Mixtape in Newcastle

Okay, shameless publicity for daughter Melanie and co-conspirator Lee Mattinson.

Enjoy ten minutes of fabulous Ingrid Hagemann's radio show from BBC Newcastle, describing Mixtape at the Dog and Parrot and Singles Club at Live Theatre. And a short slide show spin around Newcastle and Gateshead.

Win Golden Cassettes and Five English Pounds at the events!

a case of red

The man from UPS dropped off some electrical components in a couple of packets the other day. It was my updated phone and various related bits and pieces. The switchover was fine and it's all up and running. Using the 'Waterloo train line test', it's holding the phone and data signal a lot better than the prior phone.

There's one area of particular irritation.

It's the case, which is described "to follow every hole, button and curve of the phone". Yes, "even the holes on the bottom are cut to exact specifications with a high speed drill normally used for cutting circuit boards."

The thing is, with this red artwork on the phone, it won't charge in the charging dock.

It's too big.

The precision case fits snugly, so getting it back off the phone is a small test of strength. The only leverage point on the back is the small aperture for the camera. I'm not happy about using the '5 element lens' as the pressure point to remove the case.

As another experiment I tried using an old dock with one of the little old style to new style pin adapters. That doesn't work either. The 'new' pins are not long enough. So the phone won't work in its case on any music playback device from the older style (or presumably the new style).

The front of the new dock is also poorly designed given the new fingerprint scanner. There's a small overlap so that the button is fiddly to use.

I'm expecting the car cradle dock to arrive any day. I'm already predicting that it won't work with the case either.

I get the impression that the case/dock/connector designers have been kept apart on this particular piece of industrial design.

Almost Wordless Wednesday

Yes, I know, it needs tidying.

Trainerroad experiment with cadence

I decided to have a go at a specific cycling test profile using that Trainerroad custom workout creator.

Most of the regular ones I use have a block shape for the ups and downs, but I thought I'd do something tapered, so that I could use it to practice increasing my pedalling speed.

To my delight it works. The basic shape is firstly a short warm up - I used this after I'd already been for a spin outdoors. Then a 15 minute segment progressively increasing the required power output by 'simply' pedalling faster.

I selected an gear at the start. Number 4 on the index. I then pedalled just above the target power line. It stayed easy for the first few minutes until I reached my own threshold limit (that's the white line across the graph). I'd designed the power graph to keep going. My idea was to simply spin my way through to the top without changing gear. It worked and did noticeably drive my pedalling faster than normal. My first go with this has already created a new best average cadence.

Then a few minutes under and over my threshold power and a repeat. The second slope was a shorter steeper interval which was also okay.

Then the final shortest slope where I failed to sustain the power. I'm bouncing along at my threshold level.

I'll try it again and am already wondering how to build something like this into another type of plan.

October seaside sun

A chance to make the most of the sunshine, down at the seaside.

A pub lunch, people watching and a stroll, even as the shadows get longer.

virtual cycling with a turbo trainer workout creator

I've set up the recently adapted silver bike as the basis for turbo training during the winter months. The Doubletap indexed gears with the little number windows work a treat and give an extra feedback useful for turbo sessions. The leather saddle has lost its over-slipperyness since I re-Proofided it.

I've already clocked a few hundred road miles on it since I swapped the gear system over, and I've left a heavy duty TACX skewer in the back wheel to make it easy to pop on and off the turbo.

One day I'll draw the schematic of the turbo set-up, which uses a TACX wireless Bushido trainer, which is ANT+ enabled, a Garmin Edge 810 to read the speed, cadence, heart rate and power and a TACX Head Unit to set gradients and generally vary the effort required. It really is a wireless setup, with the Bushido generating its own power from the pedalling.

I've also got a PC as part of the set up, which can read the ANT+ signals and commune to the house wi-fi. This is handy because I can then use the immense TACX TTS4 software. This can use video, google or virtual routes and varies the load to the Bushido brake automatically as the route is traversed. The little video illustrates some of the features and also why it can take the tedium out of turbo training.

As well as TACX TTS4, an altogether simpler environment, ideally suited to parallel watching a movie is Trainerroad.

Trainerroad can be used on a PC/Mac full screen to run a series of intervals, or the playback of the intervals can be run horizontally across the bottom of the screen. It works fine with the Bushido and the Garmin and can even send a virtual power calculation back from the PC to the Garmin.

On the PC screen there's a space for a full screen graph of the training workout or to make a space to watch a video. I've been re-watching Weeds and Green Wing.

One day I'll provide some comments about some of the training videos that work with Trainerroad, but today I thought I'd mention my latest quick experiment, which is to create my own interval training scripts.

There's an option in Trainerroad to create custom workouts, and they use Functional Threshold Power rather than an absolute value when the workouts are being created.

If that all sounds like mumbo-jumbo, it's to do with the point up to which one can exercise aerobically. At the threshold power, glycogen starts to gets converted to support the effort and one's exercise goes anerobic with lactic acid accumulating in the blood (and accompanying huffing and puffing sounds). The little video shows how to create the custom workouts.

The trick with the exercise programmes is to do base training in the sweet spot around Functional Threshold Power. Just under and it's good for endurance, just over and it's building power.

There's a load more numbers too, like the Intensity Factor of an Exercise and the Training Stress Score (the load that the exercise creates on the individual). I wouldn't dream of creating my own plans if I hadn't already used the system for a while. The basic system includes training plans for Base Workouts and beyond to Intermediate levels. I guess any sane person would start by using some of those. I know last Winter I went through the entire Base and Intermediate plan set (50+ different routines).

The point of all of this is to make any time spent in hamster wheel mode productive rather than just pedalling. The programmed routes from Trainerroad and TACX help to do this.

For me, a big advantage of Trainerroad is its reliability. I'm running it on a Windows PC in the garage and it always starts, identifies all the gadgets, creates the plans and saves everything back to the Cloud at the end of the session. It doesn't mind whether you run it with music from iTunes, DVDs, Netflix or integrated training videos from the likes of Sufferfest and RideFit.

In the winter months I'm sure I'll appreciate that reliability.

In other news I've refitted mudguards and lights to the orange bike ready for seasonal duties.

ravens and writing desks?

It said 138.9p on the pump before I pressed the trigger. After the guy in the shop had pressed the start button, the price changed to 154.9p a litre. Hardly an example of energy and fuel price freeze in action.

We've just had a slew of political party speeches hinting at pre 2015 election positioning. Behind the scenes, the UK, like America, continues to print money to offset the bank piracy of the last few years. It's quietly eroding pension schemes and similar long term money, ultimately affecting citizens who can't see any of it happening.

I normally try to stay as positive as possible, but it's hard to think of a good storyline for the current situation. Our Chancellor of Exchequer George Gideon Osborne may have been travelling around wearing as many photogenic working hats and hi-viz jackets as possible, but it can't really wallpaper over Bullingdon Club membership, curious house expenses or that he is his heir apparent to Baronet Ballintaylor and Ballylemon.

Not quite the common touch his photographer is trying to promote.

Worryingly, across all of the conferences, I find my comparisons drawn once again from Alice's adventures. A mix of the Mad Hatter's tea party and the caucus race.

FeLiNa - blood, meth and tears?

I noticed that there's been a few recaps of TV series finales spread around t'Interweb over the last few days. One that is frequently quoted is that Sopranos ending.

I think there were two endings. The Hollywood ending a couple of episodes further back at the cliff-edge - I won't describe except to say it is Tony being King of the Canyon.

Then the writers for the last couple of shows came along to do the proper Sopranos ending. People (even the BBC) describe the 'fade to black' ending, but it was a 'cut to black'.

The popular view was that Tony Soprano was clipped by the guy in the "Members Only" Jacket. It's been described at length. But it also depends on the 'Point Of View'.

My alternative theory could be that it's the audience that gets the bullet. Cut to black with no audio. Hmm, pretty terminal.

Interestingly, Breaking Bad did something similar at the end of S5E13 To'hajiilee; Gunfire and a cut to black. Three episodes to go.

Different reasons, but it is making me wonder about false endings again?

small probabilities

I've already spotted Christmas Mince Pies in Tescos and Strictly is back on the television.

Our gang have one of those Strictly Sweepstakes running again, this time with an even more complicated scoring system than last time. The rolled garden hedgehog allocated me a contestant called Julian, so at some stage I'll need find out who I am supporting.

My picture shows some hedgehogs, who bear an uncanny resemblance to Werner Heisenberg whilst being tested against a brick wall. They should bounce off, of course, although in quantum mechanics there is a small probability that a hedgehog will appear on the far side of the wall. About the same probability as me winning the sweepstake.

And see what I've done? Managed to mention Heisenberg just before the last episode of Breaking Bad.

a small flutter

An interesting phenomenon when out cycling a couple of days ago. My Heart Rate Monitor reading suddenly sped up to 234bpm.

Fortunately, I could tell this wasn't accurate, because I wasn't even out of breath at the time.

I'd been peddling and also watching some migratory geese(?) flying east in V shaped formations. There were some big groups and a few stragglers.

I looked at the handlebar read-out and thought that maybe I should stop anyway.

As a general guideline, maximum heart rate (using the simple formula) is something like 220 minus age, which by any measure illustrates that the reading was a little on the enthusiastic side.

I quickly worked out what had happened. Let's just say my latest extra layer of clothing had created a micro-climate sufficient to create a short circuit on the HRM.

I re-traced the route today and it was at more or less my 'endurance' heart rate.

So as an ongoing reference, here's one of those little tables, based upon the work of Andrew Coggan, which illustrates cycling effort levels.

the wrong mans

I enjoyed the first episode of the spoof crime series "The Wrong Mans". Aside from its plot, which involves a Berkshire County Council employee stumbling into a ransom situation after a car crash, there's the frequent references to other movies.

It's been written by James Corden and his buddy Matthew Baynton and has funding from Hulu, who will show it on US streaming television too. I suppose it is fairly unusual for a series like this to make it across the pond without being redeveloped into an American setting.

They are only 30 minute shows but use a good shorthand to pack plenty into the episode. I almost felt like immediately watching it again, but the disappointing London Irish intervened.

The most obvious movie reference would be to Hitchcock's "The Wrong Man", although there's little pieces of snow laden Fargo, an overt reference to Fight Club, a superior version of snide UK office politics, a hybrid E.R. meets Casualty and enough swerves to keep anyone on their toes. Some of the scenes may incorporate cliches, but they are mighty fine cliches and with good twists.

I'm usually wary of "next week's show" trailers giving away too much, but on this occasion it's clear that there's plenty more fun and games as the series unpacks.

no need for speed

My last blog post included a reference to the movie Paul, which is a science fiction comedy about an ET character meeting two Brits whilst they are on an Extraterrestrial Trail holiday in a camper van.

There's a part where they meet a local Sheriff and he asks them about the UK policemen and the lack of guns. It's done for humour but also reminds me of my recent brush with US law enforcement when travelling slightly above the 25 mph speed limit in a small town. The lights from the powerful policecar filled the mirror and were like a space ship was landing behind us.

We pulled over and my out of state plates showed we were not from around these parts even before I opened my British mouth.

The shadowy police car with its re-inforced front bumper and row of red, white and blue flashing lights set the scene and the fella questioning me made sure to tell me I was being recorded.

In England we'd get out of the car, but here I asked first, and then had to fiddle around in the trunk to find the relevant paperwork. I noticed that as I did this, the Sheriff appeared to be resting his hand on his gun holster.

I found the documents, explained that we'd got lost and asked him if he knew the route we needed.

He didn't, although after he could see we were slightly hapless tourists, his attitude became very helpful and he commented that it was the first British driving licence he'd ever seen. It's fair to say we were only marginally over the speed limit and I think the effect of pulling us over right in the middle of the small town had a major effect on the local population, who would indeed think twice before edging towards 30 mph.

Suitably admonished, but also after shaking hands with the now smiling Sheriff, we made our way back into the area known as "lost".