Archives 2013

I am still feeling behind the curve physically, more than likely due to the scarcity of sleep on New Year’s Eve.  Plus I haven’t gotten to the gym yet this week so I am feeling like a lazy slob.

Yesterday before work I dropped Lucky off at my buddy’s place.  He wasn’t getting back from his trip until last night so I went back over during my lunch hour to let Lucky out.

Lucky was thrilled to see me of course.  We hung out in the back yard and lanai.  I felt bad that there was no available radio to turn on for Lucky.  Whenever I leave the house I leave the radio on for Tuki and the dogs if they are there.  For whatever reason the idea of leaving them home in total silence seems harsh.

Lucky gave me such a mopey sad face as I left. He’s a good boy.

Tonight I pick up the girls for another extended visit.  Dog sitting them is more challenging now since Nicki has been on thy”roids”.  She literally will take 6 or 7 dumps a day.  Letting her unattended in the house for more than a couple hours, especially in the morning is almost a surefire recipe for a stinky welcome home present.

Luckily for Ali, she has the ability to close off rooms to the point where only hard surfaces are exposed which makes clean up pretty simple.  I don’t have that option unless I am going to pin the dogs in the kitchen/utility room.

I STILL am feeling like I am behind on things to be done.  I think it is a by product of the holiday season where lots of unique items consume time.  I am hoping once I get through the trip to my dads place and the rest of the month (two big races to time) I can then resume cruising altitude.

Wow this 4 days actually felt quite a bit longer, it seems that my brain has far too many things spilling out of it for a relatively small time period.  I had picked up Lucky, my buddy’s dog on Friday.  I also had to pick up Nicki and Sadie so I took the van to work.

When I first picked up Lucky he didn’t quite remember me and was scared.  I knelt down and he cautiously approached.  Within about 10 seconds his tail was wagging, he was happy his buddy was here to pick him up.

It was tough getting him in the van since Nicki and Sadie were already there, both of the girls were excited to see Lucky and didn’t want to unblock the door.

On the way home I heard Lucky making unpleasant sounds followed by the smell of dog food.  He has a history of getting car sick but when I had him last time he was in the van multiple times with no incidents.  Luckily of the three vehicles I own, the party van is the best one to vomit in.

The dogs had fun playing in the back yard but unfortunately Sadie has something going with her foot/leg that is making her limp.  She wasn’t able to sprint around the yard as much as she normally would but her and Lucky still had fun playing.

Late Friday I did a quick weed whacking/mow session of the property, it was looking pretty ragged, despite the minimal rain of the last few weeks.

On Saturday morning I drug myself out of bed to go do the 6:30 AM club run, something I haven’t done in quite awhile.  I wound up running 7 miles with the running club president, the farthest I have run uninterrupted (except a brief water stop) for at least a couple months.    I spent the majority of the day working on things around the house, trying to clear up the to do’s.  I didn’t feel as successful at getting things done as I normally would be.

On Sunday Ali had asked if I could go to Ikea with her in the truck.  She was interested in some Ikea items but not in the big shipping charges.  There is an Ikea on the other side of Alligator Alley.  I had only been inside Ikea once before in my life, the store in the Philadelphia area.  I had distinct recollections of how crowded the place was.  Well it didn’t take long to have flashbacks.

We pulled into the parking area somewhere around 11.  There was a large two story parking garage that evidently was exclusively used by Ikea.  There were so much traffic flowing into the parking garage that there was a series of people directing traffic.  I knew I was about to be immersed into one of my least favorite things, masses of humanity.

Once we got into the store it felt like pure chaos, with bodies in any direction you turned.  I was just amazed that this many people needed furniture/home accessories.  Once you got into the showroom area it was like a sea of people with a definitive current.  If you were in the main walkways you were swept along.  You had to make sure to clearly step out of the flow if you didn’t want to get pushed along.

Ikea has some cool stuff and I have some of it in the house but I just didn’t get how the store could be THIS full.

Ali had picked out what she was looking for online, it took us a little while to find it.  Plus Ali wanted to take her time to see what else the store had to offer.  I did my best to just go with the flow and not get get overly irritated.  Ali jotted down the item numbers of what we would need.  You actually pick the stuff up physically downstairs in the warehouse area.

Before venturing down there we actually had a decent lunch at the store cafeteria.  As I sat there I had a clear view of the up escalator that took people to the start of the showroom area.  The entire time I was sitting there was never a moment when more than 4 or 5 steps were unoccupied by another person entering the store.  So many people…..

We entered the big warehouse and grabbed a large cart suitable for moving the unassembled furniture.  The items Ali picked out were several bookcases and a hutch type piece.  The boxes they came in were long and heavy, the bookcase boxes weighed almost 90 pounds each.  They were not easy to handle at all.  Eventually we loaded up the cart with 5 heavy boxes and slowly pushed them towards the checkout area.

Getting the boxes into the truck was more fun.  I was aggravated that I forgot to throw my box of straps/fasteners in the back.  I wound up utilizing my jumper cables to tie around the boxes and the one short bungee cord I had in the back to sloppily secure the boxes.

Between driving to Ikea and the time we spent there, I missed the first half of the Eagles game.  By the time I flipped on the game on Sirius, they were already down a ridiculous 35-7 to the Giants at halftime.  It sounded like the defense was trying to end the year setting the awfulness bar to new heights.  The return of Mike Vick to the line up appeared to make no difference, he had a lackluster performance before the Eagles raised the white flag in the second half and put Trent Edwards in.

Outside of his hot 8 or 9 games in 2010, Mike Vick has been average at best as the Eagles QB, nowhere close to earning the massive salary they bestowed upon him.  That is why he will be sent packing and partially why Andy Reid is now looking for a new job as well since it was his call to roll with Vick.

Nobody was surprised when the team announced Andy was being left go.  The past two years, the Eagles were billed as legit Super Bowl contenders and both years they underperformed.  Well to call this year underperforming would be a huge understatement. The team imploded, losing 11 of it’s last 12 games with most of the losses being of the embarrassing nature.  Andy just had no answers.

I do appreciate what Andy has given us over the years.  Yes it was frustrating as hell to go to the NFC championship 5 times and win only once.  Yes I found his dry, boring and repetitive statements at press conferences very unsatisfying as a fan.  I will be quite glad to have a coach that says more than “I have to do a better job” following a loss.

I look forward to a new coach getting put in place, it was time for a change.  I wish Andy good luck in the future but I have a sneaky suspicion that his future coaching success might parallel Donovan’s post Eagles career, downhill.

So we arrived back at Ali’s place and then had the fun task of getting the big, long and heavy boxes up two flights of stairs.  We slid them up the carpeted stairs, would stand them upright at the landing to make the turn and then repeat until we got into the living space.  For now the boxes are just leaning in an unused corner.  Once Alison gets her Christmas decorations put away I am sure I will be involved in the assembly process.

On New Year’s Eve I really wanted to get the feeling of being behind out of my head, I had a bunch of stuff I wanted to get done, a lot of it involved my sitting in front of the computer.  I plugged away the best I could for most of the day as well as heading out to do several errands.

On New Years Eve I actually left the house, something I typically prefer not to do since the road is filled with drunks.  I ventured down to see the fireworks over the gulf for the first time in quite a few years.  The beach was packed as expected but the show was very cool.  I had my latest NYE in a long time, not closing my eyes until somewhere around 2:30.

I had made a mental commitment to drag my ass out of bed and go do the New Years Day 5K as well as the 2nd Annual Polar Plunge, a chilly dip into the gulf.  When my alarm went off a scant 3 hours after I laid down in bed I was not a happy camper. I considered bailing on my exercise intentions but my internal taskmaster would not allow it and drug me out of bed.

This is an informal 5K, there is no entry fee and no chip timing.  It is basically just a race for hard core runners, crazy enough to get up early on New Years Day to go run.  Well this year there was a lot more people that were crazy.  Most years there are less than 100 people that show up.  This year I would estimate 150 to 200 people toed the line.

I knew I had not raced a 5K in a very long time, I didn’t realize just how long until I thought about it.  My last 5K race was in November of 2011, the night time 5K where I gave myself gout.  Wow.  2012 in general was almost entirely race free, I did no 5K’s and no triathlons, instead only participating in the Hooter’s Half Marathon and the Tough Mudder.

At that last 5K I recall that I set a personal best with the distance finishing right at or slightly under 24 minutes although the distance on my GPS showed slightly less than the official 3.12 mile 5K distance.  I haven’t done any real speed work since then, the fastest pace I have maintained is the 8:40-8:45 pace I can pull doing the 7 mile club run.  I had no aspirations of doing particularly well New Years Day.

When the race started my legs didn’t feel particularly well, they felt kind of tired and heavy.  This isn’t new for me though, I have had my legs feel bad early in a race but come around as time elapsed.  When I passed the one mile marker and saw 7:44 on my GPS I was surprised, that is very fast for me.

Well shortly before I passed the marker I was passed by an old guy that I am familiar with.  Despite being 75 years old, he is still quite the adept runner, adept enough to pass me.  Well this is where my competitive nature really helps me.  If I get passed by someone that I don’t think should pass me or I see someone ahead that seems inappropriate it fuels my fire.

I locked on to the old guy and would not let him get more than 20 yards ahead of me.  His pace was quick and consistent.  By keeping up with him I was passing a lot of others. As I passed George who was directing traffic around the two mile mark he made a comment about the old guy being ahead of me.  I told George I was going to get him.  It took awhile but I finally chased him down, passing him sometime shortly after the two mile mark.

Once I passed him I was now into “less than a mile” to go mode.  I lengthened my stride and ignored my discomfort, knowing the end was near.  I passed a number of people in the last mile, including two young high school age kids with about 1/4 mile to go.  The pride in doing so was short lived as their youthful energy reserves allowed them to pass me with about 25 yards to go.

When I stopped my watch I was pretty amazed.  I SMASHED my prior best, maintaining a pace at least 30 seconds per mile faster than I ever pulled on a 5K course.  Despite the course being nearly a tenth of a mile too long I still finished in 23:45 which was better than any 3.12 mile race I ever did.

To pull this off with next to no training on three hours sleep added to the mystery of the accomplishment.  It really comes down to what is between the ears, and not wanting to get beat by a 75 year old.

About an hour after the race ended we did the Polar Plunge.  Having a polar plunge in Florida is a bit of an aberration but the water in the mid 60’s does feel quite chilly to Floridians.  I was surprised that Ali did the plunge as well since she HATES water that is below 80 degrees.

I was not all that worked up about taking the plunge.  I walked out at a normal pace until the water got to mid-thigh in depth.  I then dove in, swam a bit underwater and emerged unscathed.  Yes it felt cold but compared to what I experienced at the Tough Mudder Arctic Enema obstacle, it was practically a hot tub.

I left the site feeling tired but proud that I started off my new year in this manner.

I picked up Nicki and Sadie on the way home so they could continue the play fest with Lucky.  I spent the rest of the day around the house working on various items.  One of those things was putting away the indoor Xmas decorations.  Putting away the tree was nearly as depressing as putting it up, the normal “Christmas is over” cloud amplified by pulling off shared destination ornaments Ali and I accumulated over the years.   The tree saw very “light” use this year.  I think I may have had the lights on it turned on maybe a half dozen times in the month plus it was up.  Oh well.

I like to leave the outside lights up for a while longer.

I dropped Lucky back off at my buddy’s place this morning.  He is such a good boy.  I really enjoy his company.

I have a brief, but busy three day week.  I also will be back on dog sitting duty as Ali is going to be out of town for a few days starting tomorrow.  I have to get ready for the northern road trip that begins in one scant week.