DT's Fat Boy Deluxe Blog |
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"It's not that bicycling is so important, it is that everything else is equally unimportant."
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10.27.2004
Happenings
So this is pretty messed up. Go here and read it. The basic idea is that NYC is trying to make illegal to do Critical Mass rides. Being that this is a federal case, it's a very big deal. This goes much farther than NYC, it goes to the almost 400 cities that have embraced a critical mass ride. If you want to help out, write a letter and then shoot me an email and I'll give you the fax number to send that letter out. Not a lot of time though, it's gotta go out no later than tonight. Because this is so far reaching, don't think your opinion doesn't matter because your not in NYC, that's far from the truth. Let you voice be heard! While it's not a critical mass ride, it's pretty much the same thing. It's called the Solidarity Ride and it's held when most critical mass' go off, the last Friday of the month. It would be nice to get some people out to this one to let them know where we stand. For a critical mass ride in your area, look to this site: Critical Mass Info. Next on the list is the Tour de Swill, take 3...info is up on the Pedalshop board here. This Saturday, hopefully I can make this one. DT |
Bad Religion
No bike riding last night, just a kick ass rock show! I hit up the 9:30 Club last night with a couple of friends to see Bad Religion. They truely rocked the house. Gary came over to my house a little early and we loaded up on some DogFish Head 90 Minute IPA before heading over to Whitlows to meet up with Crosby who came through with the inside track to the guest list (thanks man!). At Whitlows, it was introduction time...Gary, Crosby, meet Smithwicks (pronounced smitticks). Lacy (bartender who incidently will also be working when we hit Whitlows for the Tour de Swill on Saturday) described it best - you taste the best of a Bass Ale and finish it off with the hoppy aftertaste of a Sierra Nevada...mmm good! From there we moved onto the club. While there was no line and no waiting, we could tell we were the old guys. Average age looked to be somewhere around 17. What to do, what to do, push on through to the upstairs bar where Crosby has a bartender hook up. We grab a few DogFish Head Immort Ales and before we know it the rocking has started. The crowd is charged up! We stay at the upstairs bar for about 5 songs before Gary decides he can't take it anymore, he has to go to the floor. I'm right behind him, but Crosby decides to stick to the bar...11% beer is hard to pass up, ha. We head to the floor level and being the behemoth that Gary is, he easily pushes his way through the crowd and lands us right into the pit. It was a good pit, none of those psycho "I was picked on as a little kid and I'm taking my frustrations out" kind of people, more like your everyday teenage angst type of crowd. A little rough, a little nakedness, but all the time very cordial. Somebody goes down and 3 people are picking that person up quick. That's the sign of a good pit. For some songs we stood in the crowd outside the pit, for others it was on like donkey kong. It was funny to see Gary bend over at the edge of the pit to tie his shoe and 4 guys come over to create a shield so people don't get bounced into him while he's down there. Should call him the Pit Boss... The band played a ton of old stuff and few select songs from their latest album. While their guitars are hard, their frontman Greg does a beautiful job of laying down those sweet intellectual lyrics in complete harmony. Greg has a PhD after all...boring he is not. After sweating clear through our clothes and on the edge of exhaustion, the show ended. We headed out to the cars. Back to the house for a little grub and off to lala land. A great show indeed. I remember at one time I used attend over 50 shows a year. That number has dramatically decreased in recent years. Partially due to ticket prices getting out of hand, but mostly because I managed to pull in the reins on my musical obsession. Kristin caught me at the tail end of my obsession, walking out of a Baltimore record store with 25 CDs and 4 vinyl...only to go back later that day to pick up more... While my interest in music and hearing new bands is still there, it's hard to justify the habits I used to have. Instead of going to a ton of shows, now I pick a few real quality ones. Beastie Boys was a great one and now I can add Bad Religion to the list. Both were bands I always wanted to see, so I can check them off the list. The show took me back to my high school days of punking it out at Twisters to Avail and Inquisition back in Richmond, a surprisingly great place to grow up for punk rock. So what will the next show be? Who knows, but hopefully it can live up to the string of great shows I've been to as of late. DT | 10.25.2004
Local Info
So with a little searching, I found some really good local info. For me that means info on the Pimmit Hills area. I wanted to see if anything followed Pimmit Run and it turns out we do have some paved path stuff that I don't think I've ever been on. Hope to try it out sometime this week. Finding that info brought some other little goodies. Lots of information on the Fairfax CCT out there. That link has a ton of map hookups, all broke out in sections. Looks pretty cool. Sometime I'd like to do an entire CCT ride. Technically it looks like the CCT doesn't go past Great Falls Park, but I know you could add Riverbend Park onto the backside of that for more mileage. The final trip mileage would be a good 40 miles or so. Not bad for a day of riding, even better if you took the whole day and did it an out and back! DT |
The PreSwill
While the Pedalshop post hasn't been updated, the Tour de Swill was to go off this past weekend, but was moved to Saturday, October 30. It would have been a nice day to hit some dirt if it hadn't rained/drizzled for the last 5 days, so instead a few of us got together just off the W&OD in Falls Church. We decided to sort out some kinks and ride what everyone would probably be riding next weekend. So Aaron, Steve, and myself met up where the W&OD meets Great Falls St. Aaron rode from Alexandria and met us at the spot, while Steve and I both drove - Steve was doing breakfast with some friends and my mechanical ability always has me running late. We started out just cruising up the W&OD. It wasn't long before we were in Arlington, but still on the W&OD. Then it was a classic example of just riding along, when it all goes wrong... I'm pedaling along behind the other two when wow, my left crank arm comes clear off the bike! It's still attached to my shoe. Keeping that foot on the ground made the one leg stop a little easier. Walk back a little ways, find the crankarm bolt and start to the arm back on. It's about this time the other guys notice I'm not there and roll back up on me. Now I've got the arm nice and snug, but just realized the bottom bracket cups have started to back out so now the left arm is rubbing the cup and if I pedal forward, the cup unscrews farther out. Great, now I can't pedal forward and I'm not good enough to ride the whole way backwards. Aaron looking to get in more miles heads up the trail to Big Wheel Bikes to leave his license and credit card to bring back the tool I need to tighten the bb cup. Steve and I start walking until we meet up with Aaron again. Wrong tool size, so Aaron heads back out and tries again. Second time is good and the cup is tight enough that it won't unscrew. We ride up to Revolution Cycles and drop the bike off to see if they can do a quick fix and see why it's happening. For the record, this is the second time the bb cups have backed out of the frame. Revolution says they can do it now if I have 30 minutes...that I got, we headed over to Whitlows and grabbed some grub and 2 pitchers of Smittwicks beer. Got a chance to catch up with the Whitlows staff who I used to be neighbors with. After some beer and discussion we headed back to Revolution, turns out it's just a crappy bb and is known for having issues with the cups backing out or binding in the axle. They basically took it out and reinstalled it super tight so it would last the rest of the day. Finally back on the roads we pushed on through Clarendon and down into Rosslyn, finally cutting over to the beginning of the Key Bridge. We decided to skip Georgetown and jumped on the Mt. Vernon Trail. Took a left onto the wooden boardwalk and took that over to the 14 St. Bridge crossing. We ended up right near the Lincoln memorial and took an around the way trail to get to Constitution. I think it was decided here that any plans next weekend to use sidewalks or trails was abandoned for the good old road. Pedestrians are out in large numbers. We took a right on Constitution and rode down to 7th St. and hooked a left. Kept on riding, having fun with traffic (probably not a good idea later on in the ride, but for know it was ok) until we passed the MCI center. Next stop, RFD (Regional Food and Drink) where the beer flows like water. 90 Minute DogFish Head IPA on tap among others. Time to drink and grub again. We got in some heated political debates, brewpub talk, job smack, etc. Good times all around. A few IPAs later and it was time to head back out on the bikes. The plan was to head back the way we came and dump off on the Mt. Vernon Trail and take that into Old Town where Aaron could split off and we could finish our ride. Everything was good up until this point. Steve didn't eat anything except for breakfast and we all had our share to drink. Aaron took the turn to Alexandria and Steve didn't. I turned to tell Aaron, waited a couple of minutes then told Aaron to go on and I would go after Steve. Basically rode all the way back to Falls Church hauling ass, but never caught him. Not until I pulled up along side the cars, I hear my phone start to ring and I see Steve on the phone sitting in his car. Well with evening fast approaching, Steve rode with me back to my place and chilled out for a bit, then headed home. A pretty good day of riding for sure, not sure if I can make the real thing next weekend, but I'm gonna try. DT | 10.20.2004
Wakefield Run
Last night I was hoping to make it out to Rosaryville for the Tuesday night ride, but the weather put the kabosh on that. It was grey all day, it wasn't raining, but there was a foggy wetness that made the day raw. Ricky d. cancelled the ride for the night so Jason and I had to come up with a new plan for passing off his Scalpel to me. He said him and Peter were going to try and get a ride in at Wakefield, which is only 15 minutes away from the house, so that was the new plan. The original plan was to show up at Roasaryville, get the bike, then wait for everyone to leave the parking lot and head out on my own with Buster to work on his follow the leader skills. With the ride a bust and the new plan put into place and Buster still needing his exercise, I opted to do a trail run with Scud. This gave me the option of a slower pace with Buster off the leash, but close enough to me that I can put the leash on if need be. Scud, Buster, and I set off from the parking lot and cut through the piles of pebble rock to the singletrack. We cruised around basically doing the Wednesday at Wakefield race course, moving over to the creek trail and heading up the powerlines. At the top of the powerlines, Scud started to bonk - lack of food all day was making it tough. At least he had an excuse, I just haven't ran any since my triathlon, been a couple of months and I was hurting. Not bad hurting, like couldn't keep up, but more hurting like I haven't stretched my legs out with a good run in awhile. My muscles were tight, but no more than expected. We gradually made our way down from the powerlines and over to the trails next to 495. We took it really easy here, but Scud still needed a second cause he was losing his balance with all the bonking. We finally came out to the access road and it was the only time I had to put Buster on his leash. As we passed by the pedestrian bridge there was a couple walking their dog, looked like some kind of husky related dog, on a 20 foot leash. Buster saw the dog before I did, but didn't take off and allowed me to put him on his leash, meanwhile the other dog practically pulled his two owners down the side of the hill coming from the bridge. Lots of barking and snarling by the other dog, but Buster took it all in stride and just kept jogging towards the parking lot, didn't even get his hackles up. Back in the parking lot, Scud got some food and Buster got some water. Buster did great for the most part. He went off the trail to chase two squirrels, but as soon as we started to pass him he jumped in behind us. Also saw three deer and started into the high grass after them, but after a quick yell he came bounding back to the trail. Only ran into one person, looked like a mapping guy (big map and gps in hand, marking something). Buster basically sniffed him as we passed and didn't give him a second though, after all he had more running to do. All said and done I think we did about 30 mintues of running, a little walking here and there, but kept a pretty good pace for the most part. Scud is a much stronger runner than me, even if he is twice my age (almost). A good run, but I'm looking forward to teaching Buster how to follow me on the bike... DT | 10.19.2004
Comics
As a kid I was into comics, just as many other kids were. Well now as a grown up (some would argue that point) biker, there's a new (really old) comic book character - Sprocket Man! He's ready to whip out bike safety knowledge and whoop up on Ace the bike thief... DT | 10.18.2004
Busy Weekend
Friday night was the beginning of the second wave of "ring showing", only this time I was along for the ride. Kristin and I went to Ramparts in Alexandria (same place as Simply Fish) to meet up with some friends and watch the Sox get swept, except the game got cancelled. Not a bad night, but pretty exhausting. Decided to skip the trail maintenance day at Wakefield so I could sleep in. Managed all of 8:30am or so. I formulated a plan to go over to Jason Ashmore's place because being the nice guy he is, he's going to let me borrow his Cannondale Scalpel until I get my bike back from the shop. It will be interesting having ridden nothing but singlespeed and fixed gear for the past couple of years to ride a dually 27 speed. This all changed when I got a phone call from my Dad. My Mom's cousins who I've never met were in town visiting and they were doing a bbq at my other cousin's house around Glenn Burnie. So now the plan is to drive up there, show off Kristin's new ring, meet some new family, and then try to make it back before dark, ha. The bbq went well and we pushed back home. The weather had turned from a crappy, cloudy, rainy day into a sun shining beauty. Threw the fixie in the car and headed over to Burnsy's place, parked the car and rode into Clarendon for the tail end of Clarendon Day. Got there in time to drink a couple of beers, before the sky opened and threw up on us. Stinging, pelting rain with 25mph wind gusts. Music stopped, people started abandoning...I pulled my rain jacket out of my Chrome bag and pulled up another beer. It's about this time the group I meet up with decides to take it back to JB's house. They all load into the cars and I saddle up for the ride back. Remembering the last time I rode in the rain with the Brooks saddle, I wisely pulled a piece of tin foil from a nearby vendor's stand and covered the seat...no brown stains on the shorts - big bonus! Rode back at a good pace, keeping up with the cars until after we got past all the lights. It stopped raining about 2 minutes before I pulled into the driveway... Changed into an extra set of clothes I had in my bag and we all proceded to plow through some Fat Tire Ales. It was a long night with many hijinx...JB is now on double secret probation and must be monitored at all times when hanging out with me. Sunday I was hoping to get a good ride in, but before I could I had to finish the honeydo list. Between that and having to drive over to JB's to pick up my car/bike, play with the dog, etc. - before I knew what time it was, it was time to head over to Kristin's friend Rachel's for dinner - "I can see Blue and he's glorious!" More ring showing, steak eating, spirit tasting, cranium playing, and finally back home. Looking to hopefully make a Tuesday/Thursday ride this week, but we'll see... DT | 10.15.2004
Get Your Race On
We got two events coming up, first is an alley race, second is the invitational - SCREW BUSH ALLEYCAT Saturday Oct 23,04 Logan Circle 3PM - $5.00 party & prizes This is courtesy of Gwadzilla - our friendly ear to the underground... "an alleycat is an informal urban race often set up in a courier style format all on open roads all use at your own risk cycling is a dangerous sport I recommend that you stay in your car drive home and play video games cycling is not worth the risk" Thanks Joel! The second event is a big one, it's the 6 Pack Invitational and Uni's. It's held every year in Harrisonburg, VA the first weekend in November. The actual 6 Pack Invitational race takes place on Friday, November 5, 2004. Each of the racers must put up an 'ante' of a 24-case of 'good' beer and a bottle of Yeigermeister. What is Uni's you might be asking...well it's simply the Universe Off Road Fix Gear Championships. Many of you may remember Team Hugh Jass, they are consistently ahead of you and seem to all be wearing the same pair of shorts. Take a lesson from them and get out and ride your off road fixie... Contact the boy and girls at Shenandoah Bicycle for more information. DT |
Back to Brakes...
So yesterday I left work a couple minutes early and headed over to the City Bikes Chevy Chase store to pay manager Mike a visit. He called me earlier in the week to let me know my front Avid Juicy disc brake was back from SRAM. I got there right as he and his wife were leaving. He mentioned the note attached to the brake and that they had written down everything that they fixed. Evidently they had to replace the all the internal seals, the lever, and they even installed a new set of pads gratis. Totally appreciated. They basically said that all the internals of the brake lever had gone to shit. Now I don't think I leave the bike up on the car's roof rack too often. Yea when it's nice out the bike will be up there for weeks at a time, especially when I was riding everyday, but I took it down when I knew I wasn't riding for a week or when a big storm (hurricanes) came into town. Oh well, not much I can do about it now. Just have to keep the bike on the roof rack time as minimal as possible. So before heading to the store I stopped by the Chevy Chase supermarket and picked up a six pack of DogFish Head 60 Minute IPA to give to the mechanics. They are always willing to stop what they are doing to help me out and I figure it's always nice to get the beer when the bike comes into the store, not once it goes out... But yea, they needed to take manager Mike's Hayes disc brake off my bike and put it back on his Phil Woods single, then pull off my Avid rear disc to send back to SRAM since it is exhibiting the same crap as the front disc was and also install my front disc brake again. Kind of a pain in the ass since the rear will need to be bled in order to reinstall. With all this going on I chose to just leave the bike in their hands and let them send in the brake and do whatever they needed to when they had the time. Sucks cause I don't really have another bike to use right now, but I'll figure something out, still got the track bike... DT | 10.12.2004
Interesting Stuff
Ran across some cool stuff on the web today by accident. One is a blog of a tour of the East Coast Greenway - a 2600 mile bicycle ride from Canada to Key West. Check out East Coast Greenway Adventure - pretty cool because it actually uses Audioblogger to do most of the posting. Looks like the group just passed through D.C. last week. For those of you who have a GMail account - Google's free beta email system that allows you 1 Gig of space, there is a new tool called GMail Drive. I haven't tried it yet, but it basically allows you to integrate all that free space onto your hard drive. You can drag and drop things into the drive just like any other drive in Windows Explorer. Yet, it's physically stored in your email. Cool idea I think. Check it out, and if you don't have a GMail account yet, email me for one... And last, but not least - Pete Funk of Jetset Couriers started a new blog devoted simply to music, where he posts mini reviews on a band/CD and gives you a song for your listening pleasure. I've been following it since he recently started and I really like the taste in music - check out Bars & Guitars. DT |
Early Riding
Yesterday turned out to be just as busy as I thought it would, only not nearly as hectic. Since the government is closed for Columbus Day I ended up working in McLean, which meant no one hour commute. I took full advantage by sleeping in a little in the morning, but still heading into work early. That meant I was able to leave early, so I headed home and started packing my bike stuff for a quick romp at Wakefield. Called Gary on a whim to see if he was up for a ride and we decided to meet there. We ended up riding away from the lot right at 5pm. First we pushed through some large gravel deposits that were blatently blocking a trail entrance off the main gravel access road. Gary remarked how the entrance to the trail was kind of washed away and it doesn't look too sustainable, I guess time will tell. I think the amount of rain we got with all the storms probably loosened up the steep sides too much and they have been slowly falling away. The trail itself doesn't look too bad. In and out of the curving trail, really nice flow. Popped back out and crossed the access road for a short section of trail before cutting back into the woods and running a section of trail I previously only rode the other way while racing. It runs along side 495 and it's totally different the opposite way. There's one eroded steep crossing and I landed hard on a rock in the middle of it. It wasn't long before I heard the tell tale hiss of my Slime tube whistling out it's air. This was supposed to be a short ride and I didn't bring anything to fix the flat, luckily Gary was much more prepared than I was. After a struggle with the King Fun Bolts, I was back up and running. We finished out that section of trail and over the stream before cutting across and into the race track section to do a log hop, then instead of taking the normal bail out route, we took one of the steeper short sections straight up to the top. I made it 9/10 of the way up before a large network of roots stopped my flow. Then we quickly headed back down and made a cut onto the creek trail. When the creek trail ended we went left which took us up the back powerline hill in a round about way, then cut back down along the creek. This is where the adventure begins... First we crossed the stream, where there happens to be a complete, albeit rusted, bike in the middle of the stream on a tuft of grass. Picked up the trail going to the right and followed the sandy stream trail until we were blocked by so much downfall. We headed back the direction we came and went behind a baseball diamond. The trail continued, but right along a long patch of poison ivy (thanks to Gary for spotting that) so we motored up to the road and took that until it deadends into a trail that runs parallel to the creek trail, just on the opposite side of the stream. We continued on and broke out to the right. Found a natural dirt jump area (built by the man upstairs and not with shovels) that was super fun. Lots of little trail networks back in there that pretty much don't lead anywhere or used to lead somewhere, but due to all the storms and deadfall you can't follow the trail anymore. We followed these trails for awhile before crossing the stream again and riding the rest of the creek trail back out of the woods. At the end we crossed the stream again and caught a small trail along the stream that takes you past the communal farming/garden area and back out to Braddock Rd. More f'n around ensued and we finally headed back to the parking lot and got there by 7pm. So about 2 hours of riding, but I don't think we were ever more than 15 minutes away from the cars. It was good to just ride around and not have a set place to go. Granted it wasn't the best the trail system has to offer, but it felt good to go where the trail led us. After that it was back home to shower and make sure I got any poison ivy off me. Kristin managed just fine using the RugDoctor without me. Then it was off to dinner for Matt's birthday. Good times indeed. DT | 10.11.2004
Good Times!
So I ended up changing the schedule this weekend, all for the better though. Friday night was still the Beasties show at the Patriot Center. They rocked out hard! There was a lot less political musing going on than I thought there would be. There was one brief moment when they played the Will Ferrell as Bush video clip and it was hilarious. The came out strong with a handful of old tunes before they moved on to some songs off the new CD. I think they only played 3 new songs total, but they managed to play oldies from License to Ill, Paul's Boutique, Ill Communication, Hello Nasty and one of my favorite parts of the show - an all out jam session where they played (yes actually played their instruments) a couple of songs off Check Your Head. It was a sublime show and after the end of the show, once the lights came on and people were leaving, they came back and rocked out showing their early hardcore punk roots. I've been waiting to see the Beasties live for over a decade now, so chalk that dream/goal up. With the demise of the 2 Skinnee J's, I've been seriously lacking in the live show department. The Beasties were able to give me back that real showmanship that only true performers can bring to the stage. While the music was of course great, it was really the banter between the band and the crowd that made the evening special. It's good to have them back! Saturday was definitely hard to get up, but I pulled myself out of bed for a pre 9am meeting to make the drive up to Avalon to ride the trails in Patapsco State Park at 10am. We were surprisingly on time and ended up having to wait for a few others before we saddled up. We cut across the road from the park and ride and dropped right into an overgrown trail, complete with wet grass and thorns. I saw Ricky d. get sideways just before I took the same fate. I was not as lucky as Ricky and was headed into the thorn bushes, had to do a tuck and roll as to not go head first into the bush. Escaped with some minor arm scrapes. This first trail we hit up wasn't what we were hoping for, lots of hike-a-bike due to blow downs and lots of tall thorns to rip you up. Eventually someone else took the lead and we made our way up and down several trails. Not sure of the names as this was my first time riding Avalon. The hills are definitely longer than anything in the northern VA area and my lack of riding this past month made that well known. I was forced to huff and puff on foot up a couple of hills, usually not too far behind the rest of the group. Every uphill was rewarded with a sweet downhill. On one of these downhills, the leader on FS and Stoner on his 29er blazed ahead out of sight. I came around a sweeping curve right into a steep section where the trail had magically moved 2 feet to the right...needless to say it was time for another tuck and roll. Nothing major, but it was a total turtle on it's back moment, felt like I was breakdancing. We did another great downhill and then hiked back up because we wanted to do another section. That downhill was sweet! Lots of water bar drops and one was a hard double only a few feet apart making it pretty difficult. I managed to make it down and almost ride it out, but I got stuck behind the seat and had to pull off to the side to get back on top. I had to leave early so the rest of the guys told me how to get out and they continued on for a couple more hours. I of course got lost on the way out (a rite of passage from what I understand) and rode up a trail we rode down earlier in the day. Managed to find a good downhill trail that put me out where I really wanted to be. Followed the road to another trail which finally put me back out at the Park and Ride in a little over 30 minutes after I left the group. Evidently they had a lot of fun with logs and rocks after I left... Drove home for a quick shower and then it was out to Shirlington for the Cap City Brewfest. Plans to volunteer disentigrated and I just paid for a mug. Just about everyone ran out of beer before 6pm, pretty sad. I didn't even get any Dogfish Head, but I did manage to get a couple of Troegs and some 8.7 Victory Moonglow. Also was able to meet up with some guys who were riding in from Arlington and Steve-o and his girl. Good to have a nice crew when drinking out there. We all ended up going back to Jon's for some Speedys (spicy chicken kabob type things...mmm, so good!) and some Fat Tire Amber Ale (my favorite!). His friend Jordan drove me back to my house to grab Buster so Gracie and Buster could chase each other around the yard. Not too long after that Kristin, Buster and I made the trip back home and off to bed. Sunday was pretty lax. Cleaned the house and then metup with Gary and his girls before heading over to pumpkin picking. We did the animal tour, the hayride, picked some big ass pumpkins, got a side of apple cider and vanilla pound cake, and then headed home by way of Hunter Mill Rd. Pointed out Colt's Neck trail to Kristin and also showed her the Reston Zoo. The zoo is crazy, a ton animals all living together out in this big open area, pretty amazing. Today was awesome because I'm able to work back in McLean since the government is closed today. Pulled out the 1x1 and rolled into the work office. The cold air felt exceptionally good. I've been missing the cool early morning air whipping around my face and the all day energy it brings... DT | 10.06.2004
Beer!
While I haven't been able to ride much this week, it's nice to get out with the dog. Buster gets so excited when I grab the leash, he goes a little crazy. It's good because I get to be outside and because Buster gets a chance to smell everything and expell some of that energy he stores up from being crated 8 hours a day. This week Kristin has a ton of happy hours with friends, which means I stay home and give the dog the attention he deserves. This really isn't so bad, I didn't give her a ring to sit at home and not show it off, ha. But you know you got a winner when she gets home from her happy hour at Dominion and whips out a brand new growler filled with 2 liters of Dominion Oktoberfest! Just in time to pour a beer and settle in for drinking/watching the VP debate, which wasn't too bad. DT |
Upcoming Events
This looks to be a fun weekend. Finally I'm staying in town with no real have-to-do plans. This is where things get fun. I might not be able to ride very much, if any during the week now, but you can be damn sure I'm going to make the most out of a free weekend. Spearman just made his first post on SSO and it's exactly what I'm looking to do. Haven't formulated a full on plan yet, but it's looking something like this - Friday: Rock out to the Beastie Boys playing Patriot Center Saturday: Wake up early to clean house (hey I clean better than I cook), hopefully do an easy Wakefield ride with Chris & Matt at 9am. Depending on their cardio it might be a really short ride, but probably won't last longer than 90 minutes. Get home in time to meet up with some other peeps (JB and crew) to hopefully get in a fixie ride down the W&OD to Shirlington for the BrewFest, but might take the long route and meet up with them where the beer is...Kristin will probably be driving and meeting us there, always good to have a backup source of transportation when your drinking. Drink...drink...check in on the Hokies...drink some more...then do a ride home, depending on the level of fun we want to have on the way back. The evening is still open for discussion. Sunday: Pumpkin picking! Damn right, it's about that time. Don't know what we will be carving this year, but it's always fun. Possibly get a ride in somewhere I can do a few hours to put me in the proper pain. So that's the temporary plan, but I'm pretty good at making plans that fall apart at the seams so we'll see. The weather is looking like the perfect Fall weather, cool temps and crisp clear skies. It doesn't get much better than this. DT | 10.04.2004
Great Weekend!
This past weekend went off great! I was able to work from McLean instead of Annapolis Junction on Friday, which put me closer to home. With some last minute details taken care of and having finished up my work, I headed over to Washington Diamond to pick up the ring I had made. From there I headed over to the costume shop in Falls Church to pick up a howard stern afro wig. It only took a little convincing, but Brian (who was also going to Douthat with us) would let me into AOL early so Kristin didn't have to know I was there. I wore the same clothes I was wearing the night we might, right down to carrying my Whitlows mug and wearing the afro wig. After getting into the building and getting to her cube, her first question was how did I get in the building. I quickly slid the ring box out of the Whitlows mug and went to one knee, the question was popped and she accepted. Smiles and hugs all around from coworkers and then we headed out to the car to leave for the weekend. She was totally shocked and it definitely didn't really hit her until after we were in the car and she remembered she had to call EVERYONE! Made for a fairly quick ride to our celebration dinner at BW3s to get some stellar chicken wings. Another 90 minutes after BW3s we arrived at our cabin in Douthat State Park. We unpacked and proceeded to drink our celebratory Oktoberfest making for a long night. Saturday morning we made pancakes before heading down to meet up with rest of the MORE crew. Kristin went for a hike with the dog while Brian and I jumped in with the intermediate group and headed on out for our first ride. We took Locust Gap to Stoney Run and up to the cabin overlook. We ended up letting the group go ahead as Brian wasn't used to the long extended hills that Douthat has to offer, nothing like northern VA! We still made it to the cabin only a few minutes behind them. While we didn't see them, we did catch up to Scud, who had been leading another intermediate group. After leaving the cabin we headed up Middle Mountain to the top of the ridge. We then took the Salt Stump downhill for the first bit and then jumped back onto Middle Mountain for the rest. This downhill is incredible, worth all the climbing. It's very rocky and technical. Lot's of people prefer Brushy Hollow because it's downhill is much smoother, me I like the technical rocks better. At the end of the trail you hit these treachorous switchbacks. I managed to clear over half of them using the 90 degree nose wheelie turn, but some of them had so much exposure that I freaked out a little and didn't quite make them. Eventually we popped back out on the road and made our way back to the cabin. Brian was done for the day so we made lunch and just hung out. Soon it was time for the potluck dinner. Good food and good times. I tried to get a night ride going, but with all the drinking going on, no one seemed real interested. With the night ride idea squashed, I went with the drinking game idea, but everyone was pretty stuck to their camp seats. No rockstar awards to be handed out this year... On Sunday we headed down for the group breakfast, but it looked like they were just starting to prepare. We headed back to the cabin and packed up. By the time we got back down for breakfast, probably less than 45 minutes later...all 20 pounds of bacon were already gone! Bacon whores! That's all I wanted for breakfast was a piece of bacon, but no dice. The volunteers did a great job though cooking pancakes and breakfast burritos. After breakfast people gathered for their rides. My initial plan was to ride Brushy Hollow or Mountain Side, but ended up hiking with Kristin and Buster. We took Blue Suck Falls up to a trail that goes around the lake. We passed a ton of MORE riders and a few hikers. Buster did great off leash and was able to get some water play time in. He still doesn't like to swim, only really likes the water he can stand in. After the hike we decided to get an early start towards home. Got to BW3s right around lunch time. Kristin went in to get the food while I took Buster on a walk through the JMU campus and up the quad. After some wing intake, we jumped back on the highway. Got home, unpacked and finally decompressed from the weekend. Looking back I wish I had ridden more, but sometimes it's good to get in the family time, especially with the new engagement. DT | |
