Quick News Tidbits

Morning weigh-in (Friday) 169#, 11# BF

More photos are now posted, my Saturday shots from the BASH. Enjoy! Stay tuned for more, some BASH Sunday photos plus a bunch of trailwork shots I took last weekend.

Meantime, the rain (here and in Vermont) has caused those of us going to race to cancel our trip to the Vermont 50.

Tonight I'll probably see Brujos at Pearly Baker's, and tomorrow will probably be a Lehigh ride.

That is all.

"M" Is For "Methane"

 This can't be good.

 

"You think the end of the world's comin'?"

 

"Preacher man says it's the end of time; he says America's rivers are running dry. The interest is up, the stock market's down... You boys better be careful hanging around here this late at night, this -- no ma'am, I'm sorry we don't -- this is the perfect place to get jumped!"

 

"But do you think the end of the world's comin'?"

 

"Naw... So says the preacher man, but I don't go by what he says."

 

-- Godspeed You Black Emperor

 

Klondike Barbie Watch: Yup, witchcraft-free since 2005! Too bad the long-running affair with her husband's business partner just came to light...

Personal Best!

Morning weigh-in: 170.5#, 10.5% BF

 

Oh well, not quite.

 

Back when I lived on Southside, my best time ever for a towpath ride out to Sand Island and back (distance: 25.4 miles), was 1:28, which gives an average speed of 17.13 mph. Riding that out-and-back from where I live now cuts that distance down to 22 miles, so an equivalent "best time" would be 1:16 at that same average speed. I rode the towpath last night, and was on target for beating that number so I really made the effort -- going fast didn't seem that hard -- and got home at 1:14:48. Woo Hoo! Then I noticed that my distance was only 20 miles, so somehow my cycle computer didn't record two miles of my ride  (nor, presumably, the time spent riding those two miles) and it wasn't a "personal best" after all, though at the very least it was likely my unofficial best time this year. Which means I am right on target to choke Sunday...

 

After that was more laundry and a trip to get it dried, and dinner was at Porter's with Anne, a good time which really flew like it had wings -- saw a few peeps, earned my 4th mug, and next thing you know it's after midnight. Morning came a little too early... (By the way, my new Tevas came yesterday, and I wore them last night, though it suddenly seems late in the season for that.) Tonight is yoga, then dinner with Anne again; she's cooking up some Ethiopian food, after a restaurant visit on that DC trip piqued her interest.

 

What Are They Doing At The Horlacher House?

Morning weigh-in: 170#, 11.5% BF

 

I never drank Horlacher Beer, but as a kid I collected beer cans, along with my brothers, and those old Horlacher cans were among the prizes in our collections. We'd usually find them (and all kinds of very old, collectible beer cans) in or near the ruins of old houses, like in their personal garbage dumps or inside the walls -- part of the house's life cycle, the construction workers threw them in there, and we'd tear the lath or drywall off looking for them. Old rotting houses in the late-autumn woods after school, very Blair Witch. One house we ripped apart was such a gold mine we dubbed it the "Horlacher House," and returned to it several times. It's no wonder witches hate little kids: after what we did to that place, gingerbread-chompin' Hansel & Gretel had nothing on us...

 

Anyway, I've been on a tea tree oil kick lately, putting it on various skin problems and my one "ugly old-man TMI toenail," since it supposedly has good antiseptic/antifungal properties. The stuff is aromatic and rather pleasant, with a strong turpentine-like smell, but with overtones of rotting wood. The other day I realized why I kept thinking about the Horlacher House, the tea tree oil smell just like the insides of those rotting houses.

 

Anyway, last night was yoga, followed by the last of that leftover chili while I did laundry & uploaded a bunch of "Bash" pictures -- you know what to do -- and tonight is a towpath ride, followed by dinner at Porters while the laundry dries.

Goodbye To Selfish Day

Morning weigh-in: 167.5#, 12% BF (surprisingly enough, I'm happy with those numbers)

 

Friday night was the semi-usual towpath ride, and a trip out to Christian's Spring Hotel but I left relatively early, because early Saturday morning I'd be digging in the dirt at Allamuchy. Trailwork day, we put in a new singletrack bypass to one of the ancient and eroded roads that cut through the park. Record attendance by the way, about 20 people were there. We worked for maybe three hours and then did a ride.

 

I bailed early on the ride though, and borrowed some shower-and-rooming time at nearby Joe & Dawn's: my next stop was to Parsippany to visit my old friend Vito and his wife -- they were the ones who had the big 70th birthday surprise party that I missed because of Moab. The visit was pretty nice, I haven't seen him in a few years and we did quite a bit of catching up. (He had a knee replaced recently, took about a year for the pain to subside but he's getting there. His wife just got through a bout with lung cancer, which metastasized into her brain. They're hoping she's out of the woods now, but you never know with that kind of thing.) His daughter stopped by, and also a friend from the neighborhood, and they made homemade pizza for dinner. There was also a calzone, and cannoli's and beer and coffee...

 

I got a phone call on the way home, Pocono Joe asking me to stop by Allamuchy Joe's house to pick up the bike wheel he left at the ride, with prisoner exchange up near Saylorsburg on the ride home. I got a call from Anne too, home from Washington but I was too tired to go out. 

 

Meanwhile, What They Said: Yeah, and yeah, and oh yes definitely that too. Just sayin'...

 

Yesterday was more trailwork, this time at Sals: again about 20 people, we spent about four hours and came close to finishing John's old trail. Lotsa rock and dirt moving, followed by the obligatory group ride. Met Anne for lunch afterward, and used her computer to buy new shoes...