Fat Cyclists' Tag

I saw this too late to avoid the leprosy curse, but still wanted to play along. The idea is to answer these questions about riding in your blog and tag 3 other bike riders you know. I am not a fan of chain letters or even some tagging, but I do love to talk bike.

If you could have any one — and only one — bike in the world, what would it be?

An Orbea Diva. They are pretty.

Do you already have that coveted dream bike? If so, is it everything you hoped it would be? If not, are you working toward getting it? If you’re not working toward getting it, why not?

I've got plans.

If you had to choose one — and only one — bike route to do every day for the rest of your life, what would it be, and why?

Lighthouse Lane through Goldenrod Foot Bridge through Ocean Blvd. to PCH through Crystal Cove (give a shout out to my house in Pelican Point, in all of my dreams) through Laguna, stop at Wahoo's or The Stand and come back. Oh yeah, I did that route, every day my senior summer. I would love to do it again, like every day for the rest of my life.

What kind of sick person would force another person to ride one and only one bike ride to to do for the rest of her / his life?
Yeah, totally. That’s evil on a movie villain scale. (From the fat cyclist dude)

Do you ride both road and mountain bikes? If both, which do you prefer and why? If only one or the other, why are you so narrow minded?
I ride both, because I am a well-balanced and intelligent person, who sees the good in most things. I prefer mountain bikes, though I have definitely hurt myself much more often riding MTB than road. I am suddenly concerned about what this says about me. Still, I like riding MTB better because it’s more fun for me. I am at a loss as to why this is true, but it is. I didn't write this, but Ditto. Although I ride road 3 days a week and MTB only 1, it's a convenience/ride partner/time thing. Riding road is like walking with a buddy, with Susan and occasionally Kate, we can talk the whole time and it's very therapeutic. Mountain is more fun, but not too much chit chat going on (single track).

Have you ever ridden a recumbent? If so, why? If not, describe the circumstances under which you would ride a recumbent.
No.

Have you ever raced a triathlon? If so, have you also ever tried strangling yourself with dental floss?
I have raced one triathlon. I loved it. I have one coming up in September and I can't wait.

Suppose you were forced to either give up ice cream or bicycles for the rest of your life. Which would you give up, and why?
Ice cream. I'd still have chocolate right?

What is a question you think this questionnaire should have asked, but has not? Also, answer it.
What bike(s) are you riding now and why.

2004 Trek WSD 1200 (the cheapest road bike I could find at a local shop)

2008 KHS XC 204 (Thanks to Norda's, thanks Chip & Tom)

'94 Marin Bear Valley (love it, rode Dog Lake with it last year (no-suspension whatsoever), it is now semi-permanently attached to the Burley trailer, rust and all).

You’re riding your bike in the wilderness (if you’re a roadie, you’re on a road, but otherwise the surroundings are quite wilderness-like) and you see a bear. The bear sees you. What do you do?
I have no idea, pedal really really fast. I am going to Yellowstone this week, and I am bringing my bike, so I am actually honestly pondering this question and may need a seriously reliable answer.

Now, tag three biking bloggers. List them below.

I tag Andy, Pat & Chelsea, Christie K., Rachel, & Kate

Grateful Sabbath

It's been awhile...it's been a rough July...but I still need to be grateful for many things, and I am...including these pains in the bum (not including mi Madre, as a pain in my bum, but for whom I am always grateful).

Je suis grateful for friends and sisters ready to play and giggle and listen and let me sit and watch them bake bread and other good stuff.

I am grateful we live in such a beautiful place, against a great mountain, ready to be explored.

I am grateful that we get to go to Yellowstone this weekend. We've been wanting to take the kids there for years, and we are finally doing it. I hope the Edgley's are ready for us amateurs. And I hope we don't see bears (I am kind of freaked out about it).

I am grateful for talented, ambitious people to look up to and admire and sometimes try to emulate. I love people who evolve and improve themselves, as I hope I do too.

I am grateful AK got some fishing in yesterday.

H's Birth Day

H's Birth Day. The family came over to have grilled cheese (H's favorite) and cake. Then some of the gang headed to Millcreek for some marshmallow roasting. We did it on Monday night too. It was so quick, fun, and easy that we want to do it every night (but we won't really). Today we had H's friend party. Only 3 of the 8 kids invited were in town, but H didn't seem to mind and the boys had a blast eating their cup cakes, the pinata, and at the movie Wall E.

Last night for bike ride date night we rode the Canyons with the dude and dude's wife. Then we hit dinner at Red Rock. It was great. Thanks to Tia Dori for the babysitting.

AK's fishing with the MixWix tonight. I am chillin' watching Akeelah and the Bee which is really good. Next up, PTA. Dude, the crab man is in this movie.

H's Birthday Scones (aka p. 29 Favorites)

2 tsp dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water
2 Tbsp sugar
1/4 cup butter
2 cups milk, scalded
3 eggs
2 tsp salt
6 1/2 cups flour, divided
vegetable oil for frying

In a small bowl, combine yeast with warm water and sugar, set aside. In a large bowl, combine butter and scalded milk; let cool. Beat eggs well and add to cooled milk. Add softened yeast mixture. Stir in salt and 2 cups flour. Mix well.

Stir in 4 1/2 cups flour by hand. Mix well. Cover bowl. Place in warm spot and let rise 1 hour. Roll out portion of dough to about 3/8-inch thick (or go Doug and Emmy's style and roll out a 12X12 and fry that!) and cut into 2" squares (or 3 or 4). Pat each square down once and let rest 20 minutes. Drop small piece of dough into hot vegetable oil to test for temperature.

When oil is correct temp add scones, a few at a time, and fry to golden. Use a slotted spoon to remove cooked scones from the hot oil. Serve hot with butter, honey, powdered sugar, strawberry jam or syrup. Makes 4 dozen (or a dozen fatty ones, yum!).

*These are the Sprucedale/Utah scones, not the scottish traditional ones (which I love as well!).

Super 7 for Birthday Man H!

Last Saturday 2008

Spring Break 2008

Winter 2008
July 2007

2002

My sweet, sweet first baby H. Already 7 years old of being your momma. You are a gorgeous, talented, smart, funny, helpful, sweet young lad (at the best of times) with some definite pre-teen, embarrassed by your Mom angst starting to peek through. Only in the last few months am I sadly unable to cuddle and kiss you in public (and especially on the baseball field) and be your loudest cheerleader (you get too embarrassed and I am quite loud!). But I love you unconditionally (which you know and certainly take advantage of, especially in this late, non-committed summer!). You are very passionate about your activities of the moment. Right now you are loving swim team and being with your friends there. Or doing a science experiment, homework, or reading a book. You are incredibly imaginative, which entertains you and the rest of us daily. You are an excellent story teller and story and book summarizer and a great and creative author too. You create fantastic dragons and butterflies and other art. You are a great and entertaining and loving big brother and son. You still love the junk food, but are getting better since loving chicken, but will still not touch vegetables (although you know it's good for you as you gratefully mentioned them in a recent prayer). You love your Dad, you grandparents, you cousins, and your aunts and uncles, and all of your teachers, friends, and neighbors very loyally. You are respectful and polite. You have a girlfriend (Meg B.) and I can tell you talk about her with your brother, which is very cute. You have been sleeping in the guest room all by yourself since you claim brother O is keeping you up at night. You still love watching T.V. and probably wish I would let you watch Sponge Bob and Star Wars III and Spiderman (no way on those 3 and much, much more!). But you are pretty content with any color and moving motion on the screen, mostly Noggin' and still occasionally you are entertained and will pop in a Baby Einstein video, for P of course ;). I love you and hope your 7th year brings you more love of life, more respect for yourself and others, more love of the gospel and reverence for Heavenly Father and our Savior, Jesus Christ, more love for your siblings and friends, obedience to your parents who want the best in life for you and wish to protect you from (impossible) but at least teach you to weather well your inevitable mistakes and trials, and more fun in the mountains, at home, at the beach, in the pool, on the soccer and baseball field, on your bike and wherever this new year takes you.

Love, Mom

She Said "Jidges"!

I think Cat read my blog. She finally said "Jidges". H likes her. Kherington gone, no surprise. I was sad to see either guy go, but I guess better cute Gev than Mark right? I think he might be next though, those boys are amazing. His Thursday night solo was killer. He is a freak and I love the lizard comment reference. Seriously, I have no life right now.

AK and I went on our weekly ride tonight. We did Dog Lake. Last year I did it with Kate and I was on my old Marin '94 no-suspension (now the official Burley trailer bike) and it wasn't bad. I was also mockingly killing some guys with full-suspensions and loving every minute of their complaining, especially as I passed them on my old no-sus ride. This year, took the same path, now I have the full-suspension bike, and I fell down, down, down into stinging nettles in the first 1/10 of a mile. I led AK to the steeper way (since that's the way Kate and I did it last year) and I don't remember it being bad, but man there were a lot of large logs in the path on that initial little climb. AK played the hero again and came running back down the trail before I got my senses (it wasn't really that bad at all, just the immediate stinging of the nettles on my legs and arms). Anyway, we kept going and it was awesome. It was a long, long, long uphill (about 45 minutes of solid, steady climb) and then the pretty little lake. Stayed for about 5 minutes, if that, and started heading back (it was 8:30ish and getting more shady in the shade and chilly too). The downhill took about 20 minutes and the logs were so fun to jump. For some weird reason I had a Motley Crue song in my head, "There ain't nothing but a good time", or something, and I don't even know it. So I started singing "Summertime Rolls" by Jane's Addiction all the way down (mostly in place of a bell to alert hikers and bikers climbing up). It was fun and it made me happy. I've had a very draining week with the kids. Here's to a Saturday with my AK as relief and a new week. Thanks AK for the hot date.

Totally Geeking Out

I have voted for Mark 4 times, and I haven't watched the rest of the show yet...Wow! If you don't live in my house, you don't know that I watch Mark and Chelsie's 'Bleeding Heart' number 4 times a week (although I no longer get choked up). I think Twitch and Joshua are also fantastic. As my dancing cousin BBS pointed out weeks ago, I don't think Cat has said "Jidges" all season. And I love Tastee Oreos routines and that new punk rock chick looks how I wanted to look like from about 2nd/3rd grade on (one of my friends' Suzanne J. was a Sex Pistols fan, so I thought I was too, and I wanted to be so punk!). I never got the mohawk, oh yeah, but I do have green hair right now (I put on a light brown color over my previous "blonde"), does that count?

I also love, like my bike talk, if you don't watch SYTYCD, this post is like Latin to you.

Notes: So far I've voted for Chelsie, Gev, Mark,Twitch, Katee (based on their solo order) and the phone was busy for Joshua twice. Totally cancels it all out huh? Is this two hours long? Gotta love Joshua's tight pants (what???). Courtney is kind of bugging me. Kerrington can't talk. Canned heat. I am stunned. Yes, I still voted for Mark 4 times, wardrobe isn't his fault is it? Will is amazing. I think he has it made already. I mean dude, he is the star of Fame 2008, if you know what I mean? Didn't you love Fame? We did. I still recreate the opening of Fame, but not as much as when we were little. Confession #112...I like Chris Brown (unlike my not so secret devotion to Enrique, I don't actually own a song or CD of CBs, so my like isn't that deep yet). I recorded the Today show when he performed and I might have watched it more than once. That routine was buck. "Blah blah artisty meets blahbity blah expression". I will be watching that one more than once. I cried during the Imagine routine. Wow, wow! Okay, what it this IV Real thing? I am simply not that cool.

For probably the fifth time, this is the routine we watched over and over and over from season 3. I loved Pasha in this!

I've been hearing H mimic Mary Murphy and her screams and saying her "Hot Tamale Train" references. It cracks me up. They think she is totally funny, in like a crazy way, but I am trying to emphasize, that dude, she doesn't care what people think, she is fun and giggles and screams like a mad person and she doesn't care who is embarrassed for her. I love that about her. And the boys are going to love Mark's routine (that is O's favorite song).

I do this while AK is voluntarily cleaning the conference center with the stake, until past midnight. Nice.

Still busy calling for Joshua...good sign.

Possibly a new favorite

So I was blog stalking today (wow! there is sure a lot out there) and I believe I was on the Queen's site (I have no idea who she is) and saw in her sidebar fatcyclist.com, which I happen to be, no really I am not just being self-deprecating, I am actually a "clydesdale" in terms of weight for running races, triathlons, and biking as well (which does not mean that I won't kick your trash, it just means I will eat more later, or something like that). So anyway, I knew I found some kind of heaven, and they have a really cute fat cyclist jersey, which in my very quick perusal the proceeds of which will benefit the fat cyclists' wife's cancer treatment. Sweet huh? Get one. And if you want to get one for me, that would be great too. Women's Large thank you.

Dude, He's 6!

Check out that smile!

Getting up. When he was done, Uncle JB just reeled him in, he didn't even get his hair wet.

I'm sure your kids are cool too, but seriously, is this at least one of the cutest things you have ever seen. Thanks to Uncle JB and JP for the Dad and kid boat outing. O got wicked on the tube and Dad ripped it up on the wakey. Shout out to the River Rats RP2. Although these kids are more like Reservoir Dogs (they were at East Canyon Lake, so I guess not a reservoir, but usually here it's a reservoir right?).

Good End of Week Ride Date

Thanks to the awesome 'rents, who watched the totally excited kiddos who couldn't wait for Maama and Baampa to arrive, AK & I made a late afternoon bike ride at the Canyons. We weren't so sure about taking the "easy" way out and taking the gondola "to the top", but we did it anyway, and it was way tougher and challenging that either of us thought. I ate it probably 3 times and came out with some severe and creepy eye allergies (which has been occurring, oh all summer, but finally noticed this creepy bulging eye effect and flagged down the neighborhood Ophthalmologist (yeah, Dr. Bob) who promised some steroids and gave a name to the creepy, eye ball bulging, scratchy effect, and reassured me I wasn't going to go blind). It wasn't a huge workout, we would have liked to do the run at least one more time, but the lift closed at 6, but it was good enough and I won't be terribly worn out for Emigration to Big Mountain in the morning and hopefully a run in the afternoon. I am a little worried about the 1/2 marathon coming up...we'll see.

We did Holly's Trail tonight. Way too many huge tree roots on the trail, lots of loose, large rocks, and a few gnarly rain/run off divots, but can't wait for the challenge again. Okay, I was checking for a link and saw that on the map, this was a black diamond bike trail, for real Chip? Now I think I feel a bit better about my skills. The most beautiful thing, besides all the foliage, water, and wildflowers, was we didn't see anyone else on the trail, up, down, anywhere around. That is awesome. Except next week I really want to do Spiro to Mid-Mountain and through the Canyons.

To end the lovely date, which by the way started with some Boo inflicted AK grumpies, but ended up with AK literally sprinting off his bike and up a short hill to make sure I was okay on one of my yelping falls (the worst one, it drew a little blood, awesome!) and forgiveness, and a great shared chicken and steak (mixed!) burrito from Barbacoa and a lovely post ride-"our kids are awesome and we are radical"-chat. He loves me and I truly love him. We rock!

Busy Day, I'm Tired

The boys are off to 'The Bee Movie' at the Library with AK. AK has been looking forward to this for weeks. Last summer they saw a show at the library and they were given a bag full of goodies and stuff, like marshmallows and fake spiders to throw at the screen when appropriate and interactive stuff like that. Needless to say, they had a blast and are totally excited for tonight. And P is in bed, since missing her afternoon nap, yippee! The channel is on E! and I'm up for vegging all night long.

Eldon's back, which led the boys and I some great gardening experience, and some very rewarding visible weeding improvements.

Also a kid and Madre morning ride to the park, an afternoon swim, and an early morning 3 miler, I'm beat. Just for the record.

Grateful Sabbath

"Whash Me". H must have "corrected" his work, since he crossed out the first H by the time I got a picture.

Three silly kids, Tuesday night, July 1, 2008.

1. Having gone to bed at 8ish last night and sleeping through the night!
2. 800 mg ibuprofen for my back.
3. H etching in the dirt of my back window "Whash Me!" and me not wanting to wash it off.
4. Riding Emigration Canyon all the way to the top, talking all the way and loving it, and then speeding down (facing some downhill speed fears, but I had to keep up with Susan). An hour up, about 15 to get down, gotta love that.
   
5. Bikram Yoga. Although it was the stinkiest of all the Bikram's I've experienced (Costa Mesa, Tulsa, Ogden, & SLC), it was hard and sweaty but lovely all the same.
6. P and her goofy laugh and getting close to walking everyday. She stood up with Bailey this week for the first time I'd seen.
7. O and his "cowboy" hat, and pointing out all other cowboy hats we see now, and all things Indiauna. Tia Dori I finally heard it yesterday. Definitely Indiauna.
8. Getting to teach about the Holy Ghost and be able to reflect on my own experiences of the voice, the feeling, the guidance to a helpful scripture, prayer, meditations on life, and the peace and love felt of my Heavenly Father through this precious gift.
9. I got to be present when Adrienne T. bore or beared or bern her testimony for the first time ever! She is the woman.
   

Kid Wreck

AK successfully loaded up the bikes and trailer in the Impala (Company Car=Free Gas & Maintenance=Driving it as much as possible, even over the convenience of being able to fit ourselves and more in the Odyssey. Don't get me wrong, I am super duper grateful.). As you can see we didn't quite fit in Owen's bike, but although he is a giant, he will still ride in the trailer. We are at our favorite trail head spot for the Park City trail (the beautiful Catholic church). We headed off swell. H even made it almost all the way up the big hill and we were so close, headed down to the old white barn and we were going to take the trail under the road to try the other side. H & I were cruising down the hill to the barn, I signal to stop, to wait for the trailer and AK, and I hear this horrendous body and bike on pavement noise from behind me and a blood curdling scream. I stop, attempt to get out of the clips, but end up falling over, and run to H, who is up and checking out his wounds in the same blood curdling scream. I was sure he broke an arm or something. He showed me his side first, which was scraped and already bruising. And a pair of walkers we had just passed were coming back to help. I was looking for AK to crest the hill, and he did and I felt saved. Poor H, he had a quarter size blood hole on his elbow, and a dime size on his knee. He said he reached down to scratch an itch. We had to head back, and H refused to get on his bike, which we understood, but were still trying to get him to coast down the hill. Then AK brilliantly mentioned Cold Stone and you've never seen a more wrecked biker get back so quickly on the bike.

The trailer kids. O has a "new" cowboy/Indiana Jones hat. I fashioned it for him and he has only taken it off to go swimming.

Still not very happy.

Nothing Cold Stone won't fix. More specifically Cotton Candy mixed with gummy bears (H) and sprinkles (O), and Strawberry for P.

The siblings doing their best the cheer up H. Yeah for H giggles.

P.S. I guess the trail we hit is the Spiro Trail. Something like that. AK & I are going to do the Mid-Mountain on Saturday afternoon (PC to the Canyons), if you would like to join us.

Larry Bird

I am Larry Bird.
My birthday pre-bike ride glamor shot. Me at 33.

I had a great birthday. Sourdough blueberry pancakes with the family. Dentist appointment with H. Not my wild idea, but it was fun to be with H & no cavities! AK & I went on a hard, but fun and beautiful (tons of purple bleeding hearts & other wild flowers!) Park City Sliko to Mid-Mountain bike trail. Then we hit Norda's for some Chipwich and to Hapa for some sushi and a burger for AK (yes, he had lots of both, interesting).

When I find the camera cord I have a great PC family bike ride story and pictures. Teaser: experiments succeeded (we got the two adult bikes on top, the trailer, and kid bike in the trunk of the "free" gas company car, yeah for biking with the whole family), blood was shed by two family members, miraculously no bones were broken, and cold stone was enjoyed.