Training Log Archive: Swampfox

Another very nice day with full sun and more seasonable temps than yesterday--I will guess in the high 20s up at Happy Jack around midday, depending on whether you were in or out of the sun.

After the wind earlier in the week, the trails would benefit from some more snow to cover up some of the fallen pine needles, but it's nothing to complain about--especially compared to the conditions this time last year. Doesn't look like the forecast holds more snow anytime soon.

Went to the Wyoming-Cal Berkeley basketball game, and then ran some from home, enjoying a fine sunset and late day glow.

A beautifully mild (at least 51F) December day, and one on which the already light midday breeze trailed off as the day grew older and the sun headed for the mountains to the west. It was the perfect day for a winter trifecta of biking (got the most time today, while the sun was as high as it gets this time of year), skiing, and running, the last in the dark on the snow.

The earliest (local) sunset of the year will be here soon...

I should have mentioned that while running yesterday, I came across a bull moose standing to one side in a good sized open area with deep snow I had to cross. I didn't think my presence was threatening, but I slowed to a walk anyway, because once I got out in the middle of the open area, if the moose decided to come after me, I would be at a pretty bad disadvantage. I judged the situation correctly, and the moose didn't come after me, though I did keep glancing backwards just to make sure.

Today while running in the snow out at Remarkable Flats, I saw something even better: two bobcats out in the open! That doesn't happen every day. I bet they were out hunting hares. At any rate, once they saw me, they took off and never stopped before vanishing out of sight.

Skiing at noon was perfect in the full sun and more more seasonal temps than we have had for the past two weeks.

Sometimes people ask me: "Why do you always look so happy, don't you know about all the latest horrible news?" Well, first of all, it's not always true that I'm happy. Plus, it may be I haven't heard all the latest horrible news. But usually I'm fairly happy; aren't most folks? So, I smile back when they ask me that. I mean, sure, I know about the latest bombastic pronouncement from Der Trumpster. But, so what? At least I'm not in Texas. I can smile some more. And, you know, skiing at Happy Jack was pretty fine today, so there's always that, too.

But mostly I smile because I know if I am patient and just wait long enough, there will be new Bottom 25 rankings to peruse, as there was today.

And, a champion has been crowned! (Even though technically there are a few games involving Bottom 25 or potential move-ups still left.) Despite truly epic last gasp efforts by Kansas, and winning no games this year, they could not overcome the all too impressive resume' of the new National Bottom 25 Champion: the University of Central Florida.

It's hard to appreciate just how bad UCF was unless you consider their worst loss, to Furman. Growing up in South Carolina, Furman is not an altogether unfamiliar name to me. Back then, Furman was known for their *pom-pom* team, and I don't think things have gotten a whole lot better since.

Man. Even some decades from now, when UCF is mired in the midst of a winning season with no losses, they will still be able to look back in pride to 2015, the year they lost to Furman.

It's fun to glance at some of the statistics and notes. For instance, Wake Forest's best win this year--a 3-0 win over BC. Now *that* was an exciting game (and something of a follow-on to Wake's 6-3 win over VaTech last year.)

Another one: UMass slipping out of the Bottom 25 at the last possible moment, thus disproving a fundamental tenet of black holes: that no object having fallen into a black hole can escape it. Perhaps astrophysicists will examine the data, and conclude there must have been a massive, undetected object lingering right at the very edge of the event horizon, coming in with a mass of about 1.0000000000000001 pg, which might have been barely enough to nudge UMass back out of the black hole just as it was about to plummet out of sight, thus keeping Einstein's General Theory of Relativity intact. The universe is a strange place, after all.

Then things like: Tulane' best win 34-31 over Army, Army's best win 58-36 over Eastern Michigan, Eastern Michigan's best win 48-29 over Wyoming, and Wyoming's best win of course consisting of beating the entire state of Nevada by a combined score of 63-49.

But all good things come to an end, alas, and it could be a long period of bleakness before...the Bottom 25 starts up again next year! We'll be rooting for you, Jayhawks!

A fine, crisp day in town, and crisp up top, too, with some fine Wyoming wind cheerfully kicking in by mid-afternoon. Probably high teens when I started skiing with the sun still in sight in places, with everything in shadow not long afterwards. Temps probably high single digits when I finished, but there was nothing single digit about the wind!

Time to put pre-winter to bed, as real Winter launches tomorrow with the arrival of December!