Category: Fitness

More Summer

Travelling is mainly done for now, and we’re into the long back stretch of summertime. The fun continues with a new adventure every week. Last weekend my parents were in town for a visit, which was really great, barbeque and storytelling. Then this weekend Jeannie and I went up to Connecticut to visit a friend and splash in his pool and ride in his motorboat and go tubin’ on the Connecticut River. Wicked fun.

In between I took the girls out to the beach, Jones Beach on Long Island – on a Monday. Last few years I was only ever able to go on the weekend, but this time there was no one there, totally awesome.

I also bought a new weight set. About a year ago I added some tricep and lat exercises to my workout, as well as pullups, and my arms and shoulders have never felt better. But only I have dumbbells for weights and I’ve gone as far as I can go without a bench press. I looked online and went to several sporting goods stores but couldn’t find a good bench press rack. It was important to get a rack with a safety bar cuz I don’t have a spotter. Then I went craigslist to look for weights, figuring used weights are just as good but alot cheaper, and found this guy in Queens who deals in new and used gym equipment. Went to get a stack of weights and got a rack and bar while I was at it. Bada-bing bada-boom!

X-C

Winter continues. After several heavy snowfalls it’s been calm the last couple weeks, but still mainly bitter cold. Even now huge snowpiles linger on. Last weekend we actually had a couple days above freezing and I spent a good chunk of time outside breaking up ice to reclaim the parking spot on the street in front of our house. The parking lot at my train station is down a good dozen spots or more, between poor snow removal and people parking all over the place in response. After two or three days of parking in very sketchy spots a couple weeks back I’ve taken into going into the office earlier until spring.

Last year I didn’t go skiing at all, and this year when the conditions were best I was too busy dealing with shoveling out even think about it. When I did think about it, I was thinking I’d be lucky to get in one day before the end of the season. It’s gotten to the point where downhilling is a lot of overhead. You have to get up way too early and drive 2+ hours to get good snow, and when you’re there you spend a lot of time riding the lifts and waiting in line, just for a few runs. Although I must say a really good run can make the whole thing worth it. Still, it feels like the last few times went it was bitter cold and/or icy and not so enjoyable. With the kids in tow the cost adds up fast and they’ve grown kinda meh about it.

So this year I thought I’d get back to cross-country. I used to do x-c before I started downhilling, and over the years had some great x-c ski trips in the Adirondacks and in Yosemite. It’s much cheaper than downhill and a more relaxing vibe. I found a place called Fahnestock Winter Park. It’s not too far away, about 45 minutes up the Taconic, just a bit past Seth. By time I got a plan together Jeannie and the kids were all busy with other stuff. So I went by myself. It was just the thing I needed, a nice peaceful day in the woods. Only thing is that the conditions were icy. But now that we know it’s there we can cruise up next year any time we there’s fresh snow.

Cold Snap

Last weekend was a little ski trip up to the Berkshires with our friends Seth and Cathy and their daughter Erin. The trip coincided with a cold snap – zero degrees when we woke up Sunday morning! It got up to maybe 10. There’s been no snowfall this year but they’ve been making snow on the mountain. Conditions were pretty good, mainly cuz it was so cold. We had a great day skiing but we didn’t stay out too long. For once, though, the cold didn’t seem to bother me, and I stayed out on the mountain longer than anyone in my fur-lined tuque. I got in a good 10 runs.

Apart from the weekend this has been a mild winter and so far I’ve been feeling really good. Hope it lasts ‘til spring. The days are already starting to get longer.

The trip was a really good time and we stayed up late playing games with the kids. As an added bonus Michelle went with Erin to her horseback riding lesson Monday and got to help groom the horse and ride him too! She was absolutely thrilled.

The next day it was back to work, and the kids are already deep into school again. Tuesday night was Lizzy’s school band concert. The band sounded really good. Lizzy and the girl sitting next to her sound particularly good as the 1st flute section. It’s the same band director as the old school, which is nice cuz he’s a cool guy and a good teacher. It’s much larger ensemble now, forty kids compared to maybe a dozen. And that’s just the experienced band. The beginner group, including Michelle, will play in the spring concert and double the size!

Change O’ Season

We went on a great little ski trip over the weekend, up to Catamount Mountain in the Berkshires with our friend Seth. We had so much rain last week I almost didn’t go, but Seth talked me into it. It turned out the weather was just fine for some great spring skiing. After our last few trips, with big crowds, bitter cold, and long runs down big mountains, this was just the opposite. The temperature got up into the 40’s but there was still plenty of snow, and it wasn’t slushy or (obviously) icy, really good conditions for this time of year. Catamount is a great little mountain, with lots of intermediate level runs, and a few steep ones, and a snow park with a half pipe and contoured terrain. Great way to cap off the season.

The next day we went hiking at nearby Bash-Bish falls, officially starting hiking season. The falls was just roaring with runoff from the recent rains and melting snow. So in one weekend we go from skiing season to hiking season. Really looking forward to spring now.

Snow Crash

Last weekend we went on a family ski trip up to Vermont with Nick and some friends of his. It was mostly great. The skiing itself was awesome. The snow and the mountain were perfect and we all had a great time with the skiing. Michelle is really coming along, and Lizzy is doing good too. We stayed in a condo right on the mountain with Nick and his family, and that was a good time. Watched The Empire Strikes Back, Jeannie’s favorite movie of all time. On the other hand it was really cold the whole time, especially sitting on the lift as it approached the summit.

The big downer is we got into a bit of a road accident on the trip up. We got caught in a pileup on an off ramp. Luckily no one was hurt, but once we were done feeling relieved over that, the hassle factor set in. We had to wait an hour and half for the police to show up and get everyone’s statements. So we got up there pretty late on Friday. And we’ve been dealing with insurance and paperwork ever since. At first I thought the Jeep had only minimal damage; I just lost my license plate and maybe the fan was a bit noisy. The car in the middle, a Mini, seemed to fare the worst, with both bumpers (the flimsy plastic kind) cracked. The car in front, the cause of al of it, was another SUV and looked to be totally intact.

Close inspection later revealed a piece of framing behind my bumper was bowed. It did its job and bore the brunt of the impact. There’s other assorted minor damage, probably mostly not worth fixing on account of the car being so old. It’s safe and drives okay. I’ll take it to my local mechanic and get his opinion on the minimum necessary repairs, put the license plate back on myself and be done with it.

I guess I’ll start looking to replace the car this spring. I had hoped to keep it another year or so, since we just got a new car for Jeannie. It’s certainly good enough to get to the train station and back for a while, but longer term it’s transitioning to the beater category. Luckily time is on my side and I can research cars and wait for sales. Too bad cash for clunkers in no longer in effect!

Did I mention that the skiing part of the trip was really great? An since we’ve been back in town, it’s gotten really warm, like spring and almost half the snow from January has melted. On the way home from Vermont we saw another car crash at the exact same spot. I’m sure the police keep statistics as to how many accidents occur at the ramp. It’s be interesting to know.

Ski Season

Got a chance to go skiing this weekend up in the Catskills. Combined it with a trip up to see Martin, which was most excellent. My mind was totally blown by a thing called Dinosaur Train.

The skiing itself was pretty good. It was my first time since I hurt my back last year, so I was really taking it easy. It was pretty cold and the mountain was way crowded, cuz like everyone else we picked a long weekend to go skiing. Jeannie, the kids and I all skied together as a family, staying mainly on green trails. After a few runs we found lift G, a detachable quad which can only be reached from above, not from the base lodge. So the line was much shorter there and the lift faster. This serviced the longest run in the place, the slow way down from the summit. The snow was great but there was one really windy stretch. We just did run that a few times until it was time to go. The good news I can still ski and the next day my back felt fine. The other good news is my new ski jacket is really warm.

List night we had more snow but by the morning it had turned to rain, and everything was covered with a thick crust of ice over a few inches of wet heavy snow. Like crème broulee. By the time we were done cleaning of the cars and driveway, it had turned to rain. By the time I got out of the train station in Manhattan it was windy and raining hard, and as I hit the street my umbrella tore right apart.

At least the days are starting to get longer.

Squirrels, Concerts, Cartwheels and Fireflies

When I was kid all squirrels were grey. Then one day we went up to visit my cousins in the suburbs outside of Toronto and we saw something new: a black squirrel. It turns it was a mutant strain, but a successful one, and over the years the black squirrels have spread out across the northeastern part of North America, to the point where now in the 21st century, they are common in Westchester County, NY. We have a champion elm tree in our front yard, and in it lives a family of squirrels. One Saturday morning a few weekends ago I was sitting on the couch sipping my morning coffee when the new family of young squirrels came out to play. I called the kids over and they were knocked out by overwhelming cuteness of all those squirrels frolicking in the trees, on the power lines and on the ground. I counted nine of them, some black and some grey. Then I saw something new I’d never seen before: a black squirrel with a red tail!

I was out rollerblading earlier this week and I saw another one. That’s two. I wonder if this a new variety of squirrels, and if it’s going to become common in a few years.

…

Last Friday was Lizzy’s spring band concert. I’m happy to say that the school band is getting a lot better and Lizzy in particular is sounding quite good. This is important to me as a parent and musician, because school band was a big part of my early musical training and experience. Two years ago (Lizzy’s first year in the band) the teacher quit at the end of the year, and about half the band graduated the school. So last year it was a new teacher and a ragtag group of beginners. So as you might imagine, they sounded pretty rough. But the teacher, Mr. Quinn, was quite dedicated and patient, and the kids have been steadily improving. This year was a dramatic both in terms of the material they could handle and the level at which they played it. This year they did a dress rehearsal at the school, which by all accounts was a big success and instrumental in recruiting new kids into the band.

Lizzy had a solo too, the Hunter’s Chorus by Weber, and I’m happy to say she nailed it. And at the end of the concert the band director told me he’s inviting Lizzy to join the honor band next spring. This is a band formed from the best players from a bunch of schools in the area. It’s made up kids in grades 6 – 8, and Lizzy is just going into 6th grade next fall, so that’s pretty cool.

…

This is the time of year when the evenings are really long. This kids are all excited about summer vacation and me, well, I have a couple long weekends coming up. Lizzy had the end of her gymnastics class last weekend, complete with a demo competition. It’s something she’s been working to master, so one night this week she was out on the lawn doing cartwheels back handsprings and asking me to spot her. Michelle was out too and as it started getting dark the fireflies came out. Firefly season is always special since it’s so short and only comes when the evenings are long. The kids caught a bunch of fireflies and but them in a jar, although I persuaded them to release our little glowing friends when it was time to go inside. It was a nice shiny moment of serenity.

New Recording: Green Glove v2

Here’s a new version of the song Green Glove. I wasn’t satisfied with the sound of this song when I had finished it last fall, so I retracked quite a bit of it. I redid the lead and backing vocals. I changed the bass line and added a guitar part. I changed the horn section arrangement around and added a flute part (played by Lizzy) as the top voice. The final thing I did was to re-track that bari sax. The original take was out of tune and made the whole thing sound a bit off. The new version is spot-on, plus has a great feel and energy.

I had been waiting to redo that part because the baritone saxophone is such a giant beast. It’s heavy and takes a lot of strength just to hold it and a good deal of power to play. I’ve been getting over a back injury, but last week was the end of my physical therapy and I’m pretty much better. I’ve changed my whole workout around to incorporate the exercises my therapist gave me, and have mostly worked most of my old exercises back in. It will still take a while to be completely back to a hundred percent, but I can do most everything normally at this point. Still I was a bit hesitant about doing the bari part. It turned out well enough, but after an hour of playing I could really feel the gathering soreness in my lower back. I felt fine the next morning, so I guess that it was OK.

So this is it. All the recording is done for my record; just the finishing remains. The mastering sessions are past halfway. We’ve done five of the nine songs, including the two longest ones, or about 27 out of 47 minutes worth of music.

Spring Brake

The mild spring weather continues and we spent most of the weekend outdoors. Jeannie and I (mainly her, since my back is still recovering) did another big round of yard work, weeding, putting down mulch under the hedges, and starting with the season’s lawn mowing. The kids on our block, led by Lizzy and Michelle, took it upon themselves to clean up the trash down at the and of the street, where there is a strip of no-man’s-land lawn outside the fence to the local school athletic field. Jeannie and I were impressed with their effort and helped them out with gloves, trash bags and some tools.

I got Lizzy a new bike over the weekend too. She’s big enough now for a full size bike, with 24 inch wheels and gears and shifters and all. We went first to the big bike shop up in Scarsdale, and it was all high-end bikes that were more than I was looking to spend, and moreover the place was super crowded and there was no one to help us. So we went to Toys’r’Us, which was a much less hectic scene and they had a good selection of reasonably priced bikes. I encouraged Lizzy to pick a Schwinn, but she didn’t like the color (red and black, too “boy”) and instead picked a pink and white model from a brand called Rallye. It was a good deal less expensive than the Schwinn, and in most respects looks like a pretty good bike. Mountain bike frame with eighteen gears. The shifters and brake handles are made of plastic and look a bit flimsy, so it remains to be seen how they’ll hold up. Also the back brake doesn’t seem to grip as tight as it should. I adjusted it but am not really satisfied. I’ll try again before next weekend, but it’s an important part for safety, and if I can’t get it right we’re going to have to return it and keep looking. Probably hit the bike shop in Pelham next.

I also took a nice long ride (5 miles) on my rollerblades Sunday, which felt great.

Change in the Weather

Rewinding a bit, St. Patty’s day was sort of an unusual day. We’d had a lot of stormy weather, and it was really cold that morning, and I had to get up early for physical therapy. The road there was still closed from the big storm, so I had to take a different route. By the time I was on my back home, it was already warming up outside and turning into the first really nice warm spring day. I’d been waiting for a while for my back to start feeling better, and that turned out to be the day. Such a relief.

My train was late, and when the door opened it smelled like booze. Partiers headed into the city to enjoy the parade. I was probably the only one in the car going to work. Some guy on the train noticed me folding a color-change stellated octahedron that I’ve been working on. “Dude, is that origami? Cool! Did you get that from youTube?” The parade goes right thru my neighborhood, and it’s like that the whole day, drinking and partying, like it’s Mardi Gras or Halloween or 1999. At least I was able to cross 5th Ave. without any altercations with the police this time.

At work it was all about deploying the first release candidate of our project to the Q server. This is a major milestone on what has been a really long strange trip. I was mired in config files all day, or as I’ve come to call it, configgy pudding. Our company has a mandate to try and do more thru configuration and less thru code. But it’s already becoming hard to manage, and we haven’t even deployed to live. So I need to write a config management tool so we can have instant congfiggy pudding. Anyway, we got it working, and deployed to QA, where we’re already finding bugs.

After work was a corporate happy hour function at a hotel bar which was smack in between two Irish pubs. I made friends with a management consultant who was part of a team engaged by our overlords to hang around and analyze out office’s dysfunction and presumably figure out who to fire. She seemed pretty smart and interesting/weird with a possible MIT vibe. She told me, “You don’t look old enough to have been writing software in the 90’s.” Hell, I was writing software in the 70’s. Hopefully this means I won’t be the one who gets sacked.

The mild weather continued and by the weekend we were able to get started on the spring yardwork and enjoy the season’s first barbecue. I was really tempted to get on my rollerblades or see if I could start up my Mustang after a winter of sitting in the garage, but neither one seemed like a wise idea given the condition of my back. After the weekend the weather reverted to a more typical state of dreary cold and rain, which is pretty much how it’s been for the past week. I’ve gotten a bunch of new exercises from my therapist, and have developed a new workout routine to incorporate those along with most of the stuff from my old workout. I’ve been able to bring back most of the exercises now, and am back up to 70 percent of the weight, and some of them still have limited mobility. I did go ice skating that past Saturday with my kids, and did fine, as my back continues to improve.

The kids are going thru a Beatles phase right now, which is fun because they’re one of my all-time favorite bands. It started back in January when we were watching Anthology. Then Jeannie found the DVD’s for A Hard Day’s Night, and Magical Mystery Tour on sale. (Yes MMT is as bad as everyone says. Three or four excellent music videos and an hour of filler showing people riding a bus.) At first the kids were into all the early boy-band pop stuff like “She Loves You” and “Please Please Me”. Now they progressed to the weird John songs like “Strawberry Fields Forever”, “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds” and “I Am the Walrus”. Michelle learned how to play “All Together Now” on the ukulele.