gan 7 - Ants Marching

[gan]

Well, it's been a big couple of weeks for me. On the work front, I learned a paper has just been accepted to a pretty big journal. Plus I'm nearing completion of a chapter for a book. Whereas a year ago I was feeling pretty dispirited about work, I feel like things have tipped in the balance of "I've got a lot of big and exciting things happening." I'm also feeling like I have more work life balance than in years. I've settled into a good pattern of doing yoga 3X per week, some sort of social activity at least 1X during the week, and a big hike on the weekend with a Meetup group. I'm training as a reserve for a team-based, 100km charity walk later in the year...and am "auditioning" for a team on a 55km hike this weekend...eek. Training for that is reconnecting me to one of my pet interests - technical gear! I splurged on some new trail running shoes on the weekend and some compression leggings are in the mail. I'm also the team leader for a workplace stepping challenge and plan to get into the habit of doing a morning run at least a couple of times a week...around the Opera House no less ;-).

Coffee guy is a bit too hot and cold these days. Some days he engages, others he seems to ignore. He's busy, I'll give him that but whatever. I've decided I'll ignore him for a bit.

Smitten Meetup guy sent me a poem which I elected to ignore Actually it occurs to me that Meetup could potentially be a great aid for a stalker because you can see when people sign up to things.

Other Meetup guy, well that one is interesting. Since going out a week ago, we've exchanged emails almost daily and he's invited me to various things that he's going to. I'm not really sure what to do. On my side, I'm not interested in anything more than friendship and I have no idea what he's thinking at this point. I definitely don't want to lead him on...but don't know if/when/how to broach the topic. While I'm not discounting an R on age alone, I estimate that he's is around 55 yo, so I'm having some difficulty figuring out just which bucket this fits into. I mean, I can hang out with whomever I want, obviously, but it's.....unconventional. Actually, OD, he reminds me a bit of you. Do you have any insights to offer here?