A different day, coloriffic, Adorable Elsa, Stadium lights, Randall in town, racing a road bike, deaths
It felt weird on Thanksgiving morning to be getting up so “late” at 4:45 am since this was the first time in years I was attending a race as a participant and not a timer. We left the house around 5:30 for the race scheduled to start at 7:30. I wanted to get there early to lend a hand where needed. Once I got there it didn’t take long for me to track down my timer buddy John who was handling the event. I wound up spending almost all of the time pre-race talking and helping John, it just felt like the natural place for me to be.
The atmosphere at the Gobble Gobble was so much different from what I became accustomed to at the running club Thanksgiving race. I would compare the feel of that race to a mob waiting to beat in the doors on Black Friday. It was just chaotic as hell from start to finish. The club race has over 3000 participants, the Gobble has less than half of that. This race breaks the event apart into a chip timed and fun run division which further helps with congestion. They had a woman doing announcements on a small stage during the entire time leading up to the race which made it very clear and easy to figure out what was going on instead of just herds of people following other herds of people, hoping they are going the right way.
Cindy and I were in the timed event which took off first, 5 minutes before the fun runners started. Cindy has not been been able to do consistent running leading up to the race so I knew it was going to be tough for her. Despite her saying I should just go ahead and run whatever pace I wanted , I stayed with her for the majority of the race. She was struggling at points and I tried to give her encouragement to keep pushing ahead.
When we got to the 3.5 mile mark I told her I was going to push for the last half mile which she was fine with. It gave me a chance to briefly indulge in my normal race mode mindset where I acquire targets ahead of me to run down and pass. My official time of 38:30 was slower than most of my training runs but I could have cared less, it just felt good to be a participant instead of an organizer. Cindy came across the line pushing hard about 45 seconds after I did.
The post race scene again was far less chaotic than I was accustomed to due to less people and the simple awards structure where only the top three finishers of each gender get anything. Instead of posting paper results John just had a couple laptops set up that runners could use to print out their individual time slips, further relieving congestion. Cindy and I indulged in some of the post race refreshments. I hung at the finish line with John for a little while before we called it a morning. It was good that I got to see the race director, Matt, who I had not seen in person for a long time although I chat to him online on a regular basis. Cindy and I left the parking lot both feeling very good about the experience, it was such a refreshing change from what I had become used to.
When we got home there was no equipment to put away, no data to be massaged and no results to be uploaded. Instead I got to just flip on the Macy’s Parade and chill. I had not seen more than a few minutes of the parade for the past five or six years. I got to watch almost two hours of it this year and loved every minute of it. The rest of Thanksgiving followed the same general feel good vibe. Cindy did most of the heavy lifting for the day, preparing a hybrid tofurkey/turkey Thanksgiving dinner that we enjoyed with Katie and Daniel. Before dinner I actually shot over to the school with the kids to get some more EUC riding in where Katie once again showed massive improvements in her ability to ride the electric unicycle. The meal Cindy prepared was very, very good. We relived the meal via warm ups during the weekend and it was still delicious.
On Friday I was outside early trying to get chores down to free up the weekend since Randall was rolling in for a visit. After I finished up we headed out for some errands. Since it was Black Friday I didn’t expect it to be a pleasant experience. We stopped at Sam’s Club first which was busy but not a mob scene, I saw some good deals but nothing I wanted for myself or others. I was a bit annoyed that the 4K tv I bought at Sam’s in May was now like 400 bucks less on Black Friday.
We then headed to Lowe’s and Home Depot with a primary goal of securing a new artificial Christmas tree. The tree I have is about 5-6 years old and works fine but I am not thrilled that the built in lights are incandescent which eat a lot of power. I wanted a tree that used controllable LED lighting. Getting into the Home Depot parking lot was just ridiculous. As annoying as it was, I just reminded myself of what date on the calendar it was. I knew what I was getting myself into.
The interior of the store was no better with mobs of people clogging the aisles. Cindy swooped in and claimed the last box of a tree model that seemed to have the specs we wanted, a seven and a half footer with led lights that could be color, white or cycle between the two, perfect. While we were there we picked up a few other items. I felt relieved when we finally got out the door, the Black Friday mindset is just something that leaves me feeling unsettled.
Later in the day we actually went back out to the Bonita Home Depot, bringing Elsa along this time. I wanted to pick up a spot light I could install on the water equipment shelter to provide night illumination for that side of the house since it is where we normally walk Elsa. We took Elsa to Home Depot with Sadie the week before and she seemed to like it. Well without Sadie around it was a different story. Elsa seemed scared most of the time, I felt bad for her. Hopefully more exposure to more people, sights, and sounds will help her not react in such a scared manner.
We did our exterior decorations on Friday. I totally abandoned the all white exterior lights that I used to decorate the house with, replacing them exclusively with colored LED lights. We strung lights on the front palm trees and the opposite front fence lines. When combined with our other color/pattern changing decorations the house looks incredibly colorful. I like it.
Randall did not arrive on Saturday until early in the afternoon giving us time to get stuff done in the morning. One of those things was me installing the new flood light. It was an LED model so I was a bit concerned about it’s ability to light up the yard compared to conventional lighting. When it got dark those fears evaporated, the lights were extremely bright, it almost looked like stadium lighting. I also shaved my head Saturday morning. When Elsa first saw me with the buzz cut she barked in fear, thinking somebody new had replaced me. Once she heard my voice her stubby tail started wagging again.
Randall pulled up in his Prius with his road bike in the back. Even though I wasn’t planning to ride my road bike with him I had an idea of riding my Gotway Msuper with him instead. We hung out for a bit catching up although Randall is usually up to date with most aspects of my life via the blog. It didn’t take long until I was ready to load up the car with PTVs to take to the school, hopefully to get Randall rolling.
I brought a Minipro along as well, thinking it would be good for him to cut his teeth on the far easier to master vehicle. I was surprised that at first Randall was very unstable on the Segway. When he stepped on he was lurching forward awkwardly with the frame of the bot bouncing up and down. He soon became more accustomed to how the gyro felt, balancing for you. Within 5 minutes he was able to roll around pretty comfortably. I tooled around on my Msuper while he followed me for awhile. At first I was thinking it might make sense to just stick to the Minipro on Saturday and maybe let him try the training EUC on Sunday but when I asked him if he was up to trying the unicycle he was ready to give it a go.
We used the same game plan as what seemed to work well for Katie and Daniel, setting up the wheel next to the fenced in bike corral, giving Randall ample hand support as needed. Slowly he was able to go further in between touches and had a number of step offs as he lost balance. Within maybe 20 minutes of trying and falling he was doing better. Randall left the safety of the fence and headed down the sidewalk. He wore his helmet at the start of the EUC training but removed it later, stating he felt like it affected his balance, despite my encouragement to wear it. Randall gave me a verbal waiver of liability, claiming that his mountain biking experience has taught him how to fall. He got to put that experience to the test.
I felt nervous as I trailed Randall around the parking lot. He would have moments of extreme shakiness, sometimes he recovered, sometimes he didn’t. Most of the time he was able to jump off the wheel and let it roll to a tumbling stop. A few times he was the one that went tumbling, hitting the ground hard. To Randall’s credit, the spills didn’t slow him down, he got right back on every time. By the time we left the school some two hours later Randall was still shaky but able to ride around, turn, mount and dismount at a decent level. He said he now understood why I found riding PTVs so much fun.
On Saturday night we enjoyed more Thanksgiving warm ups while watching the latest Netflix rental, Purge, Election Year. I had already seen the first two Purge installments so I sort of knew what to expect. Randall had not seen any of them but knew the general premise. The movie was not bad by Purge standards and in some ways made me think about the 2016 election which is a bit disturbing. If you don’t deal well with movie violence, steer clear. I’d give it a B as is.
Sunday morning I was up early to run, despite logging four miles on Thanksgiving. I let Randall sleep as he isn’t doing much running nowadays. He had indicated he might get up and ride to Ave Maria and then meet me on the way back on my unicycle to head to DD. The air was nice and cool which felt refreshing as I circled the track 16 times. I wound up averaging an 8:55 pace, almost 45 seconds better than Thursday.
When I got back I saw Randall’s bike was still in the garage so I figured he scrapped the Ave Maria ride idea. We instead shoved off for Dunkin Donuts with Randall on two wheels and me on one. At first my intention was to handle the ride like I did the first time I tried it, almost exclusively on sidewalk. I started off that way but found it annoying to have to slow down at the crosswalks as Randall would be able to keep cruising along in the bike lane. About a mile and a half in I swung into the bike lane and just stayed there, riding within a few feet of Randall, taking advantage of his wind breaking.
I told Randall that if he could keep his speed around 18 mph I should be ok, well within the 25mph+ top speed of the wheel. I had never cruised this fast for this long. The wheel felt very stable at speed although I was obviously a bit nervous having nothing between me and vehicles other than a painted line. Randall said he was surprised how easily I was able to keep up. At one point his bike computer was showing we were over 20 mph and I was still right there.
After enjoying a large coffee at DD we headed the opposite direction and it was much more challenging. A strong head wind which was more like a cross wind made Randall ineffective as a wind blocker. There were periods of time where I was struggling big time to stay in place as the wind was pushing me towards the curb. I was worried that the additional wind pressure could gobble up battery life to the point where I may have an issue. The Msuper chugged along, I still had about 30% battery life when we pulled back into the driveway. The video of the ride is pretty interesting. It looks like we are going VERY fast at times.
Late morning Katie and Daniel showed up for us to go for our Sunday ride. Despite logging 20 hard miles a couple hours earlier I was happy to go back out. I had just enough vehicles to cover all of us although we are running into an electric unicycle issue. Both Katie and Daniel have advanced enough that the training wheel is just not enough machine for them. At first she rode the black MiniPro with Cindy who was on the white one. I was on my Msuper with Daniel on the Ninebot One, while Randall continued his learning curve on the training wheel. Randall was already feeling beat up from his day one of training. After a pretty bad spill he said his back was really bothering him. We switched things up and had Katie get on the training wheel while Randall got on the less physically demanding MiniPro. Once again Katie did fantastic, she was able to actually navigate the boardwalk at North Collier Park on one wheel. After the ride we all headed to Panera for a nice late lunch. It was quite busy but fun first half of the day with me logging four plus miles by foot and another 25 miles or so by wheel.
Late in the afternoon Randall, Cindy and I headed to the Miromar Outlets, a sort of holiday tradition when Randall visits. He wanted to primarily check out the Oakley outlet but we ducked into a few other stores. It was crowded but not a madhouse so my skin wasn’t crawling to leave immediately. We picked up a few heavily discounted items before calling it a day.
Before Randall left I asked him if he was interested in my Phantom drone. I plan to get a new Mavic Pro drone once they become available again and I knew in the past he had expressed interest in drones. Randall was surprised by and accepted my offer. I was happy to let him have it as opposed to selling it. I have been through a lot with the drone that Cindy so generously surprised me with years ago. It last saw consistent use when we went out west last year, capturing the footage that resulted in my prosecution by the national park service which was one of the more aggravating experiences of my life. In some ways I am sad to see it go but glad to give it to Randall instead of selling it to a stranger. I put the drone up in the air once last time Saturday morning just to make sure it was in good working order.
We thanked Randall for his visit. Elsa had up and down moments with Randall, mostly erring on the side of caution when he was around. He still had fun interacting with her.
So this weekend had two noticeable deaths on far opposite sides of the popularity spectrum, Florence Henderson and Fidel Castro. I was a big Brady Bunch fan and always thought Florence was the blueprint for the perfect mother. She remained somewhat relevant late into life which I thought was cool. Fidel, who was rumored to have died several times over the last decade finally kicked the bucket for real which has been celebrated wildly in south Florida which has a large Cuban population. The guy was a piece of shit without a doubt.
The Eagles play the Packers tonight. I have no idea which team will show up, the one that dismantled the Steelers or the team that looked so overmatched against the Seahawks.