The Beginning of the Road to "Skinny-colas"

There was a definite theme to the birthday gifts I received this year. And the theme was: "It's time to get back in shape!"

My mom sent me a set of free weights (and the bar) from our actual gym in Fort Collins, CO so that I can do the Body Pump workouts in my living room. Oh, and she recorded a class and sent a CD so that I can follow along with the instructor's directions.

Diane and her parents went in on together on a Garmin running/biking watch. It is a beast. I went out for a run today to test it out and below is a brief, brief snapshot of the data it records and gives back to me. You cannot see it here, but it traces the route I ran on the map and also gives splits of the laps. Insane.

With toys like these it is going to be a blast to get in shape.

	Untitled Wed, Aug 25, 2010 4:46 PM added by niquin21 Map data ©2010 Google - Terms of Use Map Satellite Terrain 1000 ft 200 m Activity Type: Running Event Type: Uncategorized Time: 00:36:50 Distance: 4.10 mi Elevation Gain: 110 ft Calories: 643 C View Details

One of my all-time questions is answered

Since I was a dorky/debate-team member/International Baccalaureate geeky high schooler, girlfriends were not a large (or to be more accurate - "existent") part of my youth. Yup, my memories in high school are pretty much limited to doing a lot of homework, procrastinating about doing said homework, hanging out with Dan and Andrew, and traveling to debate tournaments on Saturdays.

Oh, sure, there were the occasional dates. I shocked myself by going to both Junior and Senior prom with dates, but those events were certainly the exception and not the rule. Often, when I was spending painfully awkward or dorky moments with Dan and Andrew, I would wonder about what my future wife was doing at that moment. Is she also at a debate tournament? Maybe she's birdwatching. Or thinking about politics. I would wonder if she's Argentinean or American or German or Pakistani.

Now I know the answer to most of those questions because on July 2, 2010, Diane agreed to be my wife.

And it turns out that when I was hanging out at the CSU library studying German with Dan and Andrew, she was most likely in Colonie. She was most definitely not ever at any debate tournament.

When I was thinking about her, she was probably at a dance competition. Or eating a bagel with sausage and cheese (no egg, please and thank you). Or perhaps she was practicing the baritone.

At the most basic level, Diane and I met quite by accident. Had Dr. Moore not encouraged me to apply to Albany, it is likely our paths would not have ever crossed. Had Albany not offered a very generous scholarship, it is likely I would have gone to school in Philadelphia. Had that monkey George W. Bush not been elected and screwed up the environment, Diane would not have gone into environmental policy. Had CHH not been friendly at the Dean's office I would have avoided all human contact at Albany and gone back to Colorado at the conclusion of my degree. Quite the accident, as you can see.

And now this series of accidents has turned into a lifetime with "that tall girl from Jeffy's office".

It's the most wonderful time of every four years

I am always happy and proud to say I am Argentinean, but every four years, it feels like a privilege to be one. One of the reasons I love the World Cup is because Argentina is thrust into the international spotlight - and in a positive light no less.

I was too young to remember the 1986 World Cup when Argentina won on the back of Diego Armando Maradona. We had just moved to the US when Argentina was runner-up in the 1990 World Cup, and my memories of that Cup are limited but vivid nonetheless. I especially remember watching the semi-final match between Italy and Argentina (Italy was the host nation) in the basement of a friend's house with my dad - both of us under extreme pressure to subdue our urges to scream after a late-tying goal and during the penalty kicks that Argentina ultimately won.

During the 1994 and 1998 World Cups, I was in Argentina and the whole country would shut down whenever the team was playing. After a glorious victory over the hated English in the 1998 quarterfinals, all of Mendoza came out to celebrate in downtown as if we had won the Cup itself.

That spontaneous celebration is something that I cannot fathom happening in the US. Were the US team to win the Cup, I presume that it would be an important news event. But in many other countries, winning the Cup is not a news event - it's a life event. In the US, it seems that those events are always limited - there's a parade in the city of a team that wins the NBA championship, the Stanley Cup, the World Series, or the Super Bowl. So every year, four cities throughout the country have a spontaneous moment of unity. If you have ever been a part of those parades, imagine how that elation would feel if it was a national celebration.

In addition to being a nationally unifying moment, the World Cup as experienced in Argentina is also an important family event - which I am now much more aware of since I have been left to suffer through these games alone. However, even long distances have not mitigated the sense of joint suffering. Before the first game Argentina played last Saturday, I received phone calls from my mother, sister, and both grandmothers. You know it's serious when your grandmother is calling you about a soccer game.

VIP government visitor at ALB

The Master Cyclist sent me over this picture he took outside Albany International Airport. It looks like some sort of CRJ or ERJ with an Air Force One-type color scheme. I presume that this plane was used to transport a high-level government official - most likely Peter Orszag, who spoke at RPI's graduation.

MK rocks the Palace

Diane and I had the great fortune of catching the legendary Mark Knopfler at the Palace on Sunday, May 9th. For those of you who don't know who this living god is, first of all, shame on you and I don't even know you anymore. He was the lead singer and co-founder of Dire Straits, which rocked the world a generation before I was ready to appreciate music.

Since the end of the Dire Straits days sometime in the 1990's, Mark Knopfler has been fairly steadily putting out solo albums. To be honest, the pieces he played from his solo albums were as impressive and enjoyable as the Dire Straits classics he played.

Here is the setlist:

Bordre Reiver

What It Is

Sailing to Philadelphia

Prairie Wedding

Hill Farmer's Blues

Romeo and Juliet

Sultans of Swing

Donegan's Gone

Get Lucky

Marbletown (band introduction)

Speedway at Nazareth

Telegraph Road (part I & part II)

Encore:

Brothers in Arms

So Far Away

Piper to the End

I could not believe we were treated to Sultans of Swings AND Telegraph Road, which to me is the Mark Knopfler anthem. I have never been as familiar with most of his solo material. Don't get me wrong - I have all the albums, it's just harder to recognize the songs. But, I have to admit that even among that incredibly generous Dire Straits serving in the setlist, in my opinion, the band was at their best on Speedway at Nazareth. If you know these songs at all, that alone tells you how impressive that rendition was. It's hard to imagine Speedway at Nazareth upstaging Telegraph Road. Seriously, watch the link above.

This was my second time watching MK live. The first was on the eve of junior prom in high school. My stepdad had gotten me tickets for Christmas or a birthday or something and we went to watch the Sailing to Philadelphia tour at Red Rocks in Denver. Even after all those years, MK was still filthy on the guitar. And I am not just saying that out of blind infatuation - the TU reviewer agreed.

Technically speaking, I have never seen DS, but it turns out that MK is touring with Danny Cummings on the drums (who was an old DS percussionist) and Guy Fletcher on piano/accoustic guitar/electric guitar/percussion...vocals...everything (who was a DS ... everything). Essentially, it could be argued that we were a John Illsley short of an actual DS reunion.

One of the first things Diane and I noticed when we were walking to the Palace was that we were about 30 years younger than everybody else in the building. In fact, when we were walking out, there was a couple behind us discussing this same phenomenon and the wife said, "Where are all the young people? There aren't any young people here." We summarily turned around and remarked that we consider ourselves fairly young and a good laugh was had by all.

So now, of course, I am on an MK and DS stretch where that's all I can listen to. This morning I added Telegraph Road to my Ipod before my run. The great thing about that is that the song is 14 minutes long, so by the time I had finished listening to it, my run was halfway done. Thanks for that MK.

It's official - I'm a New Yorker (Updated)

There it is - all over my car:

I can't wait to drive back to Colorado with my fancy New York elitist liberal license plates. I can already picture all the nice simple country folk out yonder sneering at my East Coast creds. And all I am going to do while I am there is blast that New York song by Rihanna and the other guy.

UPDATE: Apparently it was Alicia Keys that sings that song. Whatever.

I have now traded my Colorado license plate - which looks like a diet Mountain Dew can to me - for a generic New York plate, with no distinguishing factors that I can identify. Doesn't matter though, baby, the only thing that matters on this plate is the name, homey.

New ride

I have a big problem with impulse buys.

In the summer of 2007, I was working at Camp Taconic, where the day starts with "Sing" - where the whole camp comes together after clean-up to sing some songs before morning announcements. There is nothing like an auditorium full of singing kids to get your day going. But to be honest, I did enjoy Sing most of the time. I mostly hated it when I was hungover.

I was quite obsessed with the guitar playing that I saw during Sing - especially during Rocky Top. And one day I snuck into town to buy a guitar --- on impulse.

Three years later and I can play some simple Neil Young songs, maybe a Cat Stevens tune or two...and that's about it. I just had to learn the hard (and expensive way) that my family genes have no regard for music. There is no ritmo running through my veins.

Last weekend, I made a similar impulse buy. Turns out that a skateboard shop opened on the corner of Lark and State. When I was walking in the park with Diane, this new shop came up in conversation, mostly because it was just nice to have a new business in that storefront. Well, needless to say, about 30 minutes later I owned a skateboard.

This skateboard.

I chose this skateboard because I am a Democrat.

Anyways, I have diligently practiced and I have become quite the avid skater. I even skateboarded to work the day after buying this amazing device.

Maybe this is my mid-life crisis.