The Secretary

Can anyone tell me where January went?

Work has been rather busy of late and I just recently celebrated my two year anniversary with Sherman's Travel. I was also recently elected to serve as Secretary for the Hellgate Road Runners and have created a Hellgate Blog for club news, photos and general club information.

Thus, I have been squeezing in my runs whenever possible. I actually did speed work (4 x 1 mile repeats) by myself at 6:30am, in the snow. My times were pretty good too!

What little spare time has been devoted to a "special project" for the forthcoming Hellgate Awards Night dinner. Hopefully I'll have enough time between now and February 10th to finish!

"It is not easy for a person to do any great harm when his tenure of office is short, whereas long possession begets tyranny."
-Aristotle

The IceMan Has Indeed Cometh

Brrrrr…With authority, Old Man Winter has finally descended on New York!

Last night I took Harry (our two year old Yorkie) out for a walk. The frigid and gusting wind nearly knocked him off his feet! This morning Harry went outside, hastily “did what he needed to do” and headed back inside… In kinder weather he’d have dragged me all over the neighborhood sniffing everything in his path.

With extra time on my hands this morning and a burgeoning recommitment to running I headed out the door and into the 19 degree chill.

The skies were clear but the rising sun did little to warm the icy air whipping off New York’s East River. Eventually I warmed enough to take my hands out of my jacket pockets affording me the opportunity to run more naturally.

Five miles at an 8:30/mile pace. It wasn’t fast but it sure felt good.

"Winter is on my head, but eternal spring is in my heart."
-Victor Hugo

Excel Bible

I have been tagged by runner/ultramarathoner StephRuns.

Yes, I know that this is the equivolent of spam... sorry.

The instructions are:

1. Find nearest book
2. Name book and author
3. Turn to page 123
4. Go to 5th sentence and copy the next three to blog
5. tag 3 others

I will ignore step 5 but the results are as follows:

1. There are no less than four books within reach.

2. The Microsoft Office Excel 2003 Bible by John Walkenbach happens to be nearest.

3. Yup.

4. "The exact dialog box that you see depends on the printer. The Properties dialog box lets you adjust printer-specific settings, such as the print quality and the paper source. In most cases, you won't have to change any of these settings, but you should be familiar with the settings that you can change."

5. Nope.

"Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can't lose."
-Bill Gates

We're Doomed

The other day I watched one of those doom-and-gloom shows on the Discovery Channel about the various scenarios in which the world as we know it comes to a catastrophic end. Gigantic tsunamis from the Canary Islands destroying the Eastern Seaboard of the United States… Super Volcanoes in Yellowstone National Park…

Come on you know you’ve seen that show too.

The very next day a colleague turned to me and coincidentally stated, “We’re doomed.” When I pressed for an explanation she noted the recent inclusion of polar bears to the endangered species list and the fifty square kilometer block of ice that broke off in North Canada and is now adrift in the Arctic Ocean.

I teased, feigned concern by stating that when the ice melts and raises the sea level I will be even more thankful for my new 6th floor apartment, and went about my business.

A few hours later a news story about UFO’s at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport caught my attention and shortly thereafter I came across this article about a meteorite concluding its intergalactic journey in a New Jersey bathroom.

While commuting home I noticed the headline of a newspaper claiming that the last time New York experienced a November and December free of snow was 1877. Then I made the poor choice of watching “War of the Worlds” on-demand.

Today the temperature has topped 70 degrees.

Perhaps we are doomed after all.

Update (1/8/2007): All this and now noxious fumes... My Caesar quote is all to appropriate!

"I durst not laugh, for fear of opening my lips and receiving the bad air."
-Shakespeare, Julius Caesar