The Random Thoughts Review

Today was a good day on the slopes. We covered 63.02 miles over the course of the day. Quite a few more than yesterday. Today we spent most of our time on blue runs. I can totally see myself on a blue-black before the end of the week. Particularly if we get some fresh snow (they are saying we might end up with anywhere from 5-12 inches over the next day or so).

For breakfast this morning I had the remainder of the pizza that I had bought last night for supper.

This morning we made our way over the Peak 7 and did all of the runs on Peak 7. Then, we came back to Peak 8 and took 4 o’clock back to the condo for lunch. I had another excellent lunch, and then we hit the slopes for the afternoon. We went to Peak 9 and did several of the blue runs there. Then, we jumped back to Peak 8 and did the loop from near the top (as high as I’ve ever been, anyway) to the midway load on the Peak 8 Superconnect lift. This is a great loop. There is only about 4-5 minutes on the lift, but you get a lot of vertical out of it. Very nice loop. Blues at the top, and greens at the bottom.

Brian’s boot wasn’t fitting quite right and he had a sore spot on his ankle, so he came back to the condo a bit after 3. Bill and myself kept going and ended up coming down Northstar on Peak 8, which is probably the longest steep section that we’ve done this year so far. Then, another loop on the midload and it was time to head to the condo.

Once back at the condo, I enjoyed a steam shower, and now we are just killing time before going to Bubba Gump’s for supper. I might have shrimp. We’ll see.

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The skiing was good in Breckenridge today. After leaving the condo this morning we went to the bus station next door and waited for a bus to take us to the nearest ski lift. It took a few minutes for the bus to arrive, but that gave me time to get all of the various pieces of clothing that I was wearing properly adjusted. The bus arrived and took us to Snowflake Lift. We hopped on the lift, rode it to the top, and slid down the side of the hill to Lift 5. We then proceeded to spend the morning going up Lift 5 and down the various green runs that are near it. I used my GPS over the course of the day and we ended up traveling 42.52 miles (including the lifts and the ski runs themselves).

We came back to the condo for lunch and I had my typical travel meal: peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I don’t typically eat PB&J any other time, but I enjoy it when I’m traveling for some reason. Go figure. Along with the sandwiches I had some chips, an apple, half an orange.. I ate well.

For the afternoon we got slightly more adventurous. We rode the bus to the bottom of Peak 9 and took the Quiksilver lift up to slide down a few more green runs. Then, we went over to the Peak 8 Superconnect chair and went to (somewhere near) the top of Peak 8. The nice thing about this lift is that it only services blue runs. So, we got the opportunity to go down a small amount of blue. We went down Springmeier and connected with the 4-o’clock run. We took that all the way back to Quiksilver, and did the loop again. The top of Quiksilver to the Peak 8 Superconnect and from the top of that down the 4-o’clock run. We then went back to the top of Peak 8 and took Crescendo down. By this point in the afternoon, the slopes were getting a little bit icy. I didn’t have a problem on Crescendo, but it could have been better. By this time it was after 3pm (the lifts close at 4) so we went to the bottom of Peak 9 and just road lift 5 a couple of times. We got on lift 5 for the final time at about 3:54pm. So, it was after 4pm when we got to the top and we were able to ski down after 4pm all the way to the end of the 4 o’clock run.

Got back to the condo, took a steam shower (wonderful thing, those steam showers) and poked around for a bit while we were getting ready to think about dinner. We ended up going to Michael’s Italiano for dinner. I got the Grilled Chicken pizza. It was a small, but ended up being about a foot across and was plenty more than I was in the mood to eat. It was really good. It had the chicken, pesto, sweet onions, tomatoes, and goat cheese on it. Brian and Bill both got the baked ziti.

After that we hit a couple of stores and made our first visit to Crepes ala Cart. This place is indescribable. You’ve just got to see it. We had a dessert crepe. I went simple. Just a chocolate crepe. I wanted dark chocolate, but they didn’t have any dark chocolate, so I had to settle for semi-sweet. Supposedly they order their dark chocolate over the internet from somewhere in Europe, and they had run out. So, I didn’t get the dark chocolate. It was tasty, though.

Skiing today was good. I felt great all day long. No muscle problems worth talking about, and I feel great now. I think my running is really paying off. I knew I did that for a reason. I’m really looking forward to the rest of the week. If we can get some fresh powder I can totally see myself on blue-blacks by the end of the week. If things stay icy…. probably not. Stay tuned!

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I’m in Breckenridge! I haven’t yet hit the slopes (nor have my skis) but that will be happening within an hour or so.

I left the house at about 7:50am on Saturday and drove down to St Louis to pick Brian up. I got there right at 11 (when I had planned to) and we quickly threw his bags into the back of my car and we headed on down to Rolla. Once at Rolla (got there about 12:35) we put all of our bags into the back of Bill’s Forester and got on the road.

When we got to Jefferson City we stopped at Backyard Burgers and had a late lunch. I had a bacon cheddar burger. It was pretty tasty. From there we went through Columbia and headed west on I-70.

We made it through Kansas City and headed into the dreaded state of kansas. Eastern Kansas isn’t too bad, because it still has the influences of Missouri acting upon it. So, it isn’t completely flat, and there are a few trees. We stopped in Salina, Kansas and ate at a family diner. They had a “garden salad” that was really good. It was a collection of raw vegetables (broccoli, cauliflour, carrots, sweet potato, onion, etc.) that had salad dressing poured over it. It was really good. I had salmon patties as the main dish, and also I had a homemade roll. After Salina we headed on to Hays, Kansas. We stayed at a Motel 6 in Hays.

When we got up the next morning it was 10 degrees. According to the TV, it was 0 degrees in Limon, Colorado, which we were driving straight through to get to Denver. But, it was supposed to warm up after that. As we made it into western Kansas snow start showing up regularly on the ground. At some points the fence rows were almost completely covered. This is, of course, the same area that had a blizzard just a month ago that killed several people. We saw several drifts that were about 10 feet high. Quite interesting.

When we stopped for gas in Limon, I talked to John and Natty in Denver and arranged a specific time to meet them at Casa Bonita. We drove on into Denver to I-25 and took it south for a few miles. Then, we turned west onto Colfax and went right in front of Mile High Stadium. It’s always neat to see places in real life that you’ve seen on TV. We obviously didn’t get very close, but that’s OK. No one was playing at that point anyway.

We headed farther west down Colfax and arrived at Casa Bonita where we met John, Natty, Gabe, and Rebecca. Casa Bonita is a mexican restaurant where the food isn’t terribly good, but the place has attitude. They do cliff diving there, they have regular shows, a puppet show, a cave with mean pirates that you can walk through, an arcade, bands that go around the tables singing, and a bunch of other stuff that I probably didn’t even see. Basically, you don’t go there for the quality of the food. You go there to see everything else. It’s a very kid friendly place. They are set up to handle a lot of people at once, and the seating is pretty neat. You don’t sit in a big flat room with everyone else. There are stairs and landings all over the place where they have tucked a table or two. One table was in the middle of this elevated gazebo. All things considered, I’m glad I went. I had never been there before, and it was definitely an experience. We said our goodbyes to John and family and headed farther west.

The trip from Denver to Breckenridge was totally uneventful. We had perfectly clear road the entire time, and the only thing of note was that traffic in the other direction was horrendous. It is definitely nice to be heading to Breck when all the Denver-ites are leaving it.

We got to Breck, found the Condo, got our stuff moved in, and went to the ski place. I needed to get my skis waxed, and Brian and Bill needed to rent theirs. We got that taken care of, and went to City Market, one of the local grocery stores. We bought food for breakfast and lunch, and then headed back to the condo. We didn’t do a whole lot else last night and turned in pretty early. I have a room to myself with a queen bed. Brian has a room to himself with 2 queen beds, and Bill has the living room to himself with a queen sofa sleeper. We have plenty of room.

More to come later….

City Market shopping list (my IGA card gave the discount, so be sure to take it next time):

2% milk - 2.99, D D Cheese - 3.50, Turkey Brst $8.49, Prsl Ham - 6.11, Havarti 5.49, Sunchips 3.49, Cheetos 3.49, Pretzel twists 1.00, KS Old fash multi bread 1.99, OW Lt Whole wheat bread 3.19, Mthrs ICD LM 4.19, Oroweat bread 3.09, raisins, 6 pack - 2.49, Nuts 2.00, Ch/Str shbrd 1.88, pecans 3.00, bigelow tea 3.19, squeeze mayo 1.89, v8 sp smthie 2.50, peanut butter 1.99, mini carrots 1.50, raspberry preserves 1.50, qkr regular oats 4.39, kroger juice 2.53, mplgrv czycttg s/f 2.49, cinnamon 2.59, granola bars 2.49, raisin bran crunch 3.99, oranges 6.89, bananas 2.35, pink ladies 4.30, cameos 6.57

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Today I’m starting my official training for the Bayshore Marathon on May 26th. I considered several different marathons. I started by wanting to do the Green Bay marathon, but I have other obligations that weekend. Then, I decided I wanted to do Grandma’s Marathon, in Duluth, Minnesota. I chose Bayshore over Grandma’s for several reasons: It’s 4 hours closer, it’s a maximum of 1,700 people versus 9,500 people, it’s $30 cheaper to enter, and it’s not over Father’s Day weekend. (It is, however, over Memorial day weekend)

I’m following Hal Higdon’s Intermediate 1 Training program. I might be too ambitious here, but I’m going to give it a try, anyway. I’m actually running a slightly modified version of that program. My special training program is also available.

My goal is to qualify for Boston. To do this, I need a time of 3:15:59. That equates to a 7 minute, 28.8 second mile. Or, about 8.02 miles per hour, for 26.2 miles.

I honestly don’t know if i can do it or not. I think I will be able to finish the marathon. Doing it in Boston-qualifying time is a very big unknown. Boston is next Spring. I am running a summer marathon so that, if I don’t qualify, I can run another marathon in the fall and still be in good shape for Boston next Spring.

I won’t be writing blog entries every day for the Marathon (I probably won’t write any, except for interesting events). I just wanted to get something up so that people know about it, which will give me great incentive to actually push myself as hard as possible. I mean, after all, since everyone knows about it, I have to do it, right?

Traverse City is supposed to be a beautiful place, and the marathon course is supposedly very nice as well. Here’s hoping they can give me a good first marathon experience!

I run firefox in Linux, and I’ve noticed a problem with the facebook extension. It seems like, if firefox ever shuts down abnormally (from dying, or from X-windows dying, etc.) the facebook toolbar gets stuck in a semi-bad state. Normally, after you login to facebook, the question marks shown below (next to the pokes, friend requests, and messages icons) disappear, and the toolbar notes the name of the person logged in.

Once the toolbar gets confused, this transition doesn’t occur. The look of the toolbar stays in a ‘not logged in’ condition. The toolbar will continue to popup little windows when certain events occur, but it won’t tell you if you’ve been poked, have friend requests, or messages.

Some background information…
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When I was growing up, lo those many years ago, we went through a year or two where we had malt-o-meal cream of wheat (or something like that) every single morning. I kinda got burnt out on the whole hot cereal thing.

This past summer, when I went into the Grand Canyon for a week, one of the things that we ate of a morning were packets of Quaker Oat Oatmeal.

The packets were very convenient. Dump in the packet, add boiling water, stir, and eat. I fell in love with them.

When I got back to Illinois, I promptly went to the store and bought a few boxes myself. They have Apple Cinnamon, Fruit and Cream, etc. etc. There is a low-sugar version that I started getting, and it tastes really good. Particularly with milk instead of water.

As I continued eating the packaged oatmeal, I figured that there had to be a way to “roll my own” and save some cash and get rid of the rest of the sugar.
A box of 10 packets of the Quaker stuff is 4-5 dollars or so. I generally ate 2 packets per meal, so it was costing me about a buck plus the cost of the milk.
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It’s been a while since I’ve been skiing (months!). Too long. As we roll into December, the weather has gotten colder, and this has allowed the midwest ski resorts to make their artificial snow with reckless abandon.

On Thursday, December 7, I received an email from Paoli Peaks (a resort in Indiana) saying that they would be opening on Saturday the 9th. I’ve been wanting to go skiing. This email intrigued me. I’ve been to Paoli Peaks. It was the first midwestern resort that I actually visited. It’s no Colorado, but I can get there and back in a day, which I can’t do with Colorado.
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Do you drink normal, non-diet soda?

If so, cut out 2 sodas a day, and you’ll lose 2-3 pounds a month. Soda contains totally empty calories. No nutrition at all.

(The math: Figure 160 calories per soda: 320 calories/day multiplied by 30 days/month divided by 3500 calories/pound = 2.74 pounds)

( Coke: 140 calories per can, Mtn. Dew: 165, Dr. Pepper: 160)

That’s a pretty easy way to lose weight, if you’re wanting to do it.