Moving
I’ve been thinking about moving for a little while and made the plunge recently to a larger place. I am a little further from the office which may or may not be a good thing. With the help of my parents we purged, packed and cleaned my old place over a couple of days. On the weekend, I moved into my new place using a 14 foot U-Haul truck that was 3/4s full. The weather cooperated as it was a sunny and a cool 8C/46.4F. It took about two hours to fill the truck and I fell in love with the box cart as I could move three boxes at a time. The drive to the new place took about ten minutes. It a little long to unload the truck at the new place as the elevator was smaller. I think that my new place is double the size of my old one. I’ll blog more on the adventure soon.br /br /During my moving week I stayed with my parents at a downtown hotel. It was more convenience for everyone and my parents did want to tackle the Ottawa city traffic. Our bedroom looked down onto a day care. As we drank our morning tea we would watch the parents drop the kids at a really early hour of 7:00 AM. The kids were all bundled up and looked like minature Michelin-man people. Before we would head out for the day we watch the kids playing during recess. Some would be making snow angels, other on tricycles, throwing snow, shoveling snow and have fun in the cold weather. One of the things they did brought a smile to my face and that was the hoola hoop. They had learned about wiggling the hips thing and we happy to throw it five feet away and to pick it up and throw it another five feet. They were getting joy from just tossing around some plastic. Another brought back memories and that was that all the kids had their mittens on strings. I can remember having my mittens on strings.br /br /Guest blogger segment — my fatherbr /br /The most notable incident occurred when returning to the hotel as we bundled up against the sub-zero freezing weather. Outside the hotel door was a stocky fellow in just a t-shirt and shorts puffing on a cigarette with a sarcastic look on his face. He ball cap said Junior a href=”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Rangers”Canadian Ranger/a. He was an Inuit/Eskimo and a member of Canada’s Army of the North and our last frontier. Somehow he found the freezing weather to his satisfaction and felt right at home.
Sneaky Geocaches
a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://picasaweb.google.ca/moulec/October_geocaching#5258909155126784450″img style=”margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px;” src=”http://picasaweb.google.ca/moulec/October_geocaching#5258909155126784450″ alt=”" border=”0″ //abr /Yesterday, I went a href=”http://geocaching.com/”geocaching /aalong the Ottawa River and eventually located a a href=”http://picasaweb.google.ca/moulec/October_geocaching#5258909155126784450″sneaky geocache/a. The GPS told me that I was within a couple of feet of the cache but where could it be. This a href=”http://picasaweb.google.ca/moulec/October_geocaching#5258909132969510242″link/a shows where the cache is. The cacher had transported the tree segment home, sliced off the top, ground out the core and the put dowling support to secure the top. From a distance it looks like a large tree stump sitting next to the river. Afterwards I was reading the logs and noticed that the tree had stumped a lot of people.
Lindy 1.2
Last Thursday, I had my first Lindy Hop dancing lesson. There is a bit of a story as to how these lessons came about. About two weeks ago Andrea, sent out a group email mentioning that they were in need of leaders for upcoming lessons. A couple of days later along comes another email saying that they were in desperate need of leaders. This caught my attention so I kept a copy of the email on my desk. At the Friday night dance, Andrea asked me if I was going to take the lessons and I was more yes than maybe. A day later I got an email saying that if you replied within 24 hours the lessons would be free as the waiting list of followers was continuing to grow. This was enough encouragement for me to signup for the lessons. The lessons will repeat what I did in an eight course in the spring and I’m looking forward to brushing up on the steps.
Adirondacks June-July 2008
Wright Peak/Algonquin/Iroquois/Phelps/Coldenbr /br /Friday June 27br /One of my goals is to eventually climb all of the 46 peaks in the Adirondacks whose elevation is above 4,000 feet. This past weekend I added one more to the tally, Iroquois. On Friday morning, Chris Mc and I headed down to Lake Placid and stopped in at the Price Chopper to get lunches and groceries for the long weekend. Once at camp we setup a tarp and bug net over the picnic table as suspected we would meet the bugs and/or rain over the weekend. Na, Paul and Ben would arrive at the campsite a little while later. After supper we started a fire and contemplated when Wendy and Erin would arrive. We took bets on when they might arrive and I won. They wouldn’t arrive until mid-afternoon on Saturday.br /br /Saturday June 28br /The five of us were up early (0630) and eating breakfast by 7:00 AM. Our goal for the day was to hike the mountains near Algonquin Peak much of this would be dependant on our stamina and the weather. At 8:21 AM we headed out from the ADK Loj trailhead and made our way south-west. After 30 minutes the trail splits, one direction leading to Marcy Dam and the other to Algonquin. We took the right path and headed south. The trail very gradually climbs and is a Mecca for boulders. Along the way we took in the sight of a a href=”http://picasaweb.google.com/moulec/2008_Adirondacks_July/photo#5218195600451739874″waterfall/a. After climbing for about an hour we reached another trailhead. Half of the group climbed Wright Peak while the others continued on the trail to Algonquin. The view from a href=”http://picasaweb.google.com/moulec/2008_Adirondacks_July/photo#5218195649465892946″Wright /awas good but we could see a storm approaching in the distance. As continued our ascent up to Algonquin it started to lightly rain and in rolled the mist. It was hard to spot the next cairn. We stopped for lunch at the summit. The mountain steward was standing on watch. The group split again and most of the people headed down a href=”http://picasaweb.google.com/moulec/2008_Adirondacks_July/photo#5218195666526403058″Algonquin/a. The remainder continued east to Boundary and Iroquois. The intensity of the rain increased and the fog grew thicker. It was at this point that the GPS proved its value. At breakfast time I punched in the coordinates for all the peaks we would be climbing. A father, his son and a large poodle mistook Boundary for Algonquin. I shouted that the GPS said we had another 300 yards to hike. They were not happy by this remark. The final 300 yards involved hiking through shoulder height trees and boggy mud flats. My knee high gators kept the spruce trees from scratching my legs as well as keeping the mud away from my boots. Once we reached the summit we retreated back to the valley between the mountains. We had a choice to head back by Avalanche Lake or return the way we had come. Three groups were making the same decision and all opted for coming back the way they had come. It would be better to head back on familiar terrain that to take a longer route with an uncertain terrain. The constant rain made this choice obvious. As we headed across Algonquin the rain became more intense and my heart went out to the steward huddled next to a large rock. It would be another three hours before he could head down. Once below the tree line the rain let up and we could take off our rain jacket. The forest was steamy hot. A little while later the sun came out. As we were heading by the falls I saw some naïve hikers making there way to Wright Peak. They were wearing button-down white and blue shirts. I wonder how long they would stay clean and dry as another storm was an hour away. Once back at the camp I had a piping hot cup of tea to celebrate my ascents. Wendy and Erin had arrived by this point and prepared a marvelous pasta dish for supper. Paul and I trimmed up a standing conifer tree and as a standing dead tree is a dry tree. A blazing warm fire was a welcome site to the group.br /br /Sunday June 29br /Most of the group was awake at sunrise and we started down the trailhead early in the morning. Our goal was to climb a href=”http://picasaweb.google.com/moulec/2008_Adirondacks_July/photo#5218195702365853618″Phelps/a. At the first trail junction we headed east towards Marcy Dam and took in the sights before heading further east. There was much relief as we were climbing the Phelps trail as it had fewer rocks than the trail leading to Wright. We ate lunch at the Phelps summit. The knats and black flies were swarming on the summit so we headed down shortly after lunch. We were at our campsite by mid-afternoon. After a Chinese stir-fry meal we headed into Bamp;J for ice cream. There were black clouds hanging over Lake Placid. As we were heading back to camp it started to pelt. There would be no fire tonight. It would rain for most of the night.br /br /Monday June 30br /On Monday morning, Na, Paul and Ben packed up and headed back to Ottawa. Chris Mc, Erin and I set out early to climb a href=”http://picasaweb.google.com/moulec/2008_Adirondacks_July/photo#5218195833553157698″Mt. Colden/a. We headed over to Marcy Dam before hiking in a southerly direction towards Avalanche Lake. By lunch hour, we were climbing over the ladders that take you along the shores of Avalanche Lake. The edge of the lake ends in a steep cliff so they have wooden ladders and platforms hanging from the edge of the cliffs. Our trek along Colden Lake was muddy. Midway down the lake we started our steep ascent of Mt. Colden and reached the summit after much exertion and heavy breathing. It was a bright and sunny day on the summit. We ate our lunch while admiring the views, of Marcy Dam, Avalanche Lake, and the a href=”http://picasaweb.google.com/moulec/2008_Adirondacks_July/photo#5218195812198272450″three other peaks /awe had climbed two days earlier. The hike down to Lake Arnold was a pleasant one as the switchbacks allowed us to gradually drop elevation. We pumped water at a href=”http://picasaweb.google.com/moulec/2008_Adirondacks_July/photo#5218195875977432370″Lake Arnold /adespite the black fly infestation. Within an hour we were back at the Marcy Dam trailhead. We all headed into town for steak dinner at thea href=”http://www.blogger.com/www.lakeplacidcp.com/dining.html” Lake Placid Boat Club /awhich sits on the edge of Mirror Lake. Erin and Wendy headed north to Ottawa after dinner. Chris Mc and I headed back to camp for the final camp fire.br /br /Tuesday July 1 – Canada Independence Daybr /We were both up at 5:00 AM. I spent a little while packing my thermarests and sleeping bag before leaving the tent. Meanwhile, Chris Mc got the Coleman stove alight. We had all our gear packed and heading north by 8:00 AM.br /br /a href=”http://picasaweb.google.com/moulec/2008_Adirondacks_July”http://picasaweb.google.com/moulec/2008_Adirondacks_July/a
Retirements and meeting the CEO
a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://bp3.blogger.com/_5w5ZZWchEd4/SEiU1QjkcZI/AAAAAAAAEG8/5J1KkbHJPBg/s1600-h/DSCF1116.JPG”img style=”margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;” src=”http://bp3.blogger.com/_5w5ZZWchEd4/SEiU1QjkcZI/AAAAAAAAEG8/5J1KkbHJPBg/s320/DSCF1116.JPG” alt=”" id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5208576611752112530″ border=”0″ //abr /span lang=”en-us”span style=”font-family:Times New Roman;”This is a sort of work-related blog, something I usually don’t write about. I work for a large organization that has about 5,000 employees and I receive about 1.3 email messages per week announcing that someone is retiring. In the past week, one of the head honchos retired with much fanfare. He has been with the organization for 51 years and 23 years as its a href=”http://picasaweb.google.com/moulec/Meeting_Dr_Fellegi_CEO”CEO/a. Around the office this was a really big deal. They organized a lottery to select employees that could informally meet him and wish him greetings for his retirement. I was selected to informally join 700 other employees to meet him. This came as a big surprise to me. My first concern was what to where, a tie, a jacket, a tie and jacket or my normal work garb. In the end, I opted to wear my usual work stuff and not to get to puffy about the gathering. I joined the reception line in our cafeteria and very slowly marched along towards the CEO. In the background, they were playing very sad and somber baroque classical music almost as if I was attending a state funeral. In hushed tones were told that we had only 15 seconds with the CEO. I can’t remember what I said to him but his reply what that we were all colleagues together. Tom, one of the guys I work with, took my picture with the CEO. In the afternoon they had live streaming of the formal retirement ceremony delivered to all employees’ desktops. I’ll talk about a couple of nuggets from the ceremony. The CEO mentioned the whole exercise was like eavesdropping on his own funeral. The new CEO was eager to know what the outgoing CEO’s wife put in his cheese sandwich to promote longevity. The last nugget is sort of weird. One of the vice-presidents gave a testimonial of the CEO and didn’t have a chance to proofread his speech. I think that he had intended to say that the CEO had been a pillar of the organization but due to translation he said that CEO had been a boat anchor to the organization.br //span/span
Another 31 second improvement…WooHoo!
2008 May 25br /292/8368br /1:33:42.7 chipbr /4:29 pacebr /br /2007br /377/7005br /1:34:13 chipbr /br /The a href=”http://www.ncm.ca/”ING Ottawa half-marathon /ais one of the three half-marathon races that I train for each year. I usually start off the year by doing the Phoenix, Arizona, PF Chang RnR half-marathon in January and close off the season with the Baltimore half-marathon in October. This year’s Ottawa race allowed me to better my time by 31 seconds but a few hours before the start even running the race was uncertain. After an 11 km tempo run on Wednesday night I developed a severe cold which affected my lungs and throat. For three days I was without a voice. I decided the best thing I could do was rest and hope that I could nix the cold. By late Saturday, my lungs were clear and throat was still coarse. Using the old running adage that it is okay to run as long as the cold as above your throat, I decided wait and see how I felt on Sunday morning.br /br /I got up on Sunday to find my legs feeling fresh, energetic and ready to go. I ate four bowls of Vector cereal and drank some strong tea before heading over to the start line. At this point my first challenge arose as I was 300 folks behind the 1:40 pace bunny who I could see off in the distance. It would take about 1.5 miles of hard and fast running for me to surge by the bunny and his entourage. The pace I was running at was fast but very comfortable. I asked myself do I want to slow down or speed up. I sped up and surged by a hoard of people. The course was very familiar to me so I was able complete the Gatineau loop quickly. I surged each hill and glided down the backside. As we were heading across the over of the Ottawa River I went into a “zone” and worked hard climbing the three hills before descending along the Rideau Canal. At this point, I saw my folks who cheered me from the sidelines. The remainder of the race would be on familiar territory, the bike paths and roads that run parallel to the Rideau Canal. My journey down to Bank Street went quickly as we were racing in ideal conditions a cool and crisp 8C/46F. At this point I had a bit of fun as there was a jazz band playing in a nearby tent. They were playing swing with a fast tempo. I decided to do a 400 meter wind sprint and have my legs keep in sync with the beat of the music. It was fun to do. I eased back on the pace once out of earshot. At the Bronson Bridge, we crossed over the Rideau Canal and started our northward trek. I threw a couple of cups of cold water over me and sponged down at the water stop. I ingested a Powergel with 35mg of caffeine when I was 5km away from the finish. As I was heading up the canal I heard the jazz band playing a fast tune from the other side of the canal, time for another surge. For the next three km I pressed myself to try and shave at least one second off the next km. This strategy worked well under the final kilometer when I stitched slightly but the energy of the crowd pulled me through. I was really pleased by the race as the 31 second improvement was unexpected.
The Spitting Goose
Today, I decided to have lunch down near the a href=”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottawa_River”Ottawa River /aalong the bike path. As I was walking along the path I was approached by a spitting a href=”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_Goose”Canada goose /awhich is a sign that it was upset. I moved along a little further and it started to follow. I opened up a 200 yard gap and sat down to eat my Ruffles. A short while later along comes the waddling goose. It started to spit at me again so I walked a little further along the path. At this point the goose backed off and it was happy to munch on dandelions. Is this normal goose behavior sort of, as this is the peak season for mating and reproducing. The goose wanted to guard its turf against invaders even if they are six feet tall and it is a mere two feet tall.br /br /Close to where I live there is a railway bridge that runs across the river a goose has setup camp underneath one of the abutments. It has built a nest and laid a couple of eggs. I pass by the spot a couple of times a day and notice the progress. I’ll try to get down there with the camera to capture some of the sights. As I meandered back to the office I kept a safe distance from the goose who was keeping a watchful over me.
11 days before half-marathon
Tonight, I did my final interval workout before my a href=”http://www.ncm.ca/”half-marathon race /anext weekend. The workout was brutal, 6×1km on 30s rest. It was over quickly but a painful experience as you are only able to take a couple of breaths before you start sprinting again. My intervals times are better than last year but I am still not sure about my fitness level so I will use the outcome of the race to act as a judge.br /br /I am looking forward to the race as I have been training for it for the past couple of months. The race really be special this year as my folks are coming to town to watch me run.
Geocaching
One of the goals I set for myself in January was to have found between 900 and 1000 geocaches. This past week I was able to go geocaching on three occasions. (current tall 886) I set a new weekly record by finding 18 geocaches. Yesterday my geocaching got off to a rough start as I spent much of the afternoon searching for geocaches underneath light standards at shopping malls. I don’t really enjoy this sort of urban caching. By mid-afternoon, I stopped in a Starbucks to log my finds using my iPod touch and to see what other caches were in the area. I copied down the coordinate for six caches which would take me into some of the wooded areas and parks in a href=”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanata,_Ontario”Kanata/a. As dusk was starting to descend the forest drew cooler and quieter and the wildlife started to appear. From a distance, I could see a furry black blob walking towards me at a slow and steady pace. It could either be a a href=”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skunk”skunk /aor a a href=”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raccoon”raccoon/a. As we got closer the raccoon decided that I was a larger animal and headed off the trail while keeping a watchful eye on me. My next animal encounter was will a flock of deer. I was headed down a railway bed that has been converted into a jogging trail. To my right, I heard a branch break and I stopped dead in my tracks. The wind was blowing towards me. It was a family of deer that were planning to cut across the trail. I stood still, held my breath as they came with ten feet of me. They were suspicious but quickly headed into the woods without flapping their tails (a warning sign of problems).
Cracking eggs
I was at the hospital recently and decided to have breakfast while waiting for my appointment. The person ahead of me ordered a Western sandwich and I decide to do the same. The chef had a unique way of cracking the eggs. He dropped the eggs, shell and all onto the hot grill, one at a time. This caused me to recall an experience a couple of years ago when I was volunteering in an industrial kitchen. One of my chores was to crack 144 eggs/12 dozen into a bucket which would be used to make scrambled eggs the next morning. I initially started by cracking one egg at a time. After watching some of the cooks I could crack two eggs at once but could never reach the “pros” level when you can crack four eggs at once, two in each hand. Hmm, I wonder if anyone can crack more than four eggs at a time.
