Month: June 2015

Run 393: The sounds of silence with bonus extra hot heat

Run 393
Average pace: 5:40/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CW)
Distance: 5.14 km
Time: 29:11
Weather: Sunny and hot, humid; some high cloud
Temp: 31-33ºC
Wind: nil to moderate
Calories burned: 371
Weight: 157.5 pounds
Total distance to date: 3199
Device used: iPhone 6

With the extended forecast promising hot weather and plenty of it, I opted to head out mid-morning for today’s run, when the temperatures were going to be merely in the mid-20s.

When I got to the lake I checked the weather app and it reported the temperature as 33ºC. As you might notice, this is not mid-20s.

I decided to go ahead and run anyway, setting up for a 10K, but not overly optimistic that I would last that long.

I somehow managed to trigger the countdown on the Nike+ app after carefully putting the phone in my SPI-belt, so I took off. It was then I realized no music was playing. I had a good pace going, so the idea of stopping to get the music playing was not overly appealing. The idea of trying to fish out the phone, start the music, then put the phone back in the SPI-belt while still running seemed laughable.

I kept running, with only my delightful wheezing serving as accompaniment. On the other hand, I got to hear birds chirping, which I normally never do. I believe the chirps interpreted to, “Man, it sure is hot today. Boy howdy.”

My pace took a big hit after 1K, which was not surprising. Nor was the big drop after 2K. It was 33ºC, after all. By about the fourth km, I had settled into a steady, if sluggish pace. I didn’t feel as sluggish as I actually was, probably thanks to an intermittent breeze and the sun being at my back rather than staring me in the face.

But the course forward was clear and uninviting. After hitting 5K I unzipped the SPI-belt to take the phone out and end the run. Then I changed my mind and zipped the belt back up. Then I repeated the entire thing again, once more changing my mind. At this point, the phone burbled “Workout paused” because my fiddling had apparently managed to invoke whatever magic command pauses a workout without specifically trying to do so. I glanced down and saw my pace was 5:40/km–yikes.

I ended the run.

I don’t feel too bad about stopping. The last two km my pace was creeping over 5:50/km and I wasn’t particularly enjoying myself. I hydrated before starting out so didn’t feel overly dry after (the walk back home felt worse for being parched, really) but obviously at these temperatures there is concern over dehydration and heatstroke.

The secret is to start running at 6 a.m. or something.

Also, I’ve decided I don’t like the SPI-belt/iPhone 6 combo. Separately each is fine but they are obviously not really designed for each other. On top of the no-music, I also had this weird thing where the cord on the left earbud kept tugging with each step (you step a lot in nearly 30 minutes of running). I don’t know if I never noticed this before when music would normally be playing or if it was new, but it was fantastically annoying. It made me think of getting wireless earphones until I found out how much they cost. I then chalked the tugging up to being a weird one-time thing.

I did, however, pick up a running watch after. More on that later.

Run 392: More spring in summer

Run 392
Average pace: 5:24/km
Location: Brunette River trail and Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Distance: 7.10 km
Time: 37:50
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 26ºC
Wind: moderate
Calories burned: 518
Weight: 158 pounds
Total distance to date: 3193
Device used: iPhone 6

My goal with tonight’s run was to improve on the horrible 5:37/km pace of my previous 7K two days ago. Barring getting hit by a blimp, I was cautiously optimistic that I would achieve this modest goal.

And I did. Woo!

Although it was 26ºC when I headed out the sun was low enough that it didn’t feel that warm, save for the Cottonwood trail being a tad on the muggy side. The only complication on the run was my right leg feeling a bit gimpy because I apparently twisted it like a pretzel while sleeping the night before. Even so the mild stiffness in the hip and elsewhere had no real impact.

I could sense I was doing better by the time I hit the 2 km mark and remarkably went on to pick up the pace for the final three km and breaking the 5:00/km mark on the first km. I pushed a little but not excessively and ended with a pace of 5:24/km, only three seconds off my best 7K pace this year.

And I lied about the only complication. There was one more–with about 2 km to go and feeling pretty good, I swallowed a bug. It wasn’t watermelon-sized like the last one I swallowed, but it made its presence known shortly after lodging in my throat. I hacked and wheezed and tried to swallow, all while determined to not slow down. The positive flow of the run would not be thrown off by a mere bug, and after a few seconds I was back to focusing on the trail and not squirming things inside me.

Oh, and there was a cyclist on the trail, riding at a stupidly fast speed. Note to cyclists on trail: I hate all of you. Go away.

Oh, Part 2: I’ve mentioned before that the only time I have ever seen people smoking on the trail is after the FIRE DANGER – No Smoking signs go up. Sure enough, some guy was merrily puffing away. Maybe he wasn’t going to start an uncontrollable forest fire with his careless carcinogens, but that stuff stinks, and the stink carries for an impressively long distance along the trail. I expect to see a group of smoking cyclists soon.

Book review: Forever Odd

Forever Odd (Odd Thomas, #2)Forever Odd by Dean Koontz

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I generally don’t like committing to a series but Odd Thomas is the kind I like. No epic story spanning ten 1,000 page tomes, just a series of short adventures featuring the same character that can be digested easily without consulting appendices to keep track of everything.

I would give Forever Odd 3.5 stars if Goodreads believed in fractions and the only reason it doesn’t rate higher is because it is an overall less ambitious outing with Odd Thomas that strips away much of the mystery and suspense of the debut novel in favor of a kidnapping orchestrated by a crazy and unpleasant woman. It’s interesting but not as rich or compelling.

The strength of the story is again the way Koontz utterly inhabits the character of Odd, taking full advantage of the first person narrative to take us on Odd’s journey into a gutted casino hotel in the desert where he confronts both the kidnappers and the tragic events of the first novel, emerging broken but not beaten (and conveniently setting up the third novel).

The plot is nothing special, starting with a kidnapping, an unnecessary murder (Koontz’s recurring theme in the series seems to be “life is awful and tragic and you will probably die horribly”) and quickly settles into an extended set piece that pits Odd against the villains. The villains are by turns vile, obnoxious, cruel and at times seemingly indestructible. Odd relies on a combination of skill, supernatural smarts and plain luck to get through.

While the book is short I wouldn’t exactly call it breezy. As with the first, Odd’s self-deprecating humor is regularly undercut by terrible events. Somehow Koontz manages to keep things light and dark at the same time–a good trick when you think about it.

Forever Odd is, then, a successful continuation of the series, even if it is somewhat slighter than the original.

View all my reviews

Ominous signs

My usual running spots are Burnaby Lake and the Brunette River trail. Metro Vancouver has in recent years provided copious new signs that provide maps, reminders and advise one of the park rules. They also strongly imply you may be lucky to get out alive as I will demonstrate below.

The Brunette River trail is an approximately two km long gravel service road used by Metro Vancouver parks vehicles and CN Rail trucks (the road parallels the train tracks, located not too far off behind a line of trees). It’s a nice place to run because the road rarely has traffic on it and is nice and wide, accommodating runners, pedestrians and cyclists with room to spare. Most of the time.

Upon entering the roadway you are currently greeted by these signs:

fire bad, water bad

  1. Venturing off the trail may result in you drowning.
  2. Venturing off the trail may result in you burning to death.
  3. Maybe both.

If you make it to the end of the trail and successfully enter Burnaby Lake Regional Park, you will find this sign at the Cariboo Dam:

water still bad

You at least now know why you may find yourself drowning if you risk venturing off the trail. It’s the unpredictable killer dam upstream unleashing fatal torrents of water.

The Cariboo Road entrance to Burnaby Lake is replete with signs. I would probably exhaust the disk space of this site trying to host images all of them. Here’s one set you will see as you pass through the gate to get in:

fire and bicycles bad

  1. No vehicles here. You will not be run over. Technically that’s not true because parks vehicles have free reign so you can in fact be run down by one of those little two-seater jobs they tool around in.
  2. No cyclists. You will not be knocked down by some dope on a bike. Technically this is also not true because people break this rule all the time. They often seem to be the worst cyclists, too.
  3. More “you may burn to death by going off the trail.”

You may notice another post festooned with signs beyond this one. Let’s take a closer look.

bears bad

  1. Pets are leashed so no worries about some dog getting in your way or attacking you. This rule is broken so regularly that the sign should actually read “Pets MUST be leashed (haha).”
  2. See above, re: cyclists. Some entrances to the park have two or three NO CYCLING signs. Cyclists cannot read.
  3. You will be eaten by a bear. This one doesn’t mention whether or not you should stay on the trail so you’re probably going to get eaten no matter where you go.

In summary, while at Burnaby Lake Regional Park, if you venture off the trail you may find yourself chased by a bear, catch on fire and then get swept away in an unexpectedly raging river. At least the raging river will put the fire out. There’s probably another bear in the river, though, waiting for a fish, you or an especially clumsy cyclist. You’re pretty much doomed no matter what.

To quote one of the other signs I didn’t get a picture of: Enjoy your visit!

Run 391: The it-feels-like summer first day of summer run

Run 391
Average pace: 5:37/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Distance: 7.10 km
Time: 39:54
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 26ºC
Wind: moderate to breezy
Calories burned: 526
Weight: 158.2 pounds
Total distance to date: 3186
Device used: iPhone 6

Today is the first day of summer and it felt like it. The temperature was 26ºC, right at the tipping point between warm and maybe-a-little-too-warm for my comfort level when running. A good breeze, normally refreshing, meant I suffered from Dry Mouth™ for much of the run.

The run also ended at 7K instead of 10K, even though I was not ailing in any particular way. My left foot behaved itself, I wasn’t cramping up or otherwise hurting. What I was, was slow. Again. The pace was a fairly awful 5:37/km. This past week has been strange and very disappointing, run-wise.

My walk to the lake went fine, showing no signs of the fatigue I’d been hit with earlier in the week. Given the higher temperature, I was still concerned. I started out and had again wrestled with getting the iPhone in the SPI-belt. I’m beginning to not like this combination. If I could have the run start after putting the phone in, I’d be good, but there doesn’t seem to be any way to do that, alas. Maybe this is a conspiracy to get me to spend $450 on an Apple Watch.

When I hit the first km mark, I knew my pace was way off. This continued and although I could have pushed on to a full 10K I had visions of not hitting it until I was actually looping back over the start of the run. The thought was so depressing, I stopped at 7K, as it would at least provide a point of comparison to my previous 7K.

That comparison is also depressing, as it turns out.

Looking at the stats for today’s run, I note a few things:

  • The first km pace was 5:26/km. This is strangely slow–it’s slower than the pace of the entire 7K I ran on June 11, just ten days ago. The phone/belt struggle appears to be partly to blame here. I also see a huge drop in pace right at the 1K mark, suggesting I was mentally defeated by the pace already.
  • My fastest km was the third at 5:22/km, with the fourth km also faster than the first at 5:24/km. It is very unusual for later km to be faster than the first. It’s only happened a few times in hundreds of runs.
  • Save for the third km, every km my pace flagged more and more.

There was also an event sponsored by the Running Room. Fortunately the event had wound down by the time I was running, so I didn’t have to face hordes of runners unused to the trail (I also wisely chose to run in the same direction the signs pointed out), but I suppose I ought to check for these things beforehand when I run on weekends. There were a bunch of people moving from the central gathering area at the rowing pavilion parking lot, but luckily they didn’t clog things up much.

Oh, and a few cyclists walking their bikes. You’re not fooling anyone, cyclists!

Overall, then, a very disappointing outing and the third run in a row (of only six this month) that has gone poorly. I’d say it can only get better from here, but even that almost feels like a bold claim at this point.

We shall see.

engadget.com: Big Picture Edition

engadget is a fluffy tech website. It doesn’t provide pages of benchmarks and charts like AnandTech or in-depth analysis like Ars Technica. It provides stories about consumer electronics in simple, easily-digested stories. And that’s okay. I don’t always want comprehensive.

The site has apparently gone through a quiet redesign in the last few days or an intern has gotten his unauthorized hands on the code. The main change is the left column that lists stories in chronological order has been widened. Eyeballing it, it now seems to occupy a little over two-thirds of the page. As every story also includes an image below the headline, the images are correspondingly bigger, too. The image in the Vimeo story shown below is 960×535 pixels. My browser window (on a 24″ 1920×1200 pixel monitor) is currently sized to 1512×1000 pixels (this is somewhat randomly chosen but seems to work for my browsing needs). This means the image–a stock photo of an iPhone showing Vimeo’s Cameo app icon–is the single largest element in my browser window. The actual content of the story is reduced to three lines before I need to scroll to see the rest of it.

Larger than life
Would you like a very big image? Yes, you would!

Having stock photos and other unneeded images dominate the page is bad design. I don’t know why they would do this, there doesn’t seem to be a logical reason for it.

Anyway, I don’t have the time or inclination to complain further. I’ll just stop here with another image of another story from the site. Enjoy very large stock image!

Also larger than life
Robot hand likes friendly pretend smartphone.

Run 390: The still slow mid-week run

Run 390
Average pace: 5:27/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Distance: 5.06 km
Time: 27:36
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 22-24ºC
Wind: moderate to breezy
Calories burned: 374
Weight: 157.8 pounds
Total distance to date: 3179
Device used: iPhone 6

Tuesday’s run was delayed a day because I was feeling strangely tired and in fact I didn’t go into work today (Wednesday). After sleeping in and supposedly shaking off whatever is afflicting me I decided to try a run at the lake early in the afternoon.

The walk there was noticeably slower than usual, an ominous sign–though I didn’t feel awful or anything. I headed out and didn’t feel bad but didn’t feel great, either. I made an effort to not push so I wasn’t expecting to set any land speed records.

I had two big drops, 11% after 2 km and an unexpected 4% drop for the last km. These combined to give me a mediocre pace of 5:27/km, six seconds slower than my previous 7K run and 13 seconds slower than my last 5K. Blargh.

The good news was no complications. The right tendon felt a bit stiff at the start but warmed up quickly. The left foot behaved right up until the very end of the walk home.

The walk home was probably the highlight. It was only fractions of a second off my fastest pace for a walk that length (about 9 km). I was ranting in my head about things I am unhappy about and this apparently translates directly into walking speed. I may have to apply it to my next run.

The other highlight was how quiet the trail was. I miss mid-afternoon weekday runs. I’m not anti-social but a trail sans people is nice for a solo runner. Maybe I’m a little anti-social.

The FIRE DANGER: LEFT FOOT run

Run 389
Average pace: 5:50/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CW)
Distance: 10.02 km
Time: 58:30
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 24-25ºC
Wind: moderate to breezy
Calories burned: 744
Weight: 158.2 pounds
Total distance to date: 3174
Device used: iPhone 6

Good news: My right Achilles tendon felt significantly better on today’s run and was a complete non-factor. Once warmed up I really didn’t notice it at all.

Bad news: Everything else.

This was a fairly terrible run. It started with me making the crazy decision to try my Merrell Apollo “to the moon!” shoes again. With the New Balance MT110s starting to wear I am thinking more about replacements and the Merrells have been worn only a few times so they are still virtually brand new. I put them on, the fit was snug but comfy. I notice the even more minimalist sole compared to the MT110s but everything seems okay as I pad around in the condo with them, so I head out. Within three blocks my left foot starts to hurt. I don’t blame the shoe (Merrell PR people seeing this via Google Alerts, relax! The Merrell shoes are very nice.) but it’s clear the knobbier trail-ready soles of the MT110s may be a better choice.

I head back, put on the MT110s and head out again. I have walked 1.6 km so far and essentially gotten nowhere. But now my left foot feels better with the additional support. I am not overly hopeful but you never know.

It is warm and only the breeze keeps it from being just this side of uncomfortable. I start out and for the first 2 km my pace is decent if not great. Then the bottom falls out. Then my left foot starts to hurt again less than 4 km in. It starts to hurt even more. I feel tired. I think about stopping.

I press on, plodding, aching, gritting my teeth. At one point my left hip starts to hurt just a tiny bit, its way of saying, “Hello, remember me? I remember you!” It stops hurting but a short time later I feel vaguely nauseated. By now the pain in my foot has peaked so I keep going. I actually pick up the pace for the final km but finish with a very slow 5:50/km pace.

Bleah.

On a possibly more positive note, I may have figured out the root cause of my left foot issues. My shiny new theory involves the desk I sit at when I am working/playing on/staring at my computer. Previously I used a foot rest to insure good posture but the current alcove with my computer setup is on a hardwood floor, making it impossible to use the foot rest, as either it or the chair will go sliding all over the place. A mat is the obvious solution but I’ve been lazy. neglectful and generally terrible in getting a mat. What I’ve come to realize is that I often slouch and then brace myself against the wall with–you guessed it–my left foot!–to keep from sliding out of the chair and into an awkward lump under the computer desk. I often keep my foot squashed against the wall until it hurts, then move it away and move it back again when I’ve forgotten that squashing it up against the wall hurts (I apparently forget this a lot).

I am going to get a mat, sit up straight and see if the foot improves. If not it’s off to the doctor and amputation! Or maybe some kind of magic cream or something. The magic cream would be preferable.

Book review: Station Eleven

Station ElevenStation Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I bought Station Eleven as a daily deal and went in with no expectations.

I’m not exactly a post-apocalypse aficionado but very much enjoyed this vignette-style book that begins on the eve of a deadly flu that kills most of the world’s population, then jumps back and forth over the next twenty years, covering its aftermath primarily through the lives of The Traveling Symphony, a group that has banded together to travel around the Great Lakes area, performing Shakespeare and classical music to the small communities that arise after society’s collapse.

While there is a main thread to follow in the story’s present day, the author frequently jumps into the past (including the pre-flu era), yet the narrative never gets bogged down or confusing. Instead, Emily St. John Mandel carefully assembles the characters, their intertwined lives, hopes and ideas as a tapestry where everything is connected in some way, the titular comic Station Eleven, created by a character who succumbs to the flu in a delirium while on a beach in Malaysia, being the main linking device. The link is both literal–it goes from its creator to her ex-husband, an actor, then to a child who grows up to be a member of The Traveling Symphony–and metaphorical, as its science fiction tale depicts a split among people living on an artificial moon whose environmental systems have malfunctioned. It’s perhaps not a deep metaphor, but it is effective.

There is violence and madness in the post-collapse world but rather than being a grim depiction of a possible future, we are presented with the notion that some–maybe even most–want to do more than merely survive. A career therapist constructs a “museum of civilization” at an airport, gathering the detritus of our modern lives now rendered useless–iPhones, laptops, credit cards–to remember what humans had achieved. The Traveling Symphony, in its caravan of gutted motor vehicles, now drawn by horses, bears a quote on one of the wagons from Star Trek: Voyager of all things: “Survival is insufficient.” It is these three words that best exemplify the drive of the characters, the need to not merely manage in the post-plague world, but to keep art alive, to nurture the mind and spirit as human civilization re-shapes and mends itself.

It’s a hopeful message and Station Eleven is ultimately a hopeful story. Recommended.

View all my reviews

The watch for fires and bears run

Run 388
Average pace: 5:21/km
Location: Brunette River trail and Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Distance: 7.03 km
Time: 37:40
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 26ºC
Wind: light
Calories burned: 520
Weight: 159.5 pounds
Total distance to date: 3164
Device used: iPhone 6

Good news: I beat my last 7K pace by a solid eight seconds.
Possibly bad news: My right Achilles tendon was sore and stiff to start, felt better after warming up, but I could still feel it a little through most of the run.
Good news: The tendon did not affect my pace.
Conclusion: I think it may still be sore but not actually injured.

I did a 7K run tonight and though I felt a little tired along the middle stretch I still finished with a pace of 5:21/km, easily beating my previous 7K pace of 5:29/km. By the end of the run I felt pretty good and other than the tendon being a bit sore there were no other issues worth noting. It was sunny and warm but not humid so it didn’t feel uncomfortable. It still seems a bit weird to have this summer-like weather so early. Today could easily have been a day in mid-August.

Speaking of weird, the fire danger signs they put up after a long dry spell were up at Burnaby Lake today, the earliest I’ve seen them go up in the four years I’ve been jogging there. Right next to them was a bear warning sign. I’m expecting a third sign soon showing a bear on fire. A smokey bear, if you will.

Noteworthy bits: My first km was 4:32/km, one of my fastest of the year and my pace improved for the last three km after I flagged, especially on the second and fourth km (moreso the fourth, the second seems steeper because the first km was extra-zippy).

Overall I am pleased with the result and cautiously hopeful that the tendon is just sore and out of shape. This weekend I will be looking for new trail runners as I’m climbing ever-closer to 400 km on my New Balance MT110s (and have probably passed that if you count the walk before and after each run). I am leaning toward getting another pair of minimalist shoes but haven’t made up my mind yet because my mind is all fickle and indecisive.

The post-Kamloops run

Run 387
Average pace: 5:14/km
Location: Brunette River trail
Distance: 5.03 km
Time: 26:20
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 25ºC
Wind: light to none
Calories burned: 371
Weight: 159.3 pounds
Total distance to date: 3157
Device used: iPhone 6

After missing Sunday’s usual run (due to travel back from the mountains/boonies) I was concerned how my first run in four days would pan out. It was sunny and warm but pleasantly so. The run was faster than my previous 5K and one of my better efforts of the year so overall I was pleased with the result. I experienced no noteworthy issues.

I was originally planning to do another 7K river/lake combo run but due to YASP (Yet Another SkyTrain Problem) I got home later than usual and opted for the basic 5K. 5:14/km may not be lightning fast but I can guarantee that for about two hours I was definitely running faster than the Expo Line trains.

The Kamloops run

Run 386
Average pace: 5:17/km
Location: North Thompson River Trail (Kamloops)
Distance: 5.06 km
Time: 26:46
Weather: Cloudy, some sun
Temp: 23ºC
Wind: light to none
Calories burned: 374
Weight: 159.6 pounds
Total distance to date: 3152
Device used: iPhone 6

For a change of pace I decided to run in Kamloops, some 400 km or so away from Vancouver.

By coincidence my partner’s sister’s daughter was having her high school graduation/convocation ceremony around the same time so we hitched the trailer to the truck and made a good ol’ camping trip out of it (more on that in other posts).

After some unseasonal rain, it was not overly warm for the run (Kamloops has what is probably the closest to a desert terrain in Canada), hitting about 23ºC. High cloud blocked the sun for the most part so conditions were pretty good.

I ran along a dike that parallels the Thompson River as it is conveniently a few blocks away from the sister’s house. The only downside is that it was relatively short, only about 2 km in length. I decided to do a 5K so I could get a direct comparison to other recent 5Ks. My pace of 5:17/km was a couple of seconds slower than my last 5K, so not much difference. Physically the biggest change was probably elevation, as Kamloops is 345 m above sea level, compared to where I normally run, which is roughly 0 m above sea level, give or take a meter or two. As it turned out, that’s not enough of a difference to have made me pass out from thin air or anything. It felt mostly like any other run.

There were a few people out walking dogs and the desire to let dogs roam free (ie. off-leash) seems universal, though the majority were either leashed or were down closer to the river, running through the tall grass and collecting brain-destroying ticks and keeping out of my way. Other than that the run was fairly ordinary, though I’d have preferred a faster pace. I’m still inching (centimetering?) toward peak form, so that’s probably still a ways off yet.