There is nothing nicer than sleeping in when you know you should be out running.

I did some running today and it was glorious. I’m visiting my parent’s near the Kananaskis. I left their place this morning and went to the highway and then started running. It is hilly so I got some good training in that way.
The first part was somewhat boring. There was a nice valley immediately, but after that it were a lot of long straightaways in the trees. It would have been nice to have been listening to my iPod at that point, but that probably isn’t the safest thing to do when you are effectively playing in traffic. When I passed Bragg Creek, the mountains opened themselves up to me and I had no need of distraction.
Luckily my family had driven ahead to take the dog for a walk in the park. So at the end of my run I got a ride back home.

I did my run today, focusing on speed work instead of hills. In theory I will do hills when I am in the mountains this Easter, visiting the family.
At the store though there was a celebration. Well, there was supposed to be. Except the mayor was running late, so all the groups left before we even knew he would be there.
But, the important thing, more important than meeting political figures and watching them accept giant checks, is loot! A clerk at the store was handing out free double guest passes to an advance screening of Run Fatboy Run. So, next Thursday I get to go see a comedy about running. Woot!

For movie night I saw The Transporter. No one else showed up, so I watched it by myself. That was probably a good thing because I didn’t find it that good.
My main complaint was the plot. I will admit it was only there to hang the action scenes off of. But it stretched credibility. The characters never seemed to be consistent. That girl, was frankly annoying.
The best part was the opening scene. It looked familiar. Then I realized that the promenade they were driving around is the same one I smeared myself on. I guess that is the benefit of being a world traveler. You get to recognize places in movies.

Lately I’ve been locking myself up in my home on the weekends. Except for the regularly scheduled activities (running, brunch) I’ve been playing computer games. And as I am wont to do, I am playing an old game. Diablo 2 reminds me on every startup that it was made in 2001. Hopefully I will finish it one of these days.
This has helped me in my plan to conserve finances. If I don’t leave the house, it is harder to spend money.
I actually used my credit card for the first time today. I went to the after-run brunch at a restaurant. This is regularly scheduled, so it is an approved expense, but I need to keep these as minimal as possible. It has actually been ten days since this exercise started, so I think I’m doing well. (Ten days since my credit card statement starts, which is the limiting factor I’m working on.)
I do see some charges coming up when I drive to Calgary to visit family. Gas isn’t free.

If I wake up early, I usually don’t have any luck falling back asleep. I lie there and pretend to sleep.
This morning when I woke up too early I decided to teach my body a lesson. I got out of bed, and went for a run on the treadmill.
That’ll teach it.
Maybe next time it will appreciate sleeping.

I’m not gorging myself enough. I need to eat more.
I’m sure this is a problem many other people would like to have.
After the really long run yesterday, I made some french toast. Then I went off to go gaming with some friends. While I was out I had a small dinner. When I got back at around 9:00 I was hungry. But I was also lazy. I went to bed on an empty stomach.
I have now fallen behind in my eating. I’ve had all my regular meals but I’m always feeling hungry early for them. What I really need to do is eat a huge meal and get myself back on track.
Or realize that I do have plenty of food in my fridge; Many of which can be cooked quickly in case of laziness.

So, I am officially “Goofy” because of the Disneyworld marathon. But I can be even stupider.
There is also the Death Race. We runners are an easily influenced bunch. One of us had the idea of doing the entire race. Solo. Get together a bunch of people and all try to stick together and finish it. 125 km over (not around) three mountain peaks. One other guy fell for this, so then there were two. They quickly got a third. And now they are all eyeing me. And I’ve been telling them that it would be stupid to do it. (It doesn’t help that they all agree.) I told the original instigator that I haven’t signed up.
But that is a lie. I signed up two weeks ago, but he is apparently too lazy to look at the official registry where I’m one of the first names you see. The second runner saw it promptly and called me an “idiot”. But he was away this week.
So it was amusing to watch the other two try to goad me to sign up. They kept saying how humiliating it will be for me with other people having the medals and how they will rub it in my face.
Honestly, I don’t know if I can do it. I ran 29km today and it was tiring. I have until August though. My mother did just find out, and she isn’t at the point yet where she is supportive. Hopefully that will come. EIther that or I get disinherited. Could go either way.

The building I work in has been getting a number of upgrades lately. I hear that there are new owners who want to spruce it up. For the longest time there has been a large brick tower that has a rotating sign on it in the front. At least the sign is supposed to be rotating, but except when the wind blows, I haven’t seen it move in half a year. In fact, I think I’ve seen pigeons sneak into it.
This afternoon, at about 5:00 a large crane came and started to tear it down. It was so cool! It banged around the fiberglass panels on the rotating cube on the top. Eventually that came down in pieces. Then it started scraping away at the bricks. With one particular motion, the entire thing shuddered and a horizontal crack appeared as the top half rotated relative to the bottom.
Unfortunately, I had decided to throw a party today so I couldn’t stay to watch. I hear that it eventually did go down in a big crash.
I do feel sorry for the pigeons though. While work was still going on, I saw one poking through the rubble. I hope it hadn’t left anything important in there.
But after being in Venice, I don’t seem to have a lot of sympathy for the sky-rats.

Several years ago I noticed that my credit card bills were fairly high. This wasn’t a big concern, as I pay off the balance every month. But I recalled a time when it never went over $300. I use my card to do almost all my purchasing, so it easily goes over that.
As a test of character, I decided to do my best to make sure my credit card bill was as low as possible for a month. I would still use the card for all the purchases I would normally do, but just try and not do them; No paying cash for things I would normally use the card for. That would be cheating.
At no time was I in financial peril. It was just an experiment. And I’ve proven it is possible for me to do it. In fact I’ve repeated the exercise every so often.
And now it is time again. After all the heavy purchasing I’ve done over the past few months, I need to get some discipline back in my life. For the month of March I will try and be a good shopper and only buy things that I actually need. Costco may provide me an out though; They don’t accept credit cards so I have to pay via debit.
This will also restrict movie nights somewhat, as I’ll be borrowing from friends instead of renting. But I have lots of friends who buy too many DVDs. All in all, this is probably good for me.
Oh, and I checked my old credit card bills. The time I recalled was a lie. I’ve never had a credit card bill below $300, except when I do these vows of poverty.

I felt dirty when I voted. I followed Kang’s opinion (“Go ahead, throw your vote away.”) and didn’t vote for who I wanted, but against who I didn’t want.
Doesn’t matter.
I might as well have voted Conservative. In fact, it is as if I had.

I have to vote tomorrow. I still don’t know who for.
I think of myself as a conservative, but mostly because I like fiscal responsibility. None of the parties really seem to be showing that. The Conservatives have been in power for 37 years in this province. Part of me likes a good tradition, but they are acting like they are destined to run the place. Which is a pity, because Ed does look like he could make a good premier.
I just wish he would raise the royalty rate.
In my riding the Liberals came close to winning last election. So if I was just interested in not having a Conservative win my riding, it is clear I should vote for the Liberals. But they haven’t done anything to inspire me. I usually like voting Green. It makes me feel good, and they have described themselves as fiscally responsible.
NDP are off the table. I don’t trust them to run the government. I am still glad they exist because their presence allows for minority governments.
In the end, it really doesn’t matter. The Conservatives always win in Alberta.
In the election for the “Leader of the Free World”, for which I do not have a say, I usually like the Democrats. But they’ve been sparring against each other for so long that they are both beginning to look bad. I used to like Hilary, because she had experience, but then they are both saying they don’t like NAFTA. McCain does seem like he would be a good leader. But the Republicans are not the party of business, but of the religious, and I support the separation of church and state.

At the start of the flight back from L.A. it was cloudy. Fortunately, halfway through it cleared up. I was presented with a gorgeous view of the mountains. Especially with sunset happening; They lit up beautifully. I find that topography inspiring. That is probably why I’ve maintained interest in my mapping program for so long. (I just wish I could maintain a regular interest so I could finish it.)
However, I may not like topography in the future. Some running friends have decided (stupidly, even for us) to do the Death Race. The peer pressure is fairly intense. I can very well see myself getting dragged into what is probably the toughest race in North America, if not the world.

Let’s discuss California.
Now that I have finally been there, I think I can comment on it. (Actually I was in California twenty years ago on a family vacation, but I don’t think we ever went to a major metropolitan area.)
The people there were friendly. And, in a surprising difference from other places I’ve been, they were not fat. Healthy people were a common sight. Also, I didn’t see as many American flags as I’m used to. This state really is different from every other one in the union.
The problem with L.A. is that, to get anywhere, you need to drive. And the driving there is terrible. Very slow. A local told me that most people rarely leave an area of five miles from where they live. I can believe that. The city also makes driving feel threatening. In several places I saw those barbs that would sherd your car’s tires if you go through in the wrong direction. Are people there that ignorant of the rules that they need to threaten you with hundreds of dollars in damage? No forgiveness for driving here.
Palm trees were a common enough vegetation. In Canada, when the leaves fall from the trees, they are easy to sweep away. When a palm tree frond falls, it becomes a major traffic hazard.
My biggest regret was that I wasn’t busier there. Most of the time I was just flapping in the breeze and going along with whatever was happening. This was not an efficient use of my time. But now that I have knowledge, I think I could plan a much better trip. One where I am going non-stop. That is how my vacations should be.

I have returned safely. I left the Calgary airport parking lot at about 7:15. And I’ve arrived here at 9:45. I’ll need to figure out if driving instead of flying is better.
I haven’t eaten since this morning.

They had better hurry up and discover me soon, they are running out of time. My plane leaves in half an hour, and it will be a lot more inconvenient for them once I’ve left the country.
As a pleasant change, I nearly got a decent night’s sleep last night. I wasn’t at the hotel anymore but was staying with friends. They have quite the party house and have had a lot of people staying with them over the long weekend. I was lucky to get any time there. But it was a fun group of people.
It was surprisingly easy to drop off the rental car. Hertz had asked me to be there an hour before I was due. I’m glad I ignored that and had time to have a home-cooked breakfast with friends. I showed up twenty minutes before the deadline. And all I really needed to do was park the car. A nice man waved a bar code reader and gave me a receipt. I suppose it would have been more difficult if I hadn’t picked up cheap American gas before arrival. However, it was also a gas guzzling American car, so it balances out.
My usual souvenir duty-free alcohol purchase had a little trouble. I wasn’t sure what local beverage to get. It can’t be wine (despite a Californian specialty), because that will spoil after opening, and this is something that I want to last. (At a Trader Joe’s yesterday I saw a good bottle of Merlot for $2. Curse you duty limit!) It can’t be beer because that is too… common. So I decided to splurge a bit and get a scotch, bottled in Scotland. But I can claim some locality because it was aged in American oak casks. I have a friend who is a Scotch connoisseur, and it would be nice to know what scotch distillery is his favored brand. He’s going to be drinking this more than I am.
I’ll be boarding soon. Los Angeles airport hasn’t been as bad as people have been telling me it would be. Things have been fairly efficient. I did help by checking in on-line yesterday. I even got to pick my seat on the plane so that I am in a window on the mountain side of the aircraft. (And they wanted to give me the window in the emergency exit row on the wrong side. Pft.)
Now I have a relaxing flight back and then a three hour drive home. Maybe I can cut that last part down a bit by driving like a maniac. How are the roads on the QE2?

Didn’t get discovered at the beach.
It took awhile for me to get functional. And I’m still seeing friends all over the place. But I finally got down to the beach. Unfortunately it was fairly late. I parked the car, got out and realized that the Santa Monica beach is very cold. I wandered through the pier a bit, and then noticed that south of it, the temperature was much nicer. So I went back to the car, changed, and started running to Venice Beach. Three miles away.
Venice Beach is much more of a destination than Santa Monica. If I had life to live over (and a better sense of how to commute in L.A.) I would have driven to Venice Beach and started the run there.
The area along the beach is full of kitsch stores. It’s like an army of hippies all descended on the place at once and made it their own. But a better mental image might be Whyte Avenue. Only more Whyte, in a non-supremacist way. And an outdoor weight training gym plunked in the middle. (Muscle Beach.)
It is nothing like Venice, Italy. Unless you replaced the road with canals, and upped the price and quality of everything by 1000. (Level of usefulness is about the same.) I found it more similar to Nice. But that was giving me flashbacks to my collision with bicycles there.
It wasn’t that nice to run in the shopping area. And I probably shouldn’t have, but the lane was separated into bicycle and pedestrian, and the pedestrian one went right into the mass of hippy shoppers. Still, I got the amount of the ambiance that I would care for. I am not that good at window shopping.
I did the run all the way out to the end of the pier. If this was a movie, inspirational music would have been playing. There was a nice view. I stopped and watched a surfer try to catch a wave. It took several minutes before he found one he liked, and then he wiped out in five seconds. Wasting my time.
On the way back, the sun set behind the clouds. I got a nice vibrant sunset. The Santa Monica pier lit up nicely, with the fairground on it. However, it was like running River Valley Road and seeing the High Level Bridge in the distance. It never seems to get closer.
But, as all things do, it came to an end. I wandered around Santa Monica pier. I was tempted to go into the Bubba Gump restaurant, but that is an event restaurant. And you can’t go there on your own. In the end, lunch (at 6:00 in the evening) was a hot dog.
This is why I would have preferred to start from the other end. Venice Beach looked like it had a lot nicer places to eat and things to look at.

Nope, not discovered.
I feel I haven’t been spending my time in L.A. as efficiently as possible. I haven’t been doing much of the really touristy stuff. But I have discovered that driving in this town is terrible. It takes forever to get anywhere by car. And the yin to that yang is that you need a car to get anywhere.
But I have been having a great time. I’m just spending it more with friends than civic monuments. I had thought about doing an official L.A. tour today, but I didn’t get back in time to make the start. On the other hand, you know you are having a wild and crazy time when you end up in the hospital. I wish I could say it was for an arm broken in a bar fight, but no, just a small ear problem. And the recovery is essentially to ignore it and it will go away.
I’ve been staying up way too late. Fun fun fun. I think I’m going on about 4-5 hours of sleep a night. It is a struggle to get up before 10:00 for the hotel’s free breakfast. I could splurge and go across the street and eat some of the local cuisine. But this isn’t Italy. This is California, and I don’t need to prove anything. Besides, the local cuisine is an IHOP.
Now I should figure what I am doing today. As mentioned, previous plans have failed.

Still not discovered.
Maybe I should change my hair?

It was like my sister was here.
We were out late partying. Then a bunch of us went to an afterparty. And someone asked how I could have this much energy this late. That is what my sister is always wondering.
Still, I left before everyone had gone. Stone cold sober, I drove back to the hotel. And this time I didn’t have a navigator with me. When I had gone to the bar, I had one, using a printout of Google maps to give directions.
I really wish I had a map of L.A.
It was a confusing trip back. I wasn’t sure if I was on the right highway, and so a bunch of U-turns were involved. Eventually I ended up right back where I had started from, just so I could try again from scratch. Obviously, in the end, everything worked out.
I am a very nervous driver. I am in a strange city, driving a strange car. I am supposedly covered from my auto insurance in Edmonton. But the Hertz representative put the fear of god in me. There will be deductibles to pay, and I would be so much better if I used their coverage. I didn’t, so I’m even more nervous.

Day two. Still not discovered.
Wandering down the street I saw a man walking by dressed in a full Spider-man costume. In the night his reflective eyes looked eerie. No idea why he was dressed that way.
At dinner I had the perfect stereotype. My waitress had come here from New York to be an actress.

I was tired. I really didn’t want to go out. I was halfway to sleep before I changed my mind. I pulled myself out of bed, got changed and went out to meet some friends at a bar.
It was Goth-er than I was led to believe.
Since I was wearing black I didn’t stick out too much.
There was a women on a pole playing a game of let’s-see-what-gravity-defying-position-I-can-pose-in. She was very good. And fairly high up. I always thought my legs were strong, but after seeing her do things, and then hold them for such a long time…
It was nice to see my friends. Especially one I hadn’t seen for over a year. She still remembered me, and was still thankful that I had sent her pictures from our vacation.
As near as I can tell, I’m only person in the world that send pictures to people.

I wandered along Hollywood Blvd., but as the sun went down, it became chilly. So I’ve retreated to my hotel to get some warmer clothes. I was expecting L.A. to be more pleasant. But then, it is winter.
The Walk of Fame is very long. And after awhile it gets sort of boring. Eventually, I stopped paying attention to it and just acted like a tourist. I wandered into any store that looked interesting. The high point was when a clerk asked if I was in the film industry.
Actually the stores on Hollywood Blvd are somewhat sketchy. The three main genres I saw were tattoo parlors, exotic dancer clothing, and Scientologists. The latter one was the oddest. Whereas in other places, the Church of Scientology is kept discreet, here there were three big Scientology places, with larger than life neon signs.
Creepy.

The plane was full of little children. I think they are heading to Disneyland. Maybe I should check that place out.
My first act in L.A. was to pick up my rental car. I splurged a bit and got a Mustang. Unfortunately, it isn’t a convertible. That would have cost a LOT more money. However, with all that power under the hood (relative to my Honda Civic) I am not treating it right. I’m going slow and nervous. I’m in a completely different city that I don’t know my way around. (I’m lucky I found the hotel.)
And yet I feel I recognize it. I am seeing so many names that I have heard before. I travelled along La Brea avenue (Which was weird. None of the “La Brea” marked businesses were mentioning tar pits, which is what I associate the name with.) I crossed Melrose and Santa Monica. My hotel is on Sunset Boulevard. (And I am not ready for my close up.)
It is weird having a hotel with a roof and walls in the hallway, and yet is still open to the elements. The people here do not have to deal with real weather.
But now, I feel the need to eat. Next door is an In-N-Out Burger place. Which I recall hearing very good things about, and only available in California. I haven’t had a greasy burger since last August, but I’m on vacation now. (Mind you, the only month I haven’t been on vacation since then was January, so that isn’t a solid argument.)

So, the Calgary Airport. We meet again. (I prefer the Edmonton airport; It has free Wi-Fi.)
My initial plan was to drive down from Edmonton this morning and then fly out. However, my parents really wanted Edmonton Farmer’s market eggs, so I drove down last night, slept over, then drove an hour to the airport this morning. This was all so I could avoid a 2-3 hour layover in Calgary if I left from Edmonton. But I’ve been wondering about that. Because it is an international flight, I am supposed to be here two hours before the flight. So maybe the long layover was necessary, and a flight would have been more efficient…
I got through all the rigamarole in less than half an hour. So now is the time when we wait.
This is why I hate flying. At least I don’t fear it; Just hate.
But this afternoon I will be spending Valentine’s day in Lala land. It beats the usual plan of going to a restaurant and glaring at the happy couples. But since I need to eat out anyway, I might just be doing that as well.
I am going for a vacation. I’ve got some friends there that I will see. I have no illusions about being “discovered”. But there is still a part of me that would think it would be cool.