26.2: The Play by Play (or Step by Step)

Yes, I am the exceptionally goofy-looking guy in all white wearing the headband. And just to my right and slightly ahead of me is my friend Phil who was both stupid enough to allow me to con him into running this one drunken night and also gracious enough to run it step for step with me the whole way yesterday. Just over Phil's right shoulder you can see my dad, who met us at the 25 mile marker and went most of the rest of the way in with us. The person taking the picture is my brother Joe, who met us at just past the mile 21 marker and walked with us the rest of the way (which was more work than it sounds considering he'd made the poor decision to wear a black t-shirt).

So, the end result was 5:53:34 but the bottom line was that I finished, got my medal, and am still alive to tell the tale. I would have considered that an accomplishment under any setting, but coming during the hottest Chicago Marathon on record and on a knee that I was positive was going to give out on me I couldn't be happier with the result. I also can't believe that a day after I had to witness in-person the demise of the Cubs season I am still considering this a really good weekend (the Bears come from behind victory helped too).

I'd just like to take a quick moment to thank everybody who sent me words of encouragement and congratulations leading up to and after the marathon. It was nice to feel the love and also just to know that people cared about something I was doing. I'd also like to thank Christy, Liz, Megan, my dad, my brothers Joe and Zack, and Phil and Christy's parents for coming out yesterday and supporting Phil and I. It's one thing to get random encouragment from spectators, but it means so much more when it comes directly at you from people you know. Of course I have to save a special thank you to Christy, who dealt with our lives revolving around my training schedule for the last 4 months and encouraged me at every step even though as a wife she was more worried about my health and safety than she was excited about me doing this. Thanks dear, you are the best!

Now I'd just like to share some thoughts, sights, and quotes from the day to give you a feel for what the experience was like.

5:30 A.M. - The alarm goes off. Way too early, considering that I just got to sleep a little before 1. I get up, shower and dress and greet Phil (who stayed over Saturday night) with "I don't know about you, but I'm ready to do something incredibly stupid!"

6:40 A.M. - We get on the el which, predictably, is a madhouse. At the next stop, a group of four French people get on. One of them is wearing an all red-white-and-blue spandex suit and has a giant French flag strapped to his back. He is also wearing a beret. All he needs is to be holding wine and cheese in his hand and he would be the perfect French stereotype.

7:35 A.M. - Phil and I reach the starting gate and get ourselves in with the 9:00 min/mile pace people so that we can get across the starting line earlier. We're not trying to be jackasses, but the course closes 6 and a half hours after the gun and thus the faster you get across the start line the more time you have. If you haven't seen the marathon before, just imagine they took Wrigley Field during a sold out Cubs game and emptied them all out into a 4 block area and held them there. Now also imagine that there are people from about 50 different countries present, all speaking different languages and holding or wearing flags you've never seen before. We sit down and stretch for a while and try not to think about the fact that we'll be running for the next 6 hours.

8:10 A.M. - We get across the starting line quicker than I thought, leaving us a whole 6:20 to finish in. We can do over 14-minute miles now and still finish in time. Woo-hoo!

~9:00 A.M. - We stop at the Port-O-Potties at the 5 mile marker. This is only significant because, despite the fact that at just about every water station the rest of the way we drink at least 2 cups of gatorade and one cup of water we will never even feel the slightest need to use the facilities again.

~9:35 A.M. - We are near the 8-mile marker and my knee starts to whine. Uh oh.

~9:50 A.M - My knee goes numb. Score! We are in upper Lakeview/Boys Town and there are massive crowds on both sides. I want to skip our walk break because it's very easy to run when you've got shade and a big audience.

~10:00 A.M. - Just before the 10-mile marker we see Christy, Liz, and Megan and about a minute later see my dad and brothers. Then we turn onto North Ave. There's a good amount of shade and a huge crowd on both sides of the street cheering us on. Just before the turn at Wells, there is an Elvis imitator performing. I don't feel the least bit tired. I say to myself "This is actually a lot more fun than I thought it would be. You know what? I might actually end up running another one of these."

~10:20 A.M. - After running down Wells for a mile and a half, during which time there is virtually no shade, no breeze, and the temperature has risen to approximately the temperature of the surface of the sun I think to myself "This is quite possibly the worst idea I've ever had. You know what? I'm glad that the first guy that ever ran a marathon dropped dead afterwards. Served him right."

~10:45 A.M. - We reach the halfway point, and the comfortable numbness of my knee is gone. I have the distinct feeling (correct, as it turns out) that this time it will not be going numb again.

~11:15 A.M. - We are past the west loop, over by the United Center. This area is markedly more suburban-looking which means both smaller buildings (and thus less shade) and not nearly as many people cheering us on. Fatigue starts to become a real issue, and I make the executive decision to modify our ratio of 4 mintes of running and 1 minute of walking to 3/2. Phil concurs with this decision.

~11:45 A.M. - We are entering Little Italy and coming to the 18-mile marker. There's a lot more people here and we are getting a 2nd (or third, or maybe fourth) wind. Christy, Liz, and Megan have come down from the north side to cheer us on here and Christy's parents are here as well. We get a nice boost.

~12:00 P.M. - We get to the water station past the mile 19 marker and hear that "the marathon has been cancelled." We have pretty much no other information other than that, but everyone seems to still be doing the course so we just keep going.

~12:15 P.M. - Just past the 20 mile marker, police officers are coming into the street and forcibly stopping people from running. We still have no idea what exactly is going on, and the announcement over the bullhorn that "the marathon has been cancelled due to a heat emergency" is decidedly unhelpful. All I can think of is "after all this, are you seriously going to tell me that I'm not going to be able to finish this and I'll have to run another one?"

~ 12: 35 P.M. - Walking now, we pass the 21 mile marker in Chinatown and see my dad and brother Joe. Joe decides to walk along with us and we see if he has any additional information. All he knows is that out of the 45,000 registered entrants, 10,000 didn't even show up due to the heat. My knee informs me that it will be doing no more bending the rest of the way.

~12:55 P.M. - Around the 22 mile marker we finally get the real story from a police officer. Yes, we are still allowed to complete the course but we are supposed to walk due to the heat and the fact that some water stations are out of water and the paramedics have been overwhelmed. We are still being timed and will still get our medals. This information improves the mood significantly.

2:03 P.M. - After walking the last 5 miles, we run through the giant mister (the photo at the top), walk the giant hill on Roosevelt, and then run down Columbus through the finish. We get our medals and then a free beer. What more could you ask for?

So all in all, had we not been forced to walk I think our time would have been right around 5:30. However, the difference between a time of 5:53 and 5:30 doesn't really mean anything. Anyone who's run a marathon before knows that both times are slow, and anyone who hasn't has absolutely no frame of reference and is just impressed that you finished.

Alright, not to make this post any more long-winded, I'll just leave you with some best-ofs from the day:

Best sign: Tie: Giant picture of David Hasselhoff captioned with "The Hoff says run Maria!" and one that said "Release Your Inner Kenyan"

Best outfit (runner): A man dressed up as giant pair of hairy testicles. Apparently he was running to benefit testicular cancer research. We only saw him once around the 5 mile mark, and none of our cheering section saw him so I'm guessing he dropped out pretty quick. That suit looked sweltering. Honorable mentions to Captain American and The Flash running together. By the looks of things, The Flash has really let himself go.

Best outfit (spectator): Two guys in Lakeview. One with a shirt that said "Gay" and next to him a shirt that said "Gayer".

Best Quote: Also a tie:

Spectator: You guys are beautiful.
Runner: I don't feel beautiful.

and

Cop (in a car, through the bullhorn after we had been told to walk): Do not run, or we will chase you.

OK, that's all I got folks. Today I am at home recuperating, icing the knee, blogging, and generally taking some well earned r&r. I plan to take my shirt (after washing of course), number, medal, and the picture of Phil and I after the finish and have them all framed together to hopefully hang in my study/den/office one day alongside my degrees (and, knock on wood, my CPA certification). When I'm recovered, I plan to go back to running about 15 miles per week (3 miles, 5 times per week). But more importantly I plan to never, EVER, run another one of these again!

The Good and the Bad

Update (9/27): This didn't warrant a separate entry, but just wanted to add that I was able to succesfully run 5 miles yesterday and the knee feels pretty good today, so that's good news.

Well, the good news is that I succesfully completed my 20 mile run, and actually did it in less time than it took me to run 18.8 miles (3:52 vs. 4:01), due mainly to having absolutely perfect weather (mid-60s and overcast) and not having to contend with any real hills. The bad is that starting around mile 15 my knee started acting up on me but it was still bearable so I plowed through to the end. I figured I would take a few days off and then get back to it. I have been waiting the last 10 days to blog about the success of my 20-mile run and how positive I was feeling about the marathon on the 7th because I wanted to make sure my knee was going to bounce back. Well, I'm still waiting. It's not that the knee is in pain all the time; after the first 2 days it's actually been fine during my normal, everyday activities. But when I tried to go run last Thursday I could feel it start to ache about half a mile in and then again on Monday right around the 1 mile mark. I think a lot of it is that I'm supremely sensitive about it now because I know that any setback at this point is going to mean missing the marathon, and I can't think of anything worse than that after I've gone through all the hell runs. I've still got another 10 days though, so I'm not worried . . .yet. The only thing that is disappointing is that I haven't been able to get in my last 2 10-mile runs, and at this point I've already accepted that those aren't going to happen. In the grand scheme of things, though, the extra 20 miles wasn't going to make a big difference one way or the other. Also, I have been substituting by exercising on the elliptical machine to at least keep up my cardio. Going to do another hour/hour and a half tonight and then try to get back to running on Saturday with a quick 3 miles and then (hopefully) Sunday I'll be able to do 5. If I get those both in I will be back to feeling pretty optimistic again.

So it's come down to the home stretch for the Cubs, and while it still is looking good for them it was looking a lot better 2 days ago when they had a 3.5 game lead (it's down to 2 now). I slept right through when playoff tickets went on sale Sunday morning at 9:00, but I have been thinking about ponying up the extra cash and buying them off of e-bay. However, I can't help but think that I am jinxing them everytime I go search through the listings. Ah, the joys of being a Cubs fan; having the feeling that every little mundane action you do somehow has this grand effect on the team's performance.

In other, semi-related news, I did receive my $3000 check from Bodog on Monday night (it's related because that's the only reason I am considering buying Cubs playoff tickets). So as long as the check doesn't bounce I can officially declare my drunken evening a roaring success!

Have the 10-year high school reunion this weekend. Looking forward to it but of course I have a whole lot of competing thoughts on the matter: 1) wow, I'm old, 2) I hope it's not ridiculously awkward, 3) I hope I don't get ridiculously drunk as a result of the afore-mentioned awkwardness, 4) hopefully, the people that I don't recognize also won't recognize me. Overall, I'm sure it will be a good time. I'm looking at it much like how I view going to a wedding: something you look forward to when it's a long ways away, then as it gets closer you see it as more of an obligation, but then you go and end up having a really good time. That's the hope, anyway.

On the day that the Bears officially made the switch from Grossman to Griese, how long before the Orton chants start? Just asking.

About halfway through Fiasco now. Newsflash: books about the Iraq War are depressing.

No Mas

So last Saturday I head out to my dad's in Tinley Park to do my long run. I have to do 17 miles, and he says he knows this 8-mile loop that we can do twice and then I can run a little extra to get to 17. He'll ride the bike along side me while I run. Sounds great. Then we get about 4 miles in and realize that, in fact, it is actually a 9.4 mile loop. So my 17-mile run turns into 18.8, which would be fine except that prior to that the longest I have ever run in my life is 14 miles. Well, to make a long (and I do mean LONG) run a short story I did survive and actually wasn't in too much physical pain. However, I immediately started thinking about how I need to run even farther this coming weekend and that made the mental pain close to unbearable. I really just want to fast-forward my life to Sunday at about 1:30 when I will be finished with it and it's quite depressing to be sitting here on a Friday morning and wish that most of your weekend was already over with. The good news is that after this weekend my training is pretty much done. I do have a couple more 10-mile runs but I no longer dread those as I once did. For the most part it will be just getting healed up and praying that I don't get a freak injury that knocks me out of commision and renders all this training useless. I do know this, though. If somehow I don't get to run the marathon in 3 weeks, that will just be a life goal that doesn't end up getting met because I am absolutely NOT going through this crap again.

In other news, if the marathon doesn't kill me I'm pretty sure the Cubs will. It's nice that they are playing meaningful baseball in September but I don't know if my heart can take it. Monday they blew a 4-1 lead and lost in 12 innings in heart-breaking fashion and then Tuesday they did their best to give up a 9th inning lead only to pull it out with a miracle double play. I was happy they won, but that didn't make the ulcer in my stomach any smaller.

It is during this time of the year that I am always starkly reminded of the difference between watching football vs. baseball. They are definitely my two favorite sports and I would probably give the nod to baseball as my #1 only because it is virtually every day for 6 months while you only get to see your football team for 3 hours a week. However, I must say that I find the two sports very difficult to watch simultaneously. A lot of people say that baseball is very slow and for most of the year I vehemently disagree. Once you get into the strategy that goes into pitch selection and how much the count matters to every batter, then every pitch becomes crucial and there's a lot of tension all the time even if to the non-fan it looks like nothing's happening. But when you're forced to compare baseball side by side with football it's hard to argue that it's definitely a lot slower. I'll have the baseball game on at the start of the inning, just as the first batter is getting ready to dig in at the plate. Then I flip over to football and see the kickoff and 22 guys running at an all-out sprint over and into each other. Then you see the offense run 3 more plays where there is just non-stop motion on the field. Maybe you even see a long run or pass or a turnover or none of that and just a punt but it all seems critical because precious seconds are ticking off the clock and the even more important strategic field position game is being waged. So then you flip back over to the baseball game and see that the same guy's still up after fouling off 4 pitches with a full count and now the catcher has gone out to hold what seems like an hour-long conference with the pitcher about pitch selection. Seriously, you start expecting a Power Point presentation to break out at any minute. It's just amazing how your perspective can change things. It's like you're driving down a normal road doing 40, and it seems neither slow or fast. But then you get on the expressway and speed up to 80 for a couple minutes. Then you go back and do 40 again and it seems like you're crawling.

I am working on another serious piece, which I was going to post today. I have come back from my break of reading fiction and finally got around to reading State of Denial (by Bob Woodward). This is the 3rd book I have read about Iraq (My Year in Iraq by Paul Bremer and The Prince of the Marshes by Rory Stewart are the others) and I already bought Fiasco by Thomas Ricks and plan to read that next. In addition to all that, I've been pretty religiously watching This Week and Meet the Press every week as well as reading The Economist and the latest GAO report on Iraq progress. So, anyway, I feel pretty well versed in what's going on over there and realized I have a lot of thoughts on the matter. So many thoughts, in fact, that I fear it is going to end up rivaling my thoughts on the national debt in length and I just wasn't up for that today. So, anyway, you can look forward to (or dread) that piece coming in the next couple weeks. I can pretty much summarize what has gone wrong over there with the following list: Rumsfeld bad, inadequate and (at times) non-existant planning, not enough troops, too much bureaucracy, money not getting to the people that needed it.

Have an excellent weekend all (3 of you)!

A (Drunken) Night's Tale

So I know that you all have barely been able to contain your excitement awaiting my next post to see what incredibly inspirational and life-changing story I had for you. OK, so probably not, but I'm going to tell you anyway.

So exactly two weeks ago we had our corporate summer outing, which took place on one of those lunch-time cruises that leave from Navy Pier. They're fun, but the only thing that's relevant about that to this story is that it meant that I started drinking while on board at about 1:00 and then got to leave work immediately after we docked at 2:00. I met some of my friends that I used to work with at HSBC for a happy hour over at Sidebar on Lasalle. Well, Christy was on her way to St. Louis for the weekend so I knew I had nowhere to be and as a consequence happy hour turned into about happy 6-hours. As I stumbled my way out of the bar and into a cab at around 8:30, I was feeling pretty good and decided that it was time to place some drunken phone calls.

Earlier in the week, my brother and I had kicked around the idea of him coming up and us going to see Superbad together so I decided to give him a call and see what the plan was. Turns out that his flight back from Charlotte Thursday night had been cancelled and he had spent the night on the floor and waited through 3 flights before finally getting home at around 6, so he wasn't in much of a mood to head right out to the city. This all seemed very logical to me, but I was in no mood for logic so I calmly presented him with his options. He could either come down to the city, or he could opt to stay home. However, if he opted to stay home I vowed to call him twice per hour to tell him 1) what I was doing at the time 2) how drunk I was; and 3) how much he sucked for not coming down and seeing Superbad with me. He carefully weighed his options and wisely chose the route that avoided future drunken phone calls (I suppose the idea that he could have simply turned off his phone did not occur to him). Anyway, he gets down to our place at around 10:30 and of course he is completely sober so naturally we need to have a few beers together before leaving to see the movie. I'm not sure what exactly it is (most likely alcoholism), but somehow when you're drunk and someone sober shows up and starts drinking you instantly feel like you're sober too and need to drink at their pace. Of course, in actuality that's the last thing you need to do, but again we're not dealing in the realm of logic at this point.

In any case, we head out to see an 11:30 showing of Superbad. The lights go down in the theatre and suddenly, now that alcohol has been removed from the equation, my body is finally able to get a message through to my brain that due to the 10 hours of non-stop drinking it is actually quite tired and now that it is dark it will be assuming that it is bedtime and act accordingly. An epic, but ultimately fruitless struggle to stay awake plays out over approximately the next 25-40 minutes (that's the best I can estimate) and the next thing I know my brother is waking me up to tell me the movie's over. Disappointed, but refreshed from my nap, we head back to my place where I begin drinking again (naturally) while playing him excerpts from The Muppet Show (Season 2) on DVD (which are kind of funny all the time, but really funny when it's 2:00 A.M. and you've been drinking for the better part of 13 hours). Finally, at around 2:45 my bro takes off to go home since he stopped drinking at 11:15 before the movie.

At this point, any sane, logical, rational being would have simply called it a night and gone to bed. So of course I did the only thing that made sense to me at the time: started gambling online. Now, this is hardly the first time that in an inebbriated state it has seemed like a good idea to me to gamble online. And pretty much uniformily the story is the same: played for a while, was up briefly, then lost it all. I had set aside $500 to load up my betting account for football season at bodog and decided I might as well get started on losing it. Of course, the problem is that there tends to not be a lot of professional sporting events being played at 3:00 A.M. (I am hoping to organize a professional curling league in Zaire to correct this problem, but I digress). Fortunately (or unfortunately) bodog has prepared for that contingency by offering online casino games 24 hours a day. Well, I have had some bad experiences playing blackjack and pai-gow poker, so those didn't really interest me. But I had only played craps a little before, to mixed results. I went through the first $100 in about 10 minutes and then loaded up with another $150. I went back and forth for about the next 45 minutes and after an hour I found myself up about $100. What occurred over the next 20 minutes pretty much defies description (mainly because I can't remember it all that clearly). The upshot of it was that during that time I did not roll a single 7 (in case you haven't played craps before, that's a very, very good thing). After a few minutes I had every number covered and was slowly but steadily increasing my bet. During the last 5 minutes, I do remember that I had over $1000 total on the board (I know because that was the table limit and it wouldn't let me bet any more) and was winning around $200 every time I rolled the dice. When I finally did roll the 7 I had to instantly double and triple-check that I was actually playing on a "real money" table because I was up over $5000. It was indeed amd I really was. I think I sat there in disbelief for about 5 minutes waiting for it all to sink in. Then, of course, I decided to push my luck. Over the next hour I gave about a grand back but still quit with my account at just over $4250 and a night's profit of over $4000. The next day I cashed out $3000 and am now using the rest for football betting. Of course, I haven't physically received my check yet so nothing's real until that happens but from every indication I've gotten (from other gamblers) bodog is legitimate. The check takes a month to a month and a half to come, but you will get paid.

In any case, I guess the moral of the story is: just because you're too drunk to stay awake during Superbad doesn't mean you're too drunk to luck your way into $4000.

And yes, I'm available to speak at children's parties.

The Home Stretch

Well, as much as it saddens me to have to replace my favorite blog title to date, it has been almost 2 weeks since I last wrote anything and it's probably time.

I'll start with a marathon training update. This past week was a planned light week although I ended up making it even lighter than scheduled, running only 10 miles total. Not good, but hopefully I have allowed my body to prepare itself for the rough road ahead. The next 3 weeks figure to be pretty brutal, as I need to log totals of 30, 32, and 39 miles each week. The good news is that once I get to the end of this stretch I really am pretty much done. Well, except for the small detail of running the actual marathon itself on October 7th.

After some brief forays into fiction for a while, I returned to reading non-fiction this past week when I picked up The Secret Man by Bob Woodward. It was written and published immediately after the identity of Deep Throat (the informant from Watergate) was finally revealed as No. 2 FBI-man Mark Felt. Woodward discusses in depth how he originally met him and for the first time provides details on how they would signal each other and the exact nature of the info that he provided. I've always had something of a fascination with Watergate and that made this book an essential read. It really helps to tie together all the ends that have until now intentionally been left loose in order to protect the source's identity. Woodward also gives a couple of interesting anecdotes about how close others came to guessing the source (and some who actually did) and how close the lid was to being blown off at any given time. It's also just interesting to reflect on the accomplishment of keeping something like this a secret for 30 years. Lastly, there's a couple of great ironies to be found. Stemming from the House investigation into the FBI's handling of Watergate, Felt was actually indicted on charges of conducting unauthorized searches on suspects. At his trial, former President Nixon testified on his behalf (the only time Nixon ever testified in court after resigning). Felt was found guilty, but a few years later Reagan pardoned him. So, basically, the man who was almost single-handedly responsible for bringing down Nixon has Nixon himself show up at his trial to defend him and then gets pardoned by Reagan. In any case, the only thing that's disappointing about the read is that you never really get a clear understanding of the exact motives Felt had when he did it. There's a lot of pretty well grounded speculation on Woodward's part, but in the end speculation is just that. Ultimately, the reason for this is that Woodward and Felt's relationship was pretty icy after Watergate and they really didn't speak for over 20 years. When Woodward finally gets up the courage to track him down again, what he finds is a frail old man in his mid-80s that suffers from dementia and can barely remember who Nixon was, let alone any of the specifics behind his downfall. If it were a novel you'd definitely call it anti-climactic but I think it just serves to remind us that real life doesn't like to wrap up all the loose ends most of the time.

Also watched a few movies this past week: Vacancy, Persona, and Letters From Iwo Jima.

Vacancy deserves only a one-word review: lame.

Persona (an old Ingmar Bergman film) deserves quite a bit more but I can sum it up with one word: huh? This movie really confused me, and even after I read two Ebert articles about it I still can't say whether they helped me figure things out or just confused me more. If you are into classic and/or foreign cinema and/orBergman films, then you absolutely need to see it but if you don't fall into any of those groups I can't imagine you liking it. And I generally love weird movies (like pretty much any David Lynch film except Inland Empire) but I'm just not sure about this one. I think the real problem is that most of the movie is presented very "normally" and then just all of a sudden it veers off into these really weird tangents for a minute or two before returning. At least with a Lynch film I'm expecting a midget and a person wearing an antelope head to come onscreen at any given moment so I'm not so caught off guard when it happens.

Letters From Iwo Jima I was really impressed with; definitely the best war film I've seen since Saving Private Ryan. It is very unique in that although it is an American film it shows the battle from the perspective of the Japanese and thus is portraying the U.S. as the "enemy". You also get a really interesting glimpse into the conflict that was going on in Japan at the time between modern "Westernized" thinking and their classic samurai culture. When the acting general (who has spent time studying in America) orders a battalion to retreat from their post and rendevous with another squadron at a fall-back position, the head of the battalion disobeys the order and he and most of his men commit suicide by falling on their own grenades. Looking at it now, it's inescapable to not think "wow, what a waste" but that's such a great illustration of a nation with an identity crisis. The strategic move is clearly to conserve your forces and rally them at a new tactical position, but the samurai way dictates that you will die with honor where you stand before you abandon your post for any reason. As you look at the Japan that exists today as a technological powerhouse among first-world nations, it's pretty evident what manor of thinking won out in the end.

I also sort of saw Superbad on Friday night, but fell asleep a little under half-way through. From what I remember, it was really funny.

Have some other interesting news, but I want to save it since this is already too long and I want to make sure I have something interesting to talk about next time. I know that all 4 of you can hardly contain your excitement . . .

Screw You Weir

Is that a good enough title for you?

Actually, I have to do something now that pains me immensely. I find myself in the unenviable position of having to admit that, shockingly and against all odds, Eric Weir was right about something. He successfully predicted my half-marathon time within 32 seconds. He said I'd knock it out in 2 and a half hours and my official finishing time clocked in at 2:29:28. I will add though, that unofficially my time was 2:28:19, which is what I had on my watch. I think the discrepancy is due to my chip activating a little early while I was still behind the starting line. In any case, my time puts me at about an 11:22 min/mile pace, which is truly mindblowing considering that I have been training at right around 12 min/mile and I had never done 13 miles before. What can I say, I guess I'm a gamer. As another pedestrian achievement, I was in fact the fastest Delaney in the race. I don't know who Tony Delaney is; I just know he's 2 minutes slower than me. Anyways, as of today I am officially recommitted to doing the marathon. Looking at my training schedule, it's actually not as bad as I thought. I really only have 4 more hellacious runs to do before the marathon; a 14-miler this weekend, a 16-miler on Sept 2, an 18-miler on Sept 9th, and a 20-miler on Sept 16th. Actually, the whole week of the 16th pretty much sucks, as I'm supposed to run a grand total of 39 miles (5-10-4-20). But after that I get to taper off for 3 weeks before the big race on October 7th.

In other exciting news, Christy and I just bought a new Prius! Actually, more accurately we will be buying it tonight. We went in yesterday and put down a deposit and the car came in today, so we will be picking it up tonight at 7:30. It will be the first new car that either of us have ever owned, and also will be quite an upgrade from our current Sunfire as well as the Escort we owned before that. We had intended to go look at a number of dealerships yesterday but after we saw the Prius we both just really liked it and decided we didn't need to look any farther. One of the cool things that will take some getting used to is the fact that the car does not have any rearview mirrors. It has a camera mounted in the trunk that shows up on a display in front of you. Very strange to back up without looking behind you, but I think the many hours I wasted playing video games will finally pay off!

While recovering from the half-marathon Sunday and yesterday, I finally got around to watching Ben-Hur. That film had the distinction of being the DVD that I have owned the longest without ever watching (~4 years). Overall I can see why the film is a classic and it has held up well almost 50 years after it was made. It is truly amazing to look at all the extravagant sets, costumes, and the sheer number of extras that were used. In modern films when you see ancient cities recreated you just assume that only a small part of it was built and the rest was all CGI. But back then they didn't have any of that so they had to build it all for real. The highlight of the film, of course, is the big 20-minute chariot race 2/3 of the way through the movie. While it lacks the explosions and manic energy of modern action movies, it again just blows your mind that something like this could be done with little to no special effects. I read later that the colliseum where the race takes place was at that time the most expensive and elaborate set ever built and that the whole sequence took over 3 months to film. I also learned that Charleton Heston really had to learn how to drive the chariot and that there is only one stunt in the sequence where a double is used. In any case, the only semi-negative I can say about the film is that it is very in-your-face Christian. Jesus shows up at pivotal points and if you're not a Christian yourself a lot of the revelry and awe that the characters feel and the story expects you to feel just won't be there. But, as long as you know that going in I don't see that as really detracting from the experience.

By the way, if you haven't gotten around to seeing The Simpsons Movie yet I highly recommend it. If you do, stick around for 3-4 minutes after the credits start to roll.

So again I have allowed myself to slack. Been very busy lately, but at least it's because of fun stuff. After Hawaii, the following Saturday we made our yearly pilgrimmage into the bleachers at Wrigley, only to watch the Cubs lose 3-2. However, much beer was drank and a generally good time was had by all. The following weekend we went up to Alpine Valley to camp and see Jimmy Buffett. Much beer was drank and a generally good time was had by all. Then I just spent the last week down in Houston visiting family. So basically I decided that Chicago in August just wasn't quite hot enough for me and I needed to go to one of the few places that was both hotter and more humid. Seriously, around this time down there you have to swim through the air and bail it out of your car with buckets. While there, though, I did get a chance to attend two Cubs games, which (of course) they lost. However, much beer was drank and a generally good time was had by all. Are you sensing a theme here? Actually, the second game I went to I had an opportunity to sit in the Crawford boxes, which are the couple rows directly above the scoreboard in left field. It's a prime spot to catch a home run ball, since it's only 315 feet right down the line. Looking out from home plate, our seats were immediately to the right of the foul pole. 10 minutes into the game, Cliff Floyd hit a ball that was just foul and landed less than 10 feet from us. We thought that was just the beginning of the excitement, but alas no other ball got within 50 feet of us the rest of the game. Still, the seats were great and I'll definitely try to sit there again next time me and the Cubs come to town.

This weekend is the half marathon, and I would by lying if I said I was not dreading it. I ran 12 miles on Monday (in 2 hours, 27 minutes) and ran a very fast 5 yesterday (52:54; well, it's fast for me anyway), so I do feel like I'm physically prepared, but mentally . . . Also, all my training (except for the one 3.5 mile race I ran in April) has been on a treadmill, so it will be a big change to be on the pavement. And of course the final obstacle is that the race kicks off at 6:30 A.M. Sunday morning, so I'll be getting up at around 5:15. I guess the good news is that I should be done by 9:30 and then I can go home and crash for 3 hours before the Cubs game starts. Anyway, I will be honest and admit that my will to run the marathon is weakening (but not broken . . .yet), so I am using this race as a barometer. Best I can figure is that I should finish in ~2:47:00; if I finish ahead of that I'll feel pretty good about my chances of finishing the marathon in under 6 hours; if I finish over that I won't feel so good. And if it takes me more than 3 hours . . .

One thing of interest I saw in the news yesterday was a new study that found that women with breast implants are more likely than average women to commit suicide (http://tinyurl.com/3clnet). I don't know how much was spent on this study, but they could have paid me $10 and I would have told them the same thing. I think it would be fair to say that women who get breats implants are more likely to have lower self-esteem than average women. If we all accept that as true, then this study boils down to the stunning discovery that women with lower self-esteem are more likely to commit suicide. Truly groundbreaking, no? The study goes on to say that "women with breast implants also had a tripled risk of death from alcohol and drug use". It's almost as if the demographic of women with implants overlaps heavily with the hard-partying crowd. Next you're going to tell me that all those nice young strippers aren't really just working to pay their way through college. All of my bubbles are bursting at one.

OK, that's all I got today (I know it ain't much). I will definitely check in early next week with an update on how the half went and the prognosis for the biggun in October.

Have a great weekend!

Insert Clever Title Here

So I finished the new (and last) Harry Potter book last night at around 12:30. Started reading it on Sunday, so that makes it 4 days to read 759 pages. Of course, the type is large, the indents are big, and the spacing is more than ample, so really I'd say it's about equivalent to a "normal" 400-45o page book. I was told by my brother Zac that this was a "weak performance" by Harry Potter fan standards, but then he told me that he had purposefully started the day by waking up at 8:30 to watch billiards on ESPN and then he baked a cake, so I'm not so sure he's in a position to criticize anyone. Anyway, the book (which I won't spoil) is excellent. It is very refreshing to see that something that was so mammothly hyped still managed to not disappoint. While I can't say that it's my favorite of the series (I like "Goblet of Fire" the best) I can't think of a better way that it could have ended. It also firmly convinced me of something I suspected ever since I read "Order of the Phoenix" (which I absolutely hated). After "Goblet of Fire", I think Rowling had a pretty clear idea of how it was all going to end, or at least a good outline of the final story arc. But, it was really only 2 books worth of material, so she needed a way to kind of "mark time" for a book before she could start it, and the result was a generally horrid waste of time. Yes, there were a couple of things introduced in that book that come back later, but there are more strange things that never get resolved and characters acting completely unnaturally and, most importantly, very little happening in the whole book. Anyway, while the first 4 books can somewhat stand on their own as individual stories (having at least some semblance of an arc that is introduced and resolved by the end), the 6th and 7th books are clearly just one story and can very much be likened to Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. People reading this series in the future may be able to stop for a while after each of the first 5 books, but most likely no one will even take a coffee break between the 6th and 7th.

Well, while we're speaking of things that are interesting to some people and could not be any less interesting to others, I'd like to revisit my preseason Cubs preview. I was tempted to give an update on this towards the end of May, and let's just say that I am very glad that I waited. Had I done it then, it probably would have looked something like this: "I was wrong. All wrong. There's not even the faintest trace of right in anything I said. I am utterly baffled by my wrongness. You would think, just by sheer chance and law of averages, that one of my statements would have been right, but no. I was wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong." Now, however, things are a little different. I hesitate to write about it for fear of jinxing the team, but I suppose if I am to believe that the Cubs ever have a chance to win it all (and I do), then I have to stop believing in curses, hexes, and such. Anyway, the Cubs season so far has been a tale of Jekyll and Hyde. The first two months, they were one of the most overpaid, underperforming group of stooges to ever don a uniform. All the bounces went against them, and it was Murphy's law everyday. If they managed to get a clutch hit, you were absoutely stunned. The last two months, it seems that they can do almost nothing wrong and all the breaks are going their way. Now, the couple times when they DON'T get a clutch hit, you feel stunned. I'm not going to talk in too much depth about it, since those that care already know all this and those that don't have probably already skipped this paragraph. All I'll say is that the whole Cubs season can be summarized in Carlos Zambrano's numbers: his record through June 1st was 5-5 with a 5.62 ERA. His record since is 8-2 with a 1.56 ERA. Anyway, while I don't think the Cubs are quite as good as they have played lately, I am very optimistic that the "real" Cubs are closer to this version than the one that took the field the first 2 months, and I am just going to enjoy the hot streak while it lasts (which will hopefully go through October).

Heading up to Wisconsin this weekend to camp and see Jimmy Buffett at Alpine Valley. I believe this will mark the 5th time I've seen him, and the first time at Alpine. To date, the band I've seen the most times is Van Halen (also 5 times), so this will tie that. However, since one of those times was during the ill-fated Gary Cherone experiment, I'm not sure it really counts. And since Buffett manages to keep coming back every year and Van Halen . . . uh . . .doesn't, it seems like only a matter of time before I've officially seen him more. Besides those two, the only band/acts I have seen more than once are Mike Doughty (3X solo and once with Soul Coughing) , Joe Satriani (3X), BB King (2X), Buddy Guy (2X), and Eric Johnson (2X). I'd feel better about myself as a person if a couple of those names weren't on the list (hint: I'm not talking about Mike, BB, and Buddy).

Going to see The Simpsons movie tonight at midnight with my bro. Not expecting anything fantastic, but it should be fun. It's always fun to see a midnight show or a premier; always makes it seem like much more of an event to go to a movie, like it was back in the day. Over/Under on number of people I see dressed as Simpsons characters: 15.

Quick marathon update: Did end up running the 10 miles after work on Friday (1:59:37; 11:58 min/mile pace). Wasn't fun, but I did it. Brought my total mileage for last week up to 24, which I'm pretty proud of. This week hasn't been as good. Legs were still sore for a while, so I eased back in with a 3-mile run Monday (31:59; 10:40 min/mile pace) and then a 6-miler Wednesday (1:10:37; 11:46 min/mile pace). Gonna try to get an 11-miler in tomorrow before heading out of town. The half marathon looms large 2 weeks from Sunday.

Have a good weekend everyone (by which I mean all 5 of you)!

Things I've Learned Over the Last Two Weeks

Just got back from our great vacation in Hawaii and I'm not gonna give the play-by-play description of the trip since my wife is doing such an admirable job of it herself (insert plug for www.christydelaney.blogspot.com here). Anyway, I just wanted to start out with some general things that have been floating around in my head over the past couple of weeks.

• Only after being in Hawaii for a week will you find the following thoughts running through your head: "Well, sure it's one of the most beautiful waterfalls in the world, but can we walk down and swim in it? No, then let's skip it."
• Despite the fact that you are on vacation, if your wife is tired enough you can convince her to have Taco Bell for dinner. Twice.
• It's a very strange feeling when you see conch shells for sale on the side of the road the day after you've finished reading "Lord of the Flies"
• It's also a very strange feeling to be running on a treadmill and have OK Go come on your iPod.
• The all-you-can-eat prime rib and king crab leg buffet with unlimited champagne is possibly mankind's greatest achievement. Seriously; if the human race had to apply for a job somewhere, it would be on the resume.
• Walking 4 miles over treachorous terrain just to get to a waterfall is totally not worth it - until you see it and get to swim under it. The walk BACK, however . . .
• Just in case you were wondering, the slowest moving human being on Earth lives just north of the town of Hilo, HI and works at a small convenience store/deli. We ordered a shaved ice there and watched her being repeatedly passed by stationary objects as she made it. We were going to order 2, but our flight was leaving in just over 20 hours and I knew it would be a close call. As a purely scientific experiment, if you had a large group and needed to order more than 6 I'd be curious to see if she could make them before the sun explodes.
• Everywhere in Hawaii is beautiful, with the exception of Honolulu, which has all the charm of Omaha, NE.
• Listening to a Cubs game on your laptop at 8:15 A.M. while having breakfast on a balcony that overlooks the ocean is a really good way to start the day.

OK, I think that's about it. Overall I managed to finish 3 books while on vacation (with most of the reading getting done on the lengthy plane rides): the aforementioned Lord of the Flies (which I was supposed to have read in high school but never did) and two more books by Neil Gaiman (Neverwhere and The Anansi Boys). All of them were excellent and Neil Gaiman is fast becoming one of my favorite authors. In my opinion, he's a lot like Stephen King in that while he doesn't create great literature he is a phenomenal storyteller. I just saw a trailer for a movie called Stardust, which is based on his graphic novel series and is coming out in the next couple weeks. I probably would have waited to rent it but now I might have to see it in theatres. I haven't started War and Peace yet, because I know I am going to be reading the last Harry Potter book (pre-ordered months ago on Amazon) as soon as it comes out next week and once I get started on the behemoth I don't want to stop. I'm still trying to get through the bio on Einstein but alas I don't see it happening in the near future.

On the marathon training front, I can't say that I was completely dilligent while on vacation, but I did about as well as could be expected. The Sunday after we got there I was due to run 8 miles and I had every intention of doing so. Unfortunately, the hotel we were at decided that their exercise room should double as a sauna and it was just unbearably hot. I threw in the towel (actually multiple, sweat-soaked towels) at the 5-mile mark. On Tuesday we switched hotels and I got in my 4 miles as planned. But on Thursday I slacked again because it was a travel day (to the Big Island) and I didn't feel like waking up at 6. Sunday, I was due for 9 miles but felt exhausted after getting in at 5:20 A.M. so I ended up pushing it off till Monday but got it done in 1:51:41 (12:24 min mile pace). This morning I woke up early and ran 5-miles in a personal best time of 53:37 (10:44 min mile pace). I am supposed to run a 10-mile race in Darien, IL this Saturday but I've already decided I am skipping it since I have a Cubs game to go to at noon and that's just asking for disaster. I'm still going to run the 10 miles, though, either Friday night or Saturday morning though. Hoping to do it in right around 2 hours. I will admit that the training is starting to get pretty brutal. It's not so much the getting tired as it is just the drudgery of being on a treadmill that long. I probably should start running outside but the humidity is pretty brutal unless I get out there at 6:00 A.M.

The one bit of other news is that I decided to take a meditation class at the Zen Buddhist temple. It's something I've been wanting to do for a long time, ever since I read Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind and The Three Pillars of Zen about 5 years ago but just never seemed to get around to it. Last night was the first class and it went well. I don't think "hard" is the right word for it but it's definitely different trying to use my mind in a way that I never have before. I think it will do me a lot of good, though, and not just in helping me calm down when Will Ohman walks consecutive batters to walk in the go-ahead run in the 8th inning, you stupid ^&^#$%!!!!! As you can see, I have a long way to go to achieve inner peace.

Chills, Thrills, and Michael F'N Bay!

I'll start out by saying that my all-time record for most movies seen in a theatre in a week is 12 (actually seen in the span of 4 days). This occurred while I was visiting my parents in Houston over Christmas right after I graduated in 2000. This is not something I recommend. The movies I saw, in no particular order, were: Proof of Life, Cast Away, Vertical Limit, Dungeons and Dragons, What Women Want, Dude, Where's My Car?, Miss Congeniality, Quills, The Family Man, The Grinch, Dracula 2000, and Little Nicky. I don't honestly remember any of them, unless I have seen them again since that time. They all just pretty much run together, and all I have is a vague sense of whether or not I liked them at the time. I bring this up because, although it is nowhere near my record, I have gone to the theatre 3 times in the past 5 days and I don't remember the last time I did that. So I figured I might as well post a review of them all, especially since 2 of them were advance previews (Live Free or Die Hard and Transformers) and the other (1408) is still less than a week old. So without further ado . . .

1408
It might not be saying much, but this is without a doubt the scariest PG-13 movie I've ever seen. It just goes to show you the oddities of the MPAA ratings criteria. They are always looking for the things you can quantify (i.e. how many uses of profanity, how many total seconds of nudity, and how much blood is shown) that when you get to some ambiguous things like tone and tension they have no idea what to do. So you end up with a film like this, which is far scarier than any Nightmare on Elm Street or Friday the 13th, going out the door with a PG-13 because there's almost no swearing and not a whole lot of blood. All I know is that had I gone to the theatre to see this as a 13-year old I probably would have run out crying and slept with the covers over my head for a month. In any case, on the whole I thought this was a real solid movie; definitely in the upper tier of the Stephen King adaptations. If any of you don't know, it's about an author (Mike Enslin played by John Cusack) who makes his living staying overnight at supposedly haunted places and then writing about them. He doesn't actually believe in the supernatural and so, when one day he gets a postcard from The Dolphin Hotel in New York that says simply "Don't Go Into 1408", of course he boards the next flight there. Samuel L. Jackson does a great job in a very small part as hotel manager who tries in vain to keep Mike from going into the room. He delivers the single best line in the movie, which I won't ruin here in case anyone plans to see it. Well of course it goes without saying that once Mike gets in the room it doesn't take too long for him to change his mind about the supernatural.

The movie is divided into three distinct acts. The first part introduces us to Mike, gives us a small bit of background on him, and then gets him into the room. The second act takes place in the room, and the third act wraps things up. The first and third acts are both solid, particularly when Jackson is on the screen, but it's the second act that really sets this movie apart. I have to give the director (Mikael Hafstrom) a lot of credit for knowing just how to create an extremely intense 35 minutes of cinema. He knows exactly how far to take you before giving you the "jump scare" or letting the air out and then building it up again. This is not an easy thing to achieve, especially when you are trying to keep things PG-13 (sorry to keep harping on that). He keeps reaching the point where it's about to go over the top and become absolutely terrifying, but he always manages to recede right before the brink in a way that feels like a real relief rather than a copout to the audience. Cusack is good here, too, although this will most likely not go down as one of the roles he's widely remembered for 10 years from now. The key with him is that while his character certainly has problems, he's largely a likeable guy who is given a solid backstory that unfolds slowly throughout the movie. It makes you actually invested in his character and that's what makes it all the worse to see him endure what he goes through.

Anyway, I know I haven't given a lot of specifics, but I think it's better that way. This movie is all about tone and suspense and it does a great job with each. Easily the best horrorish movie of 2007, although considering the competition that's not saying all that much.

Live Free or Die Hard
A very popular discussion to have while tipping back a few pints is "which is the 2nd best Die Hard movie?" Everybody is unanimous that the first one is superior, but opinions are very much divided after that. I am firmly in the Die Hard: With a Vengeance camp. I thought Samuel L. Jackson brought a lot to the movie and I also thought that Jeremy Irons made a great villain. Die Hard 2, on the other hand, I just thought was pretty much the same movie as the first Die Hard, and thus seemed pretty repetitive and unnecessary. That's not to say I won't sit and watch it when I come across it while flipping channels, though. In any case, the real question is will this new Die Hard enter into the discussion as the 2nd or, dare we dream, best Die Hard movie? Um, no. At least not for me. While I still put this one above Die Hard 2, to me it is quite a bit behind Die Hard and With a Vengeance.

Again here I have to bring up the rating. This is the first Die Hard to not be released with an R. I presume that when the studio took a look at the script's action sequence requirements and corresponding budget they wanted to make sure they hit as large an audience as possible. Overall, the movie is just as violent as its predecessors, and the only real difference is that John McClane must have gotten himself a swear jar sometime during the last 12 years and learned to say things like "jerkwad" a lot more. While that doesn't necessarily take away from the movie, there are times when he's speaking to the villains and it just doesn't seem like he's saying what John McClane would really say. I guess that's probably the most general problem with this movie; somehow it just doesn't "feel" like a Die Hard movie. In fact, change the character's name and remove about 3 different lines of dialogue, and this would just be a generic Bruce Willis action movie.

OK, so that's what's "generally" wrong with it. Specifically, there is one glaring problem with this movie and that is with the villain. I won't blame the actor (Timothy Olyphant), but this character is just one of the most bland, boring bad guys to ever appear in a big budget action film. While action movies certainly aren't known for developing 3-dimensional villains too often, this is Die Hard and the ghost of Hans Gruber really bites them here. Alan Rickman gave us one of, if not THE best, action villains of all time and to see such a cookie cutter replacement just shows us how far the series has fallen. The fact that the plot centers around high tech thievery and data manipulation doesn't help matters either. There was a time when the evil villain had a brainy henchman that did the geek-speek so that the main baddy could concentrate on being cool and evil and it just doesn't have the same affect when McClane is essentially hunting down a tech support guy. One of the head henchman (actually a woman) is pretty interesting, but as soon as she gets dispatched of (about halfway through the movie) there's really no one left worth caring about and McClane might as well be shooting at stormtroopers for the rest of the film.

You know, I realize that I am really sounding overly negative about this film and I'm really not intending to. I absolutely enjoyed it and think it's a real fun film. The action sequences are way over the top, but that's a really good thing in a Die Hard film and they are done very well. Also, some kudos to the director (Len Wiseman) for opting to not use CGI; the difference really shows. He also uses some really cool tracking shots during a car chase that some other action movie directors should take notice of. So, overall, a solid although admittedly flawed film that most fans of the series will have fun with but probably not rave about. Had this actually been a generic Bruce Willis movie I probably would have been more forgiving, but that's the double edged sword for the studio. You can't have the hype around a new Die Hard film without raising the expectations.

Transformers
Last night I had the opportunity to see an advanced screening of Transformers. Not only was it free, but it was at the theatre which is only a mile away from our apartment and the theatre was only about half full so we got some great seats. With all that going for me, I should have known my luck would not hold up.

I'm searching for the right words to use here. How about this? This. Movie. Sucks. Yep, I think that about covers it. To any of you out there that are excited to see this movie, all I can say is that the other 5 people who saw it with me all enjoyed it, so I appear to be in the minority here. 20th Century Fox and Michael Bay better hope that I am. For me, the only thing this film successfully transformed was my large Cherry Coke into a gallon of piss.

I'll take the opposite approach of my last review and talk about the good things first. By and large, the transformers look good. Going live action means you are pretty much forced to use CGI, and kudos to the special FX guys for a job well done here. Also, most of the action scenes, especially the one at the end, are pretty cool. And Megan Fox is absolutely smoking hot. Every scene she's in is good just because she's in it; usually with not a lot of clothes on.

So what's wrong with the movie? Everything else. With a run-time of 2 hrs. and 20 minutes, the transformers have maybe 40 minutes of screen time. That means we get 100 minutes of not very interesting story all about the human characters. In the Transformers cartoon, humans were very minor characters. It was all about the war between the machines. Here, it is the other way around. We are forced to follow the humans, and pretty much only see the transformers when they are around the humans. What has Optimus Prime been up to before he appears more than an hour into the movie? We don't know and don't get to find out, but I bet it was a hell of a lot more interesting than the B-movie plot we're forced to sit through. I don't know whether it was a budget constraint or a creative decision to not show more of the Transformers, but the end result is some not very entertaining cinema. The other glaring problem is that (mild spolier alert) Megatron only appears for the last 25 minutes. Why they decided to have the main villain pull a disappearing act for 75% of the film is beyond me, but they did. The other problem is that even though individually the transformers look good, in a battle it's really difficult to tell them apart (with the exception of Optimus Prime). You just see a mess of metal colliding and rolling around and have no idea who you're supposed to root for, so it quickly becomes pretty boring. Finally, again with the exception of Optimus Prime, most of the transformers speak maybe 3 lines in the whole movie. Once more, the transformers are relegated to the background while the humans take front and center. Finally, and most obnoxiously, there is an approximately 25 minute subplot concerning Rachael Taylor and Anthony Anderson's characters that goes absolutely nowhere. And I'm serious; you could completely cut them out of the movie and lose nothing (other than the gratuitous minutes). In a movie that is already pushing the boundaries with its running time this is just completely unacceptable. Even the other people I saw it with that enjoyed it couldn't tell me what the point of this subplot was.

Overall I can't say I was disappointed with this movie, only because from the moment I heard Michale Bay would be directing I instantly had zero expectations of it being good. As Trey Parker and Matt Parker said in Team America "why does Michael Bay get to keep on making movies?" With the exception of The Rock, this guy has had the reverse Midas Touch on everything he has been involved with. And given that somehow his movies continue to make money despite him, I don't see things changing anytime soon.

I'm quite certain that most of you will see Transformers at some point, and some of you will probably even like it and try to convince me that it's good. I'm always open for discussion, but I will only sit down and talk to you about it if you can answer me this: why do the Transformers growl?

I Think I'm Now Officially Old

No, not because I just turned 28 or graduated or had any other life-changing event. I believe I am now officially old because of this past Friday night. This was the first weekend in a while that Christy and I had nothing really planned and so we were just going to chill out all weekend long. We ended up deciding that on Friday night we would go out for dinner and then go to Barnes and Noble because we both wanted to pick up some books to read on our Hawaii trip. Now, it's not the act of going to dinner and a bookstore on a Friday night that I think makes me old. It's the fact that I was absolutely, genuinely excited to be doing that rather than anything else. So now I am officially old.

Anyway, as tends to be the case everytime I go to a bookstore I ended up buying way more than I planned. I decided that my summer project is going to be War and Peace, so I bought that. At 1424 pages, if I finish it will become the longest book I've ever read, topping The Stand (1138 pages) and Atlas Shrugged (1096 pages). By all accounts it is a classic and I bought a newer translation that should make it easier to read, but of course anytime you are reading a book that is over 50 years old there is going to be an adjustment period while you find the author's pulse. I also decided that I wanted to get a couple more, shorter, classics to add to my library. I bought Of Mice and Men, Animal Farm, and Lord of the Flies (which I was supposed to have, but never did, read in high school). I've already finished Of Mice and Men (seeing as it's only 107 pages) and I don't have a whole lot to say about it. On one hand, I can see why it's a classic, but on the other hand there's nothing in it that absolutely blew me away. Plus it's Steinbeck, so you know it's going to be depressing as hell going in. I also picked up American Gods, by Neil Gaiman. I'm not sure how exactly it caught my eye but I just picked it up and started reading it in the cafe area and couldn't put it down. I'm now on page 102 and it keeps getting better. I had intended to go back to the Einstein bio after this weekend but I guess that'll just have to wait. Finally, I picked up two non-fiction books. One is called The Philosopher's Handbook and is just a collection of western philosophy writings pretty much from Socrates through Nietzche. I've always enjoyed philosophy but don't have the time to read 50 different books to get a well-rounded education in the subject, so it's nice to have them all compiled in one place so I can at least get a taste of them. The other book I bought is a zen book called Not Always So. It is a collection of speeches given by Zen master Suzuki (who died in the 70s). I have his other book (Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind) and really enjoyed that, so thought I'd pick this one up since I have been looking to get back into Zen and Buddhism. On a related note, I decided to take an introductory meditation course at the Buddhist temple up in Lakeview. It's 5 Tuesdays for an hour and a half each week and starts July 17th, right after we get back from Hawaii. I'm excited to do it; it's something I've been meaning to do for a long time.

In other news, I was very happy to see a story on yahoo news this morning. A while ago, I posted about some insane judge that was suing a dry cleaners for $54 million for temporarily losing his pants. Well, the case was finally resolved today in favor of the dry cleaners (http://tinyurl.com/ywmc8v), so at least some form of common sense prevailed in the end. The judge has also been ordered to pay their court costs, although the matter of their legal fees is still being decided.

On the marathon front, I got off to a rough start at the beginning of last week. On Tuesday night at 9:40 I was all set to head out and do my 4 miles, when I suddenly remembered that the fitness center was now operating under summer hours and closed at 10. In theory I could have just done my running outside but, well, I didn't. I did end up rebounding nicely, though, by running 5 miles on Thursday (1 hour); 4 miles on Saturday (46:30), and 6 miles yesterday (71:57) for a total of 15 for the week. I realized after I ran yesterday that it was the first time in my life I have ever run 6 miles without stopping. I have actually run 10ks before, and run them faster than 72 minutes, but it was always a combo of running and walking. This week I have pretty much the same routine to look forward to, except I have a 7-miler on Sunday. It's starting to get serious now. If I can eventualy get up to doing 10 miles at a 12 minute mile pace without stopping, I'll be really happy.

Christy and I are going to Second City this Thursday night, and then the Cubs game on Friday afternoon. At present I'm excited about both of them, but of course my excitement for the Cubs always hinges on how they do the preceding day.

Quick Update

Not a lot to say today. Trying to run the clock out on my last few hours of work before I take off for a 4-day weekend. I'm definitely looking forward to it, but won't get much chance for relaxation, except for tonight. Christy and I are going to Smith and Wollensky for dinner tonight to celebrate her being done with teaching. I've never been there but I hear it's one of the best steakhouses around and it's right on the Chicago river. Of course, with this being sandwiched in between going out for my birthday last Sunday (at another great steakhouse, the Chicago Chophouse) and my graduation this Sunday we certainly are doing a lot of celebrating lately. Not that that's a bad thing (unless you're speaking in terms of a hit to our bank account). In any case, we're planning to see Ocean's 13 after that. I hated Ocean's 12 so I am not expecting all that much, but hopefully it is at least entertaining. The rest of the weekend is going to be tied up with family and graduation-related activities, so I'm sure it will pass by in a blur. I'm glad I have Monday off so I can just lay on the couch all day and recover.

On the marathon front, my "official" training schedule is about to begin next week. To kind of kickstart it, I actually decided that I would go ahead and do week 1 this week (and then repeat it next week) as sort of a practice week. Tuesday I ran 4 miles on the treadmill in 47 minutes, and then this morning (thanks to the aforementioned dinner plans) I got up at 6:00 and did an hour run on the treadmill (going about 5.1 miles). I can't even believe I have already been up for 11 hours. Hopefully I don't fall asleep during the movie, but a big meal is certainly not going to help me out in that capacity. I'm supposed to run 4 miles on Saturday and then 6 on Sunday. While I can probably make time on Saturday I see absolutely no chance that Sunday is going to happen. Good thing this is only practice!

I saw Pirates of the Caribbean and Knocked Up last week. Knocked Up was pretty good; nothing fantastic, but a solidly made romantic comedy. It's one of those rare movies you can go to on a date where one person isn't dreading the experience. Pirates was very mediocre. The name of the sequel is "At World's End" but I think a more appropriate title would have been "Let's Make a Deal." Pretty much the entirety of the first two hours has 2 of the 6 or 7 major characters (in seemingly random order) making deals with each other that everyone knows they're not going to keep, then predictably breaking the deal and making a new one with the next character while saying "I never break a deal." When it finally does get around to the action sequences, they are pretty good. Instead of the 3-way swordfight (does that sound gay?) on top of a rolling wheel (the single coolest part of the second one, IMO) we get a 30-minute duel between two ships as they are being sucked into a whirlpool (also called, as I learned from the film, a maelstrom). I heard some people didn't care for it, but it worked for me. It was the 2 hours I had to put up with en route to that which lowered my enjoyment. I mean, when did Hollywood decide that their "fun" summer movies all had to be over 2 and a half hours long. I understand wanting to give people their money's worth, but there is also such a thing as addition by subtraction. That's what you pay the gentleman at the studio with the scissors for.

I am excited to see 1408 next weekend. I love John Cusack, Samuel L Jackson, Stephen King, and horror/mysteries so it seems like it should be a can't miss. Of course, Stephen King adaptations always turn out be either excellent (The Green Mile, Shawshank Redemption, and The Shining for example) or abysmal (Dreamcatcher, The Dark Half, and Needful Things come to mind). Let's hope this one is closer to the former than the latter.

I am currently reading the new bio on Albert Einstein (Einstein: His Life and Universe) and so far it is very engaging. I'll probably end up posting a full review of it once I finish, as I can't imagine I'll have anything more interesting to talk about.

Still waiting for my "official" grades to come in on my last two classes. Hope I really am graduating this weekend.

Done!

I’ll say right up front that this is an introspective post. That’s the more sophisticated way of saying “I’m about to embark on an ego trip and just talk about me.” You’ve been warned.

Some afternoon in early 2005 as we were in the midst of wedding planning madness, Christy and I found ourselves just generally discussing how we saw our future over the next couple years after the wedding. The subject of my MBA came up. “Let’s be honest,” she said, “you’ve pretty much given up on it, haven’t you?” I couldn’t disagree with her. It had been over a year since I’d taken a class towards my MBA, and I’d taken a whopping 2 in the year before that. An average of 1 class per year wasn’t gonna cut it, unless I was able to talk Depaul into putting me on the 15-year plan. I had registered for classes a couple times in the interim, but my travel schedule at work kept forcing me to drop. That situation didn’t seem likely to improve anytime soon either. Reluctantly, I conceded, “Yeah, I pretty much have.”

Now, a little over 2 years later, much has changed. Last night, barring some sort of catastrophic performance on my final, my just-shy-of-6-years' campaign to get a masters degree came to a successful conclusion.

So what changed between then and now? Well, a whole lot of things but it can probably best be summed up in one word: Hawaii. I’m sure most of you have been subjected to the ramblings from Christy and I that it is our dream to temporarily relocate to Hawaii for a few years. Whether or not that actually happens (and the odds seem to change from month to month and sometimes day to day) it is undoubtedly true that Hawaii has had a major impact on our lives. Not only did we get the vacation of a lifetime and the memories of that, but the idea of moving there led me to think seriously about what the best way to accomplish that would be. Since my work experience is in auditing, that seemed to be the only realistic way I could make enough money to support an existence in Hawaii. Getting an auditing job in Hawaii meant working for one of the Big Four accounting firms. Getting in there meant getting my CPA. Getting my CPA meant taking more accounting classes. Taking more accounting classes meant I might as well finish my MBA. But that’s just half the domino effect that occurred over the 6 months after our honeymoon. I quickly realized that taking classes was still not going to be feasible given the workload at my current job. So that led me to look elsewhere and eventually landed me at Blue Cross Blue Shield. And once I was working downtown, we figured that we might as well live there as well, so that led to us relocating from Palatine into the city. I sometimes think about all of this and wonder, “would any of this have happened if we had decided to take our honeymoon in the Caribbean instead?” Just goes to show you that you don’t always know when you are making a decision that will have a huge impact on your life.

I still remember walking from BCBS over to the Depaul loop campus on a Monday night last March. It was my first time attending class in almost 2 years. I had already done the math and knew I needed 8 classes to graduate. At 11 meetings per class, that meant 88 occasions that I would have to go directly from work over to class. At 3 hours per class, that meant 264 hours of trying to stay awake through lectures. I haven’t kept a running total throughout, but I have recalculated after pretty much every quarter. This last quarter I had a big red number written on every class day counting down to “1”. It felt awesome to cross that last one off when I walked into work this morning. I am happy to report that out of those 88 classes, I missed only 2. They were both for the same class too; once because it was the day after the Super Bowl, and once because we had just flown in from Phoenix 2 hours before class started. That means that I had perfect attendance in 7 of my last 8 classes. In the entirety of my undergrad, I had exactly 1 class with perfect attendance. While my grades this quarter are still pending, so far I have gotten all A’s in the first 6 classes and I’m hopeful that trend will continue with these last two. If it does, I will be graduating with a 3.79 GPA. Hey, I warned you that this was gonna be an ego trip didn’t I? As some comedy, I was looking through a grade report the other day. The worst grade I received in grad school was a B- in the one and only finance class I took. The humorous part is that my bachelor degree is in Finance. Whoops!

So how does it feel to be done? Well, since I spent pretty much all of my free time Monday, Tuesday, and early Wednesday studying and then stayed up till 2 last night celebrating, right now it just feels tired. As I have found to be the case with most long-term things, it takes a while to sink in once it's finally over so I know the full force hasn't really hit me yet. I do know that overall I am more proud of getting this degree than my undergrad. Not because I think it's more prestigious or anything, but because I feel like I worked harder, learned more, and really truly earned this one. Then there's also just the fact of how much longer it took me to complete this. All told, I was only at U of I for 3 years and 4 months while my time at Depaul stretched from 9/01 - 6/07. So, basically, it took me 2 and a half years longer. But probably the biggest part of it is this overriding feeling that this degree was all for me. Certainly, the undergrad was "for me" as well, but there was a certain element where it just felt like it was the next step after high school rather than a conscious decision I was making about my future. But deciding to go to grad school was completely my decision; there were no expectations for me to do it and no pressure to keep going once I started other than the pressure I put on myself. It feels really gratifying to have set a long-term goal for myself and achieved it on my own (with the exception of some monetary assistance from Kemper, HSBC, and BCBS).

So now I am done and left wondering, “OK, what next?” Well, I am looking no further than 29 days from now when Christy and I are heading back to Hawaii for 8 days. Beyond that, I’ll worry about the rest in September.

Here the ego trip ends.

Obligatory "I Haven't Posted in 2 Weeks" Post

So I don't have an awful lot to say but feel an obligation to add something after two weeks of silence. Maybe the curse of writing about Paris Hilton has given me writer's block. But probably it's just that I've had my hands full with school and work and haven't had much of interest to say. I have class all day tomorrow and then one more lecture on Wednesday and then final the following Wednesday and that will do it. Can't wait to get to June 6th so I can celebrate, but there's still a fair amount of work to be done till then.

This weekend is crammed full of sibling-tastic action! My older brother Mike is in town and Christy and I will be showing him, his wife, and my four nieces and nephews around the city after class on Saturday. Then they are all crashing at our place. Yep, there will be a total of 8 people sleeping in our one bedroom apartment (cue circus clown music). Then on Sunday we are off to my Dad's for my other brother Joe's (aka Mooney) college graduation party. Having a younger sibling graduate from college really makes me feel old. At least I'm staying a degree ahead of him though. Then on Monday we are heading out to Christy's P's place for her brother Mike's birthday. Things don't slow down after the weekend, though. Tuesday night I'm going to the Cubs game and then Wednesday night I have class. Of course, right after that I will need to start studying for my final. Well, I guess the good news is that the next couple weeks should fly by. In other words, don't be surprised if there's another conspicuous absence of posts for a while.

I ran in the Chase Corporate Challenge last night. 3 and a half miles through the streets around Grant Park. In the words of my dad, "it's a crap race." It's just not very well organized and it's such a cluster, since you have serious runners, non-serious runners, and walkers all mixed in and starting at the same time. For the first 2 miles there's no sense of pacing; you alternate between running as fast as you can whenever you can and being bunched up in a huge pack of people at a walking pace. Nevertheless, I was pretty happy with my time (37:32); especially considering that it took me at least a minute and a half to cross the starting line so my real time was probably closer to 36:00. This was the first (and by far the easiest) of my 3 "warm-up" races. The next one is a 10-miler in late July; then the half-marathon in mid-August. I'll get a much better sense for how realistic running the marathon is after those.

I did have some time to finish a couple quick reads that I can heartily recommend for anyone looking for something they can get through on a plane ride or a weekend at the beach. First I read Lewis Black's book "Nothing Sacred" and it's a lot different than you'd expect (if you are familiar with his stand-up). While he certainly mixes-in some of his material it's mainly a bio and he's a lot more of a softy than you'd ever expect from listening to his rants. He's pretty much the epitomy of the "all bark with no bite" type of personality, and I don't mean that as a negative at all. Overall, there's nothing phenomenal about the book, but he's lived a pretty interesting life in a pretty interesting time and he's presented it in a very cohesive, fluid, humorouos way.

The other book I read was Bob Harris' "Prisoner of Trebekistan." It's about his experiences on Jeopardy! but is much more interesting than that probably makes it sound. There's a lot of info about the behind-the-scenes stuff (some psyching out but mainly more of a Mensa-type fraternity of really smart people) and also gives some insight into what Alex Trebek is really like (a really nice guy who is unfailingly professional). Finally, he also gives some good tips on how to memorize long lists of things in an easy way and make it stick. After reading the book I used his ideas and memorized all the U.S. Presidents in order (you can quiz me next time you see me) and it only took me about an hour. I also have learned all the South American, African, and Asian countries, though I don't know exactly where they all are on the map yet. I might tackle the Vice Presidents or all the country capitals next. Useless knowledge is fun! Anyway, pretty much the same things that applied to the Lewis Black book apply here, though I have to say that this is a better book. Though it gets a little preachy about some things at times, to me it never went over the top, and there is humor throughout. In fact, a couple of the jokes he sets up and pays off so beautifully I literally had to put the book down because I was laughing so hard. But then again, I'm a huge dork.

Have a good Memorial Day everyone!

Delusional

de·lu·sion

1. an act or instance of deluding.
2. the state of being deluded.
3. a false belief or opinion: delusions of grandeur.
4. Psychiatry. a fixed false belief that is resistant to reason or confrontation with actual fact: a paranoid delusion.

This week I’ll return to some lighthearted fare. I read two stories this past week that caught my eye, both of which I view with a certain amount of contempt and left me shaking my head after I read them. However, while I have no problem lampooning one, I am borderline ashamed to even discuss the other. First, a man is suing a husband & wife-owned dry-cleaning service for losing a pair of pants. He wants $65 million for his troubles. Second, Paris Hilton is (hopefully) going to jail. Use your intuition to figure out which one I’m ashamed to bring up. I wasn’t planning to make this definition intro a recurring theme (and still am not), but I was unable to read either of these stories without hearing the word “delusional” over and over again in my head. I didn’t mind, though. Frankly, it was a nice break from the voice that’s always telling me to start fires.

First things first. You can read all about the absurdity of the man suing over a $65 million dollar pair of pants here: http://tinyurl.com/2p97gy. Now I know that there are an enormous amount of frivolous lawsuits filed every day in this country, but there are a few things that make this situation unique. The main one is that the man who is suing is himself a judge. That means that someone whose main job requirement is to know the law and remain fair and impartial has determined that his is a reasonable action. The other astounding thing is that this case has been going on for two years; it wasn’t simply reviewed once and tossed out immediately, as most reasonable people would think would happen.

To summarize for those that don’t feel like reading it, in 2005 this judge brought in a pair of pants to have alterations done. When he came back two days later, they told him they had misplaced his pants. They eventually found them, two days later, but then the judge claimed that those weren’t his pants, even though they matched his measurements and the ticket numbers. So since then he has been pressing this suit, and perhaps the only thing more ridiculous than his actions is the creativity that has been involved in coming up with the figure of $65 million. Since he doesn’t want to go back to that dry cleaners anymore, he believes he is entitled to the cost of renting a car every weekend for 10 years to go to another dry cleaners. While that in itself seems pretty ridiculous, that only comes to a paltry $15,000. The bulk of the rest comes from his allegation that the cleaners have been in violation of 12 consumer protection laws (doesn’t specify which ones) since they opened (1200 days ago) and at $1500 per violation, per day, per defendant (3) that comes to a cool $64.8 million. I will repeat: This man is an active judge! There are people that come before him in court every day and he decides their punishment. Think you have any chance of talking your way out of a speeding ticket in this guy’s court? Hardly. You’d probably be lucky if he didn’t give you the death penalty along with all your blood relatives and anyone you’ve ever spoken more than 15 words to, just to make an example out of you.

Listen, I understand how the legal system works. Really, I do. I understand the concept of punitive damages that are designed to go above and beyond the actual harm caused to serve as a deterrent. But following the letter of the law shouldn’t mean that we abandon common sense. For those having trouble deciphering where the line is in this case, let me just offer this guideline: when you are making the woman who sued McDonald’s for $3 million after spilling hot coffee on herself look reasonable, you have gone too far.

Now we come to Paris, and I know that there is way too much said about her already. I know that giving this attention, even in a derogatory way, is still giving attention to something that doesn’t deserve it. I further know that there are approximately 9.7 billion topics (I counted) that are more worthy of discussion than this one. I know all of this. And yet I can’t help myself. Not after I read the petition. It’s just too damn funny, and I have to say something about it. For those of you that haven’t heard (and if you haven’t please let me know, as I wish to emulate your life in every possible way) Ms. Paris Hilton has recently been sentenced to 45 days in jail in connection with a probation violation stemming from her DUI arrest last year. As part of the original deal, her license was suspended through March of this year. Yet she was pulled over on January 15th; she was actually let go by the police after signing a document specifying that she had a suspended license and was not to drive. A month later, she was pulled over again and this time was charged with violating probation.

All that’s just the set-up. Here are the punchlines (and there are a lot of them). At her hearing, her first defense is that her publicist misinformed her by telling her that her license was only suspended for 30 days. I guess in the fantasy world of Hollywoodland, “My publicist didn’t tell me” is a valid, legally admissible defense. It may shock Ms. Hilton to know that there are actually people that exist in the world who manage to know the details of their life (or at least the important ones) even when their publicist doesn’t tell them what they are. And I would think that if you had an IQ that was just slightly higher than your shoe size, after getting out of court the first time a little voice would sound in your head that would say “You just got probation. First, go look that word up. Then, figure out what it means you have to do and not do.” I would further think that you might be better served having someone besides your publicist explain it to you. Like, say, maybe the gentleman with the law degree that you sit next to in the court room and pay all this money to. Her second defense is that when she was stopped in January, informed that she was driving on a suspended license, and forced to sign a sheet saying as much, she “thought the officer was mistaken” and “didn’t really read the document.” So, again, when there is a discrepancy between what the nice gentleman with the uniform and the gun tells you and what you remember your publicist saying, the infallibility of the publicist wins out. I believe, in legalese, this is known as the “It’s Really a Miracle I Can Even Dress Myself” defense. Astoundingly, the judge at the hearing decides this ironclad defense is somehow lacking, and sentences her to 45 days in jail.

Clearly, this is a travesty of justice. And whenever famous people feel slighted, thousands of people living a vicarious existence with far too much time on their hands are going to circulate a petition. And it was after reading this petition to Gov. Schwarzenegger (it still cracks me up to say or write that) that I felt compelled to write this, because it is a document that is so filled with non-reality that the word “delusional” just falls short. There frankly isn’t a word that I know of to describe it. To come close, just stare vacantly into space and start convulsing and drooling on yourself while making a series of increasingly louder clucking noises (extra points for you if you do this while at work).

You can read the whole petition here: http://tinyurl.com/27jshj. Here are just a few of my favorite lines. “She (Paris) provides beauty and excitement to (most of) our otherwise mundane lives.” Yes, where would we all be without Paris Hilton? I believe that most of the problems in Iraq stem from the fact that their cable provider doesn’t broadcast The Simple Life. “In addition to her work as an actress, she has achieved some recognition as a model, celebrity spokesperson, singer, and writer.” And I have received some recognition as a singer, writer, auditor, student, wandering minstrel, and shirtless drunk guy. Not a lot, mind you, but some. “We, the American public who support Paris, are shocked, dismayed and appalled by how Paris has been the person to be used as an example that Drunk Driving is wrong.” Yeah! It is absolutely appalling to dole out punishment for driving drunk. And anyway, clearly someone poor, ugly, and with a mustache and a wife-beater tee should be the one to be made an example of. Also, contrary to popular belief drunk driving is in fact not a proper noun and doesn't require capitalization. Might want to have someone in 4th grade give your petition a quick read through before you send it on to the governor. “Brandy's California Highway accident, although no proof of DUI was evidenced in her accident, resulting in the death of a young wife and mother in California, yet Brandy walks free as of today, never doing any time and A WOMAN HAS BEEN KILLED most likely due to her reckless driving!” And just a few weeks ago, a woman in Chicago filed a lawsuit against her partner for “negligent dancing.” I mean, as long as we’re bringing up legal precedents that have nothing to do with the current case, I just thought I’d share that. This last one’s my favorite, though. “If the late Former President Gerald Ford could find it in his heart to pardon the late Former President Richard Nixon after his mistake(s), we undeniably support Paris Hilton being pardoned for her honest mistake as well.” See, Gov. Schwarzenegger, play your cards right and you just might up the next Gerald Ford! And furthermore, I can think of no better way to solicit sympathy from the public and elected officials than to compare yourself to Richard Nixon.

Ambivalence

am·biv·a·lence – noun

1. uncertainty or fluctuation, esp. when caused by inability to make a choice or by a simultaneous desire to say or do two opposite or conflicting things.
2. Psychology. the coexistence within an individual of positive and negative feelings toward the same person, object, or action, simultaneously drawing him or her in opposite directions.

Well, I’ll just say right off the bat that this will be the first serious piece I’ve written in a while, as it is about the Virginia Tech shooting. Those of you who feel like you’ve heard more than enough about this incident over the past 2 weeks are certainly forgiven for not wanting to read this. Just wanted to get that out of the way.

Whenever something like this happens, the question everyone wants answered is “why?” That’s certainly not an easy thing to answer; pretty much by definition anyone who decides to go on a killing spree is operating with a mind that, to say the least, is not functioning like a “normal” person’s. Thus, any attempt to dissect and follow his train of thought logically is bound to be frustrating and probably fruitless. Of course, that doesn’t stop us from trying. One of the things that separates this from a lot of the other school and workplace shootings in recent years is that this time you didn’t hear a lot of “he seemed so normal; we never expected this.” Instead, you hear a lot of “there was something really strange and mean about him. He didn’t talk to anyone and wouldn’t look you in the eye.” So it seems like, although we’ll never know exactly why he did this, people that knew him seemed to be able to identify that if there was someone that was going to do something like this, he’d be a good candidate.

I started off with the definition of ambivalence because that’s the word that keeps coming back to me the more I think about it. Here was a guy who obviously had a lot of anger towards the social order of this country, particularly the clicks and structure inherent in the education system. It seemed like he wanted to make a statement about how the world had rejected him, so he wanted to do something to reject the world right back. He seemed particularly upset about “rich kids” who he seemed to think got an easy path through life and used that to either hold him down (and/or ignore him) or pursue meaningless diversions and excess. From that description, you can put him in the same category as Ted Kaczynski, who basically sought to rid the world of people he basically thought of as parasites. But there’s something really interesting about the way this guy chose to carry out this act that says a lot about him. Ted Kaczynski wanted to get his message across, but he also wanted to be anonymous. He didn’t want to get caught. This guy, on the other hand, went out of his way to make sure everybody knew who he was; sending photos and videos of himself to NBC a few days before the rampage. That’s what I find so interesting. Someone that hated “the system” so much made damn sure that he used “the system” to let everyone know who he was. It’s almost as if, after seemingly rejecting society his whole life, he ultimately felt the need to be validated by it, and this incredibly dysfunctional and destructive way was the only way he knew how. He was someone who was constantly screaming out for attention and then pushing away anyone that gave it to him. That’s ambivalence.

That’s why it was so disappointing to me that the news media seemed to play right into his hand by broadcasting the video footage and plastering images of him brandishing guns on the front page of newspapers. I have to think that is exactly what he was envisioning as he played it out in his head in the preceding days and months. The defense of the news media has been that it was news, and they have a duty to report it. I find that to be a cop-out and a far overly-simplistic view of the world. The news media censors out “news” all the time. After all, they didn’t feel the need to show close-ups of the victim’s bodies; nor do we get to see graphic depictions of soldiers cut down in the line of duty on a daily basis. I certainly am not arguing that the omission of these images is wrong; I’m just trying to point out the inequities here. It is my belief that you actually don’t need images at all to report “the news”. News should be an unbiased and indisputable record of the events that occurred (or at least as near to indisputable as you can get). Humans are visual learners and thus images are very valuable and should be used when they are appropriate. So if we agree that although it is not right to censor the reporting of a news item, it IS appropriate to censor (by omission) images associated with that news item, that turns the argument from the news media on its head. You can’t get away with simply saying, “this was part of the news story, so we reported it.” Instead, the charge to be addressed is “this was actually tangential to the story, and you chose to show it; why did you make that choice?”

I will have to admit a certain amount of personal bias here, as I currently have 2 brothers in undergrad and I myself currently attend classes 2 days per week. I make a point of all this, of course, because I am greatly concerned about copycat attempts. This country has long held a policy of not negotiating with terrorists, because we recognize that as soon as you do you open the floodgates to more, not less, terrorist activity. Well, I think we negotiated here, and our response is going to lead to more, not less, of this kind of destructive behavior. One of the pundits I watched over the last few weeks (might have been Bill Maher, but I don’t remember) made the point that when we are watching a baseball game on TV and a fan runs onto the field, they don’t show him because they know it would just encourage more fans to do it. I think it’s obvious to everyone that this is the correct course of action. Someone seeking attention in an inappropriate way should not be placated. But it seems that when the stakes get raised, we lose that perspective. It may seem an odd place for it, but this reminds me of a joke by the great comedian Eddie Izzard:

“You know, we think if somebody kills someone, that's murder, you go to prison. You kill 10 people, you go to Texas, they hit you with a brick, that's what they do. 20 people, you go to a hospital, they look through a small window at you forever. And over that, we can't deal with it, you know? Someone's killed 100,000 people, we're almost going, "Well done! You killed 100,000 people? You must get up very early in the morning. I can't even get down to the gym!”

Our current society is rife with examples of where just when one of our core principles should apply most, it seems to apply the least. You have a right to privacy . . . until the government worries you might be a security risk. You have a right to free speech . . .until you say something a lot of people don’t like. There is no draft . . . until we need one. I don’t want to belabor the point; and the preceding sentences could each be the subject of a 10 page essay themselves. I’m just saying that we seem to pretty much all agree on a lot of things on the micro level, but somehow it gets all cloudy when we get to the macro. That's also ambivalence.