December « 2006 « www.arareko.net

Solo again

As my last dose of fun for the year, today I did a full circumnavigation of Nevado de Toluca’s crater. There wasn’t much snow as it was almost a month ago but the mountain had good conditions in general, specially the sky was clear enough for enjoying the 360° view.

I logged a total round trip time of 4 hours 43 minutes (including a 45-minute lunch break at the summit), enough time for thinking over a lot of different things that happened through the year… Then I made my way back to the city for taking a shower and going to new year’s dinner at Güero’s place.

2006: Almost gone

I’ve managed to do a lot of stuff this year: climbs, races, trips, projects… It has also been a difficult year in more personal aspects, but I’ve learned and changed a lot as well.

Thanks to everyone who was involved in making this a very special year for me. See you in 2007!

Pleasant training revisited

Just had another dose of nightly running. I ran the long route through Satélite and this time I did it twice. I simply felt really fit and thought it was a good moment to spend a bit more time training. The long-distance pace is fully back and the nights are comfortable enough for being out there.

Who said that running 21 km wouldn’t be enjoyable?

Engineering summit

Originally, it was supposed to be an engineer-only day in which we would met Dani & Moad who came to México for the holidays (from Miami and Sunnyvale respectively), but it turned into a great reunion with other people from the office and ex-Yahoo!s as well. We had a big argentinean lunch in Polanco and spent most part of the afternoon talking and having a good time.

Back to the office, we had a quick & entertaining foosball tournament which Rubén & I won vs. Dani & Moad. Obviously, we have tons of work to do these days…

5 rarely-known things about me

Cicloid sent me this meme which supposedly must contain never-heard stuff about me. Those who know me from many years ago will probably know most of this stuff; nevertheless, I’ll try to do my best for the purpose of the meme. Here they go:

I’ve been playing electric & acoustic guitar for a bit more than 12 years. My playing style is mostly based in blues, rock, grunge, punk & metal tunes which were the main influence during my youth. Despite of developing a solid technique and the several invitations from friends, I’ve never played in a band. My hunger for an adventure lifestyle has always been stronger than the dream of becoming a “rock star” so the guitar playing has remained as a good therapy for stress and as a personal expression.
The first time I used a UNIX computer was back in 1989 at UNAM’s Supercomputing Department. My brother worked there and he frequently took me during vacations to aid him at his work with the Sun and Silicon Graphics workstations that were connected to the mainframe. It was my first experience with the Internet and with programming as well (Pascal was one of the “hot” languages those days).
I had my first girlfriend and “date” when I was in kindergarten. The “date” consisted in inviting her to my place for having lunch after school. My mom took care of the cooking, I took care of kissing the girl…
Before deciding for the scientific lifestyle I was more into the arts. I used to draw, paint & sculpt in many types of materials. I was serious about it as a way of living until the last year of secondary school. Nowadays, I still do some drawing in my spare time (very rarely) and it serves for the same purpose as guitar playing.
Despite of spending many part of my life in the vertical world while climbing, I’m afraid of heights when I’m at the top of some building (beginning on the 3rd floor).

Now, in honor of the meme tradition, I forward this one to Poli, Gunnar, Jason, Octavio & Jordi. I hope to read interesting stuff from you guys.

Friendship & life paths

This morning, the mafia got together for having a breakfast buffet at some hotel and sharing personal all-year experiences. Every year it’s becoming more than normal the distance between us due to everyone’s duties and responsibilities. Fortunately, we still manage to spend some great time just as if no time has passed by. After breakfast, each of us went back to their activities with the hope of meeting again soon…

By the evening, I went bouldering alone and had the chance to reflect a bit on all the stuff I lived with my closest friends. I felt a bit nostalgic because I realized that our paths in life had diverged a lot and that it was the natural destiny. I thought about a lot of other stuff as well, but always hoping for the best. This was my perspective, from the inside of the cave, alone in a fresh evening…

“Silent” mutations are not always silent

A mutation in a human gene that does not change the resulting amino acid can nevertheless change a protein’s function, according to an online report from Science. The research marks the first time that the phenomenon has been confirmed in mammals.

“The habit we all have of disregarding nucleotide changes that don’t change protein sequence may not be a good one,” coauthor Michael Gottesman at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Md., told The Scientist. “This may be a generalizable phenomenon that may lead to changes in function we haven’t been thinking about.”

The Scientist: “Silent” mutations are not always silent

Pleasant training

Tonight I had my regular dose of running. I did my long route through Satélite and I must confess that I was tempted to run it twice, just for the pleasure of it. Fortunately, I thought it twice and decided that it would be better if I returned home before doing something stupid, like getting injured because of my “great” ideas.

While running, I noticed that I finally returned to my marathon pace and maybe that’s why the “great” ideas came to my mind. I must get back to harder training but it must be gradually and pleasant, I don’t want to be all messed up like in the past months…

Crazy party

Yesterday was the office’s end-of-the-year party. It was in a rented house that is really close to the office and just as in every other company, we had some entertaining activities, then lunch and the rest of the evening was for enjoying the music, drinking and messing around the place.

By 11 p.m. things were already a little bit out of control but fun enough for an end-of-the-year party. Crazy people… Hehehe

Beating my laziness

Just as every other Thursday, Mau, Cova & I went to do some bouldering at Chiluca’s cave. Already at the place were Gabo, Gilman and the rest of the folks. We climbed a lot of the classic stuff and tried a couple of new problems. The weather was extremely comfortable, the sunset spectacular and the friendly vibe really good. All the necessary ingredients for a good bouldering session.

Back at home, I was almost convinced that I was done for the day, but I was wrong. I suddenly felt the psychological need to go for a little run. The hard part was to convince my body to move again after all the hard climbing. Once on the road, the legs began to cooperate and the workout became something natural. In the end, my body really likes nightly activities…