News story reports that one of DZ's cars was found.
Not much, but hopefully it's a lead to solving this crime.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
And we thought Lance had a bad run-in with thieves
Apparently, thieves broke in to DZ's house while he was off at ToC and stole ~$160k in stuff, plus two cars, all his old race bikes, race memorabilia, his Olympic ring, even some custom Marvel Comics models he had been given.
Talk about a buzzkill after such a successful ToC.
Talk about a buzzkill after such a successful ToC.
Friday, February 20, 2009
I'm surrounded! Surrounded!
By incompetence.
I see two ways out of this dilemma:
1) Accept it.
2) Fight it.
Though it seems like option 2 might be the more difficult path, I've come to the conclusion that option 1 would require significant resources. Namely, beer. Beer, and punk music. I'll certainly not drink the beer during work hours, but that's when the punk music would come in especially handy.
I also need to get on my bike more, whichever way I go. First race is in a mere 14 weeks. This is one of the events I've done for years, yet I haven't ever reached my personal goal for finishing time. Granted, that goal was chosen somewhat arbitrarily (I took my best time and rounded it down to the nearest 10-minute interval) so perhaps I should consider it meaningless. However, I've yet to let go of it, so clearly I have the same two choices in my bike life as in my work life:
1) Accept it.
2) Fight it.
I can chose to get over the fact that I'll never reach my goal for this race. Or, I can chose to get on my bike more and actually accomplish something.
The real dilemma, of course, lies in the intersection of these two decisions. In the resultant 2 x 2 matrix of options, are there any cells that are more or less desirable than others? Are there any cells that represent an impossible conflict in resource allocation or outcomes?
Perhaps there is an obvious conclusion?
I see two ways out of this dilemma:
1) Accept it.
2) Fight it.
Though it seems like option 2 might be the more difficult path, I've come to the conclusion that option 1 would require significant resources. Namely, beer. Beer, and punk music. I'll certainly not drink the beer during work hours, but that's when the punk music would come in especially handy.
I also need to get on my bike more, whichever way I go. First race is in a mere 14 weeks. This is one of the events I've done for years, yet I haven't ever reached my personal goal for finishing time. Granted, that goal was chosen somewhat arbitrarily (I took my best time and rounded it down to the nearest 10-minute interval) so perhaps I should consider it meaningless. However, I've yet to let go of it, so clearly I have the same two choices in my bike life as in my work life:
1) Accept it.
2) Fight it.
I can chose to get over the fact that I'll never reach my goal for this race. Or, I can chose to get on my bike more and actually accomplish something.
The real dilemma, of course, lies in the intersection of these two decisions. In the resultant 2 x 2 matrix of options, are there any cells that are more or less desirable than others? Are there any cells that represent an impossible conflict in resource allocation or outcomes?
Perhaps there is an obvious conclusion?
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Change in direction
I've reached that point in a blogger's life where I'm either too bored or my attention span has become too short to actually write in a cohesive sense.
So why fight it? In the future, I plan on less serious and more:
-If I showed up at a Critical Mass in pro-team-kit spandex, would I get stoned?
-Does anyone actually like Rock Racing?
-Why the hell is Wiggle named Wiggle?
-If I showed up at an alley cat in pro-team-kit spandex, would I get stoned?
-If I showed up at a local sprint triathlon in pro-team-kit spandex, would I get stoned? (I actually know the answer to this one and it's less exciting than you might guess)
So why fight it? In the future, I plan on less serious and more:
-If I showed up at a Critical Mass in pro-team-kit spandex, would I get stoned?
-Does anyone actually like Rock Racing?
-Why the hell is Wiggle named Wiggle?
-If I showed up at an alley cat in pro-team-kit spandex, would I get stoned?
-If I showed up at a local sprint triathlon in pro-team-kit spandex, would I get stoned? (I actually know the answer to this one and it's less exciting than you might guess)
Friday, February 13, 2009
The Final Countdown
No, not the song from Europe.
Rather, the final countdown to the one and only* ordinal moment in Unix time. Unix systems typically use a method for storing and working with time values based off the POSIX time standard.
The gist of this standard is that all values in time are referenced by the number of seconds they are away from midnight on the first of January, 1970. That date and time is the epoch for timekeeping in the Unix world, and hence has a value of zero. All other dates and times are referenced from that point. So, for instance, midnight on January 2, 1970 was 86400, since it was that many seconds after the epoch. Currently, by this standard, it is roughly 1234555212. Also known as roughly 3:00 PM EST on the 13th of February, 2009.
Astute observers will instantly recognize something. 1234555212 is nearly** ordinal - that is, the digits that make up that number are nearly in numerical sequence.
Astute observers with keen math skills will recognize that the Unix time value for Friday, February 13th 2009, 23:31:30 UTC*** will be completely ordinal. Huzzah for accidental patterns!
So, ladies and gentlemen, perhaps it is time Prince rewrote his infamous (and of course outdated) 1999, because in just a few short hours, it'll be time to party**** like it's 1234567890!
(* - in case there are any true nerds out there, I suppose I should qualify my "one and only" statement by adding the condition of "using every digit available for a positive 32-bit signed value" since technically, there are infinitely other ordinal occurrences according to the pure standard, if you ignore the convention of storing the value in a signed 32-bit integer. But, only two in a signed 32-bit integer with a value in the largest position, and only one that's positive.)
(** - By "nearly" I mean in terms of absolute numerical value, not positionally. In other words, the value of that number is close to the value of a number that is completely ordinal, though that number itself is less than half ordinal.)
(*** - AKA 6:31:30 PM EST)
(**** - screw everyone too busy with V-Day plans***** to appreciate this! Hah! Take that, you happy lovebirds!)
(***** - I have none.******)
(****** - Are you allowed to use *****'s in a footnote to reference another footnote? I don't think so. No more footnotes now, I mean it!*******)
(******* - Anybody want a peanut?)
Rather, the final countdown to the one and only* ordinal moment in Unix time. Unix systems typically use a method for storing and working with time values based off the POSIX time standard.
The gist of this standard is that all values in time are referenced by the number of seconds they are away from midnight on the first of January, 1970. That date and time is the epoch for timekeeping in the Unix world, and hence has a value of zero. All other dates and times are referenced from that point. So, for instance, midnight on January 2, 1970 was 86400, since it was that many seconds after the epoch. Currently, by this standard, it is roughly 1234555212. Also known as roughly 3:00 PM EST on the 13th of February, 2009.
Astute observers will instantly recognize something. 1234555212 is nearly** ordinal - that is, the digits that make up that number are nearly in numerical sequence.
Astute observers with keen math skills will recognize that the Unix time value for Friday, February 13th 2009, 23:31:30 UTC*** will be completely ordinal. Huzzah for accidental patterns!
So, ladies and gentlemen, perhaps it is time Prince rewrote his infamous (and of course outdated) 1999, because in just a few short hours, it'll be time to party**** like it's 1234567890!
(* - in case there are any true nerds out there, I suppose I should qualify my "one and only" statement by adding the condition of "using every digit available for a positive 32-bit signed value" since technically, there are infinitely other ordinal occurrences according to the pure standard, if you ignore the convention of storing the value in a signed 32-bit integer. But, only two in a signed 32-bit integer with a value in the largest position, and only one that's positive.)
(** - By "nearly" I mean in terms of absolute numerical value, not positionally. In other words, the value of that number is close to the value of a number that is completely ordinal, though that number itself is less than half ordinal.)
(*** - AKA 6:31:30 PM EST)
(**** - screw everyone too busy with V-Day plans***** to appreciate this! Hah! Take that, you happy lovebirds!)
(***** - I have none.******)
(****** - Are you allowed to use *****'s in a footnote to reference another footnote? I don't think so. No more footnotes now, I mean it!*******)
(******* - Anybody want a peanut?)
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
The fastest guy in the world meets the fastest guy in the world
AKA "My worlds collide:"
It turns out that Carlos Sastre (of bike riding fame) and Fernando Alonso (of F1 auto racing fame) met at a football match some time ago, realized they are fans of each others' sports, and as such, Fernando recently spent a day riding with Sastre's TestTeam cycling squad. Meanwhile, Fernando is (or has, probably, since that link is a few weeks old) letting Sastre into the pits during a practice day at Renault's test track.
Sastre apparently commented that he was surprised at Fernando's fitness. Knowing what conditions are like during an F1 race, it shouldn't be surprising at all - intense heat, extreme g-forces, and other unrelenting factors certainly demand a lot from an F1 driver's body, fitness-wise.
What a neat experience for both of them.
It turns out that Carlos Sastre (of bike riding fame) and Fernando Alonso (of F1 auto racing fame) met at a football match some time ago, realized they are fans of each others' sports, and as such, Fernando recently spent a day riding with Sastre's TestTeam cycling squad. Meanwhile, Fernando is (or has, probably, since that link is a few weeks old) letting Sastre into the pits during a practice day at Renault's test track.
Sastre apparently commented that he was surprised at Fernando's fitness. Knowing what conditions are like during an F1 race, it shouldn't be surprising at all - intense heat, extreme g-forces, and other unrelenting factors certainly demand a lot from an F1 driver's body, fitness-wise.
What a neat experience for both of them.
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