Once I had a new job I threw myself into the task of fully rebuilding the strength I lost last year.  I said ‘au revoir’ to the orthopedic surgeon who was opposed to physical therapy and started hitting the gym (at the office, 20 minutes from home) twice a week for weight training.  And I have returned to the occasional yoga session, hopefully stepping that up as the fall progresses to winter.   With the new job, working on full recovery, and helping the wife in her goals, and working on long neglected home maintenance, there has not been much time to sit down and tap at the keyboard much less anything of real interest to write about.  Now it is time for me to get back to some basics.   I will be participating in some century rides this fall, both organized and self-directed, getting the house and yard in shape, and working on trying to establish a new doctor-patient relationship with the objective of developing a plan to get the metal out of my hip.   I’ll have a bit more time this month, as The Wife will be taking her parents on a cycling tour of western Washington starting next Saturday.   Now to buckle down and get started.

For the past couple of weekends my time has been sucked down by a divorce.  No, not from The Wife, but a divorce from the cable provider with the local franchise.  I have had some issues with the whitewash poor tech support, but that is not the reason.  It is a pure dollars and cents decision; we have decided they overcharge substantially for what they provide.  Five+ years ago I had an old analog TV with an indoor antenna with poor reception on two channels, but that was OK.  Then as The Wife and I got married and started a home remodel we bought a digital TV, and got cable primarily for the Tour de France coverage on OLN (now Versus) and for HD.   At the same time we transitioned our separate DSL lines to a single cable connection to the i’net.   At the time we got all we wanted, cable internet and basic cable with HD, for less that $50/month.  Probably more than it was worth, but not exhorbitant enough for us to complain.  The 13 months ago they informed us we had to transition to a digital package, much more expensive, in order to get HD, but that we would get a lower price for the first 12 months.  Well the Tour de France ended a couple of weeks ago and the low introductory price on their digital package ended about the same time.

Given the high cost point of the cable, The Wife wanted something cheaper.  Satellite will put us in the same high price boat after a short introductory period and leave us with a decision about internet connectivity.  AT&T has perhaps the worst customer service in the country, which coupled with their high prices put them out of the running.  With the digital television transition over (for the most part, still some fallout) the question was: could we get sufficient reception O.T.A.  (over the air)?   I was tasked with the project, and have been busy evaluating antennas (bonus for smaller sizes) and getting everything installed, wired, and running.   While going down that road we came to realize the cable company wanted $42/month for the internet connection; we could go cheaper with lower bandwidth but I found a reputable DSL provider that will give us the same bandwidth for $20/month.

Last weekend my spare time was given over to getting the antenna installed and wired to the demarc box at the outside of the house with a temporary trial connection to the TV in our bedroom.  Lots of work on the roof, including some work tacking the cable from the antenna under the eave while laying on my back in an inverted position.   Then during the week I did the footwork to get DSL connected on Friday in preparation for moving off the cable.  Yesterday (Saturday) I spent a couple of hours under the house doing the shoulder crawl from place to place as I laid new RG6Q cabling all interconnected via a single 5-2300MHz splitter.  After terminating all the interior cable ends and adding new 3GHz faceplates we are all digital running O.T.A. for television and off the DSL for network connectivity.  Guess in a couple of days The Wife will serve the cable company with our notice of separation.

We will not be total luddites.  As part of the transition I acquired a TiVo HD so we can now plan our TV viewing around our schedule, not the schedule of the networks.  With everything in place it is time to pick back up on the riding schedule.  I did a nice 46 mile loop through the hills in the heat today, and am now relaxing while watching the first NFL game of the season.

Back when I was an employee of my good Uncle Sam he decided that too many of the lads in his service were using illicit drugs, so project ‘Golden Flow’ was born.  One iteration of the project involved supposedly random testing;  4 digit sequences were published daily and if they matched the last 4 digits of your Social Security number and you were under 27 years of age you had to go in to the testing center and provide a urine sample.  But, and this was a big but, you had to fill the jar with your own personal monitor watching intently.  I suppose I was not exhibitionist enough so this was always a problem for me.  I would drink several glasses of water before heading to the testing center, go in to provide a sample, and as soon as the monitor locked his gaze on my, ummm, apparatus the valves would clamp shut and nothing would flow.  One time it took me over 4 hours to fill the admittedly small sample jar.

The some court decided that the ‘random’ testing was not sufficiently random, so the next version of ‘Golden Flow’ was even more laughable.  One morning we would wake up to the notice that everyone under 27 years old (who decided that no one over 27 abused substances?) had to make their way to an airplane hanger for testing. In the hangar we would queue up in lines behind a circle of 55 gallon drums.  Once you were directly in front of one of the drums it was your turn to fill your cup, all under the watchful eye of the circle of monitors sitting inside the circle. I always wondered what happened to the overflow in all those drums.

Today I had to go to a local lab to fill the cup for the current pre-employment drug test, the first time I have been tested in over three decades.   I consumed plenty of water before driving to the lab, then drank constantly while waiting to be called.  Fortunately there was no private monitor, but I had to empty and evert my pants pockets before going into the room to do the deed, presumably to make sure I was not smuggling in some contraband.  And I was warned not to flush the commode or run water in the sink while in the room, either of which apparently would result in a non-test.  Fortunately I was sufficiently hydrated and spent what was probably less than a minute in the room.  No performance anxiety this time! Ahhhhh.    A slightly better experience than my past, which makes me happy I do not have to be subjected the the USADA ‘provide a sample in front of a monitor within 2 hours’ type of testing on a regular basis.

A couple of months back I tried to push myself towards working harder on a return towards what I consider ‘normal’, putting a couple of endurance events on the calendar for this spring to force me to get out more. But life has gotten in the way and I have not been able to spend the time necessary to prepare for these events, leaving me wondering what is realistic at this point as the dates for the events draw close.

I did get an unexpected surprise this week which will, at least in the short term, free up some time for me to work on the recovery (as well as some yard and house projects that have been delayed for far too long). My employer reduced the payroll, so I have a bit more time for endeavors beyond earning a paycheck. And the time I have will be allocated differently. More work on the recovery, balanced by working on networking with friends and acquaintances in an effort to find a new challenge (read job) to pay the bills. Lat month I was able to get in a mere 280 miles or so on the bike, and I have almost 70 in the first two days of this month. Perhaps I will be ready for the first of those endurance events in a couple of weeks.