Great weekend of racing!

This weekend was a racers weekend! It had the greats: Bristol’s Nascar, 12Hours of Sebring, Supercross in Texas, Australian V8 Supercars, and a great Legends Race! Man if only I could be at all of them. And today with high definition and great tv’s, you actually have better coverage than actually being there. But without smellavision and real audio and vibration, it will never be the same. For now it will just have to do. Now onto a week of demolition!

Computer Downloading!

Today my mom and I spent several hours sitting in front of the computer trying to download a program so we could do my taxes. My computer is only five years old and has been completely re-booted by me a couple months ago. But since I only had Windows XP SP1; I could not use turbo tax and also i-tunes would not work either. The download of SP2 took probably an hour to download. It sat on one task for ever! But all this aside, my mom and I got to spend some time together uncomfortably on some chairs. So that was fun, and she brought some popcorn and soda from the movies, that was sweet! We had fun and got stuff done at the same time. So taxes done and sent, yet again!

Sewer Pipe.

Today I went and bought a bunch of sewer pipe and went through all the trouble of getting a helper. After all said and done, it was the wrong size. For some reason unknown to me I have had it in my brain that I am using a three inch sewer pipe instead of the preferred four inch. What was I thinking? Well I will find out what my thoughts stemmed from when I pull the floor under my toilet and see a three inch pipe out of necessity. What can you do?

Bamboo

Today I was in search of this magnificent bamboo tree. I wanted something that was roughly one and a quarter inches in diameter and at least six feet tall. Also I was looking for a piece that was straight and not twisted. I asked my wise friend were I could find such a breed and he shouted “up on that grassy hill!” So I trekked of into the woods looking for this prized grove of bamboo three inches in diameter and forty feet tall. When I arrived to the destination I found bamboo the size of my pinky. I was so disappointed. With all the eradication as of late it has become impossible to find good sized bamboo. My journey ended today as a failure but tomorrow I have some secret intel on some good locations of some giants. What do I need this bamboo for? Well I have been instructed on stick stretching. It is a form of passive stretching where the stick becomes the stability and or support while the stretching is being performed. It not only will support and balance you as you try to find your centre, but it also lets you reach to new levels of balance. One friend mentioned that a closet pole would work, ha ha ha. But where is the style and grace in that?

What are we doing?

Where are we taking our lives? Are we working for things far beyond what we can see now? Most of us are working for retirement. What is retirement? For some it is a life of luxury and wealth, travel and leisure, relaxation and solitude. For others it is uncertain, painful, expensive, and not a reality. Does this mean that we should all go work for wealth and obtain the dream retirement? This is up to you. I know that the younger you are the more retirement plans are looking bleak. I also know that if you don’t at least try to plan for the future, when it arrives you may have nothing. The past generations have spent there whole lives building things for down the road. How many of them spent time building their lives today. Where am I going with this? There are some things that we should try to plan for: retirement, health, housing, family… But is having a project that takes ten years to complete better than having something enjoyed for those ten years? Instead of wasting time away from family and friends on a bigger something not enjoyed for years from now; how about having smaller things that you can enjoy now and later. So instead of saving for the motorhome to someday go camping; buy the tent and do it now. All this summed up “enjoy the little things.”

Icepack!

Growing up around sports does not give me the credentials of an athlete. In fact the closest athlete I have in the family is my aunt and cousin; and they live in Washington! So needless to say, I have not been trained in the art healing minor muscle aches and pains. What do you use: heat or cold? Today I went to the chiropractor and after days of blistering heat and coals to sooth the ach, he tells me to use ice! Ice, that’s not nice. That’s why I live in Redding; to get away from ice. Well after 15 minutes with an ice pack, I had gone through several sensations. First is the initial “ah” of cold. Then you are followed by a “that’s not so bad”. It actually feels good for a few minutes. Then the tingling pain sets in and if you are lucky you will end numb and may accidentally forget about it. What these 15 minutes granted me was reduced inflammation and actually makes it feel a little better. So am I an expert on healing? No, but maybe next time I will throw out the coals in favor of the bag of peas.

Reflection and Study.

Today is my day of cleaning and EMT studies as well as still soar from last week. I did a little figuring and came up with a one week long equation of disaster. It all starts with a grueling cyclocross race which not only plays on the mind but the body suffers greatly as well. Fill the next day with cleaning, wheel building, and studies. Turn the next day into 4 hours of digging and the rest of it planning. Then comes day four: sit on a mini-excavator for 8hrs along with getting on and off. The next day turns into the first of the trailer loads. First is to empty the trailer of 1300lbs of sheetrock and demolition debris. Then come back home and fill it with another ~1000lbs of stumps and bush trimmings and take them out to the grandparents burn pile. Then come back and clean out the ditches and load the trailer with 1160lbs of concrete. Now to the next day, finally. This day was a rainy day and emptying the trailer and researching supplies were all that were done. Now for the seventh day; just clean the house and take a bunch of measurements in the bathroom. This does not sound that bad. But now let’s add in that not much real physical labor has been done in a while, the gym has not been in the daily activities, and bike riding has been hit and miss. Then through in there that you go on a bike ride the day after this disaster week. So this should be a lesson to all of us: “Just because you slim down, and appear to be in decent shape, be aware.”