Winter Break

The team swam alot last week and capped things off with 10,250y of swimming on Monday. I went in expecting an easy morning swim and we got in 3750. Then that evening hit it hard with another 6500. The last 500y I was dreaming of Chipotle. Silver burritos were flying around in my head and I was ready for dinner.
I flew out to Jersey on Wednesday for an East Coast trip. I'm taking a block of time off to regroup before the last of the winter swim base training. I usually woudn't take a break now but since my season ended in September and I started training again in October this will be a long period of training. I find it's best to plan in some breaks in a time like this so that a) I don't get worn down and take forced breaks and b) I don't get to the final races of the season and want the season to be done with.
We just finished off an awesome Christmas season at Mile High Athletic which I'm happy about. We were able to nearly triple our sales compared to last year. Since prices drop big time after Christmas I tried to get nearly all our skis out in December so now it's slim pickins and we have under 200 pairs left. Although it seems odd not to have many skis during the season this is right where we want to be. Now we can take a bit of a breather before stocking up again as the season winds down.

Awesome Ofemus Party

So my girlfriend Jeanice and I went to my buddy Ofer's Ofemus party. It was supposed to snow that night so we took my 85 Trans Am since it drives sweet in the snow. You point that thing and it just goes.
The party was at my buddy Matt's house. What a house! The thing had to of cost a least a million.
Apparently it was a costume party which we didn't know about so we felt a bit outta place but it was all good. At first they had some kind of crappy weet beer but goin but once that was out it was Bud Light and the night was good.
Jeanice had a bit too much and called some other chick a tramp and they got in a lil scuffle but I broke em up.
Towards the end Jeanice and I won some kind of award, I'm not sure for what. Must have been for sweetest car or classiest or something.
Below is a picture of Jeanice and I:

McGaffigan Files $1,000,000 Suit

From the Wire Haired Wire:
Gulliver H.G. McGaffigan filed a $1,000,000 lawsuit in Denver District Court today alleging that Puppy Pics Corp. used his unauthorized likeness on their birthday cards. The German based firm responded that they would "vigorously" contest all charges and would not stop production of such cards. McGaffigan was visibly upset while speaking to reporters inside his Golden, CO estate.
McGaffigan, son of Jordan Jones and Amy Dannwolf, is well known among Denver's elite. The socialite youngster frequents the city's exclusive nightclubs and has been romantically linked to Lady as well as Tipsy. McGaffigan is currently preparing for sled dog camp in which he hopes to become the first sub-20 pound dog to lead a sled team.

Swim Meet Race #1

Swam the 1650y tonight at the big Fort Collins Holiday Meet. I was in Heat 2 with Dan on our team and 2 kids about half my age. I swam a 19:48 PB (exactly 1:12 pace). Much faster than the 21:30 I swam last winter. I went our a bit easy for the first couple hundred then got rolling. Just under 6:00 the first 500y then just over for following two 500's. I'm happy with it, great to take off so much time from last year. It'll be nice to get about two more 1650's over the winter to bring the time down a bit more.
Tomorrow is the 500y.

comScore Claims Online Spending up 15%

I woke up to read in the morning paper and read everywhere online that data from tracking firm comScore Inc showed a 15% in crease in online sales on the Monday following Thanksgiving from 2007 to 2008. That seems reasonable. Then I read on...
"And on Cyber Monday...online spending reached $846 million, up 15 percent from a year earlier, comScore found." (link here)
This $846 million figure seemed drastically low to me plus I'm always dubious of "analysts" claims so I thought I'd check a couple things out to see if this figure is reasonable.
Amazon.com reported $5.67 billion in 4th quarter sales in 2007. (Link here) Let's give comScore a huge gimme and assume that the Monday after Thanksgiving is an average sales day within the quarter. That puts Amazon sales at $63 million on the day (I'll also give them another gimme and not extrapolate their 15% figure and add it to the $63 million).
Next let's look at heavy hitter eBay. eBay had gross merchandise volume of $16.21 billion in the 4th quarter of 2007. Let's do the same math on that one and we get $180 million for Cyber Monday sales.
So now with just 2 website we've already reached $243 million in sales of the supposed $846 million total. Don't forget that we're assuming that this is an average day within the 4th quarter.
I don't have the time to go hunting around for loads of internet companies sales records but at this point for my own thirst for knowledge I'm going to assume that the claimed $846 million figure is very low.
Think of all the big online sites where people spend money that I haven't included:
Dell, Office Depot, Staples, Nike, United Airways, every other airline, Zappos, WalMart, Target, Buy.com, and my favorite MileHighAthletic.com. I think it's safe to assume that big sellers along with the tens of thousands of smaller ones will put us way over the total.
What I find annoying is how readily the media eats up "analysts" data. The "analysts" and "experts" are wrong so often that you think there'd be more analysis of their findings or at least the media wouldn't trumpet their findings with such zeal. Companies collapse all the time yet the expert analysts who track these companies for a living often don't predict their demise.
Search Google for "online spending 15%" and you get an idea of all the respected publications that publish comScore's data with a hint of research.

Look Out Middle Schoolers

Big swim meet this weekend up in Fort Collins. Our coach, Sean Wendt, always has our team race in some swim meets over the winter. The best part is that the swim meet is composed of middle school kids and then...us. We get up on the blocks and a look of terror comes across their eyes. Then more times than not they proceed to whoop us and get out of the pool sauntering around like they're Michael Phelps the rest of the day.
I've got the 1650y Friday, 500y Saturday, and 200y Sunday (yeah this weekends going to suck). The 1650 is the one I'm excited about. I swam 21:30 last year and I'm hoping I can get under 20:00 this time around. 1:12/13 will get me right around there. Sounds hard but once I get in the pool in a race I think I can swim way faster than I do in practice.
I've been sneaking in an outside ride a week, going on days when the weather is good. This week I went out the door and straight up Lookout and rode around a little bit. It was 65 that day. The next day it snowed. The weather's been all over the place here.
Other than that just been doing an additional hour ride on the trainer, two 30 minute runs, and one long run just under 1:30.
I ran this morning in the snow and I'm usually a mountain goat in the snow but all the sudden my left foot slipped out and whamo my knee nailed the icy pavement. It was hurtin' and I thought I did some damage but I kept running and it was fine.
Amy got herself into St Anthony's this week so now we're all set to go out there come springtime.