28 posts tagged “feist”

To the Indy Mini.  Just 4 more days.  I took yesterday off, didn't even do the Octane.  Got up and ran this morning, an easy 6 miles with Jacki Andrew.  Going to do a "light" workout tomorrow evening (i.e. 2x800m in 3:03), take Thursday off, then do my pre-race warmup routine Friday.  Tapering is so hard to do.  It's hard to let up on the training, and hard to slow down when your legs are fresh from the reduced mileage.  Can't wait until Friday for Fazoli's and Baskin Robbins three-scoop sundae (two scoops Chocolate Mint, one scoop Chocolate, with hot fudge, whip cream and nuts).

I finally got a chance to play Mario Kart Wii.  It's pretty cool.  Hopefully I'll have more time to play it some more.

Looks like our Summer Vacation to Arizona may be very, very expensive.  Gas is now $3.75 in Terre Haute.  When we figured up our costs last December, we were banking on $3.  Damn...  Not so sure it's going to happen.

I miss my Alaska kitty.  Tonight when I was putting the chairs back after dinner, I couldn't help but remember how Alaska would sit in the chair and stare out the window at the squirrels and birds.

Finally giving Metric a little bit of a break, and I've been listening to Feist and Rush some more.  Listened to Led Zeppelin I for the first time in a while. 

Friday night, Mariah and I took the kids to Bloomington to see Feist in concert.  It was part of Kourtney's birthday present.  Kourtney got to invite one of her friends, C, to go with us.  Mariah and I had both taken the day off.  After we got the kids off to school, we went to breakfast together.  Pretty cool.  We then headed to 100.7 Mix FM Radio Station to pick up the $45 gift card that Kourtney had won the night before.  On our way, we had seen this building that had pretty much burned to the ground on 3rd street.  Lots of fire trucks, state troopers, local cops, local TV coverage and what appeared to be secret service personnel.  Turns out that it was the Democratic headquarters here in town for Hillary Clinton.  Ironically, Bill Clinton made a stop by the burned remains that morning on his way to Clinton Indiana.  Interesting.

Mariah and I got Kourtney out of school just a tad early and we headed for Bloomington shortly after Austin got off the bus.  It's a good thing we got an early start, because it was the kick off night for the Little 500 and also Barack Obama had visited IU earlier in the day. Busy there.  The weather was so perfect. 

Hayden opened up for Feist.  He was good.  Not too exciting.  But Feist's show was awesome.  She has such a soft, pretty voice.  The IU Auditorium is actually a pretty neat building.  Not sure what the first song was that she had done.  It was either newly written or a cover.  The stage arrangement was pretty simple.  All just instruments, mics and a big backdrop. It's interesting that the "behind-the-scenes" special effects that were presented on the back-drop weren't really all that behind-the-scenes as two artists portrayed several special effects with stencils, templates, water paints, lights, "shadow puppetting", etc., right on stage with the band.  She was very interactive with the crowd.  At one point she had different parts of the audience singing different tones.  Balcony, Orchestra, etc.  Then as she had the audience going, she went into "I'm Sorry".  Really made the hair stand up on you.  She played almost every song off of  The Reminder, and about 5 songs from Let It Die.  All very good.  I hope that one of her shows can get recorded for a live DVD. 

Kourtney's soccer team won their season opener today in a cold, rainy, sleety, windy day.  Temperatures were in the low 70s last night, but today, it was 43 w/ 15 to 20 mph winds.  Talk about cold.  Her team won 5-2.  Some pretty amazing plays by the team.  And to be the first game of the season, the chemistry was really there as they didn't seem a bit rusty at all.

OK, lots of voxers have done this.  I have been a VOX member for a little over a year.  I made my first post April 1st 2007.  And this is how it looked.

April Fool's Day

Hello?   Hmm...  April Fools Day.  My daughter just had her 13th birthday party.  Lotta fun.  Did not run today.  Haven't run for 5 weeks.  I've had a sacral stress fracture since about February 26th.  Nasty.  I think I may have been hurt before that.  Left IT band tightness, nasty blister on my right foot from new shoes causing my right foot to be stiff and favored, plus combination of slipping on snow, ice, lack of core strength and a shipload of miles probably all contributed... And, no, I'm not getting old, just older. Damn.  Right when I was starting to really hit CRs around home and a breakthrough 5 mile race.  Sure puts a dent in plans, but hey, went 4 years between major injuries.  But, with my wife's foot problems and my injury, we bought an Octane elliptical and are getting back in shape.  Lots of challenging races for my training buddies lately.  Jeff Andrew winning a couple of trail run Ultras and Tom and Tim doing the Marathon Des Sabels.  And, wow, thanks for everyone's support regarding my stress fracture.  I'll be back.  25 years and going.

New Music!  Rush's new album "Snakes and Arrows" due out May 1st (www.rush.com) and (Leslie) Feist's new album "The Reminder" due out May 1st (www.listentofeist.com).  Rush tickets go on sale April 14th for their August 26th show at Verizon Wireless in Noblesville (Deercreek).  Gonna have to save up my money.  Korn's new unplugged CD pretty good, new one coming out July 18th using Terry Bazio of Missing Persons on the drums!.

Mario Party 8 out for the Nintendo Wii on June 2nd.  Ready for that. 

This has been a really surprising week running.  Saturday I ran a pretty good 10 mile race.  Sunday, I ran 7+ miles on a very tough trail that literally involved some climbing.  Monday, I did 90 minutes on the Octane.  Tuesday I did a workout and actually ran pretty well considering how sore I was.  Then lastnight, I run 8 miles in 51:06.  Can't explain it really.  6:23 pace average with the last 1.5 miles in 8:58.  Of course, tonight, I struggled for the first 5 miles of my 8 mile run, then was able to actually hold 7 minute pace the last three miles.  I ran a part of the course of Saturday's Swamp Stomp race.  It is a race in a local park that has about 75% trails and is really muddy.  We're supposed to get about an inch of rain tonight and tomorrow, so the course will be in pretty crappy condition on some parts.

Tonight, we didn't have the usual Pizza and Survivor.  Instead, it was Subway.  Tomorrow is Kourtney's 14th birthday party, so it will be a house full of girls with Pizza, cake and ice cream.  Then Saturday, it's Spaghetti dinner/birthday party at Mariah's grandma's house.  Ami got voted off of Survivor tonight.  She took it pretty hard.  So, Erik, the former Cross Country runner hangs on for another couple of days.

Work was really frustrating today.  Lots of stupid stuff.  There is too much to do and I just can't spend time on small things that others need.  I just can't do it.  I have to stick to my priorities.  But if I don't, then I have to stay up until midnight or later finishing up the things I "have" to finish.  I can't keep going to work on just 5 hours of sleep.  I just can't be available to everyone all the time.  I've always gone out of my way to help everyone in the best interest of "the team".  But, when that starts to impact my home life and starts to wear me down, I gotta think about me and my family, my "home" team.  It'd be nice to have another person hired in, but that will never happen.  The only way that my department will hire another DBA is if I leave the company.

Been listening to Feist the last couple of days.  Concert is next Friday evening.

S'well.  Time to get on the laptop and dial in to work.

Kourtney is doing better with her knee surgery recovery.  Today, I worked from home for part of the day to stay here with her.  She's going do go to school tomorrow.  Probably won't be very easy, but she's dying to get back to school.  Next week is Spring Break and she would have gone totally nuts to have missed this whole week.  Mariah stayed home with her yesterday, and I stayed with her today.  She pretty much did homework, watched MTV and played Guitar Hero III. 

Had a really good track workout lastnight.  Did 5x1000m in goal race pace.  I ended up going a little faster than I should have, but still in the ballpark.  3:38 to 3:42 on all of them.  3:45 is 6:00 min per mile pace, which is what I aim to run for my 10 mile race on Saturday.  And still looks like the weather is going to be nice.  Lower 50s, partly cloudy, slight breeze.

So, I'm watching American Idol with Mariah.  First time I've really sat down and watched it.  Pretty talented bunch.  I'm glad I'm not as goofy looking as Ryan Secrest.  Not quite.

Starting to get fired up for the Live Rush CD coming out April 15th.  Going to see Feist with the family April 11th.  I really wish I could go see Iron Maiden in Chicago this June.  That's way out of bounds unfortunately.  Tickets are going to be outrageous and Chicago is just expensive anyway.

At least the weather is.  I'm really tired today.  The time change has contributed a little to it.  I worked from 1 to 3:15 Sunday Morning.  Then getting about 4 hours of sleep Sunday night just made Monday a very long day.  I didn't run yesterday.  I was feeling beat up from the weekend's runs.  I only ran 18 miles total.  8 on Saturday easy, and 10 on Sunday easy.  No speedwork as I had already done some on Thursday.  We can thank last Tuesday's weather for throwing off my schedule.  So, I just felt really tired and didn't run or even do the Octane yesterday.  I ran a speed work session tonight.  Started out with a three mile warmup, felt like crap the whole way, struggling to just run 7:20 pace.  It was nice and warm, 45 and sunny with a 15 mph WSW breeze.  I was so glad to see warm weather.  I got back to the track following my warmup and did 4x800m in not all that great times.  Once again, legs just dead and burning.  Managed a 3:06,3:01,2:56 and 2:54.  I ran a cooldown with some guys I had run with and actually started to feel really good. I then finished the last 1.5 miles of my cooldown by myself very fast with the last mile in 6:14, totally effortless, like I could hold for a 10 mile race.  Amazing.  So, 8 miles for the day.  It's no wonder the first two miles of my races are always my slowest ones.  It could just be running on tired legs and taking a while to get going.  Who knows.  I just know I need to be able to get out at 6:06 pace in the Mini and hold on.

Less than three weeks away for my Papa John's 10 Miler in Louisville.  I've got a 10K race scheduled for this weekend that is pretty vital for my preparation for the Papa John's race.  With the weather forecast being windy and stormy, I'm not so sure.  But also that I'll drive 180 miles, which for my Toyota Corolla is only 5.5 gallons of gas, but at $3.45 a gallon now, it's going to cost $20 in gas and $20 for the race.  $40 for a 10K race, eek!  There is a 5K race here in town as well, but a 5K just won't cut it at this point.

One more month until the Feist Concert. 

Wow, I am really hooked on my new Metric DVD ever since I bought it a couple of weeks ago.  I had an excellent race yesterday.  Started out a little slow, feeling a little disgusted the first two miles, but I got going pretty well.  Five miles in 30:33, splits 6:20,6:09,5:59,6:03,6:01.  I really competed that last mile catching and holding off two runners.  I had the results e-mailed to me before I even got back in town from the race:

I'm a little sore, but I'm going to go 10 miles later this afternoon.  My next main race is the Will Power Run March 15th.  There is a local 10K race this week that I may do as a workout depending on how I hold up this week.  I need to hit 50 miles per week for the next two weeks, and then prep for the Will Power 10K.  10 more weeks until the Indy Mini.  I'm a long way off of being able to run 6:06 pace for 13 miles.  That is a pretty aggressive goal, but I may be able to hit it if I can get another strong 8 weeks in.  The weather has really improved today, probably about 38 degrees.

We've resurrected the Game Cube since our Wii is out of commission and I've been playing on of the first games that we ever got for it, Pikmin.  Pretty cool game.  Strategy and multi-tasking at its best.

Iron Maiden is going to be on tour this May and June.  Boy, I would really like to see them on their "Somewhere Back In Time" Tour where they'll be focusing on their mid-80s material.  But, I also still want to see Rush in June, and we're going to see Feist in April.  Don't think I will be able to make all three.

The good thing about Monday holidays are the fact that you get a three day weekend.  But even better than that is the 4 day work week following.  I am on call this week but hopefully things go light off hours.  I have an important race on Saturday, so I really need adequate sleep and sanity this week.  Tonight I did Mariah's Biggest Loser workout videos with her.  I had kind of a rough time with parts of it because I am so sore from Saturday and Sunday's runs.  Everything is shot.  I even had a hard time trying to replace one of the faucet hoses in our bathroom today.  I had to basically take everything all apart and it was all I could do to hold my arms in awkward, upright positions for more than 30 seconds at a time.  I wouldn't think that the two hard days running would make my entire body that sore and tired.  Goes to show I don't do enough cross-training.  So, Mariah and I got in about 40 minutes of her videos.  For the rest of the week running wise.  6+ miles tomorrow morning, light speedwork Wednesday evening, 3-6 miles Thursday, pre-race warmup routine on Friday (1+ mile jog then about 10x50 to 100m strideouts).  Race Saturday and 12+ miles on Sunday.  Hopefully the weather will cooperate this week.  Supposed to be 12 tomorrow morning when I run.

Looks like there are still some tickets available for the Feist show at IU in April.  We're going to take the kids and one of Kourtney's friends with us.  That'll be cool.

Time to play kitty cat referee.  Princess Leia is in a crabby mood, and Alaska is provoking her.

Today I braved the ice and freezing rain during my lunch hour to drive to Circuit City to spend some of the remaining $40 on my Circuit City card that I got for Christmas.  I was going to pick up the new Live DVD from Metric.  And, they didn't have it!!!!  But!  I did find Iron Maiden's "Live After Death" on DVD.  I've had the double-album since high school (1985).  I never even knew that they had a concert film of it until today.  They just released it on DVD, and I must say it is really good. Probably THE best ever produced live concert soundtrack.  It's ironic that lastnight I listened to the (double) CD when I was doing the Octane, and during the song Revelations, at a certain part, I paid real close attention (as I had headphones on because everyone else had already gone to bed).  I heard what I thought was a third guitar in the center channel.  And I'm thinking, I've never really noticed it before, but how are they doing it?  They only have two guitar players.  Well, now, watching the DVD, Bruce Dickinson (the vocalist) actually plays some melody parts in this song.  I had no idea! 

I left Circuit City, trying my best not to slip on the ice in the parking lot so I wouldn't bust my ass and break my tailbone.  Ouch that would suck.  So, on the way back to work, I stop by the mall to check if FYE has the new Metric DVD. Turns out they do, $15.91.  I only had $10 cash on me...  So, I head back to work, both pumped up from the Iron Maiden DVD, and anxious to get the Metric DVD.  So... now that I have got some money out of the credit union, I'm going to go Metric shopping and Valentine's Day shopping tomorrow.  AND!  I can't believe my daughter actually wants to do this, but I mentioned to her that Feist is going to be at IU Auditorium in Bloomington April 11th, she wants to go see her!  At this point if I had to choose between seeing Rush vs. Feist, this year, it would have to be Feist.  Speaking of which, when she performed at the Grammy's the other night, that was probably the largest crowd she'd ever played for (at least in her solo career).  I've got to find out when tickets go on sale.  Last November, they were only $21 in Louisville, which I couldn't attend.

Tonight, the weather turned from spitting ice to about half inch of powdery snow.  I called Jeff to see if anyone was going to hit an indoor track.  Ended up that we did mile repeats tonight in a pretty solid effort.  I was pretty happy with all of my repeats.  Snow and a north 10 mph wind made it a little slow.  But, my times were 6:15, 6:07,6:08,6:08,6:07 and 6:07.  Pretty consistent.  I've got the perceived effort etched into my head.  On a clear day, that would probably be more like 6:00s.  I need to run 6:06 pace for the Indy Mini to break 1 hour 20 minutes.  If I can stay healthy, I think that is still a good goal to shoot for.  My current level of fitness is about a low 1:23.  My hamstrings, butt and arches are now a little sore from running on the snow.  With the warmup and the cooldown, that's 10 miles for the day.

Work was a little hectic, although I was able to get some lingering things out of my hair.  I think my boss is pissed at me though.  I got a little short with him last week before he left town and I haven't spoken to him face to face since then.  We do some pretty stupid things at work sometimes.  Like a lot of other places I'm sure - we get put in a position that we can't best do our job due to cutting corners, perception-driven re-prioritizations, etc.  S'well...

Kourtney's first outdoor soccer practice got bumped to next Thursday.  It'll be neat to watch these girls compete at the new AA level as they all prepare to continue their soccer careers in High School starting this Fall.  It will be quite a challenge for his team, but I think the coach is doing an excellent thing in giving these girls a more realistic taste of what they may face once they start to compete for a HS team.

And even though I'm a big fan of our Wii, it picked a good time to break.  Get everyone used to getting out of the house here in about 4 weeks.  This weekend, we've got to clean up the aftermath from last Tuesday's storms.

Today I ran a pretty tough 10 miles with Jacki in 12 degree weather w/ -9 windchill.  Cold enough in some spots to make parts of my face numb.  I stayed pretty warm for the most part.  Some of the wind gusts were enough to take your breath away at times heading into a headwind.  We would have typically gone 15, but 10 was all that was going to be run in those conditions.  So that gives me 52.5 miles for the week.  Legs are kinda dead.  Very dehydrated.

Today the Wii died.  The CD motor won't spin up.  We bought the extended 2 year warranty, but what a pain in the ass.  We have to send it to get it repaired, which could take a long time.  We're going to have to wait 5 to 7 days just to get the shipping label.  What BS.  Couldn't they just e-mail us a label?  S'well.

The Grammys are on tonight.  Feist is supposed to perform.  Her song 1,2,3,4 is nominated.