And So It Begins

Let the good times roll.  After an unprecedented almost three months of no rain, Seattle is getting back to her roots.  The bike light is charging up and my commute clothes are all hanging to dry for the ride home.  Oh wait, that just means ski season is only two months away.  Wahoo!!  Pray for snow.  

Art Appreciation & Cross Racing

This is titled Hipster Fortification.  For non-locals, the paper is the Stranger, the local free weekly , Dick's is a Seattle classic late night  drive in burger joint and the rest, well....doesn't really need explanation

The Campagnolo Nouvo Record Rear Derailleur.  This derailleur is a work of art and I had one on my Erickson race bike that I bought in my first year of college.  Never really worked all that great, but man, that Italian style did go a long way!

One of my favorite aspects to them is that they were stamped with the year they were made.  "71"  or the year that I was born.  Old, so very old.

So, on to cross racing.  The venue was at a park east of Seattle that bordered a lake.  Lots of turns, pretty flat, one set of barriers, and a beach section that was very, very, very, long.  There was a lot of discussion before the race about the "rideability" of the sand, but the sad truth is that after the first of about 15 laps, I was running almost all of it.  I started at the back but surprisingly felt comfortable enough to move up quite a few spots in the grassy corners....and then we hit the sand.  The first lap out of the sand was not too bad and I continued to do battle for position and do my best not to crash in front of my wife, but then things began to unravel. Each lap on the sand I ran slower and slower and my remounts were less enthusiastic and guys I had been riding relatively easily with, literally ran away from me in the sand.  Still, for my first race, I had a blast, and am even excited to race again next weekend.  I hear there is....wait for it....a SAND section!!  My specialty!   

So much tape

I'm hurting, but having FUN!

I did battle with this bruiser for a while, but he eventually got ahead of me in the run and that was that.

I managed to not crash on the two barriers on the course, which was nice.

SO MUCH SAND!!

How do you work this thing again?

Seriously, I had this thing won, but there were all these guys in my way and did I mention all the SAND?!?

Feel Good Friday

It's been a long week, so I thought I'd end the work part with a little message of hope and inspiration.  Enjoy.

Also, this Sunday will be my first cyclocross race of the year, so look out for more tales from the back of the pack.  

The End of All Good Things

 Now I'm not saying that our 48 days of rain free summer in Seattle was directly linked to my not writing a blog post since June, but I'm also not saying it isn't.  Mostly it was just pure bone idleness on my part and I admit the fantastic weather kept me occupied with other activities like..

Freaking out my coworkers after getting my eyes dilated for my eye exam.  No, I have not developed a nasty heroin habit!

 Chasing Seafair pirates all over town in their silly boats with wheels.  Ride the Duck have nothing on these guys.

Even did a little bike racing at the weekly Thursday night series.  It was fast, painful and not very rewarding, just like I remember bike racing.  Ahhh.....

The garden expoloded around mid August, this is it in it's pre-explosion state.  We are up to our eyeballs in cherry tomatoes, carrots, beans and zucchini.  Not complaining, it's great.

 Speaking of exploding, our local beer store,  Chuck's on 85th is up to 30 taps of local and regional beers and now has food trucks in the parking lot every Sunday.  So cool, this weekend, we had a jerk pork rice bowl with plantains and curry beef empinada sandwich thingy.  Oh, we also had sushi out of a truck in Ballard two weekends ago and it was mind blowingly good, best yellow tail I have had in a long time.

 And of course, as always there has been a whole lot of cat watching...and petting.

My folks just adopted these two little lap warmers.  

 And yes, I got rained on yesterday on my ride to work, and not just a little, and then it got nice and then just in time for me to ride home, it rained again.  Joy.  Stay tuned for updates on my fall flounderings, otherwise known as CYCLOCROSS!!!!!

A Little Bit of Everything

Here is a snap shot of the last two weeks of my existence.  Ironic that's its not raining in a single picture, because it feels like that is all it has been doing all June(uary).  

Panoramic view of Puget Sound from Carkeek Park

Even rode the rollers just to stave off the madness.  Check out my new badass carbon  hoops!  

And my 40 year old rollers!  Still rockin!

Electric car sushi delivery in Ukiah, CA

Harvests, modest though they may be, are starting to come in from the garden

Snuck out for some solo mtb fun last Wednesday.  Mostly dry trails at Grand Ridge.  So much fun.  

Strange to come to end of the trail and pop out at a giant housing complex in Issaquah, WA.

Another trip to Carkeek Park to test out our new hiking boots. Happened  across these strange structures.  

Art in the park