painting

we painted the trim on the house..but now I hate the color. We'll have to paint again. I hired a consultant this time.

My new ride - Opus Scherzo

So I finally got a new bike after a year or two of humming an hawing. I got it at Wentings Cycle in Mision. I was just going to get some new tri-shorts, but Bruce showed me the bike...My size and under $1000. Amazing. It is all aluminum, has carbon fiber seat stays, seat post and forks...which seems amazing to me on a bike at this price. Kevlar wheels and Shimano 105 components as well.

It is quite a comfortable ride. It probably bumps my average speed up by about 3 km per hour. The size makes a big difference too. I can pedal more effectively, with less strain, particularly on my knee. I find the muscle group utilization interesting as well. I really engage my hamstrings quite a bit, particularly in aero position. When I am sitting upright, I use a lot more of my quads, and climbing is pretty much all quads.

While flat riding is really nice, I find that climbing is more difficult. I have to sit down mostly. Standing up is a real burn on my quads. I mean a real burn. Sitting seems to make it more difficult pedaling, but standing, you can accelerate quite quickly, probably too quickly. So I end up pedaling too fast and need to change gears...which is almost impossible with this shifter setup and my center of gravity so far forward.
Anyways, I might get used to it, or just get better technique or muscle strength after a while. The upside is that the bike is so light compared to my highbrid that pushing up the hill is easier, and offsets some of the difficulty with shifting issues. Still I can't seem to sustain a great deal of speed or power uphill without burning a hole in my quads.

As far as shifting goes on relatively flat or shallow hills, the bike is quite amazing. Really responsive shifting. I think the setup of the bike makes for a much less strenuous ride as well as more comfortable. I feel that I could usually go farther on the rides of done so far. Once my knee gets a bit better in shape, I probably will do that. I think the strengthening of the surrounding muscle in my leg will help that. Also, as Bruce suggested, keeping the knees warm seems to make a difference, as it helps prevent the tendons from 'seizing up'. Anyhow, I've had the bike for a week now almost, and I've put about 60 km on it. Hopefully as I get better in shape that will improve.

I went on a run two days ago, and I felt very strong. My cadence was quick. It felt as if the muscle build up I've got from biking so far is helping my run. Also, on the bike I am working on having a higher cadence, and I suspect that translates into a tendency for a higher cadence in running as well.

One thing I have to get used to on this bike is the lack of stability compared to my hybrid. It is more responsive, and changing positions on the bike needs to done carefully, especially getting into aero position.

I've got my regular pedals on my hybrid now, so I can use that to run quick errands if I like without having to switch into biking shoes. Should be cool. The back wheel is out of true a bit on that bike, and the spokes are too rusty/corroded to adjust, so I would have to eventually get a new wheel.

All in all , biking seems to be fun again for me. And as long as my knee isn't over stressed, I think it will be a great low impact way to get some conditioning back.

OP-SCH6-L

the cats new present

revised wish list

kinda late, I'll try to add more ideas later

-flour/sugar pots for kitchen
- some kind of thing where I can boil milk/pudding and not burn it...I want to say...double boiler??
- cool socks

patriots

Ok, maybe they're not overrated.

New England Patriots are overrated

Yes, overrated. I can't believe the hype I am hearing. So they Pats are 9-0. So were the Colts for the last 3 seasons. But the Colts lost sometimes, and even went on losing streaks for short periods of time. I think it is way too early to go talking about a 'perfect season' or upsetting the Dolphins stand alone record.

Some starry eyed New England lovers might say, "But they're the best team I've ever seen.". Just take a look at their previous schedule, their current win streak was based mostly on victories over the leagues below average or even bottom feeder teams:

New York Jets - currently 3rd last in league, 1-8
San Diego - 4-4 suffered one of the leagues worst losses
Buffalo 4-4
Cincinnati - 2-6, bottom of division
Cleveland - wow, 5-3, who knew?
Dallas - their only serious matchup
Miami - 0-8, ties for last in the league with st louis
Washington - 5-3 3rd in division

I mean there is only one serious matchup, that was against Dallas. The game against the Colts was a close one, and could easily swung the other way...especially with a healthy receiving core (harrison/gonzales) and left tackle ugoh.

I think there will be plenty of broken hearts when patriot fans learn the lessons of the Colts in the past years, that perfect seasons aren't a gimme. But I don't need to go through that needless pain. In the meantime, here's looking forward to the rematch come playoff time

New Hobby

Catan!

Surf, run, summer

Well, my ankle seems to be on the mend, finally. I am running without a brace, still carefully though. I've been doing about 3k once a week, leaving plenty of time to heal in between. That seems to have worked. I am running stronger all the time now. I have slacked off swimming lately, I've mostly just been swimming on my own doing freestyle. But I think I deserve the summer break.

It's been a good year for surfing for me, I think it would be great to make it out at least once more this year, maybe in fall.

I saw the 'escape from alcatraz' triathlon on tv the other day. That was the triathlon I was dreaming about qualifying for. I just want to swim from 'the rock' to the mainland. The Abbotsford triathlon came and went...I didn't even go watch. It rained pretty hard that weekend.

I've been getting into astronomy again lately. Did you know that 1 light year = 5.8 trillion miles? And the nearest star to the sun is over 4.2 light years away...over 24 trillion miles. That helps me not worry about the environment so much at night!!..or politics, yurbook.com, etc, etc, etc. Trillion is a big number. (Isn't that the about U.S. debt? Astronomical.)

my trees...and flowers

And, my (well not 'my') cat:

swim meet update - day 2

So I managed to make day 2 of the Chilliwack swim meet at Rotary Pool (outdoor) as my illness wasn't to bad by Saturday night. It worked out well though, because I was only signed up for 2 events on Saturday, IM 200 and 50 free...I can do without those. Sunday I swam 50 fly, 100 back, 100 breast, 100 free and a Div 8 relay where I did 50 backstroke. Click here to see my times.

The warm up swim was at 6:45...pretty early for me. And I was late cause I took a wrong turn. Then it was a lot of sitting around waiting for your event. I swam in Div 8 (20+) but there was only 1 other guy in that division (from langley I think), he was way better than me. Most of the time we got grouped with the div 8 girls to save time, there were few swimmers in that group as well. The marshaling was really unorganized. It was probably worst for my division because they were consolidating heats to save space, I was never sure when it was my turn to race. The weather was alternating between sun and rain, sometimes both at the same time.

My swims weren't inspired, though my breast stroke was probably better than it has ever been. I shaved a second off my best 100 metre freestyle, but I was still very disappointed because I thought I did poorly in that event. I kinda tanked on the second lap. What may have made it worse is that I was grouped with a bunch of guys who were all swimming probably 20 seconds faster than me. Oh well, I guess it's progress. I guess if I thought it wasn't great for me but I still beat my old time, I must be getting better overall. My relay swim was pretty good.


So we finished up around 3:30. A long day of getting changed a lot and always being a bit damp. But I learned a lot, now I understand how everything works at these swim meets, and I've got my first competitive swim race experience (not counting triathlon).

Swim meet update

Looks like I have to skip my first planned swim meet due to illness. It's really too bad, I wanted to get official times on key events. Oh well. I don't want to end up like I did when I ran the Vancouver half marathon last year with bronchitis...I was sick for weeks after that.

I'm now a whaler

I've been swimming with the ARC Masters program for about a year and a half. However, since the Centennial pool construction is delayed, the abbotsford whalers club took over ARC for most of the summer, displacing the masters. In the spirit of "if you can't beat them join them", I joined the whalers and am now swimming 6 days a week.

Actually, I was really excited about the opportunity to join. I can work on my fundamentals, and possibly compete. I've been doing it 2 weeks now, and all my strokes have improved quite a bit. They run till the end of July. I'll pick up masters again in fall, until the winter session of whalers kicks in. The winter session is long distance oriented, the summer session is more sprint oriented.

100m time trial freestyle

1.21. Beat my last time by a second

Running again

I have been able to run recently, so it looks like my ankle injury is on the way out. I have run three times in the last week, although only about 3k per time. Today I did about 4 k. It felt like the stiffness and pain were melting away, none of the sharp pain I had before. I think the ankle brace really helps, the compression seems to keep the swelling down. I still have to be careful, but I think I'm on my way back. I've lost a fair bit of conditioning, my 3 Ks feel like 10-13 Ks. I think it will come back quickly though. I'm really happy to be able to get out again, I was starting to go nuts without running. Good to get the blood flowing. It's sunny this morning for the first time in a long time. Nice to get a break from the torrential downpour we've been having.

My new coffee table

After a months long search (perhaps years) I have finally found a replacement coffee table. Yes, this is exciting enough to post on the web. It had to be the right size, narrow enough to walk past, light enough to move around easily and nothing underneath it so I can sit and eat on it while watching tv. And a decent price, $59 bucks from Rona. Needs some stain or paint or something though. My other one had a broken leg that fell off every time you moved it. It was from the 70s or early 80s or something like that. Just thought I'd share my gladness.

Mazda6 '05

Well, after driving the pig...I mean the truck for a while I decided to move on to something faster and more fuel efficient. It's a hatchback!

Colts!

What a superbowl!

tridominator has a sprained ankle

This is the road I was running on. At night in the pitch black. I guess that's not a good idea. 2.5k limp back home, icing it in some freezing puddles along the way.



No fractures or anything though, although the doctor said it would have been better a fracture than a sprain because fractures heal faster. It's been about seven weeks now, I'm still not running. I tried a couple laps at the track the other day, but it didn't seem like a good idea. I'll stick to swimming for now, and maybe put some time on the bike trainer. Hopefully I'll be back running soon.

For those brave enough, here is my foot shortly after the fall: pic1 pic2 (warning:: kinda gross-ish)

my new truck

Here it is...

car for sale

I'm selling my car



<sniff>...it's..it's...been GOOD!!..<sniff><sniff>

100m Time trial: 1:22

We did a time trial in masters swim today. My 100m time was 1:22. That's up from January, which was 1:30.

My band plays Friday night at Straighton hall. Tickets are $13. We will probably be back at Sneakers at the end of November.