Milestones

Two events of some level of importance happened this week.

First - for the last several years (hmm, like 6-7?) reaching the minimum number needed to put on some of our camp programs has been a stomach churning and occasionally heart breaking process. So it was great earlier this week to realize that we would pass that milestone for our Senior High Conference with almost a month to go. There have been several years where we took it right down to the wire and then some. Begging, pleading, arm twisting and more. At the moment we are past the minimum number with at least a handful more still to come that I'm confident of seeing. There maybe another handful out there as well. So very good. We may still have to go through the agony for our next two camps but it's great to have breathing room for a change at the start of the summer.

Second - I'm only going to give a tease here because I want to do a little bit of fancy stuff about this later today. I've been looking for challenges for my bike riding this summer beyond my annual ride around the lake (about 42 miles). I'd been eyeing one particular hill coming up from the flatlands along Lake Erie up to the village where I live. The hill is about 6 miles long with no real breaks in the climb. If I remember correctly you rise some 800 feet over the course of the ride. I had really put that down as a train all summer and take it on at the end kind of challenge. Well today I rode the "back way" into the village where the climb starts with a couple friends and they said "Let's do it today!". On my third ride of the year. With only 20 miles under my belt and 10 of those had come that very morning.

Sure. Why not?

And I whupped that hill. The ride took 45 minutes which is well below what I had expected. We stopped once about half way up to make sure everyone was OK. The break was about 2 minutes. I'm fairly certain I could have made it without stopping, I really felt pretty strong at that point. That climb would have been flat out impossible a year ago. Just amazing. (OK that turned out to be more than a tease)

It's been a good week.

Peace