My impetus for blogging has seem to hit a low for some reason. I guess there just isn't that much different going on. Different being the key word.
I've been training about 5 days a week, and find myself grumpy on the days I'm not able to pound the pedals with vigor. Not sure what that's all about. Even though I enjoy trainers (believe it or not) there is no replacement for riding outside. Even when the weather is marginal, as it often is this time of year. There's no way I'd get on a trainer for 2-3 hours, but that's no problem outside. And after said ride, my legs are tired, but I feel great. I feel like I actually did something. 70 minutes of zone 2 on the trainer doesn't really lend itself to that feeling.
This month I've tried to stay away from media sites. I did really good until today. There's a lot of stuff going on. But hardly any of it directly impacts me. I found my mood immediately crash and my blood pressure go down upon opening up the Huffington Post. Why I go to that site, I have no idea. All it does is piss me off about corporations, the government, and the Elite. I read an article discussing about what GARBAGE that McDonald's is passing off as oatmeal. Seriously, read the article. It's no wonder that America is one of the fattest nations in the world. It is one of the atrocities of this modern society that we live in that healthy food is a boutique item and economically out of reach for so many families. I'd love to shop at Whole Foods, but I don't know if I can comfortably fork over $150-$200 a week in groceries. Maybe we should try it for a month and see how it goes. The household would probably lose 10 pounds.
At least AB would poop more often.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Monday, February 14, 2011
CRAP.
I was going to title this blog "horse shit", but I felt that was a little too PG13 so I put it in the first sentence.
Goodbye NEET Moto Series?
In sum, the event series I was planning on getting the majority of my races in this year has been canceled. Hopefully someone can step up and keep it close. I'm not driving up to farkin' Smithville for this stuff. The reason this series was going to be my redeeming grace was that it was Tuesday night, every week, for like 5 months. No weekend conflicts with the myriad of activities the boys do, or our honey-dos and all the other stuff that happens on the weekends. Not that I was opposed to the occasional weekend race, but races on Tuesday night was a sweet setup for me and my family.
If I were a seasoned road racer, I'd be up for promoting it myself. But I'm not. I have 0 road race experience, let alone any promoting experience.
My goal for this season was to get my 10 races in and move up to Cat4. Learn as much as I can, race effectively, and improve my fitness so I can be a solid Cat3 in cyclocross next season. It might be a little tougher to get all that done now. Totally possible, but just a little tougher.
Goodbye NEET Moto Series?
In sum, the event series I was planning on getting the majority of my races in this year has been canceled. Hopefully someone can step up and keep it close. I'm not driving up to farkin' Smithville for this stuff. The reason this series was going to be my redeeming grace was that it was Tuesday night, every week, for like 5 months. No weekend conflicts with the myriad of activities the boys do, or our honey-dos and all the other stuff that happens on the weekends. Not that I was opposed to the occasional weekend race, but races on Tuesday night was a sweet setup for me and my family.
If I were a seasoned road racer, I'd be up for promoting it myself. But I'm not. I have 0 road race experience, let alone any promoting experience.
My goal for this season was to get my 10 races in and move up to Cat4. Learn as much as I can, race effectively, and improve my fitness so I can be a solid Cat3 in cyclocross next season. It might be a little tougher to get all that done now. Totally possible, but just a little tougher.
Friday, February 11, 2011
Busy!
My mind is going quick, so I'm just going to blurt things out as they come to me, kind of like free association, so here we go!
Massive work project going on this weekend, and I have to be in at 5:30am. That'll suck. It's almost like working at DST again. Thank God it's only for one day. Ug.
Kieran got his big boy bed last weekend. Well, most of it. We're waiting on the support rails still, so it's just a head board and a full size box spring/mattress. He loves it. Unfortunately our sleep patterns still aren't very good since he's cutting molars like they were hundred dollar bills. This kid looks like a Great White Shark when he opens his mouth. I'm glad he's out of the biting phase.
I've borrowed a set of rollers from both my teammate Jake and Britton. The ones Britton gave me are pretty nice, they are parabolic to keep you from going off the edge, and it works well. If you go/fall to the edge too hard though, you're going off. It's pretty fun as I've never used rollers
before, and I can see their benefit. Maybe I'll pick up a pair before next winter. 
Training has been going ok. I've been good about training for 3-4 days, then taking a day off. Sometimes that day off turns into 2 or 3 days, which I REALLY need to get away from doing that. Gotta keep that Chronic Training Load on the upward slope. Only a few bike/endurance nerds will know what that means.
I think that's all I got for now. There's lots more buried in my brain, but it'll have to wait. Enjoy the pending weather warmup!
Massive work project going on this weekend, and I have to be in at 5:30am. That'll suck. It's almost like working at DST again. Thank God it's only for one day. Ug.
Kieran got his big boy bed last weekend. Well, most of it. We're waiting on the support rails still, so it's just a head board and a full size box spring/mattress. He loves it. Unfortunately our sleep patterns still aren't very good since he's cutting molars like they were hundred dollar bills. This kid looks like a Great White Shark when he opens his mouth. I'm glad he's out of the biting phase.
I've borrowed a set of rollers from both my teammate Jake and Britton. The ones Britton gave me are pretty nice, they are parabolic to keep you from going off the edge, and it works well. If you go/fall to the edge too hard though, you're going off. It's pretty fun as I've never used rollers
before, and I can see their benefit. Maybe I'll pick up a pair before next winter. 
Training has been going ok. I've been good about training for 3-4 days, then taking a day off. Sometimes that day off turns into 2 or 3 days, which I REALLY need to get away from doing that. Gotta keep that Chronic Training Load on the upward slope. Only a few bike/endurance nerds will know what that means.
I think that's all I got for now. There's lots more buried in my brain, but it'll have to wait. Enjoy the pending weather warmup!
Friday, February 4, 2011
World Bicycle Relief
As you may or may have not noticed, there is an clickable icon on the upper right hand corner of this page for World Bicycle Relief. This charity empowers individuals and communities in Africa by donating bicycles that enable people to make long school commutes, service medical emergencies, deliver goods from village to village, and a host of other great things. I have made a goal of raising $250 before October 2011. I have also enlisted the support of my race team, Team Colavita/Parisi Coffee to help in this endeavor as a team. We have a team goal of $4,020, which is roughly 30 bikes (1 for each race team member).
If you can help me out in this endeavor, I'd really appreciate it. This charity is near and dear to my heart, and Barron's ranked it as one of the top 25 most efficient charities.
Thanks in advance for your support!
If you can help me out in this endeavor, I'd really appreciate it. This charity is near and dear to my heart, and Barron's ranked it as one of the top 25 most efficient charities.
Thanks in advance for your support!
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Rationing topics
Yea, there's not much going on, so I have to ration out my topics. I'm sure you don't want to hear about my time (or lack thereof) on the trainer anymore than I do. If you think golf is boring to watch, try watching a guy on a trainer. I'm not sure what that makes me, since I'd watch either over Nascar.
Anyway, I promised a rehash of our PC trip, and here is the (not-so) abbreviated version. I waited too long, and have forgotten half of what occurred. All I know is that the snow sucked. Absolutely blew. It was icy and slushy and rainy the entire time we were there. Well, at least until the day we left then there was 6" of fresh snow. I really wanted to stay another day, but it would have been big bucks since our condo rental rate tripled since Sundance was starting. I heard some people rent out their house for Sundance, and make enough money to pay for the mortgage for an entire year. That's a pretty sweet setup, but I'd bet they had been there for a long time and had bought the house when it was a more reasonable RE environment.
Every house we looked at (and the one we stayed at) was about 1.2M to 1.5M, and for about 2400 sq ft. Of course, we were in nearly a perfect location, but still, that's around $700-$800/sq ft. Tony and I had a conversation about this, and both agreed something has got to give. I also noticed that for "just" another million, you could have a hella bad-ass house, something that was actually worth 2.5M. Like 6500 sq ft, impeccably finished, and some land.
It won't be but a couple of more years and the real estate in some of the mountain towns (Park City, Jackson, Breck, etc) is going to have to correct. I think price corrections haven't happened as much in these areas because a lot of people have these as 2nd houses, and would rather sit and wait it out, than take a beating by selling now. So maybe they'll offer it for sale, but it'll be on the market for months.
Someday we'll get one, but I think that someday is a long ways off, plus I think I'd rather build something up. So few people have our tastes! Maybe I just need to save for a few years then go buy 10 acres in the foothills outside of Denver. We can sit on the land until we're ready to build. Or sell for a profit in case things don't go as planned. That's a whole 'nother discussion for a different day.
Wow, that was a long way around talking about the PC trip. I guess I'll recap AB's trip, since it was his first trip to the mountains. AB got pretty bored on the two flights to PC. I'm glad they were short flights, because he was going bonkers. Thankfully he crashed on the shuttle to our condo, because he was a worn-out little dude. I will mention that he was disappointed it wasn't a SPACE shuttle. Funny guy.
Well, we all fought sleep waiting for the Marek's to arrive from Orlando. They had a non-stop, but it was still a LONG flight. Yuck. It definitely is advantageous living in KC for the reason everywhere isn't too far away. Once their space shuttle pulled up, it was great seeing them again, and AB and Max quickly got wound up again (as much as they could). We tried putting them to bed, but as we were all retiring a few minutes later, Julie peeked in on Max only to see him uncomfortably scrunched to one side of the bed and AB was snuggled up to him fast asleep. This setup was in spite of the the fact they had each had a whole bunk bed to themselves. Max wasn't sure of AB, and that was way to close for comfort. HA! Max went back to his parent's room at that point, and then AB came and got me out of my comfy bed and I had to go sleep in the bunk bed with him. I was tired enough it didn't really matter at that point.
The next day started out with all of us waking up relatively early (on CST and EST in MST). We herded everyone the 1/2 mile walk to PC Mountain Resort, and got the boys in ski school, picked up my great Burton Custom snowboard rental, and we all hit the slopes. We had an awesome time, despite the crap snow. No one wiped out too hard, although Penny did wipe out a bit more than she usually does. I did also notice that riding was a bit easier without 35 pounds of body fat, and I didn't feel quite as tired at the end of the day. I did have a few good wipeouts myself, but there were nothing more than just a couple of flips from getting lazy and letting the nose of my board drop into the snow, which then acted like a giant leaf spring and flung me in the air. I bet you can guess what Penny's favorite part of the trip was...
AB did a great job in ski school, and by the third day, he was "shredding" the mountain. The first run he did with Penny ended with her in a full tuck trying to catch him as he was hauling arse down the mountain. The boy has no fear. Good! We negotiated having him follow Penny with me behind AB in case he fell. That worked out great, and everyone went fast enough to have fun. It really makes me proud seeing him ski so well so quickly. I was impressed.
AB was also feeling quite competitive this trip, as he kept calling out Mr. Tony on various challenges. The first was eating as many pancakes as fast as possible, then it was shredding down the mountain, and then it was Uno. Kieran is going to have a wild childhood trying to keep up with Aiden, that's for sure.
By the end of the trip, we were all ready to call it good, even though the new snow was so tempting. We had great flights back only to drive in the snow "storm" in KC, and it took almost 3 1/2 hours to get back to Kieran in Lee's Summit. That made for a long day, but it was good to be back in our beds. The end. ;-)
Anyway, I promised a rehash of our PC trip, and here is the (not-so) abbreviated version. I waited too long, and have forgotten half of what occurred. All I know is that the snow sucked. Absolutely blew. It was icy and slushy and rainy the entire time we were there. Well, at least until the day we left then there was 6" of fresh snow. I really wanted to stay another day, but it would have been big bucks since our condo rental rate tripled since Sundance was starting. I heard some people rent out their house for Sundance, and make enough money to pay for the mortgage for an entire year. That's a pretty sweet setup, but I'd bet they had been there for a long time and had bought the house when it was a more reasonable RE environment.
Every house we looked at (and the one we stayed at) was about 1.2M to 1.5M, and for about 2400 sq ft. Of course, we were in nearly a perfect location, but still, that's around $700-$800/sq ft. Tony and I had a conversation about this, and both agreed something has got to give. I also noticed that for "just" another million, you could have a hella bad-ass house, something that was actually worth 2.5M. Like 6500 sq ft, impeccably finished, and some land.
It won't be but a couple of more years and the real estate in some of the mountain towns (Park City, Jackson, Breck, etc) is going to have to correct. I think price corrections haven't happened as much in these areas because a lot of people have these as 2nd houses, and would rather sit and wait it out, than take a beating by selling now. So maybe they'll offer it for sale, but it'll be on the market for months.
Someday we'll get one, but I think that someday is a long ways off, plus I think I'd rather build something up. So few people have our tastes! Maybe I just need to save for a few years then go buy 10 acres in the foothills outside of Denver. We can sit on the land until we're ready to build. Or sell for a profit in case things don't go as planned. That's a whole 'nother discussion for a different day.
Wow, that was a long way around talking about the PC trip. I guess I'll recap AB's trip, since it was his first trip to the mountains. AB got pretty bored on the two flights to PC. I'm glad they were short flights, because he was going bonkers. Thankfully he crashed on the shuttle to our condo, because he was a worn-out little dude. I will mention that he was disappointed it wasn't a SPACE shuttle. Funny guy.
Well, we all fought sleep waiting for the Marek's to arrive from Orlando. They had a non-stop, but it was still a LONG flight. Yuck. It definitely is advantageous living in KC for the reason everywhere isn't too far away. Once their space shuttle pulled up, it was great seeing them again, and AB and Max quickly got wound up again (as much as they could). We tried putting them to bed, but as we were all retiring a few minutes later, Julie peeked in on Max only to see him uncomfortably scrunched to one side of the bed and AB was snuggled up to him fast asleep. This setup was in spite of the the fact they had each had a whole bunk bed to themselves. Max wasn't sure of AB, and that was way to close for comfort. HA! Max went back to his parent's room at that point, and then AB came and got me out of my comfy bed and I had to go sleep in the bunk bed with him. I was tired enough it didn't really matter at that point.
The next day started out with all of us waking up relatively early (on CST and EST in MST). We herded everyone the 1/2 mile walk to PC Mountain Resort, and got the boys in ski school, picked up my great Burton Custom snowboard rental, and we all hit the slopes. We had an awesome time, despite the crap snow. No one wiped out too hard, although Penny did wipe out a bit more than she usually does. I did also notice that riding was a bit easier without 35 pounds of body fat, and I didn't feel quite as tired at the end of the day. I did have a few good wipeouts myself, but there were nothing more than just a couple of flips from getting lazy and letting the nose of my board drop into the snow, which then acted like a giant leaf spring and flung me in the air. I bet you can guess what Penny's favorite part of the trip was...
AB did a great job in ski school, and by the third day, he was "shredding" the mountain. The first run he did with Penny ended with her in a full tuck trying to catch him as he was hauling arse down the mountain. The boy has no fear. Good! We negotiated having him follow Penny with me behind AB in case he fell. That worked out great, and everyone went fast enough to have fun. It really makes me proud seeing him ski so well so quickly. I was impressed.
AB was also feeling quite competitive this trip, as he kept calling out Mr. Tony on various challenges. The first was eating as many pancakes as fast as possible, then it was shredding down the mountain, and then it was Uno. Kieran is going to have a wild childhood trying to keep up with Aiden, that's for sure.
By the end of the trip, we were all ready to call it good, even though the new snow was so tempting. We had great flights back only to drive in the snow "storm" in KC, and it took almost 3 1/2 hours to get back to Kieran in Lee's Summit. That made for a long day, but it was good to be back in our beds. The end. ;-)
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Pics and vids from Park City
Here are a few pics from our trip to Park City. I'll write something up in a bit, but enjoy these for now.
AB skiing, day 3:
AB skiing, day 3:
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Occasionally I post things I say I'm going to post
Like this video, for instance. Yes, it was every bit as cold as it looked. Kudos to the race promoters and all my fellow racers for such a great event.
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