To My Amazing Wife
Today she handed in her final assignment for the year. She has one summer course and then one final course through next year and…that’s it! Graduation time.
I just want to say congratulations to my wonderful and lovely wife. You kick butt kid! Actually, she doesn’t like being called ‘kid’ so, you kick butt schaweeeet- hearrrrt!
Five years ago I didn’t know if she would be with me from one day to the next as she battled Lupus and End Stage Renal disease. But with the help of the good Lord above, a whole new diet, a few supplements, sunshine, exercise, lots of lovin’ and a new kidney from her big sister from Thailand, she tossed all the bad health issues to the side and moved on. What a long and bumpy ride it has been.
I won’t post any photos of her when she was really, really sick (she was incredibly swollen and most of her hair was gone – the people at the hospitals often called her Mr. Bowers! ) but here’s a ‘then’, ‘improving’, and a ‘now’ comparison.
That’s my girl!
AS I type this, she’s at a salon getting her hair cut to donate to the Sick Kids Hospital.
I have been with her every step of the journey but in a strange way, she is the one who sent me on a health trip as well. Helping her recover opened my eyes to so many things regarding physical, mental and spiritual health.
Together we are a pretty good team – in fact we are a great team. I think it’s going to be that way for a long time to come.
Never give up hope friends – it’s amazing what can be overcome when you put your mind to it.
Smiling from ear to ear today…
Take care – Doug
Listen and learn…or not.
It’s beautiful outside and my wife and I are heading out to enjoy the pleasant surprise of blooming Cherry Blossoms. She’s a flower fanatic and I do what I can to help her enjoy her passion.
However, the point of today’s post has nothing to do with blooming flowers but more about blooming idiots. OK, I shouldn’t be so harsh but I’m at my wits end.
I don’t feel well – can you help me?
Four years ago, two co-workers came to me, the “Coach”, for some health advice. They had no energy and constantly had a cold or flu or headache or stomach issues. So, doing what I do, I assessed their lifestyle, eating habits, stress levels, sleep patterns, health history and their goals. I believe health issues have to be dealt with on an individual basis. There is no “one size fits all” when it comes to health. Over a period of two weeks I worked with them, even taking them back to my home so they could have a look at my cupboards and fridge just so they would get a better understanding of how to manage a better diet. They took notes, talked to Thai ( my wife ) and even took photos. Then I set up a basic exercise routine for them.
...it helps but you need a plan...
However, making food changes proved too difficult. A few weeks after my “program” was put into place, I was shown some Chinese medicine they bought that they ‘hoped’ would fix them up because, even though we didn’t know what the heck it was since everything written on the package was in Chinese, it had to work because it was…Chinese!
Also the exercise routines I set up fell apart shortly there after. I don’t think the cleanses were ever started. So, you get the picture.
Deja Vu?
Two years ago, we went through the same process, back to my place again because they realized they hadn’t done much to follow my advice and they were still feeling like crap. This time I had them set up a visualization board and got some of their family involved for support. I also showed them inspirational videos and stories from some people I know personally and some from the internet. I even went shopping with them and had them join me in the park for some really basic exercises. Something fun so they would continue. They had a blast but only came out twice!
Deja Vu 2?
Ok – so here’s why I’m a little frustrated. Guess who came into my office at work last week because they one guy was constipated and they other had a cold for over two weeks? Yep, the same two guys. I shooshed them away saying I was busy.
A few years ago I would have felt responsible and taken this personally but I’ve dealt with so many people that won’t take action for themselves that my skin has become a little thicker. I can sort of justify that because I’ve seen amazing results with others that have taken action and followed some or most of my advice. I try my best to understand why people won’t do things for themselves but now it’s basically ‘three strikes and your out’, and I move on.
Why? Why? Why? I just don’t understand.
Anyway, I just e-mailed them most of the information we went through before and wished them luck.They have the information, it is time to take action and responsibility for themselves.
You can't gamble with your health! Do something about it!
I closed the file and Thai and I are heading out to the park to get some sun, some air and some fun.
Think I was too hard on the guys? They listen but they just don’t seem to learn.
New personal best!
UPDATE – New Personal record; Ran 5 km in 28 minutes then Plank with 40 lb weighted vest – 3 minutes 10 seconds…20 pushups – plank 2 minutes…10 pushups – plank 30 seconds…flat on my face. Pumped ( with my face in the grass)!
Rock on kids..and keep smiling.
Doug
The CanDouggy Derby
There is always a way around life’s little obstacles.
Pre-run prep:
Carbs in; √ Proper hydration; √ teeth cleaned; √ Laces double knotted;√√
Keys in hand, timer set;√√
————————————————————————————————
Thanks for joining me as we follow Doug through one of his daily runs. This is an unusual run for the old War Horse folks. He’s does much better on muddy trails or hills but let’s see what he can do. This route is all street running. 3 km up hill and back through the university campus. He appears to be all prepped, stretched and ready to go. He’s set his timer…
…annnnnd…he’s off!
Doug bolts out the door and down the 4 stairs – a quick turn and he’s flying down the hallway. Hold it. He slammed on the brakes and turned around. Back down the hall way – up the stairs and…he locks the door! Good move Douggy.
Down the stairs again, through the hallway; he bursts through the fire door and is bounding down the stairs. Look at him go folks. 2 – 3 – 4 steps at a time. Only holding the handrail to get around the turns. Whoa! That was close. He had to be nimble there to avoid the lady carrying her groceries, but he never lost a step.
5th floor – 4th – 3rd – 2nd and… he’s out side. That was amazing time. He’s trying to find his footing. On the sidewalk – on the road. Sidewalk – road – sidewalk – road. Ooooh that truck was close. The mirror just missing his head. He’s decided on the sidewalk. A quick sip of water and he heading down the starting stretch. Taking his time, finding his pace. He doesn’t seem really comfortable on this concrete but he’s moving well.
Round the first turn. Nicely done, now he’s lengthening his stride and settling in. A little fast at this point. Let’s see if he can keep it up. Wait a minute. He’s going faster. What’s he doing? He’ll never finish at this pace. Ah. I see them now. Two fillies up ahead. He’s within a few paces. He can overtake them easily but, but he’s slowing down. Staying behind them. What’s going on here? Ohhh, These girls are wearing Lulu Lemon spandex so short they’re more like Lu Lems. This could be their strategy to throw off his plan…but he’s not falling for it. No, he’s moving to the outside and overtakes them. Doug pushes on leaving the skimpily clad spandex behinds behind. Another 2.5 km to go uphill but he has a steady pace as he puts distance between him and the two ladies.
Now what’s he doing? He’s moving off course – heading to the right. Unbelievable folks. This isn’t part of the run. Up a hill, around a tree…back down the hill and around another tree. Up and down, around and around. What’s this guy up to? Now he’s going up again and…wait. Where is he? I can’t see around the tree but there seems to be water coming from the tree. He’s…oh he’s ahh – ( cue music from Jeopardy).
…and he’s back on the run. Off course and still up on the hill however and now he’s, he’s doing burpees! 5, 6, 12, 15 – full knee tucks to chest on each one. Unbelievable! And there go the two Lu Lems. Doug waves but never misses a jump. 20, 25, 30. He’s stopped to catch his breath. Folks this is one for the books. Another sip of water and he’s back on the side walk. His pace is slowed a little. He seems to have settled into his regular form as he approaches the top of the rise and preparing for the first big turn.
Nicely done! A ninety degree turn done in full stride. He’s breathing deep and slowing his pace a little but still has a nice kick. And he’s gaining on the short shorts again. A quick wave as he passes them and he is ready for the next turn. Whoa he nailed that beautifully. Leaning into it full speed. This is the university campus and he opts for the grass. Doug picks up speed again, looking good as he comes around a bend and look out! He has to come to a skidding halt. Construction?! This certainly isn’t part of the game plan. He tries to go over the high walls but the security guard isn’t having any of that. Discussion – waving arms…Doug tries the wall again but the guard pulls him down.
Waving his arms and stomping his feet – Doug seems really upset. He checks his time and starts back to the last turning point. Guess who is stopped at the lights? That’s right folks the two fillies. They are all jogging on the spot. Arms pointing this way and that way. Seems like Doug is out of the run and will have to go back the way he came. The Lu Lems go one way, Doug starts running the route back.
But hold it! He’s turning around again and catches up to the girls. He’s keeping pace with them, then what’s this? A quick wave and he’s gone into the bushes. I can’t see him folks. I don’t know what to say. Hang on – there he is! Through the bushes and out, he’s on the other side of the construction wall and the security guard is screaming and furiously waving him back. Doug is having no part of it. He’s in full sprint now. Over piles of dirt – jumping ditches – balancing on planks across culverts. This old warhorse is in his glory. Just look at that smile!
Up and over two more huge piles of dirt and he’s back on the road. What a run ladies and gentlemen. Always something interesting with this guy.
He’s coming into the home stretch – gulps his last drop of water and look at him turn on the jets. Wow! He’s in full sprint. Arms pumping, long strides with a strong kick. A few more paces and – he crosses the entrance gate!
What a run! A quick check of the time and it’s 26 minutes 35 seconds. Well off his pace for the regular six kilometers but we don’t even know how far he ran so let’s just say it was a great run and leave it at that.
…and that my friends way my run for the day. Hope you keep your runs interesting?
Do your best...then smile and be proud!
Smiling as always – Doug
SLEEP dEpriVatiOn zzzzzz
Huh? OK – I’m good. I’m awake. What time is it?
Oh…hello there. Sorry it’s taken me awhile to get another posting on here but lately, spare time is really scarce!
I work the dreaded afternoon shift; 3:30p.m. to 11:30p.m. Now, as if that wasn’t bad enough on it’s own, the night shift coordinator had the week booked off, so I had to cover. Which meant getting home at, oh, say, anywhere between 1:30 a.m. – 3:30a.m.
Now, as if that wasn’t rough enough , my lovely wife is finishing up her university and was in need of a ride to the campus each morning and also, ” Can you just check the punctuation and grammar quickly please? Pretty please!” My wife is Thai, and though very clever, her mother tongue doesn’t use articles – a, an or the – so I’m the ‘checking guy’. Which I don’t mind ordinarily but at 7:00a.m. after my shift, I can barely see the paper never mind checking grammar.
Now, as if that wasn’t tough enough, I was just crazy enough to try and squeeze in a few workouts and a run or two. Puh-leeze! The name of an old song comes to mind, ”What kind of fool am I?” I pulled off a couple of Kettle-bell workouts, one Muay Thai class and some basic body work but the run…hah! I did a 6km run and it felt like I had just finished a double marathon. My legs were wobbly, my head was wobbly, in fact, I was wobbly all over.
Isn’t there a saying, something about ‘older and wiser’? Well I got the older part going on but I’m still working on the wiser. Today I have two hours of Muay Thai, then straight to work. So yeah, I’ll be a complete mess tomorrow. Sigh!
Anyway, on to more fun and exciting things!
Here we go! A few months back I switched from the WordPress style to just .com. Two really dumb things on my part here.
1. I didn’t realize I could and would lose a lot of my followers and,
2. (this is really dumb) I didn’t follow a lot of my followers so after losing them I couldn’t contact them again!
Plus, I’ve since realized how much fun it is reading other peoples blogs on life in general and that all relationships must be a two way street if they are to work well.
—-Move on—-
Just recently, one amazing lady nominated me for the Very Inspiring Blogger and Sunshine Awards. That lady is none other than Jenny from The Running Thriver.
This girl absolutely rocks! She must live on adrenaline and love. Thanks so much Jen. I am humbled. Peoples, check her out, she’s incredible.
Now I’m supposed to post some some random, interesting things about myself. That’s kind of awkward for me. Hmm, let me see…
1) I’m thankful to have traveled to 28 countries and see them up close. No 2 week vacations for this kid. I was a backpacker for almost 20 years.
2) After living in Thailand for almost 11 years, I still cannot speak Thai! Lazy?
3) Give me a shovel, rake and a hoe, a big garden and I may never come inside again.
4) Every meal I make tastes the same! I’m glad my wife is an amazing cook.
5) I would love to be a good photographer. I stink at it now but I really enjoy it.
6) I have many more female friends than I do male friends. Not sure what that means though!
7) And finally – I think I’m put on this planet just to help others, in no particular place or order.
As part of my hard learned lesson, I recently started following other bloggers with much more interest. And wow, I never realized what I had been missing out on. From inspiration to amazing recipes, life lessons and great photography. There are so many wonderful bloggers out there. So I would like to mention a few that I enjoy. Please check them out;
The Everyday Warrior; funny and inspiring – I love reading all the latest updates.
Outside Air; musings on the world around Kari – just a pleasure to read.
No Time To Weight; After back surgery this gent is on a mission to regain his health through running. Amazing stuff!
drinkrunyoga; another radical runner on a health kick and looking forward to the Boston Marathon. Inspiration? Oh Yeah!!
RaeDi at Hummingbird Hollow; This blog just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy and huggy…Ahem! I mean, great recipes and photos and stories. You know. Stuff that even us tough guys can relate to.
Run,poem,run!; need to relax for awhile. His writings will allow you to drift away in peace.
There are quite a few others and my list is growing. I’ll post more as I read more. Many thanks to all of them for such fun, interesting, inspirational and down to earth insight on life.
To finish todays ramblings…I just got called to help a friend move! What’ did I just say in #7 ?!
from this little nut to all of you...
So everyone – have a great weekend. Enjoy life to the fullest. See you again soon.
Smile through the pain…
Doug
Love ( handles) – Hate Relationship !
The rest is OK - why won't 'this' go away?!
Krazy for Krav
Muay Thai, Trail running, Kettle-bell workouts; these are all awesome conditioning training techniques. However, there’s something wildly wicked about Krav Maga! We do the conditioning exercises of course, as well as stretches but getting into the meat of the training is such an adrenalin rush!
Krav Maga 
/krɑːv məˈɡɑː/ (Hebrew: קרב מגע [ˈkʁav maˈɡa], lit. ”contact combat”) is a noncompetitive eclectic self-defense system developed in Israel that involves striking techniques, wrestling and grappling. Krav Maga is known for its focus on real-world situations and extremely efficient, brutal counter-attacks. It was derived from street-fighting skills developed by Imi Lichtenfeld, who made use of his training as a boxer and wrestler, as a means of defending the Jewish quarter against fascist groups in Bratislava in the mid-to-late 1930s. In the late-1940s, following his immigration to Israel, he began to provide lessons on combat training to what was to become the IDF, who went on to develop the system that became known as Krav Maga. It has since been refined for civilian, police and military applications.
Krav Maga has a philosophy emphasizing threat neutralization, simultaneous defensive and offensive maneuvers, and aggression.
I know, I know – you’re thinking it’s so brutal and cruel and violent…and it is actually, I certainly won’t argue that. But that’s not why I enjoy it so much. In fact, I pray to the good Lord every day that I will never be in a position where I will have to even think about using it. And believe me, I definitely am not a fighter!! So why does it fascinate me? Efficiency. Getting the best results from the quickest and least amount of movement and effort. I’m not saying it’s easy but, in my opinion, Krav Maga is probably the fastest and most efficient form of self defense.
Lots of women take Krav as well.
It trains your mind to react quickly to different situations and to do so in the fastest time with the greatest results. It operates on a ‘burst’ method. That is, you defend and attack at the same time. It’s requires stamina, strength, flexibility, speed and very importantly, a calm mind. Of course other martial arts require these attributes also but Krav Maga basically has no rules so you are ad-libbing from the very get-go, using the learned techniques. You have to be creative while being aggressive. Actually its the only form of self defense that is mainly offense. No fancy schmancy, dancing around and sparring. Take your opponent out or at least down, so you can get away, that’s it – that’s all. Still, our instructor reminds us in every class that it is always best to avoid any confrontation. Give up your wallet or watch if it will keep everyone involved safe.
Benefits?
Since training in Krav Maga I’ve seen a noticeable improvement in my squash and badminton playing and I also feel much lighter on my feet when running trails. Even running up hills I think differently. Instead of, “Oh man, another 100 meters of ‘UP’!”, I think, ” There it is, bring it on. I’ll get up there one way or another.” The challenge seems less daunting and I’m more confident. I’m hoping that mentality will carry over when I run in the Tough Mudder!!
One downfall however, I’m always coming home with bruises and bumps on my arms and legs but I guess that just goes with the territory.
Have you ever taken any martial arts training? If so, did you find it helped with your other sporting endeavors or life in general? It’s still relatively new to me but for now I’m still Krazy about Krav…I just hope the bruises go away soon!
and for one of my blogger friends out there, we do a lot of Pull ups! Arrrggghh!
Smile and have a great week.
Doug
I FEEL GOOD!
Maybe the stars were properly aligned; or Mars was rising with Venus; or the moon was in the right phase. Or maybe, just maybe, I had enough proper rest and good nutrition. Whatever the case…
yeah baby!
Come on – scream it out now like James Brown!
I woke up feeling fresh. My lovely wife made a wonderful breakfast and I had energy to burn…literally and figuratively.
I did some work around the house and then headed for my Muay Thai class. The Saturday class is longer than usual. One and a half hours of technical training drills mixed with exercise and then one hour of non stop sparring.
I coasted through the first class. Burpees, planks and skipping all seemed to fly by with relative ease. I had a good sweat going but the breathing was easy and the energy high. My kicks had a nice ’snap!’ to them pushing the pad holder back. My jabs were crisp and sharpe. I even got a thumbs up and a “very nice” from the instructor on a couple of drills and that’s not easy. Neelan is a great instructor but very firm – he likes to bring out the best in his students and see a solid effort put out by the whole class.
This is how I feel in the ring most of the time!
Two hours later I was still raring to go. Time to spar. We were down to 7 so there wouldn’t be much time for resting. Three, 3 minute rounds, a one minute break, then switch partners. My first opponent was much bigger than me…actually they are all much bigger than me! But I could see he was tiring so I was relentless. I attacked aggressively. His jabs and punches seemed slow. Maybe they were or maybe they weren’t; maybe my mental clarity was peaking. I could dodge and counter easily. My punches and kicks landed frequently and he finally backed down before the bell.
Break – water – and back at it. Next up was a kid. I was three times his age! He was twice my size…a fair trade off? Still, I had to show him the ‘old guy’ still had some steam left. He was fast and I took a lot of shots. But again, I was thinking clearly, I could see how he set up his moves. Countering came easily and smoothly and I put him on the mat twice.
My final opponent was really good. One of the more senior students. I managed to hold my own, give and take, we pretty much balanced out where as he usually puts my butt on the floor. Holding pace with him was in itself a victory for me!
Class was over – we stretched and I FELT GREAT! Oh what a feeling. How can I maintain that euphoric bliss? I hurried home and Thai and I hit the park. We snacked and walked and I then had to go for a run. I mean I had to! She’s getting used to this craziness and even supports it so she just waited and read – she always has a handy supply of books regardless of where we go.
Running; the grass beneath my feet was a blur. Hopping over the was puddles I was sure footed, no slipping or stumbling. I stopped once to watch some squirrels play ‘tag’. I envied their agility and speed but loved their playfulness. I continued. Up the slopes, zig-zagging up the little hills and then up the big ski hill.
going up the ski hill - 5 kg weights on my arms.
The sweat was pouring down my back an my heart was pounding but there was this big crazy grin across my face as I came to the top of the hill.
Awesome! Wonderful! It’s a feeling that I will never forget and will strive for with each and every work out.
Have you ever been there? On an ‘exercise high‘? Is it adrenalin, released endorphins or just your body saying ‘”Well done.This is how it’s supposed to be.”?
Whatever it is I hope you get the chance to experience such a feeling. It puts all the hard training into perspective and makes it all seem worth while.
Have a great weekend…get out there and give it your best shot and I hope to hear you scream…I FEEL GOOD !
Smile – Doug
