The Napalm Blog

2011-10-17T10:04:00.000-07:00

The Other Half

I decided a little while ago that a great way to celebrate my completion of my first Olympic Triathlon would be to do another half marathon. I'd already be in pretty good shape; it would be a good way to avoid stalling after the event; and it could be a good occasion to perhaps travel a little bit and end the season on a course that I'd never done before.

My friend Braden, whose wife is a fellow tri-addict, had told me early in the summer that his Mrs. had signed up for the Moab Other Half on Oct. 16th. I took one look at the course online, and decided that I wanted in on the deal. I sent him a note to this effect: "I'll do it if you do it..." So we both signed up, and after a little while, two more friends, Darren and Greg, along with their families, decided to join us for a little friend reunion that weekend.

The weekend itself was glorious. We pooled some resources and rented a cabin off in the woods outside Moab and spent Saturday relaxing, eating, hiking, and letting our kids run around together. It was perfect and I dearly wish I had had one more day there. I love my SLC friends and I use any and every excuse to hang out with them.

But anyway - the race itself was an experience. Moab draws a unique crowd, to put it mildly. But that's what makes it fun, right? It was definitely a change from the meek gatherings at the St George area halfs that I've run, which are mostly populated with local soccer moms, weekend warriors like myself, and high school track teams. Among the throng in Moab, there was the guy wearing a collared shirt and tie and cut-off khakis, the guy who looked and smelled like he was probably 4 or 5 beers into his drinking day already, the lady in full Oktoberfest regalia, and others. I'm not knocking either crowd, let it be said, but it's interesting the kind of variety that each race brings. No shame in taking the chance to claim your individuality.

The local volunteers definitely get behind the race, as well: there was an official race day drum team that started pounding out a tribal rhythm from the back of a pickup at the starting line about half an hour before the gun was to go off. I have to say that, as silly as I thought it was at first, it did help to connect me to my inner aborigine. After the race start, they took up post at the top of a hill at mile 10, and as far as I know, they kept up the beat until the official course closure at noon that day.

Then there was the volunteer team at the aid station atop the hill at mile 8 that had banded together and dressed up as some kind of day-glo alien rodeo clowns. With every cup of water and Gatorade that they passed out, they whooped and hollered and cheered for everyone who crested the hill. "YOU MADE IT!!! KEEP GOING! YOU ROCK OUR SOCKS OFF!!" Lots of fun.

The course itself is beautiful, and deceitfully challenging. It's pretty well flat for the first 6 miles, following the Colorado River around Fisher Towers and Castle Rock, then rolls through a series of fairly serious hills for the remaining 7.1 miles. If you set too quick a pace at the beginning, you'll definitely feel it later on. But the finish is set up at the Sorrel River Ranch Resort, a small collection of rental cabins set on a surprisingly green patch of land in the middle of the red rocks. There was a local jam band playing at the finish, a "beer garden" (which I didn't really investigate to find out what that is, but it sounds interesting if you're a beer drinker), and a tent full of good recovery food and drink. Our group opted to drive back to Moab as quick as we could manage to get a good meal in us before we got back on the road, but I'm sure that the resort is a great hang out spot for the remainder of the afternoon for anyone who is so inclined.

My official finish time was 1:46:15; about 45 seconds off of my personal best, but certainly a much more challenging course. I'm definitely revved up to put in some good mileage over the winter so that I can smash my PB come January and the 2012 St George Painter's Half.

End Transmission.

2011-09-18T14:26:00.000-07:00

Kokopelli Recap (no creative title available)

What a great, great, great, great race. Anyone interested in doing this triathlon, I cannot recommend it any higher. Here's the nitty gritty:

Total time: 2:40:00 (weird, right?)

1500m Swim time: 35:48
100m splits: 2:20

20.4 mi Bike time: 1:04
MPH: 19.2

10K Run time: 56:02
Mile splits: 9:03

64/215 place overall
57/150 place in male division
13/25 place in age division

My amazing daughter also has an entry about it where she talks about the race from her point of view, but this is my account of things. And so, on with the retelling of the tale:

My stomach had been jumping up and down all week in anticipation, and I had probably gone out to the garage to fiddle with my bike 50 times that week, but on Saturday morning I got out of bed and got ready, cool as a cucumber. I had a nice shower to wake me up, and tried to eat some breakfast. I ended up only drinking about 12 oz. of banana smoothie, and that's all my stomach really wanted, and by the time I had choked down that much, my father in law was in the driveway to pick me up. We drove out to Sand Hollow chatting about little race tips, and what we were going to do the rest of the day (father in law: climbing, me: napping).

The organization at the actual event site is to die for, despite parking difficulties. The bike racks are set up according to race distance and entry number; those who had entered the race earlier got spots right close to the transition exit, making our bikes easy to find and quick to get on. I lost my father in law as we were setting up, as our assigned spots were on opposite ends of the transition area since he was racing Sprint distance and I was doing Olympic. I knew that I had a long time to wait before I would get into the water, so I basically threw everything down and sauntered over to the water to watch the first waves of guys go out.

I watched the first wave of sprinters go, mostly to look at the course and see if I could tell more or less how they handled swimming in a pack, since I've never really done so. It didn't look too bad, but there was one guy way at the back that was doomed right from the get go - the pour soul immediately started drifting to his right so bad that it wasn't long before he was headed completely in the wrong direction. I spoke to one of the lifeguards today who told me that they ended up pulling the guy out of the water after about 5 minutes. I was fairly confident in my sighting skills, but I made a mental note not to forget to sight every few strokes so that I could remain at least somewhat on course.

About 20 mins before my start time, I wandered back to transition, put on my wetsuit up to my armpits, laid out the rest of my gear in the best configuration that I could manage, and headed down to the dock. It was a bit too crowded to try and get into the water early to warm up, so I decided to chance a cold start. When the moment came, the organizers hearded us into the water single file, explained to us which buoys we needed to swim around, and just like that it was, "ready, set, go!"

I had intentionally positioned myself on the outside of the bunch to avoid the crowds, but even so, the first 200m were a little bumpy. Nevertheless I didn't ever experience the flush of nerves or jitteriness that I had before my previous swims, which I attribute now to being good and practiced in the open water. It was nice to have that peace of mind so I could just focus on my stroke and my preselected landmarks. Today's tips - get into the open water several times before you race, and learn how to defog your goggles beforehand, or invest in fog free goggles. I ended up stopping twice to clear mine off.

Anyway, I fell into a natural rhythm almost immediately and kept with it for the two triangular laps that we were required, and came in feeling good, but a little dizzy. I hopped out of the water, shouted hi to a lifeguard that I recognized, pulled my wetsuit off down to my waist, and hustled through to get onto my bike.

I got to my bike and stripped down, and immediately decided to forgo the procedure of drying off with a towel before pulling on my jersey and shoes. Probably a good move, as my T1 time was close to 3 mins, and one that I would recommend to anyone. You'll get dry on the bike, no doubt.

The bike course was a dream come true. I sped off right from the start and felt great nearly the entire 20 miles. There's a 6% grade hill right at mile 3 that lasts about 1.5 miles, which was difficult, but I alternated sitting and standing up in my pedals, and after a few minutes and a few hard pushes with my legs, I was up and over and headed for 7 more miles of straightaway. I managed to ride most of that side by side with another guy who I think is from northern Utah; we found breath enough to strike up a conversation as we rode along. We shared tri stories and swapped comments about the course, and thanked each other for keeping up the quick pace to get us through to the run. I didn't expect to have the time to talk to anybody, but the opportunity came as a very welcome surprise. I hope I can recognize that guy again in future races.

If I did make a mistake, though, it was during the bike course - I brought along two bottles of Gatorade, thinking that I would need to get in most of my calories during that hour. I felt compelled to drink it all and ended up pounding it down for most of the ride, and as it was undiluted Gatorade, my mouth felt sticky sweet the whole time. Next time, Pete, maybe just do one bottle of the Ade and one of water, and don't worry about finishing it all. The other miscalculation that I made, and this against the advice of world champ Chrissie Wellington, was that I attempted something new on race day: I decided to try out energy gels in addition to my normal nutrition regime. I took one just before the bike, and the other just before the run. Now, it may have been that my GI tract was not used to the gel, or it may have been the overhydration during the bike, or maybe it was just general indigestion caused by a nervous stomach, but as I came flying into T2, my insides started churning like a washing machine. I decided to just see if I could run it out, so I racked my bike, threw on my shoes, and headed out for the last 10K.

I think I "cracked" at about a mile and a half, just after a photographer took a snap of me with a big grin on my face. My belly was splashing like the sea at high tide, and I had a stitch in my right side from my ribs down to my hips. I was at a decision point: I could either walk for a couple of minutes and work it out, or I could keep pushing and risk collapse at about mile 3 or 4 and hobble in or wait for the sweeper truck. I decided to walk. I think I walked all the way to mile 2, stretching out my right side and trying to tell my body to absorb some of the liquid sloshing around in my stomach (does that work, just thinking about digesting faster?), and then I started back up at a slow trot. Just before then, my northern Utah friend strided by, offering words of encouragement. After I started back up, I decided that I would try to catch him.

The rest of the race was painful but in a cleansing, rite-of-passage sort of way - if all I did for the rest of my life was plod along until I crossed the finish line, it would be a job well done. I ended up catching my race friend about half a mile from the finish, and we ran together almost to the end. I crossed the finish line with a cheer from my family and a wave of relief, and stood there for a minute, unable to bend over to undo the safety pin that kept my race chip around my ankle so that I could collect my finisher's medal and sit down for heaven's sake. Eventually some kind gentlemen took it off for me, and I wandered over to my family, who had a chair waiting for me in the shade. It was over.

The post race day was great - after 20 mins or so, I managed to stand up and get some of the sponsors' post-race recovery spaghetti, which my daughters promptly pirated and ate mostly on their own, but I didn't mind as my stomach was still in a bit of a twist. I did manage to get in a few bites, though. Then a peaceful car ride home and the rest of the day, which included an AWESOME massage, a parade in downtown St. George, and watching my Utes cream the corn out of BYU. All in all, a pretty good day.

Evaluation

I'm calling this one a win, even though I didn't quite manage to hit my goal time. Of course, every race you finish is a win, since you always come away with something. I finished with a smile; I hit most of my goal paces; I overcame a serious mental and physical barrier; I can still walk today with only minimal soreness; I'm not so sick of triathlon that I never want to do one again; best of all, I'm left with the strange satisfaction of having generous room for improvement next year. I can definitely run faster with a different nutrition strategy. I'm pretty sure I can squeeze another 1-2 mph out of my current bike (and who knows how much I can get if a new bike is in the cards, which it probably isn't), and I feel like I can swim much faster. My training splits in just my jammers were all around 2:00 or under, so frankly I'm a bit surprised that I had slowed down so much on race day.

Takeaway

It's the engine that counts, folks, not the shiny exterior. I was outgunned in the equipment category during every discipline: there were guys out there in wetsuits nicer than mine, on bikes that could fund a couple of semesters' worth of quality college education, and in tri suits that made the costumes of the movie Tron look quaint and old fashioned, yet I managed to pass at least one of them during every leg.

Again, though, I'm not trying to say that equipment is not important, or that people are silly for spending their money on it; it does make a difference, but you can get surprisingly far without it. I have a serious goal of lowering the fiscal and mental overhead that keeps some people from entering the sport. If you're thinking about getting into triathlon but are low on funds, spend your money getting your body in peak shape first (which is surprisingly cheap), then supplement that by using good gear.

See you next year, Kokopelli!

End Transmission.

2011-09-12T14:47:00.000-07:00

One Week Remaining

The summer has come and gone, the miles have been put in. Muscle glycogen stores are reaching a max, and the countdown is on. A couple more light workouts, and then come Saturday, the sun will rise on the Kokopelli Triathlon.

My goals:

Swim: 35:00 including time through T1
Bike: 19mph, or 1:05 through T2
Run: 48:00

Total time: 2:28

Up until a couple of weeks ago, the weather around here was nigh unbearable. Even a short 4-mile run at 6am left me beet faced and pouring sweat. It was difficult to imagine feeling cool air again, or a time when you might actually want to wear a long-sleeved shirt on your workout. I laughed at the idea that I started training in a time when I would wear my jacket on rides. But the last week has brought rain and high winds to the area, and now I often wait until mid day or afternoon to ride. I went for a swim yesterday at my local gym and was very thankful that I had already rented my wet suit for Saturday. It took about 150m to work out the chills and get comfortable.

What does that mean for race day? For one, I don't have to worry so much about overheating, which up until the beginning of this week I thought was inevitable. I am concerned about the swim, which will probably be colder than my training sessions out on the course. I'm going out to Sand Hollow one last time to test it and see.

It's been a great summer, on all accounts, and although my race season is far from over, I find myself waxing philosophical as my A race approaches. What lessons have I learned in preparation for my first Olympic distance tri? Now that I'm waist-deep into Triathlon as a hobby, have my feelings about it changed? How well have I balanced my training with my family life and other hobbies? Why do any of us do this, anyway? Where to go from here?

Know Thyself

In my opinion, this broad, sweeping aphorism is the most valuable lesson that one can learn from Triathlon, and conversely, it's the one bit of advice that can carry you farther than anything else. And it applies to nearly everything, from training schedules to equipment, pacing and nutrition, etc.

Specifically, find out where you are on the spectrum of triathletes: are you a weekend warrior, likely to enter into just one or two races a year, looking to keep fit and have some fun? Are you part of a group or team, or do you have the time and resources available to train for and enter into multiple races a year? Perhaps you're looking for a podium finish, or a qualifying time for Kona? Are you Craig Alexander or Chrissie Wellington, making a career out of it and looking to smash your own world records? Of course, we all move up and down the spectrum every year, mostly (in my case) dependent on the other factors in our lives and how much time we can really afford to spend away from them, but spending just a little bit of time to determine where you are on the scale and what your goals really and realistically are can help you really spend that time and money wisely.

For example, I would describe myself on the mid- to lower end of the spectrum. I love triathlon, I'd love to spend many years doing it, but I can't realistically dedicate more money and effort than it takes to enter more than just a handful of races a year - maybe two A races and half a dozen B and C races. I am about 10-12 lbs above my ideal weight (I think), and my bike could be described, in horsey terms, as an "Old Paint." I donate plasma to earn my triathlon funds, so I have to think hard about where that money can be spent to the greatest benefit. It's very tempting to dedicate that money (plus a chunk from savings) toward replacing the Dawn Treader (as I call my bike) with a brand new, shiny, carbon-forked Cervelo with aero bars and top of the line rims and shifters. I can save some weight, get a better fit on my machine, look cooler, maybe think about how to equip it with a sophisticated hydration system.

However, if I take a step back and really look at myself - is this really the next logical step that I can take to get better or have a better time doing triathlon? $1500 would go an awfully long way in supplying other things. I might be able to drop 2-3 or even 5 lbs by getting a new bike; how much would it really cost to watch my diet for a few weeks and lose the 5 lbs of body fat off of my ample frame? I can maintain a more stable, aerodynamic position by switching from shifters on my down tube to something a bit more modern; am I really fit enough to be able to maintain the speed necessary to take aerodynamics into consideration? Let's even say that I do lose the 5 lbs in body weight and get fit enough to where I have to think about aerodynamics - will it make it more "worth it" to do a triathlon with a brand new bike as opposed to going through another season on the Dawn Treader?

The answer to that question will inevitably be yes at some point, but in really knowing myself and what my goals are in doing a triathlon (have fun, stay fit, maybe raise some cash for a charity), I can put that purchase in perspective and give it the right priority that it really deserves. Once I drop down to about 6-8% body fat and am consistent with my weight training, and I've got all my other equipment bought (wetsuit, goggles, good running shoes, etc), and I feel that I've progressed as far as I possibly can on the bike that I have, then it might be time to invest the money. As a side note, a big thanks to Greg who gave me the Dawn Treader for free on a semi-permanent loan. It was the turning point that got me riding and has carried me to where I am.

This applies everywhere. Are you thinking about adding more grape skins or sunflower butter to your diet and getting the right amount of Omega 3s when you might be better served by focusing on getting your basic 5 servings of fruits and vegetables every day? Are you worried about what kind of aerodynamic helmet you look best in, when you might want to think about doing some simple sprint exercises and increasing your race pace by 1 or 2 mph? Have you booked your time at the wind tunnel, when you could spend more time at the track or in the pool?

I might sound like a cynic in writing all of the above, and that I'm trying to knock down people's lofty ideas, but that's not my position at all. There seems to be a lot of information out there aimed at people who are very high up on the spectrum of "triathlon seriousness," and it can be intimidating for people who are just getting started or who are looking to get something out of triathlon other than sponsorship or a medal. At a certain level, wind tunnel time and grape skins and getting the right lubricant under your wetsuit for a quick transition time are good and important, but there are a lot of cheap, easy ways to boost your performance and increase your enjoyment of the sport that might ultimately serve you better, and the more clearly you define what you want to get out of triathlon, and the more time you spend really examining yourself and your own habits and abilities, the easier it is to find these things and prioritize them, so that you can (if it's your goal) move up the spectrum to a point where you do need to worry about things like Yasso 800's, plyometrics, what flavor Gatorade mixes best with salt tablets, which Ironman venue you want to conquer first, whom to pick among the many people who want to sponsor you, etc.

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2011-07-19T11:44:00.001-07:00

Chelsea's Run

Last Friday night my wife and I strapped on our shoes and headed over to the fourth annual "Chelsea's Run," a 5K race in memoriam of a lovely young girl and a promising athlete that was tragically killed in a car accident a few years ago.

This was my second year at Chelsea's Run, traditionally run at 10:00 at night on July 15 (Chelsea's Birthday). It's a unique and fun crowd to run with - mostly family friends and high school students who come out to have a good time, run a little bit, have some free Gatorade, and show support for a great family in the local community. All profits go to set up a series of scholarships at BYU, and participants are encouraged to donate more than the entry fee to the fund. So, it's a good crowd, a good cause, and just a good family event for couples or friends who enjoy running together. Not chip-timed or anything, so anyone who shows up looking or acting too seriously will look and feel out of place.

I can't really give an accurate accounting of my pace and time: since the race starts so late in the evening, and since all of our available babysitters were running the race with us, I ended up bringing my kids to the race, with the intent of pushing them along in a stroller. This usually goes fine, but my youngest, who is now days away from her 2nd birthday, had an absolute meltdown just moments before the gun went off - she's at the unfortunate phase of life where ideas form in her head quite clearly, but she lacks the words and grammar to communicate them to her liking, or to our understanding. At first, she said that she wanted out of the stroller, so my wife, eager to get her race under way (this was after the starting gun), pulled her out and decided to walk the first little way to see if she could calm her down. I jogged on a few yards ahead, and instantly she started to scream, "Daddyyyyy! Daddyyyyy!" So we traded - my wife caught up to me, passed me the girl, and took off with the stroller.

"Mommeeeeeee! Mommeeeee!"

We did the switch again.

"Daddeeee! Daddeeeee!"

This happened 3 or 4 times.

"Whassamatter? Do you want to run?"

"Yes!" sob, sob, sob.

"Well then you have to be in the stroller. Is that okay?"

"Okay!" All smiles and giggles.

So in the stroller she went and my wife and I took off. I think the whole exchange probably took about two minutes or so. I crossed the finish line at about 25:50, so, you know, whatever. What I did feel good about was that, while pushing 50 lbs in a jogging stroller and having a two-minute delay at the start, I ended up catching and then passing my sister-in-law, a college soccer player and very fit. Hooray! Maybe next year, Becca...

It brings up an interesting question, though - does pushing a jogging stroller affect one's pace at all? Since they have very little rolling resistance, I'd have to think that maybe no, unless one takes into consideration the mental drag that the runner experiences, trying to navigate the stroller around the madding crowds. In our case this becomes quite a task. Our stroller doubles as a bike trailer, so the bar that connects to the bike sticks out of the front like a bayonet. I remember after my first 10K talking to a lady who had been taken out by a jogging stroller. As a result, she had twisted her knee pretty badly, and was understandably miffed about it. So, last Friday I was pretty careful to take the outside turns and be pretty vocal if I were coming up behind someone that I couldn't pass so that I could avoid a similar collision.

My favorite part of the race: as we were loading up my kids into the car to take them home, my oldest daughter (3 1/2) turned to me and said, "Daddy, can I have running shorts for my birthday so I can race with you next time?" You bet, kid. You bet.

End transmission.

2011-06-25T15:17:00.000-07:00

Wasatch Back-breaker

It's taken me a bit of time to process my experience at the Ragnar Wasatch Back relay race. I once again donned the orange and ran with the same team that took me in for the Hood to Coast event last August, the Cho Mamas - a lovely bunch of people; I'd highly recommend running with them, if you ever get the chance.

The general assessment

It was loads of fun. I love the 24-hour race atmosphere that you get with a good, long team relay. The course was drop dead gorgeous from start to finish, and good weather prevailed throughout the weekend. Friendly exchanges with neighboring teams, though overall I felt a bit more isolated as a team than on HTC, and there was definitely a different mix of teams there - more amateur, "neighborhood" teams, I suppose (probably because you don't have to qualify for a Ragnar race, as opposed to HTC), which curiously also lead to a few more colder shoulders (per capita) from groups who were out there trying to prove something. A word to future WB participants of this type - just relax. The NordicTrack or BYU teams are going to beat you, anyway.

The gritty details

Very gritty. Two weeks before race day, I got waylaid for a week by a bout of what can be described as a surprise intestinal fire drill and evacuation out the back door. Running? Forget it. The only running I'd do that week would be to the latrine. What's more, I've been fighting a cough ever since before the Kau Wela tri at the beginning of the month, and I finally got an assessment the Tuesday before the race that it was bronchitis - a relatively common ailment among people training for an endurance event, I'm told, but one that means at least a week of taking it easy. My swim coach told me that, if I did decide to do the WB, I should be careful not to raise my heart rate above 75% of max, and then to do as much as I could to rest in between legs. Did I listen? Sort of. I armed myself with a bronchial anti-inflammatory (Albuterol) and my remaining stash of cough medicine, and made unfulfillable promises to my team that I would cover their vacation time at work if any of them got sick. I also brought along a pillow that I could smother my face with when a bout of coughing would start in.

I ran first in the rotation, which was fun because the race started on the USU track. I was nervous, but optimistic about my conditioning, so at the "ready, set, go" I set off at a comfortable pace that I thought I could maintain for the entire distance (6.9 miles) but that would allow me to pass some dudes. Unfortunately, within about the first 20 seconds of the race, nearly all of them were out of my reach. At least for that leg, which took us through Logan and south through Cache Valley. Highlight of the leg: a 5-year-old boy outside his Logan home who asked me, as I passed him, "Do you want a gwass of water or a spway?" I saw his younger brother a few feet away with a hose, and requested a spray, with which I was rewarded. Lowlight of the leg: the 10-min coughing fit I had after the leg was over. I kept a 8:15 pace though, which I was very happy about.

After a few hours of support during the rest of our van's shift through some gorgeous but challenging terrain, we ended up at Snow Basin for an overpriced dinner and a break. I ended up running into a long-lost friend of mine that I didn't know was going to be there, which was great, and then a few seconds later I ran into the team that my brother was supposed to run in (but checked out of a few weeks prior), peopled by his old high school friends, of whom I have very fond memories, as well.

My second leg started out with a couple of interesting twists - I was stopped after about 100 yards by a race official who told me that about 20 racers had gotten lost very early in the course, in a part that takes you up and behind the Snow Basin lodge and through the trees on a dirt path, so I should be careful and watch out for them. I nearly did get lost, but a guy with a much brighter headlamp than mine came up behind me and pointed me in the right direction, and we headed off down the mountain together, through a snowdrift that lasted about 50 yards or so. The rest of the course, though, was exquisite. While my first leg had been mostly flat, this one took a 1500-ft. plunge over 8 miles on Snowbasin Road toward some town whose name I've forgotten. I actually enjoy a good downhill run, as opposed to a lot of runners I know, and I've never really experienced any knee or ankle pain afterward, so I had actually picked this leg as my preference and had been looking forward to it. I knew that it wouldn't be difficult to keep to my estimated pace, even given my bronchial condition, so I shifted into a mid-gear and cruised for 70 minutes under a bright moon to what turned out to be a great soundtrack churned out by my iPod. Thank you, Rollins Band - Shine, indeed.

I kept about a 8:50 pace over the 8 miles, which given the terrain is pretty slow, but once I started into my 10-minute hacking session at the exchange, I'm glad I didn't push it any faster. If I run this same race next year, I hope that I'm afforded good health and the chance to take another crack at this leg to see what I can really give it.

We had the luxury on our team to have a suite at The Canyons, generously donated by our friends the Stanfields, so after our second shift was done (me mostly sleeping in the back seat), we sped up to Park City and settled in for a good three-hour nap on (can you believe it?!) actual beds. It was great. Thank you, Stanfields.

The next morning, we got off to a bit of a late start out of our opulent accommodations, and ended up arriving at my next exchange a bit late. Van 2 ended up sending out another runner to start the leg until I got there, but he only ended up running about 200 yards before I caught him. The third leg can be described in just a couple of exclamations: Distress! Fatigue! Perspiration! Oh, how my legs ached. It was only 60 degrees, but it felt like the sun had done that thing with a magnifying glass that boys do to ants, and was directing the beam right at my head. So hot! I kept the phrase in my head, "The harder you run, the sooner you're done," and I kept running at a slow shuffle through the 4.9 miles from Oakley to Kamas, at a slight uphill the whole way. Highlight of the leg: passing, no, killing three runners that had started out at the same time as me, runners who had left me in the freaking dust at the starting line, whose tanks were now dry, and who had stopped running and started the Death March to the end of the leg. The absolute highlight was leapfrogging one girl (numbered among the aforementioned three kills) who had passed me about a mile into the leg, about half a mile after that. I didn't dare look back through the whole remainder of the run, but when I got to the finish line and finally turned around, she was nowhere in sight. People tell me that I'm not a competitive person by nature, but I find great satisfaction in little moments like that in a race, especially under difficult circumstances like the third leg of a relay. The mean-spirited-ness lasts for about 5 seconds, and then I mentally wish them well, though. Or do I?

It's hard to tell exactly what my pace was for the third leg because of the snafu at the beginning, but it was timed (and it felt like) about a 10:00 pace, which is the slowest that I've ever been clocked at a race, but I didn't care and I still don't. The Wasatch Back is hard, folks. Very hard, indeed.

Case in point - our van's strongest runner, Ryan, was out on his third leg - a grueling, 7.7-mile climb just outside of Heber, and the rest of us were at the next exchange waiting for him. We waited and waited, and his estimated finish time came and went, and then we waited some more. None of us were particularly worried, but more just curious as to what may have happened. His wife, Emily (the next runner), and a couple of other teammates were standing at the exchange when all of a sudden, a race official walks up to them, holding a pale and disoriented Ryan by the arm, and says something like, "here you go - your next runner can go ahead and start." The dude had passed out there on the road. Or so we conjecture. He can't remember. He remembers running and feeling a little faint, and then all of a sudden he was sitting on the rear bumper of our team vehicle. We think what happened was, he was nearing the end and started to wobble, when someone else, either another runner or a race official, saw him and grabbed him before he fell and led him in to the exchange. After a lot of liquids, a few hours' sitting and some salty food, he was feeling better, but he told me that he has actually never run the WB without something similar happening. Last year, after running the same leg, he got out of the car after the van's shift and retched his shoes out onto the schoolyard parking lot blacktop for about half an hour.

After a trip to Wendy's and a few restful hours later back at the suite, we drove down to the finish line and crossed with our other teammates. Total time: approx. 29 hours. Hooray! Finish line highlight: the announcer, moments before we crossed the line and apparently fumbling through paperwork, failed both to recognize our finishing time and to correctly pronounce our team name. "And....the Chow Mamas!" was all he could manage. Way to go, guy.

Summary

Definitely worthwhile. Ragnar does a great job with their races and I look forward both to the WB next year (either as a Cho Mama or under some other moniker) and to any other ones that I can line up. Perhaps SoCal or Napa Valley? How 'bout both?

Prologue

I did absolutely no exercise until Wednesday of the week following the race, at which point the panic began to set in that I was losing muscle mass at an alarming rate, and that I would still be required to swim a mile in open water in what now seems like a very short time. I went for a swim at the gym pool on Wednesday, and did a full mile at a slow but steady pace and felt pretty confident that perhaps I had licked my disease and could now re-enter my training program. Until, that is, I got out of the pool and coughed violently all the way out of the gym, through the parking lot and all the drive home and into the shower. Doh! As a result, this week I'm giving my lungs a rest and sticking to the weight room. To be continued...

End Transmission

2011-06-09T13:16:00.000-07:00

Kau Wela
Kau What-a?

During my active years as a cellist in high school, when I was performing and competing fairly regularly, my teacher would use an interesting phrase to describe me: though I never won anything, or even got called back to the second round, I had become a "very seasoned performer."

I never really knew what that meant, or how I should have taken it, until after my "performance" last Saturday at the Kau Wela beginner's triathlon. It was a nice event - very small, both in distance and in crowd size, nice swag, pretty course, a good choice for a guy going out for his first open water swim.

Or so you would think.

After a brief session with my trainer on Thursday afternoon, I was feeling pretty confident on Saturday morning that I would be able to turn in a decent time or maybe, if all the cards fell in my favor, win my age group. I had slept very poorly the night before, however, due to a nagging cough that I've now been fighting for about a month, and to having to care for my poor sick little kids. At any rate, I got to the site early, got my transition set up in a way that I like, put on my rental wetsuit, and began to wander down toward the water, where I decided to dive in and put in a few strokes just to get the butterflies out and see how I could expect my wetsuit to feel, as it was my first time in one of those, as well.

I swam out, and my confidence rose considerably - boy, was I floating! This would be a cinch! The little buoy that we had to go out and around seemed so close I could nearly touch it from the shore.

About 50 yards out, I stopped and floated for a bit, looking back at the shore and feeling great - when I remembered what someone had told me about a wetsuit: that it's sometimes good to let in some water through the neck hole in order to keep you warm during the swim. So there, 50 yards from the shore, I reached up for my collar, pulled it open with both hands, and let in a flood of late spring glacier runoff into my suit which, until that moment, I had been perfectly warm in.

It felt like the Grim Reaper himself was wrapping his icy arms around my chest in the most unwelcoming of embraces. In a second, I turned from a confident, well-trained athlete into a shivering wreck, 50 yards from shore, whose ability to float was dwindling, right along side his ability to swim any distance longer than 25 meters. My wetsuit turned from the best flotation device ever invented into a vicious water predator that was determined to squeeze me to death and drag me to the miry bottom. In an instant I was shot. I couldn't get any air. I dog-paddled back in to the boat ramp, crawled back on land and instantly began to envision my impending doom - the most embarrassing water death in the shortest possible triathlon distance. I wasn't going to make it to the end of the dock, let alone around the buoy that now looked as though it may have well been on the other side of the lake. My cough started back up; I forgot to put on my watch to check my splits; it was all going down the drain. Before I knew it, the call of "ready, go!" came from the guy with the bull horn, and I surrendered myself to destruction.

I won't give you all the gory details, but let's just say that my 11-minute swim involved a surprising amount of passing other swimmers (which is much less fun than any other kind of passing in a triathlon, I've found), some back-stroking, a little help from a life-vest on a string (with a guy on a boat at the other end), and a LOT of heavy breathing.

If there's one lesson from the Kau Wela, it's this: put in some time in a wetsuit and in open water well before race day. If it's your first time for both, or either, you're in for a few surprises.

After the swim, I dragged myself to my transition and mentally tried to put myself together to at least have a good second leg. As is my custom, I shot out of T1 like a bullet from a gun, and instantly regained my confidence. By golly, the best swim time could only be a couple of minutes better than mine, maybe I could catch them on the bike.

But then fate caught me again, this time in the form of...wait for it...GEAR SLIPPAGE! On the first of two steep climbs, I stood up in the saddle and set my sights on the guy in the blue shirt just ahead of me, and just when I had flipped the setting to "kill," the all-too familiar grinding sound coming from my rear cassette sent chills down my spine. Sure enough, there were two loud pops and in a moment I was riding through clay. I shifted back down, and the bike popped back into my middle cog. In the end, it got bad enough that I ended the climb sittind down, holding my rear shifter down with my right hand, steering wobbily towards the crest of the hill with my left, and watching Blue Shirt slowly slide away.

I got to the top of the course, turned it around, and moved up to my large chain ring to try and make up some time. Sadly, Blue Shirt was gone by then, but it sure was a lot of fun coming down that course back toward the transition area. I started out watching my speedometer, but stopped after I saw a 4 in the 10's place and figured I'd be better served watching where I was going.

I screamed back into Transition, threw on my running shoes and headed back out for a quick run. Last leg was tiring, but uneventful. And I never did catch Blue Shirt, unfortunately.

All in all, I finished in 8th place (of 45 starters) overall, 3rd in my age group (out of 6). Looking just at my splits, I turned in the 4th fastest time on the bike and the 3rd fastest time on the run. Not bad, but certainly not what I feel I was capable of doing. The moral of the story: I've been near religious about my training, and my pace in all three disciplines has been going steadily down for some weeks. However, pace and strength do not equal experience - you could be the fastest you've ever been, but if you're not ready for the squeeze of a wetsuit on your lungs or for the challenges of the open water, or if you didn't check your equipment the night before for any technical issues, you're really loading the deck against yourself.

The most surprising thing that I took from Kau Wela is: I was probably a more solid cellist in high school than I thought I was at the time, and in labeling me as "seasoned," my teacher was trying to tell me so. There's nothing that can tie together the skills learned in practice like the seasoning of experience. This story may read like a failure, but I feel very positively about my race. Despite an abysmal swim time and an overall "I could have done better," I'm taking away more from the Kau Wela now in terms of seasoning and general know-how and experience than I could possibly have won in prizes had I turned in a personal best. I'm now looking for a way to do most of my swimming in open water. And I'm saving up for my own wetsuit, dang it.

Now, if only I could gain enough "seasoning" to avoid illness brought on by water-borne pathogens.

End Transmission.

2011-05-24T12:46:00.000-07:00

Visit from the SLC boys

It has been a quiet few weeks here in Napalmland. I have been steadily logging laps in the pool, miles in the saddle and on foot, and hours at the gym as my schedule permits, and not admitting to my coach the days when time does not permit. The weeks seem a lot longer during a stretch where you don't have any races scheduled; though for me it's not difficult to stay motivated, it is difficult to monitor your progress from week to week. At least, it is for me, since I haven't been training with a partner, or keeping a log. I imagine that, if I were to communicate a lesson during this post, that would be it: if you're training by yourself, or even if you're not, it's great to keep a log to watch your times go down and your weights go up (the ones that you're lifting).

I did have a bit of insight into my swim times during my last session with my coach. In the SHAC spring triathlon that I did back in March, my splits on the swim were 2:21/100m. At the time, I wasn't really pleased or displeased - I was just happy to have finished - but I used it as a measuring stick for future training. Ten days ago, my coach timed me as I swam 4x100m at a 6-7 pace, that is to say, just under my race pace. Wearing swim shorts rather than my racing suit, I swam 2:16 splits, and had plenty of breath left at the end. I commented to my coach that it's astonishing to find your workout pace drop below your last race pace. Feels great. It's not really even near the sub-2:00 splits that I saw people swimming during the Ironman St George, but I feel like I'm now at least on the path that might get me there.

But now on to the real report: Saturday, my good friends from Salt Lake City came down and joined me on a ride around the town.

Mileage: 45
Time: 3 hours
Average speed: 15 mph

At the beginning of the year, we were planning on riding a full century, from my house to Zion Natl. Park and back, but due to bad weather, injury and illness, they weren't really able to put in the miles to train for it. Curse you, Salt Lake spring weather!!

Anyway, we mapped out a nice 30-mile ride out to Sand Hollow Reservoir and back. The photo above is of us three together - as we were getting ready to go, we realized that all of us had picked our bright yellow jerseys to wear that day. Go team lemon! The ride we picked is pleasant to do and offers some good, challenging hills right off the bat. The steepest of these, in my opinion, is just 5 or 6 miles from my house - a long, windy, 5-6 minute slog up and out of Washington City and toward the land fill. Not an insane challenge, but enough of a workout that if you still are feeling the winter cobwebs in your legs, this will definitely serve to wake you up. All three of us spent a couple of minutes huffing at the top of the hill, and there were even some rumors of breakfast coming back for a visit. After that, there are some rolling hills that take you up to the SR-9, the main road that takes you into Hurricane and eventually toward Zion. We zipped down this and into the Sand Hollow recreation area, where we stopped for a few minutes to watch the St George Triathlon in progress. It was fun to watch the runners go by - I felt a few butterflies in my stomach watching these very fit people out there struggling with what looks to be a challenging course, knowing that this would be the same course that I'll be running in the fall.

We then climbed back up out of that valley to a Chevron, stopped for a quick pee and a Snickers, and then zipped on back to St George. I actually coaxed the boys into doing a few extra miles and coming with me to Bloomington Park, which on the one hand was great, as the majority of the ride is along paved bike trails, but on the other hand meant that our wives were stuck waiting for us at my house for an extra hour. Chagrin!

The post-ride afternoon consisted of a soak in my in-laws' jacuzzi, followed by burgers and a movie at my house, followed by some ice cream and sleeping, followed by more eating.

Thank you, gents, for coming down and riding with me. Let's do it again soon.

End Transmission.

2011-05-06T14:16:00.000-07:00

Check out my cool Ironman ink:

This was a test that the body marking team did to see if the ink was working properly. After two showers and a trip to the pool, I can tell you: it is.

End Transmission.

2011-05-04T15:24:00.000-07:00

Shifting Paradigms, or, an Endomorph's Lament

To those of you that know me, it's no secret that I have struggled with body fat for most of my life. I have memories of being very, very little having to look around my belly to get a glance at my toes. When I'm naked and I lie down either supine or on my stomach, the outline of my body is similar to that of a short-legged toad that's been splayed out on the dissector's table. And yes, it's bothered me most of the time.

It's also no big secret that one big draw to endurance sports for me is a lifestyle that promotes weight loss, specifically body fat loss. For some reason, simply going on a diet to "get thin" only gets me so far - what has consistently brought me to my lowest numbers on the scale is the idea of an upcoming public display and the chance to spend a Saturday morning in pursuit of a shiny finisher's medal.

Since I started training for the season at the beginning of this year, I've reaped the benefit of so many hours at the gym and outside - I've been able to shed about 15 lbs. It feels good, yes, and it motivates me to continue, but I also find myself in a peculiar and troubling position. Every morning when I step on the scale, I still look down and see a healthy serving of pudge blocking the view of my toes. After that moment every day, I find myself peeking into mirrors and other reflective surfaces around the house to check out my profile and see if my Hitchcock's Curse is visible to the rest of the world under my shirt. Depending on the time of day, whether or not I have done my workout or not, how many meals I have eaten, etc, etc, I fluctuate between being mildly pleased, happy to the point of being smug, and downright disgusted. Even though I'm pretty sure that my figure can't change all that much during the course of a single day. But, in my heart of hearts, I know that, barring a lengthy famine, no matter how hard I work, I will probably always carry around a little spare tire. Hello, my name is Peter the Napalmbrain, and I am an endomorph.

But a reason to get fit is not the only thing that draws me to train for races. I find great personal satisfaction in going out there and challenging myself to see how fast and how far I can go entirely under my own power. It becomes a great form of meditation to learn to align your mind and body, to find a rhythm in the pedals or in the sound of your footfalls and let that rhythm take over in your mind until it shuts out all distractions and you find yourself just moving forward, almost automatically, over any and all obstacles. If you've trained well enough, the idea of a 'finish line' diminishes until it almost disappears, and then you're just out there, enjoying the gift of your body with a group of other people.

Oh yeah, and passing those other people feels pretty good, too.

I've kept pretty good track of my progress since the beginning of this year: I've now clocked a 5K at a faster pace than I've ever run, and did that off the bike in a triathlon; I've logged more hours on a bike since last summer than probably in the rest of my cumulative years; I can comfortably swim a mile; so why do I wail so over being able to grab a bit of skin around my midsection? I'm as fit as I've been probably since high school, or maybe ever. Get over it, Pete... right?

Yesterday I had the chance to log some volunteer hours at the St George Ironman, as part of the body marking team, painting bib numbers on people's arms and their ages on their legs. It was a parade of chiseled perfection, to sum it up. Both men and women, I painted arm after sculpted arm, leg after shapely leg (but just with the paint roller, dear). Each athlete who came through was a living testament to the years of training and sacrifice that they had gone through in order to reach the level of badassitude that they will be displaying on Saturday.

Did I feel envy or inadequacy? Yeah. Come on, get real. But as I progress down the path of fitness that I've chosen to follow, I've come to realize that the good feelings that come to me through exercise and racing are not a result of my ability/inability to hang with such Adonises (Adoni? Charlie Sheens?) on race day; rather they are the natural consequence of putting in the effort and sacrifice necessary to reach a goal. I remember now the lesson that I wanted to drill into all of my cello students' heads - playing music, or in this case racing, is most satisfying when we know that we've put in the practice and work necessary to do our best. It's not about the instrument we play or the other people that we play around; it's about striving to do our best. And once that's done, playing (or racing) becomes truly a joy, anywhere we are.

I want to finish the Kokopelli triathlon in the fall with a big smile on my face. If I put in the hours before then, it's certainly within my grasp to do so, and when I cross the finish line, I won't be looking down to see if I can see my toes over my belly.

End transmission.

2011-04-21T07:45:00.000-07:00

Training plan basics and the reality of swim times

1) Training for an endurance sport can be like taking a beginner's course in quantum mechanics (yes, there is a parallel): the more you research, the less you're sure of. Period training vs. high intensity intervals, free weights vs. body weights, stretching before vs. after a workout, plyometrics, yoga, pilates, fartlek - there are probably as many training plans as there are people entering any event that you may be interested in. And anyone will tell you why one plan is better than another.

But there is a way to get started and sort out your own triathlon training plan without letting your head spin. The logic behind it goes like this: in a given triathlon, there is a standard ratio of time usually spent on each leg of the course. If a racer is in decent shape, the ratio of time spent on swim/bike/run usually is in the neighborhood of 1/8/4. That is, the run will take approx. 4 times as long as the swim, and the bike will take about twice as long as the run.

So, an easy way to build a basic training plan is to work out your weekly mileage in each discipline according to these ratios. Spend 4 times as much time running than swimming, and twice as much time biking as running. Build up your mileage weekly by 10% or so in each event.

2) I had a great conversation with a triathlete friend of mine last night that revealed an important truth about training and improving your overall time in any given triathlon distance - especially for people who are not as confident in the swim as in other legs (which, from my experience, is nearly everyone): the swim portion is deceivingly small - don't overthink it or spend too much time worrying about it.

For example, let's look at a sprint distance swim - 800m. Let's suppose that you're a bit slower, or perhaps you haven't done a lot of open-water swimming, so your 100m splits are in the neighborhood of 2:30. That puts your total swim time at around 20 minutes. Let's assume now that you put in a lot of training, and get your 100m splits down to 2:00. Your swim time is now down to a sleek 16 minutes - not bad! You've improved your time by 25%. However, now let's consider a different athlete who keeps his swim training about the same, but manages to arrange his transition setup a little better, perhaps pre-clipping his bike shoes into the pedals or investing in some quick, one-pull laces for his running shoes, etc, thereby managing to shave 3 minutes off of his total time. All that this same guy has to do is make up one more minute on either the bike or the run (a much easier task), and he's back up to par with you, who put in all the extra swim time.

The moral of the tale is that, on the novice level, as long as you are comfortable in the water and confident to get through the swim without drowning or burning out before the rest of the race, there are some very easy ways to improve your overall time without the risk of overtraining. Of course, once your transition times are great, then you can start transforming yourself into the triathlete who has the total package - awesome splits in every distance with nice, short transition times in between.

End Transmission.

2011-04-11T09:34:00.001-07:00

Triathlon on the cheap

In my new and continuing mission to bring useful information to the masses on how to triathlon on a budget, I'd like to present a great alternative for first-timers on how to have a great first experience for very little money.

I am continually under pressure to come up with funds for race entry fees. In a tough economy like today, it can be difficult to justify spending a couple hours' wages on a Saturday morning activity where the main take-aways are a good calorie burn, maybe some free string cheese and orange wedges, and a shirt that you can probably only wear while doing more exercise. Oh yeah, and maybe a little trinket to hang on your wall. Okay, and bragging rights that you did it. Add to that the fact that you have little or no experience doing it and don't really know if it's a hobby that you want to pursue afterward, and you're likely to go spend your money on something else more tangible. And that's okay.

But my local gym provided to me a great way that I could test my mettle against the rigors of triathlon in a low-key way that wasn't hard on my wallet. For the meager sum of $5, they put on an "informal triathlon." A sprint-distance event that started in the pool, and continued out in a small lap for the bike and run portions around the local neighborhoods.

Benefits:

At $5, it's a great way to see if you even like doing triathlon enough to dedicate more resources to it.
The field is limited to just as many people as can fit into the pool, so you can really relax and test your swimming ability, without risking a kick to the face or getting lost in the open water.
Most of the people there are likely to be beginners, so there's never a need to feel self-conscious about ability or experience.
The top benefit, in my opinion, is experience in getting to know the mechanics of transition - how and where to lay out your stuff, how to rack your bike, how to navigate the transition lanes, where the mount/dismount line usually is, etc.
If you do already have a couple of races under your belt, this is a good measuring stick for how your training is going for the next event.

Drawbacks:

There are a few points that you miss out on, like swimming in open water in a crowd, or transitioning in a very small space next to complete strangers.
Your gym may not have such an event organized, or may not even have the resources (a pool) necessary to do so.

If #2 is true, I think that the informal tri is such a good idea that any gym with a pool and an employee with a bit of initiative would be wise to set one up. Go and check it out and maybe suggest it to your local gym associate, offering to assist, of course. Heck, the snowball might just keep rolling and if you keep yourself involved, you might end up organizing your own yearly event, complete with t-shirts with your own handsome mug on them!

If your local gym doesn't have a pool, the even better (and rather more obvious solution) is just to get a bunch of your friends together and do it, yourselves, on a Saturday morning. Loser buys breakfast, or whatever. Rumor has it that there's a very famous race in Kona, Hawaii, every year, that started out that way...

End Transmission.

2011-04-03T15:19:00.000-07:00

SHAC Spring Triathlon:

What a race. So much fun. Here's a reaccounting:

This is a great race for a first-timer - 400m swim in an indoor pool, a 10mi bike ride on a fairly level course, and a 5k run on a paved recreational trail. It's been around for five or six years, so the event is well-coordinated, the volunteers are experienced and friendly, the course is well-marked, and it's popular enough now that the sponsorship is good and you get good snacks and a cool shirt at the end. Well, of course, you get the shirt BEFORE the race, but you get the idea.

The swim being in an indoor pool is the source for the only unpleasant part of the experience - the wait in line to go. SHAC (Sand Hollow Aquatic Center) tries to alleviate things by assigning people staggered start times, but they don't require you to go at your assigned time, so it's pretty much first-come, first-serve, meaning that by the time I got in line at 8:00 (with my assigned start time at 8:15), I had a good 45 minutes to stand around and chat with my line friends. Of course, this isn't necessarily bad, either. It's kind of fun to have a chance to parlay with your fellow racemates, swap stories, get tips, learn about other fun races, etc, which is something that you can't really do at the starting line of, say, a 5K or even a half marathon. It kind of added a sense of camaraderie, which is one of the main reasons I enjoy doing endurance events like this (see previous posts). I'm curious to see if that same cohesiveness exists at other events, say, those that have an open water swim. So you get to shake the hand and meet the guy in front of you who will be kicking you in the face (or so I hear).

Anywho, I was very jittery that morning and so my arrival and prep for the race was kind of a disaster. I arrived at the wee hour of 6:30 to set up my transition materials, but realized that I had forgotten my bike helmet. I quickly ran to my car, afraid that, after the 30-40 mins it would take me to go across town and get it, they wouldn't let me back into the transition area, as the first racers were entering the pool at 7:00. Of course, they did, and no one cared when I strolled through the pool area and hopped the transition fence at 7:30 to put my helmet and gloves next to my bike and grab my swimming goggles - which I then realized that I had left in the car, 10 minutes walking distance away. So now you know why I finally got in line at 8 after I had originally arrived at 6:30....

I spent about 20 minutes being the very last person in line, trying to work out where I had seen the girl standing just in front of me - did I actually know her from somewhere, or was she just one of those strangers that you see twice in your life? After turning one corner of the building and following the shrinking line down about half of the length of the building, the announcer said, "hey, looks like our swim line is finally shrinking down!" to which I gave a boisterous whoop and a fist pump, much to the amusement of the people in front of me and some of the spectators. After that, though, some people showed up and got in line behind me, so I didn't get to hold on to my title of "last of the sprint-distancers" for long.

A side note here - if you're wavering on your commitment to trying out a triathlon based on a self-consciousness around your ability to swim, let me tell you: do not fear. Nearly no one that I talked to in line was a swimmer, enjoyed swimming, or considered themselves particularly good or even adequate at it. I would watch the pool as the line went by, and people were doing all kinds of things just to get it over with - backstroke, breaststroke, doggy paddle, even just floating on their backs and kicking anemcly in the right direction. And nobody was commenting, pointing or seemed to think it was strange at all. We were all there to do the same thing, and we were all going to get it done in our own way, and that's all that mattered.

When it was my turn, I shot into the water (shared lanes) and exploded through my first 50 meters, and quickly realized that I wouldn't last at that pace, and slowed down to my regular crawl. I didn't feel great through the swim, but I got it done without too much travail, un-graciously grappled my way out of the pool and ran out to the transition area. I pulled on a jersey, slapped a bandage on the festering sore on my left ankle, a reminder to not run 6 miles on the day that you buy a new pair of shoes, pulled on my bike shoes and sauntered my way through the transition lane to start on the next leg.

Just as in the swim, I shot out from the mount line like a bullet from a gun. There's a steep climb out of the parking lot to get onto the actual course, so I quickly became breathless and decided to take it easy and save my legs for the run. After a couple of deep breaths, I settled down into the drops on my handlebars and got into a good pace. The course goes up and down a bit (I know I said before that it was relatively level, but keep in mind how many of these things I've really done), but I felt great, so I pushed up all the hills and raced down the other sides. Before I knew it, my first lap (of two) on the bike was done. I got a rush of adrenaline as I came through the SHAC parking lot on my way to my second lap as I passed the crowd of total strangers who were kind enough to cheer me on. Hooray! I love these things. Anyway, during my second lap I really began to feel the acid building up in my legs, so I started to look over at the running course, which runs parallel to the bike course, to gauge how much juice I would need to save to get through it. Horrors! All I could see was people's pained expressions as they climbed up and down what seemed to be endless hills. Oh, well, I thought, the faster I push through this, the sooner I can collapse on the grass and eat a frozen yogurt popsicle, look up at the clouds and dream of doing an Ironman (only kidding, kind of). I flew through the second bike lap and came back in to the transition to slap on my running shoes. There was a guy behind me who apparently was more serious about getting his yogurt popsicle, as he was in a much bigger hurry, and I felt a little guilty as I kind of cut him off coming through the single-rider sized transition lane, then saw him run past me pushing his bike, shoes still clipped to his pedals. If you're out there, sorry, buddy.

Running shoes now on and bike re-racked, I jogged through the now clearing lane out to the run course. Much to my elation, who did I spot but my beautiful wife and kids there on the sidelines, snapping pics and waving enthusiastically! I wasn't expecting them to be there, as the race time overlapped with my wife's favorite Saturday morning gym class, which I wouldn't have begrudged her at all, so I was enthused and energized to see them there. Anonymous cheers get you going, but someone you know and love cheering you on is a whole different thing.

Did it push me to do 6-minute miles through my 5K? I don't know, actually. I wasn't wearing my watch so I wasn't timing my own splits. Probably not, though. I was wheezing pretty good by then, and even better after I had climbed the dirt hill between the transition area and the recreation trail that the running course was on. Bad news - the agonized faces that I saw from atop my trusty steed, the Dawn Treader, were still there in spades. Good news - the course wasn't nearly as hilly as I had first assessed. I consider running my strong leg, so, tired as I was, my confidence went up and I managed to find one more gear for my legs to shift into.

Also at this point, I became very, very thirsty. There were aide stations at both ends of the course, which gave me four chances to drink before I finished, and I took all of them. Gatorade, Gatorade, water (over the head) and water. I must not be used to drinking Gatorade, though, because after my first cup I found myself smacking my lips for a good quarter mile afterward. Talk about sweet!

During my second lap, I came up alongside a kid who couldn't have been older than 10, striding along with a perfect smile on his face. What a kid! It actually cost me some effort to catch him. There were three distances that he could have done - Tuff Kids, Beginner's Tri, and Sprint Tri. He was doing the hardest one, and seemed perfectly at ease with the task. I don't know his name, but I'll be looking for his face on the TV broadcast of the Kona Ironman World Championship. Zowie.

The finish line came up sooner than expected, and I cruised through it as fast as I could manage, all alone both in front and for about 30 seconds behind me. I did it! I handed in my chip, gave my wife a sweaty kiss, and headed off to Subway with her to split a $5 egg and bacon sub.

Goal achieved: I finished with a smile.

Next week - first Triathlon on the cheap? There is probably a solution.

2011-03-20T17:41:00.000-07:00

Protein on the cheap

Here's a post for all you weekend warriors out there - the non professionals, the full-time parents, the latecomers, the new hobbyists, the blue (and white) collar job-holders that work the gears to make the world turn, the self-starters, and the validation junkies like myself, who spend time and quite a considerable amount of money on endurance sports, not because it turns them any kind of profit (though wouldn't that be nice if we could somehow turn a profit off of all our little side projects), or because we really expect to win, place, or show, but because gosh darn it we like to get out there on a Saturday and wear ourselves ragged with a new kind of adoptive family.

I'm supposing that we all read a fair amount on nutrition and diet and things like what we need to eat after a heavy lifting workout or a long Saturday run, etc, etc. I don't feel like talking a whole lot about the science behind it, except to say that it makes sense to me. Besides, there's not much that's more enjoyable after a good hour or 90 mins of sweating and lifting and pacing than tipping back an ice cold Chocolate Muscle Milk. And it's hard to beat getting 21 grams of protein at just 210 calories. Except, of course, the fact that it's about $5 wherever I can find it (not in bulk).

Prices for equipment are enough to sweat over. Just this week I dropped nearly $200 on new shoes, a pair of tri trunks, and a little love for my bike, including two new tires. And I'm still in the hole for a couple of Ragnar teams that I've signed up for. All that considered, I'm saving the $30 a week I could spend on protein drinks and I'm investing it in a little research to find a reasonable alternative at a reasonable price. I hope someone out there can find this information useful, as well.

The first thing to do is ask yourself: how much protein do you really need? According to the ADA, for the average Joe, 40-70 grams a day is enough, and frankly pretty easy to come by. For the average Joe who exercises, the calculation is about 1.5 grams per kilogram of body weight (about 0.65 grams per pound) up to double the RDA, or no more than 80-140 g. Personally, I weigh ~180lb, which puts my ideal protein consumption (if I keep up with my regimen) at around 110 grams a day. There are other ways to see how much protein based on total daily caloric intake, but whatever. Close enough.

Next thing is to ask yourself, if you're not bank rolled or you don't manage a hedge fund and can't really afford high-end protein drinks, is what do you want to sacrifice, calories, or protein intake? I don't think there's a really good substitute that can give you that amount of protein at that few calories for much less $$. If you're trying to lose weight, I'd probably stick with something lower in calories. If you're trying to build muscle mass or you can afford a bit more calories in your diet, go for something that will give you more protein and not worry so much about the calories.

I've listed some options below of regular grocery store items that you can use as post-workout food that might save you some dough while still keeping you mindful of exercise and diet, etc. I've chosen to limit the portions to sizes that are similar in calories to one serving of Muscle Milk. If you prefer the high-protein route, I suppose you could do a little math to figure out the portion size you would need to come up with 21 g of protein. Oh yeah, and I've limited the field to lower-fat proteins, of course. Enjoy:

Item Serving Size Calories Protein (grams)

Yogurt 2 cup 220 14

(vanilla or plain)

Egg (whole) 3 240 21

Egg whites 12 Tbsp 100 20

Beans 1 cup 220 14

(black)
Chicken 100 g 109 23.5
Tofu 200 g 210 24

Or, there are of course loads of sites out there dedicated to listing nutritional information on high protein foods, that breaks down their content into fat grams, etc.

As more and more of my money goes out the door doing this kind of thing, I'm becoming more and more interested in finding ways to cut back on the spending. So maybe this will be like a weekly thing, to find cheap alternatives to things that endurance athletes spend most of their money on. Because more money in the pocket means more race entry fees, right?

End Transmission.

2011-03-06T19:44:00.000-08:00

Putting the pieces together

I'm discovering a new challenge in training for a triathlon: time management. Training for a running event, or any single sport race event, tends to be fairly simple. It's just a matter of going outside and doing that one thing for an hour or so. However, as I'm sure it's logical to see, when you're working with three different things, it becomes quite a juggling trick. The degree of difficulty steps up a notch when you're training in an entirely new discipline (swimming, for me). Add to that the fact that the triathlon that I'm training for is a mere two weeks before the SoCal ragnar relay, and things get a bit more complex.

For example, here's a list of everything that I should be packing into my workout week:

1) I meet with a swimming coach on Thursday evenings, and we spend about 45 minutes together. He wants me to spend 40 minutes in the pool, 3 times a week.

2) My biking has been near non-existent this year, so I'm starting a 10-ride program that's outlined in my most recent issue of Bicycling magazine. The rides start off at about 15 miles, and go up by 10-15% every ride. If I follow the program, I should start out riding 3 times a week, then step it up to every other day, then every day by the third week. The last ride, I believe, is supposed to be ~50 miles.

3) I need to keep running in order to sustain my conditioning for the SoCal Ragnar. I'm aiming for ~20 miles a week over 4 days.

4) I'm attempting to supplement my running mileage with a weight training and plyometrics regimen in order to really get my minutes per mile down, since I won't be racing any distance above 8 miles in the foreseeable future.

5) Oh yeah, and I have a secret crush on this yoga instructor at the gym, so I must attend that 90-min class every Wednesday night. Just kidding. But I do go to the class to increase my flexibility.

I sat down last Saturday to see if I could hash out a training schedule that would jive with my work, family, and church responsibilities, and quickly became depressed at all of the 5AM mornings I was facing. I'm not a morning person, to say the least, but it would be possible. I've done it before, I suppose. But is this do or die? Will I be able to survive the race if I flag on my training, even a little bit?

As I was swimming last night, I was counting the lengths I had swam looking at my watch, and I started to calculate in my head the times that I would spend on each length of the tri, and while I was freaking out about my training time, I slowly came to the realization that, despite my lack of 5am fervor, I am probably not about to be destroyed! Here are the distances:

Swim - 400 meters (16 lengths) I'm a sloooow swimmer, and I can do that in about 12 minutes.

Bike - 10 miles (2 loops on a closed course) At my slowest, I go about 12 mph, so I can expect to spend no more than about 45 mins on the bike, but given race day adrenaline I'm hoping to kick it up to 16 mph, so less than 40 mins

Run - 5K My last 5K time, while I was pushing my two kids in a stroller, was around 26 minutes.

"Finish with a smile" has been my goal for this race since I signed up for it. In my opinion, it's a good, reasonable, and achievable goal for any first-time triathlete, and probably more important than any time-based or calorie-based (?) goals that one might set for themselves, firstly because as a first-timer it's probably hard to guess what a reasonable time might even be, and secondly because if you're like me, the smile, not the time, is what will keep you coming back for more. The Dog Town half marathon was such a suffer-fest for me that, had it been my first, I probably would have been a "one-and-done"-er.

Since last Saturday I've been far from perfect with my training schedule, but taking a look at the estimates above and considering that I do at least two of those distances (at a minimum) every day, I'll probably be okay. Lesson learned: don't be a spaz about training. Which is kind of the opposite message from my last post, "make everything a big deal." So I suppose the purpose of this week is to add an asterisk to last week: Look forward and prepare for every race, but be sure to enjoy it at the same time.

End

2011-02-28T19:35:00.000-08:00

Dog days in Dog Town

I did it! First race of the year has come and gone. Check me out holding this guy off at the finish line:

http://www.zazoosh.com/photos/386340657

Feb. 26 marked the first annual Dog Town 9K and Half Marathon in and around Washington City. It was a cold, blustery day but someone did us a favor and held off the rain until about noon that day. The course was up in the air until that very morning, and ended up being a nice, hilly challenge that my buddy Ryan would have really enjoyed (he likes the uphill stuff). I did the half marathon in about 1:55, which is about 10 mins above my personal best for a half, but taking in several considerations it's not all that bad:

1) I was horizontal nearly the entire 10 days before the race
2) Wind!
3) Cold!
4) All things considered, I probably didn't take the race as seriously as I should have, and my training was lacking.

So that's Lesson #1 for this post, I guess: Make Every Race A Grand Event. It doesn't matter if it's a 5K, an ultramarathon, a weekend group ride or an Iron Man. Of the handful of races I've completed to date, the most memorable ones were the ones that I spent the most time preparing for - not necessarily because I posted my best times, but because the anticipation for the day of the event had built it up so that, when the day came, it became a celebration. And the reverse is true, as well: the more you mark up your mental calendar in anticipation of race day, the more work you're likely to put in to prepare. One thing lends itself to the other, and then come race day, you're bound to have a lot of fun and most likely a good success.

Case in point: the night before, I went to go pick up my packet and got stuck behind a couple of 40-somethings who were whining and waffling over whether they should sign up for the race the night before. For those of you familiar with Saturday Night Live in the mid to late 80's, they sounded a lot like Doug and Wendy Whiner:

"But it'll be windy......"
"Maybe we should just do part of the Iron Man course instead..."
"But I don't need more race shirts...."
"Maybe we should just go for a bike ride..."
"I bet the finisher's medal is ugly...."

To get the proper effect, say every sentence like a 5 year old and hold the last syllable out for 5 seconds.

I was surprised at my frustration with these people - I mean first of all, who decides to sign up for a half marathon the night before? I didn't stick around to see how it turned out, but given their lackluster attitude standing in front of the freakin' sign in desk, had they decided to go for it, my guess is that they would have felt afterward like it was a waste of $45, regardless of how good of shape they were in or what their finishing time was.

On the flip side, I'm sure the person who got the most out of it was the brave soul who was race number 0001, who signed up way back in November, who had spent three months pounding the pavement to get ready, and they were going to get out there and do it, weather be damned.

Okay, enough of that.

Now that this race is behind me, I've changed gears a bit and am now training for the SHAC beginner's triathlon on April 2 (mental calendar starred and highlighted in technicolor orange). I generally SUCK as a swimmer, so I anticipate that the next few weeks' training will largely be spent in a pool or on a bike, which my legs tell me is just fine with them.

I am, however, going to keep up the running so that I can quickly change tack after the triathlon and gear up for the SoCal Ragnar, which promises to be a hoot and a half. But I'm planning on keeping the miles down and focusing a lot on strength training and interval training to see if I can get my minutes per mile down a bit from that rather mediocre 9 min/mile I posted last Saturday.

End Transmission.

2011-02-10T14:58:00.000-08:00

An interesting note this week:

An old friend of mine has been chasing me around the last month or so. Goodness, how I hate shin splints. Up to the end of last year, I was battling them with just aspirin and by following a few of the "cardinal" rules of running, namely:

1) Don't run in one week more than 10% than you ran the previous week
2) Don't run more than 400 miles in any given pair of shoes
3) Make sure you have well-built shoes that provide extra support if you pronate while you run.

Nevertheless, in the end, the shin splints won last year and prevented me from running a last half marathon in November. I assumed that they had arisen as a result of a compressed training schedule leading up to the Hood to Coast relay in August, and after taking from October through mid January off completely, I thought I may have solved the problem. When I started up again a few weeks ago, I started following the same rules, going very slowly and building up my mileage 10% at a time.

And yet, my old nemeses returned. Yargh!

So I embarked on a little experiment. I couldn't understand how I had run all the way through 2009 and the first part of 2010 without any trouble, and then became so debilitated so quickly. The only explanation that I could come up with was that it was my shoes. This week, I ended up breaking all three of the above rules, and I went back to running in my old, worn-out Asics that I first started doing things in over two years ago. Result? Next to no shin pain (though I still occasionally take ibuprofen for my knees, which I imagine also has some effect), and this week I jumped from 18 to 28 miles in a week, at just around 9 minute miles.

Lesson? I suppose "believe in the shoeless revolution" would be most appropriate. I abandoned my overbuilt "supportive" shoes in favor of my older, thinner, lighter shoes, which changed my running stride just enough that nearly all of my maladies disappeared in about 10 days. I can only imagine that going shoeless, or nearly shoeless, would have the same, if not a greater, effect.

I'm considering entering in the "Dog Days" half marathon in Washington city, to take place on the 26th. It's kind of a big race to start the year with, but it will set a good baseline for me for the rest of the season, and plus it's close to home so I don't have to eat into my "time away from home" budget. I have a long run on Saturday coming up. If that goes well, I'm in for the race.

End Transmission.

2011-01-15T20:53:00.000-08:00

The ball is officially rolling. I've signed up (but not yet paid for) 3 races later this year (more to soon follow, I'm sure), and as predicted I was able to shake myself out of my slump and start a daily running routine.

Weekly mileage: appox. 16 miles

I'm excited for the challenging races that I've stuck myself with so far this year: The SoCal Ragnar relay race from Los Angeles to San Diego on April 15-16, the Wasatch Back Ragnar relay from Logan to Park City in July, and the Kokopelli Triathlon here in St. George in September. All huge races; I plan on making them the highlights of my season, and pepper the rest of the warm weather just with supporting acts.

In this week's training, I've come up with an important discovery: Training for a distance event DOES NOT equate to weight loss. I've put on an embarrassing amount of weight since the Hood to Coast relay last summer, and due to injury and an impossible work schedule I've hardly done any running, either. Since I've started training again, my endurance has gone up VERY rapidly, but the pounds haven't followed suit. For example, today I ran just over 6 miles pretty comfortably. Not easily, just comfortably. But, since starting on a training regimen about 3 weeks ago, only a couple of pounds have come off, and I attribute those to a change in my diet. Namely, I'm not stuffing my face with garbage at every holiday occasion. I don't even want to think about what my caloric intake during December must have been when I've been able to drop some weight only by taking a passing interest in what I eat.

I'll say it again here, for emphasis, though: DO NOT, because you're training for a distance event, expect to lose weight automatically. It's not the same thing, at all. Fat guys can run half marathons, too - just ask the guy that passed me 100 yards before the finish line of the St. George half marathon last year.

Weight loss can be a very effective training measure in itself, though. I read somewhere that every excess pound of body fat adds 2 seconds per mile to your running time. Not that much, by itself, but if you're 20 or 30 pounds overweight, that can be as much as one minute per mile, even at the same aerobic fitness level. That's over 5 minutes to your time in a 10K, nearly 15 in a half marathon, and just about half an hour in a full marathon. If you want to incorporate weight loss as part of your training, do yourself a favor and adopt a weight-loss attitude: diet AND exercise. Anything else is like using one half of a pair of scissors.

Of course, if you're already thin, well then la-tee-da, aren't you special.

End Transmission.

2011-01-05T10:31:00.000-08:00

Boy, where is Burgess Meredith when you need him?

If you can't tell by the absence of posts by now, it's been a rough couple of months. Shin splints forced me to take a bit of time off after the Swiss Days 10K at the end of last year, and then I became subject to a combination of downward pressures that I woefully succumbed to:

1) My job's heroic efforts to confine me 24 hours a day to my office chair
2) A series of events that lend themselves to overeating, namely my birthday, Thanksgiving, a few days in San Francisco on the company's dime, including a truly opulent holiday lunch, and pretty much all of December
3) Church obligations that lately have eaten into my discretionary time
4) My own constant wrestle with inconsistency

So here I am, several pounds heavier, pretty much starting all over. I don't think that I'll be able to meet my first goal, which was to run in the St George half marathon on the 22nd, but I've gone and signed myself up for several other upcoming things, which seems to be the best way to motivate me. The pressure of an upcoming race event seems to be my best tonic: "Look, buddy, if you don't get out there and bust your hide, you're going to die on this day (insert race date here)."

I suppose everyone has their own favorite motivators for things; this one is mine, I guess.

End Transmission

2010-09-14T13:48:00.001-07:00

I'm going to repost my account of the Hood to Coast relay here, just for fun:

So at last, two weeks after the fact, here I am blogging about the amazing Hood to Coast relay race that I did at the end of August. It was a blast. This race was in Oregon - starting from Mt. Hood, down the mountain and along the Columbia river to Portland, and then along the Willamette river to the town of Seaside, right outside of Astoria. 196 miles total, divided between a team of 12 people. I ended up running just over 17 miles in three different legs.

In a word, it was ORANGE.

These are all the people I was in the car with. The team of 12 is divided into two cars, which take the relay in 6-leg shifts, so that you can get a 4-5 hour break, get something to eat, get some sleep, hang out, etc, while the other car is running.

My friend Ryan (in the wig) invited me to be on his regular relay team, the "Cho Mamas." If you haven't guessed, our team color was orange. What about the name Cho Mama suggests the exaggerated use of orange, you may ask? Well, here's the scoop, and I apologize if I wasn't supposed to divulge any of these Cho secrets. I hope I'm not disbarred or anything. It all goes back to high school: the original Cho Mamas were members of the SLC Murray High School cross country running team - whose school colors were blue and white. Just kidding. They were orange. The name comes from a word that their coach used to use, apparently a Native American word for "faster." Or maybe it was just "go." Anyway, it became their team mantra back then (Cho!), and the rest, as they say, is history.

This is the sweet shirt I bought second-hand as part of the team uniform. If you read closely, you can see that it says Abu Dhabi. How that shirt got all the way to lil' old Utah, I have no idea, but everyone that I saw on the course would call out, "yeah, Abu Dhabi!" Did they really think I was from the United Arab Emirates? I don't know. But it was a lot of fun making them wonder.

I was third in line, which meant out of a total of 36 legs, I ran legs 3, 15, and 27. For anyone interested, here are my splits:

Leg 3: almost 4 miles, 800-ft elevation loss. Ran at about 3 in the afternoon. I clocked just over 7 minute miles.

Leg 15: 7.25 miles, no real net elevation gain or loss, but full of rolling hills. Ran at about 2:30 in the morning. I slowed up to about 8:20/mile, but finished in an hour, which was my goal.

Leg 27: 5.8 miles, more hills, but no real net gain or loss. Did this one at about 11:00 the next morning. I was tired, but I was so ready to get it over with, I did 8:10/mile.

Our team average was I think just over 8 min/mile, so I feel pretty good about my times.

Besides all that, though, it was quite the experience. It's such a larger crowd than at a normal half marathon or 10K, but everyone seems to pull together more, just to finish the darn thing. People that would leave me in the dust would holler as they past, "hey, good work!" and "keep it up!" and stuff, and I could only oblige and do the same for anyone that I passed. Except for on the last leg, where I was so winded I couldn't really bring myself to say anything to anybody.

Here are some memorable experiences:

1) Listening to a Spencer W. Kimball book on tape on the drive up and most of the drive down. Boy, that guy sure gets you in the mood to run.

2) Here's a sweet pic of me burning up the road on my first leg:

I don't think I really run like that. More like this:

3) Running in the middle of the night, in the middle of a huge, unfamiliar forest, along a nearly deserted road, following a string of bouncing red LED lights that we all had to wear on our backs. It's amazing how motivating those lights can be. All I wanted to do was catch up to them all as fast as I could. Wish I had a pic for that one, actually.

4) Lots of cool team names and themes. To anyone thinking about putting together a relay team: first of all, get into it. The more into it you are, the cooler you look. Second, try not to have your team name be mysteriously (or obviously) anatomical or suggestive. If you do, you're probably not original. It's been done, ok?

We made friends with the "Mr. T" car on the second day, that had wired some speakers in the front of their car and could spout Mr. T quotes at anyone they wanted throughout the race. There were the "Banana Striders," whose name I can't decide if it's dirty or not, but they gave us a bunch of free bananas before my third leg, with the message, "The Banana Striders love you!" There was the Muscle Milk sponsored car, the Wheaties team who were too fast to talk to, and the ubiquitous "Wall of Sound" team, that had strapped about a dozen loudspeakers to their car and drove the whole course blasting heavy metal all the way through. Can't imagine what it must have been like driving with them at night.

5) Good fish and chips in Astoria after the running was done, and good times on the beach afterward, including a cool "Chariots of Fire" moment, which you can see here, if you care to:

Will I do it next year? Probably not. But there are plenty of local relays around here, so maybe I'll don the Orange again and become a Cho Mama in 2011.

2010-09-13T09:59:00.000-07:00

This is a funny time to start out a blog such as this, since I've just sworn off running for the remainder of the year. I ran a few races at the beginning of the year, then did a lot of training for a bike touring trip, then ended up sitting on my duff for about three weeks. After not consistently running for nearly 4 months, I made the mistake of packing in 6 weeks of hard training for the Hood to Coast relay (17 miles). Shin splints ensued. And now, although there are several more races in the year that I'd like to do, I'm at the point where I am downing ibuprofen and naproxen before every training session, which is not the kind of guy I want to be. So I'm taking some time off my feet, putting in some miles on my bike, in hopes that I can start again fresh in December to start training for next year.

In order to keep myself motivated, I've made a list of races that I'm interested in doing:

Jan. 22: St George Painters Half Marathon

Feb. ??: Tuacahn Duathlon

Mar. 06: Lake to Lake Team Relay

Mar. 19: St George Spectrum 10K

Apr. 23: Hurricane Half Marathon

May ??: St George Triathlon (Olympic Distance)

Jun. 17: Ragnar Wasatch Back

Jul. ??: Bryce Canyon Half Marathon

Jul. 29: Saints to Sinners Cycling Relay

Sep. ??: Redrock Relay

Oct. 2: St George Marathon

Nov. ??: Snow Canyon Half Marathon

That's about 144 miles of running, and who knows how many miles on a bike. Sounds like kind of an exciting year, eh? Hopefully I can put together the training and the funds and the work schedule so I can pull it all off.

2010-09-09T09:13:00.000-07:00

So after many, many months of thought and reflection, I decided to do something different and with a slightly more specific focus with the blog.

This has been many months in the making, and I've considered various different things I could write about, according to my various passions and hobbies, including:

1) Music. I am a cellist, part time, but since I don't often get a chance to play and I haven't set up a studio to teach in yet, this would be sparse at best.

2) Translation. Well, this isn't the most exciting thing to blog about, and it would be nice if I could write about something that I don't already spend most of the day doing, just to get away from it, you know?

3) Creative writing. I enjoy writing, and I thought this blog would be a good place to deposit some of my scribblings, but frankly, I'm just not quite brave enough yet to put rough drafts out into the public forum. Maybe that will be a different blog.

So I've found that running and endurance sports have become a new passion of mine. Given my body type and general life-long habits, this has been a big surprise for me, but over the past year and a half, I've come to not only really enjoy it, but I think I've become kind of good at running.

I've also discovered recently that I need a kind of pressure valve, as well. I've been bursting to talk my wife's ear off about my races, my experiences, my training, my research and reading, etc, etc, etc, ad nauseum. And while I'm grateful that she'll listen, I don't want to wear her out. So get ready, any readers that may be out there - I'm going to talk a lot about running here, and maybe about a couple other things, too.

2009-08-26T13:38:00.001-07:00

Hello out there - if there are any napalmreaders left!

Check this action out:

I'll probably post something meaningful sometime soon.

Peter

2008-09-08T09:15:00.000-07:00

I should have been more explicit about the fate of poor Ash. Here he is. If anybody knows a good soul within driving distance of the Monterey peninsula who is looking for a sweet little dog, feel free to forward this to them.

Sniff.

2008-09-04T15:33:00.001-07:00

So long, Asher. You were a good dog. And in your memory, I only have one word to say:

"Workshed!"

ps - sorry no other writings yet.

2008-08-15T13:57:00.001-07:00

Time for a make-over for the ol' Napalm blog, don't you think?

Ever since the birth of my child, I've been putting all of the really significant family stuff that I've been up to here. And so, the Napalm Blog, in its current state, has kind of become obsolete.

I mean, I can still post about how weird David Hasselhoff is, and stuff like that, but I think that I'd like to do something a bit more creative and fulfilling than that, you know?

So I think the next iteration of the blog, set to begin next week, will be a creative writing journal for myself. The aim will be this: each entry will attempt to be a complete story, written entirely within the half-hour window I give myself every few days to dedicate to blog entries. I have no idea if this will even work, but we'll just have to see.

Sound like fun?

Okay!

End transmission.

2008-05-13T09:40:00.000-07:00

I DID IT!
My two-year sojourn as a graduate student has come to an end. It's over. Thank you to family, friends, and faculty for your love and support through good times and bad.

Check out this sweet cake that Sheri commissioned for the occasion:

Isn't it awesome? In case you can't read it, it says "Way to Go" on the top, and "MATLM" along the side. That's the name of the degree, see. Master of Arts in Translation and Localization Managment.

It was a good weekend. My parents, and most of Sheri's family came in to town and spent some time down on the windy Marina beach, ate some pizza and mexican food, and generally had a good time.

End Transmission.

2008-04-15T15:57:00.001-07:00

Do you ever have one of those moments where you re-encounter something that you saw way in your past, and that you've thought about ever since, especially about how cool it would be if you were to find it again, and then you do, and it totally lives up to your expectations?

Here's a clip from this old, old show called the Dana Carvey show, which wasn't on the air for more than a couple of months, and was always changing its name due to its varying sponsors, like "The Mug Root Beer Dana Carvey Show," or the "Country Time Lemonade Dana Carvey Show." I remember liking it, and wondering why the show wasn't more popular, but this clip in particular always stuck out in my mind.

And then, thanks to YouTube, and to Rob F., I found it again, and it's just as awesome as I remember. And little did I know that the Mug Root Beer Dana Carvey Show starred these two future greats:

End Transmission.

2008-04-09T13:55:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday, Heff...
I guess...

I had a moment the other day - one of those moments that makes you realize just what a bizarre world we live in.

So Heff is on this show, right? About the life he leads with his three live-in girlfriends, lounging around in PJ's all day, buying parrots and doing weird, frankly pointless things. And the thing about this show that gets me is this: when you listen to him talk, Heff actually sounds like a regular joe his age! You'd never guess that this normal guy, a guy who frankly sounds like my uncle when he talks, could go home and do a Scrooge MacDuck into the vast millions he has made by selling racy pictures, after which he could pick which one of his Harem would bring him a snifter of brandy and give him a foot rub.

And here's the bizarre part: on the five-minute stretch of the show that I happened to watch one time (no, seriously - just five minutes, and I didn't enjoy them, not even the silky-pajamaed lovelies prancing around), Heff and his ladies decide to strike up a friendly game of Monopoly. Like you would if you didn't live in the Playboy Mansion.

So just picture the scene, if you will: my Mormon wife and I, watching a television show featuring a smutty old millionaire having a family game night with his three 20-something girlfriends. The ironies and bizarrities are boundless.

You get me?

End Transmission.

2008-03-23T19:28:00.000-07:00

Well, if I can't go to J-Tree this year, I might as well create a little J-Tree at home.

Now all I'm missing is three good friends, a dutch oven feast (hold the curry, please), a stinky Kirkham's springbar tent, a Risk game, and thousands and thousands of granite crags to shimmy up.

End Transmission.

2008-03-16T09:50:00.000-07:00

Spring must be here!

It's been warm and sunny in Monterey, and my backyard is getting into the spirit of things.

All of the above miraculously sprung up on its own, a fact that I love about living in California.

This, however,

...was deposited by the dog.

On the plus side, Ash is creating his own little obstacle course back there to add an extra challenge to slack lining across the yard.

End transmission.

2008-02-29T10:11:00.000-08:00

Happy Leap Day!

What did everyone do with their extra day this year? Reminisce about the last four years? Plan for the next crazy Leap Day party?

Myself, I took a moment and expressed gratitude for one more day to enjoy my 20's.

Just kidding. I did nothing. I sat and I stared.

End Transmission.

2008-02-13T14:46:00.000-08:00

Ah, gotta love tax season.

I don't know if it's me, or if it's everyone that I had financial dealings with last year, but lately it seems like somewhere around the first of this year, I lifted my arm or took the wrong route around a telephone pole and was transported into a different universe where everyone is constantly high. Nothing makes sense. All of my employers are withholding taxes at different rates; none of them have my name or address right; and nobody wants to take responsibility for anything.

I can't tell you how many circular conversations I've had with people about taxes in the last week. Let me give you an example.

I had to have a conversation with some people at my school about some tax problems I was having. I was already disgruntled about having to park my car under a tree three blocks away, on account of the school refuses to provide parking for more than 25 of its 1200-odd students and faculty.

As I walked through the door, a sweaty-toothed madman in a red sweater, glasses, and an absent-minded demeanor greeted me. I explained to him my dilemma.

"I'm here to ask you about my w-2 from 2007. It would seem that the school didn't withhold any taxes."

"W-2! W-2! You must be applying for direct deposit of your paycheck."

"Not at all, actually."

"Is that the form there?"

"No. Listen, I received a w-2 for income that I was told was tax exempt."

"Well don't ask me about it, I don't know anything. Gimme that pretty form in your hand!"

It took me several attempts to convince him that I was carrying something in my hand that didn't fall into his purview, and I kept having to fend him off from grabbing the homework that I was carrying from out of my hand.

"No, this isn't for you. So why did I get a W-2 for non-taxable income?"

"Because you earned income from the school, silly boy. I sent you a W-2 so that you could pay your taxes. Why are you asking me, I don't know anything about it."

"But you were the one that originally told me that it was tax exempt when I started working."

"Well, you're a student."

At this point, a March Hare wearing a blue denim blouse appeared behind him, and started repeating the last three words of every sentence the sweaty-toothed Mad Hatter said.

"What does that mean?"

"Why are you asking me, I don't know anything about tax law!"

"...about tax law..."

"You knew my income from the school was taxable, at least."

"Yes, of course."

"...yes, income is taxable..."

"But on my W-2 you didn't withhold any taxes!"

"Well why would I? You're not an employee!"

"...not employed, no no...."

"But you're paying me!"

"Yes, but you're a student, so you don't pay taxes."

"...students no taxes..."

"So I now owe taxes on my non-taxable income that I earned as a taxable employee, even though I'm still a student and don't pay taxes."

"Yes, that's correct."

The two of them then linked arms and proceeded toward the rear of the office, singing, "A Very Happy Unbirthday To You," while I followed the small white rabbit of my remaining sanity out the door, scratching my head.

Hours later, I made the hike back to my car. As I approached, I noticed that the car was completely covered in bird- and tree-droppings. I put my key into the lock, and as I turned the lock, I heard the small rustle of laughter overhead, and as I looked up, a dozen sweaty-toothed birds in red sweaters and glasses took wing and flew off.

End transmission.

2008-02-05T11:14:00.000-08:00

Happy Super Tuesday, everyone!

(This picture does not serve to incriminate the parents of one Siena Napalm of fraudulently casting a vote on behalf of their underage daughter, nor do said persons endorse in any way, shape or form any criminal or otherwise illegal voting activities. Any actions, real or implied, of a Siena Napalm appearing as having voted in California, are merely coincidental, and do in no way reflect upon the character of My Little Sweetheart.)

End Transmission.

2008-01-30T19:43:00.001-08:00

To whom do our physical bodies really belong? The following stories are real. Check it out:

A man decides to take an extended sailing trip, and ends up spending a number of days in the doldrums, with no wind to blow him anywhere. He had no radio to speak of, and the sea was calm and noiseless. Several days into his stagnation, he begins to hear an endless heavy metal guitar solo in his head. Hours and hours of endless thrashing a la Eddie Van Halen. When he describes the noise, he says that it is not the "song stuck in my head" type of low drone, but loud, distracting, like the soloist were playing just off the deck of the ship. Days later, the guitar gives way to a bagpipe, which keeps him company until he was able to return to shore. Several other people, deaf and hearing alike, report having other kinds of aural hallucinations whilst spending a lot of time in soundless environments.

A man slowly loses his sight as a result of a genetic disorder. He went from having full sight, to seeing mostly in black and white, to being completely blind. Years after losing his vision, he is lying on the couch listening to a story about sailors during the Revolutionary War, when a man passes into his transom, a man that he can describe down to the buttons on his vest. What's more, the two acknowledge the other's presence, and the sailor proceeds to accompany the blind man for the next few hours. He goes to his doctor, who tells him that many blind people experience the same thing. It's called Charles Bonnet syndrome, and it has occured with blind and sighted people alike (when sighted people are deprived of their vision for only a few hours). Besides the sailor, the blind man hallucinates of curtains, dresses, and other random objects. He says that he can now induce these hallucinations by eating tuna sashimi. Go figure.

Here's one we've all heard of: amputees can actually feel their former limbs for a lifetime after they've lost them. They ache, they get sore, they even itch, when the nerve endings that would cause any of these sensations have long since gone. It's interesting to note that Herman Melville actually included this symptom in the one-legged character of Captain Ahab, who lost his leg to Moby Dick. How's that for doing your research?

The strangest to me, though, is Alien Hand Syndrome. Sometimes, patients of brain surgery report losing control of one of their hands. Their hands may adopt separate personalities, and do things even to thwart the other hand, such as unbuttoning a shirt that the other hand is trying to button, or knock silverware out of the hand during a meal. Sufferers of AHS will give names to their foreign limbs, and may even create elaborate stories about the "occupier's" identity and past.

Many of these strange syndromes can be explained by the fact that neurons, when not being used, simply come up with work for themselves. If you're blind, for example, the neurons in your brain that receive visual signals get bored after a few years, and so invent things to see.

But what does that imply for the anima of the person him/herself? What about things like AHS, in which it would seem like, during brain surgery, the person has actually been divided into two pieces, and one bit of consciousness is trapped inside the hand, while the larger part, perhaps, takes control of everything else, like sight and speech?

The world is a crazy place.

End Transmission.

2008-01-28T11:13:00.000-08:00

Many birthdays and deathdays and such to report upon.

First of all, happy birthday to Jackson Pollock today. Did you know he was from Wyoming? Huh. More on that later.

Also happy birthday yesterday to Mozart, touted by many to be the genius of his age. That may be true, but those of us in the Cello section sure get tired of playing page after page of his endless 8th notes. Am I right guys? Give it here. But seriously, folks, go put on some Mozart today, and just feel yourself getting smarter. So they say.

And now, of course, in the midst of all these historical B-days, a most happy and belated birthday to my big brother, Adam, first among men. So sorry I haven't called you (yet). As a matter of fact, this is just another episode in a long line of bad birthday treatment from me. Remember that time when I gave you a six-pack of Coke? Or was it even a six-pack? Terrible. Or that biography of Ronald Reagan? Geez. I might as well have waved from a passing car. Anyway, happy birthday, bro.

Sadly, President Gordon Bitner Hinckley died last night at the ripe old age of 97. As if anyone who reads this blog doesn't know that already. Well, most everyone. To the man who located his soul for me after my last transmission, if you return, go here.

I'm sad about the passing of an extraordinary leader of my faith, not to mention a genuinely good soul without whom the world is a little dimmer, but on the other hand, he died surrounded by family at the end of an indelible life packed to the rafters with selfless service, stalwart leadership, and a love for all mankind. President Hinckley, you will be missed.

Now I was planning here to go off on some tangent about how extraordinary lives can begin from anywhere on the planet, but I'm tired of writing, and I'm willing to wager that you're pretty tired of reading this.

Anyway, I've got to get to class.

Cheers.

End Transmission.

2008-01-14T16:54:00.000-08:00

Alrighty then, I've been tagged, so I gotta come up with six things that no one knows about me.

I'm pretty forthcoming with information about myself, so this might take a few minutes.

1) I am fascinated by New Zealand. This one time in third grade I did a report on the country, and I dressed up like Sir Edmund Hillary, and ever since then I've always wanted to go there and hike around.

2) Top five historical people I would like to meet after I die (excluding religious people who you are probably going to be required to meet with, anyway): Abraham Lincoln, JS Bach, George Mallory, Pablo Casals, and Jimmy Stewart.

3) In another life, I'd love to be a firefighter, or paramedic.

4) I have zero interest in living in, or even visiting, the south of the US. None at all. Ever.

5) I have had this recent fascination about where people feel their souls inside their body. I had a recent conversation with my sister, who can "feel her soul" right behind her face, like it's hiding back there. I can feel my soul like a little distended, Y-shaped creature that lives behind my eyes and has two long limbs that stretch down into my arms and into my hands. Weird, eh?

6) I'd really love to learn how to cook. Really well.

Alright, tag to Josh Holyoak, Greg Corey, Patty Day, Rob Ferre, Derek Wright, and one other person who happens upon this blog for the first time.

End Transmission.

2008-01-10T16:39:00.000-08:00

How to live in a Hostel:

1) Try to avoid, if possible. Visits are okay, but don't move in to the joint.

2) Pack light - the less stuff you have to futz with, the better. On the flipside, you don't want to be wearing the same pants for five days. Just don't plan on the luxury of being able to dress according to mood.

3) Abandon your sense of privacy. It is very difficult to be alone in a hostel, especially if you book a bed in the "24-bed male/female" room. This can make going to the showers a little tricky (private stalls, though, so rest easy), but if you plan ahead and make a "bathroom bundle" out of your towel and delicates, it's not too big a deal (but, oh yeah, bring flip flops!). Also, the sooner you get over having to share a couch with a stranger in order to have a good read, the sooner you'll be able to have a comfy seat by the fireplace. If you want to avoid talking to people, bring headphones. See below:

4) Bring appropriate earware. Earplugs for the night-time, headphones for the daytime, or while your walking to wherever you're going. The earplugs are especially important, since there are perhaps a dozen things that will conspire to keep you up at night, if you don't. Snoring is the most obvious of these. If you spend a considerable amount of time in a hostel, the number of people you share a room with who seem to have, or to have developed, the capacity to out-snore a pack of bears will truly shock you. That's only a mild exaggeration. The principle of night-time earware carries over to eyeware, as well. Flashlights, though they cast a less ubiquitous beam than a room light, are still visible to nearly everything in the room and can be a major annoyance when your bunkmates are waving them around at 3:00am looking for their toothbrush.

5) Get up early. It's good for you, and you'll have first pick of bagels at the breakfast bar.

6) Enjoy the experience, for all the weirdness that it is worth. Take advantage of what hostels were made for: providing cheap room and board for people who want to see an interesting place.

7) Appreciate your home when you return there.

End Transmission.

2008-01-09T21:21:00.000-08:00

Okay, people need to take ten minutes and see this.
Especially if you are one of those people who is aware of the fact that Mike Huckabee is running for president.

2008-01-07T18:58:00.000-08:00

Alright, Napalm readers, welcome to 2008: Year of the Napalm.

Just kidding.

So an awful lot has happened since I blogged last, and most of it bears mention, but I'm looking for some kind of common thread to unite it all so that y'all don't have to read nine screens worth of text about me playing my father-in-law at raquetball over the break.

To pique your interest, though, I can tell you about my current status: I'm currently sitting in the "living room" of my beloved hostel here in San Francisco. As I blog, I'm enjoying my $1 dinner of a Nature Valley Oats 'n Honey bar and a Fruit by the Foot - a meager dinner that I somewhat regret settling for in lieu of finishing my half a turkey sandwich that I bought for lunch. On my walk home from work, I gave it to a homeless man, who, when I handed it to him and explained to him that it was a delicious sandwich, asked me, "well....what kind?"

Okay, zoom out a little. I just got a new job with a translation agency in San Francisco. It's a promising company, and a very promising job, so I'm happy about it. I'm happy that I've found a niche in the world for people of my skillset that will allow me to provide for my family. Apparently that's a pretty rare thing in my field, the being financially successful thing, a fact emphasized by the fact that most translators I have met are not the primary breadwinners of their family. But that is neither here nor there.

So I've been up here this week, and part of last week, and perhaps most if not all of next week, learning the ins and outs of the company so that I can work from our Marina abode whilst I finish my education.

And that's all there is to say about it, I think. I mean, truth be told, I could go on and on about it, but perhaps not in blog form. Maybe ask me about it next time you see me or something.

Anyway, it was a good holiday. Lots of Romney time, which was good. My two nephews were awarded (or punished?) with a pair of marshmallow guns to shoot each other with. They're lots of fun. I, myself, was ecstatic about the increase in my book collection, and the collector's edition of Star Trek II, the Wrath of Khan. Sooo nerdy....

My dad and I spent a whole evening passing a scrabble board back and forth as we watched a couple of hours of Planet Earth. Which, if you haven't seen, I highly recommend dimming your lights one weekend, turning off your phone, and watching. We live on a crazy mother of a planet.

The day after Christmas we drove down and had a week with the Larsens. They're a great bunch, and it's clear to see why Sheri is so rabid about moving back there. Yes, I did play racquetball with Gordon, and no, I didn't win.

We also attempted to uphold the Larsen Family Tradition of hot-tubbing in the New Year, with a jump in the freezing cold pool right on the stroke of 12. Well, I had to drive out early, and Gordon had to go to work at 5:30, so all 11 of us decided to celebrate New Years at 12:00, EST. We barely made that, actually, on account of the pool water that overflowed into the hot tub so often that we were freezing our cabooses off. We all thrashed about, trying to find the warm spot, which of course translated into more cold water coming into the tub. Ah, it was a great time. Good memory for the kids, ya know?

Anywho, Jan. 1st I caravan-ed back to Cali with our friends the Toons (no jokes, please), and now, here I am.

Since my return, it's been a pretty introspective time, as I've been away from my wife and child, and I've had plenty of time to sit on my duff and ponder about my weird little universe.

And, sorry to disappoint, but I haven't really come up with anything really profound or insightful to say, other than that I think that it's good for people to interact with humans on a regular basis. On a social level, I mean. After a whole day in the car, followed by five days of pretty much work and sleep and talking to the dog, I've caught myself doing some awfully peculiar things.

1) I've counted up to 100,000,000,000 using binary (not as hard as it sounds, actually)

2) I figured out the following: If you estimate that Sheri and I and Siena will each live for one hundred years (a figure that's more for mathematical convenience than for anything else), and if you equate that century to a period of 365 days, I have lived up until nearly midnight on April 19; Sheri is passing the afternoon sometime on March 29th, and Siena is just approaching midnight on Jan. 1st. I did the math several days ago, so I may not be remembering too accurately how it all worked out.

3) I've mapped out my radio so that you can listen to NPR all the way from Salt Lake to Vegas to San Francisco

4) And lastly, I've had no problem in telling everyone about all of this.

Even more amazing is the songs that have gone through my head. Isn't it weird what songs your brain pulls out of nowhere to entertain you while you walk or type or do anything? I mean, the theme song to I Dream of Jeanie, Phantom of the Opera, old cello pieces that I don't even remember the names of; the most constant, though, is the music that comes out of this little glowing plastic star that Siena likes to watch. It cycles through about a dozen classical pieces, all simplified down to this electronic-style stuff. It plays the most hypnotizing version of "Minuet #3" by Bach. It gets stuck in my head at least once a day.

Alright, so that's enough for now. I miss my family.

End transmission.

2007-12-17T17:57:00.000-08:00

This will probably be my last missive this year. So I'd better make it count, right?

Well, first things first, it's Beethoven's birthday today. As a musician, it's interesting to me that there is really no other composer that evokes such a positive response from people, musicians or not, than Beethoven. So here's a little game to play:

The Beethoven Quiz:

1) What famous Beethoven piece is this:

Ba-ba-ba-bummmmmmmm!
Ba-ba-ba-bummmmmmmmmm!

2) What did Beethoven himself say that musical phrase was supposed to sound like?

3) Beethoven's 9th Symphony is also known as:
--- -- ---

Hint: for a lot of people, this is one of the first songs they learn on the guitar.

4) Which one of his five senses did Beethoven lack by the end of his life?

5) What nationality was Beethoven?

6) What famed 1980's Keanu Reeves movie featured Mr. 'thoven playing three synthesizers in a California mall?

Okay, before you scroll down to read the answers, here's some pieces of trivia: Beethoven is the second of who in classical music circles are known as the "Three B's." Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms. I've now cited two of their birthdays on this blog. Can you name the other one? Okay, that's not a quiz question. Anyway, all three are highly good, and worth checking out. Other B composers are: Berlioz, Bartok, Barber, Bernstein, Borodin...you get the picture.

Another bit of trivia: Though Beethoven was deaf, his condition was compounded by the fact that he was a certain kind of deaf. Instead of falling into a world that was drenched in silence, Beethoven's ears were constantly filled with a "deafening" roar, which plagued him until his death. They say he would often go into "black moods," and destroy everything in his apartment. Hey, wouldn't you? To overcome his disability, he cut the legs off of his piano, and he would lie down and press his ear against the floor and bang as hard as he could on the keys so that he could hear at least a little of the song he was playing.

Okay, here are the answers:

1) The 5th Symphony
2) Fate knocking on the door (can you hear it?)
3) Ode to Joy
4) He was deaf.
5) German, though he studied and had his career in Austria.
6) Bill and Ted's excellent adventure.

If you won, give yourself a pat on the Bach. Bwa ha!

In other news, Siena has her first little head cold. Poor babe. Is it mean that I think that her sad little cries are cute?

Alright, see you after the holidays, peeps. I feel a little guilty about how little I've "Christmas-ed" on the blog this year, so....um....Merry Christmas.

End Transmission.

2007-12-13T13:14:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas, Trekkies!
(and LOTR fans, too)
(and especially fans of both)

End Transmission.

2007-12-09T19:33:00.000-08:00

A wider view of the 'hood in Bethlehem...

Merry Christmas!

2007-12-06T17:58:00.000-08:00

On the way home from the pediatrics office today, Sheri and I were comparing the rules that we used to play that "perdiddle" game by. You know, the look-for-cars-with-one-headlight game that you used to play as a teenager. Anyway, I was astounded to find the vast differences that the game was played by just between Northern and Southern Utah. Check it out:

My rules: Cars with one headlight were called perdiddles, and were worth one kiss. Cars with one taillight were called perdunkles, and were worth ten kisses. In order to claim a perdiddle or a perdunkle, you would have to be the first to kiss your palm and smack it against the ceiling of the car. Once you gained a hundred kisses, you won the game and could "cash in" with a girl you fancied. Later on, instead of kissing your palm, my friends came up with this semi-complicated smacking rhythm that you would have to do against the dashboard and windshield: two down, one up, one down. No kissing of your palm was necessary.

Sheri's rules: Cars with one headlight meant for people to shout out, "sex!" and do the same hand-kissing-ceiling-smacking ceremony as described above. Cars with four headlights meant for people to shout, "four-play!" and do the dashboard thing: one down, one up, three side to side. A "four-play" with one light out meant for people to shout, "menage-a-trois!" and do the same down-up-side-side thing. If you were the last in the car to smack or claim, five times in a row, you had to get out and run around the car at the next red light. There was no "cash-in" system in the Southern Utah version, at least as far as Sheri could recall.

Does anybody else remember any other rules?

End Transmission.

2007-12-01T14:17:00.000-08:00

Here are two videos that more people in the world need to see. The first one, I think, is pretty accessible to a wide audience, but will be most appreciated by geeks like myself.

The second is a bit more intrinsic - I had awesome friends in high school who dedicated their time to making movies. PS - Shblogger: any chance we could post "To Have Loved and Lost?" Or that other one about skiing?

The third one is a long-overdue post about my classmates. This video doesn't have all of them in it, but it shows the true spirit of those who are.

End transmission.

2007-11-25T21:27:00.000-08:00

This picture will help put the heading picture from the last post into a little better context.

I had just come back from Spain, and Sheri and I had just moved to Monterey, and it had seriously been about 4 months since my last haircut, so we decided to do these before and after pictures. This is the before, the one from the last post is the after.

Though, in all honesty, this picture is much more representative of what my brain is doing now.

Over this "Holiday" weekend, my company had a little attack. It's a long story, but in a nutshell, a project that we had committed to translate by Monday suddenly expanded by a factor of five. 2 documents turned into 11. So Sheri and I forewent going to see Bee Movie on Friday (after a lovely yet uneventful Thanksgiving dinner with our Bishop), and drove down to Carmel Valley, baby in tow, and spent our afternoon working.

The mayhem continued today, and tomorrow the brunt of the work is due to be reviewed (by me) and delivered.

Unfortunately, this is at the same time as when the brunt of my semester comes to a close, an event which includes two finals, two graded assignments, and a class all day this next Saturday. Oh, why didn't I just go to med school?

End transmission.

2007-11-18T21:49:00.000-08:00

I turned the big 29 today.

How was it, you may ask? Do I feel pensive? Reflective? Am I taking stock of the first 29 years of my life, looking at the next 29, hoping to make the best of them? Does it weigh on me that I only have one remaining year of my 20's, that I'm a relatively new husband and a newer father, that I am quickly approaching the entry gate to a promising and fulfilling career, that I'm beginning to feel the downward pressure of time and energy that I can reasonably dedicate to the number of extracurricular activities I have managed to juggle for nearly three decades, that I am coming to the realization that, despite said downward pressure, I am resisting the
temptation to succumb and forsake goals that have haunted me since my early teens, that I am thankful for a wife who supports me in my endeavors and spurs me to act, to grow and live well, and, in essence, to "crap or get off the pot," to put it crassly, in regards to such goals and dreams, and that, due to this modern age that we live in, 29 isn't all that bad, after all? Do I have an increased sense of mortality that urges me to strengthen my personal relationships, with my beautiful and caring wife and our newborn daughter, with my siblings and parents (highlight this one due to physical distance), with my friends, both old and new, scattered across the continent?

Nah. I'm not in my 30's yet.

Well, maybe a little.

ps- isn't that a scary picture? It makes me look like an ex-con.

End transmission.

2007-11-08T10:33:00.000-08:00

This is Ash. It's been a while since he's had an entire post dedicated to him; now seems like the most appropriate time, since both my beautiful wife and beautiful child are in St George this week.

And no, this isn't a picture of Ash sitting on the couch. It's a picture of Ash sitting on me sitting on the couch.

Anyway. Here's a story about what a responsible dog he is. Last night I'm watching the teevee, and Ash is sleeping in his bed in the other room. I look up from my homework to the sound of what I can only describe as the sound someone would make stomping through knee-deep mud wearing heavy rubber boots. Much to my surprise, Ash comes running around the corner, gagging (hence the sound), and gives me a desperate look in the eye that says, "I really don't want to do this to your carpet."

So I jump up, run to the back door, and let him out into the back yard. And sure enough, about 10 seconds later, I hear a big, KAAAAACK!!! And then Ash comes running back in, gets a drink, and goes back to bed.

What a great dog! Now, if only I could transfer that knowledge instantly to my baby girl, once she starts eating solids.

End Transmission.

2007-10-30T20:14:00.000-07:00

Sheri and I just survived our second California earthquake!

About five minutes ago, our windows started to rattle and it felt like someone was parking a back-hoe in our parking lot. About ten seconds later, it felt like we were on a boat and our blinds were swaying back and forth.

"Is this an earthquake?"

"It sure feels that way."

"What do we do?"

"I dunno. Nothing's really falling off the walls, yet, I suppose."

"This is exciting!"

"I know!"

"Is it still going on?"

"I'm not sure!"

And on and on like that for another few seconds.

After jumping online, we found out that it was a 5.6-er, up north past San Jose.

2007-10-30T10:13:00.000-07:00

Today is this guy's birthday. Can you guess who?

(cue Jeopardy music)

Time's up: John Adams.

Did you know that it was John Adams who finally made everyone seriously consider American independence, after giving a 2-hour-long, noteless speech before the continental congress? And that it was he who recommended George Washington to lead the US troops? And that he asked Thomas Jefferson to write the Declaration of Independence?

John Adams, Project Manager for the creation of the USA.

Oh yeah, and it's also the birthday of Ezra Pound. Look him up.

End Transmission.

2007-10-28T17:28:00.000-07:00

I have no specific purpose in blogging today, save the fact that I haven't posted in such a long time.

So what should I say? Should I reiterate what a crazy adventure school has been, and still is (I have this one professor who asked me, when I gifted him a cup of coffee that someone had gifted to me, "would Seinfeld drink that?" I still don't know a) what he meant by it, and b) what my response would be.)?

Should I talk about the greater adventure of fatherhood, and how much I love my daughter despite the fact that I'll never get a full night's sleep ever again (no way, because she's such a cute and patient baby, and she cries and fusses so little, that I truly could not expect a better child.)?

How about something halloween themed? I love Halloween. I think I get it from my mother. I, like my sister, think that my mom should win some kind of Lifetime Achievement award for her Halloween costumes, including this one that actually made my sister cry: it's a costume she called the Read Death, after the character in the famed literary work, Mask of the Read Death. She put on a long, black wig, painted her face ghostly white with seriously chilling red lines all around her eyes, and sewed a long, red cape; but here's the kicker - she rented a pair of plasterer's stilts, and spent days learning how to walk around on them in costume, so that she became this near 7-foot tall horror to behold. I'm telling you, it's disturbing to be that scared of your own mother. She went to serious lengths to scare the poop out of her high school students, none of whom ever recognized her on Halloween.

There's a story about a film-maker going to the ultimate lengths to make his film believable. For those of you who are squeamish, I'd stop reading here. So there's this film called something like Cannibal Apocalypse. I think it's Italian. Anyway, the premise of the film is that a film crew, while doing a documentary on a tribe of cannibals, goes missing. So the producer journeys down to jolly ol' Africa, or wherever, and bargains with the tribe for the film cannisters. The rest of the film is him watching the film reel watching what happened to these guys. Apparently it's pretty grim. But the genius of the film-maker (the real one) was this: when filming finished, he actually made the actors who die in the film sign a contract saying that they wouldn't appear in public for a year. He even bought them plane tickets to New York and saw them off at the airport. Well, a few months after the film was released the guy got sent to court and tried for murder because everyone was convinced that the thing was real. And so, he had to fly in the actors and have them appear, finally, so that he wouldn't get sent to jail. Epilogue - there apparently are a number of shots in the film that still remain a mystery to film-makers everywhere: no one to this day can figure out how this guy faked it, and there are many, many people who still believe that the film is real, and that the actors that appeared in court were clever lookalikes. Is it real? Who knows! Mw-ha haaaa!

End Transmission.

2007-10-10T21:19:00.000-07:00

So many interesting adventures to discuss. I'll just share two from the two worlds I spend the most time in: fatherhood and studenthood.

1) Tonight Sheri had her first night out. She went to a Pampered Chef party. And I decided that, after three days of being cooped up in the house with our little bundle of joy, she should do it alone.

So anyway, Siena woke up at around 7:45, starved to death, and with good reason because it had been a good 3 hours since she had eaten. So I started to get her bottle ready.

And Siena got mad.

I hurried to get the bottle warmed up as fast as I could, and I tried to keep her hanging in with her pacifier, alternating it with the end of my pinky finger whenever I had a free hand (she likes the pinky better, you see), and I was finally able to get it ready. And I gave her the bottle.

And Siena got mad.

About as mad as she's ever been in her short 12 days of life. As confused as ever, I wrestled with her to see if I could get the bottle into a different position in her mouth; I tried to see if the bottle was too cold or hot; I tried just about everything I could darn well think of.

Except for checking to see if the nipple had a hole in the end.

Which, I found out shortly afterward, it didn't. So, I carefully (and wisely) stowed my daughter in her bouncy chair whilst I took the tip of a knife and corrected the situation. All was well.

Now, my question is this: what kind of simpleton designs a bottle without a hole in it?

Why, people, why?

Am I just cranky from loss of sleep, coupled with a negative customer-service experience at the local Pizza Hut (not a story interesting enough to concern yourself with)?

Come on, people!

2) I half wish that I could go back to my undergraduate studies to test the following theory. Perhaps you readers can confirm this:

It seems that in every semester of schooling, regardless of your field of study, location, or size of your tuition payments, you are bound to have classes with three individuals.

Individual a: The Queen. As the title suggests, this is usually a girl (I emphasize usually.) whose normal speech volume is the envy of the livestock auctioning world. In class, you find that, for some reason, she has extensive experience in any subject matter your professors may touch upon - it's as if she moonlights as a stockbroker yet has come to spend tens of thousands of dollars at your prestigious place of learning to take a class in beginning accounting. Not only that, you are privvy to every iota, every angstrom, every mote of knowledge she possesses, related to the class matter or not, either as she raises her hand every couple of minutes to relate to her professors some story or opinion or book she's read about whatever, or as she speaks to the classmates in her closest proximity all class long, to explain to them the parts of the lecture they missed because they were trying to wrap their brain around what she herself was saying. Watch out for the Queen.

Individual b: The Logician. This is usually (again, emphasis on the disclaimer) a male. His title is ironical, as the Logician is totally and completely unable to wrap his head around the most basic principals of living and breathing as a human. His eyes usually have a certain clouded quality, and he usually speaks haltingly, with one hand in the air at about head-level. Do not be fooled, however. I have run into two Logicians in my postgraduate career. One fit the general physical description above, while the other would have fooled you for at least an hour: bright-eyed, well-spoken, but hiding a low-watt bulb behind the bright exterior. Ask the Logician the grammatical intricacies of his second language, and you will be regaled for hours; try and explain to the Logician why the Mailman is the one to pick up your letters, and you are instantly in a quagmire of a million questions. Furthermore, the Logician may feel passionately about strange subjects, and said passion may flare up at completely unexpected or inappropriate times. He may also be under the perpetual impression that you have misunderstood his every question, immediately after you have given the entire class a satisfactory answer. He jumps to conclusions that are either completely obvious ("So if you see the sun outside...it's daytime?"), or miles away ("So if you hear hooves running toward you, it must be a baboon, cleverly deceiving you by wearing false giraffe feet?"). The following story is true: In this one class, we were given a scheduling problem - if a desktop publisher has 20 pages to publish, and can do one page an hour, how many normal work days can you expect him to take to finish? Asks the Logician, "Well, can't we reasonably expect him to finish in one day? How do we know that this guy isn't a total work-a-holic?" Okay, I exagerate, but only a little. The Logician will make you want to tear your fingernails off. Many times, he will begin his sentences like this: "SSSSSSoooooooooooooooo......."

Individual c: The Professional. This person falls in the middle of the previous two categories. They are not loud speakers, necessarily, like the Queen, nor are they completely insane, like the Logician. They have the dangerous combination of a dangerous dose of insanity mixed with the conviction that they couldn't possibly ever be wrong, despite being told so by people who have been teaching the subject of study longer than the Professional has been breathing air. The Professional is easy to spot as they will confront your professors about every educational minutia, regardless as to whether the Professional is in the wrong or not, and regardless as to the obviousness of their wrongness. The wrongness happens often, and the obviousness is looming, to the point where it frequently becomes uncomfortable for you and your classmates to watch the Professional kick against the spines of empirical fact. In many instances, such arguments may occur over pieces of information that are entirely new to the Professional. Why do they argue? I don't know.

Beware these three individuals. They're out there, and your mental stability is at risk.

End rant.

2007-10-07T18:44:00.000-07:00

My father-in-law showed me this video over the weekend.

This guy is one crazy dude. Or was, rather, before he died, poor guy. But not in this video. Though he did die doing something similar.

Okay, enough jibber-jabber. Prepare to have your toes curl up so hard you'll be able to scratch your shoulders:

End crazy-a transmission.

2007-10-03T15:35:00.000-07:00

Dah, dah dah daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!

PRESENTING...

Siena Ann Romney!

Who, as of today, will have her own blog for photos, news, and general unbelievable cuteness. Check it out!

2007-09-24T15:31:00.000-07:00

That's right. My wife is pregnant.

In other news, here's a clip from an awesome IM conversation that I had with someone today. I've hidden the names to protect the innocent.

Me: something something.

Them: That's awesome. That totally made my dad.

Me: Made your dad?

Them: Day. Sorry, typo. Give me a bread.

2007-09-09T20:55:00.001-07:00

Sheri is becoming uncomfortable to the point where she is actively trying to induce labor.

Here is a video of the most popular method:

2007-08-31T11:18:00.000-07:00

Alright, napalmreaders. I've just had my mind melted by the Lackhead (aka the contributor of the Sesame Street clip below that I stole from him, to whom I owe a correction, because our social circles do overlap a little, which is how we've come to know each other).

So, in the spirit of publishing the unbelievably wacky, let's take a poll - which one is the bigger mind trip - the video you can see in the link above, or the video below?

WARNING - watching the two simultaneously may cause seizures of getting totally weirded out, overload, or you may just waste your entire weekend with the many, many, many viewings just to make sure you DID see them.

End Transmission, Continue with Disbelief.

2007-08-29T16:28:00.000-07:00

So a couple of posts ago I commented on the irony of Tori Spelling's outrage at the violation of her privacy caused by members of the paparazzi, all whilst being filmed 24 hours a day. Well, as if Heaven itself reached down to hand me a slice of Humble Pie, I was recently made aware of a couple of other ironic tidbits in my own life:

1) There's this band called Maroon 5 that some of you may have heard or read about. Poppy, youthful, successful, they proudly wear the seal of approval stamped upon them by the MTV generation on their sleeve.

I don't really take to them. Granted, I don't really take to much that's on the radio nowadays (in fact I arrogantly live my musical life by the adage, if it's on the radio, it's not worth listening to), but I took a particular disliking to the Maroon Quintet when I really started listening to what they sing about. Good heavens! I didn't expect to hear such tales that would even make Howard Stern blush.

So one day one of their songs comes on the radio, and I'm just not in the mood. I may say something to the effect of "what is this world coming to putting such teeny-bopper grunge nastiness on the airwaves. I don't know how kids today listen to this stuff without paying attention to the misogynistic lyrics." So to calm myself, I put in a CD. What do I put in? That's right: the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Ever hear the lyrics to a RHCP song? Oops! (for further musical commentary and argument, please see the comments page to this post.)

Moral: glass houses, kids.

2) A couple posts back I was commenting how busy my life is about to become. Six days and counting, by the way. Secretly, I have been wishing that I didn't have to work so much so that I could have a little breathing room in my schedule.

In the mean time, the president of the company, along with the director of my department, have been creating positions and interviewing people for those positions that would effectively eliminate their need for me to work for them anymore. What am I going to be thinking in a few weeks? Gee, I wish I could work more so that we could have a little financial breathing room.

Moral: Be careful what you wish for, kids.

Which brings us, and more to the point, me, to an interesting crossroads. My company is actually offering me a full-time position, on the condition (of course) that I take a leave of absence from school. I am completely torn down the middle as to what to do. Any advice? Please?

End Long-Winded Transmission.

2007-08-29T12:43:00.000-07:00

Shark Attack!

This happened like ten minutes' WALK from our house. Not that I expect to have to beat the sharks off of our front porch, now, or anything, but STILL.

2007-08-27T16:43:00.000-07:00

Reality TV is about the funniest thing on the planet to me. I just don't get it. I must not be their target demographic.
Here's a re-enactment of a ten-second clip that I recently saw on the show featuring Tori Spelling and her beaux:

Tori runs out of the house.

"What is it? What's the matter?"

Camera pans from Tori to Tori's husband as he comes stomping across the one-acre yard, absolutely purple in the face.

"Can you believe it? A photographer!"

Tori, off-camera: "A what?!?!"

Husband, finally having crossed the field: "A $#$^$ photographer, on our property! I can't believe it. The nerve! The violation of our privacy!"

Tori: "Oh, no! Where was he?"

Husband points, camera pans over to where husband points: a copse of trees on the other side of the lake on the far side of the acre lawn.

"Right over there, in those trees. Can you believe it? A cameraman on our property, taking pictures of us!"

I change the channel.

2007-08-21T12:50:00.000-07:00

Here's an old Sesame Street clip that I have to admit I stole from another friend's blog, but seeing as he and I don't have overlapping social circles, I think it's okay that I rebroadcast this greatness.

I'm the one with the hair.

So I'm exactly ten business days from re-entry. Into school, that is. I expect to be quite busy:

1) I'll be working 20 hours a week at my current job
2) I'm going to be working 6-10 additional hours as a TA for this one computer class
3) I'm going to squeeze in 16 hours of class somewhere in there, about half in the week and the other half as weekend seminars - luckily this activity doubles as exercise, as I'll be riding my bike the 10 miles from home to school as much as I can.
4) Sheri and I will become parents about half way through the semester (right in time for mid terms, I think) to a child who has shown every sign of being a full-time track star right out of the womb.

It's all coming, sooner than I think.

I'm not complaining - I mean, I'm the one who signed up to do all this stuff in the first place, and there's not one part of it that I'm not looking forward to, but at the same time busy-ness has its drawbacks. Like being incredibly, incredibly busy, for example. After the "leisurely" summer I've had working full time and caring for my darling pregnant sweetheart of a wife, it kind of feels like I'm standing against a wall waiting for a bare-knuckle punch from an Evander Holyfeld-type heavyweight.

End Transmission.

2007-08-20T13:47:00.000-07:00

Alright, so Concours is over, and since most of the sweeet rides that I saw were on the freeway and I couldn't get the camera out fast enough as they passed me, here are some pics of the highlights. There were:

LOADS of these:

As well as tons of other cool ones like these:

The highlight, for me at least, was that on two occasions I saw a truck hauling around the Ferris Buhler & Cameron Fry Dreamcar: The 1961 Ferrari 250 GT California:

Just passing it on the freeway gave me the urge to rub it with a diaper, and afterward get a nice stretch limo with a teevee and-a bar to drive around in.

Anyway, apparently the $200 entry fee (along with a $75 brochure) gets you a peek at more than simple Ferraris. The real showpieces all arrived, and left, in large trailers, their tires never to touch Monterey asphalt. Here's a picture of the winner of "Best In Show":

An interesting story about this Duzenberg. It's known as the "Mormon Meteor." Once owned by Salt Lake mayor Ab Jenkins, it held the 24-hour speed record in 1935 and was sold in 2004 for a record $4.4 million. Just in case you were curious. Anyway.

Let's see, anything else going on?

I've found a cool bunch of single-track mountain bike trails that I've taken to riding. Frankly, I didn't think I'd ever really find anything that geographically interesting to ride out here, but these provide plenty of hills for my fat bottom, plus the occasional sand pit, so that you can be cruising down a nice slope and then all of a sudden find your front wheel 4 inches in the ground. good stuff. Oh yeah, and I sat on my pouf the other day and squashed a spider. That was gross.

Sher's still doing fine. We're all extremely anxious for the Arrival. Especially Ash. You can see it in his eyes.

End Transmission.

2007-08-17T12:22:00.000-07:00

So this weekend is "Concorso" here in Monterey, the annual world-famous car show. You know, I'm not much of a gear-head, but some of these cars driving around are really neat. I saw a "Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang" car today, and a line, a long line of Red Ferraris from twenty or thirty years ago. That was fun, and besides them I've seen probably a million other high-end sports cars driving around. You know, it's funny - you know it must be a high-class event when the passing modern sportscars become unimpressive.

2007-08-06T19:00:00.000-07:00

RANDOM PHOTO UPDATE

Picture #1: Cute Pregnant Lady!!!!

Picture #2: "You're Good Ash! ...And I'm Sad Ash..."

p.s. - If you don't get that joke, run to a video store immediately and rent Army of Darkness and get edumacated. Which is a funny thing about video stores here in Monterey versus good ol' Salt Lake: Salt Lakers must be much more avid movie buffs, because frankly the average selection at any local Blockbuster really stinks. They don't have Sneakers, can you believe? Sneakers! The outrage. And forget about trying to find anything at Hollywood Video. Browsing through the Comedy section, I once saw The Passion of the Christ right beside Halloween. But I digress. Ash was very sad that day, but was cheered by a bonus chew treat in his bowl that afternoon.

And now, the conclusion of the Saga of the Romney Lawn:

Before:

A better representation:

After:

If you look closely, you can see Ash peeking out of his house in the upper left-hand corner, as if to say, "Any one of you primates even touches me..."

This was quite a journey, the kind that you can't really document in pictures. When we moved in to this place last November, our yard was little more than a sandbox with a dead scrub brush in the middle of it. After a couple months of sheer and complete neglect, the grass had grown so high that we could see the tips of it level with the kitchen window. We hacked it all down, then hacked it way down, reseeded, fertilized, bought a powerless mower, and watered until our neighbors called the cops. That last bit didn't happen. Anyway, it's a joy to walk out there in bare feet, now, and Ash is very content.

In other news, Margaret and the Girls spent last week here, which was full of fun and games. If any of you have not been to the San Francisco Exploratorium I highly recommend it, regardless of your age. As stupid as it is now that I've posted all of the above pictures, we didn't pull out the camera once while they were here. So here's a pic of them at their last visit:

End Transmission.

2007-08-01T13:33:00.000-07:00

As the late (?) great Joe Jackson said, Everything Gives you Cancer.

So the computer in my office is right on the other side of the wall from the break room , and where my head usually is is right on the other side of the wall from the microwave. Now for the past few months, I could tell when someone was using the microwave, because my computer screen would jiggle a little bit. Now I always assumed that this was due mainly to the fact that my computer and the microwave shared some wiring, or something.

I began to think differently, however, when I started to get really bad headaches, like two and three times a week. Well, I decided to play the "caution" card, and I took the initiative to rearrange the break room so that the microwave is now on another wall. Mind you, I did not have to move the cord to the microwave at all.

I haven't had a headache since.

My computer screen doesn't jiggle anymore.

Should I be:

1) Relieved because I'm no longer receiving microwaves to the brain, or

2) Alarmed, because, contrary to my earlier suspicions, I've been getting microwaved all along?

ps- I think The Bad Plus have a similar yet distinct effect on head/brain areas, because the past two times I have listened to one of their albums in the car, I've come out with my left ear completely stopped up.

2007-07-27T10:47:00.000-07:00

Embarrassing moment of the week:

So I put my daily energy drink in the freezer this morning, thinking about how great it would be to have a slurpee with my lunch. Well, as always happens, I forgot about it, and the thing froze - not completely, but not far from it.

Anyway, so I'm in my office shaking and rolling this thing around, and I open it up so that I can push in the little bit of frozen energy drink from the lid so as to access the melted guarana and passionfruit goodness inside. What did I forget? That the thing was full to capacity, and I mean CAPACITY, as in not even a little air bubble under the lid as usually happens with bottled drinks, and so when I pushed in the little cylinder of ice, a jet of orange liquid covered me, my desk, and my chair, in such a way that it now appears that I had an "accident" on my jeans and on my chair. Oh, the shame.

The good news is that there's still 85-90% of the home made slurpee left to enjoy.

In other news, do you know who I saw on the news yesterday? Talk about an unlikely pair of people to be sitting next to each other, chatting: Jon Voight and Oliver North. What the?!?!?!?

2007-07-23T12:48:00.000-07:00

Okay, so it's been an exciting week.

In the first place, this weekend Monterey Peninsula was host to both a major bullet-bike race (hit play on your copy of Al Hirt doing his cover of "Flight of the Bumblebees"), and the Salinas Rodeo (pronounce Ro-day-o), which amounted to, for those of us who didn't attend either one, increased yet somehow enjoyable traffic, as hives of motorcycle enthusiasts, riding everything from the largest highway bike to the meanest 80cc, zipped up and down the freeway, through the town, and over the lovely canyon road that Sheri and I take to work. Though the bikers were out in droves, I didn't see an increase in the number of horsey enthusiasts, though that could be that they just blend in better with the local peeps.

What kept Sheri and I so busy that we chose not to patronize said events? That's right, installment seven of Everyone's Favorite Secret Crush, Mr. Harry Potter. We originally had planned to digest this final tome nice and slow, so as to savor the outcome of the crazy story, but two days in and we've already blown it. We're more than half way through, and Sheri has accidentally seen a couple of things at the end that I forbade her to tell me about. I've got some cute pictures of my preggers wife that I'll post soon.

Speaking of pregnancy and related events, one of my favorite morning past times has become putting my hand on Sheri's tummy before she wakes up and feeling little Sweet Pea play the drums against the port side of Sheri's uterus. She's got impeccable rhythm, I tell you. I can't wait to meet her. She's going to be one jazzy babe. I'm never going to sleep again.

Let's see...anything else? Oh, yeah. I got published! Ch-ch-check it out. And Sheri and I watched "The Odd Couple" over the weekend, which seems like it would be much funnier as a play. I think that Walter Matthau was born looking like an old geezer.

End Transmission

2007-07-13T12:38:00.000-07:00

I think NPR is turning into a comedy station. I keep hearing these comedic gems to and from work. My question is what sort of demographic NPR is aiming at.

On the one hand, you have very high-brow, news-savvy humor, straight from the horse's mouth:

Condolezza Rice: "I wouldn't call the efforts in Iraq a faliure, no. And I wouldn't say that none of the recommended policies have been implemented. There are a couple that definitely have been considered. I would call them a work in progress. There are definitely a small number of areas in which the forces are making some headway in a small scope of efforts."

And on the other hand, you have the lowest-brow, most juvenile humor on the market:

Conversation between (The) Mr Rogers and a Mercury 7 astronaut:

"So how do you go to the potty on your way to the moon? A young friend of mine wrote to me, he was very concerned about that."

"Well, it's a lot like it is here on earth; it's just when you make a BM, you keep it in a plastic bag."

Be honest. Which one made you laugh harder? Remember, that was the Mr. Rogers.

2007-07-07T17:37:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure my profile photo gives people an accurate picture of me.

Here's a better picture:

This is how I looked growing up:

This is my wife, Sheri:

Coming in October, our daughter, Siena (hopefully she won't be this big when she's born:

And, this is how I'll probably look in about 30, 40 years:

End Transmission.

2007-07-02T19:17:00.000-07:00

Several items to report this session, most of them from our trip to sunny Vegas to see Sheri's cousin get married. Let's get going:

1) Sheri's cousin got married. We drove to Vegas to see it.

2) All in all, it was a very enjoyable vacation. I'm usually not a big fan of Vegas, and I find myself getting tired of all the humanity there after a couple of hours; I mean the mindless entertainment, the nonstop driving you to spend and forget your troubles. It didn't help when, at the Hilton where we stayed, our bellboy kept saying in this dead, droning voice,
"ALL SHALL BE ASSIMILATED..."

Just kidding. It was a lot of fun.

Highlights of the trip:

a) see above photo
b) riding the Manhattan Express rolly-coaster
c) a great moment of nostalgia: When The Shblogger and the Boy who was a Ferre and I went to Vegas when we were sixteen (I still don't know how I talked my mom and dad into letting me do that) we spent a proper day or two in the arcades at Circus Circus and the Luxor building up our stockpile of arcade tickets, which we blew entirely on little green army men (note: these brave soldiers all met a dramatic fate when we put them under our windshield wipers on the way home and watched them blow away, one by one [or by the bunch, if we needed to get something off the windshield]). Well, this time 'round, my wife, my mother in law, my sister and two brothers in law did a near re-enactment, blowing our tickets this time on six matching wristwatches that didn't light up enough for you to be able to see what time it was.
d) The wedding was cool.

3) Sheri's mom threw her a baby shower the day after we arrived in St. George. One thing's for sure - our pea will be the best-dressed little bean on the PLANET. Thanks to everybody, especially Debbie, who put the shindig together, and to my parents, who took time out of their AMAZINGLY busy "retirement" schedule to come down and say hello.

4) We had a bit of car trouble over the course of the trip: Jeers to the Honda mechanic who kept me waiting (and eating doughnuts) four hours for a simple diagnostic on my car, and who was prepared to charge me $1500 for replacing my ABS system (not my abs, which do need an overhaul, expecially after all them doughnuts, blush) when it didn't need to be replaced. Cheers to the Honda mechanics here in Monterey, who ended up digging a little deeper and charging me about a tenth of that to fix the real problem, and who was willing to drive me and Sheri to and from work today.

5) I was on the phone with said wife today when we both looked around in search of the person who was rolling a boulder outside our respective offices. It took us a couple of seconds to realize that we had just survived our first California earthquake. 4.3, 25 miles away.

End Transmission.

2007-06-25T09:44:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago Theta Naught played at the lovely and local Monterey Live, which, in my opinion was a top-notch joint, even though attendance to our particular show was..um...low.

Anyway, I'm proud to announce that Theta Naught has joined an elite group by performing in the same venue as none other than the lovely, the talented:

Mandy Moore.

2007-06-24T17:30:00.000-07:00

Photo journal: The Furniture
Sheri lookin' good whilst taking on The Dresser Assembly

Pete hands off the camera and picks up the screwdriver

The finished products:

Ash, what's your take on the whole thing?

Then, the following weekend:

Pete vs. The Lawn. The teams, Pete and Grond, the powerless mower:

versus

Oh yes. The results:

Well, better not show you quite yet.

Ash, your opinion?

End Transmission.

2007-06-21T09:52:00.000-07:00

Hmmm. I suppose you could say that the Doldrums of Summer have officially arrived here on the Monterey Peninsula. The newest, most exciting piece of news that has happened here lately: My co-worker across the hall brought doughnuts in to work this morning, and I had one. It was chocolate frosted, and delicious.

Oh yeah, and Sheri and I have started to acquire baby furniture. We spent a couple of weeks crossing our fingers for a cheap deal on a crib on Craigslist or ebay or somewhere, but we finally cracked when we saw an entire bedroom set, complete with crib, changing table and dresser, for the unbelievable price of $200 from, you guessed it, WalMart.
My personal fears of purchasing WalMart furniture were assuaged when I brought them up to the three mothers and two other ladies that I work with, who, upon hearing the price, immediately and simultaneously said, "Buy it." One of them went on to add that who cares if the stuff is made out of cardboard - you're not looking to keep it forever, and the baby's going to make a mess out of it anyway.
So we bought it, and spent last Friday with a pizza and a set of alan wrenches putting it together. The results: pretty impressive, actually. Sure, it's made out of something slightly softer than balsa wood (remember the derby days, boy scouts? I could carve a car shape into that block of wood with a spoon...), and the edges on the crib need a little sanding, but the color is great, and they're light to move around, and they'll probably last just as long as we need them. It's easy to get your money's worth out of something that doesn't cost very much. Hats off to Simplicity Designs.
Well, that's about it. I suppose I could entertain with a couple of limericks that the IDFL boys and I traded yesterday. On the other hand, they were pretty PG-13, as limericks tend to be, and a couple of them are pretty rooted in obscure Star Trek references, so...maybe next time.

End Transmission

2007-06-11T14:16:00.000-07:00

Isn't it wonderful to converse every once in a while with people who appear to have entirely lost their sense of logic? I'm in contact with this person who just about every time I talk to her completely blows my mind by the strange, outlandish connections that she makes between something I say and something completely outside the realm of human understanding. I'll give two examples:

1) She and I talk about the difference between contracting an individual translator and contracting an "outsourcer," or group of translators.

"You know what it's like? You'll get this. This is what it's exactly like. I'll bet this happens to you all the time. It's like you can either take your wife to a restaurant, and she'll either order something she totally loves or totally hates, or you can go to the store and buy like a bunch of frozen meals, and add one or two things to them, so you know, if your wife doesn't like it, you can at least say, 'well, the frozen food wasn't very good to begin with, and I added just a little bit.' Isn't that exactly what it's like? I tell you, that happens all the time."
I stare dumbly.

2) I had a class with her at school. We were in a class with a professor who's son lives in Mexico.

"Isn't it nice just to see him on line every now and again? It's like, at least you know that he's alive and doing something. Unless, of course, like he's had a heart attack and died, or people have killed him and taken over his computer or something like that. You know."

I love it. It's like every time she pops into my office I'm off on this magical journey into Non-Sequitur land. Hooray for strange people.

2007-06-03T19:18:00.000-07:00

Here's a picture of my gorgeous pregnant wife. You are now free to say, "awwwwww." She wants me to tell you that she doesn't really look that big, and that her arm is in the way of her back, so you can't really tell how skinny she still is.
And, for those of you who don't know:

IT'S A GIRL!!!!

The baby, not my wife. Tuesday afternoon we had a very successful ultrasound, where our little girl gave us a front row peek at her nether-regions, as though she was saying, "you BET I'm a girl!" We also got a great picture of her two little hands, a picture of her face, and a shot of her ear. I think she's going to look so much like Sheri the two will be indistinguishable.

As I've been seriously remiss in my blogging duties, I'll give you a report on some other happenings, as well.

Theta Naught came to town over Memorial Day. The joy of playing with those dudes is once again in my veins, and I'm once again scanning the Utah Yellow Pages for companies in Salt Lake (or thereabouts) that I could work for after graduation so that I may once again call myself a full-fledged Naughtian. Hope the rest of the tour went well, boys. And girl.

What else? Oh, yeah, I've been filling in for my boss at work, which is both a lot of fun, and rather challenging. I think I'm due for a vacation after she comes back.

End Transmission.

2007-05-15T08:47:00.001-07:00

Here are some random jokes that I thought were really funny. They involve what are currently the three axes (as in plural of axis, not as in plural of axe) on which my life currently spins (in no particular order): Language, My Cello, My Wife.

This first one comes from the Language Log. Imagine a world in which the perfect language has been invented: no more syntax to remember, no more crummy grammar rules. In fact, the entire language is made up of a single word...

This second one will strike a chord with many cellists.

This link is just funny. And no, my marriage isn't really like this.

End Transmission

2007-05-14T11:25:00.000-07:00

I am an idiot.

2007-05-12T13:05:00.000-07:00

Day four- I think I may have made an important discovery today, and that is that "Neil Young Song" by Hayden isn't actually called that. I think it's this other song called something else on a different album, but I'm not sure.

further investigation to ensue.

2007-05-11T10:04:00.000-07:00

Day three - I nearly abandoned yesterday's theory of things missing, because there are just a couple of songs that don't quite fit in well enough, and I can't seem to define the parameters well enough to make all the lyrics of all the songs that have lyrics plus the one that doesn't, fit.

So I'm playing with a new theory- falling. In Paranoid Android, Rain falls. In Eleanor Rigby, people throw rice (that one's kind of weak, I know). In Recovering the Satellites, well, satellites fall, along with shooting stars. Mad World has tears falling into a glass, Red Rabbits has rabbits falling into a crucible (weird!), and finally I got a category where I Bombed Korea fits. Obviously, bombs fall from the sky. Oh yeah, and Electrical Storm talks about something falling.

But again, there's just one or two little things that don't fit. L'Absente, the prime example, doesn't talk about anything, let alone about anything falling. You could say something musical, like it has a descending chord structure or something, but dude, the Shblogger would get my ultimate props both for his musical acumen and the familiarity he has with the content of his iPod.

Still, given that L'Absente doesn't have any lyrics, it fits best into yesterday's "missing" category. I'm going to play with that one some more and see if I can come up with a concise category to include all the songs.

End Transmission.

2007-05-10T12:19:00.000-07:00

Day two: A new hope

So I lay in bed last night analyzing different possibilities: Were all the songs off of live albums, EP's, singles or foreign releases? No. Was there any correlation between the years of the albums' release? No. All of the band names appear on the album covers, but that's so weak a connection, you might as well say that they all had music in them.

And so I just popped in the CD this morning and tried to relax on the way to work. And then it came to me. The one thing that all the songs have in common. Well kind of. I'd say about half of them explicitly say this word, and the other half just talk about something similar or related. Shall I explain, or wait until tomorrow?

Aw, what the hell. The idea came to me while rocking out to Yann Tiersen's "L'absente," then a few minutes later to Sad Sad World by Sheryl Crow = "It's a sad, sad world without you in it..." and I thought to myself, hey, self, there's something. Both of these songs talk about people not being somewhere. I wonder if other songs have that as well. Sure enough, "Emaline" by Ben Folds talks about not being able to bear life without said girl; "Take me out" by Franz Ferdinand talks about "I know I won't be leaving here without you."

The question is whether or not the theory holds for all the songs. "I bombed Korea" by Cake, "Paranoid Android" by Radiohead and "My Love" by Justin Timberlake seem only to fall loosely into this category. They don't talk about being without someone, but there's definitely something missing in each one. Perhaps after a bit of refinement and fine tuning I can crack this.

End Transmission.

2007-05-09T15:07:00.000-07:00

The sheep is jumping a fence.

I can't wait to play music with the crew again.

The Shblogger just sent me a mix with a challenge: if I figure out the defining theme shared by all 16 songs, I get a special prize. So I thought it'd be fun to document my progress, for the enjoyment of the Shblogger and for anyone else who's interested.

Day 1

I gave an initial listen to the mix on my way to work this morning and jotted down some impressions. Of course, the first conclusion I jumped to would be that all the songs would be linked by some common word or element in the lyrics. Between tracks two and three I thought I had it licked, cause both "Eleanor Rigby" as sung by Aretha Franklin and "Take my Out" by Franz Ferdinand have the word, "lonely" in them. I thought I would have the pleasure of collecting my fee after a mere 20 minutes of work.

However my whole lyrical theory was blown soon thereafter by track #8, "L'absente" by Yann Tiersen. Lyricless. Pure instrumental. It's a nice mix, though. Could it be that the only correlation between all the songs are that the Shblogger thinks they rock?

My next step was to see if there was some musical connection. Like, "each song is paired with one in the key of its minor third." I wrote a list of all the keys the songs are in, and they neither correlate in any way, nor spell anything significant. Afterwards I wrote this theory off due to the unlikelihood that the Shblogger would be able to tell exactly what key the songs were in. Away from his piano, at any rate.

Since then I've been looking for linguistic connections between song and artist, such as "the last letter in the first name of the band is the same as the second word in the song title," and such, but I don't think that that's it. Though if it is something like that, I'll be mad that I thought of it the first day and then wrote it off.

My next step is to correlate track numbers on albums and see if there's any link there. Or perhaps look at the singer's first names, or what they drove, or where the album was produced, or what color hair they all have on the cover, etc, etc.

Facts that may help: The Shblogger has a video iPod. He composed the list from said iPod while driving. He has good musical taste, and can understand French. He has a medical background, a wife and child, and red hair.

2007-05-07T12:30:00.000-07:00

This is the most masterful use of a theriman I have ever seen.

2007-05-01T08:50:00.000-07:00

A very astute cellist from Alaska was the first to notice that my picture of an "Italian dirtbag" was actually Jay and Silent Bob from the movie, "Clerks." Very good! Naturally, they are not Italian, but I thought it was hilarious that the picture of them came up under the google image search for "Italian dirtbag." Kevin Smith, wherever you are, Ciao, Ragazzo.

2007-04-30T11:40:00.000-07:00

What's your preconceived notion of an Italian stereotype? Is it:

a) the sleek professional, never seen in anything but the finest tailored suits, hair slicked back, clean-shaven, cologne detectable from several feet away?

b) the soccer enthusiast, dressed in Fila, Addidas, Nike and Puma gear, still fashionable and clean, but sporting a three day beard and jumping around a bit like he's getting ready for a match?

c) the classic European dirtbag, the guy who looks like he hasn't showered in a week, and who knows how long it's been since he changed his clothes, the kind of guy you wouldn't let your daughter near?

Imagine Sheri's and my astoundment when we saw all three of these dudes walking nearly arm in arm at the mall last Saturday, speaking Italian to one another.

ps- I found each of these pictures by googling "Italian man, Italian sports fan, and Italian dirtbag," and each one surprisingly resembles one of the people we saw.

2007-04-27T15:50:00.000-07:00

Do you remember the part in Star Wars where they're all sitting on the Millennium Falcon and Ben Kinobe has to sit down for a second because of a "great disturbance in the force," which turns out to be the ripple in the universe caused by the destruction of Alderan? (Nerd alert!)
Well call me crazy, and you'd probably be right, but I just haven't felt at all at peace with the world today. Things weren't going right in school, I was increasingly withdrawn and sullen all morning, and I couldn't really put my finger on why. At several moments it's almost like I really did have to pause, and sit down for a second to collect myself.
Then, whilst driving to The Home Depot to buy an old-school weed whacker for the lawn, I heard the terrible news: Cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, Slava to his friends, died in Moscow today at the age of 80. I could go on and on about why this Azerbaijan-born Russian is an icon in the celloing world, but I'll just let you follow the link and read for yourselves, and really, please do, because this is worth reading. Besides, if I attempted to repeat all the facts here, I'd probably get something wrong.
I'll just give you an idea: if you listen to his recordings (downloadable from the link above), one thing that you'll hear is his fierce breathing in the background. Lynn Harrell described the passion of Slava's playing as "a forest fire," and Yo Yo Ma remembers the incredible life force that was behind every performance.
Well, okay, enough weepy-weepy. I'm going to go find a way to be a better human being.

End Transmission.

2007-04-24T20:56:00.000-07:00

Did you know that last week marked the beginning and end of two central literary genres? Last Friday marked the anniversary of the publishing of the first Detective novel, "Murders of the Rue Morgue" by Edgar Allen Poe. Go read it, or something, if you feel inclined to celebrate the occasion.
Last Wednesday, on the other hand, the inventor of Cliffs Notes died. To celebrate this occasion, I'm going to go out and read a classic, cover to cover.

Moby Dick?
Wuthering Heights?
To Kill a Mockingbird?
Hamlet?

2007-04-22T18:17:00.000-07:00

Happy Day, Earth. Tomorrow, anyway.

More importantly, happy birthday to my real mom.
And, happy birthday to my blog, apparently. One year.

Fourthly, I have to run a correction. Sheri's birthday was actually the 18th, but I didn't post about it until the next day. So, in efforts to make reparations, Happy Birthday to my beautiful Eternal Companion. TQM, amorcito.

Anyway, last Saturday I had an interesting Earth Day experience. I spent the day in San Francisco at a TRADOS training seminar (nerdy translation software. If you haven't heard about it, don't sweat.) and on the way there, my school chums and I were swapping scary statistics about energy usage and stuff.

Did you know that 75% of energy into homes is used to light up those little LED screens on microwaves, VCR's and other electronics? And your phone charger and other appliances suck up power even when they're not connected to a phone and turned on?

Terrifying.

Anyway, on the BART ride back to our car, I was looking out the window at the sprawl of row houses that covered everything I could see, everyone's little pile of stuff with a cover on it (as George Carlin would say), and I was grateful that at the core of me I'm not a Big City kid. I love how small Marina is. I think if Sher and I end up in SLC again, the change will be hard.

Though, you have to ask: is anyone, really, a big city person? Or do we just end up places and have to deal with the cities we're in, bad traffic, pollution and skyrocketing housing prices and all? Something to ponder on your drive to work.

End Transmission.

ps- The worst part is I still drool over the thought of owning a house with a big yard.

2007-04-19T12:39:00.000-07:00

More on the above photo in a moment.

It's been an interesting couple of weeks, due to the fact that I've had to pony up and declare, once and for all, a major. Would I graduate in Translation and Interpretation, or would I take a different road and do Translation Management? There are a million arguments for both sides, which I won't go into. Over the last couple of weeks, I'd probably changed my mind at least 100 times, each time saying something to myself to the effect of, "boy, was I ever an idiot for considering that other dumb major! Sheesh!" only, minutes afterward, to begin the decision process all over again.

Anyway, I had a meeting with my department head about it, and she helped me out by laying it all on the line.
"Well," she said, "you don't appear to be doing very well at all in your English classes."
"Strange, I know, since that's my native language," I said. (I'm getting a B+ in them, which by her standards is barely passing.)
"Well you're perfectly welcome to continue with T&I, but I have to warn you that you must be an exceptional T&I student in order to get a job."
"Thanks, you MEAN LADY!" Just kidding, I didn't say that.
But clarity came to me after that: I don't want to be an interpreter, so why would I bother stressing myself out in the dumb ol' classes if it's something I don't want to do? Why not take the other road, the Management road, which would allow me to avoid taking classes I don't like and instead tailor my education according to my interests? Sounds like the obvious choice, doesn't it? Well, in terms of stress caused, lemme tell ya, it's been a week of exhausting spiritual weight-lifting.
Thank you for allowing me that catharsis.
Oh, and Happy Birthday to Sheri.

Now to the photo. And a warning, this is me coming into the light as a Jedi-level nerd, so all those who still consider me normal, stop reading here.

This is in response to Greg's latest post.
Historically, you must concede that Superman is the ultimate superhero. He really was the first put into mass publication in the pulps during the 1930's, and several comic book companies went to court, and lost big time, for copyright enfringement, as their executives had said to their writers something to the effect of, "I want you to invent me another Superman." So in a way, all superheroes are fragments of that one guy.

Aesthetically, though, I find Superman rather boring. I mean, come on. Nothing can kill the guy. You have to go all the way to Krypton to find something that makes him vulnerable. And, because he really only has one weakness, Superman's archenemies really just exploit it again, and again, and again. How many times has Superman died, now? And then you have the Silver Surfer, who used to be human, but really, who can fight against a guy that has a planet-eating god at his beck and call? You have to believe just for a second that your hero is in real danger, even if you know he'll get out of it in the end. At least you're left wondering how. (I commend the makers of the Fantastic Four movies for making him a bad guy. Even though the movies themselves are dumb. As most adapted superhero films are.)

You gotta dig just a little deeper in order to get at what comics are all about, which is, at least in all interesting comics, the story of how the superhero comes to terms with himself. Which knocks Spiderman out of the running for "best superhero ever" because, as you said, Greg, everything just seems to go his way. He gets the girl, he's totally capable of balancing his home life from his superhero life, he's got a steady job he enjoys; I mean, what the heck is that all about? Who can relate to that dude? Snoozer for sure.

From this standpoint, you have to reconsider Superman again, and I'll tell you why: Superman is the only guy who actually is his secret identity. He really is Superman. That Clark Kent guy is the cover. Bruce Wayne, Peter Parker, Bruce Banner, etc - all of them are just people who adopt some other identity in order to cover their nocturnal habits, or whatever. But Superman, he by definition is the most alienated. He's an alien! A fact that the writers of Superman should definitely have developed into their storylines, but they didn't. So he loses.

I, myself, was always a fan of the X-men, because that comic did something very important, which was to examine real-world issues through the lens of their heroes. Which really is what it's all about, no? If there's no connection to the real world, then it's just a story. For example, with X-men, the question was discrimination. What are the lengths that people will go to to distance themselves from people who are different? What lengths will outcasts go to in order to be accepted? And the fact that the main bad dude was a holocaust survivor? Oh, man, the epitome of apt metaphors.

Which is why Bruce Wayne is a good one, too. As he fights evil and badness, he's got to come to terms with the evil inside himself. The ultimate struggle of the duality of man, right in one nice, tight, well-written, well-rounded character. And way better looking than the Hulk, who in my opinion is just angry, not conflicted. Good choice, Greg.

End of long transmission.

2007-04-15T20:55:00.000-07:00

Whoa.

I just found two very odd links

Seriously, the most bizarre, oddly hypnotic screensaver ever. I've downloaded it.

A blog that lauds Theta Naught music, and offers free downloads of two of our albums. I have mixed feelings about it, because it's sure to get our music to more people, yet we sure could use the funds from album sales to go on tours and make more albums. I guess having your own music pirated changes how you feel about it.

2007-04-15T20:24:00.000-07:00

Two, well three events to post about this week.

1) It's been a rough week for ol' Asher. In the first place, the poor guy somehow cracked a nail right at the paw. We first noticed that something was wrong when he would randomly yelp out in pain when he would sit, scratch, or play with Margaret's kids while they were here. He's lost his nail now, and so it seems he feels a little better, but he's licked it so much, one side of his toe is now hairless, and he's spent a few restless nights trying to get comfortable in his bed without disturbing his toe. Besides his toe, though, he had a little adventure with some cocoa covered almonds, which ended up being a two-edged sword: his tummy was very upset for a couple of days, and he ate a lot of grass, which made him (stop reading here o ye who are weak of stomach) vomit up five or six large puddles of cocoa-colored drool on our carpet and on the linoleum, upsetting the unsteady peace between himself and Sheri. I think, a week later, the ceasefire has been restored. We are happy, though, that he lived through the trauma, as we have been told that many dogs who cross cocoa's path don't.

2) We spent the weekend (Friday, Saturday & Sunday afternoon) warming up our parenting skills babysitting our friends' two kids. I only have two comments: a) those two maniacs are the perfect combination of kid craziness and tenderheartedness. b) I'm glad we're doing this one kid at a time.

3) A sad farewell to Kurt Vonnegut, Don Ho, and Phish. What will be the future of American Fiction, Hawaiian Tourism, or Post-2000 Hippiedom?

2007-04-11T13:37:00.000-07:00

Well, my sister just announced the gender of her next offspring, so I thought I'd better give an update on my own.
Well, Sweet Pea (as we've decided to call the child) is currently about the size of an avocado, has all 20 teeth, can wiggle its little arms and legs, and has all of its organs.
But how amphibious is this: so now I guess Sweet Pea has eyes strong enough to sense the difference between light and dark. One website suggested that we do an experiment: shine a light on one side of momma's tummy, and the babe will swim to the other side. Weird-factor 8.5, Captain.
So we tried it the other night, but to no avail. Shame. Though it did give me the urge to see the movie "Alien," again.

ps- despite the tone that the above post might convey, I'm stoked out of my gourd to be a dad.

End Transmission.

2007-04-08T12:57:00.000-07:00

Here's the new craze in lawn care: Taoist Gardening! Simply let the nature found in your backyard take its course, and miracles will happen. For example.
Here's a picture of our backyard when we moved into our apartment. Bare, sandy, rather non-inviting.

Here's a picture of it now, lush, green. Yes, that's Ash's tail you can see behind that jungle, there.
Well wouldn't you know, after four months of not caring for our lawn, look at some of the taoist magic that has happened:

Okay, not really.

End transmission.

2007-04-06T08:44:00.000-07:00

This is yet another classic pic, taken by - actually I'm not sure who took this one, either. At any rate, the file itself is saved as "Pete Flying and Goblin Bremond," on account of me suspended tenuously above everyone else's head and, in my opinion the highlight of the picture, Bremond's (far right) goblin-like expression that he was never able to explain nor remember, but which embarrassed him so that he poked the eyes and face off of himself in every copy of the picture he could find.
Other noteworthy details:
1) Can you see my musical socks?
2) Which one of these people looks the most like Anthony Michael Hall? I know that in a post way back I said that Josh had outgrown that phase, but boy, it sure wasn't by the time this picture was taken.
3) Alli Condie - Where are you now? Surely my brother Adam will remember filming a junior-high production of "Hercules" with your brother in your back yard. Now there's a piece of historical media I wish I could get my hands on.
4) It seems to me there's some sort of higher, perhaps life-lesson type message embedded somewhere in this pic, but I can't quite put my finger on it. Something along the lines of - Between those lost in space and those who look like goblins stand those few who can raise their fists and say, "Yes, I look like one of the Brat Pack..."

2007-03-31T10:08:00.001-07:00

Isn't this a great pic? There's no friends like old friends.

Speaking of which, I've been googling the names of my old high school buddies that I've lost touch with, and I've come up with some pretty wild results. The wildest so far? A series of pics from a friend's (Matt Zollinger's) wedding reception. Check it out, East High 97

2007-03-30T09:38:00.000-07:00

For no particular reason, I've compiled a list of famous people, both real and fictional, who have my same first name. I think everyone should try it. Not my first name, though. Yours. Of course.

Peter the Apostle
Peter Sellers (the Pink Panther)
Peter Postlethwaite (famous actor)
Peter Mayhew (Chewbacca)
Peter Weller (Robocop)
Peter the Great (emperor of Russia)
Peter Jackson (director, Lord of the Rings)
Peter Parker (Spiderman)
Peter Mitchell (Tom Cruise on Top Gun, which is ironic because when Josh and I would play Top Gun as kids, I would insist on always being Pete Mitchell, aka Maverick, though not cause we had the same first name.)
Peter Schickele (composer)

I can't think of any more right now.
This was a pointless exercise.

2007-03-23T09:31:00.000-07:00

I've missed a couple of important birthdays; luckily they both happened on the same day (March 21st ((and ps, happy spring))).

1) J.s. Bach, my favorite composer, for two reasons:
a) The Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello. Due to the move to CA and my new adopted career, my collection of sheet music has dwindled to just two books.
i) Yampolski Cello Etudes
ii) The Leonard Rose edition of the Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello. and I must say, if all I ever really mastered on cello in my life were the notes in these two books, I would consider myself a great cellist.

b) The St. Matthew's Passion, which really brought Bach to fame, 75 years after his own death. Mr. Bach, two days ago, I'm sure that in some dark, gothic, German cathedral, a lonely organ played for thee.

2) Some lady whose name I'm ashamed to say I can't remember, but I thought her inclusion merited mentioning, as she was the lady who translated the entire works of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and later retranslated "Don Quixote," which is a chore just to read, let alone to translate. And really, as we translators and interpreters make a career out of blending into the background, any reason to laud or applaud one of our kind is a reason in itself to post.

2007-03-18T19:28:00.000-07:00

Here's a picture of one of the crazy howler monkeys right outside our hotel. Nothing really to do with this post.

But tell me if the following isn't something that belongs on the back of a How to Host a Murder box. Or a paperback airport novel.

Phil Spector was one of the greatest and most eccentric music producers in rock and roll history. The inventor of the "Wall of Sound," recorder and former husband of Ronnie Bennet of the Ronnettes, was known for describing his life as "Having devils fighting inside me." But until three years ago, this wig-wearing innovator lead a fairly innocuous life.

On the night of February 3, 2003, Spector met actress Lana Clarkson at the House of Blues. After a few drinks, the two were driven by her chauffer to Spector's house. Hours later, sounds of a tussle led Ms. Clarkson's driver to enter the home to investigate. What he saw was shocking.

"I think I just killed her," said Spector, standing in the foyer of his home over the body of Lana Clarkson, smoking gun in his hand.

Despite the incriminating details, you, as Mr. Spector's lawyer, believe him to be innocent. Follow the clues, dig deep, trust no one, discover the truth. Is this rock and roll legend innocent, or did the ghost of Ronnie Bennet drive him to murder? You decide!

ps- you gotta take a look at this guy:

2007-03-17T11:41:00.000-07:00

Well, so we've returned safe and sound from the third world. What a blast. Above you can see a demonstration of my new mad surfing skills.

Here's a written recap of some of the highlights:

1) Driving the 50 miles of dirt roads to get to Nosara, the little surfing community where we sojourned
2) Getting immediately sunburned
3) Staying at the Lodge Vista del Mar, which in Spanish means Place Packed with Crazy Animals, where we were accompanied by a host of howler monkeys, a pack of racoon-like Costa Rican Pizotes, a rock-eating iguana, and a freakin huge jumping green lobster that looked kind of like a grasshopper. We all just about peed our pants. Especially me.
4) Lots and lots and lots of surfing
5) Going on the largest, longest zipline in the world, carrying us 2000 feet at a time 400 feet above the jungle floor
6) Awesome Costa Rican cuisine (the Mexican restaurants especially)
7) Last but not least, our harrowing traverse of the mountains along the Panamerican Highway, which as it turns out is nothing more than a single-lane road with literally NO shoulder, making it necessary for all disabled tree-carrying semis to stop right in the dead center of the road so as you have to pass them quickly with only a general idea of what might be coming down the pike in the other direction. I tell you, them Costa Ricans who kept passing me must have ice water running through their veins.

Good to be back.

On a side note, our baby is now the size of a lime and weighs half an ounce.

End Transmission.

2007-03-07T11:07:00.000-08:00

Guess what...

Hooray!
Sheri, what do you think about all this?

How 'bout you, Pete?

See y'all after Spring Break.

2007-03-07T10:38:00.000-08:00

I had a very strange flashback last night. At some point shortly after we moved to Utah, my brother and I were having a sleepover with some of his friends. Translation: Adam was having a party and my mom made him let me horn in. Anyway, we started telling a scary story about a strange, skinny man with blue skin who would drive around in sunglasses and a mack truck terrorizing the populace and eating lightbulbs. I remember the lightbulbs in particular. Anyway, after we found that we couldn't sleep out of fear that the blue man would soon come bounding down the stairs (though he might have been unable to eat due to his dark glasses and the fact that we didn't have any lights on), Adam began to cheer us all up with a funny story, and so related to us the tale of the wonderful John Candy film: "Summer Rental." Ah, memories.

2007-03-06T09:47:00.000-08:00

The public has spoken: Let Ash win and just put a blanket on it. I suppose that's our only recourse, as we're flying off to Costa Rica for a week and won't be around to shoo him off. He's going to put a perfect little Ash-groove on our poof.
Well, in case I don't post again before 5:00 on Thursday morning, see you on the flipside.