Moronacity

Love Stinks

Diane Ursu — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 11:00:33 +0000

Monday’s trainer workout was the first after a two-day layoff. I didn’t ride on Sunday because I expected to do a hard hill workout on Monday, but those plans were squashed. Instead, I hopped on the trainer for another pyramid workout. Not only was I able to make it through the hardest gear at the “top” of the pyramid before resting a moment to drink, but I managed to push through a total of five sprints over the usual three. Marked improvement!

I popped in The Wedding Singer for motivation. It turned out to be a great movie to watch during my sufferfest. One part that I particularly enjoyed—and that had a beat that facilitated the perfect cadence—was the scene where he sings Love Stinks. That is one of my favorite scenes . . . period. This might have to go into a spinning playlist on the computer, especially since I won’t be able to crank up the TV volume now that my downstairs neighbor has returned from her winter vacation.

WINNING!

Diane Ursu — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 23:29:45 +0000

Friday’s trainer workout was difficult. I had already ridden on Thursday, so my legs were feeling a little tired on Friday. Even so, I needed exercise. The weather was shitty. The trainer was my only option.

I was going to do an hour-long workout of fairly steady spinning. Instead, I started off with a cadence of 90 rpm in a moderate-effort gear. I did that for 10 minutes. Then, I shifted into a harder gear and pedaled at a somewhat varying cadence of 88 to 100 rpm. That was hard. After the five-minute interval, I dropped it down into a really easy gear and kept the cadence around 70 or 80 rpm and spent the next five minutes regaining my breath and lowering my heart and respiration rates to much more bearable levels. I repeated the moderate, 10-minute interval; the hard, five-minute interval; and the easy, five-minute interval twice more.

The last hard, five-minute interval was a little too much for me. I had to stop pedaling for 20 seconds about halfway through; then, I resumed the hard effort to finish the interval. Wow. It. Hurt. So. Bad. During the last half of that interval, I suddenly heard some motivational voices pop into my head. The first was Gilad from the butt-kicking, strength-training videos I did last winter. “You can do it! This last interval is going to change your muscle!” Then, suddenly, another familiar thing popped into my head: “WINNING!”

It’s amazing what our minds ponder in the midst of suffering.

Best of Moronacity—2011

Diane Ursu — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 16:22:07 +0000

The Best of 2011 was pretty easy to review, but not because of all of the wonderful content. It turned out to be a pretty uninspired year, so I didn’t post very much. Even so, I managed to find a few gems.

This is a year-in-review for Moronacity Cycling. Three best of lists follow. Links will open in a new window.

Best Photos of 2011

A link to the original post follows each picture.

Glen and Ali’s Fourth of July Weekend—A Photo Essay Part I

2011 MMBA Annual Meeting & Expo—A Photo Essay

2011 Ride of Silence—A Photo Essay

Recreation 101 at the Holly Recreation Area

Hopkins Lake Requires a Rear Brake

Glen and Ali’s Fourth of July Weekend—A Photo Essay Part II

Hopkins Lake Requires a Rear Brake

Glen and Ali’s Fourth of July Weekend—A Photo Essay Part III

Trouble at Addison Oaks

Best Posts of 2011

The following are my favorite posts of 2010:

Best Photo Essays of 2011

The following are my favorites.

Trouble at Addison Oaks—A Photo Essay

Diane Ursu — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:30:40 +0000

I thought I’d squeeze in a quickie photo essay covering two events at Addison Oaks this past year.

The Golden Carrot

Diane Ursu — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 21:02:35 +0000

I wasn’t particularly looking forward to my trainer workout, today; but I seemed to go into automatic pilot when I got home. I slipped on my cycling gear—the bonus being that it’s a hell of a lot less than what I would wear if I went outside—and mounted my green steed for an honest effort over the usual 60-minute period.

As I warmed up, me debated with myself over what to do, but it was I who recommended something completely different: a pyramid! This came to me 10 minutes into my workout when I shifted into a harder, although moderately easy gear to spin for five minutes at a cadence of 80 to 90 rpm. When I realized the progression of my workout up until that point—warm-up at 70 rpm in an easy gear, progression to 90 rpm at the same gear, shifting into a harder gear at the same cadence—I decided that I would progress to one more harder gear, which just so happened to be Jake’s second hardest gear. I think my cadence slowed a bit, but it remained respectable, and well over 60 rpm. Unfortunately, it got the best of me, so I had to stop pedaling for a minute, drink, and then finish the remainder of the five-minute interval.

I was so spent after that interval that I had to hop off my bike to go fill up my glass, and quickly return for a five-minute easy spin. Afterwards, I finished the pyramid by repeating the second hardest effort, and proceeding in the reverse order of the first part of my workout.

I pedaled at a moderate effort at an 80 to 90 rpm cadence for 10 minutes and then decided to finish with three sprints. Each was in a harder gear, as fast as I could pedal while maintaining a little control, and for 30 seconds with 90-second rest periods in between. I then finished with 10 minutes of moderate spinning, because the easy cooldown that I had been doing over the past week now felt too easy.

The good news is that there was a noticeable improvement over my last workout! This is the golden carrot dangling in front of my face, encouraging me to continue my training. My new goal is to complete that pyramid without having to stop. Any bets on how long that will take?

In Spite of Cheese and Meat

Diane Ursu — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 03:25:15 +0000

Someone who works in my building saw me, today, and said, from the other end of the hallway, “You look really good! You’re looking slimmer!”

Do you have any idea how good that made me feel? I’m looking slimmer! Someone noticed! Do I think I’m slimmer? No. Do I weigh less? Not yet. Someone thinks I look slimmer, though!

I’ve been so down on myself about my weight, lately, so I felt my face go aglow and my smile beam when I heard this compliment. It’s almost as if it were the first time I received it, but I guess it really depends on my current frame of mind.

I have heard this before, and almost always when I have not lost weight, but when I started exercising regularly, like now. I’ve been pretty good, this week! In addition to regular exercise, I’ve been a little more reserved with my diet, and I’m working on eating more fruit, again. That’s not always so easy, especially when my cravings are for cheese and meat. How odd a woman am I? My cravings aren’t for donuts or milk chocolate. I want cheese and meat!

My biggest issue has been with bloating. I am a woman—for those of you who haven’t figured it out—so I do suffer regular bloat cycles predetermined by my DNA. Unfortunately, I add to it by eating high-sodium foods, particularly when I go out. If I drink beer instead of iced tea, that doesn’t help. After all, the tea will wash out the salt, and that will keep me from getting so darn bloated to begin with! Beer consumption, well, I’m pretty sure you’ve experienced that for yourself.

Perhaps my operator’s manual goes something like this:

Diet keeps things working well.
Exercise strengthens, stretches, energizes, and slims.

Seems simple, doesn’t it?

No Gung-Ho on Cycling

Diane Ursu — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 02:42:19 +0000

I’ve been doing quite well with my workouts throughout the holiday weekend. Wednesday, December 21 was the first day on the trainer (see Jake’s New Toy). I “trained” again on Thursday for 40 minutes. I sprinkled in three sprints, and my heart responded by saying, “No, not gonna slow down until you get off this damn bike.”

Friday, I got out for a hike at Stony Creek with Kristi, Eric, Nick, Marty, Steve, Walter, Chili, Roxie, Dobby, and Coriander: six people, five dogs. We spent two hours hiking all over the place. I was ready to quit long before we did, but I’m really glad that we were out for as long as we were. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I also really needed it. I guess you could say that my friends took me for a much-needed walk. Here are some awesome photos from that hike:

Saturday and Sunday were travel days for Christmas with the family, so I didn’t get any exercise, but I managed to get back on schedule with a 40-minute walk along some of the streets of Mount Clemens, yesterday. Cori wasn’t quite sure she wanted to leave the apartment. I think she thought I was going to throw her back into the car for a ride to God only knows where, but she perked up when she realized that we were hitting the pavement sans driving.

Today, I took Nick’s advice of popping in a movie during my trainer workout. Since I’m still working my way through Christmas movies, I popped in Holiday Inn. It really did make it easier to get through the workout. I managed to spin for 60 minutes. I did some faster spinning at about 90 rpm, switching between an easier and a medium gear. In fact, the faster spinning felt better than the slower spinning. This is good. It was somewhat of a challenge syncing my cadence with the early-40s music, but I managed, and I realized that musicals are great for trainer workouts. The movie focuses my mind on the plot, while the music encourages me to switch it up a bit. The problem is that I don’t own very many musicals.

I had to do three sprints toward the end of the workout. To make it more challenging, and to shock my muscles into being like little rock stars and fine-tuning their craft, which just happens to be being strong and fast, I like to do sprints or simulate hills as much as I can in my quaint, little living room.

So it seems that I have a bit of a routine, and I intend to keep it up. Instead of going gung-ho on the cycling, I am going to continue alternating cycling with walking. This means that Cori and Jake get equal time. Aside from keeping the dog and bike happy, it also keeps my body happy. While I’m going through the “getting back into shape” phase, I think it’s best to give my legs rest days between trainer workouts. In the past, my legs have responded quite well to rest days, coming back much stronger for the next workout.

If I can keep this up, I’ll be ready for race season.

Jake’s New Toy

Diane Ursu — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 01:06:36 +0000

My friends are probably sick of hearing me say, “I need a trainer!” The tropical rainforest-like climate of Metro Detroit has been getting to me. I want to fall asleep during the day, and I actually go to bed at 8 or 9 p.m. It’s really bizarre for a night owl like me! The biggest problem is that I’ve been having a very difficult time getting regular exercise.

Yesterday, I drove home for lunch to make a somewhat healthy something-or-other and to let the pooch out. It was warm and beautiful! I really wanted to ride. Who doesn’t when it’s warm and the sun is brightly shining?!

Things changed when I returned to work. I posted on Facebook:

I thought, “I really need to ride. I think I’ll email the friends.” So, I checked the forecast only to see a bit of rain in the no-so-distant future. I thought, “Crap, I guess I won’t email the friends.” Man, I really need to get a trainer so I can do a trainer session. I’m feeling like a caged hamster without a wheel, and I really need to justify that burrito.

The burrito in question was the ever-so-awesome, handcrafted burrito from Chipotle. I haven’t had Chipotle in a while, and I’m having one of those fun weeks during which I crave lots of stuff I don’t normally eat—today, I ate peanut M&Ms and a Pay Day; I don’t normally eat candy. It is also one of those weeks when I easily succumb to temptation and even suffer a little crankiness. Fortunately for me, I chose to forego the burrito in favor of a BLAT (bacon, lettuce, avocado, tomato) sandwich. Yum. I had my first BLAT when I was stationed out in Monterey, California during my Army days. That was a while ago. Those were the days when my dining life was significantly improved by the introduction of the avocado. Did I say “yum?”

Anyway, Bob replied to my Facebook post with a link to the “Pay It Forward” thread in the MMBA Forum. Thank you, Bob! Someone was giving his old trainer away because someone gave him another one. I told the guy I wanted the trainer and made arrangements to pick it up on my way into work, which was fairly close to his work. Yay!

At lunchtime, I figured the pooch could wait and opted to go to Jimmy John’s for a #12 with extra avocado (no surprise, there). I knew I was going to go straight home and try out the trainer, and the #12 was an excellent reason to do so. I was so excited about the trainer! I still am!

My biggest issue with living in Lower Michigan is that outdoor recreation is a bit of a challenge. While there are a lot of great options in the Detroit Area, the weather doesn’t like to cooperate. For this reason, I wasn’t getting enough exercise, so my metabolism wasn’t increasing. Boo! I’ve tried dieting, and even successfully lost four pounds plus the added six I gained on my work trip to Denver. The problem was that I was starving. Face it, if your stomach is hurting, even after eating, you just aren’t getting enough food, and I was going for high-fiber, high-protein food.

The only solution is to do what I did in my Keweenaw days: exercise! Boost that metabolism! This is why we ride bikes, right? Well, that, and it’s a lot of fun to push yourself just close enough to the edge of reason that you might get hurt, and probably will at some point. Okay, so we ride bikes because we like to eat and we’re just a little crazy. Check!

I think there’s a third reason why the trainer is going to be useful, and this is kind of odd. My body is definitely out of balance. The muscles along the right side are tight, and they always have been. Riding only makes this worse. It also seems to promote knots in my upper back, as well.

One thing I’ve noticed, while riding Jake, is that it seems like I ride with the bike slightly leaning to the left. I can always see the right side of the bike, but not the left. I did the same thing on the trainer, today. So, I chose to lean my body slightly the left so that the frame was lined up below me. After 40 minutes of riding, I had no knee pain—something that I usually have to work through on the right side. In fact, everything felt fine when I got off the bike! I think the trainer is going to encourage me to align everything correctly, which will lead to more balanced muscle strength. Awesome.

Riding the trainer is hard. This is harder than any road workout I’ve done. Holy crapola! Even my easy gear was challenging. I managed to do about 70 rpm at a hard effort, and then about six total minutes (split into two occurrences) at an even harder effort, because there was really only hard and harder. I did a five-minute “cool down” at a not quite as hard effort, but it was still frickin’ hard.

Goal: 40 minute workouts, four times per week. Then, I’ll go from there.

Saint Nicholas of Myra

Diane Ursu — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 00:43:06 +0000

Saint Nicholas of Myra was born in modern-day Turkey to wealthy parents who died when he was young. He dedicated his life to God and used his fortune to care for the less-fortunate. He became Bishop of Myra at a young age.

During the Roman persecution of Christians, Bishop Nicholas was thrown into prison with other clergy. It is believed that, after his release from prison, he attended the First Ecumenical Council of Nicaea in 325. This council addressed important Church teachings such as the relationship between Jesus Christ to God the Father, the date of celebration for Easter, early canon law, and the development of the Nicene Creed.

Legends of Saint Nicholas

Many legends about St. Nicholas have been handed down from generation to generation. While many of the legends are stories of fiction, they serve to illustrate his remarkable character.

The story of the three maidens and the dowries gave rise to the tradition of stuffing stockings at Christmas. The father of the three maidens did not have money for their dowries, so no one would marry them, leaving them in danger of being sold into slavery. In secret, St. Nicholas threw three bags of gold through the window; each landing in its own stocking that was hanging to dry by the fireplace. Each maiden, now having a dowry, married. Upon being found out by the father, St. Nicholas said, “You must thank God alone for providing these gifts in answer to your prayers for deliverance” (St. Nicholas Center, “Three Impoverished Maidens or the Story of the Dowries“).

Celebrating the Feast Day of Saint Nicholas

Saint Nicholas’ feast day is widely celebrated throughout Europe on December 6, the anniversary of his passing in AD 343 in Myra. In the weeks leading up to December 6, “Sinterklaas” travels the country to see how the children are behaving, much like Santa Claus checking his list to see who is naughty or nice!

“In the Netherlands and Belgium, St. Nicholas rides a white horse on his gift-giving rounds. Dutch children leave carrots and hay in their shoes for the saint’s horse, hoping St. Nicholas will exchange them for small gifts. Simple gift-giving in early Advent helps preserve a Christmas Day focus on the Christ Child,” the St. Nicholas Center explains in “Who is St. Nicholas?“

The Dutch celebrate St. Nicholas on the eve of his feast day: December 5. “Children sing traditional Sinterklaas songs while waiting for the saint to appear. A knock comes on the door and a black, gloved hand appears to toss candies and pepernoten inside. Children scramble to gather up the treats. A large burlap bag, ‘de zak van Sinterklaas,’ also appears filled with gifts,” the St. Nicholas Center describes in their article, “Netherlands.”

Each person’s place setting at the table may contain a chocolate letter, their initial. Other food items include banket, a Dutch almond-filled pastry; speculaas, Dutch windmill cookies; and beverages such as hot chocolate and Bishop’s wine. In her About.com article, “Bishop’s Wine (Bischopswijn),” Dutch Food expert, Karin Engelbrecht, describes Bishop’s wine as “a medley of red wine, oranges, lemon, and spices.” She recommends spiking two oranges and one lemon with about 15 cloves and adding to a pot containing one and one-half bottle of red wine and four cinnamon sticks, and heating slowly for three hours without boiling. Towards the end of the heating period, add one-half cup of sugar and dissolve completely. Remove the fruit spices and serve.

Learn more about St. Nicholas by visiting St. Nicholas: Discovering the Truth about Santa Claus.

St. Francis Xavier of the Society of Jesus

Diane Ursu — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 19:32:43 +0000

St. Francis Xavier was one of the greatest Catholic missionaries. The Jesuit is well-known for spreading the Gospel to faraway places such as India and Japan. He is portrayed in artwork in various forms, among them: holding a crucifix, with a flaming heart, holding a pilgrim’s staff, and raising his hands as he baptizes someone. He is one of the first of the Jesuit Order, or the Society of Jesus.

St. Francis Xavier and the Jesuit Order, Society of Jesus

St. Francis Xavier was born in Spain in 1506; but it was while he was living and teaching in France that he experienced great rebirth due to the persistence of his friend, Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Jesuit Order, or the Society of Jesus. St. Francis underwent Ignatius’ spiritual direction for several years. “Together at Montmartre, they vowed poverty, chastity and apostolic service according to the directions of the pope,” AmericanCatholic.org explains in their “Saint of the Day” article, “St. Francis Xavier.” It was here that they began the Jesuit Order with five others.

St. Francis was ordained a priest in 1537 in Venice. He traveled to places such as Portugal, India, Malaysia, and Japan. “Wherever he went, he lived with the poorest people, sharing their food and rough accommodations. He spent countless hours ministering to the sick and the poor, particularly to lepers,” says AmericanCatholic.org. He died in 1552 before he could go to China.

The Crucifix, Flaming Heart, and other Symbols

St. Francis Xavier is often depicted with a crucifix, pilgrim’s staff, and flaming heart. The crucifix is a “symbol of his role as patron of the missions,” according to Saint Xavier Church of Cinicinatti. He is also shown “raising his arms over two kneeling figures who represent the thousands he baptized.”

The Loyola Unversity Museum of Art further explains, “His attributes include lilies for purity, a flaming heart for religious ardor, a crucifix, and clerical dress.”

St. Francis Xavier was canonized in 1622 and is the patron saint of Japan and Missionaries. His feast day is December 3.

What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? Or what can one give in exchange for his life?

—Matthew 16:26