A Great Weekend

Saturday night K and I went to see 3:10 to Yuma. We were impressed it was one of the best movies that we have see I a while. Great actions scenes with with an interesting enough plot to make the movie something other than a montage of actions a scenes. I have to say that I was greatly amused by the fact that they made movie with a premise of someone fighting to the death in order to be sent to the town I am living in. The prison (now a state park) referenced throughout the movie is less than I half mile from the theatre we watch the movie in. In the picture below it is the cluster of whitish building on the horizon.

The Levee

For this weeks long training run I decided to run the Colorado & Gila River Levee. Running on top of the levee caused me to flash back to my time in New Orleans. Back when I was graduate student at the University of New Orleans, I would very often spend pass the huge amount of time between my morning and night classes by running on the many levee running through New Orleans. Levee's are the idea place to run, they are flat, separate from traffic, surfaced with easy on the knees gravel, and are usually in a scenic areas.

On the Levee

Interestingly there was a time when the levee that I was running along would have marked the border between the United States and Mexico. Prior to the Gadsden Purchase, which was the addition to the continental United States the Gila River marked the boundary between the US and Mexico. As I was running it was an interesting mental exercise to picture how the area would be today if they Gila River still was the border. The key to long distance running is keeping the mind thinking about something other than how miserable your body is.

A Very Primitive Rest Stop

The run went very well, I knocked out 17 miles with no difficulty. I have little doubt that I will be ready for the Long Beach Marathon this October. I am starting to excited about it because it is now less than a month a way. I have not run in race since the Los Angeles Marathon last March, so the the itch to race is growing.

A Field Being Flood Irrigated

The first signs of fall are finally making there appearance. This morning when I woke up the temperature was below 70 for the first time in about four months, this morning run with the dogs felt wonderful. A further sign of fall was the number of fields I saw on my Sunday run being prepared for the this fall and winters lettuce crop. Soon the roads will be once again chocked with produce trucks.

Capping off a great weekend, was another nail biting Broncos victory. For the second weekend in a row the Broncos pulled off a victory in manner that I had never seen in 20 years of watching football. The Broncos choked away a big lead and the game went into over time where the Raiders appeared to hit the winning field goal. I saw this, and quickly made for the exit of the bar where I was watching the game, not wanting to hear the Raider fans celebrate. But as I was about to step out the door I noticed that the TV was showing the referee and not the Raiders celebrating. The Broncos had called a time out seconds before the kick, the Raiders would be forced to kick again, a kick they missed. Suddenly the gloom of seeing my favorite team loose to their hated rival, was replaced with the joy of having a second chance. A chance the Broncos capitalized on by driving down the field and kicking the winning field goal. What an ending, you can't find drama like that anywhere else on TV.