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Counting My Losses

By soiledchamois on May 1, 2017 in Random

After last Tuesday’s ride, the rest of the week was lost to illness and shit weather. Thursday night I finally got more than 2 hours of sleep, as a result I felt the best I had in days on Friday. Not “let’s go for a ride” good, but good enough to catch up on some adulting, then hang with B-Man and Jake (the dog) in the yard of the Cul-de-sac Shack, capturing some of the backyard nature that can be found around our home with my camera. Due to a complete lack of doing anything, all of today’s images are from that afternoon of backyard slack.

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Wallowing

By soiledchamois on April 27, 2017 in Random

As I mentioned here in my last digital dispatch of dystopian cycling life, I appear to have contracted some sort of allergy. Since Tuesday morning I’ve been dealing with itchy eyes, sinus pressure, a scratchy throat, clogged ears, coughing, endless streams of snot, and a bright red nose that only goes to further the general public’s assumption that I am some sort of jobless, beer drinking scoundrel.

Alas, it’s taken me two days, and two sleepless nights to finally admit; I don’t think this is an allergy, I think I’m ill. If it’s not illness, it’s one bastard of an allergy, and the trees from which the pollen spores fled should be burnt to the ground by hordes of torch wielding warriors on horseback, Game of Thrones style.

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By The Numbers

By soiledchamois on April 1, 2017 in Cycling, Random

I don’t want to sound negative, but there was nothing all that special about today’s ride. After two days of wet snow and rain, the weather was near perfect today, the wind was so calm it felt like cheating, and I completed my 30+ mile road loop without much mental or (perceived) physical effort. It was swell, but I’m not going to blow smoke up your blog reading asses by telling you it was something all that amazing. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll take that shit all day long, but it was nothing special.

So, I give you three photos, by the numbers, that sum up the ride and my Saturday…

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Dealing With The Lion II

By soiledchamois on March 31, 2017 in Random

Earlier this month I lamented the fact that after a pretty sweet February of warmer weather and riding, March had come in like a lion with snow, ice, rain, and a lack of riding. Now here we are on the last day of the month and March is still twerking its wet, cold, slushy ass cheeks in the face of central Michigan like a trailer court queen drunk on wine coolers, wooing her step dad into paying for that dolphin tattoo she wants on her ankle. Thankfully I found some time–in between those unwanted wintry twerks–to get some miles in.

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Same Old, Same Old

By soiledchamois on March 15, 2017 in Random

So far this week [month?] there’s been a distinct lack of doing stuff outdoors, so today’s photo is from a ride back in February. I like the photo well enough but I hate the utility lines that cut through the middle of it. Yes, through the magic of Photoshop I removed them and the pic looked fine, but it didn’t feel right. I have no problem with retouching images to get rid of sauce spatter on a food photo, the zit on your nose, those nips poking through your wife’s t-shirt, or to make myself NOT look like the poster model for the upcoming, soon to be self-produced movie Dad Bod Gone Wild, Every Day I’m Jigglin’. In other words viva la narcissism! when it comes to spatter, zits, nips, and blubber, but in landscapes and/or documentary style photography I find it creepy and wrong (like hearing your parents talk about sex). So the power lines stay.

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Loving a Whitetard

By soiledchamois on March 11, 2017 in Random

Last Friday Wifey and I went out for a couple of beers before dinner at a local college bar/pizza place. It was fun to hang out with her, talk one on one, and catch up on stuff at the end of the week.

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Coming Clean

By soiledchamois on January 23, 2017 in Random

My family and I spent a long weekend back in Pennsylvania paying our respects to Wifey’s grandfather who passed away last Wednesday. It was a sad weekend indeed, but it was a beautiful ceremony and it did well to celebrate the life of a great man.

With all that car travel, sadness, stress, and a jam packed non-stop schedule came poor diet choices and a complete lack of exercise. I feel like I put on ten pounds in four days!

Now home, I was anxious to bet back into the routine of daily exercise and eating healthier home cooked foods. Sadly the weather would not been cooperating for outside activities. As I’ve mentioned before, the past two weeks it was ice and slush, most of that is gone but the dirt roads are a quagmire of mud and standing water. The paved roads are clear but today we were socked in with fog and misty rain most of the day and I somehow lost my rear blinky in the garage somewhere. Not wanting to be struck down by a cement truck, I needed options.

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Ice, Lakes, and Goodbyes

By soiledchamois on January 18, 2017 in Random

A real winter continues to elude Michigan as we received another round of freezing rain and ice, another two days of school cancellations, and another round of long-time Michiganderburghers talking about how “we don’t get the winters like we used to.” Hell even as a mere seven year vet of the Mitten State I find myself saying that! “I remember back in 2010! Now that was a winter!”

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Snow Day

By soiledchamois on January 10, 2017 in Random

The weather goofs were right, we got snow. Yeah! About four inches or so, then it started raining and turned everything into a slushy, sloppy mess. Boo!! Now we’re getting 35+ MPH winds, more rain, and the temps are supposed to be dropping into the low twenties later. That should REALLY make things awesome by morning. I’ve learned to tolerated winter in the past few years by riding the Fatterson and snowshoeing, but wet snow, rain, ice, is about the worst ever. What sport or outdoor activity is done best in slush? Exactly.

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Workouts & Sprouts

By soiledchamois on January 9, 2017 in Cat 5 Cooking, Random

I mentioned at least one to seventeen times in my two recent crap blog posts that I’ve been trying to workout more, even when that means not riding. I also mentioned that I’m trying to eat a little better, and a little cleaner. Thankfully that has all been happening as planned.

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