Entries from May 2007 ↓

Another Tuesday and another 20 mile group ride from the bike shop to Perkins. More of the “The Red Dirt Pedalers” than usual decided to show up and play with us today. The fast group showed up for a change, the guys I have dubbed “The Dogs Of War.” These guys only show up when the weather is nice, clad in their brightly colored lycra and straddling painfully expensive bicycles. Each one just bristling for a chance to out preform one of the others. While getting my own bike prepped for the ride I actually head on of the guys tell someone, “I must break you.” In his best Drago voice. [newline]

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We kept up a pretty fast pace all the way there and back and I had a blast riding with these guys as usual. Of course my legs hurt now but I am stillhappy. I also realized I am not really cut out for mountain biking, and I really prefer life on a road.

Last week when I participated in “The [tag]Ride[/tag] Of [tag]Silence[/tag]” I took several dozen [tag]pictures[/tag] and submitted them to the local [tag]newspaper[/tag]. Unfortunately after a week passed with no response, I just assumed they chose not to run it or not to inform me.

Then today I got a call from Sarah telling me to check the newspaper out. Turns out they decided to run my picture and my write up after all. Sad to say it went uncredited, but it is still nice to see my picture and words in the newspaper again.

Here is a link to their website Stillwater
Newspress

and here is the picture they chose to run

More pics from “Ride of Silence” are here
Ride of silence pics

So after spending all night up stressing over the quality of my work, I neglected to find out if the newspaper even ran my photos from “The Ride Of Silence.” Plus I am pretty sure that I wrote my phone number down incorrectly on the contact sheet I filled out. I also found out I missed a chance to be on the front page of the newspaper by taking “ride you bike to work day” off from work.

Actually last week kept me pretty busy. The latter part of my week was spent out at lake McMurty riding the mountain bike trails and testing out snack foods for work. Me and one of my co-workers spent several days out riding the trails, jumping creeks and bouncing off trees so we could report our findings to the trail committee. Honestly the effort kicked my ass. I remember standing in the shop on Saturday thing to myself, ” my left leg hurts and my right leg in numb.” When my co-worker walks up and ask me if I am riding, I responded, “of course.”

During the course of our trips out to the lake I have pulled upwards 15 ticks off of my legs. To make matter worse, when I unlaced my shoes I found about 6 ticks on the tongue underneath the laces. Needless to say I just left those shoes outside.

So here is the story behind the seal. It has to do with this sign.

I found this sign on a beach in Ireland. Truthfully it was one of the best find of my whole trip.

Over 60 bicyclist from Stillwater and the surrounding area came together for the annual, “Ride Of Silence.” The yearly ride serves as a silent tribute for the riders who have been involved in vehicular accidents.
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I really enjoyed myself and it was different than any other ride I have ever been on. I was a lot more aware of small things I normally miss. Usually when you get a pack of cyclist together there is a lot of chatter and cross talk, or everyone is breathing really hard ragged breaths. The silence gave me chance to look around and become a lot more aware of the people and bicycles around me.
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I also submitted photos and a short write up of the event to the Stillwater Newspress. Anyone who has ever dealt with a newspaper before knows it can be extremely impersonal and sterile. You feel like you are on trial and alone from the moment you edit your work till the point you see it in print. Here is hoping for the best.

So I have this idea I want to try but I need just a few things to make it happen. First I need a-

Sorry Management saw fit that this idea never see the light of day.

So I got home expecting to upload all these cool pictures from my day today only to realize that I had left my memory card out of my camera.

I thought I had pictures of the group of people that went on the weekly 20 mile ride from our bicycle shop, and pictures of my co-worker Anthony looking like a kid in a candy story building his new mountain bike that has been on back order for the past month.

I felt really silly when I got my card reader out to import the pics onto my computer and I saw that my memory card was already in it and not in my camera where it belongs.

It has been seven days since my last blog post here. I really hate letting StupidHurts go for that long without updates, but I have not been motivated to write lately. Granted I never was a literary powerhouse, but it is nice to keep my site somewhat up to date. It has been tricky lately partially because of the Mono, and since I haven’t been using my camera much lately, I think that my writing is missing a much needed visual component. It is nice to have pictures to reference when I am typing up the silliness that occurs in my day to day life.

My current goal is to quit being so picky about my shots and take more pictures over the next two weeks. Maybe it will help to inspire my writing just a little bit more.

Last Tuesday I took a bicycle ride with some of my co-workers and a few members of the local bicycle club. While getting prepped I met a guy named Franco, we chatted for a bit and I made note of the fact he was wearing a bright yellow leader jersey from the 1992 Tour De France. We slowly pedaled to the edge of town and then Franco took the lead. I followed him patiently for about ten feet before I took the lead and increased the pace. Then I realized something.

I am and addict. And this is now a race.

Just south of town there are several nice rolling hills. We stretched our legs out as we warmed up and steadily increased our speed.

As we got further out of town the road got a bit more interesting. Soon we had a nice ten foot wide shoulder to ride on. The hills began to rise and fall beneath us. The entire time we were pedaling about 19-20 miles an hour and I was thinking to myself, “I don’t normally climb at 20, can I keep this pace up for 25 more miles?” The miles and scenery were flashing by in a quick blur of green and brown at this point. If I were to ride back through I would not be able to point out a single road mark I passed because I was completely focused on each revolution of my pedals.

Then I found a brief reprieve from my efforts. Near the half way point my tire blows and goes completely flat. Normally this wouldn’t have been a problem but I remembered saying before leaving the house, “I won’t need my spare inner tube.” Luckily someone else had a spare. I was almost ready to go when my new inner tube went flat as well. I told the guys to go ahead without me and I would have my friends bring me a spare inner tube so I could catch them on the way back to town.

My friends brought me an inner tube and hung out with me as I got my bicycle prepare to head back into town. When the group passed back by I fell back into the pace line. And this time when Franco attacked my pride forced me to follow,I chose not to draft him but to ride next to him. I didn’t want him to pull me through the headwind back towards town.

We are carrying a much harder pace now and I feel like I am fighting for every few feet. After ten miles I felt my energy starting to wane.We enter town at over 25 miles an hour and I decide to push myself and sprint away from Franco hoping to catch a red light soon to catch my breath before he catches me.

Eventually Franco caught up and told me had a great time and will ride with me again. Then he turns off to go home. Well who do I race now?

The rest of the pack hadn’t caught up with me yet, so I rode back to the shop at a slow leisurely pace to reflect on the warm and fuzzy feeling I had.

Such is the life of an addict.

Don’t know if anyone noticed but the stupid hurts map was broken, I finally got my sorry ass around to fixing it. Check it out, I think it is sorta cool still.

It is funny how the short simple trips rarely ever are. A friend of mine invited me out for a short 10-15 mile ride with her. Figuring I would be home in time for dinner I quickly agreed. So we saddled up and headed for the hills. In less than 5 miles we had escaped the city and found our selves cresting hills and zooming past bored looking cows.

And then we got lost. The road we were cycling down suddenly turned to gravel, so I asked Liz were do we go now. She told me “I didn’t really listen to that part of the directions.” So we just chose the direction that seemed right and started spinning. When we were confident that we had chosen the right direction the rain started. Luckily it was a warm gentle rain that just sort of added to the entire experience. Then once I crested what had to be the longest climb of the day I saw something that made the entire trip worth it. The blue green sea of grass in front of me was canvassed with little galaxies of lightning bugs. I stopped for a second to let Liz catch up and to try to take it all in. What had started out to be a simple 10-15 mile ride quickly became a visually amazing 30 mile adventure.
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I also finished building my mountain bike and I even found time to fall off of it three times. I really like the way it rides and handles so far. I can’t wait to get the free time off to ride in on some of the local trails.