Monday and Tuesday are frustrating days at work as our energy is re-directed to help out a sensor that is falling behind. There's a point at which I may have to go live up in Santa Barbara for a while, but that is put off until at least next week. Both nights I get in good pyramid workouts and now I get a few days off - I can tell that these pyramid workouts are draining my strength (in addition to giving incredible pumps at the conclusion of each workout).
On Tuesday after work I drop the Yamaha YZF-R1 off for a tuneup at the dealer. "Yes, I know that because I want the valves adjusted and the injectors re-synched it will be about a $500 service." I grab two busses home via the usual route. As I'm walking to my house from halfway down the block I can see that something is amiss but I can't put my finger on it. I continue walking closer and closer and the full realization of what has happened has finally hit me. The City of Long Beach has completely removed the small palm tree in my front yard! This is the palm tree that never grew higher than 10 feet and always looked like it was struggling. And now the city, as they go and trim everyone's tall and healthy palm trees, have completely removed mine. Only a stump a half inch above the grass remains. As I walk into my yard I say aloud, "They cut down my palm tree". And the new neighbors from across the street who I have not met yet, come over and introduce themselves and start laughing as they agree that the palm tree was there yesterday. There is nothing else to be said or done now.
On Wednesday morning I wake up at 4:15 am and cannot fall back asleep. I've slept soundly until the last hour or so, but now I cannot drop back away from wakefullness. Thus I gather my things together and get on the bicycle and ride to work. This opens up my bicycle commuting account for 2007 and also starts chipping away at my gasoline deficit. (The new rule requires that I bicycle commute once for each time that I drive a car to work. I've driven a car to work 4 times this year during rains, so now I'm riding down my gasoline deficit.) I arrive at work at 5:50 am and run into a vice president in the parking lot as he is getting ready to drive to Santa Barbara. He has the typical incredulous look on his face when I answer his query that I've bicycle ridden in from Long Beach this morning. And then we have the discussion that we were supposed to have and I volunteer to get him an email of my concerns before he arrives in Santa Barbara. But Wednesday is a boring day and I enjoy the bicycle ride home. After a shower I head to the Library coffehouse and run into an acquaintance who works there and we have a little conversation about punk and goth music. And then I read until it is time to go home.
Thursday is a great day! It starts off at 5:30 am as I do housecleaning, but is followed by running errands and dropping the car off for detailing. At the detailer place I put on my inline skates (to skate home) and the people there make a number of comments about my selected mode of transportation. I proceed to welcome a visit from Person M_Fl and then I mow/trim the lawn, trim the roses, and water/feed the roses. By this time the car is finished, so I skate back over and they have moved it to the front of the line as they see me approaching on my skates. A little stop shopping for window coverings preceeds the call from the motorcycle dealer saying that the motorbike is all tuned up. Thus I do the two bus ride thingie over to the dealer and ride on home. The bike feels great with new iridium spark plugs and the fuel injectors re-synched. By late afternoon I'm starting to drag and I get the phone call canceling the ResourceScout meeting. I walk over to the video and store and rent "The Good Shpeherd" and enjoy it. It gives me something to think about. And then I drop off to sleep before 10 pm.
When I wake up on Friday morning I feel like a bus has run over me. Everything is soe and I have a bit of a sore throat. And the inside of my mouth is tender. I do some paperowrk and wait for the weather to warm up before getting in anothe aquarium bicycle ride where I can hear the cars from the Long Beach Grand Prix practice sessions. I manage to get the laundry done before I see my acupuncturist who I ell, "I need some electro-stim near my L4 and L5 discs because they should feel better". When I lay down she pokes and prods and hurts me as she starts putting needles in and turning up the voltage on the electro-stim. When I am finished she and I agree that I will be sore on Saturday but will feel fine on Sunday. I go hang out at a bookstore and buy a couple of magazines for the weekend. And then I relax. It is a semi-lazy day.
On Saturday I take the train to downtown Long Beach for the qualifying sessions. I meet up with two co-workers and we hang out and observe the cars, the drivers, and the crowd. There's a bigger corwd this year than last. I cheer for Justin "The Flying Giraffe" Wilson, but he has a bad day. Instaed of challenging for the pole like he typically does, he spends a majority of the day in run-off areas and locking up tires. He ends up qualifying 7th. But it's a fun day in the sun with cool ocean breezes. I relax at home for a while, get in an abdominal and lower back workout, and catch up on reading as I try to decide what to do tonight. There are conversations via phone, instant messaging, and text with Person T_U, Person C_T, and Persom M_C, but I decide to stay in and go to sleep early.
I'm up early on Sunday to go walking because I did not go clubbing on Saturday night. I'm walking down Orange Avenue when I see a tall blond guy wearing a long black trench coat crossing the street in the middle of a block. I see him stop in the middle of the road, pick up something from the street, and fling it with a sidearm/underarm motion to the street gutter/curb. It is a cat that has been run over and is dead. The guy continues walking up ahead of me and makes the right turn down the street where I go walking. I'm walking faster than he is, so I cross over the street and walk at a brisk pace to get ahead of him - I'm scared that I will suffer the same fate as the cat that he flung across the street. The guy sees me and yells out to me from behind, "Hello fellow morning exerciser". When I hear this my defenses go up but I just maintain a brisk pace and keep walking. I hear the guy run a few strides in my direction and I take a quick look back to see how close he is getting and wonder if today is the day that I should start running. As I keep up a brisk walking pace away from him, he continues jabbering with "It was cold this morning so I had to put on a long coat from my Canadian days" (Pause) "My name is James, by the way" (Pause) "People are really scared of terrorists sine 9/11" I keep my brisk walking pace and note that his voice is growing dimmer as I gain ground between us. When I'm a quarter mile down the street I note that he is 150 meters back and no threat anymore. Except that I'm on a long loop walk and note that he could take one of the sidestreets and be in my path on the return towards home. When I make the return leg towards home and come to a sidestreet where he could possibly be walking, I hear a dog barking. It could be him! But then a man or woman (I don't know which) wearing long black pants and a long black coat is riding a bicycle along the sidestreet and crosses about 30 meters in front of me and keeps going. A shiver runs down my spine because, at first, it appeared it was the original guy (i.e., blond hair and long black coat). But then I realize it is not the same guy. But then a second shiver runs down my spine as I note that both people had blond hair and long black coats. I keep walking and am so relieved when I see other people out walking or shopping and they are not blond and they are not wearing long black coats.
Late in the morning I start out for an aquarium bicycle ride in very windy conditions. I get about three quarters of the way down the Los Angeles river trail when the cyclist going the other way yells out my name. It's the neighbor kid (whos 24 now) that i used to ride with. So I turn around and we ride together and make a nice little loop ride as we have a great conversation about fire safety (that he is studying), finances, debt, cars, cycling, and the neighborhood. He's back down from Seattle now and we may get to ride again occasionally.
After watching the Long Beach Grand Prix on television I work on some things around the house and add a new commentary about
Monday and Tuesday see hectic days at work followed by pyramid workouts. There is no way I'll be able to finish two more pyramid workouts this week - I can feel myself getting overtrained and the repetitions are starting to fall. I look back through my records and find that I have not had more than 5 days off from lifting since Christmas week. It's probably time for a week break. On Tuesday I drop the car off at the dealer and skate back home. Afterwards Person J_V and I are going to go hang out, but he calls and is feeling sick and we agree to re-schedule.
On Friday I hear the rain coming down at 4:45 in the morning. So I get up and get out the door in the car and arrive at work well before 6 am - I want to miss traffic. It's a semi-productive day and I leave work before 3pm. I do the laundry and some grocery shopping before getting in the final pyramid workout. I'm assuming that I'll take a few extra days off to recover. In the late afternoon I've missed phone calls from Person T_U, Person M_Fl, and Person T*. With the rain present, I try to decide whether to go out tonight or not. And finally decide to go.
Both of the clubs that I go to are less crowded than usual. I only run into a few acquaintances including Person T_CT. In the midst of the evening I go use the bathroom and the lights go out momentarily - everyone just standing around in the dark. When the lights come on I notice that there is also a woman in the man's bathroom (hanging out with her boyfriend). But this is not the first time that I have witnessed this so I just go wash my hands and leave the bathroom. Just before closing time I strike up a conversation with Person J_X and later Person J_X gets my phone number. When everyone is asked to leave the club at 2 am, I wander outside and just stand around - I again do not really want to go home yet. A group of four people come and start talking with me and they want me to head over to a club that is open until 4am. The one guy, Person J_U, is a model and I just keep staring at him during the first part of the conversation. One of the four, Person D_U, has drank too much tonight and she needs to stand propped up against me at times and/or holding on to me to stay upright. Later Person J_U and I have a little side conversation. But in the end I decide not to join the group this time but we agree to try and hang out next time. As I get ready to head for the car I'm interupted by Person E_H from a country that I have visited before. Though Person E_H has not been to that country since he was one year old and though Person E_H lives over the Sepulveda pass, we have a nice conversation until he joins his friends at the after hours club. Why did Person E_H and Person J_U NOT get my phone number? That is not quantifiable. Thus I drive on home with a 10 minute delay as an accident is cleared off the 110 southbound. I'm home in bed near 3:30 am on Saturday morning.
Saturday morning is a slow day starting a bit after 6:30 am. At mid morning, after running some errands, I get on the mountain bicycle for the aquarium ride. This is a great time to ride because it is bright and sunny but the Los Angeles river is flowing strongly. I get down for a two hour nap early in the afternoon and it takes me a while to regain consciousness when I finally wake up. After a 45 minute walk I have phone cnversation with my aunt in Michigan, Person C_T, and Person T_U before I take a shower and head for another club up in West Hollywood.
Today traffic is bad, so I take a detour and cut west along 4th street across the Los Angeles river, over the Fletcher train yard, and through downtwon Los Angeles. When traffic gets to the tunnel the police are detouring us again because of a movie shoot (using the tunnel). Actually the police make us stop because just as I arrive they are going to do "a take". A few seconds later there are (fake) gunshots and a chase scene with a car turning into the tunnel and a few motocross motorcycles follwing the car in (and more fake gunshots). Afterwards the policeman lets us continue (but not into the tunnel).
I walk past one club just to see how it looks but then continue on to the destination club. At first the club is not very crowded and the music is a bit spotty. There are a few acquantainces present that I make smalltalk with, but nothing of significance. But by midnight the place is getting crowded and the music is better. By 1:30 people are starting to clear out but the music just keeps getting better and better. I strike up a conversation with Person C_K and we talk about UCLA and clubs and other stuff. Eventually Persn C_K gets my phone number as I offer to teach him how to inline skate (but only after I ask if he has health insurance). As we roll into after hours there are a couple of offers made but they are easily dismissed. At 2:40 am on Sunday morning with the music continuing to get better and better I finally leave and take my time getting home - I'm tired and I don't need an oopsie right now. Thus I'm laying my head down for sleep at 3:40 am on Sunday morning.
I'm up just before 7 am on Sunday morning. After gaining consciousness and milling around the house I get out for a nice aquarium bicycle ride - it's the most that I can do right now. And then I watch motorcycle racing from Turkey but the results are horrible. Yuki runs off the track twice in the opening laps and is soon in the pits and retiring due to a mechanical problem in the 250cc race. And Valentino Rossi in MotoGP? Valentino Rossi takes the lead of his race and runs off the track in the absolute fastest corner on the MotoGP circuit. And lives to talk about it! Acutally he loses lots of ground, fights back to third, and then loses all the way back to 10th with terrible tire problems. I just read and relax and actually watch some television for the rest of the day.
Monday is a reasonable day at work. Except that one of the vice presidents corners me and wants some back-up information for Tuesday's big meeting. How do I make back-up information at a high enough level so that a vice president can understand it? After work I walk a mile and a half for a community meeting regarding neighborhood development. The city councilperson is there and greets me along with her chief of staff and other office workers. It's a reaosnable meeting though there are still some vacancies in the development where they have already broken ground. After the meeting I continue walking to make about an hour walk. And then I watch "Desperate Housewives" and head for bed.