Running with the Little Girl

I got home from another tough, tough day at work, and the Little Girl was literally waiting at the front door pining to go on a run with me. This wasn't part of the plan but I saw she had crazy energy and decided to take her to the local track. Though she hasn't run in about a month, she starts running alongside of me and chit chatting about school. It was a great time and good bonding but I noticed she wasn't even breather hard. We cross mile 1 in 9:20; I ask her if she wants to stop and she says "no dad, I am good." So we continue to run and talk. Mile 2, she comes through in 9:15, again, barely breathing. I make her take a water break and three seconds later she's pulling me back to the track. She did sit one lap out but the last one she says "let's go dad" and full on sprints to the finish. I know I sound like an obnoxious parent but man; for a six year old to bust out a run like that out of nowhere -- pretty impressive.

Random Thoughts

I haven't been my usual consistent blogging self this past week or so; just been slammed at work. Been a ferocious week back and vacation seems like a long, long time ago.

Anyway, between work and the run I just went on to clear my head (7.5 mile tempo run!) I'm going to keep this short. Few random thoughts:

-- I am reading The Historian, a much lauded book that is an absolutely superb tale. It's a unique spin on the traditional vampire story and I am completely engrossed. This one comes highly recommended. I'd link to it but I'm too tired; check it out on Amazon.

-- Speaking of Amazon, I might have purchased a certain something from this company. Something that kind of stokes me. Can you guess what? More on this one later.

-- I'm not saying that I have the new U2 album, but I have heard it and boy oh boy is it good. I know many of you out there have a love/hate (or in certain instances, a hate/hate) relationship with U2 but to me they will always be one of my top five bands of all time. And this one IS GOOD. As in, quite possibly, there best work in a very long time. More on this later.

-- I thought our President was great last night. I hope I don't offend anyones sensibilities in saying this, but it's nice to have a President that you can root for and who is inspirational. But I do have a bit of criticism in regards to his addres: I think he's trying to do too much; his agenda was too ambitious and potentially sets him up for failure. I wish he would have stated something to the effect of "the economy is in crisis, it's real bad, and as a result, I am going to focus on X things this year. But I look you in the eye America and tell you with confidence and authority that we WILL get those three things right." I am rambling but you get my point.

Anyway, that's it for tonight. On top of work stress I've been hitting a big block of training (including almost ten hours for me last week, which is huge), and am just wiped out. On top of it, it's American Idol time in our household, which is a big deal. the kids are officially fans.

And We're Back

Well, back to reality. And boy, what a reality it was too. I will save that story for another day but man oh man, I didn't get much respite from being away.

As I stated previously, this was a fantastic vacation. Two things made it really special (three actually; the first being the spirit of Hawaii). One, we went with other families, which was awesome as the other families were not just super cool, but the kids went off and played. The second thing is that this is was our first vacation where the kids were pretty much self sufficient. Meaning, they could play in the pool without supervision. They went to the game room by themselves. They even fetched stuff in our room without any help (I think they relished the independence of being able to ride the elevators by themselves). It allowed the Wife and I some time to hang out, relax, read, etc. It was very cool.

I posted these three pictures because they captured the Kids's at their best. Generally speaking the Boy is particularly cautious and risk adverse but he really opened it up (for him) on this trip. Here he is surfing with our good friend Mark. He did awesome, too: he stood up on his second try, which is much better than his old man. Both the Boy and the Girl went snorkeling with me on our last day. The Girl bailed quickly, despite the fact that she is a MUCH stronger swimmer (I forget with her at times that she's only six), but The Boy hung tough with me for quite some time. And lastly, they both jumped off a fairly gnarly cliff. It was something I never would have tried, but they gave it a whirl. Funny how one jump can do wonders for a little Boy's confidence.

And so, Hawaii is a wrap. BUt I'll say this: so long as we can afford it and as long as we live in California, I would love to make this an annual trip. SOmething about the Aloha spirit of that place.

Lastly: before I forget, and I've been woefully negligent the past few weeks, but THANK YOU to everyone who has give to my Livestrong campaign: Amy and Bruce, Andrew Baird, Sue and Saul, Marcey Lieberman, Jill and Adam and all the rest. THANK YOU.

Pearl Harbor

Today we visited Pearl Harbor. It was a pretty amazing place. We toured the Bowfin (submarine) and the famous Missouri. In retrospect, I'm sorry that we didn't pay our respects to the sunken Arizona as well.

Overall, a very enjoyable experience, most especially because the Kids were pretty engaged. I think they were fascinated by the submarine and the missouri was really a site to behold. The Wife's highlight of the day? Eating dinner next to Brody Jenner. But that's a story for another time.

The two things that interested me most about the day: I forgot that the Missouri is where the treaty was signed that ended World War 2. That was fascinating. The other thing that I found interesting was that after a kamikaze pilot attacked an American ship, the US Commander declared that the US should give the deceased pilot a proper at sea burial. I thought that was pretty amazing; even though the US and Japan were waging a fierce battle, they still demonstrated tremendous respect towards one another. Or at least, the US demonstrated respect. I hope that the same held true on the opposite side. I don't know why that struck me so hard but it did. It was definitely a very magnanimous gesture on the part of the US.

After that we went to visit my friend's Rob's house; alas, he and his family are stationed in Hong Kong for two years. Fn to see there house al the same though.

And beyond that, more of the sam: swimming, beach, swimming.

More Hawaii

Another lovely day in Hawaii (there's no such thing as a bad day in this place. They haven't had a bad day since Pearl Harbor). I had to work more than I would have liked, but that's the way it goes, particularly in this economy. Beyond work, we went on two hikes, including a fantastic one in Waimea Valley, which is a very popular North Shore destination. We hiked around for about a mile until we came to an enormous waterfall. The Kids and I jumped in and swam to the waterfall, which was pretty fun (water was cold, but fn all the same).

On the way home we noticed that there was a big surf contest (actually, it was body boarding) at Pipeline, which is arguably the best surf spot in the world. If you have seen Blue crush (one of my all-time favorites), many surf scenes were at shot at Pipeline. It is also home to Pipeline Masters, one of the biggest competitions on the surf tour. We stuck around and watched the competition for about a half hour and it was very cool. The waves were absolutely enormous. Breatakingly enormous at times. At that. we drove up North to a hoe int he wall local spot and got some Ahi Poke (marinated raw tuna, Maui onions over rice). It is my new favorite dish in the world. I think I have eaten fish every day -- if not two times every day. My idea of a perfect meal is a simple grilled fish with a side of white rice and fresh vegetables. I find that if I eat that for five or six days in a row, I start to feel remarkably healthy.

Anyway, that's it for today. Fairly active day. Tomorrow is more hanging out and Thursday we're headed to Pearl Harbor. I will be sure to post pictures.

Hawaii

As much as I love California, take that, multiply it by 20 and you have Hawaii. This place just rules; there's absolutely nothing not to like. I've been to Hawaii several times in the past but never the famous North Shore of Oahu. I must say, it rules.

We met up with some friends from Marin earlier in the day and checked out some of the world's most famous surf spots (Sunset Beach, Pipeline) before settling on a small break for the kids. I went out there and attempted to surf -- poorly. Very poorly. It isn't as easy as it looks but it sure is fun.

We are staying at Turtle Bay, which is the hotel in the movie Forgetting Sarah Marshall. It's an interesting spot. Yesterday they were concluding an LPGA event (local girl Michelle Wie lost on the back nine) and today they are shooting episodes of The MTV show The Hills. My Wife is in heaven; it's her favorite reality show. Tonight we were in the backdrop for a dinner scene. In my opinion, it was utter nonsense; there must have been 20-30 production assistants running around, most doing nothing. Apparently they are here all week, so I am sure I'll have some good stories.

That's it for now. It's been along day and I need to put the kids to sleep. Will try to post some pictures in the morning.

Metabolism and Getting Old

Those of you who know me know that I am skinny as a rail. I've been that way my entire life. When I was a kid I was so skinny that I'd charge kid's at the local community pool a nickel to see my heart beat through my chest. That's a true story by the way. My father can back me up on that one.

For the past several years I've been trying like mad to gain weight (I know, an enviable problem) to no avail whatsoever. No matter what I did, my weight hovered between 145-148. I found it virtually impossible to break 150, which was long my goal. About six months ago, however, I felt like my metabolism came to a screeching halt. A few years ago I remember my cousin Saul telling me that the same thing happened to him when he was in his early 40's and I now understand what he meant. It's a hard feeling to describe but I looked down one day and noticed that I had a mini belly. Nothing that anyone would notice, mind you, but to me, it's almost like my body was taking on a different composition. Anyway, I weighed myself earlier today and was really surprised to see that I was 156. That's a pretty seismic leap for me and it comes at a point in time where my metabolism should still be stoked from the high volume of training I've been doing the past few months. I suspect that if I was sedentary, I'd be upwards of 160, which is somewhat unimagineable. The other side of this might be that my synthroid is too low, though I don't think this is the case.

So, the net net of this little tale? Between this and my rapid hair loss, It's pretty rough growing old. Guess it happens to the best of us.

Anyway, on a different note we are off to Hawaii in the morning. I've been so incredibly busy at work I haven't been all that psyched, but now that I know it's supposed to storm for a week straight in the Bay Area (which isn't necessarily a bad thing; we really, really need the rain) I've getting pretty excited. Look forward to a lot of swimming with the kids, surfing, running and visiting sundy tourist destinations such as Pearl Harbor. I'll have the laptop in hand and will be sure to post photos. You can also follow the "action" at Twitter: I'm Howardsol.

Have a great week, all.