Consumer Warning

File this under "You can't make this stuff up."

My son invited me to play the Wii Extreme Challenge game, which has some games related to arguably extreme sports street luge, base jumping, rock climbing, and so on. There's also Double-Dutch jump roping.

Yeah, that sounds pretty extreme I thought to myself, thinking I would humor him. My initial efforts were lacking, as my character was getting thoroughly trounced in the game. No problem... it's go time... here's where I put the two-foot vertical leap to into play.

A word to the wise - check your ceiling configuration prior to doing any jumping in the basement.

The boy was remarkably calm in the face of his bleeding father rolling on the floor, and offered helpful advice on how the staunch the bleeding and how to know if stiches are in order.

Thanksgiving Recap

This hits pretty close to home. Of course my license does not say pro, and I replaced the cables on my road bike -- not my cross bike -- during the thanksgiving break.

Cyclocross Season Wrap Up

Ok - so much for blogging as the season went. This was more a reflection of a hectic life than lack of inspiration - work has been insanely busy lately, as we've departed the mothership and are now a startup.

My season was up and down - never felt like a had a really great race, with work stress messing with me. Interestingly enough, I ended up 3rd overall in the race series.

The best part of the series was watching Conor's progress - every ride he got a little more skilled, and a little tougher.

Some random musings on the season...

First of all, I discovered to my horror that I had actually workout my race wheels. I took them into the shop for a pre-season bearing overhaul, and they refused to fix them citing safety concerns. Fortunately I was the recipient of an early birthday present.

Conor has already learned the art of mental warfare, here intimidating the competition by flexing his guns.

Here he is gunning for the finish in Heber on a fine October day.

Here's the result of the best race I've had at Weber - out of 5 races there, I was completely shelled 3 times, flatted out once, and crashed twice.

Here I get the pro treatment by my number 1 supporter:

Conor riding in the state championship at Heber:

The run up was of mountain proportions for the Jrs.

Finally, nothing like a freezing race in a snowstorm with a good crash or two as a rite of passage for a new cyclocrosser.

UT CX #1

I thought I would prepare for this year's cyclocross season a little differently. About a month out from the first race, instead of starting a solid training block, I decided to spend 9 days off the bike, throwing in some international business travel.

All kidding aside, a trip to London is not to be missed, especially if there's an expense account associated with it. There's tons of things to see and do in the city, and as I'd covered a lot of ground last year, I took a geek side trip to Greenwich. I am guessing not everyone gets worked up about seeing old nautical instruments at the Maritime Museum, and John Harrison's chronometers at the Royal Observatory.

If having one's snapshot taken at the International Meridian is not the height of geekdom...

Then resetting the GPS coordinates on your phone must be.

By the way, you might want to draw the shades, as they discovered Uranus with this...

After returning from London, I of course hit the bike with several high intensity workouts. Not satisfied with feeling flat and tired, I went out to Wheeler farm with Mike G. and Tyler F. for some hot laps on the cross bike. Not content with being completely smoked by these guys, I decided to smack my head into one tree, and crash into another tree. I'm not sure how I scraped my back but I do remember lying stunned on my back for a bit trying to work out if I had managed to kill myself in a particularly stupid way. Luckily I got off easy with some mild abrasions on the back and a chainring puncture on the back of my knee (again, no idea how that happened).

Anyway, towards the end of the next week the legs were coming back, and the power numbers were looking like I was getting my form back.

Unfortunately I came down with a substantial cold which ended up with a nasty sinus infection the week before the first race. Not sure how this could come about given a strict athlete's diet, involving precisely measuring out how much bacon goes on my nachos.

So while I felt like hell come Saturday, I decided I would go on out to the first cross race just to pick up the number and get back into the routine. And while it was all I could do to avoid getting DFL, I have to admit it was super fun - even if I couldn't hang with the gang for more than the first lap.

BTW Conor did his first cross race, riding with the nine and under crew. Apparently he did quite well.

Conor: "What place did you get, daddy"?

Daddy: "I don't know... 12th"?

Conor: "You got 17th. I got 3rd place, daddy."

Salute to Engineers

We are engineers. The kind of men (and women) who discovered the wheel and built the Eiffel out of metal and brawn. The kind of men (and women) who sent 3 brave souls perched on top of rocket to the moon and back... because we could.

So here's to the space program's glory days!

Precious Childhood Memory #17

When I was a kid my dad used to take me to minor league baseball games. In Portland, that meant attending Beaver games.

One highlight of going to Beaver games in Portland in the 70's was a little thing called 10-cent beer night. You would not believe the freaks that crawled out of the woodwork to purchase entry to the game, and the game took a back seat to the drunken hijinks that ensued in the bleachers.

One one such occasion, the rowdy crowd was apparently getting on the nerves of Mr. Baseball. Mr. Baseball was an old coot who wore a red blazer and a red batting helment with a beaver statue mounted to the visor, who would stoll through the crowd handing out game schedules.

On this occasion, a teenage hot dog vendor somehow offended Mr. Baseball, who grabbed said vendor and proceeded to bitch-slap him. This then escalated into a drunken hippy punching out Mr. Baseball, who was lucky to skulk away before the whole thing escalated into a mini riot.

Ah, Memories!

Sugar House Crit

I did the Sugarhouse crit today. This is a criterium held in Sugarhouse Park - the park is closed off to cars, giving full use of the road to the race. The course features hills, sweeping turns, and high speeds.

I was reluctant to do it, thinking why shell out 30 bucks to get chewed up and spit out the back to form a one man autobus. However, I've been wanting to try this race for a couple years now, so decided to go for it.

As it turned out, it was a good decision. I was able to stay with the group, and finished with lead group (but need to work on the sprint). The speeds were high, there were thrills and spills (nothing like riding with 50 other cat 5s in a 40mpd descent). Good times.

Public Service Announcement

Working It

Now that some signs that spring is here (though wetter than normal), it's time to start working it on the bike. This past week featured trails dry enough to finally commute to work on. Here's a snap from the first trail commute of the year, on the 29er.

Between mountain biking and dabbling in crit racing (more like a crit beat down), I'm feeling a bit worked.

I'm not the only one in the family working hard though, as 2008 has been pushing a large load preparing the legs for walking.

Of course, when pushing the body, it's important not to neglect recovery.

Earth Day 2009

Easter Tradition

Easter - be ye Christian or pagen, there's something special about this holiday and the return of spring. For us, Easter is a change to enjoy the new spring as a family, indulge in candy, hunt for eggs, and witness the queen of the classics, Paris - Roubaix. 

In Salt Lake we get ready the first week in April with our own version of the race, a circuit race with 5 mile laps featuring 1.75 miles/lap of gravel and dirt, or was the case last week, mud. I don't recall having been as dirty after any of the cross races as I was after the hell of the north salt lake, which featured wet/muddy roads, a stiff wind, 40 degree temps, and biting snow and rain. I think my bike may be clean again sometime in June.

This year's Paris - Roubaix was another classic race, with the lead group torn apart by crashes on the pave, with Tom Boonen getting it done the third time in his career... classic.

Magnificent

I bought the new U2 album on a whim, and I gotta say I am enjoying a lot more than I thought I would. Our newest addition is really digging it... 9 months old and he's got perfect rhythm.

Perspective

Before you go and get all excited...

Try to keep it in perspective...

The Knack

Must be hereditary...

I'm afraid he's got... the knack.

Medieval Times

Gather 'round and let me tell you a story of the old ways, where trees were felled, cut into pulp, mixed with water, and dried into sheets. Where words were then printed onto the sheets of paper, which were then bound together and transported through the land.

That was the old way, where night stands looked like this...

Of course, as the old ways faded into obsolescence, fewer resources were consumed, and now our night stands look like this...

Indeed, prior to the Kindle 2 it was Medieval Times.

I was fortunate to receive a kindle 2 from my wife for my birthday, a gift truly worth the 3 month delay from Amazon, and only rivaled by the xmas gift I received from my son ( a do it yourself pine-scent car air freshener - no lie!).

February 2009 Commute Roundup

I got 16 commutes in during February, making it a total for the year of 28 commutes by bike.

Keep Hope Alive

Budget cuts, lay offs, credit crisis, plunging stock markets, bank nationalism, government activism... at last, something to give us all hope...

Crawling - Version 3.0, Version 1.0

Some things never change.

Cool Website

For those of you who ever listen to music and wonder "how did they make that sound?", check out Guitar Geek and it's Rig Database. Enter the name of a musician or look them up by band name, and see a diagram of their rig.

Seeing this reminds me of a youthful indiscretion that may have involved cashing in the college fund's worth of savings bonds, riding the bus to Portland Music, then humping what felt like 100 lbs of Fender amp miles from the bus stop back home - the need to rock cannot be denied. Scored a band slot on the basis of having that large amp...

Rock on.

New Tradition

With the emergency Christmas temporarily postponed with the passage of an economic stimulus plan, I was feeling a little short changed in the holiday department - president's day definitely took a beating after the Bush 43 presidency. 

After some reflection, however, said "Why the hell not have a good time on president's day"?

We celebrated with a BBQ on a beautiful February day here in the Wasatch front (behind the Zion curtain).

Plus, there's nothing better than chilling on the deck with a nice cold one.

Zero Tolerance

Things were getting bad - total lawlessness in the house. When a man can't enjoy some fresh spinach without anarchy prevailing, it's time to crack down.

The trouble with zero tolerance policies is they tend to be inflexible. Still, if we give in now, what's the use of having a policy?

Random Stuff from the Weekend

Too much going on these days to put together a coherent blog posting, but here's a sample from the nice breather this three day weekend provided.

In no particular order...

1. The baby is getting his crawl on - between his focused demeanor and his new found mobility, he's into everything.
2. Starting to get ramped up for the season - Hell of the North Salt Lake is less than 50 days away. I spent six hours on the trainer this weekend - couple of Sergio Leonne westerns, some Robot Chicken, and the live Muse DVD helped pass the time. Need to figure out what group to race with - 45+, Masters 35+ B, ??? Same with the mountain bike - age group or open single speed division - so many way to taste bitter, bitter defeat. 
3. Watched a couple movies - Shaun of the Dead and On the Waterfront - both classics in their own way - one with zombies, one with Brando.
4. Marshalled the whole family down south and ran the Ikea maze, only to forget the dimensions of the narrow space we're looking to fill with a shelf unit.
5. Tapped some Bushmill's 10 year single malt my sweet thang gave me for Valentine's day.
6. Started the 2008 tax return.
7. Rode several laps around the block with the older kids - both have figured out via observation that cold, snow, and dark are no impediment to riding a bike.

Stimulus and Other Infographics

I thought this graphic from creditloan.com was interesting (click on the image to see it in its entirety):

And this infographic from from the Economist daily charts was plain astonishing:

January Commute Summary

Between some work obligations requiring that I drive, some icy weather, and other things messing with my schedule, I was only able to get in 12 commutes. Nothing really stands out, other than it being pretty cold, at least in the mornings. I'm at the point where 35+ degrees can be comfortable.

Super Bowl Sunday

Exit Bush 43

Finally the end of 8 years of Bush... hard to know what to say, but consider the 5.6 trillion dollar ten year surplus he inherited coming into office, and the 6 trillion dollar ten year deficit he left us with. Don't let the door hit you on the way out, Mr. Bush.

Riding home, I spied the genius owner of this truck removing the wit and wisdom he had proudly displayed on the back of his truck. It was sweet watching him do this under cover of darkness on a sub 30 degree afternoon. 

MLK Day

UPS WTF?

I guess UPS uses a different calendar than the rest of us... this was not what I envisioned when forking over for the two-day shipping. At least the package got to visit Louisville KY before returning to California, where it took a breather before it embarked on a saunter to the Pacific Northwest.

Tracking Detail

Your package has been delivered.
 
Tracking Number:
1Z 64W 127 02 3991 819 9
Type:
Package
Status:
Delivered
Delivered On:
12/31/2008 3:32 P.M.
Location:
FRONT DOOR
Delivered To:
WEST LINN, OR, US 
 
Shipped/Billed On:
12/20/2008
Service:
2ND DAY AIR
Weight:
9.00 Lbs

Package Progress
Location
Date
Local Time
Description
TUALATIN,
OR, US
12/31/2008
3:32 P.M.
DELIVERY

12/31/2008
4:39 A.M.
OUT FOR DELIVERY

12/31/2008
3:44 A.M.
DESTINATION SCAN
TUALATIN,
OR, US
12/29/2008
8:00 A.M.
ADVERSE WEATHER CONDITIONS

12/29/2008
1:26 A.M.
ARRIVAL SCAN
PORTLAND,
OR, US
12/28/2008
8:08 P.M.
DEPARTURE SCAN
WEST SACRAMENTO,
CA, US
12/22/2008
6:30 A.M.
ARRIVAL SCAN
MATHER,
CA, US
12/22/2008
6:00 A.M.
DEPARTURE SCAN
MATHER,
CA, US
12/21/2008
5:57 P.M.
ARRIVAL SCAN
LOUISVILLE,
KY, US
12/21/2008
3:57 P.M.
DEPARTURE SCAN

12/21/2008
9:51 A.M.
ARRIVAL SCAN
SALT LAKE CITY,
UT, US
12/21/2008
5:14 A.M.
DEPARTURE SCAN
SALT LAKE CITY,
UT, US
12/20/2008
9:58 P.M.
ARRIVAL SCAN

12/20/2008
8:55 P.M.
DEPARTURE SCAN

12/20/2008
7:16 P.M.
ORIGIN SCAN

12/20/2008
5:32 P.M.
PICKUP SCAN
US
12/20/2008
8:05 P.M.
BILLING INFORMATION RECEIVED

Starting the New Year Right

First thing I did this morning was to get my sorry self out to my 25 degree garage to do a field test on the trainer. Given a lot of my workouts will be on the trainer in January and February, I wanted to establish a power baseline on the trainer, especially as I cannot seem to maintain the same power levels on the trainer as I can outside (must be a character flaw).

Anyway, the numbers ended up being a lot better than I'd anticipated, which is good as I've got some big goals for the year.