Bobbie

Fighting for Air

January 28, 2011 Bobbie2 Comments

Nope, this won’t be a dramatic post about the stress of my life or some sort of me vs. the world thing. (No drama…. no no no no drama).

I’m running (walking, limping) in the American Lung Association’s 5k run/walk in Magnuson Park, Seattle on May first. I have a team and everything.

I haven’t run in 1 year, 2 months, and 2 days.

I have 3 months in which to go from zero (with a messed up knee) to 3.1, and I think I can do it.

But you know what that means, right? TRAINING! And… training posts. Lots of posts about people at the gym, and running during lunch breaks, and the benefits of various flavored Gu. Oh, and there will be clothing and shoe reviews, too, as I gear up.

Fighting for air, indeed 😀

Plus One To Self Worth

January 24, 2011 Bobbie2 Comments

In Dungeons and Dragons (yes, I used to play D&D, get over it) the very first thing you do, once your DM has declared the arena in which you are playing (or RIFTS — we did that too), is you wrote up your Character Sheet. Inevitably a piece of Xeroxed paper, it had check boxes and blank spaces for you to detail your character’s physical appearance, social abilities, physical, mental, and emotional abilities/proclivities, as well as a back story. It was not uncommon for everyone’s character to be a fantastically good-looking crack-shot nuclear physicist and ace-pro lover, ala Buckaroo Banzai, but there would be the “fatal flaw” they’d introduce in their character: you know, to remain interesting.

Life doesn’t hand you a character sheet. You are given the looks you inherit genetically, you are alloted the IQ points that amass themselves in your grey matter. Your character, however, is something you can develop and change. (Yes, you can “train your brain”. Yes, you can use surgery to enhance your physical appearance. But really, your character is something both easier and harder to manipulate, and it’s what we’re discussing here, so let’s ignore the caveats and nota benes, shall we?)

One of the best speeches in recent movie history was in The American President, where Michael Douglas’ president makes the statement that a the upcoming presidential race would be *entirely* about character. Any race: presidential, rat, or otherwise, is about character.

I’ve spent some time evaluating the things about myself I don’t like: I send emails too quickly, I take things to heart too easily, I spend too much time worrying about others opinions, I continue to not have the discipline to have the physique I’d like. Some of these are correctable via self-direction, some of these I will have to run into a brick wall or two in order to acquire the necessary mental note. Others seem doomed to compromise: my weight being one of them.

I’ve known a few people who have taken stock of their life completely, and turned it around in a fashion amazing to those who knew them well and those who knew them casually. One good friend lost nearly a hundred pounds, got divorced, acquired all sorts of new hobbies (including running, triathlons, and barhopping); another lost a significant amount of weight (she is not telling, nor should she), stayed married, took control over her education and career and is literally living the dream in Hawaii. Some friends have made changes not so sweeping: leaving an unsatisfying job, taking on new hobbies, reinvesting in their health; I think part of the human condition is to self-evaluate and, for some of us, to target improvements.

I have no idea how much of this is driven by the checklist mentality or the presumptive dopamine rush that comes from living this way. I do know that I have a few things I’d like to change, and maybe if I’m open and outward about them, and write them down, and profess them, if not in a character sheet with 8 or 12 friends and a 20-sided dice but in a blog with 8 or 12 readers and a 20-sided life, maybe then, I can upgrade my character.

Event Driven

January 21, 2011 Bobbie1 Comment

In keeping with my usual way of doing things (e.g., the dopamine rush that one gets from chocolate, online Scrabble, and checking things off of one’s list) I have signed on for a whole bunch of stuff this year. Some I will discuss, and some I will not. There will likely be an announcement of the Not Currently Discussed Items around June or July. But this isn’t about that. Think of it as one of those teaser trailers before the show.

The Events of 2011, at least sporting wise, are:

A 5-k run. Yep, I have to get back into running. I’ll be starting a team of at least 10 here at Expedia for the American Lung Association’s annual 5k, and so I shall go forth to the Running Shoe Store where they will provide me with shiny new shoes. Be prepared for posts about sore knees, the amazing physics of excess flab as you run, and whether or not this was really a good idea. Also, I have to raise money.
A 2-day double-century bike ride, known as the STP. The Seattle To Portland, more specifically, and training for that has already begun. The fact that as part of training we will be riding 80 miles one day and 80 miles the next which is what I did for The Whole Ride last year is a bit of an eye-catcher.
An October stair climb event for the ALA (place to be determined). Again with the raising money.
And then, depending on how things went with the 5 k– the Seattle Half Marathon in November. Again.

Folding into this training schedule is that thing I call my job, which I love but which has gone up to 11 as of last November and *stayed there*. When your boss looks at you earnestly and asks you when you’re going to take any time off, and at least three coworkers suggest you need a drink, you may need to take some time off. But when you’re committed to having everything come off PERFECT or at least NOT MESSED UP then you have a hard time putting down the iPhone and the Email. The Job is having me travel a bit this year, including to Geneva (let’s hope my luggage doesn’t get lost) and then there’s personal travel too (hello, Phoenix! Hello, Hawaii!). Oh, and then there’s boy schedule and its companions of sports and karate and boy scouts and camp and PTSA in there too. Mustn’t forget that.

This year is the first year I’m operating completely without a paper calendar. Usually, I am the recipient of a calendar from a friend who likes dogs, from a family member who defaults to Calendars, and some sort of work gift thing. And this year, I got none of it. My wall at work is empty, my dedicated calendar space at home is devoid of said calendarage. I’m operating completely on my Google and Outlook (syncd!) calendars. It will be an experiment in e-venting, I’m sure.

What I’m discovering thus far is that I need to stick to plans if I’m going to make them. When you put in your calendar that you are going to go to spin class, it’s because you realized two weeks ago when you put that there that you had a 7am call the next day and so you wouldn’t make it to *that* spin class and if you were going to get your required weekly time in the saddle then yes you really did need to do spin class on Thursday. Or when I lay out the menu for the week then I really do need to stick with it because if I wing it and use the potatoes with the pork tenderloin instead of the pasta then that means the chicken has to now go with the rice and you have to put peas with potatoes which takes it away from the cacciatore that was supposed to go with the pasta. Oh, and you end up with really weird menu combinations, which sounds fine for Iron Chef but not for Random Sammamish Hurried Dinner Wednesday.

I have — and love — my iPhone. I may need to expand its applications to help me keep the dopamine rush at a steady state. Meanwhile, you are to fully expect more e-Venting.

PS — Starbucks is releasing a 31 ounce coffee drink. ‘Nuff said.

The Pink Cup

January 7, 2011 Bobbie1 Comment

Absolutely accurate and unedited couple of emails I sent on Wednesday. Not all work is work.

First: Titled, “Lost Cup”

Normally I eschew sending out emails that refer to lost articles/items. The ones about money always baffle me. Also, phones left in bathrooms? Not so much. However, this is not normal and neither is the lost article:

On Thursday last (30 December 2010) I left my pink cup and saucer (Starbucks, circa 1997) in the dishwasher here on the 11^th floor. I freely admit being too lazy to walk over and retrieve it yesterday or Monday. But today when I looked in the dishwasher, and the cupboards around it, and the mailbox receptacle below the sink that serves as the ersatz lost and found/OMG you washed your personal cup in the Work Dishwasher and so we have relegated it here to punish you, it wasn’t there.

Nor did it magically appear on my desk, or the 11^th floor break room.

So I ask, if anyone has seen the pink cup, and saucer (for they are a pair and really should be together, wherever they are) to please ask them to little “r” me. I want them to come home. And I promise to never ever wash them in the Work Dishwasher again.

Second: OMG FOUND! Lost Cup…

Special thanks to DG, who found my cup and sent it to the safekeeping of MMW, who appropriately kept it in a place of honor on her desk until I retrieved it, shamefacedly, while she was in a meeting.

Thank you all for your support.

The pink cup will remain in my office and is willing to take its picture with you in honor of its newfound celebrity status.

New Beginnings

January 7, 2011 Bobbie1 Comment

There are a *lot* of changes I have on the horizon this year, most of which I’m not going to go in to. This is good project management from a “managing up” perspective: if I don’t tell you exactly what I’m planning, you can’t snipe at me that I didn’t quite do what I said I was going to do when I change my way halfway through the year based on the newer data. But trust me, when we get to the end of the year, you’re totally going to be amazed at all of the changes.

Seriously, I don’t do that in my work life. In my work life, I typically have the goal-promising restraint of say, Superman, and the social skills of say, Batman, and the subtlety of say, the Thing. I have no idea if they all belong to DC comics or Marvel or if I’ve mixed superheroes who oughtn’t. That’s your job, I’m just metamorphizing here.

At any rate, many things planned! Many goals to achieve! They are not resolutions, though, because that would be stifling. One of them includes increased fitness and banishment of the three (3) lbs gained over the holidays. Please note I am not blaming my mother. This is not just because she reads my blog; this is because the actual weight gain was realized *after* Christmas and I can only assume we lay the blame squarely at Top Pot’s door. However, please do note that I was attending my gym spin classes 2x-3x per week and Group Cyntergy the other day of the week (so that’s 3-4 times per week, got me, kiddo?) that I was going regularly pre-Christmas.

Oh My Goodness, the Resoluters are in. Spin Class (Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday) and Group Cardio (weightlifting) Monday, and the Pool yesterday? All completely packed. The parking lot? Packed. The gym is full of Resoluters, and the office has a waiting group of people eager to sign over what amounts to four figures per year to attend. I do not blame them, I do the same thing. But I’ve been doing it longer, and somehow that entitles me to all of the self-satisfied snobbery a person can develop. I don’t mind Resoluters, per se. I mind that they all come at ONCE.

If you think about it, New Years Day is an abstract day. There is no logical reason (with exception of the break between December and January as provided by the Romans, who by the way went from 10 months to 12 by shoving in 2 more months (one for Julius and one for Augustus Caesars, guess which months those are?)). Most Asian cultures celebrate a different day for New Year, as did the Mayans and Aztecs. The fact that we choose Jan 1 is completely arbitrary; to my way of thinking we would be better off to choose December 21 or March 21 or June 21 or September 21 (and if you want to know why look up “solstice” and “equinox” — although to my way of thinking Dec 21 makes the most sense). However, I am not yet the Dictator and I do not get to choose, so stuck with January 1 am I.

It would be ever so much nicer, though, if we took the extra — call it 100? 200? — people who come in for the New Year, throughout the year. My spin class would go from say, 10-12 in December to 12-14 in January to 14-16 in February, etc. Not from 10-12 in December to 30-32 in January. That causes consternation, awkward bike positioning, and massive delays while we have the instructor take time to set up all the newbies properly on their bikes. Tuesday’s class started 10 minutes late courtesy of the new folks. Again, wouldn’t mind so much if they came early. Or spaced themselves out. But please, not all at once. I give it four more weeks before the real bleed off happens (I hope).

I am totally caffeinated by the way, and we will blame my new CoHort at work. His floor has no shiny coffee maker and so there is no decaf to be had.

Resolve

January 1, 2011 Bobbie1 Comment

I have no resolutions this year.

Available data indicates that I’m not terribly good at keeping them, and that the things that need to get done get done anyway. Ergo, no formal resolutions. There is the list, which is the same list I tackle every year. This year includes finally learning to drive a stick shift (lesson two is next Saturday) and learning to ski; there is also some plan to get my Spanish back in gear. Oh, and there’s the STP and apparently I’m back in a book club (thanks, Carla).

I have no problem with other people’s resolutions… save one. The gym resolution. Now, many folks resolve to get in shape in the new year. Some have attainable goals (I’m going to lose 10 pounds! 20! 30! in 2/4/6 months!). Some have wildly fantastic goals (I’m going to lose 50 pounds by April!). And one and all, they arrive at the gym on 2 January, clogging up my classes. For those of us who were there the day before Thanksgiving and on December 23rd, as well as December 27th, 28th, 29th, and 30th, the inevitable barrage of well-intentioned people into the gym class means that we have to get to each class extra extra early (example: proper etiquette is to arrive at spin class 5 or even 10 minutes early to get your bike, fill your water, acquire the appropriate towelage, figure out if you really want to be behind *that* person, if you really want to be in front of *that other* person, etc. In the Resoluter Month, you need to arrive 20 minutes early to do all that *and* navigate around the newbies).

I would wager that most of these folks are gone by the end of January — maybe February. So it’s a discomfort of short duration. I think I can get through that. And if that’s the most I have to complain about, well, then, my life’s pretty darned good.

Subject To Good Behavior

December 30, 2010 Bobbie2 Comments

Well, I’m back in the saddle again. I gained 4 pounds over the Holiday(s), and part of it was not going to the gym as often as One Should. So this week has been a week of going to the gym and eating Lean Cuisine for dinner, which is just about as enchanting as it sounds. Don’t get me wrong, a good point of spin class is that Instructor Deb (the former cheerleader) has some excellent tunes. A good point of weights class is they vary the routine so often you’re pretty much ready to switch up when they are.

Is it bad that I spent my entire hour of weightlifting class fantasizing (as my muscles burned and twitched and shook uncontrollably, especially toward the end) about what I would *eat for dinner*? Knowing that it would be a Lean Cuisine? I think so.

Something that I’ve learned: Lean Cuisines will warn you in very STERN TERMS that they should be cooked properly. The shrimp pasta one will insist you cook it until the shrimp reach 165 degrees. Tell me: do YOU stick a thermometer into your shrimp pasta when you cook it? I do not. I cooked it until those suckers were pinky orange. If I’m dead due to undercooked shrimp tomorrow, now you know why.

Something else that I’ve learned: the guy in the weightlifting class who has the most to prove will wimp out fastest. This is an hour of loading up a bar, lifting it above your head, doing deadlifts, doing lunges with it behind your neck, doing crunches with it above your head, etc. This is not a lightweight (no pun intended) class. So YOU, Mr. loaded your bar up to prove something, you really oughtn’t’ve, and when you give up on your overhead lifts (shoulders and biceps, yo!) instead of just downweighting, it’s very sad. For you. Also, don’t wear those shorts anymore. They’re too loose and when you lift your legs for bicycle crunches I know WAY too much about you.

More sad is that I’ve spent the night (not including a conference call) watching Food TV. That’s right: I worked out to the point of shaking, I ate my 300-calorie Lean Cuisine, and now I’m watching Guy Fieri stuff his face at multiple restaurants. Tonight’s theme is apparently Italian, and if you think that some parts of my brain are screaming at other parts of my brain in what we ought to do about that, you’re right.

I could spit, but it would just burn calories.

Holiday

December 24, 2010 Bobbie1 Comment

I am, perhaps regrettably to others, without the ability to take some things on faith. That is to say, I have faith in science. I have faith in the abilities of my brain. I have faith in the abilities of my son’s brain. I have faith that the sun will rise (and I equally have faith that I will not see it, for I live in Washington and here there is a permanent cloud layer from October to April). “Faith” is defined in Merriam-Webster several ways, including: 1. allegiance or fidelity to a person or duty, 2. belief in God or religious doctrines/a firm belief in something in which there is no proof, and 3. something believed with an especially strong conviction.

So this post, then, is about that #2: firm belief in something in which there is no proof/belief in God/religious doctrines. Like most “simple” words (note: there are more definitions for small, “simple” words like “set” than there are for long, obnoxious ones like “onomatopoeia”. Check it out for yourself) this requires checking into what “proof” means, and that is defined in the MW as “the cogency of evidence that compels acceptance by the mind of a truth or a fact b : the process or an instance of establishing the validity of a statement especially by derivation from other statements in accordance with principles of reasoning”. Well that certainly clears things up.

What I am writing here is that I am devoid of the ability to believe in something that does not have a solid foundation of evidence or has not gone through a process to establish its validity. I believe the sun will rise tomorrow because it’s been doing it on this planet for some 5 billion years and I believe the science and the methods used to determine that. This does not mean that if Aliens blow up the Sun tonight I will have been wrong — that’s what’s called introducing new data and would require a new scientific review. Unfortunately, a small side effect of Aliens blowing up the Sun is we’d all kinda be dead.

I digress (always).

What I’m getting to is Why Then Does Bobbie Celebrate Christmas? (Bobbie, it should be noted, celebrates the following holidays in some form or fashion: New Years’, Mardi Gras, St. Patrick’s Day, 4th of July, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas. Bobbie will gladly participate in your celebration of Hanukkah, Solstice, etc. Bobbie thankfully takes the day off presented at Presidents Day, Memorial Day, and Labor Day, and really and truly does reserve a moment of those days to thank those nameless (and named) who have served and sacrificed. Bobbie does not acknowledge the existence of Valentines Day).

So if I have no faith, why celebrate a holiday *built on faith*. The very idea of it is a prophecy culminated in the birth of a child to newlywed yet somehow chaste parents, and that child grew to be Jesus Christ, and he was nailed to a cross for living in what amounted to a non-free-speech state, and he purportedly rose 3 days later and thereby proved his status as the son of God (and also God and also the Holy Ghost). Schizophrenia jokes aside, this is not what I celebrate when I celebrate Christmas. I could start by pointing out the new spring lambs referenced in the Bible probably had no business being around December 25th at the time of birth and it’s far more likely he was born in Spring, but that would have messed up with that whole Catholic-Church-Taking-Other-Peoples-Holidays-For-Easier-Assimilation thing. I could also point out that the Romans kept meticulous tax records (our IRS has nothing on them from what I understand) and yet there is no Jesus or Yeshua etc. in the areas he was supposed to be at that time. Perhaps he was also got for tax evasion? At any rate, no I do not celebrate that Christmas. You are absolutely, totally, and completely welcome to. I personally like the way Churches get all dolled up for the occasion and actually liked going when I did.

I celebrate the one with Santa Claus. And Reindeer. And getting a large tree (fake or real, your choice) got up in the gaudiness apropos to a 1970’s disco dancer. I celebrate the making *and burning, occasionally* of cookies, of lax gym use, of exchanged fruitcakes and dubious stocking stuffers. I celebrate the silliness of a jogger in her Santa hat and sleigh bells on her shoes (hi, Christine!), of family photos posted in seriously cute sweaters, of Norskie brunches (hi, Mindi!) and a plethora of baked goods coming in to the office and into homes (hi, Jim!). I celebrate the lights people decorate their houses with, of two weeks off of school, and the casual observations of frenetic shoppers. I celebrate the adventures of new families (and growing families) as they navigate the season, baking and prepping for days of delicacies and fun (hi, Ali!). I celebrate your best friend calling to inquire if she can in fact get the missle-firing droid robot with extra death-kill stuff for your son, because she spoils him every year (hi, Candie!). I celebrate folks who have the sanity to leave and celebrate it somewhere else (hi, Cindi!) and folks who are willing to celebrate even though they swore, they absolutely swore, they would never do it again (hi Jeff!). I celebrate a time where you can ask your coworkers, family and friends to donate money or toys or food to complete strangers, and even if they have already done it, this season, they will do it again (hi, Expedia Stairing is Caring team, and your $3000+ raised for kids!!).

Most of all, though, I celebrate a time of year where it is *expected*, almost demanded, that you are a better person. This is the time of year that you at least have to pretend to be nice, to care about your fellow man, to do the Right Thing. You may do it all year round — or you may do it this once, as a sort of Red and Green Yom Kippur. But you do it, because it is What Is Done. For about two weeks every year, people, for the most part, are Who They Should Be. They may be crowded in elevators but they’re smiling, they may be racing through Target but they’re making way for others, they may be frustrated in the baking aisle but offering recipe tips.

I celebrate that. And maybe *that* is what others celebrate, and maybe not. What do you celebrate?

Pajama Party

December 18, 2010December 18, 2010 BobbieLeave a comment

Today at work, I gathered the fruits of my labor. That labor was a hastily one-week planned pajama party.

OK, let me back up.

A week ago yesterday, I was severely inebriated. That’s ok, because I was severely inebriated with 2000 other people at the XS club at the Wynn Hotel in Las Vegas. It was fantastic — flowing booze, good music, yes I did find myself dancing on a table. The fact that I originally planned to come in, make a one-or-two drink round, and leave was lost halfway through drink one: some Work Fun events are more Work than Fun, this was not one of them. Everyone shucked off the stress of the previous days/weeks/months and kicked in to have fun.

So partway through the fun an idea that Alison* (person at work, not Ali of Doug and Ali) came up with: wouldn’t it be great to come to work in our PJ’s. I got sign off from the boss, and got sign off from a few other VP’s. And then continued to enjoy myself.

Hungover I flew home on Friday.

On Saturday I emailed a few more work folks to ensure we weren’t expecting clients on the Chosen Day.

On Sunday I emailed the last few people and got sign-off.

On Monday I emailed the entire floor and gave them the prospect: come to work in your jammies. Get a doughnut (From Top Pot — Thank You Top Pot!). Give a kid a gift from the HopeLink tree: the day after the company Holiday party.

Today we had twelve people bring in gifts, and another 20+ provide what amounted to substantial cash for kids who otherwise wouldn’t have got much of anything for the holiday. We had slightly more than that show up in jammies or sweats. And we left about a dozen doughnuts behind (apparently the excesses of last night got to some). Next year: fewer doughnuts, and maybe adopt a family instead of kids off of the tree. Or maybe both. All I know is the planning will be better done than one-week and starting at a massive party.

It’s weird to come home and not have to change *out* of my clothes and *into* PJ’s.