Dirt and Years

One day until I'm a day older (and a year older too).
Big thanks to my mom and dad for the sweet jacket and "cash" to spend where I wanted (gonna turn into some Swobo shirts and a new road helmet). Also a huge thanks to Cari,Jake, Bumpa Bill, Beth for going in an getting me the Garmin Edge 305 I have been talking about incessantly for the last year. Now I'll be able to share my rides and woefully slow speed with the world!

Gadget geek-dom!

It's been an eventful 3 days. I had Friday off and a parent teacher meeting at 1:30PM so I headed out to do Dry Creek and Veeder (after riding over an dropping off Jake's lunch). The sky was showing signs of rain later, so I tried to make it quick. I have really been needing the time alone on rides lately, so many things on my mind. As I ascended Dry Creek, right near the fire station, another rider came flying by, it was my friend Simon. We hollered our "hello's" and then Simon asked if I was heading up Veeder. I meekly replied yes and he asked to join—no sweat I said (although slightly fearful that I would now be into a suffer-fest as Simon is a lot stronger than I am). I did have to warn him I would be slow up the climb to which he replied he would too—time off the bike had worked against both of us. It was really great, we settled into the ride and talked about tons of stuff from his family wine making, our jobs and the beauty of this particular 30 mile ride—overall it was actually nice to have the company.

That night Cari was jones'ing to go buy a new MacBook, so we headed to Emeryville and voila! like that she has a faster, newer computer than me! It's been a year in the making and it will be nice to have all macs in our network.

Saturday morning brought gray skies and I headed out to join the Saturday morning ride, but quickly turned around to add a shell before the ride, good thing, although I should have opted for a rain jacket! The drizzle quickly turned to rain and the group finished 20 miles in the slop none too quick. Thankfully I had my wingman Peter to accompany me on the climbs and in the rain.

Saturday night we dropped Jake off at Papa and Yaya's and headed to Oaktown to see Ben Harper in concert. What a show! It was in the Paramount theater (built in 1931) and was incredible. We scored some sweet seats in the 5th row, main aisle and we treated to a wonderful 3 hour show. If you ever get a chance, go see Ben and The Innocent Criminals.

Sunday was breakfast downtown with Cari, a trip to the college to see the play version of Bambi (a little more grown up in terms of themes/story than I remembered). Both Cari and I kept looking at Jake to make sure things were cool. He really liked getting the autograph of the big deer after the show. It's been really cool attending these plays at NVC.

I had packed my bike in the Element before the paly and headed out directly after the for my first foray back into Skyline since my accident.

Let's see, it was July 22 when I broke. Now it's November 11...81 days since I last really rode my mountain bike.

It was a little un-nerving actually, I was kinda scared. I mean it all happened so easily on that ride long ago, what if?? Well I settled in and did it. Perfect ride! Cool, crisp, sun going down, no one else out there. I was slower than usual, but the speed will come back in time. I was just happy to be out there. Can't wait to see what SSWC08 looks like next year!

So I'm off to bed, tomorrows the "big" day and I look forward to the new bridges, especially those I have to cross very soon this week, and challenges coming. I'm far from sunk, and working on facing everything with a positive face...life was never meant to be easy, and I'll do whatever I can to meet it's challenges.