Last weekend I went up Mt. St. Helens with a few of my climbing buddies. I have no pictures of the adventure because I still don't have a digicam. But, it was pretty fun (except for the last hour, that's pretty tough.) Maureen and I glacaded (sp?) down from the top for about 3 miles. That was pretty kick ass, even got air a few times. Brynee and I decided we're gonna do other mountains next year. Which probably means I need to bump my bi-weekly 3 mile jog up a little bit.

So a few weeks ago I was biking with my buddies up in Washington, doing the Falls Creek ride, when my Crank Brothers pedal broke. It wasn't a normal break where the bearings were worn or a bushing was [whatever bushings do when they break], but the actual metal spindel snapped. This was a pain in the ass because this ride is the ride, 5 miles up and 20 down. I was on the top of the hill, just getting ready to go down. But you shouldn't try and bomb down technical hills with one pedal, just won't work. So I limped back to the cars on one pedal. I jogged by the Bike Gallery today on my way up to Washington Park to drop off my pedal. I handed my broke pedal to the guy at the counter. 'Do you have a receipt?' "No" who keeps a receipt for a pedal? Those things are supposed to be bomb proof. "The Sandy shop said they'd warranty it." 'Why didn't you take it there?' "Uh, cos you're on my jog route." Another guy came over. 'What broke?' "The spindle." 'You have a receipt?' "No, Sandy said they'd do it though." 'Oh, why not take it there? They do the warranty stuff.' "Because, you're both the same store." 'Yea, it's not a problem. We can't guarentee it'll get fixed.' "Right." 'It'll cost $10 for shipping. They'll probably fix it though, because it's a cheap pedal.' Right, I spend $75 for a pedal and it's cheap. I don't mind spending money on shipping and all that, but it's always a hassle to deal with the downtown Bike Gallery. You'd think I'll learn.

The Cassini probe just reached Saturn this week, and along with sensors and along with the Huygens probe a DVD of signatures was sent. Why is this cool? Cos my signature is on that puppy! I'm one of 600,000+! (And my forged signature of my buddy Sara's too.)

I was climbing at the gym last night and noticed a couple that I talk to occasionally had on the yellow wrist bands for the Lance Armstrong Foundation. I talked to them a bit about the bands and it turns out the woman had actually designed them. I thought that was pretty cool. I'm gonna probably pick one up soon.

We were in Moab a few years ago (I believe it was Moab IV) and there was a slideshow being given by a couple who were traveling the world by bike. It was an amazing show and they seemed pretty cool. They have a website that is over in Japan that hosts their pictures. You should check it out - the Bolivia and Argentina pages have some awesome pictures. I don't know about you, but it makes me want to get some dinero together and head out for a long ride.

Over the weekend I went over to my parents house and went through the last few boxes that I've kept there. I came across a few boxes of notes, letters and cards from high school and college. I was debating about carrying all of those things to my new house that I hadn't looked at since I put them away years ago. My buddy Ron said I should just get rid of all that stuff, no need to keep it all. So I took his advice and spent a few hours looking through birthday cards, neatly folded notes with SSL (sorry so long) written over them. Then I made a fire in the basement (fireplace, I don't just burn stuff on the floor) and started throwing in the papers. The fire got so strong I had to back off about 6 feet and throw the paper in from a distance. I did keep my ream of auto repair slips. It was interesting to look at all of the things I've done to (for?) my car. Funny, she's in the shop now. I have a few shoe boxes full of pictures and negatives from all over the place. Last night I went through and organized all of them. I came across some old pictures my grandfather took on the East Coast. I scanned in a dozen of them and put them up on my photos site. It's neat to look at 60 year old pictures, to see how New York looked. We have a wooden box with all of his negatives. I'll have to go through and scan in those pictures and see how they look. Like a little time capsule.
New York Pictures

After getting a call from my mechanic regarding the laundry list of crap to fix on my car, I've decided to buy a VW microbus. An old one that I can fix. Or at least steal parts from my parent's bus. My repair bill is going to be around $1000, or $1300 if I decide to fix the brakes. Who needs brakes? So I looked on craigslist and found a VW for $1200. Or the price of a new water pump (that was just replaced, I might add), some hoses, a flex disk (WTF?), a boot, transmission seal, thermostat and oil change. I emailed a buddy at work with a link to the bus I want to get. His response? "What a piece of shit. You like that?" I didn't think it was that bad.

I recently put slime filled inner tubes on my road bike - they're supposed to plug up holes as soon as they get punctured. On Monday I was riding home in the rain and heard the dreaded sound of "Pffttt sisssssssssssssssss" as a hole got made in my front tire. I looked down and saw the green slime shoot out and the hole stopped leaking. Amazing, it really worked. The next day I was riding to the rock gym and heard the same sound "Pfffffttt sisssss". Well, I have my trusty tube to plug the hole. I pulled over because it wasn't stopping. I looked at the hole on the top of the tire. No slime, no goo. After the tire went flat I remembered the instructions "When tire gets punctured, rotate tire until the hole is at the bottom." So the goo will fill the hole. I took the flat tube out and pumped it up to get the slime working. I held it upside down and everything. The hole was filled, but so was my valve, I couldn't add any more air. So you know, don't do what I did. Instead follow the directions. I guess they're there for a reason.

So I've been lame and not put up any pictures of my lovely little house. Guess I'm still sore that I lost my dope little camera. So I had to 'borrow' my old camera back from my dad. Here are a few pictures from the house. How cool is that toilet paper holder??

My neighbor lady who was so happy about my lawn finally being worked on went to the big garden in the sky on Sunday. I was outside (working in the yard) when I saw two people wheeling out a body bag. A man came over and told me that she had passed the previous night. Turns out she wasn't doing so well lately and it was just her time. When I saw her last she was pretty sprite and energetic. I'm glad that she at least got to see her neighbor's yard not look like a scene out of Africa. Last night I told my neighbor across the street about the neighbor lady. "Kinda strange to have someone die right next to you," I said. "Shit, that's a shame," he responded. "Guess everyone is getting out of this neighborhood."