Some Facts on My Birthday

It's my birthday today. What better day to share a few quirks you may not know about me than today. 

When I'm alone in my car for a drive at least 45 minutes long, I almost always tune my iPod to the Evita soundtrack and belt out every word to every song. I did this last Saturday night - twice.

The food on my plate cannot touch each other. Ever. Cold food touching hot food? The horror!

I find kitchen sponges frightening. These are just mops for germs that get stuck in those nook and crannies and never go away. No thank you.

It's not possible to put enough ice in my glass.

I still wear retainers every night. I paid a lot of money for these teeth 5 years ago, and so did my parents 25 years ago.

I can't stand it if I can feel my nails past the end of my fingertips.

I have a freakishly super sensitive sense of smell. Let's say we have an orange on the kitchen counter. I can smell it starting to go bad as soon as I open the front door to the house and it may not show any visible signs of rotting yet. This is an often unfortunate trait - especially when it involves other people's homes or small spaces.

One of my favorite smells in the entire world is Head and Shoulders shampoo. I've been known to crack open the cap while standing in the shampoo aisle for a quick sniff.

That's it for now. Have a wonderful day everyone! I know I will. I've already received a few donations for AIDS/LifeCycle 11 in the last few days, and I can't think of a better birthday gift than one that keeps giving to others. http://www.tofighthiv.org/goto/samanthacycles

In honor of my birthday, I thought I would share my favorite picture of me and my dad.

Update - Instagram December Photo Journal

NOTE: This post isn't just for iPhone users, as Instagram recently announced an Android app is coming soon! Also this sort of photo a day journal could be done with any camera, I just happened to run everything through an instagram filter and I'm so happy I did.

Back on November 30, I talked about how I wanted to do a December photo journal by taking instagram photos each day. Looking back over the experience I must say it was quite fun. I found after awhile that when I was out and about, my eyes were peeled on my surroundings for something interesting. Some days a certain moment just stuck out as "OMG I got to get a picture of this". On December 17, I came down with a nasty cold and for the rest of December there were days here and there where I struggled to take a picture of anything.

I didn't miss a day posting a photo with instagram, but I also didn't stick with just one a day - I ended up with 46 photos total. You see, running a photo through an instagram filter can be kind of addicting. Not to mention there is actually a social aspect to the app itself and the ability to follow/comment/like other instagram users and their photos. It's a great little community....of 14 million users! From within the app itself you can tweet, FB, email, or post your photo to Flickr all at the same time it's being posted in instagram. I usually always tweeted, often posted to my Flickr account, and sometimes posted to FB.

Sample Photos from December

Once January 1 came I was so excited to order 4"x4" prints using the free app Postal Pix that I ordered them first thing in the morning. I ordered 36 prints and the order came to $13.57 including tax and shipping. That works out to $.38/photo. Since I have a crap printer, own zero photo paper, can't cut a straight line to save my life, and these were delivered in the mail, I consider them worth every penny. The pictures arrived on January 7 and I fell instantly in love! They came out great! 

My Postal Pix prints! That's a straight out of the camera iPhone shot of what they look like. So awesome! 

Here's what I learned:

1. 4"x4" photos were much bigger in person than what I was envisioning. I was quite happy with this.
2. I wish I had used borders every time they were available on an instagram filter. I kept thinking a border might take up too much space because of the small photo size, so I would turn them on and off. My personal preference is ON at this point. The photos are plenty large enough.
3. I created a December Instagram Album in my Photo library on my iPhone. (Did you know with iOS 5 you can create albums directly on your phone?) I would copy the instagram photos into this album periodically. This made it much easier to find the photos for my Postal Pix order instead of searching through my camera roll for them. However, I need to move them into there each day and not just once a week. I missed a few of my favorite photos when ordering.
4. #3 shows you don't have to use an instagram photo to order prints from Postal Pix. ;)
5. I don't use instagram to take the picture. I take the picture with the standard iPhone camera app then run it through an instagram filter. The quality is much higher this way and since I'm printing my photos this is important to me. 
6. I have yet to figure out how I'm going to display/store my printed photos. Suggestions? I'm wrestling with a few ideas. 
7. As I look at each print they definitely invoke a memory....lunch with friends, the holiday season, the gorgeous weather we had in December, the exhausting office move at work, etc. 
8. In 2012 I'm going to continue on! I might take more than one photo a day. I may miss a day. Not going to stress over it. Whatever instagram photos I have at the end of the month I will print! I also hope to get more pictures of me and my husband together. 

Take more photos! If you see something interesting or have a moment you want to remember take a photo. Sometimes the most random photos are the most memorable. Overall this was a super fun project and at this point I'm eager to continue. 

2012 Goals

I was going to do a year end wrap-up post but decided against it. Here's my wrap-up: I rode a lot of miles, made some amazing new friends through ALC, rode every effin' mile in AIDS/LifeCycle 10, my husband and I took one of our best vacations ever by renting a beach house up in the tiny town of Trinidad, CA, took the night time tour of Alcatraz, moved offices at work, and wound up spending the better half of December sick.

Now on to 2012!

I'm not one to make New Year's Resolutions, but there are some things I want to accomplish in 2012. When thinking about those things I've divided up my desires into 3 categories: Live, Simplify, Ride. 

Live

1. I want to eat to live not live to eat.
2. Walk across the Golden Gate Bridge. 
3. Take more pictures of me and my husband. 
4. Continue my daily instagram photos.
5. Take my daily vitamins DAILY. 
6. Continue with a strength training program.
7. Make it to more Zumba classes. 
8. Be more mindful of how I spend my work day so I don't work as much during the evenings at home.
9. No computer time after 10pm.
10. No staying up past 11pm to read a book on a work night. 
11. Drastically cut back on consumption of any non-white cheese. It doesn't come out of the cow yellow, so why do I want to put that in my body? (I know...this is a weird one.)

Simplify

1. Don't buy anything unless I truly need it or absolutely have to have it. 
2. Unsubscribe from a number of blogs I follow. Going to try and get the list down to 10 or so. I don't need to follow a "lifestyle" blogger whom I am fairly certain I wouldn't be friends with in real life or follow a blogger who I've never cooked a single recipe she's posted. Why do I follow these people? I'm keeping a few friend's blogs, some cyclist's blogs, some book blogs, Young House Love, and a few "lifestyle" bloggers that live in California. 
3. Add pictures and journaling to my annual photo book at the end of every month - don't wait until the end of the year. 
4. Continue using Evernote to keep everything organized. Evernote is free and available for all mobile and computer platforms. If you haven't heard of it check it out. It's awesome!
5. No more camera apps for my iPhone! No more. I am living with my 3 main staples: the regular iPhone Camera app, Camera+, and instagram. That's it! I vow to not download another the entire year. 
6. Anything else I come across that qualifies as "simplify". ;-) 

Ride

1. Ride my bike across the Golden Gate Bridge. 
2. Increase my average mph. 
3. Cinderella Challenge
4. Sea Otter Classic
5. Wine Country Century
6. AIDS/LifeCycle 11 - ride all 545 miles & make it to Rest Stop 4 each time this year!
7. Tour of Napa
8. Levi's GranFondo - Medio route
9. Foxy's Fall Century

2012 Here I Come!! 

AIDS/LifeCycle 11 Update

Lots of things are happening related to AIDS/LifeCycle 11 (June 2012) .....

December 1 was World AIDS Day, and I reached out on Twitter and Facebook for some donations. The response was amazing, and I've now raised $1,095 of the $3,000 total I need to raise. Can I just say that the book blogging community is amazing! I received very generous donations from book bloggers and book lovers all over the world. People I have never met in person! People I have only chatted with on Twitter about the books we love! And when I look at what they gave, I bet it will end up being more total donations combined than what will come from my own family (my mom and aunt not included). AMAZING!

I've completed two ALC training rides as a Training Ride Leader. We have another one coming up on December 17. The TRL team got together last night and mapped out training rides for January-May. We'll have some great rides - short, long, flat, hilly, monstrous...and we'll be spreading them out geographically to make rides available to both Sacramento area riders and Solano County area riders. Go HERE for the ALC Training Ride Calendar - rides available all over the United States and you don't have to be a registered ALC participant to join a ride. 

TRL's hard at work. 

I'm part of an ALC team this year - Team Sacramento! This is very exciting for me since riding in ALC can be somewhat lonely at times. There are currently 8 riders on the team and I'm sure there are more to come. We had a meeting last week with our ALC Cycling Reps who came to Sac all the way from San Francisco and the turnout of people from the Sac area for the meeting was bigger than I expected. There were probably around 20 people who showed up and some of them signed up for the ride that night. It was great to see so many potential ALC riders from the area. I'm working on a website for our Team and we're working on a list of Fundraisers we plan to do. We want to make sure all of our team members raise their required minimum $3,000 so they get to do the ride.

Our ALC Cyclist Rep meeting location....of course..

And that's the ALC happenings. This time last year, I hadn't even joined a training ride yet. I'm very excited about the next 6 months but they will be BUSY. In addition, I've mapped out my other Event Rides for 2012 and will be squeezing those in between the 2 ALC Training Rides I have to do each month...oh and then there's my own training I need to do too. As a TRL, an official ALC training ride is not "your" training ride, so I have to make sure I get out there and practice all that climbing on other days.

So I'll have 2 TRL training rides a month and 3 Event Rides from January-May.  I get sleepy just thinking about it.

Tech Talk: December Daily Instagram Photo Journal

I am really into photography...like realllly into it. But up until recently I've mainly been a consumer of other's photography and not really focused on learning about taking my own photographs. That has changed recently.

I've had an iPhone for several years now and have had the Instragram photo app for quite awhile, but never used it much until last month. I always thought, "Hey this thing is cool, but what will I ever do with these little square photos?" Then I discovered a few other iPhone apps and what the tilt-shift option in Instagram does and away my brain started go.

So here's what I'm going to do:
I am going to try and take some iPhone pictures each day starting December 1. Then at the end of each day while sitting on the couch doing virtually nothing, I am going to choose ONE of my favorites from the day, use Instagram to work a little magic, and then upload to Instagram.

Then using one of the recently discovered apps called PostalPix I can print off my pictures at the end of month choosing 4"x4" squares photos. You do this all directly from your phone. PostalPix will grab your Instagram pics, you choose which ones you want, and then order. That simple! 31 pictures through PostalPix will cost me $6.87 +shipping. Then I'll put them in my 2011 photo album.

Another cool app I discovered to make it easier for me as well is MyInstaAlbum which allows me to view all my Instagram photos by date (day or month) and will sync the photos to my Dropbox so they're easily accessible on all my computers. I am loving this one so far.

If all goes well with this December project, I am thinking of doing it for EVERY Day in 2012. Then at the end of the year, we'll have a little daily snapshot look of our life. Or maybe I'll make a book at the end of 2012 instead of printing out the photos. Right now, I'm terrible about actually printing out pictures! What about you? We'll see how December goes and how the pictures look once printed on paper! Blurb.com has great and easy options for making books of your Instagram or Facebook photos.

I'm also loving the app PhotoAlbum+ which acts just like MyInstaAlbum, except it works with all the photos in your Cameral Roll on your iPhone. You can sort by day/month and sync photos directly to Dropbox, or share them on FB, Twitter, or even Instagram.

If you're on Pinterest, I've got an Instagram board going where I'm pinning all things Instagram I find online.

Holiday Shopping Guide for Your Active Loved One

Here's just a couple of gift ideas for for the athlete/active person in your life.

1. Your spouse or partner doesn't have a ROAD ID? Get one! Safety first for me when I'm out on the road, and whether your loved one is a cyclist, jogger, runner, or walker, they should have proper identification attached to his/her body when out being active. A Road ID is less than $20 with the many coupons you can find online. I made sure to list my allergies on mine!

2. Our water bottles get funky after awhile. We could all use a new one from time to time. I vote for the CamelBak Podium Chill bottle. Water stays cool and ice cubes last a nice long time with this bottle. Plus they are BPA-free.

3. Small, with a clip, wear it as a watch, use it as a Pedometer, listen to the radio, store thousands of songs and your favorite playlists, and upload your running/walking data to the Nike+ system without that stupid shoe dongle thingy. The iPod Nano is where it's at. 

4. Give your loved one a gift certificate for a one hour session with a professional coach. We all have something to learn or bad habits we need to break. We all have strengths or weaknesses. Some time spent with a professional coach is awesome. Look online for coaches in your area or talk to your local bike shop or running store like Fleet Feet. 

5. A gift certificate for a one hour massage. This sure would come in handy after a long event ride or your loved one's next 1/2 marathon. 

6. An electric blanket. Think I'm crazy? When I have to ride outside during the cold winter months I am warm when riding, but once I come to a stop and get off my bike, I am COLD. Even after a scorching hot shower I am cold. Last winter I bought an electric blanket and it has been amazing. I turn it on right before I get in the shower. After showering and getting dressed I then wrap myself up in the blanket for about 30 minutes and I'm warm and toasty. Heaven! I bought mine at Target for $35.

Links:

Road ID 

CamelBack Podium Chill Bottle

iPod Nano 

Velo Girls Coaching - Northern CA

Heather Nielson - Cycling Coach and Road Racer, Northern CA

Tech Talk

The other day I stumbled upon some photo organization pins while perusing the #1 time suckage thing on the internet: Pinterest. Then I overheard a co-worker having a discussion about their lack of computer back up at home and well .... I must say I cringed in silence while I listened and whispered dirty words in my head towards their direction. So here I am with a little Tech Talk. It may not be cycling related but I bet you all take pictures right and maybe have some music on your computers?

First off let me say my way isn't necessarily the right way. But it works for me and may give you something to think about. Our computers at home include an iMac which my husband mainly uses (except I use it as my main iTunes and Photo machine) and a MacBook Pro which I use for almost everything else. I also have an iPhone. No Apple at home? Don't leave yet - this still applies to you! 

While perusing what I consider valuable stuff on both machines things pretty much fall into the following categories:

1. Photos
2. Music/Movies
3. Documents (including personal and books)

There really isn't anything else I would need to protect or have a back up copy of. How do I handle the protection of this stuff? Pretty easy actually.

1. I have a back up hard drive which backs my entire hard drive on both computers. (I use the Time Capsule which has worked flawlessly since the day I got it.) My external back up hard drive performs backups wirelessly so I can hide it out of sight. 
2. I also use an automatic online back up service like Carbonite for backing up the things important to me which costs me just under $60/year. A service like Carbonite is more of a "recovery" service and not a "oh I need that one item" service. See item 4 below. 
3. I create Smart Albums in iPhoto to make monthly and then annual albums and then at the end of each year I burn the photos onto a DVD. When I burn them I choose to burn them categorized by month because for me that's the easiest way to remember what I'm looking for. If you take A LOT of pictures, it may be easier to do a Monthly DVD.
4. I purchase a lot of books directly from publishers on the internet in .pdf or .prc format and then I store them in my free Dropbox account. I have Dropbox loaded on each computer and my iPhone, and you can access Dropbox from the internet so these books and any other important docs are available to me all the time. You can put all kinds of stuff in your Dropbox. A Free basic Dropbox account gives you 2GB of online storage. Dropbox is my "I need this right now wherever I am" sort of storage.
5. I've scanned important personal documents and dropped them into my Dropbox account so they're easily accessible. 

Sound like overkill? I don't know....I've known people who lost everything due to computers crashing or had their house broken into and their computer and back up hard drive were both stolen. 

My Time Capsule is my wireless router and my external back up hard drive. It backs up both our iMac and the MacBook. After initial set up you basically never touch the thing again. Sometimes I go into Time Machine (software that talks to Time Capsule) on the computer just to have a looksie to see that it's really got everything in there. Yep it does. I can see every back up. At $299 it felt like a lot of money 3 years ago, but that's worked out to costing me about $.27/day - which will continue to get cheaper each day the longer it lasts. External hard drives don't usually last forever. *knocks on wood*

A service like Carbonite costs me approx $.19/day. Dropbox is free for the sort of needs I have.

So in all I am spending about $.46/day to protect years of cherished memories, my entire music collection of about 3,000 songs, movies, several 100 books, and other personal documents. And the only thing I have to do manually myself is save my document type stuff to the Dropbox folder on my computer or burn the DVD's of my photos.

I say totally worth it. 

I'm thinking of doing a weekly Tech Talk while I don't have much cycling to do through winter. Any thoughts on this? Anything you want to hear about? I am always on the search for new tech related stuff online. 

In the meantime check out theses posts I found from Pinterest from a blogger I just recently discovered:

Photo Organization

Online photo printing service comparisons 

Printing those Instagram/Hipstamatic 4x4 photos