2011 Race Schedule (UPDATE)

Completed:

January 29th: Polar Bear Plunge. I guess really not a race, but jumping into the Delaware River in January is still pretty stupid. Turned out to be more fun than expected.

February 19th: Healthy Choice 5K. I was in Florida for some school junk. Wanted to run a race, so I found out that this 5K and the marathon were going on 2 minutes away from my motel. I was able to sign up late for the marathon, but a class schedule ruined that plan. So instead I did this 5K at Hugh Taylor Birch State Park. It seemed like a nice park, but the 5K included a looped course. Looped courses in a state park seems like a cop-out on race design, so I was a little disappointed. I ran a decent time, which shows that I have almost been able to keep in shape this cold winter. 5K time was not as fast as what I was running in the Fall, but I'll take it.

Registered:



May 1st: Broad Street Run. Country's biggest 10 miler I think. A pretty mandatory thing to do at least once if you live in Philly. This will be my third in a row. I don't know why I feel the need to keep running in it. I guess because Keith Coleman signed up. The midwife who delivered Maksim will probably be running too so that's cool.

May 15th: Delaware Marathon. Third marathon. Second state. smh



Possible:

March 19th: 2011 Fight for Air Stair Climb

March 20th: Get your Rear in Gear 10K

March 27th: Citizens Bank Caesar Rodney Half Marathon & 5K. Half Marathon immediately follows 5K. I'd like to do both.

April 2nd: Tyler Arboretum 10K Trail Race. Probably my favorite race.

April 17th: Dash for Organ and Tissue Donor Awareness. 10K

Cricket-straight outta compton

Click HERE.

"I don't think there are any cricket-playing gangsters”
End Quote
Alan Jackson

Deputy district attorney

in the sun i feel as one (or the sun smells too loud)

written by Sam X.Strawberry
edited by Lisa P. Donaldson and Martin P. Stuffedshirt
originally published in Popular Mechanics, October 32, 2008.

Reprinted here w/o permission. Song Lyrics and Titles listed in the title of this article were definitely used without permission as a singer of one perished long ago, and obtaining permission for the other requires learning the language of the Scots which seems much to difficult for a man of my intellectual limitations.

Thought about the sun some this morning on the drive to work. It was impossible not to as it was directly in front of me making it incredibly difficult to really see or think about anything else. I figured if there were cars in front of me I would be able to see them at the last second which would give me more then enough time to swerve into the guard rail. Luckily I made it to work without having to smash anything.

As I was staring directly into the sun, burning whatever is left of the parts of my eyes that are needed for seeing shit, I thought about one of the last things Kurt Vonnegut ever told me and that was Mother Nature was trying to abort us. With a summer of record 100 degree days and a winter with record levels of wind, cold, and snow (Eds. Note: Not really a record in either case as the world is older than 150 years old or however long humans discovered how easy it is to terrify the masses with the news), I had gone what felt like months without seeing the sun. But the extremes made me think Vonnegut was right.

I leave before it rises and I get home after it falls. Sure I have a window at work, but Mother's Nature plan of death required that the sun lurk behind the clouds for weeks at a time to let the ground slowly freeze during the day so when we leave our posts we'll slip and slide to the depths below.

So to see the sun this morning, and to see it loud and clear, was a welcomed site, despite the fact that I was operating an expensive piece of machinery that is considered one of humanity's greatest creation as it not only gets us from here to there, but it also plays a part in assisting the sun in Mother Nature's mission of getting rid of us before we get rid of her. Survival of the fittest, in a land of big losers, edges her way, unless it's a see-saw battle because then our collective mass will result in the dangling legs of the other side. If we leave our post it will all come crashing down. Which is what it may come to. Or an explosive vest could accompany the sun one early rising, which would make the nightly descent a memory for the ages.

WAKE UP DEAD

I haven't really been drinking a lot. Occassionally I'll drink a half a bottle of Brooklyn Brewery Chocolate Stout and then pour the other half down the sink. It's weird. All day I'll think about how I want to try a beer, and then I'll get home and not be into it anymore. But...

I am perhaps inspired again.

Thanks to Joe Sixpack's weekly six pack of the week in his friday email, I now am in urgent need of buying stock in Lefthand's Wake up Dead Imperial Stout. Imperial stouts are a little bit intense for me in my now not really drinking a lot stage of life, but if you're gonna call it Wake up Dead, I will drink it.

Nice job, Lefthand.




In other news I sort of really like the songs on the Julian Casablancas' album. I'm not sure if he has multiple albums out, but I like the one that Sarah downloaded. I didn't like it at first, but with each run they seem to get better and better. Like every other frat guy, I was real big into The Strokes when they came out, but got sick of them after the first album. But now I'm not so sure I should have given up on them. Cool punk lyric in the spirit of WAKE UP DEAD from above:

From the J. Casablancas song Out of the Blue:

"Yes, I know I'm going to Hell in a leather jacket
'Least I'll be in another world while you're pissing on my casket"

Pretty good punk lyric from this elitist rich kid.

Blogger

Everytime I log into Blogger I am welcomed with a nice message that says "Create a Blog: It is Free". That is why I blog. Because it is free. It's also cool because you can write stuff that makes you sound like an idiot because it is free. Like we are. Free idiots. Free to blog and free to get into credit card debt.

Blogger is stupid. Myspace blog was better. I feel better now.

I haven't really had many ideas to blog about today, but I wanted to exercise one of my last remaining freedoms so I consulted my friend Justin. He said this:

Jusba: oh is it tuesday
me: nah well maybe
waht should i blog about?
Sent at 3:33 PM on Tuesday
Jusba: oh
can you blog about me
as a princess in a castle
me: yep
great topic
Jusba: k
me: give me 8


So here it is.

A Story of Justin the Princess

It was starting to dawn on Justin that he was taking the joke too far. He realized this as he was sitting alone in one of the towers at the far end of the castle. He had locked himself inside. In a few minutes he was going to be required to accompany one of the visiting princes' to a dinner to be held in their honor. Justin finally admitted that he was no princess. He looked at his gown and his wig and he began to cry, taking occassional breaks to brush his hair. He had to get out of this situation. He locked himself in the tower to buy a little time. He knew they were going to find him. They thought he was a she.

As he was crying and grooming, a plan popped up in his head. I can take off my wig and beautiful gown and just open the door as the regular man I am. They will never know. When asked if I saw the princess I will say "Princess? No, I was just fixing the cable". That seemed plausible enough. Justin disrobed and put on a pair of jeans and a Cafe Press t-shirt. He threw the wig down the tullet. He unlocked the door and entered the main hallway. There were princes everywhere, each with a nice princess. There was one prince who was princessless and he was scrambling around the shop looking for his date. He ran up to Justin. "Have you seen Princess Justin?".

"Nope, I'm just fixing the cable man".

"Oh, dang it, well if you see a princess with a beard lemme know."

"No problem."

And that was that.