Back from a much-needed vacation

I spent the last 12 days on vacation from my day job. I will admit that I taught skiing for half of those 12 days, so I wasn't completely idle.

I took a few rest days around Christmas and enjoyed a nice Christmas holiday with family. Starting the day after Christmas, I was scheduled to teach skiing for 7 consecutive days. Given my recent rib fracture, I was a bit concerned about that much skiing, but it turned out to not be an issue.

Our ski season here is off to a terrible start. On Monday and Tuesday after Christmas, I got no work at all. I skied a little each day and then left the mountain early. On Tuesday, I did a good workout of heavy lifts - squats, strict presses, deadlifts, bench presses and walking (weighted) lunges. The following day dawned with terrible road conditions, and I stayed home most of the day. I tried to drive my son to work in the morning, before the road crews had worked on our road, which was solid slick ice. I have a Subaru with studded snow tires, and after a mile, I gave up and drove back home.

After the town put cinders on our road, things were much better, and I finally got out to the gym. I rowed hard for half an hour instead of my normal 5K row. The extra 8-9 minutes of rowing were torture and I barely made it to the end, or at least it felt that way.

The next day, we had a foot of snow at the mountain but still very few customers. Again, I got no work, skied a little bit, and then went home early. That afternoon, I did another heavy lifting workout, doing front squats, clean and jerks, power snatches and trap bar deadlifts.

On Friday, I finally got to teach for a few hours and then I skied with my wife for a while. It was a fun day and it was nice to ski with my wife - something I don't get to do often enough. The weekend was fairly warm and I taught my normal lessons on Saturday and Sunday. The snow pack was slowly disappearing, but the skiing was fun.

Monday was my 50th birthday. My wife and I planned a day together to celebrate my birthday. I did a CrossFit workout first thing in the morning, then we did some shopping, and we met some friends for a nice lunch. We spent the rest of the afternoon with our friends, and then went home to have dinner with our children. All in all, it was a fun and almost relaxing way to spend my birthday. I did have to cook my own dinner, but it wasn't that difficult.

Yesterday, I took one final day of vacation. I spent most of the day just relaxing and then in the evening, my wife and I went to see Bucknell, our alma mater, play at Dartmouth in basketball. Bucknell trailed by as many as ten points in the first half, but used a 22-4 run in the second half to put Dartmouth away. With classes not in session at Dartmouth, it was interesting to watch a game in a nearly empty gym. It was empty enough that I got a stern look from an official after making a sarcastic remark about one of his calls. But, the Bison prevailed, so it was a good evening.

Today, I'm back at work and I'll be going to CrossFit later today. My rib injury is much better, but I'm certainly not 100%. Hopefully, it won't limit my activities much at all as the healing process continues.