Tourist Season 2012 draws to a close

April 30th is the traditional end of tourist season down here as the weather gets wet and muggy for the next several months.  Haven't written as much these past few weeks as we have all been sick for some period of time and between that and work there hasn't been much to write about.  My father is on island this week for some college business and heads home tomorrow.  We had a big faculty function on Saturday slightly marred by a tropical thunderstorm that dropped rain on us for about 18 straight hours and left parts of the island flooded.  We are still training for the mile swim in June though the recent rain and wind have made that difficult.  We have also decided to try the sprint triathlon in November so once the mile swim is passed we have a new challenge.  Arianna is fast approaching the 18 month mark and has really settled into her day care.  She used to cry when we would turn onto the road that her school is on, now she happily goes in (most days) and goes right to playing.  It is week five of the spring term and with both of us teaching two classes in addition to our other duties we don't lack for things to do.  The good news is, starting May 1 some of the prices here go down and we can take advantage of all the local deals offered over the summer months.

Open Water Practice Mile

This morning Kristy and I got in the water to practice the mile that we will be doing in June. (Scott is also going to do the Flower Sea Swim but he kindly watched Arianna to let me swim.)

We've been swimming around 2000 meters three times a week but felt we needed to get in the water to see what it would be like doing the actual route and to get an idea of what we wanted our pace time to be.

Swimming out to get past the swim ropes

The water this morning was rocky (it may not look rough in the picture but the waves got bigger around the 3/4 mile mark and even small waves when you are in the water make a difference). We could feel the waves pushing and pulling us. There were a number of times when a wave washed over me as I was trying to breathe and it put a stop to my pace as I tried to calm the panic.

It took me 48 minutes total going at a very comfortable pace. I wasn't winded at the end so I could have gone faster. The biggest thing for me was getting the realization that I COULD make it to the end. At the beginning, when I was doing a swim along part of the coast I'd never swam before, I kept panicking because I couldn't tell where I was. Once I hit the beach that we started the 600M swim from, I did much better. Even though we have been doing 2000 meters in the pool (which is more than a mile), I just felt like the open water was different and the mental side got to me. I need to push myself more knowing that I will still have the energy at the end to make it or if something goes wrong I can always swim in to the shore.

My goal for the Flowers Sea Swim in 6 weeks is to cut 5 minutes off that time and come in at 43 minutes. That means, for training purposes, that I need to be doing each 100M at no slower than a 2:45 minute pace. I've actually been doing that in practices so it seems like I need to get a better fix on my panic in rocky water just in case we don't have smooth water the day of the race.

RIP Uncle Hank

This morning my great Uncle Hank passed away at the age of 92.  Henry Spetter was the youngest brother of Grandma Rita my maternal Grandmother.  He was married to his wife Mary for fifty seven years and had four children, three daughters Sue, Mary Kay, Eileen and one son Donnie.  He was Grandfather to eight grand kids and leaves a legacy that affects not just them but literally hundreds of cousins, relatives and friends.  I will always remember visiting with him as a kid and hearing stories about his work with the newspaper, going to the flea market, and swimming in the above ground pool at the house in Lyons. Then continuing to know him as an adult, even a whale watching trip gone bad in the San Juan Islands will always be a fond memory of him and how resilient he was.  We will always be grateful that Arianna got to meet not once but twice her Great-Great Uncle Hank and to feel the connection to my Grandma Rita and her Spetter heritage.  We will always love and remember him and will be with his family in spirit this week as they lay him to rest.  We know that his brothers Al and Jake and his sisters Mitzi and Rita were there to meet him and take him home this morning. 

Easter in Texas Part IV

The last two nights in Texas we decided to have fun nights for each of us while the other stayed home with Arianna to get her to sleep at her normal time.  The two nights consisted of going to see the Texas Rangers baseball game for me and a girls night out for Katie with her Mom and sister to paint.  Monday night was the Rangers game and I went with Russ and 42,000 other fans to see the major league debut of Yu Darvish the new Japanaese baseball star who now pitches for the Rangers.  We started with an old fashioned Texas style dinner at Whataburger (hey you cant go home and not have Whataburger at least once).  The Rangers were playing the Mariners and after a shaky start by Darvish settled in and we got to see a great game that included home runs by four different Texas players and an 11-5 win.  It was a huge crowd for a Monday night and an exciting evening.

Tuesday was mostly a day to get deal with storage issues, finish any extra shopping and take Ariana to Gail's work so she could show her around.  In the afternoon Katie took Arianna up to Run On Sports in Coppell.  That night Katie went to a painting class at the Gnosh studio up in Plano, and added a second work of art to our collection (adding to the one she did last year while we were in Texas).

Wednesday morning was time to head home flying from Dallas to Houston and then on to Grand Cayman.  The flight to grand Cayman wasn't full so we were able to use the car seat in a seat just for Arianna instead of her being in our laps.

We had a great vacation and want to thank Melanie, Gail, Russ and Stephanie for a wonderful time in Houston and Duncanville.  We are already looking forward to Cayman Airways starting the nonstop to DFW so it will be cheaper and more convenient to get home more often.

Easter in Texas Part III

Easter Monday is a national holiday in the Cayman Islands but just another workday in Texas.  That was a benefit for us as we needed to meet with our accountant to sign our returns as well as our disclosure of foreign bank accounts.  We headed over to Fort Worth for the meeting and had a full day in cow town planned including a visit to Overton Park, lunch at Uncle Julio's and an afternoon at my favorite place in the metroplex, the Fort Worth Zoo.  After meeting with the accountants we headed to Overton Park to get in some play time before lunch.

Arianna of course headed right for the swings which she thoroughly enjoyed riding with some help from her aunt Stephanie who was along for the day.  We had a Tex-Mex lunch at Uncle Julio's and after a nap for Arianna that consisted of driving out toward Weatherford and then back through downtown Fort Worth, we headed to the zoo.  Last year we had not gotten back to the Texas Wild exhibit with her so this year we started our visit by heading back to that part of the zoo.  The first area of Texas Wild is a petting zoo and Arianna was only too willing to pet the animals and give them hugs.

Then it was time for the rest of the zoo and Arianna was really able to see, understand and interact with the various animals this year.

Penguins

Kangaroos

Turtle

White Tigers



We had a great day at the zoo and drove back to Duncanville feeling like Arianna really had experienced a zoo for the first time where she really knew what was happening and what she was seeing. It was a full day in Fort Worth and it was great to be back in the old stomping grounds.

Easter in Texas Part II

Easter Sunday morning we got up early and after breakfast we headed to services with GG and Grampa Russ.  Gail had sewn special purple dresses for Arianna and Katie so they matched for church and for our pictures that we planned to do later in the day.  After showing Arianna off to all their friends at church, we headed down Interstate 45 to Ennis for the bluebonnets.  The fields were in full bloom and Arianna had a great time walking among them though we had to keep telling her not to pick them.

The weather cooperated perfectly by threatening rain but only ever giving us overcast skies which protected us from the sun and gave us less shadows for the pictures while we were at the lake.  Then, as we were leaving it started to rain and we had a strong early afternoon thunder storm that would have ruined our outing had it come an hour or so earlier.  Sunday afternoon we left Arianna with her grandparents and Aunt and went out on a date.  We had both read the Hunger Games over our Christmas holiday so we went to see that and then went out for steaks for dinner. Since we had a full day in Fort Worth scheduled for Monday we called it an early evening though and headed back after dinner. Arianna had somewhat cooperated with her Aunt during bed time routine but had wheedled extra stories and singing before going to sleep.  For this trip we had rented a crib instead of a Pack n Play and she slept through the night for the second straight day, something she had never done on any of our previous trips where we had used Pack n Plays confirming that from now we will rent a crib as she sleeps better in them and without the multiple wake ups.

Easter in Texas Part I

On Good Friday we headed home to Texas to spend Easter with Katie's family in both Houston and Duncanville.  Because of the strange flight times for United we actually overnighted in Houston Friday as part of a longer than normal 18 hour layover.  This gave us a chance to stay with Arianna's Aunt Melanie and also to visit with my friend Gary and his family.  We had a fantastic Saturday morning breakfast at a restaurant called Baby Barnaby's and then headed over to Discovery Green where Arianna got to play in fountains as well as at a great play park right in the middle of downtown Houston.  We only had the morning as we had to be at the airport by 12:30 but we packed in the time and Arianna definitely had a wonderful start to her Easter visit.

Bezemek and Cummings Families

We picked up a travel car seat that had been shipped to Mel for Arianna.  It attaches to suit cases while we walk through airports and will make future traveling a lot easier as we wont have to arrange to have a car seat everywhere. 

You might not be able to tell but the car seat is attached
to the back of one of our suitcases here

We flew up to Dallas Saturday afternoon and got to spend Saturday evening in Duncanville with GG (Grandma Gail) and Papa as well as Aunt Stephanie.  It was a quiet night as we knew Sunday was going to be packed with lots of Easter activities.

800 Meter Swim

Today was my turn to do one of the warm up races for the Flowers Sea Swim in June that Katie and I are training for.  The swim in June is 1 mile long while today was 1/2 that distance at 800 meters.  I have only been training for a little over a week so my goal was just to finish in a reasonable time somewhere at or below 20 minutes.  The swim was from Governor's Beach (next to the British Governor's residence) up to Seven Mile Public Beach.  As I walked up to register I thought the man registering ahead of me looked familiar and when he turned around I realized it was the Governor who is an avid swimmer.

Yes, that is Governor Taylor and his dog in line in front of me

Katie had to leave for a baby shower so I was on my own for the swim.  Fortunately one of her friends Kristy was doing the swim and her husband was there to take some shots of us that I will post after they email them to us.  Katie did get a shot of me right before it was time to head over to the start line.

My number was S B 29 (for swim boys and entrance number 29).  I had told myself before the start to go out slow and pace myself but when the start horn went off I went out fast even as I was telling myself to slow down.  I did the first 200 meters in a little less than 3 minutes but was really winded and by the 400 meter mark was dying. I tried rolling onto my back and just kicking and then some breast stroke to try and catch my breath but my foolish sprinting at the beginning had really killed any shot at a consistent pace.  I was still moving well and crossed the line in 43rd place out of the 86 swimmers at somewhere between 18 and half minutes and 19 minutes so within my personal goal of doing the swim in under 20 minutes. 

Had I paced myself early on I think I could have done at least 1-2 minutes faster as the last 200 meters for me seemed to take forever.  At the end I was nauseous and dizzy and it took a good thirty minutes for me to start to feel OK.  I met two of the instructors for ICCI at the tent by the finish line and I must have looked bad as both were checking on me every so often and at one point, one of them even offered to drive me back down to the start area.  I was mostly embarrassed and there was no way I wasn't walking back.  Fortunately I got enough of my wind back to do so after they handed out the prizes.  Kristy's husband Justin tells me has has a couple of great shots of me at the finish still in the water and looking completely exhausted.  I was so out of it I didn't even realize he was taking photographs.  This was a good lesson in two things, first that I am no where near the shape I need to be in to swim the mile in open water, and second, I have to learn to let go of the competitive juices and swim at pace rather than going out too fast.  The good news is we have over two months now to train for the mile and get into the shape we need to be in.  We have set two days a week for training swims and this will motivate me to keep to them if I don't want to fail miserably in June.

Paper Presentation

Today was the final day of the 50/50 Caribbean Conference and during one of the afternoon sessions, Kathleen and I presented our paper on Gender Disparity in West Indies Higher Education.  We only had 20 minutes to present and thus had to really only hit the high points of our paper but it was well received and generated some interesting discussion.  Here are some photos from the presentation.  Our Paper is being published in a volume of the papers accepted at the conference later this year and the edition with all the papers will be put on file in the ICCI library.

At the end of the conference the sponsoring institutions and company sponsors created a time capsule to be opened in 50 years and I was one of the people on stage who got to put the locks on it.  Here is the capsule and the banner for the conference.  

The conference was a huge success and ICCI being a part of it was significant in terms of increasing the college's exposure and more importantly involving our students, faculty and staff in such a worthwhile academic endeavor.

50/50 Caribbean Conference

This week Katie and I are presenting a paper we co-wrote on gender disparity in West Indies tertiary institutions to a conference being held here in the Cayman Islands.  The conference is being co-hosted by the two local institutions  ICCI and UCCI, and by the University of the West Indies which has three large physical campuses in the Caribbean (Jamaica, Barbados and Trinidad) and several open campuses in almost all the jurisdictions of the Anglophone nations of the Caribbean including the Cayman Islands. The conference is called Caribbean Conference 50/50: Surveying the Past and Mapping the Future, and it is recognizing the 50th anniversary of the end of the West Indies Federation by looking at the past 50 years and their implications for the next 50 years.  Our presentation is not until this Friday near the end of the conference. 

Tonight was the opening ceremony and, with Katie teaching, I attended on behalf of the college.  I gave a few brief remarks on behalf of ICCI during the welcome portion of the ceremony and, fortunately, did not flub my lines in front of what was a huge crowd of conference attendees and dignitaries.  The event was attended by the only living national hero of the Cayman Islands Mrs. Sybil McLaughlin and by just about every politician who was on the island from the Governor down through the Cabinet Ministers and the Leader of the Opposition.  Also in attendance was the former Prime Minister and current Leader of the Opposition of Barbados, the honorable Owen Arthur, who was the keynote speaker and the Premier of Bermuda, the honorable Paula Cox.  As one of the speakers, I was seated in the front row and had a chance to get a couple of shots with my blackberry of the dignitaries and the keynote speaker.

Dignitaries on the front row including the Governor, the acting Premier of the
Cayman Islands, the Premier of Bermuda and our only living
National Hero Mrs. Sybil McLaughlin

Hon. Owen Arthur former Prime Minister of Barbados gives the
keynote address

The conference really kicks off tomorrow with a full day of presentations and four of our students are presenting as is one of our faculty in addition to the paper Katie and I are presenting.  Should be a lot of fun and an intellectually stimulating time.

Irish Jog 5K

Tonight we all went to the Butterfield Irish Jog. This was their 20th year and each year all of the proceeds go to a charity. The charity this year was Fueling Young Minds, a program that works to make sure that every single student gets a lunch every day.

We met up with Kristy, who is turning into my race buddy. We also ran into Mart Marie and Linden.

The three kids ready to race

The race had over 1000 people (that's about 2% of the population of the entire country!!!). They divided people up so that the serious runners went first, followed by the joggers/walkers (where Kristy and I went), and then lastly the people with strollers (where Justin and Tucker and Scott and Arianna went).

Scott and Arianna stayed with Justin and Tucker who were moving at the strong pace of a two year old pulling a wagon!

I passed them early on going back on a loop that was at the beginning but before the four of them decided to cut the course short and go wait to cheer us on at the finish line.

After about the first 1.5 miles I got behind a lady who nicely let me draft behind her. She was setting a good pace and keeping up with her forced me to keep jogging instead of stopping to walk at any point.  We pushed each other at the end and went around (and sometimes through) a bunch of people right at the end (she is 555).

I finished in 35 minutes which is 3 minutes faster than my time of 38 minutes on the Tower Run at the beginning of March. It was a nice route through the golf course although it was hot since it was held at 5:30 in the afternoon.

We stuck around afterwards to see if we won any of the prizes (no one did) and Arianna had a lot of fun running around and seeing all the people.

We kept Arianna up an extra hour but she had a lot of fun and it was nice to have both Scott and her support for a run!

600 M Swim

Today was the Camana Bay Athletic Club 600 M Swim. It is the second part of a three part series that slowly increases distance. I missed the first one and won't be able to do the 800 M swim in three weeks because of a baby shower but I wanted to do this one to see what it was like to do an open water swim.

I met up with my friend Kristy and we got our body markings.

After a 200M Lollipop Swim (for those under 10), we got in the water with 104 swimmers. We are over right next to the blue buoy waiting for all the swimmers to get in.

It was a bit overwhelming at the beginning with everyone clamoring to get out but I set into a good pace and made good time for me. I finished 64th out of the group in about 15.5 minutes.

Kristy, a former competitive swimmer, was waiting for me at the finish line (she finished 15th - what an inspiration!) with her son Tucker who cheered "Go, Katie!" as I got close.

I'm glad that I did it and will do as many swim races as I can in the next two and a half months as the Flowers Sea Swim (one mile open water swim) gets closer!