Necessities....

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

Friday....

Yes, yes he has....

Thanks, Missy. :)

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

Holy Buckets....!!!

It's 24F outside this morning!!!! That's a mere 37 degrees warmer than it was at this time yesterday morning. Wow! It feels GREAT out there! Kinda weird, but I like it.

I really don't have much else to say this morning. I'm in the plant and people are already working their little (and large) tails off. Just like a well oiled machine. You have to love that.

The Queen of Cross wasn't feeling well yesterday so she got to spend the day with G'mama. I think they had a bit of fun. Jackal and Moo brought her back down later in the evening and she was all wound up. Where do kids get all of that energy from? So much fun! Talked to Eric and the boys for awhile last night. That was pretty nice. I had just asked Judy if she had talked to Eric lately and the phone rang. It was Eric. ESP? Jacob wants to know when we can go fishing and Kyle has a couple of girlfriends. Whoa! Jake's 8 and Kyle is 7 years old! Such a stud. Ah well.... He'll learn :)

Not much else going on around here. I just hope we have a slow melt to get rid of all this snow so that we don't have the flooding like we did last year. We'll see.

That's it for now.

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

Finally....

The Queen of Cross working on her drink straw....
Christmas presents from The Queen....

Jackal and I rolled his VW down to The Thin Man's shop yesterday so that I could FINALLY cash in the gift card that Rhea gave me for Christmas and he could get a box. Chris was in charge yesterday and we took care of business and talked for a few minutes then headed over to the other side of Main Street to look at trains. Jackal needed a new issue of a model railroad magazine and Carol had ordered him a new boxcar, which had arrived. It was cold out there!!!!!!! I hear G-Ted went xc skiing in the sub zero temps and made it back alive. Too cold for this old fart!

I mounted the seatpost and saddle as well as the handlebars, stem, and shifters to the "bling" bike yesterday. Like I told Oldman up in Michigan.... I gotta take this one slow and easy because I think it's the only "new" bike I'll bring home in '09. Judy will do me great bodily harm if I even have thoughts of another. Heck, I could probably bring home a bike I got totally free of charge and I would die at her hands. LOL. Ahhh well. You can never have too many bikes.

Anyway, I've been chatting with my little sister in Arizona via the internet and it's been fun. Email is amazing!

Time for lunch.

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

Remember October?

Surly in October....

Last summer and fall seem about a million years ago. The summer was shortened due to the flooding and tornado and winter seems to have come quickly and early. One day it was nice, the next it was winter.

I have been diligently riding the blue Colnago Master X Light in the basement 4 or 5 times a week to help stave off the winter fattness. I've tried walking a couple of times but due to the fact that a good number of my neighbors fail to shovel the sidewalks in front of their houses I stick to the bike in the basement. Better than nothing, I guess.....

Saw Scottie D. and my old buddy Jamie (with her daughter) out at Wally World tonight. They seem to be weathering the winter in fine fashion! They were both smiling, anyway :)

Slowly working on the gold CX bike. The Thin Man has been helping with a few parts and the installation of a new Chris King headset. Thanks, Buddy!

That's about it from the Devil's Deep Freeze. I hope all of you are enjoying winter as much as I am! The only thing that's keeping me sane are the occasional harassing emails from Fat Albert and playing with The Queen of Cross..... Thanks, Buddy!

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

Global Warming....

This phenomenon of Global Warming that we are experiencing is truly kicking my ass.

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

Brrrrr.....

I'm glad Judy's car started this morning because mine didn't. Not even with the battery charger. Hmmmm.... -23F. High today of 9 below zero. -23 again tonight then a "warming trend". Slightly above freezing by Monday. Yeah, Baby!

I'd suggest not riding in this weather, but if you feel you have to.....

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

Is there a cure for wicked weather and the blahs?

Plant entrance this morning....
Snow piled up from parking lot....

A wee bit chilly this afternoon....

On the way to work this a.m....

Warm and cozy....

It was about -4F when I went to work this morning. It was -4F when I left to come home this evening. It's -9 now and getting colder. More. Please give me more!

I overslept this morning and woke up at 6 a.m., which is when I usually leave for work. I forgot to set my alarm last night. Must be a sign of old age. Anyway, I got up and brushed my teeth then shaved and walked to the back door to see what had happened overnight. I couldn't even see either of our cars since both were completely buried under a massive snow drift. Sweet! I threw on my carharts and boots, pulled on a stocking cap and gloves and stepped out into the bitterly cold morning. Refreshing! Woohoo! All I could do was to try to shovel a path between our cars to get to the garage in order to get at the snow blower. It was light and fluffy snow, which I was immensely thankful for. I fired up the old gray beast and started blowing snow. 7 inches overnight on top of the three inches that we received on Monday night. Ah well, tis Iowa in winter. I got to work an hour later than usual, which is unusual for me, and I left a nice clean driveway for Judy. I'm sure she appreciated that, even if she didn't tell me so. Poop happens.

It's going to be somewhere in the neighborhood of -20 F tonight. Sounds like it will be cold Friday too followed by a warm-up beginning on Saturday. 20 above zero sounds pretty good right now.

I spent an hour on the trainer tonight pushing a medium gear at a fairly high cadence. I need to get in shape so I can kick Fatty's ass this spring on the 2nd Street roll out. Once we get to Division Street, I don't care anymore. It's just the mile from the shop to Division that I care about. Did you get that, Fat Albert? I'm going to kick your ass on 2nd Street!

Actually, I've already ridden the trainer more this year than I did all of last year and some days, actually most days, I look forward to it. A little GnR or AC/DC and I'm good. Maybe some Billy Idol or old Stones. It works for me.

Anyone want to talk politics? Could be interesting. Definitely plenty to talk about. I read in the paper tonight that our illustrious governor is taking his cue from the feds and wants to borrow 700 million to spend on infrastructure repairs and to create 28,000 jobs and stimulate the Iowa economy. He's gonna do it without raising taxes. He just plans to use the "state's profits" from the casinos to pay it back. Hmmmm..... Whatcha gonna do Chet, when the economy really gets bad and folks stop going to the casinos? Politicians are all crazy. I take that back. The people who believe anything that a politician says are all crazy. Or STOOPID. Timothy Geithner "forgot" he needed to pay self-employment taxes for 4 years in a row on money he earned from the IMF, even after signing a document in each of the years that he failed to pay those taxes that acknowledged that he understood that he was responsible for paying them. They're calling it a boo-boo. An oversight. A little mistake. Hmmmmm..... He's gonna take over Treasury, which is responsible for the IRS, and he doesn't even know that he's responsible for his own self-employment taxes. The IRS even "forgave" the penalty for 2 of the four years. Do you think they'd do that for you or me? Folks, it just ain't possible that a fella with his intelligence, position, and background just forgot something like that. If you believe that it's possible, well, I have some ocean front property in Arizona that I'd like to sell you. Great deal, too. I also see that both parties in congress are balking at the President Elect's $800,000,000,000.00 "economic recovery" package. It's a little late to be waking up, folks. Oh well. It's all good.

On second thought, lets not talk politics. It upsets my tummy.

I think that's about it for now.

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

Kinda Cool this Morning....

-11F. I came into work before reporting for jury duty this morning. It's freaking cold outside. It doesn't appear that we got the horrible blizzard that we were told to expect. It was windy last night, for sure, and we had a few inches of light, powdery snow, but the "out of town" folks seem to be here this morning so it must not be as bad as expected. I'm not complaining. The VW started right up and got me to work without any problem, so it must be good! Ah well. It is winter in Iowa! What can I say?

Anyway, I need to talk to The Jackal for a minute then head downtown to the courthouse.

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

Cold week coming....

I guess this is what we should expect in Iowa in January. Trainer time.... I rode an hour on the old Master X Light in the basement this morning. Guns 'n Roses. Good stuff.

I spent some time yesterday "cross training" with the snow shovel.

I have been summoned to report for jury duty tomorrow. Super, tell the missus to remove my name from the list, please:)

Time to go see Jackal and Moo, along with The Queen of Cross.... I'm thinking BLT and iced tea.

More later.

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

Framed....

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!

(Mostly) Ice Ride....

Fat Albert pimpin'....
A.Lo and Super Saul....

Re-grouping at Ford Road and C-57....

North to Janesville....

Double pace line....

Lock up your women and children, the Hell's Angels are in town....

Fatty throws a right hook, Jackal covers....

A.Lo (thanks for the shirt, buddy) was in town this weekend and wanted to ride some gravel. 8 or 9 of us met up in downtown Cedar Falls for a 9 a.m. take-off that quickly became a 9:30 take-off. About half way to Cedar Falls I realized that I didn't have a spare tube or tire tools with me so I stopped to see The Thin Man and he took care of me in short order. He has my new headset in at the shop now, so he'll install that this week. A new Chris King with the "Sotto Voce", or subdued, graphics. Dark blue. Pretty sweet! Jackal rolled in right behind me and was in need of a spare tube also. What's up with that?

We rolled north on Center Street to Lone Tree Road then west over to Ford Road. This is where things got a little bit dicey. The gravel is about 90% covered in ice with a little gravel showing through in some places and a little bit of snow out toward the shoulders in others. Interesting, to say the least. Super Saul was the only one of the group that was riding studs. They would have been nice today. Anyway, we followed Ford road north to where it changes names, turns east, and connects up with old highway 218. From there we headed north to Janesville for a pit stop at the Kwik-Star.

The lady at the counter was full of piss and vinegar this morning, telling me I should have coffee rather than Bug Juice. I said no, the Bug Juice is fine. She said there were icicles hanging from my moustache and that I should have coffee. Then she asked if I had studded tires on my bike. I told her "no" and she asked if anyone had ever told us that we were crazy. I said "no, that's the first time I've ever heard that". We both had a pretty good laugh at that one. There were 8 or 9 cyclists in there and it was fairly busy so there were plenty of people thinking the same thing. The temps were in the mid to upper teens and everyone was dressed for it. It was actually quite comfortable.

After the pit stop I told the guys that I was heading back on old 218, so we said our good-byes and I was off. Not a lot of traffic so it was a pretty nice ride. Well, the 20 mph wind out of the ESE kinda sucked, but whatcha gonna do? Amazingly, every vehicle that passed me gave me all kinds of room. Thanks, drivers.

The rest of the crew was heading over to the Scout Camp area then coming back on Leversee Road. I suspect that they had a good time too. I ended up with exactly 27 miles. I suspect that they will have 35 or so when it's all done.

Anyway, that's about it for now. More later.

G-Ted.... We missed ya, Buddy!

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!