Alternadad

I don't remember who it was who recently recommended Alternadad to me (was it you, Marc?) Someone said they thought I'd like it, and I did. It wasn't what I expected - the parenting of Neal Pollack and his wife is actually pretty mainstream - but his writing style makes this a fun read. Basically, it's the story of a guy trying to maintain a sense of cool while being faced with the terminal uncoolness of parenthood. Yes, he sells out in degrees, like we all do, but it sure is a blast to read about.

Book 27

Marathon de Mayo

This Sunday in Reno was a pretty cool event; the Marathon de Mayo. It's cool in that it starts (and ends) right downtown, under the Reno Arch, and goes on city streets that I drive on all the time. In fact, the race course passes right by the house that Nathan and Sarah are remodeling right now - I saw Nathan's truck on the way by, but didn't see him. Anyway, I did the half marathon - 13.1 miles. I did this same race last year, and didn't train very much for it - I think I ran three miles twice the week before the race. I think my time was in the 2 hours 15-20 minute range - I had been trying to break 2 hours, but didn't make it. I'm in much better shape this year, and decided to just try to break two hours again, and see how things went. Well, the course didn't have a lot of mile markers, so I could only tell that I was on 8 minute mile pace up through mile 5. The second half of the race was overall downhill, though, and I ended up finishing in 1:39 - almost 7:30 mile pace, and I knocked a half an hour off last year's time! Ended up 35th overall, and 7th in my age division (30-34). Pretty happy with the way that turned out...

Wasn't so happy with the race organization - the race started and hour and 20 minutes late, due to some problems with getting the streets closed. Last year it started 30 minutes late, for similar reasons. It's really frustrating to have planned your nutrition, sleep schedule, clothes and gear all around a specific start time, just to have to stand around in the cold waiting for someone to get their act together. And 2000 people in that same situation is even worse... I think I'll do this race again next year, but if it happens again, I'm done with it.

And I wrote a letter to the editor of the Reno Gazette Journal regarding the late start - take a look.

Talking to Grandma Gail

Talking to Grandma Gail
Originally uploaded by turi_b.

Haven't been doing much in the way of simple photo posts lately, but this was just too cute to pass up. Sofia wanted to call Grandma Gail this morning, to make sure they made it home OK last night (Drove all the way from Reno-Vancouver yesterday.) As soon as she got on the phone, cute mode came on. Had to take some pics...

Boomsday

I try not to miss any of Christopher Buckley's books - although I don't consider myself terribly political, his books strike the perfect balance of politics and humor. His newest, Boomsday, again does it perfectly. The title refers to a day when the younger generations rebel against the Baby Boomers who are sucking up Social Security resources. It's a very funny book - Buckley has a talent for writing insanely kooky scenarios that sound suspiciously plausible. Lots. Of. Fun.

Book 26

Good Omens

This was a reread, one of my gym books - Good Omens, by two of my favorite authors - Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. This has been one of my favorite books ever since Mich recommended it - I grabbed it as a last-minute substitute when I couldn't find our copy of something else I was looking for. In brief: It's the story of a hilariously botched Armageddon, with a misplaced Antichrist, an Angel and Demon who would rather work together, and a 400 year old prophetess and her descendants. Pratchett and Gaiman work well together here, and the best phrase I can use to describe this book is relentlessly funny. I laughed (or at least smiled) about every other page. And that on approximately my 5th reading of it...

Book 25

Children of Hurin

Well, if it escaped anyone's attention, there is a "new" Tolkien work out, Children of Hurin, and of course, I had to read it. It was compiled by Tolkien's son, Christopher, from partially finished material. I have read a few of Christopher Tolkien's Histories of Middle Earth, at least the ones that dealt with the writing of the Lord of the Rings books. He's obviously the person to do something like this, he's spent his life immersed in his father's work to an astonishing degree.

So the story line of this work was already partially told in the Silmarillion, and told in much greater depth here. (Been a while since I read the Silmarillion, too...) That said, this sure is a downer. I'd warn about spoilers here, but I can't imagine more than two people I know reading this anyway, so I'll go ahead. This reads really like a historic epic or Shakespearean tragedy - fathers going off to war, people killing their best friends accidentally in the dark, mistaken identities leading to incest, and suicide. Anyway - wouldn't recommend this to anyone other than Mich. I doubt Ashley reads this (might have to send it to him) but he's probably already read it anyway...

Book 24

Court

Had my day in court today. Actually, it wasn't MY day, and I didn't actually make it to court. This concerned the hit and run I witnessed back in January, while I was out for a run. Unfortunately, I didn't witness quite enough - because I was directly behind the SUV that did the hitting and running, I didn't get a good look at the driver - only the back of his head. Enough to tell that he was an older white male, but not enough to positively identify him. Apparently that made my testimony useless, and after sitting around in the hallway for a couple of hours, I was told I could leave. I should get a check for $26 in a couple of weeks, though - woo hoo! Plus I got some good reading done - started an older John McPhee book on Alaska.