She Was Wearing Red Shoes

Great, three days in a row of running!  I went to Town Lake as expected after working at the airport location.  Another beautiful day, and lots of people out.  Halfway around I stopped for some water under Mo-Pac.  I was feeling tired and thought I might walk the rest of the way, but it's pretty easy to find the motivation I need down there.  There was an attractive girl checking out the trail map, and she was definitely my type.  I started walking the rest of the trail before she left but thankfully she was going my direction and passed me a minute later.  After another couple of minutes I set my goal to catch up with her, and got running again.  I waited too long though, so I never caught up and never saw her, but at least I found the motivations to run.

I don't know how I'm going to enjoy the lonely Walnut Creek run near my place compared to this.  Who am I kidding?  I'm going to end up driving down to Town Lake fairly often I think.

On Time

I managed to get up plenty early to be at work in plenty of time for an 8:00 meeting.  It's 8:45 and we still haven't started yet cause a bunch of people are showing up late!  What a waste of time.  Complaining about work is starting on time this week, however.

Weekend

I have to be in a pretty bad mood to post about frustrations at work, even briefly. So that was Friday. The good news is that on Friday they post the new internal job openings. One department, that had a job open up a couple weeks ago that I should have applied for, has posted three more openings on top of that one. I think I will apply for them this week.

I managed to run at Town Lake on Thursday, and actually felt a little guilty that I didn't run on Friday. And that's even with planning to take Friday off. I finally found the right way into Walnut Creek park on Saturday and today. I still don't know how I feel about making this my normal run, as I'm finding trail running a little frustrating with all the starting and stopping and not having a good idea of how far I've gone. Not to mention the lack of people. Maybe once I get a regular route worked out it will get better. Going out through Gracywoods and back on the North Star (or vice-versa) has some promise, but connecting the two involves going through some private property at the moment which makes me a little uncomfortable. It is just a parking lot, as opposed to a yard, and a church parking lot at that so I doubt I'd get shot at, but there may be a better way so I'll continue exploring.

My internet connection has been out since Friday and they are sending someone out Tuesday after 5 to troubleshoot it. It's annoying not having my connection, but some neighbor's wireless is filling in quite nicely. I'm even happier I bought this laptop now.

This weekend I was hoping to get my place cleaned up and program my keyboard for some new songs we are learning. Neither of those got done. I will have to straighten up a bit before the cable guy comes. Yes it's that bad.

I got the motorcycle out for a ride to get some food tonight. The sound of it running was exciting to hear after three weeks. It almost makes me want to wait another three weeks so I can have that feeling again.

Tomorrow work will probably be painful for me, but not because of me. I can only tell people so many times to get something done before I give up.

Work

I feel like walking out and not coming back.  I'm tired of this.

Town Lake Revisited

Yay, yesterday went as planned!  I did the Mo-Pac/Lamar loop (2.9 miles).  I did a fair share of walking, but hey I don't need to over exert myself right away.  The weather was okay, it was humid and overcast, but there were still plenty of people out.  Man I've almost forgotten how nice it is to be amongst so many runners.  Afterward I went to trivia downtown.  Our team got first place for my second visit in a row.  We're on fire!

I am working near the airport again today, so I'm planning on going to Town Lake again.  I may try the 4.5 mile loop today, but I expect I will still be walking a lot.  It's a start.

Morning Run

A lot of talk on the blogosphere recently about working out in the morning.  I haven't been able to do it yet, but I do think I'm getting closer!  I've been going to bed earlier, and waking up earlier.  Do you ever come out of sleep instantly awake?  Yesterday I woke at 4:30 and felt totally awake, this morning it happened at 6:00.  Even though I was completely awake, I lied in bed and fought to get back to sleep both times.  Then I woke as usual at 6:45, hit the snooze a couple of times, and felt really tired.  I thought briefly yesterday about going for a run at 4:30, but decided it was too early.  Today I work up at the perfect time but still couldn't quite do it.  At least I decided to plan a run today.  Since I'm working near the airport and have plans for trivia downtown, I packed up my running gear and will hopefully get to Zilker after work today.  Maybe that's all I need to do is bring clothes with me and always go for a run right after work.  Going home to change just takes more time and makes it more tempting to chicken out.

Good Luck!!!

Speaking of "good luck," I want to wish everyone running in the Marathon (or half) tomorrow good luck! I will see you at Mile 22 and 25, supplying you with much needed fuel in the form of beer and licorice.

Good Luck

Thursday night I had a great dream where good things kept happening to me. I can't remember any "good things" from the dream specifically, but I do remember everyone commenting on how lucky I was. I hoped the good luck from my dream would continue into the day. So how did it go? Well, I was late for work but lucky enough to be on time for a meeting I completely forgot about. So I didn't get in trouble for being late, that's lucky. I got downtown fairly late, but my timing was prefect enough that I scored an excellent parking spot right outside the bar. Lucky! Then I was lucky that many friends were still at the bar, and lucky enough to run into a pretty woman friend later and talk to her for a couple of hours. I didn't win the lottery (though I did buy tickets), I left my credit card at the bar, and I didn't get lucky in other ways, so the day was far from perfect. But it was a good day.

Do I Have to Write Something?

Fine.  Practice was moved from Thursday to Wednesday this week so that's what I'll be doing tonight.  That leaves Thursday open for...?  BB Rover's maybe, but as I'll be working south I could easily end up downtown on the way home.

Let There Be Light. And a 2x16 Character Display.

After practice last night I dove back in and tried to get my new LCD to work again.  After resoldering a few connections I came up with the genious realization that I could use the old cable if I fashioned a plug from the opposite side of the PCB.  This has the effect of reversing the odd pins for the even ones, which is what all of the instructions online say to do.  Except for pins 1, 2, and 3, and for those I just bent the pins over on the LCD so I could connect them separately.  To my amazement I turned it on and it worked.  It brought a tear to me eye, really it did.  I haven't had a working display on my keyboard for over three years.  All I need to do now is get a potentiometer soldered in so I can adjust the LCD contrast to the right level.

I need to be reminded not to be messing around with electronic stuff after a few drinks.  One of these days I'm going to break something.

Cable

Any of you mac enthusiasts have a spare mini din 8 to parallel (DB25) cable you could give me?  I believe this is the type of cable used to hook up a printer to a mac.

Upgrade

I guess I'll be holding off on getting a new keyboard for awhile, as I've found myself investing in upgrades to my old one.  I'm waiting for a $50 Flash RAM card from ebay to arrive, and this will enable my keyboard to play custom samples.  I should be able to use it for any special effects any song needs at that point.  It's amazing I've had this keyboard for about ten years and have never bought one of these.

Even though I don't really need it anymore, I located a replacement LCD for $15.  The only problem is that the pinout is slightly different than the OEM part, so I need to construct the connection between the LCD and keyboard myself.  Last night, I rather foolishly decided to try wire-wrapping the connections together rather than constructing a new ribbon cable.  It didn't work—or maybe it did, except that I forgot to reconnect some other cables before trying it out.  I had torn it all apart before I noticed the missing connection.  Making a new cable is the right way to go, anyway.

Refund

Yay, I was just looking at my bank account online and I see that my state income tax refund was just deposited!  What?  I bet you're thinking Texas doesn't have any state income tax.  You're right--this refund was for my 2002 Minnesota taxes.  Yeah I was a little late filing for it.  Now I just need to file my federal taxes for 2003 and I'll be all caught up!    

Wingra Loop, Vilas Zoo

So while I was looking up the Blues Brothers quote for the last entry I ended up at Google maps looking at the sattelite photo for Calumet City, IL. After that, I headed home to Madison, and at full zoom worked my way around Lake Wingra. I got a lot of use out of that loop when I lived in Madison from 1999-2000. It's where I started running routinely. It eventually led me to run a marathon and was my first 10K loop, and the first I ran with a significant other runner. Looking at the map now I realize what a great area of town this was. I had lived in the area before I was 26 years of age, and it was a completely different period of my life. I was 5, and that is as far back as I can remember. What I remember about the Wingra loop when I was 5 is close to what I remember about it now--you can only drive completely through the Arboreteum on Sundays. All other days the gates are closed and you would have to turn around. My family would drive through it some Sundays. For me it seemed like we were going through a tunnel. We would start out in one part of town and get immersed in this thick, green otherworld and exit in a different part of town. I always loved this ride and that's probably why I still remember it today. I'm so glad I also have the experience of running that same enjoyable route twenty years later. Every year I go back to Wisconsin now I try to run through it. I'm not always able to, but this year I was. I also try to get to the (free!) zoo which is adjacent to it. I'm sure my parents brought me there plenty, but I do remember that it wasn't enough for me when I was 5. I do understand now that going every day would've been excessive, but that's what I wanted back then. Now that I realize that we lived a mere mile away from it, I find it even harder to "forgive" them and I will always be trying to get there to make up for the days I missed!

Great Gig

I would take this time to thank y'all for coming out to my show last night, but since none of you did, I won't. It turns out I didn't need your support anyway (this time), as our demographic of middle-aged white guys and gals were out in force, as well as a few twenty-something rednecks that have the same appreciation for classic rock. We did good, real good. The waitress even commented that we were the some of the best Goddamn music they've had there in a long time. We'll have to learn the 'Rackety Ole 97' when we come back. Our tips were through the roof; my share was $35 and we have five band members--you do the math. That's on top of our regular pay which is more than that (again, per person). In total per hour it approaches what I make at my (real) job, not bad! My program didn't crash at all and worked exactly as designed. So well infact that I may even set it aside for awhile while I work on more musical goals. I am already playing two harmonica solos on the keyboard (that's so g**) and I can't let that go any further. We've got the mic, I've got the harmonica: it's time to do this right. Our next show is in downtown Austin and pays $$$+, but, sorry, you're not invited--it's a private gig.

Gig Prep

It took me until 5 pm yesterday to finally start getting ready for the gig tonight.  I wish I could get myself to start sooner, because once I start I really get into it and enjoy getting ready.  "Getting ready" includes everything: listening to songs, practicing them, programming instruments, debugging my program.  I'm happy with how everything is progressing with the possible exception of my playing abilities.  For instance, I should really have the piano solo at the end of Sweet Home Alabama mastered at this point.  It was an audition song so I've had about two months now.  And I could master it if I just focused on it for an hour, or less even.  It reminds me of taking piano lessons.  I was supposed to practice half an hour a day.  Inevitably, I would not practice and spend a half an hour or an hour on the day of my next lesson going through stuff.  I put that little effort in, yet many times there was noticeable improvement in my performance at that next lesson.  I think a lot of kids probably didn't practice, yet didn't improve much.  Or even worse, they put in a lot of time and effort and didn't improve much.  Wow that makes me feel kind of guilty.  I imagine if I practiced every day I could've been quite the pianist.  Wasted talent—I should change my blog title.

I am feeling quite a bit better today, but you might want to hold off another day or two if you feel the need to make out with me, just in case.

Got the Fever

This is the part of being sick that is really frustrating. I've been doing everything correctly: lots of fluids, sleeping as much as possible, etc. but I've still got it. Now my mind is thinking stupid thoughts along the lines of "if I was well, I would do this..." like clean the apartment, go running, etc. Things that I probably wouldn't do if I was well anyway. I suppose I should be happy that it's not really painful at the moment, just a fever and weakness, no headache. It hurts to cough but I can surpress that pretty well. I should cough though, that's probably the only way to get this out of me.

My gig is still on for Friday. It is at Mulligan's in Lakeway on 620 in the strip mall just north of Lakeway blvd and we play from 9 pm to 1 am. It sucks that it's way out in Lakeway; what sucks worse is I drive farther than that every day to work. If you decide not to go cause it's so far away (I'm talking to you AG) make sure you get downtown and buy retard a birthday drink for me!