Powder Day

Some photos from today. We took the camera with us on a couple of runs this morning. We didn't take it in the afternoon when we skied the knee-deep powder... we only have the "big" camera and didn't feel like lugging it up the T-bar. Sonja's small digital was stolen on the shuttle. Again, that story is for another time.

Here I am shredding the gnar on Cimarron.
Skiing the bumps thru the trees on The Burn.
The bumps on Corsair.
The bumps on Grits. I just had to do this run. Grits.... Girls Raised In The South!
No idea what run this was...

Hello from Breckenridge

Sonja and I are out here in Breck. We were walking along Main St. and came across this little alleyway. Hmmm, wine, cheese and chocolate all in one place. Plus I made a friend.
Leaving with my booty.
The world championship snow sculptures are this week. Here is a huge block of snow. I'm anxious to see how these look at the end of the week.
I will post some skiing pictures later. And at some point I will tell you all more about the trip. The shuttle out here from DIA is a whole post in and of itself.

Can you fit in your luggage?

I got some new luggage. It's kind of a long story how it came about. Basically, Sonja's sister, we'll just call her the Cuddly Little Piglet, "stole" my rolling duffel bag some time ago. Since then every time I pack for a trip I moan and groan about not having my bag. Sonja had heard enough of my complaining and replaced my lost bag with this one. I love it!


Yeah, you wouldn't look so hot either if you had just spent a minute stuffed in a suitcase.

Baited Breath?

Seeing how my last update was almost a month ago, you’d think I’d have a lot to blog about. Well, think again, folks. This is the Chicken… all I do is ride my bike, eat lots, and drink red wine. Or should that be eat and drink lots of red wine? Oh, and I work at a pretty boring job. I mean, I’m an accountant for the government… how exciting can that be?

So loyal readers here is the update you’ve all been waiting for with bated breath, in chronological order, no less. And only the high (low?) lights. I mean, do you really want to read about what I ate for breakfast?

(Here’s a quick sidenote. I used to always think that expression was “waiting with baited breath” and I wondered, “Why would someone wait with fish breath?”)

Christmas Eve was spent with Darlene and Pilar. It’s the first time Gabriella did not cry when she saw me.
Isa and her mother were in town… Isa from Miami and Ingrid from Sweden. Ingrid and I “scoring” chestnuts.
We gave Gabriella a tent. We should have gotten her a “real” one as she kept trying to get in this one.
Jewish Christmas – Heidi, George, Sonja and I decided to go for a nice bike ride on Christmas Day, much to the dismay of my mother and godmother. We rode something like 6 hours and 90 miles. We even had to take a ferry across the Potomac near Leesburg. How cool is that?
The ride was organized by Heidi whose last name ends in ‘burg so you can see that she had nothing better to do on a Christian holiday. When she asked if Sonja and I would like to ride, we said of course. She then asked, “Aren’t you Christian?” We replied, “Not good ones” and the ride was on. Yes, I will say hi to Hitler in Hell for you for that one. By the way, after the ride we met up with even more Jewish friends and had dinner at the Veggie Garden, ‘cause you know the only places open on Christmas are Chinese restaurants, then off to a movie (Charlie Wilson’s War – 3 ½ stars from me).
Belated Birthday Dinner – For my birthday, Sonja took me out to Belga. While we were dining on our fine Belgian food the waitress brought over a bottle of wine. It seems Laura and Gloria had dropped it off at the restaurant for me with a note… Happy Birthday, from Azucar. How sweet! A bottle of wine from the White Dog. Since Sonja and I had already ordered up a bottle I decided to keep this one for a nice home cooked meal. Laura explained to me that this Sicilian wine was perfect for pairing with steak and that’s what Azu had in mind (she of course was thinking of the leftovers). Yes, Azu did get some of this yummy meal.

The Marmot came to visit again. She’s such a good guest because there’s no stress. If I want to sit around in my underwear all day watching TV and eating pizza, she’s ok with that. If I want to take her on a 3 hour ride up the C&O to Great Falls, she’s ok with that as well. We did both, although the sitting around wasn’t necessarily in my underwear, and we weren’t eating pizza. We did eat lots of cheese, drink lots of champagne and red wine, and celebrated the new year in style with Dick Clark and Ryan Seacrest. Classic.

Since my Jewish Christmas Day ride, I’ve done several more rides of note… 2 Kelly Acres rides and 1 shop ride in addition to my weekday training. I only mention all this riding because my sis Val says I’m going to be eating her tire next year. Come on, Val. Bring. It. On. Oh, and Dad… I hope you are stepping it up. I don’t want to have to wait too long for you to catch up at RAGBRAI.

Kelley Acres was once again, everything I thought it would be and more. Sonja and I felt like we were on the Artemis team ride 2 Saturdays ago. This past Saturday was more low-key with the usual suspects minus Lynda and Sonja. I rode up with Heidi and Ilana Iguana. Heidi had baked scones and smeared them with “lumpy butter” and blueberry jam. Yum! I know it’s what got me thru the ride. And Fred’s chili is the best recovery meal one can have. By the way, that lumpy butter is actually something called clotted cream or something like that and is apparently a delicacy from England. Who knew the Brits could make something that tastes good.

The shop ride on Sunday was great. After the Kelley Acres ride the day before I was really worried about riding with a bunch of guys. Well, that and the fact that I had a bottle of wine and a bag of chips for dinner the night before. Turns out that most of the guys were suffering right along with me. How does one drink an entire bottle of wine? I’m not quite sure how I managed it, but since Sonja was out and I was home alone and drinking (I know… never drink alone) I just kept refilling my class and next thing I know, I’m passed out on the sofa. Thankfully I made it to the shop on time and had a nice ride (Arlington Hills) with the guys.

A few closing notes… I’m off to Breckenridge Friday to ski in neck-deep powder. I only hope the skiing does not bother my foot, which is only a bit better. I may have to get it x-rayed when I get back. And the best non-cycling-related purchase I’ve made in a while… my Magic Bullet.

Hanging with the White Dog

Not much to blog about. We've got the White Dog until Jan 5. We took her to Rock Creek today but the pics didn't turn out... too foggy and rainy. Here she is on yesterday's walk. When we are short on time but need to calm her down, we take her to the lawn of the Library of Congress and play fetch. She wanted to carry her ball home.

Kelley Acres Ride 12/22

Another Kelley Acres ride survived yesterday. Beautiful weather, even if the sun never came out. An even better group of people to ride with.
I got to use my new CHB winter jacket.
Heidi pees like every 10 miles.
Lynda made a friend along the way.
This dog wanted some luvin' too.
Afterwards we sat around eating chili that Fred prepared and playing with Shasta (Chris' cat). I haven't downloaded the data yet, but something like 3:30 hours and 50+ miles. A very good day.

Happy Birthday

While searching the web for birthday related cartoons I came across this site. Too funny. Savage Chickens! I love it. This guy draws all his cartoons on sticky notes.

Trebon's crash at Nationals

I was looking at some video from cyclocross nationals and saw this. No matter, I still want to go next year. Kansas City, December 2008, here I come!

My left molar

All I want for Christmas is my one front tooth and a left molar

That's right. Cancel all those wishes for fancy bike gear. I need teeth!

Yesterday I was flossing and my front tooth fell apart. I was hit in the mouth with a softball as a kid and broke it. I've had problems with it ever since. Once I was having my teeth cleaned and the dental assistant just popped it right off. I don't know the terminology for how they fixed it. I know it's not a cap or crown, maybe more like a veneer. It seems the tooth just split, front to back. Nothing to worry about though. Only the back part of it fell off, you can't even notice. Shouldn't be too painful or expensive to fix.

Well today I was flossing again and my crown fell off. This is more serious. Again, it's not visible, but my boss told me that if I ignored it, it could abscess. I hope the dentist is able to bond the crown back to the platform. If not, I could be facing the dreaded root canal. This could be extremely painful and quite costly. By the way, this tooth originally broke when I tripped and fell and hit my jaw on my desk.

On a better note, last night was Evelyn's Festivus Celebration.

Festivus is the celebration for the "rest of us" and begins with the airing of grievances. My grievance is that Ev gave Sonja and I matching jackets so we look like a couple of dorks. (Just kidding! I love my jacket.)

After the airing of grievances, come the feats of strength. I skipped out on that part. And one important thing, for Festivus you don't put up a tree but rather a pole. Here's Jeff and his Festivus pole.
It was an enjoyable evening and a great celebration to kick off the holiday season.