theCollectiveUs

My retainers are trying to kill me. I’ve been woken up – no, jolted up – more than a few times in the middle of the night because I stopped breathing.

I tell you, they’re trying to kill me.

Unicon XV is happening in New Zealand 28th Dec 09 – 7 Jan 10. Since it’s happened 14 times before, I assume it’s safe to say that yes, there is a real actual International Unicycling Convention with competitions like track, field, road races, freestyle, street, hockey and basketball, all done on one wheel. I’m honestly excited especially after reading about rides that people are doing around the world.

I’ve signed up for some track events, the 10k and 42k races and am hopeful that The Knee will hold up under stress. The world record for the men’s 42k race was set last year in an hour and a half just to have a good gauge of what’s going to happen. I will be targetting something along the lines of a 2hour finish.

Maaaybe that might mean I should start waking up at 5am or something to get some training in before work. Maaaybe.

Recently, I dug out a few school notebooks from years back with scribbles that are unadulterated awesomeness. This one from French class cracked me up so much I got a pic.

I wonder why my art teachers didn’t like me that much…

That, dear readers who are born after the 80s, is called a CD.

There’s this 50% off storewide sale going on and all their CDs and DVDs – yes, including box sets – are going for ridiculous prices. Well, most of them since the prices on some seem to be marked up by 100% to cover the losses. E and I bought 8 CDs for $75 and these aren’t the usual crap that you get at sales too.

We bought

1. Sam’s Town – The Killers
2. Mighty Like a Rose – Elvis Costello
3. Idlewild – Outkast
4. Shootenanny – Eels
5. Beautiful Freak – Eels
6. Highest Hopes – The Best of Nightwish
7. Mask and Mirror – Loreena McKennitt
8. An Ancient Muse – Loreena McKennitt

Sam’s Town for instance, cost SG$5.95 while Mighty Like a Rose cost SG$6.95 AND is a 2CD set although the CD art does look very unappealing.

I like buying CDs because cover art makes me happy. It probably has its roots in how CDs used to cost more than my weekly allowance and it was usually a luxury to buy one. I like the official-ness of having a collection of songs all glamourously packaged in a neat, glossy case. Call it anal-retentive but if I were to like a song from an album, I’d get the whole album because it would kill me to look at the solo entry in iTunes or Media Player.

Yes, it would mentally hurt me more than CD cases like this.

Hearsay literally means information gathered by the first person from a second person concerning some event, condition, or thing of which the first person had no direct experience. When submitted as evidence, such statements are called hearsay evidence. As a legal term, “hearsay” can also have the narrower meaning of the use of such information as evidence to prove the truth of what is asserted. Such use of “hearsay evidence” in court is generally not allowed. This prohibition is called the hearsay rule.

- Wikipedia

Cyber-bullying is easy. The internet offers a convenient shroud of anonymity where you don’t have to be held accountable for your words and actions – unless of course you start being sued for slander. In my book, it is particularly despicable if, when in the face of the subject of your grouses, you remain silent and sullen and only acquire a false bravado with an online persona.

Let’s talk about narrow-mindedness. When someone brings an abacus in to a math exam, it is not terribly polite to laugh, mock and pass derogatory remarks about the person just because we happen to be able to afford an electronic calculator. I can’t for the life of me master the abacus but I won’t go as far as to conclude that no one else in the world can. It might baffle my mind, the thought of someone else doing something better than I can but I will be conscious to accept that I’m not the greatest person in the world. Because that’s how the world works.

A post ago, I talked about my unicycling the sprint duathlon. My intention has never been to glorify the achievement or prove any point because I don’t see what so glorious about finishing 2nd from bottom or what point there can be to prove. My bicycling skills leave much to be desired and from my standpoint, it is really to get a good race in and figure out how to better myself.

I had never meant to write about this on a public domain but I have read enough hearsay to feel anger and indignance at being singled out for abuse. If we had never crossed paths, I don’t see why you can make a valid or convincing argument or be in a position to criticize me. However, if we had, I don’t see what’s stopping you from approaching me and telling me off in my face if you feel so strongly disapproving of my behavior.

I’ve touched on this previously – I got hit from the back in the middle of the cycling leg by a bicyclist. I had been consciously keeping to the left through the entire event at a very steady speed of between 13-18kmh. After I got hit, I never received an apology and when I saw, upon getting up, that the errant cyclist was checking on his bike instead of checking if the person he hit was fine, I lost it and commenced with the yelling. It wasn’t so much the accident but rather the unapologetic air that enraged me. Well, as I’ve said, shit happens but life goes on.

Well apparently not for some people. There was an official complaint lodged about my reckless behavior causing an accident which I’m now cleared of for all the reasons mentioned above. Depending on the source, you might have heard accusations of my swerving in and out of traffic, wobbling to and fro precariously, road-hogging, causing a massive pile-up or that the guy involved was hospitalised because of my misdeed. That’s almost equivalent to saying that were I to punch someone and injure my knuckle, I can claim insurance off the person.

Here’s to debunk the myths -

1. There was NO massive pile-up. If there were, don’t you reckon I’d have been on the headlines on the papers with much commentary and sensationalism about it?
2. NOBODY was hospitalised. I checked with official sources. If I were in such a precarious position and was hit from the back, don’t you think I have a greater likelihood of ending up in hospital? As a matter of fact, I WAS in hospital yesterday for a sports injury incurred from Sunday. So yes, harsh fact, if anyone was in hospital over the past few days, it was ME.
3. There were road marshals throughout the race course. If I were swerving recklessly and dangerously through the 15km course, shouldn’t someone have stopped me? Ditto for road-hogging.

And here’s some quick facts for those still in denial -

1. I have unicycled more distance last year than some people have walked on their own two feet. If you can trust yourself to walk without tripping or swaying all over the place, I have enough reason to believe that I can unicycle in a straight line.
2. I take my unicycling as seriously as anyone there took their cycling. I don’t utilize unicycling as a training tool for other sports – I build up on my runs to train my unicycling skills.
3. Unicycle touring, mountain unicycling and racing are all legitimate unicycle sports that involve people from all walks of life. I have yet to meet an elitist, prejudiced unicyclist anywhere in the world though.
4. I rode a cross-terrain 29″ unicycle and opted for 125mm cranks. It’s suited for distance riding over hills. I have rode a more aggressive configuration before over tougher terrains at much, much higher speeds. I don’t see any reason for doubt about my abilities and I don’t see myself as being more dangerous than the average competitive bicyclist.

There is no need for name calling. If you can point me out to a clown or entertainer who performs with my variety of unicycle or if you can provide reason and proof to dispel any of my above claims, do so.

Thus marks the temporary end to my rather short endurance sports stint. I’m taking a 3-month break – at least – to recover from the ITB injury, the mystery knee ailment and to recharge a little before diving back into training for Unicon.

Today’s duathlon was a rather decent race save for a little accident which pretty much marred the remainder of the race for me. It consisted of a 3km run, then a 15km cycle and then another 3km run. I don’t think I am up to a longer running distance at this point in time but the ideal unicycling-friendly duathlon would probably be a 5km run / 15km cycle / 5km run mostly because I can last longer and hence cut back on the time difference during the cycle and the final run legs.

My tactic was to start off slower and ease into a moderately fast pace on the first run so I don’t screw up my knee and also to get a headstart on the cycle, keep to a 17km/h pace on the cycle and end off with a regularly-paced run. I clocked 16.5 min on the first run, an hour on the cycle and ended with a 18.5 min run. I took about 10 min longer on the cycle than I’d have hoped for and this I blame on the idiot who crashed into me at about the first third of the cycling leg.

As the slowest object (who’s travelling at about 17km/h) on the flat, empty, 2 lane-wide highway, especially since I’ve been consciously keeping to the left, the last thing I expect really, is to be hit by a cyclist who’s trying to overtake me by squeezing into the 15cm space between me and the curb. But shit happens.

I started cramping on and off thereafter and had to alternate between sprints and slows for the rest of the cycling leg. I’m slightly apologetic for the colorful language I rained on the stunned cyclist who hit me but given there was no apology whatsoever AND the fact that the accident was caused by his stupidity and negligence, he deserves the tirade.

Next year, I’ll be competitive. I think a 25km/h average is within reach. Uphills are actually quite beneficial to unicyclists because while cyclists have to figure out when to switch gears and step up on their pedalling, we’re still rolling along as usual. I’ll post photos in the coming days.

So, Google tells me that I have the symptoms of IT Band Syndrome which has very little to do with sitting in front of the computer, programming software in a group and very much to do with knee pain.

According to About.com,

What are the symptoms of iliotibial band syndrome?
As stated previously, the function of the iliotibial band is both to provide stability to the knee and to assist in flexion of the knee joint. When irritated, movement of the knee joint becomes painful. Usually the pain worsens with continued movement, and resolves with rest.

Apparently it’s more or less a permanent recurring thing which adds to the misery.

Ah well.

Ref my previous post about Sengkang being from a different country, Shaun informs me that the place I ran in was probably Punggol-Sengkang since we both could agree that Punggol isn’t a part of Singapore but yet, he hasn’t seen roadkill in Pungol so I couldn’t have been there.

While surfing through some event photos today I found this -

From here

Sengkang-Punggol might not even be from this planet altogether because when’s the last time you saw a creature-from-deep-beneath like the one above? HUH? HUH???

I’ve some sort of energy bar on my desk right now that’s been there for the past week because well, it just doesn’t look very appetizing. I now see that it tries to market itself as banana bread but I’m not dumb enough to believe that because it looks like this

Actually not quite because my desk is devoid of the bananas, dates and nuts. I hate nuts incidentally. And dates. I hate dates.

So anyway I started googling for the Larabar and the first hit happens to be a link on a product recall due to a Salmonella outbreak.

As the New Zealand dollar drops and the closing date for early bird registration for Unicon XV looms closer, I find myself looking seriously at the competitions I intend to be in and the amount of work that would be involved in getting myself up to a standard that’s not going to be embarassing to all and sundry around me (cue Nelson’s ‘Ha ha!’).

So during that rare occasion that affords a spot of daydreaming today, it suddenly strikes me that maybe I should try for this other duathlon that seems so crazy and distant just a few weeks back. It’s a 5km run / 40km cycle / 5km run. I’ve done a 40km continuous cycle perhaps only twice in my entire life and the effects were quite distinct. I don’t remember on either occasion contemplating running 5km after the ride much less before and after.

Then I figured if I were to do the marathon at Unicon, it’d be equally tiring, no? After all, it’d be a smaller wheel, a slightly longer distance AND I’ll be pressured to keep up with crazy-legged unicyclists. So I think I should start getting into believing that 40km continuous rides are standard. All I’d have to worry about is how to trick my mind into believing that I’m floating and not actually running the 5km after.