Tag Archives: Blog Posts

Triathlon - I made it!

September 16, 2007 – 10:16 pm

triathlonThe Oasis USA triathlon that I mentioned earlier was yesterday morning. I’ve been a bit preoccupied to blog about it, sorry.

It was an early start (7am), although they split up the group into two “heats” for the beginning swimming part due to limited space. The three of us (Dan, Sara, and I) went in the second group, which was apparently the younger half of the crowd, but we still did pretty well because it seemed like a lot of the others weren’t super strong swimmers.

The biking wasn’t too bad, and the running part sucked about as much as I expected it to. All in all, I’d say that it wasn’t quite as brutal as I was thinking it would be.

Looking back there were several points I regretted pacing myself a little too conservatively. Specifically in the swimming part, I took it a bit easy in anticipation of the biking and running being so hard, but then it turned out that I probably could have gone pretty much all out in the swimming part (at least upper body), since the rest was all legs.

On the biking part I took a wrong turn on the first lap around the Rose Bowl, so I had to turn around and backtrack out to the outer circle, but other than that it went pretty smoothly. The running went well too, except for my calves starting to cramp at the very beginning and having to stop to stretch them out a bit.

After crossing the finish line, I still felt pretty good, which was my first indication that I should have pushed harder throughout the whole thing, but oh well; it was my first time and it was a good learning experience. Next time I will be more ready and in better shape, but it was a good start, and helped me realize (again) the value of having a goal to shoot for as you exercise and try to get in shape.

PS - There’s still time to sponsor me if you’d like, since I need to mail in the sponsorship form and money still.

By JB | Posted in Blog Posts | Comments (3)

Sponsor me

September 8, 2007 – 5:26 pm

As I mentioned earlier, I’m planning to run in the Oasis USA triathlon next Saturday.

Since this is a charity event to raise money for a great cause, I’d love it if anyone would care to sponsor me. This would just involve making a (tax deductible) donation of any amount. Checks can be made payable to “Oasis USA”, or you can give me money directly (or via paypal or whatever) and I will get it in.

If you’re interested, just drop me an e-mail (you can find an address on my “About Page” if you don’t already know one) or leave a comment here with your e-mail address and I can get back to you.

Thanks!

By JB | Posted in Blog Posts | Comments (1)

Armchair refereeing

September 8, 2007 – 3:30 pm

We were at Christian’s soccer game today, waiting for it to start when the refs came around asking for a volunteer to be a line ref.

Initially, I sat back, since I know next to nothing about soccer. However, when they said that the game would have to be delayed and it was obvious that no one else on our side was going to step up, I went ahead and volunteered.

The sideline ref position is pretty easy actually; all you need to do is watch who kicks it out to determine which team gets the throw in, and then occasionally call “offsides” whenever that might happen. It was the latter that I was a little unsure of the details on (although after I got home today I confirmed that it was pretty much exactly as I had been thinking).

The problem came in when all these people behind me (parents sitting there watching the game) started complaining after a couple plays in which the other team scored a goal, stating (intentionally loud enough for me to hear without directing the comments “at” me) that it should have been called offsides.

Now, like I said before, I certainly could have been wrong, since I’m no soccer expert, but what I saw was the offensive team just plain outrunning the defenders. There were a couple times in which there were more than one such fast offensive player that had run past the last field defender, and if the one with the ball would have made a pass to them, then it would have been offsides, but the one that ran the ball up made the shot, so I didn’t see that as being offsides.

For all I know, I could still be wrong on that (and maybe one of you who know soccer better than I can tell me), but what I felt like doing was turning around and saying “Well, it’s good to know that we’ve got a bunch of soccer experts here; but I do find it odd that you take it so seriously yet none of you came forward when they were asking for volunteers. So shut up.” The only reason I didn’t say something to that effect was that these were parents on our own team, and I thought me chewing them out might make it a bit awkward going to games and such with them every week.

But seriously, these people need to get a grip. I thought I’d take this opportunity to share some general tips for soccer moms / dads / other fans out there:

  1. It’s only a game.
  2. Do not sit there and yell and scream throughout the game - you are making fools of yourselves. (see #1)
  3. If you have any experience with the game at all, why not step up when they’re asking for volunteers?
  4. If you don’t do #3, you have no right to get all worked up about the calls you don’t like. (Also, see #1 again)
By JB | Posted in Blog Posts | Comments (8)

Almost run over

September 4, 2007 – 10:55 pm

On my way home today, I was waiting behind a stop sign to go over the bridge and get onto the freeway and had a pretty-much-near-death experience.

There was one car in front of me that had just gone, and I pulled up to the stop sign and stopped. As I glanced to the right and left before getting ready to go, something caught my eye in my rear view mirror. I think it stood out because it was large and red, but I quickly realized that there was something wrong with the huge semi truck approaching from behind: its speed.

It was coming so fast that I had to floor it to avoid getting rear ended (run over, actually), and as I looked back I could see the cab bouncing up and down as it tried to slam on its breaks way too late. It veered off diagonally while other cars scrambled to avoid it as well, and it nearly jacknifed as it skidded up very close to the edge of the hill leading up to the bridge.

I’m not sure what the deal was with the driver, if he was somehow temporarily incapacitated or if it was some kind of equipment failure, but I am sure that if I hadn’t happened to see it coming when I did, my car would have been toast, because I was directly in its path and it couldn’t have gone around me. I can only imagine that God was looking out for me on that one.

By JB | Posted in Blog Posts | Comments (2)

Society for Barefoot Living

August 27, 2007 – 1:15 pm

If I were ever to join an extremist group / movement, it might just be the Society for Barefoot Living.

I heard about it via this humorous post about a guy who went running with a friend who had made the decision to abandon footwear.

By JB | Posted in Blog Posts | Comments (2)

Wishing I had a megaphone…

August 22, 2007 – 10:55 pm

… on my bike so I could talk back to the cop that just yelled at me from his car.

I was on my way back from my bike ride just now when, right after crossing the intersection near my house, a cop car sped by (going WAY over the speed limit) and mumbled something through his PA system that had something to do with the light at the intersection.

I can only assume that it was something about how I should have waited for the light at the intersection rather than just riding through after checking both ways and ensuring there was no one around (>10pm), other than him. Although I didn’t know it was a cop car, I could see by its lights that even though it was approaching the intersection at a high rate of speed (did I mention it was over the speed limit?) that it was clear that I had plenty of time to get through well before his car got there.

Now, I realize that you’re technically supposed to wait for the light, but often on intersections such as those (at that time of night) the lights are on sensors only, and a bicycle will not set them off, so if there are no cars around, you have to ride over to the crosswalk and push the button to force the light to change. I think it’s fairly understandable to just go through in such a situation (when there’s obviously no danger). Ironically, the only thing even remotely close to dangerous happening in that intersection in the span of time I was near it was his driving too fast.

It might be my imagination, but I thought that I saw him slowing down gradually, and possibly getting ready to turn around and give me a ticket. I didn’t waste any time waiting to find out, though; since I was already at my street I quickly peddled down and into my back gate before he would have the chance. In all likelihood he wasn’t after me at all, because he could have stopped much faster to turn around, but then he would have looked like a real tool slamming on his breaks and skidding (because he was going so fast…) just to give a bike rider a ticket.

By JB | Posted in Blog Posts | Comments (2)

TLA disconnect

July 31, 2007 – 10:23 pm

For some reason, TLA keeps selling ads for me, even though I canceled my account a week ago.

By JB | Posted in Blog Posts | Also tagged | Comments (0)

Triathlon

July 30, 2007 – 8:38 pm

To give myself a goal for getting in shape (as well as to raise money for a good cause), I’m preparing / training for a triathlon in September.

Before you laugh too hard, it is only a “sprint triathlon”, which is a half mile swim, 12.4 mi. bike ride, and 3.1 mi. run, so hopefully I won’t be killing myself.

I think it will still be a challenge to get ready in time, but I think I can do it. I’m just posting about it on here to give myself some accountability to not let myself back out.

By JB | Posted in Blog Posts | Comments (6)

Really backlogged

July 23, 2007 – 9:35 pm

Wow, I’m really behind on here. There was a whole bunch of stuff I wanted to post about last weekend in NYC before I forgot, and now there’s a whole other load of stuff to post on from the WordPress con, not to mention still not having posted an update with photos of the wall I finished.

I’ll try to tackle them slowly and hope that I cover everything. Along with trying to catch up on the posts, there’s a ton of blog-related ideas and changes swirling around in my head as well, inspired by some of this weekend’s discussions. More to come on that.

By JB | Posted in Blog Posts | Comments (1)

Fireworks

July 5, 2007 – 11:00 am

Well, this year I actually caught the finale of the fireworks show (Emma and I missed it last year), and I have to say it was pretty good.

We were even close enough to catch some of the falling ashes and fireworks debris; a fairly big chunk of paper floated down right in front of us and Christian snagged it. I also got some in my eye, and a piece of tape got stuck on Riley’s arm as well.

By JB | Posted in Blog Posts | Comments (3)