Today was the perfect Bondi morning (& there are lots of 'em). I woke as usual about 4.50am & re-read a chapter on Sufism from Stephen Prothero's book "God is Not One". It's a cool read on the 8 great religions of the world. Lots of interesting things for an (ex-Catholic) atheist like me. A poem by the 11th Century Sufi Ansari (his name) says, & I'm not quoting directly:

Fasting is only good for saving on food;
Vigil & prayer are best done by old folks;
Pilgrimage is tourism by another name; and
Distributing alms is OK if you're a philanthropist & can afford to do it;
We'd all be better if we just concentrated on Falling in Love!

It sounds distinctly impious and alive. A nice thought to start the day.

When Gene woke up we wandered down to the beach for a coffee & checked the surf out. Still good sets but not as good as yesterday. Been brilliant surf most of the week (of course) making it frustrating not being able to take the board down for a wave.

Yesterday 'avo at the beach I took phone photos of a kid with his Dad & a blue tongue lizard sitting on his head. Followed that with a shot of some Tibetan monks checking out the surf & then of a Jewish couple in their orthodox gear taking their little one for a walk. It's got to be one of the more stimulating communities to live it.

Just about to get stuck into some work for the office. The girls are going for a run at around 5pm. I've set the bike trainer up in the back room so I can have a slow pedal indoors while they train for the Sydney Half. I'm grateful the down time is happening in winter rather than summer. That'd be a real bummer.

Just about finished reading Going Long the first time through, which will be my bible for the 2011 December Busso IM attempt. Training for me cannot really start until next Mon (23 Aug) & then it's going to be very slow. My first hit out will probably be a Half Marathon & then the Husskie Long Course in Feb 2011.

The thing about having a prostate operation is that it's close to your core, so any time you use your core, you feel it, & engaging your core, even slightly & involuntarily which we constantly do, seems to make the wound bleed. This fact helps you focus on slowing down. It'll be three weeks tomorrow (Monday 16 Aug) since the operation & it seems to be going way too slow. But going it is, which is great.

The coming week will be work & more work. We've got jobs in Sydney, Wollongong, Tamworth, Liverpool, Huntingwood, Townsville, Merrylands, Umina and good old Wagga Wagga currently, so things are busy.