Beep-boop-doop

Is it too much of a cliche if I subtitle this "I'm not dead" again?

Hi friends! Hello!

Welcome back. We’re doing that thing again, the thing where I semi-regularly tell you about all the thinking I’ve been doing while plodding along on two feet.

First things first - I have a repetitive motion injury in my forearm from being slightly too good at my job, so this is going to be kinda short because typing hurts. It’s fine, I have an appointment with a physiotherapist, but part of my silence in the past few months is because I literally cannot type for more than a few minutes without my right hand going numb. So that’s fun.

Much better news: I got interviewed by fucking Outside Magazine! Holy shit! There’s a picture of me smooching my cutie as the thumbail! Because I’m allergic to publicity of any kind, I of course waited a full month to tell you about it, but it’s extremely exciting and I feel low-key famous. That’s the perfect amount of famous to be, and I’m stoked.

The boy has also been doing a bunch of cool promotion for the ElevenSkys brand (did I mention we have a line of very durable hiking clothes?) and you should check it out. I’m in the process of designing the ultimate Town Dress, to complement our technical offerings. The new stuff is coming out April 1st, (not including the dress) and although this makes me a gross capitalist, I actually think you should buy it. You won’t have to buy another pair of shorts/pants for a good long time, and I am all for people buying less stuff. Our shit is size-inclusive and gender-neutral, and our hats are legitimately stylish. I designed them myself, and my boss will tell you that my window displays are the best. Also, I promise I am re-designing our janky-ass website. Sorry.

Third, and most important, I’m getting back on trail in a month. I’m back on trail in a month! Okay, I’m flying out in a month, and then I have a two-week quarantine and a PCR test, and the boy will meet me in late April for a pre-trail bacchanal of eating and movies before we hit the NCT. For the uninitiated, the NCT (or North Country Trail) is the 4,600 mile behemoth of the US National Scenic Trail system. It starts on the Vermont-New York border along the side trails of the official AT, then splits off to track through Upper Michigan, the Superior Hiking Trail, the Boundary Waters in Minnesota and finishing in the Black Hills of the Dakotas. It’s totally unlike any hiking adventure I’ve been on before, and I’m looking foward to the pure endurance challenge of sticking it out through the green tunnel and flat featureless forest roads. We’ll be pushing an average of 30 miles a day, and I want to see how my body can handle it. I’ll be the first woman to complete it in a single season, and the first Canadian, and it’ll be Constantine’s final hike to be the first person under 30 to complete all eleven national scenic trails. It’s a huge capstone achievement, and I hope you’ll follow along for the journey.

So that’s it for now! The NCT journal begin with Day 0 on April 15th, the day my official American Quarantine begins. As always, stay stafe and talk soon.

Yours truly,
Magpie.