Resurfacing

When you go scuba diving with friends on a boat, you take turns diving and staying on the boat. The team stays on the boat has some idea of how long the dive team will be under water diving based on an estimation of the depth of the dive and the amount of air in the tank. When a diver doesn't surface in the estimated time, the guys on the boat start to wonder. Did we miscalculate the amount of down time the divers had? Did they drift away from the boat and we need to start looking for them drifting away from the boat, but on the surface? Or worse, did they run out of air? Are they still alive?

Well, I've been away from blogging for almost six weeks. I now resurface. No worries, I'm OK. I'm still training for the Philly Marathon in late November, but I did get side tracked for awhile. First, my wife & I went on a 10 day trip to Europe stopping in Budapest, Vienna and Prague. It was connected to a Florida Bar Conference. It was a good time traveling with good friends. My only problem was that there was so much history, art and architecture to absorb that after a while, the sponge that is my brain had trouble absorbing all the information. Thus starts a new phase in which I've ordered history books on the areas which should occupy my free reading time for months, if not years to come.

I did manage to get in a run tours of both Budapest and Prague, but had to take a rain-check in running in Vienna as it was literally raining and windy the days we were in Vienna. Salome & I managed to see an opera at the state opera house in Vienna, a string quartet in Prague, and a choral concert in Prague. All in all, a great trip.

My only problem with trips to Europe is the return flights home. I seem to get over the pond OK, but after about 6 hours of flight time on the return, my respiratory and immune systems start to loose the battle of recirculated air and onslaught attack of the germs from the communal cesspool they call bathrooms in coach. By the time we make it to our connecting flight in New York for the last leg flight to Ft. Lauderdale, my throat is scratchy and my eyes are itchy. Sure enough, I come down with some Euro-virus and am out of training for 10 day.

I been back to training for the last couple of weeks and hope to be ready to roll in for the Philly Marathon. I'll try to surface more regularly just to give the "OK" signal.