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Oh Yeah, That Was Today

On Sunday, I got up a little bit before Rebecca did to take a nice run before our mad day of running errands.  With iPod loaded and clothing bound to keep me warm enough for the approximately five kilometer route, I was on my way towards the waterfront by Coal Harbour and into the park.  That’s when I remembered seeing some signs about a charity run going on, but I couldn’t remember if it was Saturday or Sunday.

It was Sunday.

No big deal, but here are all these people running along, completely taking over the path that they were being led on.  I did my best to avoid the congestion and stay out of their way, but coming back towards Lost Lagoon on the Tatlow trail, I had no choice but to join the group.

I wasn’t sure how far these people had ran already nor how far they were going.  I just felt like such a jerk because here I was, passing everyone on their left without missing a beat.  Out of the corner of my eye, I caught some people kind of giving that look of disbelief.  How could they be getting passed?  I was probably on kilometer 3.5 at that point.  Then someone was trying to keep pace.  I can only imagine how tired he or she must have suddenly felt when I went off to the left while the rest of the crowd ventured right.

Speaking of running, this site is a must have bookmark for anyone who is a runner in Vancouver.  Thanks to vanmega.com for the link.

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Showing Off At the Olympics

It seems to me that there have been a number of medals lost by team USA athletes due to this bizarre display of selfishness showing up here and there. The medal heat of the women’s snowboard cross kind of demonstrates my abstract thought here. I missed the race where Jacobellis’ grab cost us the gold medal, and she claims to not have been showing off. I find this kind of hard to fully believe. She wanted to share the excitement with the crowd but we’re to believe that she wasn’t showing off the fact that she had an untouchable lead? Talk about crash and burn.

Then there is Bode Miller. You love to hate him, and hate to love him. He’s a guy who speaks his mind and tells you how it is. On the other side of that, what he says can sound absolutely stupid. He’s good at what he does. He knows this. Miller is nearly his gift to you. His disqualification in one event meant to him that at least he wouldn’t have to drive a couple hours to Torino for the medal ceremony. This was the guy to watch. Known for being daring, skiing intoxicated in competition, and just being one of the best.

What is happening to team USA? Where is the team? The desire has shifted from the glory of competition and representing your country to being the best of your best. In fact, even those winning gold medals like Shani Davis exhibits this idea of this being an all for one situation. It is completely his call to participate where he believes he can be the strongest, but the team saw his abilities to win. He did bring home the gold in the 1000m, but maybe he could have another one for his fellow team members.

$25,000 bonus. That is what a member of team USA gets when they win a gold medal. Some of these people scrape by to live out their dreams for a brief moment, every four years. Others have endorsement contracts that makes the money a drop in the bucket. Joey Cheek is donating his bonus towards the cause in Sudan. That’s class, but not everyone gets this added boost to their pocket book in other countries. Canada certainly doesn’t, but there is talk of doing it in the future to “buy more gold medals” from their athletes.

This is a moment of a lifetime to just be in the games and representing their country, no matter how big, small, spectacular, or brief the event is. You show up at the opening as our country. I bet there are a bunch of people who will skip out of the closing ceremonies because it’s just too fluffy for their more important, personal lives. It’s ugly. It’s confounding.

This is where you expect me to say that I’m ashamed to have them represent my country in the olympics. I’m not saying that. I’m more so trying to portray the thought of, what the hell?

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“I’ve Decided to Gut the Whole Thing”

Mike HolmesI am a Mike Holmes fan.

I get excited on Thursday nights because it’s “Reno Thursdays” on HGTV. The only show in the line-up that I actually watch is Holmes on Homes. What creeps me out is that a guy by the same name from my home town back in Iowa does similar things, except it’s on cars. Good guy, but the Mike Holmes I’m talking about has his own TV show. HGTV Canada is where it’s mainly aired, but for those of you back home in the states, try Discovery Home and see if you can catch it there. What can you do? The show is Canadian made, in and around the Toronto area.

The formula is pretty straight forward. Reality TV with Mike Holmes examining and repairing botched contractor jobs that were of poor quality. Some of these people were completely screwed out of thousands of dollars after a contractor walked away from a job half way through the process. Sure, some of the stories are compelling and make you hear violin strings playing in your head as it tugs at your heart. It’s Mike that really makes the show though.

There are a few key phrases that I love to hear.

“I’ve decided to gut the whole thing.”

“You cannot do this without a permit!”

“I really wanna kick someone’s ass right now.”

It’s really hilarious, all the while being serious about the work he does. He gets so ticked off with the shotty work he finds from job to job. Even the guys who work with him on the job know how over dramatic Mike can get. Perhaps intense would be a better word for it. The guy knows his stuff. He also loves to use slate where ever he can.

You feel like you can learn by watching this program all the while developing this phobia of ever hiring someone other than Mike Holmes to do any work for you. We’ve developed our own group of guys that we are happy to see on whatever job he’s working on. Craig Lowe, the painter dude. The one guy who does foundation stuff. Ok, so I’m not down on knowing the names, but I know them when I see them.

I’m not the only one talking about the show. Four seasons of this program, and as horrible as some of the jobs are, I don’t think there will be any shortage, eh?

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It’s Frickin’ Freezing in Here Mr. Bigglesworth

Sitting next to the window and writing this right now, I’m cold. It’s cold here in Vancouver. Yes, I know I’m living in a climate north of forty second parallel, but it really does not get this cold here normally. In fact, this is unusually cold. How do I know that? I think part of it comes from running. When you pass some dude whose nose and ears are bright red, wearing shorts, bald, and looking at your shamefully because you have much more clothing that must be warmer than he is, you know this isn’t the usual type of weather they are used to.

The fact that Rebecca came home from work the other night and ranted about wind chills tells me another thing. Wind chills are a way of life where I come from. In Iowa, it’s just something that is associated with winter time. So cold that the snot freezes in your nose walking inside from the car. That, my friends, is cold. Vancouverites are warriors in their own right with all the rain that falls here. I’m not sure they would be able to handle an Iowan winter though.

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“That Wouldn’t Be a Home Run in a Phone Booth”

I grew up watching Harry Caray. It is nearly safe to say that he was the one who made me excited about baseball while I was growing up. He slurred, didn’t always get the calls right, and had some of the strangest references about some story from out of nowhere. It was brillant. He made you want to like the Cubs. We are fans of a different breed. It’s not about next year. It’s about having a good time. And baseball, too.

The guy who lost out on the job Harry held for a number of years still holds a grudge. Milo Hamilton feels the need to tell everyone that Caray was a miserable human being, a control freak, and hard to work with. The last part I can understand because the guy was nuts. Just watching him you had to wonder how this guy could do this job every single game of the season, switching between TV and radio the whole time.

All these years and this guy is still ticked off over the fact that Harry got the job that he didn’t. Maybe the issue is deeper, but he waits eight years after Caray’s passing to whine to the world. An attack on his character? What a load of crap. It almost shames me more that Milo is originally from Iowa. Harry’s gone. Get over it and get on with you life, Mr. Hamilton.

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Snowboard Cross is the Jet

Up until about an hour ago, I had never heard of this olympic event. When you first hear the name, you know it involves the snowboard, but what the hell is the “cross” all about?

It’s a race. Pure and simple. Think of motocross, dirt bike racing, but on snowboards. They take off out of the gate, go down the course, up, down, over jumps, passing on the curves, and all at once.

I love the olympics. Always have and probably always will. This event just gives the whole thing a jolt of aderline. It can be debated if it’s needed or not.

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I Like My New Site

There are all sorts of fun, neat things that I can do now, such as
posting via email. Pretty cool, eh? Now all I need is a blackberry
so I can do this from all over the place.

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Destroying Your Knees In the City

Stanley Park TrailsI love being able to use my near daily runs to help discover the city.  You really don’t want to stay too close to the interior of downtown if you plan to do some distance running.  The hills are one thing, and crossing intersections can be another.  It’s the plight you get from any large city. The easiest thing to do is to head towards the water or the park.  There’s still a bunch of people you have to weave through, but there is no way you would want to run down a street such as Robson(which I have seen before).

Be careful about running in the park though.  The Sea Wall is easy as long as the wind coming off the water isn’t too intense.  Rain has never been a problem. You just have to not be afraid of getting wet.  However, that route goes around all the neat trails you can take by actually going into the park.  If you’ve never been in the park, you can get into trouble.  Study the maps as well as you can before you think you can take an easy run to Beaver Lake.  If you can’t handle the hilly terrain, stick to the sea wall.

Watch out for wildlife. Dogs, raccoons, and squirrels are all over the place.  The last two want food from you.  Dogs for the most part are incredibly tame around the city.  Just today was the first time I was heckled and chased by a dog before the length on its leash ran out.  Just the other day, an otter bolted out of the brush when I was on the Bridle Trail, just off of Second Beach. That was bizzare and cool all at the sametime.  Rebecca says it was a beaver.  Google images tell me that I saw an otter.

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Corporate Radio in the Lower Mainland

I probably don’t listen to enough radio to make too many statements about the industry in and around Vancouver, but the market here seems to be easier to stomach than anywhere back in the states. This could be for the simple fact that everything here is still very new to me. Add to the fact that there is the Canadian Content regulation that requires a certain amount of Canadian material to be aired everyday.  This exposes me to all sorts of music that we simply do not have back in the states.  Within that, so much of what I am hearing is refreshing.  It’s new, and I like a lot of what I hear, minus the Nickleback.  I could really do without them.

That’s not to say that a lot of what I dislike about the American markets isn’t here either.  There is still a lot of the same programming techniques in the Vancouver market that grates on me like no other.  Over playing a single until you can’t stand it is just one of the many things that tends to drive you nuts.  Screaming DJ’s are here as well.  Seriously, who talks like that in real life?

Programming is just a slice of some of the insight that I’ve been able to gain about this market.  I’ll post more in the future as more of these thoughts get translated to here, but the tech side gets fairly interesting as well.  I need to learn more about it, obviously, but what really needs to happen is one of these stations just needs to have an opening when my work permit comes through so I can get in there and start playing again.

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there ain’t no control of things you take for granted

UBC Museum of AntropologyWe’ve been out of coffee for the past couple of days, and I felt it something fierce. In the midst of the budgeting that we’re doing these days, we take care to not over spend and do our grocery shopping in moderation. Add to the fact that the Clubside Breakfast Time Podcast is sending us a pound of dark roast coffee that I won soon, it doesn’t make too much sense to go out and buy some. Those guys down in Olympia, WA are pretty alright to me. All it took for me to win was to email them within two days after they published one of their episodes. Pretty freaking cool, eh?

Still, being out of coffee in the past few days, it hit me hard. I started to get a headache and attributed that to a lack of water intake from all the running that I do through the week. Then I felt tired and sluggish. It wasn’t until we were sitting on the couch two nights ago, waiting till Laura called to meet her from some Hon’s goodness, that it hit me. Six o’clock and I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore. Took a little nap and felt better, but it makes me feel bad that such a craving can leave me so dependent on something so tasty.

Had to run a few errands this morning in preparation for the wedding and picked up a coffee from Blenz with Rebecca. Combine that with a couple of cookies this morning and I totally have the shakes. I’m on overload now.