observation #42a

Random thought for the day - I think that men tend to be more successful than women because men can be driven and dumb at the same time. It's hard to find a woman with that combination. And I don't mean dumb as in 'not smart' but dumb as in the ability to let stuff just roll off of you. Women think more than men. Life is difficult when you think.....

Robin Pettersen - yay!

Check out this video featuring the amazing Robin Pettersen of UW-Whitewater. She was my mentor through college and played a huge role in giving me the confidence to get to where I am today. She really shaped my perspective on what it means to work hard and was a daily source of inspiration to me. Still is!
VIDEO

Where My Pitches At????

Well, it was not a spectacular debut for 'Where My Pitches At' - in our opening game we lost 0-16. (and hey - if this was football, that'd be a respectable score!)

Sigh... at least we looked good.

I signed up for a co-ed softballl league a couple of months ago because it sounded like a fun way to spend Tuesday nights over the summer - hanging out with some people, enjoying a good natured American past-time, post game beers, matching t-shirts, etc etc etc. Good stuff! (ok, I signed up mostly for the t-shirt) Of course, before I signed up, I checked, double checked and triple checked that this league was NOT COMPETITIVE IN ANY WAY.

No, seriously.

NOT COMPETITIVE IN ANY WAY!!!!

I once had a fairly traumatizing experience with a touch football league in ny - a friend convinced me to sub for a game one saturday morning and I thought sure, why not - sounds like fun! Well, first of all the game was in Staten Island.... that should have been clue enough. It wasn't. I'm not very smart.

I get into the van (yea - a van picked me up, clue #2) and am immediately handed a playbook. Not just any old playbook - this thing is LAMINATED.

A laminated playbook.

Ohhhh yeeaaa, this game isn't going to be competitive at all!

I had to play because there have to be so many girls on the field and I proceeded to spend the whole game looking like a complete dork. The ten-hut would go, everyone would scatter to their assigned place, I would run to where I thought I was supposed to go and then just stand there and wave my arms to signal 'I'm open! I'm open!' while the person who was blocking me would stand right in front of me and just sort of look at me dumbfounded.

At the end of the game, someone from the other came up to me and said "good game." I was so totally relieved that it was over and thinking 'oh yea, maybe I didn't make a total fool out of myself!' ... I answered the person "oh, thank you!"

I completely missed the obvious fact that this person was simply stating the time honored tradition of chanting "good game, good game, good game, good game" to everyone on the other team.

D'oh!!!!

So, when the chance to play on this NOT COMPETITIVE co-ed softball league came up - I was understandably hesitant. I was convinced (promised) that it was just fun times.

Well - apparently the team we played tonight didn't get that memo as they packed mad skillz.

We got spanked.

BUT, we had an awesome cheering section - and by cheering, I mean drunk hecklers. We have pretty sweet baby blue t-shirts with our logo on it. (a dude swinging a bat that says "Where my Pitches At" on it - yes, sweet) So these drunkys in the bleachers (I think they were there for the other team but they might have just wandered in off the streets) I think they took pity on how terrible we were and they started cheering - good natured heckling - us. They had a lot of fun with the name (duh) and they also called us the "baby blues."

It's always fun to have fans - who cares if they're drunk and technically making fun of you.

Oh well, it's only uphill for the "Where my Pitches At" - I foresee a dramatic scrappy comeback story that will eventually be the inspiration for a Disney movie staring Bill Pullman.

my first tri - TRY HARDER!

So this morning I did my very first triathlon. I signed up for it kind of on an impulse - I track all my workouts at this tri board and I absolutely love the people on this board. Just a seriously great group of people - and so I think I was kind of swayed by that sense of community. Also - if I'm being honest, I think my confidence got the better of me and I thought, ohhh, a sprint tri??? I can TOTALLY do that..... (.25 mile swim, 15 mile bike, 3.1 mile run)

Man - I AM DUMB

The following is basically taken from my race report on that board.....

Met up with buddy DJDavey at the Speedway in the mean streets of 'stally (west allis for those not fluent in djdavey speak).... traded bards, insults and general mockery and then we were off to Lake Mills.

So I got there, registered, walked around, got my bike set up, basically taking my sweet little time and then DOH!! Realized it was 28 minutes before my wave started and thought to myself - huh... I should probably put my wetsuit on and maybe get into the water to see what a lake feels like.
This was my first time swimming in open water, my first time wearing a wetsuit, my first time wearing a SWIM CAP.

Have I mentioned yet it was my first tri???

Oh
My
God.

I guess the best way to describe this is "wow" - I was very humbled by this whole experience. I did not expect it to feel this difficult at ALL. I signed up for this tri on an impulse 3 weeks ago and was traveling and crazy busy at work for the past two weeks. Apparently that combo makes it difficult to prepare for this sort of thing. I was thinking, oh, I just ran a half marathon a few weeks ago, I work out all the time - I'm fine.... no worries.... um, holy train FAIL!

Here's how my race went.

Took a dip before about 15 minutes before the race started, felt really good, very happy that the water didn't feel like an ice cube - generally felt fairly confident. I was totally wrecked the night before with nerves but standing in the water before the race started - I felt great.

All that changed rather quickly.

Wave started and I waded out, went freestyle stroke 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 - thought to myself, "man, it's funny that people hyperventilate on the swim" and GASP!!!! hyperventilated.

Totally, completely freaked out. I could not catch my breath, I could not settle myself down, I could not put my head in the water - heck, I couldn't even bring myself to put my ARMS in the water! Flipped over on my back and proceeded to backstroke the entire thing. Just kicking though. It was exhausting - I could not breathe at all. And could NOT turn back on my stomach - seeing the water freaked me out.

Had to grab on to the life boats 2 separate times, I was so freaked. Seriously contemplated having them haul my sorry a$$ in twice. Decided to tough it out and I guess I'm glad I did but wow.... That was honestly one of the scariest things I've ever done. And I normally consider myself fairly brave - but today I was a giant - well, insert your own choice word here. If you were on the course anywhere near me, you probably heard me audibly whimpering the entire time.

Yea..... humbling.

I was so mad coming out of the water and into transition, I don't even remember what I did. All I know is that I was THRILLED to be on land. As I ran out of the water, I must have been rockin some serious mad-face because as I see amyjo and craig - craig's yelling something on the bullhorn and as I approach, amyjo says something like 'are you ok?' and craig slowly lowers his bullhorn like 'don't disturb the beast' . I was MAD. sooooo MAD. stupid water.

I cheered up when I saw the other donkeys yelling and hollering - but I was mostly just running as fast as I could away from the water though - i didn't want it to catch me and make me swim in it again.


I actually felt kind of good on the bike - but I must have been pretty gassed because this was slower than I was on the duathlon a couple of weeks ago and i felt like I was pushing WAY harder today. I was still coughing up lake water and trying to catch my breath for the fist half of this. djdavey caught me at 27 minutes which frankly - shouldn't he have caught me earlier? I mean, really.....

Also - someone said 'hi stacey' to me about 3 or 4 miles in and I have no idea who it was (you were going to fast! which..argh! jealous) so hi back and who were you mystery man!?!?!?!

Oh - and my chain kept slipping but whatever. It was like my bike was saying 'yea, we're gonna go in THIS gear and YOU'RE just going to deal with it'.. yea, the bike made me it's b!tch today.

My feet were totally numb but I didn't feel too bad coming into the second transition. I kept thinking I was forgetting something to take on the run but hello - shoes, race number, clothes - what else do I need? Not sure what I thought I was missing (turns out it was my mo-jo).

What would I differently? Yea.... I would pack my mo-jo!

UGH. This run totally sucked. I felt like if I could just get through the bike and the swim, I would rock the run. NOPE. I was 100% gassed by this point. I think I held it together ok on the bike but I was spent by the time I got to the run. It was, how you say, being no fun. My legs felt awful - just no push at all. I stopped and walked a few times - the only thing that kept me from walking the entire first mile is knowing that djdavey was about to pass me as he came in on his last mile and I didn't feel like dealing with the death glare. (turned out he was so focused he wouldn't have even noticed - I'll remember that next time when I feel like walking!!) Of course, immediately after he passed, I think I walked for about 2 minutes.

Felt WAY better after the turn around though - FINALLY started getting some feeling back in my legs and was able to feel like I was actually running. Oy.

I think my crappy run had everything to do with the fact that I hyperventilated for about 14 minutes straight on the swim - I just had nothing left on the run. Soo.... yea, I should probably learn how to swim. because I'm kind of an ok runner.


After the race, I found the donkeys and hollered and yelled for the rest of the donks coming in - then I got really cold, realized I should probably put some dry stuff on.

Lesson learned - I am either never going to do a tri again OR I am going to spend all summer in a lake learning how to swim. Verdicts still out. Unfortunately, the people who do tris are WAY more addicting than the tri itself so I can see myself suffering through this again just for the fun afterwards.

And if you're into times (like I am!) my final time was 1:39

Peruse this!

I was at Barnes and Noble this morning, enjoying a lovely time perusing the periodicals and java. Well, I more drank than perused the java. I'm not sure how you would peruse java. Since to peruse is "to examine or consider with attention and in detail" (I swear to god it is, look it up if you don't believe me! Go on, I dare ya! Yea, I'm talking to you Scott Kelly.)

Anyway... I was speaking of java. More specifically, I was perusing said java. Man - peruse is such a twinky word. I'm going to stop using it now. Peruse has been retired. Done, dead to me. Over. finit. Finished. I shall pursue a word to replace peruse.

(editor's note - this is where the ADD kicked in and a completely new train of thought was jumped on)
I spent a lot of time in edit this week banging my head on a keyboard watching aggravating, frustrating, non-working videos. (which, after much coaxing, did finally come around to the 'moderately awesome' stage) When I wasn't banging my head, I was watching the pinwheel of death while footage rendered. Rendering is the most aggravating part of working in video. In order for playback on a video to be clean, the footage has to be "rendered" - this can take anywhere from a minute to an hour. Sometimes it's an overnight thing. There's a little progress bar that charts the progress but that bar is a big fatty McFatHead liar - it will say 7 minutes, but really it means 45. It will say 1 minute, but really it means an hour. It builds hope and then crushes you like a beer can on a strongman's forehead.

I don't exactly know what I was doing when I made up this song but at some point during my stint in Cambodia, I mean, at my last job, this song got stuck in my head. Now every time I see the render progress bar, it pops in my head.

::ahem:: ::clears throat::

(Sung to the tune of the dreidel song )
Render, render, render
Oh render I will play
And when the render's ready
Oh video I will play

WITHOUT FAIL .... literally kids - EVERY SINGLE TIME I render, I sing this song in my head. Do you have any idea how many times a day I see that freaking render status bar? Do you realize how often I must sing that little ditty? They should make this goy an honorary Jew for the amount of times I shlep that schmaltzy song around in my head. I can kvetch with the best of em so I say bat mitzvah me up. (clearly my yiddish ain't too shabby either! thanks princeton!)

Speaking of kvetching... I was searching for music this morning and I love checking out people's imixes to get ideas for new stuff to listen to but holy cow! Some of the names those kids on come up with for their iMix titles! "White egg with nothing inside"... "Dead Flowers in Memphis" ... "Instruh Mental" (ooohh.. I get it!)
In my day we just labeled em Mix Tape #1, Mix Tape #2, Mix Tape #3.....

kids.... such smendriks

So today at Barnes and Noble, a book caught my eye and I burst out laughing in the middle of the store. It's always awesome to draw attention to the fact that you're a little nuts by belly laughing right by the self-help books.

This was the book - now settle in for story hour.

One night after work, back when I was at VH1, my friend Jill and I convinced our buddy Steve to come to Bennigans and have a drink with us. We loved hitting up the tourist crap bars in times square because they had the best happy hours. And they were usually relatively empty. I mean, seriously - who goes to TGIFriday's in Times Square? (answer - a shockingly huge amount of people..... why would you go to nyc and go to TGIFridays?? It makes no sense) But Jill and I had scoped out Bennigans which was on 8th and 48th-ish - just far enough off the times square madness but still a crappy chain with an awesome happy hour. Perfect for a quick "decompress" beer before heading home.

Our friend Steve hardly ever came out with us so this particular night jill and I were all happy that we finally dragged this dude out for a beer. We take him to Bennigans and figure we'd start there and see what ensued.

Almost right when we get to the bar, an older guy walks up to our table and tells us he's a producer from 20/20. He has a crew with him and hands us his card so we know he's legit. Plus, he has that tired old dinosaur look of an old timer news producer so we pretty much believed him without the cameras and business card. He asks Steve if he would play pool with this guy for a segment they were producing for 20/20 - Jill and I say it's cool if they take our friend as long as they buy us a round. They did and so we happily sent Steve off upstairs to play pool.

So Steve is playing pool with this guy, casually chatting with him, cameras are rolling, nothing much in terms of excitement though. Jill and I are chatting with the producer and he's telling us that his daughter did an internship with VH1 and it was the worst experience of her life. Apparently she had to transcribe a bunch of tapes and didn't get to go on a lot of shoots.... uh, yea dude - that's what being an intern is. He actually gave us his card with this almost sympathetic "if you ever want to get out of there" tone.

After a few beers, we look over and Steve is doing an interview with the producer and the guy he was playing pool with. We can tell they're breaking some sort of news to him but Steve is pretty much the coolest cucumber ever and barely even blinks.... the producer comes over and tells us that oh, btw, the dude your friend is playing pool is actually a chick. We're like, "yea and?"

Steve was completely not phased, Jill and I are like, whatever and the producer and camera crew are a little flustered because there's absolutely zero shock value at the "reveal" - by going to Bennigans they told us thought they would find bible thumping tourists from Kansas who would be simply shocked to find out that this he is a she and throw a fit on camera. Instead, they found 3 jaded new yorkers who couldn't have cared less if it was a turtle in disguise.

Turns out the he-she was a girl who had spent a year living her life as a man as research for this book she wrote called "Self-Made Man." 20/20 was doing a special on her - they were looking to gather "shocked" reactions. She must have had a pretty good press agent because we saw a lot of her in the following months. It was like - oh, there's that super boring chick from the bar!

I never read the book so I'm not sure what she discovered in her research but ummm... yea, isn't that sort of a dead horse? Women and men are treated differently. Also, a table has four legs and a dog barks. And Scott Kelly will hunt birds.

Of course, we never got Steve to come to Bennigans with us again. And sadly - they closed the place down shortly after.
Sigh.....
there goes one of nyc's greatest establishments (in the crappy cheap beer category!)

uuhhh....

Tonight I mistakenly washed my face with moisturizer instead of cleanser.

That is all. I just had to share. Is it possible I'm tired? Nah... just blonde.