Wanna-Be

Did you ever get into your blog dashboard (if you are primitive like me) and get distracted from the task of writing something only to read someone else's blog leading only to further distraction and in the end a helpless feeling of inferiority that makes you seriously consider never writing anything again?

I feel like that all the time.

But press on I will.  Just like Andy Schleck who must have known that he couldn't quite beat Alberto pistol-grip Contador in the time trial today but absolutely destroyed himself trying.  Just like Floyd Landis who decided after years and years of lying and covering up what actually happened that he would just come out and tell all of it.  ALL of it basically making sure that he will never be on a cycling team or have a friend in the pro-cycling world ever again.  But apparently it does make him feel better, which is a good thing in my book.

I watched a movie yesterday and today that was quite intellectual, a big surprise actually from what I thought it was going to be about.  If you know some of my movie preferences, you might be able to easily guess which one this was, but how about a modern movie with pretty big stars in it basically examining the idea of using scripture as either a weapon or a panacea.  It had some fun twists to it as well, one that I didn't see coming that was really fabulous.  Although I do have to wonder if that particular version of that particular book wouldn't have been significantly larger than the one in the movie...

Two last semi-random notes...

1.  One of Liz's co-workers asked me yesterday if I agreed with Jonathan Kozol.  Then he asked what I thought about affirmative action programs in public universities.  Pretty interesting stuff.  I kept thinking back to what Joel Salatin brought up, the idea that by making civil rights and other things laws you may have actually hindered their progress.  I'd never considered that as an option before, but it does make for a more interesting debate, that's for sure.

2.  The folks at the Sudbury Valley School argue that children will learn to read on their own when the time is right.  They point out the fact that they've never taught a child to read since their opening in 1967 and everyone who has attended the school has learned to read.  They also claim an incredibly low (almost zero) incidence of reading disorders, their theory being that most of them are caused when adults tell a child that they are behind and then forcing them to learn to read before they are ready.  I tend to buy into this theory but I have so little practical experience in any part of that process that it is a somewhat tenuous position for me.

Really, this is a school?  I think I'd take that one over the 100+ million dollar building we are moving into in a month or so.  Then again, we have a pool...

I don't remember learning to read.  I haven't had a child learn to read and so far our three year old mutt hasn't picked it up.  I haven't taught children to read.  I haven't even really been around a child learning to read for any significant part of the process.  But it sure seems right.  I wonder what the reading specialists at school would say about it.  Maybe someday I will ask them.

Why Copenhagen makes sense

Thanks to El Presidente, I took a gander at this video detailing some of the reactions of American bicycle infrastructure folks to their visit to Copenhagen.  To be perfectly honest, the video made me want to cry a little bit.

Can you imagine a place where mothers would feel comfortable riding a bicycle with their kids attached in all kinds of different ways, perhaps this one:

I honestly can't do it.  We are about to add a player to be named later to our organization and I literally cannot imagine a place where I wouldn't worry about it, maybe Narberth...  But especially riding right next to major streets in the city?  No way.  But of course when you have low speed limits that are enforced, huge penalties for people stupid enough to hit someone on a bike, and a culture that actually celebrates cycling as a valid, viable, even wonderful part of life, everything changes.  You almost lose the need for various infrastructure changes because drivers are trained to ride around bicycles.  So too cyclists are taught in school and expected to demonstrate certain levels of competency.  Amazing.

I also wanted to mention that I've become a rather huge fan of Chris Horner after this year's tour.  He just rode himself into the top ten with a HUGE ride on the Tourmalet, bypassing his more absurd teammate Levi Leipheimer who was too busy sucking wheels and then blowing up to ride up the way Chris did, but of course Horner downplays his great achievement.  He writes a great blog about each day's stage here.  Did I mention that he is 38?  I still can't elevate him about Jens, but here's to Mr. Horner!  Chapeau!

This is Mr. Horner after winning the Basque Tour this year and got to wear the awesomely silly hat and spray the crowd with champagne.  Must be fun.

Here's to hoping that Andy Schleck knows something nobody else does about his TT in a couple days.

Suspension of Disbelief

I've had a bit more time on my hands recently, thanks to the fact that I don't have to go to work every day.  So sometimes, when I need a break from pretending I know how to do anything about fixing up or cleaning up our house...  I've watched a few things on hulu when the tour hasn't been on and I came across the pilot episode of "Covert Affairs" recently after hearing a review of it on NPR.  I can't say that I shared the same rather effusive feeling about the show but I was entertained.  I think it is pretty interesting to find that Adidas has paid for all the athletic product placement.

What I struggle with is the typical willingness of shows to just ignore the laws of physics and engineering in the simplest of ways, ways that are maddening to me.  Just like watching Goose die in Top Gun in a way that is as unlikely as me winning the lottery and the fact that they couldn't take the time to learn that Migs are always odd-numbered, the car chase in the pilot was unbelievably ridiculous.  Literally.

The young female agent in her first week on the job finds herself being chased by a black BMW after leaving work.  She manages to evade the Beamer with some fancy moves, decides to counter chase for a bit, then ends up stuck when her car kind of craps out.

Now, here's the good part.  She drives what looks very much like a 2003-04 Volkswagen Golf, a few years before but very similar to this baby:

This hot little ride will do 0-60 in about 8.5-9.5 seconds depending on the model, but hers was certainly not the R32 so we are looking at no faster than 8.5.  Quarter mile in about 16.7 seconds in case you were wondering.  Of course, it is a well-engineered German automobile and so it handles pretty well and it's a stick, which was a nice touch.

The opponent in all this fun on the roads?  Another German car, a BMW no less.  Looked like a very late model 5-series, but missing the tell-tales of an M.  So it doesn't look faster or anything:

Of course it also doesn't drive faster.  Because that would make the chase academic wouldn't it.  The fact that the BMW does 0-60 in just about 5.3 seconds.  Even if the driver is a bit slow, let's give them 6.0 seconds.  That will still cover the quarter mile in just about 14 seconds.  So if the chase lasts more than a mile or two, she would have needed a rather large lead in order to get away from this puppy.  Given the greater mass of the BMW and its far superior handling, etc., the chase should have been over just about the time it began.

As I said, I was entertained, but I do get tired of the idiotic nature of so many car-chase/stunt/war scenes and find it irresistible on those rare occasions when the director or whoever controls this sort of thing gets it right.

The beginning

So today I ran for the first time in a while, perhaps jog would be a more appropriate word.  Pretty simply I just want to be in good enough shape to run 3:10 in the marathon something this fall so I can run with my brother at Boston if he qualifies. 

Right now I am very out of shape, I've been racing on the bike sure, but I don't know why I just can't keep the weight off cycling so I have some work to do.

I've also actually started thinking about what on earth I am going to try and do better in the classroom this year, I'd love to do everything better, but I've tried that before and it usually fails.  I wanted to try and articulate very simply my goals for the year and I figured I might be able to start with these.  The idea is for us as a class (since I think this is an effort made as a group) to

1.  Value (and hopefully enjoy) reading more as an important and useful part of our lives
2.  See writing as a useful part of our lives and find ways to practice it in a way meaningful to us.

They are probably still not quite simple enough because they will get exponentially more complicated when you add in all the things that are mandated by the school, grades, assessments of various kinds, the things that must be in common with all the other freshman teachers, the books we are assigned to teach, and the list goes on and on.  But I am hoping this might not be a bad place to start.

As for the running, I was trying to think of when I've started in a worse place and I think I'd have to go all the way back to my early high school career to be in as terrible starting condition as I am now.  I have more experience sure, but I am also getting older, recovering more slowly, etc., so I've got a long way to go!