I Live in Iowa: Week 157

I'll call this a long week. It started Sunday in Massachusetts. I had breakfast with my hostess for the weekend and we had a nice hour and a half chat about life, where we are, where we are going, what has all happened, and specific events. Then I went to the church I went to in college and quite a few people were excited to see and, and of course I was thrilled to see that much of what I left was the same as when I was there. Getting from Worcester back to Dubuque ended up being more of an adventure than I anticipated. I left my host's house, went to church, stopped by another friend's house in Worcester to pick up a book, back to my host's house to drop of the loaner car (Thank you!) and walk to the commuter rail station. Catch a trail with eight minutes to spare, then switch to a bus (subway) south station and get to the airport with maybe 90 minutes until take off. Then we had a delay, before boarding the plan because of wind in the windy city. After maybe only half an hour we boarded and were quickly in the air. The whole flight I spent talking to a recent Dartmouth grad who was now back in business school at Ann Arbor, Michigan. Kind of nice to be a little social sometimes. Lading I made my way out to F lot to pick up my van. A quick drive through the city to Busse Park for a five mile run before the sun went down then a long drive back to Dubuque arriving close to midnight. Travel…

Work went well this week. The biggest event to report was that we were getting ready for one of our coworkers from India to visit for six weeks. Otherwise, it's business as usual. We did have a golf outing on Friday to celebrate one of our own taking a promotion and moving to North Carolina. That's the one golfing outing for me for this year.

Running went well, with 91 miles for the week including a 20 miler Saturday morning. I also had a 45 mile bicycle ride with the group Wednesday night and we averaged a whopping 20.5 miles an hour! Overall nothing to report on the workouts or racing scene. I need to do lateral exercises more often! I have weak hips, which causes other issues…

Saturday evening I was back out at Park Farm Winery for the first time this summer. I worked a wedding, it was actually pretty quiet. The interesting news is they have two dark dry red wines out there new this year that I have not tried yet. I'm thinking I might need to stock pile a few bottles because they are getting more experienced and better at making quality wines every year.

In general news, I need to go to a physical therapist and get my whole body tested to find out exactly where I am weak, because even now, running 90 miles a week I know I am not 100%. I hate shopping for medical professionals. It's so personal, and so often they are trying to sell pills, orthotics, surgery, or some other medical device or service I don't want.

Worth noting, I was charged a bank fee of $12 this month! I just found out one of my checking accounts instituted a new fee schedule. Another bank recently started charging me $6.95 per month, but was strangely paying it, until last month. So I will be closing a number of accounts over the next few weeks and moving most likely to just my Capital One 360 (formerly ING Direct) which still has free checking, and I will probably be opening a credit union account. I don't like the thought of paying a company for the privilege of allowing them to hold my money. I understand that a checking account costs them money to operate, but why can't they have a fee schedule like Paypal? This is a much deeper subject, I'll stop here. Happy week 157 living in Iowa!