American Discovery Trail: Starting A New Year in Bondurant, Iowa

Bondurant, Iowa. It looks pretty enough.

I resist making New Year resolutions, but this year let's say I made some goals. My first goal was to walk 3,660,000 steps during the year, because that would get me back to 10,000 per day average. That is only a shade over 10,000 steps per day, but it's not as easy as it sounds due to my bridge tournaments.

On a typical tournament day, I play bridge for about seven hours, from 10:00 AM to 1:30, then from 3:00 to 6:30. In between sessions, I eat lunch with my partner. After the second session, I either eat dinner or collapse in my motel room, or if the tournament is close enough, I drive home. Not usually good days for a lot of walking.

Allowing for bridge days then, I figure I have to get about 11,000 steps in on other days. How is that going? Well, it's January 1, and I have 7,500 steps in so far, so I have to try for 3,500 more. I will map out 3,500 steps tonight with Arlo.

Mike told me that there is a name for the second Friday in January, for people who give up on their resolutions right away. It's called Quitter's Friday. I love that idea. It's a good reason though, to make goals rather than I-resolve-to-do-this-thing-every-day resolutions. You usually don't have to abandon your goals in a week and a half.

I saw five joggers during my walk this morning. Don't worry guys: only 9 more days and you can quit along with everyone else.

Bondurant, Iowa, by the way, is 15 miles outside of Des Moines, so I will hit the big city later this week, with still over 200 miles to go to Nebraska.

Weather here continues to be surprisingly mild, with temperatures in the mid-40s most days, and nighttime lows in the high 30s. It should be about 10 degrees colder, at least. So far, it's the year without a winter.

In Des Moines right now though it is 25 degrees, with forecast temperatures in the teens and single digits all week, including down to 1 degree next Tuesday. It's good to live where I live.

For the country, 2025 will almost certainly be a particularly bad year, but there is no compelling reason to think that Jackie, Arlo, and I won't have a perfectly good year. I hope the best for everyone, and let's do what we can to survive the coming storm.