Tastytronic diary for lukas

1 Oct 2008

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 13:07:44 -0700

Wowee zowee! phish reunion! cubs in the playoffs! obama way up in the polls! If this is how the LHC is going to end the universe, I like it.

I made it on to a team for USARA Nationals, with sponsors and everything. Got a tuneup race at the end of October and then nationals is the week after the election. Which means the month of October is going to be full of really long days at work followed by long nights of training. If only I could get up in the morning and run things would be so much easier.

12 Aug 2008

Tue, 12 Aug 2008 21:48:55 -0700

A list for today, in two parts.

Things I Like:

my new fixed gear bike
the weather in DC today (feels like fall)
riding to work
the olympics
fried chicken at jackie's
laying in the grass and watching the stars
cold beer in a can

Things I Don't Like

having to install silverlight to watch the olympics
al trautwig and tim daggett's terrible gymnastics commentary
john mccain's racist ads
laundry

20 Jun 2008

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 09:56:59 -0700

check it out! Åke published a book!

Unkle Åke's Field Guide to inFrequently Found Animals on the Shore of Lake Superior

2 Jun 2008

Mon, 02 Jun 2008 14:26:48 -0700

Woke up this morning with a nasty sore throat and decided to go to the doctor to have that checked out and also to have my shoulder looked at. The good news is that it was just a basic viral infection. The bad news is that I don't just have a separated shoulder, I have a fractured clavicle. Which just means it will take longer to heal because there's not much they do for fractured or broken clavicles. I probably should have seen the doctor last week, but at least I got it done today. Tomorrow I go see an ortho specialist who will probably just give me a sling and tell me to rest my arm for a few weeks. Looks like I'll be spending a lot of time on the stationary bike.

28 May 2008

Wed, 28 May 2008 08:36:11 -0700

I wrote most of this last night when I couldn't sleep...just forgot to hit the post button.

I left work this afternoon and was confronted with a strong desire not to go back to my apartment. I walked into a local book shop and browsed for a while before walking down 19th street while talking to jeremy about the race this past weekend. Eventually I just decided to wander down towards the mall and find a nice grassy spot to read some of Vineland. I ended up on a bench by the botanical gardens where there were beautiful flowers and large sculptures of earth for some environmental awareness project. As dusk descended and my hunger grew I decided to go grab the metro at capitol south. But alas I was waylayed by the temptation of the patio at Sonoma where I was able to get a table without waiting.

As always, Sonoma was fantastic. The wine selection there is so eclectic and so wonderful. Everytime I go I'm impressed by the quality of wine the serve by the glass. The highlight of my evening was the couple who got into a fight at the table adjacent to me (the tables at sonoma on the patio are about two feet apart). I gathered that she was working on health care policy on the hill and he did something at the pentagon as a private contractor. It was also evident that he was a complete tool. They discussion turned to online medical records and Dick, as he shall be known from here on, was convined that this was the simplest problem to solve in the world. Jane, as we'll call her, was trying to argue her point and Dick would treat her like a child who knew nothing and then explain to her why he was right. He was so smug and so wrong. His idea was that just like gmail medical records could be put in a giant nationwide database...for free. I almost spit my wine up at the point. His basic argument was that well, gmail is free and I can access it anywhere so my medical records should be put in gmail, for free, and then they can be accessed anywhere. I came really close to jumping in--first to tell him to stop treating his girlfriend like a 5-year-old and second, to explain to him that setting up a nationwide medical records database with patient privacy safeguards, doctor accesibillity, etc is not anything like opening a gmail account. What a tool.

My annoyance at this couple was quickly overcome by the fidelitas wine, the fennel soup, the always excellent burger, the incredible stawberry rhubarb tart, and the caol ila 12. It was such a nice night that I wandered through capitol hill before catching the metro at union station to go home for some much needed advil and ice on the shoulder.

Given my melancholic state after work, it turned out to be a wonderful evening. The only thing that was missing was someone to share such a beautiful, whimsical night with. Which is probably why I am tapping away madly on my blackberry, ice on my shoulder and los campys on the stereo. Being able to share it with all of the internets doesn't make my great evening any less lonely, but hopefully someone out there will enjoy my story...and forgive my poor grammar and bad writing.

I'll close this long and (mostly) pointless post with some los campesinos! lyrics, since they are on the stereo:

And woe is me
And woe is you
And woe is us, together

27 May 2008

Tue, 27 May 2008 09:22:44 -0700

back from west virginia sitting here at my desk trying to move my left arm as little as possible. The race was awesome and we did really well except for that part where I took a nasty fall on my mountain bike and separated my shoulder about 7 hours in. Ouch. The start on the class 5 rapids of the new river was awesome and then we got to do a long trek along the base of the endless wall. Lots of climbers on the wall as we trekked along. It was during the next leg of biking where a messed up my shoulder and still had at least 20 miles to ride and a good 20 more miles on foot. I hung in there and we finished strong with what should be 5th place in the premier class. We really wanted to head to summersville lake for some climbing on monday but seeing as how it really hurt to lift my arm at all, climbing was out. I'll use that sport rack one of these days... The one upside to getting home early was that i got to go to a memorial day bbq for some tasty food prepared by the chef at jackie's. there was spit-roasted pig, spit-roasted chickens, blue crabs, tons of homemade sides, cupcakes, and a bottle of jameson's to top it all off.

22 May 2008

Thu, 22 May 2008 20:49:58 -0700

I'm off to Wild and Wonderful West Virginia for another 24 hour adventure race this weekend. Once again Jeremy and I will be racing, but this time we joined up with another team and we will be known as Towanda/Interstellar Overdrive.

http://checkpointtracker.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=app.showDashboard&eventID=139

The race starts saturday morning at 9 and we will have 24 hours to finish the 75 mile course. Hopefully no one will get a parasite this time around. We'll be carrying GPS trackers this time so if all goes well, you'll be able to track our progress on the map linked from the site above.

I may not get to barbecue and lay around in the sun drinking beer but it should be a fantastic weekend and I hope that everyone else also has as much fun as I will this weekend.

6 May 2008

Tue, 06 May 2008 20:23:20 -0700

Hi. Long time no see for most of you. The best part is that I still have a login cookie for the diner. Once a regular, always a regular.

Anway it's been a good 5 months since I've posted ANYTHING at all here. Life has had it's ups and downs but it has been mostly good. I still love my job and gave done a lot of adventure racing...though the racing has it's side effects: serious gear addiction, fingers still numb from frostbite, constant soreness, and a seriously skewed view on what a 'normal' workout is. My band has been practicing again and we are playing a show this thursday. Good times will be had and bourbon will be consumed. But it's not all roses and jamseons. I won't air all of that in a public forum, but, in short, I've come to realize that I'm really bad at relationships. But I'm learning and trying and making progress...or at least I hope I'm making progress.

DC this time of year is great. It's the one or two weeks of great weather. I keep wanting to have a picnic for lunch with friends but I never seem to make plans (that's another thing I'm bad at--making plans).

24 Dec 2007

Mon, 24 Dec 2007 02:44:07 -0700

Merry Christmas! On my way to colorado for Christmas. Going to be nice and quiet and hopefully I can catch up on my lost sleep from last weekend. Chicago was all kinds of crazyfun. And then it snowballed into a week of holiday parties. Besides sleeping, my only plans for CO are to get some skiing in. Some Christmas powder would be awesome and hopefully I won't try anything too stupid. I hope you all have safe travels and a wonderful holiday. Merry Christmas!

12 Dec 2007

Wed, 12 Dec 2007 15:49:03 -0700

w00t! I'm going to chicago this weekend!