What's next?

(Kato, relaxed and making air biscuits, a few months ago)
I don't know if I want to know what's next, actually. My tooth is much better today after a night of no mouthgard...amazing that it could be so painful and then almost fine (I can almost chew on it again!). Whatever I would have spent on the extra dental visit will now go toward Kato's vet bill though. Last night he was sitting forever in his litter box without 'results' of any kind, and he kept getting back in again, still without success. He's never had this problem before but I know cats (especially boys) are prone to this trouble, what with their little ductworks being so little, and that it is very serious. So this morning everyone was packed in his / her respective carrier and taken to the vet. Ripley had her 14-week checkup and next round of booster shots and was pronounced healthy; Kato's bladder was the size of an orange, the vet said, and he'll be staying at the vet overnight for maybe two nights (though I'm hoping he doesn't have to stay two...it's not exactly a cheap motel). He has to be anesthetized for the, er, procedure that will unblock him. Vet said I caught it early. He wasn't showing any other symptoms of illness--no fever, no vomiting--just obviously uncomfortable.

Owwww charlie

I wish Rite Aid carried these. I think they'd work a bit better than what I'm using and the ad suggests that even little children like them. I'm having some kind of dental adventure mystery that won't begin to be solved until tomorrow at 1:45. I haven't experienced this level of pain since the morning after my knee surgery. Though I seem to be still able to blog about it and think of things to which it compares (Dustin Hoffman vs. Laurence Olivier in "Marathon Man" comes to mind) so it can't be all that bad. The toothache drops must be kickin' in.

More than the sum of our chromosomes

My first thought as I read this NY Times op-ed, "The XY Games" was resentment for the sexism behind the requirement that female athletes have to prove they are sufficiently female. As the author of the article points out, merely testing for the presence of a Y chromosome is inconclusive. It seems like the difficulty and scandal in screening out all the performance enhancing drugs and blood doping makes trying to figure out for sure who's genetically male or female not so relevant. The Greeks had an Olympic gender test too lest any girls try to sneak in. Change is a long time coming. If an athlete who knows inside he's male wants the gold so bad that he's willing to sacrifice his male privilege on the altar, goddess bless him.

Bill Got a Laptop

and sent this post. I don't know if he typed it, which would have been quite arduous, or dictated, which also would have been arduous, but it was a good read, and I've pasted in part of it here (I added the links):

A message from the other side of brain surgery

On July 17,2008, my neurosurgeon, Dr. Muizelaar, removed an aggressive meningioma tumor from my brain. The operation was successful and removed a mass the size of a mandarin orange, according to the Doctor! Now there will be a recovery period where I will have to relearn basic functions like sitting, standing, walking, and speaking in complete sentences. I feel great support from you all, through your thoughts, prayers, and postings on CarePages.

From the ragged ruins of my swollen brain, this passage from the poem “Ullyses” by Alfred Lord Tennyson beckons. It brings comfort as evidence of a memory at least partially intact and as a reminder of the brave work of my friends and colleagues who struggle every day to make this world just a little kinder.

Come my friends.
Tis not too late to seek a newer world!
…Though much has been taken,
Much abides.
And though we are not that strength
That in younger years moved earth and heaven,
That which we are, we are.
One equal temper of heroic heart,
Made weak by time and fate,
But strong in will.
To seek, to find, to seize,
And never to yield.

My Condition

Due to general right side paralysis linked to post operative swelling of the brain, my function is quite limited. I cannot stand, walk, or manipulate the wheelchair without assistance. I cannot speak in complete sentences, though I can conceive what I want to say. The most profound symptom I am faced with is fatigue. 20 minutes of any type of activity leaves me fully spent requiring sustained rest. This will improve as the swelling goes down.

I am in good spirits feeling loved and supported by all. It seems fortuitous that most of the irritation of the brain was in the left hemisphere, the general source of our individuality and ego. As a consequence, I spend a lot of time in that blissful region of the brain where all is “one”. I get weepy at times when I feel the connections with so many who share their own stories and support at this time. We really do have more in common with each other as a species, as a community and as friends than we have dared to admit. I like this side of the brain. It joins, as one, the spiritual presence of my friends and colleagues without regard to generations, decades, or specific relationships. It sustains non-specific bliss and support from all, and in combinations never before thought of....

It sounds like his experience is similar in some respects to that of the neuroscientist Jill Bolte Taylor who wrote a book about how her stroke & subsequent recovery lit up her right hemisphere in such a way as to change her whole view and approach to life.

Interestingly there is a passage from "Ulysses" that frequently pops into my thoughts as well, and has done so for years and years since high school so that it's like a kind of mantra:

"I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move."

I think especially the line "I am a part of all that I have met" is the one that has always resonated.

Zen and the science of fuel economy

Been hearing all about the benefits of driving 60 mph for some time now, and just (coincidentally) spent about $60 filling my tank, so decided to try it on the way down to this training in Los Gatos. My truck doesn't have cruise control so it requires me to pay attention. Sometimes it felt like I was moving backwards but mostly I noticed how much calmer I felt. I got behind a Prius driving 55 at one point, and thought about driving alongside it but people are probably already disturbed enough by anyone driving below the speed limit that it would be counterproductive to aggravate them by slowing down two out of the four lanes on that stretch of the 680.

I'm going to try to do it for the whole tank (which means at least until Sunday) to see what the difference is. I think I got about 25 - 26 MPG on the last tank. They said on NPR this morning that for every mile per hour you drive over 60 mph, you add about $0.30 a gallon to the price of your gas.

It seems like a form of protest against the car culture. Or at least a refusal to keep buying into the mindset that you have to get everywhere as fast as you possibly can. I've driven the hurried way for a long time and paradoxically I'm almost always late for everything. Today I drove 'slowly' and reached my destination an hour early. Maybe the gas price thing...maybe other, um, factors...enabled me to break through my resistance to the idea of not driving 70 mph everywhere I go. I drive a lot, so if I can practice mindfulness while driving, that's a lot of practice.

She can swim, too!

Now this would have been something to catch on video (or even a still photo), but the first time it happened it was unexpected. I knew that Ripley likes to wet her paws. When she's hot (which is often), she prefers to wear her water rather than drink it. I was curious to see how she would react to Heather's koi pond. However, I wasn't expecting her to jump in and swim across. The first time she did it, I don't think she expected it either...it gets deep pretty suddenly when you're only 8" tall. I was momentarily terrified, ready to wade in and fish her out, but she kept her head up and made it to the other side just fine. The next day she was a bit more cautious but eager to try it again.


I'll have to get her one of those little doggie life jackets. I don't think they make water wings short enough.

Kinda seems like my dog is getting all the exercise lately, doesn't it? If she could learn to ride a bike she'd be ready for a triathlon. Heather is coaching a women's cycling group...maybe Ripley could sign up. Or maybe her mama just needs to get her that trailer and hit the road. Ripley could be like R2-D2...when I get tired riding uphill, I could say, "Ripley, try to increase the power..."

Update on Bill

No wonder he can remember all the lines. He's obviously a member of the troupe [as I have long suspected].

Bill's out of the ICU and into a regular hospital room. A colleague from our Executive Office in Sacramento posted this yesterday:

...[It] was wonderful to see how alert, aware and fully cognitive Bill is at this point. (And it is only getting better, as they dial down the pain meds.) As I walked up to the side of his bed, Bill began to quote back to me a poem excerpt I had shared with him several years back, from Lord Tennyson's Ulysses, "To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." [...] I just hung out with Bill and, as I read the newspaper, he asked about the latest news and we talked politics. It was pretty much just like hanging out with him in his office (sans his usual sartorial splendor) and parsing and flaying the latest political headlines. Allowing for the predictable effects of his being tired from the surgery and a bit dazed from the meds and all, Bill was totally all over the topic at hand.

The guy's unstoppable. We're talking 100% Bill, here.

Fetch!

She chases the ball enthusiastically and usually brings it back, but doesn't like to surrender it. H's kitty is not very impressed.

My friend Bill

Bill is one of my heroes and a great mentor. It's probably all his fault that I got a Legal Services job right out of law school (and if you're wondering what I mean by that, I'll just say that the feelings of gratitude far outweigh any feelings of blame). He has been doing this work for thirty-something years and still always seems full of compassion and enthusiasm. He is a creative and extensive thinker. Known for going off on tangents and having a rather messy office. Known for his ability to quote entire Monty Python skits. Sometime last year he was diagnosed with a non-malignant brain tumor. I think he was having horrible headaches and perhaps other problems, but he works in our main offices 90 miles away and I don't have a good sense of how he has been affected day to day. When I've seen him in the last several months I wouldn't have been able to tell anything was wrong. He's the one who made it possible for me and a co-worker to go to a conference in New Orleans last March, where he was presenting at one of the sessions, and he went out on the town with us and treated everybody (who dared) to a round of Absinthe in the French Quarter.

He's having surgery to remove the tumor tomorrow. Apparently it's quite deep in there and nobody knows to what extent his functioning will be impaired when he wakes up, or for how long. He says he's in great spirits because friends and family and colleagues have been showering him with love and appreciation. This is a very scary thing. I can't imagine how his wife and son must be feeling. His last pre-surgery post today reminded me of a famous line from Moby Dick that I know he'd appreciate: "I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I'll go to it laughing"--Stubb.

Night of the living kitteh...

or maybe "28 Kittehs Later."


more cat pictures

Zombies, kittens...there's a whole untapped subgenre here.

Dogs love trucks

I picked Ripley up on Monday afternoon and Tuesday we headed back out to the coast. The trip was a bit more of an endurance event than we expected. Along Highway 20, about 20 miles from the first town near the lake (Clearlake Oaks), I thought I should pull off at a vista point to let Ripley have a potty break. In the process of removing her from her carrier and attaching her leash, I dropped my keys in the front seat and locked us out. (Both of us, thank goodness.)

My cell phone was locked in the truck but there was no service in that area anyway. Unlike Blanche Dubois I have not always relied on the kindness of strangers, though sometimes there are no alternatives. We stood by the entrance of the vista point and tried to flag somebody down, and after not too much time two men in a white crew-cab Dodge pickup stopped. Due to their very clean and well-groomed appearance as well as the immaculateness of their truck I thought at first they might be a couple, but then the one not driving showed me a cellphone photo of his wife and kids (as if to resolve any unspoken suspicions).

At any rate, they were very kind, driving us all the way into Clearlake Oaks before we had any cell service, letting me borrow a cellphone to call roadside assistance, giving Ripley water (it was pretty hot outside), and then driving us back to the intersection of highways 53 and 20 so that the tow truck could pick us up on the way back to my truck without racking up extra miles that my roadside assistance wouldn't cover. The driver told me I didn't look like a typical hitchhiker, and he thought maybe I was giving away puppies there at the roadside. He was ready to gun it and drive on by, but his buddy said, "She's in trouble," so he stopped. I thanked them as profusely as I could.

The ordeal added at least three hours to our trip (and added a good chunk of time to our rescuers' trip, too). Ripley was so well-behaved and mellow I started to worry that something was wrong with her. She just seems to go into energy- saver mode in the car and slept nearly the whole time.

She perked up when we arrived. In the last two days we've worked on 'Sit' and 'Come' and she already has those down pretty well. She had her first view / taste / feel of the ocean yesterday. And passed out when we got back to the house.

[She's in the back of the truck here for photo-op purposes only.]

His legs may run in the Olympics

[Note: Puppy update and photos from our first couple days are forthcoming.]

Just found this story in the NY Times about Van Phillips, who lives in Mendocino, and who invented a prosthetic leg for elite runners and athletes while he was working at the Center for Biomedical Design at the U. of Utah. South African double-amputee sprinter Oscar Pistorius will attempt to qualify for the 400m sprint wearing two of Phillips' "Cheetah Foot" prosthetics after some controversy about whether the carbon graphite legs / feet would give Pistorius an unfair advantage over sprinters who are stuck with regular feet and legs. Huh.

Perhaps the I.A.A.F. was afraid that allowing Pistorius to participate would release a flood of double-amputee super athletes who would dominate the track with their springy, energy-efficient appendages. This man was born missing bones in his lower legs, so the fact that at some point, probably quite early in life, he decided he wanted to be a great runner kinda makes you rethink your sense of your own limitations, doesn't it? And Phillips' invention makes it possible. Sometimes it's a pretty neat thing to be human.

In with the bad air. Don't know if photo worked but can't capture how bad the smoke has been. Glad I'm escaping for awhile.

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18% of Americans...

...believe that the sun revolves around the earth, according to a poll cited in this NY Times op-ed on the brain science behind people's false beliefs (and particularly the implications for political campaigns, i.e. why people would continue to believe that Obama is Muslim despite all statements that have been made to the contrary). It has bigger implications though--actually it explains a lot of prejudice and irrational thought. For example, people keep writing letters to the editor of the local paper stating that (one of the reasons) same-sex marriage is an abomination is that gay couples can't produce children. When in reality, gays and lesbians obviously produce / acquire children by all sorts of means, sometimes even the old-fashioned accidental method, sometimes during a failed attempt at heterosexual marriage, sometimes with help from a donor, and of course by adoption in the states where they believe children should have as many chances for loving, devoted parent(s) as possible. And some people, gay or straight, choose not to have children of their own at all, but can make the world's most fabulous uncles and aunts, or can devote their energy to nurturing the world in many other ways that people with kids don't have time and resources for.

All of this information seems to have been sucked into a black hole for some people. I rode with a group of NorCal AIDS Challenge cyclists (most of whom were straight) in the Sacramento LGBT Pride parade last week, and protesters were out with signs about all the stuff God hates. We couldn't help but notice that these 'religious' people were completely fixated on one particular act as if it summed up the whole of gay male (and apparently their own) existence. And one of my favorite signs was "Hatred of Parents Causes Homosexuality." Sad, to think of all those little gay parent-hating babies.

One has to wonder sometimes what planet people are living on. But according to this article, we tend to remember information that fits our existing mental framework and forget what doesn't fit. So it probably wouldn't work to make somebody who watches FOX News all the time just listen to NPR for several hours (though I don't think that would hurt). False beliefs are difficult to undo. In order to correct them, the "truth" (i.e. Obama is a Christian, for example) has to be presented with some kind of affirmative little emotional attention-grabber, something that puts a new picture in the listener's mind. Merely contradicting the falsity can actually reinforce it.

Equal opportunity blog

I'd be remiss in not giving Kato some press. He's threatening to start his own blog if all I do is go on and on about the puppy. This is his current favorite toy. He leaps into the air and does...I'm sure there's some kind of skateboading or gymnastic term for it...but he twists and turns mid-air and lands facing the opposite way. All for the thrill of catching this blue feather. Then when he's got it, he walks off with it (and with me) to some undisclosed location, sometimes his food dish, where he lets go, and then it starts all over again.

It's a dog!

Ripley at seven weeks.
Not a gerbil or a guinea pig at all. Though if she had wings she might be mistaken for a fruit bat.

I stopped by to visit her last night, prepared with some treats to buy her attention. That was a good strategy, since otherwise she'd have completely ignored me in favor of some spilled dog food near Charlene's porch. Priorities. Understanding that she doesn't know me yet and had no reason to respond when I tried to get her attention with noise, I also have a feeling she might be one of those puppies with selective hearing. We are somewhat alike in that respect.


Less than two weeks to go.

Possibly in poor taste, considering recent events, but it's true...

Smoke does get in your eyes. I've discovered online karaoke. This is more or less how the new lead singer for Boston was discovered, so I'm hoping Richard Carpenter or the Platters (do they need a singer?) will call me one of these days.

Rate this performance at The Sims On Stage

I guess I won't ride my bike in the hills today...

And probably not this weekend, either. Not that I had plans to, but the whole place is closed down because of a 8000-acre fire burning just (barely) southeast of Chico and up into the town of Paradise. The article I just linked is updated frequently and the last update looks bad.

I first saw it on the way home from my appointments in Oroville yesterday, when it was still much smaller. Some friends of mine just recently moved out of their house on the outskirts of Paradise (yes, yes, the town lends itself to endless jokes...I can't drive there without having a litany of song lyrics play in my head, 'I've got two tickets to paradise;' 'I've been to paradise but I've never been to me;' 'awfully nice, it's paradise;' 'paradise by the dashboard light'...) to a house in Chico, and they have been preparing to put their old house on the market. The house is now in an evacuated area.

I took this photo by pointing my cellphone out the side window on the way home yesterday. I'm grateful to be upwind, not so much because the fire danger but all the smoke. Most of the burned area so far is open grassland but I read that four homes have burned (the linked map shows the location). And wind is known to change directions now and then.

If you're looking at the map, I live more or less in downtown Chico. However, one of the attorneys in our office has a lovely home in Butte Creek Canyon, which has also been evacuated, and the fire looks awfully close.

Oww charlie

My half-hour jog yesterday used some muscles that apparently haven't been used for awhile. I think I'd better go sit in the spa that my homeowner association dues are paying to keep warm.

Happy A-Knee-Versary to me

Last year on June 2, my brief and statistically unremarkable pro football career came to a sudden, expensive end. This evening, I went running in the park for a full half hour. The most running I've done in a year, and the only running I've done in months. I was happy to find that, while it kind of hurt, it was manageable, and the good feeling of running outweighed the joint discomfort.

Over the weekend I was talking to Renee, a Rage teammate who, at the age of 42, is essentially the Jerome "The Bus" Bettis of our team and scored our touchdown in the game against Portland last Saturday (after a great pass play set it up). She is doing all this with a knee brace and a torn ACL. Obviously she loves playing football way, way more than I did, and accordingly she's way, way better at it. But she made me think that my self-pitying avoidance of all running has gone on quite long enough. I don't need to start training for another marathon. But I've missed the feeling of my feet moving over the ground, of running on a path through the trees. That whole primal thing. Good to have it back.

they be stealin'

This morning I had a small, so I thought, unopened container of raspberry yogurt I got from the hotel continental breakfast. I put it in my plastic ziploc bag full of the small bottles of shampoo, conditioner, mouthwash, etc. for airport security. But they really stuck to their guns (or whatever compliance-promoting / protective devices they have) about the 3.4 ounces rule. The lady said, "Oh...I'll have to take your yogurt. It's more than 3.4 ounces. Would you like to go back so you can eat it?" (I thought, I know you're doing the right thing by offering me that choice, and it's clever psychologically as well as less illegal to offer a silly choice that preserves someone's illusion of personal property rights, than to confiscate pocketknife keyrings and baby bottles and yogurt out of hand, but NO, I WOULD NOT rather take off my shoes and empty out my pockets and unpack my laptop and remember not to put it in the same bin as the case, after adequately stowing those items again so I can leave the security area, just so I can eat this 4 ounces of yogurt.) I said, "I can't eat it right now?" (in the presence of these witnesses and all here assembled) and she said "No, afraid not." I had a spoon and everything, I could have stood aside and gobbled it right up in probably less than thirty seconds.

I wonder what would have happened if I'd said, 'Okay, I'll go back,' but then, upon accepting the container of yogurt, I'd suddenly peeled back the top and started eating it right there by the x-ray conveyor belt. Would I have been detained, or cited, or forbidden to board a plane? Or perhaps I'd never have had that option because she would have walked the yogurt outside the security area before returning it to me, as there is protocol for this kind of thing, these scenarios with yogurt.

It's a girl!

Her name is Ripley, on account of the obvious resemblance:


Practically identical except for the M41 Pulse Rifle. And I suppose my Ripley is a little bit shorter than Sigourney Weaver.

I have 5 weeks, from yesterday, in which to restructure my very existence. She'll be just shy of 9 weeks when I bring her home.

Blog drafting

Not drafting in the literary sense, but in the cycling sense, where you don't have to work so hard because the person in front is making a nice hole in the wind. I'm going to draft here just like I do on the road, and encourage you all to have a look at this ongoing description of the NCAC ride if you haven't already. Avant-garde photography and a lively telling of it. Thanks for the pull, H.

Karla's day in the (sun?) (clouds?)

Hey. Karla here. We're not sure yet what my--persona--is, exactly. Except that my sentences probably are shorter. Just like Hemingway.

I wasn't too upset about not getting to go on that 4-day ride. The distance sounded fine. But only one hill worth mentioning in 330-something miles, and that means a lotta flat ground. Don't much care for it. Leave it to the prissy roadbikes.

On Sunday, though, the old lady and I went for a ride. She didn't know how far exactly she wanted to go, or where she really wanted to ride to. She should know better than to leave it up to me. She'd been looking at maps and saw that there was this backroad way to get to Chester from Chico (no, we didn't go all the way to Chester. This time.) She couldn't tell if it was paved or not. Which definitely rules out prissy roadbikes. The turnoff for this road was about 30 miles up Highway 32. She didn't know if she was up for riding that far up the mountain. Poor thing all worn out from riding around in pancake land for four days.

We knew for sure we'd get to Forest Ranch, elevation 2415', about 14 miles up the mountain (and this is one of those more gradual 'big rig' climbs, not a wall). There's a store there and when there's a little store in the middle of nowhere, you have to stop. Here I am.

Oh -- and Chico is at 195'. For reference.

So after the store, she felt alright, and thought she'd just keep riding. Seemed like a long way to that turnoff but she was too curious about it to stop. You'd think we were looking for the Northwest Passage.

Now I think of my saddle as comfortable. So I won't take too much blame for this, but she kept standing up, trying to adjust, not sitting so well. And she needed a snack anyway, so we pulled over. Looking back from where we came, we thought, well damn if we're not in the mountains.

The darker clouds seemed to be moving away from us. It rained a little, so she says. I say it misted. On this climb there were a few reprieves, stretches of some downhill, and she said she was cold. Cold?? Temperature never quite suits you, huh? You brought a jacket, put it on.

The odometer got up around 27 - 28 miles and she thought the turnoff was around 29, so we were just about there. And then we were.



The sign was in disrepair. Humboldt is the name of the road to Butte Meadows. A sorry broke-down stretch of Humboldt Road is right at the beginning of the ride, and then it merges with Highway 32 for the next 24 miles until it splits again. 30 more miles and it takes you to Lake Almanor, which is next door to Chester. The later stretch of Humboldt is nice and smooth, like somebody cares about it. This is because the first stretch parallels the highway (it was the original highway, maybe) and the only people who ride on it are cyclists and people who like to drive somewhere to drink their Bud by the 24-pack. That sounds a lot more dangerous than it is. The Bud drinkers are nocturnal, and no cyclist would be dumb enough to ride that road in the dark, unless...well, I could haul a 24-pack, but Bud is a waste of good water. Unless she wants to fall into a pothole as deep as a mineshaft, no cyclist would ride it in the dark.

We got this far, and it wasn't too late, so she thought she'd just keep going to Butte Meadows. Only another 4 - 5 miles. To her dismay and my amusement, that's when the REAL hill started. The first 30 miles were the warmup. But we put it in low and she started picking things to ride to--that tree up there, that pole, that bump in the road, and then another thing, and then another. Had to pull over once because she got too much salt in her eye and had to wipe it off. Some people in a Suburban pulled over and asked if everything was ok and she gave 'em Thumbs Up and said thanks.

Finally we got to the top of that hill, and it looked like the top of the world. From there it was actually downhill to Butte Meadows. Their sign was in better shape.









She was obviously pleased about the elevation thing. I said, honey, that's what I do. Though now that we'd arrived at Butte Meadows (notice there's elevation but no population on the sign...) it was a lot colder, and she was low on fuel. Rode along through "town" for a bit. Looks like it's bunch of vacation cabins and campgrounds. Surely, she thought, there's some place the campers go for provisions. And then we found it.
The "Bambi Inn." Hallelujah. A sign outside said "BIKER FRIENDLY" and we weren't sure if that was supposed to mean us or not, but we didn't care. Well, I take that back. She was a little self- conscious about her lycra shorts and bright neon yellow windbreaker. But as I pointed out, it's not like she was Sir Edmund Hillary on the top of Everest. In fact it seemed like people riding their bikes (bicycles) to the Bambi Inn was a non-event to the inn-habitants.




According to her report (I waited outside) she sat up to the bar and ordered grilled cheese, chips, and a Coke. She said it was the best velveeta sandwich she'd ever had.

The ride home took about half as long as the ride up. She got mad enough to give the finger to a jeep that blasted its airhorn when it came up behind her...at a place with plenty of shoulder and we were well off the road. She was mad until she remembered the people in the Suburban who had been kind and thoughtful. The jeep had grotesquely oversized tires. The driver was probably just excited because he would to stop at a gas station again very soon.




These little wildflowers were growing everywhere by the road up there. Pale, pale yellow. She thought maybe they're some kind of wild iris? No idea.

When we got back to Chico she turned the wrong way in the park, adding another two miles for a total of 71. Good ride. I think she'll feel it for a couple days.

Gas-free holiday weekend

Since I didn't already have plans to go anywhere, this shouldn't be very hard. Just heard on NPR that 31 million Americans are projected to hit the highways this weekend. I'm going to leave my truck parked. The weather isn't very pretty right now either so it looks like it'll be good day for housekeeping. Or blogging and charting out new intra-state bike routes. (The inter-state routes I already have mapped.)

tough day on the road

This was from Day 3 of the ride. Looks like the end of the day at the Yolo County fairgrounds in Woodland, judging from the looks of the trees and the rider. Bad helmet hair, skid marks, wrist tan line, smile, and all. A good day to have ended, and to reach a place where there were showers. I thought it might be quite nice to set up camp in the shower--it was a trade-off between being cool enough and having to stand up all night.

Photo courtesy of HMR. She knows how to make her subjects look their best. Imagine how I REALLY must have looked.

A 12-mile radius

These women and their recumbent tricycles own the road. I was thinking today I'd like to adopt a 10-mile radius biking policy, now that I have my old rack installed on Karla...though anywhere in this town is probably less far away than that. Though if a 55 and 86-year-old have a 12-mile radius, maybe I should set mine at least at 20. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), 20 miles from here still isn't really anywhere that I would normally need to go. The next biggest town I need to visit a couple times a month for work purposes is about 23 - 24 miles away. By freeway. A little further by bike. Though I could ride the bus to that town if I'm not going there for a court appearance. (I did ride my bike to court here once, but I also probably could have walked.)

Hot and cold

Made it!

Ten-year record high temperatures (or something like that) for the last three days. I don't think of myself as highly heat-tolerant. In fact, it turns out that I am physically pretty heat tolerant, but mentally, maybe not so much. The riding in heat (and wind, on Day #1) was really tough but I didn't feel like I was having a 'meltdown' until after we stopped for the day and the initial bliss of finishing and having a shower had subsided. The first evening we stayed at fairgrounds in Gridley (home of Continental Athletic Supply, by the way). The main building was relatively cool and well-ventilated and there was plenty of good shade and grass for our tents. In consideration of the record-high temperatures, our director Joaquin announced we'd be rolling out at 6:00 a.m. instead of 7:00 a.m. Which meant a 4:30 a.m. wakeup call. It had been so hot that day that people cheered when they heard this. I don't think I cheered, but I agreed it was a good idea.

On Day 2, we looped to the north through Oroville and Durham (within 10 miles of my home, and my pool) and then through blazing hot, shadeless rice and wheatfields to Colusa where a bank sign in the shade said 101ºF. We stayed at the high school that night. I think I summarized my impression of it in a previous post. The legal aid lawyer in me wondered about the demographics of the high school. Not only were the facilities in sorry shape (except for the kitchen, which was air-conditioned and made our caterers very happy, so much so that I think they slept in there) but the only shady places to pitch tents were so overwatered that the ground was like walking on a sponge. I hit kind of a low point but didn't stay there too long (I say 'kind of' because I think I felt worse for awhile on the third day).

One adaptive technique was to fill ziploc bags with ice and place them on different places. Reportedly, our 55 riders and crew went through about 150 pounds of ice and 150 gallons of water per day for the 3 full days of the event.

I tried to feel grateful for the hospitality of Colusa and the high school. I don't know if I quite succeeded. The idea of having to go to school there every day was too depressing. I'm about to go off on another build school vs. build prison tirade, but I think I've done that before, and I'm too tired to do that and keep discussing the ride.

I started coming down with a cold on Day 3, but the riding before lunch (lunch happened between 10:30 and 11:00 or so) was stunning through the Capay Valley -- and mostly downhill after a long climb up Highway 20. Not only that, but the organization that provided our lunch that day cooked up some Cajun hot links in addition to the standard lunch meat and cheese. I can't help but get excited about something like that. Even though it seemed likely that I'd regret it later.

Though we didn't have wind to struggle with on Day 3, it sure did heat up in the afternoon. But sometimes heat is helpful -- in the last ten or fifteen miles I had yet another pedal - clip related spill. My second such incident during the ride and bringing my grand total to 4 times in the last 3 weeks. My bruises are getting bruises -- it's almost as good as football! But I digress. I was approaching a stop sign where it appeared that I would in fact need to make a full stop, but my right shoe cleat jammed because it had a rock and some mud stuck in it from the last rest stop and I couldn't get my foot out in time. Here we go again, I thought, as I went over. The heat was helpful in that the asphalt / gravel was so hot when I landed that I bounced right back up, whereas I might otherwise have lain there in the dust for a few seconds for the full dramatic effect.

The Yolo County fairgrounds in Woodland were an improvement over Colusa High School (except for the lack of A/C in the main building) but I was pretty much cooked. The fairgrounds had booked a dance party in the building next to where we were camping and trying to get to sleep around 8:00 p.m. "Achy Breaky Heart" in Spanish is more danceable than it is sleep-able. Too bad I wasn't there for dancing.

I think more than anything else, the people made the ride. One of my fellow riders, Travis, was featured in the Sacramento Bee last week. And singing songs with Heather made some of the hot miles pass pretty quickly. I thought of the Pioneer Children Singing as They Walked and Walked and Walked and Walked. It's an adaptive trait. I also thought of ill-fated parties who attempted their journeys at the wrong time of year. Good thing there were plenty of snacks at rest stops. I thought, at least we're not running the Badwater Ultramarathon in Death Valley where it's so hot the runners have to run on the white line so their shoes won't melt. I probably mentioned that out loud a couple more times than was necessary. Whatever it took to get through.

We're getting a CD of photos from the ride, for which I'm grateful because I was too lazy to carry my camera around. I'll post some when they arrive.

I need to go slather on more Vicks and drink my juice. I originally planned to go back to work today but I was too sick this morning. And a bit tired.

California has many natural wonders.

California has many natural wonders. This high school in Colusa where I am not really sleeping isn't one.

So we get to wake

So we get to wake up at 4.30 a.m. and do it all over again. I guess this is why they call it a `Challenge.`

However, I rode the whole

However, I rode the whole 92 miles on my own power. And so did H! All that heat and wind just cooked her lung bugs. :)

If this ride were a

If this ride were a backpacking trip, it would be up there with the family deathmarches except that we have sag support.

Alright, off I go then.

Did I mention that I made my fundraising goal sometime late Monday night? I did. Thanks to help from many sources.

I have managed, I hope, to organize my stuff for the ride so that I won't have to fuss about it too much. They recommended 1-gallon ziploc bags for this purpose. I have each day's riding clothes in a separate bag, my extra clif bars and Gu in a bag, my toothbrush and sunblock and soap and pills in a bag.... I think this is the most organized packing I've ever done.

I got a brief lecture by the meek and kindly gentleman at the bike shop today about how it's really better to get a tune up about 100 miles or so before a big event, rather than within 24 hours of a big event. I had it coming though.

I'll try to do some phone-in posts from the road.

Am I ready for this?

It'll be just like we're riding in Morocco.

Well, not really, except for the Scirocco wind that is predicted to blow the 100 degree air at 25 mph or so on Thursday. Actually the Scirocco would be better because I think it blows from the south, and we'll be riding northward. A hot tailwind is still a tailwind but I think our wind is agin' us.

So. And one of the bright stars of the ride has been fighting bronchitis and / or aggravated asthma for the last couple days. She's worked SO hard over the last five months, even before that, to get to Thursday, and apparently the universe didn't think she was being adequately challenged by the experience. Please say your best prayers, in whatever idiom you prefer, for her to have healthy happy non-inflamed bronchia at least by the time she wakes up early on Thursday morning. A friend will drive us to the start in Folsom in my truck and I think we have to leave at 5:45 or something. So that's a good 30 hours or so for us all to perform a big collective faith healing. She's doing everything she can too, having spicy soup, taking nasty herbs, regular old cough syrup, humidifying the room...Pulling out all the stops here. I think she'd have to be strapped down to a hospital bed not to ride, but she'll have a much better time of it and hold up better if she can breathe while she's riding. Though I'm thinking when it's 100 degrees out the air-conditioned sag wagon will sound pretty good.

Are you or is someone you know an effete snob?

I don't think this would be news interesting enough to repeat at this point, because it seems that Rush is a bit past the peak of his influence and popularity, much like the Canadian rock band of the same name. However, when I read his recent comment that Obama "can get effete snobs, ...wealthy academics, ...the young, and...the black vote, but Democrats do not win with that," I had to look up effete because I think I knew what he meant by it but I wasn't sure if that was really what it meant.

ef·fete (-ft)

adj.

1. Depleted of vitality, force, or effectiveness; exhausted: the final, effete period of the baroque style.

2. Marked by self-indulgence, triviality, or decadence: an effete group of self-professed intellectuals.

3. Overrefined; effeminate.

4. No longer productive; infertile.

---

[Latin efftus, worn out, exhausted : ex-, ex- + ftus, bearing young, pregnant; see dh(i)- in Indo-European roots.]

But then I was even more perplexed. What definition did he mean? That tired snobs will vote for Obama? That overrefined, decadent dandies will vote for him? Or perhaps he meant infertile snobs?

I just want to know where I fit into the Obama voting pool, because I know I'm not wealthy, and not formally an academic. I suppose I'm young, though very solidly into my full-fledged adulthood. And I have a lot of freckles, but I seriously doubt that I'm black, barring further discovery of the activities of an ancestor who reached Jamaica and made a stop, shall we say.

I suppose I could be considered a snob in some respects. I have a postgraduate degree and I won't shop at WalMart. I don't believe that pink is a legitimate wine color. And I am often tired, and sometimes a tiny bit dandy when the occasion calls for it.

Mighty Mormon Muscle Mama!

This NY Times story and the video clip embedded in it was quite moving and provocative. I think of myself as a little busier than is really manageable sometimes, and I've had some aches and pains and an injury requiring surgery as a result of my athletic endeavors, and sometimes I wish the cat wouldn't meow so forcefully and so often for no reason I can determine (though having that little tiny screaming puppy for a few days gave me some perspective). But Melanie Roach...shown here training in her gym...holy cow. She is really driven. Talk about perseverance. And triceps. I hope she makes it to Beijing.

Go team!

Yesterday I got to see the Redding Rage play the Santa Rosa Scorchers, and though the final spread was unfortunately kind of, well, big, I got to see my girls score. They've scored several times since the last game of last season but this was the first TD I was able to witness. And it was the result of a spectacular Favresque pass completion. I jumped up and screamed at the top of my lungs. I've waited so long to see this. And I have a lot of hostility toward the Scorchers, call it irrational if you want, since it's not like they're the ones who made me play football, and the season / career-ending hit I took last year was clean. Not even one of the numerous dirty, late, illegal hits that they seem to get away with quite often. I admit that was wishing them some harm yesterday. If there was one game I would like to have been suited up for, this was it. They're lucky I wasn't. And probably so am I.

climbed a mountain and turned around, pt. 1

I had my digital camera but no cell phone (about mile 10, I heard the dread low-battery-turning-off beep), and I don't have the cable with me to upload the photos. So they'll have to wait. But I can start off with a map of the route. Slightly altered because there was one stretch of road toward the end that I would not want to encourage anyone else who might look it up on Bikely.com to use. My route today was about 50 miles; the revised route is 56. Next time.

I went looking for some hills to climb and I found some. It seems like I went down more than I went up, but maybe the downs were just more concentrated. I had to stop partway down that great big one to let my rims cool off and stretch the cramps out of my hands.

I don't think the photos will really capture how amazingly beautiful the scenery was. St. Helena Road and Franz Valley School Road were stunning. Or maybe the climbing made me oxygen- deprived and I was delirious. Ha. Not that I'd want to go out and ride the Rockies tomorrow, but being from a state with real mountains I can't help but think California mountains are sort of cute and furry. In retrospect. I didn't necessarily think that today during some of the climbing though. I only felt a little bit like barfing once. That's a pretty good day of riding.

To be continued.

This time 2 weeks from now...

I'll be in my tent, hopefully asleep, at the Colusa fairgrounds, with about 180 of my 330 miles behind me.

Our household has had a bit of a stir recently. My roommate found a teeny tiny puppy...teeny tiny because it's a chihuahua...wandering around in a parking lot in some non-residential part of town. And brought it home, of course, because what else can you possibly do with a lost puppy. We're providing foster care for now. And having to practice some tough love as the puppy-wandering-around-the-house method was not having any really desirable results. I had a small animal playpen in the closet and he's been in it for about half a day now, periodically screaming like a peacock being boiled alive (I imagine).

If I got a medium sized handlebar bag and teeny tiny Doggles for him to wear, he could come with me on the bike ride.

He's pretty funny to watch with the cat (and vice versa). The cat is surprisingly tolerant of him. Though I could tell the cat wasn't thrilled with the screaming. He's a very expressive cat but I've never before, so clearly, understood his meaning to be "How long should I expect this to continue?"

Sooner or later

I had defied the odds by having gone my entire clipless pedals career--spanning the better part of a decade--without falling over due to failure to get my foot unstuck in time. Had some close calls, but never fell down. Until Sunday in the Wildflower Century, climbing the first hill. My friend H was having some kind of really frustrating derailleur problem that kept her from being able to shift into the big gears, making climbing not much fun at all relative to the joy that it typically is. I wanted her to pull off and stop so I could fuss with her bike and see if I could possibly make it work better. So finally we stopped. But I guess I thought about stopping more than I thought about the procedure of stopping, as I found myself with my right foot still stuck on the pedal (and my new pedals are a lot stickier than the old ones), and my bike suspended upright for what seemed like a long second before I tipped over.

In a way I was glad it happened because I'd been so afraid of it happening before, and it turns out it didn't hurt very much at all. A bit embarrassing, yes. I didn't put my hand out to catch myself, which is one way people actually do get injured from this kind of fall. Just rolled right down. Have a couple nice bruises to show for it. Since I stopped playing football I've really missed the bruises.

And after I got up and collected myself, I managed to make her derailleur work right, so she was free to climb the two much bigger, nastier hills after that one. Maybe she'll forgive me some day.

Diary

I wanted to have more bullet points, so here they are:

• 4:50 a.m. or so: woke up, kind of
• 5:25 a.m.: went to spinning class at the gym (a little late)
• 8:00 a.m.: breakfast meeting with a Chico city council member to talk about ACLU LGBT committee project(s) and any other letters of the alphabet
• 9:10 a.m.: arrived at work
• 1:30 p.m.: case review meeting, decided that welfare fraud cases and clients who act like they may have personality disorders should be recurring soap opera themes to complement all the comas and cases of amnesia.
• 3:30-ish: done with case review
• 5:00 p.m.: went to General Plan Citizen's Advisory Committee meeting to discuss preferred land use alternatives for eleven study areas in the unincorporated vicinity of Chico. Spoke twice in the meeting. One of my proposals for a 500-acre cluster of high density zoning in a 9,400 acre area, next to existing dense development in urban Chico, and pending a Specific Plan & City oversight, with the remaining 8,900 acres designated Resource Conservation, actually got two other votes besides mine (out of about 18...that's 16.6%! Wa-hoo!).

Worried that I sounded too meek or conciliatory and perhaps uncertain when I talked; decided it was just because the people who did most of the talking talked loudly, and a lot, and sounded like they believe they know quite a lot about everything. Coincidentally they were all white men over the age of 45. Occasionally a few white women over the age of 35 would say something too. You'd think that there were no people of other colors living in the county. I guess they didn't want to be on the Citizen's Advisory Committee. I wonder why?

• 11:00 p.m.: meeting adjourned
• 11:20 p.m.: came home, watered cat and fed plants.

Decades come and go, but a century is a long time

Lessons learned over the weekend:

• 100 miles of biking doesn't hurt as much as 26.2 miles of running.
• I arrived at the rest stops at pretty much the same time as everybody else from our group, regardless of how fast I tried to go, because they were smart enough to stay together and draft while I was riding off into a headwind.
  
• It's a bad idea to schedule things after a century ride that make you feel like you need to hurry up and finish it already, because:
• people think you're showing off (and then it's harder to get sympathy when you're tired);
• you are in danger of missing the things scheduled afterwards unless they're happening at the place where the century ends.

• The fun of riding as fast as you can for as long as you can keep it up (relative concepts; my all-out 'fast' would be a leisurely spin through the orchards for others) is costly, but the fun of having friends with whom to ride, through the good stretches and rough patches, and with whom to go to In 'n Out after two days of riding, is better than finding a sushi polka-dot jersey on sale.
• I can go farther than I ever thought. A nice motorhome with a fridge, or even a motorcycle, would be more comfortable, but there's probably lots of time to spend being comfortable.
• You can't bring too many snacks. A rider in our group said that her heart rate monitor said she burned about 2600 calories in the 8 hours it took us to finish (about six hours of actual riding and two hours of rest stops). Maybe I'll start wearing mine so I can calculate the number of In 'n Out menu items I can consume and still be in a calorie deficit.
  
• That would be some clever fast-food marketing...to hand out free heart rate monitors to people that track their exercise and how many calories they've burned, and for every 10,000 calories burned, you can get free stuff. Energy trading.

So next Sunday I've got a chance to apply some of what I learned. Maybe I'll start working on the Energy Trading project too...hello, In 'n Out Headquarters?

The most awesome jersey ever, and on sale!!

Do you ever walk into a store thinking you're looking for one thing, but then you see something else that is clearly the reason destiny brought you to that place at that moment?

For the record my skin is not oompa-loompa orange. I'm just lazy about taking pictures with my cellphone and I think it was overwhelmed by all the sushi polka-dots, so it turned me a nice shade of Uni. Mmmm.

cellphone photos wouldn't have cut it

The good news about the Wildflower Century ride is that the scenery will be fantastic, especially Table Mountain. The not quite as good news is the climbing you have to do for the fantastic scenery.
Table Mountain is that last big bump. I rode it for the first time today--and visited it for the first time as well. I'd like to go back in a motorized vehicle sometime. People were up there flying kites and driving their vintage cars back and forth, and perhaps looking at the wildflowers. I didn't take this picture but it looks a lot like some of what I saw (in the places where there were no kites or vintage cars).


Next time I'll bring my real camera and I'll try to have fresher legs. Or at least stiffer shoes.

O me of little faith

I offended Karla a little bit by suggesting to her that I didn't know if we'd be able to ride all the way up to the house from the bottom of the hill where the road turns off from Highway 1. Yes, I talk to my bicycle. Since she survived the dragging-behind-truck-on-freeway experience she is quite interesting to talk to. And every moment we have seems more precious.

I have apologized for doubting and for just plain forgetting that I put Karla together with this hill specifically in mind, along with the idea of towing a tent trailer or small RV, or perhaps a few sustainably harvested logs. She reminded me. Though I'm glad we didn't have to tow anything up the hill at this time. She wants to do it again tomorrow.

Cruisin'

I rode my road bike to the bike shop yesterday to have the wheels swapped out, and then realized I would have to walk home. I realized this out loud and the owner asked me if I wanted to borrow a bike. Sure, I thought. He went to the back and then reemerged with this 3-speed cruiser with coaster brakes. I tried to conceal my ambivalence as best I could, he was loaning me a bike, after all. I said, "This will be my first cruiser experience." The owner said "Watch out, you might get hooked."

I pushed it down to the corner so that nobody in the bike shop would be able to see my first attempt to ride it. Right away I noticed that the pedals don't go backwards. The bike seemed very high, and much heavier than I was used to, though the seat was about the right height for pedaling. I managed to jump on and start pedaling and didn't fall down. The shifting is some kind of internal hub system controlled with a grip shifter. It even tells you where to 'start.'

I can't deny that the seat was mighty comfortable. But I had to talk myself out of being embarrassed all the way home. I have nothing against other people riding cruisers...I'm all for it. Just not quite right for my idiom. Maybe this is how some dogs and cats feel when somebody dresses them up in a Halloween costume.

mama needs a new pair o' shoes

Really quite hilly 54-mile training ride yesterday (if you click that link to look at the route, please go to the 'Show' menu and select 'Elevation Profile' to see what I mean by 'quite hilly.' Coming down one of the longer hills, where the road was nice and smooth and free of traffic, I got up to 41 mph. A new speed record. (Maybe my next road bike will be the Mach 5).

My feet topped the list of parts that became especially sore during the ride (though it was a close contest). I've been riding with SPD clipless pedals with a fairly small platform, (just like these) and stylish but somewhat too flexible 'touring' style bike shoes. As a result, my toes tend to go numb after 20 miles. Having consulted the experts it looks like I need to upgrade to road pedals with a bigger platform and much stiffer road shoes (like the Pearl Izumis shown here). This will help the 'hot spot' problem that makes my feet sore and numb and also use my pedaling energy more efficiently, especially on all those climbs.

Got some good deals on both. Shoes will take a few days to get here and then I can set 'em up.

Six weeks to go until the NorCal AIDS Challenge and two century rides in April.

I was only laughing a little bit on the inside

In the process of completing a form recently, a client told me that she decided to keep her married name after getting divorced so that it would be the same as her son's last name, because she didn't want him to have astigmatism.

Kitteh is my BFF: The Historical / Social Context of Abbreviated Speech and Intentional Misspelling

I became suddenly curious today about the origin of the word "okay" and, in reading the Wikipedia entry on the subject, discovered that there have been previous fads not only involving "comic misspellings" but fads of rampant abbreviation, even abbreviation of the comic misspellings.

According to the late etymologist Allen Walker Read:

"The abbreviation fad began in Boston in the summer of 1838 ... OFM, "our first men," and used expressions like NG, "no go," GT, "gone to Texas," and SP, "small potatoes." Many of the abbreviated expressions were exaggerated misspellings, a stock in trade of the humorists of the day. One predecessor of OK was OW, "oll wright," and there was also KY, "know yuse," KG, "know go," and NS, "nuff said."

No doubt that some folks circa 1838 were more amused by the fad than others. It also seems to serve different purposes now in the era of the txt msg. In between 1838 and the event of instant messaging, we've had candy conversation hearts, vanity license plates, and the song titles of the artist previously and currently known as Prince (i.e., Nothing Compares 2 U).

So, icanhascheezburger.com is a resurfacing of an old trend. In 1838 I bet it was a lot harder to come by winsome photos of marine mammals holding plastic buckets, though.



In memory of Minazo the seal, 1994 - 2005.

Venture philanthropy

I confess to sometimes agreeing with David Brooks, "conservative" op-ed columnist for the New York Times. He actually seems to use reasoning and logic rather than just gobbling down the whole Republican enchilada without asking what's in it. Several years ago he wrote a piece on why same-sex marriage should be promoted rather than opposed by conservatives, as he felt that supporting people--any people--in their desire to make serious commitments to one another would actually be good for, rather than detrimental to, the fabric of society.

So this piece on the social entrepreneur movement got my attention. Having just come back from New Orleans where it is obvious that the government didn't just screw up at every stage of the disaster, but willfully, criminally, disregarded what was happening (if you didn't believe that before, you oughta try to see this movie), it is the private foundations and the non-profits who are getting the work done. The public school system hasn't even been able to get going again in most of the city. Charters are the only ones who were able to open their doors.

While we have a government absorbed by corporate interests (which tend to be inherently antisocial, since a corporation is legally a 'person' who is compelled to act in its own self-interest at all times), and we have a big swath the electorate who have been easily manipulated by fear, we simply can't expect the government to be all that helpful unless we're white or at least wealthy. The best possible outcome of the next election might help but it won't help overnight. But the social entrepreneurs Brooks talks about--and so many others--are harnessing the awesome power of capitalism for good. I take exception to his disparaging remarks about ponytails and crunchiness (maybe he's not spent much time in Northern CA) but otherwise he's really on to something.

I would still like the government to be really helpful for something besides putting people in prison at home and creating new terrorists abroad. But I'm interested in anything that works. It seems that attempts to overthrow capitalist systems have been largely self-defeating and created years and years of suffering. Much more effective to find ways to bend capitalism to the good of the People. To make it a tool for social progress--which has to include everybody, or it doesn't count.

Minor misquoting of Faulker, otherwise great speech.

I thought the Faulkner reference Obama made in his speech was from Absalom, Absalom. Certainly could have been: "The past isn't dead and buried. In fact, it isn't even past." I was sure I'd read that line before which meant it had to be from Absalom, or As I Lay Dying (one might naturally think it could have been in there, too), the first half of Light in August, or one of several short stories. If Yahoo's Answers.com is credible, however, it's none of the above, and Obama changed it slightly for better rhetorical effect, perhaps, or maybe he just remembered it incorrectly and nobody cite checked it for him.

Please understand that I do not want to detract from the extremely important, timely, serious messages of Obama's speech. I think this is probably the best speech given in a political campaign in my lifetime. But since we've so long languished under the dangerous rule of a man who most likely doesn't even know who Faulkner is and definitely doesn't care, I think Obama may have successfully tapped into the little-documented but no doubt influential "English major vote." Despite having taken some liberties with Faulkner. As long as he doesn't take too many liberties. Just because all our sensibilities have been offended for eight years doesn't mean we have to throw our standards out the window at the first sign of literate leadership.

I also wonder what might happen to Clinton if she tried to address gender inequality in a similarly direct way. Huh. Guess that's why she hasn't.

Powered by pretzels

Yogurt pretzels, that is. By Sunday afternoon the remaining handful had melted and re-congealed together in a big crunchy ball (imagine this picture without the empty spaces), having been both in the truck for awhile in the sunshine, and in the back pocket of my bike jersey. I think they were trying to evolve into a new snack.

I found this yogurt pretzel image online and I'm a little disturbed by it, actually. The pretzels look unhappy. They remind me of the Edvard Munch painting, or that silly horror flick of the same name (only ever saw the first one), or of the Stay-Puff'd Marshmallow Man from Ghostbusters. My pretzels had a less haunted look (at least before they melted).

I am sore in various places, but it's appropriate since I rode a total of 110 miles on Saturday and Sunday, climbing many a hill on the way. Both rides, Winters on Saturday and Sonoma County on Sunday, were graced with beautiful weather and scenery. My friend Lisa mapped out the Sonoma ride for me, having toured most of the back roads on her motorcycle, and she tried to pick a route that wasn't too hilly. The Winters ride was supposed to be the hilly one. However, I don't think it's possible to ride 67 flat miles in Sonoma unless you're dragging up and down the freeway, and even then I'm not sure you can do it. In fact that is one of the appealing features of riding in Sonoma County. Anyway, Lisa tried, and some might say she did not entirely succeed. But it was an awesome route that I would love to ride again (but not again tomorrow), up through the Alexander Valley from Santa Rosa to Cloverdale, and down through the Dry Creek Valley west of Highway 101, to River Road where my sag support (i.e. Lisa in her truck) came to get me since continuing to ride would have made the ride about 77 miles and most definitely quite hilly. Maybe sometime I'll try the whole loop when I have no interest in trying to find a not-too-hilly route.

I took my second rest stop around mile 50-something to eat a bagel (also in the back pocket of my jersey...I just love how you can put so many things in those pockets). I parked my bike in some landscaping outside the big gate to some or other winery, and happened to notice these among the woodchips. You might be saying to yourself, 'what's the big deal, those aren't even an edible variety of morels.' To which I would answer, 'I don't know what kind of morels they are, but I know they are the first morels of any kind that I have ever found in the wild (or at least in the landscaping) so, to me, it's a big deal.'