MS150 2008

For more than 10 years I have been actively involved with the National MS society. I have attended many walks, both as a volunteer and a walker. Tomorrow I am participating in my second MS bike ride, peddling my happy ass over 150 miles in the span of two days.

Multiple Sclerosis is a nasty disease that affects people near and dear to me. For me to ride my bike for two days is nothing like the challenges I see people I care about deal with every day of their lives. Challenges that most times go unnoticed because they battle silently and strongly while living lives that make people envy them unbeknownst of the struggles they face, with a disease that attacks people in the prime of their lives. For this, it seems almost selfish I get to do something I love (ride my bike), to raise awareness and money for this cause.

The weekend schedule is:

Tonight: Drive to Boulder tonight to stay at E’s best friend’s house. (Thanks E and J for letting us crash at your pad )

Tomorrow:
Wake up at 4:30
Get to start in Westminster around 5am
Get set up, check in over night bag to go to Fort Collins by truck, eat. Wake up.

6:00 am: Start peddling

Pedal some more

Have a snack

Pedal

Eat a snow cone at Carter lake (I hope the snow cone stop is there again this year)

Pedal

Pedal

Pedal

(you get the point—maybe have a snack or two)

Arrive in Fort Collins, high five my brother as he is volunteering on the route.

Ride onto campus of my alma mater (CSU).

Collect overnight bag, ride to parents house… Drink Margaritas on newly constructed deck…Go to sleep

Sunday:
Repeat Saturday’s adventure in reverse. Minus the margarita. That would not the be the way to start the ride on Sunday morning—Instead move margarita consumption to my porch on Sunday evening after I retrieve my dog from doggy camp.

To all my friends and family that donated to me for this ride I thank you more than you know! Without the support of you all I would not have been able to raise the money required to participate in this ride, and with each pedal stroke I’ll know your contributions are getting us that much closer to finding a cure for this horrendous disease.


Hope everyone has a great weekend!!!

Geeks Who Drink, er Brawl?

Last night I went to Jack Quinn’s Irish Pub for the weekly trivia game.

A bar fight broke out.

Over the theme song from the TV show SCRUBS.

I am still scratching my head…Yes, a bar fight over trivia…

Not much else to say. WEIRD!!!

Random Picture of the Day

I took this picture a couple Fridays ago while have margaritas with my friends Libby and Warren...

Even though I had to use my phone to take it...I like it.




Have great weekend!

Old 97's

AMAZING Concert last night.

Rhett and the boys put on a show that lasted into the early morning.


If you ever get the chance to see Rhett Miller or the Old 97's live I highly recommend it. Not only is it one of my favorite bands, Rhett is probably one of the most charismatic people I have ever met.

The opening bands were I Love Math (from Dallas)on tour for the first time. You could tell they were heavily influenced by the old 97's. I bought their CD. The second band was Hayes Carll. E liked them a lot and bought their Cd. They were a bit too twangy country for my taste, but respectable talented musicians none the less.

What a great night!!! Definitely worth the three cups of chia tea I have needed today to stay awake.

My Mental Health Vacation

The last week of May I took off of work for some personal mental health time.

The vacation started off with a small adventure to Angel Fire New Mexico for E’s bike race. He took Fourth in his class and for the first time I got to see him on the podium. (when he uploads the pics from his camera, I'll post them)
In the meantime, here is a bike he wishes he could race on...


We came home on Memorial day and the rest of the week I spent working on my landscaping at my house. With the help of a girlfriend (JH) we laid down close to a thousand square feet of landscaping cloth, commandeered a truckload of ‘free’ mulch, loaded, unloaded, and distributed the mulch and ordered 3 tons of rock.



JH was my consultant behind my landscape plan. I have always admired her yard, and when she offered to help me I took her up on the offer. Without her help, expertise, sweat and muscle that is no way I could have gotten as much done this week as I did. Not to mention the pile of very cool rocks she hauled over to my house to create the border around my bulb garden.


As for the ‘Free’ Mulch we got. There is a program here in our town where the parks department offers free mulch to anyone that hauls it away. Unfortunately we found out after loading up ‘The Battlewagon’ to the brim we were not at the free mulch pile. The free mulch pile was about 100 yards away, behind another fence we didn’t see. OOOPS Who knows what mulch we stole…If anyone from the City parks department is reading this, I’m sorry….



Here is what Three Tons of rock look like in a pile



and here it is almost completely spread out…I am about 95% completed.

After moving rock on Thursday and Friday I took Saturday off of doing anything too physical, instead I worked out my credit card at home depot gathering all the supplies I will need to build Sasha’s dog run in the back yard. E and I went out to dinner and then it was home and to bed early since we were leaving for Castlerock at 5:30 am to ride in the Elephant Rock Bicycle Festival.

Have I mentioned how much I LOVE this bike?

We were both debating if we would do the 65 or 100 mile course, after starting towards Monument and fighting a headwind the.entire.way, we both decided 65 miles would be the way to go.



We met up with my friend’s boyfriend (WC) about halfway through.


Unfortunately my friend (LW) had to drop out early and SAG to the finish line due to her IT band in her knee giving her fits. She was super frustrated and hopes this won’t affect our trip to Iowa later this summer. LW, WC, and I are all meeting Miss Bick in Iowa for RAGBRAI in July.

Now I am back to work and good thing too...My body has been crying for a break.

Geeks Who Drink

While sitting at home on Monday night settling in on my couch with a beer and the Stanley Cup game #5 on TV I was ready to watch some hockey and have a mellow personal night. Then my friend (I’ll call her B) called me up and suggested I meet her downtown for beer and trivia. Her husband is the quizmaster for Geeks Who Drink and every Monday they meet at a local Irish pub here in town.

Not only did we have a blast playing trivia, Nigel the bartender complied and changed the channel on the TV from baseball to hockey. Who wouldn’t have the Stanley Cup finals game on?!?! Oh yeah, I was in an Irish Pub…Nevermind.



Our team, “Not Listening”, maintained the lead throughout the night until the final round. Even though we answered more correctly than the two teams that beat us, we used our joker card early in the game and that was our detrimental downfall. I would like to add though, even though we took third place (only by 8 points) we lost to teams comprised of 5 or more people. So by my math and logic (which often makes no sense to anyone but myself, but that is all that matters), it took 10 people to be as smart or just a couple questions smarter than B and Me. Therefore, B and I are MUCH smarter than all those other people.

And to top off the night, the Red Wings were defeated in double overtime. The series continues…Extending the Hockey Season at least one more game. YAY!!!