Picture Monday

In addition to a general hiatus from writing over the last year, I realized I had taken very few photos as well.  So with few words, here is a photo at the house with a full moon following snow storm Jonas.

Plan in Pencil

As I look back over last year and begin to plan my way through 2016, one thing is clear. I need to plan in pencil. Plans, goals, dreams, or whatever you want to call them sure have a way of changing, vaporizing, or fading. This time last year I was planning to ride the Amish Roubaix (not in shape), the Wayne Ultra (event was cancelled), the Hilly Billy (days of rain), bikepack my way to Davis WV (injury of other rider) and try to get a motorcycle camping trip in. This, of course, is in addition to some sort of family vacation and the normal busyness of life. I will be honest, these targets are largely centered around myself. So, when there are questions, challenges, or compromises, these are the things that go. I have not written much in the last year either. I have had my fill of social media and honestly had very little motivation to write. I had decided to write more with a pen (in a notebook). That has happened even less, as in, not at all.

My logs say I rode 1,720 miles, climbed almost 98,000 feet, and burned 85,000 calories. (Interesting side note, while generally I think my Garmin unit overestimates my calories, this number would equate to about 24 pounds of weight.) I have done more, I have done less. Highlights? Another Gravel Rouser Wolfman, I did win a race this year (technically, I was the only one in my class), I made it half way across WV and camped at least one night by bike, I was taken down by a dog on a road ride, and I bought a geared mountain bike.

Yes, after riding rigid and single speed for years, I added a geared bike. I had to turn my gravel bike (Redline d440) back in to a mountain bike for Ethan who out grew his 26" Monocog in less than a year. I spent weeks reading about bikes, geometries, tire size, frame material, and so on. I had considered the new Cannondale F-Si 29 and the new Beast of the East (27+), the Ritchey P-29 as well as some full suspension offerings. All to settle on another Redline, a d660 carbon framed, 2x10 with a Reba 100 mm front fork. It weighs slightly less than my steel Monocog Flight 29er, It handles fast, pedals faster, and is comfortable for a long time (compared to my SS). I have really noticed that my upper body isn't as tired after a ride compared to my Monocog.

Sadly, after returning to work following the Christmas shutdown we were greeted with a large round of lay offs (about 20% of our staff). I was spared, though in such a small company, my coworkers were also my friends and it sure stings.

The future is a bit uncertain, at least from our earthly perspective.

Unboxing the Redline d660 at the Cycle Path

Our kind of happy hour at Fluff Bakery

Fun with phase diagrams.

New shirt, though apparently it isn't work appropriate.

Christmas Kale thanks to a warm December.

StreSS relief with the SS.

Winter sunrise.

I think he is doing it wrong?

Brock: can we go to Casa?

Things Brock has said this year that was worth writing down:
--
Me: Brock, what shape is the moon?
Brock: It's a crescent.
Me: Right.
Brock: What is it made of?
Me: Rocks.
Brock: How do you know?
Me: Astronauts have been there.
Brock: I want to be an astronaut.
Me: OK
Brock: A dinosaur astronaut.
Me: Of course, that goes without saying.
--
Brock: I will definitely use my listening voice when I go to kindergarten.
--
Brock: I just counted to 100! That's like a million numbers!
--
My Dad (after taking him to see Mountain Stage for his birthday): Oh, I thought Mountain Stage was a bluegrass band.

Happy 2016

Dog Gone'it

Soccer season has ended. The boy's did well, making it to regional semi-finals. Now I get to come home from work and eat supper together, even if dark out (sunset yesterday was 5:08 pm).  The weather has been mild enough that I still get some lunch trail rides from the office.

This past Saturday I even got out for a long ride (targeting 50 miles).  About 40 miles in, a youngish dog ran out from a yard and began to run along side me. It seemed non-aggressive, and my usual tricks to get a dog to stop did not work either. It followed along side me for another 50 yards or so and then suddenly dove in to my front wheel. It was a short fall to the ground and the dog just kept running.  I landed on my shoulder which is still a little sore, but thankfully no road rash and no broken collar bone.  The bike frame still seems solid, though I will get a professional opinion on that today. A bit of peripheral damage to the bike. I continued on for about another 5 miles before getting a ride home.  I felt OK, but the bike wouldn't shift right and I didn't want to damage anything (plus my lowest gear was making a lot of noise and I knew I need it to get up my driveway).

Sadly, dealing with dogs is something we just have to do in order to ride. Even good dogs like to run.

Soft

The birthday thing just happened. I decided to take a couple days off work and try to enjoy what was left of fall. The foliage was nearing peak and temperatures were in the 60's. With very little planning, over two days we managed some dual sport motorcycling, mountain biking, and a long ride on my Buell.

A pair of KTM 640's on some back "roads" of Vinton Co.

Stockport Mill and Dam as the sun was just starting to lift the fog off a cool start to the day.

Just out of Stockport along the Muskingum River. Site of  the Big Bottom Massacre of 1790. Lenape and Wyandot Indians surprised a European American settlement at the edge of the flood plain, or "bottom" land of the Muskingum River; they stormed the blockhouse and killed eleven men, one woman, and two children. Three settlers were captured while four others escaped into the woods. 

Big Muskie drag bucket. Big Muskie was a coal mining Bucyrus-Erie model 4250-W dragline (the only one ever built) owned by the Central Ohio Coal Company (formerly a division of American Electric Power), weighing nearly 13,000 metric tons (13,000 long tons; 14,000 short tons) and standing nearly 22 stories tall. With a 220-cubic-yard (170 m3) bucket, it was the largest single-bucket digging machine ever created and one of the world's largest mobile earth-moving machines.  It operated in the U.S. state of Ohio from 1969 to 1991. I can still member driving past it sometime around 1990 while it was operating at night. A sight to see.

Amish corn harvesting in Morgan county.

I made it 40 years, but after trying to keep up with Ryan (on his Cannondale F29 carbon) and feeling the beating I decided it was time to rebuild and install the White Bros Magic 80mm fork on my single speed.

View from Carpenter Hill on a road bike ride.

Fall in South East Ohio.

Soft fork meant riding over them there rocks.

And with that, it started to rain as the remnants of hurricane Patricia went through. Thanks for checking in.

Mid Life Crisis?

I am rolling up on my 41st birthday.  That's right, I am 40 years old. Middle aged white guy with a career, family, house, etc. All that responsibility kind of stuff. Work schedules, family schedules, church schedules, soccer schedules. Managing a hyper active 5 year old around all those schedules. Trying to find time on occasion to spend time with my wife.

I am tired. Worn-out. When I get to ride my bike, I have to try to cram as much in in as little time as possible. Motorcycle? It must be that I am riding to work, so long as I am not picking up a kid, pizza, etc. Having "fun" is a lot of work, especially when the work just piles up while you are away to have said fun.

Understand that I am not complaining. It does get somewhat overwhelming at times, discouraging, disappointing even. Plans are planned but rarely come though. But, I am not complaining. I am thankful for the few times I get to date my wife, play with Brock, go single speeding with Ethan, play my guitar, or just ride a motorcycle to work. I have a house in the middle of no where and vehicles that get me somewhere. I have a job that I generally enjoy and live near a town with good food and good friends.

I will stop short of claiming God's blessing because of these things since that would imply that if one doesn't have them that they somehow lack that blessing. I do however claim to be thankful, grateful, appreciative. Generally speaking our stress is man-made. We overstretch ourselves with regard to time, money, material stuff and then get overwhelmed while we try to manage them.

I just looked back at my last posting on this blog and saw the list of bike races I planned to attend. Well, I only raced once. Other races were removed from my schedule by kids birthdays, weather, and to be honest, some times a lack of physical condition and motivation.  The one race I participated in I won. But, I also was the only one in my class (and now that I am 40, I can race in "masters" classes). So I guess it means I also got last place.

I had also planned a bike packing trip this year. My goal was to ride from home to Davis, WV via Spruce Knob over 5 days. I scheduled a week off from work, a friend planned to go along, I got the bike ready, my gear ready, and myself ready to ride 300+ miles. The day came to leave and we got delayed a day. It was OK, I had already planned an alternate route if we needed to cut out a day. So day 1 for me was about 20 miles from my house to Athens. Day 2 was from Athens to North Bend State Park via the North Bend Rail Trail. Great day, 80 mile ride. I will say that riding through Belpre (and almost being hit by a car), and Parkersburg (and being called a "dick" by a skate boarder that we startled since he was rocking out with ear buds in) and then riding out route 47 with heavy traffic weren't my favorite parts of the day, but the rest made up for it. By the end of the day my friend, Ryan, had started to get some pain in his left knee. Ryan is one day older than me. He has ridden his bike from the right to the left coast. He is single, without kids. I state all that as I was more concerned about my physical shape than his. Anyway, we camped at North Bend for the night. The next day started slow and quickly got slower as we rode east. By the time we made it to Ellenboro (6 miles from the park) and got some breakfast, Ryan was in a considerable amount of pain.  We still had about 70 miles left with some big climbs to get to our next stop, Audra State Park. A couple miles later, we pulled the plug, turned around and made the 40 mile ride back to Parkersburg where we got picked up for a van ride back to A-town.

I still had the week off, Shelly and the boys were looking forward to picking me up in Davis (as they got a camping trip out of it), and I still had some miles in my legs. I took the next day for a 50 mile ride around the back roads of Meigs and Vinton counties while Ryan was trying to figure out his knee. I decided that I would head down to WV the next day via motorcycle. I wanted to get in to the area early so we could get a good campsite. There were several folks heading down and the Revenge of the Rattlesnake was happening plus bear season starting, so I knew sites would go quickly. Thursday morning I headed out. About a quarter mile from my driveway, a hornet flew in to my helmet ans stung me just below my eye. I rode to Casa for breakfast as my face swelled. I ate, took a longish route home and watched soccer. It just wasn't meant to be.

I loaded up the truck for Friday and picked up Shelly and the boys at noon. We drove down and got a great site. Good thing we came down earlier too, by 6 o'clock most sites were gone, especially any that could handle all of us. We had a great burger at Tip-Top in Thomas and then headed back to camp to make s'mores and wait for the others to make it in. We spent the rest of the weekend enjoying the mountains, biking, food, camping, and some hiking. Back to work the next Monday to what seemed like two weeks worth of work for my one week off.

I think I need to give up planning.  Few things go as planned and planning sometimes creates expectations that when not realized lead to disappointment. I was certainly disappointed that the week didn't go as I planned. Still, I got to ride my bike, camp with my family and friends, eat, and not go to work.

Speaking of planning, a new race was added this year at Spruce Knob. A three day gravel stage race. It was initially slated for summer but was postponed to fall. They have set the date for the weekend of Oct 16, 17, and 18. Soccer on the 17th, my dad's annual birthday cookout on the 18th as well as Mountain Stage at OU for his birthday gift. Won't be racing that one either.

Trying something new. 

No longer a pre-schooler.

Quick trip to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

First and Last.

The aunts/uncle/dad.

I managed to commute to work once. The sunrise was worth it.

Packed and ready.

Waking up at North Bend.

Hornets are jerks.

Burgers!

View from camp.

Ethan riding in real mountains.

Lindy Point

Not enough of this.

3.5 Days

Kind of like the old owl in the tootsie pop commercial, I have discovered that 3.5 days of life without electricity is when you find the center due to the outer shell cracking.

We were right in the cross hairs of the winter storm last week that started with about 2" of rain, flooding roads and melting most of the snow that was left from the last go around.  Then the temperatures dropped drastically and quickly and proceeded to leave us with nearly 13 inches of snow in about 12 hours.  Shortly after the snows started, our electricity also went out.  The heavy snow collected on the trees, bending and breaking them.

Trees are remarkably flexible.

The next morning, I made coffee with my camp stove and french press (using a UPS to run my grinder) and then hooked up the Generac ix2000 generator to keep our fridge going, get the TV on, and keep our phones charged.  Luckily, we have the wood stove to keep us warm as the temperature was predicted to continue to drop to a record low over night.  (Due to a level 3 snow travel emergency, even Sunpower closed for the day).

We waited until the afternoon when the snow stopped to venture outside and shovel a path from the barn (wood pile) to the back deck.  While the kids played, I got the tractor out to push some of the snow off the driveway so we could at least walk down to my truck that I had left parked by the road.
We finished off the day with grilled cheese and tomato soup, cooked on the grill followed by a movie, Night at the Museum.

Friday morning was -9F and clear blue skies.  Once I got the house taken care of, I used the generator to run our propane water heater and we took showers and headed to town.  I had to go to the office for a bit while Shelly ran some errands and Ethan worked on his blizzard bag of school work.  We even got a hot lunch and some pie and coffee before heading back home.  Once there, I scraped some more snow off our driveway in preparation of it being in the 40's on Saturday.  Then I headed to the neighbors driveway to do the same, though only doing about half of it before I slid off his driveway.  I ran Ethan to church for the youth group trip to play laser tag in Columbus while Shelly made another meal on the grill.  Finished off the night with Night at the Museum 2.

We had convinced ourselves that the power would be back on over night.  We woke Saturday morning without it however.  Some more camp stove coffee making and a load of wood to the house.  I was about out of gas for the generator and we were also out of food that could be made on the grill, so we loaded up in the truck and headed to Albany for baked steak at Ray's and a tank of gas.  On the way home, we passed an electric utility truck just about a quarter mile from our house.  Surely the power will be back on now!

Umm, no.

I got up early Sunday morning and started the generator, loaded the stove, and headed out for sound checks at church.  Shortly after, I got a text from Shelly that the generator wasn't working (even though it was running).  I dashed home between sound check and the service.  Found the problem with the generator (more below) and we headed out to the truck down the now crazy icy driveway from the thawing of Saturday followed by the re-freezing overnight.  I barely got a warning to the boys out of my mouth about the ice when Shelly landed on her backside.  This is where we found the center of the tootsie pop.  She was done to say the least.  We headed to church and then to my folks for a hot lunch.  It was around noon when our power came back on, almost exactly 3.5 days after it went out.

Normally I love to ride in the snow, but with a bottom bracket height of 11.8 inches, the BB would be under snow.  And since it was dark in the basement, I didn't ride the trainer either.  I checked my log for the year, and thus far I have ridden outside twice and done 93.5 miles on the indoor rollers. That's barley enough for basic physical well being, hardly what I might consider training.  The Gravel Rouser is going to hurt.

The generator (a mini review of the Generac ix2000):
The ix2000 is a 2000w (2200w peak) invertor-generator.  It is quieter than a regular set and it can adjust the engine speed to match the load (as opposed to a 3600 fixed RPM machine to make 60Hz).  I say quieter as it does not compare to the Honda invertor, but at half the price I did not expect it to.  It is also light.  2000W is enough generally, easily taking care of the fridge, TV, and hot water.  It is absolutely miserly with gas.  It ran somewhere between 30 and 40 hours and used about 3 gallons of gas.  The only issue was with the outlet.  On Friday, the fridge shut off when the generator was still running.  I discovered that one of the contacts in the outlet on the generator had a broken contact, presumably from the  vibration.  I moved the extension cord to the other outlet.  The second failed on Sunday morning.  I did not try to repair it since the power came back on a few hours later and because it is under warranty.  The warranty states that repairs can void the warranty, so I guess Athens Sport Cycles will get to look at it for me (would be an easy repair, takes a standard 20A 120V outlet right behind the front panel held in place with four screws).  Other than that, it was great and I am pleased with the purchase.

Two and a half weeks

Two and a half weeks to the 2015 Gravel Rouser and just under four weeks to the Lake Hope Road race.  Am I ready?  Nope.  I can barely get one trainer session in a week, just enough to keep my legs spinning and burn some winter calories.

I am now on my third round of winter illness too, this time, just a classic cold.  This past Saturday morning Shelly asked what I had planned for the day.  I responded that I would go easy, move some firewood and maybe put a new set of tires on my rouser bike.  Those plans changed quickly a short time later when Shelly yelled from the shower.  I went in to find her holding the shower head in her hand.  The shower arm had broken off in the wall.  This was then followed by a text from the middle son with a picture of his now swollen wrist and that they don't think it is broken.

I managed to get a replacement part to get by for the shower late in the afternoon and Ethan doesn't have a broken wrist.  Hopefully next time he decides to try a front side 720 with a snowboard (or maybe it was just he and a friend building a small ramp) he will be more careful.

On Sunday, the rains came (and melted a bit of the snow).  I finally did just rest through the afternoon until playing indoor soccer with Ethan.  I have two blisters, a bruised shin, and a sore hand.  Why yes, I was the oldest person there.

I managed to mount those tires though.  I had ordered a set of Continental Race King 29x2.0 tires thinking they would be fast and light for riding back roads but still have some volume and grip.  I set them up tubeless on my Sun Ringle NoTubes ready rims.  If you intend to do the same with this tire, just know it will be work.  Two days in and I am still finding leaks in the sidewalls.  But if it works, I hopefully won't end up flatting at the Hilly Billy.