Quick Personal Update Between Euro 2016 Matches and Reading
Rather long title, but should be a pretty short post, so let me get directly to last week’s run, which was Wednesday, with a time of 35:28. I could say a second less, since the stopwatch said exactly 35:28.01, but since I did hit the button first and looked later, let’s leave it as it is. Sector times were 4:49, 5:24, 6:11, 4:41, 5:04, 6:14 and 3:05, respectively, making for a first lap time of 16:24 and a second lap time of 15:59.
Being sunny and with the reported temperature getting to 30°C, it was a bit uncomfortable, but much of the route is in the shade, so still all right overall. However, after that the temperature got to and even slightly over 35°C, so that was probably the last run during the day for quite a while, and now I’ll need to see exactly when to go during the evening, since the longer distance means I’ll need some 15 minutes more now than I did last summer. Also likely means that’s it with good times over this distance until it’ll get cooler again, since it’ll be pretty crowded during the evening and I’ll have to weave around all the people, slowing down or even briefly stopping when there would just be no way through.
Moving on, on the Sunday before that, so on June 12, I went on something of a trip around the city after spotting an event that Facebook recommended that actually seemed interesting. The name was “On the Hills of Bucharest – The Green Route” and said route started with the newly-established Vacaresti Natural Park, which I did want to visit and where it’s probably not a good idea to go alone. After that, passed through Lumea Copiilor Park, Tineretului Park and Carol Park, the arrival at the Mausoleum there being timed so we’ll also catch the changing of the guard. Then we went to Xenofon Street, known for its steps, before returning to Carol Park and finishing in front of the nearby Dimitrie Leonida Museum. The back of my neck is still not completely done peeling after the sunburn I got that day, but other than that, it was nice.
I counted a total of 55 people when we went in and then back out of Vacaresti Natural Park and that was obviously the main point of attraction, as a few more joined later but the numbers dropped, none of my later counts reaching 50 again. However, the world definitely seemed small when I spotted Andreea at the starting location, and she did come up to me to say hi and we exchanged a few more words along the way. Still has me blocked on Facebook though, at least as far as I know, so I gather she couldn’t see the pictures I took.
And now I guess I’ll see what else is there to do on-line before, I hope, trying to read a few more pages of Sonya‘s new book before today’s first matches. I mean, I should have finished by now but instead I’m not even a quarter of the way through, because I still can’t get myself out of “edit mode” and that just messes up my brain, plus that there’s very little to find, so I keep thinking I must be missing something. Yes, I’m not at the level of attention and stress I was at back when I was still struggling to edit my own story, when after two pages my brain felt pretty much completely broken, but I’m not all that far from it either, so I’m thinking I wouldn’t be getting through it significantly faster even without spending all this time watching matches. But that may just be an excuse, one way or another.