When Black Friday Comes

Well, at this point it's come and gone, and taken Thanksgiving with it. Definitely a good holiday this year, here are some high points:

Thursday Morning: no ride. Rain and thunderstorms allowed me to sleep late, then I read about half of Travis Hugh Culley's The Immortal Class, really a great book, though I'm usually not sympatico with that whole bike messenger thing.

Thanksgiving Dinner: was at my parents' house. For once the drive wasn't intolerable, even Route 9 wasn't too bad, at least not bad considering that it was Route 9 South, south of the Raritan River, on Thanksgiving... But I got down and had a really nice dinner with my parents. Mom wasn't too happy with the turkey (substandard bird), but dinner was fine by me.

Dessert: We went down to my mom's cousin Laurence's place, had dessert with Laurence and Marie and their two kids, also Marie's aunt was there. Very lively conversation, mainly about cool movies and bands etc -- influence of the college girls; when family friend Brian showed up, about the same age, things got very lively, very 20-something, young-adult vivacious, kind of neat the energy they all brought to things. Alas, we were old and went home around 10:30 or so...

Ride: I got up a little late, but went out about 10:00 to ride Huber and Hartshorne Parks in Red Bank, actually just down the road from Laurence and Marie's. I brought the Surly, and was riding by about 10:45. It was really sweet, but I think I'm getting a little afraid of that bike -- I can ride just about anything when I'm fresh, but I lose my freshness very fast. About two hours into things I got so tired (arms and back as well as legs) that most hills became either hike-a-bikes, or at least required a rest partway up. It's literally like I'm starting over with this bike, at least in terms of fatigue levels I'm like a neophyte. I rode for almost exactly 3 hours, then went back to Englishtown.

Lunch: My brother and his family went to his wife's parents for Thanksgiving, so they came over today for leftovers at my parents. I got there and Chris was setting up my mom's computer in the downstairs bedroom -- my mom gets that tendon surgery on Tuesday, and she will be living downstairs for a while. Everyone else was in the kitchen, eating Turkey sandwiches with stuffing and cranberry sauce, so I joined them in the kitchen, played with my nephew. Good times, then they took off about 3:45: Tara to work, and Chris & Christopher to see the Spongebob movie. I got out of Dodge myself not long after.

Now I'm home, just did some laundry, and the traditional weekend is just starting. After a quick shower I'm heading down to Which Brew for to catch the Insidious Rays. Later, and Happy Thanksgiving!

Malaise

Morning weigh-in: 180#, 14% BF

Well, not really, but I do feel odd and tired... went to the gym kind of late last night (they close at 9:00), so I decided to skip my regular long workout and do legs, for the first time this offseason. It was good to see that my strength hadn't really dropped since the spring, but I hit the weights kind of hard, all parts of my legs plus a few upper-body things, and I think that's what's dragging me down now.

Hit Which Brew afterward while my laundry dried, got there just in time to put in a dinner order. Place was empty: just me, bartender Maura and that dude Scott -- nice guy, but once he starts talking he never, ever stops -- I can't get a word in sledgewise, can't even sit in peace, and he's physically loud like he's deaf... I like going there Tuesday nights, it's a nice routine: gym, laundry, and dinner at WB, but if Scott's there to harsh my buzz every week I'll pick a different day.

Cool song on the radio last night: "Stranger Blues" by Elmore James

Reading (re-reading): Gravity's Rainbow

More Culture

Morning weigh-in: 179.5#, 14% BF

Did laundry, played with computer, had dinner, passed out by 9:00 PM, got up at 7:06 --doh! No running this morning, but will hit the gym tonite & do some sort of stationary machine (blech) before the regular workout -- maybe I'll toss in some leg exercises.

Last night's dinner: A nice big salad of baby arugula, then baked stuffed tofu, and saurkraut with a little kim-chee I mixed into it . Microbes are my new friends? Maybe I'll grab a beer downtown tonight...

Monday Morning Blues

Morning weigh-in: 177.5#, 13.5% BF

Suppression weight loss, dehydration etc, I expect to see the numbers bounce back up in a day or two.

I'm sooo tired right now. Napped yesterday afternoon, went to bed before 10:00, got up after 7:00 AM (uh-oh), and my body feels totally drained... I suppose it's the "good kind of hurt" to be feeling after a weekend, but I think it's time for a rest day.

And It's Good!

Morning weigh-in: 179.5#, 12.5% BF

I picked up my new singlespeed from Curt's Cyclery Friday night, and took it out on the towpath as soon as I got home. That's not the place where a bike like that necessarily shines, but I still had a blast. I ran into Joe and Cindy out by Freemansburg, rode back with them. Doing the old hamster legs, 12-15 mph especially on the way out and my legs were spinning; on the way back we had a a more relaxed pace (they had their dog, and they didn't want to overwork her) butI still had a good cadence, and the gearing felt easy. That changed on the way up from the river though: 5 minutes standing climb, ouch.

Friday night was Which Brew for dinner, met Brian and saw Stu & Kathy, also a bunch of the peeps who just got back from Prague. Two guys I didn't see were Heath & Hans; I wanted to invite them to the Chili Ride on Saturday. Oh well, I tried via email earlier in the week. Their loss, since that was a good day as well.

The Chili Ride: I thought I wasn't going to make the start, but I wasn't even the last to arrive (not many showed up to ride in the November drizzle anyway); unfortunately I realized, partway into the ride, that I'd forgotten to change to my riding lenses, so I rode back to the car and played catch-up for a big part of the day. I missed a turn, didn't see anyone and so rode around semi-lost until I found myself on the old racecourse by the scout camp, then everything was gravy -- and then I ran into Beth and two others coming the opposite direction. They were the "slow group," and I hooked up for the last few miles and we rode out together. Back to Beth & Kevin's, where they had a their 10th Annual Chili Contest. A total blast: beer, chili, prizes and even a bonfire though it was kind of drizzly so we trooped back inside after a while...

Saturday's ride was on the Turner. Sunday we (Doug, Brian, Pete, Eric, Joe and myself) went to Riverside Park (or Walking Purchase Park, depending on who you ask -- it's in Salisbury behind St Luke's Hospital), where we helped the VMB with their ongoing project to build a trail system there. Amazing job so far, mostly done by that guy John, and also by Creepy Dave (hey, credit where it's due). We did about 4 hours work, put about a mile's worth of new trail in, then Doug Joe and I rode for about 2 hours -- Joe and I on our singlespeeds, Doug on his Turner.

I was a little afraid of how things would work out with the new bike, since it's completely rigid (no suspension front or rear), and Salisbury is a tough place, but the Surly is a well-set-up bike, good geometry and fit etc, and I felt very confident riding just about anything I'd take the Turner over -- more important, I was able to ride it all too. (The only negative is that the ride is harder & way more tiring on the upper body.) The singlespeed part of it was a bit harder to deal with, since I ended up going a little slower than I'd have liked for that gearing. Twisty, rough surface, lots of slight uphill grades after tight-radius turns, I had trouble maintaining momentum and staying on top of the gear. It was tough, but that's why I got it.

Anyway, now I'm filthy, just woke up from a nap while the laundry was cooking. Now it's my turn in the shower.

Fatty Fatty Fat fat

Morning weigh-in: 182#, 12.5% BF

Nothing to say here, just passing through to drop off the bad scale-tipping news...

Oh -- I'll have my new bike probably tonight. If I do I'll be riding it on the towpath; tomorrow is Beth's Chili Ride (on the Turner), and Sunday will be trail maintenance at Salisbury.

How Conveeeeenient

Well, finally got the phone guy out -- although he was supposed to show up tomorrow after 5:00 PM, he was here today in the afternoon while I was at work: landlord let him in. I got a message on my cell that he checked the line, and there was nothing wrong with it, he hooked a phone up to my connection & got dialtone etc, whatever is wrong, it was wrong with my phone. I thought "that's odd, phone and brand-new modem crapped out together" but I bought a new phone on the way home anyway. Just for laughs I tried the modem and it worked just fine -- ATH1 got a dialtone, regular old phone has no problems whatsoever either... WTF?? I figure the guy found and fixed something, like a loose connection outside (where it's their responsibility/cost), and just said he found nothing, so I'd get stuck with the bill for the visit. Fuckers.

Anyway, home phone's working, therefore home 'puter is back on the net. I kept up with my epix account via webmail, but my enter.net address had 1099 emails waiting for me. Right now is a little bill-payment catch-up, then I'm going out for a bite.

So uh, like I was saying...

Morning weigh-in: 181.5#, 13% BF

Rode last night, then stopped by Which Brew while laundry was drying: not much was going on there, kind of dead. Tonight is the Chain Gang meeting, and I might run down by the river beforehand. That is all.

Pickled

Morning weigh-in: 181#, 13.5% BF

No workout last night, instead fiddled w/ computer & did laundry. Also cooked an interesting dinner, tofu stir-fry with onions, garlic, wilted greens (arugula, baby spinach etc), and also some kimchi plus a little fermented red cabbage. I served it over rice w/ lemon juice, but put some tahini on the rice too which was a bit of a mistake, the flavors kind of clashed. I was up pretty late, so ther was no run this AM; I will either ride the towpath tonight (it's pretty nice out) or hit the gym & run there.

My boss's father just passed away this morning, 91 years old, cancer.

Conversations With Women

Morning weigh-in: 181#, 11% BF

Went to bed a little too early last night, 6:00 PM, and woke up at 12:30 for a little tossing & turning before dropping off again. Got up 6:00 AM, ran breakfast, work and now here I am...

Friday night: I stayed in, another early bedtime.

Saturday: got up early, got an early start on my day's errands, early breakfast at the coffee shop, and got to the gym way early. I only ran 2 miles so I had 20 minutes to kill, did some stationary biking before lifting with my trainer.

From there I drifted from one pleasant social situation to another, common thread was good conversation with various women I met along the way: Violetta and her co-workers at Nature's Way, then Mary M at Genesis, various people at the Quadrant, Maura the bartender, and also Rich F's wife, at Which Brew,and finally I went down to Englishtown for a High School friend's 40th birthday, where his sister gave me the lowdown on her life (kids older, she back to work) since we last talked. Really neat, social glue kind of day. The B-day party was pretty good in and of itself, too.

Sunday Morning I hung out with the parents, but had to leave around noon; I had to get back to Allentown by 2:00 for the PPRAC (aka "Perimiter Ride") kickoff meeting. That went well, as well, and things look good for this year. More on this soon...

I'm Sorry, Ben

Morning weigh-in: 180.5#, 13% BF

Well, that "early to bed early to rise" stuff died a hard death: I worked late last night, hit the gym, then went home; I was soooo close to just staying in, but I went downtown to Which Brew anyway. It was pretty good, and I had an OK time but all in all I should have stayed home. The singer, Leechboy, really wasn't my cup of tea, and the evening dragged out to past midnight. I wasn't going to run this morning anyway, and the plan was to sleep until 7:00 rather than (non-run wakeup) 6:30, but I only got moving at 7:10 -- I leave for work at 7:30...

Blasts from the past: I ran into Heath and Hans last night at Which Brew, and I noticed that Heath was walking funny, cramped and kind of stooped over -- turns out he rode with "a bunch of NORBA guys" as he put it, and they layed down a royal butt-whooping on him. I ask him who he means by "NORBA guys," and he names a bunch of young hotshot racers from the Reading area, mostly people I never heard of, but I did recognize one name: Ryan DeWald.

I always wondered what happened to that guy. I remember Ryan D as a teenager circa 1996, riding wheelies through the race-venue parking lots on his Trek Y-bike, winning every local race and moving pretty quickly up to expert, where he still won all the time. His dad would take him to the races, and we would BS about the racing scene, the Grateful Dead, yadda yadda while the junior experts finished their extra laps, pretty cool guy. Last I remember seeing of either of them was an XC race at Whitetail: Ryan was racing for Mt Gretna and I needed to contact them, so he took off his shoe to reveal their number written across his sponsor-provided sock...

I thought maybe he just vanished into senior-expert limbo, or went off to college or moved out West or whatever. It's good to see he's still around and kicking butt, though I suspect he's a pretty familiar name/face to those who (unlike me) still follow the race scene. Apparently, his dad bought a Reading-area bike shop, and these guys ride out of there. Not sure how Heath hooked up, probably through the shop. (Heath was a hurting puppy, but he won some props from me just, for hanging with that crew.)

I asked where the ride was, and he said out by Port Colden somewhere, lots and lots of hills. I asked if there was a reservoir involved, and he said yes... hmmmm, Hamburg?

The Splatter Effect

Morning weigh-in: 179.5#, 14% BF

Garbage night last night. I had a small pumpkin that was starting to rot, getting all soft etc, so I was throwing it out and -- I dropped it on the kitchen floor, and it burst. Yecch! Nasty cleanup, made worse by thinking that I dropped it because I was trying to minimize contact with the pumpkin in the first place. The smell was very wierd though, not "rotten vegetable" at all, more like some kindof industrial adhesive, something I'd smell back in school or at PPC.

That was at the end of the night, getting ready for bed. Before that, I went straight from work to Kurt's Cyclery and got things moving on gettinng that singlespeed. Picked out wheels, whole lotta components, he'll get back to me on final stuff. I should hopefully have it by Thanksgiving. Dinner was Taco Bell rather than cereal, that plus a little reading before another early bedtime -- Ben Franklin would have loved me, except there were a few unexpected chores so I wasn't as early as the past few days... Got up early and ran again; tonight is the gym, then probably a trip to good old Which Brew see what's up and to see Leechboy play, also maybe drop off that skateboard literature.

Mr. Healthy

Morning weigh-in: 179#, 14.5% BF

The bad thing about cereal whenever I buy it, is that the cereal is all I eat, breakfast lunch and dinner, until it's gone... Worked late last night, then went to the gym and realized I forgot my sneakers. Doh! There wasn't enough time to get them & still get in a good workout, so I blew it off. Dinner was cereal, then I did a little more reading & had a good phone conversation w/ Doug before another early bedtime. Got up early, ran (2 miles) this morning, cereal for breakfast. Tonight I'll be checking out that Surly 1x1, very likely to buy it but I'm not sure what components to get -- I want a fully rigid bike, Hope Mono Mini brakes, and after that I don't know. I should have the bike in a week or so. Another box of cereal to go.

Want The Change, O Be Inspired By The Fat

Morning weigh-in: 180.5#, 10% BF

I was going to ride the towpath last night, but after dinner (turkey chili w/ rice) I read for a while, then just just felt like "screw it, rest day," and went to bed at 7:30. Slept through until 5:52 AM, when I got up and ran. Only went a mile, peristalsis issues as well as cold head/hands, must relearn how to do this AM thing...

Post-run weight was 179#, 15% BF: turkey chili w/ rice...

Tonight is the gym, then more nothing -- maybe early bed again?

Reading: Gravity's Rainbow.
Listening: Velvet Underground's first album.

Happened to listen to "Venus In Furs" on the way home yesterday, and reached the part in GR last night where General Pudding, in a sort of parody of Kabbalic mysticism, passes through a series of antechambers, each with a single "trial" before the infamous masochism/coprophagia scene. In one trial he sees a coffee can that says "Savarin" but he knows it's meant to say "Severin,"which got me thinking again about the VU: they were big on decadence and depravity, but it really was a rather bookish sort -- "Venus in Furs" being cribbed from, uh, Venus In Furs, and "I'm Waiting For The Man" cribbed from Burroughs's descriptions of junkie life. Bottom line, and after all these years: it wasn't street cred, just intellectualism -- they were sophomoric teenage posers. Ahhh, but they were my sophomoric teenage posers...

Situation Normal

Morning weigh-in: 180#, 13.5% BF

Friday night was a towpath ride with Brian, then we went to Which Brew for dinner. He drove, but wasn't staying late. I liked the band, and heard that Duende was playing across the street, so opted for pedestrian status when it came time to leave.

I can't remember the band's name at WB, but it was a blues band, lotta alumni from Illinois Slim's band, plenty of guest musicians on stage at various times. Pretty cool. I picked up on what must be the 50-something white-guy bluesman uniform: the black beret. Plenty of them there, and in comes Arnie after his show, and he's got one on, high-five's the guest harmonica player as he goes by...

Over at Porter's, Duende was taking a break and they had a guest singer/songwriter on stage. He eventiually gets Dave Cahill up there with him, so I guess I didn't miss Thursday's show after all... Duende came on and rocked, but that's no longer news, they're always good.

About 1:30 I started getting hungry, so I left, ran/walked the two miles (uphill) home, got in car and just managed to make Taco Bell's 2:00 AM closing. Mmmmm, bad food...

Saturday started at the coffee shop, then another 2-mile run along River Road before lifting. (Surprising how good I felt, considering the night before, but really the only craziness was the late bedtime.) I had a pretty full Saturday agenda, but stopped at Nature's Way for a little Grocery shopping: ran into Violetta, who I thought had quit and relocated to Alaska, or at least bact to California to be with Mike. Well, she went to Cali, then she and Mike vacationed in Alaska for several weeks, hiking and camping, and she's back but not really working there, just subbing occasionally while she looks for a job. Interesting alaska conversation, & good to see her again, plus they had a "cultured foods" sampler day there -- I actually ate and enjoyed Kimchi.

Next stop was the Bethlehem Bike Co-op. My friend Damion was there until 3:00, so I dropped off a neighbor's discarded bike for refurbishment (they give them to local kids, ship them to 3rd-World countries, or in the worst case break them down for proper recycling), and we had a long conversation about the Ilick's Mill and Bayard Park skate parks -- that history didn't have a happy ending, which I sort of knew but never heard the full story. I also got to congratulate him, because he's now the proud father of a baby girl.

(I didn't have time to do it in person, but on the way over to the BBC I called Kurt's Cyclery, got the ball rolling for that new Surly 1x1 singlespeed.)

I got home, worked on the bike, tossed some laundry on and took a nap, then went over to Eric & Kris's for a little pizza and Taboo (like charades), plus some other games. Mellow fun, just what the doctor ordered.

Sunday was a huge (and very fast) group ride led by Bob at Allamuchy, followed by an early dinner in Hackettstown.

Save It Up For The Weekend

Morning weigh-in: 177#, 15% BF

I was going to go out last night, but I felt tired and headachey after lifting. I got home around 8:30-9:00, skipped dinner and was in bed before 10:00. A loud "POP" outside, followed by my printer running through startup diagnostics, woke me around 1:00. Power outage, maybe a transformer problem? Reset the alarm clock, then slept through until 6:00, then 7:00 -- I guess I needed that.

So, I didn't get to see Dave Cahill play after all. That would have been nice to see, but I could probably find a reason/excuse to go out every night -- and now I don't have to feel so bad about going out tonight, because Which Brew will be serving cask-conditioned Weyerbacher Winter Ale (my favorite, and the first batch of the year), and I wouldn't have wanted to miss that... Hitting the towpath first, trying to get into the night-riding groove.

Saturday I'll lift again, then go down to the Bethlehem Bike Co-op, drop off a neighbor's discarded bike for "recycling" and talk with Damion about how he used to organize skate park volunteers. Sunday is a ride at Allamuchy.

Back to Reality

Morning weigh-in: 178.5#, 13.5% BF

Rode towpath last night, did laundry & then hit Which Brew for dinner. It may have been a mistake, since I plan to go there tonight after the gym: David Cahill is playing and I don't want to miss it.

Another Goddamn Post-Mortem

So Bush is Preznit for another four years -- we're screwed. I hear there's a lot of AutoCAD jobs in Ireland... Too bummed to write any more.

Into The Rapids

Morning weigh-in (Monday): 178.5#, 12% BF
Morning weigh-in (Tuesday): 182#, 15% BF

Friday night I skipped riding, went to dinner with the P's and Brian at Tortilla Flat, then stopped by the Steelgaarden at the Brew Works.

Saturday I skipped the gym to do trail work with Bob W and a bunch of JORBA types. I did a ride on the towpath later in the day, out to Sand Island, then up thru Lehigh to tthe top of Suth Mountain -- I was planning on meeting Doug & Greg up there, but time was running out and i just went home from there. Hit the showers, then it was...

Saturday Night: The big Halloween Bash at Which Brew actually started for us at Greg & Judy's, where we ate dinner and got into our costumes. Too much to talk about here, but crazy good times ensued.

Sunday I did a road ride, and just took it easy.

Monday was back to Which Brew for Mug Club Night.

This morning I voted.

It's The Time Of The Season For Weight Gain

Morning weigh-in (Thurs): 179.5#, 14.5% BF
Morning weigh-in (Fri): 181#, 12.5% BF

Uh-oh, I'm not liking those recent weight gains. Not much exercise lately, plenty of bad food, happens this time every year.

Got the last of my costume last night instead of going to the gym, picked up a surgeon outfit. That and the clown wig/makeup, and the horror-movie knife (it plays the screeching shower music from Psycho), and I should be able to put something together. Call me Dr. Bozo!!

Moving right along... I went to Which Brew last night, ran into Theresa for the first time in weeks. Things look OK between us (as friends), and we talked for a while. She's had a rough two months apparently, lot of things going wrong in her life.

Linux Voyager: I cribbed a mini Java-based webserver from that Learning Java CD, which is rather primitive (it can only respond to GET requests), but I was able to browse the copy of my web site that I keep at home, as well as any file on my machine that's in a Mozilla-recognized format. I did that Wednesday night; last night I set up a perl script that writes a little gibberish (inxluding date and tme stamp) to a named pipe, then read the pipe via the server & browser. Results were somewhat unpredictable, but it did work. Very interesting, for me anyway!

By the way, the title of yesterday's post was what Renee Zellweger's character kept saying in Cold Mountain.