Ironman USA Preparation

So "Lake Placid", aka Ironman USA, has come and gone. I had a great time, but didn't get the result I wanted. I've been thinking about that, and I guess it's time to "put pen to paper." Here's the lead up.

On the Tuesday evening before the race I drove to my parent's place in Cobourg for a short visit and the obligatory computer consultation. On Wednesday I continued on to Lake Placid. My bike was stuffed in the trunk of my Mazda 3, and in the glovebox I had a new component: a nine-speed 12-27 cassette. This is the gears that turn the rear wheel, and 12-27 refers to the number of teeth on the smallest and largest gear rings. A 12-27 is optimised for hilly terrain. I hadn't been able to get it installed before leaving Toronto, so I was a bit hesitant about racing with it. You never know how new or different equipment will behave! New shirts can rub in unexpected places, different shoe models can cause blisters, new gears can be misaligned... In the end a confident housemate installed it for me and I got two good rides around Lake Placid before race day. The only concern I had was a bit of stickiness when shifting and a worry that my chain might now be a bit too long in some gears.

My friend Paula had arranged a rented townhouse. I found it easily, thank you Garmin. We were nice and close to the race venue. Being the last to join I got the last available bed, a fold-out in the basement. It was perfect though. Paula and her husband Johnny were also in the basement, Ed and Elaine were upstairs, and so was Roger. I have to say we had a great time together. I didn't know Ed or Elaine before and only knew Roger a bit, but we all had the same attitude, same sense of humour, and perhaps most importantly the same sleep habits. Three new friends and two old friendships strengthened.

Each day we went for an easy "taper" workout, riding, swimming or running. Most mornings were started with a swim on the race course, with hundreds of other athletes doing the same thing. I did a one loop Thursday morning swim in about 29 minutes so I felt totally ready for that leg of the race. On Friday I tested some different brands of wetsuits on two shorter swims. My second swim was particularly short as I spent most of it reassuring a nervous swimmer and keeping her company as we swam a few hundred metres together. A lot of triathletes have a tough time with open-water swimming. Can't see the bottom, there are weeds that will grab you, etc. I think she got past the worst of it that morning.

I biked on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, but only ran on Friday. My achilles tendons were feeling a bit tight and I wanted to give them a rest from running. On Wednesday we rode the run course together, adding the last series of hills of the bike course. On Thursday I did a break-in ride for my new gears on the bike course heading out of town and up the first big climb. Everything worked fine, and when I rode the run course route again on Friday with my new gearing I knew I would have no problem with the hills.

Friday night was the Athlete's Dinner. Image a tent so big that it can hold and feed 3,000 people. Now imagine rain coming down in biblical quantities... We stayed dry, but looking out at the downpour my friends who had raced last year in the rain looked a bit glum.

From that point on it was time to relax and try to stay off my feet. The race Expo was tempting though, I bought a few bits of clothing but managed to talk myself out of buying a new Cervelo P2C. Through out my stay I kept running into friends and team mates all over town. I couldn't go a hundred feet without bumping into someone! My favourite new "friends" were the Active Release Technique therapists in the massage tent. I got a treatment each day, and I think it helped my heels and shoulders a lot.

On Saturday afternoon we all took our bikes and bags down to the transition area to drop them off. While waiting for the others to get back to the car I spoke to vendor who was testing a product called "Trakkers". It was a GPS/cellular device that gives continuous location and speed information to people who want to follow your race through a web site. It sounded better that the four or five updates available through the official timing system, so we all signed up for the beta test (and to get free hats).

So there I was on the night before the race: well rested, confident, "feeling the love".

Listening to: Galvanize by The Chemical Brothers from Push the Button.

Winding Down

TIFF is over now for 2008. I only managed to get to three films, all of which were enjoyable. The last film I saw was a Press & Industry screening of Cooper's Camera, which was a demented comic short that would have fit perfectly on the old Canadian TV satire SCTV. Too bad it was really feature length! My son had wanted to see it too, but he never got himself organised enough to join me. The People's Choice Award winner, Slumdog Millionaire, was a film I tried to get to several times but the final free screening took place Saturday night when I was already up in Huntsville for my final triathlon of the season.

Here's how that last day played out... Up at 5:00 AM as usual for the last two weeks, back standing under the cold blast of an air conditioning outlet. I had started the Festival in t-shirt and shorts, by the last day I was wearing fairly heavy pants and a thick sweater. Didn't stop me getting a pretty solid chest cold though! I finished work at 1:00 PM, hurried back home to throw my race gear into the car. The forecast for race day was rain, and lots of it. So I threw in rain jackets, cycling booties, arm warmers, cold weather riding gloves, etc.

I headed north and two and a half hours later I was at the Deerhurst Inn in Huntsville registering for the race and setting up my bike. Just in time! There was only 40 minutes left to access the transition area. I connected with my friends and made my way to their nearby cottage and tried to spend the evening quietly getting healthy. It was so nice to be with friends, lots of emotional and practical support was on hand.

The TIFF "marathon" was over, the next one started in about eight hours.

Listening to: (Far From) Home by Tiga from Sexor.

Seven Hours of Weightlifting!

Yes, I've just finished spending seven hours lifting weights. So I'm a bit stiff. I spent all day Sunday, except for one brief excursion back into town, at The Shopping Channel demonstrating the Bowflex Extreme. Over the course of 24 hours we did seven live one hour shows. Guess what? We kept the resistance pretty damn low...

Our broadcasts started at midnight Saturday, but I had previously planned to spend the weekend at a training camp with my triathlon club up in Collingwood. So I drove up to Collingwood Friday afternoon, had a nice 60K ride that evening and followed up Saturday with a 100K ride and 9K run. There are plenty of challenging hills in the Collingwood area, I even tackled Scenic Caves Road with a team mate at the end of the day. After a serious three hour nap followed by dinner out with the gang I drove straight to the studio. I've posted some photos from the day on my Flickr page.

Nice to see some good news from Mars: the Phoenix Mars Lander touched down safely on Sunday night in the Martian Arctic, which looks more like our Arctic than I expected. Nice for Spirit and Opportunity to have some robotic company. Although Spirit and Opportunity have been operating for an undreamed of four years the Phoenix Lander faces "death" in a few short months. It's Arctic location means that when winter sets in the Lander will likely be buried in ice and run out of power.

I mentioned above that I left The Shopping Channel studio briefly on Sunday. I had just enough of a gap between two shows to whip into town to watch that morning's Monaco Formula One Grand Prix with my friend Brian on his PVR. With gas prices at a record high ($1.27/liter!) I had to pause for a moment, but tradition won out over penny-pinching.

Monaco is Formula One's most glamorous circuit, but also the slowest. It's a crazy twisty city street course, with almost no view ahead for the drivers. Sunday's race was further slowed by heavy rain, which meant that the race ended by reaching the two hour time-limit (they almost made the full distance...). Because I only had 90 minutes to watch the race in anyway we used the PVR's fast-forward option except for when there was an interesting development. But there were plenty of those. The wet conditions and lack of view led to lots of spin outs and collisions. Although the Ferrari's started on the front row there was a lot of back and forth as collisions, repairs, pit stops, safety cars and weather changes came heavily into play. Lewis Hamilton overcame an early error to ultimately win the day, Kimi struggled for grip but was holding third when he had to accept a drive-through penalty, he eventually lost grip near then end of the race and drove into the back of Adrian Sutil's Force India car, ending Adrian's best race ever and dropping Kimi back to ninth. Massa started on the pole but events lead him to a third place finish behind Lewis Hamilton and fifth-place starter Robert Kubica. Kimi's poor result and Lewis' strong one means that Lewis has taken the lead in the Driver's Championship.

This afternoon will be my "big acting break", I'm shooting a scene for a Discovery Channel documentary about the human body. I'll be portraying a sperm, swimming in my triathlon wetsuit toward the Ontario Place Cinesphere (standing in for a human egg)! The things we do for art...

Listening to: Pork and Beans by Weezer from Weezer (their albums are all called "Weezer", this one's got a red cover). This song's video is a great collection internet memes...

The Workout That Wasn't

Last Saturday I had planned to join my triathlon club for a long ride in Milton and then travel onward with Sheryl to Niagara-on-the-Lake for a weekend away. Trouble was that when I got up on Saturday I was still feeling lousy from this extended (two damn weeks!) cold I've been battling, and there was dismal weather predicted. So the ride was reluctantly dropped from the agenda and we settled for two days of wine tasting and dining. When I remember to get my camera out of the car I'll post some photos on Flickr.

We stayed at Heather Croft, a heritage farm house operating as a B&B a few clicks outside of Niagara-on-the-Lake. We visited a couple of wineries, Vineland and Cave Springs, on our way there, dodging rain storms as we went. Sheryl's dog Barkley came along as we couldn't arrange a dog sitter, he got to see a lot of the inside of the car with interspersed gallops around various parks. Sunday was damp and cold, so we drove into Niagara-on-the-Lake and along the Niagara Parkway. "NotL" is a pretty little town, but completely tourism-oriented. Not an authentic experience! The Niagara River had some interesting views though and we stopped for an expensive-but-mediocre buffet lunch atop the Queenston Heights. We drove back to the Cave Springs winery for dinner at the Inn on the Twenty, which was fabulous. On the way there we happened to cross the Welland Canal as a lake freighter was leaving the lock. The nerd in me couldn't help stopping to watch the whole process. We almost missed our dinner reservation, and almost ran out of gas, but it all worked out.

Monday was back-to-the-city day, but we visited the recreated Fort George before starting back and stopped for tastings at Inniskillin, Jackson Triggs and Hillebrand wineries. Didn't like what we tasted at Hillebrand, but we did have a great lunch there before hitting the highway. Fort George was an eye-opener for Sheryl, showing the harshness of life in the early 1800's and some details of the War of 1812.

Back in Toronto I picked up Chris. He was aching to see Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay. I very reluctantly agreed to go. My god, what a skin-crawlingly awful film! Stupid, stupid, stupid, with puerile nudity. I am so mad at myself for letting Chris talk me into seeing it.

Listening to: Time to Pretend by MGMT from Oracular Spectacular.

Downstream and Uphill

Another road trip report! This one began on Thursday morning with a trip up to Stouffville for a photo shoot (happy couple discovering the delights of their new hometown). That went smoothly enough, with our outdoor shots completed in fairly cool weather. The last few days have been blisteringly hot. I learned that there's a vineyard in Stouffville, which was a surprise. Then I tried to get to an audition downtown (didn't make it) before heading out to join my friends Adrian and Sebastian in Ottawa for a white-water rafting trip. We met in Renfrew at about midnight as we'd both been delayed and spotty cell phone reception made connecting a bit tricky.

The rafting, with Owl Rafting, on Friday was good fun. We had great weather and our guide, Alex, was a real character. We got soaked of course, as well as getting dumped out of our raft a few times. Between rapids we amused ourselves by engaging in combat with other rafts. One of the large and very stable rafts was carrying a dozen young Asian guys. They managed to get dumped completely upside down on the biggest rapid. We had a great view of the incident, which ended safely.

After a short nap we headed back toward Toronto, a five hour drive. We stopped in the little town of Tweed for a genuine "Chinese-Canadian" meal and then followed our own routes. They drove straight on to Toronto while I stopped in Cobourg to spend the night at my parents so I could get up to Peterborough quickly in the morning. There was a great pale red moon at twilight, it looked fantastic against the horizon.

My reason for wanting to get to Peterborough is that I'm racing a Half Ironman triathlon there next weekend. I wanted to get a good long ride in this weekend and I thought that it would be nice to get a look at the bike course. So 90K later I have a good idea of what I'll be facing next week. There were a few other triathletes doing the same thing, but I only encountered them at the starting point. The route is pretty hilly but there weren't any killers. It should be a good road to race on, unless the peregrine falcons that have built nests atop several telephone poles get aggressive. A couple of women who finished their ride at the same time discovered that they'd locked themselves out of their car. Despite wanting to be a knight in shining armor the best I could do was drive one of them up the road to a service station to get a mechanic's help. Should I start carrying a "Slim Jim"? Probably not.

Driving back into Toronto there was a traffic jam on the Don Valley Parkway; yet another Canadian Goose leading her "teenage" gosling flock along the highway shoulder! After a nice nap when I got home I met Sheryl for dinner at Le Paradis, a nice French restaurant in her neighbourhood and we finally had a chance to catch up, her telling me about London and Paris, me telling her about Ottawa and Peterborough...

Now it's out the door to Brian's place to see the French Grand Prix on tape.

P.S. A bit of Mars news! The Opportunity rover is about to begin a risky descent into Victoria Crater. Let's hope it makes it back out after investigating some interesting rock formations.

Listening to: 5 Days In May by Blue Rodeo from Five Days in July.

The Drowsy Chaperone

On Tuesday evening, after a 20K run, I joined a friend for drinks at Hemingway's with his visiting nephew. My friend left at around 1:00 AM, but his nephew wanted to keep going with some of our friends. I stayed too, planning to finish my drink and steer his nephew back home. Didn't work out that way. At around 3:00 AM I finally gave up and walked back to my friend's place to get my car. The nephew? He took off with one of the friends...

I got home around 4:00 AM and was awakened at 9:00 AM by Sheryl's dog Barkley wanting to go for a walk. About an hour later I met another friend to help him shop for computer accessories. Fortunately he roasts his own coffee beans and had a really strong coffee ready for me. Sheryl got back from Paris in the evening and we met for a coffee and to transfer Barkley back. I was too tired to join her for dinner though.

I tried to get to bed early that night, but I was keyed-up over a photo shoot this morning. I get tense when I have to provide my own wardrobe! It worked out well in any event, a husband and wife shoot for a new home development. The woman playing "wife" was in the young trophy category, which made for a pleasant morning. The final setup was at a winery, so we finished with a glass of Pinot Grigio.

Now I'm getting ready to head up to Ottawa for a whitewater rafting trip tomorrow morning. On the way back I'm going to stop in Peterborough for a 90K bike workout on the Half Ironman course I'll be racing on next weekend. When does this stuff stop?

P.S. iPhone! iPhone! iPhone! Everyone's talkin' 'bout it, so I think I'll join in. They go on sale tomorrow in the US. Good thing they're not going to be sold in Canada just yet, I'd be hard pressed to resist picking one up... The fewer, and sexier, the number of gadgets I carry the happier I am.

P.P.S. The Drowsy Chaperone is a little one-off Canadian play that has grown into an international hit. I've promised myself I'll see it when it comes home again.

Listening to: Into the Mystic by Van Morrison from Moondance.

A Long and Winding Road

It's been a while since I last posted, but my silence here is more about being caught up in events...

A week ago last Thursday I flew out to Regina to visit my father after his stroke. My flight left at 6:00 AM, with a plane change in Winnipeg (I never have seen more of that city that the interior of its airport!) Both flights were in jets so cramped that my head scraped the cabin ceiling. I went straight from the airport to the hospital to join up with my brothers and my father's girlfriend and kept going until 1:00 AM (3:00 Toronto time).

Seeing my father in the hospital was a shock even though I'd tried to prepare myself. He's largely immobile, with just some control of his left leg and arm. He looks so frail and helpless now! He can communicate, but speech is very difficult for him. He largely confines himself to yes/no gestures. The most he said to me was literally this: "When I turned 65..." Mostly we tried to help him eat and held his hand. There's no question he's "in there" though. I'm sure that as a man who earned his living through words he's terribly frustrated. He doesn't seem to have any significant improvements yet, although I was startled to observe that his right leg moves when he's sleeping.

It was an interesting trip in a lot of ways. It's been at least five years since I've been together with all my siblings (my sister arrived on Saturday) particularly my youngest brother who my father raised in Australia. We had a lot of catching up to do! It was also the first time we'd spent any extended time with my father's girlfriend. I actually stayed with her during my visit, and we talked into the wee hours every night. It was a very intense and emotional time.

Coming back to Toronto on Sunday night I had to dive straight into the meat of getting my house ready to list. First some more packing but then I switched to filling the shipping container that will hold all my non-essentials until I move into my new place. Lots of furniture was simply dragged to the curb where it was harvested by junk collectors of various stripes, including a large and extremely heavy sofa-bed. In the middle of this a painting crew arrived to turn the house upside down (yet again). They've just finished today. Chris has spent most of the week staying at his mother's while I slept under drop sheets and shuffled through plaster dust. I think it's been worth it though, the house now looks great inside and out.

I managed to get a few workouts in this week, including my first cycling road trip with my triathlon club. We met up near Aurora this morning and rode 47K under threatening skies. It felt great to be out on the road again after a winter of spinning classes. At the beginning of the ride I experienced a "wardrobe malfunction." The zipper on my cycling jacket fell apart in my hands as I tried to zip it up! I borrowed a handful of safety pins to hold it together. Must have looked a bit odd.

Listening to: The Long and Winding Road by The Beatles from Let It Be.

Changing Latitudes

Well, I'm back from the Florida Keys. Eight days, 400 snapshots, nine companions; it's going to take a while to cover it all... For now I'll just regale you with yesterday's journey back to Toronto.

The most practical and economical way to get back to the Ft. Lauderdale airport turned out to be "returning" a rental car from the Marathon airport (in the middle Keys). We picked up the car the afternoon before and left Big Pine Key at 6:20 AM. It was a three hour drive up to Ft. Lauderdale, but we got to enjoy a glorious sunrise along the way and drink in the tropical beauty one last time. Hunting around for a gas station when we reached our destination we passed an Orange County Choppers location that was in the middle of filming an episode of American Chopper. There was a huge crowd spilling out onto the highway, police directing traffic, stage lighting, etc. An odd thing to run across at 9:00 on a Saturday morning!

Although we were going to spend the whole day traveling north things started to go south as soon as we reached the airport. AVIS charged me twice as much as promised and it took forty minutes to correct the problem. This left us less than an hour to check in and get through security. Every queue we joined looked impossibly long, but they all moved briskly and we made it to the plane with several minutes to spare (three...). However the stress brought on a headache that got progressively worse as we traveled.

Our journey had a two hour stopover in Boston and as my headache worsened and my stomach began to churn I began to wonder if I'd make it through the first three hour flight without "trouble". In the end I managed to get off the plane, find our next departure gate and settle Chris before racing off to the washroom for the first of two sessions of projectile vomiting. Chris rose to the occasion and did a great job of supporting me and looking after himself. As we boarded our second flight, to Buffalo, I warned the flight attendant about my fragile condition and she thoughtfully provided me with a large plastic bag. In the end my symptoms slowly subsided without a public display and by the time we reached Buffalo I was healthy enough to contemplate the two hour drive home.

We arrived home at about 9:30 PM and relaxed together for a little while, happy to be back home. Then we sought the bliss of sleeping in our own beds. This morning I fired up the Mac to find 900 spam e-mails, 50 job site/technology e-mails, and five personal e-mails. Same old same old. Over the next few days I'll post about the rest of our trip and upload my photos on Flickr. Short version: we had a great time...

Listening to: There Is a Light That Never Goes Out by The Smiths from The Queen Is Dead.

Every Journey Begins with a Single Step

"Every Journey Begins with a Single Step" - In this case, the journey of an estimated seventeen hours will begin with driving, flying, waiting for connecting flights, and then driving again. We'll be joining the rest of my family who headed down to the Florida Keys shortly before Christmas. Entertainingly, seventeen hours is the cut off time in Ironman triathlons. Hope we beat it!

The photo here is of me a few weeks ago standing on the bottom of a pool and pretending to swim. My friend Adrian needed it for a job he's doing.

While Chris played World of Warcraft I joined my new running friends at a nearby Running Room store. This time I got there on time and we actually ran together. We ran a lot further than I would have on my own, in cold conditions, but I didn't want to look like a sissy. In the end I ran almost 18K. My time extrapolated to be faster than the Half Marathon I ran a few months ago! Nothing like fear of looking out of shape to motivate.

I'll be off the 'net for the next week, so you'll all just have to hold your breath in suspense until then... Sheryl has given me cookies to take down for my parents, and now I'm hastily packing for our 7:00 AM departure tomorrow morning. Hope everyone has a great end to their year!

Listening to: Truely by Enigma from Chimera.

In a Meaford State of Mind

I got back from Meaford this afternoon. We had a pretty wet and "rustic" weekend, but the weather co-operated enough for us to visit Sauble Beach. Adrian thought we could get some good shots for my modeling portfolio with the storm waves in the background. We got exactly enough 'good' weather to accomplish that. As the designated photographer's victim I didn't get much of a chance to take photos myself. I did manage to get a nice series this morning around the farm and beaver pond when the sun finally came out for a few hours before we left.

I enjoyed driving around with Adrian, we took interesting side roads all the way up and listened to Verve Remixed on my iPod. We traveled along Airport Road all the way to Georgian Bay instead of thundering up Highway 400, and crossed some steep but rolling hills. I kept thinking that I'd love to try them on my bike someday.

We stayed with Adrian's friend Roger, who was at his parent's farm/cottage tinkering with the rusty old cars he's hauled there, including a recently acquired 1948 GMC fire engine. Roger actually lives in San Diego, so this is a pretty optimistic activity... The farm is definitely isolated, and with few supplies and no running water due to a dry well we might as well have been camping. Sheryl had a good laugh this afternoon when I told her about the conditions, but I did get through a good chunk of Margaret Atwood's novel Oryx and Crake.

The woods were pretty close in on all sides of the farm so there was no view to speak of. The sky did finally clear at about midnight though, so I was able to enjoy my favourite cottage activity; staring into the starry abyss. I hate to say it, but I'm really going to miss the family cottage. It was the perfect place to soothe the soul...

Listening to: Peter Gunn (Max Sedgley Remix) by Max Sedgley and Sarah Vaughan from Verve Remixed 3.

Birthday in the Boonies

Another busy weekend. I had another triathlon to race in on Sunday morning up in Orillia. Saturday was also Chris' 13th birthday. He's been at summer camp for three weeks now, just across the lake from... Orillia. So Saturday I drove up at mid-day to visit Chris and spend the afternoon with him in Orillia. Our first stop was Couchiching Beach, to pick up my race package. It turned out we were too early so we strolled the water's edge where we saw an old "boat car" driving in and out of the lake. What a strange contraption! We had a classic burger, fries and shake lunch at French's hot dog stand, which has been operating on the beach since 1920.

Chris slept off his lunch while we drove out of town along the triathlon's bike course. When we got back into town and Chris had finished leafing through the Maxim magazine that was one of his 13th birthday presents we returned to the beach for my race kit. We ended up staying for a while to watch some of the Kids of Steel triathlon races, just like we did in Cobourg. I always get a kick out of them.

Heading back into the downtown we discovered that Orillia was in the grip of an enormous display of restored automobiles. Eight blocks were closed off and perhaps as many as 300 restored automobiles were lining the streets. There had clearly been a lot of love and attention paid to these vehicles. Almost all had been restored to mint condition, many had been customised. I've posted photos on my Flickr page if you're a car nut, Chris and I were just bemused pedestrians.

When the afternoon ended it was time for (groan) dinner. We joined ten of my triathlon club mates at Montana's Cookhouse. Most of us had the chicken penne for the pre-race protein and carbs, but Chris went with the ribs. At the end of the meal the staff, who had been alerted to Chris' birth date, brought out a big moose antler hat for Chris to wear while they sang. Too bad I left the camera in the car!

With that important humiliation out of the way it was time to return Chris to his camp and then find my motel. Race day started at 6:00 AM the following morning and I needed my sleep!

Race report tomorrow...

Listening to: Gyasi Went Home by Bedouin Soundclash from Sounding A Mosaic.

My really-bad, no-good, horrible weekend

What a weekend! Sheryl and I drove up to Parry Sound on Friday for my triathlon race on Saturday. In the course of Friday I;

1. Got a $30 parking ticket,
2. Got a flat tire while going on a test ride outside of Parry Sound and spent an hour and $60 fixing it,
3. Got the call from the head-hunter telling me I didn't get that promising job.

Saturday morning at our bed & breakfast I was briefly awakened by heavy rain at 5:00 AM. Not a promising start to this day either. When I woke at 7:00 it was back to sunny skies, but by the time the triathlon was to start it was raining again, torrentially, with lightning. In the end the race was postponed to the next day for those that could stay on (not me). As a consolation a 10K run was held an hour after the original triathlon start time. My time was a middling 47:20 (literally, as I was 19 out of 48) with a pace of 4:44 m/km. But my shoes were soggy and the trail, pretty as it was, had some serious puddles! The top three runners were a full minute faster per kilometer...

Sheryl was an excellent sport about it all, keeping me company under a beach shelter during the rain and waiting in the car for me to finish the run and recover. As we drove back into Toronto the skies opened up again. Not a problem in a nice cozy car! We did enjoy Parry Sound on Friday night though, so the trip wasn't a complete write-off.

Now I'm home and getting Chris packed for a month at camp. Sheryl and I engraved his name on his new canoe paddle before she left for her place and he has now arrived from his mother's. He leaves Sunday morning at 11:00 AM. It's going to be a bit lonely without him around...

Listening to: Hourglass by Squeeze from The Best Of Squeeze.

Home again, via NYC

Read the first half of my trip here. With work and visit completed in Woodstock, we prepared to drive back to Toronto. But New York City was calling. My brother had the key to a friend's apartment in a "transitional" part of Brooklyn... Could we do it? Yes.

Sunday morning we drove south instead of north, Google Earth instructions once again in hand, and were unpacked by 1:00PM. Straight back out and over the Brooklyn Bridge for a whirlwind tour though. The parking gods were smiling upon us, because we rarely had trouble finding convenient cheap parking as we hopped around town. First stop was on the Avenue of the Americas in the West Village, where we did a bit of window shopping and strolled past my brother's first apartment on West Tenth. A pint of Magic Hat beer each at Bar 6 restored us and it was up Broadway to the Upper East Side. We stopped at Henri Bendel where Sheryl had some important purchases to make and we chanced upon their beautiful Lalique windows. We also ran into a Toronto acquaintance of hers... Small world. Next was a pleasant stroll in Central Park, pretzels in hand, past the Boathouse and the Boat Pond. The usual assortment of NYC characters and wacky tourists were in place. For a dollar we could have had a telescope view of a nesting pair of falcons high above Fifth Avenue. Back in the car and down Fifth Avenue with a loop around Saks while Sheryl ran in to get a snow globe (don't ask...) and then further down to Soho, where we had another restful interlude dining at the Mercer Kitchen. We drove "home" through Battery Park so Sheryl could get a glimpse of the Statue of Liberty.

That was our day, except for some distress over a "lost" Dean & Delucca shopping bag that contained our breakfast for the next day and my digital camera. The camera turned up in Sheryl's handbag and breakfast was in the trunk of our car! I guess you can't put that many miles and events in without some sort of brain slip.

Monday morning we packed up early and headed out to buy breakfast in another neighbourhood my brother had lived in that I had fond memories of - Brooklyn Heights. The weather was nice, so we lingered for a few minutes more on the Promenade where we got a great view of the Hudson River and Manhattan skyline. Minus the Twin Towers this trip...

Then it was back north to Woodstock to drop off the keys at my brother's place and head directly home. We arrived in Toronto twelve hours after departing Brooklyn having listened to five hours of The Measure of All Things on audio CD and passed a traffic fatality on the I-90.

This afternoon I took Chris to a matinee of Cars, which I have to say was a pleasant way to pass the time. The usual Pixar technical skill and humour were in place, as was a straight-forward sentimental plot, and as usual the credits contained the best stuff (drive-in theatre clips of Toy Story, A Bug's Life and Monsters, Inc. as enacted by... cars). Given my interest in Formula One racing we both got a kick out of Michael Schumacher's voice cameo. Having just traversed a serious stretch of Interstate highway and also seen life on the side roads, Cars also felt like a thoughtful essay on the small town life that 'progress' has passed by.

Listening to: Route 66 by John Mayer from Cars Original Soundtrack.

There and Back Again

It's been a bit quiet "here" because last week I drove down to my brother's place for a few days and, well, plenty of things happened...

I started full of confidence with Sheryl as my navigator and a nice Google Earth print-out of my route in hand. I'd heard about the heavy rains in Pennsylvannia but I didn't think it would affect me. Wrong! Although we had sunny dry weather for the entire trip I spent 3 1/2 hours going 15 miles along the I-90 just west of Utica because of flooding miles ahead. I was desperate to get off and fuel up, because we were down to an 1/8th of a tank (moments before hitting the traffic jam I'd said "getting low. Let's fill up at the next exit." People were strolling between lanes, spreading out maps on their cars, chatting...

We finally crept off the highway, just as the low fuel light came on, tanked up and got a real New York road map. We made some good headway traveling south to an alternate route east but guess what? The same flooding, this time including an overpass that had collapsed, killing two truck drivers, led us onto a detour along farm roads that took another ninety minutes and left us heading back where we came from.

Eventually an empty road beckoned to us and we headed off on our own detour. This took us quite a way south before we again encountered flooding. This time we had to pick our way across flooded roads and almost-submerged bridges. With nightfall approaching we checked our new map and decided to check into a motel in Cooperstown. What a funny little place! It's a very pretty and well preserved example of small-town America and totally devoted to baseball. Its where the bats come from, and the home of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum... Sheryl saw the restored main street and got a shopper's glint in her eye only to be disappointed by the uniformly baseball-oriented shops.

After a sociable breakfast the next morning at the Cooperstown Diner (which I later discovered is Bill Bryson's pick for the "ideal diner in the ideal small town") we made our way uneventfully to Woodstock, where we got last-minute cell phone instructions to divert to my sister-in-law's new office where I was to help get their computers set up.

And this story is going to have to "be continued"...

Listening to: A Fine Day for a Parade by Fountains of Wayne from Utopia Parkway.

Itchy Feet

Summer's coming and I'm getting the itch to visit wild places. It's been almost ten years since I've been in the mountains! For a geologist, this can get painful... This morning I found a photo of Lake O'Hara, from a 1997 vacation in the Rocky Mountains. (Click on it to see the full-size version.) Perhaps I'll get down to see my brother in the Catskills this summer.

Sheryl flew to Australia on Tuesday, she'll be back in three weeks. Maybe this has helped trigger my wanderlust. In the meantime Chris and I are dog-sitting again and following the Edmonton Oilers' trip to the Stanley Cup. (Toronto didn't even make the playoffs and my favourites, the Ottawa Senators, were stopped by Buffalo in the first round.)

Listening to: Sand in My Shoes by Dido from Life for Rent.

Pass the Syrup, Milord

Yesterday was Sunday, which meant that Chris' team had a hockey game in the morning. Unfortunately, when I turned up at his mother's house to take him she told me that he wasn't going. My parents had come in from Cobourg (about a ninety minute drive) to watch, which meant that they and I were very disappointed in him... For me it's not about hockey. It's about learning to be part of a team, trying to improve himself, and hopefully making some friends along the way. Sigh.

Later in the day Sheryl and I drove out to the Horseshoe Resort to go cross-country skiing. Sheryl has decided to try embracing winter. I rented skis for us both, signed her up for a lesson (I tagged along and learned something too) and then we spend an wonderful sunny-but-cold hour on the resorts trails. While she enjoyed the apres ski I took another turn on a harder trail. Good fun, but we both have sore legs today.

In between though my parents and I caught up over breakfast at the Golden Griddle (Canada's version of the IHOP for my American readers). Who was at the table beside us with his grandchildren? Lord Kenneth Thomson! Yes, he's an actual British Lord. Yes, he's the guy who donated over $300 million in art to the Art Gallery of Ontario in 2002. Yes, he was enjoying the $11 all-you-can-eat buffet.

Listening to: Hell Yes by Beck from Guero.

Back from the precipice

I've been busy. But I'm back.

Last week was a tough one as I was reaching the edge of my credit at the bank and I had promised to take Sheryl away for the day on the weekend. On top of that, I'd been feeling vulnerable at work because I have a new boss and it felt like he was cutting me out of the loop and was busy doing my job for me. I really hate feeling that my contributions aren't valued. Worst still would be finding myself out of a job and out of credit all at the same time! There was lots on my mind, and I wasn't sleeping very well. On top of it all we had some server hard drive problems that looked catastrophic but ended up being minor...

Now things seem better, although I missed out on an eBay auction for a triathlon wetsuit because I felt I had to be extra-careful my my funds. I've lined things up at the bank to consolidate my debts and re-mortgage at a better rate. Sheryl and I had a great weekend at the Millcroft Inn, and I managed to stay within my current credit limits to do it. And this morning I had a chat with my new boss about my concerns. I don't know if I'm "safe" at work, but at least I opened the conversation about roles and responsibilities. The only truly bad news remaining is that Sheryl's little dog Barkley has developed cataracts rather suddenly, at the tender age of four. She's trying to decide whether to adjust to life with a blind dog or pay for some rather expensive surgery.

The weekend (well, night) at the Millcroft Inn was a great experience. We arrived Sunday afternoon and spend Monday driving through the Caledon Hills countryside. The fallout from the aforementioned server problems kept me in the office until about 2:00 PM Sunday, but we managed to get on the road in good time. I'd found some web sites describing scenic routes and we tried to get to the Millcroft along one of the suggested paths. It was a wet and blustery day, so we only stopped once. We also kept missing our turns as we were enjoying the scenery too much, even though the leaves were mostly off the trees. Our stop was the little village of Erin, which while not very scenic had a remarkable collection of top-drawer gift and house-ware shops.

You can see all my photos from the trip on my Flickr page.

Dinner was included in our package, so we made the most of the Millcroft's gourmet menu. It was a quiet night and we were able to enjoy a very intimate meal. The dining room overlooks the mill's dam, which was cascading with water. Sheryl had the tuna appetiser were followed by Muscovy duck breast, while I chose the pheasant breast and the beef tenderloin. We enjoyed a nice Aussie Shiraz over our dinner, and finished with a gourmet cheese plate and souffle. The only problem was that we were too full to take full advantage on the fireplace in our room which was in the "Manor House", a Victorian building beside the main limestone mill building...

Monday morning was sunny and warmer, so after breakfast we wandered the grounds and took some pictures. Unfortunately our phones both started ringing. Sheryl's daughter called to find out how things were going, and I took a series of calls from the office about very minor emergencies. Grumble. We tried to continue following the route I had found, but the villages we passed through were mostly disappointing. We did find a great road to drive along though, and if you're in that area I recommend taking the Forks of the Credit road. Take it from east to west. It's a winding valley road that follows a popular fishing river and has lots of surprises around corners. At the west end it climbs up the Niagara Escarpment in dramatic fashion. Here are some snaps from the climb:

Listening to: What A Day That Was by Talking Heads from Stop Making Sense.

Happy Nights

So picking up the story, after our cottage trip Chris joined his mother for his birthday and I headed over to Sheryl's to help with the final preparations for her daughter's wedding that evening. After the success of my playlist at Sheryl's barbecue I had been tapped to pull together some background music for the wedding ceremony and dinner. Between my triathlon and the trip to the cabin I only had about 90 minutes to get it organised. I'd been stressing out over it, but managed to get something nice together in a very short period of time. Mostly Stevie Wonder and Pink Martini, with a bit of Michael Buble thrown in. Hey, I said it was a rush! The requested procession music was the first movement of Bach's Italian Concerto from the Talented Mr. Ripley soundtrack.

Then we all piled into two cars. The total wedding attendance was just ten, with friends and family invited to several larger parties on following days. We drove out to Langdon Hall with 'the boys' heading off first to wander the grounds while 'the girls' visited a makeup artist. This resulted in them following us about two hours later and being in the thick of a storm that today's paper described as being "of biblical proportions." There were several small tornadoes, torrential downpours, hail, etc. The girls drove through black skies and pounding rain with literal warnings on the radio to "seek shelter now." Very frightening for them, but we only saw a few cloud bursts.

Langdon Hall is an amazing country estate built over a century ago for the Astor family located about an hour west of Toronto in the Cambridge area. It operates now as a hotel and spa. Top-drawer. Once we all reconnected we spent an hour shooting photos on the grounds and then went into the main building for a very intimate wedding ceremony in a sun room. Dinner followed in the adjacent room. Sheryl looked lovely in a pale purple beaded dress, while her daughter the bride was absolutely beautiful in a short white wedding dress. The bride's four-year old son from her unfortunate first marriage was generally well behaved, but a bit impatient during the ceremony. He made up for it with a very touching speech I elicited from him at dinner.

I took a tonne of photos until my camera began acting up ("memory card error"). One of the other guests is a professional fashion photographer, so my efforts were more for candids and as a backup to him. As soon as I get the camera sorted out I'll post a few photos here. They're going to be great!

Chris is again with me and snuggled in his bed. Time for me to catch as many winks as possible as Sunday brings both the first of two celebrations of the wedding and a Formula One race in Turkey. 'Night everyone...

Listening to: Isn't She Lovely by Stevie Wonder from Songs in the Key of Life.