Random and occasional thoughts on

While I am not currently training for a triathlon, I am still interested in tri-training, because I plan to resume tri-training in the future, maybe as soon as 2010 ramping up for another IM in 2011. I just read an article on training volume that sounded interesting. The concept being discussed is why many age-groupers hit "the wall". Jesse explains his theory of the volume required to avoid what he terms System Failure (walking the last 10 miles of the marathon in an IM for example). He states that for a triathlon, the following required distances should be met at least twice in the 6 weeks before race day. These distances are based on your race distance according to the following formula: Swim – 9/3 of the event distance, per week Bike – 8/3 of the event distance, per week Run – 7/3 of the event distance, per week For someone training for an Ironman, that means that in their final build block before race day, they should have a week with at least 12,660 yards of swimm...

No, not just the English greeting or a toast. Cheers was one of my favorite sitcoms so while in Boston I stopped by the Bull & Finch which was the inspiration for the show. That's me next to the famous stairs down the the bar "where everyone knows your name". I enjoy barfood, after all, what's not to like about greasy fries and a grilled burger. Since I am a bit cynical, sometimes I think that "landmarks" don't have great food. Maybe it is because they get a sizeable chunk of their business from tourists that won't be back for the next weekly special they don't feel the need to try to make their food special. Maybe the demanding nature of some tourists make it hard to keep good kitchen help. Whatever the reason, I have seen it more than once and accordingly was not planning on anything special at Cheers. I was surprised! The cheeseburger I had was probably second only to a great place in Minnesota. (I think it was called the Lion's T...

Sometimes a stranger can bring great meaning to your life. - fortune cookie After walking around in the rain for awhile, I decided to grab a quick bite to eat from McDonald's. Not the healthiest choice, but once in a while it's not too bad. I was partway back and I felt the bag shift a bit. Before I knew it, my bag was torn and most of my fries were on the sidewalk along with my napkins. One friendly passerby chuckled and said something like "sucks to be you doesn't it" which was in line with a fair number of people I have encountered here this week. [Side note: Before all you Bostonians jump all over me, I have encountered a fair number of sociable and friendly people here as well.] This brings me to the point of my fortune cookie. The whole incident could have ticked me off and ruined my afternoon, but it didn't for two reasons. One is that I try to not let minor things (people cutting me off in traffic, spilled milk, lack of casual dress-codes, etc....

Hiking and computers really have nothing in common, but I have to talk about both and I'm too lazy to make to make 2 separate posts. Computers Good news is my laptop is back and mostly 100%. It did take me about a week to get most of my programs reinstalled and get the operating system patched back to a reasonably current level. Bad news is the family pc took another dump. Even worse is the timing, I am out of town and can't even work on it till Saturday. That is a bit of a problem for my oldest son will need to use a neighbors computer for his school work. It is a near catastrophe for my wife who will now be hopelessly backlogged on her FaceBook "work". Hopefully I can get it back up and running quickly, but may need to pick up a new pc since this one has now had strange problems a couple times in the past couple months. If so, I'll put Linux on this and fire up some "uptime" tracking tools to see if I can figure out if it is hardware or operating s...