This week is B-Man’s Spring Break. Sadly, it hasn’t been all that spring-like, nor are we “spring-breaking” anywhere due to fact we’re buying a house in fifteen days’ time and moving in eighteen. However all is not lost, because B has been enjoying sleeping in and goofing off, and he did go on a fun day trip with Wifey and some of his friends yesterday.
Monday was more productive than usual for me since I’ve taken on the (volunteer) duties of redoing the website for B-Man’s soccer club and I was soccer balls deep into putting the finishing touches on a locally hosted version of my ideas to present to the board that night. I got a 3 mile treadmill run in, got the temp site done, got it approved at our meeting that night, and now I am up to my fatty pelvis deep in creating the real website. It’s been a lot of work, but I’ll be happy to see the club get a way better site (in my opinion) and do my part to help the club. God knows I have nothing else to offer them other than annual fees and a son who is an awesome player.
If nothing else, the club project is the continued learning/self teaching/self loathing of stuff that I was never taught in a crap two-year art school–’cause Web design classes weren’t around in 1990–and who knows, it might lead to some cash paying/bartering jobs in the future. I’ll post a link when it’s done… if it’s ever done.
Saturday morning as I sat around drinking coffee and writing this digital fishwrap I finished my post by saying “time to air up the tires, charge the camera battery, and get out in the sunshine and calm winds while it lasts.” Well, the winds sure seemed calm here in town but when I got onto the open dirt roads north of town, the winds felt anything but calm. A stiff breeze came out of the west and cut right through my jacket and Craft windstopper base layer, keeping my nipples like two diamonds attached two fleshy beanbags full lard for nearly two-hours. Oh well, at least it was sunny.
After a weekend that featured back to back rides on the Boone, I haven’t been on a bike since. Other than some borderline useless Stankment™ based workouts, pre-moving chores, and some free design work for B’s soccer club, I’ve been a slug.
Wednesday I was jonzing to get out on the bike in the morning, but a winter storm was barreling down on Michigan and I didn’t want to get caught out in the snow storm, so I opted to attempt hiking in the woods again.
I was this close to writing a blog post about how the weather’s got me down and how I feel like a paper white turd. But just as I began to type I realized that every year since the winter of 2006 I have reached a point in the winter that I write some post about how the dark days, slush, ice, cold, and muck of winter have finally beat me down like a $5 hooker with an angry pimp. I guess just in writing those first sentences I have written it again, but I will go no further. Winter has not beat me down, but the lack of riding and physical activity has beat me down and has me looking and feeling like pre weight loss, pre pedo, pre jailed Subway Jared. Or like me circa 1990.
Thursday, 6:14 AM
On Wednesday I was filled with nervousness for a variety of reasons; the proud, yet daunting reality that my boy was turning 12, waiting for a response from our real estate agent concerning an offer Wifey and I made on a home, and I was attempting not to think about a job interview scheduled for Thursday morning. All of those things are good and/or potentially great things, but my mind can’t focus on too much change at once, so I knew I needed to get outside to blow the mental stink off of me.
That rear brake cable.
As expected, there has been little no time in the saddle since Saturday’s foray out onto the snirt roads. Most of that is due to doing a crap ton of other shiz that seemed more important than freezing my tits off out on some desolate frozen dirt road.
January is notoriously the hardest month for me to get through, especially here in Michigan; it’s long, cold, snowy, icy, and as of late it’s been foggy. Snow and ice on the ground, followed by rain and warmer temperatures meant that a heavy fog rolled into the Mt. Pleazy area on Friday night and it stuck around well into Saturday morning afternoon. Not ideal conditions for getting out for a road ride, but with the rains predicted to changeover to snow Saturday night, I wanted to get a few (emphasis on few) miles in.
The year 2015 is at an end. Time to reflect, ponder, hate, and give thanks for all the good and bad things that happened in 2015.
As the Christmas holiday approaches, riding has slowed down a bit. A drop in temperatures and high winds had me opting out of rides on Friday and Saturday. However Sunday I did get in the woods for a lap at MMCC on the Procaliber.
