Are You Kidding Me !?!

While running with my training group this week, a random thought popped into my mind. (BTW, this type of thing happens during running, all the time) Why the hell can I not keep up with this running group of mine? I've been running with them for about a year, now, and I should clearly be doing better than this. Or so I thought.

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Am I slow? Am I a secret lolligager and I just don't know it? I mean really. What happens is I'll be running along with the group for a while, keeping up and everything. And then...those bastards just sloooowly pull away, once they get warmed up.

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It's like the recurrence of a bad dream. About that time, a second thought hit me. One part of my little Scooter mind (the creative side, not the squirrely one) told the other part (the more analytical side) "Are you kidding me, Dude?" Those running group clowns are really freakin' fast. I mean of the total group of twelve, seven are Boston Marathon qualifiers !! My analytical side kinda took over at this point and came up with this about my running buddies:

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Ann-I-Am: 42, 3:43 (What a hoot.)

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Missy: 43, 3:37 (Silent but deadly)

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Gary-Gary: 41, 3:16 (A sneaky little devil, indeed)

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Coach Bill: 52, 3:01 (he actually paced the 3:15 group for the Austin Marathon this year...friggin' nutz !!)

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Jay Bird: 32, 2:36 (double friggin' nutz)

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What A Joy: 31, 3:17 (at one point, last year when she was seven months pregnant, I thought if she passes me...I quitting this running crap!)

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Wild Bill: 51, 3:31 (He's like the Energizer Bunny!)

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Santa Santos: 36, 3:17 (He's close...but you get the point)

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The bottom line is: what was I thinking? As my grand pa LaFleur was apt to say about these situations "You gotta eat a lot more cornbread before you can hang with those folks." Oh well...here I go. Wish me luck! ; )~

Que Paso ??

This much is true...the Republi-Crats have lied to you and I.
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The media tells us that "deregulation" and "unfettered free markets" have wrecked our economy and will continue to make things worse without a heavy dose of federal regulation. But the real blame lies elsewhere. In Meltdown, bestselling author Thomas E. Woods Jr. unearths the real causes behind the collapse of housing values and the stock market--and it turns out the culprits reside more in Washington than on Wall Street.

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And the trillions of dollars in federal bailouts? Our politicians' ham-handed attempts to fix the problems they themselves created will only make things much worse. Woods, a senior fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute and winner of the 2006 Templeton Enterprise Award, busts the media myths and government spin. He explains how government intervention in the economy--from the Democratic hobby horse called Fannie Mae to affirmative action programs like the Community Redevelopment Act--actually caused the housing bubble.
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Most important, Woods, author of the New York Times bestseller The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History, traces this most recent boom-and-bust--and all such booms and busts of the past century--back to one of the most revered government institutions of all: the Federal Reserve System, which allows busy-body bureaucrats and ambitious politicians to pull the strings of our financial sector and manipulate the value of the very money we use.
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Meltdown also provides a timely history lesson to counter the current clamor for a new New Deal. The Great Depression, Woods demonstrates, was only as deep and as long as it was because of the government interventions by Herbert Hoover (no free-market capitalist, despite what your high school history teacher may have taught you) and Franklin D. Roosevelt (no savior of the American economy, in spite of what the mainstream media says). If you want to understand what caused the financial meltdown--and why none of the big-government solutions being tried today will work--Meltdown explains it all.
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I highly recommend it...its the best book I've read this week ! ; )

Puzzle Du Jour

I really enjoy doing one of these, to start the day.
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Have fun with it !!
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9:57; 8:23; 1:32; 11:25; 9:13; 2:48

In what way are the start and end of each of these six times identical?
(answer is below...unless, of course you know it already)
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They start and end with the same letter:
9:57...Nine fifty-seveN
8:23...Eight twenty-threE
1:32...One thirty-twO
11:25...Eleven twenty-fivE
9:13...Nine thriteeN
2:48...Two forty-eighT
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As you were... ; )

Yumeaux !!

A little secret that I've been keeping for quite some time has timely emerged. It's a long term project that has recently come to....ahem, fruition. The grapes have been planted many years ago and the winery is finally open !!

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Check it out if you're in the area: http://www.pedernalescellars.com/ The goal, here, is quite simple...to make the best, low production, wine in Texas !

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And (quickly looking left and now looking right) if anyone asks, just tell them a little bird told you about it...the secret wants to continue. Shhh...

The Law of Attraction

"Like draws to like, and the goods which belong to you gravitate to you." (Emerson)

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I suppose this is why Congress and the current administration are having so much trouble with this "Stimulus Package" thing. Borrowed money doesn't create anything...except more debt. Bad Karma on their part indeed ! BTW, I've always really enjoyed Ayn Rand's ideas and insight on this very subject matter. A woman ahead of her time, she was.

Big Abe

As an old History/Political Science major (and Philosophy minor) I dearly love to read about significant historical figures, especially those who have directly contributed to matters or situations impacting my lifetime. It's for this reason that I recently began reading and in some cases re-reading literature on Abe Lincoln. He's best known for his thinking, writing and speeches as I'm sure you all know quite well. Most notably among his writings are the following expressions, that are my favs:

-"No man resolved to make the most of himself can spare the time for personal contention." Amen to that...

-"I am rather inclined to silence, and whether that be wise or not, it is at least more unusual nowadays to find a man who can hold his tongue than to find one who cannot." Bingo !! Man do we need more of these...


-"Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing." Read that one again...it's worth it.


-"I want it said of me by those who knew me best, that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow." He was a Dowist, indeed.


And so he did...Lincoln is known for having planted many, wonderful "flowers" in his time. We learned many of these in school.

Also, I recently came across and also enjoyed the photo, above, and how it dovetails nicely into the nascent idea of Lincoln that came to mind during these recent readings: i.e., a person going along quite well in life, fully knowing and seeing the cold, hard and possibly tumultuous times just ahead. However, they continue to bravely advance and make their way towards it anyway. It is their destiny to do this.

Bandera 25k

This past Saturday was the annual Bandera run. I opted for the 25k as, for reasons obvious in photo #2, I didn't need to run any more on this particular day !! ...lol

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The race was a load of fun, up to the point were I was a little fatigued but I hadn't noticed it yet. That's the recipe for the "spill" as I've come to call it. It's about 2/3's of the way through the race, I'm doing well and then I hear the infamous 'thump' sound that indicates the first step (of which there are at least three by my definition) in the spill process. The second step is where you actually hit the deck, all the while wondering "hmmm....what exactly just happened to me?" Then you come to know that you just fell and immediately, if possible, hop up from the ground, dust yourself off and quickly look around to see if anyone saw that. (here comes #3: mild embarrassment) Two guys behind me did see it...as soon as I indicated that I was ok, the snickers and giggles commenced. Myself included. Yeah, I thought, when the legs get just a little rubbery but you haven't yet fully noticed it, that can be dangerous. That little Queen song came to mind: "another one bites the dust...let's go !!" So I did...

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Now, I'm fully aware of my condition and went on to finish the race a little more conscious of my condition and at a little more careful pace. All in all, not too bad for a rookie: a 3:21 25k, through the woods, no less.

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The last pix is of my ice bath in my in-law's pool in Kerrville. That water was like 50 friggin degrees. So, my already sore legs hurt like the devil when I first stepped into the pool. But, after about 30 seconds, POOF !, they went numb from the cold water. I gotta say, afterwards is always a better feeling than going into those ice bath things !

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All in all, Bandera was a fun race that I'll probably do again in the future...