigh, possibly originating from the back of that hip, on sector three of lap three, which repeated itself at the start of sector two of lap four and again, albeit with less intensity, on sector one of lap five, while on sector three of lap four I felt a similar jab from the left ankle, so I tried to put a little less pressure on those joints and it seems to have been enough to avoid any worse issues. Other than that, my arms were starting to go numb from the long straight of sector one of lap five, as I was pushing harder, and a pressing need also seemed to appear around the start of lap five, though that soon passed.

On the way back, I grabbed a recyclable and held on to it as I quickly checked the nearby Mega Image. Then I had lunch, changed, and left again at 8:50 PM, with the few recyclables with the deposit symbol that were here, but after jogging to Penny Basarabia I just held on to them as I quickly checked the store, then kept jogging to Kaufland Basarabia, finally putting them in the machine from there, along with three that I picked up from there and which were accepted, so I ended up with a second voucher. But I had also picked up three others which had been discarded there and which weren’t accepted, so I put those in a cabinet, washed my hands, and entered the store a couple of minutes before 9:30 PM, making use of good discounts to get some expiring germinated wheat and some spoiling lemons, and then digging through the bananas, which had a good evening discount but were clearly bad, and grabbing two that didn’t look that bad. Then I used one of the vouchers received for the recyclables when I paid and cashed in the other, rushed out before the closing announcement, and used one of the tables that are outside to put the few purchases in the backpack before making my way to that Mega Image, grabbing just one recyclable on the way, entering the store with everything… And wasting over half an hour, waiting for some products with the 90% discount to be placed, because I had seen an employee with a cart full of products discounted by 50% when I entered, but seeing that all that was eventually being placed back in those areas still had that 50% discount, so just before 10:50 PM I gave up and walked out… And I didn’t even find any more recyclables on the way back.
I got back a little after 11:20 PM, then talked to dad for a while, ate one of the bananas and left the few other purchases in the kitchen, washed a few things that were there, also ate a bag of snacks and a really thick slice of cozonac, did the day’s squats, and a few minutes before 1 AM I went to the bathroom, reading a newspaper while only leaving a little in the toilet, and then washing. I was out a little after 2 AM, then took care of a few other things, also put the lemons in their place and washed the few remaining things from the kitchen, and finally ate dinner between 4:15 AM and 5 AM. I got in bed at 6:40 AM… But after a while, just as I was drifting off, my heart started beating really irregularly again, and eventually, at 7:55 AM, I got back up and on the computer, things being fine while I was there, but I only dared to get back in bed at 8:45 AM, after peeing one more time… And shortly after that Liza went to the litter box, so after she was done I got up to clean it, so dad won’t get on my case again, getting back in bed at 9:10 AM. And at least I was able to sleep after that, waking up frequently but getting back to sleep almost right away until around 2 PM, when I couldn’t get back to sleep quickly and eventually decided to get up, the problem being that the irregular heartbeats also returned then, though they eventually went away again, without returning again so far.

Otherwise, yesterday I also finally put that thing on my chair, the problem being that, while it initially seemed to fit the chair just fine, now it’s slightly less wide than the seat, and it’s just the sides that I mainly wanted to protect with it, so I wonder if it shrunk when I washed it or it gets pulled together like that when it’s tied to the chair, the latter option possibly allowing me to find some way to make it cover the seat better… But after sitting on it for a while I found myself wet, so it wasn’t at all dry inside and I then put it back on the balcony, though the fact that I also hung a load of laundry there means that it’s unlikely to get any drier anytime soon, so I’ll have to leave actually using it for later.
At least I recovered some lost sleep today, and stayed in bed for much longer. Admittedly, I woke up as dad was getting ready to leave, and while I didn’t go out of my room before he left, close to 10:20 AM I got on the computer for a while, getting back in bed around 10:50 AM and falling asleep again pretty quickly. And when I woke up at one point I told myself that if it was before 3 PM I’ll get back in bed, and it was around 2:30 PM, so I peed one more time, just in case, and did just that, catching another nap, though I don’t know how long that was, since I only looked at the time again when I finally got up, seeing 5:23 PM at that point, but I had been awake for quite a while by then. And I definitely needed this, seeing as the plan for tomorrow is to walk the route of the half marathon.

If you also include the 2019-2020 edition, which was canceled at that stage, CSM Bucharest‘s run in the EHF Women’s Champions’ League ends in the quarter-finals for the seventh time in a row… And this comes at the hands of Team Esbjerg for the third time in four seasons, last week’s first leg actually being CSM’s only victory in the eight matches played against them during this period. But this time around it was special, the elimination resulting from today’s match marking the end of Cristina Neagu‘s international career, only a maximum of six domestic matches being left before her retirement, five if they’ll somehow fail to reach the Cup final, and that’s assuming that she’ll play in all of them.
At least she scored just the four goals needed to get to 101 today, extending her streak of scoring over 100 goals per season in the Champions’ League to five seasons in a row, and obviously also extending her lead as the top goalscorer in the history of the competition, but that’s a pale consolation for being unable to end her career by playing at least for a podium place, which last happened in 2018, if not for the trophy, which she only won back in 2015, while playing for Buducnost. And in fact 2015 was her best year from this point of view, since that was also when she won the bronze medal with the national team at the World Championship.
When you think of it like that, ten years since her best season and not much of anything for the past seven, 2018 also being the last year when she was selected World and European Player of the Year, it’s quite sad, or at the very least particularly disappointing for a player of her level. Maybe she’d have achieved more if she wouldn’t have returned to Romania, despite the apparent strength of our championship, but that’s far from certain, and at least it’s a good thing, for her as well as for the fans, that she’s ending her career here. And, either way, I for one consider her, along with Simona Halep, who has also retired this year, to be the Romanian athletes who are pretty much impossible to criticize. At the moment, David Popovici may have a chance to follow them from that point of view, but he’d need to keep himself at least at this level for several more years before that will truly be the case.