ibanez, running, photograys in no particular order

The doofus glasses are here. I have to say its kind of nice, despite their *extreme* dork factor, to have photograys rather than to screw with contacts on the days my eyes feel somewhat gummy. There's not so much humidity out here, so unless I'm really trying to see how hard I can sweat exercising, sliding glasses aren't the problem they've been in other places that I've lived (sweat evaporates rather quickly in the dry (its not arid, but definitely dry) Sacramento clime. So I'm not sure that wearing glasses while running or cycling here is that big of an issue (since I no longer triathlon the swim part... not an issue).

Anyway, the only real reason to wear contacts, anyway, is vanity. It has been nice - since I picked them up yesterday - to not have to carry a pair of sunglasses *and* readers with me when I go out. The acid test was this morning after breakfast ... we took Mr. Dog with us to Cornerstone (ate at an outside table), and then after we hit the farmer's market under the Business 80 freeway, we went over to the dog park at 28th and C by Sutter's Landing. The park is sited on top of the former landfill and they put in crushed granite - sort of an offwhite - as the material for the dog park grounds (it drains well and doesn't have the dust issues that bare dirt would have around here). Anyway, since it is now almost summer here, everything is rapidly turning brown (even though we had a long Spring in terms of rainy days... this is the first year of near normal precip since I moved here in April '07. Folsom Lake is actually almost full and there's still lots of snow on the Sierras (and they were out today) even though its almost June), so the glare sun at the dog park, even though it was barely 10 in the morning, was pretty bad. The photograys performed flawlessly.

But I still feel like a dork. After dog park, we ran up to Roseville and picked up some framing The Blonde had done at Joanne's (pictures from Mom's house that I 'gave' to her - in other words, pictures that she liked that I'm sure Mom would have liked her to have had), and while was in that store, I walked down to The Guitar Center a few doors down and played with some of the shredding guitars they had out with a more powerful version of the Vox modeling amp I have (the 50 watt vs. the 30 watt version).

And I'm still sticking to my story that Ibanez, $ for $, makes the best electric guitar value in the world. I tried a Schecter (a US custom shop that eventually ended up as a front for guitars manufactured in Asia) and while it was OK, it was blown away by a cheaper Ibanez with the Floyd Rose style locking nut/tremelo setup that I tried a few minutes later. I just love Ibanez necks and their guitar setups in general.  Why pay 1000s for a Gibson, or Fender reproduction of a guitar design from the 1950s/60s when you can get a higher quality Ibanez for much, much less ($2500 or more for an ES-335, you can get the same guitar for < $1000 from Ibanez, and it is of higher quality and plays better).

I'm not paid, BTW, to pimp for Ibanez. I simply love their products.

(but hey, if Ibanez *wants* to pay me to pimp their products, I'd be happy to receive an offer I can't refuse).

And we watched Run, Fat Boy, Run tonight. Cute movie, very British in its sense of humor (despite its American Director). But I don't think anyone could train for a marathon in 3 weeks.  I spent summer and fall 2007 training for the '07 California International Marathon, and it was *hard*... I hit the infamous wall right before Watt Avenue on Fair Oaks. God, my feet *hurt* in new and interesting ways. The legs were more or less fine the entire run, but if your feet hurt, they *hurt*.

I keep toying with the idea of running another marathon. Notice I said "toying"...

superman wears number six

My late father and I only saw one football game together... Iowa playing Tulsa in Kinnick in Iowa City in 1997. We saw Superman - Tim Dwight - play. Possibly one of the fastest players in college football in the past couple of generations, and he had a nice pro career...

Tim Dwight Punt Returns

massive doofus alert

This lovely thing called middle age is, of course, a mixed bag of good, bad and indifferent. Studies show that as people approach age 50 you get happier, and I'm pleased to confirm that's pretty much the case for yours truly, sportsfans.

But this whole far sightedness thing sucks. I've had Coke bottle (do they even MAKE Coke bottles anymore?) thick glasses since I've been about 12, and while I improved about a diaopter with this year's exam - first real improvement since I began wearing glasses in 2nd grade - because of the strength of my script, biofocals are hideously expensive. All I have to do to "read" is pull the glasses down on the end of my nose a bit, make me look even more mole and evil scientist like (cool, but not really good for getting chicks that even remotely approach the Megan Fox/Jessica Alba scale of hotness).

When I'm wearing my contacts, I can get by with readers or if I'm lucky, my arms are just long enough that I can hold the print far enough away to see it (in the case of my Mac Book Pro, I just swipe the tiny text LARGER).

I'm vain enough that I continue to screw with the contacts although juggling readers, sunglasses (have I mentioned how goddamned light sensitive contacts make me? No?) and having my glasses handy in case my eyes get irritated by contacts or pollen or alien invasions (always, alas a possibility). Plus when I'm out running or cycling or lounging by the pool, I've got to Look Dynamic and Handsome. Playing guitar... hmmm... if I didn't have a GF I'd probably wear my glasses less...

But there are mornings I want to go to breakfast and read clearly, which means glasses, or a day at work when I have a massive amount of reading to do so glasses are better. However, its usually BRIGHT AND SUNNY HERE IN CALIFORNIA which means either putting on those hideously huge oversize sunglasses over glasses or feeling my way through the environment outside with one eye squeezed shut, stumbling around.

Anyway, I finally decided this weekend, since Costco doesn't make sunglasses and a regular optical shop would change a frickin' fortune for script sunglasses to have some photogray glasses made. Oh joy. I now have something even geekier, possibly here by this weekend. But I'll be able to read at the beach and pool finally... (try slipping a pair of Costco readers under your cool Bolle floatable sunglasses. It doesn't work. It looks even stupider if you put the readers on the end of your nose OVER the sunglasses). So now I'll be a photoelectric effect Mole. Joy.

so ever distracted

I've really got to swear off, for a while, on buying books, as I have so many to read and already so many demands on my time - aside from work, self-imposed, actually.

I need to get my lazy ass out of bed and exercise, whether its running or getting up so I can bike commute to work (even though at 5 miles one way its really not much of a workout compared to a hard 3-4 mile run).

There's also practicing guitar. If you want to get better, you have to shed. And shedding requires time, but also discipline, as it is way too easy to lapse into noodling rather than practicing things that are difficult to do (like arpeggios, scale exercises, sight reading, learning new tunes, etc.).

I also like to write. Blogs take time.

There's this thing called a relationship. My GF gets really cranked when I'm plugged into the MacBook or guitar and really gets po'ed when my response to a question (that I've not heard the content of, other than the fact a question has been asked) is "Huh? What did you just say?"

And I have self-improvement/software/device manuals to read, but today, while we were at the thrift store, I grabbed the three "pre-Dune/Butlerian Jihad" novels written by Herbert's son and Kevin Anderson (actually, probably speed-typed by Anderson - I suspect that Herbert is just hanging on to Dad's legacy and OK'ing whatever Anderson felt like writing on a given day, as he is a human word processor).

Last night, I was up way too late reading the latest Prey novel. Yes, I killed a 400+ page hardback that I'd picked up at Costco in one sitting with the clip-on reading light going.

Which resulted in a 2 1/2 hour nap late Saturday afternoon. Which has now resulted in this blog entry at 1:00 amish on a Sunday morning. Which will likely impact all of the activities listed above.

I'm way too easy distracted, but having a wealth of choices is a good thing.

even though i've taken the first step and admitted i have a problem

Doing so, and doing so repeatedly is not getting me de-addicted to sales at REI...

merp hates us forever

Merp is not happy. Because as of last night, one of her favorite perches - namely, on top of a decades-old dryer that belonged to the GF's later mother - is gone.

Replaced by a fancy high tech front loading Samsung stream dryer. In timeless stainless steel, and its sitting on a riser drawer, which means its too high for her to easily jump up there and get warm while the dryer is running. And since this is an intelligent, programmable dryer, its not just going to sit there and get hot on a timer... this dryer determines from the weight and dampness of the load how long to run (and also based on what type of fabric/load you've specified when you put the washed items in).

Its way cool. These things sitting in the laundry room look like some kind of high tech experimental chamber. Hell of a lot quieter than the old set, that's for sure.

Merp was so angry with us last night, she kept mewling and wouldn't even get close to the set...

i'm feeling just Mactastic

Do you think Apple would pay me for the slogan "I'm feeling just Mactastic?"

Probably not. Chances are that they've already thought of a marketing slogan along that line and discarded it because it sounds horribly tacky. But I still think its a cool term for loving your Apple product.

That said, for the hell of it, and because I had a doc's appt. this afternoon (I'm fine, do not worry sportsfans), I brought my MacBook Pro to work so that I could go by REI afterwards and see if the Northface 15" laptop sleeve would be a good solution for lugging it around (and keeping the power cord and external USB HD in it). Even though the 13" sleeve would be a better fit, its not available right now (I think the Incase sleeves sold at the Apple store are complete shit - the Northface stuff is waterproof and actually fairly decently made), so I thought I'd give the 15 a whirl. I really like the material, but the sleeve/bag is a bit on the small side so I think I'll pass for now.

Anyway, one of my co-workers got his new 64 GB iPad this weekend and brought it in as well (we had not planned to bring our stuff, it wasn't like a pink shirt day or anything like that) and we had fun playing with it - he's got the 3G service and was bitching about how slow it is compared to his Comcast internet at home.  But he wanted to be able to surf the Net anywhere, not have to deal with our work filters (which, for the moment, aren't that bad but do filter out stuff that's not stupid or hazardous) and have something that's very portable. He now wants a MacBook Pro after seeing mine though.

I did decide to go to the Tour of California yesterday, for those of you that haunt my FB page, I've now put up an album of pictures. In rough chrono order, you see 'regular' cyclists riding the downtown finish loop a couple of hours before the race finish, some shots of the souvenir/tourist expo. I was able to station myself right at the 300 meter mark in the finish chute.

Kind of interesting how weird and possessive people will get about space at a free event that they're not paying for; I had gone near the 200m mark and a high maintenance 20something girl said "Hey, these spots are taken." Um, her friends - probably male, and since she was cute and well dressed, more than likely all trying (and unsuccessfully) to get into her pants, had gotten bored, taken off, and left their sweatshirts on the sidewalk. I'm starting to get old enough now that I really am not in a mood anymore to take bullshit from morons like this girl, but rather than fight about space when there really wasn't any way you can see how the finish is going to turn out any better from 200 vs. 300 meters without a really good set of binoculars, I just snorted and said "Its a good thing this isn't a football game with open seating, because if I had some of my buds with me, we'd toss the sweatshirts and you would be sitting somewhere else."

Some guys that were standing next to her but that I don't think were actually with her just burst out laughing. I leaned on the barricade fencing for a minute, and then found what turned out to be a much better spot with fairly pleasant company. Perhaps a little too pleasant, because a 40something woman with a HUGE wedding ring started, well, flirting with me... with her husband apparently standing off on the sidewalk somewhere (or maybe he was a friend of hers, WTH knows).

At one point, she said "You know, this is going to sound really weird, but you look at *lot* like George Stephanopoulos." Hmmm. I've been told several times I look like Michael J. Fox, but this is the first time I've been compared to George LOL. It was flattering, but I made sure several times during our conversations to mention "the GF" but I guess that doesn't slow some people down.

I am, coincidentally, part Greek on Mom's side, and I do tan easily and I'm darkening up already even though I'm barely in the sun at all. But I figured the Irishman in me was doing a fine job of stamping the Greek out. Apparently not. But it was funny because she was standing a little too close in that way that says "I'm more than casually interested in you." Weird world.

I had walked part of the way down and stopped at the J Street Taqueria at 39th fully intending to walk the remaining 2 1/2 miles, but the GF called when I was finishing Taco # 2, and offered to drive over from the house and drop me off near the expo (she had been dog/house-sitting the night before in Fair Oaks - long story, but one of her boss' dogs, a nearly year old wirehair pointer, had torn a ligament in her right rear leg and had surgery... so they've been keeping the dog doped up and were away for the night in Napa (its really tough to have a free hotel to go to I guess), and Mr. Dog couldn't go up there with her because Emma and he like to play rough, and even on drugs she'll play too hard. Anyway, she was finished, back, and I got a ride (still ended up walking almost 5 miles as she picked me up afterwards when I walked about 2+ back - its 5 miles to downtown from the house).

The expo was pretty decent; I hit the Amgen merch tent and bought my ToC KOM (King of the Mountains for you non-cycling sportsfans) 2010 jersey, a regular t-shirt and souvenir cowbells for my kids. I thought I was done pissing money away, but then I walked by the Jelly Belly team tent and they had the Jelly Belly racing jerseys out, and I mean, even though they regularly get blown out the back of major races like this, you *have* to have a Jelly Belly team jersey - especially when they're cheaper than what you would regularly pay at the Jelly Belly Outlet store.

I only have three team jerseys (technically 2 separate teams)  - 2 Steel City Endurance team jerseys (run by my friend Doc Shazam who lives in Pittsburgh) - its a amateur/semi-professional racing team based in the Pittsburgh area, and I had no 'real' pro stuff - I'm not that wild about pro team jerseys, after dabbling briefly in tris, dus and trying a cycling crit or two, racing on a bike is not for me; I'm too timid, and I'm not one to ride on the American River trail looking like some wannabe, but Jelly Belly is so FUN to wear (and eat, and look at). I don't feel wonky about wearing Steel City because it IS an amateur team that persons of all ability levels can join, but pro is a little different. But you know what, if someone doesn't like the jersey I'm wearing when I'm out riding, I guess they can kiss my big fat ass.

Anyway, watching the finish was cool; they circled the Capitol 3x after initially riding in. I think the coolest part was watching the camera helicopter circle downtown, you half expected SWAT team guys to rapple out of the 'copter or be rappelling out of the palm trees that are planted around the Capitol. The Radio Shack team kind of did an interesting thing after the finish; the loop while racing was counter clockwise but they rode back to their trailer clockwise. People were going nuts when Levi Leipheimer rode by.

I'm hoping that next year they'll reconsider doing a prologue like they did last year as a short ITT, because when they race in in this manner, you actually get to see the riders for all of 15 seconds or so as they rush by, even if its a three-peat, that's only about 1 minute of riders max. When they do an ITT of all the riders in the race, it can stretch out for two hours, and you get to cheer each rider on, and that's really cool.

I just hope they find a new sponsor for the Tour of California in 2012 - Amgen is sponsoring next year, but there's no deal after that - so it doesn't fold like the Tour of Georgia did. Its amazing to me - corps like Ford will dump millions into a three day golf tournament but won't sponsor a bike race (or a bike team - it doesn't cost as much as you think to field a team for a year) especially given that cycling is a huge sport outside the US, particularly in Europe. Hmmm... I was mentioning to my coworker when we were comparing toys this morning that Apple would be an extremely logical sponsor for the ToC because its a California company and the crowd that generally shows up to watch cycling is affluent, well-educated and has the $$$$ to piss away on toys. Anyone for a FB group Apple should sponsor the Tour of California...?

And oh... Band in a Box came today. Woo Hoo!

i'm so totally not jacked about the tour of california this year

But first... think good thoughts about my friend Marv, who has been diagnosed with a brain tumor and will have surgery on Tuesday to remove it. They do not know if it is malignant, or not, but initially the news appears to be good if having a brain tumor is a good thing.

The past two years, I have enjoyed seeing the Tour of California, especially last year, when they did the ITT to start and we had 2+ hours of pros circling the course in downtown SMF, where you could see them up close. Plus you had the expo and team trailers.

This year, they're circling downtown - like they did 2 years ago - 3x before finishing, and that's fun to watch too, but I'm simply not all that excited. I'll go down, probably buy a ToC jersey, and hang out at the lifestyle expo but if The Blonde weren't dog/housesitting this weekend I'd be at the beach instead. We've had a coolish Spring - lots of cool days and more days with rain (we are actually near normal for rainfall for the season for a change) this Winter/Spring - but its supposed to be in the 80s today and tomorrow.

Having the leg/hip/back/whateveritwas injury has changed my attitude towards competition somewhat over the past year and a half. For a long time, I was really jacked about cycling in particular because I was doing it so much (even though I was doing it poorly) and I figured that working out a lot would make me happier. Well, it made me happier to the extent that I was in good shape, but I have limited athletic ability and racing was not doing much for my self-esteem. It only took me, what, 30-40 races to figure out that I don't really need to race to stay in shape and its a lot more fun - for me - to work out without constantly worrying about prepping for a race or following some training plan (not that, aside from all the running I did to enable myself to finish a marathon, I ever followed any kind of coherent training plan).

In the process of all the racing, though, I did check a lot of things off of the bucket list. Since 2006, I've completed a marathon, a triathlon, a couple of duathlons, a 10 mile trail run, 4 half marathons, century rides, 100K rides, a lot of other rides < 100km in length, a cycling omnium, a few bike ITTs, another handful of run races from 5 miles to 10 miles... a lot of running and spinning, that's for sure.

What I learned is that I have a lot of stamina, and... that's about it. Speed is not my forte physically. Never will be, and that's not particularly important, but it doesn't make much sense to kill myself (and spend a lot of time) training to excel the pissant amount I *can* excel in a racing situation when I can spend the $25-$40 per race on something besides a t-shirt and ill-tasting Gatorade. The comforting part about all of this is I did learn (although I kind of already knew this) that:

1) Any time - and this is ANY - that I attempt a new athletic event - be it a new run distance, type of race, or activity - I'm going to suck at it the first time out, no matter how much I prepare. I'm sure if I got into paintball I'd probably shoot myself more with the damn gun than actually hit anything.

2) However, if I've done the necessary training for an endurance event, if I don't care too much about my finishing time, I will finish. Even injured and in pain. In '85, I was totally unprepared to do a half-marathon; my right ankle died at the 7 mile mark and I limped to the end and even beat the marathon winner by about a minute in a time.

3) Sometimes I'll dredge up a decent performance, and this only happens in running. I actually placed - 3rd - in a 5K - in my Age Group one time. It was a very *small* 5K field, though.

4) Running is really the only activity I am even remotely decent at. Cycling I enjoy more, but, I'm not good at it, and I've lost a lot of the zest I've had for it with the hyper-competitiveness of so many of the riders I encounter on the trails and roads around here.

5) Almost always the local amateur athletes that are good at their given sport, that I've met, are tremendously nice people. I've made some great friends. Its almost always the wanna-bees that don't have the ability to be competitive that are assholes.

Anyway, I'm not discounting racing for those that live it (and that are *good* at it!), but as a person with too many interests and all-too-short of an attention span, I'd rather focus on stuff that I'm better at. I'm way too Type A and perfectionistic to continue to wack my head against the wall if the gains to be made are limited.

I know that my parents, and father in particular were very proud of all the physical activity I did while they were alive. Dad in his mid to late 40s was afraid to do anything because of his heart condition (which he allowed to run and, in my opinion, ruin his life as well as my mother's for 33 years). He sat on his butt in his Lazy Boy before the heart attack and wore out more chairs than pairs of shoes after the heart attack and two open heart surgeries.

I'm not going to be that person, and I'm sure part of my motivation for doing all the racing - because I also went through a phase of racing in college (then got burnt out on racing when I hobbled totally unprepared through the Iowa City Marathon-Half Marathon (I did the half) in 1985) was to show that I'm *not* doomed "to have heart problems." I don't want my kids to remember Dad as someone who sat in a chair and glowered at everyone while flipping TV channels. At the time, and now, I never thought it was much of a life. 

The injury that cause me to take some stock - which almost certainly was due to riding a single speed bike with too large of a gear ratio (48x18) for my leg and also too much cycling without adequate rest - actually forced me to spend more time examining how I want to spend the time I have outside of going to work, sleeping, taking care of basic life issues, etc. in terms of self-improvement/edification. What I figured out is that I wanted to become a better guitar player, and that's been my focus for the past year.

And I'm having a lot of fun doing that, and discovering that the more I learn about music, the less I know and there's an entire lifetime you can spend learning and still barely scratch the surface. It is a very humbling experience but humbling in the best of all ways. Perhaps its art for arts sake... as someone who took a lot of courses in writing, I'm actually at a loss for words in describing or communicating why this is both fun, important, and fulfilling. I guess it really doesn't matter because its all inside my head anyway. The world outside our heads doesn't really give a damn about what's going on inside our heads as long as we are pleasant, smile, and bathe regularly.

steve jobs finally got me, or mac is the new crack

Well, not really. I mean, I'm on my 3rd iPod nano (first was killed by heat and an open bottle of contact lens solution in the car in the same bag the iPod was in, I lost the 2nd in the Denver airport last year) and I absolutely love that product. Yes, I know the file format is proprietary, blah blah blah, but I've found it far easier to use than any comparable product. I'd rather spend my time enjoying listening to music than fighting with trying to get it in and out of a mp3 player (or fighting with Windows formats).

I've been toying with the idea of getting a Mac for a long time, particularly with the rise of the iPod, iPhone, now iPad... and being around young musicians at Capitol Garage who are toting Macs around because of its traditional niche in arts and music, but the price scared me a little bit. I've always lived on the trailing edge of tech since getting a PC in the 90s... my first one was a PS/1, then I had two clone boxes (in the case of the 2nd, a guy swapped out the mob with an "old" game mob of his that he had no further use for).

The clone boxes eventually started to die of BSOD, and at that point, I thought maybe it was time to move to a cheap laptop. Well, the Compaq (HP) I bought started to die of blank screening/BSOD'ing < 1 year old (and the sticking keys), but I figured WTH, I paid < $400 with tax, so I bought a Toshiba Satellite... that also began sticking and having mysterious crashes in Vista. It still works pretty decent *most* of the time, and I've got Word on it and Sharepoint at work only interfaces with PCs for now... so I'll have it around for telecommuting...

What made me pull the trigger now is Apple putting out two Mac Book Pros in the $1200-$1500 range; I got the higher-end one with an accidental drop protection plan today, and figuring that if I take good care of this computer I won't be swapping it out after a year. Plus Garage Band, which is an excellent practice tool (I have no illusions about my song writing abilities, but being able to play along with loops is invaluable to musical development and practice). I'd looked at compact portable studios as well as Band in a Box, but... figured I'd try Garage Band for a while and I can always get BIAB for Mac later.

so i sent my son a Hawkeye basketball today...

As part of my on-going conspiracy to convert him into a full fledged Bird Cult member. Hopefully, his mother has, or will shortly put up a hoop at the CT house, preferably in a well-lit area (they have 4 acres).

Things have been very quiet since returning from Iowa, but my el cheapo laptop is showing signs of dying already, so I'm girding myself to finally Do The Right Thing and purchase a Macbook. I can't keep going through $350+tax winshit machines every 6-9 months; it makes more sense to spend 3x that and get a laptop that will last 3-5 years (and that doesn't run down on battery after 1 hour of use, or have keys that going into stick hell after 6-9 months). More importantly, the Mac has Garage Band and I *need* Garage Band. I looked at the latest line of Macbooks at Best Buy and they've got a pretty good compromise for what I want at around $1100. If you want something decent, you have to pay for it.