Pushing Myself More - The 2026 Chelanathon

Posted on Saturday October 3, 2026 by Jacob Campbell.

In mid-June, I started thinking about what felt like a crazy idea. I have a niece who is also a therapist, and she is very involved in the connection between mental health and physical health. She does races and does some health influencer activities. We were at my concuña’s birthday party. Hearing about some of her experiences, I think, started me thinking (even though I didn’t immediately decide I wanted to do my own race).

I have also honestly felt very stagnant with my health and fitness. I have been feeling like I can’t make any real or meaningful change. While I’m very active, I really need to lose some weight to be as healthy as I can be. I started thinking about trying something new. My weight has been increasing slowly over the last few years even though I consistently go and walk in the evenings and very inconsistently go to the gym. I decided I needed something to motivate myself.

So I started planning to do a race, and I decided I wanted to do a triathlon. As I started looking into options, I realized there are different lengths. An Ironman is crazy: it includes a full marathon (42.2 km) run, along with a 3.9 km swim and a 180.2 km bike ride. While I would like to build up to doing an Olympic race (a 1.5 km swim, a 40 km bike ride, and a 10 km run), there is a smaller length that can be done as well, the sprint. This is what I did, but I definitely did not sprint through it as it took me 2 hours, 52 minutes, and 1 second to finish.

The race distances for the Chelanathon Sprint were:

• Swim: 0.5 mile (805 m)
• Bike: 12.1 miles (19.5 km)
• Run: 3.1 miles (5.0 km)

Training and Working Toward It

Just under 90 days before the race, I decided that I wanted to do it and started a planning document. While I watched some videos and read some articles, a lot of my planning and thinking about this event was done with the support of AI. I had no idea how to train, how to think about things, or what I might need to do. Questions like how the transition works or how to build up my training really helped me conceptualize this.

I wanted to push myself harder than I normally do, with a goal to just finish the race. My hope is that this can jump-start my efforts to improve my physical fitness and health. Although I’ve only lost a small amount of weight in the last couple of months, I am still really glad to have participated. I’ve always loved swimming as exercise (though I didn’t get to do it as much during this summer’s training), but I’ve now decided that I do like running. I logged every workout from June 22 (when I made the final decision to do the event) through race day, and it added up to:

Comparing early summer to the four weeks before the race showed real progress:

Race Day

Here is the course as my watch recorded it: the swim along the Manson shoreline, the bike loop up past Wapato and Roses Lakes, and the run back to the finish. Hover over a leg for its official time.

GPS tracks from my Apple Watch via FitPub. Watch distances run a little long, especially in open water.

I wasn’t super happy with my final swim time. I only practiced once with a wetsuit before the race. The water was also very cold (64°F). For the first 400 m, I couldn’t really swim normally. Not only was it chaotic being in the middle of everyone, but I also felt like I couldn’t catch my breath (because of the cold). I actually thought I might not be able to make it and I might have to quit. But as I got closer to the place where we had to start coming back, I started feeling more comfortable and like I could actually swim.

After swimming my half mile in Lake Chelan, I biked 12 miles through the vineyards and orchards around Manson. There were a lot more hills than I trained on, and I am still slow on the bike. My bike is a gravel bike, not really the type used for these kinds of races, but I loved seeing all of the little lakes that we passed through. There was one hill I had to get off and walk part of the way up, but for the rest I kept a steady pace. It was also sad that we passed somebody (who appeared much more fit than me) who was receiving CPR from emergency responders at the top of the last hill overlooking the lake. After pulling into the transition space, I parked my bike and started running (more like a jog and a bit of a limp to start off with). It was 5K to the finish line.

The first time I recorded a 5K run on my watch was about two months earlier. First time running 5K…

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The night after the race, I posted each leg to FitPub:

Swim: “I wasn’t very happy with my swimming time. The first bit I felt like I couldn’t breathe or catch my breath. I almost quit but kept going.”

Bike: “There were a bunch of ups and downs and hills. Most of my practice was flat. So beautiful going through several small lakes.”

Run: “I actually felt pretty good about the run and my pace. Still lots of room for growth but good. Overall I just wanted to be able to finish.”

I finished 10th of 11 in my age group (men 40–44). More importantly, I met the only goal I set back in June: I finished. Full results are on the Pacific Multisports results page.

My daughter participated in the Splash & Dash as well. Afterwards, we went to Leavenworth and spent the afternoon wandering around the shops there and eating some Bavarian-style food. It made for a fun weekend and wonderful experience.

Touching Grass - Summer Self Care

Posted on Wednesday September 2, 2026 by Jacob Campbell.

The Pixar movie, Hoppers (Chong, 2026), follows an animal-loving college student, Mabel, who transfers her mind into a robotic beaver, where she communicates with animals to save her grandma’s forest glade from destruction.

The film starts off with Mabel as a young, kind of wild elementary school girl. We are introduced to her as she attempts to liberate all the classroom pets in the school. She is caught by the teachers, who realize she is at it again. There is a chase, and Mabel bites a staff member, prompting a school disciplinary visit and mom leaving Mabel with her grandmother Tanaka for the day.

Tanaka [finds Mabel having run off, upset, and having climbed a tree in her expansive forested property]

So, what’d they book you for this time? [Pause]

The outlaw’s life is pretty lonely, huh? [Pause]

All right, you leave me no choice. [Walks away, to a glade, sits on a large rock in front of a pond, and waits for Mabel to join]

Come on. [patting space next to her] When I was 12, I punched Suzie Perkins in the face. I used to get really mad, but not anymore. Wanna know my secret? You just have to be very still and watch and listen.

[Through the eyes of Mabel, we see her calm herself through seeing the nature, wildlife, and a sense of awe of the systems around her]

Feel better? [Mabel Nods]

That’s what nature does. It’s hard to be mad when you feel like you’re part of something big.

Mabel: Grandma, can I come here every day?

Tanaka: Anytime you want. It could be our special place. You and me.

I love this scene, and the visual it provides of a scientifically backed phenomenon. Bratman et al. (2019) provide a consensus review including a broad interdisciplinary breadth of authors who describe concurrence that evidence supports associations between common types of nature experiences and

• an increased psychological well-being
• a reduction of risk factors and burden of some types of mental illness

At the same time, opportunities for some types of nature experiences are decreasing in both quality and quantity for many people globally.

This summer, I would encourage you to seek opportunities to have nature experiences, especially those that inspire feelings of awe and connection to a greater whole (Capaldi et al., 2015). For me, I love many outdoor activities. Some of these are things I do locally and don’t take significant extra effort (for example, afternoon bike rides or walks along the river), and some include more planning and going places (such as camping, backpacking, visits to the Oregon Coast, day hikes). I find it helpful to calendar out some activities you want to do over the summer, that you are endeavoring to accomplish. Make sure some of those activities include touching lots of grass.

My MSW Program Earned Accreditation

Posted on Friday July 31, 2026 by Jacob Campbell.

In 2013, while I was still working at Tri-Cities Community Health in their Behavioral and Mental Health Services (I think that was after the name change, but I started there when it was called Nueva Esperanza), I had been working on obtaining my supervision hours to obtain my LICSW, with Jim Renner. He was a faculty at Heritage University, and as we were working on my licensure hours he invited me to do a presentation one day in class and then in the fall offered me the opportunity to teach a class on case management. One of my peers at the clinic was also teaching and she decided to step back and I started teaching her class.

Fall 2024, I stepped away from working as a program social worker at the Pasco School District, to take on a full time position as an associate professor in the newly started Master of Social Work program. Before making that step to full time, as I worked as an adjunct from that first class, I had taught 342 students over 8 different classes, and a total of 42 different class sections. As a full time faculty, those numbers are increasing rapidly. I led lots of groups throughout my career, and taught English when I lived in Peru. These all led me to think that I might like teaching, but after starting I really found out how much I love it. Not just the getting to help shape the students, but also seeing them out in the community making a difference with their clients. It was this, that when I started working on my Ph.D., I asked the school district if I could take a leave of educational absence so I didn’t have to give up all of my classes I taught as an adjunct.

When the position opened for the masters program, I knew that I had to go for it. I also felt very confident, as I had been so ingrained in the university for so many years and have been highly esteemed and valued for my work. I had actually already been helping with the start of the MSW program, and doing some consulting work on a school social work class. But it was also a chance, as the program was not fully accredited yet. I felt confident in the work we would do as a faculty (as Ruby Aguilar, our program chair, described it — the countless hours and hard work our faculty and staff invested in building this program). I am especially thankful to the students who took a chance and started their program when I did, without us being fully accredited.

It is a very proud moment to have our program validated by earning our national accreditation through the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE). It has meant going through three site visits, submitting three different benchmarks (extremely large documents describing how we are meeting the accreditation standards). We got notice a couple of weeks ago that we had been approved, but have finally got the official certificate and the university made a formal public statement. It felt so good this week, as we brought our new incoming students for the 2026-27 school year to engage in their orientation, to tell them that we are now completely accredited. This third cohort of MSW students is the largest group we’ve had (containing advanced standing students, and students in both the first and second year of their two year program). I look forward to all of the great things they will do during their education and especially after.

You can find the public statement Heritage University Master of Social Work Program Earns National Accreditation

Summer Camping and Hiking, Getting Out Into Nature

Posted on Sunday July 5, 2026 by Jacob Campbell.

Growing up, I was in Boy Scouts. While I didn’t earn my Eagle Scout, I had lots of great learning and experiences participating in Troop 237, a part of the Blue Mountain Council. I ended up dropping out of scouting in high school, when I started making poor decisions and going in a different direction. But from Webelos on through being a Boy Scout, I learned so much and went camping and on various trips so many times. It seems like almost every month I went on some sort of camping trip.

I learned to give back to my community, doing community service projects. I gained experience being in nature and picked up other skills. Consider the scouting motto,

Be Prepared!

• Scouts BSA Handbook

I do wish that I had gone through and gotten my Eagle Scout, but that would have also meant that my life during my high school years would have been pretty different.

We have been going on family camping trips every year for a number of years. I love being in nature, and always hope to camp a couple of times each summer. There is something so connecting about being in the forest and surrounded by green. This year, we went to Kachess campground. It is actually somewhere that we have wanted to go for a number of years, but we never made reservations early enough. It is near Cle Elum and is a massive campground and lake. It sits at 2,254 ft elevation, which means the water is on the cooler side, but it was still amazing to get in. The campground is nice, and while most of the bathrooms are vault toilets, next to our loop was one with running water. That positioning was nice, though the two campsites we picked across from each other were on the smaller side. Overall, the campground is pretty big. I recorded a 4 mile bike ride going through every loop.

We cooked great food and spent time together (my direct family, our grandbaby, my Cuñado, his kids, and another nephew). We made trips to the lake, I spent time writing and reading, walking through nature, and just being there. I didn’t realize that phones could now take images of the night sky, but they can to some degree.

We actually went to the lakeside one of the evenings to see the stars. While it does feel open, and a bit unnerving (Belinda and the girls started to go down, but got scared and went back to the car), it also was amazing to see the wide open sky without light pollution. You can see some photos from our trip:

On Friday, we also went on a day hike to Mt. Rainier. We did a camping trip there several years ago and have been talking about going back to visit (we want to camp there again too, but this year was just the hiking trip). So, with Friday being the observed holiday, we decided to make a day trip of it. It did make for a long day (we left at about 6:30 AM and got back at 11:30 PM with picking up and dropping off people), but it was worth it. Not just for the dinner at Miners on the way home, but really because of the experience.

There were a couple of minor surprises. First, we hadn’t realized that the entrance would be free, due to the holiday. It was very busy (I’m not sure if that is pretty normal or because of the holiday as well). While it is nice when I’ve been to places where you don’t see many other people, it wasn’t bad to have so many people. I will say, if you stopped on the trail (which we had to do a number of times), you would get passed by a number of other groups every few minutes. The second surprise came as they passed by: so many of the people who passed us were speaking different languages. I will also admit, our group was speaking Spanish most of the time, but it was a bit unexpected how diverse the population visiting this scenic area was. Again, this makes sense. We all can benefit from connecting with nature and being in landscapes that make you want to twirl like you hear The Sound of Music and understand the hills are alive.

via GIPHY

We went to Paradise, and ended up hiking Skyline and Golden Gate Loop. It took us about 3.3 hours to go 4.6 miles (with breaks and a lunch). It was a pretty challenging hike (although listed as Moderate) and had a lot of elevation gain, especially at the start.

After some overpriced ice cream and a rest, we also went to the overlook for Bench Lake. All in all, even though I’m still a bit sore, I’m so glad to have gone. You can see some photos from this as well.

I’m glad to be able to go and do these things, but I hope that getting to take my kids gives me an opportunity to teach them to be trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent (just like scouting).

Making My Own Tools: Shortcut to Convert Letter Grade to GPA

Posted on Friday June 6, 2025 by Jacob Campbell.

I would argue that social workers and university faculty align well with the concept of being a Knowledge Worker. A lot of the work that we do, apart from the directly engaged in practice, requires assessment, making connections, developing and modifying strategies, and more. We have a lot of information that we receive and must do something with it. Over the years, the writing of Cal Newport has been impactful in thinking about how I should be working (especially Slow Productivity and Deep Work). When I was going through my Ph.D. program, I talked about these approaches as necessary skills for completing my program.

One way I manage information is by developing my systems and methods for organizing my data, tasks, and sharing and planning. My systems are sometimes convoluted and complicated. I find it gratifying and valuable to build my tools and systems. Sometimes, these can be quick little things. These little helper tools probably provide me the most return on the investment of time and effort than anything that is a much larger project (as those I might sink hours, days, and even sometimes weeks) into making something work.

It can even be fun to build my own tools out of plastic, like you can see these cardboard construction tools I printed for making things with my daughter (find the file on Makerworld Cardboard Crafting Tools).

This week, I have had a few meetings with students to talk about grades. Our advising views only provide letter grades (e.g., A, A-, B, etc.). At a master’s level, students are expected to maintain a 3.0 or higher, and their graduate-level career GPA must also meet that same standard. Because they only provide letter grades and the average for the GPA, it is hard to discuss how future grades (or retaking a class to improve your grade) might impact a student’s career GPA.

I made a shortcut to be able to provide an input of letter grades, and it will provide a GPA score. It isn’t an overly complicated Shortcut. It does the following:

• Create a dictionary that defines each letter grade with its GPA value
• Asks for me to provide a list of grades, each on a new line
• Converts those to uppercase (if I don’t add the letter grade in the proper format)
• Splits each line of letter grades so they can be reviewed individually
• Gets the value of the letter grade from the dictionary
• Split each line of GPA values so they can be calculated into an average
• Shows the results

It was super simple to create. Because I decided to share this with my colleagues in case they find it useful, I wanted to try to make it error-free (I suppose they could not enter the grades as new lines, but the directions instruct you to do so). But what happens if they enter one and it isn’t uppercase to match the dictionary key? I accounted for that. I thought I would need to do something in case they add something that isn’t a usable letter grade (consider P for pass or I for incomplete). I started to try to have ChatGPT assist me in writing out some complicated regular expressions to do this. Still, I figured out that because I am only getting the values from the dictionary, only letters included in the keys get passed to the next step, so it automatically removes them.

You can find the Calculate GPA from Letter Grades. It does feel gratifying to have a simple tool that I can use to do this.

2025 Parade de Bendito Juarez en Jungapeo [YouTube Video]

Posted on Saturday April 19, 2025 by Jacob Campbell.

I got the opportunity to watch the annual parade for Jungapeo. For such a small area, there are so many schools and groups that come to represent during this time. There was great dancing, outfits, and music, and it was just a great time. I took so many photos and videos, I wanted to be able to put together something with them.

📅 March 20 and 21st 2025
🗺️ Jungapeo Mexico
🎶 Caminos de Michoacán by Federico Villa

You can see a picture of me with the hat I got.

I also ended up setting myself up to store my hat in my office and printed a hook for it.

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Make sure to check out the other posts connected this trip tagged 2025 Vejar al Mexico Spring Break

The Different Paces of Life - From Busy to Más Amiable and Unhurried

Posted on Friday March 21, 2025 by Jacob Campbell.

As I have traveled over the years and told people I’m from the United States, one of the questions I often get is, have you been to New York? While I’ve traveled to Europe, Africa, and the Americas, I have not reached the Big Apple. I have been to many Major Metropolitan Cities around the world. On my way to Jungapeo, I flew into Ciudad de México, and we took at three and a half hour taxi ride with my nieces and cuañdo to our final destination. The car didn’t fit all of the luggage, so we were left packed and carrying luggage on our laps the whole way. While we didn’t get to spend any time in CDMX, you could tell it is a bustling place, something I don’t think you can get away from with a population of over nine million. As we spent about an hour winding our way through different side roads, arterials, and highways, I told mi sobrinas (nieces) that the roads are like how ants build their tunnels. If f you have never seen one of the videos of somebody pouring liquid silver into an ant hill to make art, it is fascinating to see what lies under the ground.

Puerto Vallarta isn’t that busy, but it really can be packed with people. On Monday I wandered around the Malecón. It is really beautiful but also so busy. During the day in the plazas you can hear so much birdsong.

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There are a bunch of large clubs all next door to each other.

The prior night, I had been walking around, thinking I might buy a bottle of tequila. I ended up in a shop that sells bottles, encourages customers to try shots, and then wants to sell you timeshares or tours (or expensive tequila bottles). I’m not a fan of time shares or feel like they are a good idea. While I declined all of the above, he recommended going to Playa Las Gemelas.

Sometimes, talking to random strangers when traveling gives great recommendations (like going to Prague), and other times, I can be a bust. The beach was super pretty I liked it. But it wasn’t my best option. I took the bus (which I have always loved public transport). I checked in through the hotel there, but when I tried to go back from the beach to visit their bar, I was locked out. I just didn’t come prepared. I didn’t stay very long and ended up exploring Playa de Los Muertos. Got a margarita from the the Margarita Grill and then ate a nice dinner at Langostinos, listening to a singer eating and drinking sitting watching the sunset on the beach.

That night, I went to an Irish pub to listen to live music for Saint Patrick’s Day. I ended up making friends and going to a few other places. The next day was more relaxed with time at the beach. Although I had somebody steal $160 out of my wallet (thankfully not cards and all of that). The details are outside of what I’d share in this venue. The following day (e.g., Wednesday) led me to my flight and the start of the second leg of my trip.

My wife is from Jungapeo, and I rode over with my family. It has been a much slower pace, but it has been fun. There are two streets that go all the way through the town. When we arrived, I ate a fantastic Pan Bazo, which is my favorite Mexican food and something I think originated here or nearby. It isn’t really a thing in other parts of Mexico. We went and spent some time at the Jardin (the plaza that is the center of town) and ate ice cream with wine in it (which is really good). The next day, we went to Zitácuaro to do some shopping and wander around their much larger markets. In the evening was a parade of all elementary schools (dressed in various themes such as The Flinstones, Lion King, etc.). The kids were cute. Then, drinking and hanging out on the street, talking with people as they go by. At 530 am, there was another parade (I was asleep but tried to go out and watch the last little bit), and there is another one today (Friday) at 11 AM.

Recuerdos— Back to Vallarta and Excursions

Posted on Monday March 17, 2025 by Jacob Campbell.

I’ve been lucky to travel a lot and have often written about it here. While we went with the family to Florida and on our 2023 Summer Family Road Trip, I haven’t left the country since 2016. For years, my wife has told me I should go on a trip myself or take the kids¹. I have just hesitated, feeling bad if we couldn’t all go together. In some ways, it could feel really selfish, and I also know bringing all the kids somewhere is a challenge if I go by myself (although now that they are older, it would be much easier). I also find it best if we all go together and struggle if it isn’t that. This year, when my cuñados² told me that they were going to Mexico and I should go, I decided that this year I would. With a hopeful successful trip this year, I hope to bring kids next time. I’ve gotten a mountain of potential safety concerns in the run-up to this trip, and with all of the national political craziness, it seems like it will only get worse. Although, with how touristy Puerto Vallarta is, it is probably extra insulated.

In small Mexican cities and towns, annual celebrations are often called “fiestas patronales” or “ferias” (patron saint festivals or fairs), which are important cultural celebrations for that community. My wife’s family has returned to their hometown during this event for many years. This year, it happens to be the same week as my Spring Break. I knew I wanted to come. The first problem was that they weren’t planning on coming until mid-way through my break, then staying for a week and a half. I didn’t want to make it to Mexico only to be able to spend a few days there and come back for my regular teaching schedule. With how overloaded I feel from my classes, I probably shouldn’t have gone anywhere so I could try to use the time to catch up, and it isn’t necessarily time off. I looked at options and decided to come to first to Puerto Vallarta and spend some days here before to spend more time abroad, and then I will be meeting up with my wife’s family in Mexico City to travel together to her hometown.

I’ve been to Puerto Vallarta twice when I was growing up. On the first trip, we stayed at an all-inclusive resort on the Mismaloya Beach. On the second trip, we stayed north of Puerto Vallarta in a Bucerías. With these trips being so long ago, there is a lot that we did that I don’t remember. The following are some of the things that stood out:

• Being amazed that a hotel can have multiple pools
• Jay’s (our friends we went with) Mom telling us that if we peed in the pool, the water would change colors³
• Spending time in a foreign hospital having my appendix removed ⁴
• Going to a restaurant and having them show a menu by displaying a platter of dead fish and we could point to our selections
• Learning about Leafcutter ants and that they could take all of the grass from a yard in a single day
• Being excited that I had to carry my appendix across the border in a glass jar and wanting to show it to customs officials (I was a strange kid)
• Going Snuba Diving and deciding that when I grew up, I wanted to be an underwater photographer

These experiences and exposure to other cultures and ways of life were formative for me. These trips and some of the summertime traveling I did with my cousin also helped form a love for traveling. As I sit her on my balcony overlooking some worn cobble stone streets, sipping on a Pacifico with my speaker playing and writing on a warm summer evening with the smell of the ocean and view of palm trees I am trying to soak it all in (you can see a post showing the view from the terrace rooftop restaurant)

So far, it has been amazing to be here. I’m staying at Hotel Paloma del Mar. It is reasonably priced, in the Malecón, and simple but seems generally good so far. The staff has also been outstanding. I am making my holiday include the Friday before and the Monday after Spring Break, so I got here Friday evening. I checked into the hotel, found my way to the ocean (about five or six blocks), and then ate some Green Aguachiles at Restaurante El Malecón, sitting on the sand and listening to live music. That night, I ended up at La Bodeguita Del Medio where I got to do some Salsa/Merengue to live music in an atmosphere that is great for social dancing.

The following day, I had to get up early to make my way to Puerto Magico to go on a tour I booked a boat ride to Yelapa and Majahuitas, which was moderately priced.

I posted a few pictures of the boat ride.

You can also see some photos from Yelapa.

Today has been more of a down day sleeping in, hanging out at the hotel, eating a delicious seafood burrito, and spending time at the nearby beach. I think I will put together an album of photos to share.