It was a windy, wet day on Wednesday for the inaugural Plane Pull for the Elgin-Middlesex United Way.
I was part of a 15 person team. I really enjoyed getting to know new colleagues at Canada Life. We had fun sharing strategies and preparing to be the fastest. Our pull was 10:55 seconds.
15 people whooping it up as they pull a plane.
The winning team was less than 9 seconds!
Why do this stunt? The goal is to show that a small group of people working together can accomplish amazing things.
It’s important to remember that we can take steps to address social problems. It is easy to give in to despair when faced with big problems.
I loved the competition and camaraderie.
Nat smiles at the camera despite the wind and rain.
I’m at workout #319 of the year and there are 68 days left in 2025.
Let’s do some quick math.
If I do some intentional movement everyday that’s 387 workouts. I’m aiming for 400 so to get to that I need to do that twice on 13 days. I had considered moving the number down to 350 but that probably isn’t necessary.
I think I can do 400.
Here’s some of my workouts this past week:
Walking to workNight time dog walk
Dog walkBike commutePersonal training at the gym
Really this was just an excuse to share some pretty fall pictures. Enjoy.
I have written About this before. So has Sam, multiple times, all the way back to 2018. Our focus was on bikes more generally and how they can help with disabilities, but three years ago I predicted an e-bike would be in my future. It was and I love it.
However, it was out of service for nearly a year with some sort of electrical issue. I hadn’t worried about it over the winter. But then I had to take it to Toronto for repair, only getting it back when my son brought it with him for Thanksgiving,
Meanwhile, my knees have been sufficiently sore that I didn’t feel like biking much this year. Plus I’m still nervous about biking too hard or too long with my heart murmur. And I have needed my car much more because I combine work with errands involving hauling stuff, or visiting my mom who lives almost 30 km away.
Getting the e-bike back felt like a gift, especially when two swimming friends invited me for a little ride. One cycles everywhere and the other does triathlons. Did I mention I have barely ridden in a year?
I didn’t have to worry about keeping up or overdoing it; the little boost from my battery was just enough.
Me with my e-bike, along with Florence and Sumiko, enjoying a glorious late afternoon near the Ottawa River.
We rode for a little over 20 kilometres, with frequent stops to admire the views on both sides of the Ottawa and Gatineau rivers. And of course there was ice cream.
Me in a bright blue shirt, enjoying an ice cream cone It was a locally-made green apple flavour.
Getting all my lights ready–my bike lights for my commute, my light alarm clock that gradually brightens the room while it’s still dark outside, and my anti-SAD lamp that I turn on over breakfast or in my office if I forget.
What I’m thinking about:
There are two very different approaches to the dark days of late autumn. The first is maximizing light exposure and time outside. That’s the way I tend to go. The second is embracing the dark and leaning into fall. Think cozy, think indoors, think comfort food, and soft blankets. Mostly that’s not my speed but this year I might give it a go some of the time.
I went for a ride last week. It has been almost two years since I got on a horse. I haven’t even bothered visiting my horse Fancy very often because it’s no fun watching her run around the field avoiding me.
A couple of weeks ago I posted a picture of her on FB and said something about not riding any more. The manager of the barn where she lives offered to let me ride her horse Stella. My daughter made the scheduling arrangements and she joined me on Fancy.
Stella is a lovely placid (lazy) horse and was just perfect. I spent about half an hour ambling around the outdoor arena remembering my posture and how to use my legs and bun to steer. I even got a tiny trot out of her. Her person said that next time I should bring a crop to make her pay attention. There will be a next time – yay!
While I understand that influencers and content creators and marketing people are always looking for something to hook their current campaign on, I find the hype to ‘make the most’ of the rest of 2025 to be both tiresome and tiring.
And judging by these posts, I’m sure that Sam and Catherine feel much the same way.
I’m not tell you how to feel though! If you find yourself fired up and inspired by making the most of the rest of the year – please forge ahead.
However, if you find yourself greeting the whole ‘become unrecognizable’, ‘fall reset’, ‘maximize’ approach with a weary sigh, then I invite you to take a few minutes to consider this:
We all have plans, goals, hopes, and ideas for different time frames in our lives.
Some of them work out well, some we need to adjust, and some we abandon – consciously or by default.
All of those things are perfectly normal, human things to do – they are all part of the greater contexts of our lives and, over time, some of them will matter to us more than others. And that’s totally ok.
But, while our brains tend to default to noticing what we failed to accomplish* and to keep us focused on doing more and doing better – we can also consciously choose to notice what went well, what we have already done, what worked.
We can choose to notice our victories – planned, unplanned, large, and small.
I happen to think that this is a GREAT time of year** to reflect on the things that went right so far in 2025 – the activities and events we enjoyed, the things we accomplished, the stuff we learned – and celebrate them.
And, if we feel like it, we can try to add more of those fun, victorious things into the months ahead.
It’s totally ok to add other unrelated goals, of course, that’s up to you. Just don’t think that you MUST add stuff or that you have to always be pushing yourself to go bigger and get better at everything all the time.
Oh, and while I’m at it – Don’t forget that the whole ‘end of the year’ time frame is actually pretty arbitrary – especially for personal goals – and you can start and finish things at any time that suits you.
So, Team, today and always, I invite you to notice and celebrate your victories, to go easy on yourself for the things that didn’t work out, and to be gentle and kind to yourself throughout the whole process.
Here’s your gold star for your efforts.
Go Team Us!
Image description: a small drawing of a gold star against a background of closed spirals drawn in black ink. The star and the drawing are both framed in black. The drawing is propped upright against a green surface on a white desk.
*While we’re at it, let’s practice going easy on ourselves about all of this stuff. I’m not suggesting that we must only do easy things and I am definitely not suggesting that we avoid challenges- doing hard things, learning, and challenging ourselves helps us to shape our lives in satisfying ways – but we don’t have to be mean to ourselves about things that don’t turn out well. That meanness feels useful, it feels like being realistic and self-disciplined, but if treating ourselves that way created good results, we’d all be superheroes by now.
**Spoiler: It’s ALWAYS a good time to notice and celebrate the good things and plan for more of them!
Just last week, these remarkable women started appearing in my social media newsfeed as they got close to Australia.
“After 165 days at sea, British adventurers Jess Rowe (28) and Miriam Payne (26) have arrived in Cairns, completing their extraordinary non-stop, unsupported 8,000-plus-mile (15,200 km) Pacific Ocean crossing from Lima, Peru to Cairns, Australia. Their 9-metre rowing boat, Velocity, crossed the finish line off Cairns Yacht Club at 6.42 pm (local time in Cairns, Australia) greeted by flares, cheers, and an emotional crowd of family, friends, and supporters who had followed their six-month journey online. The pair, who together form the Seas the Day Ocean Rowing Team, are now the first women’s team to have ever rowed the full Pacific Ocean non-stop and unsupported upon completion of their crossing from South America to Australia.”
I loved interviewing Tori Murden McClure a few years ago about her solo row across the Atlantic in 1999. She was the first woman and first American to do it solo.
Friends who live north of me are posting pictures of snow to their social media accounts.
It’s not quite snow season yet in my part of the world. However, it is the start of the dark, cold, and damp season.
The overnight lows are approaching freezing. There is a week of single-digit highs and rain in the forecast.
This morning I was sleepy, not my usual perky Monday morning self. I’d been at a conference all weekend. If I were a regular faculty member, I would have felt okay sleeping in on a day like this. But I’m not. Many meetings await, and so I needed to get to campus.
The real question is whether or not to ride my bike or get a drive.
I have learned from past experience that I must keep riding. If I don’t get used to riding in the sort-of-cold, it will be impossible when it gets to the really-cold. Start as you mean continue! If I want ride my bike through most of the winter, I can’t skip the first wet, cold mornings.
Here’s the study being reported on: Ferguson C, Furrer R, Murach KA, Hepple RT, Rossiter HB. Power and Endurance: Polar Opposites or Willing Partners? Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2025 Nov 1;57(11):2480-2495.
The academic research article about the study is open access, and you can read it here.
Why it’s in the news: The incredible popularity of Hyrox competitions. From the Globe, “More than half a million people around the world will take part in a Hyrox competition this year, alternating eight kilometres of running with eight workout stations, including sled pulls, sandbag lunges and medicine ball tosses.”
Sarah and I have been doing Hyrox-style workouts at the gym with our personal trainer Cody, who is one of the many people training for Hyrox competitions. I love sled pulls, sandbag lunges, rowing, ski erg, and wall balls. (We’re also skipping burpees!)
What’s the upshot: Again from the Globe, “A growing body of evidence suggests that strength training can enhance endurance in two key ways. One is that it increases efficiency, enabling you to burn less energy while running or cycling at a given pace. The other is that it enhances physiological durability, keeping your muscles functioning well even as you fatigue. Those are the primary reasons top long-distance runners typically incorporate a few weekly weightlifting or plyometric sessions into their training routines. They’re seeking better endurance, not bigger muscles. The picture is a little more complicated when it comes to the effects of endurance training on muscular strength and power. For the average person, there’s no negative effect on muscle-building, but for trained athletes there may be a slight negative result.”
The fact of the matter is most of us aren’t athletes specializing in endurance or strength. We’re everyday athletes who want to be able to hike all day with a pack, or paddle and then portage a canoe. Or we’re everyday people who just want to carry groceries home from the store. We want to lift small children when they want to stop walking. For most of us, strength and endurance both matter, and they work together.
I love gardens all year long. Yes, the spring and summer are the flashiest times to visit, with all the wild colors and shapes and so many shades of green. But I really enjoy the shift to subtler color palettes– the browns and yellows, darker greens, all made different by the softer light and shadows.
A path in botanical garden called Garden in the Woods, near me. Photo by Native Plant Trust.
I’m a member of the Native Plant Trust, which gives me access not just to this botanical garden, but also to dozens of gardens all over the US. I’m planning a few free fall garden walks with friends for November.
But before that, I’ll be in Portland, Oregon at a conference. I’m headed there on Wednesday. While there, my friend Norah and I are taking a little break from the conference activity to visit Portland’s Japanese Garden. I can’t wait to see this place in its version of fall color. Here are some pics from their Fall Colors Tracker page:
Trees shifting to reds and yellowsStrolling pond garden path with oranges and greens.
Closer to home, the Mount Auburn Cemetery is putting on its own show of colors. On their “what’s in bloom” page for this week, here’s what they say:
By mid-October Mount Auburn’s landscape is awash in color. As our many deciduous trees and shrubs begin to transform their foliage into jewel-tone shades of red, orange, yellow, and purple, other plants set out their fall fruits and nuts.
Here’s a photo from Instagram from this week of Mount Auburn Cemetery:
A person walking near the stones amidst bright orange and yellow foliage. Photo by Corinne Elicona.
Readers, do you have any tips for great garden walks in the fall? Let us know.
