Cameras

In 1997 my friends Nora, PeeWee, and I drove out to Glacier National Park and Yellowstone National Park. We were young (18) and crazy, driving the entire way out there. Almost drove off the road in the park we were so tired!

Highlights include searching Lincoln, MT for the Unabomber's cabin. We never found it and later learned we couldn't have found it because it was taken to CA for the trial. Also memorable was our night in the rain in the tent in the middle of bear country, too afraid to leave the tent with water seeping in through the tent seams. Over the course of the night we had less and less non-wet sleeping bag-age. I had to go to the bathroom and had the Simon and Garfunkle song "I am Rock" in my head (as we had only an "island" of dry sleeping bag to share).

Nora brought three cameras with her. One she dropped down the side of a mountain. A second died when it fell into a creek with her. I don't recall off hand if the third made it back or not.

Dude ranch

Last year we thought that we were going to go to a Dude Ranch this summer, either near Sundance, WY (where the pretty girl waittress that the Enforcer likes works) or down near Laramie. I even bought myself a cowboy hat. Eforce bought cowboy boots in Wall, SD. Yet plans changed and we are not doing that this year. Maybe next year. So much to do, but too little time and money.

Real Vacation UPdate #2

I didn't even plan on bringing my Nike Free's on the trip. I was going to bring my hiking shoes (Inov8) and my sandals. The Free's were so dang comfortable, however, that I did bring them. I got to thinking before the first hike that I should try hiking in them, since I do know that some ultra-runners run mountain ultras in very minimalistic shoes. So our first hike (10 mile) I wore them. What I noticed: They are comfortable. I have a good feel of the ground that is great for balancing on logs. When they get wet they dry very quickly. However I think I would have to train a little more because my feet were kinda sore when I got back to the car. Think 80- miles- into- Superior-ouch- that- kinda- hurts- oh- well- sore (not pure hell 90 miles in soreness). Also when they are wet (or I can imagine sweaty) my feet kind of slip around a bit, making it a little more difficult to do any bouldering if the boulders aren't flat. Also they don't cover my ankle bone (whatever that is called) which could cause an injury if I bang it just right. For the record my Inov8's don't cover that bone either.

Yesterday we were rained out of Hazelton Peak as well. We did do a late afternoon cross-country off-the-trail hike over a couple peaks (probably about 11 miles between 7500' and 9500'). RR is the only person I will follow into the woods not fearing for myself or that I need to pay super good attention and be able to lead us out; I trust him completely (even more than myself). He took us on an 11 mile loop that got us right back to the car. Amazing!

Today we are going to climb Loaf Mt. (11,200'). Darton is still snow covered.

Get an eye exam

We saw a patient last week who had normal pressures for the last few years. No family history of glaucoma. This visit the pressure in one of his eyes was a high, so we did a visual field. He has pretty advanced glaucoma with visual field loss in both eyes. We started him on eye drops to lower his pressure, but he won't regain the vision he lost. This is one reason why even if you have good vision, you should still have somewhat regular eye exams! Glaucoma can sneak up on you pretty easily, ruining your baseball career if you're a famous athlete as it did a previous patient in the practice (and affecting your life if you're not).

This post is HIPAA compliant, I believe...

Real Vacation Update #1

There's still a lot of snow up the peaks, so we are in a holding pattern for now. The area received a lot of late May precipitation. It's melting fast, so we may just need to wait a week. Our number one goal is still to climb Francs Peak, and due to snow we may have to forego Darton Peak this year.

We did a 10 mile hike to about 8750' on Saturday. Long story, but we ended up coming too close for comfort to running out of gas coming back down the mountains to Buffalo. We put the car in neutral and coasted down the hills.

Yesterday RR and I rented mountain bikes, had Eforce drive us 20 miles up the road into the mountains, and then we blasted down. He had us clocked at 53 mph during some sections. We're going for a repeat today and I'm going to wear my GPS and see if I can get a more accurate reading. We had some Forcer-snafus that caused us to have to start over a few times. We did the last 5 miles of big hills 3 times!

Today we're climbing Hazelton Peak and will finally get some elevation (10,500'). We chose not to do it yesterday due to a late start and the possibility of storms rumbling through. Sure enough, while biking we could see angry dark storm clouds in that vincinity and as we ate dinner at El Sol Vallarta the storm made it into town (Buffalo, WY: home base for now).

We did get out of town, but late: 9pm, putting us into Al's Oasis at 4:00am.

Good customer service

We ended up renting our Impala from Hertz in Blaine. Heidi, the staff member who helped us mainly, was SUPER helpful. When I called on Thursday night asking if any full size sedans would be returned to them for us to get on Friday before we left she:

-Offered us a Sante Fe at a $50 discount as the gas mileage wouldn't be as good as an Impala.
-Looked up in their system to see that an Impala WAS scheduled to be returned at 9am Friday.
-Let us take the Santa Fe and their staff would drive the Impala to the Force's workplace on Friday to exchange it.
-Would still give us at least $25 discount even if we got the Impala because of the hassle we had.

Found out later that when the Impala was NOT returned as scheduled, she had someone drive one up from their Brooklyn Park location to Blaine for us.

Thanks for the great customer service!

Bad customer service examples

Here's two of many possible examples of bad customer service:

1) I was buying bear spray at Sportsman's Warehouse.

"What's the difference between that package," I said, pointing at one, "and that one?"

"Well," said the unhelpful staff member, "they're different brands."

2) My manager ordered Potbelly subs to be delivered for our meeting. When they were 20 minutes late she finally called to ask what had happened to the order.

"You're on Dupont Ave.," said the unhelpful staff member. "I don't know where that is."

So you just won't deliver the order?!?

Unhealthy eating

Probably one of the most unhealthy snacks I've ever sat down to eat on multiple occasions are pretzels dipped in cream cheese. Very yummy, but a pretzel can really scoop up a lot of cream cheese.

I like pretzels to snack on, but they are very dry. I do not want to choke, nor faint.

I also really like jelly beans. For awhile I loved the Starburst brand jelly beans. Now I really enjoy the cheap jelly beans a person can find at the gas station. My favorite fake fruit flavor is orange. I believe my brother Joe and I agree that a person should eat all of one color before moving on to the next, but disagree about the best order. I usually eat the oranges last because they're the best.

Reed Organ

My family has an old reed organ that was orginally my great grandmother's. It was built in the 1890's, I believe. It's old, anyway. My dad refinished it a handful of years ago. I saw one identical to it in an antique store in Buffalo last year. I really like antique stores and will probably rummage through it again this year some morning when I'm awake and my travel mates are still sleeping.

A person must pump pedals with their feet to blow air through the reeds to create the music. As a kid this was a lot of fun. As an adult, not as much fun, but different. The sound is a little bit irritating, too. I prefer the sound of a piano. Very unique instrument, however.

I took piano lessons for 10 years and got pretty good at it. I don't play much (at all) anymore but would like to have a piano again to pick it back up. I also played clarinet in band for many years through high school and got pretty good. I don't want to pick that back up. I donated the clarinet to the Lupus foundation a move or two ago. Maybe someone with Lupus or their offspring is playing it as we speak.

So long, farewell

Well, the plan is to leave tonight between 6pm and 7pm. We'll stay the night at Al's Oasis/ Oasis Inn in Oacoma, SD. We are big fans of stopping to eat at Al's Oasis. In fact last fall V and RR bought gift cards for the Force and I for X-mas.

We have an Impala rented, after much headache and little assistance from Eforce. Let's just say the whole ordeal involved multiple phone calls back and forth, me talking to two different car places, questions that should have been asked NOT being asked, etc. But it's all good. We wanted an Impala for a good price and we have it.

All my stuff is packed, and anything I've forgotten I haven't realized yet. Everything should fit into the car like it did on two trips last year, but the car's not loaded, so again, we'll see. We'll (I'll) probably load everything up when I get home from work, hopefully by 5:15p.

Our plan is to climb Francs Peak (no, there is not an apostrophe) and Darton Peak. We'll stay Saturday and Sunday nights at Jay and Kim's cabins in Buffalo, like we have multiple nights on multiple past trips. Ralph is the old man who lives in the RV at the cabins, or at least he did last year. His daughter-in-law (or granddaughter-in-law) paints rocks to look like animals. I bought an owl one from him last 4th of July. Then in September when we were back I commissioned a matching owl. I've always wanted a piece of commissioned art. I'm not sure if any more rock-buying is in my future for this trip.

We'll probably stay a night or two in Tensleep, WY (tiny) and Meeteetsee, WY (teeny tiny). There's a big rodeo in Tensleep on the 4th that we might try to be at. We'll see how big it really is for a tiny town, but it was being advertised all the way back last October during hunting season.

I'd thought about having scheduled posts appear every day while I was gone for the entertainment of anyone checking in, but alas, that just didn't happen. I'm running out of time to make it happen, so I really may not post until 7/14/08. I may try posting/checking email/internet hopping from various hotels/coffee shops/other outlets along the way, but no guarantees.

Have a good holiday all! Good luck at Afton for anyone running!

A present for myself

I decided to get myself a present for my 30th b-day (coming up in August).

I thought about a trip to Mexico for a couple days of lying on the beach, but realistically I don't have anyone to travel with and would get bored pretty quickly by myself.

My puppy was born on Sunday, 6/22 and will be ready for me to pick-up after 8/10. I'll probably drive out there on 8/13. I'd originally planned on getting a puppy later in the fall, but this is just how it worked out. My b-day is the 11th, so it actually coincides with that quite nicely.

The litter has 5 females and 5 males, and I have a deposit on the first pick of the males.

I talked with the breeder, who lives in Brookings, SD, yesterday and while at the vet he learned all the pups are healthy. Unfortunately the vet, who was new to the practice, docked the tails of all the puppies to the incorrect length: instead of being 2/3rds the original length as the standard is, she docked them short and stubby like German pointers. Because of this I'll get a discount. The puppy is full breed and will have limited registration (can't be bred or shown in some situations). The incorrectly docked tail would make the puppy "undesireable" for showing anyway (if not completely ineligible for showing--not sure of the specifics). That's all fine.

I'll have pictures in a few weeks. 5 day old puppies are little blind blobs.

Weight training...

I've got to do it.

My garage has turned into a workout room (or at least half of it is). I'm going to pick up some dumbbells when I get back from Wyoming and start doing more weight training. EForce traded me his weight bench for an iron (long story).

In the mean time I decided I was going to do push-ups and aim to do 100. Yeah right. I did my initial test last night only to find I can not do even one real push-up with strict form. Not to seem pessimistic, but I doubt I'll be able to do 100 push-ups in 6 weeks. So should my goal be to follow the program with strict girly-push-ups (on the knees) until I can reach 100 and then switch over to real push-ups? I'd have to think that if I could do 100 sgp's that I'd then be able to do at least a handful of real push-ups.

Z Health

Forgot to add that now that I have finally purchased my Nike Free's I need to set up an appointment with my friend Mike T. Nelson to work on mobility using Z Health. I've worked with him before and it really works and makes a noticeable difference right away. Check out the web page for more info. I've known Mike for 6 years now and he's a great guy, so if you're an athlete looking for ways to improve, check him out.

Confounding product review

Throwing all proper methods of experimentation aside, I'm going to offer up my review of two products that I began using simultaneously, so take my experience for what it's worth.

I've been meaning to buy/try a pair of Nike Frees for a long time (years). But they're kind of pricey for me to just try, so it was an item that stayed on my to-do list pretty much long term. As I've been obsessed with attempting to clear the list for the last month or so (since I have nothing else to do) I finally bought a pair. A few years ago I could easily go to the Nike web page and even design my own colors and everything. The last few months however I had a hard time even finding a pair. I'm not sure if they are discontinuing them, re-designing them, or what. If they are being changed/eliminated, I certainly didn't want to pay much money for a pair, so I search Ebay and bought a "minimally used" pair for $20 (including shipping). The web site cautions about being sure to increase a person's use of them over a period of time to "acclimate" to the reduced support the shoe offers, but I've never been a fan of that, so I jumped right in. Wearing them around (like I am today at work) all I notice is that they remind me of the $5 Target slip-on shoes I lived in for many years as a teenager. Very comfortable. I did a 10 mile run in them last weekend and I notice I run with a much lighter step. When I ran 10 miles the next day in regular shoes I felt more "clumpy". I haven't been extra sore or had new muscle soreness. I did notice on Monday morning getting out of bed my feet bottoms were a little sore for a few minutes until they "stretched" out, but that happens occasionally regardless. I also had a little knee pain on Monday during the day, but again, I leave for Wyoming tomorrow and before any race or big trip I ALWAYS have weird phantom pain that is nothing really; probably just me being extra in-tune with my body as I prepare for an event.

My treadmill is great thus far. Just wish I had more time to use it this week. It's a MUCH better treadmill than my old one is all ways, so I don't foresee it causing me trouble.

Treadmill Days 1, 2, 3

Day 1 (6/21/08): Yippee! New Treadmill! I did a 10 mile run at 6.7mph. I took a 20 minute break to do a bear spray clinic in the back yard. We used last years bottle (which two people in our group have) to test the distance it sprays and the cloud pattern. Results? The bear spray shoots about 25ft with neutral wind. The cloud is actually quite large, which is good, since the Force has bad eyes. His and V's bottles only last 5 seconds in contrast to me and RR's bottles which last 9.2 seconds, with only 30g more liquid. Is it concentration of the bear spray per second of shot?

Day 2 (6/22/08): 10 mile run at 6.7mph. Took 2 x 5min breaks to collect money to buy bear spray and to acccept delivery of a weight bench from Eforce. I got my fan set up, but I still was sweating like a hog. Post-run we did another bear spray field test, doing a brief spray of mine to analyze the cloud size. We determined it's a little narrower of a cloud, but still sufficient, especially coupled with the long spray time availability. We determined we'll carry two of the larger cloud/shorter time and two of the narrower cloud/longer time bottles.

Day 3 (6/23/08): I'm down to my last two episodes of Season 6 of "24" (about 84 minutes or so)and I'd really like to finish up before leaving for Wyoming. I was going to walk on an inlince for at least one of the episodes last night but ultimately decided to skip it. Why? Well, I only got 3 hours of sleep Sunday night, I work 45-50 hours this week before leaving, we've decided to leave Friday night instead of Saturday morning and we'll be picking up the rental car Thursday night. The departure time change means I lose two evenings of getting ready to go other than packing, and as I have a work meeting on Wednesday night I am especially crunched for time. I decided I'd get more benefit by changing the rental car reservation and sleeping than I would from 45 minutes of walking at an incline.

Total treadmill miles: 20.

*Actually, I was told that as the floor model the treadmill received 46 miles logged, so in all actuality the number is 66, but I am going to ignore that and not really mention it again.

More details on the treadmill

I headed over to Northstar Fitness this afternoon to see what I could find. I spent probably 1 1/2 hours there with Dean the manager who was very knowledgeable and helpful. We literally walked around and talked about every treadmill and covered the differences, the bonuses, the drawbacks of every model of every brand they carried.

The Precor I am getting was a floor model that currently has about 46 miles on it. Big whoop. I saved $700 on it being a floor model. What's better is that they can deliver it tomorrow! I thought for sure I was going to have to wait until I was back from Wyoming, but nope. I'll be able to give it a run all this week before leaving, assuming I can find the time.

My garage is going to turn into a workout room I believe, and I'll park my car in the driveway. Now I just need some weights.

My new treadmill

My new treadmill is being delivered tomorrow! Must mow the lawn now before it gets too late, so I'll add more details later.

DNR orders on the treadmill

My treadmill never did fill out any DNR paperwork, so until today I have continued to attempt to resuscitate the poor darn thing, futile though it may be.

As I was running on Friday night I heard a weird sound. Not the weird sound that I had fixed by reapplying silicone goo to the roller-thingy every 3 hours or so, but a weird ripping sound. I heard it once, but then noticed that every 4-20 footfalls or so I could feel that the bed felt "funny". I recognized right away that my treadmill bed must have cracked where it was uneven (from the windows) and that occasionally my footfall must hit the belt in just the right spot and for just the right amount of time that the belt was scraping over the crack and that the belt was starting to fray. So I ignored it.

On Saturday morning I took a look at the belt and realized that there WAS a tear in it--about 2" long. But it wasn't causing much problem, so on I ran.

About 10 mile into Saturday's run I heard yet ANOTHER new noise. This one was also directly related to the speed of the treadmill, but it was fairly quiet so I ignored it.

It got louder. I turned up the t.v. volume.

Finally it was too loud to ignore. I stopped the treadmill and manually turned the belt to look at the rip. It was now 8" long, which was long enough that there was a gaping wound and the belt was wrinkling up and not riding completely flat to the bed around the cut. What was happening was this: on each pass around the bed, the ripped area was scraping against the plastic piece that covers the electronics of the treadmill. As the rip grew larger and bulged up, a larger amount of belt was scraping past (hence the increase in volume). I thought immediately of Kel's suggestion to pull out the duct tape, so that I did. Alas, the duct tape caught on something while passing through the belt's rotation, and didn't last.

The way to fix it? Well, remove the plastic cover from the front of the treadmill, of course!

This is the point on Saturday morning that I realized that my treadmill was living on borrowed time. Sure, it wasn't dead yet, but every additional measure seemed to be just buying a little more time without taking into consideration the QUALITY of the life I was giving my treadmill. How long could I run on a treadmill with exposed mechanical and electrical pieces?

I unscrewed the plastic piece and used a couple of screwdrivers to raise it about 4" which should be plenty of room to allow the bulging wound to pass. Unfortunately the belt was catching on the frame, so this didn't help. My run was over at 11.5 miles.

I faced the truth today while talking with a co-worker who is also a runner (who can't believe that I run almost exclusively on a treadmill or that I have done "long" trail runs--a euphemism for the ultras. Good luck Tonya at Grandma's, where she will come close to breaking 3 hours). She told me I should replace the belt. Once I started describing the treadmill as it stands now, I think we both were able to see the truth: the treadmill is dead; repair is not the answer.

Now I plan to attempt to throw it away in my local garbage can over the next few weeks.

The electronics are still good... in fact they were replaced under warranty at the beginning of April. Any suggestions for what to do with the working parts?

Here's a picture of the treadmill post-silicone-solution. Notice footrail and endcap missing from right side as well as the black-icky silicone spray backsplash on the garage floor back from the roller junction. This is what happens when silicone is applied as the treadmill is moving. Also notice the 8" rip.


Here is where I started the autopsy. Notice the Y-incision.


With the belt removed the bed can be examined. Notice the area that is completely worn away. My footfalls must have been traditionally off-center to the left for it to be worn like that. Notice the area in the center of the worn spot that is indented (it's the more yellow central area). There is a slightly rough edge to it which must have been what originally started the tear.



Cause of death: Over-use, plain and simple. While the treadmill-as-window-storage was not a good idea to the overall health of the treadmill bed, I think the signs point that repetitive pounding ultimately finished it off.

Beware of the water

On Friday morning I was chatting with a co-worker and took a drink out of my water bottle. As I swallowed I felt a tightness in my chest and it really hurt as it was going down. "Wow," I told Shannon, "that hurt!" I immediately (within 3 seconds) started to feel lightheaded and dizzy and realized I was going to faint. I started to sit down and may or may not have made it to the ground before I passed out. I did hit the right side of my head on the floor hard enough to leave a mark, but not hard enough to hurt. I came too within about 10-15 seconds. I sat up and tried to regain my bearings, but within 30 seconds I was down again. By this time my co-workers were able to get a couple of our surgery nurses over to look out for me. My doctor came out of the laser room and when she found out what happened said right away that it was a Vasovagal syncope. Basically it means I fainted.

I laid still for about 15 minutes before attempting to get up. I was sat up and immediately the world started swimming again. Because a good amount of time had passed and I was still feeling poorly, the decision was made to call the paramedics and have me checked out. I was taken via ambulance to Fairview Southdale where I was given an EKG (normal) and IV fluids.

(Now, I TOLD the paramedic in the ambulance that my normal resting heart rate is in the low-mid 40's, but he obviously didn't listen because my heart rate "fell" from the mid-50's during the exodus from my workplace to the low-40's relaxing during the ambulance ride he decided he'd better give me an IV. He also said that he was concerned about dehydration although I had told him that I had already drank going on 50 oz. of water by the time this happened at 9:30a. When I arrived to the hospital 3 minutes after he started the IV, the nurse said, "well, may as well finish up the IV since they've already charged you for it.")

I've fainted 4 times in my life now: First time was at Bemidji University giving blood in 1996. I gave the blood, felt fine, was standing around the table snacking because I was not allowed to leave for 5 minutes, when all of a sudden, BOOM. Second time was at Northwest Airlines Bldg. C in 1998 (where I worked at the time). Again I had given blood, felt fine, standing at the table, when BOOM. Third time was in Washington DC in 2004 when I was constructing an IKEA bookshelf. I was hammering in the LAST nail (really) when my hammer hit my finger by mistake. It didn't even really hurt, but started bleeding and I calmly started rinsing it under water at the sink. I felt myself getting light headed and laid down on the kitchen floor, halfways aborting the fainting. I was still passed out in a quasi dream state, but at least I didn't hit the floor. And now number 4, fainting after drinking water.

Should I stop drinking water?

My $400K bathroom

My upstairs bathroom in Anoka is finished now and it looks GRAND! We decided it is a $400K bathroom in a house of lesser value. After RR customized the new countertops, I decided to have him replace the base throughout the bathroom; the moron who originally trimmed it out used casing instead of base and it looked dumb. We bought the painting and the bathmats for a housewarming gift for the Force. I can't wait to live in this house.