Keith’s Amusing Musings

I have selected a for my first half-marathon. I did not want to venture too far away from home and needed something in the late-September/early-October timeframe. A group of TB’s running buddies recommended the Bellingham Bay Marathon, scheduled for Sunday, September 28. Both the marathon (1,000 runners max) and half-marathon (3,000 runners max) begin at 7:30 AM.

I started training 7 weeks ago and I am now very excited now that I am registered for an actual race that is only 6 weeks away. That’s the good news.

The bad news is I strained a ligament and lower hamstring in my right leg during my long run 10 days ago. Soreness has prevented me from running since the injury and it’s likely another round of physical therapy is in my future. I don’t think the strain is severe but I still have to take it easy for a few more days. In the interim, this means my exercising consists of stationary bike and elliptical only. Yay! Not.

I decided to go green by going paperless with our investment, checking, savings and credit card accounts. The amount of paper the various banks and brokerages generate with the per-transaction, monthly and quarterly statements is obscene—Ameriprise is the biggest offender amongst our account providers.

Although we live a digital lifestyle—for example, I have been tracking my accounts electronically using Microsoft Money since 1996—I like the security of paper statements. Ridding my workflow and filing system of paper statements makes sense from a time, money and space standpoint even if it means I surrender a little peace of mind.

Our shredder has already thanked me.

As you may recall, back in late June I began training for a half-marathon (13.1 miles). I have not selected a race yet but I will probably run in late September or early October. The training has been going great and today I passed a significant milestone by running 10 miles non-stop. Averaging 9’45” miles, I finished in 1:37:53.

Running 10 miles, or significantly longer than 60 minutes, requires hydration and fuel lest one’s muscles run out of energy or start cramping. A quick conversation with our trainer, followed by a trip to REI, and I was prepared with GU energy gels and a CamelBak Alterra 28 ounce hydration pack. The “Chocolate Outrage” GU gels are great.

Previously, my longest run was 8 miles and my training program has me ramping up to 12 miles in the next few weeks. I don’t know if I could have made it another 3.1 miles today since my lower left calf started cramping around 8.5 miles in. I suppose that is why one trains.

To commemorate me reaching LD runner status, TB met me at the 8 mile mark and we ran together the rest of the way. That was nice.

The following is the last in the series of videos from my trip to Asia. I thought you might enjoy seeing a professional Peking duck carver in action. It took him 2 1/2 minutes to completely dismantle a blazing hot duck, including its crispy skin. The video below is sped up 2.5x to get it under a minute.

Happy Independence Day, America!

One of the more interesting Deep Zoom examples I have seen since Hard Rock Cafe Memorabilia, the Deep Zoom Obama Fan Site is also a great homage to presidential hopeful, Barack Obama. Consisting of over 12,000 individual pictures uploaded by Obama supporters, this massive composite in Senator Obama’s likeness provides a sense of his broad appeal and the universality of his message.

Fan sites like these tend to go away as quickly as they appear so I recorded a short video—about 70 seconds—showing the site in action.

[Warning: The following video may contain embedded ads. I am helping beta test Microsoft’s ad publishing platform. Hide the ads by clicking the ‘X’.]