Vinyl #12 – Maps and Legends

I first saw R.E.M. when they opened up for the Gang of Four at the old Metro on Landsdown Street. I was there to see the Gang, and barely noticed the opening act. Later, I’d catch on.  I’ve probably seen R.E.M. live more often than anyone, except possibly Neil Young.

Maps and Legends (Live) was recorded in 1987. It was released as the flip side of”The One I Love”, but I manged to avoid hearing it until I found it on a jukebox in a bar in Cambridge. By then, the single was no longer available, so I had to buy it for $5 some time later at a record show. I prefer it to the album version.

46 at 42

This is from 2003. I still haven’t run the 24 Hour, though I have done a few other things…

On Friday, June 20th, Tom Derderian and the Greater Boston Track Club hosted the 3rd annual Midsummer Lights Relay, a celebration of Deer Island and the summer solstice. Teams of up to ten runners race over a 3.05 mile course that winds around the island. The race goes from dusk until dawn, and the team that completes the most laps wins. People from my running club, the Somerville Road Runners, decided to participate in the event for the first time and put some teams together. Sitting at my computer, reading the messages on the club email list as the teams were organized, on the spur of the moment (more or less), I decided to run the race by myself.

SRR puts on a 24 hour relay/ultra in August every year, on a 5K loop course around Lake Quannapowitt in Wakefield, MA. I’ve volunteered at the race in the past, and have often wondered about competing in the ultra, just to see how far I could go.

The Midsummer Lights Relay seemed like a good way to ease into ultrarunning (if such a thing is possible) before making a decision about the 24 Hour. June 20th also happened to be my 42nd birthday. I got in touch with Tom the Monday before the race. He kindly agreed to reduce my entry fee since my relay team would consist of only one person, and Team Ibuprofen was born.

Since I hadn’t given the race a lot of advance thought, my training for it consisted of the base I’d developed while doing five marathons since May 2001 (PR 3:13:28). This included a good number of 20-28 mile runs while preparing for the marathons, a month of hardly any running after the 2003 Boston Marathon with a heel injury, and a 30 mile run (the farthest I’d ever gone) wandering along the Boston Harbor with my new Timex GPS two weeks before the ultra.

The lack of advance planning kept me from being too wound up before the race. I did spend the rest of the week making lists and buying supplies. I ended up packing along a bag of food, a bag of medical supplies, a bag of extra clothing, a bag of “other stuff” (a MP3 player and other distractions), a couple extra pairs of shoes, a tent, and a cooler full of drinks and ice. Thursday, I went out for my traditional pre-race short haircut. The finishing touch was the headlamp my wife gave me for my birthday before I headed out.

Friday arrived. I left work at about 1 PM, had a big lunch, and went home to pack and take a short nap. At about 6:45, I got in the car to drive to Deer Island.

Deer Island sits in Boston Harbor, connected to Winthrop by a thin stretch of land created during a 1938 hurricane. Formerly the site of a jail, its 210 acres now host a modern sewage treatment plant and a small park. GBTC puts on a weekly Saturday morning 5K on the island. The same course was used for the Midsummer Lights race. It starts at the peak of the highest hill on the island, located in the park area on the northern end. From there, the course winds gradually down the hill to the road back to the mainland, around the island, and back up to the start. There’s only one other hill on the course, a comparatively small one, though a sharp turn at the bottom on the downhill side makes that hill more difficult than necessary.

I parked my car on the course at the bottom of the hill, then walked up and met Tom at registration, which was at the start/finish line on top of the hill. There he showed me an article he’d written about my ultra attempt for the Winthrop paper. That was a bit odd – I’d never been used to advertise a race before.

The race was pretty informal. There were about 10 teams. Each team was given a multi-colored light wand to act as a baton. The wands were great, except that they turned off automatically every 10 minutes. All night long, as we ran along, we had to keep turning the wands back on.

Runners who were part of a team were going to have varying amounts of downtime during the night, waiting for their turn to run, so they pitched tents around the park and settled in. I decided to go without a tent because the weather was just about ideal for a June race. It was clear (unusual in New England this spring), in the 60’s, and there was hardly any wind.

At about 8:25, as the sun set, Tom played “Taps” on a harmonica. We all stood there waiting until he said “That’s it – you can get started now”, and we took off.

I ran the first lap with the relay runners so I could learn the course. The course was mostly concrete sidewalk, with some asphalt as it made its way through the park section. There was some dirt alongside the concrete, but I decided not to risk twisting an ankle (it’ll be a long time until I’m ready for a trail ultra!). At the end of the first mile, there was a flat, grassy space near the entrance to the sewage plant, where the SRR relay teams set up camp. Mile two went through some fenced in paths, down and around the southern tip of the island. Mile three ran alongside the breakwater on the eastern shore before turning up the hill back to the start.

There was quite a contrast in the view depending on which way you turned your head. As you ran counter-clockwise around the island, to your right was Boston Harbor, with beautiful views of the Boston skyline, ships, the ocean, and Winthrop. To the left was the Deer Island Waste Water Treatment Plant. That was interesting to look at in its own, industrial-technical-institutional way, with 170 foot high egg-shaped digesters adding an other-worldly touch. Contrary to what you might think (“Yuck!”), the sewage plant didn’t add any special odor to the event.

After the first lap, I began running 5 minutes, then walking 1 minute, to make it easier to run for an extended period. I also walked the 89 yards between the 3 mile marker and the finish line, which was the steepest part of the hill. My main goal, the one I told to my friends, was to still be running at dawn, so I went out at a comfortable pace, and planned on slowing down as needed to keep a constant level of effort. I had dreams of completing 50 miles (actually 52, since only complete laps count towards your score). However, that required averaging 30 minutes per lap, and I wasn’t going to risk doing a crash-and-burn to meet that goal in my first ultra.

Once I began walking, I lost contact with the rest of the runners. As it got dark, a booze-cruise appeared offshore. The lights on the ship added to the festivities, but not quite as much as the loud karaoke detracted. Luckily, they shut it down around midnight. After that I was mostly on my own for the rest of the night. 10 runners scattered over more than 3 miles didn’t make for much company. I’d pass the SRR encampment and get cheers and offers of a beer, and I’d climb the hill to the start and get more attaboys and get to coast downhill for a bit. SRR member Eric Forgy was out for a long run (he ended up doing 7 laps), so he ran with me for awhile. The rest of the time, I was alone except for relay runners going by, and some fishermen along the eastern shore. The fishermen were out there for a surprisingly long time, well into the morning. Still, I expect they were much more surprised at the runners continually passing through their normally quiet spot.

The running went pretty well. I didn’t dress any differently than I would for a normal long run. As usual, I had Bodyglide on my thighs, which I freshened once during the night, and a Compeed on the hotspot on the ball of my right foot. This worked out well. I ended up with no blisters, and with only minor chafing on my thighs.

Most of the course was lit well enough. There were dark patches at the southern end (with an eerie beep to warn off boats) and along the eastern breakwater, just before you turn up to the finish. Throughout the night, as I looked over the rocks along the shore of the latter section, I could see the reflection of my headlamp coming back from the eyes of the animals climbing around out there. I never figured out what animals they were.

I stopped at the car every two laps to freshen my water bottle. I was drinking Accelerade, which makes my stomach less acid than Gatorade, and has the 4/1 carbohydrate/protein ratio that’s the in thing these days. Hydration wasn’t a problem the whole night, as various visits to the Port-a Bush showed.

After 18 miles, I started taking GU, and I had a few almonds on most of the later pit stops, mostly for salt, but partly because I’d read the Vitamin E was good during a long race. Other than that, I didn’t have much to eat. The bagels, Power Bars, and beef jerky stayed in the bag. Even during the later stages of a marathon, my stomach gets unsettled. I wasn’t extra nauseous during the longer race, but still, the idea of food wasn’t too appealing. Towards the end, even the Accelerade became distasteful, so I drank water at the fueling stops (though I still kept Accelerade in the bottle) and that was easier to get down.

I had a couple of ibuprofen before the start, then two more at about 3 and 6 hours into the race. I also had a few electrolyte pills as the night wore on.

I kept to the sub-30 pace for the first 20 miles or so, but knew that wouldn’t last the whole way. The 7th and 8th laps were a transition period, then after that, I settled down to the pace I felt I’d be able to keep as long as I could keep running, about a 10 minute/mile pace for the running portions.

Staying alert was less of a problem than I had feared. The pain from the pounding got to a certain point, and didn’t seem to get worse, as long as I kept my form. I sometimes have a problem with sitting back on my heels, but my right ITB would remind me whenever I slipped into that mode. My achilles tendons were a bit more sore than usual, but nothing unmanageable.

What got to be a problem as the night went on was staying motivated. I knew I could keep running, but sometimes I had trouble remembering why. I see why ultrarunners try to have pacers for the latter stages of a race. I began walking up the shorter hill, and letting the walking breaks stretch on past the beeping of my watch, though not for more than 15-20 seconds.

Along about 2:30, I passed the finish and Tom asked me if I needed anything. “Dawn” was my reply, then I headed on down the hill yet again. Every once in awhile there was a small, cold, patch of fog, which was a pleasant change after hours of running.

After I passed 13 laps (about 40 miles), it was late enough in the race to begin planning for the end. I knew I could get in two more laps, but the third lap would be tough. If that last lap was going to get me over 50 miles, I might have gone for it, but given the situation, I decided to leave well enough alone, and just make sure I finished two more.

Along the backstretch of the second-to last lap, as the sky lightened in the east, Bob Ross pulled up alongside during a walking break, and chatted with me during the next running section (thanks, Bob!). The last lap, as I passed the SRR camp, I asked Joe O’Leary to meet me at the finish to take a picture, since I was sure he could get there faster than I (thanks, Joe!). I picked it up a bit, but was very careful to go slow enough to keep one more lap out of the question.

Finally, after 46 (well, 45.758) miles and 8 hours, 7 minutes, and 10 seconds, I was through! I had just about enough time to begin to enjoy the feeling before a swarm of mosquitoes attacked, but once again Bob Ross came through, donating his long-sleeved shirt for the trip down to the cars (thanks, Bob!). I dropped by the SRR camp, where everyone was packing up for the night, then went back up to the finish for the dawn.

Team 11 had won. I had no idea where they were from, or how many laps they finished. I just basked in the feeling of accomplishment, and enjoyed the view from the hill as the morning sun reflected off the ocean and the Boston skyline.

The mix of an ultra and a relay causes two sides of the sport to coexist more closely than usual. Running is basically a solitary experience. No one can help you with the physical requirements of running – you have to do the work yourself. Relay races are as close as running comes to being a true team sport, since you have to coordinate with others, and your results depend on the contributions of all the team members. This can be very rewarding, especially as a break from the usual competitive atmosphere that naturally springs up among people that race together often.

Ultrarunning is the opposite extreme. You’re out there by yourself for even longer than usual, testing the limits of what you can do as an individual. But even then, the contributions of others, whether supporting your effort by working as crew, by offering encouragement as you go by, or by establishing a standard against which to measure yourself, add immensely to the enjoyment of the event. Otherwise, why bother to go to a race? Just get on the treadmill, put your head down, and run until you drop.

Afterwards, there was a bit more than the usual post-marathon soreness, but nothing disastrous seems to have happened. I rested for a few days then, Tuesday morning, I went out for an easy 3 mile run, which seemed to go by in no time at all!

All in all, this was a good experience, especially since the weather cooperated. Most of the stuff I carried along remained untouched in my car throughout the race. The one thing I’d want to pass on to other beginning ultrarunners is to start with a race run on a loop course. Running the distance is difficult enough without having to worry about whether you’ll have food, drinks, dry socks, etc… easily available throughout the whole race.

I still haven’t decided whether I should run the 24 Hour….

Need

“We always needed you … like the shadows need a candle, or they can’t dance.”

-Memory & Dream – Charles de Lint (1994)

Someday when I grow up…

There are two authors I’d like to be able to emulate. One is the late Robert A. Heinlein. His stories were filled with strong ideas and interesting, larger than life characters tied together by strong plots. Charles de Lint focuses more on relationships and emotions. His characters are just as interesting, but perhaps more realistic, though most of them are still improvements on the general run of humanity. Both authors work in the fantastic and use that to show us a path through struggle to a more perfect world.

ImprovBoston moves to Central Square

For 16 years, ImprovBoston has been bringing the funny to Inman Square in Cambridge. Now the improvisational comedy theater group has outgrown their tiny home between Christina’s Ice Cream and All Star Sandwich, so they’re moving up Prospect Street into Central Square.

David Marino, one of the directors at ImprovBoston, says “The new space is going to revolutionize how improv theater is done in Boston. Suddenly, people who never had a venue before will be able to perform.” Dana Jay Bein, who teaches standup comedy at ImprovBoston, says “It’ll offer a lot more opportunities for standup. We’re gonna be making our mark in a much bigger way. People who were moving to NY, Chicago, and LA are jumping the gun. I think Boston’s got a really experimental, fun, young, lively scene.”

The cast at ImprovBoston loves the intimate old theater. Kevin Harrington, co-host of the Sunday night Sgt. Culpepper’s Comedy Jamboree said “I’m gonna miss how fearless I feel performing here, because it’s something that’s so comfortable.” The small, floor level stage, surrounded by seats for about 75 patrons, is backed by a rough brick wall that separates the theater from Christina’s. Michelle McNulty, a member of the TheaterSports troupe at ImprovBoston, says “Even when you’re not getting laughs you hear them breathe. You can feel them pull into you when you’re doing something serious. You can tell they’re into it.” The backstage area, as intern Jennifer Descharme puts it, is “up there and down here and all around. It’s like an ant farm.”

ImprovBoston started their last week at Inman Square and the celebration of their 25th year with a weekend of events showcasing the history of the group. Cast members from the entire stay at Inman came back to perform, topping things off with seven hours of shows on Sunday night that pulled together five or ten minutes from many of the showcase events of years past. Patrick French, part of the Mainstage troupe, was watching the show. “With the guys from the 80s, it’s kind of rewarding. I’ve been amazed and I’ve been touched.” It was a celebration, but also an emotional time as performers got up on the Inman stage for the last time.

But sooner or later, everyone leaves home. The theater in Inman Square has significant limitations. It’s intimate, but the small facility severely limits the size of the audiences that can see any of the shows and the number of shows and other events that can be produced in the theater on a regular basis. The tiny size of the lobby often forces patrons to wait out on the street before shows due to the tiny size of the lobby, Chip Brewer, a former cast member back from Maine to say goodbye says the lobby “gets crowded really quickly with about three people, and I don’t think that projects the kind of welcoming atmosphere you want at a theater like this.” The infrastructure is old, making it difficult to create powerful effects with lighting, sound, or video, let alone keep the toilets unclogged. The bathrooms where the toilets are located are tiny, barely larger than phone booths.

There’s no separate rehearsal space. The green room, where performers prepare before shows, is in a dark, cold, and smelly basement. Andy Ofiesh, MC of the Naked Comedy showcase, says he’ll miss the stench. “Every once in awhile you get the sweet scent of, it’s closest to chicken dung, and that to me is the scent of art.” The ceiling there is so low that many cast members can’t stand up straight. Marcello Illamo, MC of the Sunday night jamboree, pointed out the spot at the bottom of the staircase “where there’s a little bit of blood where David Mogolov split his head open after one of the shows.” Dents in the ceiling caused by wayward heads, or dents in heads caused by too much enthusiasm are common.

The whole building is hot in the summer, so the doors have to be left open to allow air in. Creatures from the back alley sometimes wander through. Kristina Smarz, a member of TheaterSports, remembers working on building sets where “we’re out in the back alley painting and watching rats go by.” It’s also cold in the winter, especially in the green room.

The small size and other limitations of the space, along with some conflicts with area residents who don’t want to share the block with a performance venue, prompted the decision to move. Additional funding was required to finance the change, since as a non-profit organization ImprovBoston does not have a large bankroll stashed away. The ImprovBoston Funny Money Capital Campaign has improvised new ways of generating income, ranging from a 24 hour improv marathon, to selling cream pies to audience members so they can interrupt the show at any time to toss the pie in the face of a performer, down to putting a box in the green room where cast members could toss loose change. Each member of the ImprovBoston community has their own web page to help them solicit donations and track the results. The campaign been much more interesting than a public TV telethon, and it has collected almost $100,000 to defray the expenses of the move.

ImprovBoston has reduced the cost of the move by doing much of the construction work in the new space themselves. Cast members, students, and other volunteers, guided by technical director Dave Totty, have spent weeks clearing out the space and putting up drywall, painting, and doing other basic labor while professionals dealt with the more complicated tasks. Bein, who is also in TheaterSports, was power spraying the ceiling in the Cabaret, the new secondary stage, earlier in the day. He had moved to Inman Square from Brighton to be closer to the theater, but he’s still looking forward to the move. “It’s inspiring to be putting my own effort, blood, sweat, and tears into our new home.”

The location of the new theater will make it much easier for audiences to get to shows. The theater is at 40 Prospect St. in Central Square, just around the corner from Mass Ave and the Central Square T Station on the Red Line. There are parking lots nearby for people who prefer to drive. The theater is near the Irish pub The Field and across the street from the Cambridge Community Television studios. The first show at the new theater is scheduled for February 15th.

Staff working at nearby establishments are happy to see ImprovBoston moving in. Over at Cambridge Community Television, Marissa Acosta, the studio manager, said “It’s good that there’s going to be another arts-oriented venue in Central Square and it’s also fitting that they’ll be right across the street from a community access center, because there might even be some crossover.” ImprovBoston’s Harrington agrees. “Being close to something like CCTV, since we’ve got so much talent, both performers and writers, it’s another toy to play with.”

The new theater is triple the size of the old one, with a dedicated rehearsal space and a clean, roomy green room, where performers meet before shows to prepare. The theater is designed with two stages, a main stage that holds about 100 people and a Cabaret Room that holds 40-45 with seating that can be rearranged to accommodate different kinds of shows.

The lobby is much larger and it contains a bar, which will draw people in and help them unwind and get involved in the show. There’s ample heat and air conditioning to keep everyone comfortable

The new theater will allow ImprovBoston to greatly expand their offerings. ImprovBoston has been presenting shows Wednesday through Sunday nights in Inman Square. They’ve been holding classes on the nights when there were no shows scheduled and on weekends during the day, and scrounging around for rehearsal space. Now they will be able to present multiple performances each night, and run those shows later into the night because there won’t be any residential neighbors upstairs. ImprovBoston will increase the number of classes they present and no longer needs to look elsewhere for rehearsals.

There’s some risk associated with the move. Operating expenses will be higher. But managing director Elyse Schuerman says that the group has a 10 year lease that is fair, and everyone expects that the proximity to the Central Square T station will result in a significant increase in traffic. Michelle Dunnewind-Nathan says “It’s so nice to find something that is so close to the heart of a community.”

Comedy has a long, proud tradition in Inman Square. In the ’60s Jane Curtin of Saturday Night Live fame worked with The Proposition out of a space behind what is now Rosie’s Bakery. The Ding Ho (now Café Ole) was a successful launching pad in the 80s for numerous comic, including Steven Wright and Bobcat Goldthwait.

Now ImprovBoston helping create a new nexus for improv comedy in Central Square. They’re raising the stakes for Bastards Inc., who have been performing Thursday nights in the basement of the Cantab Lounge, and Flaming Awesome, who have been putting on shows at the All Asia. These groups, and others, will be performing in the new ImprovBoston theater. All this is in addition to the vibrant nightlife scene that revolves around the numerous music venues in the area.

Steve Gilbane, who has played music for ImprovBoston since the first show back in Inman in 1991 when it was still the Back Alley Theater, says “Watching the troupe go from having no space at all, to sharing a space, to leasing the space completely themselves, and now moving to a large space and building it themselves, it’s quite a journey.” The crew at ImprovBoston hopes everyone joins them on the journey in Central Square starting February 20th, to help build new memories and have more than a few laughs along the way.

Vinyl #10 & #11 – For John

Here are two songs dedicated to John Lennon:

The Immigrant by Neil Sedaka was released in 1975, in the middle of John’s battle to keep his green card and his US residency.

Walking on Thin Ice by Yoko Ono was made with John just before he died.  Yoko dedicated it to him on its release in 1981.

Night splint

If you’re considering a night splint to improve calf flexibility or help with plantar fasciitis, you can now get a pretty good one for a little over $30.  It’s made by Futuro. I found it at the Porter Square CVS in Cambridge, MA.
http://www.futuro-usa.com/product_detail.aspx?id=38

It doesn’t grip you as aggressively as as more expensive ones you might get from a medical supply house, but it’s cheap, much more comfortable than most splints or the Sock, and a good way to see if a splint will help.

Vinyl #9 – Necrophilia!

You’ve Been Having Sex with Dead People Again is another song from the WGDR days. The Objects recorded “Live at the Greatwood Cafe” at Goddard College in Plainfield Vt on 12/16/78. I was a senior in high school in the next town over at that time. I had no idea that the show was happening, but with song titles like “You Don’t Have to be Smart”, “I Hate This Place”, and “I was a Cosmonaut, You were a Mermaid”, if I had known I would have gone. I probably would have been disappointed, as “You’ve Been Having Sex…” is by far the best cut on the album. Then again, at the time any punk show in central Vermont was something to be celebrated.

I picked up the album a few years later when I was working at WGDR. The disc came in the sleeve from “Chaser” by John Lee and Gerry Brown, with an Objects cover taped over it by the band. Bongo’s is trying to sell a sealed copy for $350, calling it “Ultra Rare!” Somehow I doubt that it was shrinkwrapped originally. Acid Archives says “The LP has been offered as “rare garage psych” by record dealers since the mid-1980s, but not many people seem to like it, and it’s not a highly rated title today.” That’s more in line with reality.

The band does feature Marc Weinstein as the drummer, who went on to play with MX-80 Sound. They were on Ralph Records along with The Residents.

Vinyl #8 – Ain’t That Nothin

Television made one classic album, Marquee Moon. Then they made Adventure, which was panned when it was released, but contained some songs I liked when I found the album while working at WGDR, Goddard College’s FM station in Plainfield VT. My approval didn’t help sell the album, since WGDR’s 100 watt signal could barely be heard from my house in the next town over.

Ain’t that Nothin by Television from 1978

I feel so much safer now

While waiting in line yesterday at Logan Airport, I figured out why we have to take our shoes off at airport security. Out of concern for our comfort, airlines want to ensure that everyone has clean feet. It’s the only reason that makes sense. No one really believes that scanning shoes makes airline travel much safer. The security justification is just a blind to avoid offending the potentially smelly. Or maybe someone in charge at TSA has a foot fetish?

Feet aren’t the only thing we have to expose at security. When I took my computer out of my knapsack so they could go through the scanner separately, I forgot to remove the ziplock baggie that was holding my potentially dangerous travel-sized tube of toothpaste. Luckily, the tube made it through the scan undetected, so I didn’t get pulled aside for a thorough search. I have been pulled aside before. One time I won third place in my age group at a “Beat the Sherriff” race in Florida. The guard at the scanner must have thought the badge-shaped medal was a 5-pointed ninja star. Another time, I had packed an umbrella. I only wish that umbrella actually had been sturdy enough to act as a weapon.

Airport security is only good enough to catch the stupid bombers. Fortunately, that’s almost all of them. It takes a very misguided person to fail to understand that any cause worth dying for is worth living for. Even the stupidest person understands that if he destroys the plane he’s riding on, he isn’t going to live to enjoy the better world he’s created. The only thing that makes it a better world is that there’s one less murderous idiot around to plague the rest of us.  That’s no consolation for the people on the plane, anyone underneath the pieces when they hit the ground, or their friends and families.

Unfortunately, there’s no shortage of fools in the world. All it takes is one lucky idiot to make for a very bad day. Maybe a few foolish procedures aren’t too high a price to pay.  Let’s just hope that our idiots are luckier than theirs.