I see people crash and as long as they are ok, can’t help but laugh a bit when I see them. Today while reading Bicycle Retailer they had a link to a video of some bike crashes. I figured I would have to share. Also, turn the volume up as it is a bit soft and just like Bicycle Retailer pointed out, I like the guy yelling “GO STORMTROOPER!!!”

Well it is snowing and in my opinion, that sucks. I really don’t like the cold that much and I could probably do without it ever snowing. My feet are always cold, my hands are always cold, and I complain most of the winter. Good thing I live in New Hampshire eh? If the boss said we are moving somewhere that I can ride the bike 12 months of the year with minimal gear, I would have this office packed up in 15 minutes.

One good thing about the snow. I can’t rake up the rest of my leaves this year. Guess it will have to wait until spring. ohh well. Then again, I now have to trade the rake for the shovel. Damnit…

Not a good sign:

I am sure plenty of people out there are doing this, but you have to give it to Craig, he has some dedication. Riding the trainer at 6:19am.   I can’t even wake up at the time.  Good for him.

I don’t like to be bored.  Tonight when I got home from work, I had the worst case of boredom ever.  Since I am taking this week off from riding, I sat here in front of the tv playing a little play station.  That lasted for about 3 minutes so I did what every outdoor enthusiast would do.  I dug out my headlamp, went out and raked my front yard.  That’s right, in total darkness, there I was with my headlamp on raking my yard.  Honestly, I couldn’t have been happier.  It was a nice nice, low 40’s crystal clear out.  It wasn’t as nice as riding my bike for 2 hours, but it was darn nice to be outside breathing in the fresh air.  Campy was even out with her coat on and blinky red light.  Its quite funny to just watch this red light running all over the place.  Good times..

So yesterday I moaned about the cold and I am sticking to that story.  But today I talked to some people about going for a bike ride after work one night.  Their response.  Its too cold out.  OK fair enough.  It is cold.  However, these are the same people that I will see on the ski slopes when its -5 degrees out.  Is it too cold then? No, the temps are just right.  I guess thats the difference between someone who likes to ride a bike and someone who LOVES to ride a bike.  Sure, I hate the cold, but I will layer up with 4 pair of tights if I need to if it lets me get out there and pedal.  I have done it before when I lived in Maine, I will do it again.

I must say this weekend was interesting….and very tiring.  I left NH sometime around 7:45 pm with the car loaded with gear and the dog to make the 8+ hour drive home to the parents to get ready for the big PSU weekend.  Once we got there at abotu 4am, took a 4 hour nap, took the dogs to the kennel and headed out on our 3 hour drive to State College for the game.

Things at the game went well.  It was nice weather, great to see the changes they made to the campus since I was last there, and PSU even won.  That was the best news.  Another 3 hour drive home, followed by supper and another 8+ hour drive back to NH and my weekend is over.  Now it back to the grind.

I have decided that this week is the week to take off of biking.  With weather being horrible, day light savings having messed with the after work riding and the few days off from this weekend, I thought this would be the best time.  I plan not to think about the bike or any real exercise this week as to put it as my “recharge period” for this year.  This weekend I plan on getting out twice and then starts the trainer program.  I hate the trainer program, but this year, I felt stronger and better earlier this year than any other year.  That was with my winter training starting on Jan 4th.  This year I have 2 extra months to it, so it should be a much better year next year.  Also, I will try to commute to work (sometimes that 30 degree weather makes it hard for me to do that) every day and depending on things, try to get a ride in during the morning hours.

Nothing too exciting here in Mike world..Didn’t ride, didn’t run, didn’t do anything except enter receipts into quicken for the 10 day vacation I was just on and then try to reconcile all the accounts.  Good times.

I don’t know what is going on for this weekend but I certainly need to get out and do something.  Sure, sitting around is a good time, but eventually (2 days) it gets pretty boring.  Hopefully we can take the dog for a walk and tire her out so she isn’t running all around the house for the entire weekend and maybe Kelly and I will get the fit pit rolling and burn some things.  I had planned on renting a log splitter and get the firewood ready for this winter, but honestly don’t know if that will happen.  I have all these grand schemes in my mind and I have a feeling none of them will happen.  But ya gotta love a 3 day weekend….

Instead of riding yesterday, we decided to watch the movie 24 solo.  I must say, it was one of the best mountain bike movies I have seen to date.  It followed Chris through some of his early season races and finished up with the 2006 24 Hour World Championship.  Great camera work, fantastic story, absolutely a great movie.  Certainly worth every penny I paid for it.  I have a feeling I will watch it over and over to get myself psyched up for the upcoming race.

I must say, thinking about doing a solo race and watching these guys is unbelievable.  In the finals, the laps were 8 miles and the leaders did 30 laps.  Unreal.  Then again, it almost killed the winner of the race.

Well, I am back to the home office from a great weekend at the US Nationals at Mt Snow.  Great weekend for racing.  Adam Creig took 2 national Championships, the Super D and Cross Country, and there were MANY folks on the the podium that rode Michelins.  It does make me feel good having all the athletes come back to our truck telling me that the tires made all the difference.  They might be bowing smoke at me, but either way, makes me feel like I made a bit of a difference in their race.

I am back home and back on the bike.  I did get a ride in at Mt Snow and with all that rain they got, it was rather gnarly.  I did a nice 40 mile road ride last night and tonight I will head out on the mt bike just to keep the technical skills up to par.  Weather has been rather warm these past couple of days, so I think that I am going to get the trainer out and ride in the morning doing the Spinervals workouts.  That way I get to stay cool and get a quality workout done in the morning, then I can go for a nice light cruise at night.

Well, the surgery went well.  I am not in recovery mode.  So on Monday, they went in with some lasers, blasted up the 6mm stone and sucked out as much of it as they could.  Monday I came home from the hospital and watched the tour.  Tuesday, stayed at home and watched the tour.  Wednesday, came into the office for a little, but was in too much pain so went back home and watched the tour.  Yesterday, I went into the urologists office and they removed the stint that kept the ureter open.  That wasn’t as much fun as it sounds.  Today, I am ok, but am still in quite a bit of pain.  I am on some pretty heavy meds and really can’t do much.  I am actually getting restless sitting at home.  That and being tired of peeing blood all the time.   Thank goodness for the tour being on.

As far as the bike, it is killing me being I haven’t been on it for more then 3 weeks at this point.  Kelly comes home every day from work and goes for a ride, just leaving me there.  It almost makes me cry.  It seems as if by the middle of next week I should be able to start back up road biking.  I am thinking that I will just ride the trainer for workouts instead of riding outside, as that will focus my efforts a lot better than just riding.  I am really concerned about the 24 hour race being I have spent so much time off the bike.  Seems as if I will just have to put my head down and hammer through the race.

As I read over this post, it seems as if it isn’t the best post I have written, but it is the best I can do at this point.  Maybe the meds are starting to get a hold of my mind.  Sorry..

Monday morning, 10:45 am….doomsday for the kidney stone….and boy I am excited.  Nothing like a room full of doctors and nurse’s working around “little Mikey”.  I think that is the part I am the most nervous about.  “the boys” are going to be man handled and I don’t like the sound of that.  Something else, the nurse told me today that the stint might be in for up to 3 weeks, unlike the doctor telling me up to 3 days.  Thats a bit of time difference wouldn’t you say??

Also they told me I might want to think about a living will or think about who has power of attorney in case something goes horribly wrong.   Umm….I thought this was a simple little routine surgery..sure sure, they are just “covering all basis” but still, I don’t like the sound of that…any takers who ant to be in charge of me in case I turn veggie??  yea, probably an internet poll isn’t the best and I should let a family member do that.  good thinking mike..