All Things Rowdy

I feel like an angry, petulant child right now. I slept horribly last night due to all the different stuff I watched right before bed that gave me horrible dreams and had me wake up skitish. Then there was nothing but juice to drink for breakfast, and to get that I still had to go to the store this morning. Like the candy bar commercial, you're not yourself when you're hungry. So off to a good start. I felt I needed it so I booked a 1pm massage today. Right at the last second, 1228 as I'm leaving to go to it, they call and tell me they are having plumbing issues in their building and I will be delayed an hour. Part of my waiting I went to the beach for like 3 minutes to take pictures, but wading out and looking through the lens I didn't pay attention and got totally soaked in the just regular shorts I was wearing. RAWR, that is frustrating. My plan was to go eat afterwards. You can't eat and then get a massage, it just doesn't work. So now I'm lookin...

From someone in "it", here is what I think...... Reasons why "healthcare" is soo expensive: -Torts. Lawsuits and malpractice insurance require higher costs. -Three tiered payment system. You get, and whatever coverer you have, get charged a different amount for anything if you are paying cash, paying with MediCare/MediCal, or good private insurance. -Uninsured. You have no insurance, so you never go to the doctor. Things get out of hand and you go to the emergency room. By law they have to treat you. You get stuff done that costs lots of money and you walk away. The hospital eats those costs and/or charges everyone else to make up for it. So what do to? Kinda the opposite of what the problems are, in simple terms.

(no pictures of jiu jitsu, the middle part of my day of destruction. but i did good!) breathe, balance, explode yes, beating little kids need to work on my attack position look through the turn

tourmoline parking lot 730am, on a wednesday looking out at it all 40 minutes "surfing", 5 seconds of non-fail and i'm outta here!

I kinda wanna wear myself down tomorrow. Here is what I am thinking.... 630am-go surfing for a hour. then breakfast. 900am-go to an hour of jiu jitsu practice. 1130am-lunch, much needed. 2pm-ride my bmx bike at the skate park. for my first time ever. 6pm-race bmx bike at the Kearny track. Four different activities all through the day should about do it. Sea, mats and dirt. Awesome. B2BA. Here is what really happened though..... 0730- I went surfing for 30 minutes till I got hit by the board and was just done with getting worked. 1000-  I go to jiu jitsu for 90 minutes. It went great! I was happy and am ready to go back more often. Though I did tear a huge chunk of skin off my toe, thanks Mt Whitney. Lunch. Not gonna do the skate park due to foot thingy. 700pm-racing bmx bike still.

Sunday-rest Monday-rock climb at Vertical Hold. yoga at Pilgrimage of the Heart. Tuesday-jiu jitsu at Atos. Wednesday-bmx bike racing at Kearney Moto Park. Thursday-weight lifting at home. Friday-yoga again. Saturday-downhill mnt bike race up at Big Bear/Rim Nordic

Here are some quick pictures from the trip's video. I will probably make the full video tomorrow if you want to see my experience. Enjoy!

Climbing Mt Whitney was super hard. Now that I am home and sitting on the couch looking at the videos I took, it seems much more pleasant. At one point on the trail I was having to convince myself to keep going, to not quit. As part of that thinking I kept repeating, "just keep walking" and "just put foot one foot in front of the other and soon you'll be walkin' out the door" in my mind to myself. I also thought about other physically hard things I've done and if this would be in the top 10. I think it is. Here it is, from my oxygen starved mind at 14,000 here are the physically toughest things I've had to do in my life. (in no particular order of difficulty) -Running a half marathon in 1:53 with no training and never having run farther than 5 miles before. -Get walking again right after abdominal surgery. -Climb Mt Whitney in 17 hours. -Get up and moving again after my two worst bicycle crashes. One of which resulted in broken bones and the...

Yesterday I made it to the top of Mt. Whitney, the tallest mountain in the continental United States at almost 14,500 feet. It was an arduous hike of almost 17 hours. Remember a while ago when I said, "It's not an adventure unless something goes wrong"? Well, then this was an adventure for me. -I was driving around looking at places to boulder the day before in the Alabama Hills area and got turned around and went down a dirt road meant for my truck, not for my sedan. To get out the problem I ended up leaving two long scratches down the entire passenger side of my car. -I've climbed more than one mountain that is over 12,000 feet. I grew up in the Pacific Northwest goofing off in the Cascades, Wallowa and Blue mountains. For some reason I forgot what I know and ignored my own experience and advice when it comes to climbing and clothing. I have two different shells/jackets that are light and great for this sort of thing. I didn't bring them on the mountain with...

My ode in photos and words to the first day of summer, my favorite season. For weather. Ride Your Motorcycle to Work Day was last week. I'm late, but still doing it! And since we're talking about work. Being the first day of work and all, why not kick up my feet? Take it easy. And look out the window. Oh, I used to be able to see Cowles Mountain out of my window but the trees are too big now. And as it's the first day of summer, why not have a delicious summery salad? No reason at all not to! Unless you are bbq-ing pork ribs. Then screw summer salad! Shrimps were sauteed in butter, Sri Racha chili sauce, salt and tons of Old Bay. Salad is green leaf lettuce, purple kale, red onion, avocado, green onion, cucumber, tomato, celery and with a chipotle ranch dressing. Summer is soo awesome! Summer is the best. So you know what summer doesn't need? Any sort of supplement like this:    And Summer is also for sports!! Summer,...

Today was a good day. -House keeper came. Roofing repair guy came. Always nice to have a clean house in good order. -I got some good stuff for the Whitney climb that I will use again, at REI. -I went indoor climbing/bouldering and did well. For not really trying to be good at it, but just goofing off. I also found out that if you volunteer to belay during parties, for each hour you do, they will give you a free day pass. In!! -I ran two miles at an easy pace. -The sun was shinning. -I had a delicious tri-tip sandwich for lunch at a new place to me, Moto Deli, near the climbing gym. I made a delicious banana, strawberry and blueberry smoothie for breakfast. Not sure if they off set each other, but they sure both tasted and felt good at the time. -My new motorcycle was delivered to me, and I rode it away with 00001 miles on it! I really like it and am going to have fun riding it for years! -The new mountain bike shoes I ordered showed up. Look great, feel good. Gonna help ...

-That love is an action word. It is what you do. If you love someone, you put them first and you do things for them. Love isn't really a feeling, but your actions. What you do is love. -How to handle money. You make a budget. You save. You pay your needs first. And after all that, then you can give into your wants. -Duty. There are obligations you take on and with them requirements to your behavior. And time. Sometimes you have to do things that are hard, that you don't want to do, but they are what you need to do and should do. Do your duty. Do what you gotta do! -How to be precise. Whether teaching me sight picture when shooting or building and painting model airplanes. If you are performing a skill or doing something, before you start thinking about adding style, think about doing the action to perfection. -Music can be enjoyable. -People can change. You can go from an out of control rocker to  successful small business owner. A person has it within them to make tr...

My only aunt killed herself today. She is the one who told my mom what to name me. She had a very difficult life and I'm sorry she was soo troubled. I miss ya, I just emailed you a few days ago with news about Killer....... I love you and I'll see you in the hereafter.

So I just spent the past 4 hours inputing all my undergrad coursework into my graduate school application. What dreary work! But in doing so I noticed I had been on the Dean's list 4 times and on the President's list twice! I would have never remembered that about university if I hadn't been doing this today! On the flip side, and there always is one, isn't there..... I had remembered only getting 3 C grades in college. Wrong. I got 10 C's in college! And one D! Yikes, I must have totally blocked that out.... Wish me luck!

I've been bitten, harassed, stung and attacked by a lot of different animals in my life. Of the aquatic miscreants stingrays almost became a repeat offender. I was at La Jolla Shores, north of the last bathroom but not quite to the houses. The surf was small but poorly timed. Ragged. More often than not I would catch my self zooming up on the shore and in pretty shallow water much sooner than I would have anticipated. This has happened to me before. Just 80 yards north of where I was yesterday. Calm day in the water, few surfers. Shuffle step out, catch wave, ride in, jump off and repeat. Except one time BAM, when jumping off I landed on a stingray and got a sting that turned my foot spotted and hurt like I'd broken my ankle. You can imagine my concern than as I'm whipping over the water, seeing I'm close to shore and need to get off the board I look down. Down through clear water to the sandy bottom. Covered in 6 stingrays. Help! I pick a spot that doesn't ...

"they" say that tomorrow never comes. the flip side of that is yesterday seemingly never goes away. today is one of those days where i feel soo strongly "i used to _______________", and fill in the blank. maybe it is the serious lack of sleep i am running on. i don't know. the sky is beautiful, the temperature is perfect, i'm not broke. but............................... i still have this gloomy feeling or self identity that i'll never be anywhere as good at anything as i was previously. -i used to be more passionate than i am now -i used to weigh less than i do now -i used to joke around more than i do now -i used to have more self control than i do now -i used to be stronger, faster, smarter, tougher and anything physical better than i do/am now -i used to win more than i do now. games, races, scrabble, jiu jitsu. i never win anything anymore i'm still nice to people. i still care about stuff. i'm reasonably healthy all things ...

Again, I forgot the sound editing since I was doing this in the middle of the night. Mute it for best effect. 8 days and over 1700 kilometers driven in Norway distilled into 20 minutes of video. I hope you enjoy! The pictures don't do it justice as this is one of the must beautiful places on earth. Truly.

(evidently i skipped the sound editing part making this, so mute is your best friend) Flew from San Diego to Newark. Then to Tel Aviv and a mini-bus ride to Jerusalem. Stayed west of "the seam" in the more arab side of the city. Nice hotel and within walking distance of all we wanted in Jerusalem. Or close to the train/mass transit for the things farther away. Hit up Damascus Gate, old city, David's Tower, Garden Tomb, Garden of Gethsemane, Mt of Olives, Wailing Wall, Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa mosques. Lion's Gate, Joffa Gate. Yad Vashem aka the Holocaust museum. The Dead Sea, mnt fortress of Masada, Qumran and a detour to Jericho and such in the PA controlled area. Nice weather. Lots of walking. Only heard gunfire three times. Lots of tension in the air. Peace there is a futile dream. OK food. Decent prices. I've been a few other middle eastern places and it was fairly typical in the amount of people, business, dirt and trash around. Sorry for an 18 mi...

Here are some pics of me from vacation, both from Israel and Norway. Check the pics out here! Mostly posed pics of me in the achingly beautiful Norwegian country or religious/cultural sights in Israel. For the full on video/slide show from vacation you are just going to have to wait a bit. Here is a preview of what you'll see in the above link's slideshow: Forest above Voss, Norway