Yeah, sometimes I don't know why she puts up with me either. Must be the food.

"And if there were a God, I think it very unlikely that He would have such an uneasy vanity as to be offended by those who doubt His existence." -- Bertrand Russell, What is an Agnostic?

This morning's Velocity was three rounds of:

40m standing long jump
40 side to side bench jumps
20 pushups
20 GHG situps
1 suicide

The standing long jumps were done down and back 20m, with the start of the next jump beginning with the end of the previous jump, no break, using the momentum of the previous jump to set the spring of the next jump.

The side to side bench jumps started by placing both hands on the end of a weight bench, facing down at it, standing on one side. The jumps were done by jumping over the bench, landing on the opposite side of the bench and using the landing to spring back over to the other side.

My biggest problem with the side to side bench jumps was mental. I had to convince myself that I could actually make these jumps, even though I watched Kris clear the bench by a foot or so. My biggest worry was clearing the bench, which caused me to jump farther and farther away from the bench. By jumping farther away from the bench, I had farther to jump to clear the bench, causing me to jump exactly the right distance to not quite clear the bench.

I ended up with a pressure scrape down the side of my leg, and an 8" bruise on the side of my leg. It's not deep, but wide, and looks like a raspberry birthmark along the side of my leg.

I clearly need more vitamin K.

When I showed it to Kris, Breanne saw it and gave me a look like, "How uncoordinated can my clients be?"

We all finished the three rounds in about 30 minutes, giving us a ten minutes to do n burpees on the nth minute, resting for the rest of the minute. When Breanne first described it she said "pushup" instead of "burpee," and we all thought, "How easy!" When she corrected herself to burpee, we all groaned.

1 burpee, rest the remaining time of minute 1.
2 burpees, rest the remaining time of minute 2.
3 burpees, rest the remaining time of minute 3.
4 burpees, rest the remaining time of minute 4.
5 burpees, rest the remaining time of minute 5.
6 burpees, rest the remaining time of minute 6.
7 burpees, rest the remaining time of minute 7.
8 burpees, rest the remaining time of minute 8.

I managed to the the 8 burpees in 30 seconds, though Kris did them in 20 seconds. My hamstrings, however, were shot, so I stopped for round 9, but did do round 10. Another woman at class today, one who grew up in Chesterton (to my delight, all of the women in class today except Breanne were from Indiana, the Chesterton woman having lived the closest to my hometown) also skipped the 9th round, and did the 10th round.

My hamstrings are shot.

The team had a double practice this weekend. Or rather, today, with two practices: one in the morning and one in the afternoon. I ended up missing the morning practice to take care of Kris, though I can't say I was particularly upset about not going to play ultimate at 7:30 in the morning. Of course, still waking up at 7 but not actually doing what you woke up for sorta sucks.

I left Kris propped up on the couch in front of the football game and hustled to the afternoon practice around noon.

I was (happily) called as a handler a bunch today, which once again makes sense, as it allows everyone else on the team to play the positions they're good at and have been working on all season. I had problems positioning myself on a couple points, but shwu helped me out from the sidelines. I managed to throw upfield a couple times, including a satisfying low release under my defender's arm to Will.

After a few six pulls going both ways, a scrimmage or two, and a couple drills moving the disc off the line, we neared the end of practice early. We had one more fun drill, the elimination marking drill where two lines face each other and throw to the first in the line on the opposite side. After throwing, the thrower becomes the marker on the opposite line. If a throw doesn't make it to the receiver, because of a hand block, foot block or bad throw, the thrower has a chance to stay in play by preventing the next thrower from completing her pass.

On the sideline before the elimination marking drill, Will was having some water. "Are we done?"

"No," I answered, "we have the elimination marking drill."

"That sucks."

"Why?"

"Because that's my favorite drill, and I don't feel like doing it."

"Well," I responded, "this is when you suck it up and be the champion you are." It was so cliche, what I said, but it was exactly what Kris would be thinking when he said, "Nothing hurts in the finals."

Will looked at me, and without sarcasm, said, "That's just what I needed to hear." He put down his water bottle, and trotted out to the field to throw in the marking drill.

On the women's side (we split into gendered groups), I was the first out with a bad upwind throw, much like the last time, alas. I still had a good time. Next time, I'm starting with a downwind throw.

Time is all you have. And you may find one day that you have less than you think. -- RP

I've been having a lot of problems with stress as of late. The source of the stress is very confined, specifically two sources, but it's having a monumental effect on my life. I'm not particularly pleased about all of this, and try to keep a positive outlook. As Kris often says in a resigned tone, "What are you gonna do?" much in the same was as I imagine the question "Who is John Galt?" would be asked.

When I was in school, my way of dealing with stress was very much to escape it as best I could with books. I read a lot in school, probably too much, as I wasn't necessarily reading my textbooks. I read a lot of Heinlein back then.

I've recently noticed I've myself escaping in a different way. Instead of just reading a book, though I have done that, having run through all of the young adult series I have (Sisters Grimm, Percy Jackson, Septimus Heap, most of my travelling books: Charlie Bone), I've started spending more and more time programming.

Of course, there's POUNDS, and, of course, client work.

I have to wonder, though, if just disappearing into a computer is really the best thing for me to be doing right now. Sure, it's a productive form of escapism, but I'd much prefer to address the problems head on. Not doing so well on that front. A few people know why. I suspect in two months I'll be able to adjust the permissions on some past posts and let them be open to the world at the point when no one will care. That's the best plan.

I haven't stopped reading. I'm just not reading as much as before. The most recent book I've read was the Last Lecture, which is based on the last lecture Randy Pausch gave at Carnegie Mellon before he died (and if you didn't know that, crawl out from under that rock, and watch the video). As near as I can tell, Pausch lived as I wish I had and could. The book is full of a lot of gems. I've gone back to the book uncountable times after reading it all the way through, usually ending up saddened, though comforted, if that's possible.

Last night, Shirley and I hosted a "Hungry for Obama" dinner. Think "grassroots fundraising meets communal dinner" and you have the basic idea of the HfO dinners. A host invites people over and feeds them. The guests donate to the Obama campaign, then pledge to host their own dinner, sort of a viral fundraising concept.

Shirley came over around 5, and we started: Shirley as the lead chef and I as her sous.

Now, I know my kitchen is small. Someday soon, I'd like to fix that by opening up the wall between the kitchen and the livingroom and pushing out the front door to the front of the house where it belongs and not the porch cave that it's in now. That someday comes closer every time something else fails in that room. The lights burnt out a month ago, prompting a livingroom light to be moved into the kitchen. The dishwasher started making horrible noises a week ago. The broiler on the oven failed years ago. A few other problems keep growing. At some point, I'm just going to insist that the kitchen be fixed and be fixed NOW. I warned Kris that it would happen, so he's a least somewhat prepared for it.

Somewhat.

Unfortunately, that kitchen remodel hasn't happened yet, and Shirley and I did the small kitchen dance. The small kitchen dance with lots of countertop rearranging.

Shirley had planned on eight tapas dishes. She was quite organized with the whole dinner, bringing over food items (three bags and a box) and some bowls and the like. She didn't bring much equipment ("I know your kitchen is well stocked," she commented), but the spices she had covered.

Shirley had written down the recipes, by hand, which means you know she reviewed each and every line of the recipe.

The food was amazing. Shirley made a potato and egg Spanish omelette (yum!), a lentil stew, hot hot hot salsa to go with some pita breads, amazing shrimp, croistinis, meatballs, cucumber yogurt dip, and an orange and onion fruit salad. The food was, of course, fabulous.

Well, except the croisitinis. They didn't exactly turn out well. As Shirley said, "What's a dinner party without a disaster?"

Chris was helping out in the kitchen, because, you know, two chefs in a small kitchen isn't enough, you need THREE chefs in a small kitchen to do the small-kitchen ballet. I think he was cooking meatballs, but it might have been the omelette, when we all started smelling a burning smell. We checked the burners, as one had been turned on incorrectly earlier in the cooking process, and we wondered if that was it. No, wasn't it, what was it?

Oh.

That.

Whoops.

Of course, that whole "what's a dinner party without a disaster?" question wasn't quite done with us yet. While everyone was happily eating, I stepped into the kitchen to do a little clean up.

And walked straight into a puddle that reached to the fridge.

What the?

Six beach towels, four hand towels and a lot of sponge wringing later, I discovered the source of the leak. A pipe under the sink had burst.

I turned off all of the water generating sources, which included the dishwasher which was running, and the faucet which wasn't. I mopped up the mess as best I could, and was about to leave the kitchen with everything from under the sink sitting on the countertops when Chris walked into the kitchen. After I told him what happened, he asked me for duct tape. Several pieces later and I didn't have to immediately worry about the kitchen flooding.

Yay Chris!

Of course, that's one more disaster in the kitchen, which leads Kris and I just one more step on our way to a desperately needing a new kitchen.