The Second Fourth And The Big Eight-Oh

The calendar may say July 7th, but today turned into Fourth of July version 2.0.  The continuation of this hot weather streak was practically begging residents of the Midwest to grill some meat, and it's a crime to let a call like that go unanswered.  We may have the smallest, least easy-to-use grill in the world, but that couldn't stop us from putting together a spread of meat that looked like a Noah's arc of deliciousness.

We had two of every animal cooking away on the back porch early this afternoon.  Technically, it was just cows and chickens, but within that limited group of animals, we hit 'em hard.  With the blazing afternoon sun, flame was barely even required to get things cookin'.  I'm sure the meat would have grilled up nicely if it was sitting directly on the pavement, but we went the complicated route and used charcoal briquettes and that antique of a grill.  But the flavor was unbeatable...to say that grilled tastes better than boiled would be the understatement of a lifetime.

In addition to fake Fourth of July, today was also Grandma's fake 80th birthday.  She hit the milestone a few weeks ago, but since I was out of town on vacation, we decided to do some pre-birthday celebration in early June, and today was selected as the post-birthday celebration day.  I think it's safe to say she cashed in big--personally, I'd be more than willing to trade in a celebration on the day my birthday for two parties surrounding the actual date. 

I suppose since we split the 80th celebration into two separate occasions, it would have been appropriate to celebrate twice like it was a 40th birthday party.  But eighty doesn't come around too often, so we went big and threw two full-fledged 80th parties, which is the equivalent of a 160th birthday party.   And no triple-digit birthday can pass without homemade ice cream.  That's twice this week--but this time, in a show of racial harmony, we gave a nod to our old friend the cocoa bean and whipped up a batch of dark chocolate ice cream.

And any good birthday bash needs cake to complement the ice cream, so Mom baked a book-shaped cake in honor of Grandma's 80th.  I must say, this is the kind of reading I could really get into--I've never devoured a book so quickly in my life.  I did, however, have to ask Mom to add an icing comma to the cake, because there's nothing more unsettling than a grammatically-challenged dessert.

It's been quite a week--there was the Fourth of July, fake Fourth of July, and fake 80th birthday for Grandma.  I certainly can't complain about being underfed these past few days.  With two pseudo-holidays in a single twenty-four hour period, only two things kept the day from achieving absolute perfection.  My hopes and dreams of peeing out the coals after the grilling was completed went unfulfilled, and Serena Williams won Wimbledon this morning.  Despite those notable downers, July 7th will go down in the record books as a fine, fine day of celebration.

Tragony...or Ironedy?

Death is rarely a happy event, but since every living thing's time will come eventually, I suppose there's at least some consolation in providing the world with a little entertainment while leaving the land of the living.  We can all hope that we go as quickly, painlessly, and ironically as possible.  What follows are two perfect examples of spectacularly ironic ending to some life stories.

We'll start with a tale from the animal kingdom.  The rhinoceroses population in South Africa is struggling in a big way, and strangely enough, mythical and magical powers are to blame...at least indirectly.  Poachers have been more active in rhino hunting in recent years as demand for rhino horns has soared.  While the horns don't offer much in the way of practical uses, some African and Southeast Asian cultures believe the horns have special medicinal or magical powers, and people are willing to pay top dollar.

With the increase in poaching activity, conservation groups have upped their efforts to save the rhinos.  Some groups have tried removing the horns from living rhinos to beat the poachers to the punch.  The horns, much like human hair or finger nails, grow back after a few months. 

Other conservationists are experimenting with a process that involves placing a poison capsule into the horns of living rhinos.  If poachers kill the rhino and remove the horn, the capsule releases the poison and makes the horn useless for its intended medicinal purposes.  How the poachers know the rhino has a poison capsule in its horn before killing the animal, I have no idea...but there must be a way.

Now here's where the tragic and ironic death part of the story comes into play.  Early in February, a group of conservationists in South Africa called together members of the press to watch them sedate a rhino and insert one of these anti-poaching poison capsules into its horn.  But there was one major problem with this noble effort to save the rhino's live: the outcome was the exact opposite of what the conservationists had hoped to achieve. 

When the group shot Spencer the rhino with a dart full of anesthesia, he started convulsing, went to sleep, and never woke up.  Oops! One of the would-be rhino rescuers called it, "an unfortunate reaction to the anesthesia," recognizing that there is always a risk that an animal may not wake up after being tranquilized.  We can all take comfort in knowing that Spencer lead a long and full life--like me, he was in his mid- to late-20s, which is apparently old for a rhinoceros.  The saddest part is that he was three days from retirement when they darted him.

Such tragic endings aren't limited to the animal world.  Two months after Spencer's passing, a Russian plane carrying fifty people went missing after the tower lost radio contact with the pilots.  The next day, a search team turned up debris from the plane in the mountains of Indonesia, with no survivors.  The aircraft was a new type of passenger jet called the Superjet 100, though aviation experts have since agreed that the plane was significantly less super than the name implied.

Not the intended landing site.

Aside from the sad loss of life, the crash of the Superjet also crushed the hopes and dreams of the Russian aviation industry, which has struggled with safety and quality issues since it's glory days as the USSR.  The Superjet 100's manufacturer, a company called Sukhoi that's run by the Russian government, has been trying to overcome the country's troubled history in flight and convince other nations to purchase its aircraft.  The Superjet was the first new passenger jet to come out of Russia since the USSR days, but this headline-grabbing debut doesn't bode well for sales.  Who says all publicity is good publicity?

Once again, that's where the ironic part of the tragedy comes into play.  That plane that went nose-first into the Indonesian volcano was on a demonstration flight intended to prove the safety and comfort of the new aircraft.  As such, it was full of journalists, business people, and aircraft technicians, and pilots.  If this doesn't convince the world to scoop up all the Russian aircraft they can afford, I don't know what will.  But hey, I bet you can pick up a Russian-made plane for pennies on the dollar right about now...

At least Spencer lived a long life and got to go relatively peacefully.  I'm sure there were plenty of young people among the fifty killed on the mountainside in Indonesia, and "peaceful" and "plane crash" are the oil and water of the aviation industry.  What a sad an unlikely combination...a rhino that gets killed in the name of preventing rhino killings, and a plane that crashes on a safety demonstration flight.  At all those affected got to leave a lasting impression on the world with an entertaining final chapter to their lives.

Here are some links to the stories:

http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/09/10364240-rhino-dies-in-anti-poaching-demo-by-conservationists

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/10/us-indonesia-sukhoi-idUSBRE8480LB20120510

Give Me A Sign

One of the things that really stood out during last month's vacation was the grossly inadequate signage along most of the trails in the local, state, and national parks of our fine country's southwestern region.   I was consistently amazed that for so many different trails, the guide book had one map, the sign at the trailhead had another map, and both of those maps looked nothing like the actual trail that I found once I started hiking...and in case you were wondering, yes, I confirmed that I was on the correct trail.  It's like the cartographers were blind, drunk, and lazy when they charted their course and shared it with the hiking world.

I can't begin to count the number of times I stood at an unexpected, unmarked fork in the trail, pondering my next move.  You'd think a loop trail would be a relatively circular path that would eventually bring you back to your starting point without much thought.  But it seemed like every hundred yards, I found myself at a four-way intersection, and each of the three options appeared to be equally viable candidates for the correct path toward my destination.  So many times, a simple loop trail turned into a spider web-like maze of intersecting madness.  And I fared no better when a notoriously complex network of trails had absolutely zero signage to mark the way.

Lots of trails? Don't expect any help beyond the trailhead sign....

Is it too much to ask for some periodic guidance along the way?  I'm not expecting a fancy, hand-carved masterpieces for a sign--I'm perfectly happy with a piece of cardboard with a crudely drawn arrow duct taped to a stick at a crucial intersection.  At first I figured sign problems must be a budget thing, especially with California's financial issues.  But how much can it cost to jam a branch in the ground and whip together some kind of rough arrow and a word or two?

I eventually realized that the sign problems had nothing to do with the state budget crisis.  It wasn't so much the lack of signage that was at the root it was the problem;  it was the poor placement of the few existing signs.  Apparently the park rangers installing these signs aren't the brightest stars in the sky.  Take, for example, this sign at Torrey Pines State Reserve near San Diego:

A sign like this might be helpful in some circumstances, but when you're standing thirty feet from the Pacific Ocean with an unobstructed view of the water and can barely hear yourself think over the sound of crashing waves, "Beach" isn't exactly solving any mysteries for hikers.  Why not pass on installing useless guideposts like these and plant a sign at the intersection of six different unmarked trails in the middle of the desert, where it's almost impossible to not get lost?

I know I can find at least one car full of people who can agree with my complains.  This isn't just a regional problem, and it affects road quality as much as it does trail navigation.  You know those "Bump" signs you often see along the side of the road, only to drive over what feels like a tiny pebble?

Talk about useless signage--I don't even slow down when I see those anymore.  The driver of an SUV near Eau Claire, Wisconsin took the same approach recently, with hilarious consequences:

The jump looks like something straight out of a movie.  This seems like one of those situations where the construction workers who put the signs up should have given drivers a little more advance notice.  By the time that driver was asking, "what do those orange signs say?" he was already three feet off the ground.  I smell a lawsuit on this one...

It's amazing what a person can accomplish despite not knowing how to use a smartphone camera.  The only reason this clip got captured on video at all was because someone stopped to take a picture of the heat-buckled road in Wisconsin.  The woman thought her phone was set to photo mode, but instead she shot one of the greatest accidental video clips of all time.  I imagine that's why she didn't keep the camera pointed toward the SUV to see it stick the landing.  There are plenty of people out there with a love of photography and an ignorance of handheld technology who just might be able to cobble together accidental careers.  (This includes you, Mom.  Just kidding...or am I?)

After watching this video, getting a little turned around on a trail doesn't seem like such a big deal.  But some simple signs can go a long way...

Here's a link to the story:

 http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/suv-airborne-video-140712287.html

Independence In Iowa

In all my years of full-time work, I think this was the first time that the Fourth of July fell on a Wednesday.  It really gives the work week an unusual twist to have half a weekend in the middle of the week, like a strange fantasy island of relaxation surrounded on all sides by the shark-filled waters of work.  Monday was Monday, Tuesday felt like Friday, today feels like the weekend, tomorrow will feel like Monday again, then Friday will be Friday.  By the time the actual weekend rolls around, I'll be so confused that I won't remember to show up for work on Monday.

The day started unexpectedly well when I found a workaround for my week-two Wimbledon woes.  Without access to cable or ESPN3, I thought my viewing would be limited to watching the online scoreboard update on the ESPN website.  But I landed a big win on the small screen--the iPhone came to the rescue again, with an assist from the Watch ESPN app.  I've had the app on my phone for months, but through my limited experimentation, I thought that all it did was provide a TV schedule for the ESPN channels, making it essentially useless.

Desperate to find a way to watch Wimbledon, I read more about the app and learned that Comcast customers could actually stream ESPN3 coverage on their phones. I wasn't getting my hopes up; I figured I'd have to be connected to wireless on a Comcast-powered network, but that wasn't the case.  I just logged in, and I had live Wimbledon coverage in the palm of my hands!  Sure, the app crashed quite a few times as a lot of people had complained about in reviews, but I was able to get small but high-resolution Wimbledon action!  All of the ingredients are back in place for a fantastic 4th.  I can how host a BYOBB party this weekend and convince everyone to crowd around a three-inch screen.  The BYOB, of course, stands for Bring Your Own Binoculars, and the extra B is for Breakfast at Wimbledon.

A Fourth of July celebration isn't the same without scorching hot weather, and Iowa delivered big--temperatures hit triple digits with plenty of humidity.  It made for a sweat-soaked run early in the morning and didn't let up all day.  Best of all, the forecast calls for more of the same:

I love heat and humidity anyway, but it only enhances the classic Fourth of July tradition of eating homemade ice cream.

The only thing missing was fireworks, but not having fireworks on the Fourth of July is an Ankeny tradition of its own.  For whatever reason, the city holds its "Summerfest" celebration the weekend after the Fourth, and with the holiday falling on a Wednesday this year, Ankeny will officially celebrate America's independence on July 15th.  For the locals, I suppose having something to look forward to helps avoid a post-Fourth of July letdown, but it's not so good for the out-of-towners.  I tried to satisfy my appetite for colored lights by setting fire to a box of Crayolas, but it just wasn't as majestic as the real thing.

Now I have to go mentally prepare myself to dive back into those shark-filled waters of work tomorrow.  I won't be as bad since I won't actually be in the office, but work is work, wherever it happens.  Regardless, thank you America--of all the freedoms we enjoy, freedom from work on a Wednesday is right up there with the best of them.

Warrior, Dashed

Last year marked the debut of the Warrior Dash in Minnesota, and the response was overwhelming.  More than ten thousand people ran on the first day of the race on Saturday, July 23rd, and nearly ten thousand more showed up to run the course the next day.  Red Frog Events, the company who runs theWarrior Dash, must be making a killing, because these adventure/obstacle course-style races are sweeping the nation and popping up everywhere.  There are urban obstacle courses, zombie runs, the Tough Mudder, and enough new races showing up every day to keep my email inbox littered with invitations.

Just about all of these races sound interesting, but the entry fees on each new race seems to be higher than the one before it.  When it comes to adventure races, call me a traditionalist, but I'm sticking with the Warrior Dash.  Last year, Ted, McLovin, and I all signed up for the same start time, and the race was a lot of fun.  The toughest "obstacles" were the long, painful, nearly-vertical ski slopes at Afton Alps.  I finished the course faster than I'd expected, and I now have a pair of socks and underwear that are permanently chocolate-colored from the mudpit and the end of the course.  I'm hoping that someday they'll end up enshriened in the Warrior Dash Hall of Fame...if such a thing existed.  I'm confident that one day it will.

A few weeks after the race, I received an email from Red Frog encouraging me to sign up for the 2012 Warrior Dash.  I jumped at the chance--early registrants pay a lower entry fee, and $50 later, I was registered for the race, and Ted and McLovin signed up again, too.  A few weeks after that, I received yet another email--this one said that both days of the race had already been fiilled, and with the overwhelming demand, Red Frog would hold a second Warrior Dash in Minnesota this year. 

It seemed so far away at the time, but I've been training like an Olympian, hoping to improve on last year's time.  Every day on the elliptical machine, I ask the person next to me to swing a bag of frozen oranges at me every fifteen seconds to keep my reflexes sharp.  After my workouts, I have the trainers break pool cues over my abs for fifteen minutes to toughen me up.  And for almost a year now, I've been sleeping in the oven to prepare for the intense summer heat.  Nothing could stop me from a spectacular finish in this year's race...except maybe my memory.

Two weeks ago, Red Frog sent an email saying that there was still time to register for the Warrior Dash on June 30 or July 1. I had already signed up many months ago, so I deleted the email.  And as I recalled, I signed up for the race in September, so I assumed this was a reminder for the second race that Red Frog added to the schedule after that first weekend filled up.  But you know what they say happens when you assume...

On July 2, a "Warrior Dash Results" email showed up.  Once again, I didn't think much of it...until I opened it and the first line said, "Thank you for participating in Warrior Dash Minnesota last weekend."  Needless to say, I hadn't competed in a Warrior Dash last weekend.  I started to panic.  I looked back through months of old emails and found my registration confirmation from last year.  Sure enough, I had registered for the June 30th race. Somehow, McLovin, Ted, and I had all completely forgotten about the race and missed it.

I'm still trying to figure out how this happened.  All these months, I'd been thinking that I had registred for the September race.  For whatever reason, I guess that date stuck in my head after I read that the second race that Red Frog added to the calendar was in September.  But I'm not taking all the blame for this--why didn't Red Frog send me an email saying, "REMBMER TO SHOW UP TO THE RACE ON JUNE 30!"?  Instead, all I got was a useless message saying that there was still time to register...all the while forgetting that I was already registered for that date!

After eleven months of training, preparation, and anticipation, it turns out that the only thing that could stop me from a strong showing at the Warrior Dash was forgetting to show up for the Warrior Dash.  Early this year, I'd hoped that my summer would have two race-related events.  But last month, I had to skip the Urban Assault bike race that I'd done with McLovin the past two years because it fell on a day when I was out of town on vacation.  Then, of course, my other event for the summer, the Warrior Dash, went undashed. Needless to say, the summer is going to be a lot less eventful than I'd hoped...and I mean that quite literally. 

To rub a little salt in this still-fresh wound, I received yet another email today.  This one was from Sport Photo, Inc., a company that takes pictures on race day.  Apparently my official Warrior Dash proofs are ready to view.  And, in case I was wondering, my bib number was 75875.  If only they knew...

Where do I go from here? This was a tragic and embarassing error, but true warriors don't use calendars or Outlook reminders.  I could always register for the September Warrior Dash, but I'm not too crazy about that idea, given that I already spent $50 and got absolutely nothing in return.  No obstacles, no T-shirt, no medal, no mud pit, and no glory.  Instead of the traditional "I Survived The Warrior Dash" T-shirt, I'm going to have to make one for myself.  My slogan might say something like, "I Registered for the Warrior Dash and All I Got Was This Lousy Blog Post."

Warrior Dash 2012: The year of the unleapt flames...

Another Reason I Love The Internet

I'm consistently amazed by the internet.  It's so powerful and easy to use that it's made just about everything offline obsolete...maps, photo albums, encyclopedias, phone books, letters...who uses these things anymore?  Well, maybe old people who fear and loathe technology, but it's only a matter of time before the internet completely takes over the world.

One of the other great things about the internet is that you can find the answer to just about any question.  And that includes the questions that are too politically incorrect to ask the easily-offended people who might be nearby.  Let me give an example.  I've spent the better part of the past six months changing the radio station to avoid listening to Adele's music.  I can't deny that she has a great voice, but I personally can't stand her music and have found that her songs are ridiculously overplayed.

I'm sure Adele has been on TV a lot in the past year, but I haven't cared enough to pay attention to what she looks like.  But the other day I finally saw a picture or video clip of her somewhere, and I was shocked.  It looked the Michelin Man was belting out "Someone Like You."

I was curious how much Adele weighed.  Two bills?  Maybe two and a half?  That's the kind of thing that you can't find even on Wikipedia, which is too professional and politically correct to include any mention of her weight.  (It does include her age, and to my surprise, she's only twenty-four.  I thought she looked like a middle-aged opera singer.)  But if I thought to ask the question, surely someone else was wondering the same thing. And with the internet at my fingertips, it wouldn't take me long to find the answer.

Yahoo Answers quickly came to the rescue.  Five months ago, someone else shared my same curiosity and posted the question.  Skimming through the various responses from the past few months provides a classic example of the hilarity that ensues when people are able to post anonymously on an online message board.  On one side, you have the overly sensitive types (probably the larger women), who scold the person for even asking the question and who become even more enraged by posters from the other end of the spectrum who fill the message board with sarcastic comments and fat jokes.

Here are some sample posts from the politically correct crowd:

• Who cares, she has an amazing voice!
• She is beautiful, get over it.
• Who gives a &*@# she is an amazing singer.  Do you have four Grammy's?
• None of your business.

And here's a smattering from the other end of the spectrum:

• More than you and me combined.
• 286 lbs (I think this estimate was a joke, but who knows for sure)
• More than you can handle.
• 300 lbs (I'm a little more certain this guess was a joke)

Of all the replies to that original question, one hybrid response was my favorite.  It started out sounding like a whiny complaint about how it's what's on the inside that truly counts, but then finished with spectacular and hilarious twist.  The writer even cited a source for his response:

Adele has an amazing voice, and she should be contratulated on her Grammy wins.  Simply amazing.  It's too bad her great victory will be overshadowed by the rental cost of the Bobcat that was required to hoist her onto the stage.  Source(s): I have seen pictures of Adele.

In the end, I found a reasonable answer to my question on the message board.  Someone posted that they'd read that Adele weighs 195 lbs.  I have no way of knowing if that's right, but it's pretty darn close to my guess of two bills, and it was enough to satisfy my curiosity.  Once again, the internet delivered.  I'm convinced that the answers to all the questions of the universe are out there, and if this little search was any indication, tracking down those answers can be a wildly entertaining way to spend a few minutes.  Thank you, Al Gore.

The Bitter End Of A Summer Tradition

You may not realize it, but with Sunday evening upon us, we've reached the eve of one of the greatest weeks of the year.  Some people may try to convince you that the seven day stretch with Christmas and New Year's is the best, with the vacation days, parties, food, and the holiday spirit, but it's lacking one essential quality: summer!  The week of the Fourth of July has always been one of my favorite times of year.  Fireworks, grilling, hot summer weather, some of the longest days of the year, and the second week of Wimbledon.  If any of those ingredients were missing, it wouldn't be the same.

Some of my fondest childhood memories involve spending the week at my grandparents' house, watching Wimbledon every morning during the second week of the tournament.  During that second week, NBC also had a nightly Wimbledon update after the 10PM news, with John McEnroe and Mary Carillo providing highlights from the day's matches.  Even though I'd watched them all, I loved staying up to see the recap.  At the end of the week, I'd wake up early for NBC's "Breakfast at Wimbledon" coverage of the finals on Saturday and Sunday.  Wimbledon was one of the few tennis tournaments that was covered on network TV, and it's what got me interested in the game and convinced me to start playing.

Over the years, I've kept the Wimbledon tradition alive.  Though working has kept me from watching the weekday coverage (don't get me started on how much I miss summer vacation...), I never miss the nightly Wimbledon updates or the "Breakfast at Wimbledon" coverage on the final Saturday and Sunday of the tournament.  I could tell you where I was when I watched just about every one of the finals matches over the past fifteen years, and NBC's Wimbledon theme music is the practically the summer soundtrack to my childhood:


 


Last week, I watched some of the early round matches at ESPN3.com.  I don't have cable, but I was able to watch online since ESPN covers the first week of the tournament and Comcast subscribers have access to ESPN3.  I caught a few minutes of tennis every day before work, but the first week has never been too interesting to me...watching two guys I've never heard of battle it out on court 32 for the chance to get crushed by a good player the next round just doesn't keep me entertained.  I did notice that John McEnroe was calling some of the matches on ESPN, which surprised me, since he was always a commentator for NBC.  I didn't think much of it at the time...

Yesterday afternoon, I turned on the TV and flipped to NBC, hoping to watch the last day of action in the first week...but Wimbledon was nowhere to be found.  I went to the NBC website and looked at their programming schedule, and Wimbledon didn't show up anywhere for the entire upcoming week.  I searched some more and was absolutely crushed by what I learned.  ESPN bought the rights to the entire two weeks of Wimbledon coverage, leaving NBC with nothing after 43 consecutive years of coverage.  This was announced last summer, but I'd somehow missed it...or perhaps repressed the bad memory.

Since I have access to ESPN3.com, this should be little more than a minor inconvenience--I can watch the matches live on the computer.  But I'm heading back to Iowa for the 4th of July, and my parents don't have cable, nor do they have access to ESPN3.com.  So not only does NBC's lack of coverage mean that there will be no Wimbledon theme music, no nightly Wimbledon updates, and no Breakfast at Wimbledon next weekend...it means that there will be no Wimbledon at all for me!  How can they do this to me?  That's more than fifteen years of tradition, stopped dead in its tracks!  Watching England's most prestigious tennis tournament is as important a part of celebrating America's independence as the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

There's a bit of a silver lining to this dark cloud, but it's so pathetic that I'd consider it more of an aluminum or tin lining.  ESPN is the only channel offering live coverage of the finals, but ABC will show replays later in the afternoon on Saturday and Sunday next weekend.  There will be no Breakfast at Wimbledon for me, and I'll have to go out of my way to avoid watching TV, going online, or checking my phone so I don't accidentally see who won before I watch the replay. 

Maybe 2012 will mark the beginning of a sad new "Late Lunch At Wimbledon" tradition, but I already know that it won't come anywhere close to measuring up.  Worse yet, I have little hope for the future--ESPN has locked up the rights to Wimbledon coverage through the end of the decade.  R.I.P. classic Wimbledon tradition...I feel strangely older and more bitter and jaded than I did yesterday...