Sunday, November 6, 2016

RIGHT TRIANGLE TRAIL

Lately I have been naming my pathways. I have dubbed yesterday's route, the Right Triangle Trail, in honor of the geometry that I have recently been diving into while helping (and attempting to help) my daughter with her homework. About 40 years ago I was a geometry 'genius.' Forty years can make anyone rusty. I have found it challenging to try to assist my daughter in a subject matter that I was highly proficient in about a half century ago. Nevertheless, the definition of a right triangle is fairly straightforward. It is a triangle that has one right angle (90° angle, two perpendicular sides) and this was the basic shape of my hike on Saturday morning. The 'hypotenuse' of this 'triangle' was spent mostly traveling the paved trails through multiple adjacent forest preserves in the suburbs. My responsibility yesterday was to pick up my daughter and her friend from cheerleading practice at 11:30AM. They had been dropped off by the parent of the other child at 10:00AM. I basically drove to the area where they were to be picked up at 8:30AM, so that I could take a long 2.5 hour hike. By the time I had finished, I had logged twelve miles.

This photo attempted to capture the changing colors of the leaves on the trees in the forest preserve.

The section of the trail that led to this area indicated that the trail was closed. Naturally I needed to check out why. In the background is the remnants of a bridge that used to cross the river. The bridge is no longer there. Now I know why this part of the trail is closed.

Once I emerged from the forest preserves, I hiked along Touhy Avenue and passed the iconic YMCA known for its 'Leaning Tower of Pisa' There was scaffolding at the bottom. What are they trying to do, straighten out the building?

Your Food Diary For:

BREAKFAST	Calories kcal	Carbs g	Fat g	Protein g	Sodium mg	Sugar g
Instant Oatmeal Apples & Cinnamon	320	66	4	8	400	24
	320	66	4	8	400	24
L U N C H
Orecchiette pasta, 1 cup	200	41	10	7	0	1
Teriyaki - Salmon	300	3	9	52	0	0
Seafood Pasta Salad	300	10	1	10	175	0
General Tso Chicken	300	23	18	13	713	13
	1,100	77	38	82	888	14
D I N N E R
Read - 3 Bean Salad	300	65	0	5	1,500	40
Chocolate Birthday Cake	600	87	27	15	0	99
Special K - Vanilla Almond, 174 grams	660	150	9	12	1,020	54
	1,560	302	36	32	2,520	193
S N A C K S
Nestle - Dark Chocolate Bar	500	52	30	6	0	0
	500	52	30	6	0	0

Totals	3,480	497	108	128	3,808	231
Your Daily Goal	4,299	537	143	215	2,300	161
Remaining	819	40	35	87	-1,508	-70
	Calories kcal	Carbs g	Fat g	Protein g	Sodium mg	Sugar g
	*You've earned 2,369 extra calories from exercise today

If every day were like today... You'd weigh 202.9 lbs in 5 weeks.

.

Your Exercise Diary for:

Cardiovascular	Minutes	Calories Burned
TWELVE MILE HIKE	157	2,369


Daily Total / Goal	157 / 30	2,369 / 590
Weekly Total / Goal	835 / 210	13,754 / 4,130

Sunday, September 25, 2016

WHO IS JOHN GALT?

Yesterday I was a soccer Mom - with two obvious differences.
I am a Dad.
I was driving my daughter and her friend to Cheerleading Practice - not soccer.
Other than that, I was a soccer Mom.

Had I had this same responsibility two years ago and needed to find something to do in the 90 minutes that I had to myself, perhaps I would have driven to a nearby McDonalds and had a hearty (that is, heart-killing) breakfast of two bacon egg cheese bagels. Nowadays, it is so much easier for me to find something to do with 90 minutes. In fact, since I dropped my daughter and her friend at Cheerleading practice ten minutes early - I had precisely 100 minutes to myself. This gave me enough time to squeeze in a 7 mile hike in places I had never seen before. My hike took me to LaBagh Woods Forest Preserve where I found a trail that was a converted railway line. I timed my hike perfectly so that I knew almost precisely when to turn back and head back to the place where the car was parked and my two passengers would be waiting for me. The weather was great, I was prepared with my backpack filled with ice-cold water. It was another great hike.

WHO IS JOHN GALT?
As a person who has read Ayn Rand's 1957, 1000+ page opus, Atlas Shrugged, I vaguely remember this reference. I needed to refresh my memory from wikipedia...

John Galt (/ɡɔːlt/) is a character in Ayn Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged (1957). Although he is not identified by name until the last third of the novel, he is the object of its often-repeated question "Who is John Galt?" and of the quest to discover the answer.

As the plot unfolds, Galt is acknowledged to be a philosopher and inventor; he believes in the power and glory of the human mind, and the right of the individual to use their mind solely for themself. He serves as a highly individualist counterpoint to the collectivist social and economic structure depicted in the novel, in which society is based on oppressive bureaucratic functionaries and a culture that embraces mediocrity in the name of egalitarianism, which the novel posits is the end result of Collectivist philosophy.

Here is my question? Who put up this billboard? And how long has it been there? The sign was extremely weather-beaten. I live in Illinois, a place where the collectivist mindset is prevalent. What other state could have politically birthed Barack Obama? (other than, Hawaii, Vermont, Massachussetts, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Washington or California?) President Obama is not exactly a person who has professed rugged individualism as an ideal. The current nominee for president from the Democrats thinks it takes a village to raise a child. Clearly this sign was erected by someone who is not a person who drinks the Democrat Party Kool-Aid.

The squared area is LaBagh Woods, and the GRAVEL EMBANKMENT was the old railroad line converted into a straight trail that I took north to Devon Avenue before I turned back to pick up my two passengers.

Your Food Diary For:

BREAKFAST	Calories kcal	Carbs g	Fat g	Protein g	Sodium mg	Sugar g
Trader Joe's - Multigrain O's	660	144	6	12	810	36
Quaker - Chewy Granola 90 Calories, 1 bar	90	19	2	1	80	7
	750	163	8	13	890	43
L U N C H
Trader Joe's - Cereal High Fiber, 210 g	560	161	4	21	490	35
	560	161	4	21	490	35
D I N N E R
Turkey Pot Roast	260	6	14	28	1,060	2
Shaved Brussel Sprouts	70	16	0	6	0	0
Asparagus - Steamed Fresh	60	6	0	7	0	0
Chef Salad	501	13	39	31	1,001	8
Bai Antioxidant Cocofusion - Maui Coconut	10	18	0	0	70	2
	901	59	53	72	2,131	12
S N A C K S
Nestle - Dark Chocolate Chips	500	57	36	0	0	43
	500	57	36	0	0	43

Totals	2,711	440	101	106	3,511	133
Your Daily Goal	3,354	419	111	168	2,300	125
Remaining	643	-21	10	62	-1,211	-8
	Calories kcal	Carbs g	Fat g	Protein g	Sodium mg	Sugar g
	*You've earned 1,424 extra calories from exercise today

If every day were like today... You'd weigh 202.8 lbs in 5 weeks

Your Exercise Diary for:

Cardiovascular	Minutes	Calories Burned
SEVEN MILE HIKE	94	1,338


Daily Total / Goal	94 / 30	1,338 / 590
Weekly Total / Goal	954 / 210	14,171 / 4,130

Atlas Shrugged official movie poster