Last day at work

What we call the beginning is often the end
And to make and end is to make a beginning.
The end is where we start from. And every phrase
And sentence that is right (where every word is at home,
Taking its place to support the others,
The word neither diffident nor ostentatious,
An easy commerce of the old and the new,
The common word exact without vulgarity,
The formal word precise but not pedantic,
The complete consort dancing together)
Every phrase and every sentence is an end and a beginning,
Every poem an epitaph. And any action
Is a step to the block, to the fire, down the sea's throat
Or to an illegible stone: and that is where we start.

-T.S. Eliot, "Little Gidding"

Very strange to try to clean out the office today. Not everything is finished and tied off; little ends are sticking out everywhere. But it's time to go.

And lordy, T.S. Eliot rocks.

W-w-w-wimped out

I could have gotten out of bed this morning and gone a-racin' cyclocross.

I was tired and the weather really, really sucked--though it could have improved.

I slept in, rose refreshed, and the weather never got better.

I am happy with my decision. Cyclocross season is now over.

--

Went up to SF to see a friend yesterday, spent a few hours trotting around from Market to the Marina. 'Twas a beautiful day for it, all the more so since Friday and today have ended up being downpourful. The rain had washed all the dust and haze and fog out of the sky, so you could see all the distant edges of the Bay.



--

Four more days of work, then back to Canada on Friday for paperwork reasons.

Another New York whack job

Saw I Am Legend a couple weeks ago.


Saw Cloverfield this past weekend.


What is it with filmmakers needing to (virtually) beat the #$%& out of Manhattan these days?

Hm, though I guess it's simply a continuing tradition. There was The Day After Tomorrow, Godzilla, Independence Day, Escape from New York...and the godfather of the monster movies, King Kong. Probably the only city to have taken as much cinematic abuse is Tokyo courtesy of Godzilla & Co.

London and Paris have just as many icons but they don't seem to get crushed nearly as often. San Francisco got a bit of a thrashing in X-Men 3.

I guess a film about Los Gatos, or Santa Cruz, or even San Jose getting whacked would have fairly narrow appeal.

Yup, change is a-comin'

So: I accepted a darn good job offer from a start-up in Berkeley, which will be a big change from working for GlobeCo in south San Jose in so many ways. Not quite as many as if I were moving to the Maldives, OK, but still, change. Change. CHANGE!

I don't know Berkeley terribly well: e.g. plunked down at Shattuck and University, I'd have no idea where to go to get groceries. But I won't be moving up there until after I start working, which won't happen until after I get a work visa, which won't happen until I get my passport renewed, which won't happen until I go back to Canada Feb. 1 or so...assuming ticket prices have not radically changed (!) since I last checked. For the interim working-but-not-yet-moved period, I'm really looking forward to those Los Gatos-Berkeley commutes on Hwy 880 (a.k.a. where hours and day of your life go to die).

Oddly enough, I'm still motivated to get something done at Old Job, but the time constraint has me thinking and experimenting a bit frantically. It'd probably be best to trim the to-do list down considerably at this stage to make sure a few things get done, as opposed to getting a lot of things not done.

Oh yeah: bike race this morning. Gooey, play-doh-like mud (Carr index #3) in places.* And I have no fitness. Didn't sleep in quite enough to sabotage any chance of racing, but it was enough to guarantee that there was no chance for me to warm up or pre-ride the course.** The small B field took off in front of me and I plugged along behind, which worked out well enough for me to pass a few mechanicals and outgassed riders--5.5 long laps later it was done, and I was 7/11 (+2 DNFs).

*I can plow through mud, oddly enough. Is it my size? Bike position? Big glutes? You tell me. Oh, and the pedals with their advertised "open body [that] sheds mud easily and yields easy cleat entry and exit in all types of riding conditions"? Not in mud #3. I don't know if any pedals were working well today, mind you.

**Cyclocross is a completely different beast when you do not have a chance to pre-ride a course and have no idea what's at the bottom of the hill, around the corner, under the mud, etc. It would be interesting (though impractical and unlikely) for a promoter to somehow enforce a "no pre-ride" event simply to see who can learn the fastest on the fly...or is that like MTB?

Maybe I should write something

Lacking rantable or ravable material:

1) Raced 'cross this morning after not riding a bike for three weeks. My body did not respond well to the shock therapy of reactivating, so no spectacular result (though I was v. pleased to not crash). The 1.5 hour après-ride through the trails of Fort Ord w/ the Fantastic Four was probably closer to what I should be doing.

2) My Xmas break was pretty inert: good to see the fam, but I should've coaxed myself out into winter wonderland (see the Flickr pics in the sidebar) a bit more. And the hassle of travelling over the holidays really makes me wonder if it's worth it. I should pick another tropical destination for next year and visit the parents on Jan. 25.

3) My most recent man-on-the-street-discovers-pop-culture find: muffintop, when the pants are too tight and the Christmas belly fat rolls over the edge. It's just so spot-on.

4) In a strictly financial sense, I got a shiny new radiator for Christmas. Not a stupendous present, but reassuring.

5) A better present: a job offer! Change may be a-comin'.

Heading: North

Time to check out for a week.

Here's the forecast for where I'm headed:

...which may imply shoveling.

Happy holidays, readers...

Reportage

The short, punchy version:

Men's B race: crappy. Singlespeed A race: happy.

Gory details:

Got one practice lap in for the CCCX #6 Men's B race at the Fort Ord day camp, then off we went at 10am. I found myself mixing it up with Dave P. and others like last week, a good sign. However, I found some aggro passing maneouvres from the 35+B leaders coming up from behind a tad offputting and I got gapped from my group, and then the real fun started when my chain started sucking and wedging into the spaces between my frame, crank, and chainrings, causing major delay. A soft slideout on a sharp right turn and a stupid encounter with a pole that resulted in complete dismount didn't help either. I ended up softpedaling through my sporadic and persistent mechanical difficulties, having dark thoughts of "If I can't enjoy this, does that mean I never have any fun?", and got lapped by the end. Bah, humbug! In after-race cleanup this evening, I found that a couple of links in my chain are now twisted--that takes some serious torque. I hope there's a new chain in my Xmas stocking this year...

It sucked, but I had plenty left in my legs and decided to stay for the singlespeed race. The in-between time was good, with a couple sandwiches for refueling, chatting with the friendly folks and their friendly dogs, and good racing to watch in the master A's and women's races.

With spirits restored, I took off with the men's A and singlespeed A fields for a shot at redemption. The course featured an infamous, nagging climb to start that would sap strength on every lap, leaving my legs wobbly for the barriers at the top. Some downhill singletrack followed for recovery, which got more and more fun as I figured out lines around the washboard. It bottomed out at a sharp gully followed by a single barrier that many could bunnyhop, but us earthbound-types had to run it for 20 yards or so. Twistys through the woods followed, interspersed with a long, paved out-and-back and three logs to cross (hoppable for the able, more forced dismounts for we, the unable). Grassy lumps and a final set of barriers led back to the start line. My major concern wasn't the course so much as my hands: after democratically crashing on both sides in the B race and cooling down, my bruised palms made it painful to hold onto the handlebars.

After the first lap, I found myself in pitched battle with Geoff W., also racing singlespeed as a second race. I had the gearing and go to get up the hill; he had mad bunnyhopping skills. Seriously, I was wondering if he had hydraulics tucked into his frame somewhere. I'd be running past the single barrier, hear a slight thud of wheels landing behind me, and then whoosh there would go his damn green skinsuit ahead of me as I was fumbling with remounting. Damn him! It was then half a lap of grunting to keep up before reaching the hill again and pulling ahead for the descent, only to get passed again at the barrier...

For once, though, I had the last laugh. After 4-5 laps, I reached the top ahead of him, descended, dismounted and ran, and entirely expected to have him pass me again...but no! A look behind showed naught but an empty trail! As Geoff put it afterwards, he experienced "vapor lock" after going hard for 1.5 races. Now, Geoff's a good guy with a wife and kid and all, but it does feel sorta good to have put that kind of hurt on someone else.

Cruising along, I wasn't noticing any hand pain (mmm, adrenaline), and I managed to catch Gianni C. later on. Ron escaped my clutches--I had inklings that I was catching up, but he was taking it easy before dropping the hammer for the last couple laps and he beat me by a comfy margin. Finish: 5th, out of a dozen or so, and I see no shame in having Cesar C., Scott C., and Tim C. ahead of me (note to self: must get last name starting with C). Speaking of dropping the hammer, the report from the A race is that Aaron Odell was ahead for most of the men's race before putting in some serious time and distance into the rest of the field over the last couple of laps--and he blessedly lapped me to end the pain. 2nd place in the A's went to a young fellow, Eric E., who looks to be an ass-kicking mountain bike rider.

In review: in the end, I had fun. I find it ironic that the last time I raced the singlespeed, it was having mechanical issues (I tore the brake lever loose mid-race), making the geared bike feel like a rock of dependability. The chain going to crap probably has root in me not cleaning it last week: leftover goo led to the chainsuck, chainsuck led to wedging 'twixt chainring and crank, and a little torque and mashing led to twisted metal. And I don't think my derailleurs are the happiest of mechanical beasts right now. I'll try to be a good boy and fix it all...

And to put things in perspective, I had a heck of a better day than the defending US Men's cyclocross champion, who got coldcocked in a bizzare accident in the championship race today...

OK, time to finish the frickin' Christmas cards, ho ho ho...