Wet, work

I wanted to start by expanding on my claim that McCain picking Sarah Palin was a “smart” move.  The reason that it is smart is because it preys on stupidity.  McCain will be appealing to shallow thinkers that liked Hilary Clinton.  These people will go no further than noticing that Sarah also has breasts and a vagina so that will qualify her as a suitable replacement for Hilary.  Ali’s comment on the selection is valid, yes people with a brain wouldn’t flip their vote based on such a simple ploy.  On the local news Friday they were interviewing women that supported Hilary about Palin, asking if the selection would influence their vote.  Of course the first woman they show said she would indeed be voting for McCain now because of Sarah Palin, scary but true.  It will be interesting to see how all of her personal situations getting thrown out into the spotlight will affect public opinion.  Personally I could care less if her daughter is pregnant and I would prefer if the story never hit the press.  I mean who cares really? I care that she is anti-gay, anti-abortion and has no issues with ripping up Alaska for more oil.

Friday I had a little present waiting for me, well a big box actually.  My repaired Bose system arrived back from the repair center.  I hooked it up Friday evening to put it to a quick test.  When the 15-20 minute mark hit I was nervous that it would once again cut out.  I was very pleased when it sailed past the sticking spot without issue.  It sounded as good as ever. 

During the day Ali had done more work on the office, pulling more stuff out and patching nail holes in preparation for painting the office over the weekend.  I was looking forward to the office getting painted, I wasn’t looking forward to doing the actual work.

We were up before the birds Saturday morning as the alarm went off at 4am.  I had the truck all packed up with the race timing equipment the night before so we could get out and to the site as early as possible.  I was a bit concerned when we got there to see the road was damp from some rain that came down overnight.  The duct tape I use to hold down the timing lines would not work if the road is wet obviously.  Luckily by the time I was ready to put the lines down the roadway had dried.  Our set up went well, I had everything set up and ready to go a half hour before the race started.  Again we had a large increase in runners over the prior year.  Last year we had about 370 people finish, this year the number was just under 500.

So the race starts and the waiting game begins.  I double and triple check the equipment to make sure all is in order as I nervously await the first runner crossing which happens about 16:30 after the start.  I hold my breath waiting for the confirmation beep.  I get to breathe after hearing the much anticipated BEEP! Yes!  This is the first race that we didn’t hand out finish cards, it was all on me.  The person that used to hand out cards was given a new responsibility, beep confirmer.  Basically if someone came across the line and did not beep, his job was to call out the bib number so I could quickly punch it into the system, it worked out well.  However as the number of people that came across without a beep kept increasing I found myself getting increasingly annoyed with how so many runners lack the common sense to be able to properly utilize a zip tie.  We had a number of people come across without a chip.  Some of them simply didn’t pick one up but a number of them had them fall off.  The reason they fell off was because they secured the zip tie backwards, in the manner that allows it to slip loose.  I never thought we would have to go to the degree where you are explaining to runners that a “zip” tie is attached correctly when you hear the “ZIP”, but apparently we do.  Either that or I need to find a zip tie that locks in place no matter which way you thread it. 

Even with the zip tie problems, I don’t think I had to manually enter more than 20 runners out of 500.  However once I started producing results, the second wave of problems start, the runners coming up saying “I am missing from the results or something is wrong with my results…”   I found this process even more annoying because again more often than not, the issues or problems were caused by the runner either not completely or accurately filling out their entry form or because they did something wrong with the chip.  For example we had a woman come up distraught that her daughter was the overall winner but wasn’t on the results.  Well, her chip was found on the starting line, another zip tie novice casualty.  We had family members that didn’t pay attention whose chip went on whose foot causing times to be mismatched with runners.  We also had a number of people with incorrect age’s because the runner did not enter a birth date on their form.  Now part of this problem has to do with our race volunteers.  They are supposed to be confirming that entries handed in are legible and complete as well as instructing runners on how to attach the chips.  Unfortunately with the hectic scene around the registration table, that responsibility seems to go out the window sometimes.

Even with the bumps in the road, overall the timing went very, very well. It seems each time the process gets a little smoother.  The biggest hurdle we seem to have at this point is coming up with a way of getting the chips attached to people’s sneakers that is FOOL PROOF.  We had everything cleaned up and pulled out about 9:30.  On the way home we stopped at Lowe’s to grab the paint for the office and a few extra supplies for the job.

So after we ate lunch I started doing more prep in the office by patching up a few holes Ali couldn’t reach, sanding the patches down and pulling down the blinds.  While I did this Ali hopped on the tractor and mowed down some formally wet areas on the property where the water had receded a bit.  We wanted to take the opportunity to do this now since we were supposed to be getting more rain from Gustav later in the day and most of Sunday. By the time Ali got in I had just finished wiping down the baseboards and was starting the taping process.

So after taping I get out the paint and away we go.  It didn’t take me long at all to remember how much I dislike painting.  Painting the office was more of a pain than the other rooms because we had more furniture left in the room to paint around and it has a high vaulted ceiling.  Using a paint roller on a textured wall is quite the workout.  It was an unwelcomed one considering I was still quite sore from my week of solid 300’s I just finished up.  It is a great core workout as much of the time I had both hands on the roller overhead and to the side as I pressed hard to push the paint thoroughly onto the uneven wall surface.

The work was tedious but we made good progress.  Even though the project didn’t start until after noon we were finished putting two coats of paint on the room by Saturday evening.  I was pleased with the results.  The color just makes the room look more “refined” and “warm”.  By Saturday night we had started putting stuff back in place. We celebrated getting another room done by ordering out for pizza even though we had our traditional Friday night pizza the night before already.  I collapsed into bed around 11, exhausted from a day that started some 19 hours ago.

Sunday morning I “slept in” until 7 am.  It wasn’t long until I was once again engaged in more work.  One of the changes I was making in the office was moving my computer from on top of a stand next to my desk to a spot underneath on the left side behind a door to continue the new “clean” theme of the room.  Getting it down there and everything hooked up was quite the pain in the ass.  I also had some mysterious audio problem that only surfaced once I put the system down there that mysteriously fixed itself.  I was a bit concerned that I would tire quickly from the difficult accessibility of the puter in it’s new spot as well as thermal issues from it being in a more enclosed area.  I did like the look though so at least for now, I’m going to try to work with it.

While Ali was at the gym I went outside during the morning and mowed and weed whacked the rest of “dry” land during an unexpected break in the precipitation.  Once she got back we worked in earnest in getting more stuff back in the office.  We had a lot of junk in the office, junk meaning stuff you have but don’t use or need.  Sorting through the items to determine their worth is a long process.  We spent a good chunk of Sunday afternoon just bringing in bins of stuff and sorting them.  As a result our trash and recycle can got fuller and we also started new bins for yard sale or ebay items.  We burned out on the process and stopped with a few bins to go which are still in the living room.  The office will be much less full than it was when we are done.  Many times throughout the day we commented on how we liked the color in the room. Sunday night we mostly vegged out and watched one of my favorite shows, Wife Swap.

So I had been pushing all weekend to get stuff done so my Monday could be a day of mostly leisure and that plan had come to fruition.  Ali had a shopping trip planned with my mom and then afterward she was bringing mom back for a bare bones Labor day cookout.  There were a few light chores I knocked out in the morning but while the girls were shopping I was mostly relaxing.  I played some WoW and watched a couple movies, Beowulf and Harold and Kumar go to White Castle. 

Beowulf was an animated action film. The animation was very realistic, at certain points you would swear you were looking at real people.  Actually much of the animation was digitized real actors. I found the film entertaining throughout.  There is even some digitized T&A which was funny.  I was a bit surprised to see the mother of all demons was a naked Angelina Jolie, sans nipples and other visible genitalia.  I came into the film thinking it was going to be on the lame side, I left it thinking I would recommend it to others. If you like Lord of the Rings stuff, you’ll like this.  B+

I knew little about Harold and Kumar except I remember hearing somewhere they were funny.  It doesn’t take long to laugh at the simple premise that “Harold” is an asian guy.  Kumar and he are best friends that love to smoke weed.  The movie is about them smoking weed, getting a craving for White Castle burgers and a boatload of crazy things that happen on their way to White Castle.  The plot sounds simple and stupid.  In reality the movie was very funny and had me laughing throughout, out loud at times even though I was by myself.  It made me excited that I also have “Harold and Kumar go to Guantanomo Bay” to watch.  I think Ali may have even liked this one enough to overlook that there are some bare boobs in it.  Maybe I can get her to watch the next one. Another B+.

Once Ali and mom got back Ali showed me her clothes she got as well as some stuff which she snagged for me which I liked.  It didn’t take long till we hit the pool for a bit for a Labor Day swim.  Mom said the 87 degree water felt a bit cool which I snickered at.  It was too “cold” for Ali to go in past her knees.  While mom was over we showed her the newly painted room, the repaired screens and the newly painted front door and stucco trim.  Since my mom follows my blog religiously there isn’t much new to tell her when she sees me in person, she already knows what is going on.

We had burgers and beans shortly after 5 and after that mom was anxious to get home, she was pooped from a day of shopping.  She acted like it was such a huge deal that I had to drive her ALL the way back to her house.  It took less than a half hour, I reiterated to her that it is never a big deal.  We brought Nicki along for the ride back to mom’s.  After I got home the rest of the night was low key.  We watched Sunday’s Big Brother and then got ready for bed.

So after completing the epic 1500 last week I gave thought to what I wanted to do with my workout routine.  The 1500 was sort of the top of the mountain for me.  I’m going to be scaling my 300 workouts back, maybe only doing it twice a month just to ensure I maintain that fitness level.  I want to resume my conventional workouts as well as dialing regular running back into my program. I am hoping to run several 5k’s over the winter.  We’ll have to see if my knees will agree with what my mind desires.