My Life at the Moment

My Place in this World by Michael W Smith
I hadn't heard this song in a long time.  Today a friend posted or shared, or whatever it's called, a link to a Michael W Smith song on Facebook and I saw this on the side of the page where it shows songs by the same artist.  This is my life at the moment; I am "roaming through the night searching for my place in this world".  I feel like "the wind is moving but I am standing still".  I am a "life of pages waiting to be filled". 
I hope that I am well on my way to finding my place in this world.  I am still 10 months away from graduating and it won't come soon enough.  Then, I hope to find my place in this world again. 

My Place in This World

(Michael W. Smith)

The wind is moving but I am standing still

A life of pages waiting to be filled

A heart that 's hopeful, a head that's full of dreams

But this becoming is harder than it seems

Feels like I'm looking for a reason

roaming through the night to find my place in this world

my place in this world, not a lot to lean on

I need your light to help me find my place in this world

My place in this world

If there are millions down on their knees

Among the many can you still hear me?

Hear me asking, where do I belong?

Is there a vision that I can call my own

Show me, I'm looking for a reason

Roaming through the night to find my place in this world

my place in this world, not a lot to lean on

I need your light to help me find my place in this world

My place in this world

Runner Nerd
world's oldest college student

Look! A cow running past the house!

I was in my usual spot in the public Library with my textbooks all afternoon living the nerd part of my life.  When the library closed at 5, I set out to live the runner part of my life for a short time.  I was fully looking forward to this since it is now completely light out at 5 pm.  It was a really nice sunny day today and the temp at 5 was in the 30s - unseasonably "warm" for February in southeast Michigan.  I changed my clothes in my car, thanks to the miracle of tinted windows, fired up Garmy, and was off on my mini-adventure!  My route took me through the cemetary, where I said hi to my ancestors as I ran past their graves!  (yes, I really do say, "Hi great great Uncle Adam and Aunt Mary" as I run past; that's normal, isn't it?)  I continued on through some neighborhood streets toward a trail that takes me through the woods and through the campus of the hospital.  As I was running past a house just before the entrance to the trail I heard, "MOOOOOOOOOOOO"!  OMG, somebody was mooing at me - as in calling me a cow!!!!  They did it 3 times, I think.  I could not see the person, they were either in the garage or around the corner of the house.  I did see people as I was running toward the house so they must have hid when they decided to moo!!  I admit that I have gained some pounds since I've become a full time college student and my mileage has dropped from 25-30 miles to 10-12 miles per week but I sure didn't think I was in the cow category yet!!  I wasn't wearing black and white; I was wearing pink!  I thought the rest of the world was watching the Super Bowl this afternoon!  The rest of my run was uneventful.  I ran 5 miles which is about as far as I can run these days.  It was a really great run in the sunshine.  I am still waiting for weather suitable for the miracle shirt but I'm not complaining! 
A beautiful day for a run in February and a new funny running story to tell; what more could one ask for!! 
What better motivation to get onself back into shape than being moo'd at while running!!! 

Runner Nerd
mistaken for a cow

Still a nerd

Today I had an exam in one of my classes.  I went running after class and after I got done running I had a text message from a classmate that the grades were posted.  I had to wait until I got home to look up my grade.  ONE HUNDRED PERCENT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Oh yeah!!!!  True nerd style!!! 
I'm pretty happy about it.  This is my diagnostics class.  It started out very overwhelming.  Taking multiple test results and putting it all together.  My head was swimming with facts and figures after the first two class sessions.  I really studied over the weekend and made it all make sense. 

Runner Nerd
still has it!!

Runner Nerd Runs Slow

Runner Nerd runs slow these days.  I ran 4.5 miles yesterday and each mile got slower than the one before.  It took me 50 minutes to run 4.6 miles.  Today I ran 3 miles in 34 minutes so I am sloooowwww!!  I had my gear all packed so I could change after class and head to the nearby small town where I've been running lately but I discovered that I did not have my running shoes.  Figures.  So, I came home, changed and ran my 3.2 mile route here.  I was losing daylight fast even though I was done at 5:17pm. 
Yesterday I wore my miracle shirt because it was 20 degrees but today it was 41 degrees and I only needed 2 regular long sleeve running shirts.  Only in Michigan.  I was pretty excited to wear the miracle shirt but 2 miles into my run I was too warm.  This shirt is for really really super cold days! I had a feeling that it wasn't really cold enough to wear it but I just wanted to wear it.  My prediction may come true - now that I have this "miracle shirt", we'll have a mild winter and I won't need it!!  (I won't complain!)

School is back into full swing now.  My first test of the semester is next Monday.  I have classes most of the day Monday, and clinicals at a hospital on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  My clinicals are afternoon shift so Monday is the only day I have to get up early (or what I consider early)!!  I had to give up Tuesday night running group because of my school schedule.  I will be there the 1st Tuesday in March because it's spring break and then not again until April 24th.  I'm very sad about it but it's all part of being the world's oldest college student. 
This weekend I will go back to the public library to camp out at my favorite table for hours in hopes of maintaining my 4.0 GPA.  I had forgotten how exciting college life is when I was off for 5 weeks. 
It will be fun to watch the daylight last longer and later as I run in the town where the library is after it closes and I leave - 6 p.m. on Fridays and 5 p.m Saturdays and Sundays. 

Runner Nerd
running slow

A couple of life's most pressing mysteries solved!

Steve Perry answers the South Detroit question
Well, now we know!!! 
Line from a well-known song: "Just a city boy, born and raised in South Detroit".
The reaction from anyone born and raised anywhere in Michigan:  "There is no  #%&@  place called South Detroit, IT DOESN'T EXIST"
Michiganders tend to get quite upset over this!!  (I've never really given it that much thought but I've heard it so many times from friends.) 
So, it's just poetic license; it's just what happened to sound right and fit the number of syllables he needed. 
The article also addressed another question that I'd never thought of: why a band with no connection to Detroit or even Michigan wrote a song about it.  He had the first thoughts of the song during a sleepless night in 1980 in his downtown Detroit hotel room at 2 a.m.  Which brings me to another line that I have always wondered about.  Steve Perry explains what "streetlight people" are!!  I always thought the line was: streetlights - comma - people - comma - whatever whatever, I was never quite sure of all the words.  Well, it's one thing - streetlight people.  As he was looking out of his hotel window at 2 a.m., he could see people come into the beam of the streetlight and the term, streetlight people, came to him.  Ok, that does make sense with the other lines about shadows searching in the night and hiding in the night. 

So, there you have it!!  One less mystery to have to worry about!! 
I will leave you with this thought:  don't ever stop believing!!  (sorry)

Runner Nerd
will never stop believing

Modern Technology

Thirty years ago, when I was a young adult just beginning my grown up life - if someone had told me that someday I'd be shopping in a store and just before checking out,  I'd pull a small device, which fits in the palm of my hand, out of my pocket and call up Pizza Hut and order a pizza and then 17 minutes later pull up to a drive through window, roll my window down, pay for the pizza, have the pizza handed to me through the window and then head off to home - I'd have called them crazy!!  I could not have even imagined doing such a thing.

I'm not sure why that scenario got me to thinking about how things have changed in my lifetime.  On the drive home I got to thinking about how different things are from when I was growing up.  Then, in my nerdiness, I started thinking about how things will change in the future.  I wonder if, in the future, after calling and ordering a pizza as we drive up to the restaurant our phone will somehow announce our arrival, perhaps similar to how some people "check in" when they enter a place and it goes to Twitter or Facebook or whatever.  Who knows??

I have to say, no matter what somebody would suggest to me today that we will be able to do in the future, I'd probably believe them, whereas, way back in 1982 there's no way I'd have believed such things as tiny wireless telephones would be possible. 

Runner Nerd
ponderer of great things!!

Muddy Shoes

Muddy shoes after a night cross country race

Muddy shoes are the result of a successful run!!  Last night was a run which produced many muddy shoes!  It was a night cross country race which I have run before.  Usually, this race is run in knee-deep snow (well, almost knee-deep!).  This year there was no snow and the temperature was mid 30s! 
It is an 8 miler run as 4 loops of 2 miles each.  Most of the loop is on part of the high school's cross country course; it even includes a short jaunt into the woods!  Soooooo, most of each loop was also very MUDDY!!!!  In fact, each time around the loop it was muddier than the time before! 
I ran as part of a 2 person relay so I only had to run 2 loops, or 4 miles.   I haven't run more than 5 miles since the Thanksgiving 10K and most of my runs have been 3 or 4 miles so it would have been tough to run 8 miles but I was going to do it.  One of my fellow Tuesday night running group members decided yesterday afternoon that he would like to be on a relay team since he took advantage of the unseasonable temperatures and absence of snow to go for a 50 mile bike ride!!  I was really really happy to get the text asking if I'd relay!!! 
After the race there is food in the school cafeteria.  The floor of the cafeteria was completely mud covered from everyone walking around in their muddy shoes!! 
My relay partner and I placed 2nd in the over 90 years age group!!!  (ages added together)  Everyone from our Tuesday night running group who participated went home with a medal, just like we did last year! 
I thought that I would be wearing my new miracle shirt at this race but it still wasn't cold enough for the miracle shirt.  I have yet to wear it!!  What I said in my blog post the day I bought it may come true!! (Now that I have this miracle shirt we will have a mild winter in which it will not get cold enough to wear it!)

Runner Nerd
hoping for a mild winter