Beer Thirty?

Not that I drink this much, but some mornings, like this, its tempting.







"Who taught you those new tricks?
Damn, I shouldn't start that talk,
but life is one big question when you're starin' at the clock.
And the answers always waiting at the liquor store,
40 oz to Freedom,
so I'll take that walk."

~40 oz to Freedom, Sublime


40 oz Archive

And just because its that kind of a day, here are some freebies for you:
Free Ringtones

Be Sciency.

"Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one's living at it."
~Albert Einstein





Today is a busy science day:

1) Remove smelly bacteria cultures getting smellier overnight containing hopefully mCnt2 transporter inserted in LNCX2 plasmid from the shaker and isolate plasmid DNA from the bacteria using miniprep kit. Ooooh, kits are nice.

2) Run a PCR for mCnt2 to check that the colonies are positive for carrying the stupid transporter insert.

2.5) Pull out hair, play free pacman online (www.freepacman.org)

3) Apply antibodies to western blot membrane for mouse Cnt2 and mouse Ent1 using really expensive yellowish liquid to make funny little marks that I can only see on this really expensive scanner and claim its meaningful...

4) Make an agarose gel for wasting the PCR products. Run gel and check results. Swear and make foul face when the gel breaks and falls on floor. Update colony chart to reflect mouse genotypes. Plan to kill mice.

5) Get 1 mEnt1 (-/-) mouse for coworker. Complain that I don't have help with mouse colony.

6-11) Meet with boss.

So sciency.

It doesnt sound like much, right? Ha.

Sight of First Love

"Love at first sight is easy to understand; it's when two people have been looking at each other for a lifetime that it becomes a miracle."
~Amy Bloom





I woke up and saw you sleeping in the morning light and felt your cheek. Warm like sleep and soft like the morning glow. I held that image as I got on the bus among the people and faces I do not know and never will know me. I remembered the sound of your breathing as I pet the dog and walked into my day.

I drive home and the fumes and clutter of life fill my car. Honking. "What the fuck was that??!" The large black woman yells at the asian couple in a large, American rental that just cut her off. Tension. Heat. I remember your smile in the cool morning water. The feel of your hand in the waves. The noise blur together but underneath is the steady rhythm of your constant, silent forgiveness.

The door opens with a beep and the smell of the rodents in their small ventilated micro-isolator cages is overwhelming. My senses seize as the air feels slow and hot. The sterility of the walls and floor. The sounds of lives, little lives, scratching. Anxiety and desperation. Your laughter over wine on the deck with my family. The way you grab an extra cookie for me without even having to ask. Refreshing feel of wind and smell of forest.

Surrounded, by life. But you still are there.

Lake Stevens Ironman 70.3

"It's kind of fun to do the impossible."

~ Walt Disney




Sunday, July 6th was the Ironman 70.3 in Lake Stevens.

-------Total----Swim---T1-----Bike-----T2----Run

5:14:57

34:01

2:40

2:57:47

2:03

1:38:2

I got finished with this race and was slightly disappointed in my bike time. However, I thought about everything that happened and now, instead of feeling bad about that, I feel GREAT about my other two times. For a recap... My friend Brian Kirby and I did this race together. I don't know that he trained much specifically for it, besides a few pool swims, but he has run and biked a fair amount so I knew he could finish fine. As we strolled out onto the dock where the swim start was, at the far north-east corner of Lake Stevens, I was more nervous about myself. Not whether I would finish, but whether I could reach yet another lofty goal: breaking 5 hours for the 3rd time. This was my 7th half, and I have ranged from 4:48 to 5:35. Oddly enough my fastest half time came at the well known and well feared Pacific Crest--not known, as you triathletes from the NW might imagine, for being a PR course. But although I know not to go too hard at this distance before halfway through the run, I still have trouble gauging my output during the bike ride. This year my bike training really wasn't bad, but didn't have the distance I would normally like. Then again, the year after training for Ironman, everything seems minimal.


The early morning: where are my honey buckets?

Brian showed up to ride with Mr. and Mrs. Triathlon at 4:45 ish, and we all piled into my Element for the drive to Lake Stevens. It was a nice morning, very relaxed. Maybe too relaxed.

I have always been the person who wants to arrive early at triathlons. It is bred, I suppose, from all of my early years of racing when the transition areas were first-come first-serve, hence getting there early was necessary if you were actually competing. The morning of this particular race, however, I was not so uptight about the time. I figured its a well organized, major race much like Ironman. Our bikes were put in transition the day before--maybe for that reason I thought we could get there a mere hour before the start? In retrospect, that line of thinking was dumb. The transition area closed at 6:15, our start time was 6:37, and we arrived at 5:35. In between was madness.

Lake Stevens 70.3 is NOT run like an Ironman. Not even close. Its like trailer trash in new shoes. Don't get me wrong, it was a nice race. But wearing the Ironman label, even for a half IM, should indicate the level of quality in the organization. That was not the case.

They did work hard, but the race morning strategy of dump your crap, warm up, dookie, stretch, start did not apply at all. There were multiple stops one had to make -- too few (as in 2) bathrooms in the transition area. No bike exit for warming up. We had to collect our timing chips at the SWIM START, which was nearly hidden from view. Then transition closed so make sure you have the right gear, that you don't crap your wetsuit and off with ya!

Brian and I fumbled around and got the order of events as backwards as possible. Everything I had told him about getting ready for the race went out the window as we scurried around in what felt like a pre-race scavenger hunt.

I finally found my pretty bride and gave her the car keys and told her to meet us at the start area, because they were booting us out of transition. Ugh. Too much stress and it was not even about the race. It was about when will I get to use a bathroom? Finally, finally, we get to the pottie line and make things right. Aaaah...

Why ya swimmin' in the poopy water, lads?

I don't know when it started really getting to me, but at some point during the swim I realized the water tasted eerily like... sewage. Ack, it makes me feel sick to my stomach just remembering it. Yes, I remember getting about a hundred yards out, and distinctly feeling like something was not right. Every time I breathed I smelled it. I tasted it. It was wretched. It disappeared, though, about 400 yards out. Aaah, non-sewage tainted water never felt so good. I sped up. I had left Brian long ago, and I wondered how he was doing. I was reeling in a lot of the wave which had left before mine--we were in orange caps, the wave in front of us navy, the wave behind red. I passed probably 15 navy caps before the turn, and then really stepped on the accelerator as I saw a frothing mess of angry red caps swirling in my direction. I stayed in front of most of the red caps (there were some guys with rooster tails going by, though) and actually found an opportune moment at my fingertips (literally) when I latched onto a red capper going a tad faster than I was. I pushed and got on his toes and passed probably 10 more blue caps, at least. There were not many orange caps around. I felt better, and was really moving well. I thought I might be around 30 minutes for my swim.

Then I tasted the poop. Oh god, my stomach turned and did a half-gainer. I was entering hell again, and the smell of sewage returned with the taste. I felt sick again and couldn't stay with ol' red cap and fell off. So much for my time. Was any one else tasting this? (Yes, I would find out later.)

Finally I arrived on shore. It was not as disorienting as Ironman, but for some reason I was kinda wobbly. Been a while since I swam that fast for that long. Ironman was more of just pure survival. This was actually a pretty decent swim, given the stankiness of the water. 34 minutes. Not too bad. Tummy really upset, though--not a great way to start. I jogged across the cobbly parking lot which hurt my feet (I had to run about 300 yards to my bike) and started thinking about how I am doing. Really, besides the tum-tum, I am fine. I feel good, and I am out of the water before all the people around me in transition. I notice out of the far left corner of my eye that all of their girlfriends/wives were standing there silently at the fence nearby waiting for their athletes. Silent. All of those guys had these really fancy, hot, carbon, sleek looking new bikes. I remember feeling 10 years late for the prom when we took our bikes into transition, and the girlfriends/wives standing around then beaming with pride. Hmm, so a fancy bike doesn't always mean the faster triathlete??? I knew that. But the reminder was nice.

Had the passing thought, though, that maybe I messed up the course or something--historically I am an average swimmer. Lately, my swimming has improved relatively speaking, and its a little startling sometimes.

When the going gets tough, check your brakes.

I fumbled through a very sloppy transition. It was obvious to all watching that I was not in the world's biggest hurry. I dropped things fumbling around in the pocket of my tri-shirt, had trouble getting my bike off the rack. It was comical. In the past I have learned that taking a moment longer in transition in these longer races can make a big, big difference later on. We will see.

My stomach upset as could be I set out on my bike. It took about 300 yards for me to feel like I was pedaling way too hard. I felt terrible. My legs were cooked, but that was impossible. I hadn't done anything to work my legs. I really didn't understand what was going on. I finally pulled over 4 miles into the thing and found the obvious--my rear brake caliper was twisted over and pressing onto my rear wheel. Well, sheesh. No wonder. The guy next to me in transition, one of the ones with the fans standing silently watching me in transition, kept banging into my stuff earlier in the morning. I bet his bike or something else whacked my brakes. Now I made it my personal mission to beat this guy. I will save the suspense: Yes, I beat him.

Brakes fixed, off I go. Now the bike ride should feel easy, right? Well, queasy is more like it. I couldnt eat or drink or ride hard until about mile 25 or 26 when my stomach FINALLY felt normal. I finally felt like I was ready to bike ride. What a difference that makes. I think I felt pretty decent the entire rest of the day as far as my stomach goes. I ate a couple gels and drank some and that was a huge comfort. I was concerned that the heat might come up at any time, even if it was currently cool and cloudy. THAT was a blessing.

I believe the first 26 miles I averaged a pedestrian 16 mph. The blur of fast bikers going by me, as usual, was equally as irritating as the brake pressing thing, but I have learned so many times to LET THEM GO. They usually can't run. If they could, after riding that fast, they would have been in the elite wave. And these guys were "off-the-hook" fast.

Sure enough, I torched the second half of the bike ride. The backside of the course is very hilly but nothing extreme. Its rollers with some AWESOME descents and some nice little turns. Also on the backside is a long straightaway with a tailwind during the race. It was a nice 10 mile stretch of 24 mile an hour aero riding. Sweetness. I passed many people whom had passed me eariler. It was once again proof of my belief in taking it easy and being steady instead of crushing the first half of the bike ride and surviving the rest of the race. I always try to remember there is a long run waiting, as well. I felt good the last 1o miles, but tired. The course changed from what we thought the course was, when Brian, Jan and I had come out and ridden before. They removed a part near the lake and turned it into a lollipop style course with a short out section at the end of which you do two big loops, then take that little short section back to town. Not spectator friendly at all. That little 5 mile out section was also very hilly and had some irritating winds on the way back in to town. My legs were tired. I was feeling good, but I felt a little bit concerned about how much I spent on the second lap of the ride.

I wheeled through town and surprised Jan, hoping to get a good pic, walking along. She wasn't ready and I watched her calculate and finally decide she couldn't get her mammoth camera ready in time, and instead started screaming cheers at me. She is so damned cute. I don't know what I would do without her. I turned that wonderful final corner and got my shoes unbuckled and pulled my feet out. I was so ready to be done with the bike ride at this point, I was excited about running.

Running is fun. Running fast for 13 miles and long hills is hard.

I love running. When I get off the bike and I am standing there at my transition spot, I love the feeling of being pretty good at something and knowing that although I had a tough bike ride, I can still count on a great half marathon. And then I actually start running and remember that I am closer to giraffe than runner in physiology. And giraffe-like is exactly how it felt to start. This was not Ironman, I was not merely trying to finish, I was aiming for a serious time. I needed to get out and take as little time as possible to feel my groove and loosen up. And boy was that difficult. I forced myself into a quick, but easy, pace the first couple miles. I took a potty break and told myself that when I got out I was going to slowly build the rest of this run.

It started getting warm for the first time. The sun was out, and it felt very good. I like racing hotter temps, personally. The aid stations are there and had plenty of everything, but usually during the run how well you started the day hydrated as well as how well you hydrated during the bike ride play a bigger role. If you have to drink a lot early in the run, well, its too late. Should of taken care of business earlier.

I was passed by a woman who didnt seem too much different than me in age, and was only slightly running faster. I decided to keep her in my sights as a gauge. I figured she was doing about 7:40 per mile or so. She pulled away a little, and I found myself struggling to hold that pace. The run has a figure eight kind of thing where you run out one loop which is NOT flat but is misleading in that its long slow uphill drains you and the long slow downhill rests you. I didn't figure out that was why I felt so up and down until the second lap. Going down the long easy downhill of the first half of the first loop I gained some speed and caught up to a different group, still keeping my eye out for my pacer. I held my speed through town, delighted by the screaming of Jan, Amber and Joe cheering me on. When we passed through downtown and came to the long, scary hill I tried to shorten my stride but maintain speed. For the most part it worked and I passed throngs of decent runners succumbing to the heat and hill. I caught up to the woman and stayed with her the rest of the run. Found out later her name was Jennifer and she was cheering on so many people as she ran it was ridiculous how much energy she had. Or seemed to have.

I saw Brian as I was finishing up my first lap, he had just come through downtown and looked good. Tired, but good. He had a really fine first Half IM. I decided to pick up my tempo a little the rest of the way. It was a very difficult second lap, and I saw a lot of familiar faces finishing and heading out. Its a benefit to a multilap course like this--you get to see people often and it doesnt feel so isolated. It was really amazing just how many people there were out there. Just because they wanted to. Mostly the second lap is a blur. I had been running as fast as I could and was very tired. My legs felt pretty heavy but I maintained a quick pace into downtown for the last time. Jan one the side of the road yelling at me to "RUN FASTER, BOY!" so I do. I take off as fast as I possibly can to the finish. I would be lying if I said I wasn't disappointed with my time, but I would be equally lying to say I wasn't happy to have worked through some issues and still have a great run.

All in all, it was a fun day. Racing is always fun; the circumstances that create the challenge are always different and will always be the unexpected part of being a triathlete. I ate way too much pizza after the race and got a very upset tummy for pretty much the rest of the day. Hurt like crazy. I can't blame it on the swim, though.

Become Triathlete Heart

"Training is what you are doing while your opponent is sleeping in."

~Brian Owen





Triathletes, take heart.

Look to your left and right, and take note of the people you see. Are they like you? Do they shave their legs in anticipation of a race? Do they not only strive for greatness in one sport but in three all at once? Can they swim farther than anyone you know, bike farther than anyone you know, and run farther than anyone you know---in the same day?

You are a triathlete. That makes you different for a lot of reasons.

One difference is your heart. Your heart, as a result of training, is able to provide your body with more blood per heartbeat than the people you see to your left and right who are not triathletes (and given they are not freaks of nature, cross country skiers or rowers). This results in an ECG which you see above. This is my Ecg.

Triathlon induced characteristics include the low heart rate (BPM = 42), otherwise known as bradycardia, and abnormal voltages. These are indicators that you heart, and really your entire body, has, over time from training volume year after year, become a very efficient beast. It sucks the oxygen out of your blood at astonishingly efficient levels. Your heart has more voltage for a more solid beat and stroke. Your heart is strong enough to push blood around your entire body such that it beats less times per minute than other peoples hearts.

Triathletes, take heart. Because of your lifestyle choice, you most likely have lower circulating triglyceride levels, lower overall body fat percentage, and blood glucose that is well controlled. And as a result of these things, the chances of having one of the now typical American ailments is vastly reduced.

But be careful, you might be called obsessed, weird, crazy, or worse. Just look at the people calling you these things and feel bad for them. Count to 10 and realize in that time span, their hearts had to beat almost twice as many times as yours did to keep them conscious.

Pay Attention

"Look, I get it; you come home, you work hard, and you turn on your TV... You kind of want to escape a little bit and be taken away by something. Our show required you to pay attention, and if that's not what you wanted to do, then it wasn't going to be for you, and that's OK."

~Will Arnett

How well do you pay attention?
How do you know if you aren't paying good enough attention, if you aren't paying attention to your attention span long enough to know? You know?

I find myself more and more distracted lately. So many deadlines, so many important things, so many fun things--all of them seem to demand my attention. There is a limit to how much I can do in a given unit of time, and generally I will get diminishing quality the more I try to pack into each of those units. Why is it so hard to stay focused on the priority? I have X to get done by the end of today. I A, B, and C which are due some other time. Why do I let the completion and execution of X be muddled by A, B, and C even though they aren't required at the moment?

Its more basic than a work list, though. Its every day life objects. I need to do a certain number of things every day, and mostly I can complete these things on auto-pilot. However, I have a certain number of things I want or need to do each day on top of that daily list, and these things require much prioritization. There are people and things I have to take care of which require attention. But maybe there is a finite amount of attention that can be given?

Additionally, how much can I really accomplish WELL if I am not fully immersed in it. I believe I surely can't get the most out of my life this way. Perhaps its another side-effect of graduate school...maybe its getting older. I don't know.

For now, enjoy this. But pay attention.

Awareness Test

The future is now... no, now....no, now....

“My interest is in the future because I am going to spend the rest of my life there”

~Charles F. Kettering

In the future we will have better balance.











This blog makes me feel like the world's biggest underachiever.

davesbikeblog

Huh?
Um, yeah

What Motivates?

"Just because you're not paranoid doesn't mean that no one's out to get you."

~unknown




We find our hero sitting at his desk, a deadline looming. The boss is away, the lab is quiet, and the course of action clear. Never has there been as perfect a time as this for finishing his manuscript and notching another milestone off the list.

But he waivers. He thinks. He is engulfed in an overwhelming, dark pool of apathy.

When the boss returns there will be hell to pay, and he knows this. The "action items" clearly outlined have seen less action than Rosie O'Donnell in a string bikini. Why?

Fear is a good motivator, but is it enough?
Passion is a good motivator, but is it enough?

Why do we get done the things we get done? Are we rewarded somehow? And if so, what is the reward?

George Erdman, the president of EREN Corp, says there are four main motivators:

==> Recognition
People who are motivated by "Recognition" are interested in
respect, admiration, regard, esteem, notoriety and
celebrity.

==> Influence
Those whose primary motivator is "Influence" find power,
control, competition, independence and order to be most
important.

==> Internal
If you are motivated by "Internal" factors, then morals,
duty, intellect, creativity, philanthropy, and honor are
important to you.

==> Profit
"Profit" motivated people strive for success with money,
possessions, acquisitions, wealth, income and growth.


But is it really that simple? I hardly believe I am motivated SOLELY by internal factors, but internal factors are one of my main drivers. I know I love a little recognition, but it doesn't mean anything without feeling like I made a difference and earned it. So what is it that motivates people? Why is it that when the end is clearly in sight, and he knows that all he needs is one concerted, hard effort and he will be finished, he simply can not finish the task? Even the fear of facing the disappointed boss is not enough to stir him to action. Even knowing the weight of his actions. Why?

No, this is not a particular person, but examples from many people I know. It really could be any field, any job, any situation that involves having to seek out some greater power to will ourself into action.

In my search for answers I found this site has some interesting concepts not just involving motivation but some other interesting things as well.

I am motivated to graduate. I am motivated to earn enough money to retire early and have fun while I am still mobile. I am motivated to do good work because I can't stand the thought of being associated with anything less than wonderful and polished.
I am also extremely, extremely tired.

I know no one will comment, because no one reads this except Jan, but if you want I would love to know what motivates you to get through something that feels like there is no reason to do "it" other than just to have done "it".

Victory is a Big Red Bike

"You can't be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline - it helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer."

~Frank Zappa




We all need some beer. And we got some at the:
URBAN ASSAULT SEATTLE



WE WON!!!!


My buddy Jeremy Gerking and I entered the Urban Assault bike race thinking it would be a good time. We didn't really consider that we would actually win the thing...

In the morning we were there pretty early; it was obvious from our early arrival, shaved legs, and shiny, high-octane bikes that we were not representative of the typical competitor. We had not the fixed-gear, bland-colored urban machine used by couriers and urban cyclists around town. We had our gear-ful triathlon geek bikes, toe clips and all, leaning ominously against the Fremont Open Theater screen. We thought we COULDN'T win, what with the knowledge of the city so many local bikers would have.

Little did we know we would end up with a pair of brand new bikes specially made by New Belgium Brewing?? It was a unique experience, to say the least, filled with some weird events, weird sights, and hard biking.

I stayed up the night before on the USATF Route Mapping tool, figuring out based on distance and time the best route to take from checkpoint to checkpoint. I figured it was still a long shot at best. When we got to the last mystery checkpoint and heard we were the first there, it became a realistic thought: we might just win this thing.
We hammered as fast as we could go from our final checkpoint, Bike Works in Ballard, back to Fremont, on Market and then Leary. When we arrived we had one last challenge--two laps around a course in a modified, adult sized big wheel. And then it was over. We did it.

Jan met us downtown and was at the finish line and watched us go through our last challenge. It was NOT a run-away victory, either. The second place team was behind us by only a couple of minutes, and it actually came down to a race on the big wheels. When we emerged from the course in first place, Jan was waiting and screamed when I told her we had won.

High fives all around.

Then we drank free New Belgium beer, ate some yummy free pizza and baked in the sun for a couple hours until they awarded us our new cruisers. I took mine for a spin yesterday afternoon--indeed it is a different but pleasant experience.

And now I can say I have jousted from the back of a BMX, thrown newspapers from the basket of a tiny, pink, banana seat bike, been a human wheelbarrow, and raced a bigwheel. All while riding as fast and hard as I could around Seattle with a great buddy. What a great day.

Self....ish

“Truly, nothing in the world has occupied my thoughts as much as the Self, this riddle, that I live, that I am one and am separated and different from everybody else, that I am Siddhartha; and about nothing in the world do I know less than about myself, about Siddhartha.”

~Siddharttha, from the book of the same name, Page 38.




And this is where, collectively, your eyes roll because Moss is about to embark upon yet another journey through the philosophical soul searching jungle. Oh joy.

Not so fast, jack.

Siddhartha. A "terrific little book" by Hermann Hesse that could probably be referred to in some more esoteric fancy-pants circles as a "Standard" or "archetypal" text that sets a classic and recycled character into literary life. As Heir Gerking put it, at one time or other we are all Siddhartha. In this story Siddhartha plays many parts, indeed.

Right now, I resemble Siddhartha up until and including page 38; he is locked in a battle against his own wits (what a conundrum). What is the point of learning about nirvana when no one has crossed the great barrier between it and mortal life (the pond is deep, but the darkness is shallow)? Siddhartha decides to attempt to lose the Self to attain a new state of enlightenment. And finally, who cares when I don't even know myself? The thinker is confronted with the fact that he can not think his way out of something. At this point in the story, Siddhartha comes to grips with the fact that how on earth can he know how to lose the Self when he doesn't even know what his-self is?

And who am us, anyway?

We're one of you... and you're one of us...I think. Maybe. Possibly.

The interesting part of reading this story is that I just finished reading "A Wrinkle in Time" before it. You know, the elementary school book we all have to read in 2nd grade... or maybe most people read it in 4th grade but I read it WITH the 4th graders when I was in 2nd grade. Precocious little snot that I was. Well, what comes around goes around, because here I am in grad school at 30 with all of the 23 and 24 year olds with giant brains flopping around all the time. Its ridiculous how smart these kids are. And I believe I have a right, now, to call them "kids." The difference between us is...well, several meters wide. Anyway "A Wrinkle in Time" is as deep of a read as you want to make it. I find these days that I can not help but make the Sunday morning comics deep. I manage to eek out existentialism out of the list of ingredients on a soup can for fuck's sake. But "A Wrinkle in Time" was great for me because it is such a childish book on the surface but really has a lot to say. It did not, however, prepare me well for 1922 Hermann Hesse. No sir.

But I digress. You know, I think I am always in a digression, and when I think I am stopping the digression, that is really when the digression begins...

Maybe I have turned the corner, like Siddhartha, and I am now onto a different set of problems. Maybe I have figured out who I am, but being who I am in graduate school took a little figuring of its own. Or maybe I just haven't gotten to the drunken, business, party stage yet.

Soul Finger

"You don't have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body."

~C.S. Lewis



Once again, I haven't written on my blog in a long time. There are a lot of reasons for this. Not excuses, just reasons. I haven't especially felt clever, for one, and I suppose I sometimes convince myself that if I can't write anything clever or funny, I shouldn't write. That right there is what is technically referred to as "bullshit".

The real reason is school. I don't know that I agree with calling it school anymore, because now it is a race. Its The Race. This race makes Ironman seem easy. It makes Ironman seem easy because in Ironman I knew what lay before me, I knew before I signed up, even, what I must do to finish. And once you finished, you did not have to consider anything. Not a thing. At Ironman you finish, feel wonderful, feel like shit, sit down with some pizza you cant possibly enjoy fully and go limp for a few... weeks.

This race that is graduate school is vastly different.

There is no "finish". That is the single most important thing to realize if you consider going to get a PhD in a hard science. The finish is really intangible. The final product is not the end--there is really no final product. The end is a state of mind when you, and more importantly your committee, and the faculty, can see you standing on your own two (too) pompous scientific feet before the world, proudly proclaiming "I am science. Let me be free to spread my science and the gospel of my predecessors thus to the world." More or less they feel that if they let you graduate, they won't be embarrassed. Perhaps more importantly, they now see you as a consumer of their scarce dollars instead of a producer of the rare scientific PK research commodity we produce.

Perhaps what is harder to understand, and vastly more difficult for me, is that at the beginning you are almost--no, you are completely--fooled into believing the drivel that the faculty shovels your way. That this is a very structured, well thought out process that simply involved doing your pieces along the way and then viola--PhD. Not at all. Nope. Nada.

I haven't written because I am a soul. I am a soul with a body with extremely high pressure placed upon it at times. In these times the brain overtakes the mind, and the mind overtakes the soul, and now we find ourselves not standing hand in hand with our shadow self, but looking back over our shoulder at it. The body has taken over because the brain says "hey, this pressure is pretty heavy right now. We are about to crack and YOU, SOUL, are just sitting there daydreaming and twiddling your little toes in the cool creek gurgling by. Soul, I am sorry, but you aren't getting this done."

We can appear soulless. We can even convince ourselves we are a body.

And when that point occurs, apparently, you are awarded your PhD in Pharmacokinetics.

Reality

Maybe sometimes we can't control the way we look to others. But we can control the way we respond.


I got onto the MT 25 to downtown and rode quietly down Pacific Ave. When we stopped at the front of the University of Washington Medical Center a man got on the bus and was definitely disabled by something that resembled cerebral palsy or MS. He seemed unable to voluntarily move his legs such that walking was extremely difficult for him. His face was slightly contorted while he spoke. He was black, walked (obviously based on my description) with a cane, carried a neck brace and wore the typical hospital bracelet. He had strange ticks and involuntary spasms.

The bus was mostly full and the front seats were completely full. When this man walked on no one moved. The lady seated next to me got up, and in a clear voice told the people at the front of the bus that they were supposed to vacate those seats for disabled riders. They didn't move when put on the spot, but instead looked uncomfortable and nervous.

The lady next to me insisted he sit there, next to me. He resisted saying he would stand but she fairly ordered him to sit. He did, right next to me.

I had the thought; I felt uncomfortable and felt that pang of "why do the weirdos have to sit next to me?"

He started talking to me. I felt bad for him that no one let him sit up front, and I had a feeling everyone on the bus besides that woman who gave up her seat for him thought he was "weird" and would not want to talk to him, so I listened and smiled at him. I felt bad for him and I felt bad that at the same instant I felt somewhat annoyed that he was talking to me.

And I have to write about it now because of the impact it made on me.

I didn't get his name. I wish I had. He was at the hospital because he had surgery on his back about 5 weeks ago and was in for a follow up. His speech was slurred and forced and took effort to decipher. This was, I found out, because he had nerve damage. I asked him what happened to make him have back surgery, and he told me a remarkable story that I wasn't prepared for.

He was working at Fred Meyer and fell, cracking the ball part of the femur in his right hip joint. He went for surgery to have the fragments of bone that were floating in the joint removed. Somehow the surgery left metal fragments in the joint that calcified over time and started pointing and pushing into the sciatic nerve. As a result he had what he referred to as a "permanent stroke" symptom: the slurred speech and even less control of many functions that already was terrible. I should have recognized it before he told me. Anyway, he said his surgery 5 weeks ago which was to remove those fragments. It turned out during that surgery, however, the surgeons saw that removing some of the fragments would potentially injure the nerve permanently because of how much they had grown into the cavity. Therefore they removed a few fragments at that time and would re-evaluate and decide later on what to do.

I could sense his intelligence from the way he spoke, but it was obviously masked because of the disability. I imagine most people never got to see this, and never gave him a chance at all.

I asked him where he was going. He said he was going downtown to catch a bus to take him to Everett, but that no one would help him figure out where to catch that bus. He said he would ask the bus driver again but she wasn't nice. I imagined the bus driver's response was probably annoyed and judgmental, as they are to EVERYONE. Granted, they deal with a lot of people who aren't disabled but annoying and manipulative, such that the people who really need help suffer the wrath of the driver who had been through the whole day. I told him I didn't know anything about buses to Everett but I did tell him a couple of streets that had large bus stops and might be of help.

He said he had been there since 9 AM and was hungry and hadn't eaten. He did not look like he had much, if any money. This was confirmed when he said he just wanted to get back to the mission in Everett and have some food. My heart really sank to think I was going downtown to eat expensive food at a nice restaurant downtown in excessive amounts. He was going home to a mission and maybe a sandwich.

He was very uncomfortable and I could tell he was frustrated.

He said he didn't care what it took, he was sick of the pain and sick of feeling the metallic cold through his body that the pressure on the nerve caused, and the doctors didn't listen to him. Instead they just gave him Oxycodone, a pain killer with opiates. He reached into his pocket and took out a prescription of pills they had just filled for him to show me. He said he sometimes had to sell a few of them to get money for food.

Wow.

I asked him if anything had happened to hold the surgeons accountable for leaving metal in his hip and putting him in a more disabled state than he needed to be and he said he couldn't afford a lawyer and as a result how would he do that? I didn't have an answer. He said he trusted in God to take care of him and that some people had it much worse than he did. I couldn't imagine that I could have that kind of perspective in his situation. He had a legitimate beef with life, but he still saw that other people had it worse. When it comes to religion, I don't think the same way, but I can understand the way people turn to God when they have nothing else. At least its something to hold on to.

He put the pills back in his pocket and we didn't talk much more for a while. He struggled up toward the front of the bus, nearly falling because of his difficulty walking, and asked the bus driver where to catch the certain bus. The bus driver angrily told him she didn't know, that she had already told him that. The bus stopped where I was getting off in downtown, and she yelled at him--YELLED--to get out of the way for people. I shot her a seriously dirty look and patted the guy on the arm and told him I hope he could figure it out. He said thanks and waved. I thought that was the last I would see of him. However, he got off the bus and started walking, if you can call it that, through the crowds asking people where he could catch the 510.

Everyone--EVERY one--ignored him. He started approaching specifically black people and asking them, but they ignored him too. I thought he was going to cry, to be honest, as I watched him stand there in the crowd. I ran over to him, and, being down here early, told him to walk with me and I would try to help him figure it out. He smiled and I felt like I had done, finally, something worth my breath for the first time in my life. People actually gave me the weirdest looks as I walked next to him and tried to talk to him.

I can't say I know a single thing about how it must be for him, but in that moment I grew a brand new hatred for human beings. I already hated them quite a bit.

I told him to look at the big bus signs where the stops are located and see if he sees the 510. I realized, though, that the 510 is a different bus line, through a different organization, and was going to be difficult to find. He said he just wanted to get "home."

Finally I had to head in a different direction but I knew he had to keep heading in the same direction we had been walking. I tried to get him to listen and HEAR what I was telling him about where to look, but I don't know if he heard. I shook his hand and told him I was sorry people were so mean, but not to let it get him down. I told him he was better than most of us. He thanked me profusely and struggled away.

As he walked away I saw him approach three women at another bus stop. They turned hastily away, avoiding him. They must have thought he was a homeless beggar or drunk or something. He walked toward them again and I heard him asking where could he find the 510 bus, and again they moved uncomfortably away. And then a police officer on a horse, of all things, came over and, leaning down from the horse's back, said something I couldn't hear to the man, who held up his arms in question and I heard him say "I just wanted some help finding my bus, man! Maybe you will help me? Where do I catch the 510?" I think it was the saddest part of the whole thing when I next heard the officer say, leaning up straight and firming his voice; "I best think you ought to just head away from here as fast as you can."

The disabled man I had gotten to know just a little bit to be a genuine, hungry, tired, intelligent man could have gotten angry, or cried, or made a scene, or anything. You know what he did? He stood there, put his arms down, and said "God bless you." Then limped away.

Maybe sometimes we can't control the way we look to others. But we can control the way we respond.

Sleepy Time

"I never get enough sleep. I stay up late at night, cause I'm Night Guy. Night Guy wants to stay up late. 'What about getting up after five hours sleep?', oh that's Morning Guy's problem. That's not my problem, I'm Night Guy. I stay up as late as I want. So you get up in the morning, you're alarm, you're exhausted, groggy, oooh you hate that Night Guy! See, Night Guy always screws Morning Guy. There's nothing Morning Guy can do. The only thing Morning Guy can do is try and oversleep often enough so that Day Guy loses his job and Night Guy has no money to go out anymore."

~Jerry Seinfeld






I can relate.

Responsible Guy was hanging out with the ever enticing Night Girl.

Night Guy showed up and kicked Responsible Guy in the teeth.

Morning Guy was depending on Responsible Guy to keep Night Guy in check, but it seems Night Guy and the fiendish Night Girl stay up too late together having good times.

Morning Guy now is jealous of Night Guy and Night Girl's interaction and plotting the demise of Night Guy by giving Day Guy headaches and lack of focus to get things done well. Day Guy then ruins the party by pre-empting Night Guy and going to bed before Night Guy and Night Girl have their fun.

The best part is Night Guy can't even function even when they do stay up late.

The only problem is there is NO Morning Girl.

Getting Through.

"Restlessness is discontent - and discontent is the first necessity of progress. Show me a thoroughly satisfied man - and I will show you a failure."
~Thomas Alva Edison





The goal is not to be the best, but is it really up to me to decide that? Is there a difference in my own journey between just to finish and to finish leaving some impression upon those that remain that something, someone, special just passed through?

The goal is to finish. But can I truly just finish?

At Ironman to just finish was special... but I know I will be going back.

This is different. There is no going back.

It has grown obvious to me that work ethic does not determine success where I am. It has grown apparent that my own success may not be up to me entirely; two things that go against every fiber of who I am. I refuse to believe that in this world I am not responsible for my successes, my failures. If I work hard and do what I know to be right, I will succeed.

Therefore, the equation I have always lived by, my own recipe, no longer holds true. I can not, in this realm, rely on physics as I know them, but instead am sort of bound to the tides of wherever this is and will forever struggle with fighting against the current which is counter to my own truths or to succumb to the truths of "now" until it dispenses me where it sees fit.

I thought I knew the truth about things.
The truth may, in fact, be schedule dependent.

Volcano Pictures

Without further adieu, see for yourself the madness that is the Wilderness Marathon at the top of Kilauea, HI. The pictures just do NOT do it justice. The most noticeable effect witnessed in person but unclear in the pictures is the steepness of the hills. At mile 22, for example, that sucker was probably a 10% grade for 2 more miles. That's fun.

Most of these were taken from a disposable camera I took with me during the run. One of the people I met in the middle of the thing was kind enough to take a pic of me at mile 14.5, which is a few down there. Jan and her dad also took a couple at the very beginning and at the very end.

IRONMAN FLASH BACK!

"The critic has to educate the public; the artist has to educate the critic."
~Oscar Wilde



Watch closely, you will actually see me cross the line at Ironman CDA 2007. Ah, watching that makes me want to sign up RIGHT NOW for another one... but I promised to wait until 2009...

It is what it is... What is it?

"They misunderestimated me."
~George W. Bush





Its fall. Thats what. I misunderestimated its effect.

I forgot how fall felt until this morning when it was on the verge of raining, cold and dark.

In some parts of the world fall is pretty and colorful, with changing leaves, "indian summer" (whatever that means) and gradualism. It means the gardens will begin producing a new bounty and the evening air will hang heavy in the early setting sun's red glow.

In Seattle it means ick. And get out your trusty rain-proof everything.

It means keeping plenty of towels in the garage for wiping dog feet.

Fall means another 10 months until summer. The beginning of going to work in the dark and going home in the dark.

Fall means its time to dust off the bike trainer in anticipation of garage riding for months.

Ok, this is a really bad view, I admit. Fall brings good things also. It brings another season of Seahawks football and more importantly, tailgating with the crew. Seahawks football brings its own set of ulcers and frustrations also, but we wont dedicate blog time to that, right now. Fall means marathon training for the hilly, chilly and wet Seattle Marathon. I think thats fun. Its fun getting done with it.

Fall means Oktoberfest beer-a-thons all over the northwest.

Hmph.

I dont know, its hard for me to paint it in a positive light when I love hot weather, beaches and 4:30 AM sunrise. I love swimming after coffee at 7 AM followed by running the mountains at noon and more swimming. I love seeing the sun rise beyond the cascades and Husky Stadium on my bike ride to work at 6 AM. I love summer. I can not lie.

But if it weren't for the 10 months of ICK, perhaps I might not enjoy summer quite so thoroughly every minute of every day.

Plate Champion

“A big man is always accused of gluttony, whereas a wizened or osseous man can eat like a refugee at every meal, and no one ever notices his greed.”

~Robertson Davies





On friday I turned 30. I did something extraordinary on my 30th birthday to mark the occasion. It was my first foray into competitive eating, sort of. I became a SushiLand "Plate Champion."

This is truly an American art--overeating for the sole purpose of saying you overate... The feat of becoming Plate Champion involves consuming, in whole, 30 plates of sushi in 90 minutes. 30 plates means at least two pieces of nigiri-style sushi over rice per plate, or 60 pieces of sushi. Maybe this doesn't sound difficult to many of you out there, and indeed, for me, it was not as hard as, say, Ironman. But at 25 plates my body began to negotiate with me when it came to swallowing.

Body: You think you are going to really swallow that mouthful of salmon, rice, wasabi and soy?
Gluttony: Yes.
Body: Go ahead and try.
Gluttony: (chewing, chewing, chewing, chewing...still chewing...) So you have a point.
Body: Tell you what, dumb-ass. I will let you swallow HALF of a bite at a time, and only after you mix it with some tea and chew each HALF bite for approximately 5 minutes. And you will accept this deal or barf.


I turned 30. I ate 34 plates. I am a Plate Champion. Not only that but I set a new record for our department at school, the former record being 33 plates. I actually finished 20 plates in about 45 minutes. It was nuts.

I got a t-shirt and photos to prove it. Its really not something to be proud of, but somewhere on the edge of reason I tell myself that this might decrease the amount of wasted food that might have otherwise populated the garbage. It might be partially true. Maybe.

Debunking Health Myths

"There's lots of people in this world who spend so much time watching their health that they haven't the time to enjoy it."
~Josh Billings




No, there are no hair growing herbs.

No, Rosemary does not cure toenail fungus.

Yes, several components of some red wines have been proven to lower blood pressure and reduce risk of heart attack while boosting your anti-oxidative state.

Ever had questions like these? Ever seen the stupid, cheesy, almost-too-dumb-to-not-believe ads online promising health miracles?

A few of us at UW Pharmaceutics have decided to provide the public who can find us with a way to find out the truth about these things. We would love to hear your health myth questions.

Please give it a shot, its free. Tell your friends, too; we want to spread the word and help people become informed about these false/misleading/unusual promotions and messages.




Discuss Debunking Health Myths




I hope to see some questions soon. We will provide any information we can to set the record straight!

Blank

“Many people hear voices when no-one is there. Some of them are called mad and are shut up on rooms where they stare at the walls all day. Others are called writers and they do pretty much the same thing.”

~Unknown





I sit down for the fifth time and wonder where the witty commentary went. Why, it truly is possible to sit and stare at this device, fully eager and prepared to write, and then find that when the time has arrived to fill the blank space--its inevitably the hardest thing on earth to accomplish. Just one word?? Something?

A myriad of excuses clot my thinking into a jelly-like, brownish-blue glob that gets stuck somewhere between my brain and my fingers. Nothing happens. I stare. I fidget. I convince myself of something or other that prohibits me from communicating the written, or typed, word. No matter how much I want to, its stuck in me for yet another day.

I havent written about the marathon yet. Why? The classic response that I hear emanating from my own mouth is "I didnt have time." That there is a load of hooey. I have a million thoughts about the run across the lava, in the middle of nowhere, at 4000 feet with 182 other freaks of nature, but sitting down and writing about it feels impossible. Ironman was SO overwhelming, SO amazing I couldnt wait. It was like a bomb going off inside of me. The only thing about Ironman was that it took almost 13 hours to complete and was really a novels worth of emotional and physical extremes. The marathon was certainly a rare and wonderful event that many people will never experience (fewer than Ironman for sure) and yet its not so pressing for me to discuss here. How strange, because I truly loved doing it and cant wait to share.

Writers block. I think that is what I am experiencing. Wealth of ideas, lack of motivation to clarify them as written words. And boredom with the sound of my own "voice."

One of the things I love about blogging is the fact that a few degrees of separation are all that exists between most of the world, out there, and this blog. Its creepy how many people are just one, two or three clicks from being right HERE, reading this crap. And it really is. Some one once asked TS Eliot if college professors stifled budding writers. He replied that they do not stifle enough, and that there are many a best seller out there that did not have to exist if along the way some poor author had, indeed, been stifled.

Some of us stifle ourselves, I suppose.

Cheers.