This past year seemed to fly by and frankly it is the end of January and I'm having a difficult time recalling all that I did last year. Hell, I'm having difficulty recalling what I did this week. I would rate this year a solid B+ but it would have been an A except for an event that happened just prior to my birthday. How's that a teaser to get you to read the rest of this blog post?
...well you have your health
I had a goal that I set for myself following my 41st birthday to lose 42 lbs by my 42nd birthday. I failed that goal horribly as I only lost 5 lbs in that year spread and then I gained it back. My overall weight for the whole of 2018 only increased by 1/3 of a pound. It's not great but it could have been worse considering. I began 2019 at 248.4 lbs just so that it is recorded here for next year.
Although the weight loss goal was a bust I did attend and finish a handful of races throughout the year.
Space Race 4 Miler at the Kennedy Space Center - Just over an hour flat. I would link to the official results but they seem to be missing.
Real Florida 5k (trail race) - 48:53
Wekiva Parkway 5k (new section of the local toll roads) - 47:06 - This one about killed me. I hadn't jogged in over a month and the temperature for the day topped out at 66F with strong winds.
Riverside Dash 5k - 44:57
Tactical Titan 3 Obstacle Course Race (OCR) - I finished and I wrote about it.
The Rising 5k - 40:57 - My best time for the year.
Savage Blitz OCR - I finished but I skipped a bunch of the obstacles. The running was fine but the upper body stuff I couldn't do. I should have written about it.
I think that's all of them. I'll be doing more in 2019, I've already done two races as of this writing, so hopefully I'll have a good report by next year.
Living the island life (or at least visiting)
I was fortunate to go on two amazing out of country trips this year and a few vacations a bit closer to home.
I attended the annual Derby Dive weekend in Boynton Beach where we had amazing diving and a general good time.
Next I flew off to St. Kitts for a week of amazing diving on beautiful reefs. I wrote about that trip.
Another trip with the Orlando Reef Divers down to West Palm Beach where the weather was warm and the ocean was inviting.
Only to be followed up by another amazing week of diving in Grand Cayman.
A long weekend in the mountains on month and the better part of three weeks in the mountains to round out the year.
Life is but a song
As far as I can recall I only attended two concerts this year. My friend Chris arranged for us to go to both of these. The first was Ohgr which was a definite experience in a small venue in downtown Orlando. The second was Social Distortion at the House of Blues which was great once they got past the opening acts. The audio was horrendous for the first two bands of that show.
And the rest of the story
In mid November, just days before my birthday, I was in a head on collision in my FJ Cruiser. I was fine and two of the three individuals in the other car were fine but shaken. The third had some injuries but I don't know the true extent of those. Both my FJ and the other car were totaled. This has impacted me more than I expected but I don't feel like going through that at this time. While visiting my parents in Ft. Myers and on a whim I traveled up to Port Charlotte to a Kia dealership and bought a 2019 Kia Sportage. So far I'm enjoying this vehicle and even drove it up to North Carolina and into the mountains. It doesn't replace the "Beast" but it does the job of getting me from A to B.
