March 2018 – Mo's Marketplace

2018 Race Recap #15: CMS 52-Week 5k

I’m just going to say it: today was not going to be a great race day for me regardless. It was perfect weather, if a touch cold. There was a bit of a headwind for the first mile and for the last .2 mile, but that wasn’t it. I haven’t felt quite right since last weeks’ trail race – a few dings, and dents – and I promised my boy that I would run with him today. Today was basically going to be some time on my feet with my boy, nursing some sore parts.

And so it was. My watch recorded a 9:11 pace: the first mile was respectable enough, but at about 1.5 miles I realized I had gotten a little far ahead and one of my running club friends on his way by – because, that’s his MO – said something about me throwing the kid under the bus, so I realized I needed to do a better job of running with him.

I played cat and mouse for the rest of the race, and for the last stretch I waited for him – even giving up a finishing position!! – and we sprinted to the finish. Officially we finished 17 and 18.

I’ll take that experience with him over running my best.

Counter Clockwise (Last 5):

March 31: 28:33, 40 degrees, windy
March 10: 24:11, 32-degrees, windy
March 3: 24:30 40-ish degrees, cloudy
February 17: 24:22
October 21, 2017: 25:13

Favorite Facebook Statuses: The Boy

My son and I have a pretty good relationship. He says and does goofy things – more than you might expect – and when I came across an old status update on Facebook’s “on this day” feature, I decided to go back and find my favorite updates springing from my relationship with him.

This is a pretty good selection of them; I know there are some that aren’t there, I just can’t put my hands on them, but will add them if/when I come across them again.

These aren’t in any specific order, more often than not they just happen to be the order in which they showed up in my search. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did re-living the experiences behind them.

March 27, 2014

The boy lost a tooth tonight. So for our evening story, I felt duty bound to tell him about the “Tooth Ogre” who uses kids’ teeth as a pretext for the opportunity to be invited into their rooms so she can drool on them.

March 4, 2015

As he was going to bed, I told him I love him. He then says, “ever since I could understand words, all I’ve heard you say is that you’re going to love me always no matter what.” I consider that a win.

July 23, 2017

Please stop telling the boy that hes my mini-me. It’s preventing me from calling him “Stinky” and “Clown faced dog.” Thank you.

October 1, 2011

The latest bed-time avoidance questions: “Are bunnies enemies of penguins?” and “how long can you let a fan run for 50-days without turning it off?”

July 14, 2010

The Boy said he was supposed to have a date with his girlfriend Melanie today, but she is 16 and decided to go on vacation today. He says she’s a good kisser.

May 27, 2015 ·

The Boy: “You know that awkward moment when you see a pretty girl sitting by herself and you ask her if she wants to sit with you and stuff and she says ‘No, I’m sitting with somebody…’?”

December 22, 2017

The boy is making his lunch with one hand, and holding his phone in the other watching YouTube videos.

“Why don’t you out your phone down and pay attention to what you’re doing?”

Puts phone down face up on the counter and keeps watching videos.

May 4, 2012

Me: “So how come you don’t like her? She likes you.”

The Boy: “She’s mature…and I’m not.”

Me: “So, that’s a problem for you?”

The Boy: “Yeah, I don’t like mature people.”

June 1, 2015

He just showed me his persuasive writing paper and I’m now absolutely convinced that robot teachers are bad teachers. I didn’t even know there was a controversy.

May 27, 2014

Tonight’s bedtime story was about the boy and me hitchhiking on the moon, en route to the dark side to see if there were aliens on that side. We got picked up by one of those aliens, and he didn’t want to let us out. So the boy distracted him by playing Scrabble while I took over the ship and flew it home. Of course, the only Scrabble board was in the alien’s language and he got all flustered when the boy was making up nonsense words, so when we landed on Earth, the alien simply stormed off. All of which the boy seemed to enjoy, but I lost all credibility when I suggested that I think the alien works at Wal-Mart now. He found everything else believable except that.

November 28, 2012

My favorite quote from his letter to Santa – here’s the boy stating his case: “My room is kind of messy, but I clean it sometimes…like last month.

February 26, 2015

The boys words of wisdom while avoiding bedtime:

“What if the toothfairy has a pawn shop?”

“I had to do an opinion paper – I wrote ‘Robot Teachers are bad’”

“Think about a fancy girl wearing a jewel encrusted hat…her head would keep falling down…”

“I had to look up how to spell ‘ironic’ in one of those books with the list of words…”

October 11, 2014

Out of nowhere, he says “I like talking to you, Dad” Me, thinking I’m #doingitright: “Thank you, boy. You know you can tell me anything, right?” The Boy:”Yeah, When we talk I learn all kinds of dumb things…”

May 2, 2015

The Boy: “I’ve got Thor’s bat!”

“But Thor had a hammer”

The Boy “Not when he played baseball…”

July 2, 2017

So here’s the latest letter home from camp from the boy:

“I am awesome.

Dear Mom and Dad,

I found expired glue. I got my memory foam pillow and it is good. I went to do riflery. I’m not dead and I’m happy. ”

June 1, 2015

“You should play this game. You can get married, get a dream home, and have kids.”

I already got married, have a dream home and have kids…

“Yeah, but this is fun…”

October 11, 2015

“If we get snatched by a ton of bats, I’m blaming it on you.”

December 21, 2015

Scene: At the bus stop

Me: Hey man, how do you put your jacket on inside-out?

The Boy: Same way I put sweatpants on backwards two days in a row. I was in Social Studies and realized I had a pocket in front.

August 12, 2014

The Boy: “This place is really organized”

Me: “Honey, this is a bathroom.”

May 21, 2017

The Boy: “You’re bleeding.”

Me: “I know. How manly is that?” He asks, hoping to impress the boy.

B: “How’d that happen?” Questioning further

M: “I stuck my finger on a thorn”

B: “Not very.”

October 2, 2011

We’re watching Spongebob, and the boy blurts out, “Yeah, that’s what she said…”

December 31, 2014

Picked up my first pair of glasses today. The boy tells me, “You kind of look like Papa [my Dad] in those.” He had no idea how big a compliment that was to me.

April 20, 2012

“how do you spell ‘Goober Doober’?”. G-o-o-b-e-r d-o-o-b-e-r. “Nice, I DO know how to spell make believe words.”

April 19, 2018

On our way home tonight, the boy says, “I saw this great quote: ‘There are only two days in your life that matter – the day you’re born and the day you realize why.’ I know that I’ve had them both already.”
Suitably impressed, I say “Really. So what have you realized about why you were born?” To which he said, “I dunno.”

April 27, 2014

More words of wisdom from the boy: “I think the zombies had a pretty good life before the plants showed up.”

May 8, 2009

I told the boy that he needed to learn to poop on the potty. He looked at me and said, “relax.” Oh man…

Looking for a Connection

Foreward: I wrote this March 29, 2009. Nine years ago, and one of the first lines is “where does the time go?” Indeed. Where does it go? I’d forgotten about this interaction, forgotten about that feeling of being alone in the world: I never once really, truly thought about what life would be like without both my parents. Someone who has known you your entire life, who loves you unconditionally and then to be without them feels like an existential void.

Quite a bit has changed in my world since March 2009, quite a bit has not. I still own the house I discuss, but the neighbors I talk about have since passed on – Rudy, the gentleman who was sick, passed away a month later on April 30. I imagine Elaine, who was so upset the doctors gave him perhaps 2-months, would have been happy with that in retrospect. Who were those doctors to give him only 2 months? She, herself, passed away in January 2017.

Reading this, I must have been such a difficult, lousy person to be around, so wrapped up in my own sadness and loss. At least I seem to have had a modicum of understanding that I was awful to be around, but I know from my own experience of these people, knowing you’re a jerk really doesn’t help the people around you, it just means you’re a self-aware jerk.

So, to anyone who had to deal with me, my wife specifically and in particular, I am truly sorry. I couldn’t have been easy to be around, couldn’t have been easy to live with. There remains not a day that I don’t think about my dad, but I like to think I comport myself with a little more aplomb. There’s so much self-loathing and anger in this that I think I’ve overcome – forgiven myself, and making amends.

Image may contain: one or more people, people sitting and baby — My dad and the boy, July 2005

It’s the end of March 2009. Where does the time go? Back in July, I lost my dad. Not unexpectedly, but it was a hard journey for him and for us. He was so sick and he was really ready to take that next step. Try as we might, I just don’t think despite all the preparation we had done mentally and spiritually that we were really ready for him to take that next step. A little less than 2 weeks before he passed away, he was really sick…I sat with him that night, fearing, dreading. I knew he was ready, but I wasn’t. My sister wasn’t. We called the Ambulance and he was whisked away. After a sleepless night in the ER waiting room for us, and a night filled with massive doses of antibiotics he was awake, alert, shaven, almost shiny and new.

BUT, we knew it was temporary. It was only a matter of time until his body would process out those antibiotics – his immune system incapable of helping him – and we would again find ourselves there. Those two weeks allowed us to work with him to clear up those things of this world that would have been nightmarish to try to do without him. On the night he died, I missed him by 15 minutes. 10-years previous, I had missed my grandmother by maybe a half hour.

It was a prolonged illness, which in some ways allowed us to say what we needed to say and do what we needed to do, but it took a toll on him. In the end analysis, I couldn’t help but to process over and over how much time I had squandered with him. All those things that I could have done differently. Personally, it gave me a head start on some of those stages of grief: denial, bargaining. I don’t recall having been angry, but definitely bargaining with whatever great spirit there may have been. Doing the things he’d asked me to do kept me reasonably busy tending to making sure things were as he would have wanted. There was nothing more surreal to me than to be in the basement of the funeral home – the funeral home his father had expanded years before – choosing the casket in which he would be interred. I was choosing my fathers’ casket. It’s such a blur to me now. The only thing I remember was choosing the cherry casket – even though the maple was far more his style – because I had bought him a nice dark suit, probably his first new suit in at least 20 years, which simply wouldn’t have coordinated with the lighter maple wood.

Nine months later, I still haven’t been able to get myself out of that last stage before acceptance. I guess I just haven’t been able to move forward. In some ways I just haven’t been able to grieve his loss for so many different reasons. It comes in spurts and lasts for intermittent periods of time before it gets shoved back away. Sometimes I find myself alone and something will catch my attention, “gee, Dad would have loved that…” It doesn’t take very much to set me off.

Sometimes it comes and goes that easily. Sometimes it stays. Sometimes I’m quiet and sullen. Sometimes I’m a complete jerk. Mostly though, I just think I want to be left alone.

Image may contain: one or more people, people standing, child, tree and outdoor — My dad and me, 1972

Part of what has set me off this time isn’t that easily shaken. Last week, as I was out and about doing my lumberjack thing – taking apart the trees I’ve been taking down for well over a month now – my elderly neighbor approached me. A lovely woman. I’ve lived in this house for 6-odd years – April 1, 2003 we bought this place – and really only within the past couple of years have we actually started talking to them, and then only sporadically . Her husband has progressed through the disease my dad had, MDS , and into lymphoma; a notoriously difficult variation of the disease to combat. Last week they were told that if they continued his current treatment – transfusions and antibiotics – he could have 2-months; if they went with chemo, he could have as much as 9-months.

Despite his having been living with this disease for at least the last nine months – she and I spoke just before Dad passed away – she seems to have been in denial about it, asking me who those doctors thought they were only giving him 2-months, like they’re God or something. I felt so badly for her. Her life partner of some 50-odd years is dying, and she looks to the doctors treating him with scorn: who are they to pronounce him with only 2-more months? It’s at this point that I think about Dad. How differently he accepted it, and how that quiet dignity allowed us to move forward – if not fully, at least gave us a head start. Sadly though, I just find myself at depression. I just couldn’t give her any sort of real support – I was just mired in my own sadness. I don’t think she noticed, because she was too busy being angry.

So she goes away angry, scared, and probably feeling quite alone. I go away sad, kind of scared, and definitely feeling quite alone. Two people asking for some connection, yet unable to do so. I can only hope for her that she can take the time she has been given and use it more wisely and carefully than I believe I did and that she finds some love and support when she needs it. And in the meantime, until I can figure it out for myself, I guess I’ll just be that mercurial and sullen prick.

2018 Race Recap #14: To Hale and Back

The thing I really love about TARC (Trail Animals Running Club) races is the vibe of the thing. No matter what distance you’re running for a given race, it’s like $22 to enter: Oh, you’re doing the 5k? $22; You’re doing the 6-hour? $22. The whole scene is really chill too: you’re asked to bring some food for the aid table, donuts or oranges or whatever. Today I was offered a quesadilla, a pulled pork taco, and a couple of donut holes.

Image may contain: 1 person, standing, snow, tree, outdoor and nature — Here’s a shot from a little later on in the race, after I ditched the knit hat and nylon jacket. Guessing lap 2, maybe 3 because I don’t look like a sweaty mess and the trail still has a lot of snow. Photo Credit: Mass Ultra

Hale Reservation is an educational organization with about 1100 acres of property. When I was a kid, my parents would buy a summer membership and we’d spend time at the membership beach. They had these aluminum docks demarcating swim lanes or something along the beach, and my sister and I would bring our buckets out and catch some of the ubiquitous sun-fish in them. As I was reflecting on that, I actually said to myself “Man, that seems so long ago…” when I quickly snapped back to reality: that’s because it was a long time ago. The last little round window decal I remember was from the summer of 1978 – 40 years ago, there kid. That IS a long time.

There’s a really good synopsis about this years To Hale and Back winning efforts at irunfar.com about half way down the linked page (sorry, there doesn’t seem to be any HTML anchors or anything to send you to the exact passage.) The first paragraph says everything you need to know for my purposes:

Four late-season snowstorms slammed New England in recent weeks and assured that the To Hale and Back 6-Hour Ultra–the Trail Animals Running Club’s season opener-would be a challenging affair. The snow-packed and often sloppy course conditions at Hale Reservation ensured that course records were safe, but they didn’t prevent Joe McConaughy and Elise DeRoo from delivering winning efforts.

I remember the last time I was there – not as a member as my family had stopped going years before, but my friends family was a member in the early 1980s and invited me along for an outing. I got so sunburned, I remember feeling like there were bugs crawling under my skin like some kind of addict going through detox. I remember it as a great day, but a horrible afterward.

Now, the region was just hit with its 4th winter storm in as many weeks earlier this week, so I knew the trail would be snow packed and generally gross. I wasn’t quite sure I knew what else to expect from the trails – I hadn’t seen an elevation map and frankly this was my first trail outing of the year so beyond the unfamiliar terrain and snow, I had several months of cobwebs to shake off.

My hope was to get in 20 miles – about 6 or 7 laps, it’s so hard to tell with the trails – but my goal was at least 15. I’ve done TARC 50k trail races in just under 7 hours, but given the snowpack and generally unconditioned self I set expectation low for a 6-hour accumulation. Continue reading “2018 Race Recap #14: To Hale and Back”

Hang onto your wallet – or lower your expectations

We have learned one more truth about ourselves: when we think an object is worth more, we enjoy it more. When told a bottle of wine is worth $90, researchers have found our brain tells us it’s more enjoyable than the same bottle of wine priced at $10. As if we don’t already have enough inflation to worry about – $3.10 gallons of gas, $4.00 gallons of milk, and Starbucks coffee costing more – we have to worry about the damage to the pocketbook we’re self-inflicting. Now, it may not mean we’re likely to actually go out and pay more for a bottle of wine – afterall, I’m as big a cheapskate as they come – but we’re more likely to feel better about the Night Train we’ve just bought on sale…marked down from $90 to a paltry lucky $13.

We are conditioned to believe that if something costs more, it must be better. To the point that in this California Institute of Technology and Stanford Business School study, we find that our brains actually change to accommodate this belief, by sending more blood and oxygen to the medial orbitofrontal cortex – the area of the brain associated with reward.

The study itself purports to provide evidence that marketing actions can influence the consumers’ not only expectations of quality, but our actual experience of enjoyment.

In a way, it makes sense and it is something from which marketers have made a living for as long as there have been marketers – if a person believes they’re getting a deal, they’re more likely to spring to buy a product. For instance, consumers as a whole do not understand the varying qualities of jewlery and when we see an advertisement for a sale – “with prices slashed” from/to – we think we’re getting a good deal. What we fail to notice is the caveat at the end/bottom of the advertisement: “original price may not have resulted in actual sales.” We’re told that the item is worth $X, and that the sale price is now some percentage reduced from that value, but we have no real way of knowing if it actually could sell at the “original” price.

This goes one step farther. This study asserts that marketing can actually change our physiological experience of a product, or in the argot of the profession, it can actually change the intrinsic quality of the product. Meaning that, at least with wine, if we’re told that it is an expensive bottle, we enjoy the wine – “enjoy” as operationally defined by brain activity in the pleasure center of the brain – to a greater extent.

That’s some heavy stuff. Watch out for more studies on this – the more we find out, the more likely we are to be paying more for the perception that we’re getting products of quality.

The study entitled “Marketing actions can modulate neural representations of experienced pleasantness” appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences of the United States of America January 14, 2008.

SOURCES/REFERENCE:

http://www.news.com/8301-13580_3-9849949-39.html?tag=nefd.pop

http://www.eurekalert.org/multimedia/pub/1324.php

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/gca?gca=0706929105v1&sendit=Get+All+Checked+Abstract(s)

Afterward: I wrote this in March 2008, so I don’t know if any of the links still work, but I figure it was worth reposting. For instance, gas has come down some in the last 10 years…this caused me to remember what it was like leading up to the economic crash. I’ve found a few things from 2008 and am culling through them to see what’s relevant to post.

Being a Parent

Being a parent means being consistent
Because you’re teaching your children the world has rules

Being a parent means expressing anger
Without expressing rage

Being a parent means admitting mistakes when you make them
You will not always make the right call and the world is better with people who understand they can be wrong

Being a parent means doing the right thing,
Because it’s the right thing, not because it’s the easy thing

Being a parent means acting in someone else’s best interest
Instead of your own

Being a parent means always telling the truth
Even if it is an age appropriate truth

Being a parent means never violating your child’s trust
Your child’s world cannot be safe if he doesn’t trust you

Being a parent means being firm and fair
Even when you don’t want to be

Being a parent means participating in your child’s interests
You’re showing her you’re interested in her

Being a parent means talking
About things you’d almost certainly rather not talk about

Being a parent means saying, “I love you”
And not expecting to hear it back

Being a parent means creating a safe and loving home
Where your child could not feel more safe, or more loved

Afterward: I wrote this better than 10 years ago and have recently uncovered it. Ten years have passed and when I read this I think, “wow, that’s heavy…” and then I worry I haven’t lived up to my own definition, despite my best intention to do so. I hope I’ve done enough to allow my children the charity and good faith that I tried to do whats right for them.

2018 Race Recap #13: New Bedford Half Marathon

Image may contain: 1 person, smiling — The net time is the important number here for placement and is a good thing because it took quite a bit to get through the folks who despite the clearly marked signs for 8:00 m/m pace decided that they should start closer.

Registering for this one was a bit of a lark. I’d just finished the Celtic 5k earlier in the day and was feeling pretty good about myself. So I started noodling around with upcoming Half Marathons (because that’s a thing most people do, right?) and found this one. It’s not terribly close to me but it did fit the parameters of my customary rule (don’t take longer to drive to a race than it will take you to run the race) and the extended forecast seemed like it would be a good running day. I was hung up on the late entry fee and was desperately seeking a discount code.

If I joined USATF, I could get a $25 discount code – membership is $30, so it would’ve been a net increase of $5 which I was considering – but then I happened upon a 501(c)3 charity partnered up with the race organizers: Donate $60 to the organization and get a comped race entry. Perfect. Made even more perfect is that the Arredondo Family Foundation does some really good work.

Their mission is to empower military families in the prevention of military related suicides and to provide support through education, financial relief and support services.

So, on Sunday night with about 30-minutes left in the online registration window, I pressed “submit” on my race entry. I was in. Now, what was I in for?

Well, according to at least one online write up, it is a good course: scenic and flat-ish, but with a couple of “significant” hills…the second at mile 12! Oh c’mon. Known for it’s blustery conditions, they said it can be challenging. Oh great. I then click on over the the course map (who cares, I don’t know what I’m really looking at) at the bottom of which was an elevation map. THAT’s what I was looking for. Kind of a mixed bag for me. Most of the gains are at the start of the race, then about 9 miles of descent or flat streets. I figured if I could just lump my lard-butt past the first three miles or so, I’d be golden.

Which is pretty much how it played out. The weather was just shy of perfect – a bit of a wind, but not often pushing against me, mostly blowing me sideways. The sun was out, it was on the cool side (low 30’s) but overall pretty nice.

Hey, howya doin? Photo Credit: Kim Gordon

A good group of people from my running club showed up and it was nice seeing them along the course. One guy who’d just returned from a European jaunt of what seemed like a couple of months (I mean like back on Friday…jet lag must’ve really been doing a number on him), passed me a couple of times. The first time he informed me that he stopped at a porta potty but couldn’t get anything going, so he wasted that time. About 45-minutes later he ran by me, telling me that he stopped and pooped in someone’s house. Not the usual conversation, but I’ve learned that runners are generally pretty open about such things. What blows my mind about this is that he continued on and finished a couple of minutes ahead of me. He’s a really good runner and was already convinced he’d have a “crap time” (his words, not mine, although it does ring a little true after telling this vignette, doesn’t it?) Funny, his crap time is my personal record, but hey. Everyone runs their own race.

By the 10k split, I was thinking I had a really good chance to PR – that split was my fastest 10k time.by quite a bit: 50:31. I bested my 10-Mile time by about a minute as well, and by that point my internal dialogue was pretty much talking about keeping moving, keeping a steady pace. Mile 12 was pretty much what I thought it would be. That ascent grabbed about a minute off my pace, I slowed down quite a bit, but got through it. I’m quite sure the cold weather helped me out there: at Clearwater back in January, a similar situation at mile 12 really bonked me out. I was much less well prepared for that race than this, but doubt creeps in: that’s why controlling that internal dialogue is so important.

With maybe 0.2 mile give or take, one of my friends from the running club was on the corner taking pictures and saw me. She got all wide-eyed and yelled at me that I still had a really good chance to get 1:50:00. So I pushed just a little harder, and around the corner was a slight downward hill, so I sprinted as hard as I could that last it of distance to the finish. I’m not really sure exactly where I found the juice, but I did.

My gun time was 1:49:19, but my chip/net time was 1:48:57 – either way I beat that 1:50 time with just a little urging on from someone in the right place at the right time. A little further away from the finish and I may not have pulled it off, a little closer and it wouldn’t have mattered. Serendipity and luck combined with appropriate training and a few friends never hurt anyone.

Previous Results

New Bedford Half Marathon: 1:48:57
Clearwater Half Marathon: 1:56:32
Cambridge Half Marathon: 1:57:38
Upton State Forest Half Marathon (Trail): 2:18:01.9
Worcester Half Marathon: 1:51:56
Black Goose Half Marathon: 2:00:48

Accountability in Sports

One of the criticisms professional sports players receive is that they’re paid millions to play “a child’s game.” This is to discuss one aspect of why professional athletes receive high compensation: Accountability.

I’ve spent considerable time discussing why I think professional sports at the highest level is just not playing a “childs’ game” – if you really think they’re playing a child’s game, I would direct your kind attention to some Little League baseball. Please do report out when you get back. Here’s but one defense of high salaries. Please note, however, that I do believe – as in any industry – there are those who under perform their salary, there are those who outperform their salary, and those organizations who have no idea how to compensate or evaluate.

Tell me the last time you heard anyone reference Roger Clemens’ little league or high school pitching statistics. That’s right, you haven’t.

Over a 5 year career between 1938 and 1942, Leonard Barnum played 52 games and started 21 of them for both the New York Giants and the Philadelphia Eagles as a punter, and quarterback. You can find his statistics in as much detail as was available in the day, which weren’t much, but then again they weren’t paid as much. You can look up the 1910 statistics on Nap Lajoie. In fact, you can look up just about any player who has played any professional sport ever and see what they’ve done when the lights come on. Nap died 50 years ago, yet we can find out what he did in any given season; as we get more sophisticated, we know what any player did on any given date in any given day.

There’s been a level of accountability in sports for as long as there have been professional sports – some more rudimentary than others, but the numbers are there. Today, we’ve got home/road splits, slugging, first pitch, second pitch, against lefties/righties, all sorts of minutia and all sorts of derivative statistics which will live on for as long as anyone cares about a given sport.

I’m not arguing that one has caused the other – in fact, I don’t much care which came first – I am however arguing there is a correlation: a statistical strength of relationship, but not a causal relationship.

As with any job that carries with it a high salary, there are expectations and is accountability. To pull down that six- or seven-figure salary, you’ve got to be able to demonstrate performance on specific metrics: shareholder value, income growth, expenses reduction, etc. We can argue whether or not sports metrics are meaningful, but we can’t argue that we could indeed – were we so inclined – to track just about every pitch Curt Schilling has ever thrown, how many innings thrown, how many pitches per inning, wins/losses, hit batsmen. How many of us have that level of accountability in our jobs? How many of us could account for every minute of every work day we’re on the job with definable metrics? How many of us would have a significant amount of time in the restroom or at the coffee machine?

For sure, pro athlete stats are tracked on their game performance and not necessarily what they do on the job, but off-field, but rest assured, they are fully accountable for what they do before, after and in preparation for the game. The meaning of the numbers – comparisons across different eras – is up for debate, but each athlete’s performance represented as quantified statistics is there for all time. I cannot think of any other profession where there is such a high degree of accountability.

Afterward: This is a post I had written in February/March 2008 and recently just uncovered. I’ll post them as I cull through for the most interesting among them. Happy 10 year anniversary!

A Synopsis of 5 Children’s Books from a Slightly Different Perspective

Parents cannot receive enough helping guiding their children’s growth through reading. This article seeks to look at the meanings of five different children’s books through a slightly different – perhaps the adjective would be “twisted” – perspective.

We will now explore the Dr. Seuss work Green Eggs & Ham, the bedtime classics Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown and Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson, Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Vorst, and The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

Green Eggs & Ham by Dr. Seuss

An antagonistic marketing representative named Sam has the unenviable task of promoting a less than esthetically pleasing food product; Pushes envelope and bounds of legality by badgering his target into eventually trying his edible wares.

Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown

An apparently recalcitrant child attempts to avoid going to sleep by diverting attention to every minute detail in his unkempt and unsanitary room – mice inhabit the place and leftover food remains in it’s tableware on the nightstand. Of note, a live fireplace in the child’s bedroom remains ablaze as the child is going to sleep, indicating negligent parental role models.

Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Vorst
A journey into a narcissistic, underachieving child’s complaints around how badly a day has gone for him; failing to understand the complaints of those around him – for instance the teacher can’t understand how an invisible castle would meet the stated requirements of the school project causes the child stress. His life is that much more difficult than everyone elses’.

Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson

This story perfectly illustrates why children are not to be allowed unfettered access to crayons and other such playthings, particularly near bedtime. This is another story of lax parenting as Harold’s parents are no where to be seen as he goes on a journey while he should be sleeping. In fact, he is so tired, he hallucinates his journey to vast places created simply by his crayon; ultimately growing so tired he draws his own room and goes to sleep.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

A story of a gluttonous caterpillar apparently suffering from some form of the eating disorder pica. By the end of the week the caterpillar becomes so completely obese, there is little for him to do to cure his stomach ache but to literally build a cocoon. Carries the warning of overeating and obesity to children.

Afterward: I found some old blog entries I’d written some years ago, that I’m planning to cull through. This one was written February 29, 2008, so it’s really only just about 3 years old.

2018 Race Recap #12: Celtic 5k

Image may contain: 3 people, people standing, child, shoes and outdoor — The funny part is that just before the race started, I was trying to point out the “Care Bear,” but he was otherwise cloaked in anonymity amongst everyone wearing the green race shirts discussed below. Photo Credit: Kim Gordon.

I haven’t been “into” 5k’s very much in some time – I run my running club’s weekly 5k races, but other than that I haven’t been seeking them out. I’m trying to be more of a longer distance runner — I’ll choose a longer distance over the shorter most times. I was asked to run with the primary sponsor, Sneakerama, so why wouldn’t I do that?

As an aside, Sneakerama is a small, local business that just does some really great running centric stuff: Steve sponsors a lot of local races, does a free weekly “fun run” from the store, packet pick ups for races. Things like that. And look at the Yelp and Google reviews. Steve conducts his business the way you would hope a business owner would: he gives back to the community, and doing good by the community is always good business.

Race shirts, stylized after Glasgow, Scotland’s Celtic FC’s kit – or, for we Americans, Celtic’s soccer uniform.

The Celtic 5k is part of a trifecta of “St. Patricks Day” races in the area, and there’s usually a pretty big turn out so they do a nice job of swag. It’s a fun take. The best part of the day was that the family got involved too: the kids both registered and my wife volunteered giving out the Celtic FC stylized shirts.

Image may contain: 5 people, people smiling, closeup and outdoor — Someone is dubious either about taking the selfie or about the race – I’m not entirely sure which. Note the photobomber on the left giving the rabbit ears. Smooth move there, Farkus.

It’s a very simple, flat(ish) and fast, out-and-back course. As a large race, it caters to runners of all skill levels and abilities: it’s more about the party than the race itself, and that’s fine. As I said earlier, it’s a good time. When you’re finished, you get some finisher swag, a bottle of water, perhaps a banana or a slice or two of pizza if you want it. Beer? Hell, yeah. This is Worcester. There are no less than 15 official after-parties and a beer garden.

A quick warm-up around Worcester’s Elm Park and I was ready to go. Good as clockwork, the National Anthem played, and at 11 AM sharp, the horn sounded.

The first mile was smooth. I thought it would be more difficult getting past some of the slower folks that some how decided it was a good idea to crowd the finish line, but it didn’t play out that way. Dodged and weaved, ultimately finding some clear running room. When my watch buzzed after a mile, I couldn’t believe how fast a pace I was running: 6:58. Mile 2 was a little less speedy, about 7:2. I was struggling a bit as the first mile and a half or so was a slow ride down hill, a turn around to start the out and back meant that the distance we’d been running slightly downhill was now slightly uphill…although when I’m going up, it always seems far more significantly up than it was going down. #Perception.

Image may contain: 1 person, smiling, outdoor — Team Sneakerama: For the Long Run.

Now into mile 3, I was definitely feeling it and were I not racing I would have slowed, walked, or maybe even paused the Garmin, today I pushed through. Where yesterday I emotionally gave up, today I doubled down. I was angry with myself after the race yesterday and I was determined not to be that guy again today. I was far too close to a personal record that I was not going to give it up.

Over that last mile, I went back and forth with one of the guys from my running club. He usually bests me and the fact that I was even close to him was exciting (and yes, he’s in his 60’s and crushing it on a regular basis. He went by me at the turn, I went by him a little before the second mile marker, he came up behind me and offered some encouragement as he went by, and just past the Mile 3 marker, the finish line in sight, I pushed through, passed him, and crossed the line in a personal best 22:46. My goal was to beat yesterday’s time, and get as close to 23-Minutes as possible. I was suffering at the end, I mean it took a LOT to push that last 0.1 mile, but it happened for me today. Who knows if I’ll ever run another 5k that fast, it’s not easy for a squat guy with stubby legs to move that quickly – a runners’ build I do not have – so I will cherish the feeling of today.

Results:

Time/Pace: 22:46 | 7:19.7 /mi

Overall: 91/2054
M: 77/825
M 40-49: 16/203