Archives 2010

Yesterday Jeremy asked me if I heard about the latest Florida cash for clunkers program.  I said I had not.  Florida is rolling out another program tied into saving energy.  This time they are targeting inefficient older home AC systems.  In a typical Florida home, the central AC is by far the biggest consumer of energy so it is a good thing to target.

They are offering $1500 in rebates if you replace your system with a new efficient model. On top of this there additional federal tax savings available.  In theory, you could wind up saving approximately 50% off the cost of an average sized unit.

When I mentioned this to Ali she was very into pursuing it.  Our AC system is nearly 10 years old.  It also was installed in a haphazard fashion and has a bunch of leaks in the plenum.  You may recall the water I have sucked out of the return a couple times since the air handler was installed tilting AWAY from the drain.

So I am going to be making some phone calls today.  Getting this rebate is more involved than the appliance rebate program.  In order to qualify you have to have a test done that indicates that your ducts/vents leak no more than 15% of the air flow into the attic.  Some homes may never be able to achieve that level depending on the accessibility of the vents for repair.  I know with our vaulted ceilings I sure as hell would not want to be doing anything in that area.

We’ll see what sort of response/numbers we get.  I am sure most HVAC dealers are going to be hammered.

We have had two days in a row of mostly overcast weather.  This is very rare here in SW Florida.  Usually during the summer you will have your quick hitting storm and the rest of the day will be relatively sunny.  It’s funny how you just take stuff for granted.

Friday we once again headed down to the gulf for another swim training session.  It was not very enjoyable.  This was the third time I had done it and all three times the water conditions have been rough.  There also was a large sandbar off the coast and even with swimming 50 yards off the shoreline I was still hitting the bottom with my hands.

I also decided to stretch my distance, probably more than I should have.  I think in total I swam a little more than 3/4 of a mile, of course that was broken into 10-12 stop/starts.  The rough water took it’s toll on me.  I took in a bunch of water again including one full force muggy where I was desperately breathing for air and instead got all water from a wave. It sucked.

Ali and Christy were concerned when they could hardly see me off in the distance.  I emerged from the water totally spent.  I was so delusional that I accepted a Corona Light that Christy kindly offered me, forgetting that Corona Light might be my least favorite beer on the planet. I just stood there trying to catch my breath for a long time.  We headed out as the sky was looking very forbidding.

Ali and I had talked about heading to the water park on Sunday so I wanted to get anything around the house done on Saturday which I did.  While Ali mowed I worked inside after doing various outside duties.  While I was outside I took a picture of our very robust corn plants.

Saturday night we watched Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs.  Wow, what a bizarre movie. I told Ali that whoever created this had to be on LSD or some sort of mind altering drug.

It was funny but just so damn silly.  The best part by far for me was Steve the Monkey.  I’d give it a B.  It would probably be a great movie to watch drunk.

Sunday morning I blew off any brick training.  I made the mistake of doing Romanian dead lifts on Friday and as a result my hamstrings felt like they were a couple inches short.  Plus, I just didn’t feel like it.

Ali got up very early by Sunday standards and met Christy to run before going to spin class.  While she was gone I got did whatever needed to get done yet.  When Ali returned she was exhausted.  We agreed she should lay down for a nap before we go to the waterpark.

Well while Ali was sleeping it started to pour, hard.  By the time she got up we once again had standing water all around the property.  The rain had stopped but the skies still looked very menacing.  We came up with a game plan.  We would dress for the waterpark and head there first.  If it was open and it wasn’t pouring we would hang there for a bit.  If it was closed we would just hit some stores that we needed to get stuff from.

Well when we pulled up we saw bodies up on the water slides.  It wasn’t raining but you could see the line of rain very near by.  We figured we rarely make the time to do something like go to the waterpark so we might as well give it a go.  We figured if it does rain, we will already be wet.

The first thing we did was swim a few laps in the two 25 yard swimming lanes.  I think in total I did 300 yards. That was plenty, I was panting pretty hard by the end of it.  After the swimming we headed for the water slides.  We did all of the 5 slides at least once, some more than once.  It started to rain pretty steady while we were on the slides.  The good thing was there was no lightning which would have closed the park.  The rain didn’t seem to dampen the activity of the people that already paid their 10 bucks a head to be there.

The slides there are a bit annoying.  The seams that connect the sections of fiberglass are too pronounced.  When you are sliding down on your back you feel each and every one of them. Ali and I noticed on our trips up there was a much shorter line for the slides where you went down on your back and a much longer line for the inner tube slide.  We saved the inner tube slide for last.

It becomes obvious why the inner tube slide has the most demand, it is the best one.  Not only does riding on the inner tube eliminate the back pain from the seams, that slide is a particularly cool ride where a good portion is in total darkness.  You emerge from the slide into the lazy river where you can enjoy a casual trip around the park.

The weather the entire time we were there was rainy and overcast but neither Ali or I cared, we had fun.  After a few trips around the lazy river and walking around the grounds we dried off, changed and headed out.  I really hope we can hit the park again while it was still warm and sunny before football season to make a day out of it instead of a couple hours.

After the park we stopped at Home Depot, Bed Bath & Beyond and Sports Authority.  Sports Authority was the biggest stop of the three.  I scored new lifting gloves, push up bars, an ab roller wheel, portable air pump (bike) and a second tri-style lycra suit.  Exercise can be costly. Luckily Ali had a bunch of coupons along that saved us money at both B,B&B and Sports Authority.

On the way home we decided to utilized the $15 Coldstone gift card that had been collecting dust in our house forever.  I thought I would try something different and get blueberry ice cream with crushed graham crackers and walnuts. It was in a word, gross.

I told Ali it tasted nothing like blueberry.  Instead it just tasted like some sort of artificial flavor, sort of like ice cream bubblegum.  Ali encouraged me to go back inside and tell them I didn’t like it but I declined.  I picked it and since ice cream isn’t a real big deal for me I just left well enough alone.  I ate maybe a third of it and left the rest to melt.    Tip to Coldstone customers, avoid blueberry.

It continued to rain for most of the day.  Our property had various lakes around it.  The deafening chorus of happy frogs last night was incredible.  It was so loud the dogs were hesitant to even head outside.

I finished the single player campaign in Starcraft 2 last night.  As expected it was an epic final battle and the final cinematic admittedly gave me a few goosebumps.  I thouroughly enjoyed it.  This is far from the end of my SC 2 experience.  There are numerous single player challenges I can undertake and after that the endless world of PVP combat awaits.

Last night I also successfully replaced the tube on my Dawes front tire.  I struggled with it a bit more than I should have.  I wound up attempting and undoing it three times until I got it right.  The wheel is back on the bike and ready for action, whenever that may be.

Yesterday I had a good idea.  I created a survey on Survey Monkey to send out to our running club email list.  The survey was very simple, it asked if runners avoid signing up online for our races because of the additional $3 Active charges them to do so.  The numbers that came back where staggering.

70% of the first 100 responders said they absolutely avoid using Active because of that charge.  Roughly the other 30% said they already sign up online but would welcome lower fees. Only three people said they would still prefer paper.

These results were huge reinforcement for my point at the meeting which was argued against by some board members. The numbers were indisputable.

I forwarded these results out to the board and as a result got the ok to change one of our upcoming races to eliminate the surcharge and have it absorbed by the race instead. It will be interesting to see how the change affects our online registration percentages.

Ali came home from work late last evening with tears in her eyes.  She was stressed out from work.  Her job can be very annoying at times because her duties require other people to do things in a timely manner.  If they don’t it affects her workload which is very frustrating.  Well evidently yesterday was particularly bad in that regard. Ali gets very bent out of shape if she feels “behind” at work.

We are supposed to do more swimming in the gulf tonight and I hope to do another training brick Sunday morning.  The gaps in between will be filled with various house chores I am sure but hopefully a sufficient amount of doing whatever the F we feel like as well. I invited mom to stay over Saturday night but she turned me down.

When the Camaro came out last year it was immediately put up in tests against the 2010 Mustang and Challenger.  Pretty much across the board it would win these comparisons and clearly won the performance tests with shortest braking, fastest acceleration and 1/4 mile times. The V-6 Camaro stomped the Mustang and Challenger equivalents.

Well Ford went all out for the 2011 model making a number of changes, the largest of which was an all new 5.0 liter motor that produces 412 HP.  That number is still short of the 426 HP that is produced by the Camaro’s significantly larger 6.2 liter power plant. However the Mustang is also several hundred pounds lighter than the Camaro.  These numbers resulted in a dramatic shift in power in the performance numbers.

In the latest head to heads I saw the Mustang was now about a half second faster than the Camaro in both the V-8 and V-6 variations in the 1/4 mile test.  In the Challenger/Mustang/Camaro face off the Camaro now was rated last instead of first.  Wow, what a difference a year makes.  I still want one. 🙂

Last night was another running club board meeting.  You may recall last month there were some fireworks when I proposed some changes that went against the grain of some long time club members that are resistant to change.  In the past there have been a number of hotly contested issues at these meetings.  Far too often after the argument occurs the actual issue gets tabled and not followed up on, perhaps to avoid further conflict. Well I wasn’t ready to let my issues die on the vine.

Once again I pushed for changes to our registration procedures and pushed for the changes to start sooner rather than later.  Again I met up with some resistance, some of which I found particularly annoying as conclusions were being drawn that made no sense.  After an extended session of back and forth points from various board members we sort of agreed to move forward with some changes, dipping our toes into the water slowly.

I also was voted in as an official board member last night.  Even though I have attended many, many board meetings over the past few years I have never been an official board member meaning I couldn’t vote on stuff,  bring up motions and things of that nature.  It was by my choice that I wasn’t a board member, I didn’t want the stigma.  Well last night we all sort of figured I might as well be one as my issues and opinions are often main topics in meetings since I am the timer.

Last night I was also annoyed when I found out that Ali and I were committed, without my prior knowledge to time yet another event in October, a regional cross country event.  Evidently this possibility was brought up nearly a year ago but was not brought back up to either of us until last night.  The lack of communication is a common theme in our club and as always I found it aggravating.

On top of that, this would probably be one of the most challenging races I have timed to date.  There will be 5 different races going on back to back with the different groups like varsity boys, varsity girls, jv and so on.  Timing it will be an all morning event.  Sure I like a challenge but I also like getting paid for my expertise and time.

If I was an independent timer I would be charging at least a grand or two to do this.  It makes me think seriously about the viability of buying some used equipment of my own and timing races as a source of additional income to do things like pay for a Camaro.

My lengthy, humorous, volleyball tip list has been one of the more popular pages on my site for a long time.  The other day I thought that a similar list, written with the same toungue in cheek fashion about tips on life could have some equal giggle value.  So I simply copied my existing vball list and started over.  Hell I even left the volleyball background.  Feel free to take a look at the birth of what is sure to become another internet craze. See it here.

Last year on this date I posted that Brett Farve is a tool.  Well here we are one year later exactly and Farve apparently has once again agreed to bless us with his presence after another off season of back and forth bullshit.  I am so sick of his sideshow at this point that a broken leg on the first play of the season would not make me feel very bad at all.

Great player, annoying person.

Last night I practiced removing a road bike tire.  My Dawes front tire conveniently developed a flat since I put the Trek into service.  I figured it is something I need to be proficient at since you WILL get a flat tire on the road sooner or later.  I watched a video on YouTube for reference. When I got the tire off I found that I did have a pin hole in the tube.  It could probably be patched but I think I will just snag another tube and a patch kit.  The old tube can be my new spare.

Yesterday I headed home around lunch time to meet the guy picking up the Moto Guzzi.  I got back ahead of the driver so I would have time to reconnect the battery and drive the bike from the shed to the garage.

I expected the truck to be either a big tractor trailer or a long straight body truck.  It was neither.  Instead it was a long pull behind trailer, like an extended version of what a landscaper tows around.  The driver was a friendly guy named Scott.  He told me about the motorcycle delivery business.  His trailer holds about a dozen bikes and he is usually on the road for around 12 days at a time.

Scott said the vast majority of the bikes on his trailer were Ebay transactions.  He said that Ebay is responsible for the majority of their business.  I knew people bought cars/bikes on Ebay but I didn’t know it was THAT popular.

He said he used to work construction but when that dried up he got into this.  He asked me about the bike and was surprised that it ran.  He started it up and drove it down to the trailer where it got loaded up in a narrow spot between two other bikes.

I snapped the picture a few moments before he closed the door, knowing I would never see the bike again.  The part of me that gets sentimental about inanimate objects felt a little twinge as the door was closed.  The bike was owned by my dad since the early 90’s. In a way I felt bad to be sending it off to the mid-west but in the big picture I know it made sense.  What is the point of it just sitting in my shed?

So I completed my first cross country vehicle transaction.  It wasn’t as troublesome as I anticipated.

Yesterday at work I was presented with my 10 year service ring.  I started my job here back in 2000 a week or two after picking up and moving to Florida.  When I think back to that time period it was really a pretty bold move, probably one of the boldest things I ever did in my life.  I relocated to Florida with no job lined up.

Ali had work but it wasn’t anything that was going to be workable long term, it was up in Venice, over an hour away.  I clearly remember the excitement and anxiety about changing everything I have known as familiar for the first 32 years of my life.

Luckily for me it all worked out as I got a call for the interview here during our drive to Naples.  After a year in an apartment Ali and I had our modest home built that we have lived in ever since.

The past 10 years has gone by incredibly fast.  It seems impossible that I have been in Florida for a decade already yet that is the case.

Living in Florida hasn’t exactly been what I imagined it would be prior to moving.  I had visions of me playing volleyball all the time, going to the beaches often  and living in a tropical paradise where troubles are far and few between.  Reality has been a bit less rosy.

Florida summers are something that truly need to be experienced.  It’s not that it gets significantly hotter than a PA summer, it just goes on for twice as long.  On the flip side, mild winters are simply fantastic.  I no longer have the seasonal depression that used to bother me so much, I found other things to depress me instead. 🙂

You would think that living in paradise would naturally make people more friendly and happy.  Unfortunately I have seen about the same percentage of shitheads in Naples as anywhere else.

Despite it’s warts, living in Naples overall still was a huge upgrade for us over living in PA.  I would never consider moving back there.  If this last 10 years went this fast I can only imagine how quickly the next 10 years will expire.  Who knows where I will find myself by that time?

Friday after work Ali and I once again met up with the local triathlete group for a training swim in the gulf.  I once again elected to stick with Ali and Christy and do the “short” swim.  None of us were happy to see the water again was rough and choppy.

It didn’t take long till Ali was annoyed with me.  She didn’t like that I stopped to see where she was.  She barked that I should just go so I did.  I think it frustrates her that she was the one that took all of the swimming lessons yet I still manage to pull ahead of her with my unorthodox, sloppy form.

I actually did better this time around.  I still only swam less than half what the real swimmers did but what I did do felt better.  The first time I was in the gulf I would set short term goals, swim to that house, swim to that deck and I for the most part failed to make it to even those short term goals, having to stop, gasping for breath.

On Friday I once again set some short term goals and I was able to actually hit most of them.  I also managed to drink less gulf water than two weeks ago.  I forced myself to breath to the left when I was swimming south to keep my head turned away from the incoming waves.

I still found myself getting very tired but my swimming stamina was definitely a few clicks above where it was before. I emerged from the water spent but satisfied with the progress from my initial attempt. After the rest of the people got back we hung out for a little bit before heading home.  We actually were able to still score a later than normal pizza and Tivo session.

On Saturday morning I was out early working outside in an attempt to beat the brutal heat and humidity.  The garden, which typically in the summer is nothing but a collection of failed attempts to grow stuff actually has one huge success, corn.

I installed a raised bed in the garden and filled it with nothing but that expensive Miracle-Grow garden soil.  I planted beets, carrots and onions in there as well but the corn is the star of the show.

We have tried to grow corn several times over the years with no success.  The plants got to maybe a foot tall before they would submit to the hot summers and the relentless insects.  Well this year the corn has really seemed to enjoy the raised bed.  I also have allowed the sprinklers in the garden area to continue to run nightly as I have read that corn needs a steady water supply, especially in a Florida summer.

Some of the plants are 6 foot tall at this point.  The raised bed has dense, tall, healthy corn plants.  In contrast, I also planted some corn in the regular garden area.  I don’t have a plant over a couple feet tall in that soil.  It would be an awesome thing to actually harvest real corn form our garden.

Earlier in the day our ex-neighbor dropped off their dog Zoe for us to dog sit.  Zoe was Nicki’s first dog friend.  They spent many hours together years ago.  Ironically Nicki was also the first dog that Zoe didn’t snarl and growl at.

Even though we hadn’t seen Zoe in a long time she immediately re acclimated herself with both Nicki and Sadie.  The three of them had fun trotting around the back yard.

I was busy as hell on Saturday scurrying from task to task.  Before I knew it it was late afternoon.  I told Ali earlier I wanted to run to Home Depot and thought we could stop by my mom’s work to drop off the shoo fly pie Ali got for her.

We all piled into the van and headed out.  Zoe spent a lot of time on Ali’s lap which surprisingly didn’t seem to bother Sadie that much.  At one point we had a dog in each chair and Nicki back in her bed, it looked funny.

Mom came out and said hi to the dogs.  She looked like she was getting around better on her surgically repaired knee.  We said something to mom about how she needs to come out to our place.  Mom commented that she hadn’t been out since Christmas.  It seemed hard to believe it has been that long already.  I wasn’t sure if mom’s comment was supposed to mean we don’t ask her out enough or not.  It’s weird because it seems that when I even skirt around the idea of having her out she usually is quick to offer up reasons why she can’t come.

Saturday night we finally got around to watching Close Encounters of the Third Kind which I had sitting in it’s Netflix envelope for weeks.  I rented it because of it’s focus on Devil’s Tower, one of the places we stopped during our road trip.

I forgot just how awesome the special effects were in this movie, especially when you consider it is more than 30 years old.  Hell they would hold up today. I told Ali while we were watching it that this was the movie that made me think aliens are real.  I also described how it frightened me as a child at points like when the little kid gets pulled out the dog door by the aliens.

I also forgot just how strange the ending was.  Richard Dreyfuss shows up uninvited to the big alien orgy and somehow gets handed an orange jumpsuit to be included in the group of humans that were going to willingly be abducted.  He did this with a wife and three kids at home that he apparently lost all interest in. (well the wife left when he turned the living room into a mini Devil’s Tower)  I was too young when I saw it before to realize just how odd this was.

On Saturday night I also performed surgery on one of my Roombas.  The brushes had stopped turning on this unit. After ripping it apart twice I discovered a stripped gear in the brush motor transmission.  Luckily I had a spare gear in the remains of one of my cannibalized Roombas. The counter looked like I dropped a grenade in a Roomba, parts were scattered everywhere.

Sunday morning I wanted to do more training.  I thought I would switch things up a bit.  I decided to stretch my bike ride to Dunkin Donuts and then swim afterward, skipping the run. I wasn’t quite sure how much farther Dunkin Donuts was.  It turned out to be almost exactly 10 miles from our door.

The ride was definitely more of a struggle than last week.  There wasn’t a cloud in the sky to block any of the intense sun.  The increased heat also kicked up the wind, ratcheting up the difficulty further.  When I reached Dunkin Donuts I had at least a 10-15 minute break while I drank a small coffee and had a couple munchkins.  The extended break probably cut into the effectiveness of the training session but it was a nice break regardless.

Mother nature kept the worst headwind for the last 2.5 miles of the ride, I really appreciated it.  I covered the 20 miles in 69 minutes and change.  My average pace was 17 mph which wasn’t bad and actually better than I expected it would be based on how much I was struggling.

After changing I hopped in the pool and started doing laps.  The calm pool water felt fantastic to swim in compared to the undulating water in the gulf.  I could tell early on that my endurance in the pool also felt better than the week prior where I did 5 sets of 10 laps each.  I doubled up my laps and did three sets of 20 laps for a total of 60.  I was encouraged to see such marked improvement in a weeks time.

Ali had headed off to go train with Christy at the water park.  They ran and then headed inside to swim laps.  She called me from the park asking if I wanted to come hang out.  I told her I couldn’t because I still had a lot to do around the house and Zoe was still with us and I couldn’t leave her until she got picked back up later in the day.

I also had just fallen into an unexpected Craigs List transaction.  I went online to check into just buying the small little gear that failed on the Roomba since I have had that strip out several times before.  I was appalled when I saw the going rate for the part as $20 plus shipping.  What a f’ing rip off for a tiny part that probably costs a nickel to make.

Well my outrage sparked an impromptu Craigslist search for used Roombas, my thought being I could simply have one waiting in the wings for parts. I was excited to see someone selling a 4000 series for $55.  Supposedly it worked great and had all of the accessories.

When I contacted the seller she told me not only did she still have the Roomba, she had a second one given to her father for parts.  She said she would throw the second one in for $10!  I threw the customary Craigs List negotiation out the window since the price was already low and I felt bad since the woman said she was selling the Roomba because she was hard up for cash. I’m a sucker for a woman in distress.

I made arrangements to meet her at a midway point between me and where she lived in Fort Myers. I piled the three dogs in the van and headed out.  I completed the transaction without incident.  When we got home I tested the Roombas out.  Both were operational although one of them had an issue commonly caused by a dirty bumper sensor which is easily fixed.  This same Roomba also was evidently NEVER cleaned.  I have to take a before picture of this thing before I give it a thorough once over.  I have never seen so much shit wrapped around the brushes.  The Roombas also came with two drive on floor chargers and two virtual walls.  Any way you look at it I scored a hell of a deal.

We have had a bug problem indoors.  It isn’t something nasty like spiders or roaches, it’s gnats.  These annoying pests enter the house most likely via the lanai.  Once they get inside they seem to multiply.  I noticed that they seem to really enjoy hanging out in the various plants we have around the great room.

I decided to carry every plant we have outside.  After doing so I grabbed the hose and attached the sprayer that has insecticidal oil on it and sprayed the plants liberally. I let the plants bake out in the sun for a few hours to dry and give the gnats an opportunity to fly off somewhere else to annoy something.  My actions seemed to work, I didn’t see a single gnat on the plants as I carried them back indoors.  Now only time will tell if it is a long term fix.

Despite busting my ass almost all day Saturday I still found myself doing housework late into the day Sunday, something I detest.  Doing the extended training sessions on a Sunday morning sort of moves everything back a few hours.

I got everything ready to go for the Moto Guzzi pick up. I packed up the extra parts, charged the battery and cleaned up whatever I had in the shed that was motorcycle related.  I received the check on Friday and hope to mail off the title via certified mail today.  If all goes as planned the bike should be on it’s way to Missouri by mid-week.

Late Sunday I went outside to shoot a little video of me doing some of the moves I have been referring to lately like dragonflags, german hangs as well as some brief ring work.  If you are curious about what exactly I am doing you can see it all here.

Yesterday the dealer in Missouri called me to work out details of the Moto Guzzi transaction.  I should have a check over-nighted to me today and there should be a truck coming to pick up the bike Monday or Tuesday.  I’ll be sending the title to him separately via certified mail.

I called my dad later in the day to let him know the bike was being sold to a dealer who plans to restore it to like new condition. Dad asked who the dealer was.  When I told him it was Harper’s Moto Guzzi in Missouri he laughed.  Harper’s is where dad bought the majority of his parts for the bike over the years.

I told dad what I sold it for and how I intended to give him the money minus what I spent to register the bike.  Dad said I should just hold onto the money until they come down to visit over the winter.  I told him I’d put it under his pillow.

I could tell dad was a bit pained to hear I was getting rid of the bike but I had told him months before that was my intention.  He agreed it was kind of cool that the bike would be getting restored and sold to someone that will take care of it.  I just don’t have the interest or dollars to throw at a 25 year old motorcycle.  A new Camaro is still my target. I am looking forward to clearing up the extra space in the smaller shed as well.

Yesterday at the gym I did some more dragon flag and skin the cat work.  I did 3 sets of three of both exercise.  Man I wish I got into gymnastic/body weight exercise more when I was 22 instead of 42.  You see some of this big beasts bench pressing 400 pounds at the gym but if you asked them to try a dragon flag or do a German hang they would fail miserably.

My dimensions of 6’3″ and 185 pounds is about as far away from a gymnast’s build as you can get.  Regardless of your dimensions, these moves really build dynamic, practical strength as long as you don’t hurt yourself in the progress.  I am hoping to shoot a video of some of these movements this weekend out at the pull up station.

I have been watching the Little League World Series on the cardio equipment at the gym this week.  I have found myself enjoying it more than I would typically enjoy a MLB game. Perhaps I like watching 12 year olds compete because it brings me back to when baseball was huge for me.

My best years as a baseball player were from the ages of 12-15.  When you are that age if you can throw hard you instantly have a leg up on most everyone else.  I have so many fond memories of pitching during that three year stretch. I think my best year was the summer of 1983 when I was playing for the Shillington Dodgers where I was a force on the mound and with a bat.  There is something exhilarating about striking somebody out that I haven’t quite been able to match in other sports. A called third strike with a fastball that SMACKS into the catcher’s glove is a very vivid memory.

Unfortunately after the age of 15 my baseball career went downhill from a combination of injuries, bad luck and external influences.  Anyway, watching those kids go at it brought a bit of the warm fuzzies to my heart.

Last night I decided to once again take a bite out of the weekend chore list and get the mowing done.  The hard rain from a couple days ago had still left some wet spots on the property but I figured if I raised the deck a bit I would be ok. I also received my replacement for the broken mower deck spring yesterday so I installed that before beginning. I mowed into the twilight, finishing up with the headlights on.  It took a bit longer than normal due to wet area slowdown but all in all it wasn’t a problem.

Tonight we are supposed to do another training swim in the gulf.  I am hoping the water isn’t as rough as last time.  I am hoping my endurance picks up from the last outing.  I look at the swim training as a necessary evil, I definitely don’t look forward to it.