It's cold... I hate the cold...

Lots of blog updating to do, especially now that I have a camera again, and can take lots of fun pictures. Plus, it's too cold to go outside and do much of anything anyway. Ugh.

Speaking of cold, last weekend, Seth, Kendall, Matt Dempsey, Neo and I all hit up Nederland for some snowshoeing. It was cold, it was windy, as you can see in this picture. But we went up to a lake near Eldora and it was cool. Very thick ice, very cool bubbles and cracks in the ice. VERY cold wind blowing across the lake...



It was worth it for the hippy muffins at the co-op though.

Also started the new job this week. So that's been stressful. It should be a very positive thing, I'm just struggling through that new part of the job where I have absolutely no idea of what the hell is going on, and what I'm supposed to be doing. Man is that frustrating... I'm out of my office, and back into cube world, but at least now I have a window! I couldn't even see a window from my old place, so having real sunlight is a nice new thing. I can even see the flatirons from the window. The only bad thing, is that I know they will be torturing me as the weather gets nicer, and I want to be outside playing!



I've been playing with the new camera, so how about some entertaining pet pictures? -Speaking of pictures, that reminds me that I got a sweet new digital picture frame for xmas as well. Perfect for the new desk! And with some nice summer pictures, it does a perfect job of torturing me as we're in the depths of freezing cold winter. Anyway... pet pictures...

Jordan;


Taylor;


Leigh;

Tiny Baby Jeebus

Happy Baby Jeebus Day!



This year, Baby Jeebus day was at our house. So the night before Jessica and I had everyone over for some tasty dinner. We got to open a few gifts and then off to bed. Luckily, I remembered to leave the door of the wood stove open, so Santa could make his way down, and he left a few more presents for everyone. Yes, the picture above is from Xmas morning... it was still dark out... that's how early we were up! And it was also snowing already, at 5am. It went on snowing for the entire day, so there were no questions whether or not it was a white xmas. Me, I definitely would have preferred a "tropical xmas".

I must have been good this year, I got a shiny new telescope to play with!



...of course, the only problem is that it's been cloudy ever since xmas. Sure, there's been some times that you could peak between the clouds, but then it was windy with temperatures below 20 degrees. I sure do love winter.

I also got the complete Planet Earth DVD series! Awesome! And the last biggie was a new camera! The ever so sexy Sony DSC-T200. Basically the newest version of the camera I sadly lost a few weeks back, and this one doesn't disappoint, it's been phenomenal! And finally, I can get back to regularly including some more pictures in the blog again.



Plenty of other fun stuff too... And I suppose Jessica was good too, since she got some great goodies as well. I can't wait for her to put down her new mini MP3 player, so I can steal it! And she got a comfy bed set too, that Leigh seems to enjoy.

Friday, which means?

Yep... the tradition carries on... It's Friday, so that means recovering from this weeks training with some beer, while it's cold and snowing outside. A little change though, I took a break from the Belgian beers, and have one of my very favorite wheats, Hacker-Pschorr Weisse. This one was a favorite, from the first time I tried it, many years ago. Cloudy, unfiltered, creamy, and almost like a banana bread. Sooo tasty...



Ironically, the Fine Living channel's "Thirsty Traveler" is on, and tonight's episode is Belgian beers. Convincing me only more, that I need to go to Belgium, for the 800 different beers, the history, the architecture, frites and of course, cyclocross racing.


So as promised, big changes... Today was my last day at the current job. That's right, I have a new job! Time to move on. Still in Boulder, now working for the University of Colorado. I wish I could have taken all of next week off, but instead, I'm hoping right back on the horse, starting the day after baby jeebus' birthday. At least the good part, is that I'm in, in time for the holiday vacation pay. I'm pretty excited for the change, which is helping keep the anxiety of a new job slightly less. More information once I start, I'm sure.

Other big changes, coming soon...

Don't bother looking

I'm almost afraid to post this...

Only because I haven't seen it show up on some triathlete forum yet, or some techie bike forum for TT guys, that think testing the rolling resistance of tires on rollers can be directly related real world situations on the road.

Here you go... http://www.cerevellum.com/

Sure, it's meant as a camera to watch out for cars behind you. And like that isn't bad enough, thinking of people riding their bikes, terrified of cars coming up behind thme, rather than watching where they are actually going. Plus, what happens when you look at the screen, see a car coming, and since it will appear to be on the left side of the screen, your mind automatically makes you steer your bike to the right, so that you are hit squarely by the teenager driving moms SUV at 20mph over the speed limit while texting and driving in the bike lane?

Worse... someone (Triathlete/age group TTer) will find this and think, "Wow, I could turn the camera around, and use it as a video screen to watch where I'm going, and therefore keep my head down in an aerodynamic tuck!" Okay, first thing, your fancy aero helmet is designed to work with your head looking down the road. It gets exponetnially LESS aerodynamic than a standard helmet when you look down, and raise the tail into the air. Next, in my bike shop experience, triathletes tend to have 1,000% more pinch flats than "road" cyclists. Why? Not because of their silly light weight tires, but rather because they think they are aero, riding with their head looking straight down, marveling at the musculature of their ripped legs, and they run over every piece of road debris and pothole on the course. This device will only increase their propensity to ride with their head staring straight at their stem.

And even better... they the site mentions adding a powermeter readout to the screen. That will have the timetrialists falling over themselves! How perfect! You can ride with your head down, AND stare constantly at your power number for perfect pacing!

Maybe to make cyclists using this device safer for all of us, we could borrow another car technology; the "back-up beeper" that trucks use. Instead, riders using this device can just have them constantly beeping, so once you approach these people, you can give them a WIDE berth. They likely won't hear you coming anyway since they'll probably be the same people that insist on racing with their iPod cranked up.

Still Winter

Yep... still winter here.

This past weekend was more of the same, but with the added enjoyment of our friend "Wind" added into the equation. The snow is bad enough. Snow sucks. But I can usually deal with the snow. Once the wind comes though, and starts drifting walkways, driveways, and entire roadways shut, well, then I get pretty cranky. Even better, it looks like there is even more wind and more snow in the forecast for the last half of this week.

Saturday I got out for some snowshoeing with Tom, Randy, D-rock and Neo again. Being without a camera, I'm still at the mercey of others to send me pictures to post. But it was a lovely day out. Only horribly windy in some spots, but the rest were good, and the sky was incredibly clear and blue. Just went in the forest near the house trying to get lost again. But not too lost, because later that night Jessica and I were headed out to get our Baby Jeebus Birthday tree.

I think Jessica picked out a great one. Sunday evening we had Alex over for some dinner and to help set up the tree. It was a big night for Alex, her first samplings of perogies (I even made her my special Vegan-friendly recipe), and helping to decorate her first christmas tree ever. I think she had fun, and she at least "said" that she liked the perogies. We also tried a new Penfolds variety, The Koonuga Hill Shiraz. Everyone agreed... quite delicious!

Other than that, big changes coming up soon. Stay tuned for more...

Belgian Friday

It's starting to turn into "Cold, possibly snowy, Belgian" Friday... No snow this week, at least on Friday evening, but it's all of 5 degrees outside. It's time to recover from another tough week on the trainer. And what better way to that than a light spin, followed by some pizza. And most importantly, carbo-loading - also known as beer tasting.

Tonight I picked the tastiest looking of three Belgian beers at the "package goods store". The first pick, that I had today is St. Bernardus Abt 12. My review goes something like this; WOW! Absolutely wow. This beer is so smooth, and so full of flavor. Dark and creamy with a ridiculously long lasting head. The way this beer balances it's many flavors, yet is so smooth, is really it's beauty. Highly, highly recommended, and in the top percentile of www.ratebeer.com



I'm fully prepared, and will have my favorite chocolate afterwards. Ritter Sport - Milk Chocolate with Butter Biscuit. Now we're talking.

And if that's not enough, Half Baked is the movie tonight on Fuse. Good stuff right there, a truly "deep" movie. No wonder Dave Chappelle got his own show.

Snow, snow, and more snow

This week has been a mess. A mess at work, but also with the weather. Nothing but snow, and more snow.

Saturday I got to sleep in at least, then made some homemade buttermilk pancake. Jessica even got xmas tree shaped ones, because I'm crazy. (Sorry, picture to come later). Rode the trainer for way too long and did a ton of house cleaning. Exciting stuff.

Sunday got out for some snowshoeing with Neo, Randy, D-rock and Frank. That was a good time. The snow was better than I figured it would be, but I might have still just been used to the 3+ feet we had all last winter. It was a good time, though a bit windy in spots. We did a nice 3.5hr loop right from the house.



The rest of the week? Hell, I don't even remember. It's been one long Monday. And a bad Monday at that... Plus it's been cold. Way cold. And at snowy at least half the time. I think I had some funny stuff this week at least, to keep me sane.

Monday Jessica and I went to Whole Paycheck to grab some dinner. Now I don't think I ever go there and spend less than $20. Maybe that's why I caught some lady who also bought her dinner there, but on the way out was stuffing fistfuls of little salt and pepper packets into her bag. Not the kind of fistful where you might just REALLY like salt, more like, the kind where you take them home and put them in the drawer where you keep all your salt packets, and ketchup packets that you took extra of.

Tuesday it snowed. And I was driving down the canyon, slow enough as it was, when the little train of cars I was in came nearly to a stop. Why!? What now!? Is there an upside down car in the canyon, like usual? No... some dude is RIDING HIS MOTORCYCLE down the canyon! 15 degrees, snow-packed road, with heavy falling snow, and this dude took his motorcycle to work.

Wednesday I was put onto the fact that one of the number one selling gifts for this year are talking jeebus dolls. These... well, these are just scary. Don't bother going to your local ,evil. Walmart for them, because they are out of stock. He features "63 seconds of easy to memorize scripture". Great. Personally, he's kinda scary.



Yesterday the infamous Mitchell Report came out about doping in baseball, and the world (other than the media) sighed a collective "who gives a fuck" and also a quick, "no shit, sherlock". Of course baseball dudes doped. But who cares? Do you think the fans at home care? Hell no, they've said as much. Baseball is one of the most boring sports in the world - even the fatties all doped to the gills. I'd rather watch golf, at least the announcers have that soothing tone. Maybe if had all the baseball players cracked out on some coke to speed things up. Or maybe some acid, and then we could zoom the tv cameras in on the dude in the outfield as he envisioned giant oranges that were storming out of the stands to attack him. Now that would be entertainment!

And today... with more snow, the site that caught my eye was some dude jogging with a ski mask on. Well, I guess there was snow falling... but dude, a ski mask!?

Snowy Friday

What else can you do on a cold, snowy Friday? I vote for drinking a fine, fine Belgian brown ale. Tonights selection is Brasserie des Rocs. It's quite good. I liked the La Folie that recently had better, but this one is definitely delicious. It goes down extremely easily as well... which could be a dangerous thing at 9.2% alcohol.



It is a perfect beverage for a recovery night though. My legs were fried yesterday for my training ride, and beer is very often a perfect recovery drink. It must be the carbs, right? After all, I have to prepped for a tough trainer workout tomorrow. Sadly, a trainer workout, since it's snowing now, and the weather is only supposed to get worse through the weekend.

While enjoying my beverage, and "recovering" I also watch Elementality for like the 5th time. It's a great movie, and always perfect for motivating me to dig out the board. With the garage clean, and nothing but bad weather forecast for the next week... I just might have to work on the ol' style. Maybe finally make that quarter or half pipe... Hmmm. First, I need a new deck.

New Jersey, Weddings, and Winter

Last Thursday Jessica and I went out to Durty Jersey for a long weekend. The trip started off rough, up at 4am so we could get to the airport in time for our 7am flight. Somehow, both of our flights that day left early. That's basically unheard of for my luck at the airports. I was back on schedule though, as I got pulled out for special testing as we passed through security. I was feeling neglected, as the last time I flew, was the first time in 5 flights that I WASN'T pulled. I must have that "early-thirties, pissed at the current government, non-conformist" look about me... which I welcome.

It's always fun going back to the old side of the country. Our first stop once we had our rental car was the city market in Philadelphia. I had been waiting all day for my incredibly messy cheesesteak for lunch, and I was dissapointed! Some brief exploring of Philly as we drove through, but only brief as we were trying to get out of the city before rush hour hit. We stayed in a hotel in Delaware, which actually was a first for me. I chose the "Business Suite" for it's set-up and the fact that it was advertised having wireless internet service. With no signal to be found, we called the front desk to find out that "oh, the wireless definitely won't reach down to that room, but you can get it in the lobby". Nice.

That same evening, we also hit up a Dunkin' Donuts, and a real pizzeria! I wasn't hungy... but I needed that food! We also made sure to stop by a local store to pick up 6 or 8 (maybe 10!) boxes of Tastykakes! What can I say? We had to stock up!

Friday we spent the day with Jessica's grandparents which was pretty fun. Then hit up Longwood Gardens to see their flowers and displays, and later even went back to see their light displays. It is of course, the season of Baby Jeebus' birthday.

A lot of Saturday was centered around the wedding of Jessica's cousin, our real reason for traveling out there. It was a nice little affair, though I lost track of how many times I was asked if we were taking notes for our wedding that's coming up! The nice thing is that we are well on our way to having most things all set! The wedding was a lot of fun though, and it's been awhile since I've been to one that had such an active dance floor.

Sunday it was time to head home, and what a journey it was. Snow and sleet in Philadelphia made for delays. I had the worst seat on the plane, made all the more terrible by sitting around for 45 minutes as we went through the line for de-icing. At least we had some time till our 2nd flight was scheduled to depart Hot-lanta. Of course though, that flight was also delayed, so it was 10.20 before we left, which meant I wasn't snug in my bed until 2am that night.

Oh well, great trip overall, and I'm pretty sure I visited a Dunkin' Donuts at least once a day. We had cheesesteaks, real pizza, found a good Italian restaruant, I had a pint of Yuengling beer, hit up a Wawa, and we brought back a selection of Tastykakes. All the main points of a Jersey visit.

See ya' bitches!

Free spot in Heaven (well, $24.95 for the "All Access Pass" which you know I'm getting!) reserved just for me!
http://www.reserveaspotinheaven.com/