Last week I was in Moab, Utah with my buddies Sara, Ron and Dan. It was pretty badass. We rode every day and had pretty solid weather. The poofs from the cottonwood trees were out in full force, but if you could ignore them (which we couldn't) then it would be allright.

Ron came up with a new term for getting hurt on/by the bike: gak. Ron got gakked almost every day. The worst gak was on Bartlet Slickrock and we hadn't even started the slickrock ride. He was standing on the rock and just started sliding and then fell down the slope, got attacked by his bike, did a few rolls, stood up and started bleeding from his leg.



Anyhoo, it was a lot of fun. We drank almost all of our 10 6 packs of beer, the last one is in my fridge. Awesome riding, good weather, good people.

Arches Photos

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Biking Photos

Moab IIX. We rode Sovereign Trail, Gemini Bridges, Monitor Merimack, Porcupine Rim, Bartlet Slickrock, Slickrock and Amasa Back.

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Tomorrow Ron, Sara, Dan and I are heading down to Moab for a week of biking, hopefully climbing and drinking of beer: We're taking down 10 six packs of Mirror Pond. One would think I'd stop drinking after last Saturday's birthday celebration, but it's vacation! I'd have written about my little party, but I don't remember too much.

I finally got around to picking up the pictures from the Beaver Freezer and here are a few of them.

My office moved over the weekend from downtown Portland to Lloyd Center. I lost my nice view: and got this view: So that kinda sucks. And our showers are gone, so I'm left to taking a sponge bath in the sinks. I got a weired look this morning, but what can I do? And last week I was over in Denver, CO for a developers conference. That was pretty neat, I got to spend time with some family and eat some steak and drink some beer. So that was good. I have some pictures over on my mobile blog. The little ones are my second cousins.

So this weekend was the Beaver Freezer down in Corvallis. I was pretty psyched cos Trey and I had wanted to do it before, but forgot to sign up. So this year we signed up.

I did extensive training for the race, lots of pizza, steak and beer. I've been biking to work and running at lunch, so I figured I didn't have to really do any more training. Except for the swim, so I hopped in the pool twice to make sure I wouldn't drown.

I had signed up for the swim with a 500 yard time of 9:40, but in my two swims at the gym I did about 8:30, so I knew I'd have to pass people in the triathalon.

On Saturday my heat was about an hour before Trey's because he signed up with a 8 minute time. When the swim started I went out a bit too fast and was way out in the lead. I ended up lapping the people in my lane 2 times. And then I was the first one out of the pool. But I felt like dying so I slowly jogged to the bike and hopped on.

I rode about 3 miles and got a flat. I thought that since I had my super tire and the green slime in the tube that I'd be ok. But the slime didn't stop the flat. I kept trying to pump it up but it sounded like the valve was broken. I went for my spare tube in my saddle bag. And it wasn't there. So I sat for a few minutes and swore at everyone who rode by.

I walked back to the last intersection and got a ride from a lady in her truck. We picked up another biker who got a flat and we walked back to the beginning of the race. I stuck around to take pictures of Trey in his transition and finish of the jog. He kicked some ass and finished in 1 hour 15 minutes.

Last night I took my lead test with Scott at the gym. I went up first to get it over with. My hands have been weak the past while so I ended up falling off a juggie 2/3rds of the way up and launching Scott into the air. On my way down I landed on him and turned upside down. That was pretty cool, but it didn't get me the super green card. Everyone at the gym said it was the coolest fall they had seen, so there's that.

Ant season just started, I found out. I woke up today to see the little bastards running around the dirty dishes in my kitchen sink. Guess it's time to keep up on my dishes.

Ron and I found out that it's actually difficult to break TV screens. We took a load of concrete, dirt and assorted junk to the dump on Saturday, where a few TVs were hanging out - waiting for us. So we chucked large rocks and chunks of concrete at the screens. And they wouldn't break. It took on average 15 good shots to break a screen. I bet the TV sitting in my room would shatter if I threw a sock at it though. Sunday we tried to go mountain biking and saw my frame had a crack in the paint. Well, I thought it was paint, turned out my swing arm has a crack in it. Which wouldn't be too great for biking hard, I'd rather not walk out from a ride.

Last night after climbing I did some bench to work out some stuff. About 2 months ago I would struggle with 135 lbs (2 45 plates and the bar.) Then somehow it jumped up to 185 (45s with 25s - almost looks cool.) Last night I tried out 225 (45s 35s and 10s as my gym doesn't have 4 plates) and actually squeeked out one on my own. I think it took about 30 seconds to do one rep, but it counts. It's strange because when I was lifting after college I would work out all the time and never got one rep of 225 in, and I thought I was pretty strong. So now I'm drinking beer and eating pizza almost every night and can do it. I had a beer last night to celebrate. I'll be sure to have one tomorrow when the soreness kicks in.

The hot tub is now finally hot and bubbly. And the GFCI hasn't been tripped for like a week and a half - so all is well in the tub.

So my tub hasn't been getting super hot as of late, or ever. And the GFI breaker I put on the outside of the garage has been tripping a lot. I had the repair guy come over. And of course it's like when you take your car to the shop, it won't misbehave when the mechanic is around. I couldn't get the tub to trip while he was there. He tightened down all the wire screws and said that could be it. And then he adjusted the thermostat so it'll get hot in the tub. He warned that it might get too hot, like 110, if it's set to the max. Which is fine with me. As the GFI is still being tripped, I'm going to disconnect the bonding ground, as that might be doing it as well. If that fails, I'm just going to get a non GFI breaker and throw that on the wall. The tub comes with a GFI so everything should be ok. And I picked up like a million bags of packing peanuts for insulation. Turns out I really only need like 2 bags, so now I have a bunch of black garbage bags filled with crap that likes to float around and make my yard look even trashier.

The moving party. Dan, May, Maureen, Aimee and Ron's hand.

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