Take A Deep Breath And Read The Fine Print

Some friends outside of the immediate area enjoy borrowing my posts; I guess every so often I manage to transcend the personal & slide right into the universal. Doesn't happen as often as I like, but when a good post is borrowed I really appreciate it.
If you've ever read a piece of literature or an article - or for that matter, a blog post - without looking closely into the perspective or the context under which it was written you might miss the point. Sometimes I have to point the reader to a piece of literature, a song, or a movie in order for them to understand exactly what I'm talking about. I've had friends tell me, or more often, my wife, 'you know, he's a good writer but sometimes we don't have a clue exactly what he's talking about.'

The main page of my blog has a disclaimer I adapted from one on the weblog of two-time Olympic medalist Simon Whitfield. In essence, it says: 'dude, this is my opinion. Take it with the amount of salt needed to be palatable.' My wife is wise enough to ask me to clarify. My father has read enough missives from me in the past three decades to translate (now you know why the Bible can be so hard to interpret?). Most other people only read a piece of what I've written then go off on a tangent, have a conniption fit, & set out to prove me wrong.

My friend Kevin Spain is a sportswriter for a large newspaper. There are certain times of the year he has no lack of material for the on-line & print versions. Other times he looks for something that's a little more out of the ordinary. Occasionally he borrows from me, or asks me to write something on a topic which he feels the need for coverage. I'm not one to deny the request of a friend. A blog post of mine about a Red Dress Run & my observations was decent enough to make the electronic world. I harbor no fantasies of being a big-shot writer, much less a big-shot coach or a big-shot in the running community, as I was once called by a USATF official in Dunedin. To think my opinions & observations of a very large running/social event (frankly, one of the largest of it's kind in the country!) would hold water with the lumpenproletariat is beyond my understanding.

Hey, I'm just a guy telling my story.

Imagine my surprise last night when I received a couple of e-mails: One was from the organizer of the event in question. Another was from a person who did not provide their affiliation, but must have been a member of the same organization, or all-too-emotionally attached to the event.

The rebuttal from the event organizer was gracious; to the point she wished to provide her side of the story, with a press release about the charitable proceeds of the event. The second e-mail was, er, less-than-gracious, & quite typical of e-mails I've received from members of the organization in question when they feel they've been wrongly maligned. I proceeded to tell the event organizer she missed some of the salient points of my blog, & provided some additional information I left out in the intent of putting a best face on the event.

We all have, some preacher once told me, the opportunity to influence 150 people. We have close enough relationships with that many persons; most will not hesitate to speak well of the good customer service situations, or restaurant experiences, or holiday trips, or running events. Same goes for bad experiences - those 150 can be influenced to be a future customer or to never darken the doorstep of your business. I didn't want to tell this event organizer I would be a dissuading influence on her event, but merely a single customer who decided his preferences would lie somewhere else for that particular event in the future.

After the second e-mail, I decided on dissuasion. I can spend the same amount of money in that town; stay at the same hotel, & have as good a time as a spectator...better, actually...than as a participant. And I told the event organizer thus.

That's the joy of capitalism. Sometimes the hired help shoots management in the foot.

Barry White? We're Talking Barry White!?

While R&B/disco great Barry White has no longer been with us for three years, there's still an opus of work which has not seen the light of day. Well, not any longer. His long-time friend & producer saw fit to release a three-disc collection of alternate tracks, unreleased tunes & (to borrow from Steve Taylor) some stuff which initially didn't make the cut...just in time to celebrate what would have been Barry's 65th birthday.
The interview on NPR's Morning Edition brought out some really neat stuff which could relate to your own training:

1. If you're smart enough - knowing your strengths & limiters - you can take anything & make it your own.

One of White's greatest songs was originally supposed to be a country song, called 'My First, My Last, My In-Between.' Expand what comes between the first & last to everything, hey, Barry, this turkey just might fly! NPR's Steve Inskeep & White's producer then went off the rabbit trail & into the weeds, mentioning the potential of taking a song as simple as Mary Had A Little Lamb & Barry Whiting it. I almost had to pull the car over, I was laughing at the sound in my mind.

The smart athlete considers a training plan more as a road map & less as an itinerary, because we are all an experiment of one.

2. Do One Thing. Do It Well.

When you listen to Barry White's songs, they are all about love between two people. There are no break-up songs, no songs about fighting or the hard parts of a one-to-one emotional relationship. Okay, that's why I could never stand to listen to more than one or two Barry White songs at a sitting. It was kind of like doing lunch at an all-you-can-eat pizza joint; the first plate was fantastic, the second one pretty good...after that it's self-abuse.

Focus on a particular range of distances. Try the others if you like, but keep it in perspective. While you can not suck at most everything, you aren't going to be good at everything...all at one time.

So, here's to you, Barry. We can learn how to be good athletes, and good people, perhaps, by listening to your stuff every so often. Oh, yeah...I never thought I'd hear a better version of Billy Joel's Just The Way You Are, but somehow you did it.

Over The River, Through The Woods...

When holiday decorations are on (our!) downtown light poles not long after Veterans' Day (Remembrance Day for those not in the US...) & 'Wally World' moves all the lawn & garden stuff to an undisclosed corner of the building (especially frustrating when you are looking for more cheap Chinese-made solar-powered stake lights) after the Hallowe'en candy gets moved out on sale...you know the shopping season goes on way too long. Kind of makes Thanksgiving, even if it is a dietary/gastronomic/sociological disaster waiting to occur in every US household, a small island of semi-sanity during those last 60 days of the year.
Really, I like Thanksgiving. I enjoy the fact it's a holiday for hanging out with the ones you most want to hang out with (the ones you invited because you knew you had to weren't going to show anyway). Even if there's some emotional stuff that comes to the surface (Remember what Robin Williams said? 'Catholics have confession. (We) have Thanksgiving...') after being held down over the course of the year, it's loosened in the presence of people who (pretty much) know, love & care about us.
One of my former bosses was very opinionated about the holidays. During one memorable conversation about careers and future goals, he said: 'Christmas, to me, is an economic nightmare. I'm not fond of the commercialization, & my family & I work to keep it as simple as possible. For me, Thanksgiving is the big holiday; it's all about the family, the food & a sense of gratitude.' Surprisingly enough, that conversation has stayed in my mind since 1992. It wasn't all about the holidays as much as it was about the brevity of life, the brevity of memory, & most of all, about the need to enjoy what you do for a living.
As part of our Thanksgiving, if we made the turkey, I get to take down the remains of the carcass & make stock for soup. Unlike other households, we don't go from hot turkey to turkey sandwiches to turkey a'la king to turkey in the dog's dish. Nope. I get to play Jack The Ripper and pull all the leftover meat off the carcass the day after...which means starting the stock after the last guest leaves.
Before Suzanne & I moved into our own home we had this little two-story apartment. Actually, it would have been fairly good size if we had used both floors, but we (Suzanne, me, & eventually Rubin) were all on the first deck. Some of the kitchen stuff we had included a nice, big stock pot. I mean, you couple have placed Godzilla-Turkey in this thing. Ended making so much stock we couldn't store it all in the fridge. Oops.
So yesterday, I was looking for that same stock pot, to no avail. Must have been one of those things we gave away after we moved into the new house, or when one of our related young'uns got married and moved into a place. Not certain. So I had to make do with the roasting pan. Definitely field-expedient. The good news is that the stock is all done, the bones, tendons, turkey skin, fat, & assorted inedible stuff is now in the trash can (where I pray the d-a-w-g doesn't assault it). The forecast calls for soup. Lots of it. No tacos, thanks.
Suzanne & I discussed 'what do we want/need for Christmas?' the other evening over a couple of Dos Equis' & quasi-Mexican (Called thus in deference to my southwestern-based, Latino-influenced family - not a place I would willingly take them were they to come visit me. A former significant other took my father to a Chi-Chi's about ten years ago. The manager somehow learned my father was New Mexican & asked his opinion of the cuisine. Refer to the old Fleetwood Mac song, 'Oh Well,' for a hint to his response. Suffice it to say I was cringing when the manager asked...), food at Moe's.
We have little difficulty getting around on the road to the places we enjoy traveling. Going to New Orleans...we know like the back of our hand. Other places are a tad different. Getting there is usually uneventful. It's a little more challenging, though, on the trip back. While I remember to get turn-by-turn for the outbound, the return trip is always, er, entertaining. I saw stuff around Augusta, GA I didn't want to see. Once we got an idea where the interstate was, it was time to grab enough coffee & munchies to fuel us so we could make up for lost time...oh, & a head call was in order for both of us, too.
I'm going to blame my masters' swimming friend Bill Evans for turning me on to the Garmin Nuvi GPS. It was a neat piece of gear & made the trip from Pensacola to Auburn last February at the least entertaining. Nothing like changing the b!tch-in-a-box to sound like Vincent Price-meets-James Earl Jones to make us all kind of laugh our butts off. Between that, & my conversion to the benefits of GPS receiver-as-training tool, I started to think how nice it would be to have something like that for either my wife's Mercedes or my little Scion xB when on the road. We're going to Hawai'i in January for business, again; this time we're going to have a car to get around (I've promised my father I'd make a pilgrimage to Pearl Harbor to visit the USS Arizona Memorial...a good idea regardless, since I work for the Navy.). So, rather than depend on maps & drive like a bunch of touri...yep, bring on the whiny wahine.Haven't been out for a run since I (almost) started feeling better...still breathing a little funny. But, everything I do is probably funny from the external. The local running emporium is having a Run For The Money this morning. Participants receive a $5 discount for every mile, up to six, they run on the emporium's six-mile training loop. Don't know whether the discount is transferrable to later purchases or has to be spent on the day, but it sounds like a good way to sweat off the stuffing, perspire off the pie, catabolize the cranberries & discard the dark meat calories.
Would love to have been there, but the powers that be (and we know who those powers are!) did not decide to let the non-mission essential civilian employees take the day off. Of course, the bad news is that we have to be here. The good news is that we're not at the mall.

I doubt management is in today. And I doubt we'll hear much from them, either. Not like I need to hear from them...as long as they don't call for a civilian staff meeting or call a muster at 1:00pm I don't care.

If you're traveling today, stay safe. Blessed Eid to those who celebrate the end of the pilgrimage.

Does This Course Catalog Make My Butt Look Fat?

(EDITORIAL COMMENT: I WEIGHED 183 POUNDS IN 1992, SO I UNDERSTAND WHAT IT'S LIKE TO HAVE A FEW EXTRA POUNDS. THANKFULLY, I MANAGED TO DROP 20, BUT I STILL FIGHT WITH IT REGULARLY. MB)

I heard a report on NPR's All Things Considered yesterday afternoon & said to myself: 'dude! Perfect blog material!' The initial posting in the next paragraph is from the NPR site. The article included a Getty Images photo of "adipose-enhanced people" walking down a path.

I like to think of myself as a tad more enlightened than the average bear, but I find it frightening to see very overweight people...at the Golden Corral (like I did when visiting my in-laws last month), or complaining about how they cannot lose weight, or trying everything but sensible diet & a consistent long-term exercise regimen.

News Flash: You did NOT get this way in a single day/week/month. It took years of conscious decision-making to get to this point. It's going to take time & discipline to get back...if you want to. You can make excuses, or you can make effort. I applaud effort, because I've heard more than enough excuses.

...a Pennsylvania college is telling students to shape up--or else. Entering freshmen at Lincoln University get their body mass index, or BMI, measured. If the result comes back above 30, the students have to take a physical education class or they can't graduate. The requirement kicked in for students who enrolled at Lincoln in the fall of 2006. That class is now in its senior year, and most are looking forward to their graduation this spring. But for 80 seniors, graduation will hinge upon their taking phys ed or passing the required BMI test, according to minutes of a Nov. 3 faculty meeting. The chair of the department of health, phys ed & recreation at Lincoln brought the issue up at the meeting, because he wanted to remind everyone of the requirement. About 15 percent of the entering freshman class in 2006 tested above 30. Some of the faculty were concerned about the legality of enforcing the requirement. "After all this is virgin territory," he said. "But we want to be proactive about this issue." Lincoln is a historically black university; the issue of medical disparity makes the obesity epidemic particularly concerning. "Minority folks are particularly vulnerable to diseases associated with obesity. We knew that it was potentially a political quagmire but we believe that it's that important. Do we have the answer? No. Are we trying? Yes. Will we stumble? Probably." While the school's administration deals with the legal issues, he is busy looking out for student health. "As health educators we're concerned with the whole student, not just the academic part, but all the components that make up health & wellness." An op-ed in the latest issue of the campus newspaper put a point on the problem with a headline: 'Too Fat To Graduate.' The author says she'll take a phys ed class, even though her BMI was in the acceptable range. "Not because Lincoln is requiring me to, but rather, because I would like to be healthier. This was a decision that I made... and that's the way it ought to be."
Personally, I think it's a great idea. The PE department head, when interviewed, couldn't help but admit that HBCU's are historically underfunded, & that the bill of fare at the college's dining facility might also be to blame.
How many civilian co-workers do I have who are, quite literally, ticking time bombs? I leave most of my military co-workers out of this equation because they have fitness requirements which are part & parcel with their enlistment...yes, there are some fat, nasty chiefs & officers out there who look like dog sh!t in their khakis. Sorry boys (and girls!), dunlap disease is not an acceptable medical condition in my book.
Even I, at age 47, am not immune to something sneaky underneath the surface; one bad day at a long-distance triathlon might bring up a previously-undetected medical issue. Developing a life-long habit of consistent aerobic exercise...and perhaps a cleaner diet...is not going to do anything harmful to college students. Healthier, slimmer graduates are more likely to earn higher incomes and just might be that alumni donor who improves the dining facility once and for all.
Have a fantastic Thanksgiving, everyone! See you on the road this weekend...

When Things Come To A Head

Feels like the end of the tunnel has been reached, so to speak. In the past I've always managed to survive the stretch from Thanksgiving to right around Christmas without catching whatever nasty cold or flu or creeping crud was circulating. However, this year was a major change in the immunity, or susceptibility to the stuff, I guess. I don't think my training volume changed all that much this year, & it's not like I was over-fatigued from IM FL. But I got something before the holidays, pretty much the same cold/flu bug/crud (more like upper respiratory infection, head cold, low-grade fever kind of stuff) I have visit days after Christmas.

The timing was nearly perfect...and not so perfect; it all hit like a ton of bricks last week when I was scheduled for a general practitioner's appointment. Unfortunately, it stuck around & became more noxious through the weekend's tri club party/meeting - if the photos taken showed I looked like I rolled out of a sickbed to quaff a couple of beers, well, that's because I did. The bad news is I don't feel like doing anything that resembles exercise. The good news is I didn't have any major plans for this month, anyhow.

At least that's what my body is telling me. My mind, on the other hand...wanted to jump in on the weekend's masters' swim meet a couple of days back. Hey, it would have been warmer in the water than on the deck, but I doubted hacking a six-pound loogie at the end of the 800-yard freestyle would have been a pretty sight. Some times you have to be smarter than your desire.

So, other than a couple of brief walks around the park with the wife & the woofer, my exercise regimen has been limited to a single set of 12-ounce elbow bends each evening.

Plan out your holiday period as judiciously as you would plan any other training period. It's a time to spend with family, friends, co-workers, but make certain you don't run yourself directly into the ground. I make a conscious effort to decline invitations...as nicely as possible...if I feel the schedule has become too hectic. All the same, I try not to become too bunged up if I can't get everyone to show up at a single social function.

As for the training, it's a great time to run, bike or swim with people you normally wouldn't train. We've got local runs which occur at the same time as our track workout; I'm not one to give carte blanche & say, 'go ahead and run with that group,' but if the change of pace gives you a new perspective on your training...

ISO A Guy With Initials After His Name

(EDITORIAL COMMENT: MY USE OF THE MASCULINE FORM DOES NOT MEAN I AM A MALE CHAUVINIST - USE OF MALE FORM ONLY MAKES FOR EASIER WRITING.)

Spent a few minutes after getting my weekly Six at Six beat-down talking to Mark. He asked me what I knew about chiropractic, & whether I had ever been treated by a doctor of chiropractic. I had to admit a certain degree of ignorance about the benefits of chiropractic; while I've read much in the running world about athletes being adjusted on a regular basis, I also had to look past some formerly/deeply-held (religion-based) convictions. I'm not in the mood to get into the theological side of this, so I'll stay with the semi-scientific side.

I spent 14 years working in the medical field, as an administrative person (transcribing doctors' orders), a file maintainer/receptionist & a transcriber (history/physical examinations, ER visits, progress notes, discharge orders, treatment notes, and so on). During that time I had close working/personal relationships with most of the relevant medical professions (doctors are willing to engage in some back-scratching to get their work expedited), which gave me the chance on many occasions to ask 'what's the difference between...?'

So, if I were to place the three forms of medicine on a spectrum, I would consider osteopathic medicine (practiced by doctors of osteopathic, or D.O.'s) at the center of the spectrum. Chiropractic, Homeopathic, Chinese and Ayurvedic would be on the left side; allopathic medicine (practiced by doctors of medicine, M.D.'s) would be on the right.

A V.A. friend of mine is a D.O. I would visit him on occasion in the Rehab Medicine department when I had an issue, or just to ask 'what would you do in this situation?' I always found his approach to medical issues to be pragmatic & holistic. He was more likely to try something outside the box than fall back on more traditional methods of treatment. I decided to see what Wikipedia had to say about osteopathic medicine, and whether I had gone far afield with my description to Mark.

Wiki says: "...osteopathy has been considered a form of complementary medicine, emphasizing a holistic approach and the skilled use of a range of manual and physical treatment interventions in the prevention and treatment of disease. In practice, this most commonly relates to musculoskeletal problems such as back and neck pain. Osteopathic principles teach that treatment of the musculoskeletal system (bones, muscles and joints) facilitates the recuperative powers of the body."There's a time & place for pharmaceuticals in the treatment of medical issues, but I'm always amenable to something a little more on the natural side. Mind you, the most important issue is not so much the type of initials after the name as much as whether they are compatible to your needs.

I have spent more time over the past two years in dental offices than doctor's offices, so it wasn't that important to me. However, after my episode in Panama City I knew I did not want to visit the general practitioner near my home. There's nothing worse than being an athlete who has a medical issue; a physician's visit usually leads to the typical 'stop running/cycling/swimming altogether' advice. I also could tell from the first visit the practice would not be compatible; contemporary religious background muzak & copies of Christianity Today are not preferred waiting room material for a recovering fundamentalist.

Fortunately for me, I was able to get the contact information for the physician my friend Steven sees. The guy's a masters' swimmer & does some of our long swim events, so he recognized me right away when he came into the examination room. Right away, I knew this would be a fairly comfortable fit.

And when it comes to your life, your health & your avocation, comfort is darn near everything.

A Place For Everyone; Everyone In Their Place

This morning's NPR newscast (Morning Edition) had soundbites from the President's trip to Shanghai. Cool stuff. Of course, then I read a little more in the AP wire about the "benefits of an uncensored society." You know, I don't think our society should be uncensored as much as it should be self-censored. Too many persons engage in irresponsible communications over the media and in public life. When I get to read a nasty two-way conversation via e-mail/weblog between a Canadian triathlete and an American entrepreneur; the digital equivalent of bar fight-meets-catfight...as Rodney King once said, 'can't we all just get along?' There's a fine, thin line between one's personal opinion & the truth, as evidenced by the immediate fact-checking which ensued once the press obtained a copy of Sarah Palin's new book. Probably not a cool idea to tick off the moderate members of your political party, especially if they're still in office & you're not.

So we have to take the time and energy, or at least the salt box, to figure out what is the real story here? Of course, most of us don't have the time, the energy, or the willingness to take something presented with a grain/shake/shaker/box of salt necessary to make it palatable. Is that the reason the 24-hour news cycle exists; to give us the same information over & over again, with little drips & dribbles of new (dis?)information so we think we're getting something else, but all we're getting is cotton candy?

One of the neatest things I saw this last week was a video shot by an Ironman Florida participant; IM FL has been considered notorious for the large number of participants who (shamelessly?) draft or ride in large peloton-like packs on the 112-mile, relatively-flat bike course. It's the stuff of legend, having been complained about by coaches, journalists, professional athletes and the like.

The participant mounted two cameras on his triathlon bike; one was affixed to his bike frame and faced forward, another facing to the rear. He also had a camera attached to his helmet and carried a small hand-held cam. Talk about an eye-opener.

The scariest thing was not so much that drafting existed - some participants were nailed with drafting calls - but the fact so many persons were drafting and could not self-enforce the seven-meter (AG)/ten-meter (pro) drafting rule. While there may not have been a WTC referee to record the illegality, it was still wrong.

Guess it's just part of the sport.

Deja vu weekend afternoons at Chez Bowen. Replace small cat named Ludwig with large 'hound named Rubin. Guess we all know our place, right?