The Friday Top Five: The Five Things I Have Learned Being Married

Those of you with living with a domestic partner understand how difficult it is to negotiate space, time, and responsibilities. Relationships constantly evolve as we evolve as people. I mean, are you the same person now that you were ten years ago, let alone, five years ago? I shudder to ask. Over the course of my eleven years of utterly blissful marriage to my wonderful wife—who I am lucky to have (I know this because I am reminded of it daily by my wife and my family)—I have learned some things about myself and my skill set that have come to light thanks to my wonderful wifey. Here are the top five:

5) DOMESTIC DUTIES: According to my wife, before I met her, I as unable to actually cook and clean and perform simple domestic chores. I found this revelation especially worrisome because I don't know how I survived six years of living on my own as an undergraduate and during graduate school before meeting my wife. Apparently, I suck at performing the simplest of tasks: folding laundry, making the bed, and doing the laundry, because I am no longer able to do these things. I know what you're thinking... I purposely sabotage the making of the bed and folding of laundry so that I do not have to do it. Negative. After putting together a couple of piles of clothes, wifey will inevitably sigh, grab about half of them and refold them. I love cooking, and my wife does not mind when I cook. However, upon finishing dinner, it apparently looks like "a hurricane went through the kitchen." If I clean immediately after dinner, I am allowed to cook for the family again without permission. However, if I wait too long to clean up after myself, I lose my cooking privilege for an undetermined amount of time.

And while I am on domestic chores, what the hell is the sense of making the bed? Yes, I realize it looks nice, but when I was in college, I think I actually made my bed twice during a semester, and that was only because I washed my sheets. Again, I am not sure I actually made the bed, but rather, made it so I could sleep in it comfortably.

4) I AM NOT AS FUNNY AS I THINK I AM: Marriage has taught me that although I think I am one of the most hysterical and good-humored persons on the planet, that I am in fact about as funny as the film "Leaving Las Vegas." When I took my new job and went into school the first day to teach, my wife looked at me and said, "Mark, don't try to be funny, you are not that funny." I think she was only half-serious. What I have learned about teaching is that I have stopped being cool and funny in the way that my students think of "cool" and "funny."

3) I AM A TERRIBLE DRIVER: Although I've never been in any accident (that was my fault), I may in fact be the worse driver in North America. I know this because my wife is actually responsible for giving me directions like a Nascar pit crew while I am driving with her anywhere. "You're going to fast," "Don't get so close to that car." What I like most of all are the comments and rhetorical questions she asks as I am driving:

"What do you think, you're driving a Ferrari?"

or

"Yiiiikes!  *under breath* Not safe... not safe."

2) I DO NOT NEED TO EAT A FEAST FOR DINNER EVERY NIGHT: Huh, who knew? You mean, I don't need to eat a meal every evening like it is my last meal on Earth? Yeah, unfortunately, this is one of the things left over from my impressionable Italian upbringing that is the most difficult to break from. Dinner time growing up was a festival of food. It did not matter if it was Sunday or a holiday, my mother always made a large dinner for the family which invariably consisted of enough pasta to feed an entire army barracks, or just my brothers and me. Wifey has taught me that not only could we just eat cous cous salad for dinner sans meat, but we can also have breakfast for dinner on occasion. Honestly, who does enjoy waffles and bacon any time of the day?

1) I NEED TO PRACTICE MY MIND READING: This is one of the most important skills that any person in a relationship should hone if in fact they want a long, happy relationship. Your mind-reading skills and powers of perception are two of the most crucial skills that you can hope to improve upon throughout your relationship. I have been trained to notice something as simple as a haircut. I should state that not only do I notice the haircut, but if I do not notice the haircut or new outfit within the first five minutes of speaking to the wifey, I obviously am completely self-absorbed and therefor do not care about her feelings. It is also important to work on your mind-reading so that you can know what your partner is thinking without them actually speaking the words. This is particularly difficult if you do not possess the abilities of an extra-sensory empath like Deanna Troi. I would suggest keeping a detailed journal of your partner's body language as a quick reference guide as how to respond to potentially life-threatening situations.

More soon. Train Smart!

The Friday Top Five: The Top Five Things You Give Up When You Become A Parent

5) Being Cool: Although some parents try desperately to remain cool by declaring to all the world that  they would "would never be caught dead in a minivan," having an infant pee, poop, and vomit on you makes what type of ride you're rolling in the least of your problems. You have to worry about whether anyone at work can smell that vomit on your clothes because you were too tired to change them on account of staying up all night wondering why how your child will cry all evening for you then manage to sleep all afternoon when you need to run errands.

4) Listening to your music in the Car: I have tried desperately to indoctrinate my children to my musical aesthetic. It has worked for the most part. Sometimes, it is a little embarrassing. I mean, I remember my boys singing "Brass Monkey" at some pretty inopportune times as well. Now, my youngest wants to hear her Suzuki violin CD and everyone in the car will sing Lightly Row, Twinkle Little Star (to the rhythm of "Mississippi hotdog"—a personal favorite of mine). I have also listened to enough Disney tunes in the car with the kids that I have temporarily "misplaced" the CD... perhaps forever.

3) Reasoning: It is nearly impossible to try to reason with five year old. Their brains—although amazing sponges—do not function quite the same way as a fairly well-adjusted adult. I use "fairly adjusted" here, because, let's just face it, all of us are still recovering from the trauma of are dysfunctional childhoods. Children believe that are at the center of the universe and that everyone and everything should revolve around them. Forget trying to speak sensibly to a screaming toddler. What I have learned is that inconsolable screaming over
not having the right dinner fork or wrong socks to wear with their school clothes is usually a result of on of two things:

                        1) child is hungry
                        2) child is tired

Here is a diagram of how the average child thinks:

2) Sanity: Yeah, wifey and I left this at the turnstile long ago. (I am not even sure what that means). All I can attest to is that having young, fragile lives to take care of every second of the day is a daunting task. There are times when I have been so crazed trying to get the kids ready to do something that I leave the house without remembering to bring my computer, or lunch, or brain to work with me.

1) Sleeping In: Yeah, forget this completely. Sleeping in when you have small children means waking up past 7 a.m. I remember the first time we had to set a mandatory "sleep in" time with my oldest son. He came into our bedroom and climbed into bed with me and asked if we could go downstairs and play. It was 6:30. I said "No, buddy. We have to sleep until seven o'clock." He nestled in right next to me and went back to sleep.... or so I thought. As soon as the clock hit 7 a.m., he turned around with his
eyes wide open and said "Okay!  It's seven o'clock daddy, let's go downstairs!" Ugh!


Training: Training is going pretty well, as in I am finally training and not just cobbling together a bunch of half-assed workouts and feeling good about myself. Guilt has a way of turning the screw and

My recent delve back into the world of training/self-flaggalation has been directly linked to a few different factors:

1) I was tired feeling like out-of shape. If I intend on keeping my ridiculous Ironman like diet (which I have absolutely no intention of departing with), then I thought that perhaps I should start training more consistently. I am self-motivated, but I needed some time off to regroup after Rev3 Full Cedar Point to reassess what I wanted to focus on this season.

2) I have a coach. I am now trained by Coach Kelly over at T2Multisport. The cool part about training with Kelly is that I have known her for a long time. We went to graduate school together some.... hmm, 12 years ago!

3) Work: This semester has been incredibly crazy, not to mention the fact that we moved twice in the span of two months. We are settled now, but it made training insane.

I have some lower back pain that I have been wrestling with. I could not figure out where it was coming from. I thought that perhaps it was a result of bumping up the training again. Wifey's back has also been hurting her. We have been giving each other nightly massages. Bonus.

Last night I finally figured out where all my pain is coming from. I knew that is must be some movement that I have been doing because it is really localized. While I sit in my office, I often throw my feet up on top of a chair—as I am sometimes sitting in front of my computer for hours out of my day—and write. Last evening, I noticed that my torso was having to twist around to put my feet up and that the numerous hours I have spent in that position have caused a great deal of pain. It reminded me of when I was a graduate student at the Ithaca Conservatory and I spent the summer painting houses. I was young then (with more hair), and I spent hours on a ladder painting trim with my arm stretched over my head. I didn't notice anything at the time until the next morning when I got up and my neck was absolutely killing me.

The Rest:


My youngest has graduated to her first real violin after spending a few weeks on the noodle-roni box. So awesome! Watch out, Vanessa Mae!

Blogs, Bambini, And Bonking And The Friday Top Five

Blogs:


It's not me, it's you. Really. 


Look, it's not that I don't love you, it is just that I need a better way of managing all of my fellow bloggers. Currently, I sift through ALL 170 of my dedicated followers and try to hit each of the blogs on a rotational basis. This proves tedious. What makes it tedious is that Blogger opens up this window with a link to their blog. Actually, often I can not even get a link to the blog. This is especially annoying when you would like to reciprocate the blog love you just received. Then, there are times that I get to these blogs, only to find out that they have since removed it, or they have not written a post in about three months. Still, much of the problem with not hitting everyone's blogs effectively lies in my inability to manage them. 


So!  I am open for suggestions on how to do this most effectively in Blogger. Any thoughts? Is there an effective way to make links to all the blogs that I read? I see blog menus at the top of some blogs that allow for the reader to easily click on a blog. This seems like it would take a computer science degree, or an especially large amount of time trying to figure out. 

Bambini:


Wifey and I have the best children in the world. Now, don't get me wrong. Just the other day, I was having lunch with my friend Kelly and I asked her if she ever wants to put a muzzle over her children's mouths because they drive her to the brink of insanity. I think we both agree, that while we love our children unconditionally, that we sometimes wish that our houses came with round cushioned sound proof rooms. 


However, while there is certainly a lot of insanity going around, they do manage to fill our lives with an unbelievable amount of joy and humor. Our children say the funniest things. For instance, yesterday morning, Stella looks over at wifey sitting at the kitchen table and says "Mommy.... daddy's triathlon stuff is all over the couch!"  I came home from work last week and Julian came running to the door telling me that he had a special performance that he and his sisters were going to perform for me and mommy that evening. The kiddies have two parents that are artists. They recently attended a concert that wifey and I were in in which I made a bunch of my own instruments and improvised on several instruments throughout the performance. Julian had decided that he was going to spend the day building his own set of musical instruments before I arrived home from work that evening. Check out a small part of the performance:

Bonking: 


I had a really rough run on Saturday morning. I went out for my usual 10k, but completely bonked at mile four. Like, as in, my heart rate was stratospheric. I think it was the result of: 1) Not being adequately hydrated. Imagine that. Me. Not adequately hydrated. The guy that went to the hospital twice—one of those times being personally chauffeured by my local volunteer ambulance service—over the span of five years. 2) Not enough rest. Yeah, not only had I not gone to bed early enough all last week, but I wake up far too early on account of our kids deciding that they want to make as much noise as humanly possible during the wee small hours of the morning. 


THE FRIDAY TOP FIVE:


The Friday Top Five: The Top Five Things That My Children's Generation Will Never Know:


I think every generation probably looks at the next and thinks how fortunate they are to never have the opportunity to be able to do things that they were able to experience. Those pioneer work ethic folks that grew up before the turn of the century probably felt bad for their children who would never know how to churn butter, live without indoor plumbing, and never experience the natural glow of gas lamps. Having grown up during the 1970's and 1980's, I am really a gen-exer. Thus, my list will represnt the poor taste and bias of a disillusioned generation having had to live through both bell-bottoms and Cyndi Lauper: 


5) The Adult Magazine: Look, whether for better or worse, one of the rites of passage for a teenage boy was the shame and humiliation they had to suffer going into an adult bookstore to get a glimpse, or purchase an adult magazine. With the proliferation of pornography on the internet, it seems that those days no longer exist. 


4) Vinyl: I was part of the last generation of teenagers going out to purchase albums. I always chose albums over tapes. My friends thought I was crazy, but there were two reasons for this:

1) Album art is pretty kick-ass. They either have to scale everything down to fit on a tape cover—or CD for that matter—or completely eliminate some of the material. That is lame. Album covers were sometimes provocative, humorous, or grotesque. Whatever the case, when I was a teenager, I would spend hours in a record store looking at the cover art of albums. It was my way of getting my artistic fix if I was unable to actually purchase the album, which was most often the case. 

2) You could always tape the album as soon as you brought it home. I had this crazy idea that I could tape all my albums and when one of the tapes started wearing out, then I could just record it on another tape, thus, preserving the life of my album. 


3) Arcades: Sure, arcades still exist, but not like they did back when I was growing up. Games were generally only a quarter to play. About ten years ago, a bunch of high-priced arcade/bars starting opening up in large, trendy metropolitan areas around the country selling  "points" on cards depending on how much of your hard earned money you were willing to part with. Wifey and I went to one of these places. After putting just $5 on our card, we realized that was only good for, hmmm, two games. I remember going to the mall as a teenager with a couple of dollars. That was my afternoon. It was usually a combination of Joust, Dig Dug, and Galaga. I really had to pace myself with my two dollars, otherwise I would be watching other people play for the remainder of my afternoon. I would have to comb the mall visiting Spencer Gifts, looking at posters of Samantha Fox and nameless poster models in scantily clad clothing with my friends. 


The games today are ridiculously sophisticated. When I was learning how to play Mario Kart a couple of years ago with my boys, I found the learning curve really steep. It moves fast. For the life of me, I can not understand how more people are not suffering from neurological disorders as a result of prolonged exposure to these psychedelic video game experiences. 


Nowadays, kids can sit indoors, all day on their Wii's, Crackstations, or other video gaming devices. As if nerds were not isolated enough, now nerds sit on their couch all day eating crap and playing video games, because mom and dad do not want to bother being parents. Look, I am not defending video games at all, but at least when I was a kid, we would have to stand to play them. More, we actually interacted with other nerdy kids about the best way to defeat that bad dude on the fifth screen of Kung Fu Master. 


There was recently an exhibit at the Strong Museum of Play in Rochester, New York, of on hundred old video games like Tron (my personal favorite), Pole Position, Bezerk, Defender, etc. The exhibit was so popular–especially with nerds that fall into my demographic–that they actually purchased the exhibit. Do you realize that we will be the first generation of octogenarians playing Madden?

2) Pay Phones/Phones with Cords: I will never forget the first time I realized that I had to actually bite the bullet and purchase a cellular phone. It was gigantic and had an antennae that I had to pull up. I actually remember rotary phones. 


1) Rock and Roll: The only way my children will ever understand what rock and roll is will be my me playing it and talking to them about it. There are no rock bands anymore. Seriously. Can you name one? A rock band. You know... like The Rolling Stones, The Who, and Led Zeppelin. I had a conversation with one of my classes the other day about how we are still talking about Led Zeppelin forty years later. How many bands from their generation do you think will be current forty years from now? We will look back on Maroon Five and Dave Matthews as horrible sociological experiments. The idea of rock and roll being dead brings up an even more interesting question. How will we ever experience the work of The Who again? 


In modern dance, there exists several repertory companies that keep the work of seminary figures in the modern dance world alive, such as Martha Graham, Alvin Ailey, Jose Limon, and Merce Cunningham. Are there going to be Rock and Roll repertory companies, or are we only going to know what theses bands sound like from video and audio performances? 


Training:


Okay, we have some unbelievable, unseasonably warm weather here in western New York. The sun has been shining all weekend with temperatures approaching the 60's!  In late November! Ah, global warming does have its perks. I start my official season training on Monday. Can not wait. Looking forward to getting the official ball rolling.


 More soon. Train Smart!

The Friday Top Five: The Five Worst 80's Artists

Remember the 1980's? I do. Skinny leather ties, John Hughes films (I was no-so-secretly in love with Molly Ringwald), leg warmers worn over jeans, Atari, and Garbage Pail Kids (wifey still has a huge mint collection of them in the basement). Those were among some of the coolest trends that transpired from an era that gave rise to the perm and copious amounts of Aqua Net hair spray. It was sometimes difficult to distinguish the faces of many of the girls in my high school because the feathered bangs and porcupine-like hairdos negated their faces. 

To be fair, there were some cool things that emerged  from  the 1980's. The 1980's were the golden years of both New Wave and Hip Hop. Bands like New Order, Depeche Mode, Elvis Costello and Art of Noise (named after the famous Luigi Rusollo manifesto of 1913) meant that nerdy keyboard players who previously got no love from screaming coeds attending their concerts, were now nerdy keyboard players that still got no love from screaming coeds, but were at the cutting edge of popular culture. It was this decade that invited a whole generation of white middle class suburban kids to wear baggy pants and imitate the subversive underground hip hop culture that was emerging by adopting the gesticulations and jargon of artists like RUN DMC and LL Cool J. The 80's ushered a new dance style of movement referred to as breakdancing. With Breakin' II: Electric Boogaloo as my inspiration, I spent countless hours perfecting my moonwalk  and windmill. I am proud to say that I can still throw it down and in the same awkward way nearly thirty years later. 

There was, however, some really terrible music that emerged during this era. Listed below are the top five songs that I am embarrassed to even say I know. If these artists were never to happen, I think the musical landscape of the 1980's would be a far better place:

#5) Mister Mister: Yeah, so take those broken wings and fly the heck out of here, because that song is wickety-wack. What made this band most possibly most embarrassing was the post-Bing Crosby-crooner-like lyricism that said "I am trying to be Steve Perry, but I am just not that cool." Interestingly enough, the band members all went on to have pretty decent careers in music afterwards, writing hit songs for artists like Madonna, Whitesnake, and Rod Stewart. However, lead guitarist and bassist, Richard Page, released a Christmas EP in 2010. Christmas albums are the official death of an artist's career. 

#4) Night Ranger: This San Francisco based pop-rock band quintet's most popular radio hit was the power  ballad "Sister Christian" which peaked at #5 in 1984. They are still doing it after all these years. Nice, old guys in leather pants. Move over Loverboy!

#3) Toad the Wet Sprocket: Years ahead of their time, I like to define them as the slightly less sophisticated Dave Matthews Band of their generation. You know, really Wonderbread. I am sure that the same things that made their music attractive to scores of soccer playing teenagers in the 80's are also what make Dave Matthews attractive to this generation of musically misinformed college coeds. 

Oh, you Dave Matthews apologists, don't get me started. So many of my students ask, "Yeah, but they are such talented musicians, right?" They might be, but Yngwie Malmsteen has great facility on the guitar, but he is still embarrassing. I am not going to front. I own a CD though. 

#2) Richard Marx: Did you know that his debut album yielded four hit singles and went on to sell four million copies? Don't even pretend like you did not rock it out in your mom's minivan to "Don't Mean Nothing," and I am quite confident his "Hold on to the Nights"track made it onto that mix tape you made the girl you were going to spend the rest of your life with in ninth grade. His second album, Repeat Offender, knocked Prince off of the number one position. Prince!  Who is cool and can play his proverbial ass off! Repeat Offender went triple platinum in a number of months and eventually went on to sell five million albums. Blame it on the emergence of Gangsta' rap, but unfortunately Rick never attained the same level of success he enjoyed with his first two albums. In 2006, he appeared on the Fox television show "Celebrity Duets." Although the Fox network is known for its quality programming like Who Want to Marry a Multi-Millionaire, appearing on a Fox reality television show is kind of like making a Christmas album—the kiss of death.

#1) Rick Astley: Rick Astley falls into the category of artists whose songs all sound the same. Among the artists belonging to the dedicated club of making all of their music sound the same are ZZ Top, Dave Matthews Band, and Howard Jones. The best thing that Rick Astley has contributed to popular culture is the "Rick-Rolling" phenomenon. He defines the quintessential white man dance. 

Who are your bottom five?

TRAINING:

We have all been there as athletes. You know, those times during the year when you are trying to compress the six million things that you want to do into a 24-hour period. What is up with this rotation of the earth being so quick? I have to admit though, now that we have been dealing with 24-hour days our whole life, it makes the idea of even having a slightly longer day confusing, and possibly, downright problematic. I mean. have you considered how perfect our clocks look with five numbers nestled on either side of those hemispheres between the twelve and the six? What would it look like to have even one more hour on that clock? Yeah, clearly not right.

My training the past couple of weeks have been pretty decent. The guilt of taking some downtime and continuing to eat as if I were still training for an iron distance event has caught up to me. To be honest, I clearly have to start training my proverbial ass off again, because I am not about to give up my 3500 calorie pancake breakfast with real New York State male syrup anytime soon. I have started to Rev my engines once again and start thinking about next season. My work-induced "downtime" during the month of October has officially left me hungry for more pool time and long runs.

It is shaping up to be a beautiful weekend here in western New York. I might get out for my last November ride of the season this weekend. Almost all the way through November and still no snow!

More soon. Train Smart!

The Friday Top Five

Looks like I will be going for the Ragnar double bottle opener come October in Pennsylvania. Two Ragnar races in the same season. I am clearly psychotic, or I have a subconscious desire for self-flaggelation. 

Before leaving for the Ragnar Relay, I was having some minor knee discomfort. Like, I could not run without pain in my right knee. The pain was really localized to an area on the left side of my right patella. Running Ragnar was painful. The first couple of miles were always painful, but then the pain subsided—or my knee just became relatively numb—and I managed to grimace through it. On the way back from Ragnar, I was really concerned that no amount of physical therapy, or beer, were going to be able to remedy the pain in my knee. I could not even lift my leg up off the seat I was sitting on. So, I scheduled an appointment with the orthopedic on Tuesday.

Good news. He took x-rays and said my knee looks really healthy. Apparently the pain is a result of bursitis. Therapy: no running for a bit, ice and Aleve.

Looks like the gang is getting back together to race Ragnar Relay Pennsylvania in October.

Rev 3 Quassay is only weeks away. I am a little concerned about the water temperature being really cold. It has been rainy and  miserable throughout the whole northeast this spring. What gives? Last year, it was unusually warm during the month of May. I am very excited about meeting many of my Trakkers teammates for the first time. Plus, I think my nephews are going to be out there documenting again for me. If you missed the nephews the first time around, you'll want to check them out for sure. My nephew Nicholas is an electrical engineer, and Michael is a marketing guru, but when they are together, they can not pass kindergarten. Ah, brothers!

Real excited to put all my training together in a few weeks on my way towards Rev 3 Cedar Point where I will be racing the iron distance. I believe Coach Mary has me preparing really well and I have felt confident about all my training. I have noticed a pretty substantial difference in my workouts since my semester has ended. For me, training has more of psychological toll than physical. During the semester, my mind is occupied with the laundry list of things I need to get done, and it is sometimes difficult to just compartmentalize my workout. It has definitely gotten easier. I think the solution will always be getting my ass out of bed and training earlier. That way, I can focus on what I need to get done during the day, and not worry about how I am going to fit my workout in during the day. Am I the only one who feels this way?

Okay, onto the Friday Top Five. My five favorite 80's movies:


The Friday Top Five—80's Movies:

5) The Breakfast Club: The 1985 cult classic that immediately resonated with a vast majority of generation xers because of its ability to employ every possible high school stereotype: the jock, the head, athlete, the basket case, the brain, and the princess.  Honestly, I think that everyone who is currently in the late thirties or early forties has had to seen this movie at least once, if not multiple times. The Breakfast Club is a story about five high school students who—represent every possible cliche their is—have to spend a Saturday afternoon at their high school for detention. I will be the first to admit that I had almost an unhealthy hidden love affair with the red-headed angel of all those classic John Hughes films, actress Molly Ringwald, for most of my adolescent years. For years I could watch this film and recite every line almost verbatim. I was so nerdy. Like most adolescents, I was trying desperately to find myself. I would break down my high school persona as such:

40% Anothony Michael Hall's character
40% Emilio Estevez's character
20% John Bender's character

Admittedly, every once in a while I will get on IMDB (Internet Movie Data Base—for those of you living n another galaxy ) to see what Molly and Ally are up to. Why, oh why can I not see more of my two high school girlfriends?


4) Real Geniuses: I have said it before and I'll say it again. Never has there ever been a finer film made about nerdy engineering students developing a high-powered laser that can liquidate human targets from outer space. I have probably seen this film more than any other film on my list. I watch it a couple of times a year and never tire of it. If any of you are looking at ways to blow up a house using a laser and popcorn, you should check out this movie.

3) Sixteen Candles: Another one of my John Hughes favorites. Sixteen Candles is the classic story of Samantha Baker—played by my high school girlfriend Molly Ringwald (unbeknownst to her)—in which her family completely forgets her sixteenth birthday as they are completely consumed by wedding preparations the same weekend for their oldest daughter. It is your classic "nerd likes girl, parents forget birthday, sister gets married and snookered up on muscle relaxers, girl falls for jockey sensitive, wealthy type whose father owns a Rolls Royce who Anthony Michael Hall's  nerdy character—smitten for Ringwald—will use to have sex in with  jock's ex-girlfriend story."  But, there are some twists too. How can this movie possibly miss?

2) Caddyshack: There have been a lot of golf movies: The Legend of Baggar Vance, Tin Cup, Happy Gilmore, but for me, there will never be a better movie ever made about the sport than Caddyshack. I think the comedic timing of this movie makes it so funny. What's more, comedic legends Rodney Dangerfield, Chevy Chase, and Bill Murray star in the same film. I can not play a game of H-O-R-S-E with someone now without yelling "Noonan" as they are trying to sink a shot. Hysterically, my nine year old son—who has never seen the movie—will also yell out "noonan" as I am trying to sink a shot. I've created a monster.

1) This is Spinal Tap: I would seriously give this movie a 9 out of 11. If you do not know what I am talking about, then it is right time you get hip to the greatest rock film ever made. This is SPinal Tap takes a satirical and unbelievably accurate look at the heavy metal rock scene of the late 70's and early 80's. I have enough friends who lived this lifestyle who say that this hits a little too close to home. You know... spandex, completely self-absorbed personalities with unbelievably poor self-awareness. Everything that made heavy metal great.

Honorable Mentions: Back to the Future, E.T., Blues Brothers.  What are YOURS??!!


Okay, more soon. Train Smart!

Exhaling, The Friday Top Five, And Where Have I Been?!

This picture pretty much defines my life. These are my absolutely wonderful five children—all of which with personalities so different that one would think there is no possible way they could all be related. We were on our way to go sledding a couple of weeks ago when I thought I should take a picture of the Fab Five. My daughter, Janina, is the quiet one in the purple. My son Julian, is the one in back who resembles Kenny from the television series South Park. 


So, I know what you might be thinking. Where has this guy been? I love writing my blog. Even when I am really busy, I still manage to write a post at least once a week. The last  month was probably the busiest month that I can remember in my life. Even while preparing my dissertation defense and getting ready to defend, I was still not as stressed as I was the past week. 


I started a position at a new institution after being Composer In Residence at another institution for ten years. It has been a welcome change. I have amazing colleagues, wonderful students, and a very collaborative academic environment. I am a strong believer of collaboration within academia. What do I mean by that? For instance, one of my colleagues has spoken to me about the possibility of co-teaching a course on music and poetry—looking at the way composers treat text in regard to compositional devices: form, rhythm, meter, articulations, harmony, dynamics, phrasing. I work at a place where interdisciplinary projects are the norm—and people get really creative. For instance, I had a conversation with a colleague in mathematics about taking a course on the math of Darmstadt era composers. You see, some composers write with very specific processes. How cool is my job? I am teaching an independent study to a student this semester who is learning improvisation with me. Once a week he puts it into practice by walking over to the dance department with his guitar and accompanying modern classes. 


Anyway, the last two weeks I had been preparing a class to teach and an prepping my evening talk as part of the interview process. My father use to say to us that it was okay to fail as long as we gave it everything we had. His viewpoint was that we learn from those experiences. We put our best foot forward, prepare the hell out of something, and hope that we have our best performance on that day. In a lot of ways, it is kind of like triathlon. 


I want to thank all my friends, colleagues, and my Trakkers teammates who sent out a lot of love and support the last week wishing my luck. Oh, and of course I would be remiss if I did not mention my  super-awesome coach who sent me an email reminding me that I have been preparing for the position my whole life. 


So, that is where I have been. In a cave. Well, more like the library, but you get the idea. 




The Friday Top Five

1) Pasta: Yeah, I think it should come as NO surprise that pasta is the favorite food of a guy who actually wrote a post titled "Confessions of a Complex Carboholic". It is probably only within this list that I could actually create a subcategory of my favorite pastas as well. How Italian am I?! First on the list for me would be pasta penne vodka. Seriously, how can you go wrong with a sauce made from proscuitto, cream, and vodka?  Next would be pasta with pesto (pronounced "pay-sto). We grow our own basil in our garden during the summer. My wife collects a kitchen table's worth by the end of the summer and breaks out the parmesan cheese and oil to make fresh pesto. She jars it, and I consume it in ridiculous amounts on my pasta until it has disappeared and I have to wait another summer to get my fix. I don't think a week went by last summer that I did not make pasta salad—a dish consisting of fresh cavatelli, olive oil, tomato's, basil, garlic, mozzarella cheese. After you pour the warm cavatelli in a bowl bringing out the flavor of the garlic and add the other ingredients, I would always drizzle on a little balsamic vinegar to finish. As I am writing this, I am daydreaming about making lunch today. 

2) Pizza: Seriously, I think I could eat pizza everyday of the week if I could eliminate my conscience. I don't like the "healthy" variety of this culinary masterpiece. I prefer thin crust pepperoni pizza, especially the kind made wood fired pizzerias, where the crust gets slightly toasty on the sides. A lot of love in that pizza!


3) Bruschetta: bruschetta \brü-ˈske-tə, -ˈske-\. My memories of bruschetta go back to when I was a small child. My father would cut up pieces of Italian bread from a loaf and put them on a tray in the fireplace to toast. When they got a nice golden brown, he would take a garlic clove and rub it on the bread, followed by a little olive oil and salt. That's it. No tomato's. No cheese, parsley, or citrus like you find at some of these fancy Italian restaurants that claim to be authentic. Nope. Just real good peasant food. He taught me how to make it, and I have taught my children. I don't know why something so simple is so delicious, but it just works. My father would tell me what a wonderful meal it was to have some olives, a couple pieces of cheese, bruschetta, and a glass of wine. Clearly, he was a visionary!


4) Chicken and black bean burrito: I am convinced I am one millionth Mexican, because my hunger for a decent burrito has steadily grown since I first ate one in Ithaca, New York while attending graduate school. It took me nearly 25 years years to eat one, yes. I did eat some authentic mexican food while attending school in Ohio, but I never ordered burritos for some reason. I eat about one a week now. I like them spicy. 

5) Coconut Ice Cream: Bizarre, right? Not every place has coconut ice cream, and it has been my experience that either people love it, or hate it. If it is on an ice cream parlor (do people even call it an "ice cream parlor" anymore?), I have to get it. 

Training: Needless to say, the training was pretty much non-existant this week. I had a recovery week, so my hours were pretty low anyway—I only had bout five hours of training to do. I did a straight 1500 yard swim on Monday in 27:25 (1:50 pace—hey, I'm not fast... yet!), and I ran yesterday for the first time all week. I did 4x1 mile repeats after a ten minute warm up. My splits were:  8:00. 7:53, 7:48, and 7:42. I am a good minute off my pace from the end of the season last year, but I am sure I will get it back down again..... right?!  


Oh!  I ran in my NEW Avia Quest Lite's for the first time and I absolutely DIG them. I ran my mile repeats in them. I thought I was going to need a little time breaking them in and perhaps they were not going to be comfortable right away out of the box. I was wrong. If a shoe feels that good out of the box on your first run, I can not wait to feel what it is going to be like after I put some miles in these puppies! 

Okay, I am officially ready to post my bike porn in my next post. A lot of my teammates ordered their first Kestrels this season. All I can say is that you will not be disappointed. I spoke to a bunch of my friends about how much more comfortable I have been on this bike already. You know what that mean, right? More comfortable = faster!  


Still do not have a name for my new ride. I will need one for the beginning of the season. Perhaps I should have a "Name My New Baby Contest?" 


Coach Mary has me doing 10 hours this week. I am looking forward to the therapy after a pretty stressful week last week. 


More soon. Train Smart!