Tennessee and The Shore…. for slideshow, click here.
“Fear the Deer”
You might remember a post I made a couple of months ago about a blog that I was creating about the State College Spikes baseball team. The intention at the time was to just track the Pittsburgh Pirates draft choice to try to figure out which ones might get assigned to State College. Well that worked out so well that I decided to keep it up for the entire season.
Not surpisingly I’ve swizzled the blog a lot since I originally created it – I’ve changed the format a couple of time, added a few features, and actually renamed it “Fear the Deer” which is the team’s rally cry.
I occasionally add some editorial content but for the most part the blog is simply a collection of news stories, game reports, and box scores about the team. Even with no effort of my own to promote it, it’s generated a modicum of success:
- I’ve had over 7000 visitors to date and hope to hit 10,000 before the season ends.
- I’ve made my way to the first page of Google search results when you search for “State College Spikes”.
- WordPress.com listed me as #78 on their Blog of the Day Growing Blogs list a couple of weeks ago.
- Numerous baseball blogs have found me and included me in their links, among them are:
- “The Pittsbugh Lumber Company” includes me in their blogroll
- “Bucs Dugout” has me on their homepage in the Pirates Links section
- “Crawdad’s Blog” – a blog about the Pirates Hickory TN farm club has me in their blogroll
While it certainly hasn’t enjoyed the exposure my “Every Day is Valentine’s Day” exploit did, it’s really not doing all that bad – and I’m having fun doing it.
I’m Trying to Get in Shape, too!
Over the past month or so, I’ve been trying to get back into shape by running on a regular basis. It was actually quite timely, because my first day of running was actually July 4th. It was the following day that Larry posted his entry about getting serious about doing something about his weight. BTW, Larry, let’s see some updated figures!
 I had decided I had to get serious too because a few weeks prior when I was packing for our Battle Creek golf trip I tried on some of my golf shorts, and most of them didn’t fit because I had gotten too fat. I didn’t start running at that time because back in mid-May, I was playing basketball in our driveway with Eric and was attempting to save a ball going out of bounds. I was right on the edge of the driveway and rolled my right ankle and went down like a pile of bricks. I was in maybe more pain then I’ve ever felt in my life. I didn’t see stars, but I did see one bright sun. Eric was to later say that that was probably the stupidest thing he’s ever seen me do. The kids are at the age where they show us no sympathy.
 It ends up that I not only sprained my ankle, but several days later I realized that I had strained my achilles. So due to that injury I wasn’t able to start running until it had healed significantly. It still is a little tender, but it actually gives me no problems when I’m running. It’s more bothersome in the morning when I wake up and everything has tightened up.
After a few weeks of running, I decided to start a log of my runs, so I’ve posted it here. Sorry, no time to make any graphs, but maybe on my next update.
| Date | Distance | Time | Min/Mile | Comment |
I usually run at Moraine Hills State Park a few miles from home. They’ve got 3 interconnected loops of cinder trails that are great for running. I usually do the 3.73 mile loop, but have occasionally added a second for a 6.2 mile run.
I haven’t lost much weight, maybe 4 pounds, but my clothes are fitting much better. My goal is to first run the 6.2 mile run in under an hour. I should be able to do that relatively soon. As soon as the weather cools down a bit, I’ll give it a go. My other goal is to see if I can do the 3.73 mile loop in under 30 minutes. That’s going to be the tough one, but hopefully with another couple of months of serious running and some 50 degree weather and low humidity (as opposed to the 80’s and high humidity I’ve been running in, I just may have a shot of doing it.
 I’ll work on getting my stats to publish a little better, but right now I’ve got to run. Not literally, I already ran today and it was tough. I hate running in the morning. My times are always slower because my body just isn’t ready to perform and I think it goes into shock.
Central Bucks HS – Class of ’65
Remember any of these guys Marilyn? Their class falls squarely between us.
There’s a judge, a council president, a police chief, a fire chief and a lawyer with a common thread. All five graduated from Central Bucks High School in 1965 and have become leaders in the community.
There’s Bill Cope, Doylestown Fire Co. president; Buckingham Police Chief Steven Daniels; Jeff Garton — the solicitor for Central Bucks and Centennial school districts, Doylestown Township, the Bucks County Water and Sewer Authority and Bucks County Community College; Bucks County President Judge David Heckler; and Doylestown council President John “Chip” Thome.
“It’s not every day that you have [this many leaders] from the same class,” said Cope.
I can barely remember Heckler and Thome but draw a blank on the others.
Carnoustie memories
Anyone watching the British Open today. It brought back a bunch of memories from my trip to Scotland with Tod Jeffers in 1984 when we actually played Carnoustie.
. Here’s a shot of us playing the 17th hole. I’m on the far right in the red sweater. Upon close inspection you will note that I am wearing knickers, which I wore for pretty much every round in Scotland (Tod remarked that my choice of apparel was like a guy from New York City wearing a rhinestone cowboy shirt in Dallas). Tod has the light pants on and the other guy and girl were a couple of newlyweds from the US who were on their honeymoon and were matched up with us (the guy played, the gal just walked along).
Here’s a piece of a map of the Carnoustie golf course that shows the finishing holes at the course. I’ve placed a red X on the may where our friend Glen Durso stood when he took the photo above. The direction of the photo is toward the upper right hand corner of the map. In the photo you can see the wall of the Barry Burn running along the forefront. From the map you can see how the burn snakes around on both sides of 17. On the photo at the top you can just make out the burn behind us. If you look close you can see the walk bridge across the burn on the left side of the photo and you can also notice that bridge on the map above.
If you watched the open today, you saw Ernie Els hit his approach shot fat on 18 and it came up short of the burn (notice on the map how the burn runs right in front of 18). That reminded me a little of my shot on the finishing hole. When Tod and I played it, the pin placement on 18 was in about the same location as today, i.e at the very front of the green, about 10 feet onto the green and maybe 10 yards past the burn. When I hit my approach shot, I thought I had hit it perfect but it came up about 10 yards short – I don’t know if I misclubbed myself or the wind got it but the ball came down in the burn – but only momentarily.
Here’s a closeup photo of the Barry Burn. Notice how the bank on the left is made by bricks that form a kind of stair step up the side. Remember playing stoop ball as a kid (I’m talking to the second generation here, I’m not sure the third generation ever played anything as unorganized as stoop ball 🙂 )? You would throw a ball against the steps and it would fly backward. Well that’s exactly what happened to my ball when it landed in the burn. It didn’t hit the water but rather came down against the bricks. That caused it to ricochet back down the eighteenth fairway toward me coming to rest about 20 yards short of the burn (if I remember correctly I got safely on and two putted from there).
The big hotel in the background of the above photo wasn’t there when Tod and I played the course. There was actually no clubhouse. There was a small shack that acted as a pro shop and a gravel parking lot where you could change into your spikes. Of course that meant we couldn’t roll of the course and have an immediate brew. So after we finished our round we headed back to St Andrews where we were staying.
The route back to our hotel took us through Dundee, a working class town on the River Tay. It was about a 30 mile drive and by the time we got to Dundee we were a little thirsty. I was driving and spotted a bar just off the road. I pulled over and Tod ran inside to get a six pack for the road (how times have changed? – you just wouldn’t think of doing that these days). A couple of minutes later Tod comes out of the bar laughing his head off.
While we were in Scotland we had been trying all sorts of different beers. Since we didn’t have a clue what most of the brews were we’d simply ask the bartenders in each of the establishments we’d hit, what their recommendation would be. So that’s exactly what Tod did when he went into the bar. The bartender responded (imagine a thick Scottish brogue “Ahh, we’ve got this great imported beer – RRRolling RRRock.” Tod could not keep a straight face and was still laughing as he came back out to the car (and no, he didn’t get the Rolling Rock).
I have bunches of other stories but I’ll save them for another day.
Perks of being over 50
If you’re not over 50, this is what you have to look forward to.
1. Kidnappers are not very interested in you.
2. In a hostage situation you are likely to be released first.
3. No one expects you to run–anywhere.
4. People call at 9 pm and ask, “Did I wake you???”
5. People no longer view you as a hypochondriac.
6. There is nothing left to learn the hard way.
7. Things you buy now won’t wear out.
8. You can eat dinner at 4 pm.
9. You can live without sex but not your glasses.
10. You get into heated arguments about pension plans.
11. You no longer think of speed limits as challenges.
12. You quit trying to hold your stomach in no matter who walks into the room.
13. You sing along with elevator music.
14. Your eyes won’t get much worse.
15. Your investment in health insurance is finally beginning to pay off.
16. Your joints are more accurate meteorologists than the national weather service.
17. Your secrets are safe with your friends because they can’t remember them either.
18. Your supply of brain cells is finally down to manageable size.
19. You can’t remember who sent you this list!
And you notice these are all in Big Print for your convenience.
Geni.com
Geni.com is a combination social network/genealogy site. They are trying to use the social network concept to create family trees with the eventual goal (quite ambitious I might add) of creating one giant family tree that includes everyone in the world – hence their motto “Everyone’s Connected”.
The site is extremely easy to use and is growing by leaps and bounds. They only went live six months ago – within one month they had signed up 100,000 users and they just recently added their 5,000,000th profile. I’ve registered on the site and started building the Fall Family Tree. I’ve also created a link to Geni.com under Web Identities on the blog sidebar. However, you won’t be able to get to the tree until someone who is a part of it invites you to be a part of it. Once you accept an invite to join, the link in the sidebar will take you to your view of the tree.
I though I’d run a little test case and see what you guys think of the idea of continuing to build the tree (I know Marilyn had a little bit of a genealogy urge a while ago but don’t know if that’s still there).
I added us, Mom and Dad, and our grandparents, along with Harry, Grace and Jack. That gave me a pretty good perspective of how the tree is built. I’m going to extend an invitation to Marilyn and Gary and encourage you two to add to the tree and invite others in your family to join (you can invite someone to join by merely putting them in the tree along with their email address – you can also add people without their email addresses if you just want to expand the tree).
Marilyn – I suggest you add Shannon and as much of the Bergquist clan that you can get to buy into it (also this might be a good opportunity to include Linda, Richie, and Carol). Gary – add the kids and see how many Cortners you might get to go along.
If that little test seems to go well, then we can open it up to Ken, Steve, and Ron and their in-laws and we’ll run with it.
One thing to keep in mind is be be sensitive to how much personal information you include when filling out an individual’s entry. At least for the living, I’m just going to put in their name (and email address when I invited them), then let them make the decision about how much info to include.
The two of you should be getting an email invite shortly (Marilyn – I’m sure this means tomorrow morning for you but Gary may still be awake). Let me know your thoughts as you play with it.
For any others who might be making their once a month visit here and are curious about what the site is like, here’s a Wall Street Journal article on Geni.com.
Hi Lar, Hi Mar (Shan… anybody else)
Shannon was here for a great visit over the 4th. We went to the local parade. I smoked brisket. It rained, but the show went on, and the party went on.
Thinking about coming out of retirement
No not that way.
But, after getting out and exercising for four straight days, I’m getting the urge to get into competitive shape again. Unfortunately, the Phi Psi 500 no longer exists. But there is another possibility:
The Beer Mile is a unofficial worldwide competition where competitors drink a beer, run a quarter mile, then repeat three more times.
A friend of mine here in State College, Kevin Becker is one of the organizers of the local version of the competition. In fact, there is a YouTube video of the 2005 State College Event (it’s held every Labor Day). The event is nothing like the Phi Psi which drew about 2000 entrants and 10,000 spectators. The State College Beer mile draws maybe a dozen entrants and another couple of dozen spectators.
You can see the SC Beer Mile video by clicking here. My buddy is the guy with the shaved head that appears several times in the video. He won the event that year (you can see him cross the finish line at about the 4:30 point in the video – he’s also the guy doing the cartwheel/moon at the end of the video).
While I don’t feel I can be competitive with Kevin (he trains a lot, runs marathons and triathlons, and even ran a 50 mile race two years ago), I certainly feel I can be competive in my age group. I just went to the beer mile records page and I see that, while there’s no official 60+ record only a super-Masters group that starts at 50, the fastest time for a 60+ entrant worldwide is 9:54. While it would be tough to get to that level this year, I certainly don’t think that number is out of my reach in another year or so. The best time for a 62 year old is 10:35 and that’s not out of the realm of possibility (I would have to alter one of my strategies though – in the Phi Psi, I always forced myself to throw up – in this race, if you ralph, you run an extra lap).
Version 3
This looks a little sloppy because it’s a jpeg that that I had to reduce in size to fit within the blog boundaries. If you click on the file it will look better. I’m now going to cram it in the sidebar and see how it looks there (I suspect messy because of the distortion with reducing the jpeg).
The next step will be to convert these graphs to a vector based format so that they will resize without loosing their aesthetics.