2017.02.21 – Transformation

Tonight I had a close friend express how they were scared about recent events. When I went to go reflect on it – this is what came out…

Blood pumps rapidly – faster and faster.
Eyes wide open – focused and dilated.
Paralyzed by the crawler – no better on the radio.

The uncertainty surrounds us, scares us.
Misinformation on the screen generating the doubt.
The hatred bubbling on the surface.

This is how they control.
This is how they squash.
This is their plan.

We must resist.
We must prepare.
We must fight.
We must transform.

I will not be scared – I will transform this fear into art.
I will not be intimidated – I will burn the manipulation and grow stronger.
I will not be hypnotized – I will transform this rigor mortis into life.

2017.02.19 – Transformation

Left: Me on a run roughly a year ago. Right: This morning’s selfie

It doesn’t seem to me like my body has transformed over the last year. A lot of friends and even coworkers have noticed that I have lost significant weight recently. While my close friends say it has been gradual over the last few months, it really seems like it has just accelerated over the last few months.

It took digging up a selfie in the same outfit I took a year ago and putting it side by side with this mornings selfie to see my transformation. While going through selfies from around this time last year, I really wasn’t looking good. But even then, the selfies of me when I was doing a lot of cycling didn’t look much different. I really credit the new diet I am doing for this transformation.

I am happy that I became a selfie whore a few years ago – it helps keep me honest about what my life was like.

A few weeks ago, I picked up a new scale and I was shocked that I was only 210 – and just a few weeks later, I am at 207! 210 was roughly were I was before my old scale broke about 18 months ago – which coincided with my the reduction in my cycling. Even as of 5 months ago with my visit to the cardiologist, I was still hovering in the 225 range.

This morning I realized that my body has no issue running 10k now. This afternoon, I wish I went longer this morning before it started raining. Even as of a year ago, this was unheard of for me – a 5k run was long then.

Today, I am looking forward to actually running Bay to Breakers as a serious runner in May. I will have to figure out a outfit for it. But I have made a goal of doing it in 1 hour, which would be an 8:05 minute mile pace.

My lesson learned: Life can change fast!

2017.02.18 – Pain and new long term goals

My legs are protesting!

Time to stop being lazy and post selfies again.

I am still getting used to being highly active again. I woke up and my legs were protesting even doing a quick 5k run this morning. So I listened to it and said it’s a rest day. While running helped keep a low level base it didn’t use the same muscles as cycling did. Over the last few months, I went from having about 2-3 hours of active time a week to 6-10 hours of active time a week.

These changes have really kickstarted changes in my body. Between my new diet and being back to a normal activity level – the fat is starting to come right off. I am feeling good both physically and mentally. Riding in the rain has gone from being annoying to something I look forward.

This time spent on my bike puts me into a cathartic state and many of my worries just fall off. I didn’t use to get this deep into a relaxed state before on my old bike and I have an idea why – the new bicycle I bought is a full on race bike and the way it responds has a lot to do with it. While I would not say it is twitchy, it is very responsive to any input I give it. This has resulted in something very similar to the bikers (as in motorcycles) I know say to me, you have to clear your mind and just focus on the road and bike.

This is the type of pain I enjoy. I decided last night that I am going to start training to do a Triathlon or two in 2018. Good thing the office has a nice outdoor pool.

2017 is sure shaping up to be a transformational year for me.

2017.02.05 – Am I Too Intense?

Current Mood: Coffee

Today is turning out to be a really mellow day. My week last week was a combination of coming down from DNA and then it ended in a serious of frustrations which I don’t want to go into on my public site. I was going to do a flat ride along the coast, but there is a marathon blocking the route I want to take. Maybe in the end, a good chill morning is exactly what I needed.

But over the week, I decided that I wanted to get more serious about dating. So I decided to poke my toe in the water with OK Cupid. One of the debates I had over the week was, should I go use the latex poolside selfie I took in Vegas as main image. I decided to say yes to it. The reality is, if anyone is going to date me, they are going to need to be comfortable with who I am and not some perception of what they think I am.

I updated my profile stating that, hey if you are going to even consider me you need to be good with this. Over the last few years, I have just learned to speak my mind and be up front. And I should be up front on a dating site – I really don’t have time to deal with illusions. What I noticed is the number of people liking went down. Someone I was chatting to even said that I was too intense for him.

I was chatting to one of my close long time friends and he agrees that I have gone from someone that faded in the background to being very intense. But I am not sure this is a bad thing.

The question in the back of my mind is, am I just too intense for most people?

2017.02.01 – DNA Trip Thoughts

Selfie by the poolside at DNA 2017

Over the last six days I have been out in Vegas attending Drummer North America. This was an interesting and fun trip for me in many ways. In the end, I really enjoyed the trip and had a lot of fun. But my mood going into it was preventing me from loosening up some to enjoy it.

Starting the trip was rough for me. I was still coming down from the adrenaline rush from the near accident the day before. Sometime on Wednesday evening, my body finally relaxed and I was able to make smooth muscle movements again. It even took a few more days until I was mentally unwound from it.

Thursday started off with a 7.6 mile run around the core part of the strip. I keep on forgetting how many hills we deal with in SF. Went to the Wicked Spoon Buffet at the Cosmopolitan for brunch and got an absolutely great breakfast and started to break my diet by having some added sugar. As a side note, throughout the trip, I cheated a bit on this front and allowed myself to drink. But I am back to following my diet now that I am home.

People watching at the host hotel lobby was putting me in a strange mood. More and more people in typical titleholder dress showed up and I started to feel like I was going to write off this trip as something that I would not do again. I also didn’t really have a good background about what exactly I came for – other than having a friend said ‘come on down, it’s fun.’ And for those who are just starting to follow me, there is nothing traditional or old guard about me at all. At this point, I am glad I weighed down my luggage with some formal leather,. since I was getting flashbacks to my MAL trip.

Some back story: During MAL it felt that one wanted to break the ice with me until I was more formal leather instead of my normal spandex/rubber/leather rocker look self.

But that feeling started to all fade away pretty damn quick at the first set of mixers and events. I got hypnotized on Thursday night – it was interesting seeing the different techniques used especially in a group setting. Nearly everyone there was friendly and fun and seemed to enjoy a variety of fetishes and kinks. Sometime on Friday morning after attending the Leather Uniform Club mixer, my worries all faded away and I really started to enjoy myself.

On Saturday for the Rubber mixer, I wore out the new catsuit. And oh man did it make an entrance. Afterwords, I decided to take a dip in the pool and some of the Women of Drummer helped take the following sequence of pictures for me – which I present to you in GIF form. Apparently I look like Jesus and they started calling me Rubber Jesus for the rest of the weekend – it was fun.

Rubber Jesus splashed for your sins! (Click for the animation)

I ended up winning a Silent Auction and now have yet another pup hood. There will be pictures forthcoming on that. I also got a pass to San Diego Leather Pride in that basket, and just booked my airfare for that. Plus tickets for Drummer California and I am going to plan on heading down there for that now. So much for my plans to reduce my fetish travel for the year!

Overall, I met a lot of new and friendly people, had a lot of fun, and really enjoyed myself. I’d do this again on the years I don’t do MAL.