the shoes and the jazztrack truth

One of the reasons I stopped jogging years ago is the amount of overhead involved. Warm-ups, switching clothes and shoes, walking to the park and back. It puts you off before you start.

On a whim last week I pumped up the tyres and rode to the big park, where I jogged for a careful 5 minutes or more, without a lot of time-wasting preparation. The cycling served as the warm-up, and I didn't bother with jogging shoes - when you land on your toes, you don't need all that heel cushioning. It was a qualified success - although my lungs got some insight into how asthma must feel, at least I didn't bust or twist anything. And I got a great sleep that night.

Today I streamlined things further, by using the smaller park, 3 minutes' walk down the hill from the house. No need to get out the bike and helmet. And no need to warm up, as I had just been on the home gym. Last week's run must have blown the remnants of the infection out of my chest, because this time I felt much better, and even broke into a trot on the walk back up the steep hill. Obviously I think about my dear dog at these times, but life is still rather good, isn't it?

And just now I switched on the 24-hour jazz radio station here, in the middle of a mesmerising improvisation. I tried to guess who it was. Not Coltrane. Nor George Coleman. Then who?

It turned out to be a popular piece by Oliver Nelson, the black American jazz composer and saxophonist.

Once or twice in my life I've heard marvellous music by him, but never really followed up on it. There are much bigger names than him in jazz of the 50s/60s, but he's especially muscular and exciting. As gifted as Mingus but more direct. Today I'm downloading, at last, the best bits of the album, The Blues And The Abstract Truth. Life gets better and better (sometimes).

I doubt whether anyone's interested, but here's a link. I'm using Blogger's anaemic app, so I can't make it clickable.

http://www.allmusic.com/album/the-blues-and-the-abstract-truth-mw0000188605