Unique and Special

Lately I have been fixated on trying to answer the question, "What is it that makes me special?"  Sure, this question is philosophical, but I have been contemplating it nonetheless.  I am sure that everyone has heard the phrase "People are like snowflakes, no two are alike" [If you read this like George Bailey at the end of "It's a Wonderful Life" you'll get the full effect].  Of course, that is the optimistic view.  The pessimistic phrase is something like, "Everybody's special, just like everyone else" [If you make your voice sound like Eeyore you'll get the full effect for this one].  So, what is it that makes me special?  What is it that makes me different from the 7 billion other people on Earth?  I'll try to stay between the extremes of George and Eeyore.

I sure you remember Venn diagrams from school at some point.  You know, those three perfectly overlapping circles that you saw in a math class somewhere.  I'm in the same boat as you, they are a nice visual aid, but aren't very exciting.

Would it be possible for me to draw enough circles of life experiences in my theoretical Venn diagram to identify myself uniquely? Probably, but that would require a number of circles.

I race in triathlons, so that puts me in the same circle as over 100,000 other people just in the U.S.
I am an actuary, but I share that job with 20,000 others just in the U.S.
I was a table games dealer for a year in Las Vegas.  I don't know how many casino dealers there are in Vegas, but I'll guess 4,000 current and 40,000 former.
...
If I continue this for a while, eventually I'll have drawn enough circles so that I am the only person that fits all the criteria.  Would this then make me unique? Special?

Well, yes and no.  Yes to unique because I drew enough circles so that only I qualify.  However, I don't think that qualifies me as special.  My reasoning is that you can draw enough circles of life events and eventually you will be able to identify anybody uniquely.

So, I haven't laid out anything that qualifies as special in terms of grand life events.  I don't think minor life events would work; they would suffer the same logic.

Would this apply to all physiological characteristics?  We have entire fields of study devoted to finding commonalities in the physiological space.  Look at any hospital, doctor's office, or medical school.  Since I don't have some unique disease [as far as I know, hehe], I don’t believe this one will work either.

I'm sure the same reasoning could be applied to my physical or chemical properties as well.

Is it true that I could reduce the possible areas down to just how I think, feel, and communicate?  Is it possible there is something in those areas that could make me special?  The answer to that one is a definite maybe.

I just don't know what that item is or what those items are yet.  I guess if I knew the answer to that one, I would be able to define my purpose.  Until then, I guess I have no better answer to Douglas Adams' question of the meaning of life than his "42".

Pregnant Seahorses

If we were to play the game 20 Questions, I'd bet that very few of you would be able to narrow the topic down to pregnant seahorses.  I thought about them for about a half hour earlier today.  I don't know what led my thought train to that subject, but I ended up there somehow.

 

A little trivia for you about seahorses: the seahorse is the only animal where the "male" gives birth.  Now I haven't been involved in biology since 9th grade, so don't ask me about the birds and the bees as they relate to seahorses.  I'm just relaying what I read on Wikipedia: the eggs aren’t even fertilized until they are deposited inside the male.  He then carries them to term and gives birth.

I think I picked up this trivia a long time ago and I don't have a clue who originally told me this.

I do have a suggestion for marine biologists out there:  I think it would make more sense to flip the assignment of the sexes for seahorses.  That way, the one who actually gives birth would be called the female.  Then the exception can be about how the birds and the bees bits are distributed amongst the seahorses, and not about the sex that is most directly responsible for continuing the species.

Snot Rockets and Cocaine

I certainly had an interesting weekend in the Wisconsin Dells.  I raced in my most physically demanding event of the year - the Rev3 Half-Ironman.  Yes, later the discussion will turn to snot rockets and powder cocaine.

This attempt went much better than my only other Half-Ironman I did back in 2010.  The first one was on a 95-degree day with 95% humidity and on a course with no shade.  The swim went fine, as well as the first 40+ miles of the bike.  Then, a water bottle bounced out without me noticing and I was out of water for the last 10+ miles.  Downing a ton of liquids once I got to the first aid station on the run didn’t help enough.  I slowly ran the first mile then just gave up, walking the remaining 12.1 miles.

Things were much different and better this year.  Yes, I still walked for parts of the run leg.  However, I don't blame that on my heat intolerance or under-training.  I blame that on my pulled hamstring from a slip-and-slide on RAGBRAI.

I always just try to survive the swim portion.  I’m hardly ever comfortable enough in the water to be at ease.  Most of my swim workouts are only 1200 yards in total.  Only three times have I ever had a workout go over a mile, let alone the 1.2 miles that we do on race day.  This means that I am relegated to switching to breaststroke at some point in the swim.  I can swim breaststroke all day.  It allows me to get all the air I need after each stroke, I can easily see where I am going as opposed to freestyle, and I find it rather relaxing.  The problem lies in me trying to swim fast while doing breaststroke.  I am about 20 seconds / 100 yards slower.  This means that by the end of the swim I am already about 10 to 15 minutes behind the others in my age group.

Now, as I've mentioned before, I don't try to place well in triathlons, I just try to do the best with my abilities.  It would just be a nice benefit to have some speed along with my determination.

About a third of the way through the swim portion, I could feel and see a light rain coming down.  By the time I was done, it had progressed into a steady rain.  My stuff back at the transition area was soaked.  The day before was sunny and mid 80's.  Race day it only got up to the mid 70's.  It was only in the low 60's by the time I completed the swim.  I was glad I had brought along my arm warmers.  They really helped when the rain turned into a downpour after a couple miles on the bike.

I definitely need to get some new brake pads.  The current ones I have are worn out.  I came up to one intersection where we needed to turn left.  There was a slight down grade giving me significant momentum coming into the turn.  I had just passed somebody, so I was in the left hand section of the lane.  I saw there was a car on the new road, meaning I would have to cut the corner even sharper.  This would be the sharpest corner I would have to make all day.  In addition, the heavy rain was going to cause some problems.  Because of all of this, I started braking a bit earlier than normal.

Normal pressure on the brakes yielded no benefit.  I was losing way too much ground while I was hoping for a decrease in speed.  I then squeezed as hard as I could.  In normal dry conditions, this would have brought me to a screeching halt.  I lost some speed, but not enough.  I skidded through the intersection - yes, still upright.  I was finally able to think about turning the wheel.  I just barely got the turn in on the far apron.  The volunteer at the intersection was yelling at me about the turn.  I was fully aware of it!  I saw the racers ahead of me turn, I just didn't have the ability to do so.

For the rest of the ride I was more careful with my brakes and slowed more before a turn.

The most amusing thing on the ride occurred about an hour later.  All the rain and cooler temps had led to a big case of the sniffles.  I saw a few other racers do farmer's blows.  I had forgotten about that move - lean over on the bike so your nose is over your left arm.  Take your right index finger and close the right nostril.  Then blow as hard as you can out your left.  If you do it correctly, you'll both stay upright and not blow snot on yourself.  The not blowing snot on yourself thing tripped me up the last time I had tried it several years ago.  It wasn't pretty!  During the race I was quite successful.  Twice from each nostril!

The rest of the bike portion was fun, but challenging because of all of the hills.  A couple slowed me to a snail's pace because of the steep grade.  During the last few miles, I had to make a decision about the upcoming run.  I was leery because of my injury.  I had pulled my right hamstring during RAGBRAI two weeks prior.  I had only attempted to run once during those two weeks and I didn't get more than 100 feet before I quit because of the pain.  I could bike just fine and had done that several times.  I just barely feel it on the bike and that day I only felt it during the last 5 miles.

I continued on when I hit transition.  The 5 Advil I downed all at once, combined with the adrenaline from the race, led to my determination to finish the race no matter what happened.  I don't quit, I just go slow when I have to.

In case you were wondering: Advil takes about a mile and a half to kick in.  That distance was at a kind of limping run.  The left leg went like it usually does, but the right foot didn't come back as far or up as far as it normally does.  I look silly when I run anyway, this just made it worse.  I wasn't too much slower than my usual slow pace.

From mile 1.5 through 7, things went well.  I could feel my hamstring hurting, but it didn't affect my stride or my pace.  The Advil was working well.  Around mile 7, things began to fall apart.  The Advil stopped being effective.  That shouldn't be a problem, I thought, I'll just reach into my tri-jersey and grab the three extra Advil I had placed there.  The good news was that the rain had stopped at about the same time as I had started the run.  The bad news was that my jersey was still soaked and it wouldn't get any drier with me sweating into it.

Advil is not like M&Ms.  Advil can’t claim to "Melt in your mouth, not in your hands".  Advil will turn into powdered cocaine in your pocket.  The miniscule nuggets left that didn't dissolve will burn and irritate your mouth if you attempt to consume them anyway.  I felt like an addict when I was sticking my finger on my gums trying to rub the last of the powder away. [Difference being that actual junkies do this to administer the drug, not remove it – Thanks Wikipedia!]

What little effect those nuggets had didn't last long.  Whether it was due to the injury, or the lack of recent runs, or whatever, by mile 8 I was walking up any steep hills.  By mile 9.5 or so, I was walking up any positive slope.  Downhills and flats were fine.

At least I was running some.  That, along with my increased cycling fitness, allowed me to drop my time by an hour and a half over my previous Half-Ironman.

The key to the next one will be to swim more so I don't have to use breaststroke, run more, and not be injured.  Although increased cycling fitness can and will be obtained, that is my strength and I do a lot of that and enjoy it the most, so I wouldn't benefit nearly as much by focusing on it.  I need to bring my swimming and running abilities up to match my cycling.

Pella Picture - RAGBRAI 2013 Part X

Five days of blog posts and nine previous parts, and this is likely the one that will get the most comments [*shakes head*].  I don't really know why I am posting this picture, other than to satisfy you, my readers.  Here is a photo of me in Pella in front of a statue made out of bicycle parts to look like a windmill.  Yes, I am wearing a cycling outfit with an extra accessory for Thong Thursday.  I did wear the two strands of beads all week just to be silly and fun.

A few other random topics that I couldn't develop into a full, interesting post:

1) In Perry, on Monday, there was a hailstorm and thunderstorm that rolled through at around 8:15 that night.  The brunt of the hail missed us, thankfully.  There were reports of 1-inch diameter hail in towns not too far away.  We only got pea sized hail.  I ended up spending an hour and a half stuck at Casey's gas station, either in the store or under the gas awning when it was too hot in the store.  It was interesting though, and the Speed Demons were there with me as well.  Those kinds of things are the ones you remember forever.

2) There was a homeless cat that visited our camp and the outside of a number of tents overnight in Knoxville.  I had petted that cat while walking back from the downtown area that night.

3) There was a midget wrestling show in Dallas Center on Tuesday. [They called themselves "midgets", don't get on me about it, I'll refer to them however they want to be called]  Just like WWE, but they are paid a lot less.  I had never seen one in person before.  Entertaining in a lower-level-of-humanity sort of way.  I got there too early for the main event, though.  The two shows I saw were with full-sized entertainers.  They then had a 20 minute break scheduled and I didn't want to wait, so I biked on.