Initial Impressions 2.0 Blog #69: Allergy Attack, Cereal-Flavored Ice Cream, Crab Party, etc.

1. This week was the week of the revenge of allergies. I typically get hit with allergies twice a year, early to mid-May and late August. This round was likely exacerbated by visiting Hart Farm to buy my mom’s butterfly bush and being in the swirling winds of pollen. Early in the week was the worst. I had very little energy and felt like I was moving through molasses. This is not good when your job is training people. I was practically begging for rain to knock the pollen down.

2. Monday Runday was ruined by my allergies. Sure, I still went but it was all walking while my friend Mike ran around the track. I know it’s more about the camaraderie of friends but I will admit I was disappointed that I couldn’t even run one step. By the end of my 2.5 miles of walking I was gagging on pollen and my throat was coated like I had just done that stupid cinnamon eating contest.

3. I feel so bad for Boston Celtics star Jayson Tatum. He went down in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Semi-Finals against the New York Knicks with a ruptured Achilles tendon. He’s already had surgery but will likely be sidelined for close to a year. Granted he’s only 27 and will likely make a full recovery but Achilles injuries suck. In 2012, when I was marathon training I strained my left Achilles, which took 5 months to heal. A strain took 5 months. Plus I had numbness going up into my calf. It was no fun. I was really hoping for a Celtics repeat as NBA champs but as long as Tatum recovers, they will have a good shot at another title when he’s back.

4. There are 2 types of people in this world, those who yell at the self-checkout robot voice in a supermarket, and normal people. These are the same types of people who shuck their corn at the stand in the supermarket in front of the sign that asks them not to. Obviously, you can figure out this is the same person. All I could do was shake my head and feel bad for the people who have to call him family. The guy looked like someone who is a boatload of laughs to be around.

5. So now Kellogg’s have cereal-flavored ice creams? My pants are crying knowing that at some point I will have to try all of them. If you’re curious, there are Corn Pops, Rice Krispies Treats, Frosted Flakes, Honey Smacks, Froot Loops, Fruity Pebbles, Apple Jacks, and Eggo Waffles. If you care about how healthy they are each pint appears to be 600-650 calories so use that info as you wish.

6. When out on a photo excursion to Chatham, I ended up at Cockle Cove, which has a creek that eventually meets the ocean. I stumbled upon a tiny crab colony. The little crabs that are about the size of a quarter and live near the rivers and creeks on the Cape. I ended up shooting way too much video of these crabs, much of it being me trying to get them to stand still. Amazingly, these tiny crabs didn’t like a giant pointing a phone at them. Well, this video tells the story better.

7. A few weeks ago I got my first tick on me, which I only found because it eventually crawled onto my neck. For the second tick interaction this year, naturally, I got 2 ticks on me. I am terrified of this increasing number, especially since summer won’t start for a month. In September, I’ll be mentioning getting 100 on me and that they stole my car afterward.

8. The Outdoor Boys YouTube channel is a fascinating story. It has been around for years but in the last 18 months or so has exploded. Currently, they are right at 15 million subscribers. This week, Luke, the father/main creator of the videos, made a short goodbye video. He has made over 1,100 videos. He said it’s so time-consuming and now with it blowing up he’s got way too many people wanting to meet him, contact him, or just be around him. I’m sure most subscribers will be sad and not understand but as a content creator, I totally got it. I have over 600 videos on my YouTube channel and couldn’t imagine what I’d do if suddenly I had 100x more followers. Sure, it sounds like a good problem but the more eyes that end up on you the more of a chance you take of some weirdo crossing a line. I won’t stop my content creator journey but it does make me think sometimes.

9. I had my first 1,000-calorie burn run in almost a year. 7 total miles in perfect weather. I chose a route where I could end up at Mattacheese Middle School. This is my old school, now closed, that I graduated 8^th grade from in 1992. Next door is M.E. Small School. Feeling good, I happened to go by the playground and there was a giant plastic crate filled with balls and frisbees, etc. On my way back off the school grounds, I was feeling great and decided to stop and shoot some hoops on the basketball court. I also noticed some of the balls were close to the parking area. I figured I’d kick them back toward the plastic crate. One was a kickball, which went flying and made a good sound. The other I think was a soccer ball but it felt like it was a bowling ball. My big and second toes on my right foot immediately hurt. Once I got home I had the pleasure of seeing the black and blue toenails. Mmm, tasty, those will be feeling good for the next week or so.

The facade of my old middle school.

10. Back in March, when I shot my first movie role in Provincetown, I got a lot of content for my YouTube channel. One piece of content was an interview with the cast and crew of the documentary The Old Men Of the Mountain. My friend Frank Durant of the Lady of the Dunes documentary produced it. The documentary was recently finished and is up to watch. I did and loved it. So I figured why not finish off this week by sharing that documentary?

 

Initial Impressions 2.0 Blog #65: Dock Installing, ChatCBD, Tick Stowaway, etc.

 

1. Twice a year my buddy Steve and I help a couple install and remove their lakeside dock at their property. It is good money for a short amount of time. Typically it takes us 20 minutes to get the 3 pieces of aluminum dock either down into the lake or up the stairs from the lake. It is a relatively fun time as the couple from New York are super nice and very appreciative. I will say though that it gets harder carrying the dock up and down the steps each time I do it. My elbows, shoulders, and low back are tight but getting a fistful of cash always makes the pain go away. That and ibuprofen, lots of ibuprofen.

2. I saw that Alice In Chains is on tour and is coming to Mohegan Sun in a few weeks. Man, 17-year-old me would have killed to see them, even without Layne Staley. Sadly being an adult makes spontaneous concert trips less likely. Oh I could swing the tickets and a hotel room but my mind goes to taking the day off of work and canceling clients, etc. 17-year-old me would probably slap the hell out of me if he heard that but it is what it is. Maybe if the show was a few months away I’d go. Come to think of it, I can’t remember the last concert I went to period. Boy, that’s sad. I’ll have to change that in the near future.

3. It can get frustrating when your brain and your body don’t match up. I remember all of my running feats, personal bests, etc. However since my hip injury in 2017-18 I can only match those efforts in short bursts. I get down on myself but then it dawns on me. Who am I trying to impress? Honestly, who cares if I can run a 5:30-minute mile ever again? Maybe in time I can get closer to who I used to be but for now I need to be happy with being able to just be out on the road or bike trail or wherever I go.

4. Leaving things left unsaid is the worst pain. Finding a letter you meant to send to someone very special for their birthday 20 years ago stings bad. On one hand it reinforces the feelings I had for a girl that changed my life forever. Now, 20 years on, it makes me feel a bit empty. For one I have no way to get in touch with her today which means words left unsaid will remain unsaid. Also I know she has a totally full life that I’d never want to disrupt. I’m not saying that if I sent that birthday letter back in 2005 that she and I would be together now but leaving the words unsaid means I’ll likely never know what difference those words might have meant.

5. I am a big fan of ChatGPT. I use it to help me organize my podcast notes, to brainstorm ideas for future YouTube videos. I also enjoy Bing AI to craft realistic images of things I can’t capture with my camera. Perhaps the best new offshoot of these sites is the Sora image tech that’s a part of ChatGPT. You can upload your own photos and remix them into something else. For example, a goal of mine is to take a photo of me in high school and a photo of me present day and mix them together where we’re shaking hands with a caption, “Become the person your younger self would be proud to meet.” Or something similar to that. I had to laugh, though at this idea. I took an old photo of when I discovered a secret solitary grave deep in the woods of Truro, MA. I took a photo of myself hugging it in celebration. The remixed photo shows the spirit of the man buried there embarrassed by my emotional outburst. It’s pretty funny if I do say so myself.

6. This is the longest my hair has been in a lot of years. I used to buzz it to the skin almost weekly for close to 14 years. I am having to get used to having hair but it’s not so bad. That being said I did go on a photography adventure in the woods and ended up with a tick in my hair. I didn’t notice it for a few hours because it was bushwhacking through my hair. Luckily, I found it and dispatched of it. Just to be safe I did take a shower and scald myself in search of any others.

7. That photo adventure was a trip through the overgrown brush to the remains of the West Barnstable Brick Factory. A century ago it was a thriving business on Cape Cod making tens of millions of bricks annually. They dug a hole to measure how much clay they had left to make bricks. In doing so they struck water, flooded the clay pits, and went out of business shortly thereafter. It’s wild to stand before the crumbling facade and other remnants of a once mighty business. It’s also a difficult place to get to, especially during the warmer months. There’s water everywhere, greenhead flies everywhere, and no real trail to the factory. Anyone who attempts to visit should be prepared to get muddy, wet, chewed up, sliced by thorns, jabbed by branches, and of course attacked by ticks.

8. Easter Sunday was so much fun. Food, family, loads of laughs. I had to make sure that I held back a little when it came to eating. On Thanksgiving, I ate so much that I ended up having to go home early because I was filled to the max. I was smart but I still had a good amount of ham, pot roast, mashed potatoes, and a wealth of desserts. It made me very glad that I went for a run in the morning.

My running route on Easter Sunday.

9. A highlight of Easter was the moneymaking idea my niece Emma and I came up with. In the spirit of ChatGPT, we decided to invent ChatCBD. It would be an AI product that reads your stress level and releases the appropriate amount of CBD needed for you to feel better. I have no clue how the product would get made, I’m just the idea man.

10. Easter was also April 20^th, 4/20. Naturally, I celebrated with a little edible fun in the evening. I had to look it up and find out why 4/20 is the code for weed. Credit goes to five high school students in San Rafael, California, who in 1971 used "4:20" as a code to designate their meeting time to search for an abandoned cannabis crop, referring to it as "4:20 Louis.” So there you go, the more you know.