Vacation

Isn't vacation nice. Today is day 5 of a 17 day break from work for me. Part of it was forced because I had too much vacation and the other part is forced because the company is closed between Christmas and New Year's. The picture above is a reminder of why vacation is nice. For the last month it has been wet. For the most part it rained almost every day of the last month. Some of the rain was total downpour or blowing stinging cold or simply a steady spitting rain. The picture is of my Silver (yes it is really Silver) bike after just two days of commuting to work. The mud is easy to avoid in the daylight ride to work but impossible to avoid at night in the dark. But I'm not complaining. After watching An Inconvenient Truth the other night with my lovely wife, I am determined to do my part to save this planet we live in. If a bit of suffering in the cold wet weather helps out, I'll manage. I really suggest if you haven't seen the movie, watch it. It's sobering .

Of course now that I'm on vacation the weather has turned beautiful. The mornings are crisp and cold and the afternoons are sunny. It's that winter sun that stays low in the sky but feels so good on the face. All my running this week has been in the wide open to get as much sun as possible. Even if those runs are in tights, a jacket a hat and gloves. The sun still feels good.

I've spent the last couple days reflecting on what's going well and what needs improvement. I'll spend the next few posts talking about what needs work but for now I'll simply celebrate all that is good:

- I am married to an amazing woman. She put her career on hold and has assimilated into Germany better than anyone I know. She has more Friends than you can imagine. A great deal of them native German and that's a really hard code to crack.

- Marco is like no other kid. He brings his heart every time. He is the first to bring comfort, the first to tell you good job and can play a mean game of German Monopoly.

- We realized one of our dreams to live in another country

- The three members of the family are learning another language

- We are making new friends that could last a lifetime

-We are taking our first true trip as a family next week to the Canary Islands

- Neptune is still alive and active.

- Scout gets me out the door running even when I don't feel like it.

- Winter really isn't that bad!

- adidas running is doing really well. We have surpassed our goals this year and are way ahead of the goals in 2008. This will help us hit the goals for 2010.

- Pulling out the end of the year, I'm on track to hit 100 runs in 100 days and really starting to feel good about it.

It's a good life....

Dave