Pick #178

Vera - "Sound" from The Sound

An Accidental Week Off from Running

I realized yesterday that I hadn't been running in a week! I'd been in the pool for a few sessions and on my bike all but one of those days. I went rock climbing. I'd certainly not been sedentary, but there's something different, something special about running. I decided that I wouldn't go another day without it so I ran before school today. Looking at the weather forecast, I'm glad I did because it's going to be cold enough outside tomorrow to make me question running.

Rock Climbing

I went to the Tallahassee Rock Gym to attend the FSU Rock Climbing club's meeting for the first time last night. I felt inept. Everyone else was way better at climbing than I am. I guess they've all got plenty of experience on me.

Climbing works my body in a really nice way. It's like the best feeling you can have after lifting weights. And it's so much more fun than pumping iron. I feel like it's more practical too. I guess it has an application where you can go climb real structures.

I'm thinking about going about once or twice a week to climb. Mondays with the club it's only $3.50 to boulder and Wednesday is half price day on everything. Which means those are the times I would probably try to go. I might be more inclined to go if I had someone who wanted to go with me on a regular basis. Let me know if that someone is you.

Aligned Globe

On the equator...the globe is aligned with the earth...cool concept...meaning that if you're me (taking the picture that you see here), the north pole is to your right and the south pole is to your left.

On My Grind

I went to Bread & Roses yesterday to pick up some stuff (mainly quinoa so I can make a vegetarian meal for J & Shell when they come visit). While I was in the store, I saw the bicycle grinder. The guy who built it, Justin, was working there at the time and told me that it works pretty well and they were making peanut butter with it earlier and the product flew off the shelves. I am almost out of PB at my house, so I went to grab some and they were sold out of the not-organic kind. I told him that we'd better make some more. SO, he said that we'd better make more of both organic & not-organic PB.

The bike grinder works kind of like this: you sit on a seat and there are handlebars at your side for stability. You pedal and the chain is linked to an arm that spins a corkscrew which pushes whatever is in the basin toward the mill stones. You can adjust how far apart the millstones are from each other to control the fineness of the end product. It doesn't quite feel like a bike because you really get stuck at the 12&6 position. Justin said that he plans on adding a flywheel which is driven by your pedaling and in turn drives the grinder/corkscrew arm.

It was pretty fun to make my own PB. It tastes pretty good too. Only one ingredient (if you don't count man-power!). They could make flour there or I've heard about a possible blender attachment for making smoothies. I think it's got potential!

Drop Some Weight

PowerCordz look like a fairly cheap way to drop weight and improve performance on your bike. They are lighter and stronger than your current brake and shifter cables. I bet soon they'll be used on some high end bikes like Scott or Blue.

Pick #177

The Afters - "Forty-Two" from Never Going Back to OK

My Lenten Commitment

I've never been able to figure out what to give up for lent. Everything I can think of seems either impossible or trivial or not beneficial. For the last category, think about me giving up running...it would be difficult but wouldn't serve to make me better in any way. I've thought about giving up alcohol, but I've done that for 40 days before without a problem and I don't think it's a problem for me...

With the help of a friend, I decided that ice cream is gone until Easter. I eat on average one bowl of ice cream per day. Not giant bowls, but I go through a half gallon in a typical week. I'm not addicted, I just like it. Different flavors...gotta switch it up. Anyway, ice cream isn't really good for me and it would be something that I notice its absence. I think it's a good choice. I'm looking forward to this little experiment in self control.

The Storm Before the Calm

Fat Tuesday carries a reputation as arguably the most decadent night on the calendar. It's the day made famous by Mardi Gras when all revelries are indulged before giving them up for the season of lent.

Even when not related to a season, it seems like people do this...they'll go out for a heavy night of drinking before they get shipped off to boot camp or somewhere where alcohol is off limits. I would go on a very long run if I needed some sort of medical care that would prevent me from running for a while. These behaviors are almost like we're putting some of this activity in a bank. Like we can get some sort of future utility out of the extreme actions taken today.

Tri the Rez 2010

Oct. 23rd is the tentative date for Tri the Rez 2010. Should have confirmation of that by the end of this week. Keep your ear to the ground, watch out for online registration coming soon.

Austin the Plumber

I think it was this past Tuesday when my washing machine produced a flood in my garage because there was a clog in the drain pipe leading to the sewer. I put my 20' pipe snake through the washer drain and the nearest clean-out and I couldn't get to the clog. I wanted to get a hold of a plumber (the person who works for the company) and pay about $30 cash to get them to remedy my situation. Long story short, I didn't hear from anyone and I called a family friend who is a plumber from Vero to see if he could recommend anyone. It turns out that he was coming to visit his daughter at FSU this weekend and I met up with him on Saturday to get some professional grade declogging solution. It didn't work. Twice.

I decided on Saturday night that I needed to get a "power auger" or "roto-rooter" to do the job. I found out that the Home Depot rents them. I went to HD and an associate named Big D helped me get the equipment. All the 75' rooters were rented out, so I took a 50 footer home. I felt it take care of one clog, but that apparently didn't do the job. I couldn't back feed it from the clean-out in front of the house, so I had to go back to HD and get a 75' machine which had been returned in the mean time. I bore through the remnants of the first clog and powered through a second. That fixed me up. It was a $45 fix which is not too bad considering the alternative of hiring a real plumber. And now I have that life experience that I was lacking just a few short hours ago.

Let there be no question that roto-rootering pipes is not the most pleasant thing in the world. You get that sewer smell in your nostrils and maybe even on your body if you're not lucky. However, there are plenty worse things (like having water back up in your pipes and render your clothes washer inoperable). My mom asked me if it would have been easier just to call a plumber. Of course that would have been easier, but it would also have been much more expensive ($75 minimum and probably upwards of $100). Overall, I'm happy that I ended up being able to fix it myself.

My laundry had been piling up before the giant clog

Dudes & Rain Boots

I don't see a whole lot of guys at FSU wearing rain boots...come to think of it, I don't think I've seen any guys (other than myself) wearing rain boots at FSU. Girls will use any excuse to wear them. It doesn't have to be downpouring/flooding for girls to break out their pretty designs on their rain boots.

They're so practical for wet weather that I wonder why more guys aren't rocking them. They aren't very expensive and they keep your feet dry. I hate it when my sneakers get all wet. Flip flops are great for rainy weather as long as you don't mind getting your feet wet. I would think that in this cold and wet weather we've been having that people would mind getting their feet wet. Are they just so uncool for guys that dudes are willing to sacrifice comfort and practicality in order not to look like an idiot (do I look like an idiot for wearing them? Maybe...it's usually hard to tell that I'm wearing rain boots because they're poking out from under my rain pants).

Any feedback?

Pick #176

Lorrie Morgan - "Five Minutes" from Leave the Light On

Blippy

Blippy.com is a site that will track your spending. It records transactions on accounts that you link to your Blippy account. For instance, I have a credit card, my Netflix account, and my Amazon account linked to it. When I purchase something with that particular credit card it will post the transaction to Blippy automagically. Netflix can be a little annoying at times because it posts everything you stream instantly. That can get cumbersome. I don't think I've actually purchased anything with Amazon since opening my Blippy account.

You can comment on friends' purchases. It's kinda lame for me right now because I only have one friend using the service. I think that it would be way cooler if I could follow a few more people.

If you'd like to sign up but can't, let me know and I'll send you an invite.

Square Up Rolling Out

Get ready, the future is coming.

Futuristic Bike Concepts

At least one of these bikes will blow your mind.

Satur-(new things)-day

I spent this past weekend in Indiana. Saturday was especially noteworthy because I got to do THREE things that I'd never done before. In the early afternoon, I went to an indoor rock gym and climbed for a couple hours (and I'm still a little sore). Later in the afternoon, I went downhill sledding on the deepest snow I've ever seen (probably about a foot deep). That evening I had tentative plans to go snowboarding, but they fell through, so I went to the opera.

High five for new stuff! I think I might try to climb a little bit here in Tally if I can figure out how to do it on the cheap.

Pick #175

Sawyer Brown - "Some Girls Do" from The Dirt Road

DYK?

Monkey Lectric: It's Pimp Star for Your Bike!

Cell Phone Problems

I have been having weird problems with my cell phone. The lock screen won't respond to touch if it's plugged in to an AC outlet, the phone was turning itself off for no reason (then not turning back on when I hit the power button unless I plugged the phone in [and no, the battery was not dead] or removed the battery for a few seconds), the phone was losing battery fast until I stopped using "messages" and switched to "ChompSMS," and I can't remember what else was wrong.

I took it in to the Sprint store today to have them fix it. They did a hard reset and I haven't had any issues EXCEPT that they didn't do a very good job of backing up my contacts. I've had a hell of a time with syncing my contacts with Gmail: deleting someone on my phone deletes them from Gmail contacts! AAAHHHH. There are people that I want in my email address book but don't want to carry around with me in my phone. The Sprint people didn't back up my "Phone" contacts, only the "Google" ones. I lost all the connections I had on facebook and I lost the calendar entries I'd made from the phone that weren't synced up with my google calendar. HBF. I had to go through my old cell's contacts list and manually input a bunch of junk. I'm missing some people whose #s I acquired recently.

That's all. Just wanted to vent.