Thursday, September 08, 2005

Real Renos

It has been a busy few days, mostly because of the basement reno. I am happy to report that about half of the new apartment has been framed-up and I hope to have it fully-framed by early next week. I've made some great progress over the past few days.

Unfortunately, the time spent in the basement is cutting into my running time. I have not run this week, although I am planning on a little 5-k jaunt tomorrow morning. I did make it to the gym today for a chest workout, just waiting for the muscle pain to set in, shouldn't be long now - could be a tough weekend swinging the hammer.

Sunday, September 04, 2005

Brown's Store

There's something about running on Sunday mornings. Lately, I've been a little sluggish when first waking up, so when I thought I heard rain bouncing off my bedrooom window I was relieved to have an excuse not to go for a run; when I looked out however, it was like the streets were calling to me.

It was one of those mornings when the sun was just coming up over the hills in the east and what wind there was could barely cause the leaves on the trees to flutter. I could not miss a morning like this especially now that summer is drawing to a close and the morning temps are begining to drop.

It was beautiful and warm and I could practically taste the air with every breath. My route took me to a part of town that I had not run before - an area where I used to live before moving to Ontario nearly 30 years ago. I couldn't help but think back to the visits we used to take to the convenience store I was passing on my route, still named 'Brown's Store'. I smiled at the simplicity of the street names in my old neighbourhood - Limerick Place, London Road and Dublin Road. It was a run to remember- forty-five minutes in total.

When I got back I strapped on my tool belt and went down to the basement. I had a few more wheel-barrows-full of rock to remove so I got that done before lunchtime. By the time I finished today, I had a section of wall framed and in place.

It was certainly gratifying to see that section of wall in place. All of the other work I had done to this point seemed to be taking me in the opposite direction of where I wanted to end up, but today, I began feeling that I had made the turn for the finish, to use a running analogy.

A few days of framing lie ahead.