Weekend Project update

A lot is done, but a lot is left to be done.

Mia seems to like it so far.

Home Improvement

Amber & I got some good old cash for Christmas which we decided to put into the house. So far we have gotten new curtains & blinds. Paint is next, yes paint. I'm going to say good bye to my lovely white walls. Actually have a growing list of stuff I want to do to the house this winter & Spring.

December is also the month for new tags for the Scube. The Scube has been in need of a new windshield for quite awhile. Being the procrastinator that I am I decided to wait till I knew it wouldn't pass inspection. So yesterday I went to bed needing a new windshield, I woke up no longer needing one. On sight windshield replacement is the absolute bomb!! Then this AM I noticed the new brake place across from work had finally opened for business. Wing Wang Womb the Scub is inspect & ready for the DMV. I hope the DMV has a short line tomorrow. So far I've been on a roll, will my luck hold?

Look closely you'll see paint samples.

Had to cut 3/8" of this f'er since the window was narrow.

In case you didn't know

HEHE 2

HEHEHE

Merry Christmas too all & too all go back to work

It kind of sucks having Christmas on a Monday since I know most of you will be reading this @ work today. I feel for you all since I have to go back tonight. This has been a long fun filled weekend. Lots of food, fun, & family. I did manage to get in a couple of runs to stave off all the extra calories I ate this weekend. I think I ate enough to feed 3 or 4 people. Sunday I got up early & went to a frozen & foggy Sac & ran 15k.

Sunday afternoon we made our trip to Aurora to go to Amber's family shindig. Lots of people, eating, & gift given going on. Mia made a haul & we were wishing we had brought the Subby to get it all home. By the time we had got home my Mom, Dad, Sister, Brother-in-law, & My twin nieces had made it to the house to start cooking & turning my living room in to a storage depot for xmas presents.

Christmas eve is always entertaining with my family. Its been the same for as long as I can remember. My mom wanting to open just one present & my dad refusing repeatidly. As the years have gone on & the twins have gotten older time has softened my old man & he now gives in after about an hour of my mom asking to open just one present.

Christmas morning we got up & moved all the furniture in the living room to make a big open space to pile up all the discarded wrapping paper. I say it every year wrapping paper is such a waste. Mia got more noise making, light flashing, daddy assembling toys than I knew existed. She did get her first bike. A very cool tiny tikes with a seat belt & a handle for her daddy to push & steer. I'll quit boring you with words & share a few pics.

Assembling
pushing. Farasy I know this bikes your size but don't get any ideas.

Too much riding, Mia's bonked

Bird house assembly

My grandfather made this for me over 30 years ago. Now its my daughter's passed down to her from her grandfather.

My new Inno.

Amber's cool new socks

The girl's with all the presents.

One of the lighting, noise making, daddy has to assemble toys

Mia sporting new head gear for her nanna

Merry Christmas!

Forget what's in it I just want to bang on the boxes & rip the paper.

My F'd up internal clock

This has been a rough week for me sleep wise. Normally I sleep rather sporadically, but this week has taken the cake. Short bursts of sleep, followed by waking up for many hours, followed by a nap that only makes me more tired before going to work. Oh the life of a night shift worker.

This week has kind of sucked cross training wise too. I got out for a run, in the rain, on Mon but that's it. Tues & Wednesday were zombie fests for me. Though I did plan on getting out yesterday for a run but one run in the rain a week is enough for me. To add insult to injury a BIG ASS Box of the best damn cookies EVER! came in the mail Monday. Between them & all the crap people have been bringing to work I'm weighing in @ 154! Crap that's 2 damn pounds I've gained this week. I feel my ass jiggle to Christmas carols already. Oh the humanity!

This the almost perfect breakfast sandwich I made the other morning. Whole wheat bagel would have made it perfect. I was so proud of it I figured I'd better show it to the wide world web.

Mia has really enjoyed all the XMas cards we've been getting.

I had a pic of the Xmas tree from work but it won't email from my phone to my computer. A guy brought in a 6" high tree which I wired up with a Red LED for the top, very festive & a good use of company time I might add. You have to mate just the right resistor with an LED to get the right current drop to make a 9 volt battery last a week. It took some serious OHM's Law Math to figure that one out.

No I'm not an Electrician, but I play one @ work.

Blatant stealing

In case you haven't seen it I stole this for your viewing pleasure.




Here's the route also stolen:

I know how to Embed a link unlike Hogan.

Celebrity ride

Some time this week I got one of Farasy's patented cryptic messages about a celebrity ride this weekend & since I was a celeb I should be there. Not a clue what the hell he was talking about as usual. I have yet to get a message from him that really made much sense anyway. Damn crack babies. I finally tracked him down Friday to find out the ride was Sunday not Saturday like he said in the message. See nothing makes any sense with that kid.

I hemmed & hawed about showing up all weekend. I mean I'm on a self imposed exile from riding till the New Year. So after a lot of debate I decided one ride wouldn't kill me. Am I glad I showed up. A veritable who's who's of Springfield cycling was there. All 15 or so of them. This was a Greek led ride so I figured it would be interesting. Interesting it was. From a crawl of 15kph to 50 kph at a moments notice(damn Mertz!) The day temp wise was about as good as it gets in December so I couldn't complain too much about the dew covered roads. Now I'll have to wash my bike again. I bet Skip is dismantling his as I type this. If he ever updates he should have some pics to post.

Ended up with 3 hours & change with a solid TT effort @ the end(Damn Mertz!) Damn glad I showed up was a good time even if it wasn't Joe Martin.

Saturday I got out to Sac & got in a pretty good 6 mile trail run. Two big loops that is. I'm going to work up to 4 or 5 in the near future. Never know when you might need to be in running shape.

Bet your job is boring compared to mine

I'll admit 85%of the time my job is pretty mind numbing. There are the rare occasions things get real exciting. Usually its because of a fire. We average about 3 a year @ work, almost all @ night. I won't go into the logistics but the making of industrial belts tends to have fires & 3/year is nothing in the industry.

I digress. Last night not 5 minutes after sitting down to our annual Christmas company dinner the fire page goes out. All of my guys & myself leave our food were it sits & haul ass to the fire. I should mention we rarely call the fire department, even though a fire house is across the street(above my pay grade).

When I get there I realize we have a top 3 fire on our hands; yes I have a top ten list of fires I've seen @ work & this one will end up as #2. Enough smoke to keep the back part of the plant evacuated for almost 2 hours; the back part is like 10-15 acres?

Anyway to make a long exciting story short we had flames shooting out of an exhaust stack 4' high. I had two burning bags of carbon dust that were still smoldering when I left @ 7:30(that's 4.5 hrs of burn time).

At some point the Fire Department showed up, only 1 truck though. Fire #1 of all time we had 12 fire trucks from 4 stations. That's a fire kids. Sometime during my 50 trips up to the roof(no need to run today) I managed to take a 5' shortcut off the roof. Nothing like a little free fall in the dark to get your heart pumping. I landed very cat like & walked away unscathed.

So yes my job can be exciting sometimes.

Cross training makes u sore & tired

Two days of back to back running was all I could muster. Had to put myself down for a big sleep yesterday to recover. In my defense I did 7.5 miles in 2 days averaging faster than most people can race @. Big deal you say? Well I say its a lame excuse too but its the only one I got.

I forgot how cross training makes you "find" muscles you didn't know you had. My bum shoulder has been giving me hell. Not enough expletives to describe how running makes it feel. I'm hoping some gym time will get it some what back to "normal", otherwise I might hit the Ortho up to send me back to rehab. Something is not right in it for sure. Starting to get me worried about boating. That'd suck a simple accident keeping me from boating or climbing for that matter.

What's this Celebrity Ride I hear about? Why has no one planned a night ride yet?

Off to bed before I get in more trouble . Yikes!

Tis the season to cross train

That's right I've been done with CX for one whole week. I did NOTHING for 7 days except a few 12 oz curls. Fat time is over, now its time to hit Weight Watchers for Men & work some of those long forgotten muscles.

For me that means running. "You wouldn't believe it but I can run like the wind blows" well sorta of. The next few weeks will see me putting in a few miles on my running shoes & maybe a few on my trail shoes as well. With zero miles on the bike, well maybe a few on the SS MTB for fun.

This year I didn't do as much cross training as normal & I felt it in CX. This year I think I'll do a little more alternate training methods to keep me more well rounded. I'm even hoping to get in 3 months of weight training starting in January. Build up a little power base, maybe swap a pound or two of fat for a couple pounds of muscle. I'm real close to my weight goal of sub 150 & I think the weight room will be a nice trade off.

Last night was 3.7miles in 27:35, that's 7:27/mile. Average HR 141 max 157. Not too shabby first run out the door.

BDAY Celebration

Friday I decided to start my celebration of my Birth as soon as I got off work. So on the way home I stopped & picked up a sixer of Bass for breakfast. It goes without saying I was a little hung over when my Mom showed up to have dinner with me. I'm a gamer though so switched buzz' to Starbuck's to man up for the later trip to Patton Alley.

Mom & Me

Patton Alley Pub.
This is my favorite drinking establishment. Any place with a beer menu is all right by me. Plus Bellhaven & Young's Double Chocolate Stout on tap!

Amber is a tricky one sending out an email a month in advance. I unknowingly posted we were going downtown. OOPS great minds work a like I guess.

Most of my lame friends had excuses not to come. My best good bud Darin made an appearence. Shane & Carrie even showed for a few drinks. Shane broke out his Hero Powers. Who knew he could teleport & go invisible.

Amber's Uncle Jeremy, her mom, her Aunt Penny, her cousin Ashlea all showed up to wish me well.

Mark & Mindy came by to give me some special presents.

Only those two would think to give some one Mandelay.

I swear its this big.
I drunk
Amber & Uncle Jeremy. He's a downtown Gamer. Works & Plays in the Downtown area.
Mac Daddy Darin
Artsy but still drunk
Gotta love gifts.
Working out @ the YMCA is paying off. Jeremy was working his ass all night getting free beers from dudes.

Not a clue?

A little too close to the hiney for Darin's tastes.

Our waitress. She had some sort of nervous disorder that kept causing her to arch her back.

Needless to say we all had a good time closing down the place. Amber was pretty rough Saturday AM as was her mom. Me I'm a gamer & was A OK! Thanks to everyone for showing up & helping me celebrate my start to middle age.

People born on this date

Sammy Davis Jr. 1925
Nick Nolte 1940
Jim Morrison 1943
Sam Kinison 1952
Kim Basinger 1953
Teri Hatcher 1964
Sinead O'Conner 1966
Mathew Laborteaux, Albert from Little House on the Praire (funny because I worked @ the Ingalls Museum in Mansfield in High School) 1966
Ron George 1967

The high price of racing

I've been following a discussion about the high price of CX Nationals on Treefarm's blog. Read the two posts about Nationals, then read the comments. He's got a point $52 for a race with no payout or field caps is pretty ridiculous. The high price of CX racing has been on my mind this whole season. It seemed last year prize money was a lot better & entry a lot lower. This year entry for races in KC averaged $30 with zero payout(except medals) in the Master's fields. Plus if you factor in the 2 races in Lawrence where you pay $30 + $6 to park in the park that's an expensive medal. None off that factors in gas either, but I won't go into a rant about the high price of gas.

Point is I know race promoters don't normally make money off putting on races but it seems to me this year CX promoting has been a profitable endeavor. Don't get me wrong I agree with the one comment that says racers are going to race regardless of the price. I payed my $30 & raced in the ice even though I knew I wasn't up to it @ State. I like to race. But eventually people aren't going to be able to afford racing unless they make 6 figures a year. It seems simple enough, no payout, a lot lower entry. People will still race just for the love of racing.

The price of racing has really made me stop & think about how much I'll race next year. I raced 25 days this year for a total of 31 races, though would have been more if not injured most of the year. More or less $800 in entry fees. Once again I won't figure in gas(I'm really scared to). I won about $400 in prize money give or take(most of that in road, only $40ish in CX). So I'm out 1/2 not too bad. I was out of pocket a ton more with AR racing. Where do I cap my entry fees @? Good question, one I'll be thinking a lot about this winter on those long cold, dark miles.

Habius Corpus & other Latin words

My day in court finally came. I got my subpoena over 2 months ago to testify in the dog tickets case. After sitting tin the court room for two hours thinking that the trial wasn't going to happen the dog owner & his very agitated lawyer showed up. Long story short in was a bench review & I didn't have to testify. Case ruled on though I'd better not mention the outcome.

Not a total waste of time Amber & I got some amusing trial stories out of the deal. Some highlights were the guy with 7 kids who kept getting busted for paraphernalia. The guy who admitted to changing lanes 7x in a half mile but was positive he used his blinker aka mechanical every time. The schizophrenic, bipolar guy(he told the judge this) who "didn't" steal gas from Kum N Go. When he got up to testify the first thought through my head was"why the hell doesn't this court room have metal detectors?" If you have never gone to municipal court you need to go, great way to spend an afternoon.

Tomorrow is my 35th BDay. God I'm getting freaking old. Any who Amber & I are going for pints @ Patton Alley Fri night. Come on out & have a few if you wish. We'll regale you with litigation humor.

I might rethink XMAS Lights

I work with a guy whose wife broke her hip last year hanging lights. Now two men in Dallas are paralyzed all from hanging Christmas lights!


Today is my day in court more later.

Secret Santa

If anyone out there is wanting to get me a secret Santa present here's a list to make your shopping easier:

Top of the list is a Power Tap SL 2.4 wireless power meter.Next of course is the all illusive Zipp 404's

Next up is the very Hot Scott Addict R3. Though the junior gearing SRAM Crankset would have to have man sized rings put on it.
Since we're wishing here how about a sub 16 lb TT'er. Scott Plasma LTD. I know I could break 55 min without even training on this rocket.
A vespa for scooting around town & a little Moto pacing on the Addict.
Then for next year a CX bike that weighs less than 17 lbs. Oh how I'd love to haul around 6 less lbs.

Merry XMAS!

MO State CX *

The * is for the MO State Race that no one from Missouri came too. Most of the Missouri racers were from KC & there weren't many of them. Don't get me wrong field sizes were normal for a CX race. Extraordinary if you consider the weather. St. Louis was mostly unrepresented mostly since a multi mile section of I-70 was closed, though if you ask me its was because St. Louis racers only race in St. Louis. Examples of no one being from Missouri there were 8 MO riders in the Masters Field & 2 in the 1-2 Race. The Masters only had 35-39, 40-45, & 1 55+. Sad for a state CX race.

I ended up 2nd in the 35 masters. I just didn't have it in my legs. I knew 2 weeks ago I'd peaked too soon. So lesson learned don't take a 2 week break from racing before your last race. The really crappy part was I got beat by guys I haven't lost too all season. They stepped it up when it counted, I just tried to stay upright(which I did).

I got up very early Sat Am to give myself plenty of drive time to make the 9 am start. The roads were actually pretty good once I got out of town. I was able to drive the speed limit the whole way except for one section of nasty fog.

I walked a lap of the course & slipped & fell twice which worried me about conditions. I lowered my tire pressure to 28-30 psi(Lower than I've ever ridden) & actually was able to ride stuff I couldn't walk.

Its now time for a break from the bike for a few weeks.