103,000 miles

Sapphire hit 103,000 miles this past week.

103,000 + 175

The van was just shy of 103,000 before Olivia set off for her camping trip, so I'm guessing that it hit 103,000 somewhere between home and the Warren Dunes.

72-hour fast

I've never really thought about fasting before. One of my close friends invited me to do a 72-hour fast with him leading up to Easter. As I was focused on a specific training goal, I politely declined. But I was intrigued.

You know how you get something new, then you start seeing it everywhere? Well, the 72-hour fast was like that. A guy at the gym brought it up in casual conversation. A guest speaker for one of my classes brought it up when we were having lunch. So, I decided to go for it.

Wednesday Morning

I started yesterday at 11 am. I had an electrolyte drink in the afternoon, and I was hungry last night around dinner time, but the sensation passed and I went to bed.

This morning, I felt normal. I had a cup of black coffee, took Enzo to school, walked the dogs, and headed to the gym. I did the Daily 50, which I augment by adding 4 sets of 5 pull-ups, followed by 10 rounds of a row/ski erg/fan bike circuit. I had an electrolyte drink after my workout.

A decently vigorous workout

I'm at 25 hours in, and am feeling a little hungry. It'll pass.

Wednesday Evening

It's 5 pm, so I'm about 30 hours in. At 2:35 this afternoon, I had a slight headache, but it went away. I've been feeling pretty hungry all afternoon, and am planning on enjoying an electrolyte packet for "dinner." I did enjoy a cup of tea with Luca in the afternoon. The hunger isn't distracting, but it's definitely there in the background.

For dinner, I had an electrolyte packet and a scoop of creatine in a blender bottle. It tasted delicious.

8:47, I felt an urgent need to sit down. Was it a mistake to continue taking my fish oil supplements? Unknown. This is just a big experiment.

Thursday Evening

I'm about 55 hours in. Today was good, pretty easy. I got up, feeling normal, had black coffee, took Enzo to school, and went to the gym. Not too strenuous of a workout, but enough to get my heart going. Mainly because I talked to a friend of mine who was in Singapore about a pending trip to Egypt.

Pretty chill workout

I drank electrolyte water during my workout, and was pretty hungry afterwards. I treated myself to an electrolyte packet and a scoop of creatine. I'll admit to fantasizing about a big scoop of peanut butter.

My fasting supplies

Throughout the afternoon, the hunger was in the background, but not as intense as I expected. Interestingly, the hunger feels the same today as it did yesterday and the day before, maybe even a bit more muted. It's in the background, but I certainly don't feel debilitated.

I don't have a headache exactly, more the sensation of a flight to Europe, or a post all-nighter feeling. I'll probably have another electrolyte packet after I get Enzo home from his art class.  I've gone to bed hungry twice, and I don't think the third time will be much different.

Friday Afternoon

I had a decent workout this morning.  I pushed the sled up to 345 pounds, and did a deadlift pyramid to 315.  There was a lot of socializing and time not spent working, as you can see from my heart rate:

Low-key workout

After that, I came home and took a nice long shower, by which point I was ready to break the fast.

It was really lovely to break the fast.  I started with a cup of black coffee with collagen, then proceeded to a cup of Allison's magical bone broth:

Coffee with Allison and Luca

Broth with a happy cat on my lap, what could be better?

After that, I had a small bowl of plain greek yogurt with a tiny bit of honey and a small scoop of peanut butter, followed by my first real meal: three eggs, two pieces of toast, and a pile of asparagus:

This tasted amazing

It's been an interesting experiment.  When you don't eat, you have a lot more time since you're not eating.  My sleep was pretty good, except for Wednesday when I stayed up way too late.  Unsurprisingly, when you don't eat food, you lose a lot of (presumably water and waste) weight:

Day	Weight	Hours of Sleep
Tuesday	204.6	7 hr 16 min
Wednesday	202.8	6 hr 17 min
Thursday	199.8	7 hr 20 min
Friday	198.0	7 hr 31 min

I still feel pretty hungry, but based on the past 72 hours, I know that’s just a function of mind over matter.  After mowing the lawn, visiting my mom, and getting Enzo from school, I had a protein shake, an apple, and two small slices of toast with burrata filling.

As far as I can see, there are no real negatives to the experience.  This morning, I felt like I’d been on a motorcycle trip for a week and got off.  Everything was moving slowly.  Does that mean my brain was firing differently?  Who knows. 

Overall, it was a good experience.  I proved to myself that I could do it, and I was most surprised by how muted the hunger became after the first evening.  I think doing it during the week as a good idea.  When you're busy, and moving around, you don't really notice it as much.  My energy level throughout was pretty good, and I didn't feel that off my game in the gym.  Of course, I wasn't pushing for maximum performance, but I still performed.

Hunger pangs.  They're a curious phenomenon.  It's definitely a reminder to eat, and it feels strangely good to be hungry at times.  I figure I'll probably end up doing this a couple of times per year.

If you're looking for a different kind of challenge, give it a try.  It's a curious thing, but something that's accomplishable and honestly, I feel pretty good all the way around.  And if there are some ancillary health benefits, all the better.

Boxster Bliss

I've been driving the Boxster a lot over the past couple of weeks. I've been using it to run Enzo to school, go to the gym, head to work, and on miscellaneous errands.

I think the shutdown message is cool.

I have to say, it's a really delightful car. It's small and fun to toss around. It's as usable as it is frivolous, with plenty of trunk space front and rear. And best of all, it has a musical flat 6 that is always ready to reach for the redline. It's comfortable, and top down motoring is just plain fun at any speed.

As I reflect on frequently, cars are best when shared with others! For example, some wheel time is a lovely way to celebrate finishing an AP test:

Post-AP celebration!

And honestly, it's just fun to drive! Look at that smile!

"I love how it growls!"

And I also think it's never too young to start learning how to drive. Enzo, lucky dog that he is, gets to thread his way around the neighborhood. Of course, I'm operating the throttle and brakes, and we trundle along slowly. That said, the PDK is magic, as it's getting him used to shifting.

Cruising around the neighborhood.

Happily, when folks see us puttering by at 15-20 mph, we get happy waves and smiles.

235,000 miles!

 The moon is getting closer!

Less than 4,000 miles from the moon!

The grey van is getting closer and closer to the moon!  With the end of the academic year upon us, it was time to vacate the dorms.  Yesterday, I was helping Olivia move out of her dorm.

Horses for courses

I thought the alignment of the front tires was kind of cool

It's been a wonderful year, filled with challenge and growth and promise.  Luca and Olivia were running around getting the last minute items they need to get their Italian passports.  I'm guessing the van rolled 235,000 when they were together, driving back to campus.  I'm guessing Olivia was driving, sunroof open on a gorgeous spring day, and I like to imagine them talking and laughing.

I have to say, when you need to move a lot of things, there's really nothing better than a pair of minivans:

Vans are great for hauling!

I still enjoy driving the grey van, with its low belt line, excellent visibility, and simple, hydraulic steering.  It's not fast, but it's good at being a van.  18 years and more than 235,000 miles later, it hauls as well as it ever did.

The moon is in sight, probably later this year!

Additional mileage-based musings

 Yesterday I ran down to Indy for Madeline's final lacrosse game of the season.  I think the C4S returned pretty good mileage on the trip:

26.3 mpg?

As I typically do when I go down to Indy for a late game, I stopped by Fresh Indian Grill for some paneer:

Mmmm, paneer

I had such a nice car chat with Navi, the son of the owner of the Fresh Indian Grill.  He's studying aeronautical engineering at Purdue, and is a car nut.  His dream is a Nissan GT-R, and I hope he makes it happen!

It poured rain the entire way down, and the C4S just trundled along, no problem at all:

Not slippery when wet

After Madeline and I merged onto 31 and settled in for the drive home, we happened to notice that we were right on time:

I love it when this happens!

Now that I have a few more miles and my first night drive in the car, I have a few more random thoughts to get out.

CarPlay

First off, the CarPlay adaptor works...mostly.  When I start the car, everything connects as intended.  If I use the speech button on the end of the turn signal stalk, the Siri voice is a little garbled.  However, if I tap the center screen, touch a name, and dictate a message, the interaction with Siri is smooth.  Spotify is flawless, works great.  So does the navigation.  No noticeable lag.

One odd thing happened when I stopped for gas.  I gassed up the car, got back in, and the CarPlay was visually working, but the sound was all coming through the phone.  Bizarre.  Whatever, it works well enough for now.  I'll continue to experiment and report.

For a long trip, I just plug my phone in.  The connection thus far is more reliable, but the wireless adaptor works well enough for running around on shorter errands.

Interior

Thinking a bit more about the seats, the single-foot hand-on-the-sill method really helps me climb over the side bolsters.  I don't like bolsters that look smashed and destroyed, so I'm pretty careful to climb over before settling into the seat.

The other thing that's striking is the amount of space in the rear seat area.  The rear seats themselves have much more headroom than the 964, but what's really impressive is the little space behind the rear seats, where you can easily stuff additional soft bags.  With the rear seats down, the space back there is pretty expansive for a relatively small car:

More rear seat space than in the 964

The cabin is a really lovely place to be at night.  The windshield is reasonably close, and there is glass pretty much everywhere you look.  The frameless side windows are large, and the glass roof combines to give you a sense of sitting in a fishbowl.  There is soft, dimmable lighting in the footwells, around the door handles and door storage pockets, a halo light on the roof above the rearview mirror, and rear seat lighting.  I kind of gives airplane-at-night vibes. 

Soft lighting in the door

Soft lighting for the rear seats

I like to adjust dash lighting at night, depending on how dark it is out side.  Driving through a city with lots of streetlights?  I like brighter gauges.  Out in the middle of nowhere, like the road from Indy to South Bend, it's much darker.  Using "city mode" would be much too bright and ruin my night vision.  Porsche makes it super easy to adjust the amount of light in the gauge cluster.  All you need to do is rotate the trip meter reset button, left for darker, right for brighter.  Even better, it uniformly adjusts the brightness of the center screen in unison with the gauges!  Thank you!  Please, every car should be like that.

You can adjust the brightness in one degree increments, so there are essentially 100 brightness levels, so it's really easy to tune.  Curiously, I set the illumination to 0%, which didn't actually turn off the dash lights.  It was a good, soft, low light, and the gauges were perfectly legible.

Granular brightness control affects gauges and center screen

Another nice touch - both the interior rear view mirror and exterior wing mirrors darken automatically when headlights approach from behind.  It's very easy on the eyes, and avoids the dimmed rear view/blinding side view effect in all our other vehicles.

The cabin is noticeably more spacious than the 964.  Madeline was pretty tired after her game, it was late, and she had a belly full of warm paneer, so it was unsurprising that she ended up sacking out.  Moving the passenger seat all the way back gave her lots of legroom, and then she reclined the seat.  From the driver's seat, it looked like a great place to get some rest!

I remember sleeping in the 964 on the way back from Milwaukee in the middle of the night, and though I got a cat nap, it wasn't exactly spacious.  The C4S has mcuh more space, and you feel it.

Not exactly an Easter egg, but I really like how the doorsill looks at night.  It's just a little reminder of what awaits as your companion for some nighttime escapades:

The headlights are excellent, I appreciate how they swivel into turns and throw lows of light down the road.  Madeline and I were talking about the car in general, and I kept coming back to how impressed I remain with its breadth.  It's as comfortable bombing around a back road as it is slogging along through a rain storm or following rabbits at night.  So many little driving-related details were engineered into the car, it has great grip, and there's sufficient power available at any speed.

The exploration continues!

Perseverance

In 2025, I became a Notre Dame Virtue Fellow through our Institute for Social Concerns Integrating Virtue Together initiative. As part of going through that program, I've started integrating virtues intentionally into my courses. Specifically, I emphasize neighborliness, curiosity, perseverance, and integrity.

I'd like to spend a moment reflecting on the importance of perseverance. Enzo has been training in taekwondo for about three years. He's to the point where he's going to test for his first degree black belt. However, before he can do that, he has to pass a fitness test. The test consists of a 5K run, a written test, max number of pushups in a minute, hold a plank for as long as possible (max points available at 2 minutes 30 seconds), punch with intensity for a minute, and max the number of round kicks on a bag for a minute with each leg. The faster the 5K, the more points. The more questions correct on the written test, the more points.  The more pushups, the more points. The longer the plank, the more kicks, well, I think you get the "point." Har har har.

It's not an easy test. He first started training for the 5K a year ago, then twisted his ankle and was in a walking boot for 5 or 6 weeks. After that, he started training again....and at the end of a run, twisted his ankle in a hole, back in a boot for 5 or 6 weeks. It's been a heck of a long slog.

And the first time he attempted it, he fell short by 4 points. Not massive in the grand scheme of things, but absolutely gutting for him. He was so disappointed, he didn't want to go back. He started hating taekwondo. He was in a vile mood every time he had to practice. Mostly because he was deeply embarrassed. He's a deep feeler (I wonder where he gets that...) and thought everyone saw him as a failure.

Allison and I worked hard to convince him that nothing could be further from the truth. We tried to explain that everyone believes in him, and knows he can do it, and wants him to be successful.

It was an agonizing bit of parenting. "Should we let him quit? He can't build the failure muscle, he needs to develop his resilience muscle!"

I talked about it with his favorite instructor, who coincidentally, is also a big feeler.  She pulled him aside and told him the story of the first time she took the fitness test.  She failed it.  And she didn't try again for 9 years.  "Don't do that," she said.

That night, he was optimistic for the first time, and told Allison that if he could, he'd book another lesson with his favorite instructor.  So we did.

This past weekend was the day to try again.  He was fiercely nervous, saying "I have a deal with Mom, if I don't make it, I'm never going back!!!!"  But we knew, based on his training, that he had points to play with and should be successful.  

Despite the fact that she had a lacrosse game later that day, Madeline agreed to run the 5K with him.  He was wearing his new sneakers and an Intake magnetic nose piece.  Allison and I were going for every psychological advantage possible.  He was super amped up and nervous.

Madeline and Enzo waiting for the start

They had to do four circuits of a running path to hit the 5K mark, and I was taking splits on my phone.  After the first split, I was amazed, and knew he was running faster than he needed to be running to get the points required to pass the test.

Always good to have someone pace you when running!

After sprinting home, he was pretty wiped out:

The stopwatch didn't lie - with Madeline right beside him, he cut 4 minutes of his best 5K time, netting him a nice haul of points.  And we knew that would help him psychologically, knowing he had points in the bag going into the next phase of the test.

Go Enzo go!

We packed up and headed to the studio for the written test.

Working hard!

He was feeling good about the written test, and with that done, it was time for pushups and the plank.  Again, the importance of a coach can't be understated.  His favorite instructor urged him on, and he blew past his personal pushup best by an additional 10 pushups, and he held his plank for 2 minutes 30 seconds, netting maximum points for that event.

Working those pushups!

After an intense minute punching the bag, it was time for kicks.  Once again, his coach urged him on, and he surpassed his personal best by 15 kicks on his right let and 10 on his left!

85 kicks in a minute!

70 kicks in a minute!

When the test was done, all of the instructors went into the back room to tally scores, grade the written test, and determine who had passed.  Enzo was the first person the instructors announced when they came back into the room:

The joy and the relief and the celebration!!!!!  He added 9 points to his previous score, acquiring 5 more than required to pass the test!  Enzo was a very, very happy boy, and celebrated with his coach:

Ms. Gallegos and Enzo

We went out for a celebratory lunch at Chick-fil-A:

Happy Enzo, Happy Allison!

It was such a victorious moment!!!!!  Allison and I were so happy for him, and of course so proud of him.  But mostly happy for him, because he proved to himself that he can do hard things!  He told Allison that he has never been more proud of anything else in his life.

Yes!  That's the feeling to chase forever!  Do hard things!  Do things that scare you!  Do things that stretch you and take you out of your comfort zone!  For the feeling of accomplishment is just magnificent.

I have no doubt this will be something he looks back on in years to come when things get hard.  His perseverance muscles are growing, and that's exactly what we want for all our children.  Work hard.  Work harder.  Take on challenges.  And keep on chasing that feeling of victory.

39,000 miles

 The C4S rolled 39,000 miles today!

Almost there...

...39,000!

It happened on a grey an overcast day, about 55 degrees, right as I was looping around campus and pulling up to the stop sign at the corner of Holy Cross Drive and Dorr Road:

X marks the spot!

Nothing was out of the ordinary on this trip home.  I was enjoying some music on the stereo, had the roof cranked open, seat heater cranked up, and was savoring the feeling of being seated in this magnificent machine.

Life is good.