Ben Andersen

Running

One of the great things about my new place is how close I am to Green Lake. One of my goals for coming back to Seattle and being in The Real World™ is to exercise. I tried it a year ago with CrossFit, and had mixed success. I was able to find the time to do it, but I didn’t have any idea of what I was doing. This may have contributed to my numb hand incident last year, which I eventually was resolved with a little bit of PT, however I had lost my exercise momentum.

But, this is a new year! And it would be a shame to waste Green Lake’s paths at 5am in the morning. Running seems like a pretty easy thing that I already know how to do (no special training required, although I did run track for a season back In The Day™). So I get up, drag my self out of bed (sometimes with the assistance of Ben or Quinn, who have each run with me once – although Quinn did it with me on a mid-Sunday morning), and run.

I ran two days last week and did not get around the lake either time. I ran yesterday with Quinn and today by myself and managed to get around both times1! The sun has barely started to rise and the air is nice and cool, making for ideal running conditions (for me at least).

run_ready20080909 If I can keep this up for the rest of the week, I’m planning on getting a Nike + iPod gadget that links my shoe to my iPod. My iPod will then be able to give me real time feedback on how far I’ve run, my pace, time elapsed, calories burned, etc…all to music! Anyone have any experience using the Nike + iPod and want to weigh in on it’s effectiveness?

Anyway, most mornings I’m out the door by 5:05am. If anyone wants to run with me, meet me in front of my building. If you know for sure that you want to run, try to give me a heads up the day before so I can let you know if I’m running or not the next morning.

Hopefully I can stick with this.

0

  1. getting around is not the problem, getting around in time to get ready for work so I can catch the carpool is the problem ↩

The Bachelor (Party)

I think every bachelor party should start out with someone walking into a sex shop, only to have their phone ring, “Oh, hi Mom. How’s it going? Can I call you back later?” and then turn around and ask the shopkeeper, deadpan, “Where are the inflatable dolls?

That’s how this one started out, kind of; we were actually getting ready for the party. Ben was on the floor, practically rolling in agony from laughter. I’m not quite sure it was that funny.

In any event, Kelly’s bachelor party was on Saturday. It was a party of epic proportions that started out on Lake Union, moved to The Spaghetti Factory, then Buca Di Beppo’s, and finally back to the boat. The night ended with Kelly ralphing over the side of the boat: the first two times as a result of the Gentlemen Jack’s we were taking swigs of, the next three times due to “Peter’s fucking fettuccine.”

My computer is down, although I have a new one on the way. Unfortunately, photos will have to wait for my new computer to arrive, so check back in 3ish weeks.

0

Sarah Plants

Ben recently told me that a casual acquaintance of ours, Sarah Plants, had recently passed away due to cancer. I didn’t know her very well, but saw her quite a bit since she played Ultimate Frisbee on the UW team. Doug, her husband, also lived at Your Mom’s House last year with Ben and Quinn, so she was over quite a bit. I last saw her at Thanksgiving and she seemed very happy.

From thedaily.washington.edu:

Plants, 22, died Feb. 7 of a brain tumor linked to Li-Fraumeni Syndrome, the same rare hereditary disorder that claimed the lives of her father and brother. She was diagnosed with the disorder in October.
…
Plants had survived cancer as a toddler. She suffered from adrenal cortical carcinoma, or cancer of the adrenal gland above the kidney, and went through chemotherapy at 16 months old.
…
Plants was 29 credits short of earning a degree in Public Health. When she died, the University gave her an honorary degree. She had planned to go to graduate school to study nursing.

She was captain of the UW Element women’s Ultimate Frisbee team and the coach of an Ultimate team at Whitman Middle School.

Death is a bitch, cancer even more so.

0