Well, I'm offically back from my super-annoying shoulder injury. Last week consisted of a 5K time trial to establish some heart rate zones for this season, my first bike ride back on the road since late December, and my first stroke taken in a pool since sometime in November. Let me just say...it's good to be back!
With hopes of a dominant triathlon season this year, I was determined to make the best of my bum shoulder. I don't know if I will ever ride my trainer again, but I was able to log about 50-55 hours of base riding split between the trainer and stationary bike since my surgery. On the running side, I was able to get in about 12-13 hours up until now...I wasn't allowed to run until mid-February, and not long after that I started having foot problems...but it's all good now. As of now, I'm officially cleared by my surgeon to do anything I want, so hopefully my injuries will be done plaguing me.
My 5K TT on the track this past Tuesday went pretty good. I had done absolutely no speed work (and nothing above a 140 HR for that matter) in all of 2009, so I wasn't expecting too much. My goal was a 22:30, and I managed to run a 21:52, which I was happy with. On Thursday, I got on the Lemond for the first time since December and it was awesome! I met up with Paul at the SNG building and we climbed Smyer, rolled down Shades Crest Rd, descended Columbiana Rd (in which I raced a truck and hit 48 mph), climbed back up Columbiana and Berry Roads, headed towards Mr. P's, and then rolled back home. The weather was phenomanal and it felt great to get back outside and put those climbing legs to use! On Saturday, I ran in my church's annual High Country 5K, and it too went pretty good. I ended up running a 21:59, good enough for 3rd in my age goup. Again, I think I'm at a good starting point for the season, especially with no speed work or super big volume under my belt, so I'm very optimistic about improving my run alot this year. Later that afternoon, I met up with my parents and a few guys from church for a leisurely bike ride. Starting in Bluff Park, we rolled over towards Homewood and Mt. Brook and descended Columiana (hit 50 mph this time), hit the green way and Lakeshore towards Mt. Brook Village, and eventually made it to the BBC before heading back to climb Smyer and go home. It was a good solid 36 mile ride with a little over 4,000 ft of climibng, felt great!
Last week was fun, but I'm really looking forward to this week. I've been riding my road bike, but this week I'm going to get back on the brand-new-only-ridden-3-times-Cervelo P2C! I wanted to get a few rides in to let my shoulder get used to riding on the road again before I tried to get in the aero bars. Coming up this week, I've got some TT's on the bike to establish some heart rate zones for the season, as well as a bunch of other Z2 bikes and runs. I'm also going to be getting in the pool 3 X a week and progressing with my stroke. My shoulder is fine, it's just going to take some time to get my strength back. Anyways, this year is starting to look good! First race is in 2 weeks; the Magic City Duathlon in downtown, Birmingham...it's a 5K run, 12 mi bike, 1 mi run...what a hammerfest!
4.05.2009
3.16.2009
The Story of the SLAP Tear in my Right Shoulder
SLAP stands for superior labrum anterior to posterior, which basically indicates the way in which the labrum tore.
The Cause
In January of 2008, I suffered an injury to my shoulder while playing in a church league basketball game. Shades Crest B team (my team) was up on Shades Crest A team by about 20 points. With 20 seconds left until halftime, I decided to pick up the point guard at half court and play some crazy defense for the last reamining seconds with hopes of getting a quick steal and a lay-up. In hindsight, this play-all-out-until-the-end-no-matter-what mindset would be my downfall, but hey, it was worth it. I slapped the ball away from the point guard and quickly raced to try and recover it. After diving for the ball with my right arm outstretched, a player on the opposing team also dove for the ball and landed on my right shoulder blade. You can picture how this ended up. At first, I thought it was a serious injury, but after a week of icing the pain had subsided. Nearly 10 months later, after my last triathlon of the year (and after swimming 10k a week for practically the whole summer/fall) I started lifting some weights and doing some push-ups and pull-ups. After starting this weight lifting routine, I felt as if I had aggravated my shoulder a little bit, but I couldn't really tell. It didn't really hurt; it just felt like something was not right.
The Verification
Around the start of December of 2008, my shoulder still felt jacked up so I decided to get it checked out. After getting checked out by a local and highly recommended sports medicine doctor, Dr. Kim Fagan, she determined that I most likely had torn my labrum. The labrum is a piece of cartilage that basically holds your shoulder in place. Since my shoulder was still in socket, I figured it couldn't be torn that bad, so at least I had that going for me. The only way to verify the tear it is to get an MRI, so that is what I did next. It's a pretty interesting process. They inject a dye into your shoulder cavity that shows up as a bright color on the MRI so that any tear can easily be seen. My next visit with Dr. Fagan was pretty quick: she came in, told me it was torn, I told her to schedule surgery asap, she said ok, and then I was gone. Hah. The next week I went to see Dr. Lyle Cain of The Andrews Group at St. Vincent's Hospital to get him to check me out. He verified that the labrum was indeed torn, and I scheduled a surgery for that Friday.
The Surgery
My surgery was on a Friday morning at 7:00 am. I had to get there at 5:30 am, so my parents showed up at my house at 4:30 am in order to drive me to St. Vincent's hospital. At about 6:15 am, they took me back to one of the pre-op rooms. After asking me 30 times what shoulder my surgery was supposed to be on (I thought about telling them the left one and then saying "haha just kidding" but I don't think they would have found that amusing), they stuck an IV in my left wrist and went over some basic procedural information. Next thing I knew, I was being wheeled down to the OR. Once in the OR, they hooked me up to some sort of IV and started to put the mask over my face to deliver the anesthesia. The anesthesiologist wasn't doing a very good job of holding the mask secure to my face, so when someone said "why isn't he falling asleep," I started laughing. Next thing I knew, another doctor started applying a little more pressure to the mask, and after a few deep breaths I was gone. When I woke up, I was in a recovery room.
The Rehab
The rehab for this surgery blows. That's about all there is to it. For the first 4 weeks, I had to wear a sling with an immobilizer pad. For the first 2 of those weeks, I couldn't even actively bend my arm. Of course, with my luck, the surgery was on my right shoulder. I considered myself to be fairlly decent with my left hand, but there are some things that are just flat out difficult to do with the opposite hand. Brushing teeth, for example, is one of those tasks that becomes extremely frustrating because most people (including myself) lack the fine muscle control required to brush with their opposite hand. I wasn't supposed to drive for the first 10 days, but I did anyways because work is 5 or 6 miles away and I'm not going to walk there. Taking a shower with your non-dominant arm only is pretty interesitng, as is pouring from a completely full gallon of milk, using a mouse and typing on the computer, and getting dressed. Another annoying thing is that you have to wear button down shirts for the first few weeks because the injured arm can hardly move. Besides the multide of tasks that were made extremely difficult and time consuming, daily rehab is required in order to get back to 100% strength and mobility. It's been about 3 months so far, and the rehab has probalby averaged about 30 to 45 min a day the entire time. The first 4 weeks consisted of exercises working mainly on flexibility, and now I'm working mainly on strength. At the 3 month mark, I'll be able to start doing some light swimming in the pool, as well as biking on the road. I've been knocking out a bunch of hours on the trainer indoors, but it is getting REALLY boring! In conclusion, I would not recommend tearing the labrum to anybody, especially if you enjoy swimming, biking, or running.
The Cause
In January of 2008, I suffered an injury to my shoulder while playing in a church league basketball game. Shades Crest B team (my team) was up on Shades Crest A team by about 20 points. With 20 seconds left until halftime, I decided to pick up the point guard at half court and play some crazy defense for the last reamining seconds with hopes of getting a quick steal and a lay-up. In hindsight, this play-all-out-until-the-end-no-matter-what mindset would be my downfall, but hey, it was worth it. I slapped the ball away from the point guard and quickly raced to try and recover it. After diving for the ball with my right arm outstretched, a player on the opposing team also dove for the ball and landed on my right shoulder blade. You can picture how this ended up. At first, I thought it was a serious injury, but after a week of icing the pain had subsided. Nearly 10 months later, after my last triathlon of the year (and after swimming 10k a week for practically the whole summer/fall) I started lifting some weights and doing some push-ups and pull-ups. After starting this weight lifting routine, I felt as if I had aggravated my shoulder a little bit, but I couldn't really tell. It didn't really hurt; it just felt like something was not right.
The Verification
Around the start of December of 2008, my shoulder still felt jacked up so I decided to get it checked out. After getting checked out by a local and highly recommended sports medicine doctor, Dr. Kim Fagan, she determined that I most likely had torn my labrum. The labrum is a piece of cartilage that basically holds your shoulder in place. Since my shoulder was still in socket, I figured it couldn't be torn that bad, so at least I had that going for me. The only way to verify the tear it is to get an MRI, so that is what I did next. It's a pretty interesting process. They inject a dye into your shoulder cavity that shows up as a bright color on the MRI so that any tear can easily be seen. My next visit with Dr. Fagan was pretty quick: she came in, told me it was torn, I told her to schedule surgery asap, she said ok, and then I was gone. Hah. The next week I went to see Dr. Lyle Cain of The Andrews Group at St. Vincent's Hospital to get him to check me out. He verified that the labrum was indeed torn, and I scheduled a surgery for that Friday.
The Surgery
My surgery was on a Friday morning at 7:00 am. I had to get there at 5:30 am, so my parents showed up at my house at 4:30 am in order to drive me to St. Vincent's hospital. At about 6:15 am, they took me back to one of the pre-op rooms. After asking me 30 times what shoulder my surgery was supposed to be on (I thought about telling them the left one and then saying "haha just kidding" but I don't think they would have found that amusing), they stuck an IV in my left wrist and went over some basic procedural information. Next thing I knew, I was being wheeled down to the OR. Once in the OR, they hooked me up to some sort of IV and started to put the mask over my face to deliver the anesthesia. The anesthesiologist wasn't doing a very good job of holding the mask secure to my face, so when someone said "why isn't he falling asleep," I started laughing. Next thing I knew, another doctor started applying a little more pressure to the mask, and after a few deep breaths I was gone. When I woke up, I was in a recovery room.
The Rehab
The rehab for this surgery blows. That's about all there is to it. For the first 4 weeks, I had to wear a sling with an immobilizer pad. For the first 2 of those weeks, I couldn't even actively bend my arm. Of course, with my luck, the surgery was on my right shoulder. I considered myself to be fairlly decent with my left hand, but there are some things that are just flat out difficult to do with the opposite hand. Brushing teeth, for example, is one of those tasks that becomes extremely frustrating because most people (including myself) lack the fine muscle control required to brush with their opposite hand. I wasn't supposed to drive for the first 10 days, but I did anyways because work is 5 or 6 miles away and I'm not going to walk there. Taking a shower with your non-dominant arm only is pretty interesitng, as is pouring from a completely full gallon of milk, using a mouse and typing on the computer, and getting dressed. Another annoying thing is that you have to wear button down shirts for the first few weeks because the injured arm can hardly move. Besides the multide of tasks that were made extremely difficult and time consuming, daily rehab is required in order to get back to 100% strength and mobility. It's been about 3 months so far, and the rehab has probalby averaged about 30 to 45 min a day the entire time. The first 4 weeks consisted of exercises working mainly on flexibility, and now I'm working mainly on strength. At the 3 month mark, I'll be able to start doing some light swimming in the pool, as well as biking on the road. I've been knocking out a bunch of hours on the trainer indoors, but it is getting REALLY boring! In conclusion, I would not recommend tearing the labrum to anybody, especially if you enjoy swimming, biking, or running.
2.02.2009
25 things
Rules: Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you.
1. I'm a triplet. We are not identical. Yes, that is possible. Our names are in alphabetical order according to birth.
2. I used to be scared of the dark and thunderstorms.
3. When I was younger, I had a habit of biting my fingernails; now, I have a habit of not clipping them.
4. I tried out for the school basketball team in 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th grade and NEVER made it.
5. Throughout my lifetime, I've been to 12 Major League Baseball Parks; Braves, Rangers, Rockies, Royals, Cubs, White Sox, Reds, Tigers, Indians, Orioles, Yankees, and Astros.
6. I can put down more food that you can possibly imagine in a very short amount of time. I get made fun of at work and by my friends for this talent.
7. I have 3 bikes whose cumulative monetary value is greater than that of my car.
8. I love to compete at any sport. In college it was rowing and now it is triathlon and cycling. I'll race my first half ironman in September 2009 (Augusta 70.3) and my first full Ironman will be in 2010, probably Ironman Florida!
9. I am saved by grace through faith, not because of my works.
10. I've seen every single John Wayne movie; my favorite is Rio Bravo.
11. When I was little, me and my bros had this ballin' 3 man stroller that we rode around in.
12. I'll be entering the market for a house sometime soon.
13. I believe in personal responsibility, hard work, earning everything, and striving to be great as a means of success. I think a lot of people don't realize how much harder other people work in order to succeed. Anyways, don't be a pansy and suck it up!
14. I have gotten into politics in the last few years; I love debating liberals on anything from "global warming" and economic policy to affirmative action and other social issues.
15. I drive a manual transmission. It helps pass the time on long drives, and I think it's kind of cool because a lot of people can't do it. No, I will not teach you how to drive in my car because you will tear up my clutch.
16. I enjoy reading...just no fiction. If it isn't true, why bother? Value-added stuff only!
17. I love music. I do not listen to rap or country or anything like that. I like almost all classic rock (Aerosmith, Journey, Foreigner, etc) and a lot of punk and hard rock (Taking Back Sunday, The Used, Underoath, Just Surrender, Hawthorne Heights, etc). Apparently, my taste in music is bad though because I recently got made fun of for wearing a Linkin Park shirt.
18. My job is exactly what I want to do with my engineering degree: lots of data pulling, intense analysis, and computer simulation in order to produce an optimal solution for a given problem.
19. I have only made 1 C in my life since they started assigning letter grades back in the day. It was in Calculus 1 my freshman year in college. I got so mad that I never even came close to a C for the next 4 years.
20. I use the same user name and password for pretty much everything, unless there's some stupid unreasonably high minimum character rule for the password. Dang, I hope no one ever guesses it because they could probably ruin my life, haha.
21. I've been in a car a lot during my life. Long drives include to Philadelphia 3 times, to Boston 3 times, to Colorado once, and to Las Vegas once, to name a few. For one of those Boston trips we made the whole drive without rest (24 hrs straight).
22. I just had surgery to repair a torn labrum in my right shoulder. If you don't know what the labrum is, then google it. My two brothers and I have all had this surgery in the past 4 years. I've been asked a million times if it's a genetic defect, so don't ask.
22. I want to be as active 40 years from now than I am right now. I hope to someday win the 80-84 age group in a triathlon.
23. I would, without a doubt, stimulate the economy if my income tax rate or the capital gains tax rate was cut.
24. I always set my alarm clock on an odd time (4:57 am, 6:37 am, etc).
25. I can't stand people that are not punctual. 10 minutes early is on time and on time is LATE!
1. I'm a triplet. We are not identical. Yes, that is possible. Our names are in alphabetical order according to birth.
2. I used to be scared of the dark and thunderstorms.
3. When I was younger, I had a habit of biting my fingernails; now, I have a habit of not clipping them.
4. I tried out for the school basketball team in 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th grade and NEVER made it.
5. Throughout my lifetime, I've been to 12 Major League Baseball Parks; Braves, Rangers, Rockies, Royals, Cubs, White Sox, Reds, Tigers, Indians, Orioles, Yankees, and Astros.
6. I can put down more food that you can possibly imagine in a very short amount of time. I get made fun of at work and by my friends for this talent.
7. I have 3 bikes whose cumulative monetary value is greater than that of my car.
8. I love to compete at any sport. In college it was rowing and now it is triathlon and cycling. I'll race my first half ironman in September 2009 (Augusta 70.3) and my first full Ironman will be in 2010, probably Ironman Florida!
9. I am saved by grace through faith, not because of my works.
10. I've seen every single John Wayne movie; my favorite is Rio Bravo.
11. When I was little, me and my bros had this ballin' 3 man stroller that we rode around in.
12. I'll be entering the market for a house sometime soon.
13. I believe in personal responsibility, hard work, earning everything, and striving to be great as a means of success. I think a lot of people don't realize how much harder other people work in order to succeed. Anyways, don't be a pansy and suck it up!
14. I have gotten into politics in the last few years; I love debating liberals on anything from "global warming" and economic policy to affirmative action and other social issues.
15. I drive a manual transmission. It helps pass the time on long drives, and I think it's kind of cool because a lot of people can't do it. No, I will not teach you how to drive in my car because you will tear up my clutch.
16. I enjoy reading...just no fiction. If it isn't true, why bother? Value-added stuff only!
17. I love music. I do not listen to rap or country or anything like that. I like almost all classic rock (Aerosmith, Journey, Foreigner, etc) and a lot of punk and hard rock (Taking Back Sunday, The Used, Underoath, Just Surrender, Hawthorne Heights, etc). Apparently, my taste in music is bad though because I recently got made fun of for wearing a Linkin Park shirt.
18. My job is exactly what I want to do with my engineering degree: lots of data pulling, intense analysis, and computer simulation in order to produce an optimal solution for a given problem.
19. I have only made 1 C in my life since they started assigning letter grades back in the day. It was in Calculus 1 my freshman year in college. I got so mad that I never even came close to a C for the next 4 years.
20. I use the same user name and password for pretty much everything, unless there's some stupid unreasonably high minimum character rule for the password. Dang, I hope no one ever guesses it because they could probably ruin my life, haha.
21. I've been in a car a lot during my life. Long drives include to Philadelphia 3 times, to Boston 3 times, to Colorado once, and to Las Vegas once, to name a few. For one of those Boston trips we made the whole drive without rest (24 hrs straight).
22. I just had surgery to repair a torn labrum in my right shoulder. If you don't know what the labrum is, then google it. My two brothers and I have all had this surgery in the past 4 years. I've been asked a million times if it's a genetic defect, so don't ask.
22. I want to be as active 40 years from now than I am right now. I hope to someday win the 80-84 age group in a triathlon.
23. I would, without a doubt, stimulate the economy if my income tax rate or the capital gains tax rate was cut.
24. I always set my alarm clock on an odd time (4:57 am, 6:37 am, etc).
25. I can't stand people that are not punctual. 10 minutes early is on time and on time is LATE!
1.20.2009
Unity?
Said best by a friend...
I'm stunned at the number of people who don’t know about the steps leading up to American independence and the convention in Philadelphia where the Declaration of Independence was written, primarily by Thomas Jefferson; where it was argued over, and hammered out. What happened in that room, for all of those months, was a miracle. It was a miracle that it happened. Now, the reason I'm harping on this is because Norah O'Donnell is echoing one of the things that's part of the Obama campaign and is really something that the Democrats have been trying to bamboozle everybody with, and that is you can't solve problems unless you "unify."
Can I give you just a couple of examples of this? I know unification sounds great, and can't we all get along and have the same objectives. We do have the same objectives, most of us do. It's how you get there that we argue about, and those arguments are substantive because we all want prosperity. What is best way to do it: to earn it ourselves, or have the government hand it out to people? You won't have prosperity if the government is in charge of handing it out to people, but that's what liberals want. How can you achieve prosperity and independence and education when liberals who want to run the government, have contempt for the average person's ability to accomplish anything? So they want to be the ones to provide all these things for people, whereas we conservatives think it's much better if people provide these things for themselves for a whole host of reasons, not to mention their own psyche and their own self-esteem, since liberals are concerned about that. In the 1980s, Ronald Reagan. Reagan had no Republicans to speak of in the House of Representatives. What was it, 130? I'll have to look this up; I keep guessing, but it was an insignificant number.
There was no way the Republicans were ever, ever going to be a majority in anything. I mean, they didn't have even half the number of seats in the House the Democrats had. Yet Reagan succeeded in reducing the top marginal tax rate from 90% to 28% over eight years. Now, do you think he did this unifying with the Democrats? Do you think he did this by virtue of unity with the Democrats in Congress? No! That is not how it happened. The Democrats didn't change their mind and all of a sudden think tax cuts were good, because if they had, we wouldn't be arguing about more tax cuts and we wouldn't be listening to Democrats continuing to talk about more tax increases. So they didn't change their mind about anything back in the eighties. They were just beaten, and the question is: how were they beaten? Well, they were beaten by virtue of the fact that Reagan won 49 states on the specific issue of tax cuts, rebuilding the military, and wiping out communism in the Soviet Union. He had the American people behind him, and the American people in this country get what they want.
Now, you might want to say that Reagan united the people, but he did it on the basis of policy. He did it on the basis of his personality. He did it on the basis of his patriotism. He changed people's minds, but he didn't change the minds of Democrats in Congress. They had no choice. They had to go along, and not on everything did they. You remember the Iran-Contra situation and the Boland amendment and everything they could do in the second term to undermine Ronald Reagan. They hated those tax cuts being passed, and they did everything they could to do to undermine him after that. Yet they got it done. It wasn't with "unity." It was by perseverance, the idea triumphing in the minds of as many people as possible, leading a movement, teaching and explaining. Leadership. It's what's absent today in both sides of this in the presidential race. We have no leadership from Hillary. Obama's not a leader. McCain's not a leader. These are politicians seeking a promotion, pure and simple. We don't have leadership. And that's why everybody's filled with angst. It's just sad, but it's the way it is. So we get all this talk about unity, and we can't get anything done without unity, and who is it that's saying this? Liberal Democrats.
Well, I'm sure they would love to us to unify with them, by giving up what we believe, by compromising on our principles. Sure! They love that kind of unity! John Adams. When things started out in 1770, the British were running this country, and there were a lot of people living in the 13 colonies who were all Englishmen. They had all emigrated; they were all Brits. It's why Margaret Thatcher loves them. I heard Margaret Thatcher one night at dinner speak so glowingly and so eloquently of our Founding Fathers. She loved 'em. She thought they were some of the most brilliant, marvelous individuals that have ever walked the earth. I thought, "No wonder she thinks that, they were Brits," and they were, and not all of them wanted independence. They were Englishmen. They didn't mind being under the crown of old King George. So the Brits had their army. The Redcoats were all over Boston and places, and to shorten the story -- they started shooting people. They basically started a war. It was fascinating to watch, and this was nonpolitical presentation. When we finally get to Philadelphia, to Convention Hall, and the representatives of the 13 colonies are there, John Adams was hell-bent on seeing to it that he had a unanimous vote for independence.
He wasn't going to settle for a 9-4 vote. He wasn't going to settle for just a simple majority. He needed it to be unanimous. But there were elements from Pennsylvania and New York and New Jersey who had no desire for independence. To listen to them speak, "No, this is the time for caution," while the Redcoats are firing and murdering innocent people. Essentially the war had already broken out in Boston, and these people from Pennsylvania -- not Ben Franklin, but Dickinson from Pennsylvania; a guy from New York, Howe -- they're all saying, "This is the time for caution. This is the time for restraint," and I'm watching the screen, and I'm just smiling. We've got those same kind of pansies today, and they wanted to send a proclamation to King George demanding that King George stop taxing their tea and stop taxing them exorbitantly on a number of things, to basically stop squishing them and squeezing them. So Adams says, "All right. If you want to do that, go ahead. I'm going to still try to convince you, but you do what you want to do. It's going to be months before we hear back, and I can tell you what we're going to hear back, but if it will make you feel better, go ahead and do it."
So they did it. All the while, Adams continues to try and arm-twist and persuade. Finally they get the answer from King George, and King George says, "How dare you ask me this! Now you guys are really in for it. We're going to kick your butts." So the moderates say, "Oh, further caution is required here," and then we got eloquent speeches about, "We don't need bloodshed and we don't need warfare, and this is not the way to go about this," because some of these people did not want independence. They were Englishmen. So Adams... This thing shows how difficult it was, how almost impossible it was. It's why it was a miracle, for John Adams to craft unanimity from 13 colonies who had 13 different special interests. These Founding Fathers as I said they were not all hell-bent for independence. They considered themselves Englishmen. It took a lot of time. It took a lot of persuasion. It took strategy. It took negotiation. It took compromise. It took manipulation to get the necessary unanimity. But how did he get it. His objective was independence, pure, 100% independence.
He got his unity not by watering down his version of independence, not by watering down his way of getting it, the timetable for getting it, the procedures. It was masterful to watch them portray this because it was amazingly historically accurate. It's based on David McCullough's book, by the way, on John Adams. One of the things that Adams did to get unanimity, the biggest opponent to this independence was Dickinson in Pennsylvania. He was the dove. He was the anti-war hawk. He couldn't abide any of this. But he was very persuasive, and these were very reasonable talks that they had, and Adams was very reasonable and understanding, too -- although they had knock-down, drag-outs about it. But they talked privately after a session one day. It was decided then Dickinson just wouldn't show up the next day for the vote and that New York would abstain rather than vote "no." This was done so that Dickinson would not have to compromise his principles of anti-war and so forth, but he knew the jig was up because he knew what the votes were.
They had finally persuaded Virginia and Maryland. Of course, the interesting thing here about Virginia -- the reason why it took a lot of time and persuasion and strategy, negotiation, compromise, manipulation, all of this to get unanimity -- is the wealthiest and most influential state or colony at the time was Virginia, and Virginia was a slave state. Virginia stood to lose a lot of wealth and a number of other things here, especially being a slave state. It's ironic, by the way, how this plays against the reality of Barack Obama. The point is, these 13 people got -- well, there were more than one per state, but these people got together. John Hancock was chairing the whole thing, and they got together, and Adams finally got his unanimity. But he achieved it with one abstention from New York and the Pennsylvania guy being out of the room so he wouldn't have to vote. But it took him months to persuade.
He never compromised what he wanted at all, and they ended up with unification, unanimity. You could call it unity, but he did it in a way that was not at all weakening of his desire and passion -- and, of course, George Washington is portrayed here, too. Colonel Washington becomes General Washington. Now, the next episodes of this are going to be bloody because that's what the fight for independence began. This is just the Declaration that they went through. But, gosh, it sent tingles up my spine to watch how this country actually came together. It's why I think what happened there is a miracle. In fact, Catherine Drinker Bowen has written a book called The Miracle at Philadelphia. It really, really was a miracle -- and we didn't take a little bit of the people that didn't want independence and shove it into the pro-independence side. The people that didn't want independence lost.
They were given something for it, but not at the expense of those who wanted independence. So be very, very careful when you hear Obama or any of these other liberals start talking unity and that we can't get anything done until we have unity. We got this country done without unity. It happened without unity. New York abstained, and, of course, Mr. Dickinson from Philadelphia was not even there on the day of the final vote. Now you might say, " it sounds like there was unanimity. You keep using the word." Yeah, there was, just like there was close to unanimity in Congress, as close as you can get on Reagan's tax cuts. But it's because one side maintained and fought for its principles and didn't cave.
I'm stunned at the number of people who don’t know about the steps leading up to American independence and the convention in Philadelphia where the Declaration of Independence was written, primarily by Thomas Jefferson; where it was argued over, and hammered out. What happened in that room, for all of those months, was a miracle. It was a miracle that it happened. Now, the reason I'm harping on this is because Norah O'Donnell is echoing one of the things that's part of the Obama campaign and is really something that the Democrats have been trying to bamboozle everybody with, and that is you can't solve problems unless you "unify."
Can I give you just a couple of examples of this? I know unification sounds great, and can't we all get along and have the same objectives. We do have the same objectives, most of us do. It's how you get there that we argue about, and those arguments are substantive because we all want prosperity. What is best way to do it: to earn it ourselves, or have the government hand it out to people? You won't have prosperity if the government is in charge of handing it out to people, but that's what liberals want. How can you achieve prosperity and independence and education when liberals who want to run the government, have contempt for the average person's ability to accomplish anything? So they want to be the ones to provide all these things for people, whereas we conservatives think it's much better if people provide these things for themselves for a whole host of reasons, not to mention their own psyche and their own self-esteem, since liberals are concerned about that. In the 1980s, Ronald Reagan. Reagan had no Republicans to speak of in the House of Representatives. What was it, 130? I'll have to look this up; I keep guessing, but it was an insignificant number.
There was no way the Republicans were ever, ever going to be a majority in anything. I mean, they didn't have even half the number of seats in the House the Democrats had. Yet Reagan succeeded in reducing the top marginal tax rate from 90% to 28% over eight years. Now, do you think he did this unifying with the Democrats? Do you think he did this by virtue of unity with the Democrats in Congress? No! That is not how it happened. The Democrats didn't change their mind and all of a sudden think tax cuts were good, because if they had, we wouldn't be arguing about more tax cuts and we wouldn't be listening to Democrats continuing to talk about more tax increases. So they didn't change their mind about anything back in the eighties. They were just beaten, and the question is: how were they beaten? Well, they were beaten by virtue of the fact that Reagan won 49 states on the specific issue of tax cuts, rebuilding the military, and wiping out communism in the Soviet Union. He had the American people behind him, and the American people in this country get what they want.
Now, you might want to say that Reagan united the people, but he did it on the basis of policy. He did it on the basis of his personality. He did it on the basis of his patriotism. He changed people's minds, but he didn't change the minds of Democrats in Congress. They had no choice. They had to go along, and not on everything did they. You remember the Iran-Contra situation and the Boland amendment and everything they could do in the second term to undermine Ronald Reagan. They hated those tax cuts being passed, and they did everything they could to do to undermine him after that. Yet they got it done. It wasn't with "unity." It was by perseverance, the idea triumphing in the minds of as many people as possible, leading a movement, teaching and explaining. Leadership. It's what's absent today in both sides of this in the presidential race. We have no leadership from Hillary. Obama's not a leader. McCain's not a leader. These are politicians seeking a promotion, pure and simple. We don't have leadership. And that's why everybody's filled with angst. It's just sad, but it's the way it is. So we get all this talk about unity, and we can't get anything done without unity, and who is it that's saying this? Liberal Democrats.
Well, I'm sure they would love to us to unify with them, by giving up what we believe, by compromising on our principles. Sure! They love that kind of unity! John Adams. When things started out in 1770, the British were running this country, and there were a lot of people living in the 13 colonies who were all Englishmen. They had all emigrated; they were all Brits. It's why Margaret Thatcher loves them. I heard Margaret Thatcher one night at dinner speak so glowingly and so eloquently of our Founding Fathers. She loved 'em. She thought they were some of the most brilliant, marvelous individuals that have ever walked the earth. I thought, "No wonder she thinks that, they were Brits," and they were, and not all of them wanted independence. They were Englishmen. They didn't mind being under the crown of old King George. So the Brits had their army. The Redcoats were all over Boston and places, and to shorten the story -- they started shooting people. They basically started a war. It was fascinating to watch, and this was nonpolitical presentation. When we finally get to Philadelphia, to Convention Hall, and the representatives of the 13 colonies are there, John Adams was hell-bent on seeing to it that he had a unanimous vote for independence.
He wasn't going to settle for a 9-4 vote. He wasn't going to settle for just a simple majority. He needed it to be unanimous. But there were elements from Pennsylvania and New York and New Jersey who had no desire for independence. To listen to them speak, "No, this is the time for caution," while the Redcoats are firing and murdering innocent people. Essentially the war had already broken out in Boston, and these people from Pennsylvania -- not Ben Franklin, but Dickinson from Pennsylvania; a guy from New York, Howe -- they're all saying, "This is the time for caution. This is the time for restraint," and I'm watching the screen, and I'm just smiling. We've got those same kind of pansies today, and they wanted to send a proclamation to King George demanding that King George stop taxing their tea and stop taxing them exorbitantly on a number of things, to basically stop squishing them and squeezing them. So Adams says, "All right. If you want to do that, go ahead. I'm going to still try to convince you, but you do what you want to do. It's going to be months before we hear back, and I can tell you what we're going to hear back, but if it will make you feel better, go ahead and do it."
So they did it. All the while, Adams continues to try and arm-twist and persuade. Finally they get the answer from King George, and King George says, "How dare you ask me this! Now you guys are really in for it. We're going to kick your butts." So the moderates say, "Oh, further caution is required here," and then we got eloquent speeches about, "We don't need bloodshed and we don't need warfare, and this is not the way to go about this," because some of these people did not want independence. They were Englishmen. So Adams... This thing shows how difficult it was, how almost impossible it was. It's why it was a miracle, for John Adams to craft unanimity from 13 colonies who had 13 different special interests. These Founding Fathers as I said they were not all hell-bent for independence. They considered themselves Englishmen. It took a lot of time. It took a lot of persuasion. It took strategy. It took negotiation. It took compromise. It took manipulation to get the necessary unanimity. But how did he get it. His objective was independence, pure, 100% independence.
He got his unity not by watering down his version of independence, not by watering down his way of getting it, the timetable for getting it, the procedures. It was masterful to watch them portray this because it was amazingly historically accurate. It's based on David McCullough's book, by the way, on John Adams. One of the things that Adams did to get unanimity, the biggest opponent to this independence was Dickinson in Pennsylvania. He was the dove. He was the anti-war hawk. He couldn't abide any of this. But he was very persuasive, and these were very reasonable talks that they had, and Adams was very reasonable and understanding, too -- although they had knock-down, drag-outs about it. But they talked privately after a session one day. It was decided then Dickinson just wouldn't show up the next day for the vote and that New York would abstain rather than vote "no." This was done so that Dickinson would not have to compromise his principles of anti-war and so forth, but he knew the jig was up because he knew what the votes were.
They had finally persuaded Virginia and Maryland. Of course, the interesting thing here about Virginia -- the reason why it took a lot of time and persuasion and strategy, negotiation, compromise, manipulation, all of this to get unanimity -- is the wealthiest and most influential state or colony at the time was Virginia, and Virginia was a slave state. Virginia stood to lose a lot of wealth and a number of other things here, especially being a slave state. It's ironic, by the way, how this plays against the reality of Barack Obama. The point is, these 13 people got -- well, there were more than one per state, but these people got together. John Hancock was chairing the whole thing, and they got together, and Adams finally got his unanimity. But he achieved it with one abstention from New York and the Pennsylvania guy being out of the room so he wouldn't have to vote. But it took him months to persuade.
He never compromised what he wanted at all, and they ended up with unification, unanimity. You could call it unity, but he did it in a way that was not at all weakening of his desire and passion -- and, of course, George Washington is portrayed here, too. Colonel Washington becomes General Washington. Now, the next episodes of this are going to be bloody because that's what the fight for independence began. This is just the Declaration that they went through. But, gosh, it sent tingles up my spine to watch how this country actually came together. It's why I think what happened there is a miracle. In fact, Catherine Drinker Bowen has written a book called The Miracle at Philadelphia. It really, really was a miracle -- and we didn't take a little bit of the people that didn't want independence and shove it into the pro-independence side. The people that didn't want independence lost.
They were given something for it, but not at the expense of those who wanted independence. So be very, very careful when you hear Obama or any of these other liberals start talking unity and that we can't get anything done until we have unity. We got this country done without unity. It happened without unity. New York abstained, and, of course, Mr. Dickinson from Philadelphia was not even there on the day of the final vote. Now you might say, " it sounds like there was unanimity. You keep using the word." Yeah, there was, just like there was close to unanimity in Congress, as close as you can get on Reagan's tax cuts. But it's because one side maintained and fought for its principles and didn't cave.
1.03.2009
2008
Overall, 2008 was an excellent year. I started a new job, went on some cool road trips, met some cool people, and did a bunch of triathlons and other races. Mostly, however, my time was taken up by work and training. Here is 2008 by the numbers:
races for the year
triathlons- 9
crits/road races- 5
road races (running): 3
total distances for the year
swim: 112 miles
bike: 3,215 miles
run: 430 miles
rowing: 84 miles
total training: around 350 hrs
The majority of swimming, biking, and running took place during the months of March through mid-October. After my last triathlon of the year in October, I took 6 weeks completely off and then started to ease back into things, only to find out that I need shoulder surgery. It's not a major surgery, so it should not hold me back too much. I'm going to crank out a lot of Z2 work on the trainer to minimize my losses so it's all good. As for 2009, I'm pretty pumped about the upcoming races. Compared to this time last year, I'm in exponentially better shape, and I possess a lot more knowledge about how to train and race strategy. Plus, I got my brand new bike and I love it!
As for my 2009 goals, I have a few. Just for the sake of competition, me and my brothers are going without sweets for the month of January. Actually, we can have only 1 serving a week. If anyone messes up they have to run 5 miles on a course of the other two brother's choice. Keith and Eric better hope they don't mess up, because I know all the steep grades around Birmingham, haha. Other goals include the following (in no particular order):
1. get a raise/ bonus at work
2. continue to further my knowledge of the natural gas industry
3. follow my budget
4. stay injury-free
5. grow our Sunday school class
6. grow closer to the Lord
7. read more
8. improve from last year at every triathlon that I do
9. qualify for Age Group Nationals
10. take a cool vacation
races for the year
triathlons- 9
crits/road races- 5
road races (running): 3
total distances for the year
swim: 112 miles
bike: 3,215 miles
run: 430 miles
rowing: 84 miles
total training: around 350 hrs
The majority of swimming, biking, and running took place during the months of March through mid-October. After my last triathlon of the year in October, I took 6 weeks completely off and then started to ease back into things, only to find out that I need shoulder surgery. It's not a major surgery, so it should not hold me back too much. I'm going to crank out a lot of Z2 work on the trainer to minimize my losses so it's all good. As for 2009, I'm pretty pumped about the upcoming races. Compared to this time last year, I'm in exponentially better shape, and I possess a lot more knowledge about how to train and race strategy. Plus, I got my brand new bike and I love it!
As for my 2009 goals, I have a few. Just for the sake of competition, me and my brothers are going without sweets for the month of January. Actually, we can have only 1 serving a week. If anyone messes up they have to run 5 miles on a course of the other two brother's choice. Keith and Eric better hope they don't mess up, because I know all the steep grades around Birmingham, haha. Other goals include the following (in no particular order):
1. get a raise/ bonus at work
2. continue to further my knowledge of the natural gas industry
3. follow my budget
4. stay injury-free
5. grow our Sunday school class
6. grow closer to the Lord
7. read more
8. improve from last year at every triathlon that I do
9. qualify for Age Group Nationals
10. take a cool vacation
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