Boris and JJ

For those who do not know Boris is our giant 1 year old cat. He has to be 20 pounds easy. JJ is our 8 year old son and barely 50 pounds.

I have been watching them play for awhile now. It seems to be a pretty fight. Boris was getting the upper hand until JJ went and put on his big gloves to take away the Claw and Teeth advantage. At that point Boris decide he didn't want to play any more.

An impromptu race

It began like any other morning a bit before 5AM. The alarm went off, I walked the dog and settled down for a cup of coffee. Shortly thereafter my son got up. I let him watch Super Why, snuck up to gently wake my wife and headed out for a quick 4 miles. My two training partners had blown me off so I was going solo.

It was a real nice morning. Forty degrees no wind. I was having a great run. I made the halfway turn and saw two flashes of people cross in front of me. They were sprinting for the T. Before I knew what happened I race in a race. The Green Line was on my right and it was doing everything it could to beat me home, even going through a yellow light. I picked up the pace and glanced over. The first half mile we were running neck and neck. Shortly thereafter it made it's move. I was pushing a small uphill and it accelerated. I was falling behind. I glanced at my watch 6:30 pace. I knew I had more then that in me. I dug deep and started to make up some ground. Come on red light give me some help. All I need is one stop or one slow moving person boarding. I pushed harder. I can see the finish it is going to be close. I push on and make my turn as it is crossing the intersection. I glance at my watch and see 5:27 pace and a 193 HR and I slow down. It edged my by a nose but I gave it a good run for 1.5 miles.

I slowed for the last mile. Yeah it is going to be a good day.

DirecTV

I can not say enough good about directv.

My biggest complaint is I waited way to long to make the switch. They are about the same price but I get so much more for it including the NFL package 2 HD boxes and 5 times more memory for my DVR.

However, none of that is why I am praising them. Their customer service is unbelievable. They are professional, keep me updated on their progress, and continue to thank me for being a new customer. Today I was on the phone with them for over 40 minutes fixing a billing error. I never knew it was that long. They communicated with me, told me what they were doing, updated their status regularly and were pleasant throughout.

Normal

It is a word that bugs me. I am tempted to say that in fact there is no normal. However, when I look it up in the dictionary I can actually find a definition that I can agree with:

Mathematics.

a.	being at right angles, as a line; perpendicular.

b.	of the nature of or pertaining to a mathematical normal.

c.	(of an orthogonal system of real functions) defined so that the integral of the square of the absolute value of any function is 1.

d.	(of a topological space) having the property that corresponding to every pair of disjoint closed sets are two disjoint open sets, each containing one of the closed sets.

e.	(of a subgroup) having the property that the same set of elements results when all the elements of the subgroup are operated on consistently on the left and consistently on the right by any element of the group; invariant.

Otherwise, there is no normal. Now that we have established that can the media stop telling me this is the "new normal."

Further, the only thing normal about an 8 year old is that they are not.

Car people

Can't be cheap people.

The contradiction would kill them. Car people want the gadgets, the horsepower, the stuff that cheap people never even think about and certainly wouldn't pay for.

december goal

After missing the first day of the month my goal is to workout every remaining day this month.

Lose 1 pound.

tap tap tap

This thing still on?

hmm...it seems to be.

I guess the question is where have I been? Twitter, linked in, Facebook, lots of places.
I have often thought about posting stuff here, but haven't gotten to it.

Maybe now that I got back here I will visit more often. More importantly, I do have some random observations....

If we have known that sooner or later (and more likely sooner) we would have a vacant seat senate election in MA, why couldn't we get even one interesting candidate?

I really like the NFL package and Direct TV. It took a long time to switch but now that I have there is no going back. Speaking of Football...can't say I am bothered by the fact that the 5th English word my son learned was "football."

I had a pretty good 5K fall racing season in October. Not so much in November, but in fairness I was a bit distracted.

I think the SU Men's B-Ball team is going to be really good this year.

On another note I hope she is preparing for the biggest pay cut in her life. It is coming in 6 more months.

You heard it here first. NO and Indy will not face each other in the Super bowl.

“They were what we (I) thought they were” – Dennis Green

I have run many races and over time I have done a pretty good job of standing on the start line and having a real good idea of who will be contending for the win. Unfortunately, yesterday was no different. I was standing in the pouring rain looking around and two things became perfectly clear to me.

There was not a guy in the field that could beat me.

There were 2 or 3 women who looked like they could.

The race started and a within a hundred yards there were 3 of us out front. My instincts were right on, I was running with two women. Within a half mile the lead women took off and gapped us. A few minutes later number 2 would give chase. I tried to stay calm, run my race and hope they might come back to me. Three miles in I saw my first mile marker and it was 19:30ish. I wondered if it was right. If it was I was running an over 40 10K. It was about here that I started to think of all my regrets:

I regretted not yet starting that 5 pound weight loss plan

I regretted the every other speed work.

I regretted the hill work on Thursday.
I regretted my little ménage a trio this summer with my bike and wetsuit.

I regretted my shoe choice.

I regretted that nice big dinner the night before.

I still had second place in my sight and I tried to close the gap. I had no idea if the time at 3 miles was right but I was not about to run a 10K in 40+. I pushed hard in the pouring rain finally reaching mile 5 in 31.xx and knew now was not the time to slow down. Sadly what had been a very well marked course all along all of a sudden became unmarked. I ran into an intersection saying which way and was told toward the water. This did not help. I slowed and screamed some more and was finally told how to go. I hit the long straight and managed to finish in 39:41. I told the finish people they needed someone out on the last 2 corners and they said the last runner said the same thing.

"They were what we (I) thought they were" – Dennis Green

I was third overall and first male. I did win a $30 gift certificate to the local running store and in my current shape was not going anywhere near a 37:xx that the winner ran. A few minutes later I headed back out to the course to run in my sister who was doing her first every 10K. She did great finishing in a bit over an hour and smiling the whole way in the rain.

--
Joe B