Memorializing & Stuff

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Sunday was a blissful day off the bike, fucking around in the pre-summer, holiday weekend sun. Late afternoon Wifey, B, and I headed south of town for a picnic with some friends. They live off one of the dirt roads I ride on often and it was a picturesque setting for a cookout. On one side of their house was a never-ending field of recently planted soy beans, and on the other was a wheat field. We had beers, grilled chicken, talked, had a bonfire, and goofed off. It was pretty darn next to perfect.

For some reason I had fitful night of sleep on Sunday (bad gas), and woke up Monday craving more and more sleep, and wishing my gut could rid itself of all that Texas Caviar I ate. In any event, I was happy to have the Memorial Day holiday to chill and get out on my bike.

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I thought about driving up for another go at the MMCC trails, but was in the end was content to hang ’round the house for a bit, make some French press coffee, and then head out for a local dirt road ride.

The wind was blowing pretty steady from the west, and those first 8 miles westward were a taint-grinder, only made slightly easier by being all on pavement.

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Once off of pavement, the next 17 miles would be all dirt and gravel roads featuring not-s0-bad cross winds, blessed tailwinds, and more than a few cows out munching grass in the Memorial Day sun.

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The just over 30 mile loop I did has become my go-to road loop from the house. It used to be roughly 35 miles, but then we moved out of town, and four miles of paved town riding was eliminated. I keep saying that I’m going to make up those miles somewhere out on the dirt, but have yet to really do it. My slack is strong.

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Once home it was time to chill on the porch with a beverage or three, watch no cars drive by the house, and listen to some tunes before throwing some chicken thighs on the grill, roasting some asparagus, and cooking up some homemade mac and cheese.

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It was a really good holiday weekend, and a great way to kick off Summer 2016.

Later.

Here I Go Again, Fade To Black

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Thursday night I met my friend, and fellow cyclist, Mike at our local brew pub for a couple of pints. While we were sitting there watching the hockey game (LET’S GO PENS!) the song Here I Go Again by Whitesnake came on the pub’s radio. I remarked to Mike, and our barmaid Gale, that for some reason this was my high school class song (class of ’89). Even though I didn’t vote for the song (my vote was cast for Metallica’s Fade to Black), there was a certain sense of nostalgia as I listened to the song and watched the Pens, something that I did quite a bit of through the 80s and early 90s before being priced out of attending games, and turned off by the NHL’s relentless expansion teams.

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It Lives, I Lived

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As I mentioned in my last post, based on recent back issues and the realization that fitness and any sort or racing wasn’t going to happen this year, I had made the not-so-executive decision to sell my five month old Trek Procaliber hardtail. It was boxed and ready to ship when the bike gods intervened and the buyer decided–probably wisely so–to go with his LBS to make sure he got full warranty coverage. I in turn took this as some sort of miracle from above and proceeded to unbox the bike and build it back up.
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Not THAT Crazy

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I gotta say, last week was a darn good week’s worth of riding. There was no singletrack, and the rides weren’t all that long, but I managed to get 8.5 hours worth of riding in, which isn’t too bad for a beer loving, burrito eating, crap cyclist with a bad back like myself. Speaking of my back…

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Savoring It

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I mentioned in a post earlier this week that we had some absolutely crap and freezing weather here last weekend. Until last weekend, I had never seen snow in May in my entire life…EVER. All that seems to be frozen, E. coli riddled water under the bridge right now, as the past three days have been a springtime enema of perfect 65˚ temps, bright sunshine, calm winds, and blue sky. So, as busy as I’ve been with some projects, I’ve been making sure to squeeze some ride time in.

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The Gerela Ride

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After Friday’s pretty OK, could have been better but I’ll take it, mountain bike ride, Mother Nature got her giant panties in a bunch and cast wind, rain, cold temps and snow (yes, snow in May) down upon the central Michigan area on Saturday and Sunday. It really was a kick in the longing for a real spring teeth. The weather didn’t get in the way of me riding, but a weekend packed with soccer matches, and MPSC commitments did, and I have to tell you, that cold and blustery weather made for some cold ass soccer watching.

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Wind in Black & White

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Tuesday I was pretty bogged down with home, work, and family stuff, so I snuck out for a quickie. Just before I got ready to roll, I checked the weather and it said there was a seven mile an hour wind coming from the east. That was fine with me, anything in the single digits around these parts is a blessing from the cycling gods above. However as I sat in the garage bucking down my shoes, I heard the garage door rattling. “Hmmm…. that’s a pretty strong seven mile an hour wind I thought to myself.”

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Closer To Not Being Closer To The End

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Playing Catch Up, Monday 1o:50 PM

This blog is funny in that if I go one day without posting something, I get the itch to post something; whether it be some unfunny commentary, tales of one of my short and shitty rides, or just a couple of photos. However if I go more than four days without posting I reach blissed out on Valium and sleep med levels of apathy about ever posting anything again. Then once I hit five days without posting something, apathy gives way to creative ennui, or I actually go for a ride and have something that I feel like blathering on about.

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As Expected

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In the midst of various home and freelance work projects I looked at the weather forecast for the week and saw that Tuesday looked to be the one day over the next few that I could finally get out on some singletrack. Despite my left hip and lower back being in various stages of suck, I forced myself to load up the PrOcal and head up to the trails.

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