I read the Bond books several years ago, and yes indeed, they are different from the films. If you get some time, you would probably enjoy reading a biography of Ian Fleming. He was an ... interesting guy, who lived an interesting life. The books represent some of his fantasy life to a degree. You can probably find out enough about him to better "get" where he's coming from in the books just by reading a short biography on the web somewhere.

As for the Saint, it's a tad before my time, although I've always wanted to see a few episodes to get an idea of what it's about. It's what got Roger Moore the James Bond role. I liked Moore's earlier turns as Bond, but he ended up a little over the top with the humor in the end. He still made some of my favorite Bond movies; in particular I really like Man With The Golden Gun, which, however, is generally ridiculed by most Bond aficionados. I'm a big Brosnan fan, both as Bond and in real life (From what I've read he's a genuinely decent human being, which isn't all that common in his income range). Next to Connery, he was my favorite Bond. I also liked Dalton; it's too bad some of the scripts he had to work with were so lousy (which led to the franchise going on hiatus), because he was good in the role IMO. I actually have liked all the actors who played the lead role, including the much maligned George Lazenby. OHMSS is one of the best of the Bonds even though he hadn't grown into the role yet. He was still decent, I thought. Craig is going to be interesting. I haven't closed my mind to him, but I'm really perplexed as to why they would gamble at this point. I suspect his casting has the potential to really bomb, which you would have thought was impossible given that the latest Bond film grossed more than any of them by a wide margin. The folks at EON could look like geniuses or dunces when this is all over; we'll have to see.

Still haven't seen An Inconvenient Truth yet, which is unfortunate. Other than that, I'm seeing Superman on Saturday or Sunday. Also, read the Johnny Depp piece you linked to, which was good. It is funny how Hollywood and our media work. Tom Cruise has quirky beliefs (or so we are told), and he is portrayed as a crazy man; Johnny Depp has quirky beliefs (or so we are told), and he gets friendly writeups like that one. I stopped believing most of the stuff coming from the media a long time ago, but I still pay attention to disparate treatment of people, like you see in this case. It's amazing to see how similar situations come out in ink -- it would be quite easy to make Depp look like some kind of freak (as happens to Cruise) given his lifestyle choices and political views, but when that side of him is soft peddled, he comes out looking like a cool, nonthreatening rebel.

Fifth marathon training (Details) week 9:

Tuesday:
Cross-training, special runner's lower body workout + Anderson's special runner's stretches.

Background tv: Brasil vs Ghana WC match
I am originally from a soccer crazy European country, I HAD to see all the mathes. Even if I have to miss the pint of beer, the uplifting crowded pub bakcground.

This morning I awoke with a terrible ache/cramp on the right side of my neck. Maybe yesterday I pulled something during my stretched stretching session? I do not know. Since I have had a wonderful Tempurpedic pillow, my neck problems have seemed disappear. Hm.... I had to skip today's Pilate session. I hope it heals fast - running is always elevate even the slightest neck pain/cramp.

Fifth marathon training (Details) week 9:

Wednesday:

6-mile run; sunrise, MAP-MEP combo, 70F, clear, light wind
My neck had healed fast, but still, as a precaution, I started my afternoon exercise session with Mary Winsor' neck exercises, and lowered my weights I used for Get On the Ball - all round workout 3.

Thursday:

6-mile run; sunrise, MEP, 70F, clear, no wind
Abs Total Mix - no problem with my neck
Lynn Robinson's Pilates Manual advanced programme - still no problem with my neck.


As for my background entertainement for my exercises.
There was a break in soccer WC, so I hoped to see my new DVD-s, ordered last week from amazon.com. To my big surprise according the USPS tracking info, our package from BEll, CA (40 min from us) was rerouted through MEMPHIS (2-day driving from us). 4 days after the BEll CA departure scan it is again back to Bell. Maybe we can get it today-tomorrow?

In the lack of these new DVD-s I had to watch some movies from our home DVD library. I picked two Star Trek movies the IV Voyage Home, and the I Star Trek The Motion Picture (Director's Edition)

About this "director's edition". I do not remember to see any not American movie's director's edition. I think this is an American invention. If my memory serves well, it started with the Blade Runner (The Director's Cut) (1982) That was REALLY very unique, adding something to the original movie. But since it the market is flooded by "special, extended versions".

In many cases these versions seem to be created by simply emptying the editor's garbage can - strenghtening the feeling in the viewers, that there was some reason why those scenes were cut in the first place.

Somehow betters are the extended versions, where the reason for the cuts were time limit. The added-back scenes could give more insight into the plot.

Oh, and of course there is the Lord of the Ring, where ab ovo, many scenes were recorded solely for the extended versions. Yes, the results are 4+ hours movies, but for the unsatiable nerd crowd nothing is too much.

About the Star Trek I extended version. The extensions changed this movie: filled up with poetry.... While it seems to be a little slow paced in the first 30 minutes, but I really enjoyed this slow pace during the second hour.

My semi-review of Superman is in my journal. I didn't dislike it, but was hoping it would be better. The people who saw it with me liked it more than I did, so maybe it was just me.

Fifth marathon training (Details) week 9:

Friday:
6-mile sunrise MEP run 70F, dry, sunny

Gilad's upper body workout
Lynn Robinson's Pilates & Yoga

Background tv: Italy vs Ukraine; Argentina vs Germany WC

Saturday:
7-mile sunrise hill run (70F, dry, sunny)
Kurz - Stretching

Background tv: Brasil vs France WC

Sunday:
12-mile long run start at 5AM; 70+F, temeprature increased fast after sunrise. Nevertheless we had a nice energic run.
Water before run and at mile 6, 9.

Mile splits: 9:25; 8:56; 8:30; 8:40; 8:32; 8:14; 8:35; 8:24; 8:18; 8:40; 8:37; 8:41

Plan for afternoon: long stretching Anderson and Kurz

Background movie: 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

Happy 4th July for all.

I have a theory about this. Reeve was too good looking. If you look at the actors who have been mega-stars since the studio system ended, very, very few of them were model handsome. Good looking, yes, almost all of them were, but Reeve was essentially flawless physically, which made it hard, I think, for people to really identify with him the way they can with more physically flawed actors. Tom Cruise has a funny, big nose and he's short; Johnny Depp has those dead eyes; Brad Pitt has bad skin, and so on. Reeve had no flaws at all that I ever noticed. I think that, more than the role of Superman, hurt his career. But he really was a fine actor, and he took his craft seriously. If you want to see a really well acted film, check out one of his earlier things called Street Smart. It co-stars Morgan Freeman, who is utterly brilliant in it, but Reeve is also good.



Not really. I went through a phase in my childhood when I read comics, but I always stuck to Marvel Comics, and Superman was a yucky DC character, so I never read the Superman strips.

Fifth marathon training (Details) week 10:

Had a very busy week (despite the holiday), had to work a lot. Nevertheless, were sticking to my/our running program. There is nothing more refreshing then a sunrise run. I really mean it.

Monday: leg rest day
Back maintenance programme by Fielding

Background video: Rear Window (1954) It is interesting, I saw the remake of this movie with Reeve Rear Window (1998) (TV), before the original one.

Tuesday - Wednesday - Thursday: 6-mile sunrise runs (MAP, MEP, SAP) - 70+F, high humidity - sweaty as hell
Easy exercises with Tamilee Webb's videos.

Friday: cross-training
Cross-training, special runner's lower body workout + Anderson's special runner's stretches.

Background movie: The Day of the Jackal (1973) Both the Frederick Forsyth book and the movie are among my all time favorites.

I take it you didn't care for Cussler all that much? Some people like him, some think he's silly. I think he's silly but like him, anyway.

I've pretty much listed most of what I consider throwaway literature that I like. One of the ones I didn't list was Dean Koontz, who is hit or miss for me. I've read about 8 of his books, and liked about half of them, and thought the other half would have been better left unwritten. You mentioned John Sandford's Prey series. I read the first three or four of them 10 years ago or so and lost interest. They had to be at least decent or I wouldn't have bought any more, but I just looked through one of them that is sitting on my bookshelf, Night Prey, and couldn't remember a single thing from it, so they obviously didn't make much of an impression. If I were you, when I was done with Connelly and Grisham, I'd look at Koontz and see what you think of him, or if you really like Connelly, maybe Ed McBain or one of the other crime fiction guys. I think I read one Ed McBain book and thought it was fair, but not as good as Connelly.

I had never read any crime fiction until Connelly, and after reading through all his books then in print (this was about 2000, so he had maybe 5 or 6 books out), I went through a lot of crime fiction writers, Raymond Chandler (good in a way, but dated), McBain (wooden), Erle Stanley Gardner (Perry Mason books, and fair), some Edgar Wallace (Recommend just for the history of it, but I didn't think he was any good :/), Dashiell Hammit (sp?), who wrote the Maltese Falcon or the Big Sleep (can't remember which and always mix them up because both films starred Humphrey Bogart) -- I read a lot fo the stuff. It was an interesting exercise from the standpoint of seeing how the genre evolved, particularly how sex and violence became more overt, but as entertaining literature, I wouldn't recommend most of this stuff, because on its own I didn't think much of it was remarkable. It is interesting to see how the change in those books reflects the change in our society's standards of what was fit to print, though, how they became so much more incredibly violent and perverse.

Fifth marathon training (Details) week 10:

Saturday: 7-mile hill run at sunrise, 70F, light wind, high humidity, sunny

Long stretching session (Anderson); soccer WC Germany vs Portugal match in the background.

Sunday: something new - 11.5-mile hill combo
Start at 5AM; 68F, sunny from the hill
Water before run and at mile 6, 9 1/2.

Splits: 9:30; 8:50; 8:23; 8:28; 8:15; 8:04; 29:48 hill; 8:43; 8:37
Actually to have that 8:04 mile before the hill was a little stupid, but we really felt very energized.

We live in a flat, sea level city. Training for a hilly high altitude (for low landers as us, 7000F IS high altitude) Lake Tahoe Marathon (check the course map/course profile) - is not easy. We have to drive to another city to find hills. It means, we can have hill runs only on weekends. It would have been better to alternate hill/flat days, but oh well....

This Sunday combo was a warm up for our next weekend's real challenge: 18 mile flat-hill combo on high altitude. (In Boulder, Colorado.) As we have learned, the challenge will be even bigger: hot, sunny, - and as always - dry days are expected in Boulder. Even if we start early (5 AM), there is no way to avoid the heat during the last couple of hilly miles.

Nevertheless we are highly spirited. Finishing last year a Boulder marathon - with a decent time - gave us the necessay confidence to look for more challenging courses. And to see pictures of the Lake Tahoe course is the best motivation.

Late evening we went to see the Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest. To sit 3 hours after a long run always a bad idea, so we usually avoid concerts, movies on Sundays. But this was the only free evening for my husband. Fortunately the movie was highly entertaining, taking away our mind from the discomfort of long sitting.

Fifth marathon training (Details) week 11:

Monday:

well deserved leg rest day after Saturday-Sunday hills
Back maintenance programme by Fielding

Tuesday:

6-mile easy MAP run at sunrise - 70F, but cloudy
Get On the Ball - all round workout 3
(Appropriate stretch after every exercise.)

Wednesday:

9-mile MEP-speed combo run - start at 5:30; clear sky, blinding sun from sunrise
Mile splits: 9:02; 9:06; 8:33; 8:20; 8:09; 8:10; 8:10; 8:58 - rolling; 8:42
Lynn Robinson's Pilates Manual advanced programme

Leaving to Boulder tomorrow. Very spirited - it is always great to see our son - despite of the doomsday hot weather forecast for our planned 18-mile hill run.
I feel some pattern. When I last visited him, it was record -15F cold. Last July there was a record 110F high during our visit. Last January two-day snow storm. It seems Boulder always wants to challenge us.

Fifth marathon training (Details) week 11-12:

July 13-17: BOULDER

Thursday: 6-mile speed walk (95F) + stair climbing (my favorite Boulder challenge to climb the tallest Bolder campus building.)

Friday: 6-mile walk (100+F) - I had an errand, could not wait for the 90F "cool" evening <weg> - the temperature was over 90 till sunset and high 80s till midnight.

Saturday: 19-mile heat-trail-hill combo
Start: 5 AM, 73 F, finish: before 8 AM, 85 F. Very low humidity.
Course: Boulder Creek trail
From 2E up to 0, turn, back down 6 to 4E, turn, back 4 up to 0, then up 2 to W2, turn, down 3 to 1E.
Nutrition:
huge glass of water before start. Water at every 2 miles, GU with salt at 8, 14.

Sunday: rest, 2-mile speed walk

Monday: 4-mile easy recovery run
........................................................................ ..................

Back in CA (from July 18th) My husband had injured his toes, could not run with me for a couple of days.

Tuesday: leg rest day
Back maintenance programme by Fielding

Wednesday: 6-mile easy run alone. Start at 5:30 AM, in darkness, nevertheless still 73-75F.

Thursday: 6-mile MEP run alone. Start again at 5:30AM, in darkness, but 73-75F.

Friday: cross training, special runner's lower body workout + Anderson's special runner's stretches.

Saturday: 6-mile MEP run - my husband toes had cured, it was much bigger fun to sweat with him. (5:30 AM, 75 F)

Sunday: 12-mile combo - start at 5AM; 75F, 85% humidity the HELL
What can I say? It was very hard to keep up the spirit, but we DID it. We even had a 7:59 (!!!!) 6th mile.
Splits: 9:09; 8:57; 8:26; 8:28; 8:21; 7:59; 8:37; 8:33; 8:22; 8:50; 8:51; 8:48
WATER SALT WATER SALT WATER SALT WATER SALT..before, during, after run

I actually thought of you when I was going through those books. I had a lot more stuff by Michael Palmer and Dean Koontz than I thought. I also had some Richard North Patterson (a polished hack), James Patterson (fair), and Robin Cook. I also had 5 Child/Preston books; I had completely forgotten them except for Relic/Reliquary. I had Riptide, Dragon's Mountain or some such, and Ice Limit. I remembered Dragon's Mountain a little and didn't like it; I had completely forgotten the other two, and kept Riptide to re-read and see if I liked it or not. All that stuff and plenty, plenty more (I had all the Star Wars books through about 1999, which is something like 20 titles; I couldn't remember a single thing that happened in any of them ), is now the property of the Phoenix Library system, if you want to make an offer.

I also came across the last really good science fiction series I read, The Legacy Of Herot and Beowulf's Children, by Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle, and some other guy whose name I forget. They are two first rate books for what they are. Pournelle and Niven have been favorites of mine since childhood when I read their Lucifer's Hammer (another excellent book for what it is), which is a good companion read to Steven King's The Stand, because it takes the same subject matter and goes in an entirely different direction with it. Anyway, if you like character-driven science fiction, Pournelle/Niven would be good airplane reading for you, as would the other stuff I listed.

Thanks, Eva! I honestly don't know how you do all the running while eating a truly low-carb diet. It just kills my speed and energy. You are one of the few l-c runners I know who does have good speed.

Yes, dh and I have been quite competitive lately! Even that week I did on induction was b/c he did it, and it was important for me to lose more weight than he did, LOL! I am jealous that you and you dh get to run together, we almost never do. When is your next marathon?

Fifth marathon training (Details) week 13:

A very busy, very hot week:

Monday:
leg rest day
Back maintenance programme by Fielding

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday: 6-mile sunrise runs
76-78F, high humidity

Friday: cross training - WATP 4 mile - however ridiculous it might sounds, it is an excellent program for pre-race/long run tapering, after race/long run recovery.

Saturday: total rest day - preparation for the Sunday's 21-mile long run

Sunday: 21-mile run

Start at 4:30 AM - 77F, 90 humidity. At finish: 80-82F, 75% humidity, cloudy.
OMG! It was sweaty hell. Not even one cool minute. It was not distance training, it was pure heat training.
We tried to keep up our spirits, but definitely had very hard last 6 miles.

Mile splits:
9:29; 9:17; 8:51; 8:45; 8:54; 8:36; 8:46; 8:53; 8:35; 8:46; 8:46; 8:24; 8:45; 8:44; 8:38; 8:50; 8:48; 8:46; 8:48; 9:18; 9:04

3h 9 min (with bathroom breaks) - still 9 min average!!!!

Nutrition:
Cliff bar (40 carbs), water before run. Gu (20 carbs +salt) at 9, 15. Water at every third mile.

After run, to help recovery: long walk, long cold shower, protein shake, V8, plenty of water.

Off to a long Chicago trip.

OMG!!! This log is dusty....

I have a couple of very busy, exhausting, but so happy weeks. My daughter got married . Should I say more?

Nevertheless, we managed to keep up with our marathon training programme.

A short summary:
Fifth marathon training (Details) week 15-17:
3x6-9 miles on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
Weekends:
Aug 12th 7-mile hill run

Aug 13th 12-mile run. Splits: 9:30; 8:57; 8:30; 8:28; 8:26; 8:09; 8:23; 8:26; 8:20; 8:40; 8:29; 8:49

Aug 20th: 21-mile run
67-69F, 70% humidity at start, 70F at finish - overcast
Splits: 8:59; 9:09; 8:54; 8:46; 8:56; 8:26; 8:32; 8:33; 8:36; 8:42; 8:44; 8:25; 8:33; 8:38; 8:26; 8:40; 8:37; 8:36; 8:55; 9:14; 9:15
Total time (with restroom breaks) : 3h 06' (8:51 average pace)

Aug 26th 7-mile hill run

Aug 27th 12-mile run. Splits: 9:20; 9:00; 8:30; 8:40; 8:42; 8:35; 8:51; 8:51; 8:46; 8:50; 8:48; 8:50