Stan’s Obligatory Blog

This actually contains about equal portions of “Woo-Hoo!” and “Yikes!”.

They published the starting wave times for the Aon Tower stair climb on Saturday. And they put me in the ‘Elite Men’ group that starts first. On the one hand, I’m happy that I’ll be running with the Big Dogs. But that also means that I may not be able to catch and pass anybody. And there is a very real possibility that I will be caught and passed. I’ve never been passed in one of these things before.

Yikes.

There are about 60 of us in the ‘Elite’ group. And they plan on sending us all off in 15 minutes, which means that we’re going to be going at something like 15-second intervals. I’m guessing, based on my previous showings, that I’ll be somewhere in the middle of this group. But there’s a wide range. And it only takes the guy behind me being 15 seconds faster to make for my first time being passed on the stairs.

Yikes.

On the other hand, maybe having guys passing me might be just the kick I need to go even faster. But I’m not convinced of that.

Yikes.

Today’s bike ride was the route out to Griffith Park to stop at The Trails in Fern Dell. It was a perfect spring day for riding.

We rode out by the direct route, straight down the Colorado hill into Eagle Rock, and then down Eagle Rock Blvd, across the L.A. River and then up Vermont into Griffith Park. When we got to the observatory, we took a few minutes to look at the view. And then my phone started barking. It was Carla calling. She’d been a few minutes late to the park, and she’d been chasing us ever since. So John and I rode back down the hill to find her. Then we regrouped and headed down to the The Trails. The sign outside exhorted us to “STOP Eating Animals”. But they’re made of meat. And oh so tasty.

After our snack, which contained no tasty meat, by the way, we headed back up and over the hill to the Valley side of the park. John took a small shortcut along the way. Sure it was a dirt road, but it was a little bit shorter.

Coming down the other side of the hill, I got some ‘action shots’ on one of the turns. Then we rode down around Travel Town and got on the L.A. River bike path. They’ve been building an extension on this, and we saw some of it a couple weeks ago, so we decided to try it out. The new bike path is quite nice, and it goes all the way down to where the freeways cross the river, just above the Metro Gold Line yards. We got off and took Riverside across to Figueroa St. That was where we found a bunch of lottery ticket dispensers. It looked like someone had robbed a convenience store and stolen a bunch of lottery tickets. Doesn’t seem like a Solid Career Move, but it was still slightly amusing.

We came back by way of Highland Park and South Pasadena. We passed Chicken Boy, and also a car with a bumper sticker that proudly proclaimed, “I Park Like An Idiot”. I guess we all have a special skill.

It was a fun little ride.

45 miles.
cycling

Lucinda is taking basic ice skating lessons. She said she wants to try speed skating. So I told her she needs to learn basic skating technique first. Once she’s comfortable on the ice, I’ll take her to one of the speed skating clubs here in L.A. They have skates available for kids to try, and I’ll dust off my speed skates, too. It would be fun to do it again. Back in my bike racing days, I used to skate with my other bike friends during the winter. It was fun, and it would be interesting to try it again, and possibly even to try competing.

So this could be an interesting adventure.

Today was the last practice run for the Aon Tower stair climb on the 24th. There was a good group there this time. I rode the train in from Pasadena, which makes going downtown really easy.

I set my metronome for 75 beats per minute this time. This is 4% faster than my climb on Monday. I think I’ve about found my limit now. I was able to keep pace with it up to about the 45th floor. The last 15 up to the 60th floor were pretty painful. But I made it up in 10:28, which is my fastest time yet. So I think on race day I’m going to maybe set it for 74. Just back off a slight bit, since the real climb is six stories more than the practice.

I guess this means I’m ready.

This weeks is Spring Break for Pasadena schools. Apparently, this is later than all the other school districts in southern California. This worked out well for us, since it meant that this week was not in the blackout period for our friend Mike’s Disneyland pass. So yesterday we went down there and met up with him in front of the gates. He let us in with his pass and turned us loose as he headed back to work.

We went to California Adventure first. We rode the Golden Zephyr, which was entertaining, since the wind was picking up, and it was close to the level of wind that would close that ride down. After that, we went on the Jellyfish ride, and then the Mulholland Madness roller coaster. We looked at the line for Toy Story Mania and decided it was too long. So we went and had lunch instead. Then it was time to go Soarin’.

Now it was time for the Main Event. We walked across to Disneyland and headed straight for Space Mountain. The sign said the wait was about 20 minutes, so we stopped and picked up Fast Passes and then went to wait in the line. We rode the ride, and when we got out, we had only 15 minutes before we could use our passes to go back in. So we walked over to Star Tours, which had no line at all. We rode that and then went back to Space Mountain for a second time.

Next, we walked over to Big Thunder Mountain. Again, we picked up Fast Passes and then waited in the not-very-long line. The ride was fun, as always. When we got out, we had about a half-hour before we could go back. So we went over to the Matterhorn and found it closed for maintenance. They said it would be open on Saturday, but that was too long to wait. Instead, we went back for some old favorites: Pirates and the Haunted Mansion. After that, we went back to Thunder Mountain and found it closed for repair.

At this point, we needed to do something different, so we went to Toontown and rode the Go Coaster. This is a relatively tame ride now, but it was Lucinda’s first roller coaster. Then we went back to Tomorrowland so the girls could drive the cars at Autopia. But along the way, we stopped and picked up some more Fast Passes for Space Mountain. So after they finished driving we went back and rode for the third time.

We went back and checked and found Thunder Mountain was open again, so we used our passes and rode it again. By that time, it was starting to get late. I said we had time for one more ride, and the girls said they wanted to ride Space Mountain again. So I told them we could go back there, pick up Fast Passes, and then they could do their gift shop time while we were waiting. They bought matching Mickey Mouse sweatshirts. Then we headed back for our fourth run on Space Mountain.

When we got there, we had 15 minutes to go before we could use our passes. The sign said the wait was 15 minutes. So we waited in the line, rode for the fourth time, and then we walked around and used our passes to ride it a fifth time. That’s the most times on any one ride for us except for the day at Universal when we rode the Mummy eight times.

On the way out, we stopped for the obligatory dinner at the Jazz Kitchen in Downtown Disney. This is my sentimental favorite, since I can line up all our pictures from there and see my journey through and climb out of Divorce Hell.

It was a very fun day. Tiring, but fun. All the pictures are here.

Every time I take Lucinda to Disneyland, we end the day with dinner at the Jazz Kitchen in Downtown Disney. The first time, it was because I just didn’t want to go home. It was right at the beginning of my divorce ordeal, and I was not well at all. Later, when things got better, we still went there to end our day, and I could see the progress. In each successive picture, I felt that I looked visibly happier. I know I felt happier each time.

So here is the latest installment. Life is really quite good now.

Today was the third practice day for the Aon Center stair climb a week from Saturday. Erik couldn’t go today, but I made time in my day to go do it. My quest is to do the tower in under 12 minutes, so today I put on my little electronic metronome and I set it for 72, which is 4% faster than the 69 beats per minute I had it set on last week. There were probably a bit over a dozen people there to do the climb today. I let about 10 people go ahead before I started.

On the way up, I noticed that the turns on the landings took at least one and sometimes two beats of the metronome. If I assume an average of 1.5 beats per landing, that means I spent about 1.25 seconds on each landing, and that totals up to just a bit over two minutes total for the approximately 110 landings in the 56-story climb. That’s really a lot of time spent not climbing. But sadly, 1.25 seconds rest really isn’t enough to recover in any significant way. No matter how you slice it, climbing that many stairs hurts.

Today’s climb felt like it was very close to my limit. I just kept focused on the beeping of the metronome to keep pace. And I managed to keep the pace all the way up. But the last 10 stories were pretty grim. I passed all but one of the people who’d started in front of me, which was nice. And my time at the top was 10:38, which I thought was quite good. Based on that, I should be able to do the full tower climb in about 11:45, which is well-within my goal of 12 minutes. So this is a Good Thing.

I’m really enjoying this weird little sport I stumbled upon last year. It’s fun in a way that I can’t quite explain.

Due to the earthquake this week, I didn’t have much time or inspiration to find some weird sight to go see on the Sunday bike ride. So we just rode out to San Dimas and back. It was chilly and overcast, and not much remarkable happened. Still, it was a pleasant ride.

43 miles.
cycling

Last summer, I was very pleased to see when the Earthquake Notification Service passed 150,000 subscribers. On average about 30-50 people sign up for it every day, and more after each large earthquake. And this week’s M7.2 Baja California earthquake pushed it over the top to more than 200,000 subscribers.

The earthquake also set a new record for the amount of mail sent in one day. The previous record of 2,326,000 messages was set after the M8.8 Chile earthquake in February. But this earthquake blew right past that record with 4,508,522 messages sent. And it would have been more if the database problems hadn’t slowed the system to a crawl. At the end of the first day, there were over 600,000 messages waiting to be sent, and over 500 earthquakes waiting to be processed.

Fortunately, I’ve found a workaround to keep the system from getting slow while processing large numbers of earthquakes, and I’m working on a re-architecture of the database to be able to handle heavier loads in the future.

Wednesday was the second practice session at the Aon Tower for the stair climb on the 24th. Work has been crazy this week because of the earthquake last Sunday, but I made a point to get downtown at lunchtime to try my legs on the stairs again.

Since Erik couldn’t make it this time, I rode the train there so as not to have to use my car. When I got there, Carla from the bike club was there. She works in one of the other big buildings downtown, and I’d told her about the climb on the ride last Sunday. She doesn’t want to do it, but she came by to see us practice. This worked out well, since I had my backpack and bike helmet with me, and she was able to take them on the elevator up to the 60th floor while I was climbing.

Last time, Erik and I had noticed that turning on the stair landings took a noticeable amount of time compared to the actual climbs up each flight. I took a wild guess and assumed that each stair landing eats up about 1 second. All together that would eat almost 2 minutes total for the climb. So if I want to make the top in 12 minutes, I need to do the actual 1377 steps in about 10 minutes, which would mean 137 steps per minute. Dividing by 2 to account for taking double steps, I get 69 per minute.

I got a small electronic metronome that clips on my belt. I set it for 69 beats per minute. I concentrated on just having one foot going up two steps for each beep.. And I made the climb to the 60th floor in 10:58. This was 15 seconds faster than last time, and works out to making the full climb in about 12:10. So I think it worked. Next time I’m going to try for 71 or 72.

On the train ride back, I had a touch of ‘Climber’s Cough’, which means I went pretty hard on the climb. But I still think I can go faster next time. It was a good practice session, and a good little mid-day adventure.