Wow, my last update was back in August… Oops. Back then, I was planning on running a fall marathon - probably the Fox Cities Marathon up in Appleton/Neenah, Wisconsin. Both Milwaukee and Chicago were already full. Alas, my plans were ruined by the white trash folks across the street.

I’ll get into the long and nasty history between us later, but for the moment, what’s important is that they’ve been “dogsitting” a pit bull since early summer when the dog’s owner “went to Mexico” suddenly. They don’t know when he’ll be back. They tie Athena to the front step on a line just long enough that she can reach anyone on the sidewalk. She’s very aggressive.

To make a long story short, Athena went after Tes one night. I tried to tackle her, but missed, slipped, and tore open my left big toe on the driveway. I managed to get between the dogs and rescue Tes, but my training was effectively ended for the next few weeks.

After I healed up, I took a rather lazy approach to running, trying to get at least one run in per week. I wasn’t always successful. But somewhere around Thanksgiving, I noticed something while looking at my running log. I had over 570 miles so far. A nice, round, 600-mile total for the year was within reach.

Last night, Tes and I went out for a four-miler that would bring me to 596. At about 2.5 miles we made the decision to go for it. On we went, over the ice (yay for slip-on cleats) and snow. Tes did fantastically; she’d only done more than five miles one time, and the weather was much nicer for that. We did it.

I probably would have been up close to 700 had I done another marathon, but the accomplishment felt huge anyway. Fingers crossed, I’ll be better at writing all this stuff next year - which is really starting to look ambitious!

May 25 - Madison Marathon, Madison, WI - 26.2 miles
July 12 - Lake Michigan Triathlon Series, Kenosha, WI - 13.1 miles
July 26 - Grand Island Trail Marathon, Grand Island, MI - 26.2 miles
September 27 - Road Runner Akron Marathon, Akron OH - 26.2 miles
October 18 - The North Face Endurance Challenge, Madison, WI - 13.1 miles

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

I’m stealing this text from Cedar Block’s more official invitation email, but first I’ll give you the short version: a bunch of people did some art inspired by Martin Ramirez’s works, there’s a party-time event at the Milwaukee Art Museum to show it off, and I’m involved. It opens at 8pm on 11/30/07.

And now, on to the long version: (click poster for bigger)

“The Ramirez Box”
Friday, November 30, 8PM-midnight
Milwaukee Art Museum
700 N Art Museum Dr
$5 members/$7 general public

This is the fourth collaboration between MAM and Cedar Block, happening in conjunction with the Martin Ramirez exhibition, now on display through January 13.

Cedar Block supplied each of thirty area artists with a box of rudimentary supplies, not unlike those to which Ramirez might have had access as a patient in psychiatric institutions. The boxes’ contents were all they were allowed to use when creating a new work of art. Ramirez made masterpieces. Did they? Find out Friday.

Mary Louise Schumacher, Art Critic for the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, kindly stated on Sunday

“Every one-night art party that Cedar Block puts on at the Milwaukee Art Museum seems better than the last.”

We have every intention of following suit with this one. Things are shaping up very nicely.

Scheduled to participate:

With interactive projects by:
- donebestdone - Those guys from “Milwaukee Street Milwaukee”? They’re back, with a Ramirez Box performance, film, and exhibit.
- M. Neuman & M. Falk - They of “The Baconizer” unveil “The Ramirezone”.
- Paul V./ Toby C. [that’s me! emphasis mine] / David K. - Cedar Block Hall of Famers take you inside a Ramirez work.

DJ’s Tom Crawford (WMSE 91.7FM) & Von Munz will provide music from 8-11, at which point dbd will take the stage.

Free appetizers and a cash bar will be provided. The Martin Ramirez exhibition will be open until 10PM at no additional charge.
Thanks for reading.Bundled up,

Brent.

Brent Gohde
Director - Cedar Block
 cedarblock.com

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

“GET HIM ED!” Matt roared from somewhere behind me.

“I’m trying!” I shouted back. I had no idea how close Matt was; my entire focus was on the kid up ahead, racing away on his bike in terror as two angry maniacs chased him down the street. I saw something hanging down from his hand. “You better drop that, motherfucker!” I yelled. And surprisingly, he did.

By that time he was too far for Matt and I to even think about hoping to dream about catching him. Matt and I slowed to a walk.

“What the hell, Ed? You’re supposed to be the runner!” Matt teased, out of breath.

“Yeah, but I just got done running fourteen miles!” I wheezed back.

We walked up to where the thing had been dropped. Some kids who were playing in their front yard picked it up and were looking at it when we got there. It was a CD player and tape adapter. Matt looked at me. “Dude, that ain’t Erin’s. I don’t know whose that is.”

“Okay, you go back and get the car. I’m going to go up a little farther, see if I can find him.” I ran up another block, but all I found was another kid on a bike - who was also looking for a kid in a black tank top, just like we were. Empty-handed, I headed back home, stopping to warn some other neighbors and tell them what had just happened.

After every run, provided I’m not feeling like I’m about to die, I take Tes for a walk, a little “cool down.” I’d just gotten back from a fourteen-mile run and Tes’s walk. Joy and I were standing in the driveway, with the light on the side of the house on, chatting. Suddenly, she pointed behind me and said, “Is that Matt?”

I turned and looked. Someone wearing dark shorts and a black tank top was setting a bike down in Matt and Erin’s front yard. He then went over and peeked in the windows of Erin’s car. It could be Matt… but then, “No, that’s not him. His arms are too skinny.” I turned back to Joy. “Run in and get my phone, call Matt. I’m going to watch this guy.”

I started slowly strolling down the driveway, and the mystery guy opened the car door and got in. Then I saw Matt stand up in his living room and head for the front door. “Ah, shit,” I muttered. The kid heard Matt and quickly jumped out. I was already moving - adrenaline was surging through my body as I ran straight for the kid. I heard Matt yell, “Hey! What are you…!” and the kid was on his bike, pedaling.

I’d gotten within ten feet of him. But the race was on. Matt actually jumped straight out of his open porch window and ran after us in bare feet. We ran for a good block before the CD player was dropped.

Back on the home turf, Matt had gone out looking for the kid in his car. Another neighbor, Doug, was bummed because he “always misses the action,” so he grabbed an old bat and went out looking, too. Both returned with no luck.

We live on a fairly quiet street. We’re pretty tight-knit, and I would say about half of the people on the block regularly hang out with each other, and the rest are more “now and then.” Just in the last few months, however, it seems like someone is calling the police for one thing or another every other week. But one thing I didn’t expect is that we seem to be stepping up to the plate, too. Without any sort of spoken agreement, Matt, Doug, and I have formed a little “block defensive posse.”

If a strange car drives by slowly a couple times, especially in the evening, one or more of us go outside to see if it comes by a third time. If someone is acting suspicious, we go find out what they’re up to. When someone commits - or attempts to commit - a crime, we call the police AND go see if we can stop it.

Some people might say we’re being stupid, that we should let the cops handle it, that we’re putting ourselves in danger, blah blah blah. We’ve got no problem with the police. But the fact is, they aren’t always here, RIGHT NOW, when we need them. And I’m not talking vigilante justice; had we caught the kid tonight, we’d probably have held on to him and scared the living bejeezus out of him until the cops got there to take care of things.

But this is our street. This is our *home.* Neighborhoods go to shit when no one stands up for them. We’re not going to let that happen here. Just by speaking up, making ourselves visible instead of hiding, and taking action when necessary, we’ve run off a drug house (well, around the corner), terrified a group of teenage pricks to the point that they won’t set foot on our street even though their friend lives here (egg MY house, will you?), run of a wannabe thief, and who knows what else. Just by one or more of us going out into our front yards, we’ve seen people get back in their cars and leave.

But maybe we’re just ugly, or something.

And nothing was missing from Erin’s car.

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

I interrupt this blog full of nonsense about running to make an announcement: I’ve made some updates. Our little weblog’s version of Wordpress has been upgraded to 2.2, and I also updated Akismet (the oh-so-lovely spam comments filter) to version 2.0. Also, after a quick glance around the Internet, it seems that the gallery software we’ve been using is not (yet) compatible with this new version of Wordpress, so the “random image” has been removed from the sidebar for the time being.

Speaking of image-related things, I made one more change. Now images can be viewed right on the page !

Oh, and a note on using sIFR with Lightbox 2.0, for any poor sucker who stumbles across this post while looking for information: if your sIFR text is sitting on top of the lightbox-displayed image, you need to set sWmode (or wmode, if you’re using sIFR 3) to “transparent”.

Like so:

sIFR.replaceElement(named({sSelector:"#blah",sFlashSrc:"http://url.com/swf/font.swf",sColor:"#000",sLinkColor:"#111",
sBgColor:"#222",sHoverColor:"#333",sFlashVars:"textalign=center",sWmode:"transparent"}));

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

The weekly report hasn’t got much to, well, report. I ran 7 miles on Monday in 59:11, which averaged out to 8:27. A few weeks ago, I would have considered this a perfectly good run, but I had to work to convince myself that this was supposed to be an “easy” run anyway. I had a half marathon coming up, and this seven-miler felt like I was slogging through wet concrete. Funny what a taste of speed can do to you.

I took Wednesday off. I was supposed to do another seven miles, but my legs felt like crap. I hoped the additional rest would pay off for Saturday. Friday night we went out with some friends to see the new Harry Potter, and as I got up from the theatre seat, my knees ached more than any time since the marathon. Maybe I’d get lucky and it would just be “withdrawal.” Sometimes the body gets used to the pounding of running and creates phantom pains and injuries when you get off schedule. I didn’t get to bed until just after 2, and then I was back up at 6 to prep for the race.

Okay, so against me, we’ve got only 4 hours of sleep, achy legs, I’ve just come off a high mileage week, and the weather forecast is for thunderstorms. FANTASTIC. Actually, I was kind of looking forward to the possibility of racing in the rain. I like running in rain - and if nothing else, I could blame a poor performance on the weather!

The course was four back-and-forth loops, or eight lengths of 1.63 miles. Since there was no realistic way to get the miles marked, I decided to base my pace on the lengths. I wanted to be as close to flat eight-minute-miles as possible, so I calculated that I needed to hit 13 minutes per length. That would bring me in at an hour and 44 minutes. Once again, a very aggressive goal.

We got to the starting corral just a few minutes before the duathlon kicked off. You see, the Lake Michigan Triathlon series has two triathlons (of different distances), a duathlon (run-bike-run), a 5k, 10k, and half marathon. They all happen together, so you’ve got swimmers, runners, and cyclists all racing at once. It certainly makes up for the “boringness” of the looping course.

When it was time for the foot races to start, I took my position right at the head of the group (look at those calves! Except for the kid up front with the red and white stripes, we were all half marathoners). Now, these races are conducted in a very laid-back style. The starting “gun” was a cowbell. Literally, “Ready, set, *CLANG CLANG CLANG*” And we were off! (The guy behind me took off like a bullet - and won the half marathon in 1:20)

As I ran the first leg, I led a pack of about six runners. We chatted back and forth about the course, other races, the weather (which was overcast, but holding out). After we made the first turn, I caught up to a skinny girl who suddenly decided to match pace with me. At first I was annoyed, but then we started to talk. She was a 21-year-old student from Madison running her first half marathon; her only other race experience was a 5k last year. Marissa was hoping to hit a nine-minute pace. When I told her that I was shooting for just under eight, she decided to stay with me as long as she could.

We eventually pulled away from the group. When we reached the start of loop 2, I looked at my watch and swore. Marissa asked how we were doing, and I said, “we’re almost two minutes ahead of schedule!”

“Really?” she said. “Maybe we can keep this up! I feel great!” So did I, so we did.

We kept right on running and talking, noting that we were hitting between 12:00 and 12:30 for each length, putting us further and further ahead of our goal. It was an amazing feeling. I actually felt like the old, veteran coach, putting this scrawny, freckled girl through the paces and showing her she can do more than she thought. Of course, that might have just been dehydration talking. But Marissa and I hung shoulder to shoulder for the entire second and third loop.

As we neared the end of loop three, I noticed that she was picking up her pace. I laughed and asked her if she was doing it on purpose. She said, “yeah! I read that you should start picking up three miles before the finish!”

I shook my head. “I’ll try to keep up, but I usually don’t pick up until the last mile, mile and a half.”

“Come on, Ed, you can do it!”

And then we started loop four. Marissa took off like a bloody gazelle, calling over her shoulder for me to keep up. No way, girlie. “Go for it,” I yelled, “I’ll see you at the finish!” I didn’t want her to see that I was listing to one side a bit from a side stitch. I was thinking, not now! I’m so close, I’ve been doing so well! I pushed on, making faces, until it finally subsided about a mile later. Now, with only two miles left, I suddenly felt light and dangerous.

I picked it up.

I saw Marissa just before I got to the turnaround and gave her thumbs up. There was no breath left for talking now. I was gaining ground on those leading me, and I chewed up three people over the next mile. I was pushing it hard - but saving just a little bit for the show I was going to put on at the end.

As I came over the last hill, I let gravity pull me into my kick. I was weightless. I was flying. I was a one man machine of running destruction. I was too fast for the camera (that’s my foot on the lower right). I was lucky no one was in front of me, because I totally would have run them down with a violence. As I bolted into the final few meters, I showed that actually touching the ground was for suckers and mortals.

And then I was done. A little kid handed me a bottle of water, a woman handed me a medal, and someone else asked for my timing chip. I stood there, chest heaving, thinking to myself, wait - what the hell just happened? Was that all? There’s no more? I looked at my watch; I’d managed to hit the STOP button as I crossed the finish.

1:39:52

I’d beaten my goal by five minutes. I beat last year’s time on this course by *sixteen* minutes. I beat my half time from the full marathon by over *ten* minutes. I was shocked. Later I would find that my “official” time was only 1 second different, 1:39:53.

Overall, I was ninth out of 27. I was the sixth male (of seventeen), and first in my age group (of… one). [Full results]

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

It’s been forever since I actually got around to writing anything, and I’m not going to give you any reasons why. I’ve been running all the same; I took only one week off after the marathon, and on the 4th of June (my 28th birthday!), I was back on the streets, prepping for the next marathon.

I took those first two weeks easy, not going any farther than 6 miles. Then my real training schedule kicked in, and zoom! Up those distances went. That first Saturday long run, just over two weeks ago, was 10 miles. Last week was 12, and this past Saturday was 14. I’m pushing myself harder this time around, enjoying how it feels to dip below 8 minutes per mile a few times during a long run. It’s as if a switch was thrown after the marathon. Where I was stuck in the 8:30-plus range before, I’m now consistently hitting in the 8-8:15. I like it.

We were up at my dad’s place this weekend, so my Wednesday and Saturday runs were both while we were up there. I’ve never run in northern Wisconsin, especially in the summer. Wednesday was just a five-miler, 2.5 out and back. I left the house around 5 or so, and immediately discovered what a really really bad idea it was. Nevermind the heat. Nevermind the soft gravel roads that were just a step above running on a sandy beach.

It’s fly season.

And I don’t mean little houseflies buzzing around you. No, these are big ass deer flies that BITE. It’s not uncommon for their bites to actually bleed, because they’ll take a chunk out of you if they can. I ran, but I ran while constantly swatting at the bastards and waving my arms around my head trying to keep them off. I was barely successful.

On the other hand, I did get to see three snakes (two were roadkill), a flock of grouse, and a bunch of wild turkeys. That was pretty cool. And even with all the difficulties, I still managed to finish in 41 minutes.

For my fourteen-miler on Saturday, my plan was to leave early enough to beat the flies - and heat. The forecast called for highs in the low 90s. Ugh. My dad got me up early, and by 6:10, I was on the road. The air was nice and cool, some lingering fog was hanging out in the treetops, and the air was chock full off northwoodsy smells. Pine, earth, clean.

The route was a long, narrow loop. For reference, everything up there was gravel at best, sandy, overgrown path at worst. Most of the route is completely uninhabited, though you might find a hunting shack tucked in here or there. The surrounding landscape is generally swampy forest, with a lot of evergreen and tamarack. I was generally heading north-south for most of the way, so I was in nice cool shade most of the time. It was pretty nice.

For about 45 minutes.

I hadn’t even reached the halfway point when the first fly appeared. I groaned. I knew that I had more than an hour left, and it was only going to get worse. I passed some logging equipment and thought about checking to see if I could “borrow” some bug spray, but the only thing worse than running when being followed by biting flies is stopping to make it easier on them. I ran on.

The swarm grew. I had thought Wednesday was bad, but I’ll bet I never had more than a few flies at any one time. This time, however, I went pretty quickly from one fly to a good dozen or so. I tried sprinting now and then to lose them, but honestly, I can’t keep a fast enough pace long enough to be free. I just kept running. I was like Forrest Gump crossing the country, except instead of people following me, I had a cloud of giant flies. And they kept biting me!

At 7.5 miles I turned down the aforementioned “sandy overgrown path.” This connected me back to a “real” gravel road a couple miles south. Around the eighth or ninth mile, I heard dogs baying and barking; I’d heard them earlier, several miles back, and when I was on the other side of the loop. I was confused because I knew no one lived back here, so I was a little nervous thinking that maybe someone’s dogs had gotten loose and were going to cause me trouble.

Imagine my surprise when I came over a hill and found two trucks, several people, and a bunch of hunting dogs on the other side. No wait, imagine THEIR surprise upon seeing a sweaty, sunburned man come over the hill at 7:30 in the morning, middle of nowhere, literally miles from anything, carrying a bottle of water and a tree branch with which he is constantly swatting himself. One of the guys said to the rest, “Uh, there’s a *runner* coming.”

I slowed to a walk and tossed my branch aside as I got close. “Good morning! You wouldn’t happen to have any fly spray, would ya?” I called out. They laughed, and a woman I assumed to be the mother said, “We’ve got some OFF, will that work?”

“Anything’s better than that tree branch!” I replied.

As I sprayed myself down (instantly noting that the flies were gone!), I asked what they were hunting. “Bear!” said the guy who looked like the father. “In fact, one just ran through here a bit ago.” One of the older kids asked if I should be carrying a knife or something. “For what?” I asked.

“Well, there’s bear and wolves around here!” he said. “I’d at least want a blade in case I ran into one.”

I thought to myself, and what am I going to do with a pocket knife against a bear? Throw the knife at it’s head and hope to knock it out? So I just said, “Nah, I’m not worried. I figure I’ll just box ‘em if they get to close,” and I made an exaggerated fighting stance. They laughed again. Surely I wasn’t going to be the only one with an interesting story to tell after this.

I wished them safety and luck on their hunt and continued on my way. Finally, I could run again unencumbered by the flies. Well, mostly, anyway. They kept buzzing around, biding their time, waiting for me to sweat it off. And only 15 minutes later, enough repellent had sweated off that they were starting to get to me again. There was nothing I could do but keep going. I saw another snake, and that was cool.

The rest of the run was simply arduous. The flies took any enjoyment out of the run and fighting them off sapped my strength a lot more than I expected. I was also demotivated by the fact that I really had no idea where I was or how much was left, and wouldn’t have a clue until I was only a mile from the finish. But I plugged on. As I neared the end, I saw a young deer ahead in the road. I got close enough to see it blink before it trotted off into the woods.

And then, suddenly, I was done. My time sucked, I was covered in fly bites (though I think I got more miles than bites, so that’s good), and I was sore. And there you have it.

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Came across this on Yahoo News today…

Dinosaurs Died Agonizing Deaths

LiveScience Staff

LiveScience.comSat Jun 9, 10:15 AM ET

Fossilized dinosaurs often have wide-open mouths, heads thrown back and tails that curve toward the head. Paleontologists have long assumed the dinosaurs died in water and the currents drifted the bones into that position, or that rigor mortis or drying muscles, tendons and ligaments contorted the limbs.

“I’m reading this in the literature and thinking, ‘This doesn’t make any sense to me as a veterinarian,’” said Cynthia Marshall Faux, a veterinarian-turned-paleontologist at the Museum of the Rockies.

Faux and a colleague say brain damage and asphyxiation are the more likely culprits.

A classic example of the posture, which has puzzled paleontologists for ages, is the 150-million-year-old Archaeopteryx, the first-known example of a feathered dinosaur and the proposed link between dinosaurs and present-day birds.

“Virtually all articulated specimens of Archaeopteryx are in this posture, exhibiting a classic pose of head thrown back, jaws open, back and tail reflexed backward and limbs contracted,” said Kevin Padian, professor of integrative biology and curator in the Museum of Paleontology at the University of California, Berkeley. He Faux (pronounced “Fox”) published their findings this week in the journal Paleobiology.

Some animals found in this posture may have suffocated in ash during a volcanic eruption, consistent with the fact that many fossils are found in ash deposits, Faux and Padian said. But many other possibilities exist, including disease, brain trauma, severe bleeding, thiamine deficiency or poisoning.

“This puts a whole new light on the mode of death of these animals, and interpretation of the places they died in,” Padian said. “This explanation gives us clues to interpreting a great many fossil horizons we didn’t understand before and tells us something dinosaurs experienced while dying, not after dying.”

Also, because the posture has been seen only in dinosaurs, pterosaurs and mammals, which are known or suspected to have had high metabolic rates, it appears to be a good indicator that the animal was warm blooded, as other research has suggested. Animals with lower metabolic rates, such as crocodiles and lizards, use less oxygen and so might have been less traumatically affected by hypoxia during death throes, Padian said.

Padian acknowledged that many dinosaur fossils show signs that the animal died in water and the current tugged the body into an arched position, but currents cannot explain all the characteristics of an opisthotonic pose.

This is a VERY old idea that was pretty much discounted ages ago. Even their own reasoning doesn’t make sense. “Virtually all articulated specimens of Archaeopteryx are in this posture” - yeah, I wonder why? It couldn’t be at all similar to how dead birds today look much the same after sitting out in the sun for a few hours/days. It must be the case that all these fossils are from brain damaged critters than died in agony! Way to set us back in the 1700s, guys.

And while we’re at it, let’s just ignore the fact that most fossils aren’t found in areas of volcanic ash, but in sedimentary deposits consistent with stream, lake, or oceanic environments!

Idiots.

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.