Wow, class is going to be intense! Two sessions in and the reading assignments are quite extensive. The topic of the class is Shakespeare for Teachers, which is a very useful topic. The professor is less of a jackass than my first impression of him might have given but it's still early. The idea is to give us useful ways to teach the Bard in our own classrooms. Most of my classmates are already teachers so we'll see if that serves as any sort of disadvantage as we proceed. Anyhow, reading is eating up almost all of my time, especially on the days between the Tuesday and Thursday afternoon class. On the upside, this is looking like one of the classes that will prove most valuable when I begin teaching as many of the things we'll do will be directly portable to my class. And I'm getting to read a few plays I've not read before, I am enjoying that so far. Death to the boring linguistics classes, bring on the literature!
Also this weekend, I decided I wasn't hot enough in this scorching weather so I decided to run in a 5k in my town's summer festival. It was not as early as I would have liked, starting at 8:30 am. It was flipping humid so I fully expected it to be a tough go. I was planning to try and beat the 10 minute mile mark, which is essentially what I ran in my race earlier this spring. Instead of fighting 18,000+ runners, this one was only 448 people strong.
I set off and did my first mile way too fast, clocking at about 9:23. I decided I needed to slow it down a little so I didn't find myself dying in the last half of the race. I was able to find some people to keep pace with, which was very helpful. That stretch from 1.5 to 2 miles seemed to take forever! I get to the mile marker where the dude calling out the times yelled something around 17 minutes and 50 seconds or so. What???? I thought I slowed down, not dramatically sped up? This was not going to be good.
I started to feel it and definitely slowed down significantly in the last mile. The last 1.2 miles took about another 11 minutes, so I did slow down, but not too bad from my pace I was hoping to keep. Final time came in at 28:57, or 9 min 20 second miles. I think that's a personal record so I'm happy about that. I've set a nice high bar for me to try and surpass in my future races, awesome! Hopefully I can get under 9 minute miles by the end of the summer, we'll see. I'll need to be much more diligent about running between races if I want to do that. My next race is in late July in the early evening, hopefully it won't be outrageously hot. It has a Grateful Dead theme and while I'm not a big Deadhead, the tie dye shirts with the dancing skeleton are just too cool to pass up. More to report on this in the future!
Song lyric of the day "And I ran / I ran so far away" A Flock Of Seagulls
Until next time.
Ace
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Back home
The big trip to Rocky Top was a success, albeit a very tiring one. Didn't get in until very late Friday night, annoyingly keeping our gracious hosts up half the night. Big thanks again to B & D for hosting and letting our children run amok and teach their little guy the fine arts of crazy kidness.
Saturday found us heading to the big family reunion. I could literally see kid #2 trying to translate the thick Southern accents mentally. Hadn't really heard anything like that before. It was really great to catch up with the aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews, cuncles and other assorted relations. And the weather couldn't have been better. The scenery was also beautiful, the reunion was held at a local church tucked back in the hills and there were trees everywhere. Oh, and according to my unofficial poll, I believe Tennessee has the highest church per resident ratio in the world. I'm pretty sure there are 3 or 4 churches for each resident.
Anyhow, we cruised back home Sunday, arriving right around 11:30 or so. We got in about 23 hours of driving or so in a 60 hour span, really quite sweet. But all in all, the kids did great. I'm beginning to think they're pretty good at this road trip thing after this trip and our great New York expedition last year.
Not much else to report on at the moment, class starts a week from today. Tick tock, eight weeks of madness about to ensue...
Song lyric of the day "Time keeps on slippin, slippin, slippin'/into the future" Fly Like an Eagle, Steve Miller Band
Until next time.
Ace
Saturday found us heading to the big family reunion. I could literally see kid #2 trying to translate the thick Southern accents mentally. Hadn't really heard anything like that before. It was really great to catch up with the aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews, cuncles and other assorted relations. And the weather couldn't have been better. The scenery was also beautiful, the reunion was held at a local church tucked back in the hills and there were trees everywhere. Oh, and according to my unofficial poll, I believe Tennessee has the highest church per resident ratio in the world. I'm pretty sure there are 3 or 4 churches for each resident.
Anyhow, we cruised back home Sunday, arriving right around 11:30 or so. We got in about 23 hours of driving or so in a 60 hour span, really quite sweet. But all in all, the kids did great. I'm beginning to think they're pretty good at this road trip thing after this trip and our great New York expedition last year.
Not much else to report on at the moment, class starts a week from today. Tick tock, eight weeks of madness about to ensue...
Song lyric of the day "Time keeps on slippin, slippin, slippin'/into the future" Fly Like an Eagle, Steve Miller Band
Until next time.
Ace
Thursday, June 4, 2009
Road Trip!
Packing up the fam and heading to the beautiful Smoky Mountains this weekend. 10 hour drive is the best case estimate I've heard, we'll see how it goes. #1 has the last day of school on Friday, early dismissal and straight into the car for the trip. We're going to visit family on my side as well as a friend who recently moved to the area. It should be fun, although it's going to be quite short.
I've been trying to keep myself in shape for my next run coming up in a couple of weeks. They're fairly short (5k) so I don't really need to train per se, but would like to improve on my times as I make it through the summer. Hopefully dealing with a run in the size of about 200 runners will go more smoothly than dealing with 18,000+ in my last run. Last time I did this race it was quite hot so I hope that can also be avoided!
I'm enjoying my last few days of break. Class starts up in about a week and a half, it promises to be a race since it's only 10 weeks long. It's been a pretty nice break.
Song lyric of the day "Good old rocky top / Rocky top Tennessee"
Until next time.
Ace
I've been trying to keep myself in shape for my next run coming up in a couple of weeks. They're fairly short (5k) so I don't really need to train per se, but would like to improve on my times as I make it through the summer. Hopefully dealing with a run in the size of about 200 runners will go more smoothly than dealing with 18,000+ in my last run. Last time I did this race it was quite hot so I hope that can also be avoided!
I'm enjoying my last few days of break. Class starts up in about a week and a half, it promises to be a race since it's only 10 weeks long. It's been a pretty nice break.
Song lyric of the day "Good old rocky top / Rocky top Tennessee"
Until next time.
Ace
Friday, May 29, 2009
Cont'd
Where was I?
Oh yeah, staying out too late on a school night. The next day took us to preschool graduation for #2. Hard to believe it's that time already, the time really does fly. It seems like just yesterday we were rushing to the hospital to try and get there before the little one joined us. Yikes, that was a tough time. But it has been extremely rewarding, despite any day to day stuff that goes on. We think frequently about how fortunate we are to have a healthy, happy family.
After an early evening Friday to catch up on some sleep, took the opportunity to get up early on Saturday and head down to the city and help J & Em move into their new condo. Congrats on entering the land of homeownership, next time we'd appreciate something a little higher up, maybe eighth or ninth floor? Just kidding, hope you are settling in nicely!
Sunday was quite a day. We started by heading to Chinatown, leaving #3 at home with everyone's favorite aunt. We decided to try a new place called Triple Crown on the recommendation of a neighbor. Place was really good! A really interesting calamari served as part of dim sum, had never seen that before. The food was good but it was missing a couple of favorite dishes from a few of the other places we frequent. That said, I'm sure we'll pay another visit.
From there, we headed down the street to US Cellular Field, to watch the White Sox take on the Pirates. The seats were exceptional, first row in the 3rd section past 1st base. Absolutely primo! The weather was beautiful, the kids were fairly well-behaved, and the game was quick. They have a really cool attraction out in the left field area where kids can go and do various activities, like race against a cardboard cutout of one of the Sox players on a track. Another area had a batting cage and another had the kids throw a few balls at targets. It was really cool and a great way to break up the game a little bit since the kids wouldn't be content to sit still for 3 hours.
After the game we headed home and went to a home poker game where at least I got to drink a few beers. That was about all it was worth as I played like garbage. It was actually a really fun time as it was with a new group of guys I didn't know very well.
After that, I finished the weekend off by putting in the new stuff for this year's garden in the rain on Monday. Not much fun as it was kinda chilly. But it's done and hopefully we'll have enough tomotoes and raspberries to save some for the winter.
Sheesh, now that I look back on it, maybe it wasn't all that exciting. But it sure as heck was busy. And I can hear the bell of school tolling once more for me, with classes set to start up again in a couple of weeks. Apparently I signed myself up for some Shakespeare course. I enjoyed the last Shakespeare class I had, so hopefully this one will be the same. One bad sign, I e-mailed the prof for a list of books so I could buy them online and rather than just telling me the list of books, he informed me how he had, sniff sniff, submitted the list weeks ago and I could obtain the list from the bookstore. How absolutely ridiculous of me to ask the professor! Good times ahead...
Song lyric of the day "We're movin' on up / to the east side / to a deee-luxe apt in the skyyyyy" The Jeffersons theme song
Until next time.
Ace
Oh yeah, staying out too late on a school night. The next day took us to preschool graduation for #2. Hard to believe it's that time already, the time really does fly. It seems like just yesterday we were rushing to the hospital to try and get there before the little one joined us. Yikes, that was a tough time. But it has been extremely rewarding, despite any day to day stuff that goes on. We think frequently about how fortunate we are to have a healthy, happy family.
After an early evening Friday to catch up on some sleep, took the opportunity to get up early on Saturday and head down to the city and help J & Em move into their new condo. Congrats on entering the land of homeownership, next time we'd appreciate something a little higher up, maybe eighth or ninth floor? Just kidding, hope you are settling in nicely!
Sunday was quite a day. We started by heading to Chinatown, leaving #3 at home with everyone's favorite aunt. We decided to try a new place called Triple Crown on the recommendation of a neighbor. Place was really good! A really interesting calamari served as part of dim sum, had never seen that before. The food was good but it was missing a couple of favorite dishes from a few of the other places we frequent. That said, I'm sure we'll pay another visit.
From there, we headed down the street to US Cellular Field, to watch the White Sox take on the Pirates. The seats were exceptional, first row in the 3rd section past 1st base. Absolutely primo! The weather was beautiful, the kids were fairly well-behaved, and the game was quick. They have a really cool attraction out in the left field area where kids can go and do various activities, like race against a cardboard cutout of one of the Sox players on a track. Another area had a batting cage and another had the kids throw a few balls at targets. It was really cool and a great way to break up the game a little bit since the kids wouldn't be content to sit still for 3 hours.
After the game we headed home and went to a home poker game where at least I got to drink a few beers. That was about all it was worth as I played like garbage. It was actually a really fun time as it was with a new group of guys I didn't know very well.
After that, I finished the weekend off by putting in the new stuff for this year's garden in the rain on Monday. Not much fun as it was kinda chilly. But it's done and hopefully we'll have enough tomotoes and raspberries to save some for the winter.
Sheesh, now that I look back on it, maybe it wasn't all that exciting. But it sure as heck was busy. And I can hear the bell of school tolling once more for me, with classes set to start up again in a couple of weeks. Apparently I signed myself up for some Shakespeare course. I enjoyed the last Shakespeare class I had, so hopefully this one will be the same. One bad sign, I e-mailed the prof for a list of books so I could buy them online and rather than just telling me the list of books, he informed me how he had, sniff sniff, submitted the list weeks ago and I could obtain the list from the bookstore. How absolutely ridiculous of me to ask the professor! Good times ahead...
Song lyric of the day "We're movin' on up / to the east side / to a deee-luxe apt in the skyyyyy" The Jeffersons theme song
Until next time.
Ace
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Flying!
Wow, this late spring is absolutely flying by. To close one piece of old business, I did ridiculously manage an A in my 2nd class this semester, despite logic dictating otherwise. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised, pretty sure you have to tell the teacher to take a flying leap to score otherwise.
The last couple of weeks have been quite eventful. I'll start with last week, where Thursday I started my day heading to visit a new client of mine, one that promises to make life very difficult over the next 6 months or so. But we had a good meeting so it was a nice start to the day.
I headed from the meeting to my boy Q's place, where I would work the afternoon before the evening's frivolity would ensue. But before that, he and I went to one of his favorite little Thai joints for lunch and ate more broccoli than was previously thought possible by mere mortals.
After this tasty treat and an afternoon of work, I made my way to downtown Chicago to participate in the Corporate Challenge, a 3.5 mile run through the downtown lakefront area with 18,000 of my closest friends. This is part of the commitment I made to myself to run in at least one race per month during the spring/summer/fall, while the weather will bear it. While I've been working out some, it hasn't been as consistent as it should be, it has been enough. I wound up with a time that was right in line with what I was hoping, which was nice, given my nearly 16 minute first mile that consisted of a 5 minute walk to the starting line before beginning a light jog and eventually turning into a mini-jog where I was picking and choosing my steps to avoid running over / being run over. All in all, it was a fun time although I found it a little strange that most of the food my company's tent had consisted of cookies, potato chips, etc. This is a run, you think they'd have some healthy choices!
After the run, back to Q's where I got a quick shower and a tasty bite to eat courtesy of his far better half, and we met up with Duch for a rousing good concert, checking out Local H at a Chicago venue called Double Door, which is hosting a series of shows by different artists to celebrate their 15th anniversary. It was pretty warm in Chicago that day, low to mid-80s and it wasn't much cooler at night. Given that DD was sold out, the place was absolutely smoking inside. And this is not an easy listening show folks. I'll just say that after being abused for about 2 hours by that crowd, I thought I was going to pass out more than once. But man was it worth it. Hadn't seen the H in quite some time and they delivered, playing a ton of great rocking songs and the crowd was way into it. It was a great night even though I didn't get home until past 2 on a school night and my ears didn't stop ringing for several days.
I've got a ton of other stuff to update on but it's getting close to bedtime kiddies. I'll try to post back soon.
Song lyric of the day "Hey, I made a promise to love myself" Local H
Until next time.
Ace
The last couple of weeks have been quite eventful. I'll start with last week, where Thursday I started my day heading to visit a new client of mine, one that promises to make life very difficult over the next 6 months or so. But we had a good meeting so it was a nice start to the day.
I headed from the meeting to my boy Q's place, where I would work the afternoon before the evening's frivolity would ensue. But before that, he and I went to one of his favorite little Thai joints for lunch and ate more broccoli than was previously thought possible by mere mortals.
After this tasty treat and an afternoon of work, I made my way to downtown Chicago to participate in the Corporate Challenge, a 3.5 mile run through the downtown lakefront area with 18,000 of my closest friends. This is part of the commitment I made to myself to run in at least one race per month during the spring/summer/fall, while the weather will bear it. While I've been working out some, it hasn't been as consistent as it should be, it has been enough. I wound up with a time that was right in line with what I was hoping, which was nice, given my nearly 16 minute first mile that consisted of a 5 minute walk to the starting line before beginning a light jog and eventually turning into a mini-jog where I was picking and choosing my steps to avoid running over / being run over. All in all, it was a fun time although I found it a little strange that most of the food my company's tent had consisted of cookies, potato chips, etc. This is a run, you think they'd have some healthy choices!
After the run, back to Q's where I got a quick shower and a tasty bite to eat courtesy of his far better half, and we met up with Duch for a rousing good concert, checking out Local H at a Chicago venue called Double Door, which is hosting a series of shows by different artists to celebrate their 15th anniversary. It was pretty warm in Chicago that day, low to mid-80s and it wasn't much cooler at night. Given that DD was sold out, the place was absolutely smoking inside. And this is not an easy listening show folks. I'll just say that after being abused for about 2 hours by that crowd, I thought I was going to pass out more than once. But man was it worth it. Hadn't seen the H in quite some time and they delivered, playing a ton of great rocking songs and the crowd was way into it. It was a great night even though I didn't get home until past 2 on a school night and my ears didn't stop ringing for several days.
I've got a ton of other stuff to update on but it's getting close to bedtime kiddies. I'll try to post back soon.
Song lyric of the day "Hey, I made a promise to love myself" Local H
Until next time.
Ace
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Summer of baseball!
It's the semester that wouldn't end! My instructor from my 2nd class e-mailed me last night to let me know that she hadn't received my final so I was receiving an Incomplete as a grade. What???? I 2 day mailed it to her last Tuesday so no reason she shouldn't have had it. That's what happens when the instructor refuses to accept e-mail attachments. Anyhow, she found the grace in her soul to let me e-mail it to her, sounds like we're all set. But she sure got my heart racing there for a stretch.
I hope all the mothers out there had a great Mother's Day. Ours consisted of some travel and a nice cookout, which was good. We also had a party for my nephew Josh who just got his bachelor's degree. I was beginning to wonder if the line of family members completing college had come to an early end but thankfully not. Also celebrated 13 years of wedded bliss with the better half, bringing to mind joyful memories of our nuptials in the courthouse in our youth. Good times!
Greatly looking forward to another fun summer tradition, heading to the ballpark(s) to check out some major league baseball. I've currently got a couple trips to beautiful US Cellular field on the schedule, as well as the annual trip to check out the Mets at Wrigley Field. Also trying to sneak in a visit to Cincinnati to check out the new ballpark there on the back half of a road trip. We'll see about that one. I'm sure I'll try to sneak one or two more games in over the course of the year also, especially if I manage to do any more travelling for work. It's a great way to waste time when you're on the road by yourself!
Enough for now, back to it!
Song lyric of the day "Meet the Mets, greet the Mets!" New York Mets fight song
Until next time.
Ace
I hope all the mothers out there had a great Mother's Day. Ours consisted of some travel and a nice cookout, which was good. We also had a party for my nephew Josh who just got his bachelor's degree. I was beginning to wonder if the line of family members completing college had come to an early end but thankfully not. Also celebrated 13 years of wedded bliss with the better half, bringing to mind joyful memories of our nuptials in the courthouse in our youth. Good times!
Greatly looking forward to another fun summer tradition, heading to the ballpark(s) to check out some major league baseball. I've currently got a couple trips to beautiful US Cellular field on the schedule, as well as the annual trip to check out the Mets at Wrigley Field. Also trying to sneak in a visit to Cincinnati to check out the new ballpark there on the back half of a road trip. We'll see about that one. I'm sure I'll try to sneak one or two more games in over the course of the year also, especially if I manage to do any more travelling for work. It's a great way to waste time when you're on the road by yourself!
Enough for now, back to it!
Song lyric of the day "Meet the Mets, greet the Mets!" New York Mets fight song
Until next time.
Ace
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Bwahahahahahaha!
Wow, I am really laughing today, because the patron saint of gift grades (I believe his name is Cannabis) is smiling down on the professor of one of my classes, who, despite his very specific grading scale, decided to give me an A-on my term paper and A for the class. Absolutely sick! I am not one to look a gift horse in the mouth so I'll take it. But I am doing so with the full knowledge that this one is absolutely grand larceny. Guess I shouldn't have given a half-effort on the final in my other class - I only did so because I assumed this class was a B as a forgone conclusion. Woohoo! We'll be cracking open a cold one tonight peeps.
Up next, tackling my very long to do list during the class break. Here's hoping I get a lot done, only a couple weeks of soccer left, that will definitely help. Wow, #1's team is really quite awful. 2 boys that are good, #1 is decent and the rest are just not very good at all. They have been getting annihilated every week, really not much fun for them. But, so be it. They have been improving a bit each week, hopefully it'll be better by the end of the year...
Song lyric of the day "Insane in the membrane, insane in the brain!" Cypress Hill
Until next time.
Ace
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