Flywheel | The Casual Blog

November 29, 2015

Our Thanksgiving – spinning, piano, football, eating, and talking about terrorism

Mowgli Tiller

Thanksgiving morning, after I walked the dogs and read the newspapers, Jocelyn and I went to Flywheel for a spin class – our first together, and her first Flywheel experience. After getting the bike adjusted and bike shoes clipped in, the music started, loudly. I pushed hard, in a close battle for first place, and ended with a score of 325 – 10 ahead of the nearest male competition (and well behind one amazing woman). It was my first ever first, and I was kind of proud! Jocelyn also did well, staying well out of the cellar.

That afternoon, I practiced the piano with a view to getting ready for a lesson with Olga on Sunday. I’ve been working on several challenging and beautiful pieces, including Liszt’s Un Sospiro, Debussy’s Reflets dans l’Eau, and Schumann’s Arabesque. I’ve also finally felt strong enough to take on Liszt’s powerful Vallee d’Oberman. I think I’ve gotten off a plateau and climbed a bit higher. My playing lately feels more technically secure, and also more fluid and imaginative. Olga has certainly been a wonderful guide and inspiration. The meta lesson she gives is simple in concept, but hard to do: listen, listen, listen, more closely, and then more closely still.

Then Jocelyn and I watched most of the Carolina Panthers v. Dallas Cowboys. The Panthers were 10 and 0 coming in to the game, a streak that had caught my interest and turned me into a fair weather fan. Jocelyn said that the Panthers were considered underdogs, which we agreed seemed disrespectful, and we were particularly happy to see them score early and go on to win decisively. Eleven and 0!

For Thanksgiving dinner, Jocelyn, a former professional bartender, created a new cocktail that she dubbed Apple Pie Manhattan, which involved infusing bourbon with apple, vanilla and cinnamon, and adding maple syrup, and dry Vermouth. It was delicious! Sally’s sister, Annie, brought Diane and her friend Debbie over, and Sally served a righteous butternut squash soup, black rice, and Mexican lasagna. Just like the Pilgrims!

We spent part of the meal discussing politics, and debated whether Obama had been sufficiently forceful in opposing the anti-refugee backlash, and whether Trump had gone from being a mildly entertaining fool to being an instrument of evil. By using his media platform to demonize Muslims, he’s giving permission and energy to a large racist element of the population. The Times had a report on New Yorkers harassing and spitting on Muslim women, which is appalling and frightening.

At the same time, there seems to be a growing consensus that the solution to the terrorist threat is a coalition of nations to wipe out ISIS. This seems to me a bad strategy. We’ve spent the last 14 years using bullets and bombs trying to wipe out al Qaeda and the Taliban, without success. Indeed, our military efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq helped spawn al Qaeda v. 2 – ISIS.

The source of terrorist violence is not particular individuals who can be killed, but social conditions, like poverty, lack of opportunity, lack of education, corruption, violence, and authoritarianism, which produce feelings of alienation, desperation, and rage. When we kill one terrorist, we inspire new ones to swear vengeance and take up arms, and the cycle repeats. If we obliterate ISIS, without social change, there will be a successor to ISIS. Bullets and bombs will never work.

I wonder if there is already a good name for our tendency to insist on a direct or even violent solution to a scary problem, even when part of us can recognize that there’s no quick fix. If not, there should be, because we do it over and over. I suggest calling it Fear Control Activity Disorder. The person or society with this disorder seeks to overcome a feeling of fear with a feeling of control by taking action that is dramatic though unlikely to address the actual source of the fear. We crave the feeling of being in control, and insist on seeking control even when it’s objectively unachievable. The disorder could account for a lot of our military adventures, our overimprisonment of criminals, and our overspending on medical goods and services.

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May 10, 2015

A homecoming, new flowers, and a Shakespeare concert

Raulston Arboretum, Raleigh, NC May 9, 2015

Our Gabe sold or tossed most of his possessions and loaded up the car with the rest, then he drove east, along with his golden retriever, Mowgli. He’d lived in the beautiful ski town of Telluride, Colorado for six years, and had decided that that was enough. He enjoyed the long drive, until his car broke down in eastern Tennessee on Sunday. He had to wait there until Monday to get it fixed. He arrived in Raleigh Monday night, and we gave him a big hug. Mowgli and Stuart sniffed each other.

Gabe, who’s been working as an accountant, is thinking of taking a new career direction. He’s planning to stay with us for a bit and consider his options. We’re all hoping to stay good friends and not make each other crazy. In his younger days, he had a bad habit of borrowing my clothes without permission, but so far he’s been good about that.

I made a quick trip to Raulston Arboretum on Saturday morning and took a close look at some new flowers. There were lots of little insects at work on them, and I had a go at capturing their images, but with limited success. Afterwards I went to Flywheel for a spin class, which was tough. I was happy to finish in the top four, but was way behind the champion.

In the afternoon, I spent some time experimenting with Lightroom, Adobe’s photography database program. I’m in the middle of my 30-day free trial, and am determined to test it out, if I can figure it out. I get the basics, but a lot of it isn’t at all intuitive. I’ve been reading and watching videos, and making some progress.

We went to the N.C. Symphony on Saturday night, where they were joined by actors from the Playmakers Repertory company and the N.C. School of the Arts in performing a musical version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. We enjoyed the wonderful Mendelssohn and other music, but were less enamoured of the acting. In recent seasons, the Symphony’s programming has gotten increasingly conservative (lots of warhorses), and, for us, not very exciting. It’s good to see them trying something different, but this program didn’t really work for me.

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October 5, 2014

Big birds at Crabtree Swamp, and a first spin class at Flywheel

There’s a wide-but-shallow wide body of water to one side of Raleigh Boulevard which is fed by Crabtree Creek. It has no official name that I can find, so I’m hereby naming it Crabtree Swamp. CS is worth knowing about if you enjoy seeing birds, turtles, dragonflies, and other creatures. There isn’t usually much drama, though I once saw a doe leaping and splashing in desperate flight from a pursuing buck. It has a long boardwalk over it that allows for good views into the woods and out over the water.

Sally had mentioned to me that she’d taken Stuart (our dog) for a walk up there recently, and seen a great blue heron and a great egret. They were still around fishing when I got there with my equipment last weekend. I used my long Sigma zoom lens (150-500 mm) with a 2x tele converter, a heavy set up that required a tripod.

Both birds would stand frozen, watching, for periods, and then move almost imperceptibly, and then, suddenly, they would radically change shape and position. A hundred yards or so away, I stood on the boardwalk for well over an hour, watching them, working hard to get them in focus with proper exposure, trying to anticipate their next phase shift. It was absorbing.

Happy as I was watching these brilliant creatures, later that day, when I downloaded the 423 new images, I wasn’t thrilled with the quality. Alas, I’d forgotten to switch on the lens’s image stabilization system. In any case, there were a few photos I liked enough to share.

In contrast to the subtle joys of trying to capture the essence of the big birds, also last weekend I tried a new spinning experience — Flywheel, at Cameron Village. I liked it. Whenever I try to describe spinning to a non-spinner, I realize it sounds a little crazy. The basic situation is, you ride on a stationary bike as ordered by an outrageously fit teacher to thumping club music. What’s to like? Well, it’s an amazing workout. You quit thinking, just follow orders, listen to the music, sweat, become one with the class, and feel the endorphins.

The new Flywheel operation has been successful in New York and other cities, and I can see why. They let you pre-register and reserve a bike. They figure out if you’re new the moment you walk in and take care to show you the ropes. They provide special shoes, towels, lockers, and (a great idea – it’s loud) earplugs. The bikes are set on risers, stadium style, and they’re nice, heavy non-vehicles that have digital read outs showing the amount of effort you’re putting in.

Once the class starts, the room is dark. You can see the teacher at the front (very fit) and also a screen that lists (if you opt in) your units of effort relative to those of others. Yes, there’s a kind of race – who can spin the hardest? At the end of the 45 minutes, I managed, barely, to come in second (one unit ahead of the next male down). I felt tired but good.