i feel that i touch on similar topics here everyday. not that i find them to be trivial or pejorative but they do run together somewhat. this thought runs through my head while riding and writting my next blog entry in my head. but as long as the subject within is a new turn it seems to work for me. isn't everyone's life repetitive? aren't we trying to get into a good rhythm, a place where happiness is achieved by a string of like movements? not unlike the subtle shifts required to make a ski or snowboard turn, some are surely exaggerated but others allow the rider to enjoy life without drastic, wholesale shifts. this is not too high a concept is it? i see this as one of the simplest tenets higher creatures should strive for. by higher i mean all of those that have thought. the book ishmael touches on this ideal, not indelicately either. so as you go out tonight and watch people make fools of themselves try and see the light at the other side, a new year means nothing to nature it's just another day when you look outside tomorrow.

slaves and bulldozers

shopping is very strange, we had to visit the mall yesterday to get some stuff returned for shaubie and some other stuff bought for little b. the people there at the mall made for great people watching. they way thses pseudo-city people get dressed up for the honor shoveling over their cash entertains me to no end. suburban hell is great spectating the people with their fancy shoes and too-tight clothing reassure my own belief in the conspicuous-consumption that is america in the early part of the 21st century. what ever happened to enjoying the beauty of winter, outside? i bet less than 1% of the consumers we gawked at yesterday had enjoyed the winter snow in one way or another, even sliding down the hill would be an improvement b/c then they would see the beauty of nature, not the inside of a department store for their holiday entertainment. i try not to rant but this thought really struck me yesterday as one of those things to write about ot the few people that may read this page occasionally. and then i should say i got to do a bit shopping myself at the apple store, playing on a top-of-line zillion dollar system was almost as much as the people watching we had just done at the mall. nipple boy is pretty funny today. we saw uncle travis for a coffee this morning and he was happy to just sit there quietly and watch the passers-by. not real into participating with our conversation but more of the same from yesterday. he especially likes mirrors when in the chest carrier, we stood in front of quite a few at the mall so he could see me and laugh at the image of the two of us. pretty fun for both father and son. we make quite a sight the two of us, b laughing uncontrollably and me egging him on. this morning we walked around the woods a bit, looking at tree branches (tasting them too for b) the trail was great, we had it all to ourselves, not a snow machine to be heard at all. walking slowly in the woods in winter is so quite and peaceful that you can hear the animals moving about they hear/smell you, b isn't too keen on quiet but he gets the point of walking around out there. over one of the little knolls we ski on there is a lot of construction going on, we saw one of the landmovers the other day that really pissed off shaubie, she couldn't believe a house woruld go where they were digging, too far from a good road and too close to one of our favorite ski hikes...more importantly. at least up here they preserve open space, down in the fort collins/loveland area it seems to less of a priority. the mantra reads "pave the planet." look closely, you'll be surprised

a blog before bed, i wrote this last night but it's not getting published until now. great day on the hill yesterday, the snow was really good where it was good but really icy where it wasn't. i rode well, the board and body felt like one, smooth snow and good motivation made for a great string of turns. unfortunately the clouds were there about all day to obscure the views, but i got one shot that maybe i can publish if the powers at blogger allow me to upgrade my account. the idea of photos to go along with the thoughts that are thrown out on this page would add to the flavor greatly. we did about 5 hours on a day that never got out of the single digits. for some weird reason the there were no lift lines, maybe thoughts expressed in the book downhill slide ( i want to italisize the title of the book like you are supposed to, but blogger doesn't allow those options on the mac, so i need to go and look for the html code somewhere in a previous post., hopefully i got it right!) enough geek stuff. did you know the geek boy in the old carivals was the guy who bit the heads of rats and chickens? wanna get some tacos? we got off the hill and drove home without traffic, i didn't get in a hike with the boys though, went to town for more coffee and got lost in conversation with todd and his new girlfriend, not a bad way to spend an afternoon but i should have gone rollers or hike. great pizza and salad last night, a friends over to enjoy the last night my folks are here, giampietro's really hook it up, one white pie and one red. amazing! do something today

i have been thinking about this guy i knew in college who worked at a book store, when he said book store you wondered what they were selling, was it the latest danielle steele effort or the newest in decorating ideas for adult tastes. really when you went to the store it wasn't novels as much as an extensive collection of fetish mags and other deviant lifestyle handbooks. i could tell you stories of the ex-mob guy who was the mop guy, or of the teenage patrons trying to buy the latest issue of panther or nugget. the periodical collection was extensive, from all over the world. proper victorian decorations in her house just a few blocks from the store, she would walk through the place every so often to make an appearance to staff, sticky fingers were a problem. the real story of this place was the little old lady who ran it, she was straight out of a sylvester and tweedy cartoon. never a bad word when she would invite us over for sandwiches after bryan's shift, and she made the best lemonade, anytime day or night. it always seemed odd to share sandwiches adn lemonade with a 70 year old owner of porn shop at 3 in the morning. you would never really knew she was the owner, she never talked about it, and it was never mentioned in conversation. i enjoyed talking history with her,not about her business but about the landmarks she experienced, pearl harbor, jfk, churchill all of the mid century world war two stuff. we would sit and talk about the newspaper issues she had in her reading room. more later

work kind of sucked today, i don't know why when people go on vacation they are assholes, maybe they are assholes at home too, but why push somebody you don't know b/c they are doing their job, not trying to screw them. i sincerely make an effort to be nice, helpful and actually nice to a good number of assholes, some i give up on but others i try to turn over to the fact that maybe, just maybe, life is worth living, and you don't have to be a prick to the guy you don't know who is trying to help you on your vacation. alright, i know that i always say that my body does one thing well, reasonably well i should say. but skiing on trails after a few inches of fresh snow has fallen is a subtle pleasure. work, no doubt is involved but it isn't any worse than riding up loveland pass. my enjoyment of nordic skiing is greatly related to who i go with and how long i go for. the legs don't really know how to ski for more than 2 hours. it was amazing today, great snow and a ton of fun with shaubie, tim and the dogs. the lungs are coming around slowly and the body is really enjoying the variety. no aches and pains yet. maybe slight cross-training isn't a bad thing entirely. then when you are enjoying the company of wife, good friend and dog all of the sudden a f-ing snow machine comes out of nowhere and ruins a good five minutes of your ski. why can't we have a way around the f-ing motors ruining our quiet, when i think of the pleasure of moving through the woods under my own power i wonder why you would feel the need to f it up with an engine.

i survived the hectic nature of an all inclusive christmas. little b didn't really know why he had a pile of stuff in front of him but he enjoyed the paper and boxes nonetheless. we ate like kings for three days. shaubie and i had thai food tuesday night and it was amazing, a new place for us b/c the usual places were closed. a different take on the same three dishes normally get, with one new thing each time. this time it was a noodle dish that was super-spicy, as thai-hot as we have had! someday we'll go there and see what native food is like, after reading the beach (having not seen the movie, yet) it just sounded like an amazing place, full of new things for a white-bread westerner to see. three days of riding outside in a row was wonderful, little things are what make riding a bicycle so enjoyable. i found a curvy road i had never ridden before outside carter lake, the way the bike flowed through the turns made the whole ride better, then just going fast in a straight line up and down rolling hills, working hard thinking about the first group races and then the first stazio sufferfests a couple months away. i really believe that this year will be better than last year. my motivation is better than ever and i feel good about my off season workload. now that i won't have that luxury of sustained outdoor cycling for a while i need to maybe get out at the nordic cneter on a regular basis. the lungs are in far worse shape than the legs. going hard for a few k yesterday had my lungs seared and my legs a bit fatigued but not near equal the way they would be mid-season. more work is needed, in the lt department, sustained 20-30 minute efforts are in order, wait, isn't that nordic skiing? great, done. enjoy your holiday break

two days in a row on the bike, outside! yesterday i rode from about two hours out. a bit chilly but it felt good to be on the bike outside. great fun, solo, just listening to the wind and enjoying every pedal stroke. starting my season three weeks earlier than last year is a good thing as i ride i feel good and motivated and it's the heart of winter, now soon i'll work in some skating to complete the package. nordic work will only help the fitness. now we have both sets of grandparents doting on b almost every waking minute, he loves the attention, eats it up! he knows when to ham it up, just like his mother. last night he slept in a crib beside shaubie and i, we were on an inflatable mattress that absolutely sucked! it didn't inflate all the way b/c the pump wasn't charged. shaubie lasted until about 3 am and bailed for the only slightly better couch, crappy sleep! today shaubie and i went for a great two hour spin around loveland and toured some of the executive ghettos that are so prevalent around here, houses that could house six families but hold barely one. oh how i love conspicuous consumption. i am especially happy with my pseudo-vegetarian diet right now, mad cow in washington state, oh how those poor creatures are in for a terrible few weeks. i hope it is all just a scare. more later as i look around the web for the rest of the story. happy boxing day

a blog before the onslught that is the holiday season, if i didn't have a family i don't think i would be the guy on the ledge. i would do what i always did on holidays on the years i was alone, as though it wasn't any different from another day, which it isn't. i know i have beat this topic to death but i need this catharsis, venting is healthy. b was great yesterday, we had fun running errands and we were actually productive, got a lot done and even scrubbed both toilets, he was amazing got right in there with the comet and really tried to scrub under the rim where the nasties hangout. we cleaned the steps too and i still manged to pay the insurance bill, get mail and even an hour on the rollers. on sunday we skied up the sally barber with b in the sled, he either laughed or slept the whole way, great kid! good work and the snow was perfect, we even got in a bit of skating on the way down, i was trying to help shaubie learn the movement, she needs to visit the nordic center and get a lesson from someone who really knows how to ski. very cool to ski 5 minutes from home, great views too! now i get three days on the bike, i even get to ride on xmas, i know it will be good, especially with hawaii only two weeks away. a good break followed by maybe a florida trip or an arizona visit in a month or two. my second season full-time at the highest level, with a bit of work helping out the 35+ guys. i know it will be a great season! maybe even get in univest in september. new music monday was yesterday, i got some really good stuff, layo+bushwacka! real good trip-hop or trance whatever you call it. verve-remixed jazz/blues songs re-done with trance beats, great ride/work music. if i could save up the pennies to get an ipod and be able to listen to it on the bike i would be so psyched. but when i break down to the most joy, just having a bike to ride eclipses all else, except shaubie, b and jackson. enjoy the wheel

my lack of sleep is no one's fault but my own. 9 pm last night, 9 pm! stupid! i want food and coffee now! eggs toast, good hearty hash browns. food is not a substitute for sleep but it sure can spike the level of participation in life for an hour or two. i didn't wear glasses on the way in today, odd the way the air felt, more biting than normal. not that it was any colder than the other days this week just...sharper. today i'll get on the rollers for 90 minutes again, it just feels right, good video, good cytomax, maybe a mid ride pee break. i was supposed to go on tv last night to tape a segment on rec center stuff for the holiday season, i showed up on time for the taping and waited around for the other segments to get done and then for about another 15 minutes nothing was happening so i ordered a plate of fries on the tv station's tab and waited again for a few minutes after i finished them and nothing still. so i asked what the story was and they said a battery died and they sent somebody to get a new one, i gave them my phone number and went home, the phone never rang, not worth and hour of my time better spent hanging out my shaubie and b. at least the fries were good.

the snow has melted a bit, making the roads and paths more icy than they have been, the sun came out and turned the whole thing to sluch yesterday afternoon. i knew this leaving this morning so i made sure my packs wasn't filled with fragile stuff, and my mind was sharp to deal with a slip without over-correcting and really going down in a heap. all of this on 4 hours sleep. not that i'm looking for sympathy, we had dinner at the ranch at keystone last night, the best place to eat in the whole region. the food was unreal, we got a limo ride over there from breck, with cristal flowin' and for me daydreams of the meal i was about to have. no dissapointment here! lobster tempura, soup, salad, all the way through top shelf. the wines we had choices of were unreal, the one i chose was a pinot noir, the waiter said that it was from a "boutique vineyard" whatever that means it was the best glass of wine i have ever had! then the desserts and coffee were perfect, i tried to stay awake on the way home, with success but a late night isn't really in my program. i kind of feel foggy right now, like a walk down an unfamiliar street in a place i don't normally visit, ethereal like after a storm. now i try to get it all together, little b now just wears contacts, he is sooo cool, as i was leaving this morning he stopped eating and looked over at me and smiled a full head smile, that kept me warm the whole way to work. last night from the ranch i called the babysitter to make sure she could reach us at the restaurant. i felt like such an adult, it was one of those moments where your place in life fits, you realize that your decisions have paid off well. enjoy your day