Thank You

Cold again today for an overall temperature.  Did some reading on 2013 PTCA website blogs to learn the little nuggets only sometimes written about.  The subtleties and nuances of what the previously initiated has an offering to learn from.  The walk was cold and I kept to my pace for two miles.  Just another grey day to match my mood for a few hours.  Cheerful enough once the blood started flowing and making me endorphin happy; even if briefly.  I enjoyed that.  Keeping on the new eating regime and so far so good.  I am not feeling very talkative and not much done to write down about anyway.
Thank you to those in Equador, Malaysia, Guam, and France who are reading this; as well as to those reading this in the United States.
And so,
Sit down and write a brief note or card to somebody and mail it with a stamp. Think about what that might do?
Hans

Bad Night's Sleep Doesn't Make Good Day's Walk

Bad night's sleep doesn't always make for a good day's walking, but it's got to get done.  Cold when I finally got my house cleaning done to where I had planned.  I missed a chance to walk with my friend Jai.  Bummer. One of these days our schedules will mesh and she and I can walk together.  On today's walk I kept a pace of 20 minute miles for two miles. Because of my boots I need to stop and fix them every so often, such is reality. Hey, okay, I know that two miles is not many miles, however, this journey of 2660+ miles still has to begin one step at a time. The first thing I began to change was my food intake. Now it is the addition of walking. It will afterall be a hike of approx. 1760+/- steps per mile X 2660 miles = 4,680,000 +/- steps more or less.  With my normal walking pace being fast I believe that I will be able to better utilize my working into walking more miles with more muscle work and fat burned. At a yet to be determined point I will begin carrying a backpack with ever increasing amounts of weight.  That's my thinking in any case and I will modify it as I go as necessity provides and as I increase to the eventually nessessary mileage of 25-28 miles per day. Tomorrow I will begin writing about my mental work-outs in order to get ready for this new challenge.  I believe that mental conditioning will be as necessary as is the physical buildup.  An example is that for today's walk I was tired, cold, sad, and yet walked head down to shuffle through the walk because I needed to.
No pretty things to write about seeing while waking today. Just walking.  Oh, I did enjoy the decorated cross at the refinery in the distance thru the trees of my apartment parking lot afterwards tho..
I thanked God I enjoyed another day.
Peace within ones-self overflows then into peace for others also.  Hans

T - 448 Test Walk Timing

Church today of course.  Afterwards, I visited a friend of mine who is living with brain cancer.  A late lunch followed and then I walked two miles down at River Parks.  Lovely brisk day.  The river was low and rocks were exposed.  Water birds were scattered about feeding.  Leaves cluttered the grass.  The sky was streeked with bright gun steel grey.  My walk averaged 15 minute miles.  Good for a beginning time, altho I also didn't carry any pack or water.  I walked on the grass instead of the trail to lesson impact fatigue.  The first sponsorship needed is for shoes, protein, walking poles, and water filtration.  Brooks Cascadia's I hope.  EAS protein?  Sawyer filtration?  Walking poles??

I'll keep you posted.
Wear your seatbelt.  Hans

Walking Forward, Always Forward

No turning back sometimes.  Dad's memorial was at 10:10 A.M. today.  My cousin Rich whom I had never met came in for the memeorial.  After the service we went for lunch with my Bishop Lee Poteet.  After lunch we went to a Irish pub and all visited until 8 P.M. Awesome draw of old memories and beginnings on new ones.  I drank three I.B.C. rootbeers.
I parked far from the doors and walked.

Why SantaHans & As for T - 450

I shaved my head completely for the first time when Mom's cancer came back for a second time.  I did it as much in solidarity as I did for curiousity.  Somewhere there is a picture of me with a Mohawk during the shaving process.  It is a weird feeling to have no hair on your head and only a goat-tee; at least for the first time.  I continued to shave my head for about two years until I wore a Santa hat to work during the Christmas of 2001.  So many of the staff and customers at the Italian restaurant where I worked at the time told me I should play Santa, that I grew my hair and and beard and "played" Santa Christmas 2002.  A dear friend of mine Crista made my suit and off I went.  Because I liked the "shaved" look, I began to grow my beard (to follow company policy) while on my two week summer vacation and then my hair in about September so that my "look" would be complete just in time.  By the Christmas of 2003 I became a "Partner In Education" thru the Tulsa Chamber and continued thru Christmas 2013.  This Christmas 2014 I took a break because of Dad's death (22 Oct.) from cancer, and Mom's impending death (5 Dec.) from cancer.  By last year I had partnered not only with my original Tulsa elementary school McKinley, but had also adopted Remington (2012) and Kendall Whitier (2013) also.  At McKinley each child received a picture, candy cane, and minute with Santa.  Other fun awaited the children at the other two schools.
After Christmas I would shave eventually by the first of the new year, and repeat the beard and hair growth cycle each year thereafter.
SantaHans came about because many folks began calling me such by fall every year thru Christmas.  Some folks continued/continue calling me SantaHans long after Christmas season is complete.  As for "Pacificcresttrail", it is/was the next goal after graduation from Oklahoma State University Tulsa December 2015.  So the name was born.  My facebook site is SantaHans Pacificcresttrail so it all ties together.

Make a possitive difference in somebody's life today.
Peace.  Hans

A zero day exercise wise.  An awesome day othewise.  I enjoyed the day with my dear friend Erin, her husband Brian and her family in Owasso, Oklahoma.  They even had presents for me.  That was so nice to be remembered.  Mom and Erin clicked when they first met and at subsequent meetings.  So many new memories of my favorite celebration of the year, Christmas.  I went to services at St. Augustines officiated by my spiritual leader Bishop Lee Poteet.  This was Mom's favorite season also.  I spent some of today listening to voice messages that Mom had left that I never cleaned up and am now so greatful that they are there.  How's that for a run-on sentence.  Oh well for gramatics.  I bid you peace and Merry Christmas.  Hans

A Merry Christmas Eve's Day indeed.  20 weeks sober and a lifetime to go.  Nice walk up to and past the QuikTrip and on, on an otherwise kinda gray day weather wise.  I am so greatful that I am alive.  So many wonderful memories of my parents and growing up going thru my head today.  I am going to keep this short as I wanted to take in the day without much dialogue and am concluding it the same.  Peace. Hans.

T - 453 = 2660+

I have been give permission to add the link for CancerSucks http://store.cancersucks.com/
In addition to The Tyler Robinson Foundation  http://www.trf.org/donate/ , The Scott Carter Foundation http://www.scottcarterfoundation.org/#!donate/ctzx , and The Spondylitis Association of America http://www.spondylitis.org/support/ .  PLEASE mention me when commenting or donating on their sites please.
I know that spondylitis arthritis is not cancer, however, it afflicts my daughter so I want to walk for them that one day they may also walk freely.  I want to be able to walk while I can.  If not now when?  It is never too late to be what you want to be.  And so I walk.
Today up to the Quik Trip, over the highway and around and back thru the neighborhood.  Tomorrow, Christmas Eve's Day, after lunch of lamb wursts, I will pace out what I am able to walk mph.  3 miles an hour is a pretty good pace.  I think I am up to 2 miles per hour.  I will post the results tomorrow.  Hopefully tonight's sleep will be better than the last two.  After Dad's memorial service 27 Dec., I will shop for a scale so I can begin marking weight loss with something other than with a leather tool punching a new hole into my belt so I can tighten it lol. I bid you peace.  Good Day.  Hans

So, Onward I Walk.

This has been a long day full of only one challange, the memorial service and placement of Mom's ashes in her final resting spot of a collumbarium.  Part of the challange was over when Mom died from cancer 5 December 2014.  Today was something of a conclusion of her death and the beginning of my life without her advice and input and love anymore, however, begun 17 days before.  The challange of the PCT and its mental game can at most only compare briefly to the stresses of this Fall semester for me at OSU-Tulsa (I'll address that more in 500 days or so).  Fall semester as I was unable to acheive more that 3-4 hours of sleep a night because of stresses.  Then in September a lady stoned on pills hit & totaled my car.  By the time I was trying to catch-up from all that, Dad who had been hospitalized since 16 July was diagnosed with terminal cancer and died 22 October.  About the time I was in my 3rd week of greiving his death and struggling to stay caught-up in my schooling, Mom took a turn for the worse in her 4th battle with cancer in 25 years, and died with grace, peace, and dignity 5 December.  During her last two weeks she would smile, then nod when I told her I was leaving to study or go to class.  I earned one A, two B's, and took an incomplete, which I will complete before the beginning of Spring 2015 semester.  At this point three B's and one A will be my worse semester grade-wise since I re-entered college Spring 2011 semester.  I've also earned an A and two B's already from OSU-Tulsa.
I graduated from Tulsa Community College (TCC) with Honors and a 3.68 GPA with my first  Associates May 2013, and my second May 2014.  Being an Honors student at TCC, Provost Scholar, and consistantly on president's and dean's Honor Roll earned me tuition wavers.
My grades of failure from Fall 1979 and Spring & Fall 1980 still cause me to loose my tuition waver at OSU-Tulsa because I am being "punished" by a system of laws that I fell thru the cracks of.
So, onward I walk towards the completion of my Bachelor's degree.  Most certainly Mom just might rise from the dead long enough to kick my tookis if I don't graduate college lol.  I will succeed because failure is not an option.  So, onward I walk.  Christmas Eve's day I celebrate 20 weeks sober.  And onward I walk.
Call somebody you haven't spoken with in a while and listen.  Hans

455 Days Til Day 1

Another day I am so greatful for.  The sun will rise tomorrow and I will be there to greet it.  Mom's memorial is tomorrow also.  My champion for her courage and grace.  I pray I do her fighting spirit honor while I train for and eventually walk the PCT.
455 days until day T-455/0/0 the first number is what day on trail, the second is that day's miles, and the third is the accumulation.  At least that's what I think now.  I'll see when I get there as this trail blog explanation morph's into a most excellent journey.  Pushing forward and growing now is as functionally important for me as 10-20-30-40 years ago were for me to persist and live and grow.  Standing on my feet and waiting tables for 10-12 hours a day on concrete floors was difficult work for 10 years, but I ground on.  Wading chest deep in Southern Louisiana swamps surveying pipeline for a year had its get down to it moments, as did 6 years night shift out of 8 years working in an ICU.  Nutritional changes are working in my life as I eat more protein (soy protein), less fat, and more fiber.  Training time is upon me, and worked into a schedule of part-time work and being a full-time 53 y/o college student.  I will graduate Oklahoma State University Tulsa Campus December 2015.  I am succeeding now where once I failed at OSU Stillwater 3 semesters in a row from fall 1979 thru fall 1980.  Because of that failure I still cannot receive tuition waver for tuition.  I graduated from Tulsa Community College with a Associates in Elementary and Secondary Education Spring of 2013, and with an Associates in Liberal Arts Spring of 2014.  I will graduate with a Bachelors in University Studies with an emphasis in History and Hummanities.
This is another day that I am so greatful for. Peace. It's all good. Hans

Listing has been today's order of business.  What is on my need list besides walking more and more and more... A backpack is tops.  I really like what I read about ULA backpacks from PCT'ers and from their website.  Tarptent is my leaning to (pun intended) for a tent choice. I am just now researching what sleeping bags I have to choose from according to my needs.  JetBoil is definately my choice for stove and I want their 3 oz wt coffee press for morning coffee on the trail.  Hopefully enjoying QT coffee on trail.  Plate, bowl, dual ended spork or foon whatever you call it.  Piece of Tyvek for tent/ground cover, solar charger, emergency tracker, Halfmiles app downloaded, hiking poles, headlamp, extended wear contacts, water filtration system, containers able to carry up to 6 liters+ of water, camera, etc, and 26 pieces of AP for 2660+miles:)  I am sure there are a few personal toiletries such as tooth paste and brush, flint, super glue, etc.  So there is some of my list making.
Put your best foot forward always, daily.  Hans

A "nero" is a day when you nearly walk more than zero.  A "zero" day is one in which you don't walk at all.  With this blog I have now taken about 45 "zero's" now.  Enough of a break and I will muscle on.  Right after I began this blog was only 2 days after my Dad's death.  I really wasn't ready to begin blogging and then my Mom's cancer began winning and my Mom died 5 December.  In tribute to my Mom's fighting winning spirit I begin again this blog dedicated to my hero, my Mom.  Her favorite charity was the Scott Carter Foundation because Scott was dear to my Mom's heart.  He called her "the chocolate lady" because she brought him chocolate.  I initially wanted to hike the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) when I was in my early-mid-teens.  Time moved on, however, my dream to walk the PCT remained.  While doing a summer 2013 biology class at TCC I had a re-awakening to complete the PCT.  I began reading trail blogs from thru-hikers on their journeys Northbound from The Pacific Crest Trail Association. (thru-hiker is one who hikes all 2660+ miles of the PCT in one season)-(Hikers either walk No.-bound or So.-bound) I like the choice of Northbound because of the weather logistics thru the desert part of So. Cali.  I will be racing Northward trying to beat the snow by trying and reaching Canada by the last of August, or at worse case, the first week of September.  I read trail blogs trail season 2014 also.  I started planning my PCT journey 2013 and then by spring of this year I decided to walk raising awareness for 2 pediatric cancer foundations; one of which raises money to off-set the cost to families fighting pediatric cancer, while the other raises money to fight and find cures for pediatric cancer.  In honor of my daughter Ren I am also walking to raise awareness about the Spondylitis Arthritis Association and their donations towards Spondylitis arthritis research.  I planned my kick-off time of early spring 2016 at the start of this year to coincide with happening after my graduation from OSU-Tulsa December 2015.  And so I have begun my journey towards Campo and the Southern termanus of the PCT.
Do yourself a favor and call somebody you have not talked with in a while and then listen to them.  
Peace. It's all good.  Hans