I don't want to let you go

Since everyone's been so patient with me on this blog, let me give you something honest and raw today.  All lyrics are from Brand New's Sink.

I don't want to let you go/But it hurts my hands to hold the rope/I won't be such an easy mark/You're no better than they say

Jump back to late April - things were good for me.  I had had a good semester and the school year was winding down.  Plans were in place to spend a couple days with Lisa in Vegas and then a week hiking Utah with Luke.  Things had cooled a little between Tori and me but I still knew I was going to marry her.  I was really quite happy.  By the start of May though, Tori had decided differently and we were no longer together.  I was confused about relationships and how things went wrong and if things would ever be right for me.  Thankfully, that time in Utah with Luke gave me someone to vent to and just to discuss the entirety of the situation.  Around the start of June, I got back into online dating because I wanted to get back to where I thought I was and I was distinctly hoping this would help me get over Tori.

The first girl I had a date with after this was Lauren.  When I saw her profile, I thought there was great potential (she was a former college athlete and active in her church).  I do distinctly remember thinking "This has to be helpful because if it doesn't work with someone like this, maybe online dating won't give me anything".  Our first date went well and we ended up talking for a couple of hours and set up a second date a week later.  That date went fine, but there just wasn't the excitement there.  I hate to say it, but I was comparing her to Tori and Lauren couldn't match the excitement I had felt in that relationship.  At this point, I was still holding on to hope that Tori and I could be friends.  A part of me at that point might have even been hoping that we could be friends and she would come to her senses and take me back and we could have the life we had talked about before.

If you call, then I'm coming to get you/You want to sink, so I'm going to let you/...Now I'm falling asleep to forget you

Tori wasn't having any of it.  I had made my play at being friends and she just ignored it, but that didn't stop me from hoping.  In late June, I was out hiking ("hiking") Missouri when I saw I had an email from Uncle Jay.  I had assumed it was just an update on his bike ride for charity, but when I looked at it later, it was an email introducing me to this girl Lindsey who had been with their group and who also happened to live in Indy.  I didn't think too much of it, but when I got back into town, I sent her an email because, why not? We emailed back and forth a little and eventually set up a lunch date at a Thai restaurant.  Things went okay on that first date, though we did only make it about 10 minutes before the first awkward silence popped up.  I was intrigued, but it would have been easy to find reasons I was still a better match with Tori (she has a science career, a kick-ass dog, makes a buttload of money (money certainly isn't everything, but after 30 years of scraping by, to first go to financial stability and then financial freedom held a great appeal), etc.), but I didn't want this to be something that held me back from something that could potentially be good.  We set up a second date that ended up being bowling and dinner at a Mexican restaurant.  Things changed during that date.  We laughed easily and found quite a few things that we had in common.  It was good. I smiled. A lot.  Unfortunately, we had to wait quite a while for a third date since Lindsey had a trip out East and then I had a trip out West before we could get together again.  After that, things have progressively gotten better as we've gotten to know each other more deeply.  Thoughts of other women have faded as I realize that Lindsey is better than any of my recent relationships.  We just have done so many more things in terms of dates.  There isn't stagnation.  She's much more willing to meet me halfway on the things where I'm weird.  She's genuine and caring and probably too nice for me.  She has good goals and priorities and I look forward to getting to know her better everyday.  I would have to try really, really hard to be around her and not smile.  Once again I'm happy.

Drowned with applause

Wow. Over three weeks since I've last posted.  This is what happens when you get into the part of the school year where you just fall into the routine and find a way to get through.  I could blame Lindsey because honestly, she's rather distracting, but that just wouldn't be true.  So if nothing else, here's the recap of goals for September.

Work Harder:  Its just been normal school stuff so not much to comment on there.  Physically, I've done a good job of being in the gym three times a week and that's still going strong, so hooray for that.  Running has been bad, especially when my colleague who is an awesome runner tweets about his 90 mile weeks.  I hate him a little bit because he's better than me at most everything.

Play Harder:  This is where Lindsey's distraction comes in.  We've been on several dates including an Iowa game, a corn maze, a picnic at the reservoir, etc.

Travel More:  Outside of going out to Purdue, I didn't make it anywhere.  School is in session, what did you expect?

Read More: I obviously finished The Long Walk which actually seemed somewhat feasible until they talked about yetis.  I also made my way through Laurie Halse Andersen's Speak and Antoine de Saint-Exupery's The Little Prince.

Drink Better Beer:  I'm still working my way through this case of Sierra Nevada Red IPA as I've been drinking a lot more wine than beer.  Next up is Firestone Walker's IPA.

Sorry its a short entry but hey, at least its something.

I'm not really that fat

First, yes, I know a song that has they lyric "I'm not really that fat" in it.  Its from NOFX's Theme From a NOFX Album.  I'd prefer if you wouldn't google the rest of the lyrics.  I know no one wants to read a post where I basically call myself fat again (possible exception: Julie.  She'll like calling me a fatty.) but that's what you're getting.  For the entire month of September, my scale has told me I've weighed at least 183 pounds every morning.  Adjusting for the fact that my scale is light and I've probably been greater than 186 for the entire month and most likely have been pushing 190.  Seeing as how I'd like to be at around 175, you can see where this is a problem.  I've gotten back into lifting and have been hitting the gym three times a week at 6:30 in the morning to start packing on some muscle.  I'm still trying to run a couple of times a week or so too, but so far, that's very much been hit and miss.  Going to the gym has been nice and while muscle may be made there, unfortunately, it gets defined in the kitchen.  I have struggled there.  In fact, I may have made apple pie cupcakes earlier today whose base is a cinnamon roll.  They're not fantastic, but certainly not bad.  I've already had four.  Now you know why I'm fat.  There's a reason my last roommate called me the skinniest fat guy he knew.

I do see this as a problem though since I don't particularly like how I look in pictures right now so I'll need to find a way to drop the weight again.  Actually, the weight's not the problem.  I've got a gut that shows up and my chest isn't as tight as I'd like it to be so if I just change that, I'll be fine.  To get there, I'm strongly considering taking a dietbet and putting my money where my mouth shouldn't be and now making it actually hurt if I don't back it up.  The hardest part of this will be asking Lindsey to stop baking because she's really, really good at it and I don't want to discourage this in any way.  At least I'll die fat and happy.

I am too weak to be your cure

This is a post I've imagined writing for a long time, but I never thought I actually would.  I'm currently reading Speak, a young adult novel by Laurie Anderson about a girl entering high school who was raped the previous summer and essentially loses her voice because she can't talk about it.  So yeah, this post is about rape culture.  A few of my friends have posted things on facebook about rape culture and I always had some negative reaction to it.  I always felt this need to defend myself - to let people know that this is never something I would do.  Obviously, its not.  I'm a 32 year old virgin.  Several people have let it be known that they'd be willing to sleep with me and I haven't taken them up on it so why would I ever feel the need to take it from someone that's not willing?  Why do I bring this up?  Because rape culture is too prevalent in our society and its simply not fucking okay.  Roughly half of the women I've dated have been survivors of some sort of sexual assault, ranging from verbal assault to straight out rape.  If you're curious to who has and who hasn't, I'm not going to tell you that because that's not my story to tell.  Just know this: I know way too many people (women and men) who have been subjected to this and I feel absolutely awful for anyone who has suffered through this.

The first time I dealt with it was when I was driving back home with her in my car and Sublime's Date Rape came on the radio.  Its a song about a man who commits date rape but gets his comeuppance and is sent to jail and gets raped himself.  Halfway through the song she broke down and started crying.  I had no idea anything had happened and had no idea how to react.  I still wouldn't know what to say.  What can you possibly say to anyone who has suffered through such ugliness?  A few years later, I remember a girlfriend telling me that she had been raped and just discussing the basic details of it.  I couldn't think of anything to say so I just hugged her because I had no idea what else to do and my heart broke for her.  It had been several years but she could still let me know when it was the same day that it had happened.  The first emotional response I had was anger but there was nothing I could do with it.  I'm still not sure what I can do other than be an advocate for anyone who's been strong enough to fight through this.

Honestly, I'm not sure how to end this post.  There has to be something more out there that can be done for those who have suffered at the hands of the scum of the earth.  I want to do more.  

Break the moment into something more than gold

Everything in life is basically falling into the categories of either school or Lindsey and that's pretty sweet, but it doesn't give me a lot of stuff about which to blog.  On a side note, making sure you don't end a sentence with a preposition just makes it sound like you had to reword the sentence simply so you wouldn't end with a preposition.  I'm coming back to an old favorite post because I've spent a decent amount of time daydreaming about all the places that I want to travel to.  I'm breaking out the old Top ten places I've visited/Top ten places to go.  Trust me, the list of places to go is significantly longer than this.  It wasn't tremendously difficult to narrow it down to the top ten though.  That said, I will remember some places I missed and there will be near-constant addendums to this list.  Before I change it again,

Top Ten Places I've Visited:

1) New York - If there weren't a money issue, I would LOVE to live in New York for a few years.

2) Sydney - Still my gold standard for international travel.  Ignore the naysayers pointing out my lack of passport stamps.

3) The Pacific Northwest - I couldn't find a way to separate Portland and Seattle.  This should be higher but I can't find a way to bump it up.

4) Denver - I would move to Denver in a heartbeat and be immensely happy.

5) Utah - So incredibly beautiful and a hiker's dream.

6) Chicago - This may be a little high but it scored very well with sentimentality points.

7) Washington DC - If you come back from DC without being wowed, its your own fault.

8) Grand Rapids - This may very well take over Chicago's spot in the next few years.  There's a lot of good going on up there.

9) Cairns (Australia) - Oceans and mountains.  Yes.

10) The Great Smoky Mountains - This would be higher if I would've spent more time in a city better than Gatlinburg.

Las Vegas fell way off the list just because I don't have the same wonder attached to it that I used to.  I'm surprised San Diego fell off as well, but its just been too long since I've been there and its too expensive to go back.  It's just off the list, as is Boston.  L.A. would be on the list if it wasn't so spread out.  The Grand Canyon will rightfully claim a spot as soon as I hike it instead of just having looked at it.  Mammoth Cave would have made the list if they'd let me explore it solo.

Top Ten Places to Visit:

1) Belize - Central America is high on the To Visit list and Belize wins out because they predominantly speak English.

2) Acadia National Park - This will be the highlight of a huge hiking trip in the Northeast.

3) Italy - Like Acadia, this was a trip that was briefly planned in the past.

4) South Africa - If only the flights weren't so expensive....

5) Hawaii - Everyone I want to convince to go there has already been.  I'm jealous of all of you.

6) Costa Rica - I need to learn Spanish.

7) Greece - Most likely to be done on that same trip where I tour Italy.

8) The top of Half-Dome - A comparison between this and Zion National Park would be amazing.  This is obviously dependent on winning the hiking permit lottery.

9) Argentina - This is the mystery spot as I'm not sure what I'd expect from traveling there, but it holds a certain allure.

10) Tie - Mt. Kiliminjaro/Machu Picchu - If you need an explanation, we aren't friends.

Others that were cut from the list that were close were New Zealand, everywhere in Australia I haven't yet been, Germany and New Orleans.

Hey Joe, where you gonna run to now?

All right, its my monthly update on my goals for the year, just encompassing both July and August this time.

1) Work harder. I wish.  I've put on 15 pounds since the start of June and I don't like it.  I did get some work done on looking at the stability regions of SDC algorithms, just nothing useful yet, unfortunately.  At least the physical stuff I'm working on.  I've started lifting again at AU's gym just to I can throw around some actual weight.  I definitely needed the bigger weights to start doing leg lifts again because I was disappointed in the size of my legs in some of the cabin pictures.  I've also officially signed up for the Flying Pig marathon in May, so hopefully that'll kick my ass and get me running again.

2) Play harder. This has a direct link to my failures at working harder.  I hiked Multnomah Falls near Portland.  I hiked in Bellingham.  I hiked Red River gorge.  I hiked parts of Mammoth Cave.  I kayaked in Northern Indiana.  I had a voodoo doughnut.  I talked about triathlons with a gay Jewish Alabaman firefighter named Dakota.

3) Travel more - Portland, Bellingham, Seattle, Kentucky (twice), Menninga Island.  Check and check.

4) Read more.  This has gone pretty well.  I finished The Book Thief and I may have cried at the end.  Judge me all you want.  If that ending doesn't move you, you're dead inside.  I've also finished Alex Stone's Fooling Houdini, Marie Lu's Prodigy, Nick Cave's The Death of Bunny Munro (just awful), Patricia Highsmith's The Talented Mr. Ripley, Neal Shusterman's Unwind and I'm currently working on Slavomir Rawicz's The Long Walk.

5) Drink better beer.  Very much a success.  All sorts of good stuff in Portland and Bellingham.  Lisa brought a bunch of very legit stuff out to the cabin.  I've had Sierra Nevada in my fridge for the past month.  I even had a black and blue at the Carraig with Brooke last week.  It's been delightful these past two months.

I was born without this fear

What a summer.  There were trips to Chicago, Milwaukee, East Lansing, Grand Rapids, Las Vegas, Utah, Kansas City, St. Louis, Portland, Bellingham and twice to Kentucky.  I put a ton of miles on my car and nearly another 1500 on rentals.  I would love to have all of my summers look like this from now on if I could simply afford it.  In a straight comparison with most people, I would probably qualify as underpaid, but I just like to think that I could get paid in time over the summer.  If you take my salary and multiply by 1.5 to accommodate for the fact that I only work for eight months, it makes things look a lot better.

That said, the extra money that would come with a full twelve months of work would be nice.  I see what my friends have and I know there's no way I could currently support a wife, kids and the mortgage on a $250,000 house.  I get a little anxious about my car now too as its about at the mileage where my last car crapped out.  Of all those things, I could probably afford one at the most right now.  Thankfully, Indy is quite cheap and so my house won't be nearly that expensive.  Someone could see my travels and think I've got a fear of missing out.  Its not that.  I see the things my friends have and its not that I feel like I'm missing out, but rather, I fear that I'm falling behind compared to all of them.  I feel like some of the benchmarks of the early 30s (family and home) are things I should have by now.  There is the obvious reason behind it as the vast majority of my friends didn't spend seven years in grad school making just enough to survive.  I know I just need to be patient as these things will come.  I should revel in the fact that I am doing exactly what I want to do and I am exploiting the fact that I essentially have summers off if I so desire.  I get it, I really do.  Its just hard for me to be patient, especially now that I have this massive list of places I want to visit that gets longer by the day.