One of the really nice things about these seats is that they came with passes to the Legends club, which is basically a restaurant and bar located in the Garden. It’s somewhat civilized to sit down to a meal before the game, and then place a desert order before leaving, which will be waiting for you at your table when you come back at halftime (see the last picture).

So why am I bothering to tell you this? It really isn’t all that interesting in and if itself, and quite frankly the game was a bit of a snoozer. The short story is that you can’t take a backpack into the Garden. That meant that I had to leave all my reading materials at home. That meant that I needed something to do on the long T ride home. That meant I could use the iPhone WordPress app to blog. That means that you get to see and read about my marvelous evening, while I increase my touch screen typing expertise.

You’re welcome.

I hesitate sharing this dream with my loyal readers. With the exception of two-hour slide shows of Aunt Phyllis’s grandchildren, there is perhaps nothing as annoying as hearing about someone else’s dreams. I am taking the bet that this is just so bizarre that you’ll power through just to see how it ends.

It starts off on a golf course, where I am playing in a foursome, although I can’t recall if they are my usual partners or just some guys. At about the 9th hole on this very lovely course, I tee off and when I get to my ball, I decide to take a nap before hitting my second shot. I climb up on a hill to the side of the fairway, and plop down in the grass.

I wake up some indeterminate time later, and start wandering up to the green, oblivious to the approach shots raining down upon me, in order to catch up with my playing partners. As I get to the green, I realize that it is occupied by another foursome, and that my group has already moved on to the next hole.

I amble over the next tee box, and my partners invite me to hit my drive. I realize that I don’t have my clubs with me, so I excuse myself to go find them. For some reason, they are now in the parking lot, which is, oddly, adjacent to the tee box.

I go over to the where my clubs are, but instead of a golf bag, they have morphed into a mountain bike. Not only has it been transfigured, but this mountain bike, which is tied up to a large SUV, has a Denver boot on it. I find this perplexing. Mind you, although I am apparently nonplussed by the transformation of my golf clubs into a mountain bike, the fact that the bike was parked illegally is getting me all hot and bothered.

Now things start getting bizarre. It turns out that as I am trying to extricate the bike from the boot, Reggie Jackson walks over to me and starts yelling. I had, it seems, indeed parked my bike on his car and he was obviously not pleased. Neither was I, because this was Reggie circa mid 1980s.

I somehow manage to escape from Reggie, and take my mountain bike back over the tee box. I take out my driver and get set to tee off. The only problem is that the tee box is now a parquet floor, not dissimilar from that in the old Garden. While quite fetching, this made it quite difficult to place my tee.

As it turns out, there were some convenient rivet holes in the parquet floor into which I could place the tee. Unfortunately, they were quite deep, so that the ball rested just millimeters above the floor. I tried a couple of drives, but it was impossible to hit the ball accurately. So one of my partners produced what can only be described as a tee extender, which attached to the embedded tee. The only problem was the that the extender was alive, and so the ball would move in unpredictable patterns, rendering my subsequent tee shots even more out of bounds than before.

It was at this point that I woke up.

As I said before, I generally don’t remember my dreams and despite my professional status as a trained “brain guy”, I am no expert in dream analysis. I fervently hope that my loyal readers will help me out here, and provide their insights. I will only point out a few things that might be helpful with your diagnosis. There are fearsome images in this dream that are obvious to even the untrained eye: Reggie Jackson is second only to Bucky F***ing Dent in Red Sox Nation’s pantheon of villains. And believe me when I tell you that there are few things in this world scarier than me with a driver in my hand and the ball on the tee.

So have it, dear reader. I await your insights full of hope and with more than a little trepidation.

In any event, being on my own, I decided to have a “me” day on Saturday. I got up early, went out for a brisk 25 mile bike ride, did some stretching, and then went to the gym for weight training. I got back, had some lunch, and did a little yoga for an hour or so, before going and doing some food shopping. Had a lovely dinner with an old friend that night, polishing off a tasty Barollo (2000 Parusso Barbera d’Alba Superiore Ornati) and went to bed early. All in all, it was a full day.

I got up on Sunday and was out the door for my usual 25-mile Dover bike ride by 7 AM. Being an observant fellow, I noticed that it seemed to take a long time to get warmed up. An exceedingly long time. Put simply, at no point on the loop did I feel strong, and was remarkably beat by the end of the ride. The only good news was that none of my tires deflated, and I was at least able to walk to and from the golf cart later that day.

I could have blamed this miserable performance on dehydration, but that didn’t fly because I drank about 1.5 liters of water with electrolytes in the 90 minutes it took me to finish the ride. I could try to blame nutrition, except that I had a homemade protein bar before I started. I came to the sad conclusion that I simply can’t expect at my age to be able to sandwich 2 moderately long bike rides between weight training (especially quad and other leg exercises). I reckoned that I didn’t have the same stamina that I had when I was 25.

But I was wrong. As I thought about it, I recalled the depressing fact that I was not in better shape when I was 25 than I am now. If anything, I am in much better physical condition now than I have been any other time in my adult life. This gave me some solace, I as realized that my difficult day on Sunday was not necessarily a sign of aging. But this reprieve was temporary as I realized that my inability to remember what a slug I was was perhaps an even more obvious sign of my rapidly diminishing capacity.

So in short, not being able to perform like you used to is a sign of aging. Not remembering how poorly you performed when you were young is a sign of aging.

I think I’ll just sign off.

On my way back from Saturday’s round at Shaker Hills (a disappointing 97 after a front side 45), I was arranging carpooling with my friend Paul for the following day’s round. I mentioned that all I needed was enough time to do an early morning bike ride. Paul asked whether I rode with anyone or went solo. I replied that with my wife out of town, I was mostly riding solo. He wondered whether that was such a good idea, pointing out that if something went wrong, it would be nice to have someone to help out. I chuckled to myself and casually and condescendingly mentioned that 1) nothing ever goes wrong and 2) if something did go wrong, I have a cell phone. “In fact” I said, “should something go wrong during tomorrow’s ride, I will call you to help me.”

So this morning I woke up early and was on my bike by and riding out to Dover by 7 AM. After about 3 miles into the ride, I noticed that I was struggling a little bit: my speed was down from my usual, and it just seemed as if I was riding in sludge. I figured that this was due to the fact that I had worked out the day before and my quads were weakened from the excessive amount of iron pumping that is standard in my typical weight training regimen. At the five mile mark, I finally figured out what it was: I had a flat rear tire.

So I pull off the road and proceed to replace the inner tube on the tire. It needs to be said that I don’t have much experience with basic bicycle repair. If we’re getting technical about it, I actually have no direct experience. In fact, I have ridden over 2000 miles and my bike and have had only one flat tire, and that was while we were on our Vermont tour last year, and so someone else changed it for me. It took me a while, but I finally figured out how to replace the tube, and was ready to go in about half an hour. Just before taking off again, I decided that I needed a little more air in my tires. So I reattached the hand pump, added a few more PSI. When I removed the the pump, I also removed about half of the valve stem and all the air poured out of the tire.

Now things got interesting, because I don’t have another inner tube with me (I had given away my other tube last year to someone I saw broken down on the side of the road). I immediately thought back to my conversation with Paul the previous day, and was all set to give him a call to pick me up, when I realized that he didn’t have a car big enough to handle the bike. So I began my long walk home.

About a mile into the walk, a kind person in a car stopped and asked if I needed some help. I said I would love a ride because I had a rear flat and no extra inner tubes. It turns out this guy was on his way to a bike race in Newton and had an extra inner tube. After about 15 minutes, I was good to go. I profusely thanked the good samaritan as he departed, hopped on the bike and within 10 feet realized the front tire was also flat. For those of you keeping score at home, that means that prior to today, I had a grand total of one flat in 2000 miles. Today alone I had three.

I eventually got a ride home from our generous and patient next door neighbor. About an hour later when Paul picked me up for our round of golf (a pretty good 91 at Blackstone National), I gave him a lesson in scientific logic: 1) I had ridden bikes in Newton without incidence for 3 years, 2) On Saturday, Paul raised the possibility of problems during a ride, 3) On Sunday I had 3 flats in the space of one ride. Therefore, Paul caused me to have problems on Sunday. It is comforting to know that in these uncertain times, the law of cause and effect still holds.

And now I am sitting here writing this blog holed up in my TV room, because there is a bat loose in the first floor of the house. I think I’ll sneak upstairs to bed and try to sleep before I see what else the gods have in store for me today.

SAN DIEGO—A man who used several different bent sticks to hit a ball to an area comprised of very short grass surrounding a hole in the ground was praised for his courage Monday after he used a somewhat smaller stick to gently roll the ball into the aforementioned hole in fewer attempts than his competitors. “What guts, what confidence,” ESPN commentator Scott Van Pelt said of the man, who was evidently unable to carry his sticks himself, employing someone else to hold the sticks and manipulate the flag sticking out of the hole in the ground while he rolled the ball into it. “You have to be so brave, so self-assured, so strong mentally to [roll a ball into a hole in the ground]. Amazing.” The man in question apparently hurt his knee during this activity.

Thanks to Dan for pointing this one out.

My crime? I went to bed in mid-third quarter of game 4 of the recent Celtics vs. Lakers Finals. At the time (which was around 11:00 PM), the Celtics, who were leading the series 2-1, were 18 points behind the Lakers. I have seen and played in many basketball games throughout my life, and calling on this extensive experience—and given the fact that the Celtics were showing no signs that they were going to close the gap—I realized that it was going to be foolhardy to make it another late night when work beckoned in a few hours.

Funny thing. I was wrong. The Celtics staged an historic comeback and won the game. I can’t say that I was exceptionally proud of myself for bailing when I did, and I truly regretted not seeing the whole game. My remorse, however, was nothing compared to the abuse heaped upon me by my children. One went so far as disowning me (incidentally, its the child who no longer requires tuition bills to be paid). It got so bad that during the clinching game 6 of the series, with Boston leading by 30 points, I received simultaneous text messages warning me not to go to bed. One of these ingrates had the nerve to call after the final buzzer just to make sure I was awake.

I am not someone to take challenges to my sports credibility lightly. I won’t go into historic details, but suffice it so say that if I had spent even a fraction of the time that I devoted to playing and watching sports during my early years to my studies, I would have been smart enough to raise children that worship me like a god. Instead, I’ve raised a passel of nasty guttersnipes. But I digress. I decided in order to restore my authority as a lover of sports, drastic measures were necessary. It turns out that the impending surgery of one of golfing buddies provided the opportunity for redemption. Because he was not going to be able to golf for the next six weeks, we decided to get in six weeks of golf in a weekend. We therefore planned to play 36 holes on Saturday, and I would join him for the final 18 of 36 on Sunday.

Saturday started well, and I shot about my average for the first 18 holes. We traveled to the next course, had some lunch, and arrived ready to go for the second 18. I hit my first drive right down the fairway. My second shot was a little off, and I ended up with a easy bunker shot. I won’t bother you with the details, but it took another 6 shots to get my ball in the hole. Sad to say, that may have been the highlight of the round, as I shot the worst score for 18 holes that I have had in over 15 years.

In reconstructing the debacle, I realized that I wasn’t physically tired. There were no aches or pains. And I had played 36 holes in a day many times before with no discernible difference between the first and last hole. But it is now obvious that I no longer have the mental capacity to concentrate for that length of time on golf. Usually, I can reconstruct how I butchered each hole after the round. Not this time (come to think of that may the only blessing that came from this horror show).

I don’t know what is worse: the fact that I’m obviously no longer the sportsman that I thought I was or that the kids were right.

The second reason for loving TiVo is the ability zap uninteresting content, whether it is commercials or a really boring story arc. I have developed a twitch in my right thumb that operates whenever I am confronted by less than interesting content. No matter where I am, I reflexively start hitting the 30-second skip button. This has proved embarassing when I find myself at someone else’s TiVo-free household and am forced to watch regular TV. It gets downright pathological as the thumb starts spasming when I’m in boring conversations at cocktail parties. But that’s another story.

This weekend I was faced with a sporting dilemma. I was playing golf late in the day on Sunday, and was therefore going to miss the final round of the US Open. So I set up the TiVo to record the final round, which was scheduled to end at 9PM eastern time. As it turns out, that was precisely the starting time of game 5 of the NBA finals (Celtics vs. Lakers), so I set that game up to TiVo.

My goal was to maintain a news blackout until I could watch the Open on the TiVo, which is no mean feat given that I was on a golf course. Fortunately, I arrived home ignorant as to the outcome, and proceeded to watch 5 hours of golf coverage in a little over an hour. The end result was a dramatic finish as Tiger sunk a birdie on the final hole to get himself and his recovering left knee into the a playoff scheduled for Monday (more on that in a bit). By that time, we were well into the Celtics game, so I fired up the TiVo and watched that game in its entirety, catching up to the live broadcast by 11 PM or so. While the result wasn’t what I wished for, it was a perfect example of why TiVo rocks.

Now that I was on a roll, I set up the TiVo to record the 18-hole US Open playoff on Monday, which was taking place on ESPN from 12-5:30. As with the day before, I came home having shielded myself from all news about the match, so I was in my naturally ignorant state when I started watching. I got through the first 8 holes or so, and then realized that the good-for-nothing bozos at ESPN switched their coverage to another one of their channels (I assume ESPN2). Switching in midstream is one thing that TiVo just can’t do. So I had to find out who won the Open the way other working stiffs had to find out–by watching selected news highlights.

It was a sad day to be sure, but don’t cry for me Argentina. The British Open is coming up next month, and I’m sure I’ll be in love with my TiVo again.

How lame is this?

According to the New York Times, the New York Yankees (or as I like to refer to them, the team of the twentieth century) are considering banning a promotion during the Home Run Derby at the All-Star game, which is taking place at Yankee Stadium this summer. It seems that Major League Baseball along State Farm Insurance, the sponsor of the derby, want to give a lucky fan the opportunity to choose a spot where David Ortiz of the Boston Red Sox can hit a homer.

But the Yankees do not seem as if they want Ortiz to take that swing. The Yankees were upset about the plans involving Ortiz and said they were unaware of the promotion until a reporter contacted them Thursday night. The Yankees were discussing the matter internally and planning to contact Major League Baseball for an explanation.

This, following the recent fiasco where the Yankees financed at $50,000 disinterment of an Ortiz jersey burried by a Red Sox fan during the construction of the New Yankee stadium (not to mention the pathetic pronouncements of Hank Steinbrenner, the new voice of ownership) just illustrate how far this franchise has fallen. I feel like I want to have Dr. Phil come in and give a big self esteem building pep talk to the organization. In normal circumstances, one could at least count on the product on the field to produce something pride-worthy, but at least so far this millennium, it hasn’t happened.

I feel your pain, Yankee fans. Really, I do.

Just a bit too much information for me.

Today was the Tour de Cure, and I’m happy to report that I finished the race with most of myself intact. I made only one wrong turn, which didn’t cost me much in terms of extra miles. It was a cloudy and cool day (temperatures hovering around 50 all day), and the rain held off until we finished the ride.

The ride itself was quite beautiful. We spent a fair amount of time along the coastline, which while windy was quintessential Cape Cod. The interior part of the ride was also quite pretty, with rolling hills and not very much traffic.

I think the weather scared a number of participants away as there weren’t all that many riders, which was slightly disappointing, mostly because the race lacked the energy that I would expect from a bigger event. For next year, I will sign up for another Tour de Cure ride in the north shore that looks to be a bigger deal. If I can get in shape, I might try the 75K or 100K ride.

I also wanted to publicly thank Jim & Dena, June, Stu & Em, Debbie, and Jennifer and Matt from Grand Central Marketing for supporting the tour to the tune of $700 raised for diabetes research!

Here are the vital statistics of the tour:

Distance	31.44 miles
Riding time	2:05
Average Speed	15 mph
Maximum speed	28.5 mph
Total Altitude	893 feet
Maximum Altitude	110 feet
Maximum Climb Grade	7%
Average Climb Grade	2%

]]> http://blog.agdarosen.com/2008/04/27/tour-de-cure-statistics/feed/ 1 http://blog.agdarosen.com/2008/04/24/what-will-they-think-of-next/ http://blog.agdarosen.com/2008/04/24/what-will-they-think-of-next/#comments Fri, 25 Apr 2008 02:04:07 +0000 Glenn http://blog.agdarosen.com/?p=99 As I mentioned before, I am planning to ride in the Tour de Cure on the April 27th. Thanks to all of my friends and family who are supporting me on this ride. Thanks to your generosity, I have raised $700 to support diabetes research!

You will be happy to know I have been in training and have planned out my entire agenda for the ride this Saturday. I Mapquested the directions, got my bike tuned up, and re-arranged my schedule so I can meet friends later that day at the BC spring football game. I am locked and loaded and ready to go. I even checked out the weather for this Saturday (clear and in the upper 50s).

Apparently, one can now purchase a piece of paper that aligns the days of the week with the dates in the month. Some of these devices, often found in gas stations, feature photos of scantily-clad women. I also believe that many computers have this ability as well. Had I been aware of this technological breakthrough, perhaps I would have realized that April 27th falls on a Sunday.

Thanks to Joe for saving my bacon on this one. And for those keeping score at home, yes I am that stupid.

What is it about a new bicycle that makes one feel like a kid?

I still remember my first bike. I was being dropped off at my house from nursery school, I think. As I walked down the driveway, the garage door opened (my father, being the king of gadgets, was the first on the block with an automatic door opener) and there, directly beneath the “Edifice Rex” sign above the door, was a shiny new two-wheeler. I have no memory of any of the particulars, but I am certain that I was never more thrilled as a kid than when that bike magically appeared. A close second was a few days later when I found myself peddling down the street continually yelling back at my father, who was at the time 100 yards behind me, not to let go of the back of the bike.

I suppose that one’s first bike is memorable because it is the a kid’s first taste of independence. Once you have a bike, your world expands enormously. I could go to my friend’s house on the next block and together we could go the five and dime store that must have been a whole 1/2 mile away.

From the time you get your bike until the time you get your driver’s license, it is hard to think of another event in one’s life that fosters your independence to such an extent. Those who live in cities with mass transit may point to learning how to navigate the subway or bus system as key events. But the difference is that unlike your bike or your car, you really don’t control those conveyances.

So which of the two, the bike or the car, is more evocative for the average American? I would guess that for most, their first car would stand out most. I would have thought that the same held for me, but today when I picked up my road bike after its annual tune-up, and got an eyeful of the new tires, chain, cassette, newly taped handlebars, shiny body, I started giggling like a boy. I can’t wait to take it out for spin tomorrow morning.

I have signed up to ride the “Tour de Cure” sponsored by the American Diabetes Association. It is a 30 mile bike ride in Falmouth, Massachusetts taking place on April 27 to raise money for diabetes research. If you feel so moved, I would be most appreciative if would sponsor this ride. It is a good cause that is near and dear to my heart, not to mention my HbA1c levels. Just click here to go to my donation page.

Thanks!

I have adjusted the times during which I go to the gym so as I can avoid traffic jams at the stations. Still, there are occasional times that I find myself waiting on a machine for someone to finish their workout. Obviously, I don’t begrudge other people the intermittent use of my machines, but there are categories of people that simply drive me crazy.

iPod Can’t Hear You

• Almost everyone in the gym is plugged into their iPods. It is, apparently, currently impossible to workout without a soundtrack. They blissfully monopolize their machines while the plaintive cries of patrons begging to “work in” go unheeded.

The Reader

• This person will run through one set of repetitions and then sit on the machine reading a magazine until they are ready for their second set. They sometimes appear to be quite absorbed in the story. When the reader has a iPod, all hope is lost.

The Chatterer

• Groups of them congregate around a machine and share their life stories. Apparently the chair on the hip abductor machine is more comfortable than that at the Starbucks next door.

The Endless Set

• These fellows are on a new workout regimen with as yet undiscovered benefits. Using low weights, they will work the machine for 5 minutes at a time. I lose count of the repetitions after 50. When you ask to “work in,” they respond “I only have one more set.”

The Wet Guy

• I probably don’t need to go into details here. It is generally better to get to a machine before his workout begins. Preferably a few hours before.

The Sigher

• This is the fellow, generally not in the best of shape, who, while blocking access to my locker, will, like clockwork, emit a vocalization that sounds halfway between a throttled goose and a mouth fart every 20 seconds. This noise serves to alert all within the metro area of the difficulty of his workout.

A husband and wife are playing golf. They arrive at the 12th hole where the wife tees off and hits a perfect drive. The husband follows and shanks his shot off into the woods. They eventually find his ball directly behind a shed blocking his shot to the green. The man is livid, but his wife points out that if they open the doors on both sides of the shed, he had a direct shot through the shed to the green. The man opens the door on his side and the wife opens the door on the opposite side. As his wife is holding open the door on the other side, the husband swings, but as the ball goes through it strikes the wife in the head and kills her instantly.

The man refuses to golf again for a year. Eventually, his friends convince him to get back out. Sure enough, they find themselves at the same course, back on the 12th tee. The husband tees off and once again shanks his shot behind the very same shed. After contemplating his options for a few moments, his friend comes over and says:

“Why don’t you open the door on your side of the shed and I will hold open the door on the opposite side of the shed and you can hit your shot to the green.”

“I can’t do that,” the man replied.

“Why not?”

“The last time I tried that I double-bogeyed the hole”

For the first time in my life, I started my golf season in New England in March. I went to Waverly Oaks in Plymouth, which is one of my favorite courses. The fairways were soft and the greens bumpy, and I haven’t touched a club since October 13, 2007. We got lost on the way, so we had only 5 minutes to warm up on the range and no time on the putting green. It was 41 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s officially “cold” for our Celsius friends. I shot an 89 (46-43), which matches my best score all of last year and it only one stroke away from my best ever. My playing partners did nearly as well.

We all decided to burn our clubs and retire as things can only go downhill from here.