Dozens + 1

As I mentioned the other day, I now have literally dozens of route options when mountain biking to work and over the weekend, while on a roundabout, try to link stuff together type ride I found yet another good mountain bike option to work which effectively avoids the big, nasty, unclimbable climb at the beginning of my commute. It forces me to ride a bit more on the road and I miss some nice singletrack but it sure will be nice to skip that climb on occasion (like I did on Tuesday).

Are you tired of me talking about my commute yet? Yeah, me too. What I'd love to talk about instead is the new Salsa Selma attached to my roof rack. Unfortunately though, it's not on my rack yet and I'm not sure when it will be. As I mentioned yesterday, bikeman is swamped and despite having some pull there, I can't exactly make time magically appear. As a compromise, I've asked Al to just get the headset pressed, ebb in and brakes mounted and I'd screw the rest of it up myself. That's one thing I CAN do. Give me a six pack, some tools and a partially assembled bike and in a few hours time you'll have six empties, a few less tools (always seem to lose a few) AND a partially assembled bike that is marginally rideable. Once again, pray for me.

Beginning of the Road

For my relationship with dear, sweet Selma. As I type this, she is in Al's trusting hands at Bikeman.com's world headquarters ready to be built. Unfortunately, I have no time to do it myself and their build wait is 3+ weeks so hopefully Al will be able to do it himself in short order. Please keep me in your prayers...

Recent Success

It's surprisingly tough to blog when you don't have Internet access. We're without access at home for the foreseeable future so I'm forced to do all my blogage while at work and since I'm working a 4 day week and trying to cram 5 days of work into those four days, it can be tough indeed. Thankfully though, while the blogging has slid a bit, the riding has improved greatly. The new commute rocks and with so many trail options right from my front door I haven't even touched the road bike in the last two weeks (ok, maybe one quick ride). I've also been able to spread the love a bit, getting Marcy out for close to two hours on Saturday and my father and brother for 1.5 on Sunday. All told, I think I rode 6 of the last 7 days and I'm finally starting to feel normal on a bike again.

Marcy getn' er done.

My brother and father hating every minute of it.

Uttered by Marcy

"I so felt like you today as I squeezed my meatballs..."

Sure, she was actually talking about squeezing her meatballs for lunch out of a ziplock bag (so that she could comfortably fit them in her brand new, for mother's day, Ergon BD1 pack) but I prefer to take the low road (who doesn't???) and conjure up some other images. Wait, I don't like those images. High road it shall be!

Today, I completed my first of what will probably prove to be thousands of commutes from our new place. Sure the new place is technically a camper right now but at least it's parked NEXT TO the new place. That's got to count for something. So anyway, as many of you know, I've been pretty giddy about the new commute because, as it stands, I can do the whole thing minus a few miles on trail and with a little work and a bit of time (multi land trust shenanigans) I'll be able to do it by just crossing two roads.

Today was the first test of the new route and it turned out awesome. I managed to take my 6-7 mile, 20 minute road commute and turn it into a 14 mile, 2 hour mountain biking extravaganza. During that entire two hour ride, I spent less than 15 minutes on the road. Now that's good stuff right there. The best part is that I did one of possibly dozens of route options available since there are a bunch of trails that I missed today because of lack of time. I think that I'll be able to do the ride in as quick as one hour (straightest route) or as long as three hours if I hit all of the options. Good times, good times.

Haven't seen a pic of myself for a while on the interweb so here you go.

Roughin It

shave those damn legs, you look like a wookie!

Well, it's official, we're out of our winter abode and into a 5th wheel camper until our new home is habitable. When will it be habitable you ask? I DON'T FREAKIN KNOW! is my reply. If I were to guess I'd say somewhere between June and December 2011. What I do know is that cramming three people, a 120 lb dog and a cat into an itty bitty camper is no easy task. To add to that, we ran out of water in the camper yesterday, right before I worked a 13 hour day and Marcy worked all day putting fiberglass insulation into interior walls and ceilings. Can you say "rough night's sleep?". Anyway, we're full on hillbillies now right down to the tires in the yard (marcy's winter tires have to go somewhere!!!!!) and Schlitz in the fridge. Kidding about the beer part, it's actually Geary's and there's no room in the camper's pint size fridge so I'm enjoying my fine bevvies just the way god intended, piss warm. Thankfully, the step father-in-law (I think that's right) is bringing down a mini fridge to put in the basement for the time being. Phew. Let it be known that our first real appliance in the house is a beer fridge (and some grilling stuff too).

The year's first race came and went yesterday. I was bummed to not make it but considering I don't have a race bike, it was raining biblical proportions and I'd likely drop a nut or two trying to hit race pace, it was probably for the best. I did hear (haven't confirmed though) that my new riding buddy (how cute, he's got himself a boyfriend!) won the expert class. So to Steve (now to be known as KillBill), congrats!

That's killbill hamming it up for the cam on Friday.

Selma's not on my doorstep just yet, but I can almost feel her luscious tubes between my legs already. All silky smooth and carbony. The parts are in (mostly) and awaiting the build by my friends and yours at Bikeman.com. Giggidy, giggidy.

In case you're wondering, here's the build thus far.

Frame: Salsa Selma (uh, duh!)
Wheels: Hope P2 hubs and Stans Arch rims (same wheels I used last year on the Dos)
Fork: Rock Shox Reba 29'er
Brakes: Avid Juicy Ultimate
Headset: Chris King
Stem: Tru-Vativ or Salsa
Handlebars: TruVativ Stylo Team Flat
Grips: Ergon GX2 Leichtbau
Post: Tru-Vativ Team Carbon
Saddle: Fizik Airione
Crank: Tru-Vativ Style Oct 1.1G

Too Late

This morning because I had other commitments later in the day I wasn't able to do my typical commute so, instead, I decided to bust out the Dos and hit the trails I rode past the other day. Boy am I glad that I did, it turns out that there is a pretty decent network of singletrack practically out our current front door. Four minutes on the road and I was into singletrack bliss. It's pretty amazing, what probably would have been a sub-par commute on the road (because of how tired I was feeling) turned into 1:20 of exhilarating trail riding. I could tell it was a good ride because when I got home I couldn't stop yammering on and on about the trails to Marcy. I was almost giddy.

The one unfortunate thing about the discovery is that I made it when we only have four more days in that particular locale and once we move it's pretty unlikely I'd make the drive down for it specifically (and it would be 40 minutes on the road with a mountain bike ICK!). Oh well, I'll try to enjoy it one more time before we move. That reminds me, starting next week I'll be able to start putting my new commute together and that IS something to be excited about since it will probably be 2/3 singletrack. Giggidy, giggidy.

I swear there is singletrack in this pick. Also, if you look really closely for 15 second (and turn your volume way up) the fog in the center of the pic will do an awesome John Fogerty impersonation.

The new "from home" loop.

All Coming Together

Things are finally feeling like they're all coming together. We're (way?) behind on the house build but we're finally approaching a time that we'll be able to move in as we complete all of the final details (something we swore we would not do before construction started). In the push to get everything set for drywall, the last few weeks have been hell. I figure we have one more hell week and then things will ease up a bit.

Probably a good part of my positive vibes is thanks to me getting out for a couple of decent rides recently. Friday night I was once again able to hit up the Rage ride in Bath. It was a smaller group this time (5 instead of 12) so it meant for a quicker pace and less regrouping. I continue to be amazed at the amount of trails in that area. We rode for 2 1/4 hours and barely touched the trails I rode there two weeks ago. I'm thinking that I may need to incorporate that trail system into the GRRRRR.

Sorry, no time for more today.

Parts are IN!

You'd think that I'd be more excited to know that all of the parts for my Selma build are in at the fantabulous Bikeman.com. But I'm not. Why? You ask. Well, maybe it's because Selma in a caniving beyoutch and is taking her sweet ass time on that slow boat from China. Sight seeing probably. If I were actually doing next week's race I'd be more keyed up but I just found out that my company is organizing a little get together at my place next week and will be helping us side the house, on the same day as the first race of the season. So, I could do one of two things, I could say "thank for the generous offer to help BUILD OUR HOUSE but I've got a race to do" or I could bag a race in which I'll suck more than anyone has ever sucked before. Hmmm, tough decision.

Speaking of the house (like you haven't heard enough about it recently) I found out the other day that it will be featured in a sweet new mag called Maine Home and Design in their Drawing Board section. Pretty cool since it's THE design mag for Maine. Yeah, it's only Maine but they still have some pretty cool shit. Hopefully this means that once construction is done (ever???) they'll feature it in a full article. Fingers crossed. Until then, I'll be eagerly awaiting the July issue.

Two Days, Two Rides

It doesn't happen often these days but between Monday and Tuesday I somehow managed two rides. Monday's was a short, one hour mountain bike jaunt in my new local stomping grounds and today was commuting action. Nothing too exciting but it was nice to be out and finally feeling good again. That frickin bug I had last monday totally screwed me up for the whole week and weekend. On monday's ride I finally felt human again. A slow as snot, out of shape donkey of a human but human none-the-less.

The following pics aren't from my most recent rides but actually from an ill conceived ride last week (on a day I thought I was feeling better). It turned out I was still sick and ended up suffering mightily for 1:30. If I'd had an out, I would have taken it. During the ride I was tasked with retrieving Marcy's coat which we had stashed on a ride two week prior (woopsie!). Thankfully, it was still there and not suffering from a case of mildewdies.

notice anything wrong with this picture?

Ok, how 'bout now?

the ride was sucking so much donkey d*ck that I decided to walk the final stretch to marcy's jacket to avoid a very short hill. Tail between legs, check.

No mildew, check.

Not Much to Report

There is precious little to report these days. The closer our move-out date approaches, the less I get to ride or even think about riding so that I can focus all of my energy on finishing the house. In two weeks I have my first race of the year and it makes me wonder how effective my 3 hour/week, low intensity "training" will be. I'm not a betting man but if I were I'd be laying money down on extreme cramping and trailside pizza. Who knows, maybe I'll find that I thrive on no training.

To add to the drama, the Selma still isn't in the hizouse and I'm not sure when it will be AND the earliest my crank will be ready (it's on back-order) is 5 days before the race. Yeah, this is gonna be fun.

No riding pics for today so here are a couple from the house showing the master bedroom curved ceiling and insulation in progress. Enjoy.