I found my apartment on Craigslist before I had ever even so much as set foot in Portland. It seemed like a nice place, a late model condo, secure building, secure, covered parking which is perfect for my motorcycle. And after I arrived in Portland and found the building, it seemed like a pretty quiet area for the most part. It's kind of an industrial area and a little on the scummy side, but nothing like the 'bad' parts of town back in Virginia. Not my ideal place to live, but it'll do for now.
Well, I started to get more concerned about the location once I started telling people where it was. They'd say things like, 'oh, I never go up there' and 'oh yeah, there are a lot of meth addicts in that area.' So I began jokingly referring to it as the Meth District whenever I'd tell anyone where I lived.
It's been pretty quiet, however about a month ago around midnight, I was awakened to loud talking - loud talking through a bullhorn - from a police car. It was directed at a neighboring apartment complex and they were pleading with the guy to please come out or pick up the phone and let them know he was alright. It didn't seem like he had hostages, but appeared to be a lone individual who had for whatever reason become holed up in his apartment. It must've ended peacefully because I got to sleep and wasn't awakened by the sound of gunshots.
Then a couple of weeks ago on a Saturday, I was headed out and just about a block away on the major bike path that parallels Interstate 205 there were a bunch of cops and a van marked 'Homicide'. There on the bike path, under a sheet lay some poor bastard, who either died on his own or was helped along during the wee hours by someone no doubt seeking his next fix.
Finally, tonight just as I arrived home on my motorcycle police cars started racing into the neighborhood and strategically placing themselves at various intersections. Looks like someone made a withdrawl from the Plaid Pantry convenience store up the block. It doesn't appear to be more than a robbery or robbery attempt because the police presence has dwindled and the familiar 'Homicide' van hasn't showed up.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Portland Century Post-Ride
I knew it was going to be a long day the night before the ride when I couldn't get to sleep. I finally managed to eek out about 4 1/2 hours before the alarm woke me a 5 a.m. I got up, showered, gathered my gear and off I rode to the start line downtown at Portland State University. It's about a 7 mile ride down so I got a pretty good warm-up before we set off on the hundred miles. There weren't nearly as many people riding as I thought there might be so I found Kirsten and Dr. Paul pretty quickly. I met Kirsten at the 11 Bridges Ride, she manages a large vet clinic and Dr. Paul is one of the managing partners of the practice. He was a super-nice guy, very down to earth and really funny - and as it turned out, very fast on a bike.
It's tough to ride with people and actually stick together and right out off the start I was moving and quickly lost my two companions. I slowed down and rejoined them a couple of times. That's how the first 20 miles or so went. The next 80 miles consisted of me riding alone while the two of them rode off ahead at what seemed like breakneck speed. I would manage to get to the rest stops just as they were ready to pull out for the next leg - so they got to rest for 20 minutes and I rested for like 5, then rode out with them only to watch them slowly disappear up the road from me. Each time asking myself why the hell I didn't just stay at the rest stop.
The ride itself was nice, but they weren't kidding about the extreme climbing. There were three or four hills that were damn near straight up and went on forever. I've never climbed something so steep for so long. I remember looking down at my bike computer several times on the climbs and was averaging 3.5 to 4 miles per hour. To give you some idea just how slow that is, 3 mph is really the point at which you can't ride a bike without falling over. Lots of folks were throwing in the towel and just walking. I didn't give up, but I sure as hell seriously considered it a few times.
The weather was perfect, hovering around 70 pretty much all day and cloudy with some sun. But what would a bike ride around Portland be without some rain? At the final rest stop about 11 miles from the finish, it started raining and the closer we got to the finish the harder it rained.
My knee bothered my pretty much throughout the entire ride and really ached on the climbs. I'm not near as sore as I was after the Seattle-to-Portland ride though. I think my long rides are done for the season, although Dr. Paul was trying to convince me to do another century to the coast in October. I'm not ready to commit, but I'm not ruling it out yet either.
It's tough to ride with people and actually stick together and right out off the start I was moving and quickly lost my two companions. I slowed down and rejoined them a couple of times. That's how the first 20 miles or so went. The next 80 miles consisted of me riding alone while the two of them rode off ahead at what seemed like breakneck speed. I would manage to get to the rest stops just as they were ready to pull out for the next leg - so they got to rest for 20 minutes and I rested for like 5, then rode out with them only to watch them slowly disappear up the road from me. Each time asking myself why the hell I didn't just stay at the rest stop.
The ride itself was nice, but they weren't kidding about the extreme climbing. There were three or four hills that were damn near straight up and went on forever. I've never climbed something so steep for so long. I remember looking down at my bike computer several times on the climbs and was averaging 3.5 to 4 miles per hour. To give you some idea just how slow that is, 3 mph is really the point at which you can't ride a bike without falling over. Lots of folks were throwing in the towel and just walking. I didn't give up, but I sure as hell seriously considered it a few times.
The weather was perfect, hovering around 70 pretty much all day and cloudy with some sun. But what would a bike ride around Portland be without some rain? At the final rest stop about 11 miles from the finish, it started raining and the closer we got to the finish the harder it rained.
My knee bothered my pretty much throughout the entire ride and really ached on the climbs. I'm not near as sore as I was after the Seattle-to-Portland ride though. I think my long rides are done for the season, although Dr. Paul was trying to convince me to do another century to the coast in October. I'm not ready to commit, but I'm not ruling it out yet either.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Portland Century
Well, tomorrow's the big day, the Portland Century ride. One hundred miles of extreme climbing, or at least that's what they keep telling me by e-mail. I've received two e-mails from the organizers this week alerting me to the extreme climbing riders will face tomorrow. Of course, when I signed up for this mother-scratcher they made no mention of extreme climbing. In fact, they made this sound more like cozy picnic in the park than a trip up Alpe D'Huez.
To make things worse, I'm riding with a very pretty girl. I met her at the 11 Bridges Ride a couple of weekends ago. We've corresponded by e-mail, but I'm not sure she's interested yet. She surely won't be if she sees my body start to betray me by the mid-point. She doesn't seem like the kind of girl who might be attracted to guys who cry openly and beg for mercy on bike rides. Shame, because that's exactly how I roll.
So think of me tomorrow as I ride off in the dark at 5:45 a.m. toward the starting line. I'll post a few updates through twitter tomorrow, assuming I can still move my thumbs to type.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
More Meditation
I've decided that I'm going to try as many different meditation classes as I can, provided they are free or at least cheap. This past Tuesday I attended a talk called, "Find Inner Peace." The talk opened with 25 minutes of meditation, but it was pretty slack - we just sat in chairs with our eyes closed while the speaker spoke about relaxation.
The speaker was a very small, very quiet woman with a huge smile - I mean, she never stopped smiling. Who better to give a talk about inner peace? It was an interesting and insightful talk and I plan on going back for another talk in early September. I also may attend a couple of their meditation sessions.
Last night I headed back to Sunlun Meditation with Dr. Susan, this is the weird heavy breathing class. For the first class last week there were 8 people, when I showed up last night right before class was to begin, it was just me and Dr. Susan. I said, "I hope I'm not the only one tonight", to which she responded, "that's OK, we'll just meditate together." I said, "I was afraid you were going to say that." She laughed. Thankfully, over the next few minutes, my classmates started trickling in.
The meditaiton was longer than last week, a total of 1 hour. It's kinda tough to do anything for an hour, sitting and trying to focus only on your breathing is definitely one of those things. It probably didn't help that I didn't practice at all during the week. I hope to remedy that this coming week. The hardest part will no doubt be keeping Pants out of my lap while I'm sitting.
The speaker was a very small, very quiet woman with a huge smile - I mean, she never stopped smiling. Who better to give a talk about inner peace? It was an interesting and insightful talk and I plan on going back for another talk in early September. I also may attend a couple of their meditation sessions.
Last night I headed back to Sunlun Meditation with Dr. Susan, this is the weird heavy breathing class. For the first class last week there were 8 people, when I showed up last night right before class was to begin, it was just me and Dr. Susan. I said, "I hope I'm not the only one tonight", to which she responded, "that's OK, we'll just meditate together." I said, "I was afraid you were going to say that." She laughed. Thankfully, over the next few minutes, my classmates started trickling in.
The meditaiton was longer than last week, a total of 1 hour. It's kinda tough to do anything for an hour, sitting and trying to focus only on your breathing is definitely one of those things. It probably didn't help that I didn't practice at all during the week. I hope to remedy that this coming week. The hardest part will no doubt be keeping Pants out of my lap while I'm sitting.
Saturday, August 16, 2008
I Just Want To See The Boy Happy
So I'm looking seriously into starting a meditation routine in hopes of putting my mind a little more at ease. It's something I've been interested in for a while and now that I'm in Portland, I really don't have an excuse not to pursue it.
The first class I tried was a yoga/meditation class at the The Movement Center. Having never taken yoga or done meditation before, I figured this was as good a place as any to start. They have a beginner class once a week on Wednesday nights. The first hour is beginners yoga followed by 30 minutes of meditation. Trying anything new is a little scary and yes, there were times (like every few minutes) when I seriously questioned what the hell I was doing there, but when you just let go and stop thinking about how insane you must look, it makes it much easier. I went a few times to this class with mixed results. It really depends on the instructor and since they changed instructors every week it made it difficult to get into a routine. I feel like I need a more structured and challenging yoga class and I wanted to look at some other meditation options.
I started looking around at different meditation options again earlier this week and also looking into a few Buddhism classes to better familiarize myself with the different flavors of Buddhism. The great thing about Portland is there are a ton of things going on - almost too many. I stumbled across a Sunlun Vipassana Meditation class offered for free at the Bhodi Tree Center. The price was certainly right, but I really should've looked into Sunlun Mediation before I jumped at the free class. Had I read this FAQ, I might have been better prepared for what came next.
The class started off normal enough - nice Asian lady explaining the origins of Sunlun Meditation to the class of about 8 people. However, when she got around to explaining the breathing process, things took a turn for the weird. Sunlun requires you to breath rapidly (and loudly) in and out for the first half of the meditation session. When she demostrated it, I had one of those 'oh shit' moments - like, oh shit, how do I get out of here before I have to do that? Of course there wasn't a way to leave without looking like a complete jackass, so I just settled in and rode it out. When the bell sounded, we all started our rapid breathing - a big group of creepy heavy breathers. The good thing was everyone was doing it, so we all looked nuts, not just me.
The session lasted for 40 minutes, which may not seem like a long time, but trust me, it took forever. The problem for me wasn't the creepy heavy breathing or the quiet breathing, it was trying to stay focused. All I could think of was one-line zingers and wished I could get to my iPhone to type them into Twitter. Of course this is the same problem I had at the last medition class I took, lack of concentration. Hopefully with more practice and patience, it'll come together. But that's the tough thing about settling on a class or style, knowing which one is right for you. I'll go to the Sunlun class next week, but I also plan on continuing to look around for other classes.
The first class I tried was a yoga/meditation class at the The Movement Center. Having never taken yoga or done meditation before, I figured this was as good a place as any to start. They have a beginner class once a week on Wednesday nights. The first hour is beginners yoga followed by 30 minutes of meditation. Trying anything new is a little scary and yes, there were times (like every few minutes) when I seriously questioned what the hell I was doing there, but when you just let go and stop thinking about how insane you must look, it makes it much easier. I went a few times to this class with mixed results. It really depends on the instructor and since they changed instructors every week it made it difficult to get into a routine. I feel like I need a more structured and challenging yoga class and I wanted to look at some other meditation options.
I started looking around at different meditation options again earlier this week and also looking into a few Buddhism classes to better familiarize myself with the different flavors of Buddhism. The great thing about Portland is there are a ton of things going on - almost too many. I stumbled across a Sunlun Vipassana Meditation class offered for free at the Bhodi Tree Center. The price was certainly right, but I really should've looked into Sunlun Mediation before I jumped at the free class. Had I read this FAQ, I might have been better prepared for what came next.
The class started off normal enough - nice Asian lady explaining the origins of Sunlun Meditation to the class of about 8 people. However, when she got around to explaining the breathing process, things took a turn for the weird. Sunlun requires you to breath rapidly (and loudly) in and out for the first half of the meditation session. When she demostrated it, I had one of those 'oh shit' moments - like, oh shit, how do I get out of here before I have to do that? Of course there wasn't a way to leave without looking like a complete jackass, so I just settled in and rode it out. When the bell sounded, we all started our rapid breathing - a big group of creepy heavy breathers. The good thing was everyone was doing it, so we all looked nuts, not just me.
The session lasted for 40 minutes, which may not seem like a long time, but trust me, it took forever. The problem for me wasn't the creepy heavy breathing or the quiet breathing, it was trying to stay focused. All I could think of was one-line zingers and wished I could get to my iPhone to type them into Twitter. Of course this is the same problem I had at the last medition class I took, lack of concentration. Hopefully with more practice and patience, it'll come together. But that's the tough thing about settling on a class or style, knowing which one is right for you. I'll go to the Sunlun class next week, but I also plan on continuing to look around for other classes.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
In The Future When All's Well
Last night I headed to another MIPL event, No Smokey Karaoke. It wasn't as bad as I feared it might be and I didn't have to sing, so that was a relief. I really only went to see James, who I haven't seen in a while and Rachel was also there, so that was nice because I hadn't seen her in a while either. James and Rachel were a couple for a very short while, but no longer. They remain friends, which is good. They are both really nice vegan folk.
This morning I went to see a new hand surgeon about my hand. My hope was to just ask a few questions about why it still hurts and if I'll regain anymore movement or grip strength and get a letter from him for my litigation stating how much disability I now have in that hand as a result of the accident. Unfortunately, the surgeon was a little nuts. Scratch that, a lot nuts. The first 5-10 minutes consisted of him berating me about coming to see him. How dare I? After a while, he calmed down, but was still all over the place. He insisted that he'd have to talk to my attorney and told me that when they called, they'd have to hold on the phone until he got to them, because he wasn't going to call them back if they left a message. Douche. I was warned about this guy before I went, but he was much worse than the warnings I got. I also waited over a month to get in to see him. Why? Hopefully when my attorney calls they can get it ironed out and we can proceed, but I have serious doubts.
My tech tip of the day is to start using a RSS reader. What is a RSS reader you ask? See this for a techie explanation. Here's a layman's explanation - it's a program you download (for free) like NetNewsWire, which is what I use on my Mac - the Windows equivalent is FeedDemon. After you download and install it, visit a website you frequent, like Lifehacker.com (which is one of my favorites), look for the little RSS feed icon and click on it. Your RSS reader will now ask if you want to add it to your list of feeds, click yes. Here's what it does, several times a day it updates your 'feeds' from the site. What you have is essentially all the information you used to have to visit a bunch of different sites to see, all in one place. Trust me on this, it rocks. Give it a try and if you do, let me know what you think.
Here's an awesome wallpaper for you to try out: http://www.zomgclan.com/nate/WG/bliss%20ceiling%20cat.jpg
I can't believe there are many people out there who haven't see this, but just in case. The video is from this past June in Alaska and is of two twin baby moose and their mom playing in a backyard sprinkler. The music is kind of cheesy, but the clip is precious. Yeah, I said precious.
This morning I went to see a new hand surgeon about my hand. My hope was to just ask a few questions about why it still hurts and if I'll regain anymore movement or grip strength and get a letter from him for my litigation stating how much disability I now have in that hand as a result of the accident. Unfortunately, the surgeon was a little nuts. Scratch that, a lot nuts. The first 5-10 minutes consisted of him berating me about coming to see him. How dare I? After a while, he calmed down, but was still all over the place. He insisted that he'd have to talk to my attorney and told me that when they called, they'd have to hold on the phone until he got to them, because he wasn't going to call them back if they left a message. Douche. I was warned about this guy before I went, but he was much worse than the warnings I got. I also waited over a month to get in to see him. Why? Hopefully when my attorney calls they can get it ironed out and we can proceed, but I have serious doubts.
My tech tip of the day is to start using a RSS reader. What is a RSS reader you ask? See this for a techie explanation. Here's a layman's explanation - it's a program you download (for free) like NetNewsWire, which is what I use on my Mac - the Windows equivalent is FeedDemon. After you download and install it, visit a website you frequent, like Lifehacker.com (which is one of my favorites), look for the little RSS feed icon and click on it. Your RSS reader will now ask if you want to add it to your list of feeds, click yes. Here's what it does, several times a day it updates your 'feeds' from the site. What you have is essentially all the information you used to have to visit a bunch of different sites to see, all in one place. Trust me on this, it rocks. Give it a try and if you do, let me know what you think.
Here's an awesome wallpaper for you to try out: http://www.zomgclan.com/nate/WG/bliss%20ceiling%20cat.jpg
I can't believe there are many people out there who haven't see this, but just in case. The video is from this past June in Alaska and is of two twin baby moose and their mom playing in a backyard sprinkler. The music is kind of cheesy, but the clip is precious. Yeah, I said precious.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now
This is the only picture I tookyesterday that really turned out.
Pretty cute, though.
The Providence Bridge Pedal yesterday was really nice. The weather was perfect and it was a route replete with views of the city. It was a 37 mile ride, but including the trip down and then back to my apartment, I rode over 50 miles. I met up with a group from MeetIn, but there were something like 15,000 to 20,000 riders, so we lost each other pretty early on in the ride. I did manage to ride the whole way with one girl from the MeetIn group who manages a huge vet clinic. It was nice to have someone to ride with and made the time pass much quicker.
Unfortunately, my left knee is killing me again. I'm starting to wonder if it's not as a result of the car accident. My right knee is fine but my left, where I took the impact of the accident, is absolutely unbearable at times. If I had to ride more than 50 miles yesterday, I doubt I would've been able to do it. I'm concerned that I'll be able to ride the entire 100 miles on the 24th. I plan to at least try and I guess I'll just hope for the best.
I have what I hope is my final doctor's appointment for my hand on Wednesday. I'm hoping I'll just go in and he'll look at it and give me some kind of number on the amount of disability in it. I doubt it will go as smooth as that, but I'm hoping. I'll ask about my knee as well, since this surgeon is also an avid cyclist. (In fact, my regular doctor who referred me told me that this surgeon was hit by a car several months back while bike riding and spent a few days in a coma.)
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