New year party
Started the year 2012 with a party at Minneapolis, MN. I drove to the cities, two day before the new year, from La Crosse-WI where I used to live then. And I stayed at my friends place. I was determined to go to a party with fully dressed up. Its an inspiration from "Barney" :-), an awesome character in the series "How I met your Mother". I convinced my friends also. We all suited up & went to the new year party in EPIC event center. It was snowing on the midnight & its the first snow of the year. The night was very beautiful, people were all dressed up & looking nice. I had many drinks, didn't keep the count of it after couple of drinks, or actually couldn't keep the count :-), danced with strangers. When I think about it now, it was little heavy on the wallet :-) but definitely a fun night to remember.
Birthday
I am not big fan of celebrating birthdays. One of my friend, living in twin cities then, invited me for the Monster Jam event. I was reluctant in the beginning and said no to him. But later I realized it's my birthday as well on that day, then I thought why not go to cities & have fun. So again I came to the cities to party with my friends for my birthday and went to the Monster Jam event as well. It was at Vikings stadium, liked it very much. The music and truck engine noises were so loud initially and later got used to it. I have seen these programs in TV when I was in school, got excited to see these live; big trucks, stunts, loud music and big engine noise. It was fun.
Came back to La Crosse on Sunday night and my wonderful friends were ready with a cake to celebrate my birthday. I was really happy that they came over to my place to celebrate it. They might have came to take revenge on me too :-) Happy to have them as friends.
32 mile bike tour
I was reading an article about the TCS CEO Chandrasekar, and in that he said he trained himself to run full Marathon at the age of around 45. I decided then and there, that I will have to run a marathon one day. So I decided to start with Half Marathon. I participated in a beginner triathlon before and I know my training was not good as I was training alone. So this time I decided to train with friends and colleagues Persuaded 4-5 guys to register for Half Marathon with me. Though its little selfish here :-), its a win win for everyone. We all registered for May event in Jan. Started training, created a Facebook event page and started posting the training progress. Since it was my first time, I didn't know how to train myself. Didn't know I need a good pair of running shoes. I bought a bare foot experience running shoe, trained hard, without proper rest and damaged my shins. I didn't even know what shin splints mean that time. Only after getting hurt came to know I needed a good running shoes that fits my running style and rest is equally important as training. I gave rest for couple of weeks and trained back again, but I couldn't recover from the damage in short time. Gave rest again for couple of weeks, but didn't help at all. So I decided to switch to 32 mile biking event. That's how I ended up doing 32 mile biking. Started training for it. I go to gym on weekdays and bike in the trails on weekends. On weekends I used to do 20-22 miles in my mountain bike @ 10 miles/hour pace. Meanwhile I moved to twin cities for other Job opportunity. But I came back to La Crosse for the event. All my friends who registered with me completed their first Half marathon and I completed my 32 mile biking. It was a good experience and fun to train with friends.
Moved to St. Paul, MN from La Crosse, WI
I was bored with my project, it was not technically challenging. Also I wanted to move to a big city. But that thought become stronger when I went to Salt Lake City on the way to yellow stone national park in Sep 2011. Though its not a big city like NY, its a good city. It has few sky scrappers. Then after few weeks the thought become weaker. Then I visited twin cities couple of times for new year & birthday. Liked the city very much. I decided firmly this time that I want to move out to a bigger city. I went and told my manager to release me, and luckily we got an opportunity in twin cities itself. Everything worked out well and I moved to St. paul. Though I was happy on one side that I am moving to a new city, new technical project; I was sad that I am going to miss the La Crosse gang. We had a booz party on a weekend before I left, & we had great fun on that night. La Crosse guys gave me a nice send off lunch, everyone was there that day. I was happy to see everyone on that day. Few of my close friends gifted me a unique funny tequila.
After moving to the cities, I really enjoyed working in the new project, had lots of parties, made new friends, perspective on technology has changed. Definitely this is one of the top decisions of the year.
Half Marathon
Though I could not complete my first Half Marathon, I was determined to do a half marathon before 2012 ends. Luckily I found the Monster Dash half marathon in twin cities and registered for it. Came to know about the Lake Calhoun from friends, that it is a good place for running and biking. I am glad I found this place. I should say that this lake has contributed a lot on my half marathon training. Also slowly I started liking running outdoors, felt like that's my yoga time. But I kinda over did my training. Its enough if you were able to do 10 mile once in your training. I did 10 mile 5 - 6 times every weekend and I got my knee injured just 2 weeks before the event. I was scared that I will not be able to run this time also. I didn't run for the next two weeks. On the day of the event, my knees started giving pain after 10 min of run itself. I thought I will quit and walk out, but little part of my heart said to keep it going. I kept limping from mile 2 till the end but some how finished it. I was so happy that I completed the race.
45 mile bike ride
This happened just like that. I didn't have any plan for a long weekend. So I decided I will bike the grand rounds, a 50 mile scenic byway around twin cities. I took the bile rental and just did that. I was tough at the end. Once again a great experience to be remebered.
Motor Cycle ride to Duluth
Long time wish to ride a motor cycle in US highways. Took my motor cycle license in 2011 summer itself but couldn't ride in 2011. Again I was so determined to tick this off from my bucket list by 2012. Once my customer invited me for a group ride, but I could not get the motor cycle rental for my size that day. I got Harley Road King, which is big for me. The Honda Shadow 750 cc is the right for me but it was fully booked almost all the weekends. After many attempts I got it in fall, as the temperature dropped to 50F and no was riding. Phew! a shivering experience to ride in 50F. But still enjoyed as it was my first time in US and moreover I was riding after a long time. I drove around 400 mile in one day :-)
When I look back the year 2012, I feel happy that I have few experiences to remember. Hope 2013 will be more interesting. Wish you all a happy new year!
