Blinded

Yesterday I did my first Time Trial. Marc has been trying to talk me into doing a TT for a few weeks now. Last Friday I finally agreed that I would do one. Then he was on a mission to get me stuff to set me up properly. First came TT bars. So Sunday he hooked them up and we went out for a very wobbly ride. Monday was booties, of course everyone was out, so he ordered me some and they showed up Thursday. Wed he picked up a helmet and skin suit from Ethan that he very kindly agreed to let me borrow. I tried on the skin suit in advance and realized that wasn't going to work, if that was my skin, then I was a Sharpei. So I wore my shorts & jersey. I had briefly stuck the helmet on and it was a little loose, but figured no big deal.

Friday morning we head up. Of course it's raining as I'm heading to NJ to race. It always rains in Jersey if I'm racing, never fails. We get within about 10 miles and get thoroughly lost with no where to ask directions. We try looking it up on our phones, but it's being slow & difficult, so we wake Ethan up and ask him to please tell us where we are. He find us and guides us in. Thanks Ethan! Marc now has less than an hour to get ready. I'm trying to help him, plus get me ready as I start shortly after him. He takes off, I hop on the trainer, trying to get in a rhythm and the dude next to me keeps coming over to ask me questions. First his number is on upside down, so I help him out. Then he can't get his jersey on, so I point out that he pinned his number clean through. Finally I realize I'm running late and have to get up to the starting line. I grab my stuff, throw on the helmet and take off. At this moment is when I realize the extent of the helmet being too big. I had gotten the straps down to it was ok and not wobbly. The probably was that it has a back stabilizer and when I got myself down into TT position, it dug into my neck and threw the helmet forward over my eyes. Crap! No time to do anything about it. Went to the line as they're yelling my number and I take off. Every couple minutes I'm shoving it backwards trying to see more than 5 feet in front of me. Most the time I just left it down and rode blind. Luckily a TT is straight. Puts a whole new meaning on put your head down and go.

Anyway, with mishaps aside, was lots of fun.

Troublemakers

Recently we went to a show in Philly and due to a bad parking spot and poor maneuvering getting back to the car, our usual 1 hour drive home, turned into 2 hours. It sucked!
Last night Marc and I headed up to Hershey, Pa for a show. We've never gone to this venue before and it is a bit of a hike. The last thing we wanted was a repeat of the Philly incident. Unfortunately in trying to avoid one incident, we kinda provoked another one.
After the final song of the encore (I do not believe in leaving early) we took off. Marc led the way, I hung on as he weaved his way through the crowd. Then he noticed a short cut, but we'd have to climb a gate. I didn't hesitate and swung myself over. Unfortunately for me and the guy on the other side it was a little higher than I anticipated and I smashed into him. Luckily he took it well and I kept on my way going under the next one. As we are moving towards the intersection there is a big pile up on one side and far fewer people on the other, so we chose the path of least resistance. As we stand there waiting for the ok to cross, a rent-a-cop is pulling a huge power play with the other side. He's pointing and screaming about to burst a vein, "I'm only going to tell you this once". He was an ass. Anyway, then he starts in on us. He starts screaming at us that there's no way we're crossing there and we have to back track and go the other way around. With the clock ticking, I pipe up and say that's crap, there's a cross walk right here, I'm not going back across. Well a couple teens figured this sounded just great and took off across the street. I figured what the hell and followed. Marc meanwhile is standing there chanting 'asshole' to the guy. It catches on quickly with the crowd. Before I know it, the entire crowd of 100's of people bum rush the guy and the intersection. I look back and I can't see Marc as he did not follow me. But I do see a ton of full out running and chanting 'asshole' coming at me quickly. I keep going, Marc catches up and we high tail it to the car. We were out quickly without incident. Well besides the little riot we kinda started. Ooops.

Falling

I don't really have a fear of heights. Going up is perfectly fine. Coming down however, is another matter.
In movies they show some person hanging on for dear life, fear in their eyes, and their fingers slowly slipping off of whatever they are holding on to and then eventually they end up falling to their death. I always thought as I'm watching, these people are crazy. If I knew I was gonna die I could hold on. It wouldn't matter how bad it hurt, I'd just keep fighting until I was ok just because I'd have too. ha ha ha Yeah it doesn't work that way.
Last week I was at the climbing gym. I decided to go up a bouldering problem that had a particularly high finish. Once up there I froze and couldn't get myself down. Marc was below me telling me to jump, yet I couldn't. I tried to down climb, but the holds were too small and I was fatiguing from the panic. As I stayed up there the worse the panic got and the more my arms fatigued prematurely. Eventually I saw my hands slipping, and even though I knew it wasn't to my death, there was nothing I could do about it. I ended up falling and I was fine, just shaken.
Turns out the movies are right. Your will will only get you so far.

In The Dark

These are some of the things I smelled, heard or saw on last night's urban ride. Most of them are smelt and heard as it was dark and I could pretty much only see Marc's ass.

• exhaust fumes
• spring peepers
• labored breathing
• wind
• cigars
• kids
• laundry detergent
• steak
• bunnies (lots of them)
• steak (ok we went back past, it smelt too good)
• beer

Spring Is Good

Ok, it's not really Spring yet. But things are already starting to get better. Yeah, it's probably a tease, as that's what March is, a big fat tease. But hey I'll take it. I need anything to break the doldrums of January and February. Don't get me wrong, I kept myself busy and I've been able to ride more than most winters as it's been more mild. But it's just not the same as Spring. Something changes as everything comes alive. Though the flower and trees aren't alive yet, people are starting to show signs.

Last night we went to a show in Philly. It was held in a little basement of a church. We saw Jonathan Rice and Matt Costa. It was great. We got there a little late and were way back at the end of the line and the show was General Admission. But once we got in people seemed to have disappeared and we got a fairly good spot. According to Marc they were all in line for the bathroom. Anyway, the show opened with Jonathan Rice, which I've never heard before. He's a one man band. Just him and his acoustic guitar. He was a super laid back hippie, and super funny. Than Matt Costa came on. He was very solid. Apparently from talking to the very talkative and informative girl next to me there is a new album that I didn't know about, so he had a bunch of new material. She kept telling me his line up as it was the same from the Brooklyn show she saw a few nights prior. So yeah, she's scary, she's following him. Anyway, the old songs were great, the new songs were great and way more rocking, to Marc's great pleasure, and he was way more talkative than the last time we saw him 2 years ago. In the middle of one song he started to choke and had to stop and start over. He apologized as he drank his beer to sooth his throat so he could continue. It was funny. I always wondered what would happen or if that ever happened to anyone while performing. In all the years of seeing shows that was the first time I've seen someone choke in the middle of a song. Now I know. Another cool aspect was his crowd was very much on the young side. So that made it much easier for me to see for a change since many of them haven't hit their growth spurt yet. That worked out to my advantage. I hate when I get some big huge 6 ft something guy that always ends up standing right in front of me. That sucks.

All in all it was a great show. Small and intimate, which is a nice change of pace from the giant venues.It was great to get out, even though I had to go to work today on 3 1/2hrs of sleep. I've been a little on edge all day. But it'll be ok. Just took a nap and already feeling better. I'm looking forward to what comes next.

Hammer Time!

Yesterday Marc, Amy and I went on a road ride. It was a beautiful day for February. Sunny and 50 degrees. Yeah, when you see the pictures it doesn't look 50 degrees. That's because when we started out it was only 35. So you have to dress for what it is, not for what it might be. Plus it's colder on the road right?

Marc sporting his spiffy new thermal vest. He loves this thing.

Amy riding by a farm. But don't worry, it didn't stay this flat and boring.

Soon we came across Hammer Time!

So we all got off our bikes and did Hammer Time. Well err ahhh I did.

We even ran into James up by the resevoir.

It was a great day to to be out on the bike. Ahhhh....

Mishaps and Mayhem

I'm so sore. I rode Rittenhouse with Marc yesterday. After the night ride Thursday I figured this would be a nice easy ride. No stress, middle of the afternoon, fairly flat trail other than lots of roots. Well it turned out I was on my ass more than I was on my bike.

First I was going through a rooty section, loosing momentum, so I tried to lunge forward to push it out. I hit a big rock and it stopped me dead. Well it stopped my bike dead. Me, not so much. I flew about 6 feet in the air over my handlebars and head first onto the ground. I heard a big crack and pain seems to shoot from everywhere. I layed there for a second waiting for the initial shock to subside and realize what was actually hurt. I hit my funny bone, which hurt like hell. I don't know why they call it that, it's never funny. Also tore back my thumbnail, yeah that hurt too. And the loud cracking sound was just my neck cracking, oh and maybe my helmet as I noticed today it's cracked. But after a few minutes I was able to get up and continue on.

A little later I had to dismount over something and when I went to get back on and missed my saddle. This was big ouch #2. I have a beautiful bruise today.

#3 was the best though. I was just about to bonk and Marc asked if I wanted to stop. I said no, there wasn't too much further. We headed down the next section of trail when I came across a stream crossing. All day I had rode across the ice without breaking through. So I took off across this one as well. I got half way and CRACK! My front wheel busted through. I instantly popped out my right foot. Only problem was I fell to the left. I got my foot out and shoved it toward the ground to catch me. And oh it did, only by the time I hit solid ground it was plunged deep through the ice and into the icy water. This is when I panicked. And instead of just waiting, thinking about my next move and I'd only have one foot wet. Instead I quickly pulled my foot back up, which caused me to fall onto the ice. Then I panicked more not wanted to fall through and shot my arm out and deep into the water. Then my knee. It was a mess. Finally I was able to get up, but by now I was drenched in freezing water. At this point I stood up and said, "now I'm done". Marc quickly got me out of the woods and back to the car with heat. Ah heat! I can't wait until warm weather.

Today I rode Middlerun with Marc, Amy, Ted, Dennis, Epi, Elizabeth and Rich. Things went much better. I managed to stay upright all day. Yeah! It was a lot of fun. Thanks guys!