Tweet Map

I'm not on Twitter, and don't follow anyone on twitter other than what ends up in wider social and media circles. But I'm not a luddite - I'm an engineer and technophile - so I am not immune to Twitter usefulness and impact on the world. So I read with interest a blog post from the Smithsonian, reporting on research done by The Global Twitter Heartbeat project out of the University of Illinois. They took the geographic information from millions of tweets and graphed it on a map:


Which looks impressively like the global distribution of electric lights:


But they went further and looked at the where is, and more importantly, where there isn't overlap. For instance, the maps show places that don't have widespread electrification, but a decent amount of twitter traffic (e.g., the Amazon). Conversely, places that have electrification but very little twitter traffic (e.g., Iran, where twitter is banned).

There is also geographic analysis of what language gets used where. So, for instance, they found that, unsurprisingly, that a country's native language is also the most likely to be used for tweets from that country. However, they could also find where, for instance, there were heavy infusions of Spanish-language tweets from within the U.S.

Good data visualization is something I greatly enjoy. These guys have done a neat job with it. I urge you all to have a look.

Race Recon

This was, apparently, a big weekend in the world of triathlon. As we were driving down to CT friday night, Hilary noticed that Ironman Taiwan was happening on Saturday - at that moment, actually. Saturday there were two major races going on: the Wildflower Long Course (70.3 miles, a half-iron distance) in sunny california, and the US Pro 70.3 Championships at St. George, Utah. We weren't there for either, but followed them with some interest. We've been following the exploits of pro triathlete Jesse Thomas for a while. Picky Bars, the race nutrition that Thomas and his pro-runner wife, Lauren Fleshman, produce, are Hilary's power-up of choice these days. In Utah, Amber Ferreira, a pro triathlete we know from Concord, had a pretty good day against a tough course and packed field.

Hilary and I are getting psyched for our first tri of the season coming up in less than a month: Rev3 Quassy. We'll be doing the Olympic on Saturday, then spectate the half-iron the following day. We'll be bringing down a sizable contingent of our Capital Multisport teammates, too. The race happens to be near to Hilary's hometown, so it was easy to stay with her folks - who entertain B much better than we do these days - and scope out the bike and run courses. Hilary had already done this about a month ago, and was a bit discouraged by the hilly bike course, solo, on her road bike, on a day of crummy weather. This weekend, under clear skies, warm sun, on her super awesome tri bike, and already knowing the course, it was much better.

Saturday we hit the 10-k course. It has two serious climbs in the middle, followed by one quad-killing downhill, and one final climb to the finish, set along well-shaded residential streets. There were lots of people out and about scoping out the courses, too, though I suspect more of them are doing the half-iron. Neither Hilary nor I pushed it, but mostly enjoyed ourselves. Hilary's got a training schedule she's sticking to, which did not include a fast run that day. I had done a hard and fast five miles Friday before we left, and was feeling it in my legs. The ice cream for dessert that night was well earned.

Sunday was the main event: following the 25-mile bike course, then immediately running the 10-k again. (Training one discipline right after the other, like a bike-run combo, is called a "brick".) Again it was gorgeous weather, and with Hilary's familiarity with the course, we made pretty good time. Again, we weren't trying to race the course, just scope it out at a decent pace. We only made one wrong turn, which tacked on an extra 2.5 miles and a small climb. You can't go anywhere in this part of CT without going up and down hills. Overall the course has some 1800 feet of climbing - something we've been trying to emphasize in our training over the last month or so. It feels good knowing what to expect, or at least knowing you won't be surprised and daunted by the hills when you come to them. We both felt really good going into the run, and managed to push our respective paces even up the climbs. More ice cream tonight.

On the whole, we are feeling pretty good about this race coming up. It should be a good time with family and teammates, and we should be able to perform well. This is not to say that either of us are aiming for the podium. To be frank: we just aren't at that level. The top finishers in our age groups will probably be 10-15 minutes ahead. That's OK, we're just looking forward to a fun weekend.

Local Mushrooms

Here's a great find at the Farmer's Market yesterday: exotic mushrooms cultivated in New Hampshire. The NH Mushroom Company churns out a few hundred pounds each week from their facility in Tamworth, NH. They sell to restaurants and wholesalers, and this past week made an appearance at the Concord Farmer's Market. Chestnut (the brownish ones - like shiitakes, but with a less-chewy stem) and Oyster. Not terribly expensive either at $12-14/lb. A half pound of the chestnut mushrooms, combined with asparagus and tofu, will offer up one of our favorite springtime dishes.

WMUR profiled the company over the winter. Video here, including great video of how they do their growing (bags and bags of woodchips and sawdust!).

Spring is Here!

In great contrast to my last post (oh so many weeks ago, I know), there are some signs of Spring around Concord. Despite the fact that it has been pretty cold this past week - the first week of April - we are well on our way:

1. Maple Syrup season is just about wrapped up. After reading Maple Syrup Season by Ann Purmell about twenty times in February and March, we went out to see sugaring in action a few weeks back during NH's official maple syrup weekend. The season was already pretty far long, because we sampled some hot Grade B fresh from the evaporator. In other news


2. I sent off an order form for seedlings for our vegetable garden. Sure, we won't pick them up until Memorial Day weekend, but it is a comfort, looking over the strawa-covered raised beds on a grey morning - to know that our tomato, pepper, tomatillo, and brocolli plants are at that moment growing in a greenhouse a two towns away.


3. The raised beds may be looking a bit forlorn and have nothing but old straw to show at the moment, but there are twinges of green to be seen as well: garlic popping up


4. Although it's been chilly when we do it, Hilary and I have been able to do some outdoor bike rides in the last few weeks. We even did a 30-miler last weekend coming back from an Easter get together in Amherst.


5. Easter! We aren't particularly observant, but Easter is always a fun holiday for us. At the said family get-together, Brynna's easter egg hunt was a real crowd pleaser. Picture one adorable and giggling 4-year old chasing through a yard with 9 adults trailing behind with cameras. Or, better yet, observe:

source: Bill R.


6. The end of snow. Enjoy it while it lasts, Jasper!
source: Bill R.


7. March Madness. Go UConn Huskies! What do you mean "men play basketball, too"?


8. Changing wardrobes. We have bins of hand-me-down girl clothes from our former neighbors. Just today Brynna and Hilary did a grand changing of the wardrobe: culling the extra warm and increasingly small clothes and replacing them with sundresses and shirtsleeves for the coming summer.


9. Ice cream. Sure, it was hovering around freezing when we got it, but the neighborhood ice cream shop opened for the season on April 1st - and we made a point to be there! Not that we sat around outside to eat it through.

Blizzard Nemo

A'yuh, here in New Hampshuh, we got a bit uh snow.
 

Our snowblower-equipped neighbors were out in force to save the neighborhood. Much thanks for their help!
 

All bundled up, B finds a fun snow bank. I was tempted to pitch her off the porch and into a snowbank. For fun, you see.
 

We found that we could not open our back door to let Jasper into the yard this morning, so we cut a path to it by way of the gate.
 

Jasper the wonderdog LOVES the snow. Here he is reenacting the battle of the Somme from WWI.
 

Being near the fence, the snow tended to drift into high piles on the raspberry path. Look closely and you can see the horizontal wires for training the canes: those are 18" apart, and there's one that you can't see that's 18" off the ground!
 

The back door has snow piled about halfway up the lower pane. Fun drifting, too.
 

 

Jasper likes bounding and rolling in the snow. Here, he wades.
 

Brynna did make it to the swingset eventually, slid once to clear the slide, swung once to clear the swings, then gave it up.
 

That's a 4-foot fence. The pile on the raspberries comes almost level with the top!
 
Actually, my favorite part of the storm was last night around 11 pm. I pulled on my backcountry skis (I rock the old-school 3-pin bindings, no heel strap) and went cruising around the neighborhood. Great weather for it, and I had the streets to myself for the most part. The wind was up (sustained approaching 20 mph, gusts up to 30), temperature in the mid-teens, and snowfall over 1" per hour of fine powder. Heading down towards a local park was fine: in places where a car or truck has passed in the last hour, the tire tracks made a nice packed surface. In the park the powder parted around my shins. Heading back home was tough: into the wind. Had I planned a bit better, I would have had a balaclava and ski mask. As it was, the headwind and snow made things quite uncomfortable. As I returned home, I noticed that my outbound tracks down the middle of our street had been completely obliterated by wind and fresh snow - all in less than an hour!

A budding scientist

One of the most endearing things about Alex is that he is completely committed to making sure that Brynna gets a thorough scientific education, even in her preschool years.

Here are a few of my favorite Alex-to-Brynna-isms:

1. "Look, Brynna, it's a rhombicuboctahedron!"

...I needed help with that one, too. Here it is:

2. "Now, the tricky thing about snowflakes—real snowflakes—is that they have six-fold symmetry"

...And indeed they do.

3. [While discussing whether heavy and light things fall at the same speed]..."Now, Brynna, this is a FUNDAMENTAL theory of physics. If you get this, you can understand almost everything else about the natural world."

...Go try it out yourself!

4. [While looking at Brynna's world map placemat] "This is a Mercator projection."

...For alternate projections and what they mean about you as a person...see this awesome xkcd comic. 

Pain Cave

In Winter, days of cold darkness can be squandered in somnambulance, waiting for warmth and light to return. For the triathlete, winter is a fine time to put in some serious training time. If the cold and darkness has you holed up indoors, may as well spend a little effort warming yourself. If it's dark outside, then even the basement, poorly light by a buzzing fluorescent tube, can become a sanctuary. This is the Pain Cave.

That basement may the coldest place in the whole house, but it is still warmer than it is outside. The lowered temperature means you can work it that much harder without overdoing it. Standing there in just your bike shorts, facing off against yourself in a mental struggle just to mount that bike again, you might shiver just a bit. But five minutes after clipping your shoes into the pedals you will feel warm from head to toe. In ten minutes the first drop of sweat will collect on your face. Fifteen minutes in you'll see beads of sweat building up on your shoulders. By the half-hour mark you'll be glad of the towel draped over the handlebars, the contacts you put on instead of glasses. The whir of the trainer is loud; the speakers turned up louder to get above it. Inside your own head, though, you will still easily hear the quick beat of your own heart and the heavy whoosh of your breathing. A quick click and accompanying shunck announces you've shifted up another gear. The rest of the house will not hear any of it: you are in your Pain Cave.

*   *   *

OK. Perhaps it's not always that intense. But sometimes it is, which can in fact bring you back the next time. It is true that we'd much rather be outside swimming, biking, and running. Running we can usually still pull off unless it's down into the single digits. Biking is largely infeasible because of the scant daylight and the fact that a self-generated 18 mph wind makes things that much colder. Swimming outdoors it right out, even if you could find an open lead of water. So Hilary or I, sometimes both in the same night, make a visit to the basement, where among the piled storage boxes, washing machine, and cluttered workbenches is our bike trainer. Here's a shot from just the other night:

It's a good way to catch up on reading or the Netflix queue.

Brynna Skiing

A little ways down the road (about one half hour door-to-slope) is a modest ski area: Pat's Peak. They have a surprisingly large beginner's area, which is free of charge. This is BRILLIANT. It means that we can take B most anytime with almost no risk. If she is done after one or two runs, we aren't our umpti-ump dollars for a lift pass. It has also meant that we've gone more than we otherwise would dare. And so, probably not this year but next, they'll score at least one and perhaps several season passes from the Mooses. We took her a few times last winter. She wore the strap-on skis that Hilary had when she was that age. But she advanced out of those pretty quick, so at the end of last season we got her a set of real skis and boots. She's got to going downhill part pretty well squared away. Turning and stopping, those minor details, are a work in progress. Two weeks ago she got to show off for one set of grandparents. The following weekend: her other set of grandparents. And now the whole world:



I never considered myself all that good skiing backwards. Turns out to be pretty easy on the bunny slope! Holding a camera steady while skiing backwards and watching out for others is still pretty tough.