In his late forties, Henry McKenzie, now about to take coffee wit a nip of French brandy in it on his breezy veranda with a clear view of Mount Kenya, was a sound success at a task that had made drunks of some men and suicides of others.
The last sentence of Chapter One from my current read, ‘Something of Value
‘ by Robert Ruark
Last month, when entering a run in my running diary, I noticed an anniversary was approaching. One year ago today, I put on a pair of crappy sneakers and set out on a run. It was a Thursday morning, and I did a three mile loop in 45 minutes. My doctor had told me that I could afford to drop 20-pounds, and I thought I’d do some running in addition to the weight training I also started doing.
I hadn’t run since high school, at least not without being chased. I had done a few 5 & 10ks, and my longest run had been a 10-miler around the Newport Beach Back Bay. I read Jim Fixx‘s book, The Complete Book of Running, and shared with my father an idea that maybe we’d do a marathon one day. But that dream got shelved and forgotten for 25 years.
But a year ago, at age 43, I took up running again, and a year later, I’m still at it. Time to reflect, why have I stuck with it and what good has it done me?
Keeping a running diary has played a very major role in my running. I was fortunate to find a great Mac program, TrailRunner, for logging and mapping my runs and maintaining a diary. I recommend it highly to anyone. Not only is the program great, but the developer is very responsive to help requests and is constantly improving what is already a great program. And it’s because of that diary that I can report that in the last year I’ve headed outside to run 123 times, and covered a total of 652.45 miles. I also recently added a Garmin Forerunner 305r to my running gadgets, and it does much to feed my tech geeky need to track every step.
I read somewhere that the difference between a jogger and a runner is the ‘entry form’. I’ve certainly found that a looming race provides much needed motivation. In the last year I’ve run two 5k’s, a 10-miler, two Half-Marathon’s (1,2), and last November in Richmond, completed a Marathon with my friend Jay. The picture above shows us running in the final mile, joined by our kids. That was definitely a highlight.
I’ve been chased by big snarling dogs in Vermont, and out-paced by my boss in NYC’s Central Park. I ran to the top of the hill in Kitty Hawk that the Wright Brother’s launched their gliders from, and the country roads of Central Illinois. I’ve run along the shore of Lady Bird Lake in Austin, and Cherry Creek in Denver.
I lost the 20 pounds, and two toe nails (they came back, hopefully the weight won’t). And for every time that I find myself asking what the hell I’m doing, lifting legs that feel like sandbags, there is usually a nice Forrest Gump moment to capture the quiet peace and beauty of just running through your surroundings. It took until last year for me to figure out what IS chasing me… age. Hopefully my running will keep me just a few steps ahead of it.
We’re scoreless here at NGP’s office outing to the Braves @ Nats game. The Nat’s mascot, Screech, just blew his beak in our Cubs blanket, so I had to kick his ass. Regardless, Go Nats!
 Gun Fight |
 Battle Zone |
 Front Line |
While I don’t really think of myself as a ‘gamer’, I’ve pumped my share of quarters into quite a few machines in their 80’s heyday, and we’ve had our share of computer games and game consoles in my adult life. I typically play games in obsessive spurts. Not dabbling across many different games, but becoming totally engrossed by a particular game until I rule it, or it sends me away defeated. My latest addiction is Call of Duty: World at War.
First some quick history. Video games have been giving us the opportunity to kill each other, again and again, since the earliest classic games. I cut my combat teeth on games such as Gun Fight, Battlezone, and Front Line (much more to follow from me soon on my recent renaissance of classic arcade game play) The 90’s and our Playstation provided new and more realistic opportunities to play at war with EA’s Medal of Honor series.
On his last birthday, my son Will received an Xbox, and his first game was Call of Duty: World at War. Not surprisingly, the graphics, sound effects and overall gameplay make all the predecessor games seem pitifully primitive, and by comparison, they certainly are. But the biggest innovation is the ability to play the game on Xbox Live, in real time against other players. And unlike playing soldier as kids with the uncertainty of shouted, “I got you” and “No you didn’t”, the online game leaves no doubt when you’ve been got or have gotten someone else, typically with a graphic display of your limbless corpse and a ‘Nemesis Killcam” view showing you what your killer saw as he ‘got you’.
The other innovation, almost sinister in it’s ability to keep you playing, is the way the game doles out new and improved weapons earned with Experience Points (XP), and dangles ‘challenges‘ to be completed, such as my favorite in the ‘Humiliation’ category called ‘Cruelty’ in which you must “Kill an enemy, pick up his weapon, then kill him again with his own weapon”. After fighting your way up 65 levels of rank, unlocking new features along the way, you have the option of doing it all over again by entering a ‘Prestige’ level, which gives a new insignia and one new slot to save your favorite guns, but basically is just a voluntary do over.
So, after more than a couple of late nights of doing my duty, killing (and more often being killed by) my fellow basement dwelling online warriors you can expect to find online at any time of day, I noticed that my accumulated play time had passed seven days. Not seven days in a row, but 168 cumulative hours playing this damn game. And I can say with my new lingo that I took advantage of a Double-XP weekend to enter 2nd Prestige, and ‘Nightfire’ is my favorite level from the new map pack. Previous experience tells me that that I WILL reach a burnout point and put this game behind me. But for now I’m still hooked. Here’s what I’ve accomplished in this online week of war;
| Playing Time: | 7 Days, 2 Hours, 1 Minute |
| Score: | 94,109 |
| Kills: | 7,463 |
| Headshots: | 713 |
| Streak: | 18 |
| Deaths: | 13,862 |
| Rank: | 542,550 |
| Wins: | 669 |
And for those who’ve never seen the game, here’s a brief video example of what it’s like;
For those that remember the 1983 hit movie War Games, in which Matthew Broderick’s character almost accidently begins WWIII by playing ‘Global Thermonuclear War’ against the W.O.P.R. computer. I’d like to reassure you that no such thing could ever happen. But when I ponder that I’m playing a realtime shooter against the typical 100,000+ people who are playing at any time of day, on a platform built by Microsoft, I just can’t make an promises that something won’t go horribly wrong.
So I did a little pre-season Facebook trash talking with my friend Heather, a die-hard Yahnkee fan, in advance of last weekends visit to the new Yankee Stadium by the Cubs. I should never talk trash, because it never works for me, and I apologize to the Cubs for the fact that my doing so led them to drop both games, the 2nd by a painful margin. But having won their division two years in a row, and with all predictions that they’ll do it again, the Cubs are actually a solid prediction for success this year. Heather pointed out to me that The New York times predicts the Cubs to defeat the Yankees in this year’s World Series. But I shouldn’t say that, or I’ll blow it for them.
Still, it’s hard. There are probably fewer teams that take more crap than the Cubs. Their 100-year championship drought is the biggest monkey on the back of any team in baseball (so screw you Indians and your measly 60-years!). Last year’s pre-election SNL special is a good example, watch this debate bit and keep an eye out for Cub-fan Bill Murray’s question. Or this headline from this weeks copy of The Onion, Cubs To Continue Tradition Of Playing Baseball. Ouch!
Well, as I sit here at home, Cub flag flying outside in the dark, watching the Cubs winning 3-0 in their season opener against the Astros, I invite all detractors to just keep it coming. I had very high hopes for last year. Now I’m thinking, maybe this year. And failing that, I’ll repeat baseball’s timeless refrain, ‘Wait until next year!’.
Update: Cubs win their season opener, 4-2.
This week Katie and I caught a great concert at the University of Mary Washington. The draw was Ben Folds, who has been a recent favorite on my iPod and whose new album, Way to Normal, is particularly great. And due to musical associations with Amanda Palmer and Regina Spektor, my daughter Katie was willing first to give Ben a listen, and then actually excited to join me at the concert. And the night began with a concert first for me, a free gift at the door in the form of a commemorative plastic Ben Folds shot glass. The night was filled with promise!
A commenter on Katie’s Facebook page tipped her off to pay close attention to the opening band, Jukebox the Ghost, and they did not disappoint, we really enjoyed them.
Ready then for Ben, there was one more surprise opener, The Virginia Sil’hooettes, an all-female a cappella group from the University of Virginia. Later this month, Ben is releasing an album titled Ben Folds Presents: University A Capella, a compilation album of, obviously, University A Capella groups performing Ben Folds music. The Virginia Sils performed a couple songs, including their rendition of ‘You Don’t Know Me At All‘.
After a painfully long wait, Ben and his band took the stage, starting off with ‘Errant Dog’, followed by ‘Annie Waits’, and from there heading into a lengthy and fun performance o songs new and old. During ‘The Bitch Went Nuts’, Ben stopped twice, having messed up the words. And that led to a brief bit of storytelling, about a time he was performing in England and stopped mid song about 20 times. He said each time there was the slightest noise from the audience, he would stop and start the song at the beginning, and he did eventually finished when they achieved absolute silence. They thought he was an uptight performer, he says he was just fucking with them. And speaking of ‘Fuck’, that was of course a shouted sing-along highlight of the song ‘Rockin’ the Suburbs‘.
As is typical, I tried to share some tunes, calling my brother Kevin to share ‘Effington‘, and my sister Jennifer to share ‘Brick‘. Not sure if either got through, but it’s the thought. Later, I finally got around to getting my sibs something for Christmas (yes, last Christmas, yes, I know it’s April), buying each of them Jukebox the Ghost’s album titled Let Live and Let Ghosts. I hope they enjoy it, I am.
Thanks to Katie for joining me on a great night of music. It a pretty cool thing, taking your daughter to a concert (maybe less so from her point of view, but cool for a dad anyway).
dig deeper …
Review of ‘Let Live & Let Ghosts’
The Washington Post – March 7, 2008
My friends and I have a long standing tradition of sharing a live song with each other via cell phone whenever we’re at a concert. It’s a nice way of saying, “Wish you were here”, and a treat to be on the receiving end of such a call (although frequently you’ll hear nothing but a unrecognizable cacophony of noise).
So it was a not unexpected when my brother Kevin called one night last week, just as I was tucking in for bed. We didn’t speak, but knowing he was at the Eagles concert in Columbia, Missouri, I had an idea what was in mind, and I thoroughly enjoyed a few minutes of Joe Walsh singing his hit “Life’s Been Good“.
Last Saturday, I listened to music from my iPhone for the last four miles of the half-marathon that I ran with a friend. And from the shuffle play of my ‘workout’ playlist, guess which song brought me across the finish… Life’s Been Good.
The two encounters with the song brought me back. I was 13 years old the year ‘Life’s Been Good’ came out, a summertime hit that reached #12 on the Billboard charts. I have one specific memory of singing along, while in the family station, loaded with friends and on our way to the beach.
Anyway, the The coincidence led me to enjoy a Joe Walsh tunefest. I certainly have more in common with the ‘Ordinary Average Guy‘ that Joe sang about in 1991 than the rock star of ‘Life’s Been Good’ from ’78. Regardless, I’m a fan, and there are many classics and favorites in Joe’s library. Thanks for the great tune’s Joe.
read more about Joe…
Joe Walsh Rides Again
Rolling Stone, 8/9/2006
My Delegate to the Virginia House of Delegates is Jeff Frederick. He also happens to be the Chairman of the Republican Party in Virginia. He’s been making so much of the wrong sort of news, that it almost feels redundant to repeat, but at the same time it’s too good not to share.
Last week, Virginia’s Senate Republicans sought to tip their balance away from the Democrat’s narrow 21-19 majority by luring Democrat Ralph Northam to switch sides (in the event of a 20-20 tie, our Republican Lt. Governor would cast tiebreaking votes). Frederick’s Tweet about the looming switch tipped the Democrats off the the scheme and allowed them to thwart it.
On the heels of that, Frederick offered this bizarre slam against Charles Darwin on the floor of the House of Delegates…
The next day, Frederick announced that he will not be seeking re-election to the House of Delegates, and has offered up his wife Amy as “just that person to continue the work I started”. Jeff has shown he’ll be a hard act to follow. Best of luck to Amy, but I’d be happy to see Jeff’s work come to an end.
for further reading…
After Resigning Seat as Failure, Frederick Denounces Darwin
NBC News, Washington, DC 2/13/2009
Va. GOP Chair Out … Wife May Be In?
MSNBC, 2/14/2009
Today is the 200th Anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, and hence the occasion to celebrate Darwin Day! Seeking some appropriate reading material for the occasion, I’ve begun a book that’s been sitting unread on my shelf for a long time, The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins. In the first paragraph of his book, Dawkins writes;
Living organisms had existed on earth, without ever knowing why, for over three thousand million years before the truth finally dawned on one of them. His name was Charles Darwin.
I am among the ‘layman’ readers that Dawkins says he had in mind when he wrote the book 33 years ago, and I predict I won’t always quickly grasp that my body as well as those of every other living thing on the planet are in fact ‘survival machines’, designed solely to protect the genes that we carry within us. Science wasn’t a strong subject for me. But I’m gonna try. I was glad to see the Washington Post put an article on Darwin and advances in the study of evolution on the front page of the paper today, well placed.
for further reading…
On Darwin’s Birthday, Only 4 in 10 Believe in Evolution
Gallup Poll
7 Major “Missing Links” Since Darwin
National Geographic Magazine
Feb. 12, 1809: Darwin — Adapted There, Evolved That
Wired Magazine
And not to overlook today’s other notable 200th, Happy Birthday also to Abe!
An interesting story in the Washington Post today describes how the prigs on the ‘Old Georgetown Board‘ have thrice rejected Apple’s proposed design for their planned retail store in Georgetown. Tonight Apple will take a fourth swing with a design that’s pretty similar to their first one.
In tough economic times, you would think a shopping community such as Georgetown is would eagerly embrace a new Apple store. Personally I’d rather see an Apple store downtown, closer to my office. Georgetown is not a convenient place to get to. So please Georgetown Board, reject Apple yet again. And hopefully they’ll find a more welcoming place in DC to open up a store.
Apple Tries, Tries Again To Open in Georgetown
The Washington Post, 2/6/09
