"A hen is only an egg's way of making another egg." - Samuel Butler

Another pic stolen from Facebook.

Crossfit gyms all across the country host an open workout they call the Murphy every Memorial Day that's named after a soldier killed in the line of duty in Afghanistan. There are two versions, the full "Murph" and the half-Murph. The full begins with a 1 mile run, followed by ten rounds of 10 pull ups, 20 pushups, and 30 squats, followed by another 1 mile run. You can probably guess the specs for the half-Murphy. I did the half two years ago at Josh & Aubri's gym but I knew going in I couldn't do it as prescribed because I couldn't do 50 pull ups, so I did what they call jump pull ups, where you stand on something - in my case a couple of weight disks that totaled about 4" in height - that you can spring off of to help with the pull up.
I got the run/10 rounds/run finished in 45 minutes but it felt like I'd cheated.

Last year I couldn't do the event because they were trying to decide if the lump that had appeared on my shin was cancer. Chances were good, tests were negative (T'ank you, Fadder), but by the time we knew that it was well into June.

Next Monday I'm going to give the half-Murph another go, but this time I'm committed to doing it as prescribed; no cheating on the pull ups. That's why I've been working to build up to higher numbers. Today I did 120 pull ups (12 sets of 10 done throughout the day) and did an extra hard workout at the gym this afternoon that included squats with weight and pushups. I'll do more of the same every day between now and Thursday, then a light workout Friday, and nothing but BACON Saturday and Sunday. We'll see if that's enough.

It's been decades since I trained for an endurance event. First it was marathons, then centuries (100-mile bike rides), but nothing like that since the mid-90's. Those distances on foot or bike require too many hours spent training, and I just can't get myself motivated to devote that much of my life to one activity. So this gives me an opportunity to push myself toward my physical limits without surrendering the rest of life to the effort.

I got the rest of the headliner rubber installed this morning and then put in the headlight assemblies. That last part has the front end looking a lot like a '59 Chevy truck. With the misc. parts UPS delivered this evening I'll pretty much finish up the interior, which will mean the doors can go on.
We're getting closer!

That quote up at the top struck me as particularly interesting in light of something I watched a few nights ago. I was outside at dusk and noticed the tiny gnats (or something similar) hovering around the shrubs next to the patio. I thought about their life cycle; they take wing long enough to find a mate, the females lay their eggs, and then they die. Their offspring hatch, take wing, mate, and die. Repeat endlessly.
That's depressing!

If the theory of evolution is correct we're just bigger gnats who manage to live a little longer in between birth and death. We can't fly, though.
I'm not buying it. Gnats don't write songs, or paint pictures of gardens, or record their history. They don't ponder the big questions like, "Is this all there is?" or strive to be better gnats.
Just a minimal bit of reflection says humans are qualitatively different from gnats. And gnus. And any other critter in the woods or pastures. Some of them look a little like us, and every once in awhile act a little like us (or we act a little like them), but there's this big gap that shows up as soon as we think about things like the arts, or history, or self-awareness.
And they don't try to do more pull ups than they've ever done before just to see where their limit is.

Imago Dei.