Bachelorhood (Part II)

this is the second installment of a recurring series wherein I'm temporarily forced to face the trials and tribulations of life as I once experienced them long ago -- as a single guy. you may recall last time... it did NOT go well. 

So Kelly is gone this week at Young Life camp, which means I’m solo-dadding all week long. The week is only half over, but I’m beginning to develop some takeaways that I think are worth sharing.

Firstly, to be congruent with the emphasis of this blog, this makes workouts and nutrition more difficult (lots of runs with the stroller). Most notably, I no longer have time for nice long bike rides, which is regrettable. But also, and this is a larger takeaway… I no longer have TIME.

Emily Joy is smart and awesome and hilarious and insightful and caring and pretty much the best miniature person in the entire world… but she also is a black hole of time. (wait… are black holes already black holes of time? I mean isn’t time theoretically affected by how black holes consume light? Wait, do they CONSUME light? Sigh – I wish I understood astrophysics. I should probably re-watch that Cosmos mini-series…)

Anyway, she takes an incredible amount of time and energy. And here’s the thing… there is only one of her (I think… I should probably check on this -- it would explain a lot). Between going on walks, playing at the playground, prepping meals, cleaning up meals, changing diapers, going to the store to buy diapers or stuff for meals, reading books, playing with blocks, stuffed animals, sports paraphernalia, and chasing each other… there’s just not time for… well, anything.

*** and right on cue – she woke up early from her nap. I am now continuing this post on the following day ***

This brings me to my main point: Moms are awesome. At this point, it can seem cliche to say that moms are overworked and under-appreciated, but come on. They're amazing! Moms of lots of kids? Single moms? How do they do ANYTHING else? How do they do it? No, seriously… how. do. they. do. it?!

Also, in case you’re offended by my focus on moms (as opposed to dads)… allow me three points:

1. It’s not as though I’m normally shirking my parenting responsibilities. I’ve had Emily for multiple days in a row before… but a whole week by myself is a different ball game. (I’m retroactively realizing this is essentially what Kelly had to do the entire month of June while I was teaching a double-session of summer school)
2. Yes, some dads are stay-at-home dads, and the responsibilities I’m describing here are certainly not exclusively held by women. I’m merely playing into our culture’s largely-held societal gender norms… I guess that makes me part of the problem.
3. In regards to #2 above, please accept this (not actually very) counter-cultural cheerios ad as my peace offering. It’s a little corny and contrived… but I still like it.

  

 

I can’t really remember what else I was going to write about yesterday, and the kitchen still looks like a ravioli-yogurt bomb went off in there, so I’ll close with this:

Go hug your mom.

If you’re not near your mom, call her to tell her you love her.

And for good measure, hug/call your dad. That dude was at least picking up some of the slack at some point.

Thanks Mom & Dad. Love you.

(just to have some photos in this post: here’s a couple recent shots of Emily Joy & me)

trying on her new "hat" - she loves it. safety first

final day of the Tour - I'm wearing yellow... she's riding in yellow...

story time. she's the best.

Peak Summits & Tornados

First things first: did you know that the plural of "tornado" can end in "dos" or "does"? I've chosen the former in the name of efficiency.

Anyway, much to my chagrin, I never wrote the final installment of my Western escapades. I had previously ended with my arrival to Jackson, Wyoming. Which WAS sort of the end, but I tacked on one more chapter... the highest paved road in North America: Mount Evans. 

You can read about it here.

So why mention it? Well, for one, I meant to discuss it yesterday on the two-year anniversary. But, also... I recently discovered something unbelievable. 

Quick backstory: On my descent down Mt Evans I passed a cyclist accident. In writing about it after the fact, attempting to provide my readers with closure, I performed a google search including things like "evans" "accident" and the date I was on the mountain "july 28". No news on the cyclist (which is probably good news), but non-cyclist news was HUGE!

Get this: on July 28, 2012 there was a TORNADO on the mountain. The second-highest ever recorded tornado (at 11,900 feet) in US history (missing this highest ever recorded by only 100 feet). UNBELIEVABLE!

According to the National Weather Service, the tornado touched down at 2:51 pm, so I was off the mountain long before that (I had woken at 5am specifically to avoid afternoon weather on the mountaintop)... but crazy to think if I had gotten a late start, and was basically stuck on the mountain on a bicycle with a tornado nearby! Yeesh!

So here is the tornado:

I biked on that road just a few hours earlier.

Link to the news coverage.

And here is a map from the National Weather Service pinpointing where the tornado touchdown occurred. Compare that to the Google Earth image from my actual GPS data... holy crap.

Yeah, so that barren spot, about halfway up the image. At the base of that, on the left. That's where it was. And look at that road! No cover or protection anywhere! Yikes!

According to my GPS, I started my ride at 6:45am and total elapsed time (including breaks for food, photos, etc) was 6 hours and 13 minutes. So I was completely done by 1pm and elbow-deep in cheeseburger by probably about 1:15. By the time the tornado showed up (almost 3pm), I was probably back in Denver already. But still... that's today's lesson, kids: whether hiking or biking, plan to hit your summits EARLY to avoid weather & other potential problems.

Anyway, if you haven't yet - feel free to check out my Mt Evans story - it might be my single proudest accomplishment on my bike. I'll get back to the "here and now" tomorrow...

If Time Is Relative... So Is Speed.

note: This will be a sort of “part 2”… with the first installment being yesterday’s post.

I last left you with the lingering stench of my failure in the arboretum. A measly 14 seconds kept me from the immortal glory… of barely making the top ten on an obscure social media site focusing on an obscure sport…

Anyway, despite the recognizable absurdity of my endeavor, and my subsequent recent failure, I knew I needed another shot. This year, the Tour holds its Time Trial on the penultimate day of the race – July 26th (sidenote: I love the word “penultimate”). In the past I had “time trialed” a course of my choosing that was pretty flat and try to keep the speedometer up in the mid-20s. But this time, it would be in the (comparatively) hilly arboretum.

I’ve addressed “speed” in my previous post, but it warrants reiteration: speed is relative. Keeping it over 20mph on the flats (or certainly in a paceline) is no great feat… but *averaging* over 20mph in the arboretum would be very fast… for me anyway. Here’s partly why:

The hills aren't tall, but there's some quazi-legit steepness there

So the day has been set. It’s embarrassing, but honestly I woke up feeling nervous. Nervous. Note: there is no one watching me… no one except Kelly even knows I’m attempting this. I have no explanation or excuse for why I feel nervous. But I do. I want to do well.

I get into the arboretum, start up my “TT” playlist (for the curious: “Helter Skelter” and “Bullet the Blue Sky” off Rattle & Hum, Pearl Jam's rendition of "Love Reign O'er Me", and then a couple Foo Fighter songs. That should be all the time I need).

I hammer up the first hill, still over 20mph halfway up. This is fast. But my legs feel weak. Not in pain… just not CAPABLE of what I want to happen. Turn those pedals! Come on legs!

I’m pretty fast through the West side (the arboretum is split into two sides: West and East). But I was fast through the West side last time. The East has a long gradual rise (false flat)… and THAT’s where I need to make up time. The side starts with a good climb. I’m slow. I can feel the pain and deadness in my legs. SHOOT… that’s gonna cost me time.

Pulling into the flat, I get as low as I can and try to keep my cadence (pedal speed) up. I’ve GOT to make time here. Spin Spin Spin.

I hit the last rise before a long descent starts, knowing I need every second I fly downhill – still pedaling hard. Near the bottom of the hill, I see a security car. He's going slower than me... ummm... yup, okay, I'm gonna have to pass him. Can't slow down now, I'm under two miles to the finish! He sees me and pulls to the side.

I pass him in the mid-20s. The speed limit is 20.  He hits the loudspeaker on his car…

"The speed limit is 20! Please slow down!"

Luckily, I’m pulling up to a steep-ish hill. I point at the hill and wave. It slows me down to about 17mph… but as soon as it’s over, it’s all downhill to the finish. Plus, there are 3 stop signs near the parking lot and the route ends on the other side of those signs. I am 100% certain that I am blowing through all 3 stop signs… above the speed limit.

I start having thoughts flash through my head: if this guy sees me run those stop signs is he gonna pull me over? Since I didn't heed his warning, will he cut up my arboretum card and ban me for life?! I love the arboretum. Oh no!

Doesn’t matter. Totally worth it.

I’m beyond reason at this point. All I know is that my time looks good. I might actually do this.

"so you’re saying there’s a chance…"

I get to the bottom of the hill. About half a mile of flat. I have one recurring thought: “Fourteen seconds. Fourteen seconds. Fourteen seconds.” I’m going all out – what if I’m a second short?

I pass what I think is the finish line but keep going (strava can be finicky with its finish lines). When I finally stop, the garmin tells me 7.66 (a quarter mile extra) and my time is 21:44. Unofficially, I have it… unless something went wrong. I won’t know for sure until I upload it to strava at home (and the ride home will be sloooowwww - my legs are fried).

Upon upload… SUCCESS!

21:14 – 20.9mph average – top 5! 

… and the crowd goes wild! Oh wait… no crowd. Welp, meeting goals feels good, even when they’re trivial and ultimately not that impressive. One man’s PR is another man’s easy recovery day. Or however that saying goes.

I realize this entire post has a relatively high potential to come off as braggy, but let me remind you that this is a blog wherein I once celebrated running 3 miles without stopping… so it’s really a story more of progress than triumph. That said, I don’t do much very well, athletically speaking: I’m not sure if I can bench the bar, or curl a gallon of milk in each hand (I also apparently don’t know how to use regular weights), and Lord knows I am not fleet-a-foot on the track. But here’s the thing… considering my other athletic shortcomings, I am disproportionally fast on my bicycle. Much faster than you’d think, and much faster than many others who are in much better shape. I like being fast… even if it's just "fast, for me".

500 [miles] of Summer

edit: after posting, I changed the title from the snoozy-lame "My Tour" to the almost impossibly witty current title. word play! just goes to show how rusty I am. let that be a lesson to you, kids: that's what happens when you're out the blog game for two years!

As cycling-nerds (cyrds) like myself are well aware, July is the month of Le Tour de France. There are a lot of nuances and peculiarities within the Tour that will not endeavor to explain or defend here. Only this: I like it.  And each year of the recent past, I’ve participated in some version of my own little tribute.

This year, my goal was to complete a fourth of the mileage, while mimicking the day’s experience as closely as possible (e.g. mountain stages, time trials, etc)

I missed the first couple days because I was out of town for a wedding, and then I was sick… but all things considered, a pretty solid three-week effort. I didn’t hit my mileage goal, but considering the late start and the sickness… 500 is a lot of miles in 21 days (19 if you take out the sick days). Here it is in chart form:

For those of you who are curious, “mountain” stages were just me trying to find “big” (for the area) hills, and ride them more times than seemed reasonable. For instance, on the final mountain day in the Pyrenees, I climbed the Park Blvd hill (coming up out of the arboretum) 10 times to get my mileage that day. Nothing else, just climb the hill, turn around, bomb down the hill, turn around, climb the hill… on and on. Mundane perhaps, but a decent workout… and the closest I’ll get to anything “mountain”y around here.

There was a landscaping crew working the yard of a house along the route… and every time I passed I tried to imagine what they thought of the spandex-bedecked fat guy who is going up and down the same hill over and over. 

But this post isn’t about me acting irrationally foolish on some pathetic misinterpretation of a mountain stage…

It’s about me acting irrationally foolish on some pathetic misinterpretation of a TIME TRIAL stage.

First, a quick background: I bike in the Morton Arboretum a lot. It’s a 7.4 mile loop and it’s the best place to bike in the western suburbs for the following reasons:

1. Considerate (and limited) traffic
2. Smooth roads
3. Good hills
4. It’s pretty

Also, since 2012, I’ve used a website/app called “strava” that allows you to virtually race other people over different segments of road (or trail). It crowns riders “King of the Mountain” and alerts you of your PRs and all sorts of neat nerdy things. It’s pretty brilliant, actually. I won’t explain more here, but google is your friend.

So one of my days in the arboretum (a good place to simulate “mountain” stages), I accidentally went pretty fast because, in a moment of misplaced competitiveness, I passed some guy and I didn’t want him to come back and pass me.  After finishing, being successful in not being passed after passing (a faux pas, to be sure), I was alerted of my PR.  Huh. I had beaten my previous PR around the arboretum by almost two minutes... and that got me thinking… how fast could I go? Ya know, if I really TRIED to go fast*?

* two notes on speed:

• “fast” is a relative term
• I LIKE going fast. It’s fun. It’s one of the many reasons cycling is much better than running. But I don’t often think “oh I need to go fast or TRY to go fast”… I just go… and since fast is fun, I keep trying to go faster. This is perhaps difficult to explain with any degree of lucidity. Suffice it to say that my “pursuit of speed” (if you can call it that) is more like a little kid flying downhill than someone who takes cycling seriously (or for that matter, does it well). This explains how “what if I TRIED to go fast?” can be somewhat of a novel concept.

So I decided to try. After looking at the strava leaderboard, I made a goal of finishing the 7.4 mile loop in 22:12 – exactly 20mph. That would also put me in the top 10. Not bad.

On July 19^th, I made my attempt. I was in an absolute sprint for 22 minutes… gasping up hills, talking to myself (sometimes in whisper-screams: “come on!”), passing cars, and blowing through stop signs. Looking ridiculous. All in the name of this goal I had made in this silly online community that pretty much everyone who saw me had no idea existed. I just imagine the old couple on a stroll through the trees of the arboretum seeing me pass, pedaling as hard as physically possible, panting, grunting, maybe drooling a bit… and thinking “what the crap is that guy doing?” It’s not like there are other cyclists racing me (that they can see, anyway).

Finally I finish. The “unofficial” time looks good. I won’t know for sure until I get home and load it intro strava. 

aaaaaaaaaaand... 22:26.

DANG IT! 14 seconds! Fourteen stupid seconds!!!

Ranking is #11… all that ridiculous effort… for nothin’.

But of course, this means I’d have to come back and try another day…

Once More Unto the Breach, Dear Friends

In the words of the great Ladies Love Cool James: don’t call it a comeback – I been here for years. (wait – what’s that? I haven’t posted in two years? oh, well sure. THAT'S a comeback).

So I originally started this interweb-based-log to chronicle my (mis)adventures in attempting to lose weight, and also to embarrass myself enough to add to the motivation.  In 2011, I was successful. I ate less (sometimes), I ran, and I biked. I lost about 40 pounds. Which is great.

The problem is I gained it back. Then I lost some. Then I gained it back again.

… you see where this is headed.

Here’s a quick list of the extremes:

• Feb 2011 – 242
• Aug 2011 – 198
• Mar 2012 – 216
• Aug 2012 – 198
• Mar 2013 – 239
• Sep 2013 – 215 (notice how my “low” mark here was my high mark in 2012)
• Winter of 2014 – 240… and STILL 240 as late as May 5

Yes, there is a troubling trend. This spring I started running again after Chicagoland began to thaw, and was not really seeing results because I still ate everything I looked at, and my running could be more aptly described as “plodding”.

So I ramped it up a bit, started a workout program (more on this later probably), and have also been biking quite a bit the last few weeks. I was “successful” again. I’m down to 208 and still dropping. But here’s the thing, if I’m just yo-yoing back and forth… is it really success?

So I thought I’d dust off the ole blog and recondition its purpose. Here is the plan: I’m not blogging about my boring weight loss again. That part has already (mostly) happened. When I’m getting results, I don’t need “accountability” – the results themselves serve that purpose (and this whole thing just turn into a giant humblebrag… a thin line I walk far too often anyway). I need accountability AFTER the weight loss – the problem is availability of time during the school year. Oh, but also the part where I eat everything I look at. Have I mentioned that yet?

Ergo, the focus of this blog will become less about losing the initial weight… rather, the emphasis will be on keeping the weight OFF. Fighting the fat, as it were. An epilogue of sorts.

And just to end on a positive… here is my progress over the last 12 weeks.

Now, try not to screw it up…

- - -

Saturday Weigh-in: 207.6

Two additional notes:

1 – I still have a goal of sub-200lbs before school starts. I think this is attainable, but there might be some hiccups along the way. So there will (hopefully) still be discussion of SOME weight loss.

2 – I also plan to use this blog to broadcast some more general thoughts and opinions. So you (you = no one) have that to look forward to.