Sunday, February 14, 2010

Lesson Learned

Here is a little bit of helpful advice for today. If you want to try and immitate those Discovery Channel 'survivor-men" like Bear Grylls and the "Survivor Man"...think again, because the idea is terrible.

I woke up bright and early at 8 a.m. to go for yet another training expedition for my backpacking trip this Spring Break on the Appalachian Trail. Today's exercise was twenty 'suicide' sprints up the moutain across the street from the Ohio University Golf Course.

The inclement weather makes it an especially good exercise, because the patches of snow and loose rubble that you have to avoid makes a great shock to your muscles, which is exactly what your body needs to develop and strengthen muscle.

Anyway, I set up my $400 Canon Powershot camera that I got for Christmas just last year on a tripod at the base of the hill. I got a short intro and started my exercises, but today, I was not the only one looking to do suicides.

As I was trotting down to start my fifth set, I notice out of the corner of my eye what I believe to be a small animal flipping down the snow. Was it a small animal? No, of course not. IT WAS MY CAMERA!

I chased after the equipment, only to find it cracked and wet at the very bottom of the hill.

I couldn't do anything much but stand their in disbelief. How could I have been so stupid? Not only had my teacher suggested that we take a partner with us to film, but my girlfriend had made that very offer before I left!

"Oh, no," I said. That would have been too safe!

Overall the workout turned out to be a failed attempt. I was too sick to my stomach after the incident and decided to call it quits for the day. I've been looking on ebay for a new camera to potentially hide the event from my parents, but we'll see how that turns out!

So to all of you bloggers out their that wish to use multimedia like I wanted to this week, here's a piece of advice.

Don't take an expensive camera out into the forest, set it up on a tripod...on an incline...that is wet...piled with unstable rubble...and icy, leave it there by itself and expect it to be okay. Give it a second or two of thought...unlike me.

Best Travels,
Matthew

4 comments:

  1. Oh my gosh! That's awful! I'll let you know if I hear of any of those cameras being on sale.

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  2. Jeeze, too bad for your camera. Also, you're a better man than I for being up at 8am on a weekend.

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  3. So bummed for you, Matthew. It might be a tad interesting to see the video anyway....! In general, how many days a week are you training?

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  4. I've been training three to four days a week. I trained for a marathon last year six days a week, and ended up injuring my knee with chondramalacia, so i'm still trying to go hard but not as many days!

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