andy reagan only the interesting stuff

Christmas update

In my last post, I laid out my options for going back to Blacksburg.  I've decided to stay in Syracuse and work through that last week, going down to Bluebell with OBG, and then driving to school Monday 1/17 from Bluebell.  So this upcoming New Year's weekend will be my last weekend at home.  Below is what I've been up to the past week and a half.

Training

Training for the upcoming racing season hasn't been spectacular, although I've done some hard workouts on the trainer, and two days ago went on a 4.5mile run with my Mom...but working a full day really makes it too hard to ride when I get home.  For example, I should try to ride tonight before the SU game and going out after, but I'm going to pick up a fixie after work so I won't get home till 6, and won't have time to eat, ride, and shower before heading up to the game.  Tip is at 9, but we're going to get there early to see warm ups and make a night out of it, since this is a bigger Christmas present for our family.  It doesn't look like a trainer ride is going to happen.

Christmas

Speaking of Christmas, I was really happy with how my gifts came out, and with those that I recieved.  I filled Kyle's book-safe flask with some good Scotch, Mom's ice cream maker is fully functional and we'll get to try it out very soon, and my brewery tour for Dad tomorrow is shaping up.  Tim, from Empire Brewing Co, is going to show us around the brewery which should be awesome.   Then we're going to hit up the other two breweries: Syracuse Suds Factory and Middle Ages Brewing's tasting room.  The Brooklyn Brewery Winter Ale holiday 5-pack, which I gave the tour brochure to him in, was delicious as well.  I got some new Keen winter boots, Shower's Pass rain jacket, a Woolrich flannel, waterproof Goretex pants, Bontrager cycling gloves, a variety of beer glass styles, 0 degree sleeping bag, fleece ba la clava, two pairs of warm winter socks, an SLR gorilla pod, Uncle Carl's birthday card and I'm sure there are at least a few things I'm leaving out.  Not really a present, but the guy at Verizon warrantied my phone and so now I've got a new DROID as well, which I wasn't expecting and am really happy about.

Partying!

For Zdanowski's birthday on Christmas, and last night we went out downtown.  I'm beginning to learn my way around Syracuse's bars as well as the restaurants which we walk to for lunch sometimes from O'Brien & Gere's awesome new downtown location.  Syracuse is a actually a really fun city, despite the cold and snow.  And it's not really even that cold here when it's in the teens, often Blacksburg is colder.  Sarah drove both ways for Zdan's birthday, in what was possibly the most uncomfortable car ride of my life with Dan K on one leg and Dan Z on the other, crammed into the tiny back seat.  The way home was better, I laid across the back seat on top of Del Dan and John as Zdan held his head out the front window.

Resolutions

For the new year, I've decided to attempt all three challenges below and so I'm going to lay out the reasons I'm doing it.

Bye bye meat: becoming vegetarian

How? Sounds as simple as can be, just cutting meat out of my diet.  This is only possible now that I do eat enough fruits and vegetables that I can sustain myself on them, I used to be far too "picky."

Reason 1, the earth: Since the very beginnings of my education in sustainability, and culminating with the semester of Earth Sustainability focused on food (including the tour of Joel Salatin's Polyface Farm), I've learned about the connections that we all share with our food and how that affects the world we live in.  Zeroing in on the meat-eating of Americans, we eat more meat, more often than has even been eaten in history.  Its rare that we know where that meat comes from, and there are some figures that I find particularly alarming.  Around 70% of the antibiotics produced in the US are fed to livestock.  The number of calories that we feed to cows, in the form of grain which they can barely digest, is 20 times what we get back in terms of meat.  This grain is almost always corn, producing the "marbled" fat in their flesh, and their waste is not given back to farms.  Instead, the massive farming operations rely on fertilizers and pesticides derived from oil.  There's a big disconnect in this system.  In performing a personal carbon analysis, the food I eat results in more carbon emissions than driving (#2) or heating/cooling the house (#3).

Reason 2, health: Simply because I don't see the effects on my waistline, I often eat way too much food.

Biking miles > SOV miles

Simple enough, I'm planning a repeat of putting more miles on two wheels than on four in 2011.  I'm counting all the miles I bike (for transportation, recreation, racing) against the miles that I put on my 1999 Honda Accord.  I'm going to reset my "Trip B" odometer in the car, and keep an excel spreadsheet of miles biked.  My Mom pointed out that I without a doubt did this in 2010, with my cross-country bike trip.  The big driving miles that I do are to/from Blacksburg and Syracuse, and in 2010 I only did two one-way drives.  Back to school in the Spring, and back here in December.  Lauren drove me to the start of my trip, and to school in the fall from NY.  The only other significant drives were to/from Chapel Hill and to/from Parkersburg, both from Blacksburg.  Only 400 miles round trip each, and with 1200 Blacksburg->Syr miles, that puts me at 2000 miles in the car.  And I'm sure there is quite a bit of miscellaneous mileage, but I primarily bike around school.  Consider the 4,000 miles I biked during the summer and all those I put in the Spring training and racing, and this fall training...no question I got it.

Why would I try such a foolish thing? For starters, cycling is an active, safe, and healthy mode of transportation that is not going away anytime soon.  Commuting actively means that I get some exercise going to class, get there much more quickly and with much greater flexibility.  It saves money on gas, although that money that is likely spent on bike upgrades and lights, going entirely carless would save heaps in maintenance and insurance.  In our oil-dependent society (my lifestyle as well depends very much on foreign oil), and the fact that sooner or later we are bound to have burnt through this greatest-of-resources that we've ever stumbled across.  Our use of the oceans of oil beneath Saudi Arabia is without doubt irresponsible, and to develop a real energy alternative to maintain the "convenience" of driving to work from suburbia is not happening.

Anheuser-Busch Imbev and SABMiller

In 2011, I'm saying NO to bland, multinational beer.  This shouldn't be too hard, really, yet I have to decide whether this means buying those beers, or consuming them altogether.  There are some downsides: could possibly be more expensive (but I don't think it will be), doesn't work as well to buy craft beer for a party (and those who wouldn't appreciate it), and what to do for drinking games?!  The positives are definitely better though: discourages binge drinking/overconsumption at $4.50/beer at the bar and $2/beer in the store, favors the local instead of the multinational and puts homebrew before BL, and I could go on for hours but I can't explain it any better than the movie Beer Wars, which I think you'll need to watch to fully understand.