Cured

Ingredients:
1 part surly long haul trucker
1 gloomy, cold, and windy day
1 decently steep hill
30 spare minutes before work
1 grumpy and gloomy chubby dude

Mix together, bake at 28 deg F for 20 minutes.

Amazing what a ride can do for the mind. Simply amazing. Yesterday's ride home wasn't great, in fact it might not even have been good, but this morning was 5 miles of pure wonderfulness.

In other news, stopped by the bike shop on the way back from a meeting yesterday morning to talk about shoes, and looks like I might have a plan in place. I'll blog about everything next week after I've gotten it all straightened out, but I'm still pleased with the Bontrager shoes, and still REALLY pleased with my shop. The folks at Cycle Works are awesome, consistently and evenly. Or something? Heh.

Interesting note, on the way there I noticed that the bridge over 27th street that will connect the mopac trail to the rock island (essentially) is almost complete! That would rock, and would mean that I could basically go from my house to wabash and back all on multi-use paths, with only about 5 blocks of side streets to go to/from the paths. So, so, so, so awesome. It's not hard for me to get there now, just hodge-podge and kinda annoying - annoying enough that I started to prefer the Jamaica just for ease of access. But the mopac, I like the mopac's scenery oh so much better, espescially past Eagle.

Now all I need is for the bridge to be completed, and spring to arrive. I've got good feelings about both, I'm tellin ya.

The "wagon"

I'm tiring of having to make the same "I screwed up" posts over and over again. If there is a common theme in this blog over the past two years, it's those, coupled with the "this ride rocked" posts. It's, in a word, shameful. I keep making great leaps forward, then great leaps back, which essentially amount to baby steps forward.

I could say all kinds of things to sugar coat it, but I'm not going that route this time. I fell off, and it sucks worse than anything I could summarize.

There's light at the end, I see it, the sun is coming around and heating things up again. Clipless pedals are on the way. Shoes are coming around. I've just gotta, gotta, gotta stop screwing up.

Two great moments...

1 - My little girl turns 8 today. It hit me pretty hard this morning a little bit ago, rolling in (a car..) to work. Hard in the "holy crap she's growing up and I'm totally missing it" way, and hard in the "I really finally need to change something if I want to make it to see her kids turn 8". This time it wasn't a moment where you'd need to cue the Coldplay for some hardcore emo time. It was different.

2 - Whilst walking through the store yesterday, being my usual dork self with the now almost 10 month old Nick, I leaned forward (as I had been doing) and said "MISTER CHEESE!" to which he replied "DADDY!" No, ain't the first word, that was "KIGGY!" a while back, kid sure like the kitties.

1 + 2 = Not sure yet. Just not sure. Something's gotta move in one direction or the other, because I'll tell you, I sure like 1 + 2 better than any beer or cheeseburger or chinese foooood or nachos or or... you get the idea.

It hath frozen over..

Order Information
Items:
QTY     Product Name            Item#   Size    Color   Price   Total

1   Shimano M520L MTB Pedal     $35.99   $35.99

It is, most certainly, the end of the world.  Or rather, "I discovered how amazing stiff-soled cycling shoes are for efficency, so now I'm going to jump completely off the reservation and try clipless out to see if I'm missing out on that, too". 

p.s. Nashbar.com is having a crazy 20% off everything that's already on sale right now

p.p.s.s.  Bontrager shoes are good, real good, with one minor exception.  I think I'm missing something, or they missed something HUGE when making nearly the most comfortable shoes I've ever worn on my gigantizoid feet.  More on that later. 

Peace

You know what 61 degrees feels like? No? I do, it's summarized with: Good. Dang good. It feels like gliding, laughter, hammering, and singing out loud "Yellow Submarine" whilst blazing a path down the multi-use path.

Sometimes I don't even have any idea - myself - that I have seasonal depression until I realize that I do. Dat be proper english. You get the idea.

Stepped on the scale yesterday - cringing - and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I haven't lost a pound since before the moving fiesta, nor have I gained a pound. I hugged the scale. Repeatedly. My wife was right, thankfully, I might not have been cycling but my constant running around moving helped keep me from turning into a gigantic beer and chinese food filled balloon.

Back to the cycling. Yesterday I left work and didn't really know where I wanted to go. It was 61 out, so I could go anywhere (!!!) and not worry about frostbite, ice, snow, etc etc. In the end I opted to head north to the shop, the rear der has been skipping a bit lately and I wanted to look at shoes. Man, am I glad I did. Here's why:

So yeah get this - Bontrager (Trek) makes shoes. I know, I know! But also, get this - they feel good. First pair I tried (a 48cm/13.5 US) didn't, my toes were cramped and I went "eh, I'll pass". I have big feet, gigantic feet, I wear a 13 or 14 US and they run a little wide (shocking, I know!), so finding shoes for me is always a challenge, and finding ones that fit me well nearly impossible. Looked at Shimanos and Pearl Izumis, neither floated my boat.

Right before I left I said "oh what the hell" and tried the size 14.5. I stood talking to my favorite mechanic there about the LHT, and kept thinking "dang, these feel good, really good". Standing up being different than cycling, of course, but it gives you a good idea how they'll feel regardless. Stiff sole, comfy fit.. wow. I passed at the moment thinking "jeez lousie, next thing you do, you'll be going clipless and walking around sounding like a mix between a horse and a hooker as the cleats click on the floor".

Riding home in my trusty North Face hiker/tennies, I couldn't help but constantly think about how good those felt. The North Faces have felt good, great, for three years of cycling and exercise at the gym, but now they felt weird. Small. Odd. Foreign almost. Thousands of miles, several centuries, but now they just didn't feel right. Kind of how the Trek FX felt after the first time I rode a LHT.

And, you know, that was good. That change was one of the best I ever did for cycling. So baby steps, goona go pick 'em up and try them out with the platforms and just enjoy a sturdier pedaling platform, and comfier fit. The writing, however, is on the wall.

"Thou shalt sound like a tramp whilst walking, and smile as thy feet are clipped sturdily to thy pedals whilst riding."

Or, you know, something like that.

It's in the air..

Spring, that is.  This morning threw me off, I looked at my smartphone bleary eyed at 6:30am, and the weather app said 48 degrees.  Must be wrong, so I refreshed.  And again.  And again.  No, sure enough, it was almost 50 degrees by the time I walked out the door.  Humid, and 50 degrees.  It was crazy enough that I wore nearly normal clothes.  No Gore Tex, no Thinsulate, no fleece.. just normal stuff.  Not even wool!  

It was just what was needed this morning.  Utterly amazing.  Were it not for the wind on the way home, I would have gotten myself lost in the nearly 60 degree wonderfulness.  As it were, I fought the wind, smiled, fought some more, sweated, and fought.  It was... glorious.  

And now for a confession: My beer fast has been blown completely out the window.  No excuses, just an admission.  I love beer, and I'm a weak, weak man.  

That and, well, watching me in the rum and or wine aisles is a completely and utterly comical experience.  If I could just grab something and go, I'd be fine, but I'm the ultimate comparison shopper.  Which is great if I know something about what I'm buying, but this is similar to putting me in charge of buying, say, nuclear weapons:

"So uhh, what's the difference between those two?"  

"Sir, that one has a triple thermonuclear bloopity bloo flux capacitor with ultra super turbo nuke power.  That one is your standard 3,000 megajule bliggity bloop eight trillion flux power unit" 

"Umm.." (I start thinking) (pull out smartphone and go for Google)

"Sir, should I have my wife cancel christmas for the next three years?" 

"probably a good idea"

You get the idea.  Of course the easy solution would be to find a more productive outlet for my stress, but where's the fun in that?

Anyway, life is good.  We're moved, and absolutely love our new home.  The new commute is awesome in ways I can't really summarize, so the year holds promise.  

Now all I've got to do is get back in my groove.  Somewhere it is, I just gotta find it. 

New Commute

Fantastic.  Wonderful.  Great.  Awesome.  

Amazing what even a move a mile away can make, am I right?  Used to be 90% bike path with lots of road crossings, 5% residential streets, and 5% sidewalk.  Problem with it was the street crossings (Normal and 40th being the two I hated most) and sidewalk, sidewalk on a really busy street to boot. 

New one?  Long way is 95% bike path with a couple annoying street crossings, and 5% residential streets.  It's pretty much, you know, awesome.  

Either that or, you know, I completely forgot how peaceful a bike ride after a long day of work can be.  Could be.  Just maybe.