Canoe

I hate to admit it, but I let an entire week go by without exercise. Taking last Wednesday off was on purpose, but then I just sorta let life get in the way again. Ugh!

Last Friday was a stressful 15 hours at work. Made even more so because of an indecisive supervisor. A member on my team offered the solution we needed earlier in the day but it took my super the extra seven hours to finally come full circle and agree. I'm sure the the fine folks over in (undisclosed city) Illinois really liked not having any TV during prime time on a Friday night. I took my frustrations out on a thin crust supreme pizza. The whole pizza. I know, I know, wrong move.

So the result of stress and lack of exercise equated to a 4.4lb gain on Monday.

OK that's enough of that. On to other more pleasant things.

Last night after work I asked my wife if she wanted to run up to the local YMCA. She is a member and I have a one week pass. (still not sure I want to give up the 24hr availability I have at SNAP) She said sure and then for some reason I asked if she would rather go canoeing.

Recently my Father gave our family an Old Town Canoe. This would be our first time using it. So we backed out the van, lowered the canoe from its suspension in the garage and began loading. Its not very heavy but it is a little bit of an awkward thing to handle. Soon we had it up on the luggage rack and strapped down. Our destination "Big Creek Lake."

I bet its been over 35 years since I was on the water at Big Creek. When I was a kid we fished there nearly every weekend. We mostly caught Blue Gill and Bass. I always enjoyed when Dad carefully took the boat back into the inlets. They were cool because there were a lot of big trees growing straight up out of the water. You had to be cautious of submerged stumps and we often lost hooks due to snags. But it was great fun.

Last night we put in at the Williams Drive ramp and after a humorous start we were off. Neither of us had paddled a canoe in years but we soon got the hang of it. The lake was very calm and quiet. At one point I told my wife how nice it was to do something peaceful. We counted about seven other boats and three kayaks while we were there. We paddled down to the spillway that feeds Saylorville Lake and back. We came very near to a deer feeding on leaves along the bank in the spillway channel. As we floated by she never took her eyes off us. In all, our round trip was four miles in a little under two hours.



Oh and I nearly forgot, at one point my wife began singing "Just Around the River Bend." Disney is clearly on our minds. We leave in just two weeks!