Matt Makes Me Crazy

 You know how there are some couples where one half of the couple has, maybe, a strong personality or a very conspicuous habit, and you can see HUGE pull that has on the other person? The sort of, "Wow, if I had to live with someone like that, I'd go nuts!" situation? Well, I think, in a way, I might be the other half of that couple- but probably not the way you are thinking.

It's not that Matt has a strong personality, but some how, living with him has desensitized me to some things I NEVER thought I'd be desensitized to. Here is just a punch list:

• While at speed on my bike, I collided with a squirrel, who was flipped into my pedals, bounced off my leg, before he ran away. I screamed a lot, (a LOT) and then rode my bike home.
• Sometimes, I deadlift.
• For more than a minute, I was considering the feasibility of running a half marathon. (I don't have any special love for running, it's just easy to do wherever you are.)
• I ran my first 10k. It took 1hr and 17 min. I repeat, I was running for an hour and seventeen minutes.
• Matt had a race that I didn't want to wait around for, so I made our friend Adam go on a 10 mile hike with me.(We saw the changing of the larches- which was beautiful)
• The previous two bullets happened on the same weekend. My hips are punishing me today. What kind of crazy person have I become??

You see, I live with someone who apparently rides 100 miles a week, who has at least one race booked for every weekend in the foreseeable future, and who gets really weird if he doesn't get a proper sweaty workout in every day. And of course, our friends support this crazy healthy lifestyle by participating in as much running, hiking and biking as is imaginable. It's inevitable that I'd get sucked into this craziness, and even forget that while I can sometimes do one epic thing, stringing them together doesn't make them easier. Ha! Of course, Matt makes all this look quite effortless. He will often ride 14 miles in a day in his commute, then run 5 miles before dinner. And maybe lift weights with me, if I need his help spotting anyway. He ran the 5K version of that 10K I ran, and he came in second. To Jeffrey. Oh, and they both decided to run the 5K, because they had a cyclocross race on Sunday. TWO RACES in ONE weekend. Living with He-man kinda makes you want to stay in shape.

But of course, now he is in the kitchen doing the dishes and singing along to MAGIC! and the pop charts like no one can hear him. ("Marry that girl, I'm gonna marry her anyway...") I suppose this marital influence goes both ways.

On perhaps a related note, I'm struggling to make my weight lifting goals (2-3 times per week, training to squat, deadlift and press my own weight). I'm about halfway there, but it's slow going. Does anyone want to be my virtual weight lifting buddy?

Monthly goals

I made my two fitness goals this month: Cycle 100 km, and run 50 km. (Total, over the month).
Strava tells me I've biked 176 km, and run 51 so far. Hooray! Will see if I can keep up next month. I was pleased that the hardest part was making the time, not the fitness required. But it's going to be harder to make the time now that the weather is getting dodgier, bike commuting seems more questionable, and late night runs require more planning. But, it's nice to maintain a (comparatively) high level of fitness, so that when it is nice out, I can easily go for long hikes without killing myself.

One of my other goals for the month was job hunt related. It's definitely time in the process where I need to be putting out regular application, but I'm still... unsure what I'm looking for.

I made myself go to a networking meeting for people who are arguable in my instructional design field. And I hated it! We had nothing in common, I found them difficult to communicate with, and it was a nightmare to try and imagine myself as some self serving middle manager, fretting first and foremost over "personal branding" and leadership coaching. (Especially as it became clear that no one was in perfect agreement about what those things meant.) I might be too objective for this career path.

But, rather than write another "Woe is the perennial job hunter," I'm doing something about it. One of my coworkers used to work as a career coach, and currently supervises a team of people who help students find jobs. She agreed to work with me (for super cheap!) because she wants to do more career development stuff, and I need help! She is a very positive person, and because we work together, she has a better sense of my capabilities than if I tried to explain this to someone in a one hour session. Step one is describing some positive previous work experiences, and describing my dreams for my next job. It's amazing to me how little detail I have in the dream, but we are just starting the process. I've also been sending really nosy emails to people on campus, so hopefully I can rustle up some interesting opportunities for myself. Today I realized I have 14 weeks left in my contract, and will have 7 weeks of vacation/holiday/sick leave to expend, so now is a good time to get serious about What Next.

I know other family members are thinking about career moves, so I'll let you know how this coaching works out.

Telling some Stories

Casey likes to talk now.  It's not babble, which is when your baby starts mimicking the sounds of language.  This is some sort of pre-babble, where she just looks at you right in your face and sticks out her tongue and raspberries you.  Then you raspberry back.  Then she repeats.  This can last up to an hour. Then it transitions to happy shrieking.

Today, I was putting Tyler to sleep.  He grabbed my arm, rolled over and just said.  "Stay, Daddy."  It's been a while since he's done that.

Casey can keep her head up really well now, as well as roll from her front to her back.  We're working on sitting up, but there are two problems.  One is that whenever she gets excited, she likes to straighten out her body.  This means she flings herself onto her back without warning.  The other is that whenever she sits, she kinda leans forward, and forward, and forward, until she's essentially eating her toes.  Then she rolls to her side and then is right back on her back again.  It might be intentional.

I'm running infrequently, but being able to run at all with the kids in the house is a pretty big accomplishment.  Casey sleeps really well, though she can occasionally be hard to put down.  We've taken to cutting off her naps at 4:00, or sometimes earlier.  It means she gets a little loopy in the late afternoon, but she usually perks up when you nibble on her fingers.  Anyway, my 3 mile time is still roughly 45 minutes, which isn't good, but it's faster than when I'm sitting down.  And if the calorie counter is to be believed, it burns a lot of fuel.  (I'm not convinced it is to be fully believed.)

Fran was here last month, and Mom and (eventually) Dad are here this month.  We're going to go to a photo studio and get adorable pictures of everyone taken.  And then we aren't going to share those pictures at all.  We're just going to hoard them and look at them in dark corners where no one else can see.  This is a joke, of course.  Watch out for Christmas presents.

Tyler took some swim classes.  We're not trying to turn him into an Olympian, we just want him to feel comfortable (and safe) around a pool.  He started out pretty nervous, but got better at each class.  By a few times in, he was excited to go.  He's a decent swimmer now, he just keeps popping his head up instead of forward, and when you tell him to jump in the pool, he sits down, turns around, and shuffles in backwards.  Not a bad reflex.

It was my birthday last week!  I got to make a yellow cake.  It was really good, despite the fact that Jessie thought it was dry but who cares about her opinion anyway.  I haven't had any Ice Cream yet.  I'm saving that for later.  I don't eat ice cream as a matter of responsibility now.  Not eating ice cream reminds me that I'm being careful about what I eat.  The last time I had any was during my birthday last year.  I figure once a year is pretty responsible, I'm just going to reserve that splurge for another time.

I still hover around between 202 and 205 on the scale, with 199 always hovering just out of reach.  I'm really hungry, though.

If something big and dramatic happens, I'll try and let you know.

-N

Mosaic of Happenings

A few short notes of no special relevance, in no particular order:

I rode my bike to work on Friday.
Matt rides his bike in every day- the 7 mile trip takes him 20-25 min each way.
My 9+ mile trip took about an hour.
My friend Adam drove me home, so we could begin our weekend adventures. Next time, tomorrow, I will be driving my bike past some of the scary/trafficy part of the ride, and still probably riding 6ish miles, in 45 min or so. But I have to ride home, too.

* * *

I've been running "a lot"* lately. I bought some new trail running shoes, since my knees report my old ones were wearing out. The first pair I bought were super light weight, looked like a unicorn puked them up (vibrant reds, purples and yellows all swirled together), and made my toes fall asleep when I ran. I traded them in for a blue pair that look like keds skate shoes. The new ones meet the approval of both my knees and toes. And ankles.

*I can claim to be running a lot based on my current Strava standings. Strava is an app that tracks your mileage, records, etc, and lets you virtually race others. I've joined a "how many miles can you run this month?" challenge every month this summer, and I've been in the  top half every time. That's right- I run more than some people!

* * *

This year we were invited to 4 weddings, 3 of them in August.
One of Matt's old roommates got married a couple weekends ago. They found a beautiful castle/B&B in Tacoma to get married in. They rented out the whole B&B for thier family, but most of the family decided to make the drive home after, so we got to stay in the castle over night.
Castle weddings are awesome.
Also, macaroons are a legit substitute for wedding cake, especially (but not only) if you are marrying a French person.

* * *

This weekend, we did a hike to Mt Shuksan and Lake Ann.The trail was storybook perfect, with long meandering creeks that had wide, flat, not-slippery stones at easy points across them, and switch backs that gently climbed us the ~2,000 feet over a ridge.
The appeal of Mt Shuksan is that there are glaciers there. I haven't seen a lot of glaciers not in Alaska. Mt Shuksan has "hanging glaciers." We tried to guess how a hanging glacier was different, and I wondered why one mountain would have more than one glacier.
The actual view looked like some bits of a big glacier were stuck on the side of this mountain- so little compared to glacier attached to ice fields.
Still totally worth the hike.

We also saw some pika.

* * *

For Labor Day weekend, I am going to a wedding in Toronto, and Matt is going to spend two weeks in Death Valley doing "summer testing" of a truck. I assume this means they stress test the truck- driving it hot and hard in the worst possible climate to see if they can kill it. This seems like the weirdest possible way to explore Death Valley, but I'm really excited for Matt to go on this trip.

I'm also excited for when he comes back- we might actually spend a weekend in our own house.
Or we might go camping. With mountain bikes.
I'm excited for both options.

Weekend of Champions

I would like to support some of the blog action that has been happening here. And while my pictures aren't as cute, there are pictures. 

As part of the whole, raise $30K for charity scheme, and a general sense of learning to lead a fitter lifestyle, we've been trying to run some 5Ks this summer.  I just completed a training program for running 5K distance (using the Pear app and a heart rate monitor- it was pretty great), so I figured we shoudl find a race. Hence, the OFIT 5K for Queen Anne Public Schools. Also the race map indicated this was a mostly flat course, along Elliot Bay's beautiful waterfront. Sign me up! And Matt! And my friend Jessica who just decided to get in to running, thanks to the Oatmeal. 

My goal was to finish in 45 min. 

I finished in about 42. 

My friend's goal was to finish.

She finished about 1 minute behind me (she let me pace her for about the first 3 miles).

Matt's goal was not to wear himself outbefore his bike race the next day.

He finished third overall and first in his age group.

So all around success. What was great about this event- and I have found many similar events in the region- was that there were a lot of children running. Or "running." This is cool, because it really mellows out whatever sense of competitiveness there might be for a 5K. And it pretty much guarantees I can pass someone. Yes, some/many/most of those people were less than 10 years old. Yes, one of those 6 year olds had a prosthetic leg. Whatever. My training worked, and I was able to run as far and as fast as I planned, and I felt great afterwards, and we went to eat eggs for breakfast. It was cool.

Oh, and Matt was a ribbon.  

Today, Sunday, was the final race in the mountain bike series Matt has been riding in this winter/spring. This is a fun event, with cash prizes to top finishers, and the seasons awards are given out. Matt wanted to do well in this race, in general because he has been doing well this seasons, but in particular because of the chance to win some $$. I took a cow bell out and cheered people on. Or tried.

Let me give you a sense of what spectating mountain biking is like. So the riders are launched in groups by age- ~10 under 18 riders, ~12 under 29 riders, 6 under 40 riders, etc... the launch 2 minutes apart. The spread of talent and pace is such that the fastest over 50 rider will definitely pass the slowest under 18 rider... and everyone else in the field. So when Matt starts a race like this, he looks at passing ~26 other guys. He has a decent start (meaning he launches and elbows his way in front of most of the guys in his age group). 

There was one very technical section that was easy for spectators to watch, with these guys bounding over tree roots, then landing and turning immediately on a gravel road and shooting off uphill into the woods again. It's 10 minutes from the start line. I try to put out of my mind that there seems to be a lot of minor injury in this event- guys regularly laugh about scrapped and bloodyknees or elbows. About 6 riders in, and under 29 rider jumps out of the trees, and his bike slides sideways on the gravel out from under him. He is embarassed, but looks over his shoulder (no oncoming riders, just a small crowd of spectators who start clapping when he stands up), grabs the bike and starts running to flatter ground. This guy will definitely have gravel in his shins.

Matt goes through in a tight group with 4 or so other riders. The person at the front of his group looks like he might be 15, but it's hard to guess other ages. For each of them, as the come flying out of the woods, thier tires skid but the hold it together and continue on. I'm about to go to the next spot for spectating when another pair of kids come out of the woods. The first makes the transition with enough grace, but the second does not. The rider is down, and I can see he is tangled up in his bike enough that spectators lean in to give him a hand. I see one of the organizers go sprinting down the hill to catch a first aid kit, and in the meantime, someone has stepped into the woods to tell the next riders to watch out for the kid laying in the trail. Shudder.

The kid was fine. I saw him cooling down later with an icepack taped to his knee while he pedaled around. 

The general take away is that mountain bike spectating is boring and then scary. And then boring again if you are lucky.

Anyway, Matt came in 3rd overall on this race. He won $40 for this feat.

 

 Third overall was also first in his age group. He won $40 for this. And another medal.

 

After a season of racing, Matt was first in his category for (Intermediate riders, aged 30-39). 

He got a sweet plaque. This will probably go with the rest of his hardware, gathering dust in various corners of his office and garage.

First 5K of the Year

Matt and I ran (or "ran") a 5K this weekend.  This was Betty's idea, she was going to walk a 5K in Concrete to support the local Lion's Club Booster, and since I'm trying to find ways to support family and friend's communities efforts, we decided to go.  I thought I might walk, but the weather was wet, which made me think I should "run," you know, to finish "faster."

Let's discuss my running quickly. (Or maybe just briefly, since my running quickly doesn't come up much.)  At various times in the past, I've thought, "I should run," and this idea is almost immediately rejected by by lungs and legs. A coworker has been running, and since we have this fitness challenge, at work, I thought I should go with her.  She runs really slow.  And you know what, if I go really slow, I can run.  Or jog.  Or possibly wog.  You know those skinny late-middle aged women who get all decked out in high visibility fluorescent spandex and then go for runs so slow, you wonder why they are even wearing work out clothes?  I'm a little slower than that.  And I'm totally ok with it.

Let's just compare that to Matt's running.  Matt, my dearly beloved, wear a heart rate monitor when he runs.  He will occasionally let his bestie talk him into going into a 5, no oops, 8 mile trail run up a mountain. When Matt saw last year's times for this 5K, he simply said, "I'm pretty sure I could beat that." 

Needless to say, Matt and I never run together.  Matt thinks running together would be nice, but I am much happier running and suffering on my own then listening to his chipper banter about how he is almost warmed-up while I'm already too out of breathe to tell him I don't want to talk about how wind sprints might help me.  It's one of those secrets to our happy marriage: we don't run together.

But, we can run at the same event.  This was an out and back kind of race- run away from the school 2.5K, then come back 2.5K. IT was paired with a 10K, where lean people would run out 5K, and back 5K. Now, I'm a "running my own race" type, but I was hoping to see racers returning, since this would indicate that at least someone made it near the halfway point.  I finally saw some kids running back (yes, actual children), eventually followed by Matt. As he passed, he rolled his eyes and said, "I forgot to turn around." When I got back, 45 min from the start time (a personal best, thank you), Matt was there to greet me.  I got a participation ribbon (Woo!), and we went to get some water before watching to see Betty come in.

We compared notes: I was not passed by the 83 year old trail walker, but I'd been dropped by most everyone else who ran.  After he forgot to turn around (because he was keeping up with people running the 10K), he had to run pretty hard to make up the time.  He had to pass several children, and a guy with one leg.  He has been hoping to post a personal best (since he is in great shape from Mt Bike Racing this winter), but that was not to be.  I finally asked him what he did with his ribbon, and he sheepishly pulled out his SECOND PLACE MEDAL from his pocket.  Yup, second place, behind a 15 year old, and in front of 12 year old and a man running with a blade in place of his foot.

Blah-blah-blog

I have two main excuse for intermittent blogging- 1- working and job hunting keeps me crazy busy, 2- I see my primary audience quite often.  I tend to think of my core readership as, well... Nana.  And I see her about as often as I might blog, so it seems less pressing to get a post together.  But I blog for my MOMMY, so here is a little effort.

Real quick, no updates on the job front.  Although I sometimes wonder if I'll ever miss semi-regular coffee meetings with strangers and unending follow-up/scheduling meetings.  Ahahaha...

I'm taking this class at the community college which is proving to be interesting.  Introduction to Project Management- it's a good add-on skill to the many skills I have (on the other blog, I am using my job hunt as a case study for project management).  I am thinking about taking the next class,or possible the Intro to Technical Writing Class, or possibly... studying for the patent agent bar- because having a B.Sc. in Biochemistry allows me to skip Law School for this purpose.  Basically, I'm bored with not knowing where my career is going so I am scrambling to make up more viable paths for myself.  Would anyone like to weigh in on which of these things seem most in-line with my interests in skills? 

Mom and Dad were down for one scant day over the weekend, but it was enough to showcase the great digs Nana has set up in Bothell and catch up a little.  I don't mind if they come for short visits so long as they come often.  On a related note, the campaign to have the first "Post-Retirement Vacay" at my house has already started.  Noel, I think we could easily rope together a couple legs of this journey, as a "Make Dad jealous of Mom's travel schedule and want to retire, too" trip.  We can discuss more later.

Matt's CDL class is moving along.  They've been driving on the streets, and will probably be on the highway this weekend.  I'm glad he is making progress, but I can't wait for it to be over.  To adjust to his new hectic schedule, we are trying (trying) to go for some short runs in the evening.  I don't mind jogging at night, but it seems silly to do after some of the beautiful days we've had here.  Matt is just about down to a 6 minute mile (what?!), and whatever his whole warm-up/cool down cycle is is how long it takes me to run a mile as well.  Oh, and another favor dear readers: I am re-reading a Terry Pratchett book (Feet of Clay, I forgot how much I like that one), which is a sign that I am both over-extended, and out of good reading material.  Suggestions?

Barely Coherent Blogging: Stuff just happens

My feet hurt, but I will endeavor to blog anyway.

Jess and I just got back from a pretty long run/rollerblade, a good 5 miles or so, which is pretty long for me, especially when running barefoot. I’ll probably have to get some better barefoot shoes soon, I’m starting to wear out the old ones, and there isn’t a whole lot of them to wear. Jess was on wheels, and was kind enough to slow down for me, I got pretty slow near the end.

We had a pretty relaxing week, overall. We spent a few days at home watching movies and cuddling on the couch, which is always nice. I started to feel bad about not going to Judo right up until the point where Jess grabbed my arm, cuddled my shoulder, and made a contented noise. Then I didn’t feel so bad about anything, really.

There’s a decided lull in new video game releases during the summer, or at least ones I care about, which has the nice effect of making me do other stuff for a while. I’ve been working on music and reading a LOT of books. I’ve gone through a significant percentage of our previous book splurge, and so I got to buy some of the sequels to the books I’ve already worked through. Books like:

Hyperion: A Hugo Award-winning book. Really good, very atmospheric and interesting. I got the sequel today.

Mistborn: Written by Brandon Sanderson, an author I’d been hearing a lot about (he’s writing the last books in the wheel of time series). Quite good, he writes books with really interesting magic systems, totally different than anything you’re used to and quite intriguing.

The Cobra Trilogy: Written by Timothy Zahn, and pretty much anything by him, I will read. Not a bad series, either, full of interesting ideas and good twists that you usually don’t see coming. I always like when a book does that successfully.

Tomorrow I get to go eat lunch with an old friend from Juneau who lives here in Austin now. So exciting! And then next week I get to head up to Dallas to get a polygraph taken. Significantly less exciting!

-N

Exercisey!

So I still haven’t gotten on any Martial Art-based exercise program, but don’t think that means I’m idle. I’ve been doing some outdoor running and some indoor aerobics to get my heart rate up a few times a week. Running is *so much easier* now that I weigh less. I’ve noticed a few other changes, too. It’s easier for me to move around, and yesterday I went from laying on my stomach to standing up by walking my hands back toward my feet. And this time I got all the way up. I haven’t been able to do that before. Also, my wedding ring is dangerously close to falling off. I’m thinking about getting another one a half-size smaller. Maybe tungsten or titanium this time. Current low weight: 206 pounds. Leveling off, but still room to grow. Or shrink, I guess.

My latest exercise escapade has been ‘barefoot running’. Which I’m actually not doing barefoot. I have some old waders which offer excellent ‘pebble and asphalt’ protection, without offering a lot of foot support, which is the idea. It forces you to run on your toes, which is a serious calf workout, let me tell you. But the idea is that running shoes ‘allow’ you to run on your heels, stomping down with enough protection that it doesn’t hurt to run that way. But unfortunately, that means that all the impact is either absorbed by your shoes or by your *knees*. A little rough, in the long term. Barefoot running means you land on the balls of your feet. Any other running method will feel really weird. That means you have a much longer impact time and much more impact is absorbed by your feet and calves. It’s definitely a different mode of running. We’ll see how it works out.

I eventually want to get back into some form of ‘exercise inspiration’, whether martial arts-based or otherwise. I never exercised until I had some reason to, and that used to be Tae Kwon Do or some other martial art. I do it now for the health, and because I get really tired if I don’t, but it’s nice to have something else to work for. I’m actually considering taking drum lessons. I know that every time I sit down at my (electronic) drums for more than a few minutes, I work up a serious sweat. Could be something else neat to try.

Speaking of music, I’ve started doing that, as well, though in a decidedly roundabout way. I’ve actually gone back to my old music theory textbooks, which are great because they offer *tons* of examples and exercises to work through, and I’m re-learning everything again, from simple part-writing and chord selection all the way through writing simple Piano music. I’m hoping to start with some simple melodies and chords, written properly, and then get into the strange synthesizers and filters of the rest of my ‘studio’. We’ll see how it goes. If I make anything that sounds good, I’ll put it up here.

And on a final note, I’m sitting on the couch, and Tigger is laying next to me. Nagano is laying on the back of the couch above my head. They’re both asleep. Very cute.

-N

Gone Runnin'

Today Jess and I went out to get some exercise along Brushy Creek Trail We didn't go along the whole thing, but my estimates put my run at approximately 2.5 miles out, and then the same back again. I wasn't always running, to be fair, but that is a definite distance record for me, so I'm proud. Now Jess and I are resting off our morning exercise after having some delicious lunch. I made some homemade bread and we made grilled cheese sandwiches on our brand new...grittle! Thanks so much Sandlin! We've already gotten a couple of uses out of it, once for breakfast, which was great because you can make a massive dose of pancakes, all at once, and then agian for grilled cheese. It warms up really quickly and you can easily control the temperature, which is very nice.

The the parents, we also got your other present in the mail, a pair of kitchen shears. They're really nice, and the two blades unhinge from each other for easy dishwasher cleaning. Thanks so much again!

The arcade was really neat. It was Buzzing, full of people, a lot of competition going on. Most of the games were competitive fighting games, which is great because it fosters a sense of community in your arcade when you meet up with people, play with them, and actually get to see their face. I played a bunch and then Jess and I came home to relax.

Oh, and the fish was great, too.

-N

5K finished

Waking up at 5:45 in the morning on vacation is unusual enough. Doing it so that I can run a 5K is downright weird.

Regardless, 'Team Venture' managed to run our 5Ks today just fine. I brought up the rear at 41:23, which is a pretty slow pace for a 5k, but I did beat...8 people in the race out of 177. Shannon was a few minutes ahead of me, and Jess was about ten minutes faster, which makes her *really fast*. Quite a change from the girl that used to stay beind me while I went running for TKD. No doubt I would do a lot better if I ran with any regularity, but unfortunately Texas summer heat procludes me from getting outside and running until the sun goes down.

Still though, the most important opponent when running is yourself, and I made my personal goal of running the entire time, despite being completely soaked through by the end of the run. The one upside of having to wake up early for a 7:30 run is that the sun wasn't fully up and toasty for the entire time. Humid, though. I would however, like to point out that I also was faster than everyone who did not go running today, and that's several million people, at the very least. So that certainly makes me feel better.

Tomorrow we're heading down to Miami to depart on our CRUISE which is very exciting. Communication will be somewhat limited, but cell phones will work if there's some sort of emergency. We do get charged international roaming rates, so use this power wisely. E-mail will be better. For some reason the ship has free wi-fi. Odd, that.

-N