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I've never been a huge Jimmy Buffett fan but like many people of my (and several other) generation, I went through a phase and got to know his most popular music. I turned forty yesterday. I woke up with the title song in my head not having given it a thought in maybe over a decade. I worked it out on the guitar and came across a decent version of Jack Johnson covering the song. Nothing especially profound about the song itself, but did you get that? I turned forty yesterday!?

Since the last update, there are pictures of a bunch of different activities. Libby's parents visited us and helped out with a bunch of home improvement tasks. A hiking excursion just south of Boston in the Blue Hills. Luke and Ben are taking guitar lessons with a real teacher and doing really well. Something about Dad not having the right approach I guess. Libby's brother, Josh, and their family came out for about a week. We all had fun, but the cousins really enjoyed some beach time. While they were here, Luke had his summer league hockey championship, which was amazing. They began the season 1-3 as the most penalized team in the league by a mile after four games. They hung in there, made some adjustments, and never looked back with some real quality hockey along the way.

Finally, on my birthday I ran the Spartan Race. Click on the home page for an entertaining video of the event. In short it's a 5K trail run with some crazy obstacles along the way. Fire jumping, cargo nets, wall scaling, barbed wire crawling, spear throwing, etc. Just my kind of entertainment. I've been excited all summer for the event, but I didn't really train too hard mostly due to lack of time. I figured I'd do fine because my running wasn't that bad, and I'm an obstacle course kind of guy.

So I ran the event pushing myself pretty hard pretty early. I leapt the file and front-handsprung over the cargo net with no problem. Then came the mud bog where I managed to lose not one but two shoes. I was barely able to find them in the knee-deep mud, but I did pull them out of the muck and continued on in my socks. As the discomfort and uncertainty were peaking in this surprisingly long stretch of bog, I got a bee sting on my right hamstring. Dang! That hurt. How much worse could it get? Zap! Right on top of the head in a spot that I never even knew had flesh. I was no longer worried about running through the woods in my socks. Eventually, I cleared the bog and ran for about a half mile in my socks. Then I lost the socks and put my mud-filled, lead weights...I mean shoes back on. The rest of the course was treacherously steep on the downhills immediately followed by punishing, never-ending hills. The obstacles were tough but very fun. I finished strong and felt good about my effort.

There were 10 heats of about 200 people. I was in heat 4 at 1130a, and when my time came in (34:17) I was feeling really proud. Top 10% or better for an old guy with minimal training--not too shabby. Shortly after I returned, Libby thought what the heck, she might like to do it, too. There was an available slot so off she went. The happy, prancing pixie returned 32:56 later with no consideration for her husband's pride on his birthday. She was the 9th woman and 107th overall, putting her in the top 5% of all contenders. I was 152nd just under top 8%. What can I say? She's so much younger than me...and she has the gift of speed.

We wrapped it up with a nice dinner at the The Black Cow in Newburyport right on the water on beautiful day. August 30th is our 13th anniversary! That's something to cheer about. I'm a lucky man. Enjoy the photos.

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