Touring My Trophy Case

I reorganized my trophy case, going from two rows to three. In the process, I added a few things that had previously been either in our library or in our china cabinet, and I removed a few things that either weren't true trophies or that were redundant with other stuff that was already in there.

Here's where we landed. I tried to leave a little room at the top for future Swim Across the Sound trophies.

I'm now dying to explain this. If you're interested, the explanation is past the jump.

Let’s Talk a Little About the BYU Cancellation & Why There Hasn’t Been a Make-Up Scheduled

A couple of guys were arguing about this on my Twitter timeline, and it got maddeningly acrimonious. Typical Twitter slap-fight maybe, but it’s still one of those things were both guys were mashing the PUSH TO TALK button without actually receiving anything. Obviously, both sides have a particular point of view, so that approach accomplished nothing.

Welcome to America.

5 Things on a Friday: Panic?!

Hi folks.  Happy Friday.  As you read this, I am skiing Mount Snow.  As I write this, though, it’s Thursday morning, and there’s precipitation in Vermont.

So.  Was it rain or snow?  Am I having a good day or a bad day?

With Josh & Rob at Killington.  I'll be with Josh again today.

These are burning questions.  But by the time you read this, we’ll know the answers.  As I write it, however, I can only worry and wait.  Kind of like the Coronavirus.

5 Things on a Friday: The ‘Stick to Sports’ Edition

With the State of the Union, impeachment, and every other thing going 24/7 on all the major new channels and Internet sites, we’ve decided to stick to sports here at Casa Cabeza.  Not because we don’t have opinions -- we definitely do have opinions -- but rather, because it feels very much like the best thing we can do collectively as a society is to just suck some of the air out of the room.  

EVERYTHING is politics, all the time.  It doesn’t feel like that’s helping.

For all the outrage, the actual Will of the People has become a forgotten concept.  No one cares what people actually think.  The only thing that matters is that we stay mad -- about anything.  It doesn’t matter what you’re angry about, just that you’re angry.  There are a million places to post an opinion, but just so we’re clear: NO ONE IS LISTENING.  We’re relevant only to the extent that we can be commoditized, and not one inch further than that.

Thankfully, it’s been an interesting sports week.

Skiing Breckenridge

I know what you’re thinking.  This section of the blog is called “Ski East Coast,” but here I am talking about Breckenridge.

Eh.  What can I say?  It was a good trip.

Breckenridge from mid-mountain on Peak 6.

Favorite Photos of 2019

Happy New Year, everyone! 

This has been a year in which Sally and I have mostly kept on keeping on.  Arguably the biggest changes in my life were my decision to commit to skiing more last winter, taking up photography early in the summer, and writing a Hell of a lot for As For Football. 

This post is most obviously about the photography.  However, it's influenced by all three.  First, I wrote so much for AFF that there's really not enough material from the blog to do a best-of retrospective for 2019.  That's been a long-running series here, and I'm sad to skip it, but there's just not much point.  Luckily, I have these pictures to show, so it's not a total wash.  A good number of these come from shots taken for AFF, so before we bemoan the lack of additional writing, it's worth remembering that the As For Football crew sent me to a heck of a lot of really fun football games this year. 

That's not nothing.

The one regret that I have with this is that it's tough to show size and aspect ratios via the blog.  Some of these ought to be shown big and others are just wide or skinny.  None of that comes across in this format.  I'd like to have a little show in our backyard, but that's definitely a project for the spring or early summer.  Paired with beer tasting and a friendly audience, it could be fun.  We'll see.

Let me just say, too, that I don't know that I'm necessarily good at this.  However, I enjoy it, and I've never been shy about showing my work to others.

For all of these, you can click the pics to them at full size.

Twitter is Not IRL

I saw a couple of interesting articles about the Democratic primary election this week, one from the NY Times and one from the Atlantic.  Both papers are struggling to understand the Democratic electorate in the Twitter Age. That’s no easy task.  Bottom line, though, the Young Left of Twitter (YLT) has decided that it hates Mayor Pete Buttigeg of South Bend, Indiana, with an abiding passion.  Apparently, this is because he is either too successful personally or else he’s not far enough left.  Or perhaps both.

My message to those I meet is simple: "este país es tu país."

This country is your country. Everyone who has made the United States their home deserves to participate fully and freely in their communities.https://t.co/sMRkVfwFwF

— Pete Buttigieg (@PeteButtigieg) December 17, 2019

Pics from Round Pond and Army vs. Tulane

It's been a week.  I know.  But better late than never, right?

Before we get started with these, let me stipulate that I definitely need to read more about how and why we edit photographs, especially with filters.  I've read a few Internet articles, but that's not the same as understanding of the process.  I've learned a few things, but I like to understand why things work.  I need more theory.  I did most of these based solely on "feel," and in a lot of cases, that means that I know something's wrong, but I can't put my finger on what or how to fix it.

I took about half of these.  My wife took the ones from Michie Stadium and of the game.  She also, obviously, took the one of me.  I took the landscapes from Round Pond.

Technical note: to see full screen versions, click any picture.  You can even scroll through from that view.

Ready?

Let's get it on.

Pics from Rice at Army

I took 109 pictures at Army's first home game.  Three-quarters of them were total garbage, even for me, but I liked a few.  A few of my favorites are below.

Tailgating with friends.

I edited these rather indulgently, so have some patience, okay?  I mean, I didn't have to crop everything 16 x 9, but I wanted to, so that's what I did.  

Be thankful they're not all sepia-toned.

Digital Camera Experiments

One of my projects over the offseason has been trying to improve as a photographer.  I've taken half-a-million pictures at Army Football games, but I don't feel like I've ever successfully captured the experience of being up in the stands at Michie Stadium.  That needs to change.

Alas, photography is a fully-formed and complex art form.  People spend their lives trying to take better pictures.  I'm not going to necessarily get where I want to be in a couple of weeks.  And yet, there is an enormous difference between wholly self-taught swimmers and those who've spent just a single year on an organized team.  I'm not looking to shoot at the Olympic level, but I would like to approach the comparative competence of a low-end high school letter-winner.  That seems doable, though maybe this is one of those occasions where I don't know what I don't know.

Seems possible.

My buddy Andy took this one at the 2018 Armed Forces Bowl.  He did a great job capturing the action, though I cropped it quite a bit for emphasis.  I also dialed the colors down a little to try to emphasize the drama of the action.  I like this 16:9 format, especially for football, because I feel like it gives the scene a scene of perspective and impending action.

Team RBG 2.0 & the Swim Across the Sound

Friends,

As many of you know, I'm competing in this year's Swim Across the Sound to support St. Vincent's Hospital's Cancer Center.  The Swim is a 15-mile open water event that starts in Port Jefferson, NY, and finishes on the far side of Long Island Sound in Bridgeport, CT.  Team RBG 2.0 is entered in the Classic (No Wetsuit) category, which means that we'll swim as a relay, taking half-hour pulls while a boat motors slowly alongside us.  We have a team of legitimately talented swimmers -- Andy and I both swam for the Army Swim Team, Class of 1995, while Chris and Stephen are experienced triathletes (and Navy vets).  However, we'll have the tide against us this year, making this a serious challenge.

We're going to beat it, though, and we're going to beat cancer, too.

5 Things on a Friday: Trying to Move On

Back to work this week.  It hasn’t been an easy transition, and yet here we are.

I hope you all enjoyed your time off.  I know I did.  I already miss skiing.

Blog in Review: Top 15 Posts of 2018

The 80/20 Rule is a basic business guideline.  It says that any business will get 80% of its revenue from just 20% of its offerings or services.  For example, we should expect McDonald’s to earn 80% of its revenue from just 20% of its menu items.  This makes sense; almost everyone orders either a Big Mac or a Quarter-Pounder with Cheese.  Really, most of the menu is revenue neutral; the only reason to even offer a lot of that stuff is to make it easier for Big Mac lovers to bring their non-Big Mac friends into the store.  It’s the Big Macs that are keeping McDonald’s in the black.

Happy New Year!

Blogging is the same but moreso.  Much more than half of this blog’s readership has come from a handful of posts, and the rest is here either to entertain me as a writer or to give legitimate fans of my writing a reason to come back on a semi-regular basis.

#SBRLLR: Afterword

My wife Sally and I conceived this book as a joint project.  We wanted to show off our partnership as one of the world’s great love affairs.  I gradually came to realize, though, that Sally doesn’t quite have the time to write a whole book about her formative years, and even if she did, the resulting two-volume biography would read like The Winds of War.  Part of me still wants to do it that way, but I wonder who would read two hundred thousand words about a couple who are not famous and not looking to become famous.  

It seems like a tough sell.

Swim, Bike, Run, Live, Love, Repeat

“I want it all.

“I want it all.

“I want it all.

“And I want it now!”

― Freddie Mercury from Queen’s, “I Want It All”

I trained through the fall and into the spring, improving my fitness while remaining conscious of the fact that I could no longer afford the kind of single-minded devotion that had made me a champion in the pool.  I wanted to race and do well, but I needed to be a good father and a good husband, and I needed to find meaning in my professional work as well.  I had to find balance.  I ran Brian’s Beachside Boogie, an off-road run-bike-run duathlon, in the spring of 2009 and followed it up in June with the HealthNet Olympic Triathlon at Connecticut’s Indian Well State Park.  This was my first Olympic distance race, and it proved to be much more of a struggle than I’d expected.  I finished in just over three hours, realizing in the process that I would need to recommit to training longer before my next Olympic distance race.  

5 Things on a Friday: In the Top 10!

Happy Friday, everyone.  Let’s go!

5 Things on a Friday: Acoustic Metallica!

Friday!  Let’s get it on!!!

5 Things on a Friday: It’s Officially Christmas Season

I'm actually excited for Christmas this year.  I think that marks a certain amount of personal growth.

This is how I plan to commute to New York City this month.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving has become one of my favorite days of the year.  There aren't any presents to worry about, lots of football is on TV, and we have abundant friends to keep us in good cheer.  It's great!  This year, we're headed over to our friends Bruce and Tammy's house.  I don't even have to grill the turkey because Bruce is doing it.

I'm getting over!

Pics from Senior Day: Army 28, Colgate 14

Sally and I took nearly 200 pictures at the game on Saturday.  I wound up using just a few in my write-up, but there were lots more that were worth sharing.

Selected additions are below.  What a game!

Obligatory selfie at Michie Stadium.

Go Army!  Beat Navy!!!