BDR is Done

A dreary, rainy day for a bike ride.  If this had been any other Saturday, I would have waived off and stayed indoors to drink coffee.  Instead, we were in a hotel room putting on our biking garb and I was grimacing at the lobby coffee.  I chose not to actually check the radar on the phone - it didn't matter, I was going biking unless they closed the course.

I'll cut to the chase.  I cleared my goal and closed out the course at 101 miles and change.  Wind was thankfully minimal, and the temperatures were quite moderate.  However, the nice-then-rainy-then-nice-then-rainy forecast that I'd been watching the past week actually chose a middle ground - constant spitting rain with a few downpours, but no actual heavy stuff that would have caused a safety concern.

101.15 miles on the trip odometer

I wasn't actually sure that I was going to make the distance until about mile 80.  By mile 50, I was struggling a bit and was worried about being able to continue.  I had planned to stop every 15 miles or so, but from mile 60 forward, I increased the frequency and had a short break every 10 miles. This made the interval distance more manageable (instead of saying "gawd, I have another 40 miles to do," I was saying "ok, another 10 miles to 70, I can do that...").

The rain sucked; was a huge distraction and was effectively another layer of discomfort on top of the normal discomforts of a long day on the bike.  But I'll take sucky rain over sucky wind - wind grinds you down without remorse.  Light rain is manageable.

I hesitate to give stats, because there are lots of guys faster than me, but here's what I did today:

• Total Distance: 101.15 miles / 162.8 km
• Moving time: 6:07:55
• Avg moving speed: 16.5 mph
• Avg speed (including time for stops): 15.6 mph
• Calories burned: 2,342
• Avg cadence (crank rpm): 82

BDR Final Prep

A few people have asked -- the Big Dumb Ride (BDR) is now a few days away.

Mechanical shakedown ride will be tomorrow (Wednesday). This is a final check that all is well with our bikes.  Thursday I am taking entirely off (I'm having dental work done) and then on Friday we'll come home from work, pack up the gear, and head to the hotel near the venue.

Sign-ins start at 6am on Saturday and I'll be rolling on the course around 7:45am.  The course is open until 4pm, though I hope to be done by around 2pm. Mrs. Durden is also doing the ride, but is signed up for the 'fun ride' while I'm headed for the century (100mi).  We'll see each other regularly around the course, and plan to ride together for parts of it.  But for the majority of my day, I'll be on my own, or making friends with strangers as best I can.

I'm as ready as I think I could have been.  I followed a 10 week training plan, but started it knowing that I'd fall short of it due to weather and RL commitments -- and I did.  I fell well short, actually.  But I'm exiting the training period stronger than I've been in a long while, perhaps ever.

I'm also far smarter about what I need to eat and drink to function at a high aerobic rate for 3, 4, or 6 hours without leg cramps, gastrointestinal distress, or early energy drop (aka "bonking").  I've been doing endurance events for awhile now, but hadn't been happy with the results of my nutritional plan until this year.

As I type, the forecast for this weekend continues to churn.  The past few days the long term models have been highly favorable for a good riding day.  At the moment, it's 80% chance of rain and thunderstorms, which makes me less than happy.  Hopefully the weather systems involved accelerate or decelerate and give me the day I need to be successful.

Brain Dump

Many thoughts have been swirling lately, so let me give you a brain dump.  Just for fun, I'll sort these by word-association.  These are in no particular order and are appearing just in the manner in which I begin typing them.

Behind:
Work sent me to the east coast this week for a series of meetings.  Productive and overall a good experience, but I really didn't have the time at home or at the office to be out of pocket that long.  Lugging the work laptop around, I didn't bring the gaming laptop and have been out of touch with most everything. A modern cell phone can do a lot, but only so much.  I got back to the house after 11pm on Thursday, was too wired from the trip home to sleep and was still awake at 1am.  Alarm clock went off at 5am and I did a full day at the office. Came home and crashed, then took Mrs. Durden for mexican at the local cantina since we hadn't really talked in almost a week.  There were a handful of things I should have done last night and I didn't do any of them.

As I type, I'm staring out the window at grass that's well beyond needing mowed.  So that's task 1 for today.

Discouraged:
Big Dumb Ride prep has again been interrupted.  When I signed up for the ride, I knew that I'd struggle to get the miles I needed in April and May.  The weather is unpredictable, and waffles between "super mega-nice" and "shitstorm rain."  I track all the miles I've ridden since 2013, and April is typically in my lowest mileage months, with some years recording a big fat zero.

Although I've hit some great high marks - longest unsupported ride, and a non-formal-event metric century (100km), I am not getting the less glamorous weekday rides in that I need to maintain and extend my base.  With the work trip this week, I'm behind on a thousand things at the house and the weather is again uncooperative - I may not ride at all this weekend.  The BDR event day is closing in and I'm now beginning to doubt my ability to hang on for the full Imperial Century (100 mile) goal.

Hopeful:
One bonus perk of the cold/windy/wet weather is that I might actually be able to undock this weekend and kill some Guristas or Sanshas.  It's been awhile....

Philosophical:
I've had a sequel post in my head for the previous "85%" bandwagoning, but will spare you the long dissertations and give a few thoughts with bullet points.  Bullet points are cool.

• No, I don't agree with everything in Neville's post.  But I do agree with the overall sentiment.
• I am not against Citadels.  I'm not personally interested in them, but I see the perks, and like the overall size/shape/flavor of the design.  For the past year or more, I've been pretty happy that CCP seemed to be balancing dev investments pretty well.  All corners of the community got something (sometimes big, sometimes small, but SOMETHING) in each patch.  
• My beef with the 2016 plan seems to be that CCP is banking on "trickle down economics" of null driving interactions in other areas of space.  And yah, they will.  But it's that feeling of being second class citizens that chafes.
• As a person pretty heavily invested in capship BPOs, I really do want to see capship Fleet warfare get fixed and come back to being en vogue.  But I wanted it alongside content directly focused at my preferred way to play.
• I am not upset with CCP Affinity.  I think she's done the PVE community a few favors over the past year.
• That being said, I stand behind my previous words about the lack of focus, clarity, and scope control from a project management perspective.  I'm not disappointed with any single hardworking dev; I'm disappointed with CCP as a whole for being unable to demonstrate reasonable management and having the balls to communicate directly with us.
• Is it the end of the world?  Bah, hardly.  I can still rain hot kinetic cruise missile death down upon my foes, save the damsel, and poke the occasional burner in the eye.  I've said before and I'll continue to say: EVE today is the most playable state we've ever enjoyed.  And that's pretty ok with me.

Aging:
Abavus quietly celebrated another birthday.  He was born just after midnight server time on May 10th, 2003.  That's a few days after the original launch.  In those early days, owning a battleship seemed like an impossible goal; having 1B isk in your wallet (let alone 20B) was a laughable thought.  I don't exactly how how I pictured spending my time in EVE, but at the time it probably involved a lot of Merlins and Kestrels.  Every time I think I've peaked in this game, I find another goal and another plateau to climb to.

Pukin' Dogs was actually born several months before EVE's launch, notionally in October of 2002 (though the exact day and even month are now fading with time).  We existed in EVE's beta7 but because of skills and cost didn't actually appear in EVE until 31 May 2003.  So, around Memorial Day in the US, I'll be hefting an icy cold beverage to the Dogs.

Back then, the notion of playing this silly space game in 2016 was absurd.  Perhaps just as absurd as playing the game in another 13 years in 2029.  But who knows?


And with that, it's time to go mow the lawn... fly safe!

Big Dumb Ride Prep

Looking at the calendar, there are 5 training weekends remaining until my long (100mi) charity bike ride (hereafter dubbed the 'Big Dumb Ride').  Normally this ride is later in June, allowing a later start to training, but they've moved it forward to avoid other conflicts.  I signed up knowing this, of course, and hoped that the March and April weather would let me get out and get some miles in.

Some background:

• I'm embarrassed to admit that I've never done an Imperial Century (i.e. 100mi - a 'Metric Century is 100km).  
• This is a rite of passage for many bikers, and a lot of guys do multiple Imperials per year. Now in my 8th biking season, I've never done a single one.
• I've been close a few times; my longest ride is 75mi and I've done several metric centuries, plus a Half-Iron distance Swim/Bike event where I swam 2000m and then biked just short of 100km with one short rest break.
• I've had several attempts thwarted by weather, injury (I almost scrubbed my entire 2014 season due to lower back pain) or making a snap decision early in the day to ride with family instead of scooting off on my own.
• The past 2-3 years, I've focused on triathlons. Biking is my favorite, but with swim+run events to consider, training time gets sacrificed.  More, the TYPE of training that I do tends to be different, since my Tri events are far shorter (14-26mi), the training I do is more to prepare myself for a sprint and then manage the transition to jogging after.
• This season, we have no, zero Triathlons on the calendar.  This is intentional.  If I miss my goal in June, there are 2-3 other events I could jump on to knock the Imperial Century off my bucket list.
• The BDR is not a timed event (i.e. not a race) but there is a time limit to how long the venue will be open, and the longer I'm on the course the more weather plays a variable (in particular, wind is typically worse as the day goes on). So I want to turn in a decent average speed (and besides, going slow sucks).
• We've done portions of the BDR in 2009, 10, 11, and 12, but due to cost and other commitments we haven't been back since then.  
• I want to finish in good form, not just limp across the finish line and need help to get to the car.  On a perfect day, I could probably do 100mi right now.  Having some reserve strength will help me get past whatever the weather happens to be that day; and after 2014, I don't want to risk any sort of injury by being stupid.

Early march weather was fine; above average even.  But late March and most of April have been pretty poopy.  I don't deal well with biking in the cold, and although I got some time on the spin bike at the gym, my mileage overall was far below what I'd planned

That being said, I started the season stronger than any other season to date.  Dropping swimming in late winter let me focus.  Time on the indoor bike on the gym reduced the amount of 'acclimation time' to my bike seat (aka sore ass).  In 2014 and into 2015 I made several minor changes and adjustments to my bike's equipment and setup, and although my bike isn't the quickest/lightest/sexiest carbon-fibre beast out there (it is, in fact, a steel framed Italian bike designed for fast touring on questionable roads), I have never felt more confident on it.  Things just 'clicked' when I grabbed it off the wall this spring.  So, despite not hitting all my goals, I am better and stronger and in better condition of any biking season to date.

Looking at the calendar, it's make or break time.  Either I'm going to get the training miles or I'm not.  If I'm not, then I should admit it now and enjoy sleeping in on the weekends while I can.

However, last weekend the weather finally cooperated and I set out to extend my mileage and make up for lost time.  It was a COLD morning (46 deg F), but the temp raised 20 degrees while I was out and I was hot by the time I came in.  I turned in a 41ish mile ride with a decent average moving speed. I wasn't out to set speed records but was happy with the pace.

This week I set out for a 50 mile ride as the next stepping stone.  I left my driveway this morning (Sunday) a little before 8am and followed a slightly modified course to get the additional miles.  Temperatures were about the same - a chilly 46 deg at the start - but I was better prepared and broke my thermal gear back out of the closet.  Wind was far different - last weekend there was almost none, just a whisper from the NE; this weekend was a steady 10mph SE at the start that shifted to a 15mph straight out of the south by the time I was coming back home.

The grind home today was a rude surprise. Weatherbug had predicted steady 6-8 mph SE winds shifting South throughout the day.  I set out knowing I'd be returning into the wind, but 6-8 is very manageable.  However, the wind was actually double that (confirmed when I got home). The crops of course aren't in the fields yet and the area I was in was flat and bare - the wind simply howled at me and all I could do was pedal on.  At a few points, the wind funneled between trees and I'd drop into granny gear just to keep moving. Although it wasn't the worst wind I've ever ridden in, the amount of time I had to keep at it really wore on me.

Today I finished 50.3 miles with an avg moving speed only slightly below last week. I'm happy with this, considering the ~15 miles of grinding I did in the wind.  Garmin says my avg HR was 150 (146 in my 'all day' target) and I burned 1637 calories.  This represents the longest unsupported (no chase car, non-event) ride that I've ever done.  It's the 4th longest ride I've done since I got my Garmin in 2013, displacing last weeks' ride for that spot.  Training wise, I finished strong and could have done another 10-15 if I'd had to, though I would not have tolerated more time into the wind very well.

Next weekend my folks are in town; with an appointment on Tuesday and weather turning to shit on Weds/Thurs, I may not get a ride in at all.  But if I get lucky, I hope to add another 5-10 to the course and maybe even push for a metric century (100km, 62mi).

Chainsaw Therapy

Chainsaw Therapy is a category of yard work that I put under the category of "tedious, exhausting, and often good for the soul."  It started with any sort of literal chainsaw duty - with hearing protection on and the noise of the saw, you're alone with yourself inside your head for the duration.  While one part of my brain works on the puzzle of the task at hand (like how to safely knock over a very heavy tree without catching power lines, the house, etc.) the other part of my brain is chewing on EVE issues or work issues or whatever has been keeping me up at night.

Chainsaw Therapy is an expression I use with friends and often get blank stares in return.  Many folks don't get it.  I enjoy being outside, doing something manual, and losing myself within it.  For many, the only reference to a chainsaw is the one in DOOM or a random zombie movie.  These are the ones that might respond with a bad pun or a comment so idiotic that only demonstrates their lack of knowledge.  (These are the same people that seem to believe the scenes in the movies that show a 12ga shotgun knocking people backwards several feet with the kick, sigh).

But a few understand.  Usually people with property or farmers.

I took today off to work around our 10 acres.  I started the morning with a pot of coffee made from my special, expensive, and utterly delicious Hammer 53x11 coffee instead of the usual Folgers.  I drank coffee and made a list on an 8.5x11 inch piece of printer paper, folded in half.  The to-do list ended up taking up 2/3 of the half-page and resulted in 2 columns of tasks.  By 8, I was headed to the garage and began working down the task list.  I picked up sticks by the armload (thank you, wind storm), fertilized the lawn, seeded a bare patch, plugged a hole in the pole barn foundation where critters had been getting in, pruned several trees, mowed 2 1/2 acres, and a half dozen other tasks. I stopped only for a couple of breaks and took a 45 minute lunch (egg and cheese burritos, yum).  I'm now sitting on the couch, exhausted, happy, empty beer bottle next to me, and maybe a little sore.

But my mind is free, and my mental burdens seem lighter.  Chainsaw Therapy works, more people should try it.

And Then it was April

Things continue to shuffle along here.  The pace at work has slackened just a bit, and a few things that were hard for me a couple months ago are now getting easier with additional experience.  With the spring thaw has brought the return of yard work, and although I enjoy being outside a great deal, it's also a distraction.

I should have started an 8 week bike training regimen this week and I did pretty poorly.  I actually haven't biked (indoor or out) for over a week and a half.  Random weather and a sudden work commitment kept me grounded this week.  Wednesday was absolutely fantastic weather, but I opted to re-mount the mower deck and spend an hour mowing an acre out front that gets ahead of everything else.

I'm actually off work today; it's a premeditated vacation day with the intent of accomplishing more random things in 3 days than I could realistically hope to get in 2.  With the forecast, today was chainsawing and brush hawging until the rain came around lunch and drowned me out.  This afternoon we'll off for errands and a late lunch at a local diner we found a few weeks ago.

Tomorrow will hopefully be a 35-40 mile bike ride to jump start my training regimen, I need to pick a route that takes into account the amount of wind I suspect we'll get.  I hope to collapse in a heap afterwards.

Sunday's task will be to light the pair of brush piles I've built and toss on all the stuff I cut this morning.  Sounds simple, but will be 4-6 hours outside eating smoke.  Oh, and somewhere in there, I need to clean the gutters and pile some gravel in the hole the raccoons are using to access my pole barn.

This has left precious little time for EVE.  This year has warped past me at a blistering pace; I can't believe it's April already.  I've been in game a few times to try to keep some plates spinning, and I'm trying to follow the onslaught of the Imperium war, but most things I need to do within the game involve a lot of time investment.

Oh wow, now it's hailing outside.  We came inside just in time. :)

Begone Winter Demons!

This week, I hope, is the start of something different.

Fall and Winter are my favorite times of year.  I hate hot weather, and hate humidity more.  I'd rather be sitting by a fireplace under a blanket than at a back yard BBQ sweating and swatting bugs.  I'd rather be splitting wood outside at 20 degrees (F) than mowing the lawn at 85.

But Winter took its toll on me this year.  The past month has been especially hard.  Week after week I feel further into a funk.  It started with a sinus infection just after the holidays.  There were things I should have been doing outside, but weekend after weekend I'd say "it's too cold," or "it's too windy, and I don't want to get sick again."  This basically amounted to saying "screw it, I'm staying inside today; I'm tired and I earned it."  As things went on, I couldn't seem to get enough sleep, and the sleep I got has been intermittent and elusive.

My funk extended to games.  I've been in EVE very little although I have plenty to do.  I've been on the laptop on the couch a lot; but felt lethargic towards much of anything, including EVE.

The physical toll began to mount.  The longer I kept wollowing in my funk the worse I felt.  Aches, pains, swollen joints, and generally just feeling ... old.

Last weekend the weather was bitterly cold, but began to shift.  The sun came back and through the week the temperatures rose.  I decided it was time to expunge the Winter Demons and get on with Spring.

The only way I know how to do this is to flip the bird to feeling old and getting off my ass to MOVE.

On Monday, I reset my diet and began eating very precisely again; measured amounts at specific times of day.  It takes effort to do this, but it was something I could focus on.

Tuesday we went to a concert downtown at a small, historic theater and ate a fine dinner at a hundred year old building across the street from the venue.  The music was Mrs. Durden's choice, and was good, but perhaps more importantly we were out of the house and doing something social surrounded by young people.

On Wednesday we hit the gym, and I climbed on the spin bike for a 30 minute tempo session.  Instead of doing a precise "class" style workout against one of the Youtube videos I have on my phone, I queued up some of my favorite music and worked on my cadence.  I backed up and repeated my favorite songs and the session went quickly.  Doing something impulsive (vs. the regimented workout I had planned) and getting into music that I hadn't heard in awhile made the time fly by.

On Friday, I got the bike out of the garage and took a 30 minute loop around a training circuit that I like to use. It was windy but warm - 50 degrees (F) but wind gusting to 30 mph - and at times I was leaning so hard into the wind that I felt like I was riding sideways.  Rides like this can be a real grind; the brutal relentlessness of the wind can really take its toll on you.  But I had gone out impulsively by choice, not by guilt, and ignored the speedometer.  But the return leg was mostly downhill and with the wind and I simply flew home.  I hung up my bike in its place and thought, "this is why I ride."

On Saturday, we were signed up for a 5k trail run at a venue about 45 minutes from the house.  This was basically a bonfire party with a run somewhere in the middle.  We showed up early and hung out by the fire, and then hit the trail.  I hadn't run since last July and was doing the event very much unprepared.  While last weekend was bitter cold, this weekend was spring-like and I was shedding layers of clothes by the time I hit the 1/3 mile mark.  The crowd was big, but friendly.  The trail was challenging, very muddy, but along a gorgeous lake shore on a bright sunny day.  More time by the bonfire and then I splurged on the diet and had a cheeseburger and fries as a reward for a hard race.  We came home tired, but good.  We have already signed up for next year.

Today, I spent about 2 hours doing yard work - pruning my stand of Walnut (aka my retirement fund) - and I feel more alert and alive.

Checking the weather, it looks like Winter will attempt to come back for at least one more try this week.  But as far as I'm concerned, it is already beaten.

Forever Forward

A year ago I wrote a resolutions post.  I was rubbish at my goals.  As in, truly hideously bad.  There are some good and compelling reasons for this, and I don't see 2015 as a "failure" by any stretch.  All it really means is that the year took a severe left turn in early Spring and I never had a hope of returning to the course that I thought I was going to be on.

But that doesn't mean I didn't have an interesting year.

Work sucked worse in 2015 than it did in 2014, as in "sucked so bad I quit and started over." I miss the old job (as in the actual product and tasking) and old crew (as in my local team) but am now in a much better place for both stability and professional growth.  And while the new gig is a good deal for me, it also comes with the bonus of not working for fools, liars, and assholes.  Bonus points.

In terms of bikes and triathlons, 2015 was a year of rebuilding.  The Imperial Century still eluded me.  With the lack of clear weather (and 2x the normal lawn mowing), I was well off the training curve to even think about attempting a long ride of any flavor.  But my lower back held strong, and I regained much of my lost stamina.  I found a great indoor training video for hill climbs and my consistency on hilly bike courses improved dramatically.  I am still not fast, but I am more consistent.

I started the year planning to compete in maybe 1 sanctioned race.  Instead, I completed 3 multi-sport races (more than any other year) - one sprint tri and two Olympic distance swim/bike events.  I track everything I do in a big spreadsheet, and I can say that I biked more than 2014 (but not as much as 2013).  I also swam more yards this year than any other year in my life.

It was a good year for EVE.  My isk balance is way up, higher than it's ever been by double the amount it was a year ago. I am not rich, but I do ok,  I have a hanger full of ships, and I flew more new hulls this year than I really expected to.  I got around to some areas of space I've not been to in ages.  Thanks to the anomic agents, I also lost more ships this year than any other, which is actually a healthy thing in the big picture.  EVE Vegas was a great time, and the PVE content I've wanted for awhile has continued to be deployed.

Forever Forward.

Time marches on relentlessly; it pauses for no man.

I don't have many discrete goals for 2016.  If anything, 2015 reminded me that life isn't nearly that predictable.

What I find myself wanting is more.

More time. More miles on the bike.  More laps at the pool. More evenings splitting wood and burning brush.  More time repairing grandad's tractors.  More afternoons running agents, incursions, and trading trinkets.  More time for offshoots like GW2.  More time with family.  More Saturdays quietly at home.  More trips across the country.  More vacation days spent at home.  More progress, less conflict.

So what I should beg for is more focus.  The ability to say "no" decisively yet gracefully.  The insight to understand that if I indulge all tasks then all suffer equally.  I should beg for the wisdom to know which things to ignore, which people to disappoint, and to which I should give attention.  To allow that establishing priorities means that many things simply can't and won't get done.

So what's my goal for 2016?  To get SOME things done and let the rest wait, and to be at peace with that.

Winter Plans

Winter is the time of year when we start planning for the next Triathlon / Biking season.

(Yes, I know it's not winter yet, technically.  But it's damn near December, we've already driven through one major snow storm, and that's close enough.)

Our season wraps up in mid-September, when fall chores catch up with us and the weather turns cold on weekend mornings when we prefer to get out and ride.  At the end of the season, the idea of another event makes my stomach twist.  By the beginning of October, I'm burned out, tired, and very much wanting to spend a few Saturday morning snug in my bed instead of getting up to load bikes and drive to some race venue.

Something funny happens in November, and by December, the plans begin anew.  By late December, all kinds of crazy things are possible.  Charity bike ride the next town over?  Sure.  Triathlon series that bounces around the state - 7 races in 6 months? Sounds great. Half-Ironman Swim-Bike (no-run) a full timezone away with a $250 entry fee, 2 nights at a hotel, dinners (i.e. about a $1000 weekend for a 4 hour race)?  Well, I should do it this year since I'll already be in shape.  Multi-state thousand mile bike ride?  Sign me up.

Everything seems more plausible when it's 6-9mo away.  I was barely able to take the trash out this morning, and here I am plotting thousands of miles of training and races.  How exactly does that happen?

The first piece of it is of course the absence from the bike.  It's easy to forget why you enjoy the sport; getting some time away gives perspective.  Most seasons I end up taking most of Oct and Nov off so I can get settled for winter.  I spin a bit at the gym, but the long hours on the bike are done for awhile.

The second piece is the family events that pop up in the holiday season.  Chatting with friends and my brothers about all the great past events we've done makes me pine for events of the future.  It's not a competition thing - my brothers and I don't overtly compete with each other - it's the shared memories and the "wouldn't it be cool if...." factor.

Anyway, I typed all that so I can type this:  Next year, I'm looking at more bike distance, fewer Triathlons.  We did three multisport events this year, and I'd dial that back to one, maybe zero.  In exchange, I'm hoping to knock a couple of events off my biking bucket list.  Some of these are specific charity rides nearby that I'd been meaning to do.  The big one is the Imperial Century (100mi).  Most bikers hit this in their first couple seasons; it has eluded me.  Several times I've been trained up but the weather on the appointed day didn't cooperate.  A couple of times I punted in order to ride with family at a slower pace, knowing as I did it that it would put me off pace to finish the target mileage.  This year's plans are focusing around several possible Imperial Century attempts in case one or more doesn't pan out.

And we'll see how it goes.

Back in the Saddle

I'll (hopefully)  have an EVE post tomorrow, but for now I'll ramble a bit about real life.

The title of the post refers to this being the first week that I'd really done any rigorous exercise in a long while.  Onyx and I are back to our regular 2 days at the gym a week, and I did body weight stuff at home on the off days.  At the gym, we did a fairly normal swim workout one day, and I put on my funny biker clothes and hit the spin bike the other.  Instead of making me feel tired, all the effort has made me feel more focused and alert.  I have aches and pains, but the colors outside are a little brighter, and I've been sleeping a little more deeply.

I spent a good chunk of the early afternoon outside.  It's cold, but sunny, and I enjoyed getting my heavy Carhartt jacket out of the closet for the first time of the year.  Here's a secret:  I actually detest warm weather and really love temps from the 30s to 50s.  I don't mind snow, and a decade ago I would have moved north if a job or two I applied against had actually hit.  So, all that to say that today was a good day to be outside, and the work I got done was satisfying.

I should probably sharpen the saw and tackle an offending maple that I intended to take out this fall, but I stopped after mulching an acre of leaves.  Perhaps tomorrow if it's not too windy.

It occurred to me that this has been the first 'normal' week since perhaps July or maybe June.  I'm not working extra hours, or sick with the plague, or travelling, or entertaining out of town friends or customers, or getting ready for a race, or dealing with contractors at the house.  I keep saying that this year has been exhausting and I'm glad that we're finally seeing things settle back down.  (The weather here meant that from April to maybe June, I was mowing 2-3 times a week just to stay ahead.  The rest of the time it was raining.  The grass grew absurdly fast; all other chores went out the window ... once it dried out, I was neck deep in work politics and a job change and the last 3 months we've been on the road almost every weekend).

There's a zillion things I could do around the property, but considering all that we've done, I feel justified in a little recovery before I get too concerned about my to-do list.  Hopefully Fall is a slow burn and winter is mild and I can make progress.

I need to get my weight and diet back under control.  I'm not crazy out of bounds, but I'm above a magic number, and about 10 lb over my doc's target.  Travel and entertaining are bad news for the way I eat, and overall 2015 has been a crappy year for my weight.  Although I've kept the damage to a minimum, as things begin to return to normal, I'm also reminded that I should look at the scale too.

In terms of bikes and triathlons, right now next season is very much in flux.  I feel like I need to scope out the season at least at a high level as it'll affect my off season training.  For example, if I'm not doing any triathlons then I can dial back the swimming.  Right now I'm leaning towards focusing on biking, and taking on a couple of my bucket list goals -- an Imperial Century (100mi) or maybe a Double Metric Century (200km).  I've been biking since 2008 and have yet to complete my first Century - this is a right of passage for most bikers, and over the years I've been thwarted by injury and weather whenever my attempts are made.  I didn't even plan an attempt for 2015, but maybe 2016 should be the year.

The Real Life Post (and Fun With Footnotes)

Non-EVE content lurks ahead, with big nasty pointy teeth(1).  You've been warned.

It's been an interesting few weeks around here, and by "interesting" I mean things keep colliding with me in a way that keeps me away from EVE.(2)

Countdown the Race Day

Non-EVE post about biking and triathlons follows:

Our first race of the season is this weekend.  The weather looks like it's holding, although the cold snap in the central US is keeping the water temperature down under 70 degrees.  I'm currently in a "taper" week where we do very light workouts and coast up to the big event.

This will be my 8th overall race and 5th at Olympic Distance or higher, in my 5th overall season of racing.  This particular event, I'm signed up for the Aquabike - I will swim and bike but not run.  I'm starting to get used to the pre-race jitters, but this year they're manifesting differently than in past seasons.  Typically right now I'd be feeling a sense of regret and dread as I stared down the gauntlet of the challenge; the sense of "obligation" for consuming a perfectly good Saturday by getting up at 4:30am.

This year, instead of feeling overwhelmed or stressed, I'm excited.  In fact, a few minutes ago, I signed up for a 2nd race later in the summer.  Crazy. (Normally race signups are something I do in the cold days of winter....never EVER when the weather is nice, hah.)

Part of my change in attitude, I think, is that this time last year my lower back hurt so bad that I thought I'd maybe never seriously ride the bike again.  Months of therapy and stretching, some time off in the off season, and I'm back at it and wanting to find out where my new limits are.  In the month of May, I logged more miles on the bike in almost 2 years (August 2013, the month I did my Half Iron distance Aquabike).

Another part of it (and I hate to jinx myself by saying this...) is that I'm reasonably prepared; perhaps mentally more prepared than any other race, and physically almost back to my peak of 2013.  Stronger in some ways, and weaker in a few others, actually.

Sure, I'd like to have another 2-3 weeks to prepare.  The weather in April was crappy, and work tied me up with unanticipated travel and more than a few late nights.  That delayed the start of outdoor biking and obliterated the semi-structured training plan I'd wanted to take on.  But, I've come a long ways in the past 3-4 weeks, and I'm very happy with the change in stamina over such a short time.

I don't expect to necessarily set a personal best for the course, but I think it'll be close enough that my time will depend on the weather conditions (chop/clarity of the swim course, as well as wind on the bike route) as much as anything.

Idle moments are filled with thoughts of things I need to remember to do, equipment I need to check, or dig out of the closet.  Other moments are filled with race day strategy or mentally rehearsing key moments of the event (swim start, in particular, has been on my mind today -- it's tempting to jump in the water and swim as fast as you can, even with a warmup before the race start, you can still blow your heart rate up and be hurting at the 100m marker ... with 1500m to go).  I'll print out my checklist and start gathering hardware tomorrow.

And on the plus side, Sunday is planned to be a day for being lazy on the couch and playing EVE.
 

Saturday Morning on the Bike

The last week has been a blur at the office.  Typical day for me starts at 5am, answering email while eating breakfast.  In the office by 6:45.  The next 9 hours will be a blur, typically working through lunch and eating a sandwich with one hand while I click the mouse with the other.  Around 4, I will give up and go home, and then the phone calls will start.  I'll break for dinner, manage a chore or two (the lawn must be mowed even if the world ends), and then after dinner I'll stare at more email or more likely will end up on the phone with either the East Coast lead or the West Coast team debriefing what we've done and what we plan to do the next day.  All of that will wind down around 9:30,  get in bed around 10 and I'll lay in bed awake until after midnight, and then repeat.

Mrs. Durden has been a real champ through this.  The stress has been building for several weeks, but the last week in particular we've been in overdrive mode.

We are thankfully in a position where most people will get the weekend, and I won't be back to the office until Monday (although I have some homework to do on Sunday while we're watching whatever blue-ray goes in the player).

There are things that I should be doing around our property today.  Burning brush, running the weed whacker, replacing the security light that finally burned out.  Normal crap for someone that owns and cares for 10 acres.

Instead, I got on the bike, clipped on my new GoPro, and burned almost 1200 calories in an early morning ride.  I was on the bike by 7:40 to avoid traffic around Home Depot and Walmart, and got away from everything and everyone for a blissful 90 minutes.

I was following a route that I've used the past couple years for training.  It's a 20-25 mile loop, depending how I do it.  There are some hilly sections, pretty sections, and a good mix of road surfaces (good new smooth pavement and old cruddy stuff).

Partway through the route, I noticed that a local club/shop had marked the route for their local rides and I happened to be following their course turn for turn.

I got outside a small town near me, and I had a choice - break from the shop/club route and follow my old route and climb two monstrous hills back to back, and into a stiff headwind, or follow the white rabbit into the unknown and stay with the club route (Matrix reference there, woot).  I chose the latter.

I got treated with this:

It was a 3-4 mile detour through some of the prettiest, twistiest, windiest, rolliest terrain that I know of.  The road surface was great, and it was mostly downhill out of the wind, so I got to really open it up and crank it.  I've driven this road in the car, but had never biked it.  There's a creek on the left side that the road follows, the birds were singing, and I was fully and blissfully alone.  I was grinning so wide, I no doubt now have bugs in my teeth.

Sometimes it's good to be impulsive.

Then, I came home and the water heater had quit.  It was an easy fix, but I'm sitting here in my stinky bike clothes waiting for enough hot water to shower.

Back to reality.

Friday Post: Burning, Bikes, and Beer

Lately this place has been Burner grand central, and I've stayed pretty EVE-centric in general over the past few months (other than a rant or two about airline travel...).

Today is Friday, and I'm debating on whether to fire up the EVE client at all.  The weather is outstanding, and it's one of those rare spring days we get around here where it's low-wind, sunny, without bugs, pollen, or other nasties.

Burning:  The RL kind.  I was off work today, and spent the morning on the phone trying to line up a contractor to tackle a new pole barn.  We own 10 acres, and the main project for this year is to expand the outbuildings by one.  The spot we intend to put the barn is presently in the center of a many-acre woods, and that means clearing trees and brush and thorny things so that the contractor can get his equipment in and out and put up the barn.  I could pay him to do it, but I enjoy this kind of work, and it's far cheaper to do it myself.

A few weeks back I cut down 8-10 mediums sized Ash, chunked it into fireplace sized logs, and left the tops where they lay.  Today was a perfect day for burning -- so after I had a PBJ sandwich, I went out and built a monster bonfire.

People talk about bonfires with a party atmosphere.  To me, they're a helluva lot of work.  I spent the early afternoon dragging, hauling, cussing, and tossing branches.  I lit off the fire and prayed it would stay lit (I avoid using nasty accelerants like oil; whatever doesn't burn goes straight in my well water).  Once the fire caught, I spent the next several hours feeding it.  Feed the fire fast enough that it stays going strong but not so fast that it flares up and gets away from me.

Finally, I sat in a lawn chair and watched the fire burn down to nothing so that I could safely douse it and come inside.  But I was pooped, tired, exhausted.

I'd have had a much easier day if I'd gone to work, but getting the brush cleared is satisfying.


Bikes:  I haven't posted much about triathlons or biking.  I am signed up for one race this season in early June.  Last season I suffered a lower back injury and thought maybe I'd never ride again.  I got back on the bike by Fall but was nowhere near where I wanted to be in terms of stamina or speed.  I stumbled through the rest of the season and then took many weeks off this winter.

After the first of the year, I started back on the spin bike at the gym.  I downloaded several workout videos to my phone and did interval sprints and hill climbs.  I don't have many real-road miles thanks to the weather, but have been on the bike at the gym 2x per week for the past 4 months (unless I was traveling) and I feel stronger in the bike seat now than I have in a long long time.  I'm really interested to see what I can do on the open road, and have high hopes to knock off some bucket-list achievements this season.

Swimming, likewise, has come along.  We swim 1x per week and I've basically been doing the same interval workout for the past 4ish years.  When I started the workout I could barely finish, but over the past year I peaked and started coasting.  It took me awhile to realize it, and about 6 weeks ago I changed up my routine.  The difference is dramatic - I feel stronger during my weekly sessions than I ever have and have increased the distance another 20% for each session (now swim 2000 yards per session).

Beer:  I don't drink much alcohol these days.  Partially because of my diet and trying to keep weight off, and partially because it just generally disagrees with me.  But I do like dark, creamy beers (Guinness, when I can find it), and from time to time I miss having one.  It's Friday and I worked my butt off today.  So I'm opening a bottle of St. Peter's Cream Stout, which I picked up last weekend and have never tried before.

It has a cool bottle, and the St. Peter's stuff I've tried has been good.

<Pause for Effect> The taste is good, but would be better if I had a large steak in front of me.

Anyway, I'm going to stop typing and finish my beer.  And after that, I may take a nap.

Cheers.

Depth of Endurance

Non-EVE content.

I follow the Surly (bike company) factory blog.  I own one of their bikes and love it.  They seem like an eccentric but fun group of guys (and gals) and generally spin a good yarn in their posts.

One write-up in particular that I look forward to every year is the report on the Arrowhead 135.

It's a 135mi bike race*.  In January.  In northern Minnesota.

Read that again and ponder the implications.  People do crazy things in the name of fun.

Anyway, this years' article has appeared, so here's a link to it.  I thump my chest and say that I do Triathlons, but the things I have done are nowhere near the depth of endurance and tolerance for discomfort as this. /salute.


*Actually, you can bike, run, or (assuming there's snow) ski the course.

Resolutions (2015)

Warning:  Non-EVE Content, etc. etc.

---
I don't normally do crazy big lists of New Year's Resolutions.  As I said in the first of this series:

I've never been big on New Year's Resolutions.  I'm not sure how widespread this kind of thing is internationally, but in the States, this is the phenomenon where people commit to doing something they should already be doing, fail miserably at it, and then make the same commitment the following year.

I posted the previous entries on Weight Loss and Triathlons partially so that this post on January 1st was in the right context.  My journey has been something that I'm personally very proud of, and I like to share.  But if I came here and proclaimed that I was going to do X, Y, or Z, I'm not sure it'd make much sense as a one-off post.

So if you've read all the other propaganda leading to this, I thank you.

Oh Crap, I am Doing a Triathlon

This is Part IV in a multi-part series.  It is non-EVE related content, skip ahead a bit if you don't like reading this kind of thing.

Previous Entries:

1. Self Improvement Through Threats from the Doctor
2. Self Improvement Through Threats from the Doctor II
3. Reactions

This is probably going to be a moderately picture heavy post, so let's start it off right with a picture of my current race bike.

2009 Bianchi Imola - Steel Frame Race Bike

Steel frame, carbon fork, rides pretty well.  Someday I'll plunk down the money for a carbon-fiber wonderbike, but this one has many miles left in it.

That out of the way, let's set the stage.

Reactions

This is Part III in a multi-part series.

Previous Entries:

• Self Improvement Through Threats from the Doctor
• Self Improvement Through Threats from the Doctor II

When the dust settled, I had lost 40 lbs in about 4 1/2 months and was 90 pounds lighter than my previous high.

I'm a nerd, so I graph things.  I still maintain this weight chart, although the annotated version above shows the interesting parts of 2013.

This changes caused a ripple effect through the people around me.  Some of it good.  Some of it tiresome.  Some of it comical.  

Self Improvement Through Threats From the Doctor II

Previous posts:

1. Part I

Welcome to Part II.  At the point I left off, it was March of 2013 and I had just decided to try the South Beach 2wk intro phase so that when it didn't work, I could tell the Doc that I'd tried real hard.

From June 2008 to January 2013 I had lost about 50 lbs, gotten generally pretty decently fit, and I didn't really expect to go much below 210 lbs.  In other words, I expected to be overweight my entire adult life.

Anyway, enough recap. Where was I?

Self Improvement Through Threats From the Doctor

Opening warning:  Non-EVE personal content lurking ahead.  

This is a pre-year-end post.  It is also part of a series.  I'll be talking on this topic on/around Jan 1st, but want some background on the books to refer to.

I've never been big on New Year's Resolutions.  I'm not sure how widespread this kind of thing is internationally, but in the States, this is the phenomenon where people commit to doing something they should already be doing, fail miserably at it, and then make the same commitment the following year.

Or at least that's my snarky observation of how it usually works.  :)  For me, if I know I should do something different, I'd rather start now than wait for an arbitrary mark on the calendar.

But in January of 2013, I did make a pretty good commitment.  I resolved to losing 20 lbs by my birthday in the Fall.  AND, I resolved to track my progress throughout the year.  That means a big ol' spreadsheet with graphs and stuff.