I hate loud music...

Thursday, August 26, 2010

I’ve probably mentioned before that I love the movie ‘Dances with Wolves’. There are so many things about it that I enjoy, but particularly the relationships that are developed throughout the movie. They are simple, but powerful examples of the unbreakable bonds of friendship – how quickly they can develop and how completely they can be cemented. Kostner’s character, a Union Cavalry soldier, befriends a tribe of Sioux Indians and particularly two braves, one a fierce warrior and the other a more peaceful man, wise in medicine and life. Kostner comes to adopt their ways and leaves his white world behind to become a Sioux, but circumstances dictate that he must leave the Tribe and when he makes this announcement to the group, his warrior friend says “be quiet…you are hurting my ears.” It is not his ears Kostner is hurting, of course, but his heart. He does not want to lose contact with his close friend…his brother.

My ears have been hurting over the last few weeks with the death of my friend Bob, the break-up of two other close mates, and now my brother tells us he will need more radiation. He says it’s no big deal, but when one of my brothers is going through life stresses…well…it hurts my ears. Hang in there, bro.

Okay…now the workout. John put me on to a cool website that allows you to monitor the routes you ride, run, or hike as workouts providing things like distance traveled, elevation changes, calories burned and other useful information. It’s free and you can check it out at www.mapmyride.com. It graphs out the elevation changes, which I like because I can see just how tough the ‘rolling hills’ are in the courses I ride. I actually already know that information from the way my thighs and lungs scream while I’m climbing them, but this quantifies my whining. I’m guessing I could plug in the trails I follow in the Adirondacks and gather the same information. I’ll try that and report back.

My riding legs are returning. I completed my sixth ride in seven days with a 25-miler though I skipped Rogers for what I thought was a lack of time. Don was coming over and we were heading to Akron to listen to a band replicating the music of Mahavishnu Orchestra. He was due at the house around 5:30 p.m., but wouldn’t actually arrive for another two hours…vintage Don and what was I thinking…worrying I needed to get back quickly.

Don loves music and insists that is MUST be loud if one is to completely appreciate all that it has to offer. I hate loud music and had told him so…but somehow he talked me into going. “Heidi will appreciate it and if they can play the music of ……., they’re really good musicians,” he said in trying to convince me to go. Heidi’s boyfriend Matt is the base player and Don spent a bunch of time explaining to me the importance of the base and the difficulty of playing it well.

I ran into Kim there…and she had a beer in her hands. “Aren’t you running tomorrow?”

“Yep…workout at 7:45 a.m. But this is only half a beer and I’ll have the other half later,” she said. Right. The bartender only filled the glass halfway and she’ll go back and get the other half later. She knew one of the musicians as well and was there to hear the music. She says she likes the taste of that vile, disgusting stuff. “I need to replace the fluids I lost from the workout today,” she said.

“I’ll grab you a glass of water. Besides…that stuff doesn’t rehydrate…it just makes you pee…which is why I think people drink the stuff in the first place…they like to pee,” I said. I actually did witness her returning to the bar and getting the other half of her beer…she wasn’t fooling. Interesting idea.

Tomorrow should be interesting. I need to fit a bike ride in between helping Jason roof his garage and pick Heidi up from Kent…and I have to do it before it gets dark. Man…do I miss running.

Bike duration: 88 minutes.
Training Heart Rate: 120.
Calories burned during workout: 1,275.