Back in the saddle...not really.

Well I am back working out. Today I ran then swam. Swimming is very hard when you do something tiring before it. I ran 4.1 miles in 30 min on the dreadmill and then swam for 30 mins alternating laps between breast stoke and freestyle. I was able to convince Capt Cueball to run and swim with me. It was fun having someone to endure my pain with. He did the same amount of time as I did, but just different distances. He just had a surgery on his man parts recently and is still a bit sore. Give him sometime.
I have kind of stopped riding my bike to work. It has gotten cold here in orlando (I know cold is relative to people in the N.E.) and biking to work in the cold is not an idea I am fond of. I didn't ride yesterday because it was cold. I was going to man up and ride today, but it was cold AND windy. If hadn't been windy I might have done it, but the combination is a tough one to over come. I have been told that when it gets cold in FL, wait a few days and it will warm up again. I surely hope so cause I might need to get warm workout clothes. I can't fathom how people in NYC run in the snow. That is retarded. If you can see your nose breath, you have business being outside for ANY reason. I am ok with your mouth breath, but if you can see your nose breath... stop what you are doing and go back inside.
Top 5 reasons not to go out into the cold...
1. I am skinny and cold to me is probably much colder than it is to you
2. Sometimes you can't simply put on more clothes to warm up
3. Nose breath... you have to be insane to be outside if you can see it
4. Cause warm is just so much nicer and way more enjoyable
5. Because the cold sucks. Flat out, it sucks

I almost didn't get to workout

So today at work we had the Marine Corp Cake Cutting Ceremony. Quite boring. Mostly pomp and circumstance for the civilians we work with. An opportunity to parade ourselves around and tell people that we are better than the other services. All while standing in the back row and getting served cake last. I'm sorry I thought this was the MARINE'S birthday cake, not the civilians that work with us... I'm off my soap box but Capt Cue Ball at work agrees with me.

Moving along...
I went to the YMCA (it's fun to stay at the Y.M.C.Aaaa) and there was all this police activity. Luckily I still got into the Y. Rumor has it that the park the YMCA is next to is where Caylee Anthony (google the name, but if you are too lazy... local little girl that went missing a while ago and was totally killed by her mom. I mean this mom is like O.J. guilty) was killed. Diver's apparently found human remains in the river, so police closed down the area. Like I said...luckily I was still able to get my workout in. Started off with a swim but actually did a warm up. I don't normally do that kind of thing (cause I'm always so hot enough...ohhh). Just kidding. Anyways, after the warm-up I did 800 meters as fast as I could alternating between freestyle and breast stroke. 800 meters (or 16 laps) in 16 mins. Not too shabby. After that I did a cool down.
After my swim I got on the dread mill (I mean, treadmill) and ran. I figure if I can run 7 miles an hour I can finish a marathon in under 4 hours easy. So I ran at 7 miles an hour. But around mile 3 music from the Foot Loose soundtrack came on, and I was unable to maintain my slow easy jog. It was like I could control my hand as I pushed the increase speed button making the machine go faster and faster. Luckily my legs were also possessed by the movie ghost of kevin bacon and were able to keep up with my possessed, speed increasing hands. In the end my whole body stayed in rhythm and I kept on running at what I call "Foot Loose Speed". For those of you keeping track "foot loose speed" is just a few notches below "hyper speed" which is just below "ludicrous speed". Those of course were made famous by the movie Space Balls (and if you haven't seen that movie, you are a bad person and Santa Clause won't visit your house until you rent it). So needless to say "Foot Loose Speed" is pretty fast.
Anyways...
Top Five Reason the Marines are the best...
1. Dress Blues
2. Jessica Lynch wasn't one of ours
3. Our Junior Officers can tell the difference between our head and our ass
4. Our Junior Enlisted Leadership (NCOs) really know the difference between their heads and their asses. This critical fact makes #3 possible.
5. Marine Movies get actors like Clint Eastwood (Heart Break Ridge), John Cena (The Marine), John Wayne (Sands of Iwo Jima), Samuel L Jackson (Clear and Present Danger), Will Smith (Independence Day) and Mark Wahlberg (Shooter).
The Army gets actors like Bill Murray (Stripes), Tom Hanks (Saving Private Ryan), Meg Ryan (Courage Under Fire), Tom Hanks (again) (Forest Gump), Alec Baldwin and Ben Affleck (Pearl Harbor).
The Navy gets actors like Tom Arnold (McHale's Navy), Owen Wilson (Behind Enemy Lines) and the Village People (Song: In the Navy).
And finally ... the US Air Force only has one movie about them and it is Air Force One. And they get their plane stolen from them and the President (an Old Harrison Ford) has to save the day.
Game, set, match.

A review...

So I have been busy the past few days. Let me fill you in.
Today my work had a card board (one word?) boat race. I had no idea what that was until now. I got voluntold that I was a rower for the team. So my buddy and I figured CHPs would be our theme for this year. He was Ponch and I was John from the late 70's show CHPs (California Highway Patrol). But our CHP was Combat Hardened People; he is an Afghanistan Vet. Here is me and jose as Ponch and John...

And this is what a boat race looks like...

And here are the other boats sinking...

We ended up getting second place in our heat for the fastest boat, but we took first place in the most laps (without sinking) in 10 mins. It was a fun race.

And also this past weekend the in-laws were in town visiting. I would call him papa-bear but he is more of a bull guy then a bear guy so let's call him papa bull. Papa Bull works for a company that has seminars from time to time at various locations throughout the US. Well when Papa bull saw there was one in Orlando he and Mama bull (ok I am done with the bull names) came out for a visit. The wifey's dad spend the day time in seminars and the wifey and her mom were shopping. Ok, they didn't shop everyday. One day we all sat out by the pool at the Ritz Carlton. The company doesn't skimp on accommodations. So I swam laps at the Ritz Carlton’s 50m resort style swimming pool. Ahh the swimming lap of luxury. Last night we all went to go see cirque du soleil at Downtown Disney. It was the first cirque du soleil I had ever been to and it really is a circus, just french and way cooler. It was a good chance to show off our house and show them our little world here in FL. And now that they have visited I can show pictures of our newly painted kitchen and living room. Complete with curtains (that I had nothing to do with).
Kitchen then Living Room before...

Kitchen then Living Room after...

And finally a family pic from the weekend...

And we had Veterans Day yesterday. I guess I never realized what a veteran was cause I found myself saying "happy veterans day" to guys and wondering if they were veterans or not. At first I thought veterans were people who had served in the military. But then I thought veterans had to sever in a war. But these days it is hard to be in the military and not be in a war, but still. So I asked around at work and asked the all knowing Google. So for those that don't know a veteran is "one who has served in the armed forces, but usually not someone who had a dishonorable discharge. " According to Wikipedia. Another definition I am fond of is "For dogs of not less than Seven years of age on the first day of the show". That is a quote from http://www.show-dogs.co.uk/ - The UK's premier site for dog showing, dog shows and schedules. So Veterans day in the UK is a day to celebrate dogs over the age of 7?!?

But I think a guy at work said it best (and he heard this from someone else) that a veteran is "someone that wrote a check to their country equal to the value of their life when they volunteered." I think the quote is pretty accurate. So I hope you all had a happy veterans day. I know I did.

So I am still training for something, but not sure what. My sister threw out the NYC Marathon but we will see. I guess I could try to qualify for Boston? Who knows? Top Five today...?
Top Five Reasons I am not doing a top five today...
1. I don't want to
2. I am tired
3. I used all my creativity at the boat race
4. Cause you don't pay me enough
5.

So what do I do now??

So I am a newbie to this insanity called triathlons and the Ironman and tend to make rookie mistakes quite often. Now as you can read directly to the right -----> you will see that the point of this blog was to document my training as I trained for the Florida Ironman next year. Well in the Ironman world, signup for next year's race starts the day after this year's race. so the 2008 Florida Ironman was on Nov 1 and signups for the 2009 (my goal) opened shortly there after. Seeing as how I have never done a single triathlon, I thought it was pretty ambitious to sign up for a full Ironman so soon. I figured I would give myself a bit of time and sign up in the next few months. I know these events can sell out so I didn't have forever... well less than forever turned out to be shorter than expected. The 2009 Florida Ironman sold out in a matter of hours. I recently bought concert tickets for a Fall Out Boy concert in December... and they didn't even sell out in hours like the Ironman did. Could it be that Ironman > Fall Out Boy? This thing is more popular than your senior prom queen. I knew there were crazy people in this world but a few hours?!?
So now begs the big question? So now what? With no 2009 Florida Ironman what do I do now. I don't know. I haven't figured it out yet. I guess I will just keep working out and keep looking.
Peace out.

A bit of rambling...

Well again, it has been a while. I have still been training but I was slacking on the blogging about it. Day light savings was this past weekend and I might as well call in Bud’s training light savings. I hate being awake in the morning and it still be dark outside. Getting up when it is still dark outside sucks. Staying awake and actually exercising while it is still dark outside… impossible. But now the sun is awake when I am and things are happy. From personal experiences of not seeing sunlight for days upon days, it is amazing what sunlight makes on our body clocks. I am staying up later, waking up earlier and I am feeling less tired then I did before. The Sun Rocks.
Anyways, this weekend the wifey’s best friend (or besty or BFF) flew into town. It was mainly a social visit, but she is an interior designer, so we put her to work. The weekend was spent taping, painting, buying curtains, hanging curtains, buying more throw pillows and then more painting. Luckily I didn’t have to be involved for all of it (namely the pillows and curtains, we have a lot of pillows) and I even was allowed to go to a college football game. The local team UCF (University of Central Florida) is pretty smart. They aren’t good just smart. And many other smaller and equally sucky schools have figured this out too. They know they aren’t going to ever be played on prime time or on a station other than local access if their games are the same times as everyone else. So they wised up and started playing college football on Thursday, Friday and Sunday nights. UCF played East Carolina on Sunday. Both teams sucked but I had fun.

Ok, new topic real quick… No that wasn’t a typo earlier. I said EAST Carolina. My map only has North and South Carolina, but no East on it. When I asked where East Carolina was I was told, just next to West Carolina but a bit more East. Seriously?!? East Carolina? I guess that isn’t as bad when there are schools like San Diego State or Chicago State University. Since when are San Diego or Chicago states?? Now I have Aztec pride and have a SDSU Diploma mounted on my wall (not mine though) but come on. San Diego isn’t a state but at least it is real. There is a San Diego. I can google it and look in up on a map. There isn’t an East Carolina. I can not look it up or google it. East Carolina? Seriously?? Ok soap box complete.

Anyways work outs…I got a book yesterday about how to train for multisport events. It should help me focus and better define a training plan. Right now my training plan is run, bike and swim as long and as fast as I can and eventually build up enough endurance and speed to finish an Ironman. That might not be the best training plan. Hopefully this book will help.
And here it is, today’s top 5: In honor of the elections I figured I would politically charge today’s top 5…
Reasons YOU should NOT vote:
1. It makes my vote more important
2. Most people are too stupid to know what they are voting for (that statement doesn’t exclude myself, but that doesn’t matter because of #1)
3. You probably don’t understand the electoral college and feel like you vote REALLY doesn’t matter because of it. For those of you who want to understand it better google “History of electoral college” and learn a thing or two. Or check out http://www.fec.gov/pdf/eleccoll.pdf
4. You think both candidates suck and really wish there was a choice of ‘neither’ on the ballot. If ‘neither’ wins both parties should elect a new candidate.
5. You are Katie Couric-ish and plan to move to Canada if your candidate loses. If this is the case don’t waste out time, don’t vote and move to Canada NOW! I am still waiting for her to move to Canada BTW…
Honorable mention:
You have a fear of public places (agoraphobia) and there isn’t online voting (yet).
You don’t want to give into the man and validate and contribute to the corruption involved in American politics. (If this is you, please refer to #1)