Band of Brothers

Last night I moved one step closer to fulfilling resolution #6 on my list of new years life resolutions, by finishing my second book of 2010: Band of Brothers by Stephen Ambrose. The book is a historical account of an American company of paratroopers, and follows them from their training to their first combat jump on D-day at Normandy, and throughout the rest of World War II. The book's strength is it's historical accuracy, it is pretty amazing reading some of the anecdotes knowing that they are all true. However, in my opinion this painstaking historical accuracy was also the book's weakness, since at times it seems to get bogged down in the specifics of exactly who did what at what time, etc. I can see why the author did it, since if I was a participant in these events I would want to see my name show up where it should, but at times it made for a less enjoyable read. One other complaint is that the author uses a lot of military acronyms and jargon which are completely unfamiliar to a civilian like myself. It would have been helpful if there was a military primer at the start explaining the difference between a battalion, a company, and a division, and also a glossary where all of the acronyms are defined. Those things being said, it was still an excellent read (and a quick one, good for my resolution!) and I would recommend it.

One other piece of news that is pertinent to a new years resolution: I actually have a job interview today! I had gotten so used to submitting resumes and never hearing anything back from anyone that I almost fell off my chair when I read an e-mail from someone telling me they might interview me. A few days ago I was scanning monster.com for job postings, and I noticed they had a list of recommended jobs associated for my account; Job #2 on the list of recommendations was a posting for a Warehouse Driver in Spokane, WA. This was a bit disheartening, since I had been under the assumption that a PhD in Electrical Engineering qualified me for a higher level job (no offense meant to any warehouse drivers reading this, I'm sure your training was equally intense). At least they asked for "PC Skills" in the posting, I'm pretty sure I picked those up somewhere along the line.

Anyways, the position I am interviewing for this morning (or at least meeting with someone from the company, I'm not sure if it is a full interview) sounds like a great job: the company does really interesting work, the location is perfect (right downtown), and they even have a climbing gym in their headquarters. I don't want to write too much about it since who knows what will happen, but it is at least a step in the right direction towards fulfilling resolution #5 on my list of new years life resolutions.

Weight: 162.4
Body Fat: 5.2%

Race planning II

After unveiling the first part of my winter racing schedule last week with the announcement of my plans to participate in the Gatineau Loppet on Feb. 21, I think it is time to announce the next part of my racing program: on March 13 I will be racing in the Wasatch Powder Keg, a backcountry ski race in Salt Lake City. I will do the race with my friend Mike who I worked with at the University of Utah, also an avid skier/climber/cyclist. Those of you who have skied with me might be thinking: "What is this muppet doing entering a backcountry ski race, he can barely ski!". To that, I say "Touche". It is true that I am severely lacking in the downhill skiing skills department, but I am hoping that my uphill fitness and patented "survival skiing" downhill style will allow me to reach the finish line in one piece. The race is 14.4 km long, with 5 climbs totaling 5000 feet in elevation gain. At the very least it will be a great day out in the mountains, so I am really excited.

Other news (from the "Things that actually matter" department) is that Roanne had her 5th chemotherapy infusion this past Monday, and is doing really well. The first 4 injections were a mix of two drugs (Adriamycin and Cytoxan) that apparently have more side effects than the drug used for the last 4 injections (Taxol). So this past week was Roanne's first Taxol injection and so far she is feeling far better than she was after the A/C injections. That is to say she is now getting up at 5am to head into work, rather than the 6am rising time she has had in prior weeks. Roanne is pretty amazing/crazy, even while undergoing chemotherapy she clocks more hours of work than I ever will (in the event that I do at some point in the future have the misfortune of finding gainful employment). The only time off she has taken during this whole ordeal has been one day when she first heard the news, and every other Monday since chemotherapy started since the infusion and accompanying doctors appointments take the better part of the day.

Anyways, back to stuff that has no real-world significance: this morning I had another record setting weigh-in, Huzzah!

Weight: 161.4
Body Fat: 5.0%

The Musical Bumps

Sorry for the lack of postings lately! When I don't post it either means that I am busy not having fun (as was the case on Friday when I spent the day working on the bathroom) or busy having fun (as was the case over the weekend when I was up in Vancouver visiting Fras and Carla). Anyways, Friday morning I had a reasonable weigh-in at 163.8, and since I didn't weigh myself over the weekend (my excuse was that I was in Vancouver so it would have been too hard on an unfamiliar scale, in reality I had eaten so many cookies on Friday that I felt sick so I didn't want to face the numbers), so that makes my weekly average for the third week 164.4, meaning that I actually went UP from the second week. Oops! I'm going to have to do better than that to hit my New Years Resolution weight of 160.0!

Anyways, enough about how heavy I am, on to how I spent my weekend! All day Friday I worked on the bathroom, the result being that the sink and vanity is now installed and working (with some help from Roanne when she arrived home from work on Friday) On the left is a picture of our lovely Asian-themed washing station.

I headed up to Vancouver on Friday night, Roanne was staying in Seattle since her Mom was flying in for a visit. The drive went smoothly, and we went to bed soon after my arrival since we had big plans for the following day: a backcountry ski tour of the Musical Bumps up in Whistler!

The alarm went off at 5:30am, and we rolled out of bed and fired up the Bialetti espresso maker and ate some steel cut oats that we had soaked overnight in soy milk. Kyle arrived promptly at 6:20am, and Fras and I loaded up our gear into his Forerunner and we were off! Below is a shot of the early morning drive through downtown Vancouver, headed for the Lions Gate.

We arrived in Squamish just before 7:30am, and rendezvoused with Martin and John (a.k.a. Markezzy). We then continued on to Whistler, and after some routefinding hijinks we finally found the staging area for our backcountry adventure. Below is a shot of us getting our gear in order. After gearing up, Kyle and Markezzy drove the cars to the day lots and took a cab back, since there was no parking at the "trailhead".

With everything now in order, we donned our skins and headed up the trail, making good progress despite the icy conditions that made skinning up steep parts precarious. On the left is a shot of Fras heading up through the trees, it was a beautiful sunny day which made things very enjoyable!

After just under an hour of ascending, we emerged at the Gondola midstation, decided that aerobic activity was over-rated, and hopped on the lift. After riding a few lifts and sampling some of the icy groomers and crowded lift lines, we finally arrived at the taking off point for the start of the real skiing, the gateway to powderland! Below is a shot of Martin and Markezzy looking out over our kingdom.

I wasn't that familiar with the names of all the features so I might be off a bit, but I think that we started by skiing some nice gentle slopes down into flute bowl. Not super steep, but there wasn't so much powder that you couldn't make nice turns so it was still a lot of fun. Here is a shot of Martin at the bottom of our first descent, with Fras approaching in the background:

From here we put our skins back on and headed up Oboe Peak, then de-skinned and had another amazing run, this one being a little steeper with some tree skiing at the bottom. So awesome! Every time I go backcountry skiing it seems like I have having the best runs of my life, so awesome! We regrouped at the base, and rendezvoused with another group led by the fearless Stu "Bookie" Bookbinder. We then all headed up our next objective called Russet Ridge, which turned out to be the longest ascent of the day. We all followed in Markezzy's contrails as he rocketed up the ascent, then deskinned and headed down for the best run of the day. Here is a shot of Fras shredding a turn, Fras has only been on skis a handful of times (Martin lent him his old AT gear for the day) but he is already one of the most promising young skiers of 2010.

At the base we ate some food and regrouped, then started the ascent back up Oboe Peak. We reached the top of Oboe Peak in some amazing light, here is a shot of me after completing this ascent.
We had some amazing views looking south towards Black Tusk, here is a shot of the scenery. Black Tusk is noticeable is the little bump in the middle of the horizon (ascending Black Tusk is still on my to-do list!).

We had planned on skinning back up and into the in-bounds Whistler terrain, since that would make for the easiest way down. The other option was to drop into the valley that leads to Singing Pass, and ski out along that hiking trail, but from talking to Markezzy who had done it three times previously it sounded like a bit of an ordeal. However, Bookie caught up with us as we were de-skinning on Oboe Peak, and he convinced us to follow him on a descent that would take us into Singing Pass. We headed down one more sweet powder descent into the valley, along the way encountering a 5 foot cornice drop that the others fired with ease, and on which Fras and myself deployed the "Cornice Butt Drop" technique where you sit down and swing your skis over the edge, then sitting on the edge of the cornice slowly ooze off of it until your skis touch the slope beneath. Watch for it in the next extreme ski video you see. We also encountered a "booter" (jump) someone had built, Martin, Kyle, Markezzy, and Stu all launched off this while Fras and I skied beside it (equally awesome). Finally there was a small cliff that the others dropped and Fras and I again managed to avoid. Below is a shot of Martin sailing off the cliff.

We eventually made our way down into the valley, where we followed the seemingly never-ending trail/bobsled course back into the village. The bobsled course was punctuated by narrow log bridges that you could either try to ski across (with dire consequences if you went off the edge) or keep taking your skis off and walking across in your slippery ski boots. It was a real nightmare, if you ever are faced with an option of descending Singing Pass on skis (or a snowboard, that would have been even worse) you should avoid it at all costs. The only good thing, as Markezzy opined as we finished up, was that we are all now "Singing Pass Certified" and we never have to do it again. Sweet! We emerged at the Whistler Base area in the dark (as all good adventures should end), and sat down to enjoy a pint under the heat lamps.

What an awesome day! After experiencing backcountry ski rides, I can't believe that anyone would ever ski at a resort (other than to bum a lift up into the backcountry). On the ride back to Vancouver we were feeling pretty tired and sore from the full day, and Fras put in a request that our next day's activities not involve using our arms. He thought a little longer, and then put in a request for the activity to not involve using our legs either. I assented, knowing that he would come to his senses after a good night's sleep.

We woke up Sunday morning around 8am, fired up the Bialetti, and then picked a restful activity we could do for the day: nordic skiing! What a great idea, so easy on the arms and legs! So we headed up to Cypress, where they are currently in a state of panic with low snow conditions and the Olympics just around the corner. Looking across from the nordic center at the downhill runs was pretty wild, one set of runs was entirely brown and green with grass and dirt, and there where helicopters flying around with loads of snow to dump on the other set of runs where they had been making snow.

At the nordic area we were greeted by thin coverage and brown slush, as seen in the photo below.

It looked like some of the worst conditions I have ever skied in, definitely the highest dirt to snow ratio. But, we had come all the way there, and nordic skiing is so stinkin' fun that even if you are skiing in pure mud it is probably more fun than most other things, so we bought two passes it and it was off to the races! Luckily the snow was better at the higher elevations, here is a shot of me skiing in some slightly whiter snow.

In the upper loops we stopped for a while at the warming hut where Fras started a fire to warm us up. Luckily the poor snow meant that we didn't have to deal with any crowds in the hut (come to think of it, you never have to deal with crowds while nordic skiing since the misery sticks don't appeal to most people).



There was also some sort of children's event going on near Hollyburn Lodge, with little kids wearing race bibs and milling around. I dubbed this event the Sitzmark Loppet after one of the runs, but Fras didn't like that title so he renamed it the Spitzmark Locket, which has a nice ring to it also. After skiing for a couple of hours we headed back to Vancouver and finished the day with a bike ride to MEC and a trip to Granville Island to make a delicious dinner of grilled halibut and veg. What a great weekend!

Anyways, one last piece of info before I sign off: I am on fire with my weigh-ins this week! I think it must have been the delicious canoli that Fras and Carla fed me on Sunday night, yesterday morning I set a 2010 record with 162.8 lbs, and then this morning I smashed it again with 162.2! Bene!

Matze!

I had a great day yesterday, somehow I frittered away the morning, then around 11am I headed out for my longest roller ski to date. I made it right to the end of the Burke-Gilman Trail and back for a 3 hour ski, which was really good. It also helped that it was so stinkin' nice out, sunny and really warm. I was pretty shattered when I got back from that, so I lazed around some more, watched the Versus coverage of the Tour Down Under, and then around 4 pm I finally switched into home improvement mode and started working on the bathroom. Unfortunately I had to break off around 5:30 pm to start making dinner, so not too much accomplished on that front.

The reason I had to start dinner preparations was that our favourite German (Matthias) was in town and was stopping by after he finished his work-related activities. I had lined up an ambitious menu that included seared scallops, sunchoke puree, steamed artichokes, and collared greens. I had never worked with artichokes before, they are really confusing, and collared greens were new to me also. This led to some frustration, but luckily Matthias the vegetable expert showed up partway through prep-time and took over the collared greens. Dinner ended up being really good, and it was great to hang out with Matze as well. On the left is an action shot from dinner; Roanne is in the foreground wearing her wizard cloak.

Lastly, I had a terrible weigh-in this morning, coming in at 165.6! I am supposed to be averaging 163 this week, what is going on!?! I think it might have had something to do with overdosing on chocolate milk and granola after my ski, under the pretense of it being a recovery drink. I'm all out of chocolate milk now, so maybe I will have better luck tomorrow.

Race planning

This past week I laid plans for achieving #5 of my New Years sporting resolutions: I registered for the Gatineau Loppet, a 53 km nordic ski race held in Quebec. I don't think it is quite as large as the Birkie, but the website touts it as "Canada's #1 Cross Country Ski Event" so it should be good. An added bonus is that I am combining it with a trip back to Toronto to visit my family, who I missed over Christmas when Roanne and I had to cancel our trip home because of her chemo treatments. Another great thing about this event is that I will be doing it with Trev, it will be fun to race together. I have been doing some other race planning lately, which I will announce in a subsequent posting.

Weight: 164.0

Toilet!

Yesterday was an amazing day here in Seattle, with the sun making its first appearance in a few weeks. I got out for a short roller ski in the morning, then spent the afternoon running some errands and installing the toilet in our downstairs bathroom. After a few hiccups with the supply line (it has an auto shut off feature that I was inadvertently activating by turning the water on too fast) it finally came together, and we now have a working toilet on our main floor! Roanne will be very happy about this as she is not fond of making the trek up the stairs when she is laid out on the couch with no energy after her chemo treatments (I gave a few piggy back rides to the upstairs bathroom to help out with this, but the last one ended with me almost dropping her in the toilet during the dismount so we haven't had many of those lately).

We met our friends Cam and Annie for dinner at Cafe Lago which was good, though I should have ordered lasagna instead of pizza. After dinner I went to the climbing gym for about an hour, though it ended up being late and I have now realized that despite my best intentions there is no point in me being at the climbing past 10pm since I have no energy and just feel like going to sleep on the crash pads. For the last week or so the outside of one elbow has been bothering me, it feels like some tendonitis but I was not sure if it was from climbing or skiing. Having now done both activities a few times I now think it is from climbing, so I will take a week off and be diligent about icing it so that I can get back after it next week.

Weight: 163.6

Router

We have been doing some renovations on our new house in Seattle (new to us, not newly constructed), and after stalling out during the holidays I decided it was time to ramp up again. All the drywall is completed, so the next big step is to get the trim up. This is most urgent in the downstairs bathroom, since it will allow the toilet to be installed. The difficulty with installing the trim is finding a match for the existing trim, the house was built 106 years ago (in 1903) which means that replacement parts can be hard to come by. On Friday I went to a millwork place in Seattle to see what they had, they did not have a suitable replacement but could custom make some for us. There were two problems with this: first, there was a 2-3 week lead time, and second, it was pretty expensive with setup fees of a few hundred dollars and then about $13 per linear foot of baseboard trim.

In light of these drawbacks, I decided to head to home depot, buy a router (using the money saved by avoiding setup fees), and see what I could cobble together using their stock moulding. Here is a photo of the baseboard I was trying to match, it is unusual in that it is about 10 inches high:


Here is a shot of my trim fabrication station (located on our front porch due to rainy Seattle weather), we already had the miter saw but the router is a new addition:


At Home Depot I procured some 7 inch MDF boards and some door trim, at about $1.50 per linear foot:


Et, voila! With a little routing I was able to come up with a reasonable approximation to the existing trim for the cost of the router (which would have been put towards set up fees for the custom trim) and about 1/10th the cost per linear foot of the custom trim!


Hopefully this week I can get the toilet and sink installed (my progress is usually inversely correlated with how good the weather is, sunny days lead to more time spent skiing and riding my bike and very little time spent on home improvements), further updates as events warrant.

Weight: 164.6